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band--psycho · 4 years ago

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Gally x Reader-I Don’t Want To Just Exist

Y/Ns POV

“She can’t see anything! So what job do you plan on giving her?” One voice said, this one was unrecognisable though.

“We might as well send her into the Maze,” another voice said, I believe it belonged to same person who jumped down into the cage-I believe his name was Gally. I don’t know what the Maze was but it certainly didn’t sound good. But his words clearly struck an issue with some of the others and quickly caused an argument between them all.

“I’m blind not deaf,” I snapped, silencing the argument that they were having.

“I deserve a chance to prove myself like everyone else does,” I explained calmly.

“Okay Greenie, you got a chance,” a voice said, as he placed a somewhat comforting hand on my shoulder.

“Alby, you can’t be-”

“She’s got as much right to a chance as everyone else, Gally,” Alby quickly cut him off as he lightly grabbed my hand.

“Who knows I might just prove you wrong,” I said before letting Alby guide me away from them.

Small Time Skip-That evening

“Fry, this is one of the best things you’ve ever cooked,” Alby shouted, but Fry just simply chuckled as he nudged my arm slightly.

“Can’t take the credit for this one, Greenie here did most of the work, I just made sure she didn’t burn herself,” he joked.

“Well, it looks like we’ve found a job you can do,” Alby said, before the others burst out in a cheer.

“Welcome to the family, Greenie,” Alby said before pulling me into a hug.

“Call me Y/n..” I whispered to him.

“Y/n, welcome home,” he said to me before the others crowded around us, each of them introducing themselves properly- the rest night was filled with jokes and laughter..it was weird, I’d only known these people for a number of hours but I already cared about them. Then I heard this bloodcurdling type noise that shook me to my core.

“What was that?” I asked, trying to hide the panic in my voice.

“That was a Griever,” Alby explained.

“A Griever?” I asked, confusion washing over me.

“I’ll explain tomorrow,” he said before ordering everyone to go to bed-as the only girl in the Glade, I got certain privileges...one of them was being able to sleep in a hut. I was just drifting off to sleep when I heard the door creep open, making me sit up almost instantly.

“It’s okay, It’s just me,” Gally said, a felt a bit of relief wash over me; but not enough to let my guard down completely-mere hours ago he’d suggested throwing me in the Maze.

“I..uh..I think I owe you an apology..I shouldn't have judged you so quickly,” he apologised, his voice was quiet, but I felt like his words were sincere.

“It’s okay,” I said simply as a small smile came across my face.

“I’ll..I’ll let you sleep,” Gally said, as he made his way over to the door.

“I’m glad I proved you wrong,” I heard him let out a chuckle at my words as his footsteps faded away and the door shut behind him.

Time Skip-A Year Later

Things had been slightly off lately with Gally; and I knew why. Thomas. Ever since he arrived he’d had this chip on his shoulder that he couldn’t seem to shift. I knew better than anyone that Gally wasn’t the most welcoming of people, but he had a softer side..one that I don’t think anyone other than me knew about. Since my time in the Glade we’ve grown closer, I liked him..and I think he liked me too-but neither of us were ready to tell each other that, and that was okay-but one thing I couldn’t deal with was his jealousy. Thomas was a nice guy and pretty much whenever we would talk Gally would interrupt him, and not leave my side whilst I was with him; it was ridiculous and annoying; Thomas and I were just friends, but it didn’t matter how many times I tried to tell Gally that.

“It’s just..you’re nice and Gallys just-”

“An arrogant ass, with a bad temper; he can be, sometimes at least-but he’s not like that all the time, he’s got a softer side to him and he means well, he just wants to keep everyone safe,” I explained, chopping some of the veg ready for dinner.

“You’ll get used to him, he tried to have me thrown into the Maze on my first day..and now here we are,” I continued, feeling around for the pot, luckily Fry was at my side to guide my hands onto it.

“You should probably go, before Gally comes and rips both of our heads off for talking,” I joked as I put the veg into the pot.

“Gallys coming,” Fry said just as Thomas began to walk away, I waited for the sound of a punch, but thankfully no sound like that came-instead Gally just wrapped his arms around my waist, placing a light kiss on my shoulder and then proceeded to try and help Fry and I cook; much to both mine and Frys annoyance because there was a reason he was a builder, he couldn’t cook. The night came quickly and soon Gally and I were in our hut, my head resting on his chest as his hand rested on my hip, it didn’t take a rocket scientist to know that something was playing on his mind though-he’d been quiet, more so than usual, not just today, but for the last few.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, lightly tracing my hand on his stomach.

“Nothing, I’m fine,” Gally answered bluntly.

“You do realise I can tell when you’re lying right, I don’t need eyes to see that,” I shot back in a somewhat jokey tone, but Gally just simply sighed, as he pulled me closer to him.

“Things are changing, they have been ever since Thomas arrived...he could ruin everything we’ve worked for,” Gally confessed.

“He’s just trying to help; to work out what’s out there,” I said in an attempt to defend Thomas. Everyone here wanted the same thing-to protect each other; the problem, is that Gally and Thomas both have very different ideas on how to do that, and slowly it’s causing tension which Alby is trying to avoid.

“Well his help might just get us killed,” he bit back, before letting out a long sigh.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to snap,”

“It’s okay,” I said,moving my hand up to trace his chin.

“It’s all gonna be okay, Gal,”I whispered.

“Princess, I want to believe you but-”

“But nothing,” I interrupted him, moving slightly so we were now face to face.

“As long as we’ve got each other everything will be okay,” I reassured, placing a delicate kiss on his lips.

“You’re always so optimistic,” Gally whispered against my lips, as one of his hands moved to slowly my face, lightly caressing my cheek.

“Well, one of us has to be,” I chuckled before he pulled me into another kiss.

Time skip(yes another one)-After the attack on the Glade

So many were dead. Alby was dead. Our leader was dead. Thomas used the stinger to sting himself and find out whatever truth Alby had found out, he’d spent the night in the pit..and now was being dragged infront of the maze. Thersea was being tied to a pole; both of them being some kind of offering to the Grievers. And Gally had become the leader that decided this.

“This is such a waste,” He said, clearly talking about Thomas Theresea.

“Gally, this is wrong,” I said, trying to reason with him.

“I’m trying to protect everyone that’s still alive in here, I’m trying to protect you,” he defended

“What if Thomas is right, maybe he could lead us home,” Geoff said

“We are home,” Gally argued back; he’d always referred to this place as home-most of us did, but I also felt like there was something more out there..something more than this; a life that wasn’t filled with the same four walls and the same daily routine, maybe that’s why Thomas and I got on well, because we both thought the same thing-the difference was he could go out and find the truth, unlike me. Just because this was the only place I remembered living in, didn’t make it my home. I was so lost in my thoughts the only thing that brought me back to reality when I heard Thomas’ voice. I don’t know exactly what had happened, but I knew it wasn't good..

“You don’t have to come with us but we are leaving,” Thomas said. Causing thoughts to run through my head again. Thoughts that had me torn about what to do..we could all go with them, find out the truth together about why we were here.

“We don’t belong here,” I heard him say, and that one sentence was enough for me to make up my mind..he was right, we didn’t belong here, none of us did.

“We were put here, we’re trapped here,” he continued, but Gally just scoffed in response.

“Gal, what is he’s right?” I asked calmly, trying once again to reason with him. I couldn’t see the expression on his face...but I was pretty sure it was mixture between angry, confused and shocked.

“And what if he's not, then we all die,” he said as I heard his footsteps get closer to me.

“That could happen anyway..we might..we might have some sort of a chance out there,” I tried to explain to him.

“So, you’re going to go with them?! Gally asked with venom in his voice.

“We need to at least try and find out the truth..come with us,” I begged, trying to persuade him to see sense; I lightly reached for his hand but he just pulled it away.

“As long as we’ve got eachother, everything will be okay, that’s what you said..and now you’re leaving..you’re leaving me...leaving our home,” Gally said the sadness evident in his voice, and it broke my heart; but I believed that either way we were gonna die and that I might as well die trying to get out of this place.

“This isn’t out home, Gal, it’s just a place we exist in...please come with us,” I said, trying once again to grab Gallys hand and get him to come with us, but when I reached out to him he wasn’t there, so I just slowly walked forward towards where Thomas’ voice was coming from; Newt quickly ran to my side, grabbing my hand once he realised that I was coming with them, guiding me to the rest of the group.

“Gally, come with us,” I begged one final time.

“Good luck against the Grievers,” was all he said, and that was our cue to leave. Newt hadn’t let go of my hand since we’d started running, he’d always been like an older brother to me,I trusted him-but one bad thing about being close to someone is that they can tell when somethings wrong and Newt knew me better than most.

“What’s wrong?” Newt asked, squeezing my hand lightly.

“Maybe I should’ve stayed in the Glade, I don’t want to be a burden to anyone” I said, trying to decide to follow my heart or my head.

“What?” Newt asked, confusion lacing his voice.

“I’m blind, Newt, I can’t see what’s right infront of me, let alone try and kill a Griever,” I explained, attempting to pull my hand away from his, but he just gripped it tighter.

“You deserve a chance to know the truth, just like the rest of us,” he stated, as our running halted slightly so he could pull me into a quick hug.

“We’re like family, Y/n/n, I’m not gonna let anything happen to you,” he whispered in my ear, before grabbing my hand again so we could carry on running, I only hoped the people that we left behind would be safe too. That Gally would be safe...and maybe one day we’d see each other again.

Tag list:

@glicabhainn00

#gally imagine #maze runner imagine #maze runner imagines #gally x reader #gally x oc #gally x y/n #gally x ofc #the maze runner #the maze runner imagines #the maze runner x reader #tmr gally #maze runner gally #will poulter #newt #tmr newt #thomas #tmr thomas #tmr alby

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whetstonefires · 5 years ago

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Do you think the DC fandom maybe, Infantilizes Tim a little too much? Like for a rich kid character who's main trauma for a long time was a getting left home alone too much there's an oddly amount of meta abt how much how much his parents hurt him~ compared to, y'know the two poor characters who grew up with physically abusive dad's+druggie mom's, or the two that were raised assassin cult's, etc

…well, yeah, I do kind of think that? His whole schtick for so long was being too old for his age in ways that didn’t sacrifice his jokey, relatable teenager energies. It’s weird how little of that we see anymore, sometimes.

And then DC broke him and discarded him and he’s sort of awkwardly hanging around getting reimagined as more woobie with every fan generation. It is weird!

But tbh I do get it. And I think the reason his parents’ failure of him and his vulnerability get played up so much, and Jason and Steph’s sufferings (while used a lot for things like motivation and context) not dwelt on quite so much in the same lugubrious style, are kind of the same reason.

Which is that canon didn’t commit to it. Jason and Steph’s experiences with bad parenting were foregrounded and retconned more dramatically awful several times. (There’s some definite classism in how that was approached imo, and I’m never budging on being mad about DC retconning out Catherine being sick and then ignoring her forever in all Jason characterization because a drug death invalidates a person ig, great message during the opioid crisis guys.)

They engaged and coped with it–Steph (and Cass, our #1 canon batfam parental abuse victim) pretty directly, Jason a little less so because of the dubious and fluctuating canon status of most of the content more specific than ‘poverty, homelessness, theft, parental drugs and crime in there somewhere,’ so most of his parent issues have been focused on Bruce. He sure has dug into them tho. 😂 Rarely well or productively, thanks DC, but it’s explicitly part of his character, is my point.

Whereas upper-middle-class Tim was always treated by the narrative as fortunate and unharmed by his experiences with his parents. Even though they were clearly behaving badly in several ways, and Tim showed signs of being harmed by it.

Tim outside of immediate moments of frustration always was of the opinion he was Fine, and Very Fortunate Actually.

Therefore a huge chunk of the numerous everyone who’s got parent-related mental and emotional harm, but has struggled to have that validated and hasn’t responded with a lot of anger toward the parent, identifies with Tim. The only one who’s never really lashed out at his parents for fucking up with him. The one who still needs it explored, because canon ultimately didn’t.

[editing post to put in a readmore because lol it’s long, post otherwise unchanged]

(Dick obviously didn’t ever have any Issues with the Graysons, but he Angry Teenagered at Bruce so hard it changed Bruce’s characterization permanently, rip.)

The things Jason, Steph, and Cass have been through are dramatic, obvious, and fit stereotypes because that’s what they’re based on.

That’s important content to have, but because it’s right out there in your face even people who identify with it quite a lot are less likely to feel the need to work all the way through it again in fanworks. That part’s there. It’s text.

(Well actually Jason having been physically abused kind of wasn’t? I think? It was mostly assumed on the basis of stereotyping and Jason’s not caring about the man much even as he felt possessive of information about his death, which is valid. I don’t actually know what’s up with Willis now, Lobdell did some weird shit that lacked emotional resonance or staying power because he’s Lobdell and has no soul.

Cass’ wandering years are also ludicrously underdeveloped. But very very few comics fans or writers can personally relate to being amazing child warriors with no grasp of language living feral under bridges. That part of her life is consistently represented in terms of absences, in terms of its deviation from the norm and the deficits of normality it left her with, which is typical but unfortunate.)

The interesting things to do with these characters are often informed by the bad stuff in their childhoods, but there’s relatively rarely that much more to say about the fact that those things were bad. They know they’re bad. They’ve had a lot of on-panel rage about it, as discussed above. Steph and Cass both beat the shit out of their dads.

Jason is, in fandom especially, a sort of Platonic ideal of a kid who’s mad about his bad childhood and really bad at figuring out where to point that rage.

(Damian is a whole other kettle of fish, because he’s been lumbered by so many detailed retcons coming so fast no two people can seem to construct compatible models of what his early childhood was like, and even more because he’s still ‘a child’ enough that he’s necessarily in a different stage of processing than someone who’s officially only a few years older than him at this point, but still functionally 8 and also 20 years older, and whose parents are no longer in the picture to continue screwing up.

Also there’s no question that if he brings up an abusive thing the League did, he will be validated by his current environment about his realization that it was in fact bad. There’s a lot of fic on that theme! But it doesn’t have the same tone precisely because it is usually understood that that support will be there if he wants it. Realizing that his previous context contained things that were wrong keeps being made the focus of his arc.)

The badness of Tim’s childhood, on the other hand, was mainly in subtext. Even when we were clearly meant to understand Jack was fucking up, like when he canceled plans with Tim at the last minute to go on a date with Tim’s stepmother, or that infamous time he came to apologize for not being a great parent and got mad Tim was distracted by a crisis on TV so he flew into a rage and took the TV and smashed it and was like ‘that’ll teach you,’ it wasn’t leaned into.

The story didn’t treat Jack as a minor villain to be overcome but like a sort of environmental hazard of childhood, like homework, to be endured and coped with. Tim said things like ‘it’s fine’ and ‘at least he left the computer.’

(And like. It’s not about having a TV and computer in his room. It’s about not letting a child have boundaries, pointedly not respecting a child’s possessions, creating an emotionally insecure environment, punishing minor infractions in proportion to their momentary impact on your own ego, physically lashing out at a proxy for the child…)

Rather like Tom King later didn’t understand about the punching from Bruce, whoever did that story (probably Dixon? I don’t care enough to check) did not understand how serious a case of bad parenting that scene was. That is most definitely textbook abusive behavior. (It’s a hell of a lot more common abusive behavior than being a lame supervillain or shooting you when you screw up, and a lot more specific than ‘was a thug, might have hit me, dead now.’)

And Tim was never allowed to be mad at his parents about it. It was fine. He needed to be ignored so he had the freedom to be Robin. He deserved his dad being mad at him because he was keeping secrets. He complained too much, although objectively he did not.

The universe punished him for ‘complaining,’ more than once. We cut straight from him shunting aside his disappointment that his postcard from his parents was just to say they weren’t coming home yet after all with ‘if it will stop all the fights they’ve been having lately it’s more than fine’ to them getting kidnapped.

He agreed not to come on the rescue mission. His mom never made it home, and his dad was in a coma for a while. And then ultimately Jack died as a result of Tim’s decision to be Robin, immediately after finally deciding to accept it.

So Tim walks around feeling a huge burden of responsibility for his parents’ deaths, and completely unable to process any hurt they did him as real or valid, especially in comparison with the far more blatant awfulness other people have been through, and canon is clearly never going to address it. Or even acknowledge it properly.

Let me repeat that because it’s kind of my main point:

People are fixated on getting Tim’s emotional abuse validated because that’s an incredibly important step in recovering from emotional abuse, and it’s one canon consistently denied him.

How ‘bad’ things are ‘in comparison to’ problems other people have is a bad and unhealthy way to engage with trauma. Okay? That’s just a really harmful framework to apply to pain.

It’s also a way that both Tim and people with experiences similar to Tim’s are encouraged to engage with their own experiences, compounding the existing problems.

So. Not a form of relatable DC was ever actually aiming for when they tried so hard (and pretty effectively) to make him a relatable character as Robin, but an enduring one for a lot of fans.

So Tim’s childhood is a natural target for fanworks in a different way than the traumas that have been made explicit and taken seriously by the text. And then a lot of that got compounded by the way the introduction of Damian as Robin was handled, and the lack of resolution that got. And his current status as not quite having a place in the family anymore.

So between the level of projection encouraged by that context and how relatively difficult to access Tim’s Robin run has become ten years after the fact, this has led to a lot of fanworks on these themes that are based mostly on other fanworks, and stray further and further from the original content.

So at this point there’s an entire wing of Tim’s fandom wherein this side of him has expanded enormously, and he primarily exists to suffer, frequently in ways that 1) escalate to a point that is inarguably ‘valid’ and hard to dismiss and 2) set him up to rebound from it in whatever way the writer finds emotionally satisfying or useful–being ultimately cared for and reassured by people who value him (the most infantilizing option but like, popular for obvious reasons), or unveiling his brilliant scheme that was causing him to pretend to be passive in the face of mistreatment, or turning around and using his genius ninja skills to wrest power back from his abusers, or just laying down some sick burns about being treated fairly.

But not that many of the last one, because that’s mostly done with other batfam members.

Tim’s become a vehicle for a lot of vicarious coping that Steph and Jason just aren’t appropriate for, because they get angry and they get even. And those are stories that exist already, so there’s less scope for telling your own.

And because Jason’s reaction pattern is ultimately so masculine (i’ll make them all sorry! with my guns! blam blam!) while Tim’s is pretty gender-neutral, the demographics of fanfic mean that the bulk of the people using Tim vicariously in this manner are female-aligned, which has over time feminized this archetype of him a lot. Sometimes in ways I find really uncomfortable, like there’s a lot of forced pregnancy stuff which activates my panic buttons. x.x

But, ultimately, it’s fandom. People are going to do what they’re going to do, DC in their perpetual fail has hung Tim out to dry in narrative terms, and I’d rather the people who are using Tim for victimization narratives over the people who can’t dismiss or discredit him fast enough now that his position has been filled. 🤷‍♀️ What we gonna do? Fave’s in an awkward spot. DC hates us. This is the life in this comic book pit. XD

Also if you’re the same anon who left me a callout about op of that weird Steph post in my inbox, or if you aren’t @ that person, 1) I refuse to get involved so I’m not answering that ask 2) those aren’t even particularly dramatic fandom crimes? That’s pretty normal? That’s just…Caring Too Much About Ships And Disagreeing With Me.

Do I also feel those opinions are kinda bad? Yeah. But I disagree with everyone about something. Chill.

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stixxxy · 4 years ago

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Siege-o-ween Day 14

Heyoo!!! I’m so happy to take part in this event @dualrainbow hosted. apologies if there’s any errors I’m no way as skilled as the other people who took part! so the only warning is there’s some kinda graphic scenes at the end (not adult, kinda like somewhat gore).

Prompt: “If you say let’s split up, I swear to God.”

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The weatherbeaten roof seemingly curved in, threatening to give in at any moment; even from a kilometre away, you could hear the creaks of the infrastructure as the wind battered its side. The house was almost hidden by the contorted pine trees which surrounded it as though they were a shield, protecting the old building from the eyes of passerby’s and the clouds above casting a shadow onto the area. The mist creeped through the bends of the trees and hovered above the ground before disappearing a meter in front of where they stood.

Jordan “Thermite” Trace was leaning against the rover which had been parked outside the rickety house, lighting a cigarette as he waited for the others to grab the equipment. He let out a sigh, the smoke escaping from his lips and fading into the mist. The mission wasn’t too extreme, just a quick in and out job from where a suspected white mask group ran in to.. nothing to drastic. But yet Jordan stood still as the cold nipped his tanned nose, looking onward at the eerily old house which seemed as though one small step could cause the place to crumble... that’s why there was only 4 of them. He tapped his cigarette, the ash crumbling onto the soggy mud beside his boots.

“You ready to go?” The approaching brit asked, his gear in hand.

The American nodded his head, letting the cigarette plummet to the ground.

The 4 sent where consisted on him, Jordan Trace, the Brit- Mark Chandar, Eliza Cohen & their newest (but certainly not youngest) recruit Sam Fisher, or he preferred “Zero”. The mission was, what Jordan believed, to just be a simple intel gathering mission to get Fisher accustomed to being in team Rainbow. Even if it was, Jordan knew there wouldn’t be a ‘jokey’ atmosphere, Zero was more of an edgy ‘i do everything myself’ kinda guy, Mark was brash also honest to a point, Eliza was Eliza- intense, and then there was Jordan, an extrovert who likes to joke around. Of course the 3 weren’t too bad, they just lacked the energy that Jordan thrived on. And the house in front was no help.

“You reckon it’s haunted?” Jordan joked, throwing a sideways smile to Mark who just shrugged in response... life of the party.

“I don’t believe in stuff like that, it doesn’t make sense scientifically. Even if you ignore the science it still doesn’t make sense,” the young man let out a sigh,” like what does it accomplish becoming a ghost? What causes you to become a ghost?”

Another topic added on what to bring up when speaking to Mute. Ghosts. That list was ever growing by the day. Thankfully Eliza and Fisher were just coming around the corner, allowing another Mute rant to fade as the man retreated back into his quieter self. It was an interesting quirk that Mark had, Jordan thought, Mark managed to hold conversations for what would seem like hours with a one on one with someone he knew, but the second another joined- there was silence.

“Jäger called,” Eliza announced, tossing a radio to Jordan, “he said he’ll pick us up at 15:00, giving us an hour and a half to find whatever information is here. I and Mute will take the back, covering the second floor and attic. Zero, I want you and Jordan to take the first and basement,” Jordan shot a glance at the elder who had his gaze focused on Ash, “we’ll meet back here at 14:50.”

Everyone nodded in agreement, it wasn’t long until Ash and Mute left to trek into unknown territory, leaving Jordan with the new recruit.

“Loosen up, you’ll pull a muscle,” those were the first words Fisher spoke to Jordan, this was definitely going to be fun.

The short walk to the creepy house was filled with silence, the only sound being the gravel shifting underneath their boots and the creaking of the trees fighting against the wind. There was nothing suspicious of the area, apart from the groaning of the ancient building and how something so seemingly dead uttered noises of so much life. Despite what Mark had said earlier, the place definitely had a ‘haunted’ vibe, but fortunately ‘ghost hunting’ wasn’t part of their job- it was to find the real monsters.

Oh to be at the base rewatching Mamma Mia for the fifth time instead, but he still pitied the rest who had to stay behind to watch musicals all day- yet Jordan would prefer listening to Senaviev’s attempt at singing than enter the chilling structure which lay before him.

“So did ‘Liza specify what we’re looking for?” Jordan’s question broke the silence as they entered the building careful, as if it would crumble to a single wrong step.

Zero steadily peered around the corner as they were about to step into the hallway, “Just something that would give us any more information on the White Masks, whether it be location or weapon sources.”

The hard breacher nodded, gripping his gun a bit tighter as a small groan tore through the air. It was stupid to be scared, the supernatural was that, supernatural. Not real. But yet even with a gun, every small noise caused fear- if there was a person or a rabid animal, he had a gun, so statistically he should be safe.

Jordan followed fisher through the first floor, keeping an eye out for any potential hiding spots or where they could get jumped- it was doubtful that there’d be any White Masks anyways, the electricity wasn’t on and the place seemed as if it had been left abandoned to rot away for years. There was occasionally some muttering, but Jordan just reduced that to Eliza and Mark on the floor above them- nothing out of the ordinary. From the last question Jordan asked, there had been no words spoken between the two operators for nearly 10 minutes- 10 long minutes of searching what seemed to be a barren building. This whole thing was making Jordan miss talking to their newest hard breacher, Ace would’ve annoyed the shit out of him- but a conversation would be great to calm his nerves.

The duo entered the basement, drips from leaky pipes echoed through the tunnels. The tunnel was long, seemingly endless with curves separating from it into their own empty labyrinths. If there was someone in that building, it would have to be here. Zero took lead, walking down the hallway with only the flashlight on their guns to show the way- at this point Thermite had removed his goggles which allowed him a bit more sight. It was too quiet also, the water dripping had seemed to stop and the only noise was their breaths and footing on the basement floor.

Jordan finally tried to engage in a conversation,”quiet ain’t it, must be more familiar to you?”

A simple ‘hm’ was all Zero responded with, his old eyes scanning what little they could see. Jordan ran a hand through his greying hair, not to bad- mid 30s and he had already got grey hairs... Usually the job was more active, running and gunning white masks, the underwhelming mission only added a tad of frustration to the Texan. Jordan couldn’t wait to get away from this creep show ‘base’ and to get back to civilisation where he wasn’t a mix of boredom and paranoid.

A soft growl hummed to the right of Jordan, causing him to turn- gun hoisted up ready to shoot-

“It’s probably just an animal Trace,” Fisher rest a hand on Jordan’s gun- lowering it, “you alright son?”

Jordan shrugged, bitting his lip as he rubbed the side of his head, “yeah, I.. I’m fine, just not a fan of the quiet. Grown accustomed to being more on the front lines I guess.”

Fisher’s glare softened, “alright if you say so.” The older returned to himself, leaving Jordan to catch a breath, “this place is creepy though.”

The texan could only respond with a soft laugh, “yeah.”

They continued their search of the basement, making sure every stone was turned practically. This time with a little more conversation from Zero so the silence wouldn’t turn him insane- Jordan suspected the quiet was even getting to the other man too. Jordan stood still in his tracks, he noted a door which was slightly ajar unlike the others which had been shut but not locked. Fisher turned his head to face the door in question, its hinges rusted from the pipe leaking unknown substances onto it for probably years. The liquid was most likely water, but with sewage mixed in.

Jordan took front, pushing the door slightly open which the door creaked in compliance- their flashlights seeping light into the room and onto what sat pushed to the side.

Bingo.

“Should we radio in saying we found it?” Jordan asked, watching Fisher jog towards the desk and attempt to boot up the computer which was oddly modern compared to the murky surroundings.

Jordan stood at the doorway, keeping the door open with the steal-toe cap on his boot. The room had power, and seemingly was the only room to do so as the bulb on the ceiling flickered but remained on. The White Masks must have left in a hurry and dumped all the gear they couldn’t bring in that room. Blood soaked clothing, pistols and others had been shoved to the side and out of the dim bulb light path.

Fisher let out a groan, his face tensing,” I can’t get in, we’re going to need that kid.”

“Wait wait wait, let me have at it first,” Jordan suggested, leaving the door to slam shut as he headed towards the computer.

Guessing a terrorist groups’ password was not exactly in the job description, but there was no harm in trying. Jordan budged past Zero, leaning on the desk as he looked at the screen *enter password* was flashing in white upon the light blue backing- here went nothing.. Jordan’s burnt hands scattered across the keyboard as he typed in his guess.

•welcome user_77_657_39•

The screen lit up with documents filling the home screen, clustering it up like a virus. They had access to whatever the hell the White Masks were hiding- finally, team rainbow was on the same step and with this information could climb further up, letting them have an advantage over the terrorists finally. All Jordan had to do was enter the chemical name for the white masks infamous gas and add a largely known number linked with terrorism and he was in. Bringing the chemistry know it all did accomplish something for the mission. Jordan took a step back, allowing Zero to scan the documents for any information that was to be read asap. He swore a look of horror shifted onto Fishers previously numb face.

“We still need Ash and Mute, they need to download this information so we can take the files with us back asap,” Zero grabbed his radio, “Ash this is Zero, we’ve found a computer with a tone of files. You need to get down ASAP. Over.”

Silence.

“Copy that Zero, We’re heading down now. Over.”

Zero put his face in his hands for a minute before muttering something about chemical testing.. but Jordan didn’t catch it all.

Zero huffed, pushing himself away from the desk to stand upright. “They’re going to need help navigating that corridor-“

“-If you say let’s split up, I swear to god.”

“Relax, there’s nothing here- all you have to do is walk back to the entrance and lead the two here,” Fisher told, crossing his arms as he stood back.

Jordan let out a sigh, nodding his head. Of course he had no reason to be scared, they’d checked the corridor before hand, he was just going to return back and lead Eliza and Mark to the room, then they could leave this cursed building forever. Letting out a small ‘yes sir’, the Texan exited the room and was plunged into the damp tunnel

The tunnel now felt a lot colder than before, the wind which had been battering the above building clearly managed to shove open a door and make itsway down into the depths below the first floor. Sewage was piling up at where the wall met the floor, making a sickly smell which filled the endless corridor. Jordan started to make his way to the entrance, his gun ready incase something popped out of nowhere. This wasn’t to do with Jordan being scared of the dark- he never had been; his sister would often make fun of him when they were kids because he got too scared to walk anywhere in the dark after watching the IT miniseries, but yet that was what lead Jordan to be scared of what used the shadows as a cloak. To be fair, Jordan knew what was somewhat valid.. But a 35 year old man with a gun who toured with the marines scared of what hid in the dark.. That did sound a bit iffy.

Walking back was easier than before, before they had no idea about what his behind each door and what would be ahead, but yet his stomachs felt queasy as if there was something they had missed. But that’s all it was, a feeling right? The ever growing pit which deepened each step he took down the infinite corridor, the smell of sewage growing more putrid to a level it resembled the smell of rotting flesh, the smell wasn’t real right? But as the odour grabbed his throat, it haulted him in his tracks- pulling him towards the source from which it came from. Behind a locked door was where the source of the smell had been trapped away. Kicking locked doors down wasn’t hard, especially if the door was barely secured onto the doorframe. The beaten wood topled to the floor with a bang, splashing some unknown liquid onto Jordan. The flashlight was brought up to glaze across the room, the light flickering as it glanced upon what lay in the center of the room.

“Fuck,” was all Jordan could choke out, the smell making him gag as he opened his mouth, or maybe it was the sight.

Whatever lay in front of him had been altered so many times that it barely even resembled a human, flesh stuck together as if it were play-doh, a face could barely be put together due to the amount of flies playing in the pile of rotting flesh and blood. The more breaths he took, the more faint he felt. There would always be something that’s too much. Jordan stumbled back, an attempt to catch the damp air of the corridor outside. The pile of body parts cried out for him, begging for him to save them from that torture.

“Jordan where are you?” the crackle of his radio barely reached through to him.

Jordan leant against the mouldy wall opposite the room, eyes dull as he looked at the darkness where the thing was. Splitting up was a great idea.. he tried to smile but all he could was stand motionless. Hoping someone would get to him and help him out of this rotting house.

——————

jehdjdh sorry it’s short (still over 1k though) but i struggle with focusing, i hope it’s alright though.

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divine-motion · 5 years ago

Text

finished pathologic 2 so day 9 to 12 thoughts below because i have to

the abattoir was fucking rough i can only imagine artemy is running around with at least broken arm after that bc worms hit like a brick shit house

also nara... nara... i’m sad. didn’t feel good.

i love pathologic but didn’t so much like “the plague was sent from earth to kill people” that sounds too much like those ecofascists going on about how corona is “cleaning up” or whatever. i think it could’ve been a Miracle of earth without being a punishment you know?

really wish i could’ve had artemy be angrier with isidor in that dream. i know you love your dad and he was your only family you had left before you accidentally became a dad, artemy, but isidor is an old bitch and i hate him.

seriously releasing the plague on purpose?? what the fuck?? “oh it’s a vaccination” yeah that cost tens of thousands of lives?? summon your son back so he can risk death and infection every day as he tries to fix what you did??

isidor: these seven children will build the future of this town and that’s why i released a plague sand pest: *immediately infects specifically those seven children* isidor, presumably: welp son looks like you gotta deal with that now

also the plague just coming to my house and infecting ALL of my children??? what the fuck??? grief and aspity got infected too it was so stressful but luckily i had just enough panaceas and shmowders to save them all but all the conversations with the kids were fucking gut-punches... murky bringing funeral wreaths for sticky... fuck...

artemy dialogue options to people other than grief: i can vouch for grief, he’s good, deep down, and he didn’t want any of these cutthroats running around. it was really ugly of lara and stakh to just leave him behind. lay off grief, ok, he’s a decent man, better than most! artemy dialogue options to grief: what’s up you idiot crime clown stop whining and stop talking about puppets already, also for the love of god don’t become a monk i don’t even want to imagine it

maybe he just wants to play along and let grief think that his Criminal Mastermind act has fooled him i don’t know

day 10 really had me running about desperately trying to save my children and then some dude tells me “did they execute lara yet?” and i had to sprint off to save her and felt awful seeing her say she didn’t want to live anymore... pathologic is sad

also i told her “hand me the gun ok, discreetly” but my inventory had no space for a gun so it looked like artemy just dropped it on the ground after she handed him the gun and was like “ok it’s fine it’s fine let’s go let’s go”

of course after i thought nothing could get more stressful than day 10, day 11 of course managed to be more stressful, at least time-wise, because at least i knew that i could cure all my kids and friends

out of morbid curiosity i performed an autopsy on madam inquisitor and uh. ma’am. ma’am? you had no blood and no organs whatsoever. what’s up with that??

daniil dankovsky bachelor of medicine really straight up murdered an innocent courier because he wanted the polyhedron to survive and cursed about how this “wretched town” should be sacrificed instead huh

also he just had to praise himself by saying “smart of me not to eat the letter and burning it instead” like this man really thinks that he’s the smartest man in the world for just doing what any other person would’ve done

i love daniil dankovsky he’s an idiot

house of death is still the scariest thing in the game for me bc i hate being chased but the fucking. army approaching from all sides around me and the changeling, trying to find a way without soldiers to escape through... i don’t know it was just. scary. they were just walking towards me with their rifles drawn. also i knew they could all kill me in like one shot so that added to it

in the context of pathologic 2 being a play, what does that make the Other Artemy Burakh? like i know it’s because there are several actors that can play the haruspex but like. imagine watching a play and then the main character stumbles upon another guy who says “no i’m the actor that’s gonna play you now”. would it look like it’s some guy who got snubbed at the audition ran on stage and started improv’ing about killing the courier and the rest of the show just went along with it? the “real” actor maybe starts beating the snubbed guy up on stage?

i went with the diurnal ending partially because of the whole “echoing ecofascist words” that’s unfortunately there in some of it, but it still felt bad when faced with the fact that the miracles were going to die out if i went through with it

also, managed to only have two people die of the plague and it was the two Vlads! so, you know, no great loss. sorry capella you’re orphaned now but you seemed to get on well

it was worth it to see murky and sticky standing outside the burakh residence and talking about living there with artemy

also to hear lara say she was going to help me raise them

stakh is way more sarcastic and jokey than i originally expected of him. he’s gonna do well as artemy’s apprentice

“what are your commands, mentor” “my first command is for you to never call me that again”

they are brothers.

immediately felt like reloading and choosing the nocturnal ending when i spoke to aspity and realized she was dying and once again felt like crying when artemy said that he still needed her and apologized to her

miss aspity i’ll let the plague live next time just for you

in conclusion pathologic 2 good game, can’t wait to play marble nest next

#pathologic #pathologic 2 #i don't really have anything of worth to say here i just needed to get my thoughts out #and to tell everyone i think isidor is a bitch #murky was right

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vecna · 5 years ago

Note

Oohh for the fandom meme! Dragon Age?

Send me a fandom!

Oh boy, this is going to be spicy.

It’s also very Anders-negative, so apologies up front.

The character(s) I first fell in love with:

I’m actually not sure which was the FIRST, but it’s a tie between Morrigan and Alistair. I saw fanart of them going around at the time Origins first released, and that’s what got me to try the game!

Alistair was a breath of fresh air, because at the time, I was used to warrior men in games being all Edgy and Rough, and he was the total opposite and a sweetheart.

And Morrigan was just instantly my goth wife, and had Claudia Black as a VA, so I was sold immediately.

Both still hold a special place for me!

The character(s) I never expected to love as much as I do now:

Loghain is the main one. He does a lot of truly reprehensible shit in the first game. But once I sat down and read the prequel novels about young Loghain, plus saw what he’s like if you recruit him, he grew on me A LOT and now he’s a top fave.

Nathaniel I expected to hate as soon as I saw his name + who his father was, but then the expansion came out and I ended up loving that dude almost immediately. I really wish he was around more after Awakening, and also really wish he’d been a romance option, especially for a Cousland haha.

Merrill is a weird one because she was totally uninteresting to me in DA:O, so when they announced her as a companion in DA2 I was like, “Ehhhh.” Then they punked me by making her adorable and sweet and now I love her.

Plus a bunch of side-characters like The Architect? I liked him a bunch in the novel + Awakening – although I found his Plan in the novel much more appealing. But as the years have gone by, I keep surprising myself at just HOW disappointed I am he’s never appeared again haha.

The character(s) everyone else loves that I don’t:

There’s a few, and all of them will get me yelled at, but here we go.

First: Isabela. This one’s a bit complicated, but it really just boils down to her attitude towards how you play your character. I actively dislike characters who are super sexual – regardless of gender. But Isabela in particular bothers me because she’s constantly pushing her lewdness and sexual humor on you, and when you try to discourage it, she admonishes you with, “Well, you’re no fun.” Her whole character is just… like that for me. Super pushy, overly lewd, gets uppity when you don’t have the same ~liberated~ opinions she does, and this is all played up in the writing like she’s this Empowered Woman the player absolutely must love, especially if they’re playing a male character lol. I hate her for the same reasons a lot of people hate Liara in Mass Effect, but with the addition of pushy lewd jokey characters always rubbing me the wrong way.

Second: Iron Bull. I’ve written a lot about why he makes me more uncomfortable than any fictional character I’ve ever encountered, and I just outright hate him, he makes my skin crawl. If you want details, feel free to DM me, I don’t really want to rant about it again publicly.

Third: Anders. Again, I’ve written a lot about him before, but. I hated him in Awakening, for a lot of the same reasons I hate Isabela in DA2. But the changes they made to him in DA2 are just kinda :/. While I absolutely agree with him about Mage Rights, the level of preachiness they added to him drove me nuts, and the fact that you’re painted as a Bad Guy if you don’t like him blowing up the chantry. And from a purely OOC standpoint: He’s become a figurehead for all the aggressive Discourse people in the fandom, and if I see someone list Anders in their sidebar bio, I know pre-emptively that their blog is going to be full of 6 page long essays of meta about how everything is Problematic, and no thanks.

To a lesser extent, I’m also not fond of Zevran. But in his case, it’s not anything major like the others, I’m just tired of Bioware’s habit of making the bisexual characters overly lewd sex-focused rogues/deviants.

The character(s) I love that everyone else hates:

Loghain, lol.

But also Sebastian Vael? There’s so much about him that I find genuinely fascinating, especially regarding his backstory, and his struggles between his feelings of responsibility to his family vs his dedication to the Chantry and bettering himself. He’s such a dear character to me, and such a pivotal part of any playthrough, I’m always blown away when I remember he’s a DLC character and many people don’t have him.

HOWEVER Anders being the fandom darling means that people tend to unfairly shit on Sebastian for reacting poorly to the Chantry explosion. People also like to label him as a poster child of a White Straight Church Boy, while refusing to acknowledge he’s… not straight, and not exactly a church boy either lol.

Also Vivienne, but I think that one’s really self-explanatory. I love her, and she gives a really needed perspective on the Circle, since most of the mage companions previously were apostates. But of course, she gets written off as a Chantry apologist, and an uppity bitch, when people would def love her for the same traits if she was not black lol.

The character(s) I used to love but don’t any longer:

Justice. And by extension, Anders. A lot of people like to rant about how Justice ruined Anders, but I always saw it the other way around.Justice was my favorite character in Awakening. The whole concept around him, that he was a Fade spirit who took human form and was experiencing life for the first time was SO fascinating. I felt like there was so much to explore there with his character.

Buuuut then they had him merge with Anders. With the narrative being that he WAS a spirit of Justice, but the moment he connected with Anders, it corrupted his entire spirit into something he wasn’t anymore. So essentially, the character I used to love no longer exists, thanks to Anders. And it reminds me of that phrase recently, about how the destination is so terrible you can no longer enjoy the journey? I can’t even appreciate Justice in Awakening anymore, knowing what happens to him.

To a lesser extent, Corypheus. He was SO COOL and the premise of him was AMAZING when he first appeared in the DA2 DLC, but then Inquisition had to go and turn him into a weird shallow mustache twirl villain.

The character(s) I would totally smooch:

None? Idk I don’t really have the Smooch Fictional Character gene.

The character(s) I’d want to be like:

MAEVARIS TILANI. May I one day finally have the confidence in my identity that she does, and also marry a sweet bear man who adores me.

The character(s) I’d slap:

Too many to list, really. Probably Anders.

The pairing(s) that I love:

THERE’S SO MANY. And most of them are with the PC, because I generally don’t ship NPCs together. But my top 3 are:

M!Hawke / Fenris is my ultimate OTP in the Dragon Age series, by a long-shot. Not even sure where to start on how much I love it, but two damaged guys leaning on each other to work through their respective loneliness and trauma is MY JAM. And lmao I love silver-sideburned Hawke chillin in retirement somewhere but being a supportive husband while Fenris goes off hunting the Bad Guys, it’s great.

Solas / Lavellan is a close second, with the caveat that I increasingly prefer it with a male Lavellan. Having the Inquisitor in love with Solas just changes the entire tone of the game for me, for the better, and him actually being the villain trying to end the world while in love with this normie elf is just (chef kiss). Too bad I’m burned out by how overly spammed it is.

Dorian / Inquisitor is in third, I will just always be fond of how it’s a story of the Inquisitor helping Dorian be happy with who he is, escape an abusive family, and realize that he’s allowed to be loved. Good shit good shit.

Some others:

Warden / Morrigan is probably my favorite Origins ship, and that only intensified with the way she talks about the Warden in Inquisition, esp if they’re Kieran’s other parent. What a cute goth family, regardless of the Warden’s gender, cause you can pry Bi Morrigan from my cold dead fingers.

Cassandra / Inquisitor might have a lot of Romance Cliches, but I adore it – although, similar others, I increasingly prefer it with a female Inquisitor. I actively dislike the weird no-homo rejection with her, and come on, a lady Inquisitor being her Knight In Shining Armor is just good storytelling.

Cullen / Inquisitor, for a lot of the same reasons as Cassandra. I love me a cliche romance, but I’m also fond of the narrative w/ him of someone he loves helping him heal through the lyrium withdrawals and take time to rest.

Josephine / F!Inquisitor is just adorable all around, and wholesome, and great.

Varric / Hawke COME ON HOW WAS THIS NOT AN OPTION.

On the rarepair end:

Sebastian / Hawke doesn’t seem like it would be a rarepair – you’d think everyone who loves Cullen/Inquisitor would love this one too. I do! But alas. That said, I’m also pretty aggro about this one with a male Hawke because SEBASTIAN IS CANON BI. WHY WAS HIS ROMANCE STRAIGHT.

Maric / Loghain is a rarepair I will take with me to my grave LOL. Never forget the scene where Maric thought Loghain was leaving, and bolted across the camp with almost no clothes on to beg Loghain to stay. Come on.

Nathaniel / Cousland is dear to me, and I love it so much more than Alistair / Cousland haha.

Greagoir / Wynne, I can’t believe this got validated in canon ahhhh.

The pairing(s) that I despise:

Again: THERE’S SO MANY.

Iron Bull / Dorian is my least fave by a longshot. Again, I have written about why I hate this pairing a great many times, but it’s awful and toxic and makes me deeply uncomfortable, and I could happily go the rest of my life without seeing anything about it ever again. Please keep poor Dorian away from that man. He deserves someone that doesn’t sexually harass him until he’s finally worn down into dubious consent (while drunk) and then outted to everyone about it.

Isabela / Fenris. Sorry, but it’s just bad writing that Fenris bails on Hawke because the physical intimacy triggered his PTSD and he needs space to process, but then will turn around and have a casual sex relationship with Isabela instead. Yikes.

Anders / Fenris. Aveline / Isabela. Alistair / Morrigan. All of the DA2 Hawke/companion rivalmances. I don’t enjoy “these two people hate and antagonize and want to kill each other… but they fuck” in any form.

Cullen / Amell. Yikes.

And basically ALL of the canon wlw pairings in this series suffer from the fact they have men writing them, and as a result they’re almost always some kind of abusive or racist, and skeeve me out. See: Celene / Briala, Leliana / Marjolaine, Branka / Hespith, etc. Please Bioware, I’m begging you to consult some actual queer women. It’s insane how badly they’re treated compared to how the canon mlm couples are written.

FINALLY, I recognize this will be the most unpopular of all, but. As much as I love M!Hawke/Fenris, I just honestly cannot stand seeing F!Hawke/Fenris. There are some pairings where I’m so attached to the m/m or f/f version, I cannot deal with the m/f version anymore, and that’s one of them. (The others are mainly non-Bioware.)

#LONG POST #REALLY LONG #SORRY #misc: text #misc: asks #misc: meme #series: dragon age #gen: bioware #utopianoverlord

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thesloppiestbitch · 6 years ago

Text

Sick Day - Roger Taylor x Reader

A/N: I’m sick and my girlfriend lives in a different country, so this is how I’m passing the time and comforting myself lmao enjoy

I apologize for any typos or grammatical errors, I don’t feel well enough to proof read

Masterlist

You groaned quietly as you sat up, voice cracking quite a bit, as you attempted let the man beside you continue his sleep. Your hands dragged down your face, and, as you did so, you noticed you had a small fever. Nothing that a thermometer would pick up, but a fever nonetheless.

Perfect, because to be sick is exactly what I need today, you thought as you slowly swung your feet over the bed, head already becoming swimmy.

Today was the last day the boys had to work on their album, and they wanted you there to hear what they’d been working on, and to help them choose tour stops in the US, as you were really the only one who’d travelled there enough to know what cities had the good bars and clubs. They were really counting on you being there, but it’s not like your presence would make or break the meeting, and you knew that, but you’d been waiting all month for this.

You sighed again, finally ready to attempt standing up. Which did not go so well. As soon as you stood, your sinuses seemed to clog and your vision darkened around the edges. You also began to feel nauseous and the room looked like it was tilted for some reason. Nevertheless, you needed to start the pot of coffee and hop in the shower, hoping the combination would give you enough energy to make it through the day.

You stumbled forwards, stubbing your big toe on the dresser and cursing under your breath. The thud and the speech was enough to wake Roger. He sat up slightly, obviously stretching under the duvet. “You alright, love?”

You nodded. “Yeah,” You spoke, voice hoarse and croaky due to your immensely dry throat. You attempted to clear it, but only winced in pain. “I’m fine,” You croaked.

“Are you sick?” He asked, sitting up completely, now fully awake.

“What? No,” You waved him off, now supporting yourself by leaning on the doorframe, afraid you might fall over if you didn’t have something to prop yourself up. “I just need a glass of water,”

“[Name], you’re as white as the wallpaper. Get back in bed,”

“No, Roggie,” You whined. “I need a drink,”

He laughed at your childishness, rolling his eyes. “I will get you a drink,”

You looked to the ground, suddenly feeling self conscious. “I gotta pee, too.”

He chuckled, standing up. “Fine, go to the bathroom and I’ll get you a drink. You’re not leaving the bed today,”

“But we have that meeting with the boys!” You protested, attempting to stand straight, but wobbling side to side slightly.

“They’ll understand,”

“Don’t they need you for recording?”

“They’re mixing. If it’s anything that’s that important, they’ll wait till I get back or call,”

You sighed, throwing your head back, suddenly realizing it was pointless to argue with him once he had his mind set to something. “Fine.”

“Good,”

•••

As the day went on, you grew to feel more disgusting. Your nose continued to run, and you got tired of wiping it, so you’d stuffed small wads of toilet paper up your nose. You knew you looked stupid, but you didn’t really care. Plus, Roger still made you feel like the prettiest girl in the world.

“Rog, I feel bad,” You started, looking down at your hands. Your voice sounded a little funny due to your stuffy nose, as well as the toilet paper up there.

“I know,” He interrupted. “You’re sick. That tends to go with it; kinda like a package deal sorta thing.”

You rolled your eyes, chuckling softly. “No! I mean I feel bad about you missing the meeting today. You really didn’t need to stay home and babysit me,”

“Oh, [Name], babysitting is fun!” He teased.

You were slightly taken aback by his response, but still laughed, even though it hurt your throat. “Can you pass me the Halls please? Oh, and I think you should have a good heaping of ‘be nice to me, I’m sick’.”

He laughed, handing you the small package of couch drops. “You really don’t have to feel bad about this, love. The boys were very understanding on the phone; they even offered to stop by after the meeting and bring us something for supper,”

A small smile broke out on your face. “Well aren’t they sweet,”

He nodded. “Plus, if they weren’t able to finish everything today because we weren’t there, they can always book extra time with the studio tomorrow; it’s really no big deal. Plus, I like getting to spend the day with you in bed,”

You rolled your eyes.

•••

A few hours passed and you’d managed to fall back asleep to the sound of the TV playing some rerun of a show you’d seen a million times before. You cuddled right up to Roger, happy to have the extra heat to keep you warm.

Just as Roger was about to fall asleep as well, a knock at the door caught his attention. He stood up carefully, trying to make sure you stayed asleep as you clearly needed the extra rest.

When he opened the door, he was greeted by his three other band mates. They were all smiling as they waited for their friend to let them in. Roger glanced down, seeing Freddie was holding a bag from KFC and returned the smile as he opened the door wider, motioning them inside.

“Where’s [Name]?” Brian asked on his way to the kitchen.

“How’s she feeling?” John asked, staying behind an extra minute to take off and hang up his coat.

“She’s asleep in the bedroom right now, and she seems to be feeling a little better. She’s still being her sassy, jokey self,” Roger replies, closing the door once all three were in his flat.

“You should’ve called us! We don’t want to wake her,” Freddie called softly from the kitchen.

Roger shrugged it off, making his way towards the room as well. “Its fine, she’s been asleep for a few hours anyways, she’s probably starving. She hasn’t eaten all day; didn’t even want her coffee that she insisted I make for her,” He laughed as he recalled the last part.

“Well, go wake her then, I suppose,” Freddie replied, getting plates from the cupboard.

Roger nodded, making his way towards the bedroom. When he walked in, he saw you sprawled across the bed, mouth wide open, and the wads of toilet paper still sticking out from your nostrils. He smiled to himself, thinking you still looked adorable.

Roger knelt beside the bed, gently rubbing your arm to wake you up. You stirred in the bed for a moment, and eventually your eyes fluttered open.

“What time is it?” You croaked.

“Almost seven, love. The guys are here and they brought chicken. Care to join us?”

You nodded, stretching your arms above your head as you sat up.

Roger laughed as he watched you do this.

You glared at him. “What?”

“Might wanna take out those snot wads before you see them. If you don’t, they’ll never let you live it down.”

Your brows knit together in confusion as you reached up to tap your nose. You laughed softly, having forgotten you’d stuffed them up there. “Okay, look away,”

He laughed. “You act as though I haven’t held your hair back for you as you’ve thrown up before,”

“Roger!” You scolded, laughing. “Just look away!”

He put his hands up in surrender and turned away.

After you’d made yourself look slightly more presentable, Roger helped you keep your balance as the two of you went to the kitchen where the rest of the band had set up plates, utensils, glasses, and had made you some tea. You audibly “awe’d” upon seeing this.

“You guys really didn’t have to do this,” You said after clearing your throat.

“We wanted to,” John shrugged.

Roger pushed your seat in for you before sitting beside you. “They’re sickeningly sweet when it comes to you, but if one of us were to get sick, the others wouldn’t do jack shit for them. You’re really something special to us, [Name].” He commented, grabbing the box of chicken strips.

You nodded, sipping your tea. “Thanks guys,” They all nodded in response, all getting some sort of food or waiting for someone else to finish with what they wanted. “And I’m really sorry for missing the meeting today, I feel really bad about it. And about keeping Roger home all day, even if he did insist on staying even after I told him to go,” You shot him a glare to which he shrugged.

“[Name], it’s no big deal, really. We did miss you, but we can always have another meeting once you’re feeling better,” Brian reassured.

“What, you didn’t miss me?” Roger asked, pretending to be hurt by this.

“Nope.” Freddie responded, biting into some food.

“Not in the slightest.” John added.

You laughed at their comments

•••

After supper, and after the guys had left, you sulked back to bed after having had a refreshing and relaxing soak in a hot bath. You were only beginning to feel better now, but you still didn’t feel at the top of your game. You knew you’d be feeling the same tomorrow, but you didn’t really care. There was nothing planned for the following day, so you weren’t stressing over anything.

After a minute or so, Roger climbed into bed beside you and you cuddling up close to him again. Despite the hot bath, you were still freezing cold.

“You have a fever, love,” Roger mumbled, resting a hand softly on your forehead.

“I know,” You croaked.

“Did you take any medicine?”

You nodded. “Uh-huh.”

He laughed softly. “Tired?”

“Very.”

“Alright then, goodnight, love,”

“‘Night.”

“I love you,” He stated quietly, shifting in a way so he was closer to you.

You opened your eyes to find him very close to your face, about to kiss you. You shuffled back a little bit. “Don’t, you’ll get sick.”

“Don’t care,” He said nonchalantly, leaning in again.

You chuckled, kissing him.

“Don’t complain to me when you wake up feeling like shit,” You whispered once you two had pulled apart.

He laughed. “I won’t.”

“I love you,”

“I love you, too,”

You cuddled close to him again, hoping for a restful sleep.

#roger taylor #roger taylor x reader #roger taylor imagine #queen #queen imagine #queen band #freddie mercury #john deadon #brian may #bohemian rhapsody movie #bohemian rhapsody #borhap #borhap imagine #ben hardy #ben hardy x reader #joe mazzello #gwilym lee #rami malek

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pinesposts · 7 years ago

Text

Vote for Mabel!

hello! thank you to everyone who gave me feedback on my first fic. it really really means a lot.

this one is quite a bit longer, and is also NSFW, so beware of that if it that’s not your thang. i hope you enjoy, and as always, feedback is appreciated :) (also, excuse any minor grammatical errors. i’m pretty sure i caught most of them but they tend to slip through the cracks haha)

welcome to Vote for Mabel!

“Hi, my name is Mabel Pines, and I want to be your next student-body president.”

“That’s great, Mabes. Though it might be worth your while to try it on somebody who isn’t, you know, your brother.”

Mabel blows him a big fat raspberry. Okay, so maybe she’s been a little nervous to campaign to the people at school. So what? No matter how bubbly and friendly you are, this is a whole different ballpark. She needs to show everyone how great of a president she’d be in just a few short words, and dangit, that’s hard stuff!

“Ugh. I know.” She sighs, falling back onto her bed. Dipper follows suit, lying down next to her across her rainbow comforter. “I’m sure it’ll be easier once I get started, but right now my nerves are having a party in my stomach and they forgot to invite me.”

He snorts, rolling over to face her. “You’ll win them all over, you know it.”

“Well, duh.” She giggles. A comfortable silence washes over them as Mabel stares up at the ceiling, mentally going over her speech for the billionth time. As she nears the part about her idea for Pet Day, her eyes wander over to look at Dipper. He has been such a big help for this whole thing, hasn’t he? Despite his protests, he was never too busy to come and listen to her speech or suggest that maybe her posters don’t really need to be covered from top to bottom in glitter glue.

Too bad he’s not running for a position, she muses. They balance each other out perfectly. Whenever Dipper gets too focused on doing everything according to the book, she’s the one who helps him look at the creative side. And he’s the one who helps ground Mabel when she gets a little too crazy. Still, he never makes her feel weird for it. Though he’d never admit it, she secretly knows as well as he does that Dipper loves all her crazy weirdness. She loves his too, when cares to show it.

“So, what’s next on the agenda for President Pines?” Dipper asks. “World domination?”

“We’re getting there,” giggles Mabel, “but for now all the candidates have a meeting tomorrow. Just about speeches and stuff, you know the drill. No campaign managers, allowed, sorry.”

“Campaign manager, eh?” Dipper quips. “Got a nice ring to it.”

“I’m glad you approve. I mean, you’ve done a ton for this campaign. Though I still resent your stance on the glitter.”

“Please. You’ll be thanking me when the student body isn’t choking up sparkles during your speech.”

“Pffft. As if glitter could ever be used for evil.” Mabel scoffs, propping herself up onto her elbows.

“Ahem?” teases Dipper. “Don’t you recall a certain April Fools, circa three years ago? I was scrubbing glitter out of my hair for weeks afterwards.”

“Those were rhinestones, my dear bro. A completely different beast.”

“Ah, right. My apologies.” He smirks, pushing himself off of the bed. “Well, if there are no more election duties, calculus homework calls.”

“Aw, boo.” Mabel protests. She reaches out to grab his wrist, pulling him back onto the bed. Her angle is a little wonky, though, and she accidentally pulls down towards her. Giggling, she watches Dipper’s slender frame move closer and closer as he falls. Despite his best effort to stop himself, they land in a heap with Dipper pressed up a little too close to her face. She keeps laughing, hoping to dissuade any weird tension that might come from the slightly awkward position. She expects him to get up any second now and laugh it off. But instead of pulling back, he lingers there for a moment, awkwardly holding himself up above her.

Then, as quick as his weird freezing happened, it quickly unpauses and he’s standing up on his feet again. He gulps, his face unnaturally red even for him. “Uh, like I said. Calculus.” Before she can spit out a second protest, he’s gone from the room. Mabel giggles. She may be the weird one, but Dipper can sure be strange sometimes.

___

Mabel gets to the meeting just in time, sliding into a seat next to a particularly cute blonde-haired boy. She had gotten into a nasty game of tug-of-war with the vending machine but luckily had came out victorious. Now, settling into her seat with her fruit snacks in hand, she gazes around the room. There are a couple people here she recognizes from various classes but the rest are completely unknown to her. She gives a tiny wave at Lizzie from Art just as the teacher supervisor strides in.

“Hello, everyone!” greets the cheery red-haired teacher. “I’m Ms. Blais. It’s great to see so many candidates this year! That means the pressure’s on, though!”

Mabel smiles. She’s pretty sure that this Blais lady teaches science, which is why they’ve never met, but she seems cool enough.

“Have you had Blais before?” A voice whispers from beside her. Mabel shakes her head in the voice’s direction, realizing it’s none other than Cute Blonde Boy. “That sucks. She’s a riot. Mind you, her class is brutal, but she’s so cool it makes up for it.”

“If I ever lose my mind and decide to take a chemistry course, I’ll make sure she’s the unfortunate soul that gets to teach me.” Mabel giggles.

“Maybe I’m jumping the gun a bit, but I wouldn’t call it unfortunate to have you around.” The boy replies, his cheeks turning pink ever-so-slightly.

“D’awww.” Mabel replies, unable to contain her smile. “I’m Mabel.”

“Felix.” He replies, running a hand through those pretty yellow locks. “So, what are you-”

“Felix!” Ms. Blais cries out, shooting an overly-animated disapproving glare his way. “There’ll be plenty of time to chat up the girls after the meeting, ‘kay?”

Felix smirks back at her. “Sure thing, Ms. B.” The petite teacher clicks her tongue disapprovingly, but that doesn’t mask the smile stretching across her face. She continues making her way around the room, passing out identical white forms to every student.

“Now, I’ll keep this short. We’ve got speeches coming up at the end of the week, which means you all need to submit your final drafts by Wednesday. Not that I don’t trust you all to keep your speeches G-rated, but I don’t trust any of you. The next day will be speeches right after lunch, and then everyone will return to their classes to vote. We’ll announce the results Friday! Any questions?” Ms. Blais finishes her short speech, glancing around the room a couple times for raised hands. Upon finding none, she smiles and places the remaining forms into the crook of her arm. “Well, then. See you on the ice, kids.”

Felix and Mabel continue to chat as they exit the meeting. She finds out that he’s a total science nerd (but like, an adorkable one), he’s in three of Dipper’s classes, and he has a pet snake. How awesome is that! She also learns that he’s directly competing against her for president, but hey! Who doesn’t like some friendly competition now and again? Mabel leaves her lunch hour behind feeling totally smitten, and knows she has to tell Dipper as soon as freakin’ possible.

“Do you know a guy named Felix Ross?” she asks later on their car drive home. Dipper absentmindedly turns onto their street, his face contorted in thought.

“I think so. Kinda tall, blonde guy?” Dipper asks, and is promptly replied to with a nod. “Yeah, he’s in my Calculus class, I think. And maybe Physics? Not sure.” He pauses. “Why do you ask?”

“I met him at the campaign meeting during lunch. Gosh, and to think I could’ve gone my whole life without meeting a dreamboat like him. Running for prez sure has its perks, eh?” Mabel giggles. She notices Dipper’s grip grows slightly tighter on the steering wheel as he pulls into their driveway.

“I mean, he seems like kind of an ass to me.” Dipper says. And with that, he exits the car. Mabel huffs in her seat. Dip sure can be a party pooper sometimes.

Mabel spends the next day and a half falling head over heels for Felix. As soon as she gets home from school that day, she cracks open her phone and sent Felix a jokey message she hopes will make him laugh. Success is reached in the form of a laughing emoji reply, followed by him asking about her day went. He was so nice to her, but never in a way that felt forced or phony. It was just him being a genuinely nice guy. And she felt so comfortable talking to him! The only other guy she felt like that with was Dipper.

Who, speaking of which, has grown even more sure that Felix is a “total ass”. But how does he know? It’s not like he’s ever talked to the guy. As far as Mabel is concerned, Felix is as perfect as they come. And heck if she was going to pass that up!

Which is why she might have gotten a teensy-weensy bit carried away the following day after school, when Felix asks her to help him “Mabel-ify” his posters. It’s not her fault the guy doesn’t know which end of a glue gun is up! As far as Mabel’s concerned, this is a crafting emergency that desperately begs for her attention.

Still, she winces when she sees Dipper’s name come up on her phone. Shoot! She forgot to cancel.

“Hey, Dip. Listen…”

“Hey, where are you?” Dipper asks. He sounds concern, like he’s worried something must’ve happened to her. Aww. “Are you okay?”

“Oh, yeah, I’m fine…” she trails off, dreading having to tell Dipper the truth. “Listen, I’m kinda sorta at Felix’s house right now. Do you think you could pick up the extra poster copies without me? Please?”

She hears Dipper sigh on the other end of the line. “What are you even doing at his house, Mabel?” he asks, his voice small and meek.

“I’m helping him with his posters is all. They are in desperate need of some Mabel TLC.”

That gets a half-hearted chuckle out of him, but she can tell he’s upset. Ugh, she feels so bad! Why does her dumb brain always get so caught up in the moment with boys? Now her brother is upset. But before she can apologize further, his voice stirs on the other end of the line.

“I’ll go get the posters, okay? Just…don’t stay out too late or anything.”

Mabel giggles. “Okay, Mom.” She quips, coaxing yet another chuckle out of him. Operation Dipper-Cheer Up has done the best possible job considering the circumstances. “I’ll be home nice and early so we can practice my speech, ‘mkay?”

“Sure, Mabes.” She hears him say, before giving her a quick goodbye and hanging up the phone. Aw, crud. Now she feels terrible. Still, she’d be lying if she said those feelings didn’t go away a little when Felix re-enters the room with two cans of pop for them.

“Dr. Pepper for you, Diet Coke for me.” Felix recites, passing her the can of soda. “Who was that on the phone?”

“Just Dipper.” She says, smiling up at him. “Now, let’s see those posters.”

It’s just after eight thirty when Mabel finally gets home, which is admittedly a bit later than she had intended to leave. Whatever, she got carried away! Plus, those posters seriously needed some work. She makes her way up to Dipper’s room, knocking lightly on the door.

“Come in.” His voice echoes through the door. She turns the handle, meekly walking into his room. He’s lying on the bed, idly drumming his fingers across the cover of a torn-up mystery book that his eyes have neglected in favour of wistfully gazing at the ceiling.

“Hey.” She says, giving her brother her best I’m really super sorry smile.

He gives her a weak smile in return. “Hey.”

“I’m sorry about running off. I just got kind of carried away, and Felix is soooo cute Dipper, seriously like I almost start drooling when I look at him for too long, it’s really…”

“Yeah, I get it, Mabel.” Dipper says harshly. He instantly looks regretful, and lets out a sigh as he runs his hand through his messy brown hair. “Sorry, I know you like him. It’s okay, don’t worry about it.”

Mabel knows that look. She knows it means that Dipper is holding something in, because she’s always the one that can see past it. Because she is the one that he lets everything out to. It’s a look that, when she’s on the receiving end, makes her heart break.

“Dip, come on. I know it’s not okay.” She says, plopping herself down at the foot of his bed. His legs curl into his chest and he tries very very hard not to look at her. Why is he being like this? Dipper has always been one to hold in his emotions to everyone else, but when it comes to his sister, he always lets them out.

“No, it is. You’re-you’re just…You’re having fun. And I’m glad that, uh, Felix is a cool guy after all.” He says, picking at his faded Legend of Zelda t-shirt.

Mabel frowns, thinking hard. She knows she majorly screwed up and all that, but would that really make Dipper this mopey? Something must be way seriously wrong. Ugh, she’s never been good with this sort of thing.

“Okay, just…” She hears herself say. “If you want to talk, y’know my door’s always open!” She ends this by shooting him finger guns, giving him her goofiest Mabel smile. Luckily, this gets a chuckle out of him.

“Okay, Dr. Mabel.” He says, picking up his book and burying himself back into it.

She sighs. That look is still there behind his eyes, but she doesn’t know if there’s anything she can do about it but wait.

The next day, Mabel spends extra-long at the mirror getting ready. This is for two reasons. One, because today’s Speech Day! And while of course she's going to wow them with all her fantastic ideas, it can’t hurt to be looking spiffy too. Reason number two is that she’s going out for lunch with rival candidate and all around cute dude Felix Ross right before the speeches.

Their lunch goes perfectly. Duh, why wouldn’t it? Felix is a total gentleman. He holds the door for her, makes her laugh like a gazillion times, and even pays for her meal at the end. She idly thinks over their date as they walk back to school, her arm in his. No matter what happens with the election, Mabel’s sure glad that she met Felix. This state of bliss doesn’t last long, unfortunately. Her current Felix mental fantasy is pierced by her twin’s voice calling her name. Ugh. Right now, Dipper? Really?

“Mabel?” He calls again, now standing in front of her and Felix.

Felix clears his throat, probably feeling more than a tad awkward. She may have let it slip to him that her brother isn’t the hugest Felix fan. “I’ll see you out there, okay, Mabel?” He says, giving her hand a squeeze. She smiles at him as he walks off, though that smile quickly fades to a look of annoyance that gets flashed Dipper’s direction.

“Seriously, Dip? I was kind of in the middle of something!” Mabel accuses, exasperated.

“Yeah, I know. That’s why I stopped you.” Dipper replies, his face redder than usual.

“What?”

“Listen, Mabel, you can do whatever you want, but I don’t know if it’s such a good idea to be hanging out with your opponent right before the election, y’know?” He shrugs, idly picking at the fuzz on his forest green sweater.

Say what? Who does Dipper think he is? He can’t just barge into the middle of her Felix fantasy, interrupt their date and then yell at her for having a little fun. She won’t stand for it.

“What the heck?” She says, raising her voice despite the other people still standing around in the halls. “This is a high school election! This doesn’t mean anything! “My opponent”? Seriously, we aren’t running for Congress, you know. This is supposed to be for fun.”

“Yeah, I know, it’s just…” He says, his voice tinged with regret. “Listen, I’m your campaign manager, right? It’s just my advice, is all. I don’t trust that guy.”

“You don’t trust anyone, Dipper! And by the way, “campaign manager”, I only gave you that title because you were being nice and helping me out. Not because you were bossing me around. I’m not a little kid, Dipper, I can handle myself.”

“I’m trying to help, Mabel!” Dipper says, his voice raising to match hers. Not a good move.

“Well, quit it!” She yells, backing away from him. “I don’t need any help from you!” She can’t stand to look at him anymore; she’s practically seeing red. Where the heck is this all coming from, anyway?

Mabel feels a single tear trickle down her cheek. Oh boy, here come the waterworks. She ducks into the girl’s bathroom, quickly locking herself into a stall so she can let the tears fly. Why did he have to do this right now? Now she’s going to be all shaken up and sad for her speech! She’s supposed to be all fun and happy; that’s how she was planning to win the student body over. God, everything is so messed up now.

She curls her knees into her chest, pressing her back into the wall of the stall. Tears dance across the scrapes on her legs as she presses her palms into her eyeballs. C’mon, Mabel girl, pull yourself together.

What the heck is she going to do?

—

Mabel makes her way up to podium, still desperately trying to scrub the mascara off of her tear-stained cheeks. God, she must look like a total mess. Eventually she finds herself positioned above the microphone and opens her mouth, praying that her voice won’t be as shaky as the rest of her.

“H-hello, everyone!” Mabel starts off. Lovely. Her shaky voice decided to make an appearance after all. “I, uh, am so excited to be running for your president. And, I, um…” Her eyes scan the room desperately for Dipper. Why can’t she remember what she’s supposed to say next? Where is he even sitting? He didn't leave, right?

“I want to be your next president because I’m super organized, for one thing. I’ve, uh, been part of tons of clubs over the years too! Like, ah…” She had her whole speech memorized less than an hour ago. Then she had to go have a stupid fight with her brother and now she can’t remember anything! Finally, Mabel spots Dipper in the crowd. Despite their argument, it still hurts her heart to see that his face is just as red and splotchy as hers. He looks just as scared as she feels.

Eventually Mabel makes her way through the speech, stumbling over her words and just generally making a total fool of herself. She can’t believe this. All the campaigning in the world can’t save her now. Her posters, the ones she spent days making, might as well not even be up there on the walls. She totally effed everything up.

She finishes her speech on the verge of tears, and is met with a half-hearted applause from the audience. Pushing her way through the couple of people waiting to go on next, Felix included, Mabel finds herself inside an empty classroom. Immediately, she slumps down in a nearby chair and breaks down crying. She’s so mad at herself right now she could scream.

The classroom door gently creaks open as a lanky figure approaches Mabel. She instantly knows who it is, even though she doesn’t really want to face him right now. She feels Dipper’s arms wrap around her, silently rubbing circles on her back. Despite how angry she was at him, all she wants to do now is let herself melt into his warm, comforting frame. She lets her tear-stained face rest on his shoulder and wonders what in the heck to say to him.

“Dipper, I-”

“Listen, Mabel-”

They both speak at once, cutting each other off. The twins let out soft giggles, both secretly glad to have alleviated a fraction of the tension in the room. Mabel motions for Dipper to continue, infinitely grateful that he’s not making her take control of this scary conversation.

“I’m sorry, Mabel. I’m sorry I was such an asshole earlier, honestly, I had no right to say those things about Felix, or any of this. I know you like him and I just— I feel awful. This is all my fault and I never, ever, want to hurt you, okay? And you can hang out with whoever you want, obviously, I just missed you is all. But I know I didn't handle it right, like, at all, and I’m really sorry. God, I’m so sorry, Mabes.”

Mabel can’t help it, she starts to sob. She isn’t upset with Dipper anymore, at least not nearly as much as she was before. Now she’s just upset with herself for letting everyone down, most of all her brother.

“I just feel like I let you down.” She says in a small voice, avoiding all eye contact. “You worked so hard helping me, and I just blew it.”

Dipper grabs her chin, tilting it up gently to look at him. “Hey. That’s crazy talk. I’m so proud of all the work that you’ve done, okay? Seriously. I’ve been looking up at those crazy cool posters on the wall all week and every time all I can think is how lucky I am to be your brother.”

“Really?”

“Of course. Mabel, you’re the coolest, funniest, most amazing girl I know. I’m sorry I made you feel like you weren’t.”

Mabel smiles, finally meeting his eyes. But when she does, she notices something there that’s never existed in his eyes before. There’s this intensely passionate look lingering on his features, like he’s looking at her as if he can’t believe she’s really there. She’s been on the receiving end of similar looks from boys a handful of times before, but nothing this intense and definitely nothing like this from her brother.

Behind all that is something else. It’s almost hidden, but Mabel knows him better than anyone and picks up on it. Behind the adoration is fear, she realizes. He’s deeply afraid. She gulps, watching him gaze at her in a way he hasn’t ever looked at her before. A look of admiration, of passion, of fear of what it all must mean.

A montage plays in Mabel’s head of the past few days and she realizes something earth-shattering. This isn’t the first time Dipper’s looked at her like this; not by a long shot. He’s been looking at her like this for a while now. But there’s always been some distraction; the campaign, an upcoming test, a new cute boy. Right now, though, it’s just the two Pines twins, staring deeply into each other’s eyes. And for the first time, she’s finally noticing just how Dipper looks at her. It’s anything but platonic.

She watches him get closer and closer to her face. This can’t be real. Dipper Pines, her brother, is inching his way towards her lips. There’s no way he’s really doing this, right? He’s just… he’s just… Her mind goes blank.

He’s kissing her.

It’s extremely soft; so gentle that if she wasn’t holding her breath and remaining as still as a statue she might not even have noticed it. She can’t bring herself to push him off of her; she’s in shock. Dipper takes this as a green light, and continues to gently press kisses upon her lips. His thumb caresses her cheek, in a way that (gulp) might have actually made her shudder a little.

So this is really happening, then. Her brother, her best friend for life is kissing her. Why isn’t she pushing him away? Why is she kind of sort of maybe—

“What the fuck.” A deep male voice whispers from behind them. Oh no. Oh no oh no oh no.

The twins instantly break apart. All the colour has drained from Dipper’s face. He’s terrified. Still, he inches his way in front of Mabel to shield her from the person in front of them.

“Felix, let’s not make any rash decisions, okay?” Dipper speaks, his voice quivering and breaking in ways she hasn’t heard since middle school. Mabel, meanwhile, can’t even manage to look up at Felix’s face. She’s frozen in place.

She hears Felix slam the door, presumably running off to go tell everyone what he saw. Mabel sinks to her knees, her face once again buried in her hands as she sobs. This time, though, she isn’t sobbing for some stupid presidential campaign. She’s crying for her, and her brother, and oh god, she’s going to have to move schools, and her parents will find out, and they’ll separate her and Dipper, even though neither of them know what they’re doing. They’re just stupid kids, for God’s sake. They’re just kids.

“Mabel.” Dipper finally breaks the silence, his voice shaking ever so slightly.

“I-I don’t want to talk to you right now.” She heaves through tears.

“I’ll make this right, Mabel, okay? I’ll fix everything. You don’t need to worry. Just pretend this never happened. Please.” The pleading in his voice is so desperate it makes her heart break. But she can’t seem to move from her position. She can’t go comfort him right now. She can’t do anything but cry.

By the time she looks up, he’s gone.

—

Mabel wants to scream. Instead, she settles for roughly throwing her phone down against her mattress. She’s called Felix a grand total of six times, and every single time she’s gone straight through to voicemail.

Truthfully, she doesn’t even really know what she’d say to him if he picked up. Beg him to take her back? Definitely not. They’re way beyond that. Probably just plead with him not to think she’s a freak, to keep quiet about what he saw. To yell, to apologize. Maybe she’d just cry. Who knows?

Usually she’d ask Dipper for guidance about these kinds of situations. She’d curl up next to him under his covers and have a good cry. Then, once she was all cried out, she’d watch as he sat down at his desk and sketched out a thirty-something part plan to fix everything.

This time, though, there’s no long-winded plan to guide her. In fact, Mabel hasn’t even seen Dipper since that super awful moment in the empty classroom. When she had finally gotten home, she gave his bedroom door a soft knock that was met with no answer. She knew he was in there; she could hear him softly crying. The sound felt close, as if he was right on the other side of the door. She slumped down against his doorframe, her chest heaving as she silently cried into her knees.

Now, she’s lying down on her bed, still heaving the same tears but desperately trying to think of absolutely anything else.

How on Earth are they going to fix this?

The next day is almost as tough, though at least the tears have died down. Dipper had left extremely early in the morning, leaving her to sullenly pick at her breakfast for fifteen minutes until her mom told her to just leave it.

Dipper left her the car, but she’s never liked driving. She spends the entire lonely walk to school chewing on the inside of cheek as she tries to resist the urge to cry. How can she face everyone at school, when they probably know the whole sucky thing? How can she possibly face Felix? Her mind has long forgotten the fact that today is Election Day. Now, she’s just trying to survive. To Mabel’s surprise, no one mentions the incident to her all day. In fact, everyone treats her as normally as ever. It’s as if Felix kept the secret to himself. Mabel is completely baffled.

When the results are announced in last period, it’s no surprise to Mabel that she lost to Felix. Frankly, he deserves it a lot more than her. She’s a freak, a stupid, brother-kissing freak. All she cares about now is fixing things. Luckily, she manages to catch a glimpse of Felix right as he’s exiting the school. She speeds up instantly, racing through the halls to catch up with him.

“Felix!” Mabel cries, making everyone in the halls turn to look at her. Oops. “I need to talk to you.”

Felix gives her a blank look. Silently, he follows her around the corner and into an empty classroom. Without a word he sits down on top of one of the desks and crosses his arms. Okay, Mabel girl. This is what counts.

“Felix, I don’t really know how much you saw yesterday, or anything, honestly I’m not even sure what it was that you saw, but…” She trails off. Blargh, she’s no good at this. God, she wants Dipper here. He’d be able to reason with Felix. Even more, he’d be able to put his arms around her and pull her close. He’d be able to make her feel okay again.

“It’s okay, Mabel. I’m not going to tell anyone about what I saw, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Say whaaaa?

“You’re not?” She asks tentatively.

“I’m not that much of a dick.” Felix says, his eyes very pointedly avoiding her. “Besides, your, uh, your brother came to talk to me last night. He showed up at my door and begged me not to tell anyone. I’m not saying I’m not weirded out by what I saw, but, well, he assured me it wasn’t what it looked like. Even if it was, that’s your business to deal with.”

Mabel can’t help it. She runs at Felix, enveloping him in a bear hug. Thank God. He really was a good guy all along, huh? Dipper must realize that now too. Felix gives her back a couple of awkward pats before clearing his throat. Oh, right. Despite everything he’s said, he’s probably not exactly thrilled about being around her.

“That being said, I don’t really think we should be spending anymore time together.” Felix continues, drumming his fingers along the side of the desk. “You clearly have some stuff to work out and I don’t really think you need the added confusion.”

“You’re right, you’re so totally right.” Mabel says, breaking away from their hug. Still, she can’t help but conceal the smile on her face. She’s so freaking relieved, it doesn’t bother her that Felix is ending their barely-a-relationship. There are plenty of blonde-haired dreamboats out there, after all.

“Right, so, uh… I’m gonna go.” Felix says, using his arms to push himself back off the desk. He gives her a slightly awkward smile before quickly ushering himself out of the room. Mabel wants to cry again, but for an entirely different reason. This time it’s out of relief, and most of all, gratefulness.

Thank God for Dipper Pines.

Mabel skips her way back home, a drastic change from the somber way she had trudged to school this morning. Now, she feels light as a feather. She and her brother are going to be okay. She just knows it.

In fact, it surprises her just how happy she feels. Even if Felix isn’t going to let their little secret slip, she should still be upset by the fact that her brother freaking kissed her. That’s wrong, right? Any normal person would think so.

But for some reason, Mabel doesn’t. It caught her off guard, alright. But after she had gotten over the initial shock that it was indeed her brother kissing her, she had been able to focus on the actual kiss. And okay, fine! It wasn’t horrible! In fact, it was kind of nice. She had never, ever, been kissed like that before. No one had ever made her feel so cared for, so safe. No one had ever made her shudder like that either.

What’s even more is that no kiss had ever felt so right to her. Having Dipper there, gently cupping her cheek and leading her through a minefield of emotions in one kiss felt strangely perfect to her. As if it was meant to be that way all along.

That’s not as big of a surprise, though. Everything with Dipper always felt so natural to her. He always made her feel like she could be herself with him, even (especially) at her weirdest. She knew that Dipper felt the same way too. Heck, she was the only person he was ever truly comfortable around. It made her feel good, knowing that she was the one person he trusted in that way.

Why Dipper has such a problem with being himself, she’ll never understand. Frankly, he’s the best person she’s ever known. From his weird-mystery solving antics to his torn-up collection of mystery books to the super cute way he looks at her when he’s just woken up—

Oh, fiddlesticks.

It hits her like a dang truck.

She loves him.

She really, truly is head over heels for her brother. Her best friend for life.

Mabel can’t believe it took her this long to see it. She’s always known on some level that they were different than your average siblings. She’s heard countless people tell her how nice it is that they’re so close, but even then, she knew it was something more. And in a way, the platonic love is still there. They tease each other relentlessly, and get into stupid arguments, and god knows how competitive they both get over Saturday morning video game marathons. But there’s always been that longing, that insatiable urging inside of her that they’ve got to be more than just “close”.

Dipper just seemed to realize it first, is all. That’s no surprise, though. He’s the one who loves mysteries. He thrives off of them, it seems. While Mabel is always content with stopping to smell the roses, Dipper constantly needs to know exactly what’s going on. She wonders how long he’s known for.

Her feet stop at the front door of her house. Oh. She’s home. Well, it’s now or never. Mabel slowly makes her way up to her brother’s door. She’s made the trip up these stairs thousands of times, and yet now it feels completely new. In a way, she’s a completely new Mabel.

Before she knows it, though, her knuckles are rapping against his door.

“Mabel?” A shaky voice calls out through the door.

“That’s my name.” Mabel replies softly. There’s no answer, so she gingerly reaches over to the doorknob and opens the way in. The sight she’s met with makes her heart break. Dipper is sitting on his bed, eyes puffy and red. His knees are tucked into his chest and he is quite deliberately avoiding eye contact with her.

“Dipper?” She whispers. Without looking up at her, his hand reaches up and gives her a gentle wave. Welp. This might be harder than she thought. Truthfully, Mabel had sort of pictured that she’d just run up here and fall into his arms and they’d figure everything out later. Turns out, this might require a tiny bit more tact.

After a long silence, Dipper finally looks up at her. “I know what you’re going to say, okay.”

Mabel almost giggles, but realizes he probably wouldn’t take that too well. “I really don’t think you do.”

Dipper looks confused for a second, but then shakes his head sternly. “I do, so just-just listen, okay? I know I’ve made things weird for you, and god, I know I totally fucked up. I should’ve never, y’know, kissed you, especially where anyone could’ve easily walked in. Sometimes I just don’t think, like, at all. I should’ve been thinking that day because I’m the one who’s supposed to protect us. But for whatever reason, I wasn’t. Still, you don’t have to worry. I fixed it all. I talked to Felix and he promised not to tell anyone. Honestly, Mabel, he really does seem like a good guy. I was prepared to threaten him or to pay him off but he just promised not to tell right away. I’m sorry I was such an ass about him.”

“Dipper-”

“Hold on, I’m not done.” He says, clearly working himself up over this. Mabel crosses over to put her hands on his shoulders but he quickly scoots away. “Sorry, just… Well, I think you know why. Anyway, I’m really sorry about the whole kiss situation and I’ve already started working on it. I’m gonna work out all these fucked up feelings for you, I’ll even see a therapist if I have to. I promise, Mabel, whatever it takes. I’ll fix everything I’ll stop— whatever this is.”

With that, Dipper gets up and runs a hand through his hair, beginning to walk towards his bedroom door.

“Wait.” Mabel’s voice calls out. Is that her voice? She can barely recall. “You don’t, uh… I don’t want you to stop.”

Dipper stops in his tracks, turning around slowly to look at her. His eyes are staring at her more intensely than they ever have before, searching every line and shape of her face for some sort of sign. She watches him, turning words over in his head as he tries to figure out what to say back. She knows him best, after all. She knows exactly what’s going on in his head.

So she takes a deep breath in, closing her eyes as she sits waiting on Dipper’s bed. She can’t be the one to walk over, to close the gap, to put her lips on his. But she can sure make it easier on him.

Sure enough, the next thing she feels are Dipper’s chapped lips softly placing themselves in line with hers. He kisses her ever-so-softly, the warmth of his cheeks emanating off of him. Hesitancy lingers in his motions, but he doesn’t find that reason enough to stop. Slowly but surely, just as he had done after her speech, Mabel finds herself being kissed by her very own brother.

And she’s kissing him back.

The rational parts of her whispers to stop, that this is wrong. And yet something deep inside her never wants this to end. For whatever reason, that part deep down is the part that wins, and her hands float up to press softly against his chest. Dipper immediately reaches his hands up to her shoulders, and then her hair, and then the nape of her neck. His hands continue to run up and down her, as if they were dead set on touching every inch of her skin.

Their kiss quickly transitions into something more than the gentle, soft kiss that had originated this whole dang thing. No, this kiss was deep and passionate and god, throws Mabel for such a loop that she can barely even think straight. She clings onto Dipper, the only thing she’s sure of right now.

Oh, and look, now his tongue is —yup, Dipper’s tongue is definitely entering the equation. Wowzers. He is kissing her like his life depends on it, like if he doesn’t get it all done now there might never be another shot. Will there be? Could there be? Her thoughts are having quite the temper tantrum in her brain right now at this whole situation.

Dipper holds her closer than he ever has before, gently lying her down onto his bed. Their warm bodies line up almost perfectly (he’s got a good two inches on her) as he continues to kiss the freaking heck out of her. Her racing thoughts are quickly banished by Dipper’s lips placing soft open-mouth kisses along her jaw, and then along her neck. Jeepers, this feels like nothing she’s ever felt before and oh my gosh did she just moan?

Dipper evidently heard it too, looking up at her with that damn sheepish grin. Her insides start going wild, butterflies flapping in every direction. She knows she’s an oddball sometimes but that is most definitely not how you’re supposed to feel when you’re looking at your brother. Then again, you’re definitely not supposed to be in love with your brother either, but here they are.

Mabel registers that Dipper’s lips are hovering just over the space in between her breasts. That sheepish grin is asking her a deliberate question. Without thinking, she reaches down to the hem of her shirt and it quickly loses itself in the mound of dirty clothes lying on Dipper’s floor. It’s then she remembers that, oh right, she’s not actually wearing a bra. Oh well. Dipper looks her over like she’s nothing he’s ever seen before, like she’s a real life goddess lying there for him. It makes her tummy do another triple backflip because she’s had boys look every which way at her but never like that.

Finally, Dipper seems to remember where he is and presses a kiss in between her breasts. His hand floats up to softly cup her right breast, running a gentle thumb over her nipple. It instantly makes her shudder, but oh boy is it a good kind of shudder. His other hand quickly drifts up too, and his awe-driven fondling of her breasts makes her weaker and weaker. It makes realizes very quickly that she wants all the Dipper she can get.

Her hands tug on the bottom of his shirt, silently pleading with him to throw it away too. Luckily, he gets the message and before she knows it he’s practically ripped his shirt away. And yes, she’s seen him shirtless at the community pool and whatever but he’s never looked quite like this. Quite this…aw god, she’s gonna say it. Quite this hot.

Their bare chests press against one another as Dipper pulls her into another deeply passionate kiss. And she feels something hard push up against her leg. Is that…? To test out her theory, she holds him as close as she can and delicately rocks her hips up into his.

Yup, Dipper has definitely got a case of the sister-boners. But truthfully, she isn’t all that upset about it. Actually….

Maybe it’s out of curiosity, or maybe it’s out of pure lust, or maybe it just feels right in the moment. She doesn’t know. What she does know is she can feel her hand making its way down to Dipper’s bulge and gently grazes her fingers over it. Now it’s Dipper’s turn to let out a moan, and he buries his face in the crook of her neck. She decides she likes this very much, and continues to rub him through his pants. Now he’s the one clinging to her, cursing under his breath and shaking ever-so-slightly. It makes her feel good how easily she can work him up like this, and she’d be lying if she said she didn’t want more.

So she allows herself to unbutton those pesky jeans for him, and feels Dipper quickly kicking them off the rest of the way. That’s more like it.

Dipper reaches around to cup Mabel’s butt, using that to pull himself back onto her. It riles her up beyond belief and without thinking she rocks herself ever-so-slightly into him again. And it feels insanely good, so she does it once more. Dipper lets out another curse under his breath before slowly rolling his hips back into hers.

And oh boy, does he hit the nail right on its friggin’ head.

Mabel squeaks, clinging to him as he continues to grind against her in a place that makes her legs turn to putty. She eagerly presses herself into him, but that’s all the work she can really do at this point. She’s overwhelmed in the best possible way and all she can think of is how she’s going to get her own pesky pants off.

Not wanting this to end, she reaches down and wiggles out of her sweatpants as fast as she possibly can. And while she’s there, she might as well get rid of the other pesky clothing down there, right? Soon, she’s lying completely naked on Dipper’s bed. She’s not quite sure how she got there, but she wants to be there; she needs to be there. She needs him.

That awe-filled, holy shit holy shit type of look returns to Dipper’s face as he takes in her naked body. She sees him lick his lips ever so slightly and dang she’s really freaking wet. His fingers trace their way down her ribcage all the way to her lower stomach, and then they halt delicately.

“Can I…?” He asks, drumming his fingers against her lower stomach. She nods frantically, eternally thankful that he just seems to know exactly what she needs.

His fingers maneuver their way through her slick folds, placing just the right amount of pressure against her. She’s always been rather sensitive down there, so it’s lucky that her bro has decided to be gentle. Her insides continue to flip-flop as he continues to rub her, making her want to squirm and thrash about because holy shit how is he so good at this? Dipper’s always been a man of his research, and clearly he’s researched a lot more than Gravity Falls anomalies.

She can’t stop herself anymore and starts to moan, trying as hard as she can to keep quiet so as to not wake up her parents. Still, it’s hard to think about your pesky ol’ parents two doors down when your brother has three fingers pressed up against your lady bits and is making you pant and squeak in ways you never thought you could.

Suddenly, he withdraws and reaches down to his underwear, quickly tugging himself out of it. Instantly her eyes go to his, ahem, junk. Mabel’s never actually seen a real-live penis up close before, so she takes her sweet time studying it. The head, the way it curves ever-so-slightly to the right, the curly wisps of black hair peeking out from underneath. He smiles shyly at her, his face growing even redder than before.

“So, are we… Are you okay with doing this?” Dipper asks, looking down at her. His face is creased with worry and hesitation.

“Heck yeah I am, Dippingsauce.” Mabel giggles, reaching up to graze her fingers along his inner thighs. He shivers ever-so-slightly at her touch. Yup, she could definitely get used to that.

He gulps, quickly sitting himself back down onto the bed. What’s going on? Is he having second thoughts? Oh boy, did she push it too far? She kind of does that sometimes… These thoughts circle around in Mabel’s brain, making her more and more nervous. That is, until she bothers to look at what Dipper’s actually doing.

Dipper Pines is currently hunched over, frantically trying to rip open a condom wrapper.

That’s when it really sets in for Mabel. They’re really going to do this, aren’t they? Less than an hour ago Mabel had been completely (well, not completely) unaware of her feelings for her brother and now here they are, about to go just about as far as two people can go together. She should be scared, right? At least a little worried?

But, well, she isn’t. Sure, the butterflies are still flapping around down there as strong as ever. But scared? Never. Not with Dipper by her side. He would never do anything, ever, to hurt her. In fact, she’s glad that she’s doing it with him and not some random clown from school. Dipper’s a guy she knows, a guy that she trusts. No matter what happens from here on out, she knows he’ll have her best interest at heart. The thought makes her smile.

Dipper finally looks back up at her, seeming to have come out victorious in his battle against the condom wrapper. He quickly rolls the condom on, looking almost upset to have paused their, uh, previous activities. Still, he is soon back and ready for action. He climbs on top of Mabel, looking at her so fondly that it makes her stomach do another round of backflips.

He’s nervous. She can read it in his face. To calm his nerves, she leans up ever so slightly and kisses him. Their lips connecting seem to spring him back to life as his hands instantly begin exploring her body once again. This time, they don’t hesitate in the slightest. Her whole body is free reign to him now. Suddenly, she feels him prop himself up on his hands, his body looming over her. Mabel looks up into his deep brown eyes, giving him a silent, yearning nod.

Dipper lines himself up at her entrance. And ever so slowly, he coaxes his way inside her. She’s way too wet for it to be painful, but it’s definitely a new sensation. She feels every inch of him pressing against her walls and oh god she feels so full. She watches his face contort and twitch ever-so-slightly as he rests himself inside her.

Once she’s gotten used to the sensation, Mabel gently rocks herself against him. Clearly, he’s not expecting that, as she hears a sharp moan emit from his mouth followed by a mumbled curse. She surprises herself too, letting out a quiet whine. Dipper picks up on it though, and gently begins swaying his hips. Holy jeepers, this is all so new and unreal and yet it feels so freaking good and right doing this with him. She can tell that Dipper feels it too, from the way that he’s cursing under his breath and letting out tiny moans into the crook of her neck.

And oh god, she can feel every single inch of him, twitching ever so slightly every once in a while as he keeps his steady rhythm. She looks up at him fondly, shooting him a shy smile that he returns with one of his own. Suddenly Dipper’s forehead is pressed up against hers and he’s locking lips with her once again, covering her frame with his own.

His hands start to wander along Mabel’s body, delicately grazing along her smooth stomach. But frankly, she’s growing a little impatient. Unable to wait any longer, Mabel grabs his right hand and places it atop her breast. Dipper certainly takes the bait, beginning fondling her in a way that’s certainly a little more, uh, rough. And hoo boy, does that work for her. His fingers catch along her nipples, giving them a tiny squeeze that sends shivers down her spine. She needs more.

“Faster, Dipper. Please.” Mabel whispers, trying not to sound too needy. Dipper looks like his eyes are going to bulge out of his head, causing Mabel to stifle a giggle. He certainly listens, though, and soon Mabel has a hand clamped over her mouth, trying desperately to suppress her moans.

Dipper begins planting kisses along her jaw, tickling her cheek slightly with his hint of peach fuzz. His path continues down her neck, placing wet, open mouth kisses all the way down to her collarbone. This, combined with Dipper’s never-faltering rhythm, make Mabel’s toes curl under and her hips buck up into him. It’s all so deliciously overwhelming and…

An idea strikes. She gently takes Dipper’s hand, placing it inches above her labia. He looks at her confused for just a second and then instantly gets to work. She keeps her hand atop his for a couple moments, guiding his fingers in circles around her clit that make her almost afraid she’ll scream. Once he’s making her good and squirmy, she lies back, eyes clamped shut and clinging to Dipper’s back for dear life.

Mabel feels lucky her brother is such a quick learner. He soon begins rocking three fingers across her, placing pressure all around her clit (but never directly on, she’s still sensitive!) and follows each tiny moan, each whine and gasp so he knows exactly what gets her going. Soon she’s panting even harder than before, coming completely undone for him. She reaches up to her breasts, squeezing and tweaking them in a way that Dipper can’t seem to take his eyes off of.

She can feel Dipper’s rhythm faltering ever so slightly, hinting to her that he’s probably closer than he cares to admit. Luckily, her back is arching and her hips keep involuntarily bucking up against his, so she knows she’s rather close too. One hand remains tightly wound around Dipper’s back, while the other slams into the mattress to grab a fistful of Dipper’s dark blue sheets.

“Dip, I-I…” She starts, barely able to string together a sentence at this point. He nods, instantly knowing what she means.

Mabel feels her orgasm wash over her, reaching from her curled toes to her flushed cheeks as she moans into Dipper’s shoulder as quietly as she can. No boy has ever made her feel this way, made her feel so unbelievably squirmy and heated as she feels right now. And he never lets up, keeps rubbing her as she begins to tense up and her thighs squeeze even tighter around him. She hopes she’s not hurting him but at this point she’s finding it hard not to give into her every impulse. Her breathing, while still ragged, begins to slow as she comes down from her high.

She looks up at Dipper’s face, watching her in awe as he clamps a hand over his own mouth. He’s not far behind her, slamming himself into her in quick, deep strokes. He buries his face into the crook of her neck once again, his cheeks warming her. She can feel little whinnies and moans being echoed into her skin as he finishes, his strokes beginning to progressively slow until he stops completely. For a moment he just lies atop her, desperately trying to catch his breath.

Eventually, he looks up at her.

Now Mabel has gotten plenty of smiles from her brother. “Happy Birthday I love you” smiles, “Oops I accidentally ate your last cookie” smiles, even sarcastic “oh aren’t you funny” smiles. Such is the nature of their relationship, after all. They are a smiley duo. But the smile she gets right then from him is unlike any she’s ever gotten before. It’s swimming with desire and with contentment, but most of all with adoration. It’s a smile she hopes she’ll get to see plenty more of.

—

Soon, Mabel is lying under Dipper’s comforter in his baggy old Mathletes t-shirt, his arms wrapped snugly around her. She can feel his rhythmic breathing on her shoulder, and her heart flutters happily.

Oh, boy, is there gonna be a big long talk between them tomorrow. Probably some tears shed, at least on her part. She’s no stranger to getting emotional, but Dipper has been known to grow a little teary-eyed when the time is right.

If this is going to be a regular thing, there’ll be even more to work out. They won’t be able to walk down the halls holding hands like a regular couple, and they’ll have to figure out a way to maneuver around her parents. Heck, they’ve already started that trend; Dipper has an alarm set for early in the morning so she can safely retreat back to her own room.

But no matter what happens, they’ll always have each other. That much, at least, she knows to be true.

#pinecest #pinescest #dipper x mabel #mabel x dipper #ppfics

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danfanciesphil · 7 years ago

Text

Give Me A Try (New Chapter)

Gay Instagram Model/Bartender Phan AU Part 7

(Part One)

(Part Two)

(Part Three)

(Part Four)

(Part Five)

(Part Six)

(Read on Ao3)

“Thanks again for doing this, Dan. It’s really nice of you,” Phil is saying, though Dan is barely listening. He’s typing the various codes and instructions Phil had reeled off a moment ago into the notes of his phone, but mostly he’s trying to keep himself from looking Phil in the eye.

“It’s really not a problem,” Dan says, shrugging. He pockets his phone, wrapping his arms around his middle. “Your flat is, like, ten times nicer than mine. Not to mention super close to the bar.”

Phil smiles, though he still looks abashed. Perhaps Dan should invite him round to his shitty Kemptown flat one day, then Phil might feel less guilty for asking Dan to house-sit.

“I’m gone until Wednesday,” Phil informs him, grabbing a jacket from the row of hooks nearby. “I’ll be back around midday, probably jetlagged and grumpy as hell, so you might wanna steer clear of me.”

Phil laughs, and Dan infers that this is Phil’s polite way of asking him to be gone by Wednesday lunch time. “Got it. I should have everyone out of here by then.”

Phil pauses, one arm in one sleeve, an adorable frown caught on his befuddled face. “Who out of where?”

“Oh, all the hundreds of people I’ll be inviting round for a week-long orgy.”

Dan’s straight face seems to catch Phil off guard for a split second, and then he laughs, giving himself away. Phil dissolves into laughter with him, tongue caught between his teeth.

“Just put a cover over the couch, yeah? It’s velvet. Stains easily.”

“Ooft, no promises.” Dan jokes back. His heart pangs as the easy banter slips off his tongue.

Doing this jokey back and forth with Phil used to be fun. It used to excite him, how effortlessly they could buffet off one another’s humour; now, in the wake of Tyler’s words the other day, it’s just painful. This ‘friendship’ with Phil had once seemed like a miracle. Now all Dan can see is a pretence. He hasn’t told Tyler about the fact that Phil has asked him to stay in his flat, because it just seems further proof that Phil is only using him.

But Dan’s weak, and he couldn’t refuse Phil anything if he tried.

“...and I’ll call and check in now and then just to make sure you’re okay,” Phil is saying, Dan realises with a start. He nods, trying to show he’s been listening, and Phil beams at him, jacket zipped up. “So, see you in a week then, I guess!”

Dan’s about to go in for a safe handshake, but then Phil is wrapping an arm around him, his other hand on the handle of his suitcase. He squeezes Dan tight, and Dan lets out a sound that he hopes is muffled by the broad, warm chest he’s smushed against.

He’s released after a moment, and he’s pretty sure he’s bright red. He nods, taking a swift step backwards. “Y-yep, see you. Have fun in the Maldives.”

Phil rolls his eyes, making an ‘ugh’ sound. “Not likely.”

It seems a bizarre reaction, but Dan is used to Phil speaking about his work with distaste at this point. Dan tries to stave off judgement, but it’s difficult to view these eye rolls and grimaces as anything other than ungrateful. Phil is going to spend a week pouting for a camera on a beach in the blazing sunshine. Dan is going to spend this week sweating behind a bar, then crawling home to someone else’s sofa to eat his weight in crisps and fall asleep.

“Well, uh, send me some pics,” Dan says, not sure what else to say. For whatever reason, the idea of this seems to perk Phil up.

“I will!” He gives Dan a small wave as he opens the door, and then, right before it closes, he blows a kiss. “By-eee!”

The door clicks shut behind him, and Dan stares at it for a moment, replaying that kiss in his mind. “Bye,” he whispers to nobody.

Friday nights are karaoke, and it usually gets a little messy. The gays love to sing, and with a few drinks in their system, they’re practically unstoppable. More often than not, the hardest part of the evening is dragging them off stage when it’s closing time.

With the help of Matt, Dan manages to boot the last few out of the door, and sighs in relief. Now there’s just a final clear up to do, and he can wander down the road to crash at Phil’s. He grabs a rag and starts wiping down the bar.

“Dodie, could you switch the music off?” Dan calls.

“On it!”

“Lara, would you grab a mop? I think the guy’s bathroom could use a once over.”

“Already did it, Dan!”

Dan lifts a smile to her, impressed. She’s sealing the mop and bucket back in the cleaning cupboard already. “Thanks, you’re a star.”

“What shall I do, boss?”

Dan turns to face Tyler, who is smiling sheepishly at him from the other end of the bar. “You’re as much of a boss as I am, Ty. Figure your own jobs out.”

It comes out a little bit colder than he intends it to, but Tyler is undeterred. “Don’t equate such lowly peasants with yourself, boss!”

Tyler scoots close, then grabs the rag from Dan’s hand. “Hey!” Dan exclaims.

“Let me do that,” Ty says, still beaming. “You’re tired. Go home, I’ll lock up.”

“It’s my turn,” Dan points out.

“Pfft,” Tyler say, swiping the rag through the air. “I don’t mind. Besides, I’ve got Dodie and Lara to help me.”

Dan sighs, wanting to protest. He knows this is Tyler’s way of apologising for what he said about Phil the other night, but it makes Dan uncomfortable. Sure, Tyler had said some things Dan didn’t exactly want to hear, but that doesn’t mean he shouldn’t have said them. His apologies are unnecessary.

“Fine,” Dan says, exasperated. “But I’m locking up tomorrow.”

Tyler holds the rag up, and places his other hand over his heart. “Scout’s honour.”

Dan shoots him a tight smile, then squeezes out from behind the bar. He crosses the dancefloor to the staff room and gathers his things. As he’s coming out, he notices Tyler and Dodie in a deep discussion that ends abruptly when they spot him.

Wanting to groan, Dan shakes his head at them. “Guys, I’m not a fucking idiot okay, I know you’re talking about me.”

“It’s just…” Dodie swallows, her eyes darting to Tyler’s briefly. “We’re worried. Are you okay? You’ve been really quiet since…”

She trails off.

“Since I shoved my foot in everything and tore you to pieces for just having a crush,” Tyler finishes. “I’m sorry about that.”

“Ty, you’ve apologised literally like fifty times,” Dan reminds him, already pulling on his jacket.

“I know but… I just don’t want you to think that anything I said was anything except me lashing out because of my own love troubles,” Tyler says, walking over to him. “I don’t think Phil is intentionally being a dick to you. I just let all the gossip from the bar filter into my brain.”

“We’re just worried,” Dodie says again, biting her thumb.

“Well, that’s all very sweet,” Dan says, sighing. “But you don’t have to worry anymore. You were right in a way, it’s not very healthy for me to be so… close to him. I’m distancing myself for the time being.”

Technically, technically, there’s a lot of distance between he and Phil right now. Over 5,000 miles, in fact. This probably doesn’t count, however. After all, he saw Phil earlier on today, and will probably be texting him from his very own couch later on. Dodie and Tyler don’t need to know this, though.

Dan watches with mild despair as the two of them exchange one of their long, loaded glances; it’s filled with unspoken concern.

“Okay, I’m off,” Dan announces before either of them can verbalise it. He gives a brief wave, then heads for the door. “See you gays tomorrow.”

“Wait, Dan-” Tyler begins to say, but Dan just throws him another dismissive wave.

“Bye!” He calls, then wrenches open the door and steps out into damp morning chill.

Phil has every season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on DVD, along with all of Game of Thrones, every Studio Ghibli movie, and most Marvel films. Once he’s let himself into Phil’s flat, checked the houseplants, removed his jacket and shoes, and made a de-stress cup of tea, Dan kneels before Phil’s collection. He’s down there for a good ten minutes before settling on Captain America as his choice for a wind-down film.

He pops it in the DVD player and loads it up, then settles into Phil’s deliciously comfy couch to watch. As the opening credits roll, he snaps a photo of his hand holding the mug of tea, the film’s title screen in the background. He dithers, unsure whether to post it to his newly popular Instagram. His overtired brain is too mushy to think about it too much, so he slaps a warm filter on it, and posts it with the caption:

cap’s helping me wind down after a long shift

It immediately starts being hit with likes and comments, which is too much for Dan to comprehend right now, so he just locks the phone and shoves it in his pocket. He’ll read the comments tomorrow.

Dan’s just getting to the bit where Chris Evans’ CGI skinny body is being pumped up into his muscly self, when his phone trills. Confused, Dan pauses the film and reaches for it. Phil’s name stares out from the screen. He swipes it immediately, already bolt upright with concern.

“Hello?”

“Hey!”

“Is everything okay?”

“Yeah! Everything’s great,” Phil says. “Just checking in.”

Dan had been expecting a sombre, possibly urgent tone; contrarily, Phil seems to be his usual, chipper self. Dan checks the time on his phone, frowning. It’s 3am, meaning it’s 7am in the Maldives.

Dan rubs his eyes. “It’s so early.”

“Oh, crap, did I wake you up? I just thought ‘cause of your Instagram post that you’d be chilling after work, sorry.”

“No, I mean it’s early for you.”

“Oh,” Phil says, laughing. “Nah, this is when I have to get up for my shoot. The best light for beach photos is sunrise.”

“Oh,” Dan says, surprised. He never thought about that. “God, that must suck. Aren’t you jetlagged?”

“Super jetlagged!” Phil laughs again. “I’m used to doing shoots half asleep, don’t worry.”

“Have some coffee,” Dan suggests.

“I’ll definitely be trying to wrangle some caffeine from somewhere,” Phil agrees. His tone of voice suggests that it doesn’t look promising. “So, how’s your first night in the flat going?”

Dan glances around himself. “It’s, uh, quiet.”

“Hmm, yeah,” Phil says. “It can get pretty lonely there.”

This makes Dan frown. Phil has never mentioned being lonely before. “It’s cool, I’ve got Cap and Bucky to keep me company.”

“Ah, yes! Are you watching Civil War?”

“No, just the first one.”

“Awesome,” Phil says emphatically. “Well, enjoy the not-so-subtle gay undertones. I’d better get to the beach.”

“You poor soul,” Dan says sarcastically, which makes Phil laugh.

“Get to bed soon, okay? I know Chris Evans’ abs look really good on my obnoxiously large TV, but you’re working tomorrow.”

Dan chuckles. “Yes mum.”

“Night, young man.”

“Morning, you mean.”

“Hah, I guess you’re right. I’ll check in tomorrow, sweet dreams!”

“Oh, you don’t have to check in tomorrow if-”

The line goes dead, and Phil is gone. Dan blinks down at his phone, slightly thrown by the conversation. It’s difficult to believe that Phil is so concerned about the wellbeing of his houseplants that he’d call Dan the first morning of his trip. Now that Dan thinks about it, Phil hadn’t even asked about the houseplants.

An overwhelming fatigue throws itself over Dan suddenly, and he yawns, throwing his phone to one side, where it continues to blink with Instagram notifications. He should really switch those off. He blinks at the TV, eyes already growing heavy; he’s sure he won’t make it to the end of the movie.

With a hefty amount of willpower, Dan switches off the TV and heads to Phil’s room to grab the duvet. As he’s pulling the heavy quilt from the mattress however, he pauses, arms aching with the weight of it already. Would it really be so bad to take up Phil’s offer of just falling into the bed?

It will undoubtedly be weird, and he’ll probably hate himself for it tomorrow morning, because he’ll spend the whole of the next day (week, month, and year) dreaming about exactly how Phil’s bed feels and smells. But he’s exhausted, and it looks far more inviting than the couch right now.

Before he can argue himself out of it, Dan is shimmying off his jeans, pulling his t-shirt over his head, and crawling into the tantalisingly soft cocoon of the bed. He actually moans; these sheets feel divine against his skin. They’re probably Egyptian cotton or something. Dan would take longer to think about it, but he closes his eyes, and falls instantly asleep.

Two hours before they are due to close on Saturday, at around 3am, a girl approaches the bar. She is pretty and slim, with a short, tight dress on and long dangly earrings. She’s wearing red lipstick and her hair is bleach blonde. Not wanting to judge prematurely, Dan gives her his usual customer-service smile; in the back of his mind, however, he can’t help but note that this girl is very much not the type of customer that they usually get at Habenero’s.

In other words, she gives off a rather… heterosexual vibe.

“Hi,” the girl says, grinning at him. She leans forwards on the bartop, pushing out her boobs rather obviously. Dan raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t comment. “A Malibu and Coke, please.”

“Sure,” Dan says, turning to make it.

“Actually,” she says, making him turn. “Make it a Diet Coke. I’m such a sugar fiend. Need to watch myself.”

Briefly, Dan looks her up and down. Her body is gorgeous, clearly the result of daily gym trips and a careful diet. A full-fat Coke wouldn’t even touch her skinny frame, and she knows it. He’s not in the mood to pander to her obvious attempt at fishing for compliments.

If she wants her ego stroked, she’s barking up the wrong tree.

“Don’t we all,” Dan says instead, and reaches for the soda hose.

The drink takes seconds to make, and he places it before her. “No straw?” She asks, smirking. “My lipstick is Dior. Can’t waste it on the rim of a glass, can I?”

Dan shrugs at her. “Sorry, we’ve introduced a no-straw policy at the club. Brighton’s a green city.”

For a moment, her smile wavers, but then it’s fixed back in place. “Hey, do I know you from somewhere?”

“I don’t think so.”

The scarlet lips form a perfect ‘o’. Her look of realisation seems ingenuine, like she’s performing a pre-rehearsed scene. “Oh my God! You’re AmazingPhil’s friend, right?” At the sound of his name, Dan freezes up. “David, is it? No, wait, Dan!”

“Uh, I think you’ve got the wrong person,” Dan mutters, though he can feel the heat flood to his cheeks.

“Oh, don’t be coy!” She laughs, and then she’s got her arm on his shoulder; she’s leaning right over the bar to reach him, which looks awkward. “You’re the bartender he keeps posting about, right?”

“Could be,” Dan says vaguely.

“Yes, yes, it’s totally you! Gosh, you’re so much cuter in person.”

“Oh, uh, thanks.” He shifts awkwardly. “So, it’s five-fity for the Malibu and Diet Coke,” Dan tries to say, but she just laughs him off.

“So, oh my gosh,” she leans even closer somehow, a wry, knowing smile stretching her lipsticked mouth into a joker-ish smear. “Tell me. Is Phil just as cute in person too?”

Dan feels his cheeks warming. “Oh, um, I- I don’t know.”

“Aw, come off it. You have to admit he’s cute, right?” Her teeth are dazzlingly white as she grins at him; it’s mildly disconcerting in the low light.

“I guess,” Dan says. He looks around for another customer, trying to find an excuse to leave the conversation.

“And you guys met in Brighton? At this club?”

“...Yep.”

“So, like, you already knew who he was, right?”

“Well, yeah, but-”

“You were a fan of him? You followed his Insta?”

“I, uh, well… yes, but-”

“I bet he was flirty.” She grins again, teeth blinding. “Does he flirt with you?”

“He’s kind of flirty, I suppose,” Dan admits, trying not to picture all the many, many times Phil has knocked the air from his lungs with an off-handed comment.

“Ooh,” she says, eyebrows wriggling. “That sounds intriguing. So go on, tell me, Dan. Is he good?”

“What do you mean?” Dan asks, stupidly.

“Oh, you know,” she says, and winks. “Is he good in bed? With that body, he probably doesn’t have to be, yeah?”

“Wait what? That’s not- we’re not-” Dan stammers out, cheeks scarlet by this point.

“Right, right, you’re just friends,” she says, rolling her eyes. When they meet Dan’s again, she winks a second time. “Come on, Dan, I’m not an idiot. I mean, you’re staying in his house, right?”

Immediately, Dan’s hackles go up, and he pulls back from her. “How do you know that I’m… who are you?”

Suddenly a ruckus nearby captures Dan’s attention, and he turns to see Matt ploughing through the crowd and seizing another girl by the shoulders. This second girl, also blonde and in a skimpy outfit, is holding up a phone, obviously videoing Dan.

Dan gawps at the camera, then Matt plucks it from her hand. “Unsolicited filming of our staff is not permitted. Get out.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, we’re just asking him a few questions!” shouts at Matt. Her charming smile is gone now, and in its place is a ferocious snarl. “It’s perfectly within our rights to do that! He’s in the public eye, isn’t he?”

One hand on the filming girl’s shoulder still, Matt seizes Malibu-and-Diet-Coke-girl by her upper arm. “You’re out too, Princess. Highly doubt this is your sort of establishment anyway.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Malibu-and-Diet-Coke-girl shouts, trying to break free of his grip.

“It means,” Dan cuts in, anger starting to swirl in his blood as he processes the situation. “That we don’t throw a Pride parade every year just so you and your gaggle of plastic friends can paint on rainbows and find a GBF.”

“You heard him,” Matt says, beginning to frogmarch the two girls towards the exit.

“This is discrimination!” One of them shouts on their way.

“Must be so hard for you poor straight white girls,” Matt replies, ever the sarcastic one.

A few people gathered near the bar clap then, cheering as the girls depart.

“Nice one, mate,” Nick, one of their regulars, calls out to Dan. He nods, still embarrassed, and Nick approaches the bar. “She was out of order.”

“Yeah,” Dan says, mind still reeling. “I don’t get it, though. Why was she filming me?”

“Well, ‘cause you’re in with that good-looking model dude, right? She wants exclusive behind the scenes gossip for her own account, I’d imagine. Chicks like that are always after their ten minutes of fame, so they try guzzle it from other people.” Nick says; it kind of makes sense, except for the fact that some random girl thinks Dan is anywhere near important enough in Phil’s life for him to be harbouring any secrets about the man.

Nick takes hold of the Malibu and Diet Coke Dan made for the girl, the one he now realises she never paid for. Before Dan has a moment to be annoyed about it however, Nick pushes a tenner towards him. “For the drink. Nasty stuff, Malibu, but someone’s gotta drink it, eh?”

Dan smiles at him gratefully. “Thanks. I’ll grab you some change for it.”

“No need!” Nick calls out, making Dan pause.

“Nick, it’s only a five-fifty drink.”

“Yeah, well. We’re mates, aren’t we? Keep the tip.”

Dan’s eyes fall to the ten pound note in his hands. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, course!”

“Wow,” Dan says, taken aback. “That’s seriously good of you, thanks. I appreciate it.”

“No worries!” Nick takes a sip of his drink, eyes darting around the room. “So… as I was sayin’. You and that Phil fella. That’s… a thing, right?”

“What?”

“The two of you are… gettin’ it on?”

Dan drops the ten pound note back onto the bar like it’s burning. “Is this a fucking bribe? Are you trying to get me to talk about Phil?”

“Aw, come on Dan, we’re mates, aren’t we?”

“You know what,” Dan grits his teeth, snatching the drink out of Nick’s hands. “I’m not your mate, and you can fucking hit the street with those other vultures.” Dan cups a hand to his mouth, and pushes up onto his tiptoes, scanning the crowd. “Matt! Got another one!”

“Dan, for fuck’s sake, you know me,” Nick says, annoyed. “Come on, you and the Insta dude are the hottest story in town right now! You can’t blame me for trying to get in on the goss!”

“What so you can tweet about some non-existent scandal for a few more followers?” Dan asks, disgusted. “Grow up.”

“Aw, come on, you know what it’s like in the gay world,” Nick fires back. “It’s fucking vicious out there! I’ve gotta stay relevant! I need to keep up-”

Dan just ignores him and turns away. He chucks the drink, glass and all, into the sink below the bar. In the background, he vaguely hears Nick protesting as Matt drags him away, but he can’t bring himself to turn and see it.

This is insane.

Never in his wildest imaginings did Dan think that people would actually seek him out and attempt to pry information from him just because he’s vaguely associated with a moderately famous Instagram account. That one girl had even filmed the entire exchange.

It makes Dan feel sick to his stomach. He leans over the sink, watching the broken shards of glass gleam and glint in the swirling disco lights. He’s trying, over the thump of the bass, to remember what he said to her. Whatever his answers had been to Malibu girl’s interrogating questions, they’re now saved to someone’s phone.

A hand claps down on his shoulder, making Dan jump. Tyler is beside him, looking concerned.

“Matt just told me what happened, are you okay?”

Dan nods, slowly. Then, he shakes his head. “They were filming me, Ty. What did I even say? It all happened so quickly, I-”

Tyler wraps him in a hug; it helps, a little. “Shh, don’t worry about that right now.”

“I’m gonna have to tell him,” Dan says, cold realisation dawning.

“Tell Phil? About the girls, you mean?” Dan nods into Tyler’s shoulder. “Maybe. But it’s okay, you won’t have said anything that bad, I’m sure. There’s nothing to tell, right?” Dan bites his lip. “They’re just some fame-whores trying to get a slice of the action behind the scenes. You can tell Phil about it in the morning. It wasn’t a big deal.”

Dan sighs, wanting him to be right. “Okay. Yeah. I’ll ring him in the morning or something.”

Tyler pulls back to look him in the eye. “Whatever you said, it won’t be anywhere near as bad as you think, I’m sure. And hey, Phil’s a nice guy. He’ll understand.”

Dan nods, trying to calm himself with the sure, solid gleam in Tyler’s eyes. “Okay.”

On Sunday afternoon, Dan wakes up in Phil’s bed to a flurry of notifications on his phone. His followers haven’t stopped climbing since that first night Phil put him in his story; now, Dan’s follower count is in the hundred-thousands.

He checks his last photo, which is the one with Captain America and tea from Friday night. It has forty thousand likes. He reads the comments, covers balled up in one fist from nerves.

that’s phil’s place!! i recognise the rug!!! #phanisreal

dan is staying at phil’s!

isn’t he in the maldives atm? dan must be housesitting :o

i’d know that hello kitty mug anywhere!! hows phil’s place treating u dan? ;) #phan

He closes the app quickly, half wanting to delete the entire thing off his phone. These fans are bloodhounds, obsessed with a scent of some rumour they caught a whiff of. ‘Phan’ is such an alien concept to Dan, still. How can these followers even justify it to themselves? It’s preposterous to think that Dan and AmazingPhil are anywhere near on the same level, let alone in a secret romantic relationship.

“Oh, shit,” Dan mutters, his heart sinking. He clicks onto his missed calls, noting that he has five, all from Phil.

He swallows, trying to remain cool. There are some texts too, all of which came through whilst he was sleeping.

From: Phil To: Dan hey can you call me when you get a sec pls xx

From: Phil To: Dan did something happen last night at the bar? im getting a lot of messages… xx

From: Phil To: Dan ok… wanna let me know why #phan is trending worldwide?

From: Phil To: Dan have u seen what that girl @lucyintheskaii posted on twitter?? there’s a video of you. did you tell ppl that ur staying at mine? how did she find u?

From: Phil To: Dan dan i need to talk to u ur probs asleep and i get tht but im gonna skype u at 2pm your time. x

By the time he gets to the final message, Dan’s heart is pounding against his chest. He hangs onto that one final kiss, despite the fact Phil usually ends his messages with two. He glances at the time at the top of the screen, and curses, loudly.

It’s 13:59pm.

Before he can do anything to prepare, his phone is buzzing in his hand, notifying him of a Skype call coming through. He thinks seriously about declining, as he’s on the verge of a panic attack, but he reluctantly comes to a decision that not facing up to this would be far, far worse.

He accepts the call, and watches in mild horror as his own sleep-crumpled face and bare chest fills the screen. Then, Phil’s camera bursts into life, and Dan’s own image is replaced by something far more pleasing to the eye. He braces himself for Phil’s anger, having no idea what that would even look like.

“Phil, oh my God, I’m so sorry,” Dan blurts. “I should’ve called you last night when I got back from work and told you what happened, but Tyler convinced me I should wait until morning, and I was just so exhausted, and I convinced myself the thing with that girl wasn’t that big of a deal, but obviously you have every right to be mad, I was so stupid and-”

“Dan, hey, hold up,” Phil says, voice raised to be heard over Dan’s ramble. “Calm down, I’m not mad. Why would I be? I’m worried about you.”

Dan blinks. “Why?”

For some reason, this makes Phil laugh. “Because you were ambushed by some deranged fangirls! And it’s all my fault. I’m so sorry, Dan. I should never have said where you worked on my account. My fans are… intense.”

“Wait,” Dan says, confused. He sits up a little, trying to understand. “You’re not the one who needs to apologise. I said all that stuff to that girl! Her friend filmed it all. And she… did you say she put the video of it on Twitter? That’s awful, Phil, I’m such a fucking idiot, I-”

“Yeah,” Phil interrupts with a long sigh. “The Twitter video isn’t… ideal. But I’ve had literal nudes leaked before, Dan. I can handle you telling people I get a bit flirty IRL.”

Phil winks, and Dan blushes, partly because he’s only just now remembered telling that girl Phil is a flirt, and partly because he remembers the leaked nudes Phil is referring to. Not one of Dan’s proudest moments, searching the internet for those on incognito mode. He’d only found them once. And once was definitely enough; he’s not about to forget something like that.

“I guess,” Dan says, trying hard to focus on the situation at hand. “But I’m just so sorry for not realising what was happening, Phil. I should’ve known that girl was after something. I must’ve caused you so much stress.”

Phil shrugs. “Nothing I can’t handle.”

He’s too nice, that’s the trouble. Dan stares at the pixelated version of this beautiful man, wishing he could reach out for Phil’s hand. Phil would probably take it; he’s not opposed to touchy-feely stuff, and if he knew how badly Dan needed physical reassurance right now, he’d do it, Dan’s sure. Phil’s sitting at a table outside, on what appears to be a balcony overlooking a white sandy beach. There’s a light breeze ruffling his hair, and the sun is setting behind him. He has his chin in one hand, and a tiredness in his eyes.

Dan imagines he can smell the salt spray blowing through Phil’s locks. Stupid, soppy words are on the tip of Dan’s tongue, about how gorgeous Phil looks in the soft evening light, or how much it means to Dan that Phil’s deigning to so much as speak to him after he was so stupid with that girl, but right then, a door slams, hard. It comes from somewhere on Phil’s end, and it’s muffled, but it still makes Dan jump.

Phil looks towards the noise, sighing.

“What was that?”

“Charlie. He’s pretty annoyed about… this.”

Something heavy and blunt falls into Dan’s stomach. “Oh. I didn’t know Charlie was with you.”

Phil glances back at the screen. “Didn’t I say?”

Dan shakes his head. He would have remembered that small detail, he’s sure. Though he guesses it makes a little more sense now that Phil picked him to house-sit, as opposed to asking Charlie.

“So, Charlie’s annoyed with me, then,” Dan deduces.

Phil shrugs. “I think Charlie’s annoyed with everyone most of the time. I wouldn’t take it personally.”

“What’s he been saying?”

“It doesn’t matter.” Phil’s eyes avert from Dan’s.

From this small gesture alone, Dan can imagine exactly what Charlie’s saying.

Why are you even associating with that rando from the bar?

This is what happens when you stoop to their level, Phil!

He’s got the hots for you, and he’s gonna make up some bollocks about how you’re secretly fucking to bump up his follower count even more!

“Sorry I got you guys into a fight.”

Phil chuckles, but it sounds dark, hollow. “When are we not in a fight?”

So many words fight to push their way out of Dan’s throat. They want to scream that Phil is so much more than this, that he should realise his own worth and ditch Charlie for someone that deserves him. He swallows them down as best he can, creating a lump, the size of a boulder, in his throat.

Phil turns back to look at him, a sad smile on his face. Then, one eyebrow twitches, and he smirks. “Are you in my bed?”

Heat flames into Dan’s cheeks, and he attempts to pull the covers over his chest. “Fuck, sorry… I’ll wash the sheets and stuff-”

Phil is laughing, which cuts Dan off. “Dan, it’s okay. I said you could have the bed, didn’t I?”

“Well… yes, but-”

Phil yawns then, smiling sleepily at him. “You look cute under my covers. Wish I was there, to be honest.”

Dan’s heart spasms. He wonders if Charlie can hear what Phil’s saying, and whether Phil is only saying it to get a rise out of his boyfriend.

“It’s, um, very comfy. High thread count.”

Phil laughs again. “The thread count is top of my priorities.”

“So, is the shoot going okay and stuff?” Dan asks, wanting to move the subject into safer territory, so his heart rate can settle back into a human rhythm.

Phil shrugs. “It’s kind of difficult posing sexily on a beach with someone who currently hates my guts, but other than that it’s fine.”

Dan winces. “Is it that bad?”

“He’ll get over it.”

“Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

“Teleport me into the bed with you so we can watch Buffy and fall asleep?”

Another heart spasm. Another flush whipping into his cheeks. “Hah, I’ll…. see what I can do.”

There’s another door slam then, and Phil glances up, smile disappearing. “I’d better go.” He sounds reluctant. “I’ll call tomorrow, see how you’re holding up.”

“Okay,” Dan says. He shifts, still feeling guilty. “Seriously Phil, I don’t know how much of that video you saw, but… I’m sorry. I didn’t think. It won’t happen again.”

“I know, Dan. It’s my fault, I threw you in the deep end with all this stuff.” Phil smiles at him. “I forget sometimes that being friends with me isn’t as simple as it used to be. I come with a twin. His name’s AmazingPhil, and he’s kind of a jerk. Causes all sorts of trouble.”

Dan laughs at the analogy, shrugging one shoulder. “I kinda like him.”

“He likes you too,” Phil says, winking again. “It’s not your fault some girl attacked you over him though, Dan. You’re wonderful, okay? It’s everyone else who sucks.”

The corner of Dan’s mouth twitches. “Um, thanks. You… you too.”

“Enjoy your day off.” Phil waves. “Try not to worry about this. It’ll all blow over in two seconds anyway.”

“Okay,” Dan says, unsurely. “Enjoy the rest of your trip.”

The expression that flits across Phil’s face suggests that this is unlikely. “Thanks, Dan,” he says anyway, then blows a kiss, and is gone.

At around eight in the evening on Sunday, Charlie posts a photo to his Instagram account. Dan follows Charlie out of curiosity more than politeness, but he sees it in his feed, right at the top. It’s a photo of him and Phil, knee deep in the ocean, holding hands as they stare out towards the horizon.

Their silhouettes are perfect and symmetrical, their broad shoulders and tapered waists looking as if they’d been painted onto the streaky orange sky behind them. The picturesque image hits Dan like a punch to the stomach, dull and painful, winding him momentarily.

The caption reads:

happy anniversary baby <3

It’s been bombed with likes.

omg i didnt know you guys had an anniversary today!!!

congratulations charlie and phil! u r couple goals!! #chil4eva

so happy for you both! give phil a kiss from me cha ;) xx

#netflixandchil later guys?! ;) <3

A hot, stinging sensation burns in Dan’s retinas. He throws his phone to the couch, and doesn’t look at it again for the rest of the night.

Three more fame-hungry girls and nine more gossip-thirsty guys track Dan down over the course of Monday night. Tyler makes a sign for the bar counter that says ‘Want To Quiz The Bartender? Hope You Like The Taste Of Ass...phalt’, which helps a little, but doesn’t entirely ward off the AmazingPhil stans.

Dan just keeps his mouth clamped shut for the night. He’s not really in the mood to talk to anyone anyway. That photo of Charlie and Phil seems to be burned into the back of his mind; it’s there every time he so much as blinks, taunting him. He refuses to take his break halfway through his shift, sure that the photo will dance teasingly in front of his retinas for the whole twenty minutes.

It just makes so little sense. Phil had seemed beaten down by the weight of Charlie’s anger when he and Dan had Skyped last night. How is it that, hours later, they’re knee deep in the warm waves of a tropical beach, holding hands in celebration of their anniversary?

“Hey, you’re him right? Dan Is Not On Fire?” It’s a giggling pair of young guys this time, nudging each other forwards. “Phil is totally into you.”

The other one squeals, clapping a hand over the first one’s mouth. “Oh my God, I can’t believe my friend I’m so sorry.” He releases his hold on the other guy, laughing. “But seriously, we both ship Phan way more than Chil.”

It feels like a bolt in his chest, screwed too tightly, digging in just below Dan’s ribs. “Guys, do you wanna order something?”

“Oh, no, we’re seventeen,” one of them says, and the other one smacks him. “Shit, I shouldn’t’ve said that-”

“Matt!” Dan yells for what feels like the millionth time tonight. “Matt, get over here!”

“Wait, wait, can we just, like, get a selfie?” They’re snapping the photo before Dan can turn away, and he scowls at them both. “Thanks! Follow us on Insta!” They chirp, laughing, and are gone before Matt can push through the crowd.

Tyler throws a plastic cup after them, which Dan is grateful to him for. “We’re gonna need to hire more security at this rate.”

“It’ll blow over when Phil gets sick of me,” Dan says.

“Gets sick of you? He’s in here all the time!”

For now, Dan thinks privately.

He doesn’t reply out loud, he just turns to the next customer, who is, mercifully, just another regular. The realisation that Dan is coming to with the blow of each crushing Phil/Charlie couple photo, is that eventually Phil is going to seek out greener pastures.

Once he’s settled into Brighton, Phil will find his own social class of people to hang out with, people more like Charlie, that understand designer labels and spend their weekends at fancy film premieres or in their second homes in Bali.

Up with the elite is where Phil belongs, even if Dan was able to tether him in the dirt for a while, playing Mario Kart and plying him with sugary alcoholic drinks. Dan is an ‘in-the-meantime’ friend, someone to pass the time with until he finds a better crowd. Someone to house-sit for him, and someone who doesn’t have a lot of free time, and is therefore low-commitment. There will come a time, Dan is sure, when he will once again be just a bartender to Phil. Sure, Phil will wave and chat when he comes into the bar, but they won’t hang out, and the fans that followed Dan out of curiosity will drop away like flies when they realise that Dan is simply… dull.

It will be difficult when it happens. But Dan won’t struggle against the current; he’s not stupid, and he’s been poor since he was a kid. He knows how society is separated into the wealthy and the not-so-much, and how the divide can rip through even the tightest of bonds.

He barely even knows Phil, still. There’s no doubt in Dan’s mind that one day, yet again he won’t know Phil at all besides the pictures that occasionally flash up on his phone.

On Tuesday morning, Dan wakes up earlier than usual. At first, he thinks it might be the seagull screeching right outside his window, but he’s lived in Brighton for years; it takes a lot of squawking to wake him.

He rolls over, still swathed like a baby in the thick covers of Phil’s bed, and immediately freezes, realising what it is that has woken him. There’s a body beside him, faced away. Even if Dan couldn’t recognise him by the shock of black hair, he’d know the bare, pale back, dotted with tiny freckles. He’d know the Emoji pyjama pants, and the shallow, even breaths that come out with a slight snore.

For a long, long time, Dan doesn’t move an inch. He just stares at the silhouette of the man he’s dreamed about laying next to for so, so long. He suspends his belief, and allows his mind to wander, to imagine that this is real, that Phil is his, and that he’ll roll over any second, give Dan a lazy smile, and kiss Dan’s world into colour.

None of this happens, obviously. So Dan just watches him, counting the minutes he gets to have this, and prays that it never ends.

(Part 8 !)

#phanfic #phan #bartender au #phanfiction

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prill-ocs · 6 years ago

Text

i fucking did it here ya go my self indulgent basically 4k word First Time TM Meeku smut fic that had way more exposition than I intended

“What can I do to get it through his head…” Raku paced back and forth through the living room, with Reika and Cashew on the couch. They watched on as Raku seemed to be having some sort of crisis.

“Wellllllll…Why don’t you just - I dunno - be direct about it?” Cashew suggested.

“I sucked him off the other day! How much more direct can I get?!” Raku threw his hands up in the air.

“Oh my god.” Reika covered her ears and looked away. Her and Raku were close, but she did not need to know about his sexual endeavors with the town cryptid he’d been trying to woo for the past year or so.

“Look, you guys don’t seem to get it. I love the guy, but like…Meemo is kinda dense as fuck. I don’t think us doing intimate stuff or me hanging out with him more often is really…making it clear to him that I want us to be more than just fuckbuddies, y'know?” Raku paused. “Not that we’ve actually gone all the way…Do you still call that being fuckbuddies? Or is it blow buddies? Is that a thing?”

“Raku. Please.” Reika looked at him with pleading eyes.

“Right, sorry.” Raku cleared his throat. He stopped his pacing and plopped down on the couch between the other two. He let out a deep sigh as he sunk further into the cushion.

“Honestly, I think you’re just over complicating this! You say he’s dense, right? Then just straight up do a confession. Tell him you love him! He’d get it then, wouldn’t he?” Cashew made a kissy face, batting her eyelashes teasingly at Raku.

“Wha- No way! I think he’d combust from something that direct! He could barely even process when I was going down on hi- “

“I think,” Reika interrupted, “it’s at least worth a try. If you care about him that much, I think you need to let him know straight to his face.”

Raku looked unsure, eyebrows furrowed as he carefully thought about the challenge he was faced with. He knew Reika had a point, but he was also afraid of being rejected. Sure, Meemo probably reciprocated his feelings, but there was also the small possibility he didn’t; and that miniscule chance weighed heavily on Raku’s mind.

“Anyways, if it backfires, we’ll be here to cheer ya up!” Reika threw a stern glance at Cashew, which the latter replied to with a playful nudge to Raku. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding. It’s obvious he’s got the hots for you – granted not as much as you have the hots for him – but! I know he at least likes you back; so, stop moping around already and get your man!” She gave Raku a quick slap on the back before getting up off the couch. To be honest, she wasn’t quite sold on that, seeing as how Meemo was so hard to read; but who was she to kick Raku when he was already down?

“Ow…” Raku let out another sigh, before sitting straight up. “Okay, fine, you’ve got me. I’ll do it. I’m expecting a top-notch pity party if this all blows up in my face, you guys got that? “

With that, Raku at least felt a little more confident in confronting Meemo. He’d committed himself to winning Meemo over for the past year, and by God, he was going to finish this off strongly.

*******************************

Unbeknownst to Raku, Meemo was having his own crisis. However, unlike Raku, it wasn’t like Meemo had a support system. Chai wasn’t exactly the optimal person to vent to about -dare he say it- feelings. Romantic feelings at that. No one taught him about this. How was he supposed to know how to deal with the quickening beat of his heart every time Raku got near him? How was he supposed to know if there was some deeper meaning to Raku sucking him off other than he just could?

“This is stupid.” Meemo grumbled as he buried his face into his pillow.

He couldn’t even pinpoint when he began to see Raku in a different light. Was it really so long ago when he considered him a pest? Raku at first was very subtle about his encounters with Meemo, but the occurrences became more frequent over time, much to Meemo’s chagrin. He didn’t think that over time, he’d come to tolerate Raku’s presence, and even -*gasp*- anticipate it. Fast forward to now, and the two of them were in this strange limbo area regarding their relationship.

“Maybe it’s just better if I don’t say anything…” Meemo rolled over onto his side and let out a startled yell after seeing who had entered his room.

“Meemo…?” Chai had walked into Meemo’s room, with the latter too deep into his thoughts to have noticed. “You ‘kay…?” Chai peered up at Meemo with worried eyes.

“…Yes,I’m okay.” Meemo sat up and gave a reassuring pat on Chai’s head.

With Chai here, Meemo then thought about how Raku was good at handling Chai, and how Chai, who was usually so shy around people, seemed to be comfortable around Raku. It was definitely a plus to have them two get along so well. Meemo recalled how just the other day, they had gone to a park. Raku had picked Chai up and carried him up on his shoulders, smiling and laughing the whole way. The entire time, it was hard for Meemo to tear his eyes away from Raku, as he had looked so…radiant? Something like that. Meemo had nearly gotten a heart attack when Raku had noticed the other’s gaze, and he cocked his head to the side before playfully sticking his tongue out at Meemo.

“Ugh…I think I like Raku.” Meemo finally admitted out loud.

“Mm..me too! I like Raku lots too.” Chai beamed up at Meemo with a big grin.

Well then, if they were both in agreement here, maybe Meemo should just go ahead and let Raku know. How hard could it possibly be?

(Hard. It’d be very hard, as he would come to find out soon enough.)

*******************************

A couple of days passed after Raku had his pep talk with Cashew and Reika. Raku had asked if he could stay over at Meemo’s place while the other two did their part with by offering to babysit Chai for the day. Meemo was understandably suspicious at first, questioning what Raku wanted to even do with just the two of them alone.

“I dunno, I just want to have a sleepover. It’ll be fun!” was Raku’s excuse. Meemo was a little tense about it, unsure if this would escalate into another encounter of the sexual kind. Much to his ignorance, however, he accepted the offer, seeing this as an opportunity to tell Raku about his feelings; and while Meemo had his plan, Raku was preparing his own confession.

The pair made their way back to Meemo’s house, with Raku up to his usual antics and making jokes while Meemo stayed quiet, save for the occasional dry chuckle. The day continued on as usual for the most part. Meemo was never one to initiate conversations, so he’d let Raku run his mouth while he’d add his two cents occasionally. However, something did seem…different. The atmosphere in the room was heavy, and it was undeniable that there was some tension going on between them; and this was more noticeable once it reached evening, and things came to a lull.

Even if he appeared as aloof and jokey as usual, Raku felt like he was going to implode. Having things planned out in his head and having to actually execute said plan were two different things. He could just imagine Cashew taunting him right now for procrastinating.

“…I have to shit.” Raku suddenly announced. They were watching a movie, but he really couldn’t concentrate on it as he had his mind preoccupied with other things. He figured he could use this time to clear his mind before maybe finally making a move. Raku quickly got up and made his way to the bathroom.

Once Meemo was sure that Raku was out of the living room, he took a breath of relief. Finally, he could relax, if only for a little while.

“Okay…when he gets back, I’ll do it………Somehow.”

Back in the bathroom, Raku was spending his time hyping himself up as well. Now had to be the time, right? He wasn’t so sure he could go on the rest of the night with this kind of atmosphere. He looked at himself in the mirror, took a deep breath, and made his way back to Meemo.

When Raku got back to the living room, Meemo began to fidget in his seat. As soon as he sits back down, he thought to himself. Three…two…one…

“So-!” Meemo said, as did Raku……at the same time.

“Uh…go ahead.” Meemo kicked himself for backing down.

Raku recoiled at being put on the spot, but it was now or never.

“Well...” He scooted closer to Meemo. “Y’know…that thing we did last time. I, uh…Don’t do that to just anyone, alright?” Wow, this was off to a great start. “I mean…! We’ve been hanging out a lot more lately, and we’ve gotten a lot closer I’d say. A-and! I really like being around you. All these feelings have been building up slowly and all that sorta culminated in me blowin’ ya.”

Raku couldn’t see it but dredging up memories of that was flustering Meemo beyond belief. A part of him just wished the couch would swallow him whole and get him out of this.

“Anyways, I’m getting side tracked here! “Raku put his hand on Meemo’s lap, which the other flinched at. “Meemo. Meems. Meemster. Meemeo—”

“Raku get on with it.”

“What! This is hard okay! “

“Just say that you like me already or else I’m going to have to say I like you first!”

“…”

“…Fuck.”

Raku’s face lit up and he grabbed Meemo by the shoulders and shook him.

“OhmygodMeemoyoulikemetooIwassoscaredIwastoopushylasttimeImeanIwasjustsofuckinghornylasttimeandIletthatgetthebestofmebutIdon’twantittoseemlikeI’mjustusingyoutosatisfymydeepcarnalneedsorwhateverthefucklikeIactuallyreallylikeyoualotand—”

“RAKU FOR FUCK’S SAKE.”

Raku withdrew his hands and let go of Meemo. “S-sorry…I just…I’m so relieved. I thought for sure you didn’t feel the same way…” He looked away and rubbed at his arm.

Meemo felt a twinge of guilt. “Raku…Don’t apologize. I…shouldn’t have raised my voice.” He took a second to compose himself. “It’s just weird for me, is all. It was just me for a long time, and then Chai came around, and then eventually…you. Everything’s so new to me, and feelings are already hard enough for me to deal with, but you just kept coming along throwing me curveballs and it really threw me for a loop. Honestly, can you blame me?”

A hand peeked out from his cloak and Meemo reached over to Raku’s face and cupped it gently.

“I…like you too. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t keep tolerating you like this.”

“Wooow, how romantic.” Raku couldn’t help but stifle a chuckle at how blunt that statement was.

“You- You know what I mean!”

“Yeah, yeah I do.” Raku leaned up and placed a swift kiss at Meemo’s mask.

“?!”

“So now that all that’s taken care of…We gonna do it or what cuz all that tension has got me worked up like no tomorrow.”

Meemo sighed. “Looks like I’m not the only one who needs to rethink what being romantic is all about.”

*******************************

Without a moment to waste, the pair found themselves in Meemo’s room. While Raku was raring to go, Meemo was more hesitant.

“I don’t know if you got this from what I was saying earlier, but I don’t have much experience, so you’re…going to have to guide me a little here. “He mumbled the last part, embarrassed to have to admit that.

“Oh, trust me, I got that, given how quickly you came undone the last time.” Raku said teasingly. “For now, why don’t we start off simple? But to do that, we gotta get this,” he took a step forward and tapped at Meemo’s mask, “outta the way.”

“…I suppose.”

Raku had already seen Meemo without his mask once before, so it wasn’t that big of a deal anymore. Even so, there was still a trace of embarrassment, especially given the situation. At least Raku let Meemo take it off himself – he knew that Meemo was self-conscious without it, so he wouldn’t rush it. Meemo reached up and started by taking off his hood, revealing his messy hair, then undid the string of his mask. As he took the mask away, Raku stared up at Meemo.

“W-what?” Meemo retorted.

“Nothing~ Just admiring the sight.”

Before Meemo could have time to be flustered about that statement, Raku got even closer, placing a kiss on Meemo’s lips. Although taken aback, Meemo slowly but surely reciprocated the gesture, leaning into Raku’s touch. Raku wrapped his arms around the other’s neck, deepening the kiss. While Meemo was preoccupied with that, Raku was gradually leading themselves towards the bed. Once he reached it, he pulled away from the kiss, licking his lips as he looked at Meemo who was visibly more worked up now.

“Not bad. A little sloppy, sure, but we can work on that.” Raku winked at Meemo, as he went ahead and got onto the bed.

“Yeah,yeah.” Meemo replied, not really taking Raku’s jab to heart. Black tendrils went to work at disrobing Meemo of his cloak, as he crawled onto the bed as well, hovering over Raku.

“I’ve been meaning to ask this.” Raku said, as he began to undress as well, tossing his jacket, shirt, and pants off to the floor. “Are you like…technically always naked under your robe?”

Meemo rolled his eyes (how that was possibly seeing as he had no pupils was unclear, but a lot of things Meemo did seemed to defy logic). “No, don’t be ridiculous.” But if he was being completely honest with himself, even he didn’t know how it worked. His body was just this goopy, shadowy, mass. One that could sprout a dick when needed.

“Sure, if you say so.” Raku shrugged, knowing it’d be futile to press on.

“Anyways, what do you want me to do now…?” Meemo tilted his head to the side, genuinely curious.

“Hm…Well, I think now’s a good time than any to return the favor from last time. Buuut before that, help me get these off~” Sure Raku wanted to get to the good part, but he also wanted to tease the hell out of Meemo first.

Giving it some thought first, Meemo reached for the band of Raku’s underwear and tugged on it. He then looked at the fluffy mass that was Raku’s tails. It’d certainly be a hassle if he had to do this slowly, so without much warning, he yanked them off.

“Whoa-!” Raku flopped onto his back from the force Meemo used. “Geez, couldn’t be a little more graceful there?” He pouted.

Meemo held in a chuckle. “Sorry.”

“Nah, sorry won’t cut it, pal. Gotta apologize some other way.” Raku waggled his eyebrows with a smirk at Meemo and slowly spread his legs, displaying himself fully to the other.

Again, Meemo was at a loss, his brain frozen at the mere sight of Raku naked below him. Alright, fine, so maybe Raku had done a little too much teasing and had to take matters into his own hands – literally. Raku reached down to his nether regions, using his fingers to spread his lips.

“Remember what I said about returning the favor…?”

Meemo nodded absently, eyes fixated on Raku’s hand as he began to play with himself. Meemo scoot down the bed a bit, so he could lower himself and be level to Raku’s crotch. His eyes looked up to Raku, who was very much anticipating what would come next. Meemo kissed at Raku’s inner thigh, peppering small pecks until finally giving a tentative lick to Raku’s already slick entrance. As Meemo continued to test the waters, soft gasps were coming from Raku.

“Mmn…y-yeah, juuust like that.” He rested his hands on Meemo’s head, petting his hair reassuringly.

Seeing as how he had his hands full (or, well, mouth full) at the moment, Meemo couldn’t answer. He continued to lap at Raku’s lips, before beginning to prod his tongue in deeper. The more Meemo worked Raku up, the tighter Raku’s grip on Meemo’s hair got.

“Ah-!” Meemo had redirected his focus to Raku’s clit, teasing it with his tongue as he used a finger to slip back into Raku’s heat. “Fffuck…Meemo, please.” For someone who didn’t have much experience, Meemo was doing one hell of a job.

With Meemo sucking here and there and his fingers slowly thrusting in and out, Raku was starting to come undone, his breathing becoming shallower as his legs began to tremble; but Raku didn’t want it to just end here. Not yet.

“M-Meemo…hey.” He tapped the other on his head.

Meemo stopped what he was doing and looked up. “Mm…Yes?”

“I think that’s enough of that. I want…somethin’ else now.” He adjusted his leg, so he could nudge his foot in between Meemo’s legs. “

“R…ight.”

Meemo leaned away so he could sit back. Shadowy wisps appeared at his crotch, slowly taking form as Raku watched on in fascination.

“I’m really gonna have to get used to that.”

When Meemo’s cock stood fully erect, Raku got up to move and straddle Meemo’s lap. Meemo gulped, being hyper aware of the other’s body pressing against him. Before moving on, Raku stole another kiss, this one needier than the last. When he got his fill, he pulled away, a trail of saliva connecting their lips.

“Hm hm…Here I go~” Raku reached down, giving Meemo’s shaft a few strokes before aligning it against his entrance. Meemo bit his lip as Raku lowered himself onto his hard cock.

“Nngh…It’s so…” Tight? Warm? Just overwhelming in general? It was definitely a very different sensation than being in a mouth, that was for sure. Meemo placed his hands on Raku’s hips, steadying the other as he began to move himself up and down, letting out sweet moans with each movement.

“You feel so good.” Meemo muttered, resting his head against Raku’s chest. He began to thrust up in sync with Raku, wanting to go deeper, feel more. He was torn between giving into his lust and going easy on Raku’s body.

“Meemo, I need it…Move faster, go harder, anything, please.” Raku whispered breathlessly into Meemo’s ear.

That was more than enough to flip Meemo’s switch as he swiftly pushed Raku back onto the bed. He had slipped out in the transition, so he took a moment to push himself back into Raku’s tight heat, savoring the warmth that enveloped him once more.

Meemo’s movements were a little more sporadic now that he was more in control in this position; but he gradually picked up a rhythm and quickened his thrusts. For the first time, he leaned down and initiated a kiss, letting his tongue thoroughly explore Raku’s mouth, as his mind was hazed over from pleasure. Raku was more than happy to oblige, moaning wantonly into the kiss as he was fucked harder and faster with each thrust.

“Meemo…Meemo…Haah…I can’t…!” He wrapped his arms around Meemo’s back, clinging on for dear life as he was reaching his climax. Meemo could also feel himself reaching that point, all the while panting and letting out sounds he never thought he’d make. He used a free hand to tend to Raku’s clit once more, his thumb rubbing in tantalizing circles as he continued to thrust into him.

Raku yelled out in ecstasy, not able to contain himself from the over stimulation. “Mmngh…Yes…A-ahh…Fuck…!” It didn’t take long before he was finally driven over the edge. Raku rode out his orgasm, his whole body trembling as he continued to grind against Meemo, trying to milk that feeling all the way through the end.

Meemo, in turn, let out a stifled groan as Raku tightened around him. That added pressure as well as the sweet, sweet sounds Raku was making brought Meemo to his climax. He pulled out just in time, spilling his cum over Raku’s chest and navel. With a shuddered breath, he laid down beside Raku, and the two of them remained wordless, their labored breaths echoing throughout the room.

“That…” Raku said when he finally caught his breath. “…Was fucking great.”

“Y-yeah?” Meemo turned his head to look at the other, still coming out of his post-orgasmic bliss.

“Mhm. You didn’t do such a bad job after all.” Raku swiped his finger over some of the cum on his chest, playing with it between his fingers.

Meemo felt his face heat up again. “Wait, let me go get some towels to-“

“No, no, it’s fine. Let’s just…enjoy this right now, okay? We’ll clean up in a bit.”

Raku scoot closer to Meemo, resting his head on his chest. “How about you? Didja enjoy yourself?”

“I mean, yes, of course. I thought that was pretty obvious, especially from how…unhinged I got towards the end, there.”

“Yep, ya really fucked me good.” Raku snickered. He was sure to replay the image of Meemo over him, succumbing to lust, over in his head for a long time coming.

They went silent again, just enjoying each other’s company. Raku was gently stroking a thumb over Meemo’s hand when Meemo mumbled something.

“Mmh? What was that?”

“…ve……y…”

“…Babe,I can’t understand what you’re sayin’.”

“I said.” Meemo made sure to look Raku in the eyes. “I…love you…”

“………” Raku blinked a few times, his cheeks heating up and sprouting a nice blush.

“Uh, Raku? …Was that too far? Should I not hav—”

“N-no! You just…you just do these things when I least expect it. My heart can’t take it, y’know?” Raku chuckled softly and shook his head. “I love you too, Meems.” He leaned up and pecked Meemo on the cheek. “So! Ready for the next round?”

“……I’m going to get those towels now.”

“Eh?! No, I was kidding, Meemo come back!!!”

*******************************

“Can we assume it went well?” Reika and Cashew stood at the doorway. They each looked at Raku, hair all disheveled and hickeys clearly visible on his neck, then to Meemo, who although was wearing his mask again, seemed to be giving off an air of guilt.

“Yeeep.” Raku gave the two a peace sign. “Mission accomplished. It’s a wrap, fellas. Etcetera, etcetera.”

Chai, who Reika had been carrying, was set down so he could be toddle on over to Meemo. Meemo wasn’t even sure he could look Chai in the eyes at the moment, not after all he did just the night before; but he knew he had to welcome him back. Meemo lifted Chai up, giving him a hug. “Did you have fun?”

“Mhm!”

“Welp, I best be hittin’ the ol’ dusty trail here. “ Raku went to join his sister and Cashew. “I’ll see ya soon, ‘kay? Love ya, darling.” He said with a wink, before turning on his heel and walking off, whistling all the while.

Reika and Cashew both shook their heads. If Raku had already been so transparent about his crush before, they knew he’d be ten times worse now that he and Meemo were officially together.

“…He’s really going to be the death of me.” Meemo mumbled, as he shut the door; but as he did, he found it hard to stop himself from cracking a small smile.

#oc drabble*#ro drabbles #pkmn gijinka*#meemo*#raku*#nsfw///

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blessed-but-distressed · 7 years ago

Text

Blindspot 3/3

A short CS AU three-parter based on a prompt by @shady-swan-jones. A mutual pining, roommates kind of prompt. And who am I to deny?

also on ff.net

“Don’t you think you should, I don’t know, talk to her? Clear the air?”

This wasn’t the first time Emma had suggested this. Not by a long shot. But their kitchen was now about 90% peony, and something had to give. Preferably the peonies.

Ruby grimaced. “Emma, I love you, but if we couldn’t bring ourselves to talk on a nine-hour non-refundable train ride through the alps, do you really think we’re going to start now?”

She had a point. But Emma could think of at least twenty newly delivered reasons why it might be worth giving it a shot.

Whatever had happened before The World’s Most Awkward Non-Refundable Holiday, clearly someone was eager to make amends. Unless of course Dorothy was under the mistaken impression Ruby suffered from hayfever, and was attempting slow torture, one arrangement at a time. Somehow Emma doubted it.

“You sure you don’t want to try, like, actual healthy adult communication? It seems to be working for Killian and Belle.”

“Why do you do that?”

“Do what?” Emma asked.

“Get that pinched look whenever you say her name. With this crease right between your eyebrows. Right here.”

Emma slapped her hand away.

“You don’t like her, do you?” Ruby said, as though this somehow confirmed a long-held suspicion of hers.

“What?” Emma blustered. “Of course I like her. What’s not to like? She’s sweet and nice and god, her pancakes. It’s just…”

“She’s sleeping with the guy you’re carrying a torch for?” Ruby finished, all innocence.

Nail. Head.

But it wasn’t like she was going to tell Ruby that. Ruby, who regularly came home tanked. Ruby, who had always been a very honest drunk. Ruby, who liked to sit up with Killian at all hours on the weekends, playing cards and gambling away household chores.

It was not a good combination.

“A torch? Me? Hey, no one’s carrying any torch here!”

“Oh, c’mon!” Ruby snorted. “You’ve had a raging Maglite for the guy as long as I’ve known you. And look, I get it, okay? He’s got that whole tall, dark and broody thing going on, and it’s working for him. And we’ve all caught him leaving the bathroom in that towel that’s just a little too small on him. But if you didn’t like seeing him with his girlfriend, don’t you think maybe you should have, I don’t know, told him how you felt? You had three whole years do to it in!”

Not. Helping.

But Ruby was on a roll now. “No, instead you chose to go out with that jerk from the furniture store. The one I thought looked kind of like a monkey. And that writer guy…”

“August,” Emma supplied.

“Right,” Ruby continued. “You keep going out with all these deadbeats you don’t even really care about. Because when it ends, and with those guys it’s definitely just a matter of when, you get to just brush yourself off and go, ‘oh well, I tried,’ and you never actually have to risk getting your heart broken again.”

Any way you sliced it, Ruby was ruined as a waitress. With those kind of insights, she should’ve been sitting in a fancy office, charging $250 an hour to see into people’s heads.

But no, Emma wasn’t going to tell her that. Not when Ruby was so right. Not when denial, her old friend, was so readily available as an easy out.

“I liked August!” Emma protested.

“Uh huh. So when he sold that script and moved to California, approximately how long did you spend considering going with him?”

Of course she hadn’t considered it. Los Angeles, was, well… Los Angeles. And her life was in Boston. Her job. Her friends. Killian-

Shit.

Ruby had her dead to rights, and she knew it. And that self-satisfied smile wasn’t helping.

“You know what I did after my first date with Dorothy?” Ruby said suddenly, interrupting Emma’s shame spiral.

“Text me all of the gory, gory details?” Emma supplied, remembering just how gory.

Ruby waved her hand dismissively. “I mean after that. You know what I did?”

“What?”

“I went on Pinterest and started looking at wedding themes.”

Emma opened her mouth, but nothing came out. That is, that was…

“So unlike me, right?” Ruby said, rolling her eyes. “But I just knew, you know? She was it. Still is it.” She made a face. “I should call her, huh?”

“Uh, yeah,” Emma said, stretching her hands wide to take in the peonies that now occupied every available surface of their apartment.

“Fine,” Ruby relented. “I’ll call her. But you have to tell Killian how you feel.”

“Rubes! That’s not anywhere near the same thing. For one thing, we live together. And let’s not forget he has a girlfriend.”

“Actually,” came a deeper voice from the doorway, “He doesn’t.”

Please don’t be, please don’t be… It was Killian. Leaning oh-so-casually against the door jamb, his thumbs hooked in the belt loops of his jeans.

Did he have to look like he’d just stumbled out of an ad for Levis right now?

Ruby had never exactly been one for subtlety. Between the hair and the cleavage and the everything, you somehow knew not to expect it. But when she made a big show of getting up and leaving the two of them there, alone, Emma still kinda wished she could have one friend who could be chill for like, two seconds.

The one saving grace was that when Ruby slipped into the hallway, she already had her phone in her hand. If Emma had to meet her humiliating end, and that was a dead certainty, at least it would be in service of making their apartment peony-free.

Only once Ruby’s footsteps had died away did Killian finally heave himself up into a standing position, his attention still keenly fixated on her.

There was only one thing for it, Emma had to go on the offense.

“So I hope you’re not going to miss living in a greenhouse, because I give it three hours and Ruby and Dorothy are back on. Goodbye apology flowers, hello having to announce yourself before you walk into rooms, because you know what they’re-”

“Swan-”

“Which I guess is better than the flowers. In some ways. I mean, it’s gross, obviously. But at least I’ll be able to get to the coffee maker without-”

“Swan.”

He’d taken Ruby’s empty chair now, and Emma felt herself bite her lip, to stop even more of the babble from spilling out.

“How much did you hear?” Emma asked, her voice a lot more shaky than she’d like.

“Raging Maglite?” he repeated. His amused tone was reassuring enough, but his words? Not so much.

Shit.

“You and Belle broke up?”

“Aye,” he said, one hand reaching up to scratch behind one ear. “A few weeks ago now. You might’ve noticed, but you’ve been hard to pin down lately. Extra hours and what not.”

An intentional choice, on her part. Sure, she needed the money. But there was also only so much domestic bliss one person could accidentally walk in on. Taking a few extra diner shifts seemed like the more responsible choice than dragging her sorry ass to the nearest bar and drowning her sorrows, night after night.

“You okay?”

It wasn’t what Emma really wanted to know. Sure, she cared about the guy. About his well-being. That’s what had started this whole mess, after all. But the larger part of her was just dying to know why? Had he broken it off? Had she? Did Belle think scruffy, intelligent, piercing-eyed Brits just grew on trees?

“Aye. Just not meant to be.”

The smart thing would have been to leave it alone. Change the subject right quick, and then get all the details off Ruby later. Emma Swan was not all the smart.

“So it was a mutual decision, then?”

At this, Killian made a noise. A not exactly kind of noise. “It was mutual in that she pointed out, quite rightly, that she could do a lot better than a guy who’s completely hung up on his flatmate. And I agreed.”

If there was any oxygen left in that room, it sure didn’t feel like it. Emma felt dizzy. Lightheaded. He didn’t- He couldn’t-

“You’re hung up on Ruby?” she managed, her jokey tone taking a brittle turn half way through.

“Don’t you know, Emma?” he said, reaching across to take her hand in his.

It was everything she’d ever wanted, and also everything she was deathly afraid of, all in one innocuous gesture. She wanted to throw up. Or cry. Mostly cry. She settled for keeping her hand steady, even as he drew it up to his mouth. Even as he pressed his lips to the skin above her knuckles. Even as every cell in her body turned to liquid.

“Me?”

He was still holding her hand when he smiled again, his thumb rubbing small circles into her palm. “Aye, love. It’s always been you.”

“Always?”

“Well, at least since the first time I accidentally drank one of your fancy beers, and you nearly took my head off. Or the time you forgot your towel coming out of the bathroom. That was also a particular highlight.”

Stupidly in love with him or not, he still got a whack on the arm for that. And it was just that little shot of normality that gave Emma the courage to form her next words.

“You’re not kidding about this? I mean, you’re serious. About us?”

“Deathly serious. And I know, I know I should have said something sooner, but you always had some perfectly average bloke hanging around, and I figured you weren’t interested. And when I met Belle at the library I thought you were still with that Walsh fellow and-

He didn’t get further than that. Not with Emma’s hands rough on his collar, dragging her towards him. It was bad enough she’d practically climbed up onto the table to eliminate any remaining space between them, but he didn’t seem to mind, not when she ducked her head and kissed him for all she was worth.

Three years was a long time to think about kissing someone. Emma had plenty of ideas up her sleeve.

When they did eventually break apart, breaths ragged and Ruby’s excitable squeals kind of ruining the mood, she stayed close, her forehead pressed to his.

“You’re not gonna hurt me, right, Jones?”

“Are you kidding, Swan? Ruby would kill me if I did.”

The both looked across to where Ruby stood by the stove, her FaceTime conversation with Dorothy still in progress, a smug smile pasted across her face. “Yep. What he said.”

#cs ff #cs au #cs fic #cs roommates au #blindspot

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sleepykittypaws · 5 years ago

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Greyson Family Christmas

Original Airdate: December 8, 2019 (Bounce TV) Where to Watch?: Bounce has re-aired it a number of times, and will do so again Dec. 24 and Dec. 25 of this year, and likely in future seasons as well

So, I didn’t even know that Bounce TV, which is available on many cable systems, Dish network and as a digital sub-channel in many areas, was a thing, but when I found they had made two original Christmas movies for 2019 (and one last year too, which I didn’t know at the time), I felt like I should try and check out at least one out this season. (Here’s where to find Bounce in your area, which I include not as an ad, but because I know I needed it.)

Greyson Family Christmas, directed by Lisa France, stars Kalilah Harris, Karson Kern, Stan Shaw and Robinne Lee, as well as quite a few other strong actors—for instance, the great Carol Sutton as Gran. Seriously, that a movie I know must have been quite low budget could get this strong a cast—even those I was unfamiliar with were really good—is a testament to the fact that inexpensively made doesn’t have to equal amateurish acting.

Harris’ Maya is bringing her boyfriend (Kern as Trent) home from college to meet her activist, liberal family, as well as her conservative Aunt and Uncle who live next door. She has failed to mention to them that Trent is white. And also doesn't inform Trent of that omission till they’re knocking on the door.

Based on the set-up, I sort of expected a broad family comedy, but instead this was a nuanced, well-written and well-acted family drama that touched on serious subjects with more depth than I ever would have imagined from both a made-for-TV Christmas movie and the trailer. I can’t locate a screenwriting credit, but kudos to whoever authored this well-done script. (UPDATE: IMDb now lists J.J. Jamieson as the screenwriter, a credit not available when I first wrote this review.)

Yes, it is Guess Who’s Coming to Christmas Dinner, as one of the characters themselves spells out, but it’s a much stronger version of that than I ever would have expected from a little-known channel’s original production.

For example, immediately after that awkward intro, Maya promptly apologizes to Trent for putting him in the situation and, like a real couple would, they strategize together on how to win over Maya’s skeptical family, one by one.

Heck, even the various member's personality exposition dump at the beginning feels fairly organic, thanks to a believable travel conversation where she’s making sure her boyfriend knows what to expect from her family…Except that they don’t know his race, of course, which she does try to tell them on the phone, in another scene that was far better written and more subtle than I would have expected.

While this is also fully G-rated in terms of sexual content—as in, there is none at all—Maya and Trent do have a couple brief moments where they seem like what they’re supposed to be: 20-somethings in love, awkwardly holding back their horniness because they’re in her parents’ house.

All of the characters, including Trent, are written as refreshingly multi-dimensional, with realistic motivation for their actions. There’s chemistry between Harris and Kern that not only make them believable as a couple, but also allow them to be imperfect to each other, without being off-putting. The story is as much about going away to college and forging your own identity, which might deviate from what your parents envisioned for you, as it is about race, though (at least from my perspective as a clueless white girl), that’s handled pretty well, too.

Trent, for sure, says plenty of stuff that made me cringe, but the explaination of why claiming to be “colorblind” is actually an insult is (eventually) addressed as effectively and efficiently as I’ve ever seen it.

I thought the dynamic of him growing up working class, and her clearly affluent was a nice twist, and there were plenty of moments of levity that felt earned, like when Trent first glimpses Maya’s ex and says, “That tall handsome guy over there? Great.”

Or, when Shaw’s “Uncle Doc" first jokes around with him, and then turns serous, while he undergoes a dental procedure. Naturalistic humor that worked, without feeling jokey.

There’s also some fantastic intrafamily scenes, particularly with Shaw and Lee as in-laws who don’t always see eye-to-eye, but clearly feel great love for each other, and Sutton and Harris. (The families are also dealing with the loss of Maya’s father to cancer.)

Kern is believable (and looks like) the sometimes clueless college boyfriend, but you can also see why someone as smart and focused as Maya would have fallen for him. While I wanted her to speak up sooner in his defense at the movie’s climax—like right away at the dinner table, even if it was still after he left—I think they made her standing up for herself, and her relationship, work well when it did come a little bit later, and the inability to speak her mind to her mother had been well established by that point. Do wish they’d let Harris wear her much prettier natural hair though. Even though the contrast to her upbringing was clearly intentional, the wig they used was not great in a way that was distracting.

Yes, the ending was too pat, but the "find this white boy” stuff via black social media, was pretty cute, since they didn’t overplay what could have been hokey. (Not that the airport wouldn’t have been his most likely location regardless, but whatever.) And while the final family stuff seemed a little saccharine under the circumstances, the conversation between Maya and Trent got me in the feels, just as her earlier speech to her family had.

There were a couple of jarring edits (cuts for time, most likely), that left a few loose ends, but all in all, this reminded me of my favorite from last season, Every Other Holiday. Not in content, but that it wasn’t at all what I was expecting going in, but turned out to be a really good, well-written movie that felt both holiday sweet, yet firmly grounded in reality.

This was my first brush with a Bounce original movie, but I’ll definitely be on the lookout for more of their holiday stuff in the future.

Final Judgement: 4 Paws Up

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a-lbeit · 6 years ago

Text

an issue

ok so there’s a guy at the college bookstore i work at who nobody really likes. it’s understandable because he’s not very nice and he’s got a short temper. but when i worked there summer 2017, we got along all right and i didn’t mind him. i wouldn’t have wanted to hang out with him or anything, but he wasn’t too bad to work with.

well, that all changed today. so my supervisor explains to me the task that i and this guy are going to be doing all day, which is to collect books from the textbook area that are getting shipped off to various other schools so they can be sold there. most of them are going to be in that area, but a few are going to be in the back (and they are marked on the order sheet as such). my supervisor explains this to me at 8am when i come in, and the guy comes in at 10. after a while, this guy calls my name and asks me to see something on his sheet. it’s the notation that one of the books in that order is in the back. he asks if i’ve seen this before. i say i haven’t, but the supervisor said if it had that notation, it would be in the back. i thought he was asking where to find these books. so i tell him what i’ve been told. then i guess he said something else, but i wasn’t really paying attention because i’m in the middle of collecting my own order and i thought that the conversation had ended with me answering the question i thought he had (and he talks to himself a lot lmfao). he leaves for a minute, and then comes back. i don’t remember exactly what he said, but i believe he said that he went back to get the book and to show me where it was, but “i guess you didn’t appreciate that” (i sure as hell distinctly remember this bit). i come to the realization that when he asked me if i had seen it before, he was trying to help me in case i came upon something like that--he was not asking me to answer a question for his own knowledge. i begin to apologize because i genuinely didn’t realize this! but he walks away, saying something about how he won’t do that again. a few seconds later, i go to where he went and ask if he found the book. he says “don’t worry about it.” i say again, “i’m sorry. i didn’t realize you were trying to explain it to me.” again, he mumbles something. i walk away. we’re separated by a few rows of books.

at this point, i’m getting hot. when i do something that someone else perceives as wrong, i feel my skin burning. a few seconds later, he starts laughing. at first, a chuckle, but then it gets a bit louder. it’s not like maniacal or especially loud, but it’s certainly mean-spirited. he mumbles something through the laughter that i can’t catch, but it seems like he’s mocking me. i can’t believe it. i’m almost crying (because i can barely control my emotions lmfao). over the next few minutes, i try to continue my work, but i keep having to stop because i can’t think straight. we don’t really speak again as the day goes on.

and now i empathize with the people who hate him. because that was so, so mean and unnecessary. obviously i wouldn’t purposely ignore you trying to teach me something. it’s so apparent that it’s a misunderstanding and a miscommunication that this shouldn’t haven’t even happened at all. but that’s what does happen when a rude, defensive, tunnel-visioned, impolite person doesn’t have it within them to see that maybe, just maybe, i can’t read their fucking mind and i don’t always hear what they say. i can’t get over that he wouldn’t even listen to my explanation or apology. it would have been so simple to just go, “ah ok, you didn’t hear me, no worries, do you want me to show you now?” and i would have gladly accepted the help. if it had been any other employee, they would have come back to me (after i had failed to follow them) and maybe would’ve joked about me not wanting to go with them or something, and then i would have been like “shit, i’m sorry, i didn’t hear what you said!” and we would have laughed and they would have showed me what they were trying to show me.

i wanted to say something to someone about it, but i didn’t want to be a snitch. my disposition did change noticeably, though, because my supervisor asked me what was wrong. and i said that it was really nothing, but that guy had just been really mean. and she apologized (because she knows about this asshole firsthand and feels the same way i now do) and asked what happened, but i said that it was nothing and continued with my work. and she went about with hers.

later on in the day, nearer to the end (i had more or less been silently stewing on and off for my whole shift), i was talking to her about some book i was having an issue with, and the manager walked up, making a face and mimicking scratching his arm. (he has a rash from poison ivy on his arm and he’s been trying not to scratch it, but i forgot about that because i only work there 2 days a week and i’m shit at remembering things. that’s why i’m writing all this out.) i read that as him being angry about something, but in kind of a joking way, because that’s the way he is. and i said in a joking but still kind of serious manner, “i feel the same way.” and he and my supervisor looked confused, and my supervisor reminded me of his rash. and i exclaimed, “oh! i thought you were just mad. yikes” and he went, “whoa.” and we kind of laughed it off (because i’m really closed off and don’t talk about how i generally feel, so that was kind of an outburst on my part). but right before closing, he came back up to me and asked if i was really okay, if i was mad because of something work related and if there was anything he could do to help. and i only laughed and said, “i’m good.”

and now i just feel like an idiot because even though i know what happened wasn’t right and the way i feel about this is valid and not insignificant, i would never tell anyone what happened because i’m not going to cause a rift at a job that i’m only at for a couple of months. it certainly wouldn’t be the first complaint about this guy, anyway. and i especially don’t want to talk about it with the manager because i really like him as a person and a manager and i don’t want to mess with the jokey vibe we have. but i do wish i had said “thanks though, i appreciate it” when he asked if he could do anything, because he’s so, so kind and caring and i don’t want to seem ungrateful.

#me #post college life #my thoughts #work reflections

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supertam87 · 8 years ago

Photo

Ok guys, I think I can finally wrap my brain around this enough to give a coherent recap. I'm a processor, so I had to live it in the moment, and now that I'm on the plane leaving the experience behind, hopefully I can make sense of it. I posted pictures in order of event. Sorry I can't write in between each pic, but I'm on my iPhone and it won't let me add pics as I go. Anyway, to get on with it... I started my epic adventure with a 4 hour layover in San Francisco which isn't as bad as it might seem, because I've been married for 25 years and have 4 kids and rarely get to be alone! Let the adventure begin. I roomed with the amazing @sileas84 who is 100% responsible for me attending this con. She employed shameless peer pressure and I crumpled like a card tower in the hands of a toddler. I have no regrets. We arrived at the con at 6:30 am and immediately met up with a group of awesome women (in picture two - this is @myguiltyolpleasure's pic btw). We were determined to be up close. FIVE HOURS OF WAITING later, we sat on row 5 center and I was thrilled. I was really hoping for a good view. And boy did I get one! Sam twirled in that kilt and I didn't even try to look, his knickers presented themselves to me! Simple black boxer-briefs - always a classy choice 😂. For most of the panel I could see right up his thigh just because of the way he was sitting in relation to where I was sitting. It's not that I looked, it's just that it was thigh porn and I totally looked. At one point we were directed to take a selfie, so we did. (Pic 3) If there's one thing I can tell you about this particular con, it's that it was all about obedience. I have never been yelled at by adult strangers so many times in one day since I was a pre-teen. If you stepped out of line, and I mean that literally and figuratively, you heard about it. I won't talk about the panel because all y'all have seen it. It was fun, they were adorable and I love them. The hour flew by and I could have sat there and listened to them for the rest of the day. Sam's unintentional joke about reading about stuff on Tumblr cracked me up, mostly because he was mortified and blushed. After the panel the autograph session filled up immediately, so we went to get lunch. Ladies, I got up at 4:30am. It was 12:30. I was starving, parched, desperate to pee - cons are not for the weaklings of the herd. That Diet Coke was on par with meeting Sam. I'm just sayin'. Lunch was a tiny little respite in a sea of hurry up and wait. Following our brief lunch we did our photo ops. You need to understand, those two photos took 4 hours. Compare the photo with only Sam vs the photo with both and look at Sam's eyes. By the time we got to group photos, he was literally exhausted, yet he treated us exactly the same both times (as did Cait) - warm and welcoming, said hello, eye contact, a little squeeze of the hand on the shoulder (ded. I am ded) They were ultimately respectful of the fans and the time and money we put into this. Said thanks and goodbye as we left. I am so impressed with both their professionalism and their basic humanity. These are quality people. The solo photo op is where I had my hair/armpit incident. We walked up and Sam just throws his arms open to engulf you in his superior humanity. As he was putting his arm around me (did I REALLY just type that!) he caught my very long hair with his arm and I ended up being trapped right up against him with my head sort of forced to lay against his arm. I. Am. Not. Complaining. I'm stunned that I had the presence of mind to smile. All I could think of was that I was pressed up against Sam so tight that I could feel how soft the leather of his jacket was. I didn't even notice that he had changed from kilt to jeans until later. My first thought about Caitriona when she entered the panel stage is that no picture or video can ever prepare you for how tall and thin she really is. And how gorgeous and graceful she is. And how charming and funny and silly and well spoken and sincere and kind. Ok, I'll stop. Just look up all the positive adjectives. Next we went to the autograph line. I was there when the lights went out and Caitriona joked about that not being the way to get to Sam and also when he was jokey about being bored because he had no one at his station so he teased her about taking too long and went over to harass her at her table. They were funny and relaxed and enjoying themselves and it was great to see the spontaneous interaction. Every event was very rushed, but they again did their best to say hello, make eye contact, say a little something to you, and thank you for coming. I had them sign my original Outlander book that was given to me by a friend about twelve years ago, who said, "You might like this." Famous last words. As you can see, it's lived a good life. I've lent it out many times. I said at dinner last night that I was too nervous and hadn't really say anything to Caitriona, until I literally went oh my gosh! I did say something to Cait. I had totally blocked it in my nervous state. She commented on how well loved my book was, and I said 'yes, it's been read many times by many people and it opens right to the wedding scene' and then I proved it, by opening it right to that scene. So, yep. I did that. I blushed so hard my eyeballs turned red when I remembered that. Sam was equally adorable, but I just had 'do not say that to sam' on repeat so then I didn't really know what to say to him. He was so sweet. His handler was rushing him a little bit and he sort of looked at him and then apologized to me for being rushed along. He looked me right in the eyes. He winked at me and smiled. Ladies, the smolder is real. I was POSITIVE I was immune to the Sam effect and I am NOT. I literally went weak at the knees. My stomach churned. I started shaking. I giggled. I could not think. Well, I could. But the only thing I could think was 'Sam. Sam winked at me. Sam's eyes are so blue. Sam is so beautiful. Sam. Sam winked at me.' My brain sort of jammed. After dinner a huge group (like 17) of us went to dinner. It was awesome. It was amazing. These ladies are incredible. Our fandom is incredible. Last night we went to a smaller dinner and stayed for hours. I can't tell you how hard we laughed. It was so much fun. I seriously love this place for so much more than Tumblr. We are such a diverse group. Different cultures, different educational and socio-economic backgrounds, different personal and relationship statuses, and most importantly, different ages. We have so much to teach each other and so much to learn, and as a group, we are so generous with our time, talents, resources, emotional support and wisdom. I treasure this. I am so grateful I went. I loved meeting Sam and Caitriona. It was great fun. Meeting dear friends who will remain forever was life changing. I look forward to doing this again one day and meeting even more of you. Sorry I bombarded you with a DG length post, but thanks for making it through. All I can finish with is if you didn't leave with a Totes McGoat tote, then you didn't con right!!

#eccc2017 #outlander #sam heughan #Caitriona Balfe #personal

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justlookfrightened · 8 years ago

Text

Chapter 5: Dec. 24-26, Christmas: Montréal/Madison/Providence

Read it on AO3

Or read chapter 1, 2, 3, or 4

Jack wedged the last of his gifts for his parents behind the tree and then sat back on his heels to look at the effect.

His first thought was that there way too many presents for having only three people in the house.

His second thought was that at least a quarter of the gifts were for Eric.

His third thought was, how was he supposed to get those all home?

Oh, well. He couldn’t really complain that his parents liked his boyfriend too much, could he? Besides, he could insist that his parents ship anything that didn’t fit in his suitcase. That way, they wouldn’t upstage him when he and Eric exchanged gifts on Boxing Day.

“I know it makes me sound like a child, but I think my favorite part of Christmas is looking at all the presents piled up under the tree,” his mother said from behind him.

Jack turned to see her looking at the tree with a mug of something, tea probably, a book under her arm.

“That’s why we always wrap so many things for Christmas,” she said. “So I apologize in advance for when you open the socks. At least you’re not getting toilet paper this year.”

“Toilet paper?” Jack said.

His mother indicated a large package with his dad’s name on it.

“Twenty rolls,” she said.

“Toilet paper.”

“He’ll think it’s funny,” Alicia said. “It will remind him of the year you were two and we bought you your very own box of Kleenex and you opened it and sat there and pulled out all the tissues one by one. And when we’re through laughing, I’ll put the toilet paper away in the cupboard and we won’t have to buy more for months.”

Jack could see the humor in that, and, more importantly, knew his dad would too.

“It’s partly, ‘What do you get for the man who had everything?’” Alicia said. “I do buy him clothes, sometimes even at holidays, but that’s more just to make him look presentable. He has everything he needs. So I try to get him one or two serious gifts, things I see that remind me of him, or things I think he’ll enjoy, and then I wrap up things we would need anyway for fun. It’s not like he needs another pen, and he doesn’t wear jewelry.”

“How do you find gifts year after year?” Jack asked.

“It’s not as hard as you might think,” she said. “Your dad’s a busy guy, he has hobbies and interests. Actually, this year I asked Eric for help.”

“Eric?”

“Since your dad started baking more, I asked Eric what would be good,” she said. “That one’s a KitchenAid stand mixer, which Eric was horrified to see we didn’t have when he was here at Thanksgiving.”

“Yeah, Eric has one of those,” Jack said. “I think he bought it with his graduation money. High school graduation.”

“In his little apartment?”

“It might have moved into my kitchen,” Jack said. “Months ago.”

“See, I knew your relationship was serious.”

“It was maybe a couple of months after I gave him the key?” Jack said. “When we had our West Coast road trip. He said it was a pain going back and forth when he wanted to use the mixer, and there was plenty of room in my cabinets, so if I minded he was happy to take it back, but he really found it convenient to have it there.”

“I was thinking I’d ask you if you had any plans to ask Eric to move in,” his mother said. “But if his mixer is in your kitchen, well, I think maybe he has.”

Jack felt himself blush.

“He just really appreciates a bigger kitchen than what he has,” he said.

“And I’m sure he likes the view, too,” she said.

“Well, you can see the river from my apartment, and I have more windows,” Jack said.

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Maman! Please,” Jack said. “I do want to ask him if we can … rearrange … a bit. I don’t think he wants to give up his apartment, because he likes to have his own space sometimes, but maybe he could move more of his clothes and things over, and stay in our apartment. His unit could be like our study or something. Like a guest suite. I don’t know.”

“How do you think he’ll react?”

“I don’t know. I really don’t. Sometimes I think he wants to move in, but he’ll never bring it up because he still hesitates to ask to sleep over, even though I’ve told him over and over that he’s always welcome, whether I’m home or not,” Jack said. “But if he doesn’t want to, I don’t want to put any pressure on him.”

“I’m sure you’ll figure it out,” his mother said. “Just trust him to tell you what he wants, or what he doesn’t want.”

****************************

Eric sipped his coffee and ate his traditional Christmas breakfast of his mother’s cinnamon bread, contemplating the Christmas tree. With Christmas falling on a Sunday, he had flown down yesterday, after finishing his shift, but he was taking Dec. 26 and 27 off as well.

The bakery was closed on Dec. 26 -- Eric had convinced Matthew that would make more sense than closing Christmas Eve, when people would want to pick up orders for Christmas -- and Dex had volunteered to take charge the next day.

Then he had made the executive decision to close at 2 p.m. on Christmas Eve, leaving Dex and Nurse to finish up after he left at noon. That allowed him to make sure all the holiday orders were done, and most of them picked up, before leaving for the airport, and it got him to Madison in time for the Christmas Eve service.

But he hadn’t been home to help his mother decorate the tree for the first time this year. Last year, she waited until two days before Christmas, but this year he came too late.

It looked like she put all the ornaments on -- the elegant ones that his parents had bought for themselves or received as gifts, the jokey ones that they had exchanged over the years, the ones he had made in Sunday school and in kindergarten. It must have taken her hours to do it by herself, he thought, and he wouldn’t have blamed her if she left some of the ornaments off, maybe tried to make it look like some of the trees they saw on Pinterest.

His eyes picked out six different ice skate ornaments -- mostly figure skates but some hockey skates too -- and a dozen or more pies, tarts and rolling pins.

“Big job, decorating that tree,” his father said from his seat in the recliner. “Took your mother and I the best part of last Saturday.”

“You helped?” Eric supposed he should have kept the surprise out of his voice.

“It seemed like it would be a good idea,” Coach said. “If I wanted dinner that night.”

Eric nodded. Of course his father hadn’t joined in to stop his mother from being lonely or sad that Eric wasn’t there.

“Don’t think I did as good of a job as you. She kept moving ornaments after I put them on.”

Eric looked at Coach and looked at the tree again. Really, it looked like all the ornaments had been thrown at it with no rhyme or reason.

“She always did that to me too,” Eric said.

“You have a tree up in Providence?”

“Not in my apartment,” Eric said. “A little one in Jack’s apartment. One of those fake ones that come with lights already on.”

“You have ornaments?” Coach said. “‘Cause you could probably take some of these.”

“Just because you don’t want to get stuck taking them down --” Eric started. Then he thought better of it. “Maybe a couple. There’s nothing really personal on our tree, because Jack always goes to his parents in Montreal and I’m always here for Christmas. Jack said he got the tree because he said it felt weird to not have any decorations, but I get my fill of decorating at the bakery.”

And Eric realized a moment after he spoke that he had called it “our tree” and not “Jack’s tree.” It didn’t seem Coach had noticed.

Eric put his feet on the floor and got ready to stand up and go help his mother get dinner going. If nothing else, he could start the dough for the rolls and see what she had planned for dessert. Family would be there a few hours.

“Wait, Junior,” Coach said. “Before you go, you know that you’re always welcome here. Jack, too, if you both want to come for Christmas.”

“Thanks, Coach,” Eric said. “He’s always spent the Christmas break with his parents, though.”

“It’s also OK if you want to go with him, or if you and he decide to have Christmas in Providence,” Coach said. “Your mother and I will survive. Although she probably wouldn’t turn down an invitation to join you.”

“I’ve never been anywhere else for Christmas.” Of course, his father knew that.

“But you will be, eventually, and that’s OK,” Coach said. “Things change. Kids grow up, get their own lives, their own families. Parents get older, maybe get to enjoy being guests sometimes.”

He paused.

“Anyway, I wanted you to know that you should do what’s right for you, not worry about us,” Coach said. “Your mother will understand. You should know we couldn’t be more proud of you, and she’s really looking forward to seeing your bakery next month.”

“What about you?” Eric asked. “Me too,” Coach said. “But I also can’t wait for the hockey game. I’ve never been to an NHL game.”

Eric smiled. The gift he and Jack had put together for his parents -- Falconers hats and T-shirts, and tickets for a game over the MLK holiday -- had been a hit. His father wanted to pay Jack back for the airfare, also included, but Eric had a feeling Jack would prevail after Eric suggested Coach Google Jack’s salary.

“Fine,” his father had said, “But I’m taking the two of you out to dinner while I’m there.”

It was strange, letting Jack pay for so much, but Eric had come to the conclusion that sometimes it was best to let Jack do what he wanted. Plus, Jack had agreed that the gift to Eric’s parents would also serve as his gift to Eric. There was no point to refusing and having everyone unhappy when everyone could be happy, he thought.

***********************

Jack put his sunglasses on and tugged his Habs cap down on his forehead as soon as he exited the plane, and found the nearest arrivals board to see which gate Eric’s flight would arrive at.

On time. Eric should be on the ground in 20 minutes.

Jack mentally thanked the travel gods that he had pre-cleared U.S. customs and immigration at Trudeau so he could remain inside the security perimeter and meet Eric at his gate. And that it worked out for them to fly into Logan within a half-hour of each other. If nothing else, Eric knew where he had parked when he drove Jack’s car to the airport on Saturday.

He took a seat in the area by Eric’s gate and pulled his phone out. Sure enough, there was a text from Eric as soon as the plane was at the gate.

On the ground. See you soon!

Jack waited as people trickled out of the jetway, probably the ones in business class first, but it was impossible to tell.

Finally, he saw Eric, not by himself, but with a young woman, carrying a baby seat and pushing a stroller. The girl was carrying a fussing infant and looked exhausted, even though it was only 11:30 a.m.

As soon as they got out of the jetway, Eric stepped to the side.

“That just snaps on top,” the woman was saying.

Eric figured it out and attached the baby seat to the stroller, giving it a tug to make sure it was secure..

“There you go,” Eric said. “Come on, sweetheart.”

And Eric actually took the baby. Damn, Eric looked natural with a baby in his arms. Probably all those little cousins.

He set it (her? him?) in the seat and pulled the straps over the baby’s shoulders while the baby’s mother (she had to be the baby’s mother, right?) set down the bag she had strapped to her back and rolled her shoulders.

“Thank you so much, Eric,” she said. “She’s gotten so heavy.”

“Please, it was no trouble at all,” Eric said. “Do you have those gingerbread cookies I gave you?”

“Of course you travel with cookies,” Jack said, approaching them.

“You know it,” Eric said, giving Jack a brief hug. “How was your flight?”

“Fine,” Jack said. “But I’m ready to get home.”

He turned to the young woman and said, “Hi, I’m Jack.”

“Sarah,” she said. “Can I just say how lucky you are? Eric is a treasure. I was so nervous to fly on my own with Izzy, and then she started crying when we took off, and I was afraid I’d have an angry seat-mate on my hands. Instead, he did his best to entertain her. He’s going to make a great daddy one day.”

Jack looked to Eric, whose eyebrows had risen. So Eric probably hadn’t said anything about Jack being his boyfriend, or about wanting kids. Did Eric want kids? They hadn’t really talked about it. On the boyfriend front … Were they that obvious? Well, yes, probably. And this was the advantage of having been outed, right?

So Jack put his arm around Eric’s shoulders and pulled him in so he could kiss Eric’s cheek. He said, “I know. He’s great.”

Now Eric was pink -- a good look on him, Jack thought, but then most looks were good on Eric -- and he was saying, “I was just glad I could help with the peanut. You have someone meeting you?”

“Yes,” Sarah said. “My husband should be here. We just went home for Christmas because he had to work, and my parents really wanted to see her. But I’ll text you. We should really get that coffee.”

Jack let her walk away before pulling Eric into a longer hug.

“There you go, winning hearts right and left.”

“Hush, you,” Eric said. “She just needed a friendly face on that plane.”

“Well, you’ve certainly won my heart.”

****************************

Eric still felt nervous driving Jack’s car, even more with Jack in it.

Which was strange, because Jack’s small SUV -- OK, small compared to ones with names that evoked whole fleets of ships; who names a car “the Armada”? -- was not a challenge to maneuver compared to the oversized pickup trucks Eric had learned on, and it drove like a dream. A dream with heated seats, no less.

After the second or third time Eric had demurred at the idea of using Jack’s car while he was away -- “What if I get pulled over? What if there’s an accident?” -- Jack had added Eric as a regular driver to his car insurance policy.

“Now no one can question if you have permission to use the car,” Jack said. “And if there is an accident, they can’t deny coverage. So please, take the car. Especially if you’re going somewhere at night, or by yourself.”

Once they had retrieved Jack’s suitcase from the carousel, Jack had said to Eric “Lead the way.”

When they arrived at the car, Jack threw his bags in the back and himself into the passenger seat.

“I’m so glad we don’t have a game tomorrow,” he said. “I want to spend the day with you.”

So Eric climbed into the driver’s seat and started the car, wondering how this became his life.

Once they arrived at their building, Eric headed to his apartment to drop off his overnight bag and pick up Jack’s gifts.

He really hoped Jack would like them. He’d spent more than he should -- he had swallowed his pride and asked his parents for money for Christmas, and asked if he could have it two weeks early -- but he wanted to get something Jack wouldn’t think of getting for himself, something he would enjoy.

So he gathered the box and the padded envelope and headed back to Jack’s apartment.

Jack was heating two servings of Eric’s lasagna in the oven and cutting vegetables for a salad when Eric came in and looked at the tree. There were packages all around it -- at least half a dozen, from almost square to very long and thin.

“Are those all for me?” Eric asked. “It’s too much. You said the tickets for my parents were my gift.”

“One of your gifts,” Jack said. “And these are all kind of part of one gift.”

“That’s good, I guess, because I only got you one thing,” Eric said. “Well, two, really, but only one real gift.”

“I should warn you: there’s also an envelope of printed out pictures of gifts from my parents,” Jack said. “It’s all stuff they ordered for you. They had the pictures all wrapped up in boxes and they made me open them. If you want, you can go through those while we eat.”

“They shouldn’t have,” Eric said. “I mean, my parents only sent you a card.”

“It’s fine, Eric.” Jack said. “My parents are like that. They practically adopted Kent.”

Eric’s head snapped up.

“Kent? As in, your ex, Kent Parson?”

“Uh, yeah,” Jack said. “But it’s been so long I don’t really think of him like that. Now he’s a friend, I guess, someone who’s known me forever. But when we were kids, he was around a lot, even before we … we were friends and teammates first, and the physical part got added to that. And he was kind of lost, and they took him under their wing. They’re still close to him. But in the beginning, they were always buying him stuff. To the point I got a little jealous.”

“I’m sorry,” Eric said. “Does it bother you now?”

“Not at all,” Jack said. “And it really shouldn’t have bothered me then. I just wasn’t in a good frame of mind to see things accurately. Anyway, trust me, they like to give gifts, especially my mother, and they’re thrilled to have someone new to buy gifts for.”

“OK,” Eric said.

“And a lot of it isn’t expensive stuff,” Jack said. “You seem to be in family territory already, getting things that you’d probably have to buy anyway. I can tell you she didn’t buy you toilet paper -- my dad got 20 rolls.”

“Well, now I have to look,” Eric said, sitting at the table with his plate.

There were two sweaters -- one a dark red, almost a Samwell-red, and one a deep blue -- a cookbook of Quebecois specialties, a mortar and pestle and several jars of whole spices, and four rolls of baking parchment.

“There is one actual present from them in my suitcase,” Jack said. “I’ll get it.”

“I’ll bring the tea over to the tree,” Eric said.

Jack brought a soft package to Eric, who unwrapped it to find a replica of Bob’s Habs jersey.

Eric put it on immediately and took a selfie, posting it with the caption, Who’s my favorite Zimmermann?

Jack tried to pretend he was pouting, but Eric wasn’t fooled. He just kissed Jack’s lower lip and said, “You know it’s you.”

Jack pulled him closer and kissed him again, longer and deeper, just to make sure, and when Eric pulled back, he was pink. “I think I like jealous Jack. Or at least pretending-to-be-jealous Jack.”

“Here, open this one next,” Jack said. He handed Eric a square box, almost the same size as the box Eric had for him.

Inside was a new hockey helmet, in Falconers’ blue.

“I didn’t have them put a visor on, in case you wanted to use your facemask,” Jack said. “But last time we played, I noticed that your helmet was out of date.”

“Thanks, Jack. I guess I never thought about replacing it because I wasn’t on a team anymore.”

The rest of the boxes turned out to include a full set of pads and gloves and a new stick, with the last box holding two pictures similar to those his mother had sent.

Jack shrugged. “I learned from the best.”

The pictures showed two pairs of skates, one for hockey and one for figure skates.

“I didn’t want to choose the model and wrap them because different brands fit differently, and you need to get what;s good for you. But Dominic at the skate shop knows that I’m buying them for you, so you can go pick them out whenever you want.”

“But Jack, it’s too much. I know you know how much good skates cost,” Eric said.

“So I’ll know if you don’t get good ones,” Jack said. “I’ve seen your skates. They’re good, but they’re what, three or four years old? For as much as you skate, they should have been replaced at least a year ago, maybe longer.”

“It’s still too much,” Eric said. “With all the other stuff too?”

“But I like to play with you,” Jack said. “When it’s just us, or when we get the other guys to come too. It’s important that you have good equipment.”

“And the figure skates?”

“I wanted you to know that I value that too,” Jack said. “Otherwise it would feel like I was trying to make you prioritize hockey. And I know you love it.”

Eric couldn’t help his smile. It was too much -- far too much, and made the gift Eric scrimped to buy for Jack pale in comparison -- but it also reflected so much of what Eric loved about Jack: his enthusiasm, the way he paid attention to what Eric loved, just that he wanted to spend time with him.

“OK, mine’s nowhere near as big,” Eric said. “But I thought you’d like it.”

Jack opened the gift, a Nikon D5500, which the clerk at the camera store assured him was an excellent choice for a beginner.

Jack not only unwrapped it, he opened the box and pulled the camera body out, cradling it in his large hands while he looked at it from every angle.

“The lady at the store said it would be good for someone to learn on, because you can make it automatic but you can also play with the settings,” Eric said. “There’s a lens in there, but you can get others. If you want advice, I tucked in the lady’s card. She said she’d be happy to help.”

The words tumbled out of Eric, who was desperate to fill the silence.

“Eric, I love it,” Jack said. “When I was in high school, I wanted to take a photography class, but it didn’t fit with my schedule, what with hockey and all. But I’ve always liked it.”

“I got the idea with how much care you take with pictures for Instagram,” Eric said. “Even if they’re just phone pictures, you make things look amazing.”

“Thanks, Eric,” Jack said. “It’s great.”

“There’s one more thing,” Eric said, handing Jack the padded envelope. He opened it to find a key, one he recognized.

“Is this the key to your apartment?” Jack asked.

“Um, yeah,” Eric said. “I don’t really expect you to spend any time there, because everything you need is here. But it felt wrong that I’ve had your key so long, and you didn’t have mine. So if you ever want to stop over, whether I’m there or not, feel free. If you need to find an obscure recipe from an old cookbook, or borrow a springform pan or --”

“Wrap myself in your blankets and hug Senor Bun if I need to feel close to you but you aren’t here?” Jack said.

“Well, sure. Or that.”

****************************

After lunch and their gifts were cleaned up, Eric suggested going for a run, since Lardo wasn’t around and Meehan would be closed.

“We can go to the practice facility if you want,” Jack said. “You’ll have to wear your old skates, but you can break in the new pads. See if I got everything the right size.”

“Will there be anyone there today?” Eric asked. “I wouldn’t want to put anyone out by making them come in on their day off.”

“I don’t know if Rick’s there, but we’re not on the ice until 10 tomorrow,” Jack said. “If it makes you feel better, I’ll find out if he was planning to be in earlier than that so he can cut the ice. And don’t worry -- security will be there. I won’t be able to ravish you on the ice or anything.”

Eric arched an eyebrow at him.

“Ravish me?” he asked. “What have you been reading?”

He sounded amused, so Jack counted it as a win.

“Did you want to figure skate first, like you usually do?” Jack said.

“I don’t know,” Eric said. “If I’m going to get all geared up, maybe just play around with a puck? I can use my old stick -- I haven’t got any tape for this one.”

Jack blinked.

“We’re going to an NHL practice facility,” he said. “I’m pretty sure I can find tape. I’ll even tape your stick for you if you want. But I was hoping you’d figure skate for at least a little while so I can try out the camera.”

“Lord,” Eric said. “I didn’t get that for you so you could take pictures of me. Don’t you want to try it out by taking pictures of the Christmas tree, or an artfully posed hockey stick, or the geese on the river or something?”

“I took pictures of the Christmas tree already, as soon as the battery was charged,” Jack said. “Please? I want to see how I do with action shots.”

“Fine,” Eric said. “But just for you, not for Insta.”

Eric dressed in his usual (snug, body-hugging, thank-God-for-Lycra) black workout clothes to skate. He started with his usual routine: step sequences, spins and a few jumps, then skated over to where Jack was standing at the boards, frowning down at the little monitor on the back of the camera. The camera was great -- every shot was in focus -- but Jack found that it was harder than he thought to keep a moving target where he wanted in the frame. The best ones were of Eric spinning, if only because he wasn’t moving across the ice. This was going to take some practice.

“Want me to do an actual program?” he asked. “Something that has some flow to it?”

“Sure,” Jack said. “I’m not sure how well you’ll like these pictures. I’m going to have to work at this.”

“First, I don’t ever need to see the pictures, unless you want to show me, so don’t worry about that,” Eric said. “Second, can I just say how much I love that you sound excited about having to spend time learning something?”

Eric leaned across the boards to kiss him.

“Um, could you skate to ‘Halo,’ the way you did the first time we came here together?” Jack asked. “I really liked that routine.”

He liked it so much he had thought about for weeks afterwards, wondering what it would be like if Eric actually meant all the sentiments in the song for him. Now he could watch it and know Eric loved him.

“Sure thing, sweet pea,” Eric said. “My phone and a speaker are in my bag right there. Get them out and I’ll set it up.”

That evening, after cleaning up and going for a walk along the river, stopping for take-out on the way home, Jack flicked through the pictures he had taken. Eric had skated to “Halo” twice, and by the second time, Jack was better at leading him with the camera, so he was skating into the frame instead of out of it. Jack had even managed a few close-ups, of Eric’s radiant smile when he finished, of his skate-blades flashing as he completed an intricate series of steps.

Jack’s favorite was a shot he got of Eric spinning in the air like a top, arms wrapped close around him, legs crossed at the ankle, the light glinting off his hair. It was amazing.

Later, there were pictures of Eric dressed for hockey, with his new blue helmet -- Eric had let Jack send that one to his parents -- and, yes, the geese on the river. But Jack kept coming back to the picture of Eric caught in mid-air, like his feet never needed to touch the ground.

“Eric,” Jack said. “Look at this one.”

Eric came out of the bathroom where he was getting ready for bed, and looked over Jack’s shoulder.

“That is a good shot,” he said. “Although Katya would probably crucify me for my form.”

“Can I post this one?’ Jack asked. “I won’t tag you if you don’t want. But I want everyone to see how amazing you are.”

“I think people who follow you know who I am anyway,” Eric said. “Go ahead, if you want. I just hope Katya has no idea who you are.”

Jack used the wifi feature on the camera to send the image to his phone, then posted it with the caption #myboyfriendisbrilliant

#my fic #zimbits #omgcheckplease #omg check please #neighbors au

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