#sac scrawls stuff

[patchworkgargoyle]

Booty 🌿

Steve has a plan, and Eddie falls for it. || read on ao3

Here it finally is, folks! My first smut for the ST fandom. I hope you like it!! Inspired by this post.

WC: ~4.8k || E || CW: Unsafe sex

“Please, Eddie?”

“Are you insane, Steve? It’s hotter than Satan’s taint out there, you cannot expect me to peel myself off this couch.”

Eddie heard a frustrated sigh and a small thud, imagining that Steve had let his head drop on the wall by his phone. “Yeah, I’m aware, I’m sweating buckets right now. But I gotta have the car fixed before tomorrow, I promised Claudia I’d pick up Dustin from the bus station and I can’t do that if it won’t start.”

Thing was, Eddie did kinda want to go and help him, heatwave be damned. They’d grown close in the months since spring break and despite his previous misgivings Eddie had gotten to like Steve. More than he should, really. He can’t help it if his queer little heart does a jig every time he manages to make Steve laugh in that eye-crinkling, head-tipped-back kind of way. Got good at it too, which made Eddie feel a great deal of selfish pride. And if he can’t take his eyes off the long lines of Steve’s mole-dotted neck, that’s his own business.

But this was something else. As soon as Steve called to ask if Eddie would help fix the Bimmer he couldn’t get the thought of him–sweaty and greasy and bent over the open hood of the car, his hair falling just so and lip bitten between his teeth in concentration–out of his dirty little mind. The things he’d want to do. It did as much to convince Eddie to go as it did to make him want to keep his distance.

He was a weak man, however.

“Fine. Alright. But you’d better make it worth my time, I’m risking my pale, un-sunburnt ass for this.”

Steve snorted. “Don’t worry, I will,” he said blandly.

They hung up after Eddie promised to be there in a few minutes, and he rolled off of the couch with a melodramatic groan. Moving in the muggy heat trapped inside the trailer sucked, but he wasn’t going to back out. Steve had sounded so relieved when he’d said goodbye that it gave Eddie enough pep to lurch his way to the kitchen to grab a few cold beers before scrambling into his van. He appreciated his own forethought when he burned his hand on the door handle and could hold a cold bottle against the spot. Fucking summer.

Parking in the Harringtons’ driveway, he spotted the Bimmer pulled halfway into the garage, the front shaded by the overhang in what must be an attempt to avoid the worst of the sunlight. The hood was popped open, but Eddie couldn’t see Steve.

“Ohh Stevie!” he sang, “your knight in shining armour has arrived!” He heard something thunk from the garage but got no response, so he wandered inside, trying to peer around the hood. “I come bearing gifts but they’re gonna get–”

Wheels squeaked from below and Eddie looked down, only to be treated to the sight of Steve’s legs, long and hairy and sprawled open, flexing as he dragged himself out from under the car on the creeper and revealing more inches of mouth-watering thighs. He was–oh fuck, Steve was wearing the tiniest cut-off jean shorts Eddie had ever seen, the fabric of the pockets poking out from under the frayed hems. They were tight, too, hugging his hips and, god, his bulge. The white tank top Steve wore had ridden up, too, exposing the trail of hair that dipped below the fucking shorts, but Eddie followed it up, along the grease stains and the swell of his pecs to Steve’s grinning face.

“...Hot.” Eddie’s voice cracked around the word.

“What was that?” Steve asked.

Clearing his throat, Eddie said, “The beer, it’s uh, gonna get hot.” Somehow he managed to not sound like he was choking on his own drool while Steve still stared up at him from the ground, a few strands of hair stuck to his forehead with sweat. There was a slight smear of dirt across his cheek and Eddie wanted to lick it off.

“You know where the fridge is, Eddie, if you’re that worried.”

“Nah, you look like you need a break. Get up here,” he said, waggling the bottle over Steve’s face. Steve chuckled but finally stood and relieved Eddie of the misery of seeing Steve on his back and not having been the one to put him there.

He popped the caps off with the bottle opener on his keychain, and Steve took his with a ‘thank you,’ downing half in a few gulps. Eddie distracted himself from the sight of Steve’s throat bobbing by peering over at the engine.

“So what’s the issue, doc?”

Steve pulled away from the bottle with a soft popping sound from his pink lips and a gasp. “Dunno yet. That’s why I called you,” he said, leaning on the car beside Eddie. “Oil and battery are fine, spark plugs look good too.”

“She been making a sputtering kind of sound recently? Could be the throttle.”

“Nah, no weird noises.”

Eddie hummed, then set his bottle aside. “Alright, let’s get underneath her then.” Lowering himself onto the creeper and sliding under the car, he said, “Could be a belt has finally busted. Got a flashlight?”

“Really need to ask that?” Steve’s voice got fainter as he walked a little ways away. “The kids insisted on a disaster preparedness kit after round two with the Upside Down.”

There was a tap on the wood under Eddie’s hip, and blindly he reached down to grab the flashlight Steve found. He tinkered around under the Bimmer, unable to wipe away the sweat that started to drip and stick his bangs to his forehead. But eventually he began to roll back out into open, but no less stupidly hot, air.

“Looks like everything’s shipshape, captain–” Eddie choked on his own words when he looked up and was met with a sight straight out of his wet dreams.

Steve stood over Eddie, his legs spread wide enough that Eddie had rolled right between them. If he sat down, Steve would be straddling Eddie’s hips, but that would deprive him of this new angle at which to admire all of Steve’s assets wrapped so tightly in frayed, lightwash denim. Mouth falling open, Eddie let out an eloquent, “Uhhh,” and Steve laughed, holding out his hand.

“Thought you’d like a hand,” Steve explained, smirking.

He took it without thinking and let Steve haul him off the creeper board and up to his feet. A kick, and Steve sent the board skittering away underneath the car, but Eddie barely winced at the noise. He was too busy standing so close to Steve that they breathed the same humid air. If he so much as swayed, their noses would bump together. Christ, Steve had pretty eyes, a bright, warm brown flecked with amber even in the shade of the garage and he swore he could see Steve’s pupils dilate the longer their gazes locked together.

“So, what were you saying?” Steve asked in a low tone. He tilted his head ever so slightly and those eyes held some kind of dare within them, one eyebrow ticked upward. Eddie couldn’t help swallowing, licking his lips, and Steve went from staring into Eddie’s eyes to down at his lips.

“Just saying that, that everything looked fine. Might, uh, might be the crankshaft or the–” Steve stepped forward just enough to bring their chests together, the back of Eddie’s knees hitting the bumper, and Eddie’s breath hitched, his voice cracking, “–the sensor.”

“Eddie.” The way Steve said his name sent a frisson of heat through Eddie, right to his dick, which was becoming a very obvious guest between them.

“Yeah, Stevie?” he whispered.

Broad, warm hands wrapped around Eddie’s slim hips. Steve worked a finger through a belt loop on each side and tugged, and Eddie realised he wasn’t the only one with a hard on when Steve’s pressed up against his own, pulling a hiss of pleasure from them both. Oh, shit. Leaning impossibly closer, Steve’s lips brushed against Eddie’s when he spoke. “I don’t care about the car right now.”

That snapped whatever faint, lingering reservations Eddie had. “Fuck, Stevie, please kiss m–” He didn’t even finish before Steve’s lips crashed into his, plush and hungry. It wasn’t long before Eddie began to nip and lick, his teeth drawing short, pleased noises from Steve’s mouth before he pulled back a scant inch.

“Fucking finally,” Steve said, and dove back in, biting back, making Eddie groan. His hands found their way to Steve’s sides, then, spurred on by Steve’s enthusiasm, he reached down and grabbed at his ass. His fingers wrapped under the hem and he yanked Steve’s hips in and up, rising to meet them.

Steve’s cock grinding against Eddie’s was a fucking revelation. From the way Steve’s mouth parted with a hot gasp, Eddie guessed he felt the same. “Hold on, baby,” he rasped, and using what leverage he had, Eddie hoisted Steve onto his lap, Steve’s knees spread and braced on the car. There was no way he could keep them there for long, but fuck it was hot, rutting their hips together while they kissed, wet and messy.

Eddie tasted the salt of his own sweat when Steve licked into his mouth and moaned, hands fisted into the denim in his grip, feeling more sweat beginning to drip down his back. The heat was stifling, but nothing compared to what started to grow in Eddie’s gut. One of Steve’s hands buried in his curls and pulled, had Eddie bucking up and whimpering around Steve’s tongue. He could come like this, dry humping on top of the Bimmer, lap full of Steve in those shorts, hands on his perfect ass, would’ve if the idea weren’t more embarrassing than hot.

“St-Steve, wait,” Eddie panted, whining again when Steve’s hand clenched in his hair again.

“Why’d you stop? Don’t wanna stop, Eddie,” Steve groaned, before a little more clarity seeped into him and he leaned back into his arms, concerned. “Or, shit, wait, is this okay?”

“God, fuck yes this is okay. Been thinking about this forever, man.” Steve smiled widely, verging on a little goofy, before ducking in and pressing open-mouthed kisses to Eddie’s throat. Eddie’s arms began to shake. His legs had long since begun to tremble. “But, hang on, ah, I’m gonna either drop you or come in my shorts in like two minutes if we don’t rethink this.”

All that did was make Steve start rocking into him again. “Hot,” he mumbled as he licked up a trail of sweat under Eddie’s jaw, making Eddie swear and tip his head back.

Eddie’s knees decided to buckle right then. They shouted, Eddie scrambled, locking Steve in his arms and getting his feet under himself before standing, his hands still hooked around Steve’s ass while Steve’s legs clung to his waist. Steve’s shocked expression likely matched Eddie’s, before he rested his forehead against Eddie’s and laughed so hard his body shook. Helpless, Eddie joined in, holding Steve close while their giggling faded out. But his arms were aching so, gently, he put Steve down.

“Do you wanna stop?” Steve asked. Eddie shook his head.

“You?” Steve shook his. “Thank fuck,” Eddie said. He ran his hands over Steve’s ass, over the crease of his thigh, the tips of his fingers tickling the hair on the back of his thighs before guiding him close again. “Didn’t wanna let you go now that I’ve got you, sweetheart.”

Steve dove into Eddie’s mouth with a hungry groan. The slick sounds of their lips echoed in the garage. With a tug, Steve turned them around and backed up into the car, his hands wandering underneath Eddie’s cut up Iron Maiden tee and clutching at his sides, over the fresh demobat scars, nails digging in bluntly.

Eddie couldn’t keep his hands off Steve either. He pawed at whatever he could, finding the places that made Steve pant and hum into his mouth. But he wanted more, because Eddie has always been a bit greedy. One hand snaked its way around to cup Steve through the shorts that barely contained him, pressing his fingers around the hard outline of Steve’s cock and squeezing, rubbing. The low, raspy moan he got for his efforts made Eddie grin wolfishly.

Head lolling back, Steve breathed hard and rose to meet each stroke of Eddie’s palm. Eddie began to bite and suck his way down the strong line of Steve’s neck, biting every mole he could find. “E-Eddie, I want you to fuck me.”

The words made Eddie bite down just shy of too hard. Steve whined, and Eddie lapped at the spot in apology. “I wanna, I wanna so bad, Steve, but we’re fucking filthy, sweetheart,” he mumbled into Steve’s neck.

“Don’t need to do anything. I, mmh, prepared for this.”

Eddie pulled back to blink at him in disbelief. “You what?”

“I’ve been wanting this for months and nothing was working! So I just, made this as obvious as I fucking could.”

“Months?” Eddie’s jaw dropped when Steve gave him a look that managed to be both fond, flirty, and frustrated. “I could’ve been fucking you for months!?”

“Or I could’ve been fucking you.”

That idea, as sexy as it was, had to be pushed aside before it managed to make Eddie’s horny little brain leak out of his ears. “Putting a pin in that, that’s absolutely gonna happen, but I wanna revisit something. You prepared?”

Steve smirked. “Yeah,” he said, simple and cocky and so hot Eddie could combust. Eddie tried to capture Steve’s lips again but Steve stopped him with a firm hand against his chest, pushing Eddie back a few steps. Turning, he closed the hood of his car and instead of twisting back around to face Eddie, Steve leaned on his arms and arched his back.

Now that was a sight. Steve’s long, tan legs spread just so, one knee cocked to give a slight tilt to his hips. The firm, round swell of his ass peeking out under the denim that struggled to hold together. And right on the apex of those pretty, biteable, jean-clad cheeks: two dark, dirty handprints. There’s even the blackened imprint of fingers on Steve’s skin. Eddie’s fingers, Eddie’s hands. His cock twitched against his zipper and he moaned out, “Ohhh my god…”

Looking over his shoulder, Steve’s smug smirk grew, and he tilted his hips up a little further. “I know I look good, Munson, but are you gonna do something about it or what?”

Eddie stepped forward and draped himself along the expanse of Steve’s back, rutting his hips into Steve’s and making him hum sweetly. “Don’t have to get bratty about it, baby,” he said. He dragged his fingers along Steve’s sides, letting his nails catch on the soft texture of Steve’s scars before dipping down and popping his button open in one swift motion. “Tell me how you prepared.”

He felt the shiver his words evoked run down Steve’s spine. As he slid the zipper down and slid his hand in to find Steve had gone commando–both of them groaning when Eddie’s hand wrapped around Steve’s leaking, twitching cock–Eddie nuzzled into the dip between Steve’s ear and neck, inhaling the scent of his sweat and musk and the faint traces of a clean, fresh cologne valiantly hanging on.

“I, I got this toy. In Indy,” Steve gasped as Eddie pumped him, pulling his cock out as his hand sped up the more Steve spoke. “Worked myself open on it.”

“What’dya think of?” Eddie squeezed.

“You,” Steve keened, jerking into Eddie’s grip.

“Fuck. God. Alright, enough of this.” Standing, Eddie took his hand away and ignored the needy noise Steve made to instead yank the shorts down. Steve only bothered to step out of one leg, having to kick his foot when they got stuck on his shoe. It made his cheeks jiggle. Eddie couldn’t resist giving him a few taps just to watch it again before spreading those cheeks with his thumbs. More dirt smeared over Steve’s dewy skin, but that was only the opening act. The true star of the show glistened with lube and twitched under Eddie’s hungry stare, already loose and used and ready for him. He held himself back from burying his tongue in Steve’s hole, but just barely, letting out a low, hungry rumble instead.

Eddie couldn't move fast enough after that. He grappled with his belt, popped the button of his shorts and shoved them and his boxers out of the way enough for his cock to spring out without help. Then he stepped forward. Eddie let out a shuddering gasp when his aching cock met the searing heat of Steve’s taint and smeared precome along it, echoed when Steve sighed unsteadily as his head slipped up, up, up. Brushed over Steve’s hole once, twice, before catching on the rim.

“Please, Eddie,” Steve whined as he pushed back, and who was Eddie to deny such a pretty request?

He thrust forward and sank into Steve with a slick sound and such little resistance that Eddie’s jaw dropped open in a soundless moan, eyelids fluttering at the hot, wet clench of muscle around him. Another thrust and Steve groaned thickly, his head tilting back so Eddie could see how his bitten-red lips parted deliciously.

“Steve, you good? Please tell me you’re good. Fuck. I wanna fuck you so bad, you feel so good, hot, please Steve,” Eddie begged and rambled, his hands shaking with the need to grab and pull and take.

“If you don’t fucking start right now I’m leaving–”

That was all the permission Eddie needed.

He sank slowly past that ring of muscle and Eddie didn’t have the capacity to be embarrassed about the high-pitched, breathy whine that escaped him. Steve really had prepped, just loose enough and slick enough, but he still took his time. He wanted to savour this, the way he slid into Steve’s tight heat, how the feeling made his legs tremble and his stomach clench. Steve deserved the caution. At first, at least.

“Tell me,” Eddie demanded, needing to talk to distract from the sheer feeling of bliss of being enveloped by Steve. “Tell me about what you were thinking when you fucked yourself on that dildo.”

Steve’s head tilted back with a moan, his brows drawn together, and Eddie longed to bite and lick the strong column of his throat, but he didn’t want to get distracted. He wanted to know.

“I thought about your fingers, first. Those rings, fuck, they drive me nuts. Wish you’d worn them today.” Eddie gave his hips a firm squeeze, fingers spread wide to catch as much soft skin as he could, and grinned when he felt Steve clench around him and heard a stuttering breath.

“I’ll wear them next time, big boy. Wanna see how good they look when I’m jerking you off.” The appreciative groan caused by Eddie’s words was divine.

“God yes. Next time.”

Of course it was then that the phrase sunk in. Next time. Eddie hadn’t even noticed he’d said it but Steve repeating it had something other than raging hormones rising in his gut. He didn’t even have time to process the implication because Steve kept going, and started meeting Eddie’s thrusts with small movements of his own.

“Then I thought about your dick. Y’know, it’s so hard not to stare when you get out of the pool.”

“Did you?”

“Duh.” Steve shot a bitchy look over his shoulder. The usual power behind the look was lost in the bright red flush on his face. It completely fell apart when Eddie shifted and hit somewhere new, Steve’s mouth dropping open with a guttural noise that made Eddie’s cock twitch. “S-shit, it’s so perfect,” he said.

Steve’s head hung loose from his shoulders, forehead resting on the hood of the car, needy, lingering moans bouncing off the metal, breath and sweat condensing on it while Eddie inched further into him every time he slid out and pressed back in. With his palms on the Bimmer, Steve used the leverage to rock into Eddie, the muscles in his shoulders rippling under the white cotton tank starting to go translucent with sweat.

Watching his cock steadily disappear into Steve’s hole was addicting. He leaned back to get a better view of how he split Steve open between the grimy handprints he’d left on the globes of his ass, placed his hands there again and dug his nails in, making Steve’s hips jerk so that Eddie sank the rest of the way with a groan.

“God, Eddie,” Steve mumbled, “fuck, you feel so. So, uh, so good.”

“Y-you too, baby.” Eddie could barely form words. The tight pressure around his cock threatened to end things there and then, but Eddie closed his eyes and breathed, letting the fire and the urge and the want die down to a less immediate threat. But then he opened his eyes, saw how good they looked locked together, the way his darker thatch caught against the lighter brown hairs decorating Steve’s ass, both of them wet from the lube he’d pushed out of his hole, and jesus fucking christ he didn’t want, he needed.

Pulling out slowly and bracing Steve’s hips with a punishing grip was the only warning he gave before snapping forward with a loud grunt, the slap of damp skin a filthy echo in the garage. Steve cried out at the second hard thrust, choked off when Eddie kept going, his hips picking up speed.

“Good?” Eddie gasped. Nodding, Steve uttered a desperate, pleading ‘yes’ that made him fuck into Steve faster.

“Look so fucking hot, Steve,” he started babbling, his voice reedy with pleasure. “God, my handprints on you. Want ‘em to stain, be there forever.” Steve moaned and Eddie felt him tighten around his cock. “Like that, sweetheart?”

“Yeah, fuck, I do, I do!”

Eddie leaned forward, draped himself across Steve’s back, and the angle was so fucking good, so much better, and he knew he’d started pounding into Steve’s prostate by the way his gasps had turned into a delicious mix of thin moans and choked out grunts. Fucking him into the car, Eddie let his hands roam. He rucked up the tank top, watched as the last of the dirt on his hands smeared over Steve’s perfect, scarred skin like loving and greedy claw marks. Finding a nipple, he pinched and squeezed until Steve writhed and squirmed.

Then Steve reached up. Buried a hand into Eddie’s hair, grabbed a handful and pulled.

“Oh fuck!” Eddie whined, his hips stuttering, the pain mixing with pleasure and zinging down his spine.

Steve chuckled, unsteady and breathy but so self-satisfied. “Thought about this… for so long, Eddie.”

“Thinkin’ about me so much, sweetheart. I’m honoured. What, hah, what did you think about?” he asked into Steve’s neck, lips catching on his skin, tempting him to lick, to bite. He did, groaning at the taste of salt.

“This. On your couch, by the pool, my bed, anywhere. Been desperate for it.” Steve pulled Eddie closer by his hair while he bounced back on Eddie’s cock as if to prove it. “Or, shit, bending you over that throne of yours and fucking you into it.” Eddie let out a pitchy whimper and Steve cooed in a way that could’ve been condescending but instead made Eddie melt. “But now, now that I know the kinds of fucking sounds you make–t-there, yes–I wanna take you apart. Slow a-and gentle until you’re a mess–”

He cut himself off with a broken moan. Eddie’s hips kept up their brutal pace with short, sharp, hard thrusts, the sound of their sweat-slicked fucking and and the jingle of Eddie’s belt buckle filling the room. His brain was nothing but static. The image was stuck in a loop like the end of a record left to spin. Eddie heard a desperate, animalistic whine and realised it came from himself.

“Close, baby?” Steve asked. Eddie nodded frantically, his lips dragging through beads of sweat dripping down his neck. He’d been holding it off, the fraying coil threatening to snap, his balls aching as they slapped into Steve’s asscheeks.

“You?” Eddie wanted to beg for Steve to be ready. 

“Getting there, just, don’t stop,” Steve gasped.

Twisting, Steve pulled Eddie down to catch his lips in an open-mouthed kiss, fingers tangled in his damp curls. Their tongues met sloppily. Shared panting breaths like trying to inhale each other. Eddie’s thrusts were starting to falter. He was going to shake apart at this rate. Might just shatter when he comes, the pressure and heat and need too much and so fucking perfect.

“Steve,” Eddie whined, and Steve’s eyes met his. “So good to me, Stevie, sweetheart. Feel so wet, fuckin’ beautiful. Nee–mmh–need you, need you to come, please baby, please.”

“Touch me,” Steve said, practically commanded, and Eddie wasted no time.

Spitting in his hand and hoping it was enough, Eddie wrapped his fingers around Steve’s dick, mixing his spit with the shocking amount of precome leaking from the head and spreading it over his length. Christ he was hung. Steve let out a relieved sigh, which Eddie swallowed, smashing their lips together again while fucking hard enough that he rocked Steve into his fist. Steve started making little ah, ah, ah noises. Next time–please let there actually be a next time–he’d worship this cock in the ways he wanted to, the ways Steve deserved, but for now he pumped him mercilessly. Then, then.

Steve seized, a full-body tremble ripping through him as he came, pulsing in Eddie’s hand as he tightened around Eddie’s cock and he was so fucking gorgeous, plush kissed-red lips open in a silent scream, so hot and tight and, and, and–

With a hoarse shout, Eddie came too, rutting helplessly into Steve as he rode out the sparking shockwaves that also had him shaking, the wet sounds between them even more obscene with Eddie’s come slicking the way. He finally stopped when Steve’s whimpers sounded a little too sharp. Breathing heavily, Eddie braced himself on the hood of the car on weak arms to keep himself from collapsing on top of Steve, only letting his head rest in the crook of Steve’s neck where he left one final, achingly gentle love bite.

“Okay?” he whispered.

“Mhmm,” Steve hummed contentedly, leaning his head against Eddie’s, their damp hair sticking together.

“Gonna pull out now, Stevie, okay?” When Steve just nodded lazily, Eddie slowly pulled out, both of them groaning at the feeling. And he couldn’t keep himself from parting Steve’s cheeks to see his come dribble out a little, feeling a great deal of pride and greedy satisfaction at the sight.

“Bit late to ask, but you’re still clean, right? After all those tests for the bat bites?” Steve asked, grimacing when he stood up. He was the perfect picture of debauchery, only wearing his rumpled, practically see-through tank top, socks, and shoes, with his hair a wild mess and sweat still dripping from his forehead. The dirty fingerprints and red marks starting to bloom on his neck and hips were Eddie’s favourite part.

“Yep, only time I’ll ever thank those shady government fuckers for poking me with all those needles.” Eddie grinned at Steve’s tired, but fond, chuckle.

Steve looked at the car with heavy-lidded eyes, then did a double-take. “Shit, I gotta wash that off.” There, on the shiny burgundy hood of the Bimmer, was the white splash of Steve’s come, stark against the dark colour. Eddie started cackling and Steve complained, “Dude, shut up, it’ll ruin the paint!” 

“Gonna wash your car without these, Winnie the Pooh?” Eddie bent down to scoop up Steve’s shorts, dangling them from a finger. He laughed when Steve snatched them back with a glare that barely hid his begrudging smile. While he stepped back into them with a wince, Eddie said, “Interesting choice of clothing to work on your car, by the way.”

“Worked, though, didn’t it?”

“What?” Eddie’s eyes narrowed when Steve smiled innocently and shrugged before he wandered off to get a chamois towel and soap. And it clicked. “You planned this? You lured me in with slutty shorts?”

Tossing the towel up and catching it, Steve’s smile widened into something smug. “Yep.”

“Wait. Is the car even broken?”

Steve just offered Eddie another sly shrug and started wiping his come off the hood.

[convexicalcrow]

Cub musing about various methods to induce memory loss, as well as memory recovery, as well as thoughts on masks, possession, and his own experience with memory loss and how that feels.

I am tempted to do a follow-up with Scar and some Area 77 stuff bc they also had memory wiping tech, but idk if he'd actually commit any of that to paper, especially if it was something Cub could access. But idk, I'll think about it.

Transcript below so you don't need to read my chicken scrawl. :D

Methods for Inducing Memory Loss A potion of water-breathing corrupted with magma cream, and then with the sap of weeping vines, creates the most reliable amnesia potion. This combination took me a long time to discover, as it wasn't particularly instinctive in terms of finding the right combination to produce the desired effect.

My initial experiments with night vision potions and ink sacs ended up creating some very effective blindness potions, which I was then able to refine into other options to disguise movement, weapon fire, footsteps, voices with a ghast tear and ice crystals, lots of different uses. Nothing like what I was looking for, but all still useful nonetheless.

Even when I did stumble upon the right formula for amnesia, it's still taken many months to work out the dosages and how they actually work on memory. Scar and I are used to memory loss due to Vex possession, and it's mostly discrete blocks of time that get cut. We remember things if They allow it, but mostly They do not.

We do need to be wearing our masks, though, for the possession to work. The Vex have never said why this is necessary for unlocking the transformations They require, but masks have been used for possession in many cultures for thousands of years, so it makes sense that the Vex are tapping into similar magics.

Memory loss is common with these possessive magics too, thoughnot all possession does need masks. The memory loss was a surprise and a shock at first when Scar and I first got the Vex masks. I remember Scar spending hours trying to create potions to recover his memories. It did panic him at first, but the Vex soon manages to soothe him. Now he doesn't care.

For myself, I find it, well. I notice things floating into my dreams that feel like memories, even if I can't verify them. But I got used to the memory gaps because it's the price I pay for what the Vex have given me.

I will admit that I have, at times, dabbled in memory recovery potions. Just out of curiosity. Just to see if it can be done. That also took a while, but combining honey, milk, and gunpowder to night vision potions did seem to be the most reliable. Of course, I tested these on someone other than me or Scar. Scxar did offer, but I just felt the Vex would be mad if I used the potions on ourselves.

I'll have to write up these recipes later, because they require some quite difficult brewing. I needed to modify a brewing stand to get the concentrations I needed. Distillation is super important and has to be done with precision or the potions won't work. Memories are super sensitive to tampering, and an incorrectly brewed amnesia potion can remove far more than you intend, and a memory recovery potion that's too strong can recover things you may not wish to remember.

They are not potions to use trivially, and with little care. In many cases, there are reasons to simply let the memories be lost, rather than risk recovering or forgetting too much or too little.

Sometimes Scar and I stay up all night, thining about when we first got the masks. Remembering what we can about that time. The Vex, of course, have memories of all the pranks, and we're allowed to remember the final forms, but everything else is lost to us. Sometimes we revisit them, too. Not for any reason, just to- sometimes, it's nice to reassure ourselves they really happened. We did those things.

Last time we did that, Scar asked me if False remembers anything. I'm not really sure. She's never realy talked to us about it. I do sometimes feel Vex magic coming from her, but something always tells me not to pry. If the Vex still have business with her, that's for Them to deal with. We'll know if it's important to know. Until then, False is her own person. Can't say I don't think about it. She did wear a mask, even for a short time, and surely that has to have had some kind of effect. Maybe one day I'll ask her about it.

[zoydraft]

SJ's Rakdos Autoexsanguination, December 29, 2024.

I keep drafting Bx decks that pay way too much life to function. Yes, I will draw a ton of cards and kill a bunch of stuff, but I will also die with that full hand of cards.

With the above in mind, Deep-Cavern Bat and Butcher of the Horde's lifelink were crucial. As much as I don't like lifegain, there's still plenty to go around, and it's more than enough.

This deck really wanted a Blood Artist and a Mayhem Devil. It wasn't to be.

I once got to do Captivating Crew + sac outlet and it was obviously great. I think that's a good benchmark for "combo" in this list. It can turn the game around, but it probably takes a full turn cycle to do anything, and most removal will disrupt it. It's a removal check that feels more special than just a threat.

Shriekmaw was usually ~Terror, which I like as evidence that games feel tight and tense. You have to respond, you can't wait for full value.

Scrawling Crawler was great, it accelerated games really nicely with both the card flow and life loss. Exactly what I hoped for.

[angelisverba]

pink + white

in which harry owns a flower shop and things are going really well with the girl who buys flowers from him because he finally gathered the guts to ask for her number and his best friend won’t stop teasing him about it. 

read part one here

word count: 10.5K+

pairing: florist!h and y/n

warnings: more pining and more love-sickness and maybe some h-word stuff. some cursing, and some light drinking :D enjoy!!! (also, why lie: this isn’t edited. sorry).

*   *   *   *   *   *

For the first time in months, maybe even years, Harry is preparing for a date. 

The word itself sounded so foreign in his mind’s tongue, and his physical one as well because he would occasionally stop what he was doing and mouth the word to himself. 

Date. 

In the middle of humming to himself while stirring the homemade pasta sauce, he realizes that his peppy demeanor is reminiscent of Snow White. All that is missing are the twittering birds and other scurrying creatures bathing in his contagious bliss, helping him hang sliced fettucini on the pasta racks, trying the straps of his apron behind his waist, and harmonizing with his steady, rumble-y, chocolate-y renditions of Otis Redding and The Temptations as they come out of the speaker sitting on his counter.

He’s happy. He’s so fucking happy that he wonders if he’s sleeping and is bound to wake up to grey skies and rain and ice, cold feet. His cheeks are sure to ache by the end of the day because he just cannot stop smiling; it’s the only way to release the bursting joy cramped inside his chest at the thought of meeting with the girl who had been gloriously plaguing his dreams for the past two months. 

A few nights ago, they’d decided on dinner (she’d even said ‘it’s a date!’ and he had bit his lip with a smile while ogling his phone) being that same weekend at Harry’s house. Saturday at six. Y/n was bringing desert, and her sweet self. He was antsy, just as a child on Christmas morning, his train of thought nonsensical and in short spurts, bumping into round cul-de-sacs and dead-end streets that were vandalized with y/n’s face. 

When he wasn’t working, he was scouring the internet for recipes that looked good and had good reviews. Saturday morning he woke early, went to the market and bought the freshest looking vegetables, chicken, and a bag of flour. He even called his buddy who worked at a five-star Italian restaurant and asked if he had any tips on how to make the meal tastier. The floral bordered notepad had two pages worth of notes, his eager scrawl spelling out an entire new recipe for buttered pesto fettucini, a dozen garlic knots, and marinara sauce to dip the bread balls in. Confident enough in his own cooking skills, he’s not worried about a disaster resulting from the step-taking and recipe-following. He knows the food will be good, he just hopes they’re her liking. What if she doesn’t like Italian? 

But, that would be impossible because… who doesn’t like Italian… right? 

Flour dotted his nose and cheeks, contrasting starkly with the light and sparse caramel freckles on his cheeks. The red marks of tomato lingered on the frilly trim of his apron, blending with the tiny strawberries that belted across his angular hips. Harry wasn’t exactly the cleanest cook, but he figured that sacrifices always had to be made, and he would negotiate cleanliness if it meant wondrous faces of approval from the second the prongs of food-filled forks touched tongues. He liked praise. Verbally communicated. Through notes and texts. But his favorite kind was physical. He loved knowing that the subtle changed in poster- the straightening of backs, the widening of eyes- were caused by him (and the uncontrolled moans and writhes that came from his partners in did more for him that the actual sex). Insignificant stains would not stop him from beholding the unconscious demonstrations of indulgence and delight in y/n’s body language. 

At a quarter to five, when all of the lids were placed on pots and pans, buns staying warm in the oven, and his kitchen smells like what he would imagine Italy to smell like, Harry clapped his hands together, untied the neat bow at the small of his back and walked into the shower to freshen up for his special guest. One hour was pushing his ‘get ready’ abilities, but as long as he got out of the shower in thirty minutes, which was a little more than usual, he would make time. The outfit he wanted to wear was pre-selected and ironed the night before, resting on a hanger on the back of his closet door. 

Shucking off his clothes and tossing them into the woven basket at the corner of his bedroom, Harry clicks open Owen’s enclosure and allows his tiny green friend to climb into his fingers. The poor thing had been inside for a large chunk of the day, and would most likely go back inside soon after the mist cleared from the bathroom mirrors. That morning, after a refreshing session of yoga with his owner, Owen was gently placed back into his home with an orange slice and three crickets (one of whom Harry thinks he saw just before picking up Owen for company during his shower). It wasn’t unusual for him to spend so much time locked up, and Harry was sure to open the enclosure to an agitated chameleon after y/n left, his spoiled antics procuring an attitude for the change in his schedule. 

When the water is running in his shower and slow clouds of vapor start to rise from behind the steam-blurred sliding door, Harry sets Owen onto the thick bundle of eucalyptus that hangs around the shower head, careful to make sure he’s out of the stream’s way and settled upon the reader, coiled leaves. He showers in silence in hopes to be out quicker, and uses an expensive coconut and cinnamon scented shampoo meant to enhance your curls!’ that he only brings out on special occasions when he wants to boost the amount of cappuccino springs bouncing off his head. Bubbles trail the path of his mint-green loofa, under his armpits and across his chest, up and down his abdomen and over the taught muscles of his thighs. 

“Hope y’not peeking at my bits, perv,” he chuckles, picking up Owen and twisting the water knob with slippery fingers, soapy moisture from the shea additive lingering between his knuckles, “got the best seat in the house for that.” 

The numbers on his phone- which is frosted over with a blurry sheen of white that turn into water droplets when he swipes at it with his thumb- read 5:26pm, and even though he’s out four minutes earlier than he expected, a sense of hurry settles over him. Speeding to complete the final steps of his routine (a bit of moisturizer that smells sickeningly sweet to keep his hair soft and a dash of hydrating cream on his face because it always got really dry after a shower), Harry’s cursing under his breath in fear of being late to open the door to y/n when she arrived. He’s thinking he should’ve gotten up earlier and skipped yoga to start cooking or something when he steps in front of the mirror. 

Tonight he dons a long-sleeve shirt that matched the hue of coffee with a little too much milk, the two top buttons left undone to display his signature string of pearls perched delicately on his collarbones. Midnight blue pants dotted with small, embroidered silver stars stretch around his thighs and flare softly at his ankles to conceal the heel of his ‘fuck me’ ankle boots that were the same color of his shirt, the heels a chocolate brown tone with rhinestones dotting the bottom edge, spelling out the words. A bit vulgar, considering this was a date with cotton candy, bubblegum, and all things sweet personified herself, but it exposed (if you could even call it that, she’d have to concentrate on the heel of his shoes to see it) the racier side of him only some got to see. Dirty, naughty, smutty. 

Fuzzy pink handcuffs in his nightstand are more than enough evidence to prove that there’s more to him that it seems, but only really, really special people got to see that side of him. People who made him comfortable and confident because sometimes he needs a little push- a little reassurance. 

People who made him want to act in such a way. Men and women who openly embraced the fluctuation of his diverse character, soft and cool one second, and dominating the next. He was versatile and double-sided, like the sexiest presidential portrait on the back of a coin. 

But, he’s getting ahead of himself. Y/n is to be with him in no less than- fuck. Ten minutes. A quick look at the time increased his speed by at least 3 x’s, and resulted with a bruise sure to form on the side of his shin as he banged his leg at the end of his bed while walking out of his room. Long, lean, bambi-like legs made it hard to maneuver a space with efficiency when you were- in Harry’s case- a 6’2 frenzied man bustling around a semi-crowded bedroom. 

y/n <3: hiiiii harry! 

y/n <3: could you send me your address? i’m in my car rn and i just realized i have no idea where i’m going 

God help him. He doesn’t think the letter ‘i’ has ever sent him to a state of near-squealing before, and that’s only because Sarah once sent him a screenshot of a tweet explaining the various ways different vowels and the amounts they came in conveyed how the girl felt about the receiver. And… well, if that was anything to go by- and that’s not saying y/n goes by the same grammatical standards as everyone else, it was just nice to think about- the five i’s and her use of the word ‘hi’ instead of ‘hey’ and even ‘hello’ implied that she was very into him. Lucky, considering he felt the same way. 

But then again, just because it was something that he’d read online doesn’t mean that it’s true or that it applied to her. The excessive use of smile-inspiring letters could be her preferred use of texting, and she could talk to everyone this way, not just to him. 

That though alone slowed his rubber-burning heart by two beats, and so did the realization that he hadn’t told her where he lives. Slimy feelings of insecurity oiled his spine while his brain looped a montage of his guests' faces as they approached the back (sometimes front) entrance of his home. Half-hidden pinches of amusement, doubt, and sometimes even disgust. He would be lying if he said he could handle any of those concealed expressions because it’s his life, but he thinks that what hurt the most are their offensive remarks. As a result of these precarious situations, he’s learned to conceal much of himself from those he doesn’t trust, but it was hard to do that with y/n. 

His ears rang with the echoes of previous lovers. 

“You live in a store?”

“Is this your home? A flower shop?”

“So, what, are you like some kind of homeless person living in a store?”

Harry wasn’t ready for the possibility that any of… feedback could possibly come from his sweet daydream come to life, but he supposed it was way too late to back out now. 

Harry: I live above the flower shop, so just let me know when you’re here :) ! 

Devastating grey bubbles jumped on her corner of the screen, and before he even had time to register his panic, Harry had her response.

y/n: omg ok! I’ll be there in a few minutes then!!! 

Then. 

He panics. 

It’s not that he didn’t time himself correctly. No, he meticulously planned out every detail of this day from the moment they agreed on dinner so that every single detail would be perfect and remarkable. But, what he hadn’t counted on was her estimated time or arrival. Minutes? Minutes? How many fucking minutes? 

A rebel curl escaped from the neat up-do Harry had combed his unruly hair into, nearly remiscenest of the chocolate swoop of a Hershey’s Kiss, and he would have thought so too if he’s taken the time to look into the mirror one last time, but he couldn’t afford to blow his seconds like that. The heels of his shoes clicked and clacked furiously as he raced across into his bedroom, flashing ‘fuck me’s’ over and over again. Slender, ring-clad fingers glittered as they curled around a plastic bag sitting on his bedside table, and crinkled as he turned it over so all of it’s contents spilled on his bed. The red bag was from a local craft store down the street, and Therese, owner of Thistles & Things, had applied an employee discount before he even had the chance to modestly complain. Seven packets of pastel pink flower-shaped tea lights tumbled onto his duvet, and Harry mercilessly tore each one open with excessive force and bared teeth. Three, six, nine, and eventually twenty-one of the small candles landed in an incongruous pile that he scooped up immediately. 

He was halfway out of his room before he remembered that he needed to grab a record, too, and he skittered backwards like a cartoon chased-animal. A hiss steamed from his lips as he slammed the same shin into the same place on his bed. He’d bruise for sure, and as much as he wanted to bend down and sooth the tender skin with a press of his palm, there was no time. 

“Fuck me,” he echoed the statement on his shoes, half-limping into the living room and clamping a hand over the eye-shaped knob to yank the door shut behind him.

Over the last few days, Harry had memorized the placing of every candle that he had bought, and it didn’t take him long to settle them all into their places. The dining table didn’t require any because he had already positioned two golden candelabras at either end of the rectangular oak surface, candle sticks birthing tender pale wisps of light that cascaded over the covered ceramic pots of food. Two plates were already made opposite each other, across the short end of the table, giving Harry the hope of a game of footsie.  

His living room, however, did need lighting. He placed two on every small table, and four lined up in a row across his coffee table, albeit slightly crooked because he feared he was running out of time and his hands weren’t all that steady. The sudden realization that he needed a lighter for it all to work had him rushing back into his kitchen and rapidly pulling open drawers to find the forsaken stick. When he does, he’s sipping back to every flower, delivering fire to their center with fingers that trembled too much to make an easy, smooth process. 

“C’mon,” Harry muttered, shaking his wrist lightly in hopes that the small wicks catch fire sooner. 

With knees that knock together nervously, he straightens at the last candle. His heart is pounding wildly in his chest, and a crazy picture of someone plugging an aux cord over his heart with speakers that blare louder than a vibrating gong flashes quickly through his mind’s eye. He feels like a silly, love struck boy, and as much as it scares him, it also feels good. Because it meant that he was opening himself up for someone, rejection be damned. 

Just as he was settling the needle into the first groove of the record- a classical compilation of soothing pianos and violins- his phone brightened with an incoming message.

y/n: i’m outside!

Harry: I’m on my way down 

A chorus of ‘fuck, fuck, fuck’s’ spewed from his soft mouth, and his shadow was followed by rapid clicks of his boots against the hardwood floor. When he reached the door to the stairs, he turned to inspect his setting one last time and took a deep breath, his cheeks puffing out through the exhale. 

The soft hue of gold glazed the color palette of his ‘princess-home’, as a boy had once labeled it, with strokes of languid romance, softening the atmosphere with the same sweetness as that of a marshmallow. He’s turned the rest of the lights off, leaving the candles as their primary source of light. Though the flame itself was not colored, hues of pink tinged the light that dipped into the wax, making it look like orbs of light the color of Venus’ navel burned serenely around his home, adding to the tender setting Harry tried so hard to create. Vases that so beautifully littered his living room were filled with sprigs of mint, lavender, dahlias (a deep affection),and white roses (new beginnings) favorably polluted the air with the distinct scent of flora and rich herbal life. The heady smells blended with the creamy tones of the Italian food on his table, creating the orgasmic sensory experience that Harry toiled to articulate. 

It wasn’t the time to question his thought-out vision, but the wretched coils of hesitation prompted him to question if his efforts would overwhelm her and possibly scare her off.  Harry had never gone this far for anyone before, at least not really. He always pictured pretty things for people he liked, wanted to lather them in treasures and receive their smiles and words of praises with a blush that painted his face from satisfaction rather than bashfulness, but he’d never brought these visions to fruition… until y/n. 

Well, he thought, it’s too late to back out now. 

Spinning on his heel with purpose and wavering confidence, Harry closed his eyes, steadied himself with an unstable intake of oxygen, and tried very hard not to fall face forward down the stairs in his rush to get to her. His grip on the rail was slippery from the moisture of his palms, and the thunderous impact of his feet against the ground reflected the discordant pumping of his impatient heart. There was no booming music anywhere nearby, but the ghost of rumbling bass echoed at the base of his throat, vibrating against the pearls nestled against his collarbone… or maybe that was also his heart. 

A tugging thought makes him want to hesitate before opening the door, but by some miracle he doesn’t. He’s shoving the second to last barrier between them open with his shoulder, trying to control his breathing with strategies his old therapist had taught him long ago, and striding through a dark flower shop while the flaring fabric of his pants whispering with every step towards… her. 

The singular light hanging above his front door had been purposefully left on past their shut down time because Harry didn’t want her standing- not even for a few seconds- in the dark while she waited for him to welcome her in, and it shone down on her like a spotlight on center stage, highlighting her role as the sweetest love interest. His love interest. Because surely, there was nothing sweeter than her, and there was nothing but feeling in the shape of hearts- both anatomically correct and incorrect. And that made them both Prince and Princess, bound for a happily ever after, did it not? Two coy, blushing youths meeting with gifts and food and whispered words of bashful compliments and a heap of unspoken secrets hidden in their chests. The classic Disney set up. 

Harry’s steps faltered. 

Did she have to be so… so adorable? He thought for a moment that there was a ringing in his ears, but then realized that it was just a pathetic whine coming from the back of his throat at the sight of the angel waiting for him. Y/n truly looked like a tuft of cloud dropped from the sky of the clearest day, clad in a ditzy white summer dress that sprouted from her waist like the bell cap of foxgloves, cutting off elegantly at just below her knees where the smallest sliver of her skin winked at him before disappearing into a pair of go-go boots. A white headband held back the stubborn fringe that still somewhere managed to escape, and….they were wearing matching pearls (this detail ignited an inexplicable flame in the depths of Harry’s loins, and his fingers unconsciously came to rest on top of his own necklace). No ounce of color adorned her person save for the baby blue ceramic container she held in her hands. 

Both of them appeared to be each other’s opposites. Harry in his dark color scheme, y/n in her shade of white. Yin and yang. Strangely, his mind conjured an image that he had seen during one of his late nights scrolling through Pinterest: an art piece depicting Hades, a dark, looming shadow, and Persephone, a small white fairy-looking thing. Their colors, Harry knew, only served to highlight the compatibility of their love, the brightness Persephone brought into the God of the Dead’s life after eons of being alone in his realm of souls. Part of him felt warmth at the romance and poetic nature of the similarities between their relationships, and the other side of him- the ‘fuck me’ side- turned to a much more provocative view of things. 

How delicate could y/n feel in his arms? How… How vulnerable could he make her feel during an act that required physical transparency? He wondered briefly if he would be able to make a small bump at the bottom of her navel with the head of his cock, and instantly felt guilty that his thoughts were so salacious when the night had only just begun. 

Her lips spread into a shy smile the moment he entered the circle of light streaming from the light at the top of the door, and his own expression of pure happiness was a natural- instinctual reaction to hers. A sheepish twist of lips blossomed into a blushing grin, and the gleam of romantic recognition danced around the edges of his irises like the sparkle of light against the condensation of a Coca-Cola bottle. He was hyper-aware of the way she watched him as he turned the already-there key and broke the last barrier between them. 

“Hi,” he squeaked, the greeting breaking against the roof of his mouth. He cleared his throat, and tried again. “Hi. Let me take that for you.” Reaching for the container in her hands and shaking his head when she begins to mumble an argument, he nudges the door back further with the heel of his foot and gives her space to enter, feeling dizzy when the smell of her sweeps over him as she passes through. 

“Hey, you,” are her first official words of the night to him. Y/n folds her hands in front of herself and looks around the store as if she’s looking at it for the first time (and Harry guesses that, at night, it is a completely different place).“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me you lived on top of your store, Harry!”

Dread drops down his spine like a tsunami. There it was. The single sentence that usually signaled the night would be underlined with bitter awkwardness. However, the form of delivery was different. Y/n didn’t sound as put off as others usually do, but he couldn’t be too sure. She wasn’t facing him, instead slightly crouched and inspecting a stem up close in the darkness. It was hard to read her, or anyone at all really, when he couldn’t see their faces. His tongue dried, and while blinking back the embarrassing threat of tears, he swallowed and asked, “Y-you don’t think it’s a bit… weird or anythin’?”

“Of course not, silly,” she gasps, spinning on her heels before popping up straight. She sounded confused at the question, the furrow in her brows telling him that she hadn’t expected that, and the relief that floods through him is palpable. The tension that crept up his shoulders dissolves like steam in the air when she makes eye contact with him, a warmth similar to the inner heat that spreads throughout his sternum when he drinks hot chocolate or coffee settles at the base of his spine and he’s tingly. “My favorite book as a little girl was about a toy teddy bear who stayed the night at a mall because his owner forgot him, and he spent the entire time looking for one of the missing buttons on his overalls. This is kinda like that… I think.” 

“Y’talking about Corduroy?” Harry asked. His brain was going a mile a minute, barely able to keep up with the way this conversation was moving, the new direction it was taking, and the imagery of the lost bear from a storybook his mother still has in the attic somewhere, loved and covered in his fingerprints (both young and recent). It didn’t usually go like this. His dates never talked about stuffed bears. His date never talked about something he knew or was familiar with. His dates never continued the conversation with such a non-caring attitude, and he wasn’t quite sure what to do, what was right, and what he should or should not say to make sure nothing got spoiled. Giddy and deadly anxious, he breaks eye contact, eyes downcast, and starts making his way back up the stairs. 

“Yes!” Y/n replied, the tap of her shoes making Harry’s ears prick in awareness, “did you read his story, too?” 

“He was…” He hesitated. Up until now, this sweet angel of a girl had been nothing but kind to him. Her words were not double-edged or traitorous to his feelings, her tone held no stale sarcasm, only genuine interest. Harry could be honest with her, he knew that. Nothing about her pointed to future embarrassment, but that hesitation was second nature to him. Like breathing. Only instead of releasing and taking, he’d constantly been holding back, and this was new. It was good. He cleared his throat, playing off the pause in his sentence, “he was actually my favorite as well.” 

The confession left him on the edge of anticipation, horrified that he would start sweating because he was so set on pleasing her. On making sure that none of what made him him, acted like a fold of carpet, causing her to trip up and leave in a foul mood. He instantly questioned if his comment was ‘weird’. Queer, maybe, but not wierd to him. Y/n, though… she wasn’t him. What if she did think- no. No, Harry couldn’t go there. She was sweeter than every jar of organic honey he’s ever tasted, her shine prettier than the opaque glaze of the amber syrup, and even if she did think something was off about him, Harry knew that she wouldn’t admit it openly. 

Y/n was not like the rest. She had already proved that by not turning up her nose in a visible sign of distaste at his living accommodation. In fact, she had seemed… intrigued. Curious. Maybe even fascinated. 

They’re halfway up the stairs, so he can’t look over his shoulder and risk dropping the pan in his hands while tripping down the stairs to read the emotions on her face while she responds. Both of their legs sync in stride, slicing like a pair of twin scissors as they move up to his open door. A soft chorus of swishing fabrics accompany their slightly bated breaths, hers more than his. 

“Are you just saying that or are you being serious?” Y/n said, the curve of a question mark contorting her breathy words with the cleanest swoop. Sincere. 

“M’being serious!” Now at the entrance of home, Harry can partially twist his upper body so that his eyes can feast on the delicacy of her glorious image. If his eyes were physical entities, and what he was seeing was a frozen, tangible thing, he imagines they would be starving beasts eating for the first time in months, clawed fingers scooping morsel after pink morsel into their irises. Gorging. Consuming. Devouring the heavenly art they so had the privilege of touching, biting. 

Not even the praised masterpiece of the Sistine Chapel could compare to what he was looking at. In the dim lighting of his decorated apartment, y/n’s virginal clothing was bathed in a dusting shade of blush from the pink candles that were placed throughout the place. Color snuggled against the contour of her body, multiplying her tender appeal to surpass the effect of a newborn lamb on wobbly knees. Or the inner veins of a pink rose. So incredibly soft. Her fingers toyed with each other, wiggling amongst themselves as her chin slowly dipped and lifted, her eyes slowly taking in the scene Harry worked so hard to set. They were slightly wider than normal, her mouth parted as her tongue ran along her bottom lip, moistening the skin before they closed and the tendons of her throat contracted around her swallow. 

Her silence was shattering his insides, in a way that Harry could not determine. Would this be the tipping point? Would this be what makes her run away? Did she not like his home? He was filled with questions that piled on top of each other too quickly for processing. The side of his trousers were damp with the sweat that he wiped from the center of his palms, and also to keep from running his hands through his hair and turning it into an unruly, poofy mess like a cartoon electrocuted cat. 

Setting the baby blue container next to the kitchen sink, Harry asked, “you don’t like it?” His words were merely a sound. Meek and feeble. Frail like a defenseless baby. The tremble of a kicked puppy’s shoulders. The heavy vulnerability in his tone makes y/n whip her head in his direction, the same air of confusion coating her features like a thick buttercream frosting, and her first words were a swipe of grabby fingers revealing bread underneath. 

“What?” Her chin digs into her neck in recoil. “No, Harry… no, I love it. You did all this?” She lifts a hand and sweeps it around her in a half circle, the end of her skirt curling upwards and Harry thinks fire ants are biting the apples of his cheeks when his gaze drops down as she moves. Instantly, he feels like a creep for checking her out, and even worse, for allowing his blood to flow in a nether direction. “For me?”

He stutters a response, blushing and grinning like a school kid and mentally kicking himself over it. But he’s so relieved and a little shocked that he allows the tension that’s built up throughout the day to leave his body and decides to just… enjoy himself without overthinking every action. Scratching the back of his neck with one hand and stuffing the other into his pocket, he leans one shoulder against the wall and stares at a candle by her hip.“O-of course, I thought you, um, deserved it.” 

It’s her turn to flush now. They look silly, practically toeing at the ground like cherubs in a vintage Valentine’s card, but just as adorable. Plumes of the finest birds feathers couldn’t match the downy lilt of her voice as she spoke to him. It felt like a caress against his skin. “No one has ever done anything like this for me before.”

I’ll do this a million times over for you and more if y’let me’, Harry thinks. In that moment, every inkling of a future, desire, dream, want, every fantasy solidifies itself and he knows that he wants more with her. He wants it all with her, all because she was nice to him (might as well call him a puppy; a few pets and coos and he’s loyal forever). 

Instead he pushes himself off the wall and backtracks the few steps to the sink, fingering the aluminum covering the casserole she had brought, and answered with more fluidity and confidence that he had ever possessed around a conquest, “It was my pleasure, y/n. What’s in here?” 

Several squares of flaky, buttery looking pastry sit on the inside. A nutty, sweet smell wafts it’s way up to his nose, slinking down the ridged of his throat and dropping down to his stomach, where the aroma pokes a sleeping dragon called Hunger. Harry comes to the realization that he hasn't had anything to eat since breakfast that morning, and even that was just a serving of oatmeal and half a banana. Too busy preparing and thinking, worrying. 

“Baklava,” y/n said, her voice sounding far-away and distant. Harry looks towards her, his heartstrings tugging now that she was further away- now that she didn’t have his full attention- because she was looking around his apartment, her back to him. “Got the recipe from a greek restaurant I ate at every morning when I spent a semester abroad. It’s not as good as the gran’s who taught me, but it’s still pretty g-,” her sentence broke off in a breathy gasp that fueled a rocketship in Harry’s belly, the flames feathering further, below, because it was reminiscent of a surprised pleasure that came after the first thrus- “Is that Matisse?”

There’s a scene in the movie Twilight that illustrates the moment Bella’s heart stops- the crystallization of every blood cell and vein, the freeze of every artery and the hollow within- and Harry imagines that is exactly what is happening inside his body when y/n correctly inquires the name of the artist he loves so much. 

“It is.” Nodding, Harry brings two slender fingers to rub underneath his nose, his closed fist a feeble attempt to hide the smile fighting it’s watch across his mouth. Tens of thousands of hummingbirds tickled the inside of his rib cage every time she spoke, and he had to shift his weight because the bottoms of his feet were sizzling with the emotion that raked his body. He watched her as her head moved slightly up and down, observing the blue silhouette of a curving woman that was framed on his wall. “Y’know Matisse?”

“Mhm, he’s one of my favorites,” her hair bounced in affirmation, then she turned to him, “I love your home, Harry. It’s very pretty.” 

Roses bloomed on his cheeks.“Thank you, love,” twin flowers appeared on the roundness of her face, too, and Harry was satisfied knowing that the nickname he let slip affected her as much as it did him while saying it.“Y’wanna come see what I made for us?” 

“Yes, please!” 

They both took the small steps to the set up kitchen area where an array of pots, food, and arranged plates waited elegantly and poised. The gold accents and shine of ceramic shouldered an enchanting allure underneath the incubating glow of the candelabras perched at the ends of the table. Harry waited for y/n to reach a stand besides him before reaching for the closest lid with a steady hand. Surprisingly steady, given that she was so close to him their arms pressed against each other, creating a bubbly static of electricity between them. Her warmth scorched through layers of clothing and branded his skin, her smell- a unique blend of vanilla, mint, and a flower Harry couldn’t place because his mind was too frazzled- invaded his nostrils with the same flurry of an aggravated hornet. His mind was only y/n, y/n, y/n, while his mouth spewed ornate descriptions of the meal before them. 

The smell of roasted garlic, butter, tomatoes, grated parmesan cheese, and freshly baked bread surrounded them in the form of a large Italian cloud. Clinking dishware twined with the smooth drawl of Harry’s accent that dipped and stuttered whenever he glanced at her and found her already looking at him from the side, the bridge of her nose covered in the lace-like shadow of her eyelashes. His thoughts scattered, and once or twice she had to fill in the final word of his sentence. 

“...and here is homemade garlic and rosemary…”

“Bread?” She suggested.

“Y-yes. Bread. Or, knots. Whichever works.” Setting his hand back down on the back of the chair in front of him, Harry inclined his head towards the food, gesturing his question, “s’what do you think? Ready to eat?”

Y/n nods, smiling up at him with stars in her eyes (really just the reflection of the flames on the table, but Harry attributes them to her inner sun shining through). “Pretty please,” she said. 

“Sit. I’ll serve you.” Pulling out the chair in front of him and motioning for her to sit, Harry tries his best to not look down as she flattens her hands underneath her bum while sitting, emphasizing the curve of her hips. He pretends not to notice, like he isn’t fighting a sweat, like his collar isn’t tightening by the second, and like the statement written on his shoes isn’t repeating over and over in his head. Fuck me, fuck me, fuck. Me. “If I’m serving too much, let me know, okay?”

Y/n shoots him an excited smile and nods quickly, like an eager puppy, and fuck if Harry’s cock isn’t jumping in his pants. He feels so inappropriate. He fears that the word ‘HORNY’ is written in a glittery hot pink across his forehead, and that his semi-hard-on was transparent through his starry pants. Shame makes him even hotter, the angel on his shoulder shunning him for mentally defiling someone so innocent, and yet somehow that only spurred the ache in his groin further. Praying that it was dark enough for shadows and the midnight blue of his pants to conceal his hormonal reaction, Harry began serving her from the closet casserole: basil pesto angel hair pasta.

She doesn’t interrupt his portioning until he reaches for the second garlic knot and a timid squeak leaves her worried lips, “can I just have one, please?” Her hand is outstretched, reaching out towards the plate and her eyes slightly wide and her eyebrows raised. He thought that she looked so cute underneath the dim light, ethereal, and his semi grew closer to full-on hard. Literally. 

“‘Course, love.” The edges of his eyes go soft and downturned like half-crescent moons, and he nods to assure her that her request was well received. “Did y’want any more or is this okay?”

“That’s okay. I’m not sure I’ll be able to eat it all as it is, and I feel bad because it smells and looks really good.” She glances down apologetically at her food. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll give you plenty of leftovers to take home,” he waves her worries away, and serves himself, bringing out the wine he had for them to share.

They eat in comfortable banter that switches from chat, jokes, and silence everyone in a while, but hidden glances (that aren’t so hidden because they often catch one another) are heavy throughout the meal. So is the ‘accidental’ knocking and nudging of their feet underneath the table. 

Everytime y/n hums about how good the food is, Harry has to pull at his collar, cross and uncross his legs to alleviate his dick, and lower his gaze to his own food to hide the flush that’s heavy on his cheeks. 

When they wrap up their meal, they playfully fight over washing the dishes, and then finally settle on sharing the washing and drying duty (Harry washing of course, because he couldn’t let her take the brunt of it) and ‘accidentally’ bump hips while they stand at the sink. While putting the plates away, Harry boldly stands behind her ‘to place a plate in the cabinet above her head’ and places a hand on her waist to let her know that he was there. But he doesn’t move away right after setting the plate down, and maybe it was the wine he drank because before either of them know it, y/n is tilting her head to the side so that Harry can run his nose down the length of her throat, inhaling her scent as he does so. 

Reaching her shoulder, he presses a kiss there, straightens, and then walks back to his kitchen area to refill both of their wine glasses so they can sit on the couch and converse a while longer. 

They talk about things that Harry can’t concentrate on because he’s staring at her too hard, and he notes that her crossed legs are angled to his, both of their body languages pointing to each other. He remembers reading once that it was an indication of interest, something that our bodies did without notice because it was a procreation survival instinct or some shit. He doesn’t know and he can’t care enough to remember because all he can think about is how pretty she looks in his home. His mind is muddy with cartoon red heart bubbles that blow out of his ears and pop as soon as they’re free, only to be replaced by another. 

And then he can’t take it anymore. He has to tell her. 

“Love, you’re so beautiful it hurts,” he states bluntly, peering up at her with a steady gaze. 

“It’s the wine talking,” she says, brushing off his compliment. 

“No,” Harry shakes his head solemnly. “It’s me talking. Tispy me. This is what sober me thinks all the time, but I don’t have the balls to tell you because I’m afraid you’ll run away from me.” 

She was in the middle of taking a sip of wine, and Harry’s statement made her giggle. 

Some of it slips out of her mouth and down her chin.

Time stops.

Time stops the moment that dainty dollop of white wine slips past her lips and down her chin, glistening like a precious diamond as it marks a wet track down her throat, settling at the delicate hollow of her throat that still vibrates from her bashful laugh. 

Everything around Harry freezes, even her movements, and before he knows it, he’s moving. The low concerto playing on his vinyl record sounds like it’s underwater, drowned by his adrenaline. Somewhere, something in his mind is telling him that this is wrong, that he should get her explicit permission before acting so boldly, but a louder, PSA-level thought is telling him that she wouldn’t push him away. There was more than enough to prove that she felt the same way that he did (the way she froze and her breath hitched when they were putting their dirty dishes into the sink, her eyes fluttering when his nose dipped to smell the curve of her neck). 

Wrapping his long, slender fingers around her wrist to keep the wine steady and away from his line of fire, was okay. Leaning in with the same speed of a cornered cobra- thought this was no prey and predator scenario, because had that ‘time freeze’ effect not muddled his tizzied senses, Harry would have seen that y/n tipped her head back in the slightest centimeter, almost expectant and welcoming of his salacious touch- was okay. The fact that his salivating tongue dropped out of his mouth instinctually to trace the path left by the rebellious wine in reverse, was okay. 

What was even better than that, was the revolutionary flavor that exploded like fireworks across his tongue- the perfect mixture of her, her skin, and the bittersweet bubbly wine- buzzing him all the way down to his toes. The crotch section of his pants becomes uncomfortably tight, and Harry can feel the head of his dick leaking precum onto the  lower section of his abdomen, where the waist of his pants sits just below his belly button. His lips flutter around the vein where her pulse thrums, and continues all the way up to her chin, nibbling on the tender, baby-soft underside. A whimper leaves her when he pinches her skin with his teeth particularly hard, and he moans in response, licking over his assault apologetically, soothing her. 

Leaning back, he takes her in, and fights the urge to rut into the air. 

Her breathing is erratic, her chest heaving as she sucks in loud gulps of breaths, head thrown back. If Harry hadn’t grabbed hold of her hand, that wine would be all over his vintage couch.  She’s flushed, her neck from his abrasions, and her face from- well, he hopes it’s because of him, too. A faint shine decorated the curves of her face, highlighted from the candles on the coffee table, and her lips are shiny and red from her own lips and tongue, a brilliant color of rushing blood coating them as air leaves in soft tufts. Her eyes are closed, but her eyelids and lashes flick and flutter from erratic movement. 

The music slowly comes back into the focus of his eyes, and Harry’s teeth sink painfully into his bottom lip, muffling a noise that’s a mix between a whine and a moan. His ankles cross and uncross nervously, and he begins to detach her fingers from the stem of the wine glass, a task that proves to be more difficult than it should have because y/n’s knuckles are whiter than bone as they clench tightly underneath his hand. Her eyes snap open when he strokes the bumps of her fingers, coaxing her to let go. Gulping, she flexes her fingers, and Harry takes the glass, setting it on the table before taking that same hand and turning it over in his, taking it up to this mouth and gently kissing every finger tip, all while holding eye contact with her. 

“Please,” he whispers hoarsely after her pinky. Her hands, he notices, and trembling, and the endearing notion of her own nerves, makes him press her spread out hand against his chest. “Let me kiss you, darling.” It was a plea and a question all the same. His desperation and adoration were written all over his drawn eyebrows and dilated pupils. Cock stiff and straining against the seam of his pants, he fights off another pitiful whimper as y/n pulls in a ragged breath.

“Yes,” she whispers, her voice shaky like the crunch of broken glass under a boot. Her hand, small within Harry’s, continues to tremble as she continues to speak, her head nodding along with her feeling while her red lips shape around her words.“Yes, I want- want you to kiss me.” 

Swiftly, yet lightly, like the flap of a butterfly’s wings, the pads of Harry’s fingertips map a trail down to her wrist, where he presses a wet kiss against the vulnerable underside, and continues to the crook of her elbow, goosebumps prickling below his wake like paint and a paintbrush.  “Thank you,” he groans, his breath harshly fanning against her skin as he continues up to her bicep, his lips hovering over her skin now that her sleeve creates an offensive barrier. “Thank you, love. Y’such a treasure.”

 The tip of Harry’s nose replaces his lips in a smooth transition, and dips into her collarbone where the movements stall, running back and forth the little hollow in a way that makes her suck in a breath, her hand coming up to sink into his bicep because she’s begun to sink into the couch and away from the affections of Harry, which is something that neither of them can have, so he remedies the situation. 

Wrapping an arm around her waist, he hauls her up and her thighs part without instruction so that she is straddling him, her bum resting on the thick of his thighs. White cloth flares against her thighs, obscenely creeping up high near the juncture of her thighs before swooping back down, and the sight sends a throb down Harry’s cock. He’s sweating now, every inch of his body hot, but he wants to look at her. Drink her. He wanted to worship her, kiss and lick at every crevice of her body and cum from that alone. 

Y/n stared at him, her eyes wide, dazed, and glossy like a doe’s. Lashes fluttering innocently, eyebrows meeting on her forehead almost petulantly. “You’re not kissing me,” she whines. 

Fuck, he thinks. Fuck, fuck, fuck. The words on his shoes burn into his heels, and a smirk teases his lip at her impatience. Old ways, domineering ways, begin to take hold of every thought, action, and word. A side of him that doesn’t really come out unless it’s during sex prowls behind a cage that’s in the process of being opened. Since he first saw her, and even before that, Harry hasn’t had any company in his bed. It didn’t feel right. Nearly three months, and the fire within him was raging, eager for arson. Maybe this was the reason for his teenage-like reactions. Everything about her had his prick swelling. It was ridiculous.

The arm remains around her waist (he wants to drag her closer to him, but it didn’t seem appropriate, yet) and he brushes her hair behind her ear, his finger coming down her jaw to caress the underside of her bottom lip. Y/n is preening at his touch, leaning into his hand as her eyes flutter closed and her breath comes out a little heavier. “Be patient with me, love.” He says, voice husky, “I’ve wanted you for so long, and now that I have you I want t’make it last. Don’t y’want it to be good?”

She nods, her eyes closed and her face tilted up at him expectantly. This won’t do for Harry. He required her full attention, her complete contribution. It was more comfortable for him when there was communication, and he understood that his actions and words could sometimes be a little overwhelming, so he didn’t mind providing an extra command or reminder to be present when it was needed. He takes her chin in his hand and taps his finger against her jaw to make her open her eyes, “Can y’use your words for me, darling? I asked you a question, did I not?”

Her throat nudges Harry’s knuckles as it contracts around a very thick swallow, eyes fluttering open like she’s waking up from a pleasurable dream, “y-you did.”

A pleased look smooths over Harry’s face, the arm around her waist tightening slightly. “Then answer me: don’t you want to feel good? Don’t you want me to make you feel good?”

“I do.Yes, I do Harry. I wanna feel good… please,” y/n whimpers, pouting and twining her hands around his neck so that the tips of her fingers could play with the ends of his hair. That dazed look in her eye was getting heavier at the same rate that Harry’s dick was growing even thicker in his pants because he was enjoying the desperation in her tone. He loved that she trusted him enough to melt in his arms the way she was doing, shuffling forward to try on his lap in a way that showed she was positively itching to be kissed, and noises of his own arousal were fighting, clawing their way up his throat. 

The raspy-ness of his voice has increased by tenfold, adding a devilish gravel to his voice that coaxed a soft mew from her. “Good. That’s much better,” he mutters, praising her. His eyes travel all around her form and snag on her chest, where pebbled points clearly outline her nipples through the fabric of her dress. Harry chews on the inside of his cheek, using every ounce of self-restraint to keep from bucking his hips into the air while she’s patiently waiting, innocently yearning for something that- from him- wasn’t going to be innocent at all.

Tenderly, Harry strokes the pads of her fingers in a line from her cheekbone, to her lips, to her other cheekbone, and back down to her lips, pulling the bottom one down and licking his pink mouth as he watches it spring back out. He meets her eyes while tucking his hand behind her neck, his fingers digging into her hips with more of a bracing force than necessary because he was too tense. Too wound up, and she was droopy like a drizzle of caramel, waiting and falling wherever he led her. Harry needed her calmness because he was afraid all hell would break loose once he tasted her. Thighs flexing beneath her, his abdomen clenched with both heat and nerves, and his heart was beating light-years per millisecond. 

The couch creaked once as Harry shifted his weight forwards, and y/n’s eyes fluttered closed to the beat of the quiet and serene piano keys in the background, her breath puffing out once more before it lodged in her throat, her chest stilling, and he can’t held the endeared smile that inches itself onto his face. “Breathe, baby,” he mumbles, getting close enough that he was inhaling her air, the smell of sweet wine and her shrouding his hyperactive senses, “And you tell me if you want to stop, okay?” 

She responds with a soft, weak, “okay,” and a bob of her head, his previous order on her mind. “Please kiss me, Harry.” Y/n’s eyes are still closed, but her impatience is clear to him when her eyebrows furrow like she’s about to cry and her eyelids crinkle with the pressure she’s putting on them. A rare, mean side of him wants to chuckle, revel in how lax she is for him, but he knows that too much for her right now, and that he shouldn’t tease her anymore. 

���Okay, love. Only because you asked so nicely.”

He’s a little more rough than he needs to be, shutting his eyes while holding her in place by the back of her neck and firmly but slowly sliding their lips together- hers between his-, groaning at the same time that she preens and allows his mouth to move hers, parting her lips and suckling on her top one at a pace that makes her jump right on top of his groin, eager for more and eager to be closer to him. The feeling of their lips meeting feels like running his fingers against silk and lace, or underneath warm bath water that has been sprinkled with velvety lavender salts. 

A cry escaped her when Harry parts from her, panting like he’s just ran a marathon with matching beads of sweat gathering at his temples, distraught from the loss of connection, and her eyes snap open, tears welling quickly, but they only escape when he flicks his wet tongue vertically from her bottom lip to a dainty cupid’s bow, all while keeping eye contact. This makes her yank on the soft chestnut strands of Harry’s hair that were twirled around her fingers, not hard enough for it to even be remotely painful, but the force tilts his head back a little and a drawn out moan ribbons from him. 

Y/n shifts in his lap, arching forward so that the tips of her breasts rub against his chest and while he continues to lick into her mouth, Harry feels that his chest is on fire. Muffled sounds of pleasure interrupt the slicking noises of their lips moving against each other and it’s so obscene that he pulls her tighter against his chest, positioning his feet wider against the ground so he can push his hips off the couch and right into her-

“Fuck me!” Harry groans the words that have been on his mind all night, the same ones etched on his shoes, and rests his forehead against hers, breathing heavily and trying to collect himself. His lower abdomen, just where the head of his cock sits, feels uncomfortably moist, and throbs from the pressure of her pussy that had been sure not even seconds before. It was too much. Too much for him to go through it without embarrassing himself, and just when he’s about to say something, shaking his head defeatedly with a regretful, dull shine in the dark green of his eyes, y/n mewls, restless, and grinds back down onto the thick length begging for release. 

Hissing, Harry’s head falls against the back of the couch and his hands come to grip her hips, stilling her movements. His chest rises and falls rapidly while incoherent thoughts on why he has to stop what’s happening crumble in his mind. “Love,” he pants, “don’t wriggle y’hips like that, s’driving me insane.”

“But I need…” Her words leave her in something less than a whisper and more than a breath, her skin around her neck dotted with perspiration. Attempting to move her hips down again, she’s met with a harsh squeeze from Harry, and both of them know that there will likely be bruises the size and color of graped blooming there in the near future. Her thighs begin to quiver, and she takes her hands out of Harry’s hair to plant them on his shoulders as leverage because the position he has her in is tiring her muscles. 

“What is it, y/n? What d’you need?” The classical music continues, the violins playing a quiet, violent song to match the tone of Harry’s voice, the build-up right before the drop. He knows what she needs, because he needs the same thing, and it’s driving him insane. His balls are tight against the base of his cock, a visible outline of himself protruding against his pants that not even the dark color can hide in the dim, terracotta lighting anymore. With his head still leaning against the back of the couch, his eyelids droop as he speaks to her. “Want to come? Is that it?”

The urgency of her nod makes the headband that was clinging loosely on her head to fall back against the wooden floor with an obtuse clack. Her eyes are wide, glossy. Harry’s spit paints her mouth like a red lip gloss, and his are painted by her saliva, a sparkling champagne. 

Cooing at her, he lets go of her hips and wraps her up in his arms again, pulling her close and nuzzling into her neck as she pushes down on him with no direction, “Oh, angel. All y’had to do was ask.” The warmth of her pussy surpasses the layers between them and shoots straight down to his dick. She lifts herself again, and arches befores sitting again. Having gathered the amount of leverage she wanted, y/n drags her hips forwards, up the thickness of him, and stops just at the swollen head before jerking a bit, a needy moan evaporating on her tongue. Harry clenches his jaw, trying to hold off his orgasm so that he can watch her get herself off while all of their clothes were still on. “S’right baby, use me. Rub y’tight little pussy all over my clothes. Y’gonna come on me? Y’gonna leave your taste on me?” 

Her jaw falls slack at his words. “Yes. God, Harry, yes,” the movement of her hips stutters, delivering a particularly heavy grind over the wet tip so that it presses against the heated skin of his stomach and Harry’s eyes roll to the back of his head, his grip on her hips steady so that he can buck up into her warmth. The crotch of his pants is so wet, and not just from his own precum, but the moisture that has seeped through whatever underwear she’s wearing. And suddenly, suddenly he needs more. Suddenly, he has to see her pussy rubbing down on him. 

“Are you wet f’me, darling?” Hands settling on her lower, exposed thighs in preparation to slide the dress upwards (or away if she doesn’t want to), Harry leans in closer and drags the tip of his nose from her jaw to her ear, where he nibbles on the lobe, suckling it to soothe and particularly hard bite, and whispers into her ear, “can I see?”

“Yeah,” y/n squeaks and looks down at Harry’s large hands and they slowly slide upwards, but never stops moving. Not even as her white thong comes into view, the delicate, pale fabric transparent from her wetness and sticking to her like a second skin. The gift of Harry’s prick slides right between her folds, parting them even through the underwear. A small, pearl-like roundness indicated the location of her clit,  and he understands why her hips jolt everytime they go over the head of his dick. 

Because she’s rubbing her clit against him.  

White spots litter his vision, and by some miracle he doesn’t bust right then and there. Instead he cries out, almost shouting the next time her hips buck against him, but he doesn’t take his off where they meet. The room has become unbearably hot, filled by their sweat, panting and moaning, and jerky, desperate movements. “I’m gonna come, baby, fuck. Let me,” he’s thrusting up, wanting to go in, but knows that it’s not the right time, and so he slips his hand underneath the bunched dress so that he can hold her by the waist and take them both over the edge. Up until that point he had been enjoying watching her use him, take what he needs from him, but now he needs to do it himself because he won’t allow her to orgasm after him. “Let me finish fucking you through y’clothes.”

They move so fast their movements are blurry under the lighting, rutting up and down into each other with a new sense of urgency. Y/n moans every time he nudges her clit, and when he begins to feel a faint pulse coming from her heated center, he grinds against her harder, pulling her down against him in addition to the force of her own movements. He does this once,twice, and then she’s crying, tears actually falling down the side of her face as she jerks in his hold, swiping up and down his crotch in quick, messy moves. 

Her nails cut the skin of his bicep, even through his long sleeve, and the small bit of pain throws him over the edge, his own body convulsing as his balls draw up and that ache that has made his dick stiff exploded into a prickling, liquid heat that shot through him and stained the inside of his pants. Rutting into her a few more times, mindful of her oversensitive whimpers, Harry drags her to his chest and kisses her languidly. It’s messy his tongue tripping on the outer corners of her mouth while her’s is skittish, but it’s okay because they’re both sated and it feels good to be in each other’s arms where they’ve dreamed of being for longer than normal without doing anything about it.

They’re both quiet, catching their breath as the needle trips over and over again at the end of the record, demanding to be turned off. Y/n is nuzzling into Harry’s throat, and a flicker of guilt flashes against his heart, faint apprehension because he knows that they both wanted it, they both spoke consensual words out loud, but he feels he had a little too hard on her. Too rough with his words.  “Fuck, I’m sorry. Was supposed to be a gentleman, but you’re so angel-like and soft, I couldn't stop myself.” He drops his head to the side and kisses her temple, “had to taint you a little bit.” 

Y/n giggles, a response that he wasn’t expecting, fisting his sweater vest in her hand. “Are you always like this?”

He feels that he knows what she’s going to say, but he asks anyway, but to hear her say it.“Like what?” 

“Dunno… um…” her voice decreases in increments, “bossy?”

Harry smirks. “Did you not like me telling y’what to do?”

“I did like it,” she whispers, hiding her face into his neck so that her breath hits his collarbones. Goosebumps are born where her warm air lands, and he chuckles, rubbing her back in slow, comforting circles. 

“That’s all that matters to me. I’m happy I didn’t push you too much.” 

They grow silent again, content. She kisses his neck occasionally, the same spot over and over again until his shoulder hitches up and a breathy laugh leaves him. He leaves one hand on her back and the other trails up and down the hand clenching his shirt, enjoying the way she shivers when he caresses the crease of her elbow. 

Eventually, she sits up straight. “Suppose I should start walking back home,” she mutters, blushing. 

“Walk? Love, you walked here?” He’s shocked, and his grip tightens around her possessively when she mentions leaving. After things went so well? Maybe he was growing attached too fast, but it was hard not to when y/n was so sweet to him, with him. 

She responds like the answer is obvious. “Yeah. I live just down the street remember?” 

Harry shakes his head. “Y’can’t go out there by yourself right now, s’dark and y’have to pass alleyways to get home. I can drive you-” 

“No!” Y/n is quick to interrupt him, shaking her head in denial. “I don’t want you to get up and fuss.”

“Then we’ll stay right here.”

“Okay.” That was easier than I thought, he thinks. He’s not letting her leave tonight, and if he could have it his way, he would like her to spend the night tomorrow as well. 

“And please don’t push me away like that, saying ‘it’s time to go home’. I don’t mind y’being here. I want you to be here more than I’ve wanted anything in a long time, okay?” He pauses so that he can get her understanding (he gets it, in the form of a nod). It pinched his heart knowing that she would be so quick to leave, and he wonders if maybe she had that reaction because she was used to leaving after a hookup (not that this classified as that) and the thought made him sad because he knew firsthand how shitty that was. He didn’t want her to feel that way ever again. “Good. How ‘bout we get out of these clothes and go to sleep, hmm? S’that sound good to you?”

“Yeah,” she says, smiling up at him with stars in her eyes, “yeah, that sounds good.”

And Harry is so full. He’s so full of love and happiness, more than he has been in a long time, and it’s all because of the pretty flower girl in his arms.

******

ngl i had to take several pauses while writing him.... lol....riding.....

anyway, part 3 (the final part) is loading! thank you for being so patient with me and reading! don’t forget to reblog (bc i love reading the tags) and leave any comments you have in my inbox! i love you!!

<3 abigail may

[rosemaidenvixen]

A Secret’s Worth

Chapter 14: Barbara

Ao3

The brochure had been feather light when Barbara had picked it up at the travel agency earlier today, but now it felt like there was a brick in her purse.

It took a great deal of effort to keep her eyes on the road and not on the handbag sitting in the passenger seat. 

Ever since Barbara had seen that magazine article all those months ago, in the back of her mind she always knew how ridiculous it sounded. Her son's nightly transformation being linked to seventeenth century witch trials that had happened on the other side of the country; no matter which way you cut it, it was a stretch. Nix that, even a stretch started from somewhere rational, this was a half-baked, half-assed, barely-plausible, hypothesis. 

But she couldn’t let it go without making sure. The odds of finding anything might be slim to none, but Barbara couldn’t risk letting a cure slip through her fingers. 

And she’d already done all the research she could from California, the only thing left was to go to Massachusetts and look for answers there. 

It wouldn’t be an easy trip, by any stretch of the word. Taking a plane was theoretically possible but in practicality way too risky, and it was much too far for her to drive them. Their journey was going to involve switching between buses and trains and stopping at different motels each night. But maybe, just maybe, three thousand miles away, they would find the answers they were looking for. 

A lead weight sank into the pit of her abdomen as the house came into view.

Logistics aside, what worried Barbara the most was that in all the research she’d done the past few months, there was nothing suggesting that there was actual magic involved in the Salem witch trials. Nada. Zip. Zilch. And mounds and mounds of evidence to suggest colonial mass hysteria and a gigantic coincidence based on a common name. Knowing that, the thought of dragging them both to the other side of the country, only to find nothing.... 

That scared her.

But not because she was afraid of failing, Barbara had plenty of opportunities to get used to that over the past ten years, but because this was it. Their last clue, the final stone to unturn, the end of the line. If they didn’t find anything on this trip…

Her throat tightened as the house came into view.

Then it was over, for good.

Turning to pull into the driveway, she was surprised by the presence of an unfamiliar Niesan parked on the sidewalk. Usually they didn’t get many strangers in their little cul de sac, maybe it was a salesman, or Jehova’s Witnesses. Either way she had bigger things to worry about. Putting it out of her mind, Barbara pulled into the driveway and killed the ignition; five breaths in, hold for five, out for five more. 

The conversation she was about to have with Jim was going to be rough. No matter how tactful she was there was no way he was going to react well to hearing about the Salem Witch hypothesis she’d been sitting on for months, much less how she was planning on taking them to the east coast for a good chunk of the summer.

But as much as she was tempted to, Barbara couldn’t put off telling him forever.

Best to not drag her feet any longer and rip the bandaid right off.

Steeling herself with a final deep breath, Barbara grabbed her purse, stepped out of the car, and marched up to the front door.

“Jim?” she peeked inside “Are you--”

The rest of the sentence died in her throat.

There was a man, not a particularly threatening looking one but still a stranger to her, sitting on their staircase, going through their clean laundry basket like he owned it.

She froze midstep; the picture in front of her too baffling to form a coherent reaction to. 

The man glanced up at her from the basket “Oh Dr. Lake, glad to see you here,”

“I-- you-- who-- who are you? What are you doing in my house?”

The man didn’t answer, instead a new voice cut in “Hello Dr. Lake, how about you join us in the living room?”

Still bewildered beyond all belief, Barbara found herself moving towards the living room. Stepping around the corner, the first thing she noticed was a woman, just as unthreatening and unfamiliar as the man on the stairs, sitting on their couch and smiling at her. It was the second thing she noticed that caused her confusion to shift into concern. 

Jim, sitting bolt upright on the other side of the couch facing the woman, plastic smile carved into his face “Hi mom, welcome home,”

Barbara just stood there frozen in the door frame. What was happening, these people didn’t look or act like burglars or home invaders….but who were they? What were they doing here? And why was Jim so on edge and desperate not to show it? 

“What is….going on?”

“Oh I’m sorry, let me introduce myself,” the woman stood and held up an ID badge “My name is Dorothy Butler, you can call me Dorrie, I’m an investigator with CPS,”

For a second it felt like time had stopped.

Then Dorrie, 

The child protective services investigator

Held out her hand, and everything became painfully real.

Forcibly snapping herself out of it, Barbara reached out and shook the offered hand, willing herself not to tremble, and returned Dorrie’s smile with one of her own. Panicked scream ringing silently in her skull.

Dorothy Butler.

CPS investigator.

A fist to the gut would have been less shocking and painful.

Who had called, what had they seen? Had it been their routine made someone suspicious, or had they seen something more--

Barbara clamped down on that thought hard, walking over and taking a seat at the couch next to Jim, using years of practice as an ER doctor to compartmentalize and stay composed. 

For whatever reason these people were here, right now it was vital for Barbara to maintain a level head. Keep calm, tread carefully, figure out what exactly had brought these people to their home, and what it would take for them to leave.

Besides, if someone had seen something...telling, it wouldn’t be CPS that came knocking on the door.

“Sorry I guess I’m just...a little confused, why are you here, who called you?”

Dorrie’s porcelain smile didn’t so much as twitch “Someone came to us concerned that about the disciplinary methods going on in your household, but I’m afraid I can’t tell you who, that information is confidential,”

Not the answer she’d been hoping for, but not an unexpected one. Even with the waves of dread it sent through her.

Barbara leaned over to get a better look at the man still sitting on the stairs “So who is…”

“That’s Detective Charles Lunau, he’s my police escort,”

“I’m sorry your what now?”

“It’s nothing to be concerned about,” Dorrie’s expression instantly switched from chipper to contrite “It’s just standard department procedure,”

Barbara had more questions but bit her tongue, it would not be in her, or Jim’s, best interests to come off as defensive right now.

But her brain was starting to catch up to her surroundings. And anger was starting to rise past the shock.

“I know you’re with child protective services, but you can’t come in to my house, talk to my son, without--”

Dorrie whipped a folded piece of paper out of her bag and held it towards Barbara “Here’s your copy of the search warrant, please feel free to look it over and keep it for your records,”

The bottom dropped out of her stomach for the second time today. From beside her she could see Jim flinch.

Barbara numbly reached out and took the paper, a quick glance revealing the seals and signatures that meant it was official. Turning the anger in her veins to ice.

An investigation was one thing, anyone could shoot their mouth off and get CPS to come sniffing around. But a warrant meant that not only had someone reported them, but they had given something concrete enough for someone else to take it to a judge and get him to put down his signature.

More than that, a warrant meant that Dorrie and Charles could look where they wanted, talk to who they wanted, and stay as long as they darn well pleased.

Which meant that now Barbara really had to play nice.

“Well then…” she took a deep, grounding breath “How can I help you?”

Dorrie beamed, clearly pleased at the cooperation “Right now we’re just trying to get a feel for how things are in your household, Jim and I were already talking about some things, now I’d like the three of us to talk together, does that sound good?”

“Yes...that would be fine,”

“Great, then let’s get started,” she pulled over a notebook that had been sitting on the coffee table “Besides Jim and yourself, who comes and goes from your home on a regular basis?”

“No one I think, it’s mostly just us-- Oh! Except for Jim’s friends, they come around fairly regularly,”

He nodded along with her words “Yeah, and they’re all pretty well behaved, straight A’s and all that stuff,”  

Dorrie quickly scrawled something in her notebook “What are your friends’ full names?”

Jim frowned but answered all the same “Toby Domzalski, Claire Nuñez, Darci Scott, Mary Wang,”

A few more notes and Dorrie paused her pen and looked up “And how are your grades Jim, any areas where you’re struggling in school?”

“No not really, all A’s and B’s and stuff,”

“I can send you a copy of Jim’s most recent report card if that would help,” Barbara added.

Dorrie beamed “That would be great, now can you tell me what kind of family activities you two do together?”

Barbara and Jim turned towards each other simultaneously.

“We...go camping pretty often,” Barbara said haltingly.

“Yeah, kind of our thing, love the great outdoors,” Jim let out an awkward chuckle.

“Good good,” Dorrie turned towards Barbara, smile shifting into something more somber “Now how do punishments and discipline work in your house?”

Her heart skipped a beat “There aren’t really any huge issues, Jim’s never had behavioral problems severe enough for me to be deeply concerned about discipline,” she risked a peek at Jim from the corner of her eye, for the most part he appeared calm, but his face had gone deathly pale.

“On the rare occasions I do find a punishment necessary, it’s usually grounding from video games or electronics, how long depends on the severity of the situation,”

Dorrie’s smile slid back into place as she jotted down another note “I know a lot of households operate at different hours, so do you have any kind of set curfew in place?”

“Yes…” Barbara continued “Four pm during the winter and six pm after daylight savings,”

“Why did you pick those hours?”

Barbara paused, and very deliberately did not look towards Jim “I think it's safer that he’s home before dark,”

In her peripheral vision she could see Jim stiffen.

Her chest tightened. She just got a sinking feeling she’d just said something she shouldn’t.

Dorrie’s only response was to keep smiling and jot down another note “So between school and work how do you--”

“Actually I have a question,”

Barbara over to see Detective Lunau coming into the room holding the laundry basket “Are you dating anyone Dr. Lake?”

She was momentarily taken aback “I’m sorry, what?”

“As of this moment are you currently dating or in a romantic relationship?”

“No. No I’m not. I haven’t dated anyone for years,”

He set down the basket and pulled out something on top. Her breath hitched when she saw it was one of Jim’s pajama shirts.

“Do you mind telling me who this belongs to?”

“That’s mine,” Jim piped up, startling her.

Lunau looked at the shirt, then back at Jim, frowning “Seems pretty big for you,”

Jim’s smile slipped just a fraction “I like baggy clothes...”

Going by the look on Lunau’s face he found this hard to believe. Jim trailed off, tension in the room rising.

“Ok,” Dorrie abruptly broke the silence, shutting her notebook and getting to her feet “How about we all take a break and go look around the house?”

This new development had problems of its own, but Barbara was mainly relieved that the subjects of clothes and her social life were being dropped “That’s fine,”

Dorrie grinned at her “Great,”

The rest of them stood and followed her towards the stairs. Lunau held back to let them pass, and then followed them up.

Meanwhile Barbara was still trying to reassemble her mind. Trying to gather her thoughts felt like herding bees, but she needed to get it together and figure out what they had laying around the house that needed to be tucked out of sight, or at the least they should come up with a very good explanation for.

She only remembered right as they all stepped up to Jim’s bedroom door.

They all reacted the instant Dorrie pulled it open; Dorrie herself flinched and took half a step back, both her and Charles cringing, Jim had gone even paler and Barbara had to fight to keep a wince off her face.

Frowning for the first time since Barbara had seen, Dorrie turned back and addressed her “Can you tell me about this smell?”

Barbara just stood there, hoping she didn’t look as much like a deer in headlights as she felt.

The smell wasn’t anything overly rotten, halfway between vegetation and musk, but it was distinctly animal. And it got even more noticeable after Jim started puberty. At first Barbara had been vigilant about scrubbing it out of his clothes and sheets as soon as it started to linger. Until Jim had admitted he couldn’t stand the way soap and air freshener smelled when he was blue. Since then they'd decided to more or less let the scent go in his room while making sure to keep it out of the rest of the house.

None of which she could say to the woman in front of her.

Not to mention that she’d just now recalled the other thing that was unusual about Jim’s room.

“I...it’s--”

“It’s my fault,” Jim said abruptly, causing every head in the room to swivel towards him.

He flushed under the scrutiny “I’m...bad about washing my sheets and stuff,” 

Dorrie, still frowning, jotted something down in her notebook before looking back up “Is it ok if we go inside Jim?”

His face was tight “Sure….”

Jim stepped ahead of them and pushed open the door, allowing them to file in before he followed suit.

Barbara’s insides knotted as he shut the door behind him. 

Dorrie stumbled a little bit, the space was cramped with four of them in it, before glancing between Barbara and Jim, looking equal parts confused and concerned “Is there any particular reason your bed is so messy?”

This time Barbara knew the flinch showed on her face. Calling it messy was being generous.

During the little time that Jim slept at night he tossed and turned aggressively, inevitably making tangled nests out of sheets rather than sleeping under them. It had taken years of work and a special hypoallergenic fitted sheet to keep Jim from tearing the mattress apart. But they still couldn’t keep him from tangling up the sheets.

Jim forced out an uncomfortable laugh “Guess I’m just bad about making it…” 

Dorrie briefly held his gaze before looking towards Barbara.

Barbara knew that she was waiting for her to say something regarding Jim’s bedding situation, to step in as his parent and caretaker and provide a good explanation.

But she couldn’t speak past the lump of static in her throat, teeth digging into her lip.

After a few moments of loaded silence Dorrie quietly raised her ever present book and took down another note.

“How about we look at the bathroom?”

The bathroom was, mercifully, normal. But Barbara had to force herself not to glance out the window at the steadily setting sun while Dorrie rifled through their medicine cabinet.

They were running against the clock here, sunset was in less than an hour and she didn’t know how long Dorrie and Chalres were planning on staying. And the warrant meant that they weren’t leaving until they were good and ready.

And the way he kept tugging at his sleeve and glancing at his watch told her the time hadn't escaped Jim’s notice either.

After finding nothing amiss in the bathroom or her bedroom, they soon found themselves back downstairs; Dorrie casually peeking inside their fridge and cabinets “How do you handle meal times with Jim’s school and your irregular hours,”

Finally an easy question “I try to keep a good supply of snacks and ready-to-eat meals on hand, we go shopping together once a week to get everything we need,” Barbara said, Jim nodding along in agreement with her “Jim enjoys cooking and does a lot of our meals together, We try to to eat together as often as possible, but there will be some nights I leave Jim to find his own dinner,”

“What about chores and housework?”

This question was a bit trickier, Barbara hadn’t even thought of the best way to answer before Jim piped up.

“I--”

“Jim,” Dorrie interrupted, not unkindly “I know you’re trying to be helpful, but I really need to hear this from your mom,”

He clapped his mouth shut, face red, all eyes in the room slowly turning towards Barbara. 

“We...try to split things up pretty equally. I do clean and cook on my days off, and Jim has a chore list and contributes to meals when he’s up for it,”

Barbara glanced around the room, Dorrie’s face was still a neutral mask, but Lunau was frowning darkly and Jim was positively ashen.

A cold lump dropped in her ribcage. She knew she had just said the wrong thing.

How many times did that make now?

This was too much, she couldn’t keep doing this, guessing and trying to give the right answer. She was already on edge, and didn’t know how many more straws she could take before she snapped.

“I’m tired,” Jim spoke up suddenly “Can I be done?”

Barbara stared at him in surprise, before shooting a discreet glance out the window. They had a little time left, but she wasn’t sure how Dorrie would react to such a blunt demand.

Looking over at Dorrie, also appearing surprised by the sudden request, she appeared to consider it for a moment before smiling at him “Oh of course, but before you go just one more thing,” she flipped through her notebook “You’ve sustained injuries from an animal attack on your ankle, correct?”

This time when she bit her lip Barbara tasted blood, how on earth did they know about that!?

Jim raised an eyebrow, looking more confused than anything else “....yeah?”

“Do you mind showing us?”

He froze “What now?”

“If you don’t want to that’s perfectly alright, you don’t have to,”

Anger rippled up, eclipsing every ounce of anxiety. Damn right he didn’t have to, warrant or no warrant, this woman had just crossed a line. Barbara was half a second away from telling Dorrie just how outrageous her request was and that there was no way she was examining her son, when Jim cut in.

“No! No--” Jim stopped himself and took in a deep breath “It’s fine,”

Before she could stop him Jim propped up his foot on a stool and rolled up a pant leg, exposing faint pink lines an inch above the ankle joint “There, see? No big deal,”

Dorrie stepped closer, leaning in to glance at the scars. Lunau hung back, but kept his eyes locked on Jim and Dorrie. She spent the longest ten seconds of Barbara’s life staring at her son’s ankle before looking up “Thank you Jim, that will be all,”

He gave a curt nod, before jerking his pant leg back over his ankle and putting his foot down “I’ll be in my room,”

With that he turned and headed upstairs. Barbara hoped that his rush to escape the room was only obvious to her.

Dorrie and Lunau watched him retreat up the stairs, once he was gone their focus shifted onto towards Barbara. 

“Now Dr. Lake we’re just about done here there’s a few more things I want to ask you,”

Barbara nodded along, even as her heart soared at the words ‘just about done’ “Alright then, do you mind if we sit at the table?”

“Not at all,”

Forcing herself to maintain a neutral expression, she was in the homestretch just had to make it to the end, Barbara stepped over and took a seat at the table; Dorrie and Lunau right behind her.

She was going to make it, just a few more questions and these people would be out of her house.

She was going to be ok. Jim was going to be ok.

Settling into the wooden chair, Lunau standing behind her, Dorrie held up her notebook and pen “Can you describe your and Jim’s relationship with your extended family?”

The second those words fell from her lips whatever relief Barbara had started feeling vanished. Her stomach curdled, acid rising in the back of her throat.

Not a completely unexpected question, they wanted to get some background on the situation and see if there was a history of abuse. But that still didn’t mean it was going to be easy for her to answer.

“Of-- of course,” Barbara took in several gusty breaths to steady herself, and then spoke.

“I’m not in contact with any of my living relatives and I haven’t been for sixteen years, Jim has never met or spoken with any of them,”

That statement caused both Dorrie and Lunau to perk up instantly.

“Why is that?” Dorrie asked, pen poised and ready.

Somehow Barbara’s throat got even tighter “My maternal grandmother, my last grandparent, passed away when Jim was two, my only aunt and uncle are my mother’s sister and her husband, they were never interested in a relationship with me so I never pursued one. I have no siblings,”

“And your parents?”

Her face burned, chest tight, all the emotion from this afternoon threatening to bubble out and explode, along with decades old wounds ready to tear open and bleed fresh. 

“I made the choice to cut them out of my life when I was twenty three,” Barbara said at last, unable to maintain eye contact as she did.

When Dorrie spoke up again her voice was softer than she expected “And why did you decide to do that?”

It was a long time before Barbara answered, summoning the words back from a part of her life she had long tried to move past.

“Both of my parents were emotionally abusive to me for my entire childhood,”

“Do you mind giving me a specific example?”

Actually she’d prefer to get an appendectomy without anesthesia “They….they were constantly critical of me,” not good enough, some people wouldn’t even call that abusive “They used guilt to manipulate me all the time, growing up I was always trying to appease them and keep them happy,”

Her voice nearly cracked towards the end. It was true, all of it, but there was more, so much more. How much were these people going to drag out of her before they were satisfied?

In a move that surprised her, Dorrie extended a hand across the table, not touching, but close “I’d like to know the steps you took to go no contact with them, but please take all the time you need Dr. Lake,” 

Barbara nodded her acknowledgement while gripping the armrests of her chair, knuckles white  She was standing on the edge of a cliff, pushed there inch by inch by everything that had happened to her since she walked in the door. She needed to calm down, get it together, shut this chapter of her life back up and plow forward. 

“When I realized that they were never going to change I decided that I didn’t want them in my life anymore, I left home at seventeen to live with my grandmother, but for a while we still spoke on the phone and saw each other at family gatherings. But when Jim was born I knew I never wanted him exposed to any of that toxicity and cut them off completely. To this day my parents don’t have our contact information or even know what city we live in,”

She risked a glance across the table.

Lunau, whether because he was unbothered or had an excellent poker face, hadn’t responded at all to Barbara’s story, for her part Dorrie’s expression was somber, but also sympathetic “I can see why you would make that decision, what about his father’s family?”

Now that question was a lot easier, even if knowing what question was sure to come after it made the burning in her gut return with a vengeance “We’re not in contact with them either, James’ grandparents were never involved in his life, neither were his aunts and uncles. His parents live in South Carolina, we never visited but we did speak over the phone back when we-- James and I, were together, but once we….separated that contact ceased, James has a half brother, but he lives in Georgia and I’ve never had contact with him,”

“And James, your ex-husband,” Dorrie said gently “How did your relationship with him end?”

Even though she’d seen that question coming from a mile away, hearing it out loud, Barbara knew she must look physically ill.

With her parents she hadn’t asked to be born or chosen to grow up with them, but James….

James was a mess she’d gotten into all on her own.

All of a sudden Barbara couldn’t do this anymore, she was fighting with everything she had to stay composed, but all she wanted to do was scream, tear off her skin and let the raging storm inside her explode “I...I...I’m sorry can we just take a break for a minute?”

Lunau frowned “Actually--”

“Actually,” Dorrie cut in “I think we’re at a good spot to stop for today,”

Shock and relief rushed through her like twin lightning bolts, hot and cold all at once “Really?”

“Yes,” Dorrie said, getting to her feet “It sounds like that’s a complicated subject, and it’s getting late, so how about we meet up another day so you can tell me everything in more detail?”

So it didn’t look like she was completely out of the woods, but still Barbara would take what she could get “Of course, that would be just fine,”

“Excellent,” Dorrie tore a page out of her notebook and slid it and her pen towards Barbara “If you can just give me your contact info I’ll send you some dates and times and you can let me know what works best for you,”

Beyond grateful that today’s visit was almost at an end, Barbra hastily scratched down her phone number and email address before sliding it back to Dorrie, who gently folded it and tucked it into her pocket.

“Just one last question before we go, is there anything in particular that you find yourself struggling with as a single parent?”

By this point Barbara was so burnt out that she was barely able to put together a cohesive answer “I...I’m sure there is, but nothing comes to mind right now,” 

Dorrie beamed at her, and as much as she was grateful for her patience this woman’s overly cheery attitude was uncanny “Struggling is nothing to be ashamed of, taking care of a family is hard work,”

She held out a pamphlet towards Barbara “Here are some general resources if you ever feel like things are getting to be too much,”

Barbara barely had time to take the pamphlet before Dorrie was flashing a business card in her direction to “And here’s my card with my contact information. If you ever have any problems or get into a jam, or even if you just want to talk, don’t hesitate to call me,”

“Thank you,” Barbara said as she took the card, guilt managing to wriggle it’s way in past every other emotion.

These people hadn’t come here with the intention of destroying their lives, they just wanted to help. But the fact of the matter was they couldn’t, not unless Dorrie had a magic wand tucked next to her pen.

The cold hard truth was that one else could be trusted with Jim’s secret, and by extension, taking care of him.

Dorrie glanced over at Lunau, that seemed to be some kind of queue as they both got to their feet “Alright I think we’re done here,”

Even though she was counting the seconds until they were gone, Barbara forced herself to go through the motions “Are you sure? Is there anything else you need to see?”

Once again Dorrie flashed Barbara her unflappable smile “No need, we were able to take a look at everything we needed to. Take care,”

Barbara gave a halfhearted wave as they walked away “Thanks, have a good rest of your night,”

“You to,” with that Dorrie and Lunau stepped out the front door, shutting it behind them. Barbara sat in silence for a few seconds, then thirty, only when a whole minute had passed did Barbara allow herself to go limp and collapse against the table, awashed with equal parts overwhelming relief and overpowering dread.

It was a massive load off her back to have the investigators out of the house, why had they been here in the first place? Who had called? What exactly had they seen?

Dorrie and Lunau. What were they talking about right now? The curfew? The smell? The bed? The scars? Her?

Barbara pushed against the table and forced herself up straight.

She couldn’t let herself fall into a spiral of paranoia, the bottom line was if one person saw something concerning, another could as well. And regardless of what Dorrie and Lunau had seen, that bell had been well and truly rung. The only thing they could do was watch themselves on all sides and make sure that no one in their lives had reason to be suspicious. 

And it was just one visit, it wasn’t like they were already looking up foster homes. If she and Jim cooperated and played along this was sure to fizzle out in a month or two.

But then why couldn’t she stop trembling?

Barbara dragged herself to her feet, heading into the kitchen to make some tea to hopefully settle her nerves, fighting and losing the battle against working herself into a panic.

And she couldn’t stop thinking about what could have possibly been concerning enough to get a warrant signed?

She paused mid step and glanced around the room. Admittedly the visit with Dorrie and Lunau could have gone better, but it wasn’t like they’d seen anything outright damning. If they made a point to clean up Jim’s room and for Barbara to pick up a few more chores they should be in the clear. And the scars….

Well every animal bit had to look a little different.

So why did she feel almost sick with dread, why couldn’t she shake the feeling that something deeply private had been exposed?

All they’d done was talk a little bit and look around the house, granted Barbara hadn’t exactly been thrilled to walk in on strangers talking to Jim and--

Her heart stopped.

Dorrie and Lunau had a warrant, and they’d already been here when she got home, who’s to say they hadn’t already been here when Jim got home to? What if they’d gotten here way ahead of both of them and done some poking around on their own?

And there was one area of the house they hadn’t touched while Barbara was here.

Chill spreading out from her chest to the rest of her body, Barbara slowly walked over to the door that Dorrie and Lunau had ignored in her presence; desperately hoping to be mistaken. Maybe it wasn’t that noticeable. Maybe it could probably easily be mistaken for something else.

She pulled it open, blowing every last one of those possibilities out of the water.

The claw marks were still there, fresh as if they’d been made that afternoon. A neon sign would be less obvious.

Barbara shut the door, feeling disconnected from the action, like her body didn’t belong to her anymore. But she could still see the claw marks flashing in the front of her brain. They needed to get those fixed, yesterday. But wait, if they’d already been noticed wouldn’t covering them up be more--

Then she caught a glimpse of something worse. 

The exercise band, hanging just inches away; deliberately hung and placed in such a way that it could only have one clear purpose.

How many times had she pulled it shut over the basement doorknob? How many times had she listened to her child screaming from behind that same door?

Just because she couldn’t trust anyone else to take care of Jim didn’t mean she deserved him.

A child wouldn’t get taken away for a slightly smelly room or messy bed, but this….

This would do it.

Suddenly keeping herself under control was the furthest thing from her mind.

Barbara ripped the band off its hook.

Get rid of it get rid of it now.

Couldn’t throw it away, someone might see it in the trash, she needed to destroy it, she needed to--

Barbara ran over to the junk drawer, yanking it open and tearing through its contents, grabbing the first thing that could do the job. A box cutter. 

Whipping the blade out, she slashed and hacked at the rubber cords without hesitation.

Strangers in their house.

Tiny chunks of yellow rubber flew to the floor.

Jim being taken away from her.

She didn’t slow down her frenzied assault on the band. Not even when the blade missed her fingers by millimeters. If anything she sped up, all the emotion from the past hour she’d tried to suppress boiling up to the surface.

Her baby, far away and surrounded by other people.

She couldn’t cut fast enough, tearing and cutting and shredding with everything she had.

Someone else seeing his other face.

Her hands were shaking as she kept slashing at the blade, unable to pull in enough breath as the world collapsed around her.

Strangers, hurting, or even killing Jim because of it.

All of a sudden she had nothing left to cut at. Panting with exhaustion as the band lay in pieces on the floor all around her, just the empty handle in one hand and the box cutter in the other.

It was only now that she registered the feeling of tears running down her face.

“Mom?”

Barbara jerked her head in the direction of the sound. Jim, he had already changed for the night and come downstairs without her noticing, she’d forgotten how stealthy his blue form could be despite his size.

Walking in on his mother tearing apart an exercise band like a madwoman.

Her eyes stung. How could she? How could she let herself break down like this? No matter how stressed she was about the CPS visit, her child must be even more--

Jim hurried over to her and got down on his knees; starting to pick the bits of yellow rubber up off the floor “What’s going on mom? Why were you--”

Acting completely on impulse she hugged him, kneeling down just far enough so that the top of Jim’s head went up to her chin.

“It’s going to be ok sweetie,” she squeezed his shoulders “No--”

No one’s going to take you away.

“N-- nuh-- nothing’s going to happen from just one visit,”

Don’t say those words, don’t put that idea in his head. Barbara was the parent, right now her feelings weren’t what mattered. She needed to pull herself together so she could be there for Jim.

“We-- we just need to cooperate and go along with them for now, everything’s going to be ok, I promise,”

For a moment Jim didn’t move, frozen and stiff in her embrace. Then he softened, leaning into the hug.

Barbara squeezed him tighter “We’re going to get through this together,”

Jim slowly reached up and returned the hug “Right, we take care of each other,”

In spite of everything that drew a fragile smile out of Barbara, even as fresh tears threatened to spill “Right,”

[jemej3m]

HAVE U EVER THOUGHT OF A BAND!AU?? i love band au's and ur work!!! (not to mention but i think u would write an excellent drummer!andrew)

are you kidding me??? have i ever thought of a band au? bruh i breathe band au’s

also, i wanted this to be soft, so have some childhood friends starting a band out of their mum’s garage :DD

*

“Can I now?”

Neil ducked his head, trying not to show Andrew his grin. “No, ‘Drew.”

Andrew cocked his head. “How about now?”

Neil turned around and arched a singular eyebrow at the man. “You cannot shove your drum stick through Kevin’s brain, Andrew. Not now: not ever.”

“I hate you,” he muttered. Neil just grinned. 

“You say the sweetest things to me, ‘Drew.” With that, he turned and continued to tune his acoustic. Behind him, Andrew was going bright red. 

What started as a friendly, neighbourhood band had turned into something else entirely: Neil and Andrew were cramped backstage, tuning and warming up. Kevin was probably talking to his mom on the phone, whilst Nicky was most certainly trying to escape their security detail and go flirt with fans in the event centre’s foyer. He could charm a crowd. 

They’d started the band up when they were just kids: Neil remembered Kevin grabbing him by the sleeve and dragging him across the street, where he’d noticed the three Dobson boys setting up instruments in their garage: Nicky on bass, Aaron on keyboard and Andrew on his drumkit. 

Neil, having been only 11 whilst the others were 12 or 13, wasn’t as outspoken or enthusiastic about joining them as Kevin was. 

“Come on, Neil,” Kevin insisted, dragging him by the elbow. “I’ll sing and you play the guitar. Okay?”

“It might be fun, Neil,” his sister, Dan, insisted, giving him a gentle push out the door. “It’s just messing around in a garage band. Nothing serious.”

If little Neil knew where he’d be, nine years later, he probably would’ve spontaneously combusted out of paranoia and fear. 

Adult Neil still got anxious - he always wanted to perform his best - but it’d taken years of gigs and scouts and labels to work them up to where they were now. It was a gradual process, which definitely helped the whole stage-fright thing. 

“What are you thinking about?” Andrew inquired, sitting down behind Neil and hooking his chin over Neil’s shoulder. He smiled, leaning back against his best friend. 

“Just stuff,” he responded. “How we got here. Where we’ll go.”

“Next stop on the tour is D.C.”

“Funny.”

“Yes,” Andrew agreed, deadpan. “That’s what I’m known for.”

Neil just laughed, getting to his feet. “We’d better get ready before Kevin comes back.”

“Your brother is the worst,” Andrew grunted, following suit. 

“At least we’re not related,” Neil grinned, jostling Andrew’s shoulder. “You can’t talk: you’re Aaron’s twin.”

Andrew just pointed a stick at Neil in warning. 

*

The lights were flashing. Audience screaming. Neil opened his eyes out of his reverie and looked to his counterparts: Nicky was rushing up and down the front lines, giving out as many hugs as he could. Kevin was waving and blowing kisses. And Andrew - 

He stood behind his drumkit, shirtless and dripping with sweat. He still bore his armbands, brimming with blades and secrets, and in his hands he loosely held his favourite pair of drumsticks, a pair Betsy had bought him, one’s he’d been careful to not break. 

Neil’s mouth was dry as he walked over to where Andrew stood. A spotlight blazed from above, shrouding Andrew’s head and illuminating his hair like a golden halo. He looked angelic. He was angelic. 

“You were amazing,” Neil said, voice lost under the cacophony of the crowd. His hand was reached out, gently brushing the bare skin of Andrew’s bicep. He didn’t know what he was doing anymore: the post-show euphoria was driving him. 

Andrew didn’t need to hear him. He could read lips. Read intentions. 

They were ushered off the stage soon after, Neil’s ears still ringing, his fingertips still burning. Andrew tugged on a fresh shirt, a towel around his neck. He had the most laborious job out of all of them, save maybe Kevin. Neil looked away from the way his hair curled at the nape of his neck. 

“Good show,” Kevin panted, sweat sticking his hair to his forehead. Neil nodded, the exhaustion of playing for four hours settling in. His shoulders ached, fingertips raw with playing both his guitar and the keyboard (Neil filled Aaron’s vacancy when he’d fucked off to college) whilst his throat ached from countless harmonies and backups he sung for Kevin. 

Genuine praise from Kevin was rare and prized for their band, and was usually reserved to the few moments after a performance finished. Then he’d go back to his regularly scheduled criticisms and evaluations. 

“Wasn’t it?” Nicky grinned. “We are such hot shit sometimes! Anyway,” he slung his guitar off to the side, careless. Neil winced a little. “I’ve got a cutie waiting in my car, apparently.” He winked. “His name’s Erik and he’s built like a wall. I’ll see y’all tomorrow!” 

“Jesus Christ,” Kevin said, not unkindly. They were all used to Nicky’s antics by now. He looked back to Neil. “You gonna stay with Andrew or me?”

Neil narrowed his eyes. Was he going to stay with his brother or his best friend? The choice wasn’t exactly hard to make. 

Kevin put up his hands. “What? I thought you two’d had a lover’s spat or something, before the show.”

“Kevin,” Andrew warned, voice low. 

“You guys weren’t as synthesised as you usually are,” Kevin continued. “Did Neil say something, again? Neil, what did you do?”

“Kevin,” Andrew snapped. 

The man took his final warning with a grain of salt and rolled his eyes, peeling off to cool down and head back to the hotel. He left Neil standing in the middle of the corridor, baffled. What the fuck was he talking about? A lover’s spat?

“Don’t think too hard, junkie,” Andrew muttered, fingers hooked into the collar of Neil’s shirt. “He’s just sprouting his usual bullshit.” But Andrew couldn’t look him in the eyes. 

“Right,” Neil agreed, smiling weakly. “You’re right. Sorry.”

“Shut up,” Andrew tugged him down the corridor with a finger hooked through Neil’s belt loop. 

Neil went willingly. He always went willingly with Andrew. There was no one else in the world that he trusted more.

*

“What do you mean, you’re not a thing?”

Neil paused with his fingertips up to the door, ready to push it open. It seemed as though he had stumbled upon a conversation - perhaps not for Neil’s ears. 

“He’s not interested,” Andrew said, sounding exhausted. “And I’m not about to pressure him into something he doesn’t want.”

Huh. Maybe they were talking about a new guy. Andrew didn’t date that often - or very successfully - and he was usually not willing to talk to Neil about it whenever it did happen. Neil wasn’t quite sure why but respected his boundaries nevertheless. He just didn’t know that Andrew went to Kevin about it. 

Neil wondered who it was, this time. Roland? He’d been the most long-term thing Andrew had ever attempted. No, Andrew said he wasn’t interested in Roland. Unless he was lying. 

Andrew doesn’t lie to me, Neil reminded himself. 

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Kevin insisted. “He’s been in love with you ever since he first saw you. Don’t give me that look, Andrew. Put away your knives.”

“Do you think so?” Andrew asked, voice low. Gravelly. Tainted by disbelief.

Something in Neil’s chest tightened. He sounded…hopeful. Neil was arbitrarily jealous. Who was this guy? 

Wait, why was Neil jealous?

He pushed against the door, ignoring the way that the two of them shifted so that it didn’t look like they were engaged in conversation. 

“We’re loading up the bus,” he supplied. “Time to get moving.”

And if Neil noticed the way that Andrew walked around him, careful not to brush their knuckles, well. 

He didn’t say anything. 

*

By the end of the third week, Neil couldn’t handle it anymore. He wasn’t sure what he’d done, or why Andrew was so adamant in avoiding him, but he hated it. He hadn’t felt this isolated since his early years when his father would shut him in a wardrobe and his mother would scold him for eliciting his father’s ire, before both of his parents died and Wymack adopted him into his strange little family, brought him into the tiny cul de sac  where Betsy Dobson and Abby Winfield lived with their own collections of abandoned kids. 

“Andrew,” he mumbled as he watched Andrew tuck himself into his own bed. They were sleeping in the same hotel room but they were millions of miles away from each other. Neil felt stiff and confused. 

Resigned, he shut the light off. 

*

“Fix it,” Kevin demanded. 

“Fix what?”

“Just tell him already. It’s getting nauseating.” 

Neil narrowed his eyes. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Kevin threw Neil’s lyric notepad back at him. “‘Living limbless, lost, lonely, ever since you went and left me’? What do you mean, what am I talking about? I thought you two were already together - now he’s saying you were never interested? What the fuck, Neil. You’ve been practically married for years.” 

Neil blinked. “Me and -”

“Andrew, yes, who else?” Kevin continued, irritable as he scrawled down new ideas. “You’re so fucking dense sometimes - ow!” 

Neil stuck out his tongue, satisfied with the large black line his thrown pen had left behind. He fished out another pen from his bag and kept writing, letting Kevin’s banter distract him from how painful his chest felt. 

*

The tour was ending. They were looping back to South Carolina. Andrew hardly looked at him anymore, let alone spoke to him. Kevin looked at Neil with pity. Nicky tried to cheer everyone up with icecream. 

Neil couldn’t understand why they were falling apart. What had he done? What had he said? 

The screams irked him. They sounded less ecstatic and more afraid. Neil was falling apart onstage, overthinking. They’d just played for Charleston, one of their last stops on the tour. 

The curtains came down. Neil couldn’t move. The others were already off the stage. Neil couldn’t breathe. 

“Neil,” Andrew said. He couldn’t look Andrew in the eye. How was he to explain that Andrew’s estrangement had left him in such a miserable state that he could hardly perform without breaking down? 

“Neil, look at me.” 

Neil closed his eyes. “Whatever I did - I’m sorr -” 

“Abram,” Andrew whispered, before pressing a bruising kiss to Neil’s lips. His eyes flew open, though he didn’t move. It didn’t matter: Not a moment later, Andrew ricocheted back, hand over his own mouth. In his other hand, his favourite drumsticks snapped, falling to the floor in uneven halves. 

By the time Neil had opened his mouth, Andrew was gone. 

Neil spent the drive to the pub they’d chosen to ride out their performance high in silence. Andrew was stoic and unmoving, silent despite Nicky’s attempts at conversation. When they arrived, Neil felt like he wanted to throw up. 

It was bustling at the late hour, but dark enough to slip in unnoticed. Neil followed Andrew up to the bar: at one point, someone shoved into Andrew and Neil felt him press Neil against the marble top, warm from shoulder to shin. Neil wanted to lean back into him. He wanted Andrew to look at him, to talk to him. He wanted Andrew back. He wanted Andrew. 

Quickly, he turned around, ignoring the bar tender when he asked if he was sure he wanted a virgin martini. Andrew was right there, pupils blown, cheeks red. Angry. 

He was furious. 

“Andrew,” Neil insisted. “Why -” 

He grabbed the tray of drinks and disappeared before Neil could form a sentence. 

And - well. Neil wasn’t known for subordination. 

He waited patiently for the others to get drunk and disappear into the crowd, like they always did. Sometimes Nicky dragged Neil with him, if the night was right. Andrew usually just sat, patiently waiting for his family to return to him. His whiskey sips were cautious and slow. 

Tonight was different. As soon as they were alone, Andrew stood, knocked back the entire glass and strode towards the exit. Neil let his breath hitch and followed, almost jogging in order to keep up with Andrew’s stride. 

“Andrew, this is insane,” he said as they walked down the street, leaving the bar behind. “I’m losing my mind here. Why won’t you talk to me? Why won’t you even look at me? What did I do?” 

“Exist,” Andrew snarled, hands curled into fists and shoved into the pockets of his denim jacket. 

Neil ran ahead of him, almost tripping over the uneven sidewalk. They’d walked far enough that they seemed to have removed themselves from any remnants of the club, and instead were stood in front of a circular, patheon-esque church and its haphazard graveyard. 

Andrew stopped walking and stared. In the moonlight his skin was pale enough to be translucent. 

“Tell me,” Neil whispered. “Truth for truth. We promised, Andrew. To never lie, to never leave. Why did you kiss me?”

“You promised,” Andrew corrected him. “I swore I would have your back. Does that have to constitute being attached at the hip?” 

Neil crossed his arms, petulant. 

Andrew’s sigh was aggravated. “It was never meant to be a problem.”

“What was?”

“You.”

“Andrew -” 

Fingers curled in the collar of his shirt, then slipped across the warm skin at the nape of his neck, then tangled themselves into Neil’s hair. Andrew pulled their foreheads together, squeezing his eyes closed too tight. Neil wanted to iron out the crease between his brows. 

“‘Drew?”

“Shut up,” the man croaked. “Shut up. Shut up.”

“Andrew,” Neil said, weakly. “I wanted to kiss you.” 

Andrew’s nails dug into Neil’s scalp. “No you didn’t.”

“Yes,” his fingers carefully found their way onto Andrew’s jaw, forcing the man to look up at him. “I did.” 

Andrew just swallowed, red-cheeked. 

Neil pulled Andrew closer, head dropping to Andrew’s shoulder. His heart throbbed like a drumbeat, heavy and insistent and never, ever out of time. “Is that what this is about?”

“No,” Andrew lied. 

“I think I like you, ‘Drew,” Neil whispered into the skin of Andrew’s neck. “I think I really do.” 

“I hate you,” Andrew managed, sliding his hands around Neil’s waist and holding him close under the Charleston moonlight. “I hate you.” 

“I know,” Neil managed, closing his eyes. It made a lot more sense, now. 

Between their erratic breathing and racing pulses, a drumbeat formed. 

[recipereruns]

#TBT Recipe - 'Back to School Lunch From When We Hated Mornings and Loved The Dukes of Hazard'

It is clear looking at this picture that I was not a fan of mornings, my brother loved The Duke Boys and I didn’t have a lunch box. Also, which school nurses missed my scoliosis?

I was entering third grade – actually a combination class of third and fourth graders that made up one of two ‘Challenge Program’  classes.  Being with older kids doing harder stuff, I opted to leave behind the metal Strawberry Shortcake and Charlie’s Angels lunch boxes and go with the more understated, yet sophisticated, brown paper sack.

It was only yesterday we spent hours playing ‘Dukes of Hazard’. Brother and his friend would play Bo and Luke riding around the cul-de-sac on their bikes. I, Daisy, walked around inside with empty plates, serving pretend rednecks at the ‘Boars Nest’ while wearing cut-offs and a Slinky pinned to my head.

Yes, you did read correctly, I pinned a Slinky to my head. Did I mention I was SELECTED for the ‘Challenge Program’? I grew up with short, puffy hair because Meth Mom was so busy making meth she didn’t have time to learn to braid so she had it cut ‘real short’. In my make believe, I resorted to using other items as hair; pillow cases, t-shirts, bath towels, mop heads and yes, a mangled, rusted out slinky I found in a ditch by my house.

Alas, if I was going to learn to about high level punctuation, fractions and how to format a fan letter, I’d have to grow up, ditch the cartoon lunchbox and unpin the tetanus weave from my head. Time to brown sack up and learn cursive!

I even upgraded the sandwich in my lunch from a childish peanut butter and honey to the more elevated bagel with cream cheese and ham.

Day one of the ‘Challenge Program’ was no joke. We were given our first task making our desk ‘name plates’. In addition to writing our names, we had to write a country that we always wanted to visit. I started sweating in my nylon knee highs and could feel my hair frizzing.

Looking around some kids started writing their names in CURSIVE!?!? It’s okay, some of these kids are older. But then some of the girls had the most beautiful, bubbly lettered penmanship and my writing looked like it was scrawled by a character in Huckleberry Finn.  This has never changed.

Next to my uneven name, I had to write a place outside of the United States that I would like to visit. I wrote Mexico. Not because I necessarily wanted to go there, it’s just because I knew it from ‘The Love Boat’.  And I did know to spell it.

The Challenge program was just that. Hard AF. Colon’s, semicolon’s, Greek Mythology, abacuses and my new nemesis, cursive. At some point, a few weeks in, I noticed that other’s still had their novelty lunch boxes boasting Garfield, Snoopy and Hello Kitty.  With hours of arduous learning about cells and bones it was a relief to spend some time snacking, chatting and talking about cartoons.

Looking for a work/life balance, I went back to the Charlie’s Angels lunch box. (Strawberry Shortcake would have been way too big of a backslide). I kept the bagel, tho.  

Whatever you have in your lunch box is as important as what you’re carrying it in.  Though you want to grow up as fast as you can, sometimes you’re just not ready for the paper sack.

Here are some of my old favorite lunches from a sack and a box and items other children were allowed to have and I was not. Welcome back to school!

SCHOOL LUNCHES:

Peanut Butter and Honey Sandwich on a Whole Wheat Roll - I had this for all of first and second grade. It was nice to live in time where schools allowed peanut butter and no peanut segregation.

Plain Bagel, Plain Cream Cheese and Ham - This was before bagels were as big as your face. I ate this sandwich through the sixth grade.

Spaghettio's in the Crappy Thermos - They were always lukewarm, but a good break every now and then.

Capri Sun - EVERYONE got this but ME. EVERYONE. I guess if I would have played sports, I might have. I was too busy running round with a Slinky on my head to play soccer, tho.

Tiny Cans of Pap - Meth Mom thought these were 'too expensive', though we never would have been allowed these for lunch. I just remained jealous of the Shinoda sisters with their rich Japanese family and cute, tiny cans!

Or-E-Fucking-O's - Never once did I have them in my lunch. Not to complain of my two homemade amazing cookies I did get every day, but man, sometimes' a girls just needs some junk.

Chips in Individual Bags - First, we only got chips at parties and church picnics, so I was very envious of kids who munched on individual bags of Cheetos and Doritos. If they would have had the mini-cans of Pringles back the day , I would have probably killed someone.

Straight up Full Size Candy Bar - Whoa. Your mom works a lot, doesn't she?

[the-lady-ren]

Hello, hello

Hello my friend!Thank you so much for your patience in waiting for this. WOW. I loved writing this for you. Before receiving your prompt, I never even really thought much on Kitty’s origin. But here we are! I hope you find this as interesting to read as I did to write.

Again. Thank you so much for this fun prompt. Shoot me a line and let me know how you like the outcome. 💜

Back when the cathedral still stood, curled in his strong arms, you ask Kylo one day how he came to be. Kylo has mentioned from time to time that he is the only one of his kind that he is aware of. He always remembers living in the cathedral, fending for himself since he was about ten years of human age. While he can’t recall specifically how he got there, he has some ideas, but he has never delved too deeply into his past.

Sighing heavily, Kylo unwinds his body from yours in the warm, nestlike bed. You sit up, watching as he moves through the shadows, drawing a warm scarf around his neck. It’s always a bit drafty in the cathedral, especially deep within where his room is, and he’s always wearing a scarf of some sort and wraps you in them as well whenever you come visit. After moving some boxes aside, Kylo finds what he is looking for. A battered and patched suitcase, the handle worn. Lifting it with a grimace he brings it over to the bed and turns the combination locks with his broad thumb, clicking the latches open.

“This is all I have,” he explains, lifting out folders and tattered Manila envelopes. “I don’t know much about where I came from, and I think that it was purposeful that I forgot. Maybe to protect me, maybe to protect them, I’m not sure.” Opening one of the large yellow envelopes, he thumbs through the papers within and hands you a thick file folder, the pages faded with age. “This should answer at least some of your questions,” he says, his tone apprehensive and sad.

As you flick through the pages, you realize that these represent the years long documentation of some sort of experiment. The terms are unfamiliar to you, but you learned enough in high school and college science classes to grasp at least some of it. Genetic engineering, selective hybridization, all of these terms with calculations, diagrams and observation reports.

Kylo rakes his hand through his hair, flattening his ears briefly as he paces the room, his tail flicking sharply, nervously behind him. “There were more before me,” his voice is soft and full of untold sorrow, “but I was the only one to survive past infancy.”

Coming back towards the bed he lowers himself down and sits next to you as you scan over the documents. He reaches into the suitcase and pulls out an envelope. This one is full of pictures. As he flips through them, he puts certain ones aside. “These came out of order somehow,” he murmurs, his voice irritated. Your eyes stare, wide with wonder at what he’s sharing with you. Handing you a stack of photographs, you go through them, staring at each one individually.

In one, a group of people in white lab coats, wide, proud grins on their faces as they hold up a Petri dish of unknown contents. Kylo points a long index finger at them and explains, “Their specialty was mammalian hybridization. Uh…cross breeding, through manipulation of DNA, different kinds of mammals. Not hard with non-human species. There are hybrids that live among us all the time. But crossing that barrier…introducing animal DNA into a human embryo,” he pauses, swallowing and clearing his throat, “that’s a whole different subject,” Taking the stack of photographs from you, he places the top one at the back of the stack, bringing the next one to the front. This one shows an odd series of scientific instruments, different tanks and tubing.

“From what I can gather,” he says, “these were the incubation chambers for the hybrid embryos. Modeled to replicate a womb and an amniotic sac as much as possible, once the embryos were deemed viable, they would be placed here for development. Closely monitored. Many didn’t make it past the first few days here…” Brushing his hair out of his eyes again, you look up at him, the solemn expression on his face, his brow coming together in his obvious discomfort and lingering sadness. Feeling a pang in your chest you wrap your arms around him in a quick hug. He smiles, a thin, tight smile, and turns your attention back towards the photos.

Spreading them out on the bed in a sort of chronological order, he goes through each one. Most of them are for documentation purposes only, just showing the labs, instruments and unrecognizable information on a computer screen. “Ah, here,” he says, handing one to you. In the photo you see a tall, smiling man, his labcoat pristine. In his arms he holds a plump baby, but not just any baby. This baby is very obviously Kylo. Tiny cat ears stand up from his round head, his black hair plastered low against his baby scalp. His eyes are different, though a lay person wouldn’t see it right away, and draped over the man’s arm is a long, black tail. The baby is chewing on something, as babies do.

“This is me, I guess,” Kylo says. He points out other pictures of himself, showing his growth and development over time. The same man is in every picture with him, whether it’s a more formal pose for the official record or something candid, watching him stalk a tiny toy mouse, interacting with non hybrid kittens or playing with blocks and toy cars like a normal child. “I can’t say I was mistreated,” he tells you, “at least from what I can tell. Again, these pictures serve as the only memories I have. I don’t recall these specific moments, that specific man. Just a vague sense of…observation, an overwhelming curiosity. He seems…"Kylo pauses again, gathering his thoughts before moving on, "kind?” Again he sighs, his broad shoulders slumping as he scans his mind for anything, even a shred of a real, concrete memory. You’re in awe of him, all this information he’s sharing with you. The trust he has in you is overwhelming.

“Here,” he says, taking the folder of documents from your hands. You’d been clutching it, your palms damp with sweat and your heart pounding in your chest as you listen to him explain these things to you. He flips to the back of the folder, pulling free the last few yellowed pages. “These pages mark the end of the experiment,” Kylo lays the pages on his thick thigh, his index finger scanning the words, pointing to the sentences he wants you to read. Your eyes follow his finger, reading the cramped, sloppy handwriting of a scientist. They explain that the lab is to be closed, these are really the final days of the experiment. Funding has been pulled, redirected to something more “worthwhile”. The last few sentences demonstrate an attachment, unexpected certainly, but there nonetheless, as the scientist in charge of the lab struggles with what to do with the subject.

“And as we conclude what can only be described as a more than successful hybridization, what to do with Kylo? Any remaining embryos have been destroyed, the incubation tanks broken down, drained and packed away. But still Kylo remains, playing in his room, reading books and daydreaming like any relatively normal human male. I cannot take him home. How would I explain it to Lydia, how could we keep him safe when he was scheduled for euthanization? Could I take him to a hospital or to Child Protective Services? Absolutely not. He would be ostracized and brought somewhere that he would be experimented on. There are enough DNA markers to connect him to me, to this lab and this corporation. No, I am too connected to him to take him home. I have to find a place where he will be safe. I have given him the knowledge and the tools to make a life for himself, now it is time to put those tools to good use. I had hoped for just a little more time…he is still so young.”

Here it cuts off, the fading signature of whoever this person was scrawled below, illegibly. Your eyes fill with tears realizing that he was supposed to be killed. This living, breathing man sitting next to you could have been “put to sleep” like so many unwanted animals. The kindness of this unknown scientist prevented that. Throwing your arms around Kylo, you hug him tight, your face buried in his chest, struggling to control your tears. “Did you ever want to find him?” You murmur, your voice muffled by his shirt.

Kylo shakes his head, “No, ” he answers, “there is too much risk involved. Not only for him, but for myself. Who knows what could happen were I to reach out. That he saved my life, brought me here,” he sweeps his arm in a grand gesture, drawing your attention around the room. “As far as I remember, a lot of this stuff was here. There was food here, books and tools to begin to grow my own. I may not remember where I came from, but I remember what I learned. With the books and tools left for me, I was able to grow food, reconnect the electricity, make sure the water was safe and clean…” he shrugs again, “and now with you,” he swings his arm around your shoulder, pressing his full lips against your temple, “I have everything I could have ever wanted.” You nuzzle against him, smiling softly. Sliding slowly away from him and off the bed, you begin gathering the papers and photographs, placing them back into the envelopes and folders and back into the battered suitcase.

“Thank you,” your voice rings out softly in the cozy room that Kylo has made his own. He raises his yellow eyes to meet yours, a crooked smile on his handsome face. “I mean it. Thank you. I…I don’t know why you trust me like this, you could have lied, told me you fell from space and I would have believed you. The risk you face…” Kylo places his large hands on your hips and pulls you towards him, burying his face in your middle and sighing with relief.

“I don’t know what it is about you,” he says, lifting his gaze to meet yours, “In such a short time, you have not only accepted me and what I am wholeheartedly, but you’ve made me trust another living being in a way I didn’t think I was capable of.” He raises himself onto his knees, wrapping his arms around you again, holding you close, making you feel safe. “You are my home,” he says, “and you are the closest thing to family I have ever had.” A single tear rolls down your cheek as you crush your lips against his, sealing a silent promise that you are more than happy to make.

[adambstingus]

5 Accidental X-Rated Subliminal Messages That Are Everywhere

If you’re anything like us, you can’t help but see penises in everything: in clouds, in buildings, even in men’s underwear. People can’t seem to help but create phallic symbols, almost as if dicks secretly run the entire world. And dick imagery can pop up in the most awkward places. Pay enough attention to anything, no matter how mundane, and, as if by magic, a wang will appear out of the ether.

Here are some of those special miracles.

5

Halftime Shows Are Full Of Dicks

Halftime shows are as much an American sporting tradition as Gatorade or lasting brain damage, and apart from the occasional wardrobe malfunction, they’re usually wholesome affairs — pop stars lip-sync to their biggest hits, and cheerleaders twirl around while trying to ignore some of the drunkest pick-up lines ever shouted in a public place. But sometimes all the raging testosterone from the game bursts over to the halftime entertainment, resulting in secret dicks.

When Prince was asked to play the halftime slot of the 2007 Super Bowl, it remains unknown what kind of family fun the organizers expected from the human personification of sex froth. Viewers tuning in for a little taste of “Purple Rain” or “1999” were instead treated to a David Copperfield-esque magic silhouette curtain, specially lit to show the diminutive music legend jerking his guitar dick.

That’s the risk you take when hiring a man with more thrusting masculinity in his lithe elvish body than the whole defensive line. But a phallic faux pas can even happen with the nerdiest of all sporting entertainers: the marching band. To be sure, nothing is more erotic than a bunch of people dressed up like nutcrackers hammering out the Batman theme, but marching bands are generally tightly regimented paragons of discipline. Yet even they can break formation and fall face-first into a pile of accidental wangs. Like these rhythmic dweebs who wanted to celebrate their Kansas State team by recreating their beloved Jayhawk mascot next to the iconic Starship Enterprise …

Kansas State Marching Band

… but ended up forming a fiercely erect cock angling towards a bird’s open beak:

Deadspin Boldly going where no man should go.

Even highbrow institutions like Harvard can’t control themselves. While battling it out with the University Of Pennsylvania, the marching band claimed they wanted to honor their opponent by forming “Penn ’15.” All they did, however, was highlight the inherent floppiness of a human font:

SB Nation Still not the worst incident involving a penis at a Pennsylvania college.

4

Weather And Traffic Reporters Draw Peens All The Time

If there’s one place that should be a respite for all the wang-typhoons swirling around in the world, it’s the news. The journalists on TV bring us serious, often tragic stories, and do so with great composure, grace, and the highest degree of professionalism.

Except for the weather presenters, who occasionally just scrawl floppy dongs all over every available surface.

It’s not their fault, really. It’s their job to track the weather, and sometimes the weather can take some pretty turgid shapes. When that happens, a tornado report can take quickly turn into a dire message warning people of a far more terrifying event.

Similarly, a New Jersey website tried to warn residents of a potential flood risk by unleashing a massive unsheathed poonhammer on the entire Eastern seaboard:

And those worried about illegal immigration from neighboring Mexico have reason to be alarmed, as Zeus’ massive dick and balls are in the process of breaching the southern border crossing:

Apparently you can’t even tune in for traffic updates without correspondents finger-tracing blocks-long hard-ons that will most definitely jam up your commute.

The moral of the story is: Don’t give presenters interactive screens and expect them not to accidentally dip a giant boner in your kid’s breakfast cereal.

3

Advertisers Deal Heavily In Accidental Dicks

There’s a long history of people slipping subliminal sexual innuendos into commercials, hence the age-old mantra “sex sells.” Unless, of course, the subliminal sexuality was totally accidental, in which case it does the exact opposite of sell.

With so many heavy hitters and specialty craft brewers in the beer industry, it can be awful hard to set yourself apart from the pack. One brewer in Costa Rica thought that having a giant grilled sausage plastered on a billboard on the side of the road would get people thinking about delicious barbecues featuring their refreshing beer:

Unless they were driving on the other side of the road, which makes it look like a giant cock is peering from behind the billboard like a Scooby-Doo detective.

Restaurant advertising is a phallic landmine as well. Ever noticed how a chef’s hat kind of looks like an elongated bropedo? We didn’t either, until the heroes behind this Virginia bistro’s logo showed us the light:

Market Place swears it had no idea when it chose the logo, thinking it was just a mustachioed chef greeting customers from the window. Instead, customers can only see a winged dick dive-bombing the soup d’jour.

Meanwhile, a Brazilian university, meaning to unveil a logo consisting of an ornate tiered tower with a gorgeous red sun rising in the sky behind it to commemorate an Oriental Studies institute on their campus, wound up accidentally shoving those good intentions directly up its own ass:

Obviously, because no institute of higher learning wants to be known for telling its Oriental Studies department to go boof itself, they quickly withdrew the logo. But the internet is forever.

2

Women’s Hair Products Look Like Sex Toys

Hair is not generally considered to be an erogenous zone, which is why the Kama Sutra doesn’t have an entry called the “Mounting Ponytail.” Yet it seems that the maniacs who come up with hair styling tools have finally given up on finding new ways to design their feminine products without throwing a few dicks into the mix.

“Hot Buns” is ostensibly a helpful hair styling tool for women, but it is so clearly a giant knobby dildo that not even its product demonstrators can deny it.

Similarly, the Pearl Curling Wand looks like what old timey psychiatrists used to get rid of hysteria. Now, we understand that there’s only one shape a curling iron can take — that of a thick, powerful penis — and we’re even willing to forgive the many sexual images that a “pearl wand” conjures up. But if this thing didn’t heat up to scorching temperatures, we don’t think this would see much upstairs hair action. Hell, it’s basically a multitool.

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Buildings All Over The World Are Secretly Giant Dicks

Thanks to Google Earth, the world has gotten used to looking at their buildings from above, like a winged cartographer. Which is bad news for some architects and construction engineers, who thought the biggest threat to people finding out they’ve erected skyscrapers that look like skyscraping erections was Groupons for helicopter lessons.

That’s London’s soon-to-be largest apartment block: Spire London. From the bottom, it looks like a giant eyesore, but from the top, it looks like it’ll actually poke your eye out. The Spire London promises to be the highest residential building in Western Europe, so Londoners can soon enjoy watching pilots desperately pulling up in order to avoid crashing into the tip.

The Supreme Court of India also suffers from an acute case of phallisitis. The court, with its bushy garden and squat features, perfectly captures the shriveled old dicks gathering in this building to uphold their archaic rules.

Meanwhile, residents of an otherwise-lovely middle-class neighborhood in northern England have begun to fear for the value of their homes since it was revealed that their cul-de-sac is a bit heavy in the sac department:

And while residents might be miffed that they’re now living on the wrong side of Shaftesbury Lane, at least their town’s entire tourism isn’t based on the revelation that their little canal paradise kind of looks like an anatomically correct penis with a healthy urethra:

Yet it’s quite easy to notice that a rectangle with a few round edges looks a bit like a penis. So how about a building complex that looks like a naked man squatting, ass agape, with a flaccid dick drooping pendulously down between his bulging red balls? A sprawling health center in Ontario, Canada offers just that:

But sometimes, there’s no need for human ineptitude; nature provides. For the low sum of $122,000, you can buy land on a 42-acre island near Fiji with some pretty stunning scenery …

… which you can view from both the head and the scrote of this shy little nub of an island:

Justin occasionally writes funny stuff that’s not about dicks here. Tweet at him if you need a used Dodge Durango.

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from All Of Beer http://allofbeer.com/5-accidental-x-rated-subliminal-messages-that-are-everywhere/ from All of Beer https://allofbeercom.tumblr.com/post/181062584112