#rot in the fridge. we have literally no room in the fridge its basically all her stuff i feel bad throwing it out but like. ugh

[raven]

btw my roommate said she would take the trash out of the trash can tonight after work so i could take it outside and the bin to the curb. and guess what ! She did not take out the bag so i had to do it all. Because i am the martyr of this household.

[poojalate]

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[strawberry-nugget]

𝙄 𝙝𝙖𝙫𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙨𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙤𝙪𝙜𝙝𝙩𝙨 𝙄 𝙠𝙚𝙚𝙥 𝙄 𝙬𝙖𝙣𝙣𝙖 𝙨𝙝𝙖𝙧𝙚 𝙬𝙞𝙩𝙝 𝙮𝙤𝙪 | E. Kirishima/ Reader/ K. Bakugo

𝙋𝙖𝙧𝙩 1

𝙎𝙮𝙣𝙤𝙥𝙨𝙞𝙨: after weeks of Bakugo distancing himself from you and Kirishima you finally get the chance to talk out what happened the other day, one thing leads to another and...

𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙣𝙞𝙣𝙜𝙨: 18+ MINORS DO NOT INTERACT, thr*esome, oral (f! and m! receiving), double penetration, fingering, p*ssy slapping, dacryphilia, all characters portrayed are over the age of 20

𝘼/𝙉: I'm so sorry this took me so long. I know this is 6.5k with little to no plot but I hope you enjoy this, hehe, thanks for all of the notes and amazing comments on the last one. I'll be reblogging in a few minutes with the tags in those who asked. Also. This is top Kirishima. Top top top top Kirishima.

It's been two weeks now that you and Bakugo exist in different timelines.

He's never home, lost in patrol after patrol, leaving a hot mess behind him in his room, belts, gear, his back up costume messily sprawled across his room -you guess he doesn't have enough time to clean everything up. Still, the rest of the apartment always looks inhabitable, save for the little mess you make in the kitchen when you cook; he never cleans what's supposed to be your task.

You feel yourself growing sadder every day. It's something Kirishima notices and informs you he feels as well, rooted deep in how Bakugo is treating the two of you ever since that night. And the worst part is you can't do anything about it. He doesn't return his phone calls nor does he ever pick up, and by now you've accepted that he purposely avoids being in the house with you. It hurts even more knowing that he and Kirishima see each other at work every day; at least he knows Katsuki is doing okay, though as he reports, he rarely ever talks more than patrol and business.

You only wonder why he acts the way he does, thinking you don't deserve to get ghosted over for what happened. He's your roommate and one of your best friends, whatever made him feel like he has the right to ghost you with such each is not going to go by so easily and you're not willing to wait it out anymore either.

Thus, this Thursday night you call in sick for work and emerge yourself in the bathtub after checking the clock. 7.25pm. It's still an hour until Katsuki is off his shift, which means you have plenty of time to do some self care. Shave your legs, scrub your whole body with your coconut scrub- anything to calm down that put of anxiety that's starting to boil in the pit of your stomach.

You fear for the worst. That Katsuki doesn't want to be your friend anymore, and losing him doesn't sit right with you. Not over just catching him masturbating once.

There's a ton of things you want to say, or ask him. The lingering thought of him liking Kirishima or you digs deep enough into your brain and plants itself there, getting comfortable right next to the thought of him being jealous of your relationship. Could this be it? Could he just be lonely? He never talks about meeting anyone or having sex -that must be it, he's lonely, that's all.

Your bath doesn't last for long because you're nervous and the water runs cold before you have the chance to enjoy yourself. Maybe it's time to start turning the heating on in the apartment and you curse yourself because you have to talk this out with Bakugo as well -fuck its hard to not live on your own when you have to make shared decisions with someone. To your stomach's turbulence dismay you can't get out of talking to Katsuki.

"No, I literally won't tell you where she is Bakugo"

Your heart skips a beat at the sound of the door unlocking and closing again, followed by your boyfriend's familiar voice. You don't make a single movement to exit the bathroom yet- you're frozen, opting to rest on top of the toilet cap until you hear Bakugo's reply, your gut falling into a muddy pit of panic.

"I swear to fucking god if you two are trapping me to talk about it"

Typically of him, he shouts, barking and chewing a few sounds of what he's saying. Kirishima knows he's all bark and no bite though, you're eager to figure out how he'll oppose him.

"She wants to talk to you, you can't just ghost her like that when you live with her" There's a long pause next "and you should have told me that you're in fucking love with her"

"What?" Katsuki exclaims

What?

"You think I'm an idiot? Or that I can't comprehend basic human behavior? I know how people who feel the way you do act"

"What are you even saying Kirishima? That I'm jealous?"

You blink feverously, trying to take in what you're listening to unfold in the other room. You know a part of you has been wishing that this scenario wasn't true.

"Yeah, that's what I'm saying. You should have told me you liked her in the beginning. I would have never made a move"

They bicker back and forth for a few minutes; Katsuki accusing and Eijiro defending, then switching back and forth before going silent. It's then that you think you should emerge from the bathroom. It feels wrong to not be part of this conversation when you're the reason for their bickering, but at this point the guilt in your stomach is rotting and polluting your insides.

With a sigh, you turn the doorknob and inhale deeply. You tell yourself you can do this. You have to do this, yet your eyes are filled with hot and salty tears as you approach the living room.

Both of them eye you simultaneously, pursed lips and hands crossed over their chests; the only relieving thing about this is that they're sitting next to each other on the couch, their calves slightly touching. You know they'll make up again, they always will, but you're scared you won't be able to be part of that make up. Not with the information that's been poured onto you.

"Hi" You whisper and despite being sure both of them heard you, they make no effort to open their mouths and talk back "I uhm" You clear your throat "I heard what you were ah saying"

"Course ya did" Katsuki growls "course ya fucking did"

"Baku- I-"

"Save it! I'm gonna-" He snaps and makes a move to get off the couch, though Eijiro has other plans; he slams him back down with just a push of his hand

The same hand that's extended to you, overlapping Katsuki's chest, wordlessly asking you to join them on the couch. Your heart warms up slightly. Kirishima always does his best to make you feel included, it's no surprise he's smiling at you when you take a seat next to the blond.

"You're not going anywhere Bakugo. And babe, you can speak now"

Though you smile nervously with your lips, your first word falls silent, in awe of a lung filling sigh. Then by the time you gather some thoughts together your chest is shivering and the tears that you managed to drown before are now threatening to spill from your eyes again.

Kirishima is watching you religiously, pouting as you throw your head to the opposite direction of his to let out a small sob. He tightens the grip of his hand around yours and barely notices Bakugo batting his eyes to that direction.

"Hey, no, don't cry"

"I just don't want to lose Bakugo because of this" you sob and Kirishima shoots a killer gaze at the blond, biting the inside of his lip.

"You're not losing anyone idiot" Bakugo says, clearing his throat, giving Kirishima a strained look as well

"Babe, don't worry, Bakugo and I will be fine, you and Bakugo will be fine"

You sob again, wiping a stream of tears that's falling from your eyes and Kirishima wastes no time on cupping your cheek after bullying Bakugo to do the same. A nice change, you think, two hands reaching out for your face, you could almost get used to this.

"Yeah, you're not losing me" Bakugo tries to soothe, though by Kirishima's demand he adds to his words "I- uhh, I might want you but this has nothing to do with us not being friends"

"Yeah?" You sniffle, looking up

"Yeah"

It's too soft how you're cuddled into their arms instantly, pulled on top of them to sit on both of their laps, held tightly in both of their embraces. You coo into their arms for a while, content when Kirishima kisses your cheek and sobbing faintly when Bakugo rubs your back in circles.

"Do you want a beer baby?" Kirishima asks, softly patting your back and kissing your nape as he leaves you clinging onto Bakugo. You nod into the crook of Bakugo's neck in reply and Kirishima smiles from the other side of the couch.

The sound of the fridge opening is timelines away from what's entering your mind. Is it wrong that you like that cuddle too much? And is it even more wrong that you want more? Bakugo feels nice when you're curling up onto his lap and Kirishima adds warmth and love into everything he's touching, you almost feel your thighs clench at the idea of where your mind's traveling to.

"What if we had a threesome?"

It's so faint when it comes out of your mouth that you're convinced there shouldn't be any loud reaction to it, though you hear the can of beer that's presumably in Kirishima's hand hit the floor, you feel Katsuki's hand freeze on your back. Both of them wonder if they've heard correctly, but never asking you to repeat it.

"A uhm.. Threesome?" Kirishima asks "you'd like that?"

"Yes"

You try to hide your face deeper into Bakugo's neck, but he doesn't seem to approve of it- he pushes you back softly, with a thick hand on your stomach and another still on your back. You feel your face burning as you're forced to face him

"You'd really want a threesome?" You nod and Bakugo gulps "Right now?"

"Mhm" You gulp too, your nose almost nuzzling against his "if- if you want to"

The way you're swamped with attention is overwhelming. From the way Kirishima jumps to the edge of the couch towards you, to the way Bakugo lifts you up and stands on his feet, urging you to do the same as your feet land one by one on the carpet underneath you.

"Fuck okay uh, are you fine with it Bakugo?" The redhead asks, scratching the back of his neck.

"Yeah, I am."

Kirishima gulps when he sees Bakugo latch onto you, placing his hand on your shoulder and coughing up slightly "Should we set some rules?"

"Yes" Bakugo coughs as well, though you can feel him getting hard to where your thoughts are meeting his "wanna suggest anything?"

"Great uh, maybe no kissing between the two of you, since she's my girlfriend? And Katsuki you're wearing a condom too. Are these fine?"

Both of you gulp and nod. It's natural for Kirishima to ask this. Sharing you out of the blue can't completely sit right with him; it almost flicks a switch on inside your gut, making you gulp again when you feel him hugging you from behind.

"Safeword?" Bakugo asks

"Red" You reply cooing when your back finally hits your boyfriend's chest.

You don't even have enough time to count down seconds before you're pounded and squished between the two of them. It's a miracle that you somehow manage to convince them to move it to the bedroom.

Even if making a small stop at the hall wasn't in your original plan

Kirishima's hands are everlastingly on your waist pulling your back into his chest. He's nibbling on the nape of your neck, his fingers light as feathers as they're peeling your T-shirt off of you. He almost grunts at your exposed back, leaning down just to place a kiss on each of your shoulders before latching onto your ear

"It's fine baby, it's fine if you're embarrassed okay?" He blows into you then takes a bite of your ear lobe to which you shiver as you snap your head to his face. “what? Are you that excited?"

You gulp, nodding with your eyes shutting, an expression on your face that looks almost painful -Bakugo can't help but palm himself, searching Kirishima's carmine eyes with his, waiting for a sign that he should make a move or retreat. Anything that doesn't involve him getting a front row seat to how your chest bounces as Kirishima runs his hands on your torso from behind.

"Fuck, I-" He says, swallowijg his tongue in the process, just when Kirishima's hands change paths, now wiggling underneath your sweatpants.

"Enjoying the show Bakugo?" Kirishima's smiles and fuck- when did he adopt such an attitude? "Come 'ere"

Bakugo does as he's commanded, guided by Kirishima, as he trails your torso with his hands intertwined with his, squeezing your upper hips, trailing your belly button, eyeing you with doe eyes before launching a kiss to your navel. You writhe and wiggle in Kirishima's embrace- the feeling of another man too new, too strange to take in in less than a few moments, but Eijiro's got you, kissing your nape, your cheek, softly playing with your breasts above your bralette. Whispering his praises with his hands across your body.

"Good girl" You're sure he whispers in your ear "I got you" But all you can feel is Katsuki's breath as he's placing open mouthed kisses across your tummy, over the valley of your chest, your cheek.

Kirishima is overly alert by this, jumping in between the little scene, capturing your lips with his, using a hand to push Bakugo into the kiss as well, pulling him in as lips as smeared against lips, your saliva trailing out of your mouth. You instinctively rub your thighs together to relieve some of the burning sensation between your legs

Soon enough, Bakugo is taking off your pants, rhen his shirt, Kirishima's taking his off too, managing not to let you go all while pushing the three of you into the bedroom. There's nothing but a trail of clothing in the hallway that could suggest what's happening inside the room once the door closes shut; three pairs of sweats, three different t-shirts and maybe the white ghost of hot and heavy breathing.

On the bed, it's way more comfortable. Your arching back is finally resting against the pillowy mattress, Kirishima's smile from upside down soothing and forgiving, you almost melt away while he cups your face and bumps his nose to yours, giggling slightly, before glaring at Bakugo. He guides your head into his lap, still holding your cheeks, still rubbing circles onto your soft face, pouting hard before facing your friend.

"You good babe?" He asks you and you nod again, humming a small reply to him "you too Katsuki?"

"Yeah, fuck yeah, I am" He gulps, pumping himself twice.

"You're not getting in without prep by the way"

You writhe in Kirishima's lap, gooey eyes and mouth open wide as he leans to pry your legs open, trailing his middle finger across your clothes slit. Your chest jumps when you hear him chuckle. You know he's struck the gold vein he's searching for, your panties swimming in a puddle, completely damp from getting your neck attacked only a few minutes ago.

Katsuki marvels a finger across your slit as well, avoiding your clit purposely or flicking it occasionally, moaning every time his finger touches the chilly dampness of your underwear.

Kirishima pries your legs open wider, hooking his middle finger under your panties and pulling them over and slightly to the side, flashing the blond with a glimpse of you -you swear you see him gulp. Hard.

"Want a taste?" Kirishima asks, chuckling, as if Bakugo isn't frothing at the mouth at the mention of the action, as if he isn't diving in between your thighs like a starved man.

He almost rips your panties by pulling them to the side. Your hands link through his platinum hair and you almost whine at how soft it feels, or, about the moaning sounds he makes as he's digging his fingers in the plush skin of your thigh, swinging your leg wider. You slide a little further along, laid completely flat on the bed -head still on Kirishima's lap.

Sweetly, Kirishima captures your inner lips with his fingers and circles them around before making you hump on him, his knuckles bumping with Bakugo's nose when he chuckles again. You almost tear up by the over stimulating pressure Kirishima's fingers provide for you, but you decide to hold it in; not sure hitched breath leaves your mouth until Bakugo takes an experimental lick across your slit.

With a thumb presses to your clit he retreats for a second, just to watch as he sinks his middle finger inside of you and -"oh my fucking god Katsuki"- he's back at it again, licking at you religiously. Softly, like Kirishima always does, patiently. Just like you love it.

It has your back arching, chest bouncing for Kirishima's eyes to enjoy. He decides he won't have you hanging, bouncing and thrashing. With two huge palms he cups your breasts, flicking your nipples, massaging you for just enough time to make your heart burn, then he wiggles a finger to the hood of your clit, applying throbbing pressure.

The knot in your stomach is tight, your vision blurry, you're sure what you think is silent moaning is probably full-on screaming, mewling or pleas of pleasure that you can't comprehend.

Kirishima is smiling at you from above, still wiggling his finger on you left and right in Bakugo's business and you can't help it- you yelp, pushing Bakugo's face deeper into you. It feels good- too good, like your legs are nothing but jello, your stomach and thighs feeling like they've transformed into liquid smooth. You mewl in Kirishima's arms, coiling, desperately eyeing him in hopes that he and Katsuki won't stop what they're doing.

"M so close" You slur when Kirishima takes a hand of yours away from Bakugo's hair, softly turning it upside down, until your palm is met with the wetness of his foreskin, the pulsing slit of his that leaks precum into your hand.

He whines -"ohh"- when you wrap your fingers around him, instantly pumping your hand up and down, your grip firm and steady as you twist your wrist with every bob of your hand.

"Suck me off baby" Kirishima softly commands, rubbing an experimental circle with his tip on your lips, smearing some of his precum around your mouth. You gulp at how carelessly he pumps his base, until he pries your lips open.

You take him eagerly into your mouth, feeling your stomach churn and your thighs freezing in place by Bakugos movements; so long as you're steadily sucking Kirishima's cock into your mouth, he scissors his fingers inside of you.

"You like that?" He moans into you, eyeing Kirishima "you twitched- fuck you're twitching"

"Show me how wet she is"

Kirishima commands and Bakugo complies by taking his fingers away from your heat and shining them into Kirishima's face. You whimper but how good it feels when he moans against you, blinking as you watch your boyfriend take your friend's fingers in his mouth, sucking in eagerly, before popping the digits out of his mouth, leaving a trail of saliva fall faintly onto the valley of your breasts

"Your pussy's s'wet baby, you're dripping all over over Katsuki's hands" Kirishima thrusts in your mouth "you taste so good" then turns his attention to Bakugo "tell 'er, how fucking good she tastes"

Bulky fingers rub on your clit once more and Bakugos hand secures your tummy in place while pinning you down; you feel it then, the inevitable end of what has been building up in your stomach for such a long while and you can't help but scream at the feeling of coming undone. Shaking, struggling to take a breath without popping Kirishima out of your mouth.

"Fucking perfect"

Your vision is white, your head is buzzing and your legs are frozen. You can feel Kirishima fucking into your mouth once, twice and ever so slightly, depending in how relaxed your jaw is as he's moaning. You don't choke when he hits your throat, you simply moan onto him, too blinded by the afterglow of your orgasm to even react to what's about to unfold.

"Fuck- take 'em off- Fuuck" Kirishima says, you notice. Bakugo probably does as he's told; you hear shuffling and grunting, the soft pop of his dick to his stomach. You want to see-

Bakugo, hazed and drenched in you, cups your womanhood with his hand, landing his thumb on your clit and you yelp again, thrassing onto the bed, finally popping Kirishima out of your mouth. He tugs and drags his fingers away- he's opening you up, of course, that's it- and you can't help but roam your eyes all over him. Searching for his cock, wanting to see it dive inevitably into you.

It's unfair that Kirishima has a better view than you do, but at least, you hope he enjoys the view. You buck your hips forward when you feel Katsukis thighs grace against your own. His skin is unbelievably cold, making the hair on your legs and tummy raise; a tear rolls down your cheek then the moment the tip of his cock touches your clit.

"We've got- ah- condoms in the first drawer. On your left" Kirishima says cheerfully, bucking his hips away from your face, kneeling just to place a kiss on your forehead- your nose- your lips, finally bumping the tip of his nose to yours when he sucks your inner lip into his mouth

"You liked that baby?" Kirishima breathes "You liked Bakugo eating you out?"

"Mhm" You nod, not wanting to break away from the kiss, unlike Kirishima

You can hear Katsuki cursing, slamming the drawer shut as he fidgets with the condom. Everything seems slow, from the way his thick fingers can't grasp the tiny edges of the wrapper, to him finding out what's the right side to put it on -he grunts, inevitably- stealing giggles from both you and Kirishima

"Ah man, you're struggling, come 'ere let me help"

Bakugo grunts once again, although this time it's not out of frustration. Kirishima playfully pulls him close, places a kiss on his navel and extends his hand underneath Bakugo's, politely asking for the condom -you know his lips are pressed into a goofy smiley line right now just by the way his body moves.

Kirishima lets your cheek rest on his thigh when he moves to grab Katsuki's cock, to roll the condom on him while twisting his fist on him no more than twice -unfair- before playfully slapping the blond's ass, urging him to climb onto the bed again.

It's then that your hips are jerked and raised towards the blond, huge palms on your hips, pulling you towards him. Nervous touches, unspoken apologies for potentially harsh movements, his eyes are flickering into yours and his lips are all pouty, scrunched, his cheeks plump with embarrassment. He doesn't know if you notice, nor does he think he ever will, but it's killing him -that he's only allowed to line himself up with you under this circumstance.

Whether you notice the hurt in his eyes or not, you don't comment on it, nor do you spare him any worried look. He doesn't even know if he wants you to take pity on this state of his.

No.

No, he doesn't.

He only hopes Kirishima won't get mad when he cups your face tenderly, nor when he traps your face with his other hand caging you away from the redhead thigh -it's for better leverage he'll say if he's asked to- but you melt into his touch.

And his chest burns.

It's worse when he finally pushes into you. His heart won't stop beating hard and fast and he's scared he's going to have a fall. No-no- he shouldn't think about it, if he does think about it, he'll definitely have a fall.

"Ooh, ooh, ooh," You murmur, feeling the voice come from the depths of your chest.

That's the only confirmation he needs to ignite his ego and light it on fire. You feel good, you're sucking him in deeper and your cheek is still melting into his palm. It's more than enough; he ignores Kirishima's gaze and whatever it may carry behind it. It's for his own sanity he reminds himself.

"You're doing so good babe,'' Kirishima asks you, cupping your other cheek. He's smiling- no need to worry about him not having a positive reaction to Bakugo caressing you

(The rules that had been presented to him were simple- wear a condom and no kissing)

"You're taking it so well, isn't she Katsuki?"

"Fuck yeah" He grunts, thrusting harder

"So, so well baby, we'll make sure you get to come first okay?" You ogle your eyes at Kirishima, teary and soft by his words, clapping your lips together and pouting, begging him silently for a kiss. Only to feel the void when his soft lips don't come in contact with yours

"Oh no, no kiss for baby. You're so naughty, wanting me to kiss you when you're getting fucked by our friend"

"What?" You whine, popping on to your left elbow "Eiji- i want my kiss"

"None can do" He smiles and Bakugo snaps his hips into you "unless you earn it"

Your stomach is tied in a knot again, gummy walls tightening around Bakugo, back arching. It's almost painful to watch you sprawled like this underneath him, reacting in peak with the rhythm of his hips, begging him to go faster, harder. At one point, he's losing himself in the speed he's fucking you with, feeling like he's about to combust from inside out is not helping either

-He thinks, he'll be spent for days after this-

It's guttural, the way you feel as Bakugo thrusts inside of you, the way you mewl and twitch and feel your eyes roll to the back of your head. You feel full, so much that you mutter it, slurred and incomprehensibly at Kirishima. It's more than enough for him to rub your chin with his thumb and buck his hips on your face again. You take him eagerly, smiling with your lips when he lands on your tongue. You swirl it around, pump him deeper into your mouth, suck on his tip until he moans in sync with you.

"Bakugoo" He hisses, biting his lip as he's eyeing you "don't chase your own satisfaction! Go slower and rub her clit too" He takes Bakugos hand away from your face, tracing it down your body before landing on your heat, pinching your clit softly making you moan "ah so responsive"

For a while he doesn't move his hand away, focused on guiding Bakugo's fingers on you, teaching him how to make you feel good while he's fucking and you're on fire, gut churning and chest tight, ovestimulated by how good it all feels. You can't even take a proper breath as Kirishima humps deeper into your mouth. He groans too loud when his tip hits your cheek.

You know this is too much for him, you know he can't hold back any longer, but you grab onto his shaft and twirl your grin on his base, bobbing it into your cheek and popping it out before swallowing it again.

And while Bakugo's thrusts are becoming desperate, Kirishima bursts into your mouth, holding your hair softly, pulling you closer to you- closer, closer, until your nose hits his navel, biting on his cheeks and squinting his eyes so he won't shut them, drunk on the view of you overflowing with his come. He only grubs your chin, swiping his thumb on the white trail that's spilling from the corner of your lips, trying his best to smirk at you without taking a breath.

"Swallow it sweetheart -ah- that's right, you're so -fuck- perfect for me"

Your lower stomach is protesting, bursting slowly as Bakugo is thrusting faster into you. His speed, him hitting that spot in your gut repeatedly, creating the perfect feeling of numbness, it's all too much and not enough all at once, you want to cry out- you gush and you writhe as your legs hook around Bakugo's waist.

Your boyfriend retreats from his previous position, smiling as ever, petting Bakugo's blonde hair, massaging your breast, kissing your nipple, then attacking your upper chest, trapping supple skin in between his tongue and teeth, dragging Bakugo along with him. It's what ultimately leads Bakugo over the edge, his tip feeling numb, blood rushing all over his body, he thrusts a few more times before he pulls out, spilling his own satisfaction into the condom, feeling his heart race faster than ever before.

"Your doing sooo good" Kirishima says once more, pecking your lips repeatedly. "Wanna ride me? Or are you tired? "

"Fuck no, lay down"

"That's my girl" He smiles "Katsuki, come here"

Kirishima rubs your wetness up and down, grunting when he finds your clit, grazing it with the back of his hand, whispering about how wet you are, to which you respond by hugging your arms around his neck, hiding your face in the crook of his neck. You only pull back when he lets you coo into him by petting your hair softly.

You're instantly met with Bakugo's eyes blazing into yours from above- it's not intimidating, rather, it's lustful, but you still need some time to pull yourself back, despite the eagerness in his eyes. You must have missed the point where he discarded his condom, or just how thick he actually is, because he's standing hard and proud before you, nervously searching for Kirishima's approval.

Your boyfriend's approval comes with gripping on him and easing him close to you. You take him in both of your hands, relying on Kirishima to keep your torso lifted, focusing on twisting your hand around him in the same way you did for Eijiro. Too bad you almost lose grip when He snaps his hips into you.

You can feel Katsuki's dick twitch into your hands as you pull him down lower, getting your tongue out of your mouth to place kitten lips all over his length. Eijiro mimics you, licking the tip when you're not licking the base, letting you take control when he ceases his movements for a bit, to lift both of you a little higher, so you don't have to bend your neck as much. He strokes some sweaty strands of hair away from your face, he kisses your cheek and Bakugo is already thrusting into your mouth feverously.

"Fuck"

"You're so wet baby, you feel like you could take us both" You yelp, wide eyes as you freeze on the spot "want to take us both?"

"I do" You yelp with tears in your eyes "I do I do, I do I do"

"Oh, look at you being so desperate, want to get -ah- wrecked, don't you?"

"I do Eiji- you cry out

"Then ask Katsuki to take you too, ask him to shove his cock into you while I'm fucking you too, like the greedy little thing you are"

At this point, you think poor Bakugo isn't going to make it to the end of this.

"Katsu" You plead, watery eyes staring into desperate carmine ones "Katsu fuck me while Eiji fucking me too-"

"Say please" Kirishima interrupts, pinching your nipple "or I'm not going to let him"

"Please, pleaseplease, please"

"Fuck yeah" Katsuki replies "ill fucking wreck you" The sounds he's making are supposed to be words, though they're far from being clear and understandable, his veins are pulsing into your mouth. He's too excited for this, so excited that you know he'll never make it to the drawer to reach for a new condom. So Kirishima is doing it for him, hooking the little rubber between his fingers as he's opening the drawer.

"Come on baby, pull back" He taps on your shoulder and places a kiss on your collar bone, thrusting deeper into you this time. The reaction is immediate, you're throwing your head back in seconds and Bakugo whines at the sudden departure of your warm mouth.

Kirishima allows you to kiss his thighs, his tip, his navel, to squeeze the small of his back and his ass before letting you wear the condom onto him.

You lose track of Bakugo until you feel wet kisses being planted on your thighs and ass, the back of your knees. You feel his hand being placed on your thigh, the warmth of his palm as he's soothingly rubbing it up and down your skin, to prepare you, raising his thumb to graze at your crotch occasionally. You whine every time he thumbs your clit, or flicks it when it meets with Kirishima's navel.

"You good? I'll start with my fingers" You choke on the sound of his words and nod frantically. If only you could actually watch him when he delves his middle finger in you along with Eijiro's cock. Still you whine loudly, when another finger joins the first one, slowly scissoring inside of you "fuck you're gonna take it so well aren't you? Kirishima's right. You love this"

"Answer him," Kirishima whispers, teeth biting down in your lobe. He grabs your face, trapping your cheeks between his fingers, turning you in Katsuki's direction, pushing your cheeks together. You swallow when you see the blind focused on watching you stretch.

"I love it

But Eijiro isn't satisfied with how you're trying to make your words get past from your lips

"Say it like you mean it doll, or I won't let your friend put it in"

You eye him dangerously, putting your lips even further before muttering a soft 'fine' -your redhead doesn't make a comment on your little attitude, probably because he's gotten what he's wanted from you- and Katsuki hisses, fisting his cock faster.

"I love it so much Katsuh"

"And Eiji- you mean. It's not only him that's here" Kirishima smirks and this time he pulls out of you, flipping your body so that your back is facing him. One hand comes to your wetness, spreading your lips apart, stretching you wide open "Try again" He lets go just for a moment, to slap your clit loosely. Once. Twice. Never ceasing when you whine. Your hips buck up towards Katsuki.

"Look at how nice I am, I even gave you a full view. Am I not?"

"You are Eiji. You're the best, the best. And I love this so much, I'm going to combust"

"Oh you will?" Katsuki interrupts, grunting when Kirishima pulls his dick closer to you, rubbing the head on your clit until Katsuki gets the hint. You let out a guttural groan at the feeling, tears starting to form in the corners of your eyes from being too overstimulated for so long

"Yes baby, I will, just please"

"M going in-" Katsuki announces, earning a nod from Kirishima "If he won't let you come, then we don't listen to him 'kay?"

Kirishima chuckles at the one and bites the top of your ears dragging his tongue to the base of it- a warning- to not try and agree with what Katsuki's offering. And being obedient definitely pays off when you feel your boyfriend's head poke against your entrance.

It feels splitting and painful all at once; the tears in your eyes are pouring, and none of the caresses you're receiving is helping. You need time to adjust and both men provide that for you. Minutes pass spent with soft kisses. Kirishima sucking your neck and Bakugo kissing your breasts, the three of you making out- anything until you feel like you can get used to them.

And when you do, they go slow, each at their own pace, simultaneously hitting spots that you don't know could or should ever be hit at the same time.

"You good?" Both men ask and you have to gulp that frog that sits at the top of your mouth if you want to talk, but you can't. Your throat is too tight, your eyes are too watery

"Babe"

"Better than I thought I'd be actually"

You get lost in the haze of their hips, their thrusts and you can already feel Katsuki collapsing onto you, chasing his own pit of pleasure when it hits you. Your gut coming undone for the last time has your heart leaping and skipping beats; you hook your arm around Katsuki's neck, jumping up and down from how fast both men are thrusting into you and you bring your face to his, cooling your mouths together.

When he feels you clamp down on him -and Kirishima- he pulls out, rolls the condom off and strokes himself slightly. You whine at the sudden departure of him inside of you but you quickly clamp down on just your boyfriend, before feeling him shifting from underneath you, finally pushing down the small of your back. You take Katsuki into your mouth while Kirishima slaps your ass, thrusting fast and hard into you.

There's no sweet talk right now, authority and intimidation hiding away as satisfaction is being chased. Sloppily and not carefully at all. It's evident in how you're sucking Katsuki off. There's no consistency in your rhythm, you're squirming as Kirishima is slowing down before picking up his pace again, running his hands through your hair affectionately. When he comes, he coats your insides in white ropes of pleasure, riding off his orgasm softly, until he feels himself stop twitching.

By the time he pulls out you've made Katsuki come as well, hearing his high pitched grunts as he lets it all out in your mouth. Although this time you're not overwhelmed with the amount; it's his second round nonetheless.

Katsuki's hands don't cease to take this chance, even if they're awkward and shaking he's grabbing your cheeks squishing them just like Kirishima did a while ago and kisses you, poking his tongue in your mouth, moaning at his own taste, pulling your lips under his teeth.

You know your lips will be bruised by this. And you don't care. Because when he pulls back, Kirishima is kissing you as well, pulling you into his arms, caging you into his chest.

You even smile as tiny, peppery kisses are pressed onto your skin.

"You did so well" Kirishima smiles "you too Katsu, you both were amazing"

Katsuki smiles, popping onto the bed as well, wrapping his arms around your waist and pulling himself onto you and Kirishima. He nuzzles his nose at the crook of your neck and for the first time in a while he feels warm, content, calm and collected. Or so you think by the kiss that's planted onto your back by him.

It's tender and soft, mimicking Kirishima's but feeling nothing like your boyfriend's kisses at the same time. You collapse further into Kirishima's chest and he kisses the top of your hair and your cheek, mellowy.

"Wanna take a bath?" He suggests under his breath and both you and Katsuki nod, sinking further in the sheets with heavy eyes. Maybe when your feet won't feel like they'll betray you, you'll get up and have a warm bath, sandwiched between Katsuki and Eijiro, smothered in kisses, lathered in lavender soap, maybe you'll make a cup of chamomile for the three of of you and cuddle between them before you go to sleep.

Until then…

[mxrcayong]

part of @nct-writers​’s cafe resonance collab!

genre: fluff, a more UK-based pov of university

summary: jisung, a college student now looking for a job, has decided to apply for a job at the local café. he thought being friends with the manager and its employees has it perks; from unlimited free coffee to whatever pastries haven’t been eaten by the end of the day. needless to say; the perks must end somewhere. 

word count: 2317 words

note: i didn’t make the divider!!

College students practically live by coffee shops. If university was a religion, the on-campus coffee shop would be the bible. Daily, college students’ breath in the coffee beans like oxygen, feel the permanent imprint of coffee mug or a ‘to go’ cup on their lips. They’re surrounded by the smells of different fruity pastries and savory snacks, and the sounds of students either chatting or typing away on their computers. 

It’s no wonder that the university coffee shop was practically a hub of activity. When you sit down to work at Café Resonance, it’s feels like you’re a part of a bigger and collective community, stressing for assessments or just taking a break from their hectic university schedules. It’s especially hectic when you’re a full-time student and work part time.   

“Do I really need to get a job?” Jisung sighed, scratching his head as he leant against the barista’s counter. His six closest friends were working behind the counter: using the coffee machines and decorating the pastries. “Can’t I just use your employee discount on everything?” 

Jaemin furrowed his eyebrows. “You know I want to, my little mouse.” He teased as he placed another order on his tray, “But I can only put the café employee discount on so many things.” He practically sung as he left, heading to a table to bring another set of students their own cups of their own ambrosia.     

From the cash register, Haechan had just finished taking the orders of the last bunch of the line and immediately replaced Jaemin’s place next to Jisung. “You can always just become a sugar baby.” He suggested, coming over to the display case to grab one of the pastries to heat up per the customer’s order. “Or a pole dancer… aren’t you a good dancer?” 

Jisung immediately protested. “Firstly, no. Secondly, is it even legal? I literally only became an adult this year.” 

“Actually…” Haechan started to counter, only to be interrupted by Mark approaching with a raised hand and a dirty mop. 

“Stop telling everyone to become a sugar baby.” Mark chided as he ducked to get back behind the counter, drudging the cleaning supplies with him. “You do realize that if someone does become a sugar baby, they aren’t entitled to paying for your shit either.” In response, Haechan grumbled under his breath as he gave the bewildered customer overhearing the odd conversation their fruity treat. 

Jisung has visited his closest friends enough to know that working at the café is like a beautifully choreographed dance. It moves like clockwork; with the six doing their roles diligently and without question. So, it’s not unusual for his friends to come and go during the conversation – all taking part whilst separating themselves at the same time. 

“Why don’t you just ask Chenle if you could work here?” Renjun suggested, coming out from the back room where he started baking some more pastries – obvious through his powdered apron. “We all work here already, and we can go through the ropes with you.” 

Jeno immediately stepped in and basically rejected the offer. “Do you remember the last time we hosted an event and Jisung wanted to help?” He prompted, before chuckling. “He tried to wash the food with dish soap…and he broke the broom when cleaning!” 

Almost as if the thought of teasing Jisung summons him, Chenle came out of seemingly nowhere. “Didn’t he leave the broken broom on the floor and just started playing video games?” Jeno, Haechan, and Renjun nodded – remembering the mess the 00-line apartment was that night.  

“Not the best party we hosted.” Jaemin commented, going around the counter to make his own drink now that the list of waiting customers is gone. “But, still, Jisung learns fast. I think he could work here.” 

Chenle let out an introspective hum, before leaning over to whisper to Haechan. With a questionable look on their faces, Chenle decided to call Jisung into the back room and in his makeshift ‘managers office’ (a perk of being family with the owner of the university café). “I’ll consider your application, but I can’t do any nepotism.” He started, “so, you must go through the whole application process.” He paused. “You must come up with your own recipe.” 

With a rule to not discuss recipes with his ‘potential future co-workers’ – which Chenle weirdly specified as everyone but Haechan, Jisung had to get straight to work. In all honesty, he had no baking experience nor ever made a drink without a guiding recipe.

While his six closest friends were out of the equation, he had another friend he could reach out to; Y/N. 

You were in his freshmen orientation group earlier this year. Not going to lie, you initially thought of each other as familiar faces who you’d occasionally wave at or nod in acknowledgement when you walk past each other. However, you later found yourself eating in the same hall cafeteria…and then the same hall pantry…and then, it clicked. You two lived only four doors away from each other in your university hall. 

Needless to say, you two ran midnight McDonald trips basically on a weekly basis. You became integral to Jisung’s daily routine; from waking each other up for breakfast to storming into each other rooms, armed with complaints and rants about the shitty professor who made you read 300 pages for one night. Even on your busiest days, you two would always pick each other up for the hall provided breakfasts and dinners. 

So here you were - Jisung was slouching down on your desk chair while you were resting on the bed, your back against the wall and a pillow in your lap as you tried to help Jisung solve his current problem. “Well…did Chenle give you a prompt or anything?” 

Jisung shook his head, groaning back. “It’s not like we have a kitchen to try and bake either! We only have fridges and a microwave and a….” He tried to recall what was on the floor pantry. 

“Just a fridge and a microwave.” You added. “That means pastries are off the table…how about a drink?” 

Jisung groaned again. “I have a hard time making pre-made coffee!” 

You couldn’t help but chuckle; you remembered that day. It was a scary time for you; your credit card company sent you a text about a fraudulent use of your student account. Not only did you end up stressing to the point of crying, but you also learned it was a false alarm. Luckily, while still reeling from the anxiety inducing news, you ran into Jisung as he was leaving his room. He then took you to the pantry to try and cheer you up with coffee…however, a fire alarm went off and practically deafened the whole university housing cohort for hours. 

And poor Jisung…Jisung was just an awkward little mouse, trying to look innocent as he saw his exhausted neighbors clamber out into the park due to his attempt of making pre-made coffee. 

“Well…you have me. This isn’t hopeless.” Climbing off the bed, you pretended to dust yourself off. “So, let’s go to the pantry? Another one of our…”

Jisung quickly furrowed his brows, interjecting while you still spoke “I don’t think this can be considered snacking…”

“Pantry-time dates.” You stuttered, obviously unsure of the title. Usually, you call them ‘cup noodle dates’ or ‘popcorn dates’; a joke that ran through your small group of friends as well as the resident advisors at the university hall. 

No one likes being in the pantry. Especially the second floor. For one, things always get stolen; from cutlery to a six pack of coke. Secondly, the few times people use the microwave to heat up their meals, they tend to leave the leftovers to rot on the windowsill. But you and Jisung sit there together; maybe because something about it feels open and comfortable, despite the terrible smell. Plus…the two of you placed bets on who could be the thief when people awkwardly clamber on by, and if on one of these ‘dates’ you catch the thief obviously taking something that isn’t theirs? Even better. 

But today… you two will have to be the forsaken thieves. 

“So someone put chocolate powder in the fridge…” You commented incredulously, especially as this fridge is known for freezing things into ice in minutes. “There’s some…expired milk.” Jisung watched as you searched through the fridge for any hidden treasures; feeling more and more unsure of himself as you listed more and more ingredients. “Oh, okay, some non-expired milk. That will be useful.” 

“We can make a latte?” Jisung offered, now on his phone searching up popular café drinks. 

“Yes!” You enthused, finally feeling like this trip to the pantry isn’t useless after all. “But…we should probably write an apology note to the people we’re stealing from.” 

It’s been almost five hours in the pantry. Countless of people came in (however, this time you tried not to place bets as you knew who the real thieves were tonight) and would just stare at the two of you, arguing over a kettle of milk. Even your neighbor Victor came in; having sat and watched you two for a good while (which made Jisung extra cautious; he’s had a theory about him being the forsaken pantry thief for a while). Victor, however, said you two should have a cooking show, to which you scoffed while Jisung basked in the compliment. This very same compliment crossed Victor off of Jisung’s “potential criminals�� list. 

Eventually, you had a drink in front of you. A chocolate latte that Jisung insisted on putting salt in, as “Modern Family said it was a good idea”. Admittedly, the first ten versions of this drink were absolute failures; making you go to the bathroom numerous times to vomit out the thick and almost flour-like texture.  

So, for your final check, the two of you grabbed the non-eaten pastries Jisung brought home from the café. Hopefully, this will act as a palette cleanser; especially since tasting all of the failed drinks probably have messed with your taste buds and lowered all sorts of expectations. 

After taking bites into the Suh-ndwitch and Henpretzel, you two finally took sips of the drink you attempted to make since 10pm – with Jisung making far too many references to the Powerpuff Girls opening theme. 

Alas – the taste that flooded their senses wasn’t at all bad, no. Nor was it ‘a little bit of sugar and everything ice’, but it was something you’d expect from Starbucks. You two immediately squealed out of excitement, ignoring the fact that you probably woke the neighboring rooms up at three in the morning. Jisung immediately went over to hug your waist, spinning you around as fast as he could; before something unexpected happens. 

You felt his lips on yours; tasting like chocolate and leftover ingredients that were remnants from his palette cleanser of a sandwich. The feeling was foreign; you never expected to kiss Jisung. He was your best friend, your neighbour; but his lips were soft…and something about this felt right. 

But then the door slammed opened. A zombie-like RA came in and you two immediately jumped to different sides of the room. “I know you two always do your pantry dates, but…” The RA started, obviously sluggish from being woken up at 3am. “We got noise complaints.” 

Jisung awkwardly coughed, apologized, and ran away; leaving you confused in the corner of the pantry. 

Café Resonance were never busy Friday evenings. People were most likely out pubbing or preparing for their weekends of antics. So when Jisung stormed in with a recipe in hand, he wasn’t afraid to celebrate as loudly as if he had just won the Olympic World Cup. “I got the recipe! Can I please have the job?” He practically pleaded, dropping the piece of paper with messy handwriting and the sample drink you two whipped up again the night prior. On top of the page with chocolate colored stains were the words; “Hamji Choco Latte” with (served hot or cold)  at the bottom.

“A recipe?” Everyone but Haechan and Chenle looked confused; with the latter two smirking in the corner of the room. But as soon as Haechan cracked and let out a loud laugh, Mark turned around and immediately recognized the culprits of this misunderstanding. 

“Bruh,” Chenle let out throughout his charming ‘dolphin laugh’, “You had the job – I was just messing with you.” 

Haechan pouted, approaching Jisung to ruffle his hair. “My sweet, small, dumb idiot…how much I love you.” He placed a sloppy kiss at the corner of his head, making Jisung immediately try to scrub it off. 

Jisung scowled, upset he let himself get fooled by his best friends. “At least I got a girlfriend from it…” He mumbled, more to himself, but forgetful of how Jeno’s ears can pick up on anything. It was from my ASMR stint, Jeno would say. 

“WHAT!?” He exclaimed, as if Jisung getting a girlfriend would happen the day pigs would fly. 

“I sent you to make a café recipe, not a love potion!” Chenle cackled even more; while his fellow friends made him explain what happened. 

By the time the store closed, Jaemin gave Jisung the ‘talk’ and warned that although they spent nights in each other’s rooms before, Jisung and you must be ‘safe’ and ‘protected’. 

People always say the first people you become friends with at university don’t always stay friends for life. People tend to clash, find their hobbies, and go different ways. But Jisung was lucky. He met you; his best friend and now his other half. And despite the annoying prank Chenle made that wasted hours of your time, Chenle was right; the Hamji Choco Latte was basically a love potion as it brought the hidden infatuation you had for each other to light.  

Now, every time he picks you up from your lecture hall, he brings one extra-large chocolatey drink to share. 

“Email sent out to residents of NCU Hall: 

Dear residents of the second floor, 

The person who has been stealing cultlery and food has been identified. Victor Cho will be coming by to return any items that may have belonged to you.”

Jisung screamed at the top of his lungs when he got this email. “I TOLD YOU SO!” 

[saiilorstars]

Stars Dance

Ch. 13: The Writer

Fandom: Doctor Who Pairing: 11th Doctor x Original Female Character

~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~

Chapter summary: The Doctor and Avalon get thrown out of the TARDIS and are forced to stay with Craig Owens, a man who can't seem to figure out what he was literally has right in front of him. At the same time, the Doctor finally learns what has been preventing Avalon from finding peace in her sleep. 

(Previous chapters)

Fairy Tale Memoirs (Companion story)

The TARDIS materialized in a modern day city of London, unbeknownst to the trio inside. Avalon hurried up to the doors with a long, shoulder brown bag dangling on her side. She was expecting something grand as the Doctor promised but when she poked her head out, all she saw a boring old park. "Oh, nope not that fifth moon of whatever," she called and hopped onto the grass.

"It's the fifth moon of Sinda Callista," the Doctor corrected as he headed for the doors.

Avalon scoffed, "You do realize how terrible your piloting skills are, right? I keep telling you that you need to teach me so that I can one day teach that River Song woman."

"The day I do that is the day pigs will fly," he poked his head out and looked around, "Is that a Ryman's?" he blinked.

"I should punch you," Avalon muttered.

However, a blast from inside pushed the Doctor forwards. Avalon stepped to the side in time and watched him fall to the ground with a small laugh, "That's what you get," she teased. "I bet the TARDIS agreed with me!"

The Doctor groaned on the ground, about to believe that once again his TARDIS chose to side with Avalon, when the doors shut abruptly. Avalon blinked in surprise and even more so when the box began dematerializing.

"Amy!" the Doctor shouted as he sat up, "Amy!"

"What's going on?" Avalon frowned and put a hand in the air where the TARDIS had just been in, "Why'd it just...go? Is Amy alright?" she looked down at the Doctor, the man confused as much as she was.

~ 0 ~

"Are you sure this is the house, Amy?" Avalon was asking as she hurried down the street, speaking to her friend through an ear piece the Doctor had come up with earlier to communicate with her in the TARDIS.

"Yes, that's the place," Amy answered, "Now hurry please and get me out of here!"

It seemed like something nonhuman was preventing the TARDIS from making a proper landing and therefore was keeping Amy inside. The Doctor had found its origins in a flat owned by a Craig Owens. They'd found an advert in a shop with a note saying to go to that flat, written by Amy apparently. But, the Doctor being himself wanted to go straight to the house and pose as lodgers. Avalon reminded him that they needed money and would therefore go to take out some money from her account. And being impatient as usual, he went first to the flat while Avalon went to take out money. She only hoped that he hadn't ruined it for them yet.

Avalon knocked on the door of the designated flat and waited for someone to answer. Eventually, a man with brown hair and blue eyes opened up, and by the face he had Avalon could tell the Doctor had already made his usual impression.

"Hi," Avalon politely smiled, "I'm-"

"Ginger hair," Craig mumbled.

And immediately Avalon went into a fit of irritation, "Is that how that stupid bow-tie, floppy haired man introduced me?"

"And there's the temper," Craig nodded.

Avalon frowned even deeper, "DOCTOR!" she shouted and went inside.

The Doctor casually came out of the living room and smiled, "Avalon, nice of you to make it."

Avalon controlled herself from strangling him right there and then, "You introduced me how?"

"Just the basics," the Doctor shrugged, not even realizing how much worse that made it for her.

"You introduced me as the temperamental, ginger haired woman?" Avalon's mouth dropped, not sure whether to feel more angry or be hurt. But if it was true, which she knew it was, why would it 'hurt' to be introduced like that? Lots of people used to do that back in Leadworth. Why was it such a big deal now? And upon coming to an inconclusive answer, she let the entire thing go and simply cleared her throat and turned to Craig, basically starting all over again, "Hi, my name is Avalon Reynolds," she extended her hand and waited for it to be shaken.

"Craig Owens..." the man slowly shook her hand, being cautious not to upset her again.

"Um, I'm with him," Avalon gestured to the Doctor, "Heard about the room...um, we've got money to cover the month," she picked up her purse and took out a paper bag, "Here you go," she handed it to Craig.

"Yeah, but I was explaining to him that...I only just put the advert today," Craig was eyeing them oddly, probably suspicious which Avalon couldn't blame him for.

"I shop a lot," was her excuse, "Saw the advert myself and told him about it."

"Yes, so...who lives upstairs?" the Doctor had been staring up at the door of the second level. Avalon followed his gaze and found it creepy with the flickering light bulb.

"Just some bloke," Craig answered, still eyeing them.

"What does he look like?" the Doctor asked.

"Normal. He's very quiet," Craig said and soon after they heard a loud bang from upstairs.

"Sure about that?" Avalon raised an eyebrow.

Without another word, the Doctor entered the living room again, much to Craig's irritation as the man seemed to like wandering about in a place that hadn't even been rented to him yet.

"Excuse me!?" Craig went to follow him in.

Avalon sighed and entered the living room afterwards. She saw the Doctor once more looking up and followed it to a corner of the ceiling where a stain was prominently set. "Is that...dry rot?" she guessed, not entirely sure it was even close. To anyone else it might seem like a normal stain, herself included, but knowing that there was something alien in this house was a bit of a cheat.

"Or damp. Or mildew," Craig shrugged.

"Or none of the above," the Doctor mumbled.

"I'll get someone to fix it," Craig waved it off and turned to the pair.

"No, I'll fix it. I'm good at fixing rot," the Doctor began, "Call me the Rotmeister. No, I'm the Doctor, don't call me the Rotmeister..."

"Before you say something more stupid-" Avalon turned and looked around, "-this is the most beautiful parlor I have ever seen, you're obviously a man of impeccable taste, Craig," she complemented and walked around a bit, "Not many men can manage living on their own and still have a nice house. I mean, the only reason my house was clean was because I cleaned it. My dad is lovely and all but he was not a cleaning man, much less my brother," she rolled her eyes, "So kudos to you, really," she smiled, "Can we stay?"

"You haven't even seen the room," Craig felt the need to point out.

"The room?" the Doctor repeated, not quite there yet.

"He means the room we'd be staying in," Avalon sighed and walked up to Craig, taking charge of the situation, "Can we see it, then?"

"Uh, right," Craig nodded and walked back into the hallway.

"Take us to our room!" the Doctor cheerfully exclaimed. Avalon looked back at him and stared for a moment, "What?" he frowned.

"You are really lucky that box of yours can serve as a home because quite frankly...you stink at being human," she shook her head and led them into the hallway where Craig awaited them by the door of the room they'd be taking.

He unlocked it for them and opened the door to reveal a simple room with a bed in the center, pushed up against the wall, wardrobe pieces set around with a couch chair at the far end. Craig allowed Avalon and the Doctor in first while he explained the details, "Yeah, this is Mark's old room, he owns the place, moved out about a month ago. An uncle he'd never even heard of died and left a load of money."

The Doctor was testing the bed while looking around, "How very convenient. This'll do just right. In fact..." but he stopped when they heard more noise upstairs.

"We'll take it," Avalon said quietly as she looked up.

The Doctor stood up and pulled out his psychic paper, "You'll want to see our credentials," and he started listing each as he swapped the paper from hand to hand behind his back, "There...National Insurance number... NHS number... References..."

"Is that a reference from the Archbishop of Canterbury?" Craig pointed as the Doctor put away the psychic paper.

"I'm his special favorite," the Doctor informed casually and put a finger to his lips, "Are you hungry? I'm hungry."

"I haven't got anything in," Craig said but the Doctor was already halfway out the room.

"Believe me that won't stop him," Avalon shrugged and went after the Doctor.

The Doctor was raiding the fridge and cabinets as if it really were his home, "You've got everything I need for an omelette fines herbes! Pour deux!" he cheered and started to cook, "So who's the girl on the fridge?"

Avalon looked at the fridge and saw a picture of Craig and a blonde, blue-eyed, woman set on the top door. Alright, so maybe he did notice some things...

"My friend. Sophie," Craig said.

"Girlfriend?" Avalon asked.

"A friend who is a girl. There's nothing going on."

Avalon narrowed her eyes with an amused smile, "Okay," she sarcastically said.

"We met at work about a year ago at the call center," Craig hadn't even noticed the look of Avalon as he was still staring at the picture.

"Oh, really, a communications exchange?" the Doctor mused, "That could be handy."

"Firm's going down though. The bosses are using a totally rubbish business model. I know what they should do, I got a plan all worked out, but I'm just a phone drone, I can't go running in saying I know best," Craig suddenly stopped and stared at the pair, "Why am I telling you this? I don't even know you."

"I've got one of those faces. People never stop blurting out their plans while I'm around," the Doctor shrugged.

"He wishes," Avalon scoffed and went into the fridge, feeling hungry herself but not in the mood for omelettes.

"Right, where's your stuff?" Craig asked.

"Don't worry, it'll materialize, if all goes to plan," the Doctor looked around.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor and Craig sat down in the living room after finishing up their food, Craig surprised by the talent of the Doctor had for cooking, "Oh, that was incredible! That was absolutely brilliant. Where did you learn to cook?"

"Paris, in the 18th century," the Doctor said without thinking then shook his head, "No, hang on, that's not recent, is it? 17th? No, no, no, 20th. Sorry, I'm not used to doing them in the right order."

"Stop talking before you really ruin it," Avalon joined them holding a bottle of yogurt in her hands. She managed to find it all the way in the back of the fridge.

"Has anyone ever told you that you're a bit weird?" Craig had to ask. Avalon seemed far more normal which then made him question how the two worked together.

"They never really stop," the Doctor shrugged. Avalon gave him his credit for not being fazed by the question. "Ever been to Paris, Craig?"

"Nah, I can't see the point of Paris. I'm not much of a traveler."

"I can tell from your sofa," the Doctor gestured, Avalon wondering where the hell he was going to take that.

"My sofa?" Craig repeated, confused.

"You're starting to look like it."

"I have half a mind to throw this at you," Avalon sighed as she played with her spoon in her yogurt, "But I'm hungry so I'll settle for this," she whacked the Doctor's arm. The Doctor still didn't seem to understand what she was so upset over, Craig didn't seem upset. He was laughing.

"Thanks, mate, that's lovely! No, I like it here..." Craig seemed to get distant as he fondled a bright pink key chain in his hand, "I'd miss it, I'd miss..."

"Whoever owns those keys, I'm assuming," Avalon stared with amusement as she moved over to sit on the long couch with Craig.

"What?" Craig snapped out of his nearlike trance.

"You're fondling the key chain," the Doctor pointed.

"I'm holding them."

Avalon quietly scoffed, "Right."

"Anyway..." Craig stood up and walked to a table by the entrance of the room to grab some keys, "These are your keys."

"We can stay?" the Doctor stood up and went to take the keys.

"Hooray," Avalon gave a pretend cheer and continued to eat her yogurt on the couch.

"Yeah, you're weird," Craig began but was cut off by Avalon clearing her throat.

"Him," she pointed at the Doctor without looking back, "He is weird."

Craig chuckled while the Doctor rolled his eyes, "And you can cook, it's good enough for me," Craig continued then held up each key and explained its function, "Right, outdoor, front door, your door."

"Ha-ha! Yes! Me with a key!" the Doctor exclaimed.

"Oh boy, that can't go right," Avalon mumbled to herself.

"And listen, Mark and I, we had an arrangement where if you ever need me out of your hair, just give me a shout, OK?" Craig said quieter to the Doctor, nodding over to Avalon and winking.

The Doctor, not understanding, winked back, "Why would I want that?"

"In case you and your girlfriend want some time alone, I don't know..."

And then they heard Avalon coughing loudly from the couch, "Sorry," she stood up and scarfed down the yogurt in her mouth, "Sorry, we're not…" but she continued to cough. Before she made a further fool of herself, she rose to her feet, "It's not like that," she pointed at Craig and went for the kitchen to throw away her yogurt.

"Is she okay?" Craig asked.

The Doctor, who was also in a fit of blushes, averted the human's eyes and instead focused on the stain on the ceiling, clearing his throat, "I've got the strangest feeling we shouldn't touch it."

"Wasn't planning on it..." Craig looked back at it for a minute, seeing no relevant point of the stain. And when he looked to the Doctor he saw the man was gone. That was odd, then again the Doctor was odd as a person.

~ 0 ~

Avalon was returning to Craig's flat holding her journal in her hands, her long purse hanging on her shoulder. She'd taken a day out with her journal, going through every last page she'd ever written on to see just how many blank spaces there were. It had taken her all day but she'd finally come to the conclusion that she had forgotten something entirely big, something that had messed with her head. She entered the flat and quietly walked to the room designated hers, stopping a moment as she heard Craig speaking to someone over the phone in his room, assuming it was that Sophie woman again. She shook her head and entered her room just as the Doctor was heading out.

"Where are you going?" she asked, confused.

"I've got to go gather things for a makeshift scanner!" he cheered.

"Right, okay," she ignored it and walked further into the room, "Have you talked to Amy yet?"

"She's um...doing alright," the Doctor winced, preferring not to tell her about the TARDIS jolting poor Amy around each time there was a 'time loop' which originated from their upstairs roommate.

"By the way, there was something odd I saw at the park," Avalon let her purse fall on the bed, "People kept repeating themselves, like, um..."

"A time loop," the Doctor sighed.

"Yeah, what...what's that exactly?"

The Doctor pointed up and made Avalon look up, "Lovely gift from our roomie," the Doctor said, "The earpiece protects you from it. Don't take it off."

"I won't," she assured and opened her journal, hearing the Doctor begin to head out again, "Fairy tale man, can we...can we talk for a moment?" she turned to him, her journal still in hands.

"Oh, this is serious," the Doctor noticed the ginger's face. She rolled her eyes but let him have this one.

"Look, I don't know...maybe it's just me...I don't..." she bit her lip, the words were beginning to get strained. She didn't like asking for help, she never asked for help. It was who she was; asking for help meant she couldn't take care of herself and her problems.

"Avalon," the Doctor noticed the severity of what ever was she was trying to say and so he closed the door and walked over to her, "It's okay," he cautiously put a hand on her back, "You can tell me."

But Avalon sighed and shook her head, dropping her journal on the bed, "No, I can't. Forget this, forget I ever mentioned, I just..." she closed her eyes and rubbed the side of her head, "I'm tired."

"You are," the Doctor agreed.

He had grown worried to full blown morbidly concerned with her lack of sleep. Insomnia was one thing for humans but Avalon seemed to never want to sleep. He'd was tempted to simply knock her out and force her to sleep but then he would think of the big temper she'd throw after waking up and realizing what he'd done. He was not prepared for that kind of anger.

"I'm just...confused," Avalon mumbled, "There's things that don't make sense and with the lack of sleep I'm probably just making a big deal out of nothing," she pushed her journal and purse to the side.

That was also another possibility, she thought. Amy had also pointed that out and it could very well be true. Avalon couldn't remember the last time she'd gotten decent sleep. The lack of sleep could be making her over think the blank spaces in her journal.

"Look, why don't you lie down for a minute and I don't know...sleep?" the Doctor suggested ever-so-casually.

"Yeah, that...that doesn't sound so bad," Avalon admitted, "But don't you need help gathering the, um...what was it that you were going to get?"

"You leave that to me," the Doctor said and walked her to a side of the bed, "You just sleep, please."

"Okay, I get the memo," Avalon sat down, "I'm slowly losing it. I'll try to sleep, but...please stay out of trouble."

"I will...genuinely, try my best."

Avalon smiled and shook her head, "Please do. I don't want to get a call from the local police station. Although, it would be different being on the receiving end of the call this time," she mused of how odd it would be to be the good person for once.

"Try to get sleep, alright?" the Doctor said as she laid down, "I'll be back..." he trailed off as the ginger had her eyes closed and practically on the verge of sleep.

He sighed and quietly walked to the door, making sure to close it as quietly as possible. He looked up at the door at the top of the staircase while he backed to the entrance door of the flat. He didn't feel very comfortable leaving Avalon on her own, asleep, with the an unknown evil entity. He'd rather she come with him but he would also prefer for her to actually get some sleep. The only thing he could do now was hurry up and get back as fast as possible.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor kept true to his word and returned a mere hour and a half later...with a trolley filled different objects he'd found from random trash bins in the streets. He was being extra careful not to make any noise for Avalon as he entered their room. He closed the door and looked over at Avalon, disappointed to find her fussing in her sleep. By the looks of it, she was having a dream. He left the trolley and started walking for her when he spotted her journal and purse on the floor, probably knocked off by her fuss. He bent down and picked up the opened journal, about to shut it when he noticed empty spaces in the middle of her writing. He made sure not to read any lines for her privacy. He too had books about himself that he never wanted anyone to see and so he followed the same expectations with Avalon's journal. He shut it and looked at the cover. It was a dark brown leather bound journal that looked old and tattered. It bore Avalon's initials on lower bottom 'A.H .R.' and was covered in stickers he assumed she'd posted as a child. He smiled only for a moment before Avalon screamed and sat right up, scaring him enough to drop the journal.

"No! No! No! No!" Avalon was in actual sobs as she repeatedly swatted invisible things on her neck, "Get off me!"

The Doctor hurriedly moved on the bed to calm her down, trying to catch her swatting hands as she continued to shout in terror, "Avalon! Avalon it's me!" he tried to say but she was too much in a frantic mode to listen.

"No! No! Get off me! Get off me!" she sobbed with her eyes shut, "Please!"

"AVA!" the Doctor finally shouted in a louder tone that overpowered Avalon's.

She stopped and opened her eyes, breathing rapidly and heavily, and finally took a look around to see where she was again. She was in the flat, yes, she remembered now. She tried to sleep again...and had another nightmare. Again.

"It's okay now," the Doctor whispered, watching her eyes flicker from one thing in the room to another in such fear it actually pained him. Was that...was that normal?

"I'm sorry," her breath hitched as she spoke, "I...I had a dream..."

"Nightmare," he corrected, "And I'm guessing that's the reason behind your sleepless nights," she nodded and he recalled the other nights she'd appeared in the kitchen with more or less of the same appearance she had now, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"N-no," she managed to say.

"I bet another reason you can't sleep is because you've been bottling this up to yourself," he sighed, "You can tell me, I've had plenty experience with nightmares."

"You have?" Avalon sniffled, hating how she must look to the Doctor at the moment. Her face was covered in tears and her hair was (and felt) like a mess. This was not how she ever wanted anyone to see her. She was Avalon, the girl who never cried. What was she doing?

"Yes, I have had terrible nightmares in my life," the Doctor sighed. He never told Avalon nor Amy what exactly happened with the rest of the Time Lords and Gallifrey, only that there'd been a war and they'd lost. He didn't want them to fear him nor look at him any different. He supposed that was probably selfish of him to let them believe he was a good man but...he just couldn't find it in him to actually sit down and tell the gingers what had happened.

"What about?" Avalon asked and wiped some tears off her face.

"Nothing you need to know about right now," the Doctor waved it off, "But you need sleep, Avalon. Now I would really like to know how to help you but I can't do anything unless I know what the problem is. Have some trust in me, Ava. I promise not a word about this will leave my mouth."

Avalon looked at him for a good minute as she pondered what he would think of her after she told him what kept her up every night.

"Trust in me, Ava," the Doctor insisted.

He knew that nickname was something she used with Rory but after visiting Mary Costa, the name had simply stuck as the name of Avalon's professional debut. He saw it as the moment their relationship had grown into actual friendship.

"It's about Venice..." Avalon suddenly said, her eyes looking down as if in shame.

"What about Venice?"

"It's, um..." she sniffled, "...I can't..." she quickly closed her eyes, "...it's hard to, um..."

"If it's too hard to say, you could just show me," the Doctor suggested as he saw the heavy struggle Avalon was in to utter a word about her nightmares.

"H-how?" Avalon looked up to see him holding his fingers to motion a telepathic exchange. With a sigh, Avalon she nodded and allowed him to place his fingers on her temples.

"I won't look at anything, just show me your dreams," the Doctor instructed.

"Okay," she swallowed hard and closed her eyes, doing just what he asked.

Immediately, the Doctor saw her nightmare...different moments in which she had been bitten and fed on by the Saturnynes. His hearts broke to see her so terrified and defenseless against them. He'd heard that Avalon never showed fear for the sake of Lena so she always kept it bottled in. He understood how difficult it must have been for Avalon to deal with what happened to her in Venice on her own. But because she never showed an ounce of fear to the others, the fear found another way to express itself: nightmares. And, because she kept the nightmares to herself and never asked for help, the nightmares increased in quantities and in strength.

"Avalon..." the Doctor took back his hands and looked at the ginger before him.

Avalon teared up and started sniffling louder and louder until she couldn't keep it in anymore and burst into sobs, "I was scared! I was really scared!" she clung onto him for a hug.

The Doctor, though startled by the outburst, hugged back. He felt this was probably something she used to do with Rory, and well...since he'd taken him away from her as well...she felt truly alone with no one to talk to. He hugged her back and let her cry all she needed to do in order to start overcoming those nightmares of hers and finally get some needed sleep.

"I'm sorry, Ava," he rubbed her back, "You should have told one of us. We would've helped."

"I didn't want to worry," Avalon tried to say through her sobs.

"Don't try to lie, I saw it, remember? You didn't want to talk about it because 'Avalon Reynolds does not get scared'," the Doctor sighed, "Everyone gets scared, Ava. It's natural, normal. But it stops being normal when you keep it bottled inside," he pulled away and made her look up at him, "Your fear found another way to express itself. Now it's harming you for real."

"Wh-What can I do? Please tell me, I can't take it anymore," she shook her head, "I'm tired. Every time I close my eyes I can feel them on my neck," she shivered and swatted her hands over her neck, "They're drinking and I scream over and over and-"

"Sh, sh, sh, it's okay," the Doctor said and pulled her hands from her neck, "It's very simple, actually."

"It is?"

"Yes," the Doctor nodded, "Just talk about it. Admit you were afraid. And I promise you, little by little, those pesky nightmares will fade away."

"I have to talk about it?" Avalon hesitated as she took her hands from his, "I...I can't. It's embarrassing," she mumbled.

The Doctor sighed, he should've guessed she'd feel like that, "Well, then...don't look at me," he offered, "I'll sit here," he moved to the other side of the bed, "And you lay down where you were," he admitted he was a bit surprise to actually see her obeying and taking her place back for sleep, "Okay, um, just...talk, tell me what happened. Tell me how you felt and I'll listen."

"Um..." she stared at the window across her spot, "...I was mad cos I was caught sneaking down to the chamber, the one where you'd be coming through. Then I saw Francesco, and I...I don't remember much," she paused as she thought, "...I slapped him. But I can't remember why I did it. I just know that I was really, really angry with him...cos he did something."

The Doctor knew that it had to be because of what Francesco had done to Lena. He could see Avalon angry as hell and slapping the man, triggering his instinct to fight back...and biting her.

"Then I was brought into another chamber and they...they strapped me down to this chair and...I met Rosanna, and we argued...and..." Avalon swallowed hard and shut her eyes.

The Doctor noticed her breathing picking up and gently put a hand on her arm, "It's okay," he whispered, "Deep breath," he instructed.

Avalon took a deep breath and waited a moment more before she felt enough to talk again, "They bit me...both of them, the Saturnynes, they...the fed on me like I was a dinner plate," she sniffled, "I can still feel their hands on my neck...pushing my hair away, and I just..." she quietly cried, her hands clutching the blanket underneath.

The Doctor didn't know how to help her at this point. Should he hug her? But it would be a bit awkward considering she was laying down. But he just didn't like hearing her cry and needed a way to stop her. He reached for a nearby blanket and draped it over Avalon, "I promise you nothing like that will ever happen to you again," he whispered, "And whenever you feel scared, please tell me, or even Amy. You don't have to pretend anymore."

Avalon looked back with red eyes and managed a small smile, "Thank you, Fairy Tale Man."

"I didn't really do much," the Doctor admitted, "Sort of acted like a psychologist."

"Well it's been long since I had a 'psychologist'," she chuckled lightly, "I don't...I don't really have anyone to talk to anymore..." she paused, the Doctor saw confusion spreading on her face the more silent she continued to be, "...I..I don't think I really had anyone to begin with," she mumbled, "My mum, Amy...Mels. But Mum died and then I...no one."

The Doctor found it difficult to look her in the eye and not feel guilty. On his watch he'd let Rory and Lena die, leaving Amy and Avalon alone.

"I was scared," Avalon took a breath and turned back to her side, "I admit it," she closed her eyes, "And it actually...feels better."

"Try getting some sleep," the Doctor offered, smiling when she pulled the blanket closer to her.

"God I really hope there's no more dreams tonight," she whispered as she closed her eyes.

"Dream yourself up a knight in shinning armor or something to keep the bad people away," the Doctor said and got a laugh from her, "Meanwhile, I'll be as quiet as possible for you."

Before he got up, Avalon reached back and took his hand, "Thank you," she whispered.

The Doctor smiled back, "You're welcome," he surprised her, and himself, by giving her a kiss on the cheek.

She blinked but nonetheless smiled, "Goodnight." She let his hand go and finally decided to try once more to sleep.

~ 0 ~

The next morning, Craig stood outside the bathroom where he'd been waiting a decent amount of time for the Doctor to come. The Doctor was singing at the top of his lungs, making it just a bit hard to hear Craig's calls from the other side of the door.

Craig gave one particularly loud bang against the door. "Doctor!"

The Doctor stopped his singing for a moment and heard Craig's next call. "Hello?!"

"How long are you going to be in there?" Craig called, sighing.

"Oh, sorry, I like a good soak!"

Craig was about to tell him to hurry up when he'd heard a loud banging above, "What the hell was that?"

~ 0 ~

Inside the bathroom, the Doctor poked his head out from the curtain, "What did you say?"

~ 0 ~

"I'm just going to go upstairs, see if he's OK," Craig headed for the stairs.

~ 0 ~

"Sorry?" the Doctor called but received no answer, "What did you say?"

~ 0 ~

Craig was finishing coming up the stairs and went right ahead to knock on the door of the upstairs room. An elderly man opened up the door by a creak, "Yes? Hello?" he asked.

~ 0 ~

"Craig?" the Doctor called one again and decided to go check what was happening. He grabbed a towel as he got out of the shower but ended up slipping on the floor with a loud thud.

~ 0 ~

"It's me from downstairs. I heard a big bang," Craig was saying to the elder man.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor sat up on the bathroom floor and with soap in his eyes, "No choice...it's sonicking time," he reached out to grab his screwdriver placed in a toothbrush holder but ended up grabbing a toothbrush due to the soap in the eyes.

~ 0 ~

"Thank you, Craig, but I don't need your help," the elderly man closed the door on Craig.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor ran out the bathroom only for the towel wrapped around his waist to slip to the floor, "Oops!" he quickly picked it up and tied around himself again. He needed to get out there because he was sure Craig said something about going upstairs. He reached the stairs and aimed his 'screwdriver' up the stairs, "What happened, what's going on?"

"Is that my toothbrush?" Craig raised an eyebrow as he came down the stairs.

"Correct. You spoke to the man upstairs?" the Doctor stared up at the shut door.

"Yeah."

"What did he look like?"

"More normal than you do at the moment, mate," Craig smiled in amusement, "What are you doing?"

"What is going on!?" they heard Avalon's call as she emerged from her bedroom. She came round the staircase, rubbing her eyes and with a big yawn. "Between shouts and..." she yawned again.

"I thought Craig was in trouble," the Doctor winced. He'd tried keeping his word of being as quiet as possible while she slept. Throughout the rest of the night she slept peacefully while he worked on the makeshift device that would help them with the upstairs flatmate. When morning came by, Avalon wasn't giving any indication that she'd be waking up soon so the Doctor got himself out of there before he did something to wake her up.

"And you couldn't have gotten dressed to go and save him?" Avalon tried not to laugh when she'd finally opened her eyes and saw him with the towel and his hair in the worse state ever. She reached over to flick some of his wet hair off his forehead. "Might wanna go easier on the shampoo next time."

The Doctor swatted her hand away from him, making her laugh again. At least she seemed chipper than usual.

"And with my toothbrush," Craig pointed and headed off to answer a ringing phone in the living room.

"What's going on?" Avalon looked up at the stairs, "Did I miss an attack or something?"

"No, no...suppose not..." the Doctor frowned, "...you should go back to sleep."

"It's past noon," she smiled, "Plus, I want breakfast," she shrugged and moved for the living room when she saw the front door opening.

It was Sophie, coming in with another key. She walked in and lightly gasped when she saw the two, a bit more startled by the Doctor due to his lack of clothing, "Oh...Hello?"

Avalon sighed, "Avalon Reynolds," she waved and entered the living room, "I want breakfast."

She went straight into the kitchen and started raiding the fridge. Knowing men when they said they had nothing it really meant they only had healthy food and didn't actually eat it. She went through that with her father and brother. If there were things like apples and oranges for them there was 'nothing to eat'. She took out a plate and took out a celery stick with a bottle of ranch. Just like she'd guessed, there were things to eat.

"What are you doing?" she sighed when the Doctor came over to the fridge and took out a milk carton...to drink from it.

"The better question is what are you doing?" the Doctor moved to her side and grimaced at the celery.

"Breakfast," she snatched the carton from him and placed a glass in front of him.

"Past noon?"

"Shut up," she muttered, "I never sleep past noon. Barely sleep past six in the morning."

"Well I wasn't going to wake you. It looked like you were finally getting well-deserved sleep."

"I did, actually," she smiled as she took a piece of celery and bit into it, "For the first time..."

"Followed my advice, then," he nudged her, turning her smile into confusion.

"What do you mean?"

"Dreamed up some sort of savior," he reached for one of her celery sticks.

Avalon started coughed unexpectedly for a second as she gave a small smile, "Yeah, actually...I did," she quickly turned away, "...and it helped."

"Let me guess, Prince Charming?" the Doctor smirked as he bit into the celery, quickly spitting it back out into the sink, "Bad, very bad," he mumbled.

"Um, yeah, yeah...Prince Charming," Avalon rubbed the side of her neck, "Knight in Shining Armor," she cleared her throat and looked at him with a smile, "Thanks. For real. I'm not used to this kind of treatment."

"Kind of treatment?" the Doctor raised an eyebrow, "Do you mean you're not used to people treating you kindly? ...cos you're not a 'nice person'?"

Avalon looked at him, "Where did you hear that?"

"Look, I'm going to be honest here..." he looked back at Craig and Sophie, making sure they weren't listening. They seemed to be having a conversation while Craig held the phone, "...I heard what you said to Vincent," he spoke quietly to Avalon.

"You eavesdropped?" Avalon blinked.

"I didn't mean to, but...the voices sort of carried out and I...I heard," the Doctor winced as if he could already feel one of her slaps that were sure to come his way. But instead, Avalon stepped back her head turning to the side as if she were avoiding his look, "Ava, I'm sorry, I...I know how reserved you are with your things," the Doctor sighed, "I promise I won't say anything."

Avalon scoffed quietly, "Oh please, it's nothing no one's new to. At least now you know who you brought into your home," he opened his mouth to remark on his confusion but she continued without noticing, "I don't need the pity, I get that from Amy at times. Mels is...well...she's the only one that doesn't really care, actually."

"Hold on, I'm not telling you this because I pity you," the Doctor frowned, "I'm telling you this because I'm sorry for what you've been through."

"Isn't that the same?"

"No, it's not. I'm, frankly irritated and upset you've been treated like that for so long," he stepped up to her, "And, I share some of those feelings."

"What? They did that to you too?" she raised an eyebrow.

"Have you met me?" he challenged and she chuckled, "On my home planet, Gallifrey, things were strict. There were rules and laws and I...sort of didn't follow them. Everyone knew who I was, I had an infamous legacy..." he laughed bitterly, "...the infamous child, actually."

"You understand," Avalon realized.

"Of course I do," he nodded.

"But you weren't a criminal like me..."

"Actually," he didn't want to bring up the manner in which he'd ended a war she didn't even know about yet. but perhaps he could mention briefly the object that he used, "...I stole something from my people, and I used it for something bad."

"You don't look like a criminal," she remarked, making him smile.

"I could say the same to you," he shrugged, "But the thing is Avalon, the thing I want you to get from all this is that I try to have my hope, to be happy and to have some friends. I'd like for you to try that too."

"I do have friends," she said quietly, "And I am happy..."

"You've known Amy all your life and yet she doesn't even know what your favorite color is, what you want to be in life...you never talk about yourself," he sighed, "I don't even know you that well. And I'm not that big of an idiot to miss the fact that you're not truly happy."

"Why do you insist so much on this?" Avalon had to ask as she thought of the many times he'd talk to her like this, about things that she didn't even talk to Amy about, "We have a pending alien flatmate to deal with and your wasting your time with a hopeless case?"

"Because it's not hopeless and I clearly care for you," the Doctor casually shrugged.

"You care for me this much?" Avalon whispered.

"Yes," he answered slowly so she would get it through her head, "With your violent ways, your sarcasm, preppiness-"

"I'm not preppy," she crossed her arms.

"Have you seen what you're wearing?"

Avalon opened her mouth but then looked down at her clothes. She wore a buttoned up, pink and white vertically-striped blouse with a high-collared, yoke-styled neckline. It had ruffles around the sleeveless hemlines on each arm. She wore dark blue jeans and brown leather boots with small heels. "Okay so maybe I'm a little preppy..." Avalon reconsidered with a sigh.

The Doctor laughed, "And that's just fine."

"You are one weird alien," she whispered, "But a very helpful one."

"Oh, I've moved up ranks," the Doctor joked and got a laugh from her.

"Don't get too cocky on that, just because you helped one insomniac sleep for the first time doesn't mean anything...ish,"

"Oi?" they heard Craig call, "The game is in an hour, remember Doctor?"

Avalon sent an odd look at the Doctor. "What game is he talking about?"

"Did I forget to mention?" he beamed, "I'm playing football!"

"Oh no..." she whispered and stepped back.

"I'm gonna hit the shower," Craig said and looked over at the pair again, "Doctor, like I said, the spare kit's in the bottom drawer."

"Right," the Doctor nodded, "Best get dressed now."

"Yeah, I'll see you in a bit too," Craig said goodbye to Sophie and hurriedly went for a shower.

Sophie looked around a bit awkwardly as she noticed Avalon silently eating in the kitchen. Avalon then turned to her holding the plate she was eating from, "Celery, Sophie?"

"Um, no thanks," Sophie shook her head.

"So, you don't play or anything?" Avalon walked into the living room and sat down on the couch chair.

"Nah, I just watch," Sophie sat down on the large couch.

"Well, it's not half bad of a date," Avalon smirked as Sophie gasped with a flushed face.

"It's...it's not a date," she quickly shook her head, "Craig and I, we're not..."

"I never said you and Craig," Avalon's smirk widened as Sophie blushed even deeper.

"Oh! U-um, well...um...I, uh..." Sophie looked around in plain embarrassment as she tried figuring out what to say.

"You know," Avalon went on like nothing happened, "People who aren't dating don't usually have two sets of keys to a 'friend's house but yet yours are in your purse," she pointed to Sophie's purse on her lap, "And then Craig had those over there," she then pointed to the table near the threshold, "It's also yours, which he's been holding by the way."

"What's the point of this?" Sophie asked, confused.

Avalon shrugged with a smile, "Nothing, I just guess you must really like it here."

"Um, yeah..."

"It's not bad," Avalon said, "I gotta say back in my house with my dad and brother, they're total slobs at time. If I don't do a regular clean up," she did a whistle, "They are lucky to have me."

"You still go back and clean for them?" Sophie wondered.

"Oh no, they don't even know I'm gone," Avalon shrugged, forgetting for the moment that while for her it was still the night she'd gone off with the Doctor and Amy, for Sophie it looked more like a runaway.

"Don't you think you should've mentioned to your father you decided to go and live with your boyfriend?"

Avalon nearly choked on her celery stick, "Seriously, we're not," she looked at Sophie, "Just friends."

"So you ran away with your 'friend'?" Sophie raised an eyebrow.

"We didn't run away!" Avalon exclaimed and finally scarfed down the rest of her celery stick, "I didn't run away!"

"Then why are you here...?" Sophie asked. She wasn't trying to be rude but it was confusing and a bit odd for two friends to go and rent a room when the logical thing would've been to rent out an entire flat and simply be flatmates like Craig had done with Mark, the anterior flatmate.

"Because we're..." Avalon looked at the ceiling with the spreading stain, "...we're um...you know what, conversation over," she sweetly smiled and stood up, placing the finished plate of celery on the table, "I'm gonna go help my...friend, out," she hurried out of the room.

That conversation probably could've gone better.

~ 0 ~

"No it's not the one with the sticks," Avalon muttered to the Doctor as they followed Craig and Sophie through the park towards the field.

All the way there the Doctor had tried narrowing down what kind of game football was and so he had burdened Avalon with all the questions he could think of. While it had been amusing in the beginning for Avalon, she was beginning to grow tired of answering questions that were clearly not relevant to the sport...especially when the Doctor held the football in his hands.

One of Craig's teammates, Sean, came over to greet them as soon the group had arrived, "All right, Craig. Soph. All right, mate."

"Hello, I'm Craig's new flatmate," the Doctor shook his hand and gave another Gallic kiss, making Avalon sigh as she'd spoken to him about that habit, "I'm called the Doctor. Oh, and that's Avalon," Avalon gave a nod for a greeting.

"All right, I'm Sean," he smiled, "Where are you strongest?"

"Arms," the Doctor said.

Avalon shook her head, "He meant what position, genius," she mumbled to him.

"Oh, not sure," he shrugged, "The front? The side? Below?"

"Are you any good though?" Sean raised an eyebrow.

The Doctor spun the ball on his fingers and grinned, "Let's find out," he kicked the ball into the field and ran to catch it.

"It'll be a real lottery," Avalon warned and moved to go sit on a nearby bench.

"You don't play either?" Sophie came to sit beside her.

"Um, no...not really," Avalon shook her head and sighed, "As a kid I, um, I actually liked sports but you know how it is. 'Girls don't play sports' and all, never really got to do it."

"I like watching," Sophie admitted and looked out to the field.

"Could only guess why," Avalon mumbled and caught the woman blushing again.

"Has anyone told you you're a bit bold?"

"The cops," Avalon shrugged, "My dad...lots of people," she concluded and got a laugh, "Makes it a bit harder to make some friends, though."

"Ava!" she heard the Doctor calling as he ran towards her, "Apparently, you don't play with this." He held out his tweed jacket to her.

"You don't say," Avalon sarcastically gasped and took the jacket from him.

"You could've said something," the Doctor huffed at her sarcasm.

"I did," she reminded, growing serious, "But I do recall you saying 'it's cool'."

"It is!"

Avalon rolled her eyes, "Oh go out and play. And please try not to hurt yourself or the other players." The Doctor beamed and ran off.

"Why did you tell him that?" Sophie wondered, "Isn't he good?"

Avalon opened her mouth but let out a nervous laugh and looked at the field, "Oh look, the game's starting," she pointed, "Let's watch."

Sophie thought the ginger was acting weirder than was the normal but agreed and turned to watch the game begin. As the game progressed the Doctor began to show some genuine skills that helped score some goals for Craig's team. As little as she knew about the sport, Avalon found herself actually getting more into the game along with the onlookers. Together, they cheered for the Craig's team, but more specifically the Doctor who scored the winning goal, and most of the others goals. At the end of the game, Sophie went to congratulate Craig on the team;s win, though the more Avalon looked at the man the more she thought Craig looked upset for some reason.

"Ava!" Avalon heard the Doctor call to her. She barely had time to react when she was taken into a great, big hug. "We won! I won! Did you see that!?" the Doctor spun her around like crazy.

"Wow! Yes, I did! Gotta say, I'm surprised." Avalon laughed as she was set down, actually feeling a blush for his surprise hug, unbeknownst to her the Doctor was also in the same predicament. He'd just been so happy that he'd won and since all the other team members went to hug their friends, he thought he should do the same.

"Ha! Another win! Impressed yet?" he flashed her a smirk that made her roll her eyes.

"You wish! You just had a lucky streak, that's all," she chuckled when his face went flat. "Oh c'mon, just kidding. Congrats! You did win!" She gave him another hug, completely ignoring his sweaty state - she'd let it slide this time. She actually thought he played a good game for somebody who had no idea how to play the game.

The Doctor was always happy to get a hug from Avalon. She always smelled so nice, so floral and...nice.

"Hey!" Sean called to the pair, breaking them apart. "You two just gonna stay there or come join us?"

Avalon quickly untangled herself from the Doctor's arms and pulled them towards the rest of the team. Since neither of them looked at each other, they didn't notice the same blushes they sported on their faces.

"You are so on the team!" Sean immediately said to the Doctor after giving them their drinks. "Next week we've got the Crown and Anchor, we'll annihilate them!"

The Doctor took the words quite literally and moved up to Sean, "No violence, not while I'm around, not today, not ever. I'm the Doctor, the oncoming storm-"

Avalon yanked him back and laughed nervously, urgently motioning him to shut up. "He's just joking," she said to the group and shot a look at the Doctor, "He meant you were totally going to win the next game."

"Oh..." the Doctor blinked and looked back to Sean, the man was overly puzzled with his reaction. "Lovely, what sort of time?"

At that moment, Craig had opened up a can that spilled over, making everyone laugh. However, the action started to repeat itself over and over as a time loop.

Quickly, the Doctor took Avalon away from them and activated the earpieces, "Amy?" he called.

Avalon activated her earpiece in time to hear Amy's scream, 'It's happening again! Worse!'

"What does the scanner say?" the Doctor urgently asked.

"A lot of nines. Is it good that they're nines? Tell me it's good that they're all nines!"

Avalon studied the face the Doctor had and sighed, "Not good, is it?" she asked him.

"No, no, it's...it's good," he tried to say to her and Amy, "Just um, the zigzag plotter, zigzag plotter, Amy," they heard another scream, "Amy? Are you there?"

"Yes, hello," she finally called, the TARDIS seeming a bit better now.

"Ah, thank heavens. I thought the TARDIS had been flung off into the vortex with you inside it, lost forever."

"You mean that could actually happen!?" Avalon blinked with wide eyes, "That's the sort of things you need to mention!" she whacked his arm.

"You have got to get me out of here!" Amy exclaimed.

"How are the numbers?" the Doctor made her focus on that again, not able to handle two alarmed gingers.

"All fives."

"Fives?" the Doctor looked back at the human group to see them acting normally, "Even better. Still, it means the effect's almost unbelievably powerful and dangerous, but don't worry. Hang on, OK? I've got some rewiring to do."

"Hey! You...'hang on'!"

Avalon scoffed, "Great comeback, Amy."

"Oh...shut up!"

Avalon shook her head and followed the Doctor back to Craig's flat.

~ 0 ~

The travelers were lucky that no more time loops happened for the rest of the day. The Doctor set back to work on whatever he was building and since Avalon had zero clue what he was doing, she decided that the best thing she could do for him was to stay out of his way. Today was the first day in a very long time that she was wide awake and she wanted to take advantage of it.

She went out and did a bit of exploring without making herself known. She visited a few shops, bought nothing though since the TARDIS' wardrobe pretty much beat everything they had, and then headed for the local food shops. Since the flat basically had no food, and she couldn't eat healthy forever, she went in for some groceries.

She returned to the flat by evening and had found Craig and the Doctor conversing something in the foyer. The first thing she noticed - because how could she not notice - the great big orange cone the Doctor was holding. A street cone. He literally went out and got a street cone.

"Oh dear Lord," she muttered as she wobbled her way towards them with the grocery bags in her hands.

"Need some help?" Craig offered his hands to which Avalon was very grateful. He definitely seemed in a better mood than he was earlier at the game.

"Thanks," Avalon pushed her purse's strap back over her shoulder and gave the Doctor a look for his chosen cone. "What were you talking about? Didn't get into trouble did you?"

"Oh nothing, I was just telling Craig he shouldn't mind us. Won't even know we're here."

"Right," Avalon nodded then let her eyes linger over the cone. "Doctor, why the hell do you have a street cone? Most guys bring beer or, I don't know, something that's not street cones!"

"Why would I want beer of all things? That smells disgusting," the Doctor scrunched his face, even shuddering as if he was smelling it right now.

"It's actually pretty good. Craig, I'll put the stuff away!" Avalon turned for the living room but before she could even step inside, Craig hollered that he got it and that she and the Doctor could go off.

"Go off where?" Avalon barely asked when the Doctor yanked her for their room.

The Doctor quickly opened the door for Avalon and pulled her inside before Craig could see what laid inside. Avalon was stunned to see the bed covered with a spinning machine-type-wheel.

"Isn't it a beauty!?" the Doctor gestured quite proudly to his creation.

"It's a machine," Avalon said and hushed him, "You may want to speak quieter before Craig or the flatmate upstairs hears you."

The Doctor merely shrugged and returned to work. Apparently, he wasn't done yet. "So, where did you go? Besides the grocery store apparently."

"Places," Avalon moved towards the couch chair, genuinely smiling as she let herself fall onto it. "Today's the first day that I'm actually awake so I celebrated by going to the shops and the park again. I busied myself with more writing." She pulled her journal out of her bag and gave it a sigh that distinctly sounded sad.

The Doctor stopped working to shoot her a suspicious look. "You don't seem too happy about it. And I do believe we talked about that."

"It's not that I'm unhappy, it's just..." she shook her head, "...it's nothing."

"No, c'mon, tell me," he glanced at her with an encouraging nod.

Avalon closed her journal and stared at the cover, "My mum gave me this journal for my fifteenth birthday," she swallowed hard, "Also known as the year she died. So...this is kinda the last thing I have from her," the Doctor stopped working and turned to her as he sensed the importance of her words, "I've been writing in thing for six years and...I've used up all the pages now," she looked up with a sad smile, "I've got no where else to write anymore."

"Um...it's called buying another journal," the Doctor said, feeling like now she was missing the obvious and she rarely did that.

"Doctor, were you not listening? My mother gave me this journal," Avalon clutched the journal to her chest, "I wanted to be a writer, still do, actually," she whispered, "She gave me the journal so that I could start practicing."

"But after her death it turned more into sentimental value for you," the Doctor started to understand.

"It's silly, I know, but...to buy another journal is like replacing my mother and I don't want to do that," she smiled sadly, "I don't want to start a new journal anymore because then I'd have to stop carrying this one," she waved her journal, "And that would be like that forgetting about my mum."

"So you're just going to stop the writing?" the Doctor raised an eyebrow.

She shrugged, "I guess...I just can't let go of these pages...pictures..." she opened up the front cover and turned it around fo him to see, "See? My mum wrote me a letter and put a picture of us together, I can't buy a new one."

The Doctor smiled as he saw the teenage version of Avalon with her mother, "I understand," he nodded, "But hey," he beamed, confusing Avalon for a second.

"What?"

"I just learned something about you," he gestured, "And I mean something that not even Amy knows about."

"What?"

He laughed at her genuine confusion, "You want to be a writer!"

"Oh," she looked to the side, "What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing!" the Doctor exclaimed, "I'm just happy to know something about you that you've told no one else."

She playfully rolled her eyes, "Oh don't make such a big deal about it. And get back to work," she pointed back to the device he'd left alone.

"Yes, ma'am," he pretended to salute. She laughed and leaned back on the chair, opening her journal to reread some of the pages. The Doctor looked at her for a minute and softly smiled, she actually looked genuinely happy. That was a version of her he hadn't seen just yet so it was more than special for him.

~ 0 ~

"Hello," the Doctor poked his head up from behind the couch where Craig and Sophie sat on.

"What?" Craig blinked at the sight of the man.

"Whoops, sorry, don't worry, I wasn't listening, in a world of my own down there," the Doctor quickly said and winced when he heard Avalon shout his name.

"I thought we were over this," she entered the living room, noticing Sophie and Craig, "Sorry, sorry, he's a bit of an idiot when it comes to tools and he thinks I was lying," she looked at the Doctor, "Which I am not!"

"I thought you were going out!" Craig said to both of them, Avalon sensing an irritation in his tone.

"Why would we go out?" she crossed her arms.

"Because I told him we needed...space," Craig answered quietly.

"This is the first time I hear any such statements," Avalon shrugged and walked up to pull the Doctor up to his feet, snatching the screwdriver from his hand, "This-" she held it up to him, "-is a regular screwdriver. No buttons, no nothing. Have you finally gotten it?"

"What's going on?" Sophie looked between the two, finding a bit irrelevant to be talking over a screwdriver.

"They're really on their way out," Craig tried to say.

"No, I don't mind, if you don't mind," Sophie cut in, smiling at the pair unlike Craig.

"I don't mind, why would I mind?"

"Then stay, have a drink with us," Sophie gestured for the pair to move over and take a seat.

"What, do I have to stay now?" the Doctor looked at Avalon who just sighed.

"Do you want to stay?" she countered.

"I don't mind," he shrugged, completely oblivious to the fact he'd ruined a moment between Sophie and Craig.

"Okay then," Sophie once again gestured for them to move over.

"Great," Craig muttered.

Later on would find the Doctor sitting in the couch chair, still with the wires wrapped around his neck. Avalon had brought a chair from the kitchen and placed it across the couch as she didn't want to intrude even more on poor Craig's night. They'd started to talk and while the Doctor continued working on the wires, Sophie had taken to talking about them of the routine of life and slowly getting more and more upset about it.

"Cos life can seem pointless," she went on, "Work, weekend, work, weekend. And there's six billion people on the planet doing pretty much the same."

"Six billion people? Watching you two at work," the Doctor gave them a small look, "I'm starting to wonder where they all come from."

"What? What do you mean by that?" Sophie became alarmed.

"So that call center," Avalon cut in before the Doctor said something else he shouldn't, "You don't think that's good enough?" Sophie gave a small shrug, "What do you really want to do?"

"Don't laugh. I only ever told Craig about it. I want to work looking after animals. Maybe abroad? I saw this orangutan sanctuary on telly."

"And what's stopping you?"

"She can't, you need loads of qualifications," Craig finally looked down from the ceiling he'd been staring at ever since Avalon and the Doctor had stayed.

"Yeah, true. Plus it's scary, everyone I know lives round here," Sophie gave another shrug, "Craig got offered a job in London, better money, didn't take it."

"What's wrong with staying here? I can't see the point of London," Craig shook his head.

"Well, perhaps that's you, then. Perhaps you'll just have to stay here, secure and a little bit miserable until the day you drop," the Doctor suddenly said, getting the eyes of everyone of horror, "Better than trying and failing, eh?"

"You think I'd fail?" Sophie softly asked, sounding so disappointed it almost made Avalon smack the Doctor for it.

"Everybody's got dreams, Sophie, very few are going to achieve them, so why pretend?" the Doctor grabbed a wine glass he'd been given and took a sip. Although once he tasted it he spat it out quickly into the glass and set it back down, "Perhaps, in the whole universe, a call center is where you should be?"

"Why are you saying that? That's horrible!" Sophie gasped.

"Is it true?"

"Of course it's not true. I'm not staying in a call center all my life, I can do anything I want!" the Doctor stayed silent and only smiled, making Sophie realize she'd been tricked, "Oh! Yeah! Right!" Sophie fist-bumped the Doctor and chuckled, "Oh my God," she glanced at Craig, "Did you see what he just did?"

"No, what's happening?" Craig, heavily alarmed, looked between her and the Doctor, "Are you going to live with monkeys now?"

"You're good," Avalon complemented the Doctor, feeling a bit guilty she'd actually thought he meant every word he said to Sophie.

"It's a big old world, Sophie," the Doctor said to her after giving a wink to Avalon, "Work out what's really keeping you here, eh?"

"I don't know. Dunno..." Sophie mumbled and discreetly glanced at Craig.

~ 0 ~

"And you're sure this is going to work?" Avalon stared at the finished device on the bed, now spinning endlessly.

The Doctor stood beside her with overbearing excitement, "Shield's up! Let's scan!" he announced.

"What are you getting?" Amy asked both of them through the earpieces.

"Upstairs," the Doctor looked at a converted digital clock, "No traces of high technology. Totally normal. No no, no, no, it can't be! It's too normal."

"Only for you could too normal be a problem," Avalon scoffed.

"You said I could be lost forever. Just go upstairs," Amy ordered him.

"Without knowing, get myself killed, then you really are lost," the Doctor informed, "If I could just get a look in there... Hold on," he stopped the device from spinning, "Use the data bank, get me the plans of this building - its history, the layout, everything. Meanwhile, I shall recruit a spy," he de-activated the earpieces.

"And when you say 'spy', what exactly do you mean...?" Avalon crossed her arms.

"How do you feel about animals?" he turned to her with a grin.

"Oh no," Avalon dreaded it as she was pulled out of the room towards God knew where.

~ 0 ~

Avalon was pouring more ranch onto her plate when the Doctor suddenly ran into the kitchen holding the tea pot she'd given him for the breakfast they'd prepared for Craig.

"What are you doing?" she grimaced as he stuffed more tea bags into the pot.

"Craig was oh-so-smart to touch the stain!" the Doctor exclaimed as he ran around the kitchen, even taking her celery stick to drop it into the pot.

"Oi! That was mine!" she frowned.

"Going to reverse the poison, bye!" he dashed out.

"Poison?" Avalon ran after him and came into Craig's room where the man laid on his bed, barely conscious and with an odd streak running on his arm, "What happened to him?"

"He touched the stain," the Doctor sighed.

"What, so he's been poisoned?'

"Yes, hence the tea pot," the Doctor gestured to the pot he held.

"I can heal him," Avalon moved up to the bed.

"What? What are you talking about?" the Doctor frowned.

She rolled her eyes, "I'm from New Earth, remember? My family line descends from the livestock you saved, the same one that carries antibodies in their immune system," she smiled and held her hand to her mouth, gently blowing on her palm. The Doctor watched in awe as small little particles emerged from her mouth. Avalon gave him one more smile before pressing her hand on Craig's arm.

"Is that how that works?" the Doctor mused as he watched the glowing particles take over the streak of the human's arm, "Never seen it in action."

Avalon looked up, "It's through contact of the skin. It can be hands, feet, lips, etc. Though most people prefer the hands," she waved her free hand, "Unless your married."

"That's amazing," the Doctor remarked as he set down the no longer needed pot on the bed stand.

"I've got to go to work," Craig hoarsely tried to say.

"On no account. You need rest," the Doctor pointed.

"It's the planning meeting, it's important."

"You're important. You're going to be fine, Craig," Avalon hushed, "I'm bit rusty on this so it'll take some hours before he'll actually feel better. But the antigens should start taking over again."

The Doctor nodded and led her out of the room.

"Poor Craig, we haven't been making his life easier," Avalon crossed her arms, "Don't you think we should call in to his work so they'll excuse him?"

"Nah, I'll just fill in for him!"

Avalon's eyes widened, "Um...let's not...do that...no..."

"Why not?" he frowned, "I'll be great!" and headed for the doors.

"No! Stop!" she ran after him.

"It'll be fine," he assured.

"It really won't!"

"It will!"

Avalon sighed, "I guess I'll have to go with you or you might get Craig fired," so she followed the Doctor out to the call center where Craig worked.

~ 0 ~

And just as Avalon suspected, things had taken a rather bad turn...for Craig. She was actually surprised to see the Doctor doing well at a human job. He'd managed to do the planning meeting for Craig and get his ideas approved. Even the boss seemed to like the Doctor as he was placed in Craig's seat to manage some customers who were quite rude. Despite barely knowing anything of the job, the Doctor managed to get even more customers for the company which only made the boss like him even more. It was going fine until Craig had come in thinking he'd missed the meeting. Avalon felt guilty the way the poor man was sent back home to 'rest' and especially after he'd blatantly ignored Sophie's request of advice. She'd spoken to Avalon earlier in the day when they first arrived at the center, telling Avalon about a wildlife charity she'd applied for. Though Sophie felt nervous about leaving and so Avalon had advised her to talk to Craig about it, hoping she could give them back the moment she and the Doctor had taken from them last night. But Craig was too upset to notice what Sophie was saying and had accidentally told her to go ahead and do it.

Avalon had never found herself in such chaos.

She'd talked to the Doctor about it on the way back to Craig's flat, trying to make him see that they were actually ruining Craig's life in literal terms. But the Doctor, being himself, didn't catch it.

They returned back to the flat where the cat they'd brought in last night was just coming down the stairs.

"Have you been upstairs?" the Doctor immediately questioned it.

"You speak 'cat'?" Avalon crossed her arms and laughed when he mimicked a meow as a response to the cat.

"You can do it. Show me what's up there? What's behind that door?" he ignored her and continued talking to the cat, "Try to show me. Ohh, that doesn't make sense! Ever see anyone go up there? Lots of people? Good good. What kind of people? People who never come back down. That's very bad."

Craig opened the door for the living room and stalked towards the Doctor, "I can't take this any more. I want you to go!" he returned into the living room and gave back the bag of money Avalon had given him as rent, "You can have this back an' all."

"What have I done?" the Doctor frowned.

"I told you," Avalon mumbled.

"For a start, talking to a cat," Craig pointed.

"Lots of people talk to cats," the Doctor shrugged and handed the money back to Avalon.

"Everybody loves you, you're better at football than me, and my job, and now Sophie's all "Oh, monkeys, monkeys-"

"Woah, hey, that one was all your fault!" Avalon cut in, "You ignored Sophie when she tried talking to you about it," she crossed her arms, "That one's not the Doctor's fault."

Craig frowned and moved to their bedroom, "Yeah, well, this is his fault!" he opened the door and pointed to the device on the bed, "What the hell is that!?"

The Doctor ran over to the device while Avalon quickly shut the door behind them, "It's art! A statement on modern society," the Doctor exclaimed, ""Ooh, ain't modern society awful?" he stopped the device from spinning.

"Me and you two, it's not gonna work out," Craig declared, "You've been here three days, the three weirdest days of my life."

"Your days will get a lot weirder if we go!"

"I thought it was good weird, but it's not, it's bad weird! I can't do this any more!"

"I can't leave this place," the Doctor stalked up to him, "I'm like you, I can't see the point of anywhere else. Madrid, hah, what a dump! I have to stay."

"No, you don't, you have to leave!"

"I can't go!"

"Arguing isn't going to help," Avalon could not believe she just said that. She, the one with the biggest, baddest temper had just said that! What was going on!?

"Right," the Doctor agreed with Avalon and looked at Craig, grimacing as he thought of the oncoming pain, "I'm going to show you something, but ssh, really, ssh! Oh, I am going to regret this. OK, right... First, general background!"

Avalon jumped when the Doctor head-butted Craig, actually hearing the big smacks. However, Craig immediately saw the Doctor's set of past incarnations and his actual identity.

"You're a..." Craig pointed at him.

"Yes," the Doctor groaned as he rubbed his forehead.

"From..." Craig pointed up.

"Sh!"

"You've got a TARDIS!"

"Yes. Ssh!" the Doctor pointed at his face, "Eleventh! Right... OK, specific detail!" he head-butted once more and showed Craig the reasons why he and Avalon were in the flat.

"You saw my ad in the paper shop window," Craig gasped.

"Yes, with this right above it," the Doctor pulled out a note signed by Amy they'd found in the shop of the advert, "Which is odd, because Amy hasn't written it yet. Time travel, it can happen."

"That's a scanner! You used non-technological technology of Lammasteen," Craig moved up to the spinning device.

"You're both so mad," Avalon concluded after the spectacle she just saw.

"Shush," the Doctor pointed at her, making her roll her eyes.

"How's the forehead?" she smirked.

"Never doing that again!" he declared and turned on the earpiece, "Amy!"

"That's Amy Pond!" Craig turned to them.

"Oh, someone's happy they caught up," Avalon smiled.

"Got those plans yet?" the Doctor was asking Amy.

"Still searching for them!"

"I've worked it out with psychic help from a cat."

"Cat?"

"Yes, Amy, he talks to cats now," Avalon shook her head.

"I know he's got a time engine in the flat upstairs," the Doctor cut in before they mocked as was expected, "He's using innocent people to try and launch it. Whenever he does, they get burnt up, hence the stain..."

"From the ceiling?" Craig grimaced.

"Well done, Craig," the Doctor glanced back, "And you, Miss Pond, nearly get thrown off into the Vortex."

"Lovely!" Amy sighed.

They heard a loud crash from above and they could only guess what was going on.

"People are dying up there?" Craig said...only to keep repeating it, "People are dying. People are dying."

"Amy!" the Doctor called as the ginger screamed over the communicator.

"They're being killed!" Craig came out of the time loop.

"Someone's up there so we need to go!" Avalon rushed out of the room with the two following behind.

As they headed up the stairs, Craig stopped and looked at the opened front door to see Sophie's keys in the lock. Avalon and the Doctor noticed them too and ran faster up the stairs.

"It's Sophie. It's Sophie that's dying up there, it's Sophie!" Craig cried and followed them up.

"Doctor! Avalon! Stop!" Amy shouted to them as they arrived at the door of the upstairs flat.

"What is it, Amy?" Avalon asked.

"Are you upstairs?"

"Just going in," the Doctor said.

"But you can't be upstairs!"

"Amy, what the hell are you talking about?" Avalon frowned.

"I've got the plans, you cannot be upstairs, it's a one-storey building. There is no upstairs!"

"Oh..." Avalon and the two men looked down the stairs with nervousness.

Quickly, the Doctor used the screwdriver to entered the 'flat' and came face to face with spaceship room instead, a control panel in the center.

"What?" Craig looked around, dumbfounded.

"What is this?" Avalon stepped further inside.

"The time engine isn't IN the flat, the time engine IS the flat!" the Doctor blinked with surprise, "Someone's attempt to build a TARDIS."

"No, there's always been an upstairs," Craig looked at them surely.

"Has there?" the Doctor challenged, "Think about it!"

"Yes. No. I don't..."

"A perception filter, right?" Avalon turned to the Doctor, "I learned about those, very tricky to spot...cos they can't be spotted. It tricks your memory, like the Angels did."

"Sophie emerged from the other side of the room, screaming as she was forced to walk towards the control panel by energy tendrils.

"Sophie!" Craig shouted and ran towards the woman, the Doctor and Avalon rushing to help.

"Sophie! Oh, my God, Sophie!" Craig grabbed Sophie's hand to keep it from touching a glowing large button on the panel.

"Craig! It's controlling her. It's willing her to touch the activator," the Doctor concluded as he checked the panel with the screwdriver.

"Solutions would be really helpful, then!" Avalon exclaimed.

"Ah! Deadlock seal!" the Doctor stopped with the sonic, meanwhile Sophie's hand had now reached the large button.

"You've got to do something!" Craig said just as Sophie was set free from the panel.

"Wait, why's it let her go?" Avalon blinked, confused, "All that trouble to set her free?"

The Doctor agreed with her and started to look around, grimacing at a dried up skeleton in a corner of the room. He walked to the other side of the panel when suddenly a hologram of a man appeared behind him.

"You will help me," it announced.

The Doctor turned to face the hologram, "Right! Stop! Crashed ship, let's see. Hello, I'm Captain Troy Handsome of International Rescue. Please state the nature of your emergency."

"Really?" Avalon crossed her arms, rolling her eyes at the fake title he'd given himself.

"Sh!" he waved her off as the hologram responded his request.

"The ship has crashed. The crew are dead. A pilot is required."

"You're the emergency crash program. A hologram. You've been luring people up here so you can try them out," the Doctor used the sscrewdriver on the hologram and watched it go through a series of appearance changes.

"You will help me, you will help me, you will help me."

"Craig!" Sophie exclaimed weakly, "Where am I?"

"Hush! Human brains aren't strong enough, they just burn," the Doctor said to the hologram, "You're stupid, aren't you? You just keep trying."

"17 people have been tried. 6,000,400,026 remain."

Sophie stood up now with a bit of irritation, "Seriously, what is going on?"

"Oh, for goodness' sake," the Doctor shook his head, "The top floor of Craig's building is in reality an alien space ship intent on slaughtering the population of this planet."

"In other words now, be quiet!" Avalon shush es the woman.

"The correct pilot has now been found," the hologram said.

The Doctor stiffened, "Yes, I was worried you'd say that."

"He means you, Doctor, doesn't he?" Amy said through the earpiece.

"Why am I not surprised?" Avalon sighed but flinched when the energy tendrils pulled the Doctor towards the panel.

"The correct pilot has been found. The correct pilot has been found."

"What's happening?" Amy cried.

"It's pulling me in! I'm the new pilot!" the Doctor struggled to stay away from the panel.

"Could you do it?" Avalon rushed over to him, "Could you fly the ship safely?"

"No, I'm way too much for this ship. My hand touches that panel, the planet doesn't blow up, the whole solar system does."

"Figures," Avalon sighed and started helping him by pulling with him.

"The correct pilot has been found," the hologram continuously said.

"No...worst choice ever, I promise you," the Doctor looked up, "Stop this!"

"Doctor!" Amy shouted, "It's getting worse."

"It doesn't want everyone," Avalon pointed out and so the Doctor immediately looked at Craig.

"Craig, it didn't want you!" he remembered.

"I spoke to him and he said I couldn't help him," Craig shrugged.

"And it also never wanted Sophie before," Avalon thought, "I don't understand, what's changed?"

"I gave her the idea of leaving!" the Doctor realized the problem, "It's a machine that needs to leave, it wants people who want to escape! And you don't want to leave, Craig, you're Mr Sofa Man. Craig, you can shut down the engine. Put your hand on the panel and concentrate on why you want to stay!"

"Craig, no!" Sophie quickly shook her head.

"Will it work?" Craig looked at the button in doubt.

"Yes!" the Doctor nodded through his pain.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes!"

"...Is that a lie?"

"Of course, it's a lie!"

Craig shrugged, "It's good enough for me. Geronimo!" he slammed his hand on to the button and immediately screamed with pain.

The Doctor was set free and ran to Craig's side,Craig, what's keeping you here? Think about everything that makes you want to stay here!" he gave Craig a small slap to get him to focus away from thr pain, "Why don't you want to leave?"

"Sophie! And I don't want to leave Sophie! I can't leave Sophie! I love Sophie!"

Sophie's half widened, "I love you, too, Craig, you idiot!" she slammed her hand over his on the panel. The ship began smoking and sparking upon the second hand's touch.

"Honestly, do you mean that?" Craig blinked at Sophie.

"Of course I mean it! Do you mean it?"

"I've always meant it. Seriously though, do you mean it?"

"Yes."

"But what about the monkeys?"

"Oh my God," Avalon pressed a hand to her forehead, "Don't turn this into something annoying!"

"Craig, the planet's about to burn! For God's sake, kiss the girl!" the Doctor had to agree Avalon, even Amy shouting the same thing through the earpiece.

Craig and Sophie kissed and were able to take their hands off the panel. Even the TARDIS was able to calm and finally materialization, leaving a very relieved Amy to call to her friends, "Doctor! Avalon! You've done it. Aha, you've done it! Oh, now the screen's just zeros! Now it's minus ones, minus twos, minus threes...Big yes!"

But the hologram in the ship started changing appearances again, its voice becoming high pitched as it shorted out.

"Big no," the Doctor stepped back towards the doors, pulling Avalon with him.

"Did we switch it off?" Craig questioned, noticing the still worried face the Doctor had even when they'd just shut down the panel.

"Emergency shutdown, it's imploding, everybody out, out, out!" the Doctor tan out with Avalon, the other humans quickly following in suit.

They ran out the house to the next street and watched as the second floor reverted to the ship and then completely disappeared without anyone noticing a thing.

"Look at them," Craig watched people walking by the house, "Didn't they see that? The whole top floor just vanished."

"Perception filter. There never was a top floor," the Doctor reminded them.

~ 0 ~

After cleaning up the mess in the room they rented, Avalon and the Doctor stepped out the room and walked towards the living room to hand back the keys to Craig. Unfortunately, they entered to find Craig and Sophie kissing and so quickly hurried out. The Doctor left the keys on the sideboard and moved to leave when Craig called for them and halted them on their steps.

"What, you're trying to sneak off?" Sophie raised an eyebrow as they joined the pair.

"Yes, well, you were sort of... busy," the Doctor weakly supplied the word..

Craig picked up the keys and held them to the Doctor, "I want you to keep these. Thank you."

"Thank you," the Doctor took the keys, "Cos I might pop back soon, have another little stay."

"Yeah, in 14 years," Avalon smirked, "Or, if you're really lucky, in 12."

"I said I was sorry!" the Doctor exclaimed with a frown.

He had fully apologized to her and Amy, (and Lena unbeknownst to them) about his tardiness. Unfortunately, it had turned into a more joking matter for Avalon in which she used it to tease him and and irritate him. He supposed he should just be content with the fact Avalon wasn't angry about the 14 years. But, it wasn't fun being teased!

Avalon laughed at his comical expressions and turned back to the others, "Now then. 6,000,400,026 people in the world. That's the number to beat."

"Yeah," Sophie chuckled, "That's what my friend Lena tells me."

Avalon stiffened and blinked, "Wh-What did you say?"

"We'll just be going now, bye," the Doctor waved and hurried out the door with Avalon.

Avalon continued to ponder on the name she'd heard. It was a nice name, pretty, but she couldn't help but feel like there was more to it than just a pretty name. Was there?

~ 0 ~

The Doctor finished starting up the TARDIS and already had a destination, "Back in time! You need to go to the paper shop, leave that note for us," he pointed at Amy.

"Right little matchmaker, you two turned out to be," Amy laughed as she moved up to the Doctor, "Can't you find me a fella?"

The Doctor had a stethoscope on rhe console and quickly pulled it off when he'd heard something wrong, "Oh, rectifier's playing up again...Hold on," he eyed Avalon sitting on the console chair with her journal open. She'd not shaken off the name Lena just yet and the Doctor feared she could be actually remembering, "Amy, you write the note and I'll change that will," he walked off go another room in the console.

"You got a pen?" Amy called.

"Make sure it's a red pen!"

Amy went over to his jacket hanging on armrest of the chair Avalon was in, "What's the matter with you?" she eyed Avalon while searching for the pen.

"What do you think of the name Lena?" Avalon blurted rather urgently. She was racking her head for any possible connection to it but was coming up with nothing. But Amy hadn't answered as she took out a jewelry box from the Doctor's jacket, leaving her stunned. "Amy?" Avalon asked and looked up to see her holding the box, "What is that?"

Amy gave a small shrug and moved closer to her, opening the box to find an engagement ring inside. Avalon raised her eyebrows as she looked at the beautiful ring inside. With no answer, the two gingers stared at it wondering what the Doctor was doing with an engagement ring.

[kpopisthereasonihavenolife]

Bracelet Bells & Teddy Bears

BTS

Jeon Jungkook/Reader [F]

Genre: Paranormal, Thriller, Ghost Hunter AU

Words: 10.9k

Jungkook- a stupid, self-proclaimed ghost hunter in college- decided to take his best friend with him to investigate a 2-story old house that has been on the market for ages.  The reason he was interested in it? Well, it hadn’t been rented or bought ever since he was a child. The ‘It’s not haunted!’ attached above the ‘For Sale/Rent’ didn’t help. 

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“This is literally the stupidest fuckin’ idea you’ve ever pitched to me before.  I honestly don’t know why I’m standing next to you right now.  I actually hate you,” Taehyung grumbled as he stood next to his excited best friend of 6 years.  He held a camera around his neck with a bag on his back filled with different lenses to attach on.  

“The only thing you hate is the fear of pissing your pants when we get in there and see some ghosts!” The best friend- Jungkook- in question, quipped back. Having a pocket full of batteries and a ready to go ‘state of the art’ camcorder in his hand he was practically giddy.  Black pants, white tee and a jean jacket over his shoulder with a black cap on his head to cover his messy black hair.  Taehyung, on the other hand, was a bit more creative in clothing with his blue skinnies and checkered button down, a black bandana strapped around his forehead.

“I’m gonna kill you and throw your stupid body in that house so you haunt it for the rest of existence.”  Taehyung seethed.  He wasn’t scared per se, he's used to Jungkook’s ‘ghost hunting’ by now.  It’s just that he had a recital coming up soon and he wanted to be home right now practicing for it.  Not breaking and entering into a property that is no doubt private by now.

Jungkook new this, but tonight was the perfect night for a good ole ghost hunting!  The moon was high, shining brightly with the light of the full moon and not a cloud was in the sky.  The stars speckled the sky and the soft spring breeze was calming and warm.  It wasn’t cold, nor rainy and the full moon so clear had to be a sign!  It was now, or never.  Of course, if he explained why it had to be today to Taehyung, he’d ultimately leave him behind to hunt on his own.  Every famous ghost hunter needed an assistant; even if Taehyung denies that he is.

“We go in, walk around a little bit and batta-bing batta-boom, we’re out.  If we don’t see a ghost in the first 2 hours, then I promise we’ll call it quits and we can go for a late night burger run.”  

“And I expect you to be paying for this burger run?”

“Well, that’s up for debate.” Taehyung rolled his eyes as he hiked his bag up his shoulders more and clicked off the camera’s lens cover for it to dangle. Seeing his fall into submission of Jungkook’s scheme, he cheered and fired up his camcorder.  “Alright!  Exploration and investigation of 12th Avenue’s mystery house is officially underway. Let’s get it!”  He charged off the sidewalk and weeded through the knee-high tanned grass- if you can call it that- all the way up to the porch.  Taehyung followed, taking the walkway up to the door, however, and watched as Jungkook turned and swiveled in every which way to capture anything he could on his cam.

Taehyung sighed as he watched his friend even film underneath the old, broken table that sat on the very unstable, rotten wood.  “I’m leaving your sorry ass behind I swear to god,” he muttered as he looked at the front door.  Or the poor excuse for one.  The hinges were all busted, the door handle rusted and the front oval shaped glass broken.  The wind whistled in through the broken glass.  There was no way the door wasn’t going to fall off if he touched it.

Jungkook stood next to Taehyung and cupped his chin. “Maybe we can just pluck it off the frame and move it?  If we make too much noise, the ghosts may hide.”

“You made enough sound going through the treacherous jungle that is the lawn.  I’m pretty certain the ghosts- if there are any- are already well aware some fuckboy is trying to get in.” Jungkook walked forward and hooked his camcorder to his belt as he gripped over sides of the broke door and jerked.  Once, twice and the third time he nearly stumbled backward.  The door flew off the hinges ti was barely attached to and Jungkook blinked.

“Yo, we wanted to take the door off, not destroy the damn frame.”  Jungkook moved the door to the side as Taehyung examined the wooden, splintered frame.  “That was some force you had, Jesus.”

“It.. no.  It felt like someone kicked the door at me.”  Taehyung ticked a brow up at his friend as he rolled his eyes.  Already not believing him.  “I’m serious!  It felt like someone pushed the door off for me!”  Taehyung just waved him off as he stepped inside.  Jungkook huffed as he followed him in.  “Damn,” Jungkook looked around, “this place is a wreck.”

“No kidding.  It’s been vacant for a while and no one bothers with upkeep around here.”  Taehyung answered back as he snapped pictures here and there.  The flash of his camera igniting the dark room for milliseconds, leaving only outlines of objects behind.  “No doubt the power’s been cut.”  Jungkook unhooked his cam from his belt and switched the camera mood to ‘night vision’ and trotted to Taehyung’s bag on his back.

He pulled out two small flashlights.  There were small and like 4$ at the local drug store, but damn they were bright and the batteries lasted- what Jungkook swore- eons. Not to mention it was a sweet deal when they came in packs of 2.  Just what he needed for only 4$.

He flicked them both on, already stocking it with prime AA+ batteries, and tossing one to Taehyung, keeping the other for himself.  Of course, out of the two colors, he tossed the pink one and kept the blue.  Taehyung only rolled his eyes as he separated from his friend to waltz into the living room.  

“Hey!  Rule #1 in hunting in old, creepy houses is not separating!”  Jungkook scolded.  Taehyung only flipped him a slender, middle finger as he rounded the doorway into the dusty room.  Jungkook swung himself around. “Fine, get molested by a ghost.  I don’t care.”  He walked into the kitchen.

The island in the middle of the open room was dusty and a glass vase filled with cooking utensils caught his eye.  Why would they be here? Did the last family who lived here- whenever that was- leave them?  He shrugged as he filmed the room thoroughly, capturing anything.  

Cobwebs hung and swung in the slight draft in the air from the ceilings, connecting to walls.  The tiles of the floor were cracks or just flat out broken as Jungkook crunched them under his feet or kicked them with his heels. The counters were a mess, dusty, grimy and coated in a thick layer of dirt.  The windows were cracked and covered in a hefty layer of dust. Opening the fridge, he cringed as he saw a dead rat in the lower rack of the fridge door.

Shutting it back, he looked up at the ceiling.  Damaged and moldy.  “Gross,” he muttered as he filmed. Working his way back out into the main room, he followed Taehyung into the living room, seeing his friend capture photos and looked around furniture.  

The house was still almost completely furnished. A love seat and 4 person couch sat adjacent to one another with an old-style box TV the size of a bathroom window sat on an old, open shelved audio tower. The shelves were lined with dusty DVD and VHS players with a small collection of about 20 movies below on the bottom shelf.  Jungkook zoomed on the old piece of technology.  

“Woah, dude.  This is older than I thought.  Just how long has this place been vacant?”

“Don’t act like you didn’t watch back to back Sailor Moon on VHS when you were 5.  It’s not that ancient.”  Jungkook gasped.

“Don’t insult me.  Everyone knows Sailor Moon was the best anime of its era.” Taehyung opened up an old china cabinet, still filled with expensive china.  

“Yeah, yeah.  Whatever weeb.” The two continued to investigate and look around. Directly behind the living room, the dining room sat.  The table oval and fit for a large family with 6 chairs surrounding it.  A vacant fishbowl was filled with far-stale water with stupid rocks in the bottom and things floating in the water that Jungkook would rather not guess the name of.  

The house creaked with each step of the grown men, being an almost all wood floor home.  Rugs placed here and there, basically attached to the floor by grime and some mystery fluids here and there.  Honestly, if some homeless beggar, squatting in the corner popped out at any moment, he wouldn’t be surprised. 

Having gone through the downstairs enough, they set their sights on the staircase leading up.  By now, even Taehyung was thoroughly invested in the exploration of the house.  Not that he wasn’t before, Taehyug literally wrote a report in high school about this house and the weird vague origins around it.  He was hardly able to dig up any information on it, even when he called up the retailers, they just hung up on him and never picked up again.  Jungkook nudged his arm with a broad, shit eating grin on his face.  

“You’re having fun.  Admit it.  I’m a genius.”  Taehyung shoved his shoulder as he started up, testing the wood of the stairs, making sure he wouldn’t fall through with each step.  “Hey!  It’s the team leader’s job to go first!”

“How humble,” Taehyung monotonously replied as he headed up.  The wooden stairs were in the middle of the main entrance by the front door.  Kitchen to the right, living room and dining room to the left.  The stairs themselves weren’t looking so hot. A torn and tattered rug lining each step upwards posed a threat of someone tripping and subsequently dying, but thank god for rotted, old railings, right?  

After a careful hike up, the two looked around the upstairs landing.  In front of them was a large, bay window.  The portion of the window poking out for aesthetically pleasing selfies or calm poetry sessions were covered with a sense of dread.  A lone, torn and stained teddy bear lay face down on the bay.  

Jungkook walked over to the window and knelt, getting a close up on the bear.  “If ever I’ve seen a cursed object,” he muttered as he moved to get another angle of it.  Taehyung walked up behind him, snapping a picture of the window letting in the moonlight as it illuminated the landing on the ground.  Taehyung gently picked up the teddy bear as Jungkook rolled his eyes.  “I just said it was probably cursed, and what do you do?  Pick it up.” Taehyung gave yet another famous eye roll.

“Shut up.  It’s a bear with a hole in the side of it.  If it’s cursed, then surely its eyes would glow red and it'd bite my hand off or something.”

“That’s a horrible picture, thank you,” Jungkook shook his head as he stood.  Taehyung was gentle in setting the bear back down, only now sitting it up and against the wall comfortably.  The bear will surely remember his kindness.

Jungkook moved around and went to the left side of the stair landing while Tae took the right side.  Down Jungkook’s end was one door and the other side was 2. Of course, the unspoken agreement was to open and explore. Taehyung went into the first of the two room and scoffed.  Typical.

There was a bunk bed against the east wall.  The bottom bunk had a hole in the mattress as springs pierced through clumps of polyester covered in grime.  The floor was covered in toys that had paint chipped away or were broken and well worn in time.  Climbing a step up the ladder in the bed, the top bunk seemed oddly in place  A blanket thrown over the mattress and a pillow, albeit devoid of a pillowcase, wasn’t torn at all.  All with a stuffed elephant standing against the pillow.  He snapped a shot and descended to look in the closet across the room.

The closet door was stuck.  Even with digging his heels in the floor and jerking, the door just wouldn’t budge.  So, with a huff and a little fixing of his shirt he had bunched up, he turned and abandoned that hope.  Not realizing the reason he couldn’t open it was the hand holding the doorknob from the other side.

The other room was nearly identical save for the lack of a bunk bed and only a king.  Fit for parents.  The room was lined with shelves with empty or broken frames.  The frames that held pictures of people, the faces were all scratched out or cut out completely.  He’d be lying if Taehyung said it didn’t give him the chills.  This room had the door of the closet completely off, only there was absolutely nothing inside. Not even a mouse trap.

On Jungkook’s neck of the woods, the room he entered was the bathroom.  It was pretty old styled.  The toilet sat against the back wall with a shelf above it where one would place towels.  Next to the throne was a broken toilet paper holder.  Further along, the main wall was the sink with a mirror opening to reveal a medicine cabinet inside it.  When he opened it, old prescription bottles rolled out, crashing into the sink’s bowl and scaring the poor boy.  He shut it back as he took the bottle that fell and read the label the best he could.

“Chlorpromazine,” he read, reading each syllable out he could.  Not knowing exactly what it treated and the label being far too damaged to read, he simply placed it on the side of the sink and turned to investigate further. “What the fu-” he trailed off when he looked at the bathtub.  The tub filled to the brim with water, clear and freezing. The shower curtain lay on the floor under his boots as the shower head dripped with a never-ending water splash into the tub.  “Oookay, right. Moving on.”  He spun, not able to capture the small ripple rip through the water’s surface.

He caught Taehyung coming out of the second room as he waved to him and leaned against the wall.  

“Find anything?”  

“Maybe.  Just the kids and parents room, a lot of dusty shit but there were a few creepy things, not gonna lie.” Jungkook’s face broke into a smile.

“Lemme see!”  He pushed off the wall, ready to rush to his friend to go through the sweet picture he got, but he hardly got two steps in.  The floor gave way under a particularly hard step and buckled under the young man’s weight.  

“Jungkook!” Taehyung screamed as he watched his best friend fall through the floor.  Rushing down the stairs, nearly falling on that damned rug, he stopped at the bottom and looked around and up at the hole above him.  Yet, at his feet, didn’t lay Jungkook groaning in pain.  He wasn’t in the kitchen, the living room, the dining area, the landing, the front yard, he just wasn’t there. Not even hanging pathetically from the hole he fell through. He just… disappeared?

XXX

Jungkook groaned as he rolled from his side and onto his back.  He coughed as a shiver ran up his spine.  Cracking open his eyes, he expected to see Taehyung peering up at him with a hole in the floor where he very clearly remembers falling through.  But, to his shock, he stared at a perfectly whole, wooden ceiling.  

“He probably just moved me,” Jungkook reasoned as he pushed his sore body up and grabbed the back of his head.  A nice lump on the head and a killer headache are exactly what he didn’t need.  Beside him, his camcorder lay completely busted.  He gasped as he grabbed it.  “Aw, man it’s completely fucked.”  He sighed as he popped open the battery compartment and ejected the SD memory card and carefully pocketed it.  Whatever was recorded on this puppy was all he would have, unfortunately.  

Leaving the broken piece of metal, he forced himself up and thank god for dollar store flashlights.  Seeing the light of the torch he hobbled over to it and picked it up. Bending at his hip to pick it up and then straighten back out his light shone into the face of a someone.  

“AHh!”  He screamed as the person he was pretty sure he just blinded screamed back at his own scream.  Jungkook, ever the baby, fell back onto his ass as he whipped his light back up to see who he just shone his light onto.  But, no one was there.  He took the broken cam and tossed it into the darkness of nowhere, only to wait.  There was nothing.  

Next thing he knew, the cam was flying back at him, skimming past his shoulder as he quickly leaned out of the way.

“Hey!”  He scolded into nowhere.  “Don’t throw my shit!”  Suddenly, a person’s face hung upside down and annoyed in front of his face.  

“You threw it at me first!”  He screamed again as the person, floated above him? Their- her- feet off the ground and body languid and iridescent? “I swear, men are the most pathetic thing.”  She floated around, just relaxing in the air as her body was transparent and she wore older clothes.  She looked no older than 19, and her capris and loose, untucked stripped teeshirt were at least early 2000s fashion.  

“What the- I mean- you’re a-”  An actual ghost was floating right in front of his eyes and his damn video camera was conveniently broken.  God, what awful timing.  He jumped when he heard the squeaking of the floors above him.  Where was he, or rather where was Taehyung?! He was missing all the action!  The ghost girl gasped as she grabbed something and threw it at Jungkook, grabbing his wrist as his body disappears.  

“Shh,” the ghost hushed as he clutched a cube of scented wax in his hand, the thing the ghost threw at him and listened.  The squeaking moved and soon was down the hall, and before he knew it he saw something pass through the floors above and come down.  It was just across the room from him.  It, he didn’t know what it was.  It was tall, completely shadowed, it twitched, red hazy red like unfocused cat lasers.  It was unbelievably tall, hunched as it’s pointed shoulders and chin seemed like it could impale steel.   Soon, the figure who had sniffed around searching for anything-anyone that could be around- phased away.  Where to, Jungkook really didn’t want to find out.

The ghost girl let go of him, as Jungkook became visible once again.  A cold sweat gathered at his nape and traveled down his spine.

“What in the hell was that thing?” He fearfully whispered.  Just looking at it instilled him with pure terror.  He’d never experienced freezing fear before, now he has.  He moved to look at the ghost who had moved to kneel on both her knees in front of him, sitting politely as she signaled for him to look at the cube of wax in his hand.

“That should keep you safe.  It’ll make sure he doesn’t smell you.  His eyesight isn’t good.  If you don’t move and don’t make a sound with that cube, you’ll be safe.” The ghost explained, but that didn’t explain hardly anything at all.  

“Who are you?” Was the only thing he found himself asking.  

“My name is Y/n.  I lived here a long time ago.  My little brother, father and mother lived here with me.”  You leaned closer to Jungkook and inspected him.  His style, his face, his hair, his clothes, his shoes, everything.  “What year is it outside?  Time is kinda jumbled in here.”  He opened his mouth.

“Uh, 2019 just started.”  You gasped.  

“It’s been that long!”  You hushed yourself immediately and looked around, making sure no one, or rather, nothing heard you.  “I’ve been dead for that long?” You lowered your voice significantly, almost in disbelief.  

“So, you know you’re dead?”

“Well, of course.  How else could I logically explain glowing, floating in the air and just conveniently turning invisible.”

“You were also able to touch me. How’s that work?”

“It took me a while to get that down, but with enough focused energy, I can become tangible.  It’s pretty hard to do though.” He shook his head as he blinked and put his hands in front of him.

“Wait, wait, hold the fuckin’ phone.  This is all way too much to process.”  He took a moment, pinching the bridge of his phone, eyes skewed shut.  “Right, so you’re an old, but young, dead girl.  There’s some sort of demon? Roaming around?  And I fell through the floor into a whole other room.”  He opened his mouth, trying to make sense of it, yet it still left him utterly confused.  Then his mind jumped back to Taehyung. “Oh god, Taehyung.”

“You’re friend?” You had seen him?  He nodded.  

“Yes!  Oh my god, is he going to be okay?!”  You nodded.  “You’re way too calm about this.  That thing is somewhere and my best friend also happens to be somewhere and I have no idea what to do about it.  I don’t even know where the hell I am!”

“Calm down.  My brother’s animals will see to it he is kept safe.  He was very kind after all.”  He blinked, falling further and further into confusion.  

“Animals? What, so there are ghost animals too?”

“Not exactly.  My little brother was forced to leave all his possessions behind when Mother left with him.  He cared so much for his little stuff animals, they now possess souls.  Your friend was very kind, so they will keep him safe.”

“Kind? When was he-” Jungkook remembered him picking up and replacing the teddybear ever so carefully. “The bear,” he said in realization.  You nodded as the bear in question waved to you from the far end of the room behind Jungkook, before phasing out.  “That small thing is gonna keep him safe?”  You stood up, hopping up to have your toes brush the ground as you lazily floated.  

“There are others.  My brother had many toys.  His favorite animal was an elephant,” you chuckled as you remembered him running around his room, elephant toy in hand making the most obnoxious sounds.  

“An elephant ghost?!”  You swore you saw the human’s eyes light up, just like your brother’s. He must be rather immature himself yet.  

“Come on, I’ll get you back to your friend.  You two should get out of her as soon as possible.”  Jungkook sprung up, chasing after your elegant, flowing body.  Your hair wisped behind you, like spider webs. If you stood on the ground in front of him, he’d be quite a bit taller than you.  Actually, even for a ghost, you were rather pretty.  

He followed you to a small ramp to a trapdoor above the two of you.  He watched as you phased through the door above and he heard a click of what he assumed to be a lock and small bang on the door.  He crawled up the ramp and pushed the door open. It squeaked with rusty hinges as he pushed it and it fell open.  Peaking out, his hair whipped around, the cap he had lost previous somewhere no long restraining it in place.  He was outside?  Be looked around.  

“The cellar?”  

“That’s right.  This house had an extensive cellar that runs underneath a good portion of the house.  Now hurry, we need to find your friend.”  He stopped you.

“I- I haven’t told you my name yet.”

“Why would I need to know it?”

“I know yours,” that was a fair point.  You turned to him and sat with your knees to your chest as you got eye level with him.  Waiting patiently for his name he was so eager to give.  “My name’s Jungkook.”

XXX

He kept following your back, like a lost puppy.  He felt oddly too trusting, but you didn’t seem like you’d walk him into a dangerous situation. I mean, you gave him a way to hide and stay safe and reassured him his best friend would be alright.  He was worried about Taehyung, he was worried about when he’d get to go home, how long he’s been here and just exactly who were you?

You said you’d use to live here, with your family in this house.  And your reaction when he told you the year out, you were shocked, too shocked for your death to be anytime in the last decade.  That’s to be expected though, this house hadn’t been lived in for as along as Jungkook could remember.  

He had a bazillion questions in his head, but his main priority was to find Taehyung.  He needed to located and secure his best friend’s safety first, then maybe he could ask you a few questions.  

You had led him around the house and back to the front door.  The door had been replaced on its hinges and even locked shut.  

“What the..” he looked at the door.  It was like he never ripped it off in the first place, in fact, it looked better than it did before!  “I- does that stupid shadow thing fix doors?” You shook your head.  

“No.  That was probably a different spirit here.  There’s some here who don’t like it when stupid kids destroy their property.”  

“You mean there are others here?”  

“Of course.  You’ve run into 3 already. Even your friend didn’t realize he was right in front of one before.  Of course, Vivi doesn’t like it when people try to go into the closest without knocking first.  It’s just bad manners.”  Your hand phased through the doorknob, twisting the lock and opening the door perfectly.  Opening like a door should.  “We here aren’t allowed to leave until we’re found.”  

“What- found?”  You nodded as you both reentered the house.  It was just as before, the hole Jungkook fell through still there.  “Oh sure, fix the door but not the floor that’s convenient.”  He spits in spite.  You focused enough to whack him on the head as he cursed your stupid ability to become tangible in the first place.  

His whining was cut off by a scream up above.  It was Taehyung.  You were off, floating in speed up the stairs in which Jungkook followed.  Checking each room upstairs, not to fall through again, he didn’t see his friend. He very clearly heard him up here though!  You stood in front of the bay window, Jungkook joining your side.  

“The- that damn bear is gone!”  You nodded.  

“He probably has your friend.”  

“Well, how do I get him back!”  You looked up at the ceiling.  “What?  Is there something important about the ceiling?”  You rolled your eyes as you floated up and soon revealed a hidden attic door.  Dangling the custy pull, he rushed open and gripped it.  Yanking it, he squawked and backed up as quick as possible before the stairs relentlessly fell onto the floor.  It was like some cheap ass booby-trap.  You flew up into the opening as he carefully climbed the how-ever-old ladder.  

His head popped up the opening and he gasped as he saw his friend backed in a corner, that small teddy bear in front of him while that same shadow man-thing stood around.  Taehyung had his palms clamped over his mouth as his nose exhaled harshly, making the tall shadow try and pinpoint his location.  The bear hovered around Taehyung’s head, dinging like a soft bell.  With each ring, the shadow twitched until it screech.  It was a god awful sound.  

Jungkook almost let go of the ladder to cover his ears, but you stopped him as you covered them for him.  Your hands that you made physical were soft over his own, and it as like he was listening to the ocean waves.  He didn’t realize that ghosts had such a pleasant internal sound.  

The shadow screeched and seethed as it slashed through boxes, torn fabrics, threw anything it could touch in madness.  It was horrific.  What if what he was doing was done to a person? They would be mutilated, ripped, torn no doubt killed.  The thought chilled Jungkook as you felt the change in his atmosphere.  You hung upside down in front of his face and stopped his eyes from reaching that horrid, shadow.  

“Don’t look,” you mouthed but didn’t speak.  Soon, the shadow seemed to have enough and Jungkook once again saw it fade into nothing, leaving nothing but cold behind.  You removed your hands and spoke.  “You’re friend,” Jungkook was quick to get the rest of the way into the attic and rush to Taehyung’s side.  

His hands had dropped to his stomach, holding it like he was going to retch.  The teddy sat at Tae’s side, swaying in the air like it had marionette strings attached to it.  His eyes were wide and he was shocked to see his camera in one piece around his neck yet.

“Tae! Tae!  Hey, snap out of it!”  You floated down to your knees as you knelt beside the frozen young man.  He looked to you. “Can you help him?”

“I’m going to try.”  You looked at the small teddy and asked him for something.  The teddy rung again, a pleasant sound and a small cube sat in your palm.  It was just like his scented one, so the bear is responsible for creating those?  You held it up under his nose and soon he began to cough.  You smiled as Taehyung seemed to come around as he gasped and held at his shirt.  Jungkook smiled as he pat his friend on the back, trying to soothe him.  

“Thank you,” Jungkook whispered to you.  

“What the fuck was that?” Taehyung practically whimpered.  Jungkook looked at you.

“That’s what I’d like to know.  I have more than a few questions for you.”  You nodded as you sat and crossed your legs.  After Taehyung gathered himself, Jungkook caught him up on the situation to the best of his ability.  Though, after that, the questions just kept growing.  

“Alright,” you sat, ready for a questionnaire.  “What do you want to know.”

“Everything,” Jungkook answered.  “What the hell is going on?  Why are you here, how did you die, when and-”

“What the ever loving fuck was Mr. Shadow-beast?”   Taehyung injected in the final question.  You sighed.  It wasn’t a hobby of yourself to revisit your death, much less the last leg of your life, but if it will stop their questions and make sure they don’t come back like horror-driven kids tend to do, you’d tell it.  The full story.  Your story.

“I lived here with my family.  We moved in the early 1990s.  I was only a teenager at the time, and after 4 years of living here, my mother had my little brother.  A family of 4, and we were happy.  For a time, but then my dad started to get sick.  He was ill, not right in the head.  Nothing we did would pacify him.  He’d get angry over any little thing, he’d push us around and scream and terrify my little brother.  Soon, mother wanted out, so she ran out, taken my brother with her and leaving me behind.  I was 19, so I could leave whenever I wanted, but…” you stopped as you looked around at the mess.  

The mess that shadow man-made.

“Father, he became too ill.  He stopped me from going anywhere.  He locked me away in a secret room, told me ‘they’ told him to.  He’d keep me there and I was never allowed to leave.  Soon, I just lost track of time and one night when I fell asleep, I woke up-” you gestured to yourself “-like this.”

“You’re dad... he killed you?”  Taehyung asked delicately.  

“In a sense.”  

“That isn’t ‘in a sense’, Y/n! He killed you.  He forced you into a cage and killed you!”  Jungkook scolded.  “Is that why you can’t leave?  You’re angry at your father?” You shook your head.

“No, that’s not it.  Dad, he hid me.  I can’t leave before he’s hidden me and he won’t let me leave.  You saw earlier what happens when I try.” You looked once more at the wreckage.  

“No way, that thing is your dad?!”  You sighed.  

“I don’t know what happened to him, but I don’t really care either.  I’m sure he’s in a lot of pain, but what he’s put everyone threw, he deserves all the pain he’s receiving.  Even after death, he won’t stop.”  You looked at the two boys.  “But, he’s confined here.  He can’t leave this house, this property. He’s stuck here too.”

“When you say he hid you, do you mean your body?” You nodded.  “So, what you said earlier, about being found.  You want someone to find your body so you can finally go?”  You nodded again.  Jungkook shook his head in confusion though.  “But, we were in the house, Y/n.  Where could he possibly hide you in a house you know so well?”  

“I don’t know, Jungkook.  If I just managed to get close to my body- wherever it may be- I’m sure I could sense it somehow. Even a ghost has limits, and finding their own body is a major one. Why else do you think it takes exorcisms or man-lead discoveries for spirits to move one.  We can’t do it alone.”  The teddy that sat beside Taehyung rung once, twice and moved to fly and circle your head.  It was almost trying to cheer you up. You smiled after giving the small teddy a poke as it floated back to Taehyung. You giggled.  “I think he likes you.”  Taehyung rolled his eyes.

“Y/n, what if we found your body?”  Jungkook proposed.  Taehyung looked at him shocked.  

“Woah, what?  Did you hear her, she doesn’t know where it is?”

“I know, but I don’t feel comfortable keeping her here with him.  She’s helped us and with these,” he showed his wax cube, “he can’t see us.  I swear, if we do this, I won’t mess with ghosts ever again.”  Taehyung squinted at him, obviously skeptical.  “I’ll pinkie promise.”  Taehyung gasped.  

“Oh my god, you’re serious.” Taehyung thought it over.  “Well, I suppose we can’t have a full-on horror movie themed adventure without concluding the obvious plot slapping us in the face, now can we.  I’m in, but you’re so giving up your title after this.”  The two clasped pinkies- like real men would- and you interjected.

“But you can't!  You need to go!”  

“Sorry girlie, we’ve already done promised on it.  Do you know the punishment for breaking a pinkie promise?  It’s not fun man,” Taehyung said.  You just huffed as you cradled your forehead, making the boys chuckle in the small moment of amusement.

“Boys.”

XXX

Jungkook lead Taehyung around to the still open door to the cellar.  Crouching and shuffling down the ramp the 2 of them practically sashayed inside.  You floated behind them, silent the whole time.  Now, they were here, but where to look? Jungkook rubbed the back of his neck.

“Just, start looking around I guess?” Taehyung just shrugged as he turned and began doing just that.  That same teddy floating ever near at his back.  You stayed near Jungkook as he looked around.  Behind boxes, barrels, under tables, he even pulled objects from shelves expecting a secret room to pop out from the wall. But, nothing.  You sat on a box, a hopeless look on your face.  You never expected to see yourself again and refuse to get your feeble hopes up.

“Y/n, don’t worry. We’ll find it- er you.”  You shook your head.

“You shouldn’t have bothered,” Jungkook wished you were something, someone he could touch.  He’d hold you, tell you it’d all be okay.  But, how do you comfort someone who has already died while you search their old house for their body? With their demonic father stalking around no less.

Speak of the Devil.

Taehyung froze as he sunk back into the shadows, teddy at his chest to ‘protect’ him. You gasped as the shadow, your father, just barely caught sight of you.  The shadow moved fast- too fast. The walls behind you morphed, sucking in the shadows as they peeled off the wall like twisted arms. THey grabbed your body, sucking you partially into the wall to keep you imprisoned.  You struggled as your father approached, danger in every footstep.

Just as he always did when he saw you.  He’d suck the energy out of you, growing darker- stronger- with each time you allowed yourself to be so foolish you were seen.  Just as he did when you were alive.  He’s taking everything away from you, even in death.

The wall would sink you further and further in, sucking you through space.  Taehyung watched as Jungkook quickly started moving, knocking over anything he could in his wake.  “Idiot!” Taehyung screamed at him before he realized that they were both now side by side, and easily located by the demon that once was your father. The Shadow turned towards the sound, making out the faint, blue, breathing outlines of the two men and the small pesky bear that floated at their side.  

The scream the shadow emitted was very different this time. Directed directly at the boys, they covered their ears and you struggled against the shadows that forced themselves down your throat as you choked and gagged and wanted so badly to scream. Jungkook swore he almost saw what you would look like if your body wasn’t see through- if you weren’t dead.  He thought he caught a glimpse of what or who you would be if you were still alive.  

All before he was thrust away, and found himself and Taehyung none to gently thrown back into the front lawn.  They don’t know exactly how they got back out there from the back of the house from the cellar, but nonetheless, there they lay in the tall unkempt grass.  The bear sat on Taehyung’s leg, latched to his thigh with those stuffed arms of it’s.  The two sat up with a collective groan and endless whining as they rubbed their shoulders, back, arms, head, anything that hit the ground with at least minimum force.

“What the hell just happened?”  Jungkook whined as he looked around the outside.  Still dark as a pupil with the moon covered by clouds that appeared from nowhere.  Masking the once bright guiding light it provided.  “Y/n?” He looked around, you weren’t there.  He quickly stood up, too quickly as his vision blanked for a moment and a wave of dizziness washed over him as he stumbled. Rubbing his eyes as he regained his sense of balance, he looked around the abandoned yard.  Taehyung moved to stand next to him, a much slower pace than his best friend.

“He threw us out,” he murmured.  Taehyung looked behind him at the property line leading to the road and away from the godforsaken house. “He must be telling us to leave,” he looked at Jungkook, “but we aren’t, are we?” Jungkook shook his head.

“Abso-fuckin’-lutely not.  Not when we know what’s going on and that people are being hurt.” He looked down at his feet, at his palms and remembering the broken camera and the memory card in his back pocket.  He could go home now, prove so much about ghosts and the dead that roam around this house.  He can’t though, his conscience wouldn’t let him.  He couldn’t leave you without solace.  “We promised her,” was all he said.  

He was going to find your body.  He swore.  Taehyung nodded as he plucked the bear from his thigh and placed it on his shoulder where it sat upright and steady on his shirt.  Was it strange to say a grown man walking around a haunted demon house was comforted by a possessed teddy bear who protected him?  It’s a phrase best left unsaid, for his pride’s sake.

The two men started to go back around, but something stopped them.  When they came back to the cellar door, it wasn’t there anymore.  The door was just gone.  The place in the ground where the entrance would be, was just dirt and mud with a water spigot on the side of the house, dripping with something they both assumed was most definitely not water.

Jungkook dropped to his knees, in a frenzy started digging with his hands into the disgusting mix of mud and the mystery ghost fluid in the ground.  Surely if he dug, he’d bust through into the cellar he knew was there.  Taehyung grabbed the back of his jean jacket as he yanked him up, screaming at him to get ahold of himself when a window from above caught their attention.  

The old, rickety window shambled open and all was silent for a moment as the two boys looked up in curiosity.  Thinking some random ghost who just wanted to smell the good ole night air opened the window, they were quickly jumping out of the way of something that was thrown out.  

It was small, not larger than the palm of Taehyung’s hand, as it hit the grass at their feet.  Taehyung looked at the curtains that were sucked out by the wind’s breeze while Jungkook knelt and picked up whatever was thrown out.  Taehyung tore his eyes away from the window above with caution as he looked at the now rising Jungkook, holding a medicine bottle in his hand.

“This was in the bathroom, I found it when I was in there before,” the familiar word ‘Chlorpromazine’, reflecting in Jungkook’s vision.

“So,” Taehyung drew out the word as he hooked his thumbs in the belt loop of his skinnies.  “We’re going to the bathroom together?  Adventurous.”  Jungkook threw the bottle at his friend who was obviously trying to get Jungkook out of the panic he buried himself in.  The gesture was recognized and greatly appreciated.  No wonder the ghost bear liked him so much.  

The two of them hiked it back to the front of the house where they saw a blurred silhouette of a very blurry dog.  Remembering what you told him earlier about the animals being coherently on their side, he reassured the friend at his side who raised his fist. Yeah, like he was going to throw hands at a ghost, real clever fella he is in the face of danger.  

Walking inside for the third time for the young Jeon, he noticed that there were animals in the rooms.  The living room held a dog, the same dog from earlier as he sat in the doorway.  His ghost tongue hanging from his almost smiling chops. The kitchen was a monkey, Taehyung almost smiled as he saw it’s figure having a ball along the ceiling and the small noises of it swinging to and fro from whatever was in there.  From further back in the house, Jungkook practically fist pumped the air with the loud, vibrating belt of mighty elephant.  He whipped around to an ever confused Taehyung as he looked at the car laying on the top of the landing at the top of the stairs.

“These are the spirits Y/n’s little brother gifted to his toys. Tae, they’re not going to hurt us.”  Taehyung relaxed as he saw his best friend no longer frowning, but smiling at the animals who signified a save zone.  Even if temporary.

The two made it up the stairs as the cat that lay at the landing stretched and pranced around the giant hole in the floor and turned into the bathroom.  Okay, so whatever was in there was harmless- the animals said so after all.  

With care sidles along the wall, the boys came into the tiled, dirty bathroom with the water still dripping one drop at a time into the full tub.  

“Was that always full?” Taehyung questioned as he pointed accusingly at the tub.

“Yeah, it was earlier too,” Jungkook replied.

“Ah,” a rather short, unpleasant response of confirmation. Enough to get the point across that it was both disturbing and confusing for this full bathtub to be a thing when the water has long been shut off. The two watched as the cat sat at the side of the tub and then both boys let out unattractive shouts of terror when someone started to come out of the water.  

The clear water turned murky when a little boy with the shaggiest, wet hair sat up.  The water of the deep tub hit just at his chest as he sat and piddled his hands in the water to make small splashes.  He was just a child having fun and playing at bath time. Jungkook looked at Taehyung as he just shook his head.

“No way,” he whispered at his gaze as Jungkook then approached the tub’s edge in the end. He knelt down and placed his fingertips in the water.  The little boy followed the foreign ripples and looked at Jungkook, and Taehyung with the bear behind him. He smiled so innocently.

“Hello there,” Jungkook softly spoke.  “Do you like playing in the water?”  The little boy nodded eagerly.  “Would you mind if I played a bit too, with you that is?  The boy silently seemed to want to laugh as he turned and motioned to a dirty rubber duck on the edge of the tub where a bar of soap could sit snuggly.  Reaching over he looked at it.

The yellow paint was chipped in places and it was horribly faded.  The face had only one eye still painted black while the blue and purple paint scarf was patchy.  The sailor hat on the duck was still a shade of navy blue though.  It was stiff, not having the warmth and usage of a child for a very long time.  “Is this your favorite toy?” The boy nodded again.  “Well, he’s mighty dirty.  I think this sailor needs a bath too.” The boy splashed happily as Jungkook scrunched his nose cutely to his new little friend and stuck the toy under the water and gently cleaned it.

He thumbed off the as much dirt he could.  Some coming off in chunks other bits smearing and wiping off.  Soon, the duck wasn’t perfect, but significantly better.  The little boy smiled as he reached out for it, wanting to bad to have his toy back.  Jungkook gently placed the toy in his hand and it was like the toy and little boy were alive again.

The little boy's body glowed and his skin was honey tanned and hair dark and damp.  The duck looked bright and newer than ever.  The boy mouthed a happy ‘thank you’ without actually speaking before he disappeared and the tub began to drain. Once the water was gone, at the bottom of the tub sat a hairpin. Picking it up he stood and bowing once to the tub, trying to honor and say goodbye to that sweet little ghost boy as he went to Tae’s side.

“So, you played with a ghost kid. We’re just meeting all sorts of ghosts, huh?” Jungkook nodded as he showed Taehyung the pin. It was thin, black and one of those you could run your thumb over and glitter would suddenly be fused with your skin for the next three days. It was far from a fancy pin, but if a little girl who had long bangs needed to pin them back, it’d be the perfect hairpiece. “So, where too now chef?”

“Y/n mentioned something about a ghost in the kid’s room closet.”  Taehyung though as he cupped his chin.

“Come to think of it, that closet didn’t open for me.  I couldn’t get it open to save my life.” Jungkook nodded as Taehyung took the hairpin from his palm and held it in his own.  

“It’s because Vivi doesn’t like people who don’t knock.”  

The two of them moved carefully to the children’s room.  Inside on the bottom bunk of the bed sat plethora of small animal ghosts.  Small bears, snakes, tigers, lions even a T-rex sat miniature sized on the torn up mattress.  Y/n’s little brother sure had a heart full of love for all his toys, just as you said.

They moved to stand in front of the closet as Taehyung moved forward.  He was the one who tried to barge in earlier, so he’d suck it up and stop being a weenie for once and apologize for his lack of manners: in this case, not knocking. He took a shaky breath, gripping the hairpin in his hand as he knocked three soft times.

The door handle turned as the door cracked open and a little girl, no older than 7 stood at Taehyung’s midsection.  Looking up at him through her long, thick locks that covered half her face.  Her one visible eye a shining blue contrasted to her colorless body.  He knelt down to one knee as the girl’s head followed him as they were eye to eye now.  He smiled to her, making her shoulders drop any tension they once had.  

“Why are you hiding in your closet?  I’m sure all the animals here would love to play with you?” The older man suggested as he gestured to the animals gathered on the bed.  “Wouldn’t you like to play with some friends?”  She nodded but remained in the closet, hands gripping the door handle in fear.  

“They would tease me,” she whimpered.

“Tease you?  A sweet little girl like you?  No way,” he cooed as opened his palm and showed her the hairpin.  “Tell me, is this your hairpin?”  He saw her eye shine in recognition.  “A sweet little boy showed us where you lost it and asked to give it back to its pretty owner next door.”  The little girl peeked out just a bit more to glance over into the bathroom across the way.  

“Did he finally get to play?” Taehyung looked over his shoulder to Jungkook behind him, then back to the girl in front of him.

“He had a blast playing with my friend here.  They splashed and played with his favorite duck.  Now, it’s your turn to play with your friends.”  He slowly reached forwards and the pin was able to clip into her hair, pulling her bangs fully back where the other half of her face showed an empty socket where her other shining blue eye should be. So, she lost an eye somehow.  How tragic for such a small child.  “Is that why you’re too shy to go play?”

“The grown-ups always made fun of me,” she cried as her one eye allowed a small crystal tear run down her ghostly face. “They wouldn’t let me go out and make friends because I was too scary.”

Taehyung shook his head as he poked at the little girl’s tummy and smiled at her when she let out a little giggle. “Well, can I be your friend then? And this little guy will be your friend too,” Taehyung spoke to the teddy still sat on his shoulder. “If we're your friends, then those fun little rascals behind me would love to play with you for as long as you want.”  She gasped in glee.

“Would they play hide and seek with me?”  He nodded.  

“It’s their favorite game. Go on and play now, Vivi.”  She smiled wide as she pushed open the closet door fully and stepped out.  She hugged Taehyung around his neck as she giggled in his ear and placed something in his hand before she ran off to the crowd of animals behind her.  She chatted away before running out of the room, laughing the entire way until the laughter faded, leaving only a gentle, pleasant breeze.

Taehyung stood up as Jungkook clapped his back. “Good job, now we both have some cute little ghost friends.”  Taehyung laughed as he looked at the key in his hand.  It was old, really old.  The end looped like an oval while the front of it was shaped like it would slide into a music box. “Where would there be a music box around here?”

“I think I remember seeing one downstairs on one of the dining room shelves.”  Taehyung recollected.  The two worked their way out of the room, but not before saying goodbye to their friendly ghost companions.  They would surely remember to always mind their manners now.

Just as Taehyung said, downstairs sat a single, wooden music box.  It sat about eye level with the boys as they tried to take it off the shelve, but it shouldn’t budge.  It was like it was attached on. Not wanting to possibly break anything and create a panic or worse stir up more trouble, Taehyung just placed the key in the music box on the shelf.  With 3 good cranks, the key locked in place, sticking out of the keyhole and started turned counter-clockwise and a small melody began to play.  

It was a soft tune, friendly and warm.  As Jungkook listened, the more it reminded him of you and how you were a warm presence, despite you being a ghost. Once the soft lullaby ended the key was spit back out and the wall next to the shelf slid open to reveal a hidden wall.  A secret passage of sorts.  Taehyung picked up the key and placed it next to its rightful partner; the lovely little box of lullabies.  

“Well,” Jungkook chirped, “if ever I’ve seen a horror movie-”

“We’re so going into the new hidden door. Let’s move Mr. Ghost-Professional.”  Taehyung interrupted as he shoved his friend's shoulder and the two began to shimmy through the small passageway.  It wasn’t long before the passage leads to a small opening in the floor with a ladder leading down.  

“This has to go to the cellar.” The ever attached bear of Taehyung’s moved to his head as the two began to descend the ladder without second thoughts.  It’s not like they’d through in the towel now anyways.  The assumption was correct.  The boys had indeed found themselves back to the cellar.

You were held captive against the wall from shadows, but the demon was nowhere around.  

“Y/n…!” Jungkook breathed as he ran to you and touched the black restraining you.  The shadows were just shadows.  They were a strange, disgusting black goop that felt like slime and peeled like tar as he shook his hand away from it’s gross, slimy texture.   Though, regardless of how revolting, he reached your mouth and dug away the grime from your throat.  Once you were free of the black from your tongue, you coughed and hung your head low.  “Y/n,” he repeated, “please, talk to me. Say something.” He pleaded as Taehyung joined his side.  

The bear looked at your ‘unconscious’, dull eyes figure and as it did before when it comforted you.  It shook it’s furry body and rang like a bell.  The ringing reverberated in your head as your eyes came back to life, regaining their ghostly glow as you were finally able to see the two boys- two friends in front of you.  

“Jungkook, Taehyung?”  The nodded.  “How did you get here?” They looked at each other and smiled.

“Vivi and the little boy in the bathtub helped us.  Oh, and the animal’s of course.”  Jungkook chirped.  

“You.. you helped Vivi and Jacob?” The two of them explained how they were able to help make the two children smile and laugh.  “Jacob was a little boy who was drowned by his mother.  She believed her child was cursed since he was born without a voice.  Vivi was a little girl teased constantly because when she was younger, she lost her eye in an accident.  You helped them both?”  The boys nodded.  

“They were very sweet little kids.”  You smiled.

“Thank you,” you bowed your head, best you could.  Then your smiled faded as you looked back at them and turned seriously once again.  “You two need to go.  If he comes back, then he’ll-”

“No.  We promised you, remember,” Jungkook interrupted.

“You don’t understand!  Please, just-”  You stopped short when you stiffened.  “Go back, back away to the walls.  Now, hurry!”  They did so without argument.  Just as they were on opposite walls, the demon pulled himself up from the fucking floor.  From below?  Could there be- was there another section below the cellar? The shadow moved and stood in front of you, your body that was once relaxed now shaking uncontrollably.

Jungkook stood still, staring at your expression.  For the first 2 times, he’s been saved by you, you hadn’t shown your fear.  Now, you were close to crying- weeping rather- as your father disgustingly stood above you. Ghost tears, it was almost an interesting concept if they weren’t being threatened to be spilled by you.

He slowly shuffled to a shelf, grabbing a nearby bottle and quickly throwing it.  The bottle shattered on the ground, making the shadow turn and screech.  Jungkook covered his ears, hissing.  The shadow stepped away from you, just a bit.  He still hadn’t located Jungkook yet.

Taehyung understanding gave his small, stuffed possessed companion a nod.  A shield of sorts surrounded the both of them. Taehyung was officially safe. “Hey!” He shouted. The shadow whipped around.  Seeing the spiritual essence around Taehyung, he marched with heavy steps forward.

“Wrong way!”  Now, it was Jungkook’s turn.  He held that scented wax so tightly in his warm palm, it threatened to begin to melt.  He remained completely still, not moving a muscle. When the shadow turned again, Taehyung sprint to a shelf of alcohol bottles.  Pushing every bottle off, they shattered on the hardwood floor one by one.

“You've had enough beer, pal!” Taehyung chided. You watched the two continue to jerk around and confuse the shadow- your father.  Back and forth, like a game of pong with your father as the ball. While the boys continued to distract the reel shadow demon, the teddy by Taehyung’s side rung, that same rining echoing into the small enclosure of the cellar.  

A loud screech ripped out of the shadow as he turned his back on the sound.  It seemed to cradle it’s head as it screamed and the shadow of its body almost seemed to fluctuate.  It was like bells hurt the beast?  The beast raised it's arms into the air, ready to strike into the ground.  

You forced yourself from the shadow’s harsh imprisonment for the first time ever.  You focused your entire body before you ripped free of its confines.  You were quick to get to Jungkook’s side who was currently in the way of taking the brunt of the soon to come smash of your father’s fists.  Desperate to save him, you made your entire body tangible and wrapped your arms around his shoulders, your head next to his own.

Jungkook instinctively held you against him.  It was odd, holding you.  You were solid, but light.  It was like he was hugging a breathing person, but you were so cold.  He didn’t fell the beat of your heart, didn’t feel the pushing of your chest against his when you breathed.  You were a dead person, a ghost, yet he held you.  

The shadow slammed his fists into the floor with utter rage, the wood splitting and creating chaos.  Taehyung lost his balance as he fell against the back wall, the bear floating to his chest, still protecting him with a shield of sorts.  The hole created by the beast was jagged as Jungkook and yourself fell through it. All while the demon faded away for the time being mid-tantrum.

Jungkook groaned, falling through the floor for the second time that night.  He looked at your exhausted ghostly body.  Your spiritual glow fluctuating as you seemed so tired, too tired.  He wanted to open his mouth and ask about your state, but the sound of bells silenced him.  They weren’t the sound of that dumb bear.  This sound was much different.  So pure, innocent in a sense.  

Jungkook got up, following the sound of the bells, leaving your ghostly body to lay on the ground.  He didn’t exactly know how to help someone he could no longer grasp.  He ran until he found a single case hidden in the underneath hideaway of the cellar floor. Inside that case was none other than a skeleton, full body with a set of bells next to the yellow and while colored skull.  

Down the way, your spirit fluctuated until it blew into a graceful wisp of blue. You traveled the wind until you found Jungkook; until you found your bones.  Jungkook watched in awe, it was like your soul was dancing around the body long lost to you.  A bright flame of peace.  He smiled as the bells floated towards him and he reached out with his palm as they fell into his hand.

Your spirit manifested once more- for the last time- now in a beautiful, white sundress. He smiled as did you. You came towards him, relief in your ghostly gaze.  You kissed his cheek, your flame giving warmth and spreading a wisp of blue along with it.

“Thank you, Jungkook.  Give my thanks to Taehyung as well.”  

“I will,” he almost choked.  Your spirit sprung to life, your fire bright as your spirit shot up the ceiling and out of the cellar floor- scaring the poor Taehyung mind you. Your fierce, powerful, free spirit easily located your tainted, evil father in the house and quickly wasted no time in surrounding him. Your fire latched onto his shadows, devouring it as the spirits and ghosts of your comrades, his other victims, joined your plight to finally put your father down.  

“You’ve done enough, Father.” The shadows pulled back from the host form of your father just enough to see his grotesque face once more.  Burned, disfigured and rotten was his flesh from the long age of his demons.  His time was ending, and he would get what he finally deserved.  You seethed and sneered at his face.  “Begone, you wretched disgrace.”  Engulfed by his shadows once more, he was ignited by your pure light and disappeared.  Along, so did you.  Your presence, and those others not gone.  

The house was finally vacant.

Jungkook climbed back up to the cellar, Taehyung helping him as he looked at the motionless bear at Taehyung’s feet.  

“Was she- I mean did Y/n?”

“Yeah.  she’s gone now.”

“Oh,” he spoke with a dip in his voice.  “I didn’t even get to say goodbye.”  

“Let’s get out of here, Taehyung.”  Tae nodded as he reached down and grabbed the bear at his feet, not hesitating to take the little guy along with him back to the surface.  Perhaps he had gotten a bit attached.

With the disperse of the demon, the cellar door had reappeared and the two men crawled out onto the lawn outside once again.  They rounded the house and soon took the way walk back up to the sideway at the edge of the property before turning and staring back at the house.  

“So,” Taehyung started, “what was it like?”

“What was what like?  Nearly dying?”

“Hitting on a ghost.”

“Oh my god,” Jungkook left, Taehyung laughing behind him as he held your bells tight and safe in his palm.

XXX

The following week, your remains were found by the police when Tae put in an ‘anonoymous message’ that someone was found going into that house.  Now, somehow that house- your house- was scheduled for destruction within the month. Jungkook sat in Taehyung’s room as he flipped through his newest comic he nabbed at a store downtown.

“You think they’ll rebuild over the property?” Taehyung asked as Jungkook shrugged.

“Beats me.  It’d be nice if they didn’t.  Maybe put a small little cemetery or memorial instead.”  Taehyung nodded with a smile.

“You should pitch that idea.  It’s a good one, and I’m sure the city hall would listen since a body was discovered.”  Jungkook smiled as he looked out the window of his best friend’s room.  The sunny sky devoid of any pesky clouds.

“You know, I think I just might,” Jungkook said.  He wanted to put a grave down for you, and all the other ghosts too.  For Vivi and for Jacob who were just innocent children who hadn’t done wrong; far too young for death’s unfair grip.  

That’s what he thought as he watched over the sewn up and cleaned teddy bear on Tae’s window sill.  The jingling of the two bells around his wrist that had been weaved and carefully placed onto a precious new bracelet he wore wherever he went- without exception- as they always seemed to jingle in approval.

Yes, a memorial was a fine idea.  Maybe he did like you a little bit- just a ghost of a crush.

[wonderlustlucas]

eggs - lee taeyong

⇢ prompt Breakfast does not go to the stomach, it goes to the heart. ⇢ pairing taeyong x female reader ⇢ word count 3.1k ⇢ genre fluff ⇢ warnings none unless fluff gives u whiplash :D ⇢ summary “Taeyong fluff. basically like they aren’t a couple yet but they know they both like each other so they’re all cutesy and shit :) plot doesn’t really matter tbh as long as it’s some cute ass fluff”—request ⇢ a/n take this fluffy shit and shove it up ur ass for optimum benefit

“Noona, will you please make us breakfast?” You are one hundred percent going to kill him.

“Ten, call me that again and the only thing I will cook is your arms and legs. I just bought cereal and milk, so leave me alone,” you groan like a branch under the weight of snow, rolling away from the brightness of the sun filtering through the window and swinging a leg out from beneath the covers to dangle off the bed. “No, you finished the cereal Thursday and never told me to pick up more, plus there’s no milk left,” Ten retorts, voice muffled behind the white door and at the sound of his—your—friends laughing, you feel like screaming. “Then go out and buy some more!”

“___, there’s like fifty eggs in the fridge, plus it’s past twelve and loverboy is starving, don’t you want to cook for T—“

“Okay, shut up!” You shout, accepting defeat rather than embarrassment and whipping the blankets away with an annoyed sigh. Picking a crumpled tee shirt from the floor, you pull it over your head with a certain irritation and make way for the door, swinging it open and glaring coldly at the grinning boy despite the heat growing on your cheeks like sunburn. “I hope you rot in Hell,” you hiss, jabbing a finger into his chest and stomping past him.

In a weak attempt to move past your guests as quietly as possible, you direct your attention to the floor and scurry through the living room quiet as a mouse, embarrassingly aware of loverboy’s—as Ten called him—presence. “Morning, ___.”

Caught. “Good morning,” you sigh, finally averting your gaze to look at the trio and offering a feeble wave. Maybe if you just pretend that he isn’t here, you can survive the day. However, as soon as your eyes land on Lee Taeyong and all his glory, hot rosiness is already burning its way up your neck quicker than before and settling on the apples of your cheeks. Curse you, you want to say, mouth sour and stare fixated on the brunette for a heartbeat too long until he smiles and you embarrassingly hurry on to the kitchen.

If it’s not for the incessant growling of your stomach, you truly contemplate opening the refrigerator door just to slam it back on your head; however, even though you would never admit it, cooking breakfast for Taeyong remains to be your first and foremost priority on this lovely afternoon. And so, no matter how much you don’t want to, you smack a cast-iron pan loudly on the stove and twist on the gas, pausing to count with your fingers how many eggs you’ll need before eventually just grabbing the whole carton.

You see, developing a crush on one of Ten’s friends was never part of the plan. To be entirely honest, you had laid in bed the night Ten first moved in, tucked delightfully in your duvets wondering how in the name of God you were going to survive just a week without falling for him. However, as time went on, Ten’s fiery attitude and the fact that it seemed as if his friend Johnny was the one who in fact moved in based on the amount of time he spent in your shared apartment made it quite painless to get over the brief obsession in your newest flatmate.

And while Ten does have a mentality spicier than sriracha, you could not find it in yourself to complain when he brought not one but three friends over two months into moving in. By that time, you were fairly close to Johnny, considering he was knocking on the door almost every day (at this point, you had already settled on the idea that the two were one hundred and fifty percent dating, although you would never ask), but had zero ideas that Ten even had other friends, let alone met them.

And to be quite frank, you did not expect another two attractive men to enter your life. Jung Jaehyun, quite possibly the most angelic human you have ever met and Lee Taeyong, the greatest threat to your existence.

Perhaps you would not have fallen so quickly if it was not for the fact Ten was adamant on having the three over every fucking day. The first time you met was a terrifying case of embarrassment; you had been sleeping in when you woke to quite possibly the loudest noise to ever enter your eardrums. And so, with speed faster than light, you fled from bed with nothing but measly undergarments to see what sort of Satanic ritual Ten was pulling, only to find two strangers grimacing at an enormous box now flat on the floor.

It was painfully awkward, from the moment they noticed your ghastly presence in the doorway, to the realization they just dropped the new television Ten just bought, and finally to the fact you were practically naked in front of them. Without even a glance to their faces and with a noise akin to a frightened mouse caught in a trap you spun back behind the door, slammed it closed, and dove back into bed, shivering under the covers and planning your plan of survival that included never leaving the one hundred and twenty-seven square feet of your bedroom.

However, five hours later your stomach had a mind of its own.

6:07 PM - To Ten: i will literally do absolutely anything u want ever in ur life if u bring me cereal

6:07 PM - From Ten: No shot

6:07 PM - To Ten: oh my god ten please

6:08 PM - From Ten: I think my friends need an apology for seeing ur titties this morning🤧

6:08 PM - To Ten: please dont do this to me im so hungry i will literally do anything

6:08 PM - From Ten: Bj?

6:08 PM - To Ten: yes an infinite everyday

6:08 PM - From Ten: hmmmm

6:09 PM - From Ten: nah

6:09 PM - From Ten: come get food urself

With an infuriated, muffled scream into the downy pillow, you hurl your phone to the mattress before leaning up and mentally preparing yourself for the onslaught of teasing from your sinister flatmate. Sighing obnoxiously as you exit your bedroom for the first time in almost twenty-four hours, absolutely nothing in the entire fucking universe could have prepared you enough for the unquestionably perfectly crafted specimen of Lee Taeyong.

Upon first glance, you barely noticed his figure hidden in the corner of the room, simply a monochrome silhouette concealed in the darkness. It was not until the hues flashing from the television lit up the dark space with brightly colored shades from a commercial did he come into view, seated on the farthest side of the sofa. He was like a single brilliant star on a sky of perfect midnight velvet, a star whose gravity stole the air from your lungs and left you breathless in the doorway upon first glance.

He was by far the most alluring human you have ever seen.

“Hey ___!” Ten suddenly shouted, cutting your train—or lack thereof—of thought into shreds and replacing it with your previous hatred. “Die,” was all you said, earning a chuckle from someone, although you could not seem to care to find out who and instead continued for the kitchen.

“How’s your day been?” He continued, yelling from the other room and you contemplated whacking the side of his head with a cast-iron pan. “Don’t talk to me,” you shouted back while rummaging through the refrigerator, only to pull out a container of half empty white rice left over two days prior and a gallon of Breyers Extra Creamy Vanilla from the freezer.

“Are you grumpy because of what happened this morning?” He singsongs, followed by just leave her alone from an unknown voice as you grab two spoons and slam the drawer close. He was truly pushing your buttons. Ice cream, rice, and spoons in hand you made way for the living room, paused midway, and mercilessly pegged one of the metal spoons at Ten.

It unexpectedly hit him square in the forehead, creating a chorus of oohs from the others and you beamed. “Don’t forget who owns this apartment, Chittaphon,” you sneered, gracing his friends with a beaming smile before spinning on your heels and marching back into your bedroom.

Needless to say, Ten found it in himself to never tread that deep into your patience again and even apologized the next morning. However, the image stuck in your brain of whoever sat in the corner of the living room could not go without questioning.

“Hey, who was over last night, by the way?” You asked as Ten took a seat on the couch beside you, flicking between different television channels. “Taeyong and Jaehyun.”

“Which one had the pink hair?”

Ten huffed, throwing in the towel when it came to choosing an adequate channel, “Taeyong, why?”

You shrugged, “Nothing.” He rolled his eyes. “I’m not dumb, c’mon. You think he’s cute?” More than cute.

“I only saw him for like, a millisecond,” you sniffed, waving him off and returning to your assignment. “Good news. They’re coming over again tonight!”

You groaned, throwing your head back onto the plush cushion and kneading your eyes with your knuckles. “I didn’t pick up enough groceries to feed a whole soccer team,” you sighed, lolling your head over to blink at him. “We have eggs?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Tae will help you.”

And only after a proper introduction when Johnny, Jaehyun, and Taeyong arrived an hour later, you found yourself in the talons of a trap designed to drag you down into the depths of drool-worthy dreams and endless nights of “being in your bag.”

When it came time to cook a meal for the new clan you found ravaging your apartment, it took no less than half a minute for the cotton candy haired art-major (something you found out about him during some unacceptably adorable small talk) to jump up from his spot on the loveseat to aid you in any way possible.

“You like cooking?” He asked as you passed him another egg to be whisked, and you laughed heartily. “No, I just have to so I don’t blow all my money on takeout,” you explained, shrugged, and then followed with, “well, I don’t know. If I had time to cook out of enjoyment rather than survival, I would probably like it.”

“You should, it can be really relaxing,” he said, voice luxurious velvet as he poured the whisked eggs into the hot pan. “I don’t really know any recipes,” you shrugged, watching with quiet admiration as he went through what minimal spices you had while simultaneously folding the eggs into what would eventually be an omelet.

“Oh! I’ll have to show some you one day, then,” Taeyong grinned, and no matter how hard you tried you could not fight the rosy blush warming your features.

It was at this moment you realized you were royally fucked. There was absolutely no way of getting out of this one, you told yourself, and it was a constant reminder nearly every day when him, Johnny, and Jaehyun made their entrance. It was especially obvious on days he came over after class, the top few buttons of his shirt undone and revealing an inch too much skin that made your insides crawl, or the alone time you shared when he would help you in the kitchen, when one day over the course of three months you realized it had gone from two strangers forced to feed a group of helpless college kids to a pair naturally creating meals together, including a handful too many hip bumps, tickles, and any other type of physical touching to be categorized as just friends.

“No way,” you blew Ten off one morning when he asked if you thought you would ever date Taeyong, “he doesn’t like me like that.”

When all he did was roll his eyes, some part of you truly did drop with disappointment. For if he had said, “You should hear how he talks about you,” or, “You really are a dumb bitch,” then maybe you would have had some hope. But his lack of response confirmed your thoughts: Taeyong was an unattainable love.

Four months later, you and your now crimson haired friend dragged an absolutely wasted beyond repair Ten into his bedroom, flung him onto his mattress, removed his shoes, and patted him a good night.

“Sorry you had to deal with him,” you frowned, making way for the tiny kitchen and offering him a water in which he graciously took. Lord knows, if you had known he was coming, you would have been more prepared. And yet there you were, in nothing but an oversized tee shirt in front of the man who held all the stars in his irises and the very being of you in his hands.

“Don’t worry about it,” Taeyong smiled, clicked his tongue after taking a sip of water, “either way, I got to see my gi—you.”

Realizing his miniscule slip-up, Taeyong’s eyes grew the size of saucers, as did yours. My girl? Was that what he was going to say? You gulped, windpipe suddenly dryer than any desert on Earth, heart bumping frantically in your chest because holy shit, were you to blow it off or act on it?

Taeyong cleared his throat, and you did the same, an awkward tension suddenly filling the room thick like syrup and you were suffocating. “Anyway, I’m gonna head home. G’night, ___,” said Taeyong, offering a weak pat to your cheek. You watched him in silence as he left, and as soon as the door shut behind him the world came crashing down, the walls suddenly seemed to shrink and you hopped off the barstool in order to save yourself and sped to your bedroom in a rush of excitement and undeniable shock.

Only two days later you saw him again, a mini celebration in your apartment for the end of the semester with a bit too much soju involved. You found yourself curled into his side as the antics settled down further into the night, however alcohol still had your nerves on fire and you were hyperaware of Taeyong’s hand on what was exposed of your waist where your shirt had ridden up, long fingers drawing random patterns onto the bare skin and you could not breathe.

“___,” he said, you turned from the loud Raymour & Flanigan commercial blaring from the television to look at him, eyes wide and honest and his heart lurched. He suddenly could not find it in himself anymore to ask if he could stay the night and instead languidly studied your pretty features, face hovering closely above your own so you could feel his warm breath fanning across your cheeks and he did not know what to do.

“Taeyong!”

Ten shouted and the two of you jerked back, the serene moment suddenly popped like a bubble and you wanted to scream at him for ruining the possibilities.

The exchange between Taeyong and Ten turned to nothing but marbles in your ears, the idea of kissing him much too loud and growing from a small mustard seed hidden within your brain to an enormous tree. Except now it was in bold font and flashing every color known to man because there was no way he was actually going to kiss you, right?

Fast forward nearly a month later and here you were, found in yet another treacherous predicament as the man of your dreams sat only feet away. The past twenty-seven days were the worst of your life, you tell yourself; for every time you close your eyes, all you can picture is all the diminutive moments shared with Taeyong since your almost-kiss, every insignificant touch, every drawn-out ogling, every unnecessary compliment that only increasing became worse because Ten told him that you liked him. And instead of bringing it up, too fearful to do so even though you are convinced he must like you back, you push it away, avoiding any possible interaction that will lead to your potential collapse.

And so, when a, “Hey, do you want any help?” erupts from just around the wall, you nearly drop an egg when every muscle in your body freezes because yes he’s here but no get away. “Um,” you sniff, glancing down at the dozen eggs and then back to the boy sporting hair the shade of oozy caramel, “sure.”

You go on in silence, continuously passing Taeyong an egg to be cracked and then throwing out the shells, and you are telling yourself oh, this isn’t too bad until he decides to break the relative silence, “I like you.” You blink, squint at the wall before moving around him to wash yoke from your hands, hearing the words from those damn kissable lips makes your legs burn and heart thump at a rate that definitely is not healthy. “I know,” you finally answer, voice clogged in the back of your throat so you continue, “I like you too.”

“I know,” says Taeyong once you look up at him and he bestows upon you a toothy grin.

“I’m glad that’s settled, then,” you laugh breathlessly, leaning into his side as he scrambles the eggs, cheek pressed against his bicep, “you’re bulking up, I like it.” Taeyong drops his head to look down and you glance up with a smile that cannot seem to leave your face. “Jaehyun said the same thing,” he grins, pulling his arm away so that you must pull away but, just as your lips start to pout, he pulls your body close and wraps his arms around your waist.

In a sudden surge of courage, you raise your hand to trail a finger down the razor-sharp edge of his jawline, something you have dreamed of doing for months and now that you are finally able to, you do not know whether you will ever be able to stop. “Wow,” you almost say, breathlessly infatuated by his presence, however, the sudden pressure of his lips upon yours steals your breath furthermore and suddenly everything is all him and you pull yourself closer, air hitching in your lungs, nerves fizzing with sparks, melding your mouth against his own as the anticipation of kissing him over the past months has reached its boiling point.

“Does this mean you’re my girlfriend?” Taeyong asks once you have pulled away, lips swollen red. “That’s the general plan, yes,” you laugh softly, planting a milder peck on the side of his mouth.

.

.

.

“Does anyone smell burning eggs?”

[thegravecartel]

((Alright, this ooc post will be under the cut since there’s actually quite a lot to read.  It’s basically a recap on what’s been going on irl for the past few months since the crisis is finally over, and hopefully it’s actually the end of it.))

((So, from October to after December, three other roommates and I have had to deal with a now ex-roommate that was an absolute dickhead.  That asshole was thirty-years-old, and acted like a goddamn man-child after he broke up with his girlfriend during the first few weeks he lived in the apartment five of us share.  We didn’t see any warning signs before that happened, but it eventually spiraled out of control.  During the Thanksgiving holiday, everyone was supposed to be out of town to see family because it was established among all of us that that had been the plan.

Saturday, after Black Friday, I get a text from his mother saying that she was concerned for the cat he had living with him at the time because he was in the hospital for some unknown reason.  I tell her what he told me- which was that a friend was supposed to take care of his cat while he was gone, but to my shock, he never left town for Thanksgiving.  On that very same day, one of my roommates who also has a cat living with her, sent me texts on what she came home to when she got back from Thanksgiving.  The common area (living room and kitchen) was completely trashed and looked like a hoarder’s nest.  Food from the freezer (that belonged to various roommates because we all have to share one fridge) had been strewn out on the counter and was left there to rot; the ex-roommate’s furniture was cluttering the whole living room space; all of the lights were on along with the ceiling fan; the window screens of the living room had been torn out of their frames; beer cans and dirty dishes flooded the two sinks; and the ex-roommate’s cat was starved, scared, and parched from being locked out of his room where her litter box was.

On top of that, the smoke detectors had been torn out from the ceiling.  When I got back from holiday, I immediately fed the cat and gave it water.  I tried cleaning up the common area, but ended breaking into hysterics when I tried to start cleaning up the mess by myself, so I ended up calling on my parents to help me.  Thankfully, the roommate who returned first helped me clean up the common area and get the loose cat back into the ex-roommate’s unit.  

Now, what he told us when he tried to explain the story, was that the fire alarms went off and he freaked out.  He admitted to breaking the window screens because he was trying to escape the apartment (even though we all know that he could have just used the front door, we literally live across the street from the fire department station, and we live on the first floor), but the police arrested him when he broke out.  This ended with the police taking him into custody, and incapacitating him with ketamine.  With that in mind, he made it seem like he was a victim of police brutality and only focused on trying to convince us of his innocence.  However, whenever we tried to ask him why the apartment was in such a state of utter shit, he went off on complete and utter nonsense that was completely irrelevant to what we were asking.  

Then, I turned to the property manager of the complex we live in, and they gave me information that cleared things up a bit more.  Turns out, he got the cops called him because he was freaking out when the fire alarms went off, and he wasn’t the one who tore the smoke detectors out like we speculated.  We also know that complex security locked the apartment when no one else would be in there while the ex-roommate was in the hospital, so no one broke in and just wrecked the place.  That fucker was the one who did it, but we know that he will neither admit, nor remember doing it.  This is because it turns out that this guy was not only an alcoholic, but a frequent heavy drug user.

To make things worse, the roommate who helped me clean up the wreckage confided in me that the ex-roommate had attempted to steal something from her room.  Not only that, but he consistently stole food and used her kitchen items without cleaning them afterwards, nor did he even ask for her permission to use them.  And if that wasn’t bad enough, she had told him that she’d be around the apartment over Thanksgiving because she didn’t trust him to be in the apartment by himself, but while she was packing her things to leave, she saw him staring at her through her bedroom window.  Remember, this is a thirty-year-old man subletting in an apartment with people who are in their twenty’s; my other three roommates are college students, or at least the other two are, I’m not sure about the third one.  Even creepier, the two roommates who are sharing a unit that are the youngest, told me about how the ex-roommate went to college parties to hit on the girls; alongside stalking the one other roommate when she went to campus.

For the following months, it was misery for the rest of us.  That dumbass may have apologized to us, but he never made any attempts at improving his disgusting behavior, and continued to get worse.  He’d come back to the apartment high as fuck on god knows what, waste the electricity and water by leaving all the lights on and running several loads of laundry at a time.  Not only that, but he fucked up the common area AGAIN after my roommate and I spent an entire Sunday cleaning up that goddamn mess.  Eventually, he got arrested and taken to the hospital again for breaking stuff in the apartment complex lounge.  When the cops came to the apartment, I let them in to investigate his room, and it turns out that he smuggled his cat back into the unit (which he actually never registered, and he had it there illegally) after the poor thing was previously taken out of the unit by his friend, and his room was an absolute horror show.  

Even the cops couldn’t believe the state of the unit, and after I told them everything from the Thanksgiving incident, they were in shock and ended up putting me in charge of feeding and watering his cat until further notice.  Mind you, I have a cat of my own, and don’t have enough resources to take care of two cats long-term.  However, I was able to do as instructed and made sure the cat didn’t starve.  Unfortunately, this cat was always scared and hissed at everyone, old, and required medication for anxiety.  At this point, I had recommended surrendering the cat to the local humane society if he struggled so much to care for his cat, but he refused to do so and claimed that the cat would die, as he put it (which is stupid because humane societies are no-kill shelters).  At this point, I had been constantly trying to get animal control involved, but I eventually broke down into hysterics when dispatch told me nothing could be done, and the ex-roommate would be returning to the apartment sometime soon (I was triggered, I suppose).

Fast-forward to Christmas.  The ex-roommate was supposed to have been transferred long before December even rolled around, but the law wasn’t on our side for the most part.  In fact, they ended up prolonging to suffering, much to all of our dismay.  The court system prevented the ex-roommate from moving out because he was months behind on rent, and this ended up having even more problems because I had to leave town for Christmas, leaving one of the other roommates along with the ex-roommate.  Before I had to leave, however, both of us were walking on eggshells because the ex-roommate came back into the apartment one night, high as hell, and tried breaking into her room.  While she was still in there, changing so she could get ready for a work party.

That sleazy-gross-ass fuck.  This one roommate, in specific, had the misfortune of having to deal with the brunt of the guy’s repulsive behavior.  While the rest of us were gone, he decided to spite everyone by wasting as much water and electricity as he could (which pissed me off quite a bit because I’m the one who pays everyone’s electricity bill, and he hadn’t paid me back for the previous months) to the point of forcing the other roommate to take a cold shower because he wasted all the hot water (WHICH WAS USED TO SUPPLY A FOUR BEDROOM FLAT); he threatened, screamed at, and harassed the other roommate.  He even accused her of discriminating his mental disabilities because she confronted him about tampering with her mail (which is a FELONY).  During all of this, I had been texting with her to make sure she was safe, especially because she wasn’t able to make outgoing phone calls due to being unable to pay her phone bill.  

On Christmas Eve, the ex-roommate was acting out violently, so I called the police for her, and had them reach out to her (A friend of mine pointed out that- I think- the police department can be contacted through text, but I had no idea at the time).  Finally, I return to the apartment, and unfortunately- the ex-roommate is still given the rights to enter and leave the apartment as he pleased.  But at the time, I was far too pissed off to remember this; as a result, he got locked out of the apartment.  Funny thing is, while he had screamed and cursed at the other roommate for dead-bolting him out because she didn’t feel safe, he did absolutely nothing after he was finally let back in.  He realized I had come back, and because he thought he could have his last hoorah while I was gone, I made the last days he was living in the apartment an absolute hell for him.

It wasn’t even hard to do, all I had to do was be there.  The very day I got back, he acted like an animal with its tail between its legs once he realized I had returned.  Mind you, it was just my other roommate and I currently present when he started cowering, we even laughed about it in the kitchen while he was in his room- and could hear us throw shade.  I stared at him through the opening of my bedroom door when he came back into the apartment, he just ducked right back into his room without a word.  Even better, I had the chance to tell him right to his face that his apologies didn’t mean shit to me, and that was all I needed to say to verbally destroy him.  

He couldn’t even talk shit to the other roommate the one time I was out of the apartment; she was in the kitchen, made eye contact with him and waited for him to say something, but he just hung his head in shame and went back into hiding.  I had never wanted to physically hurt someone so much in my life, but at least the story was coming to an end.  He eventually just disappeared- which we found out that it was because he got arrested for forgery, and he got arrested again for misconduct on the apartment complex property.  Unfortunately, he left behind his cat, and she had been left to starve in his room with some hairband bracelet thing around her neck.  Even after reporting this to animal control, and having the property manager try to push for an officer to take the cat into custody, I once again volunteered to feed and water the cat until the authorities could reach a proper decision.  

Over the course of the days, I did my best to get the cat used to socializing (because she was constantly locked in the ex-roommate’s unit all the damn time), and she warmed up more and more each day.  Finally, I was given legal permission to take her to the humane society and surrender her myself.  Vet techs were able to remove the thing around her neck, and I got to see her again during my last volunteer shift.  She remembered me, and let me pet her; it was rewarding to see her so happy for once, and it is an absolute relief knowing that the ex-roommate can no longer try to take her back.  She belongs to the humane society I volunteer at now, and that was an accomplishment that I was glad to keep persisting on achieving.  

In the end, the ex-roommate is officially no longer allowed to step foot on the complex property by law, the locks have been changed, and all the trash called his belongings that were left in the common area were finally removed today.  I thank you all for being so patient with me, not just during the time of the irl problems, but also just in general.  My energy has been on a weird on-and-off basis lately, and this had greatly taken a toll on my muse.  I’ll keep doing my best though, and rest assured, I have the threads in my Drafts.  I’m just constantly tired.))

[angelofthenightposts]

Feel it still. // Ch.2

Series Masterlist. | My Masterlist.

“I don’t think Sam likes me.” You take a sip of your beer and reach out to bowl on the coffee table to grab a handful of popcorn. Steve takes his eyes off from the TV for a second; he arches his left eyebrow at your sudden opinion before taking a sip from his bottle.

“Don’t take him to the heart, he likes you. He just, he has a little trouble in getting along with women, that’s all. “

You have just come home after your shift and found Steve watching the old baseball game in the living room, even though it is pretty late considering it’s a weekday. You changed your clothes into comfy sweatpants and an old t-shirt before joining him on the couch. It is a little over a week since you moved in, and knock on wood it’s all great. Steve is the first person you became friends with as expected. He is a polite, thoughtful, and decent man, and you have no reason not to like him. On the other hand, Sam is still at the phase of ignoring your presence.

“If you say so… Oh god, the dead pixels on the TV screen are killing me.”

You love the place, you really do, but the thing is a few things are old. For example, on the second day you finished moving in, you had a little incident at the shower and the only person to save you from stuck valve was Bucky. All day of him messing you wasn’t enough apparently.  It was Saturday, your day off and you found Bucky in the kitchen eating cornflakes as you left your room to grab a cup of coffee. You would rot in hell if you kept lying that you didn’t like him; you had always a thing for a man like him, mysterious, a bit flirty. But you didn’t want to risk everything out just for your biological time. Everything was normal until he asked you if you liked what you see; until that point you weren’t aware that you were staring at his body, it was impossible not to; his bare chest looked so good to ignore it in the first place. But just to avoid any uncomfortable situation, you teased him that he wasn’t your type; his laugh was enough to let you know he didn’t believe you. The thing that frustrated you the most was his nickname for you. No matter how many times you asked him not to call you, angel, he didn’t stop.

“We need to get a new TV.” You nod as you try to find a more comfortable position in your seat and not to miss the game at the same time, baseball is never your thing but watching with Steve is always fun. With key clicking and door shutting, you both look over your shoulders. Bucky throws his keys into a corner and walks towards you. For a second he stands still as if he can’t decide where to sit, you shake your head no, he shouldn’t sit next to you, your side of the couch is barely enough for you.

He lifts your legs up and sits down on the couch. When you roll your eyes and try to sit up Bucky catches your ankle with his left hand. “It’s okay, angel, stretch your legs.”

Steve doesn’t take his gaze away from you two; he is surprised that his childhood friend came home tonight. It’s 02.20; he usually spends the night with the women he met at the parties. Bucky, while drawing circles on your soft skin, notices Steve’s curious eyes and shrugs. “I didn’t get much pleasure at the party.”

“Do you mean you didn’t get pleasure from the party or the women at the party?” you ask him with a grin on your face and take your bottle to your lips. Bucky doesn’t answer you but it’s clear that he is happy to find someone who likes to mess with people as much as he does. He reaches for your hand and pulls the cold bottle to himself. You watch him taking a big sip of it, “Dude, there is literally a bottle in front of you.”

He shrugs again and tells you something about being more delicious this way.  You got used to his flirty mood because you know, he could flirt with anyone, and it is not that special. You turn your eyes back at the screen, trying to ignore the slight touches on your legs. It feels so good, you’re a sucker for featherlike touches; you find it hard to keep your eyes open as his index finger draws another circle.  

“I think, I’m going to head out to sleep, it was so tiring tonight. Good night, fellas.” You are unaware of two pairs of eyes that stared at your body as you stand up and walk to your bedroom.  The tattoo, which is seen because of your shorts, attracts the attention of both men and it looks like a masterpiece on your skin.

“This girl will be a cause of my death.” Bucky in surprise looks away from you, he has never thought that his friend would be bold to say that.

“Yeah, mine too. But don’t forget our deal. No funny business. ” he warns Steve, as the green-eyed monster called jealousy tries to take control over his body.

//xxx//

It is the next day, you are in your bedroom, and getting ready to go out; you and Michela are going to meet for a cup of coffee. And suddenly you hear a curse coming from the living room, it is nothing unusual, the guys love cursing at things they can’t change or take control over. After putting your keys and your smartphone in the bag, you notice that it’s Steve’s voice, and a couple of seconds later other two join him. You leave the room to see what it’s about and find them standing in front of the TV. Sam is staring blankly at the black wire he holds in the air while Steve and Bucky are removing the TV from the wall. "Um, what’s going on here?”

“It’s gone; we have to buy a new one.” If they decide to get a big, high-quality TV like this one, you would have to eat your shoe for the next week. But you can’t just tell them that, it’s way too embarrassing for you so you try to find another way.

“Nope, we don’t; we just have to get one from somewhere.” As the three men look at you with confused expressions, you grab Steve’s car keys and throw them at him, “Come on, we need to hurry before she comes back.”

 "So your big plan is going to your old apartment and stealing TV? “ You unbuckle your seatbelt and look out the window after Steve parks his car in front of your old place. It feels weird, it’s been only one week since you moved out but the place feels foreign. You roll your eyes at Sam as you look back over your left shoulder.

"I am not stealing it; I am just taking it back. I bought it a few months ago with my own money, and I won’t let that bitch use it. "

"It sounds dangerous to me.”Steve joins in the conversation as he turns off the ignition, his eyes meet with Sam’s at the rearview mirror.

“No, it’s not. All we have to do is to get off the car, take the TV and drive back. But if you don’t have the balls to do this, wait for me in the car. "You step out of the car and begin to walk to the entrance of the building. You want to look back to check if your friends are behind. They can’t really be that scared to send you up alone, can they?

"Wait for us!”You see them running towards the elevator; Bucky is the first one to reach you and Steve and Sam after him, grunting.

"I know you wouldn’t let me do this all by myself. But we can’t all go up, someone has to watch out. Bucky, you come with me. Steve, wait for us in the car, I want you to be ready if we have to drive away. And Sam, you let me know if Maria comes back." It feels like a scene from bank robbery movies and you all nod each other excitingly.

"Well, I don’t know what Maria looks like.” Sam stops the sliding door of the elevator once he realizes the problem.

“Let me know if some blond, faint-hearted bitch comes.”

    Bucky and you are in front of the door, he asks you what you are waiting for but quickly you shush him. The moment you hear a voice, you are all out.  But there is nothing so, with the pleasure of justifying that Maria isn’t at home, you push the key into the hole and open the door.

“Oh god, someone is dead.” At first, you laugh at Bucky’s reaction but your eyes are also burning with the disgusting smell. The place is a mess; the health department is probably on its way to shut it down. “Is that a condom? I thought your roommate is gay." You grimace after a glance at the used object that Bucky points at the floor. You suppress the desire to open the window and fill the inside with fresh air and you point to the television.

"Come on; help me get the cables out.” You quickly take an action but look up when Bucky stands still and does nothing to help you.  He is staring at you, you basically kneel before him and he looks so intimidating. He rubs his chin with his finger and grins at you, you know he’s about to comment something naughty but you stop him arching an eyebrow.

“You’re gonna break it, let me.” He kneels next to you and you watch Bucky pulling the cables out of the sockets by one by. He is as muscular and big as Steve; his thick arms seem to tear his white t-shirt at any moment. Since he is so focused, his sharp white teeth sunk into his bottom lip. You finally take the TV and stand up but a voice stops you both, your phone in your pocket starts to buzz. You hear keys clicking and the door burst opens. Now, what are you supposed to? Maria folds her arms over her chest and gives you the look, the angry one.

  Steve hands you the ice bag and sits down on the couch, a worried look on his face. You gladly put it on your swollen eyebrow, biting your lip and sucking in a sharp breath with pain. You rest your head on the headrest and shut your eyes when Sam offers you help, you give him the ice. As he gently puts it back on your face, you cross your legs on the coffee table. “I still can’t believe you fought with that girl over a television.”

“If I wasn’t in shock, I would record all fight. It would be viral on YouTube. "You want to flip out Bucky; since you came back all he does is to tease you about your catfight with Maria. Sure you could’ve found a wise answer to tell him if you’re not so fucked up, but your all muscles are aching.

"I’m happy to have a nice new TV, though,” Steve says before going to the fridge and pulls out beers for everyone. He hands you one after opening it for you, you realize even Sam isn’t so distant from you, it makes you smile.

“Is it strange that I still find you still sexy, despite your wounds and bruises?” If your eyes aren’t closed you would’ve rolled your eyes at Bucky, but instead of that you just snort.

“Dude, you have to get laid immediately. You are acting like a horny teenager. And it’s creepy because you are 26 years old man.” Sam tells his friend and you all agree.

[landoftheoutsiders]

Day 8: A Recap & Short Rant About Shitty People

Today I drove from about 1:00pm to 11:00pm with an hour break to see a friend on the way from NC to GA. I thought I was going to have to complete a play analysis tonight for my class, but come to find out that low and behold, there is a God and he is in my corner because ya girl’s analysis is due tomorrow night at 10:00pm! So that means I can get a good night’s sleep and be refreshed for the next day after a solid 4 days of staying up until 4:00 am and trying not to die the next day.       Today stared off like any other day. Waking up to my alarm, silencing it a solid 15 times before waking up, and then staring at the ceiling wondering why the fuck I’m still alive. I went to go have a nice breakfast with an old friend at the Waffle House, and then all of that came to a halting stop when the Wicked Bitch of West Atlanta (WBWA) and I had this conversation:           WBWA: “Hey Rian, hope you had fun out of town. I see you didn’t come to get your food out. At 1:30 I’m putting everything in get fridge thats yours in a trash bag and it will be outside since it smells. If you plan on staying here again, let us know and we’ll change your shower curtain back.”           Me: “Actually, I’m still out of town. I left Tuesday morning. I don’t care if you throw stuff away. Don’t leave it on the patio though.”           WBWA: “Okay, you said a few days, and its been 5. Another reason to be really clear about when you plan to do something. And you should care if someone has to clean up after you. I’m either leaving it on the patio or in your room.”           Me: “I’m coming home later tonight, so if you leave them in the fridge, I’ll get them tomorrow.”      Okay, so my initial response was kind of bitchy, but this human being has been doing this petty shit for a solid 6 months now, and I’m done being patient and trying to play nice. She apparently wants to deal with a bitch, so I’m going to gracefully deliver; however, she wants to talk about how I should care about when other people have to clean up after me. CAN WE TALK ABOUT THE SEVERAL TIMES I HAVE CLEANED OUT THE FRIDGE AND HAVE THROWN OUT HER MOLDY ASS FOOD, HAVE PUT AWAY HER SMELLY ASS CAT FOOD, AND HAVE REORGANIZED THE CABINETS BECAUSE FOR WHATEVER GOD FORSAKEN REASON, SHE CANT SEEM TO KEEP ORDER TO ANYTHING??? Because... I really want to.       Oh, and the thing with the shower. curtain. Let me set the scene for you. WBWA has her own bathroom, Aloof (our other roommate) and I share a bathroom. Now. When Aloof moved in, she brought soooo much furniture. Which WBWA and I were thankful for. But she changed literally everything, and things in our bathroom we share that she didn’t even ask my input on. Whatever... I can deal. I was mildly freaking out though because everything was on our patio while we were trying to get everything settled. Mind you, our patio is on the ground level. If people wanted to, they could steal our shit.      But back to the shower curtain. Aloof had a conversation/asked in passing (I’m not sure which) with WBWA if I’d care if she put up her shower curtain in the bathroom we shared. WBWA asked me... I told her I felt as though so much has already changed, I would really like if my curtain stayed up. Fast forward to a few days ago. WBWA and I had this conversation:           WBWA: “Hey Rian, your fish tank was making a lot of noise for a really long time today, so I unplugged it. Been meaning to mention, there is rotting food in the fridge--Next time you’re here, would you please make time to get rid of it all? I could use the extra space. And do you mind if we open your door to show people coming to look at the apartment what the room looks like?” [side note, thanks for killing my fish, fam. Especially without even telling me that my fish tank was making noise]           Me: “I’m going out of town for a few days, so when I get back I’ll clean it. Then you can show it. I’ll get the food when I come as well.”           WBWA: “Thank you! Miss ya! [the polygraph detected that was a lie] Have fun out of town. Just remembered to ask--Do you prefer that your shower curtain stays up in the bathroom?”           Me: “Yes please.”           WBWA: “Thumbs up emoji”

     First of all.... Why are you in my room without my permission or even saying something about my fish tank. Second of all, Why are you, yet again, asking for an opinion about something that doesn’t concern you? Third of all, why in the absolute fuck are you going to ask my my opinion on something if you’re going to do what you want to do anyways? People. This isn’t even scratching the fucking surface of the bullshit that I have had to deal with. Again, I’ll make a post on that later, but I swear to fucking god, if this bitch has put rotting food in my room or on the patio, I’m going to lose my shit.       I’m honestly over the consistent lack of respect for my property, the double standards, the themes of a need for controlling others, and undertones of manipulation. The reason why I say themes is because you don’t quite see any of this coming when you first meet her. She’s a little odd, but most people chalk it up to, “well maybe she’s just a little awkward.” No. She is a lot awkward. She told my boyfriend at the time that 26 was a sexy age in front of me.      Did I mention that she is 30? Aloof is also 30. What the actual fuck am I dealing with. So I’m taking away the Keurig that is mine without a warning, and if there is anything on the patio or in my room that resembles food--I’m putting all of her shit that is out of place on the goddamn patio like she has been doing to me for months that I have just let slide. I’ve turned the other cheek, I’ve been nice about it, I’ve tried to just pick my battles, but she has broken the thin ice she was on with me, and the bitch is about to barely be treading water.       WBWA also wants to have a conversation and buy me a birthday present in a few weeks. The present is going on the patio where she thinks everything else belongs, and we can definitely have this talk. But she is not going to be prepared for the shit I’m going to say. This time I’m coming prepared with an itemized list of grievances along with my psychoanalysis of the whole situation. I’ve been holding this in for a very long time, and I’m done being nice. Take note in this, reader: Don’t fuck over an Aries. We may have a lot of patience, but once they’re done giving endless second chances, you’re done. If you don’t understand that you’re done and you keep provoking us, we’re going to have some shit to say.       Jesus... okay. Rant over. Thats basically it though. Everything else that has happened was nice. My mom helped me dye my hair, and we watched Rent while doing it. Fuck I feel like I need a shot of tequila or something after that rant. The wedding I went down for was so beautiful. It was a small ceremony and it was honestly perfect. I caught the bouquet and my friend who was getting married came up to me and said, “this is a get your shit together bouquet.” Which honestly I didn’t mind.. I could use some inspiration. My mom got so excited and I simply said, “don’t hold your breath.” I’m not really marriage material. I'm not good at the whole family thing. I also don’t want to pass on my DNA because that poor kid would be all kinds of fucked up.  I think thats honestly it. I'm tired after driving all day and my brain feels suffocated by the childish behavior coming from my awful roommate. I can't wait until a, I move into my next apartment in June, and b, Aloof realizes how shitty of a human being WBWA is when they get a new roommate. Or maybe they’ll find someone who is also just as indifferent and passive as Aloof and WBWA can have complete control over their apartment and wonder why she’s alone while sitting with her cat. God I just don’t think I’ve loathed someone as much as I have her. I’ll have to make the explanation post about her soon. I hope your living situation is much less toxic than mine. -- Rian Dianna

[endlessarchite]

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex!

If you haven’t already heard the news: we’re doubling down in the beach house department. And I mean the “double” part quite literally because we lost our minds and bought a DUPLEX!

If you caught our podcast yesterday, you already know the whys, hows, and wheres of this story. The price was right (we even got them down 30K), the location is awesome (close to the park, shops, and a few blocks from the beach), and we didn’t feel like we could ever afford this much house in such a great spot if we waited much longer. This small town only has so many affordable fixer-uppers available before everything gets renovated and we get priced out (we paid $220K for this, which breaks down to $110K per side – which is cheaper than the pink one!).

But there’s lots more of the story in the podcast (you can listen in the player below) including how it took us a few weeks to come around to its charm and how we’re making this all work financially (spoiler: we were able to pay off our mortgage here in Richmond – and we share specifics about exactly how we did that).

But if you just haven’t had a chance to listen yet, here are tons of details, photos, and even two video tours for you. #SoMuchMoreToTile #LonelyToilet #Also,WhoHidesWindows?!

The Basics

This is another historic fixer-upper in the quaint Chesapeake Bay-side town of Cape Charles on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. We talked more about why we’ve fallen hard for Cape Charles back when we shared our pink house purchase last year (and I’ll be calling it the “pink house” in this post for clarity’s sake). Not only is the duplex in the same town as our pink house, it’s actually on the same street – just two doors down!

Yep, our two houses are separated by just one home (the one that was featured on HGTV). This street was a big part of why we bought the pink house thanks to its proximity to the shops/park/beach, so location was also a HUGE reason that we were attracted to the duplex.

We’ve always known the pink house wouldn’t be our last big project, but I can’t say we were expecting to dive into another one quite this quickly. But over the months of working on our pink house, we noticed how limited the inventory was for houses in Cape Charles that fit our price range. So the good location and price of this duplex accelerated our plans a little bit – and despite our initial aversions to this house, we just couldn’t fight that feeling anymore. We wanted the dang duplex. Badly.

Beyond just the excitement of another project, the duplex made a lot of practical sense too:

It creates additional vacation rental opportunities. We won’t use this ourselves, so it creates two spaces dedicated solely for renting to others – great for times when we plan to stay at the pink house, but still want to earn rental income.

It accommodates larger groups or pink house overflow. Our pink house is 3 bedrooms (4 if you count the bunk room) but all together, we’re hoping to create 6 bedrooms in the duplex. So groups that can’t squeeze into ol’ pinkie could rent both sides of the duplex instead. We also may use it when our own extended family or friends want to vacation with us, which is pretty handy since it’s so close.

Renovating a duplex can be more efficient. Although we have double the kitchens and baths to redo (oh the tiling! THE TILING!!), many of the big tasks – like replacing the roof/siding, foundation fixes, or landscape updates  – are a lot more cost effective and time efficient because we can do them all at once, whereas it may have taken us a few years to fix up two separate houses.

Plus, having already established our go-to contractors in Cape Charles and worked out some of the kinks of the process while doing the pink house, this project seems a LOT less daunting than our first go ’round.

The Before Tour

The duplex is split right down the middle, with each side being a mirror of the other in layout, but NOT in condition, look, or….um…smell. One side smells exactly like the apartment I rented in Queens for a year (and no, that is not a compliment). The home had previously been a long-term rental property but the tenants on both sides moved out earlier this summer before the owner listed it for sale. So let’s start with a video tour of the LEFT SIDE, since it’s the one we previewed in our podcast show notes yesterday. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  If you can’t watch the video right now, I’ve got photos below – but first here’s the (shorter) video tour of the RIGHT SIDE, which is in slightly better condition. Oh, and be warned, there’s a smoke detector beep in this one, so if you’ve got a dog who freaks out at the stuff (we’re speaking from experience) you might want to throw on some headphones. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  The Left Side

As you saw in the videos, both sides open right into the stairwell. We’re hoping we can open up the wall to the living room to let more natural light into the stairs and make them feel less cramped. You know, sort of like this.

From the doorway, you can step into the living room, which is pretty decently sized. The floors are in better shape than they look, so we know they’ll refinish beautifully (don’t mind that carpet pad that got stuck to them). And see that bubbled part of the ceiling to the left of the fan? That’s a leak with some mold on it. It continues down the wall and there’s actually a hole above that paneling that’s so big you could stick your arm into it. You could but I’m not volunteering.

Beyond the living room is a dining room of sorts, which has a narrow galley kitchen attached to it. Spoiler alert: we will not be keeping that fridge location or the trim color.

The kitchen is in rough shape. It appears to be squeezed into a former side porch area and connects to a small dark hallway in the back with an old water heater and a door that leads to the backyard. So we definitely want to rethink this layout to make it more functional.

Actually we want to tweak the entire downstairs layout so it’s more functional. Sherry mentioned trying to add a bedroom down here in the video, but since recording that we’re brewing another plan that’ll keep all the bedrooms upstairs and result in a larger kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, and laundry area down here instead. What’s that old saying? “Your first idea is rarely your best idea.” Truth.

Moving along… there are two bedrooms and one full bath upstairs right now, all of which are off of this little landing at the top of the steps.

The rooms upstairs are surprisingly large, which is why we think there’s gotta be a way to squeeze in a third bedroom (and maybe even a second bathroom) if we reconfigure things. Here’s the front bedroom:

The back bedroom got the same wood paneling treatment as the front bedroom (it’s just painted white) along with the same foam square ceiling panels that have been glued over the actual drywall or plaster. We have a working theory that someone many years ago just disguised problem areas with more and more coverings: wallpaper, foam ceilings panels, fake wood paneling, etc. So who knows what we’ll find behind them, but the pink house has trained us well. I ain’t afraid of no ghosts duplex.

The bathroom sits between the two bedrooms and is, again, remarkably large for the overall size of the house. It’s also shaped like a weirdly long triangle, which is why we’d love to find a way to split it into two better laid out bathrooms. We’re still sketching alternative floor plan options, so we’ll share those when we land on something we think could work.

Here it is from another angle. Is it bad that I’m actually kinda liking that treatment on the shower doors? It’s like a modesty decal.

The Right Side

While the layout on each side is identical, the look and condition of this side is slightly better. And the living room is keeping things interesting with green and blue trim. Oddly enough it has a ceiling leak along the exterior wall just like the other side, but it’s right out of frame in the shot below.

This side also sports a fridge just hanging out in the dining room, and some faux greenery (you know Sherry loves a faux plant or ten).

Upstairs is where things get sticky. And I mean that literally. The floors up here have a thin layer of adhesive that grabs your shoes with every step. It appears to be from some vinyl tiles that got peeled up, but the stickiness suspiciously continues ON TOP of the remaining vinyl tiles. Layers upon layers upon layers, guys. It’s a theme.

I personally have not even walked fully into this room yet because it’s so sticky. Sherry’s a braver person than me, but it basically ripped her flip-flops apart when she first toured this house with the realtor. She described it as hilarious for the first minute and then just plain savage as she fought to flip and flop her way outta there without getting glue all over her feet.

The stickiness stops at the back bedroom thanks to the carpet. And I can’t say I hate the wall color in here. It’s kind of a moody eggplant. But as you can see in the video, we think there’s some rot/moisture damage behind the foam ceiling panels and the fake wood paneling – but on the bright since there’s also a brick chimney hiding in one corner, so we’re hoping to expose it when we peel off all of the various other coverings.

The bathroom on this side actually has a clawfoot tub in it. Were we not in the midst of fixing up our tub in the pink house already, I’d be tempted to steal this one for that house since it’s in much better condition to start. Both this bathroom (and the one on the other side) are so large and oddly shaped you could drop a 5 x 7′ rug on the floor and it wouldn’t touch anything. It’s like a skating rink of space that’s not being used. So again, the name of the game is to bring this place back to its former glory, strip away all of the strange add-ons that hide/cover various things, and reconfigure things so they make a little more sense and are hopefully a lot more like how this house was laid out originally.

I’ll end this tour with the view looking back down the stairs at the front door (don’t mind the mylar “Happy Birthday” balloon that lives on this side of the house – it’s like a less sinister version of the red Pennywise balloon). Picture the left side of the stairway wall taken down so that it opens into the living room (again, sort of like this). Our contractor thinks we can do it so we’re itching to get started.

The Plan

Right now we’re in the excitement / daydreaming phase of this renovation. We don’t have any immediate plans to start knocking down walls yet since we’re trying to wrap up a few things on the pink house first (it’s so close to being done we can taste it!). But as you can tell, we’re certainly deep into brainstorming what this house COULD look like and how we could give it all the love it needs. Because it needs some serious love. And also some serious deodorizing. No one is sure of the exact year this was built (one local historian guessed the 1880’s, which might be a stretch, but we know it’s at least 100 years old) and it has certainly seen some things over the years.

We plan to work with the same contractor we have used on the pink house (he’s already brainstorming floorpans with us!) since we’ll need to do a lot of the same whole-house updates we did to the pink house: all new plumbing & electrical, new HVAC system, new roof & siding… THE WORKS. But our main decisions at the offset are: (1) how do we maximize the floorplan and (2) how do we make the front more attractive.

Sherry found this inspiration photo online and it’s definitely not identical to ours, but comparing them at the same angle like this definitely convinced us there’s plenty of charm to unlock here.

image source

We also came across another duplex a couple blocks away that helped us “see” how ours might fit into town once we fix it up. Picture this one with mint green shutters and doors like this – or maybe wood doors and these shutters? Or maybe this color for the shutters? Please stand by as we flip flop more than Sherry’s sticky flip flops trying to make it out of that bedroom. It was like human flypaper, folks.

Unlike the house above, which appears to have its original decorative details (how awesome is that ornate trim under the porch ceiling?!) we learned that the decorative trim on our house is far from original and was probably added pretty recently – especially the wagon wheels) so we’re thinking that’ll go. But we do have those cool diamond windows in the middle which, get this, are currently covered over with plywood inside (!!!) to make for more closet space. No way those things are staying covered up!

So there’s the rundown. We’ll share a lot more info, photos, and videos as we go, and a big thank you to everyone who was so excited and encouraging about this news yesterday. We still feel a little bit like we’ve lost our minds, but your enthusiasm (and shouts of “you’re crazy… but I’m into it!” brought big smiles to our faces). So when our eyes are crossed from a month straight of tiling double the bathrooms and kitchens I want you to lean in real close and whisper “I told you you were crazy.”

The post A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! appeared first on Young House Love.

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! published first on http://ift.tt/2qxZz2j

[statusreview]

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex!

If you haven’t already heard the news: we’re doubling down in the beach house department. And I mean the “double” part quite literally because we lost our minds and bought a DUPLEX!

If you caught our podcast yesterday, you already know the whys, hows, and wheres of this story. The price was right (we even got them down 30K), the location is awesome (close to the park, shops, and a few blocks from the beach), and we didn’t feel like we could ever afford this much house in such a great spot if we waited much longer. This small town only has so many affordable fixer-uppers available before everything gets renovated and we get priced out (we paid $220K for this, which breaks down to $110K per side – which is cheaper than the pink one!).

But there’s lots more of the story in the podcast (you can listen in the player below) including how it took us a few weeks to come around to its charm and how we’re making this all work financially (spoiler: we were able to pay off our mortgage here in Richmond – and we share specifics about exactly how we did that).

But if you just haven’t had a chance to listen yet, here are tons of details, photos, and even two video tours for you. #SoMuchMoreToTile #LonelyToilet #Also,WhoHidesWindows?!

The Basics

This is another historic fixer-upper in the quaint Chesapeake Bay-side town of Cape Charles on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. We talked more about why we’ve fallen hard for Cape Charles back when we shared our pink house purchase last year (and I’ll be calling it the “pink house” in this post for clarity’s sake). Not only is the duplex in the same town as our pink house, it’s actually on the same street – just two doors down!

Yep, our two houses are separated by just one home (the one that was featured on HGTV). This street was a big part of why we bought the pink house thanks to its proximity to the shops/park/beach, so location was also a HUGE reason that we were attracted to the duplex.

We’ve always known the pink house wouldn’t be our last big project, but I can’t say we were expecting to dive into another one quite this quickly. But over the months of working on our pink house, we noticed how limited the inventory was for houses in Cape Charles that fit our price range. So the good location and price of this duplex accelerated our plans a little bit – and despite our initial aversions to this house, we just couldn’t fight that feeling anymore. We wanted the dang duplex. Badly.

Beyond just the excitement of another project, the duplex made a lot of practical sense too:

It creates additional vacation rental opportunities. We won’t use this ourselves, so it creates two spaces dedicated solely for renting to others – great for times when we plan to stay at the pink house, but still want to earn rental income.

It accommodates larger groups or pink house overflow. Our pink house is 3 bedrooms (4 if you count the bunk room) but all together, we’re hoping to create 6 bedrooms in the duplex. So groups that can’t squeeze into ol’ pinkie could rent both sides of the duplex instead. We also may use it when our own extended family or friends want to vacation with us, which is pretty handy since it’s so close.

Renovating a duplex can be more efficient. Although we have double the kitchens and baths to redo (oh the tiling! THE TILING!!), many of the big tasks – like replacing the roof/siding, foundation fixes, or landscape updates  – are a lot more cost effective and time efficient because we can do them all at once, whereas it may have taken us a few years to fix up two separate houses.

Plus, having already established our go-to contractors in Cape Charles and worked out some of the kinks of the process while doing the pink house, this project seems a LOT less daunting than our first go ’round.

The Before Tour

The duplex is split right down the middle, with each side being a mirror of the other in layout, but NOT in condition, look, or….um…smell. One side smells exactly like the apartment I rented in Queens for a year (and no, that is not a compliment). The home had previously been a long-term rental property but the tenants on both sides moved out earlier this summer before the owner listed it for sale. So let’s start with a video tour of the LEFT SIDE, since it’s the one we previewed in our podcast show notes yesterday. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  If you can’t watch the video right now, I’ve got photos below – but first here’s the (shorter) video tour of the RIGHT SIDE, which is in slightly better condition. Oh, and be warned, there’s a smoke detector beep in this one, so if you’ve got a dog who freaks out at the stuff (we’re speaking from experience) you might want to throw on some headphones. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  The Left Side

As you saw in the videos, both sides open right into the stairwell. We’re hoping we can open up the wall to the living room to let more natural light into the stairs and make them feel less cramped. You know, sort of like this.

From the doorway, you can step into the living room, which is pretty decently sized. The floors are in better shape than they look, so we know they’ll refinish beautifully (don’t mind that carpet pad that got stuck to them). And see that bubbled part of the ceiling to the left of the fan? That’s a leak with some mold on it. It continues down the wall and there’s actually a hole above that paneling that’s so big you could stick your arm into it. You could but I’m not volunteering.

Beyond the living room is a dining room of sorts, which has a narrow galley kitchen attached to it. Spoiler alert: we will not be keeping that fridge location or the trim color.

The kitchen is in rough shape. It appears to be squeezed into a former side porch area and connects to a small dark hallway in the back with an old water heater and a door that leads to the backyard. So we definitely want to rethink this layout to make it more functional.

Actually we want to tweak the entire downstairs layout so it’s more functional. Sherry mentioned trying to add a bedroom down here in the video, but since recording that we’re brewing another plan that’ll keep all the bedrooms upstairs and result in a larger kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, and laundry area down here instead. What’s that old saying? “Your first idea is rarely your best idea.” Truth.

Moving along… there are two bedrooms and one full bath upstairs right now, all of which are off of this little landing at the top of the steps.

The rooms upstairs are surprisingly large, which is why we think there’s gotta be a way to squeeze in a third bedroom (and maybe even a second bathroom) if we reconfigure things. Here’s the front bedroom:

The back bedroom got the same wood paneling treatment as the front bedroom (it’s just painted white) along with the same foam square ceiling panels that have been glued over the actual drywall or plaster. We have a working theory that someone many years ago just disguised problem areas with more and more coverings: wallpaper, foam ceilings panels, fake wood paneling, etc. So who knows what we’ll find behind them, but the pink house has trained us well. I ain’t afraid of no ghosts duplex.

The bathroom sits between the two bedrooms and is, again, remarkably large for the overall size of the house. It’s also shaped like a weirdly long triangle, which is why we’d love to find a way to split it into two better laid out bathrooms. We’re still sketching alternative floor plan options, so we’ll share those when we land on something we think could work.

Here it is from another angle. Is it bad that I’m actually kinda liking that treatment on the shower doors? It’s like a modesty decal.

The Right Side

While the layout on each side is identical, the look and condition of this side is slightly better. And the living room is keeping things interesting with green and blue trim. Oddly enough it has a ceiling leak along the exterior wall just like the other side, but it’s right out of frame in the shot below.

This side also sports a fridge just hanging out in the dining room, and some faux greenery (you know Sherry loves a faux plant or ten).

Upstairs is where things get sticky. And I mean that literally. The floors up here have a thin layer of adhesive that grabs your shoes with every step. It appears to be from some vinyl tiles that got peeled up, but the stickiness suspiciously continues ON TOP of the remaining vinyl tiles. Layers upon layers upon layers, guys. It’s a theme.

I personally have not even walked fully into this room yet because it’s so sticky. Sherry’s a braver person than me, but it basically ripped her flip-flops apart when she first toured this house with the realtor. She described it as hilarious for the first minute and then just plain savage as she fought to flip and flop her way outta there without getting glue all over her feet.

The stickiness stops at the back bedroom thanks to the carpet. And I can’t say I hate the wall color in here. It’s kind of a moody eggplant. But as you can see in the video, we think there’s some rot/moisture damage behind the foam ceiling panels and the fake wood paneling – but on the bright since there’s also a brick chimney hiding in one corner, so we’re hoping to expose it when we peel off all of the various other coverings.

The bathroom on this side actually has a clawfoot tub in it. Were we not in the midst of fixing up our tub in the pink house already, I’d be tempted to steal this one for that house since it’s in much better condition to start. Both this bathroom (and the one on the other side) are so large and oddly shaped you could drop a 5 x 7′ rug on the floor and it wouldn’t touch anything. It’s like a skating rink of space that’s not being used. So again, the name of the game is to bring this place back to its former glory, strip away all of the strange add-ons that hide/cover various things, and reconfigure things so they make a little more sense and are hopefully a lot more like how this house was laid out originally.

I’ll end this tour with the view looking back down the stairs at the front door (don’t mind the mylar “Happy Birthday” balloon that lives on this side of the house – it’s like a less sinister version of the red Pennywise balloon). Picture the left side of the stairway wall taken down so that it opens into the living room (again, sort of like this). Our contractor thinks we can do it so we’re itching to get started.

The Plan

Right now we’re in the excitement / daydreaming phase of this renovation. We don’t have any immediate plans to start knocking down walls yet since we’re trying to wrap up a few things on the pink house first (it’s so close to being done we can taste it!). But as you can tell, we’re certainly deep into brainstorming what this house COULD look like and how we could give it all the love it needs. Because it needs some serious love. And also some serious deodorizing. No one is sure of the exact year this was built (one local historian guessed the 1880’s, which might be a stretch, but we know it’s at least 100 years old) and it has certainly seen some things over the years.

We plan to work with the same contractor we have used on the pink house (he’s already brainstorming floorpans with us!) since we’ll need to do a lot of the same whole-house updates we did to the pink house: all new plumbing & electrical, new HVAC system, new roof & siding… THE WORKS. But our main decisions at the offset are: (1) how do we maximize the floorplan and (2) how do we make the front more attractive.

Sherry found this inspiration photo online and it’s definitely not identical to ours, but comparing them at the same angle like this definitely convinced us there’s plenty of charm to unlock here.

We also came across another duplex a couple blocks away that helped us “see” how ours might fit into town once we fix it up. Picture this one with mint green shutters and doors like this – or maybe wood doors and these shutters? Or maybe this color for the shutters? Please stand by as we flip flop more than Sherry’s sticky flip flops trying to make it out of that bedroom. It was like human flypaper, folks.

Unlike the house above, which appears to have its original decorative details (how awesome is that ornate trim under the porch ceiling?!) we learned that the decorative trim on our house is far from original and was probably added pretty recently – especially the wagon wheels) so we’re thinking that’ll go. But we do have those cool diamond windows in the middle which, get this, are currently covered over with plywood inside (!!!) to make for more closet space. No way those things are staying covered up!

So there’s the rundown. We’ll share a lot more info, photos, and videos as we go, and a big thank you to everyone who was so excited and encouraging about this news yesterday. We still feel a little bit like we’ve lost our minds, but your enthusiasm (and shouts of “you’re crazy… but I’m into it!” brought big smiles to our faces). So when our eyes are crossed from a month straight of tiling double the bathrooms and kitchens I want you to lean in real close and whisper “I told you you were crazy.”

The post A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! appeared first on Young House Love.

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! published first on http://ift.tt/2r6hzQy

[truereviewpage]

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex!

If you haven’t already heard the news: we’re doubling down in the beach house department. And I mean the “double” part quite literally because we lost our minds and bought a DUPLEX!

If you caught our podcast yesterday, you already know the whys, hows, and wheres of this story. The price was right (we even got them down 30K), the location is awesome (close to the park, shops, and a few blocks from the beach), and we didn’t feel like we could ever afford this much house in such a great spot if we waited much longer. This small town only has so many affordable fixer-uppers available before everything gets renovated and we get priced out (we paid $220K for this, which breaks down to $110K per side – which is cheaper than the pink one!).

But there’s lots more of the story in the podcast (you can listen in the player below) including how it took us a few weeks to come around to its charm and how we’re making this all work financially (spoiler: we were able to pay off our mortgage here in Richmond – and we share specifics about exactly how we did that).

But if you just haven’t had a chance to listen yet, here are tons of details, photos, and even two video tours for you. #SoMuchMoreToTile #LonelyToilet #Also,WhoHidesWindows?!

The Basics

This is another historic fixer-upper in the quaint Chesapeake Bay-side town of Cape Charles on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. We talked more about why we’ve fallen hard for Cape Charles back when we shared our pink house purchase last year (and I’ll be calling it the “pink house” in this post for clarity’s sake). Not only is the duplex in the same town as our pink house, it’s actually on the same street – just two doors down!

Yep, our two houses are separated by just one home (the one that was featured on HGTV). This street was a big part of why we bought the pink house thanks to its proximity to the shops/park/beach, so location was also a HUGE reason that we were attracted to the duplex.

We’ve always known the pink house wouldn’t be our last big project, but I can’t say we were expecting to dive into another one quite this quickly. But over the months of working on our pink house, we noticed how limited the inventory was for houses in Cape Charles that fit our price range. So the good location and price of this duplex accelerated our plans a little bit – and despite our initial aversions to this house, we just couldn’t fight that feeling anymore. We wanted the dang duplex. Badly.

Beyond just the excitement of another project, the duplex made a lot of practical sense too:

It creates additional vacation rental opportunities. We won’t use this ourselves, so it creates two spaces dedicated solely for renting to others – great for times when we plan to stay at the pink house, but still want to earn rental income.

It accommodates larger groups or pink house overflow. Our pink house is 3 bedrooms (4 if you count the bunk room) but all together, we’re hoping to create 6 bedrooms in the duplex. So groups that can’t squeeze into ol’ pinkie could rent both sides of the duplex instead. We also may use it when our own extended family or friends want to vacation with us, which is pretty handy since it’s so close.

Renovating a duplex can be more efficient. Although we have double the kitchens and baths to redo (oh the tiling! THE TILING!!), many of the big tasks – like replacing the roof/siding, foundation fixes, or landscape updates  – are a lot more cost effective and time efficient because we can do them all at once, whereas it may have taken us a few years to fix up two separate houses.

Plus, having already established our go-to contractors in Cape Charles and worked out some of the kinks of the process while doing the pink house, this project seems a LOT less daunting than our first go ’round.

The Before Tour

The duplex is split right down the middle, with each side being a mirror of the other in layout, but NOT in condition, look, or….um…smell. One side smells exactly like the apartment I rented in Queens for a year (and no, that is not a compliment). The home had previously been a long-term rental property but the tenants on both sides moved out earlier this summer before the owner listed it for sale. So let’s start with a video tour of the LEFT SIDE, since it’s the one we previewed in our podcast show notes yesterday. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  If you can’t watch the video right now, I’ve got photos below – but first here’s the (shorter) video tour of the RIGHT SIDE, which is in slightly better condition. Oh, and be warned, there’s a smoke detector beep in this one, so if you’ve got a dog who freaks out at the stuff (we’re speaking from experience) you might want to throw on some headphones. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  The Left Side

As you saw in the videos, both sides open right into the stairwell. We’re hoping we can open up the wall to the living room to let more natural light into the stairs and make them feel less cramped. You know, sort of like this.

From the doorway, you can step into the living room, which is pretty decently sized. The floors are in better shape than they look, so we know they’ll refinish beautifully (don’t mind that carpet pad that got stuck to them). And see that bubbled part of the ceiling to the left of the fan? That’s a leak with some mold on it. It continues down the wall and there’s actually a hole above that paneling that’s so big you could stick your arm into it. You could but I’m not volunteering.

Beyond the living room is a dining room of sorts, which has a narrow galley kitchen attached to it. Spoiler alert: we will not be keeping that fridge location or the trim color.

The kitchen is in rough shape. It appears to be squeezed into a former side porch area and connects to a small dark hallway in the back with an old water heater and a door that leads to the backyard. So we definitely want to rethink this layout to make it more functional.

Actually we want to tweak the entire downstairs layout so it’s more functional. Sherry mentioned trying to add a bedroom down here in the video, but since recording that we’re brewing another plan that’ll keep all the bedrooms upstairs and result in a larger kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, and laundry area down here instead. What’s that old saying? “Your first idea is rarely your best idea.” Truth.

Moving along… there are two bedrooms and one full bath upstairs right now, all of which are off of this little landing at the top of the steps.

The rooms upstairs are surprisingly large, which is why we think there’s gotta be a way to squeeze in a third bedroom (and maybe even a second bathroom) if we reconfigure things. Here’s the front bedroom:

The back bedroom got the same wood paneling treatment as the front bedroom (it’s just painted white) along with the same foam square ceiling panels that have been glued over the actual drywall or plaster. We have a working theory that someone many years ago just disguised problem areas with more and more coverings: wallpaper, foam ceilings panels, fake wood paneling, etc. So who knows what we’ll find behind them, but the pink house has trained us well. I ain’t afraid of no ghosts duplex.

The bathroom sits between the two bedrooms and is, again, remarkably large for the overall size of the house. It’s also shaped like a weirdly long triangle, which is why we’d love to find a way to split it into two better laid out bathrooms. We’re still sketching alternative floor plan options, so we’ll share those when we land on something we think could work.

Here it is from another angle. Is it bad that I’m actually kinda liking that treatment on the shower doors? It’s like a modesty decal.

The Right Side

While the layout on each side is identical, the look and condition of this side is slightly better. And the living room is keeping things interesting with green and blue trim. Oddly enough it has a ceiling leak along the exterior wall just like the other side, but it’s right out of frame in the shot below.

This side also sports a fridge just hanging out in the dining room, and some faux greenery (you know Sherry loves a faux plant or ten).

Upstairs is where things get sticky. And I mean that literally. The floors up here have a thin layer of adhesive that grabs your shoes with every step. It appears to be from some vinyl tiles that got peeled up, but the stickiness suspiciously continues ON TOP of the remaining vinyl tiles. Layers upon layers upon layers, guys. It’s a theme.

I personally have not even walked fully into this room yet because it’s so sticky. Sherry’s a braver person than me, but it basically ripped her flip-flops apart when she first toured this house with the realtor. She described it as hilarious for the first minute and then just plain savage as she fought to flip and flop her way outta there without getting glue all over her feet.

The stickiness stops at the back bedroom thanks to the carpet. And I can’t say I hate the wall color in here. It’s kind of a moody eggplant. But as you can see in the video, we think there’s some rot/moisture damage behind the foam ceiling panels and the fake wood paneling – but on the bright since there’s also a brick chimney hiding in one corner, so we’re hoping to expose it when we peel off all of the various other coverings.

The bathroom on this side actually has a clawfoot tub in it. Were we not in the midst of fixing up our tub in the pink house already, I’d be tempted to steal this one for that house since it’s in much better condition to start. Both this bathroom (and the one on the other side) are so large and oddly shaped you could drop a 5 x 7′ rug on the floor and it wouldn’t touch anything. It’s like a skating rink of space that’s not being used. So again, the name of the game is to bring this place back to its former glory, strip away all of the strange add-ons that hide/cover various things, and reconfigure things so they make a little more sense and are hopefully a lot more like how this house was laid out originally.

I’ll end this tour with the view looking back down the stairs at the front door (don’t mind the mylar “Happy Birthday” balloon that lives on this side of the house – it’s like a less sinister version of the red Pennywise balloon). Picture the left side of the stairway wall taken down so that it opens into the living room (again, sort of like this). Our contractor thinks we can do it so we’re itching to get started.

The Plan

Right now we’re in the excitement / daydreaming phase of this renovation. We don’t have any immediate plans to start knocking down walls yet since we’re trying to wrap up a few things on the pink house first (it’s so close to being done we can taste it!). But as you can tell, we’re certainly deep into brainstorming what this house COULD look like and how we could give it all the love it needs. Because it needs some serious love. And also some serious deodorizing. No one is sure of the exact year this was built (one local historian guessed the 1880’s, which might be a stretch, but we know it’s at least 100 years old) and it has certainly seen some things over the years.

We plan to work with the same contractor we have used on the pink house (he’s already brainstorming floorpans with us!) since we’ll need to do a lot of the same whole-house updates we did to the pink house: all new plumbing & electrical, new HVAC system, new roof & siding… THE WORKS. But our main decisions at the offset are: (1) how do we maximize the floorplan and (2) how do we make the front more attractive.

Sherry found this inspiration photo online and it’s definitely not identical to ours, but comparing them at the same angle like this definitely convinced us there’s plenty of charm to unlock here.

We also came across another duplex a couple blocks away that helped us “see” how ours might fit into town once we fix it up. Picture this one with mint green shutters and doors like this – or maybe wood doors and these shutters? Or maybe this color for the shutters? Please stand by as we flip flop more than Sherry’s sticky flip flops trying to make it out of that bedroom. It was like human flypaper, folks.

Unlike the house above, which appears to have its original decorative details (how awesome is that ornate trim under the porch ceiling?!) we learned that the decorative trim on our house is far from original and was probably added pretty recently – especially the wagon wheels) so we’re thinking that’ll go. But we do have those cool diamond windows in the middle which, get this, are currently covered over with plywood inside (!!!) to make for more closet space. No way those things are staying covered up!

So there’s the rundown. We’ll share a lot more info, photos, and videos as we go, and a big thank you to everyone who was so excited and encouraging about this news yesterday. We still feel a little bit like we’ve lost our minds, but your enthusiasm (and shouts of “you’re crazy… but I’m into it!” brought big smiles to our faces). So when our eyes are crossed from a month straight of tiling double the bathrooms and kitchens I want you to lean in real close and whisper “I told you you were crazy.”

The post A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! appeared first on Young House Love.

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! published first on http://ift.tt/2qCHnUt

[additionallysad]

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! http://ift.tt/2hdaQoM

If you haven’t already heard the news: we’re doubling down in the beach house department. And I mean the “double” part quite literally because we lost our minds and bought a DUPLEX!

If you caught our podcast yesterday, you already know the whys, hows, and wheres of this story. The price was right (we even got them down 30K), the location is awesome (close to the park, shops, and a few blocks from the beach), and we didn’t feel like we could ever afford this much house in such a great spot if we waited much longer. This small town only has so many affordable fixer-uppers available before everything gets renovated and we get priced out (we paid $220K for this, which breaks down to $110K per side – which is cheaper than the pink one!).

But there’s lots more of the story in the podcast (you can listen in the player below) including how it took us a few weeks to come around to its charm and how we’re making this all work financially (spoiler: we were able to pay off our mortgage here in Richmond – and we share specifics about exactly how we did that).

But if you just haven’t had a chance to listen yet, here are tons of details, photos, and even two video tours for you. #SoMuchMoreToTile #LonelyToilet #Also,WhoHidesWindows?!

The Basics

This is another historic fixer-upper in the quaint Chesapeake Bay-side town of Cape Charles on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. We talked more about why we’ve fallen hard for Cape Charles back when we shared our pink house purchase last year (and I’ll be calling it the “pink house” in this post for clarity’s sake). Not only is the duplex in the same town as our pink house, it’s actually on the same street – just two doors down!

Yep, our two houses are separated by just one home (the one that was featured on HGTV). This street was a big part of why we bought the pink house thanks to its proximity to the shops/park/beach, so location was also a HUGE reason that we were attracted to the duplex.

We’ve always known the pink house wouldn’t be our last big project, but I can’t say we were expecting to dive into another one quite this quickly. But over the months of working on our pink house, we noticed how limited the inventory was for houses in Cape Charles that fit our price range. So the good location and price of this duplex accelerated our plans a little bit – and despite our initial aversions to this house, we just couldn’t fight that feeling anymore. We wanted the dang duplex. Badly.

Beyond just the excitement of another project, the duplex made a lot of practical sense too:

It creates additional vacation rental opportunities. We won’t use this ourselves, so it creates two spaces dedicated solely for renting to others – great for times when we plan to stay at the pink house, but still want to earn rental income.

It accommodates larger groups or pink house overflow. Our pink house is 3 bedrooms (4 if you count the bunk room) but all together, we’re hoping to create 6 bedrooms in the duplex. So groups that can’t squeeze into ol’ pinkie could rent both sides of the duplex instead. We also may use it when our own extended family or friends want to vacation with us, which is pretty handy since it’s so close.

Renovating a duplex can be more efficient. Although we have double the kitchens and baths to redo (oh the tiling! THE TILING!!), many of the big tasks – like replacing the roof/siding, foundation fixes, or landscape updates  – are a lot more cost effective and time efficient because we can do them all at once, whereas it may have taken us a few years to fix up two separate houses.

Plus, having already established our go-to contractors in Cape Charles and worked out some of the kinks of the process while doing the pink house, this project seems a LOT less daunting than our first go ’round.

The Before Tour

The duplex is split right down the middle, with each side being a mirror of the other in layout, but NOT in condition, look, or….um…smell. One side smells exactly like the apartment I rented in Queens for a year (and no, that is not a compliment). The home had previously been a long-term rental property but the tenants on both sides moved out earlier this summer before the owner listed it for sale. So let’s start with a video tour of the LEFT SIDE, since it’s the one we previewed in our podcast show notes yesterday. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  If you can’t watch the video right now, I’ve got photos below – but first here’s the (shorter) video tour of the RIGHT SIDE, which is in slightly better condition. Oh, and be warned, there’s a smoke detector beep in this one, so if you’ve got a dog who freaks out at the stuff (we’re speaking from experience) you might want to throw on some headphones. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  The Left Side

As you saw in the videos, both sides open right into the stairwell. We’re hoping we can open up the wall to the living room to let more natural light into the stairs and make them feel less cramped. You know, sort of like this.

From the doorway, you can step into the living room, which is pretty decently sized. The floors are in better shape than they look, so we know they’ll refinish beautifully (don’t mind that carpet pad that got stuck to them). And see that bubbled part of the ceiling to the left of the fan? That’s a leak with some mold on it. It continues down the wall and there’s actually a hole above that paneling that’s so big you could stick your arm into it. You could but I’m not volunteering.

Beyond the living room is a dining room of sorts, which has a narrow galley kitchen attached to it. Spoiler alert: we will not be keeping that fridge location or the trim color.

The kitchen is in rough shape. It appears to be squeezed into a former side porch area and connects to a small dark hallway in the back with an old water heater and a door that leads to the backyard. So we definitely want to rethink this layout to make it more functional.

Actually we want to tweak the entire downstairs layout so it’s more functional. Sherry mentioned trying to add a bedroom down here in the video, but since recording that we’re brewing another plan that’ll keep all the bedrooms upstairs and result in a larger kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, and laundry area down here instead. What’s that old saying? “Your first idea is rarely your best idea.” Truth.

Moving along… there are two bedrooms and one full bath upstairs right now, all of which are off of this little landing at the top of the steps.

The rooms upstairs are surprisingly large, which is why we think there’s gotta be a way to squeeze in a third bedroom (and maybe even a second bathroom) if we reconfigure things. Here’s the front bedroom:

The back bedroom got the same wood paneling treatment as the front bedroom (it’s just painted white) along with the same foam square ceiling panels that have been glued over the actual drywall or plaster. We have a working theory that someone many years ago just disguised problem areas with more and more coverings: wallpaper, foam ceilings panels, fake wood paneling, etc. So who knows what we’ll find behind them, but the pink house has trained us well. I ain’t afraid of no ghosts duplex.

The bathroom sits between the two bedrooms and is, again, remarkably large for the overall size of the house. It’s also shaped like a weirdly long triangle, which is why we’d love to find a way to split it into two better laid out bathrooms. We’re still sketching alternative floor plan options, so we’ll share those when we land on something we think could work.

Here it is from another angle. Is it bad that I’m actually kinda liking that treatment on the shower doors? It’s like a modesty decal.

The Right Side

While the layout on each side is identical, the look and condition of this side is slightly better. And the living room is keeping things interesting with green and blue trim. Oddly enough it has a ceiling leak along the exterior wall just like the other side, but it’s right out of frame in the shot below.

This side also sports a fridge just hanging out in the dining room, and some faux greenery (you know Sherry loves a faux plant or ten).

Upstairs is where things get sticky. And I mean that literally. The floors up here have a thin layer of adhesive that grabs your shoes with every step. It appears to be from some vinyl tiles that got peeled up, but the stickiness suspiciously continues ON TOP of the remaining vinyl tiles. Layers upon layers upon layers, guys. It’s a theme.

I personally have not even walked fully into this room yet because it’s so sticky. Sherry’s a braver person than me, but it basically ripped her flip-flops apart when she first toured this house with the realtor. She described it as hilarious for the first minute and then just plain savage as she fought to flip and flop her way outta there without getting glue all over her feet.

The stickiness stops at the back bedroom thanks to the carpet. And I can’t say I hate the wall color in here. It’s kind of a moody eggplant. But as you can see in the video, we think there’s some rot/moisture damage behind the foam ceiling panels and the fake wood paneling – but on the bright since there’s also a brick chimney hiding in one corner, so we’re hoping to expose it when we peel off all of the various other coverings.

The bathroom on this side actually has a clawfoot tub in it. Were we not in the midst of fixing up our tub in the pink house already, I’d be tempted to steal this one for that house since it’s in much better condition to start. Both this bathroom (and the one on the other side) are so large and oddly shaped you could drop a 5 x 7′ rug on the floor and it wouldn’t touch anything. It’s like a skating rink of space that’s not being used. So again, the name of the game is to bring this place back to its former glory, strip away all of the strange add-ons that hide/cover various things, and reconfigure things so they make a little more sense and are hopefully a lot more like how this house was laid out originally.

I’ll end this tour with the view looking back down the stairs at the front door (don’t mind the mylar “Happy Birthday” balloon that lives on this side of the house – it’s like a less sinister version of the red Pennywise balloon). Picture the left side of the stairway wall taken down so that it opens into the living room (again, sort of like this). Our contractor thinks we can do it so we’re itching to get started.

The Plan

Right now we’re in the excitement / daydreaming phase of this renovation. We don’t have any immediate plans to start knocking down walls yet since we’re trying to wrap up a few things on the pink house first (it’s so close to being done we can taste it!). But as you can tell, we’re certainly deep into brainstorming what this house COULD look like and how we could give it all the love it needs. Because it needs some serious love. And also some serious deodorizing. No one is sure of the exact year this was built (one local historian guessed the 1880’s, which might be a stretch, but we know it’s at least 100 years old) and it has certainly seen some things over the years.

We plan to work with the same contractor we have used on the pink house (he’s already brainstorming floorpans with us!) since we’ll need to do a lot of the same whole-house updates we did to the pink house: all new plumbing & electrical, new HVAC system, new roof & siding… THE WORKS. But our main decisions at the offset are: (1) how do we maximize the floorplan and (2) how do we make the front more attractive.

Sherry found this inspiration photo online and it’s definitely not identical to ours, but comparing them at the same angle like this definitely convinced us there’s plenty of charm to unlock here.

We also came across another duplex a couple blocks away that helped us “see” how ours might fit into town once we fix it up. Picture this one with mint green shutters and doors like this – or maybe wood doors and these shutters? Or maybe this color for the shutters? Please stand by as we flip flop more than Sherry’s sticky flip flops trying to make it out of that bedroom. It was like human flypaper, folks.

Unlike the house above, which appears to have its original decorative details (how awesome is that ornate trim under the porch ceiling?!) we learned that the decorative trim on our house is far from original and was probably added pretty recently – especially the wagon wheels) so we’re thinking that’ll go. But we do have those cool diamond windows in the middle which, get this, are currently covered over with plywood inside (!!!) to make for more closet space. No way those things are staying covered up!

So there’s the rundown. We’ll share a lot more info, photos, and videos as we go, and a big thank you to everyone who was so excited and encouraging about this news yesterday. We still feel a little bit like we’ve lost our minds, but your enthusiasm (and shouts of “you’re crazy… but I’m into it!” brought big smiles to our faces). So when our eyes are crossed from a month straight of tiling double the bathrooms and kitchens I want you to lean in real close and whisper “I told you you were crazy.”

The post A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! appeared first on Young House Love.

[interiorstarweb]

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex!

If you haven’t already heard the news: we’re doubling down in the beach house department. And I mean the “double” part quite literally because we lost our minds and bought a DUPLEX!

If you caught our podcast yesterday, you already know the whys, hows, and wheres of this story. The price was right (we even got them down 30K), the location is awesome (close to the park, shops, and a few blocks from the beach), and we didn’t feel like we could ever afford this much house in such a great spot if we waited much longer. This small town only has so many affordable fixer-uppers available before everything gets renovated and we get priced out (we paid $220K for this, which breaks down to $110K per side – which is cheaper than the pink one!).

But there’s lots more of the story in the podcast (you can listen in the player below) including how it took us a few weeks to come around to its charm and how we’re making this all work financially (spoiler: we were able to pay off our mortgage here in Richmond – and we share specifics about exactly how we did that).

But if you just haven’t had a chance to listen yet, here are tons of details, photos, and even two video tours for you. #SoMuchMoreToTile #LonelyToilet #Also,WhoHidesWindows?!

The Basics

This is another historic fixer-upper in the quaint Chesapeake Bay-side town of Cape Charles on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. We talked more about why we’ve fallen hard for Cape Charles back when we shared our pink house purchase last year (and I’ll be calling it the “pink house” in this post for clarity’s sake). Not only is the duplex in the same town as our pink house, it’s actually on the same street – just two doors down!

Yep, our two houses are separated by just one home (the one that was featured on HGTV). This street was a big part of why we bought the pink house thanks to its proximity to the shops/park/beach, so location was also a HUGE reason that we were attracted to the duplex.

We’ve always known the pink house wouldn’t be our last big project, but I can’t say we were expecting to dive into another one quite this quickly. But over the months of working on our pink house, we noticed how limited the inventory was for houses in Cape Charles that fit our price range. So the good location and price of this duplex accelerated our plans a little bit – and despite our initial aversions to this house, we just couldn’t fight that feeling anymore. We wanted the dang duplex. Badly.

Beyond just the excitement of another project, the duplex made a lot of practical sense too:

It creates additional vacation rental opportunities. We won’t use this ourselves, so it creates two spaces dedicated solely for renting to others – great for times when we plan to stay at the pink house, but still want to earn rental income.

It accommodates larger groups or pink house overflow. Our pink house is 3 bedrooms (4 if you count the bunk room) but all together, we’re hoping to create 6 bedrooms in the duplex. So groups that can’t squeeze into ol’ pinkie could rent both sides of the duplex instead. We also may use it when our own extended family or friends want to vacation with us, which is pretty handy since it’s so close.

Renovating a duplex can be more efficient. Although we have double the kitchens and baths to redo (oh the tiling! THE TILING!!), many of the big tasks – like replacing the roof/siding, foundation fixes, or landscape updates  – are a lot more cost effective and time efficient because we can do them all at once, whereas it may have taken us a few years to fix up two separate houses.

Plus, having already established our go-to contractors in Cape Charles and worked out some of the kinks of the process while doing the pink house, this project seems a LOT less daunting than our first go ’round.

The Before Tour

The duplex is split right down the middle, with each side being a mirror of the other in layout, but NOT in condition, look, or….um…smell. One side smells exactly like the apartment I rented in Queens for a year (and no, that is not a compliment). The home had previously been a long-term rental property but the tenants on both sides moved out earlier this summer before the owner listed it for sale. So let’s start with a video tour of the LEFT SIDE, since it’s the one we previewed in our podcast show notes yesterday. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  If you can’t watch the video right now, I’ve got photos below – but first here’s the (shorter) video tour of the RIGHT SIDE, which is in slightly better condition. Oh, and be warned, there’s a smoke detector beep in this one, so if you’ve got a dog who freaks out at the stuff (we’re speaking from experience) you might want to throw on some headphones. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  The Left Side

As you saw in the videos, both sides open right into the stairwell. We’re hoping we can open up the wall to the living room to let more natural light into the stairs and make them feel less cramped. You know, sort of like this.

From the doorway, you can step into the living room, which is pretty decently sized. The floors are in better shape than they look, so we know they’ll refinish beautifully (don’t mind that carpet pad that got stuck to them). And see that bubbled part of the ceiling to the left of the fan? That’s a leak with some mold on it. It continues down the wall and there’s actually a hole above that paneling that’s so big you could stick your arm into it. You could but I’m not volunteering.

Beyond the living room is a dining room of sorts, which has a narrow galley kitchen attached to it. Spoiler alert: we will not be keeping that fridge location or the trim color.

The kitchen is in rough shape. It appears to be squeezed into a former side porch area and connects to a small dark hallway in the back with an old water heater and a door that leads to the backyard. So we definitely want to rethink this layout to make it more functional.

Actually we want to tweak the entire downstairs layout so it’s more functional. Sherry mentioned trying to add a bedroom down here in the video, but since recording that we’re brewing another plan that’ll keep all the bedrooms upstairs and result in a larger kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, and laundry area down here instead. What’s that old saying? “Your first idea is rarely your best idea.” Truth.

Moving along… there are two bedrooms and one full bath upstairs right now, all of which are off of this little landing at the top of the steps.

The rooms upstairs are surprisingly large, which is why we think there’s gotta be a way to squeeze in a third bedroom (and maybe even a second bathroom) if we reconfigure things. Here’s the front bedroom:

The back bedroom got the same wood paneling treatment as the front bedroom (it’s just painted white) along with the same foam square ceiling panels that have been glued over the actual drywall or plaster. We have a working theory that someone many years ago just disguised problem areas with more and more coverings: wallpaper, foam ceilings panels, fake wood paneling, etc. So who knows what we’ll find behind them, but the pink house has trained us well. I ain’t afraid of no ghosts duplex.

The bathroom sits between the two bedrooms and is, again, remarkably large for the overall size of the house. It’s also shaped like a weirdly long triangle, which is why we’d love to find a way to split it into two better laid out bathrooms. We’re still sketching alternative floor plan options, so we’ll share those when we land on something we think could work.

Here it is from another angle. Is it bad that I’m actually kinda liking that treatment on the shower doors? It’s like a modesty decal.

The Right Side

While the layout on each side is identical, the look and condition of this side is slightly better. And the living room is keeping things interesting with green and blue trim. Oddly enough it has a ceiling leak along the exterior wall just like the other side, but it’s right out of frame in the shot below.

This side also sports a fridge just hanging out in the dining room, and some faux greenery (you know Sherry loves a faux plant or ten).

Upstairs is where things get sticky. And I mean that literally. The floors up here have a thin layer of adhesive that grabs your shoes with every step. It appears to be from some vinyl tiles that got peeled up, but the stickiness suspiciously continues ON TOP of the remaining vinyl tiles. Layers upon layers upon layers, guys. It’s a theme.

I personally have not even walked fully into this room yet because it’s so sticky. Sherry’s a braver person than me, but it basically ripped her flip-flops apart when she first toured this house with the realtor. She described it as hilarious for the first minute and then just plain savage as she fought to flip and flop her way outta there without getting glue all over her feet.

The stickiness stops at the back bedroom thanks to the carpet. And I can’t say I hate the wall color in here. It’s kind of a moody eggplant. But as you can see in the video, we think there’s some rot/moisture damage behind the foam ceiling panels and the fake wood paneling – but on the bright since there’s also a brick chimney hiding in one corner, so we’re hoping to expose it when we peel off all of the various other coverings.

The bathroom on this side actually has a clawfoot tub in it. Were we not in the midst of fixing up our tub in the pink house already, I’d be tempted to steal this one for that house since it’s in much better condition to start. Both this bathroom (and the one on the other side) are so large and oddly shaped you could drop a 5 x 7′ rug on the floor and it wouldn’t touch anything. It’s like a skating rink of space that’s not being used. So again, the name of the game is to bring this place back to its former glory, strip away all of the strange add-ons that hide/cover various things, and reconfigure things so they make a little more sense and are hopefully a lot more like how this house was laid out originally.

I’ll end this tour with the view looking back down the stairs at the front door (don’t mind the mylar “Happy Birthday” balloon that lives on this side of the house – it’s like a less sinister version of the red Pennywise balloon). Picture the left side of the stairway wall taken down so that it opens into the living room (again, sort of like this). Our contractor thinks we can do it so we’re itching to get started.

The Plan

Right now we’re in the excitement / daydreaming phase of this renovation. We don’t have any immediate plans to start knocking down walls yet since we’re trying to wrap up a few things on the pink house first (it’s so close to being done we can taste it!). But as you can tell, we’re certainly deep into brainstorming what this house COULD look like and how we could give it all the love it needs. Because it needs some serious love. And also some serious deodorizing. No one is sure of the exact year this was built (one local historian guessed the 1880’s, which might be a stretch, but we know it’s at least 100 years old) and it has certainly seen some things over the years.

We plan to work with the same contractor we have used on the pink house (he’s already brainstorming floorpans with us!) since we’ll need to do a lot of the same whole-house updates we did to the pink house: all new plumbing & electrical, new HVAC system, new roof & siding… THE WORKS. But our main decisions at the offset are: (1) how do we maximize the floorplan and (2) how do we make the front more attractive.

Sherry found this inspiration photo online and it’s definitely not identical to ours, but comparing them at the same angle like this definitely convinced us there’s plenty of charm to unlock here.

We also came across another duplex a couple blocks away that helped us “see” how ours might fit into town once we fix it up. Picture this one with mint green shutters and doors like this – or maybe wood doors and these shutters? Or maybe this color for the shutters? Please stand by as we flip flop more than Sherry’s sticky flip flops trying to make it out of that bedroom. It was like human flypaper, folks.

Unlike the house above, which appears to have its original decorative details (how awesome is that ornate trim under the porch ceiling?!) we learned that the decorative trim on our house is far from original and was probably added pretty recently – especially the wagon wheels) so we’re thinking that’ll go. But we do have those cool diamond windows in the middle which, get this, are currently covered over with plywood inside (!!!) to make for more closet space. No way those things are staying covered up!

So there’s the rundown. We’ll share a lot more info, photos, and videos as we go, and a big thank you to everyone who was so excited and encouraging about this news yesterday. We still feel a little bit like we’ve lost our minds, but your enthusiasm (and shouts of “you’re crazy… but I’m into it!” brought big smiles to our faces). So when our eyes are crossed from a month straight of tiling double the bathrooms and kitchens I want you to lean in real close and whisper “I told you you were crazy.”

The post A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! appeared first on Young House Love.

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex! published first on http://ift.tt/2uiWrIt

[lukerhill]

A Tour Of Our New Beach Duplex!

If you haven’t already heard the news: we’re doubling down in the beach house department. And I mean the “double” part quite literally because we lost our minds and bought a DUPLEX!

If you caught our podcast yesterday, you already know the whys, hows, and wheres of this story. The price was right (we even got them down 30K), the location is awesome (close to the park, shops, and a few blocks from the beach), and we didn’t feel like we could ever afford this much house in such a great spot if we waited much longer. This small town only has so many affordable fixer-uppers available before everything gets renovated and we get priced out (we paid $220K for this, which breaks down to $110K per side – which is cheaper than the pink one!).

But there’s lots more of the story in the podcast (you can listen in the player below) including how it took us a few weeks to come around to its charm and how we’re making this all work financially (spoiler: we were able to pay off our mortgage here in Richmond – and we share specifics about exactly how we did that).

But if you just haven’t had a chance to listen yet, here are tons of details, photos, and even two video tours for you. #SoMuchMoreToTile #LonelyToilet #Also,WhoHidesWindows?!

The Basics

This is another historic fixer-upper in the quaint Chesapeake Bay-side town of Cape Charles on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. We talked more about why we’ve fallen hard for Cape Charles back when we shared our pink house purchase last year (and I’ll be calling it the “pink house” in this post for clarity’s sake). Not only is the duplex in the same town as our pink house, it’s actually on the same street – just two doors down!

Yep, our two houses are separated by just one home (the one that was featured on HGTV). This street was a big part of why we bought the pink house thanks to its proximity to the shops/park/beach, so location was also a HUGE reason that we were attracted to the duplex.

We’ve always known the pink house wouldn’t be our last big project, but I can’t say we were expecting to dive into another one quite this quickly. But over the months of working on our pink house, we noticed how limited the inventory was for houses in Cape Charles that fit our price range. So the good location and price of this duplex accelerated our plans a little bit – and despite our initial aversions to this house, we just couldn’t fight that feeling anymore. We wanted the dang duplex. Badly.

Beyond just the excitement of another project, the duplex made a lot of practical sense too:

It creates additional vacation rental opportunities. We won’t use this ourselves, so it creates two spaces dedicated solely for renting to others – great for times when we plan to stay at the pink house, but still want to earn rental income.

It accommodates larger groups or pink house overflow. Our pink house is 3 bedrooms (4 if you count the bunk room) but all together, we’re hoping to create 6 bedrooms in the duplex. So groups that can’t squeeze into ol’ pinkie could rent both sides of the duplex instead. We also may use it when our own extended family or friends want to vacation with us, which is pretty handy since it’s so close.

Renovating a duplex can be more efficient. Although we have double the kitchens and baths to redo (oh the tiling! THE TILING!!), many of the big tasks – like replacing the roof/siding, foundation fixes, or landscape updates  – are a lot more cost effective and time efficient because we can do them all at once, whereas it may have taken us a few years to fix up two separate houses.

Plus, having already established our go-to contractors in Cape Charles and worked out some of the kinks of the process while doing the pink house, this project seems a LOT less daunting than our first go ’round.

The Before Tour

The duplex is split right down the middle, with each side being a mirror of the other in layout, but NOT in condition, look, or….um…smell. One side smells exactly like the apartment I rented in Queens for a year (and no, that is not a compliment). The home had previously been a long-term rental property but the tenants on both sides moved out earlier this summer before the owner listed it for sale. So let’s start with a video tour of the LEFT SIDE, since it’s the one we previewed in our podcast show notes yesterday. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  If you can’t watch the video right now, I’ve got photos below – but first here’s the (shorter) video tour of the RIGHT SIDE, which is in slightly better condition. Oh, and be warned, there’s a smoke detector beep in this one, so if you’ve got a dog who freaks out at the stuff (we’re speaking from experience) you might want to throw on some headphones. *Note: if you’re viewing through a feed reader, you may need to click through to see the video player.

  The Left Side

As you saw in the videos, both sides open right into the stairwell. We’re hoping we can open up the wall to the living room to let more natural light into the stairs and make them feel less cramped. You know, sort of like this.

From the doorway, you can step into the living room, which is pretty decently sized. The floors are in better shape than they look, so we know they’ll refinish beautifully (don’t mind that carpet pad that got stuck to them). And see that bubbled part of the ceiling to the left of the fan? That’s a leak with some mold on it. It continues down the wall and there’s actually a hole above that paneling that’s so big you could stick your arm into it. You could but I’m not volunteering.

Beyond the living room is a dining room of sorts, which has a narrow galley kitchen attached to it. Spoiler alert: we will not be keeping that fridge location or the trim color.

The kitchen is in rough shape. It appears to be squeezed into a former side porch area and connects to a small dark hallway in the back with an old water heater and a door that leads to the backyard. So we definitely want to rethink this layout to make it more functional.

Actually we want to tweak the entire downstairs layout so it’s more functional. Sherry mentioned trying to add a bedroom down here in the video, but since recording that we’re brewing another plan that’ll keep all the bedrooms upstairs and result in a larger kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, and laundry area down here instead. What’s that old saying? “Your first idea is rarely your best idea.” Truth.

Moving along… there are two bedrooms and one full bath upstairs right now, all of which are off of this little landing at the top of the steps.

The rooms upstairs are surprisingly large, which is why we think there’s gotta be a way to squeeze in a third bedroom (and maybe even a second bathroom) if we reconfigure things. Here’s the front bedroom:

The back bedroom got the same wood paneling treatment as the front bedroom (it’s just painted white) along with the same foam square ceiling panels that have been glued over the actual drywall or plaster. We have a working theory that someone many years ago just disguised problem areas with more and more coverings: wallpaper, foam ceilings panels, fake wood paneling, etc. So who knows what we’ll find behind them, but the pink house has trained us well. I ain’t afraid of no ghosts duplex.

The bathroom sits between the two bedrooms and is, again, remarkably large for the overall size of the house. It’s also shaped like a weirdly long triangle, which is why we’d love to find a way to split it into two better laid out bathrooms. We’re still sketching alternative floor plan options, so we’ll share those when we land on something we think could work.

Here it is from another angle. Is it bad that I’m actually kinda liking that treatment on the shower doors? It’s like a modesty decal.

The Right Side

While the layout on each side is identical, the look and condition of this side is slightly better. And the living room is keeping things interesting with green and blue trim. Oddly enough it has a ceiling leak along the exterior wall just like the other side, but it’s right out of frame in the shot below.

This side also sports a fridge just hanging out in the dining room, and some faux greenery (you know Sherry loves a faux plant or ten).

Upstairs is where things get sticky. And I mean that literally. The floors up here have a thin layer of adhesive that grabs your shoes with every step. It appears to be from some vinyl tiles that got peeled up, but the stickiness suspiciously continues ON TOP of the remaining vinyl tiles. Layers upon layers upon layers, guys. It’s a theme.

I personally have not even walked fully into this room yet because it’s so sticky. Sherry’s a braver person than me, but it basically ripped her flip-flops apart when she first toured this house with the realtor. She described it as hilarious for the first minute and then just plain savage as she fought to flip and flop her way outta there without getting glue all over her feet.

The stickiness stops at the back bedroom thanks to the carpet. And I can’t say I hate the wall color in here. It’s kind of a moody eggplant. But as you can see in the video, we think there’s some rot/moisture damage behind the foam ceiling panels and the fake wood paneling – but on the bright since there’s also a brick chimney hiding in one corner, so we’re hoping to expose it when we peel off all of the various other coverings.

The bathroom on this side actually has a clawfoot tub in it. Were we not in the midst of fixing up our tub in the pink house already, I’d be tempted to steal this one for that house since it’s in much better condition to start. Both this bathroom (and the one on the other side) are so large and oddly shaped you could drop a 5 x 7′ rug on the floor and it wouldn’t touch anything. It’s like a skating rink of space that’s not being used. So again, the name of the game is to bring this place back to its former glory, strip away all of the strange add-ons that hide/cover various things, and reconfigure things so they make a little more sense and are hopefully a lot more like how this house was laid out originally.

I’ll end this tour with the view looking back down the stairs at the front door (don’t mind the mylar “Happy Birthday” balloon that lives on this side of the house – it’s like a less sinister version of the red Pennywise balloon). Picture the left side of the stairway wall taken down so that it opens into the living room (again, sort of like this). Our contractor thinks we can do it so we’re itching to get started.

The Plan

Right now we’re in the excitement / daydreaming phase of this renovation. We don’t have any immediate plans to start knocking down walls yet since we’re trying to wrap up a few things on the pink house first (it’s so close to being done we can taste it!). But as you can tell, we’re certainly deep into brainstorming what this house COULD look like and how we could give it all the love it needs. Because it needs some serious love. And also some serious deodorizing. No one is sure of the exact year this was built (one local historian guessed the 1880’s, which might be a stretch, but we know it’s at least 100 years old) and it has certainly seen some things over the years.

We plan to work with the same contractor we have used on the pink house (he’s already brainstorming floorpans with us!) since we’ll need to do a lot of the same whole-house updates we did to the pink house: all new plumbing & electrical, new HVAC system, new roof & siding… THE WORKS. But our main decisions at the offset are: (1) how do we maximize the floorplan and (2) how do we make the front more attractive.

Sherry found this inspiration photo online and it’s definitely not identical to ours, but comparing them at the same angle like this definitely convinced us there’s plenty of charm to unlock here.

We also came across another duplex a couple blocks away that helped us “see” how ours might fit into town once we fix it up. Picture this one with mint green shutters and doors like this – or maybe wood doors and these shutters? Or maybe this color for the shutters? Please stand by as we flip flop more than Sherry’s sticky flip flops trying to make it out of that bedroom. It was like human flypaper, folks.

Unlike the house above, which appears to have its original decorative details (how awesome is that ornate trim under the porch ceiling?!) we learned that the decorative trim on our house is far from original and was probably added pretty recently – especially the wagon wheels) so we’re thinking that’ll go. But we do have those cool diamond windows in the middle which, get this, are currently covered over with plywood inside (!!!) to make for more closet space. No way those things are staying covered up!

So there’s the rundown. We’ll share a lot more info, photos, and videos as we go, and a big thank you to everyone who was so excited and encouraging about this news yesterday. We still feel a little bit like we’ve lost our minds, but your enthusiasm (and shouts of “you’re crazy… but I’m into it!” brought big smiles to our faces). So when our eyes are crossed from a month straight of tiling double the bathrooms and kitchens I want you to lean in real close and whisper “I told you you were crazy.”

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