#the [week] the music died but for aloha shirt guys...

[rugessnome]

so bye, bye, Aloha shirt guys,

went out to the beach heard the seagulls cry

music dudes rest in peace, now your years've gone by

years of the things that help you hang on

first Jimmy Buffett now Steve from Smash Mouth this is like 9/11 for dudes with closets full of Hawaiian shirts

[brooklynislandgirl]

Shipping meme: Beth/Marion ;D

Ship Meme || Accepting

Immediately begins to shimmy when maroon 5 comes on

Beth remembers laughing. There was nothing mean or cruel about it, but an innocent delight when Marion slanted her that Look the first time she played Animals. She couldn’t have possibly known then just why the other woman seemed disconcerted, or maybe confused. Certainly not thrilled by it. So what did she do? She turned the volume up until the beat vibrated through the floor and she started swaying to the beat, bare and tawny limbs almost a physical manifestation of the music. Eyes closed, she shimmied her way closer and closer, before reaching out, taking the Cajun by the hand and dragging her to her feet. Tiny delicate hands on her hips, Beth tried to get her to mimic the same moves she was making.

She’s still sure Marion hates the song.

Wakes the other up at 3am demanding pancakes.

It’s a euphemism. A dark one at that, but sometimes…necessary. Marion never makes the call lightly, or frequently. And Beth would be a liar if she said it didn’t worry her when she hears that raspy, wind-blown autumn leaves voice on the other end of the phone.But she always goes, crosses the trackless fens from one house to another. Sometimes she swims, sometimes…sometimes she even flies. She never stops to think that it’s unnatural, that in many ways even others of her kind would find this to be an abomination, but…she’s got a gift.And maybe for Marion, it’s kind of a sacrament, too. She always tries to be gentle, and sometimes, if Beth can focus beyond the agony, she swears she sees a kind of wonder in the other woman’s eyes.

Sends the other unsolicited nudes

“Mais non, chere,” she says. Shakes her head and waves a hand, but the ash on the cigarette never falls no matter how much Beth imagines it should.

“Why no? Ya lovely.”

“An’ yer a liar, you.”

No matter how often she asks, Marion refuses.

She stands in front of her canvas, considering what to paint when the text comes, almost frightening the little Hawai’ian. She doesn’t get many calls these days. She sets down her pallet, sets down her brush and goes to collect it. 

She’s silent for long minutes. She doesn’t know how. She doesn’t know why. She didn’t even think Marion had a cell-phone, but there it is. The woman’s frame is shadowed in places, blurred in others, a little out of focus, but just as expected, there’s so much life in them. 

Beth takes the phone back to the easel and changes out paint. She spends hours at her work, days, maybe a life time. And when she’s done, she carefully deletes each naked limb, each curve, each bit of Marion that has been sent, exactly as she promised.

After snapping a couple of photos to show her later, Beth hangs the portrait of Marion in her sanctum, to live with all of her other flowers.

Brags about knowing karate even though they never made it past yellow belt

“Is true!”

Another slanted look full of disbelief as Marion takes a sip of her beer.

“Okay, okay. Mebbe he was jus’ playin’ nice, but I don’ t’ink he was. Had dis look on his face, starin’ up a’ me from da floor. Firs’ I t’ought he was gonna get up an’ murder me righ’ den an’ dere, yeah? Saw m’ whole life flash in da abyssal pits of his eyes an’ every kine. But den…hand t’ god an’ alla His angels, he smile. An’ dere was dis look of pride dat I manage to drop him.”

But the delight in her eyes dimmed after admitting that. “Kinda stopped teachin’ me t’ fight aftah dat.”

“Ya blame him? Men don’ like t’ be shown up.”“I guess.”“Still. Ya should be proud of yaself.” Marion grinned. “If it’s true.”

Comes to a complete halt outside bakeries/candy shops

Marion is determined to prove to Beth that for all it’s fame, the Cafe du Monde isn’t the only place to get beignets. Some times, Beth feels like she’s cheating. Marion assures her that fried lumps of dough don’t have feelings, and how does she know she’s not going to like something if she doesn’t try it. Beth’s brother used to tell her that all the time, so she can hardly belabour the point.Every once in a while, though, Beth has to wonder if they’re really talking about donuts.

Blows sarcastic kisses after doing ridiculous shit

Marion’s fingers are surprisingly gentle when she trace’s Beth’s scar, though the lines, the whorls, the callouses are far rougher than they ought to be. They remind Beth of sharkskin. And when she reluctantly tells her the story, Beth is absolutely sure that Marion will make fun of her. Everyone who’s ever heard it always does.So when she doesn’t, Beth is…confused.

“Wha’ don’ kill ya…makes you stronger. So why would I poke fun at ya, girl?”

Beth looks away, maybe a little ashamed for having misjudged her.“But keepin’ gators as pets…is pretty stupid.”

Killed the guy (also, which hid the body)

She doesn’t come around for weeks. Why, she can’t say. It’s not fear, it’s not even really surprise. Maybe it’s because she has to take time to process her feelings about things, maybe it’s because she feels like she stole the secret and she’s not sure what Marion will say to her, if she even let’s Beth visit.

But the rain pours down behind her, and a few drops collect under the decaying porch. The screen door hangs limply from its frame. On the other side of it, not a little unlike being on opposite sides of the Confessional, Marion’s face is…hard.

Something about her eyes hurts Beth and all the words she thought she was going to say evaporate on her tongue, leaving prolonged silence to eat at them. And maybe that was the wrong choice of words.

“I don’ care,” she says eventually. “No, dat’s not it. I do. I mean. Ya no can jus’. What I mean…”

Marion’s mouth twists into an ugly snarl. “Didn’t need ya advice or ya permission, but thanks.”

The little witch snaps then, not meaning to, planting her bare, muddy feet like oak roots. “And ya gonna lissen f’ me. I care… because I care about you. So if ya gonna go ‘round eatin’ people, well…firs’ ya gonna prolly have t’ explain dat t’ me, an’ wha’ ya are… an’ den…mebbe…work some kine out.”

A small epoch passes, but eventually, Marion pushes the door open and walks back into the recesses of her house.But it’s a start.

Wears the least clothing around the house

Marion considers allowing Beth to keep a spare set of clothes at her house. She  understands that there’s limitations to the witch’s magick and Beth confesses never being able to figure out how to change shape and retain clothes at the same time. Beth tells her it’s got something to do with the Spheres, as she calls them, and how Matter and Life aren’t the same, how nature …and around there is where Marion kind of tunes her out. 

It’s not that hard to grasp but it’s unnecessary and if anything Beth talks a lot. Like she has all these words saved up and they tend to spill out at the least provocation.

She’s offered Beth use of a shirt now and then. Girl goes out of her way to return it, primly folded and laundered. Sometimes it’s still warm as if fresh from her skin. And it always smells like her…faintly tropical, faintly earthy, sweetness and spice.

Has icky sentimental moments for no apparent reason

She’s a touchy little thing, Beth. If it’s not the dancing a little too close, she likes to card her fingers through Marion’s hair. Sometimes it’s a hug before she slips out of the door and into the trees. Sometimes, it’s dropping her chin to look over Marion’s shoulder. Or an ‘aloha’ peck on the cheek.

Beth seems to like to play with fire, and she doesn’t think the girl understands just how dangerous that inclination is.

One of these days, she’ll find out the hard way, and Marion hopes, for Beth’s sake, it’s long in coming.

[secretlystephaniebrown]

Come On Home: 1/5

After the war, Locus ends up spending his days on Hawaii, where he meets Kai and Grif. Nothing will ever be the same.

I had a lot of Grif feelings after this season, and his dynamic with Locus was INCREDIBLE. So I threw around an AU where Locus got redeemed pre-Chorus through the power of Kai and Grif being a family. I got a shocking amount of support for it, but put it in a drawer because I had too much going on. Fastforward to now, add in a very encouraging @sroloc--elbisivni, and well. Here we are.

Special thanks to @a-taller-tale for being my beta here, and @illumynare, who let me borrow her origin for Locus's scar.

Also on Ao3

Locus doesn’t like this city. It’s loud, cramped, and swamped with tourists. Most are civilian tourists, but others are like Locus. He sees uniforms out of the corner of his eye, recognizes the postures and scars on others. Some are on leave. Those ones tend to gather in groups.

And a few are like him. No home to go to after their tours ended, so when asked to be dropped off, they picked somewhere unlike the war. Somewhere bright and sunny and beautiful.

Hawaii had been Felix’s idea, when they had gone their separate ways. For a moment, Locus had thought that Felix was going to suggest they return to their old ways, to the bounty circuit. But Siris wasn’t interested, and without Siris, there was no reason for them to stay together. Siris had gone home, to Megan and his children. Felix had things to take care of. Locus had nothing.

So here he is, wandering the streets of a tourist trap city on an island. In the distance, a busker is playing music. It’s too cheerful, Locus feels. The crowd is obnoxious, pressing in at all sides. The streets crawl with pick pockets, but the thieves are smart enough to avoid the soldiers, let alone soldiers like Locus. One look at his scar is enough to tell people exactly what he is.

Noticing someone staring at him, he ducks his head and turns into one of the shops that line the street. Half of the wares are out on the street, while the rest are inside the building. There are small statuettes, cheaply painted and obnoxiously colored. Siris’ children might like them, Locus thinks, weighing one of them in his hand. It’s a turtle.

But then he remembers that Siris says he wants to put the life behind him, and he knows that it includes him. He places the turtle back down on the shelf and goes back out onto the street.

A group of children are on the other side of the road now. They’re loud; laughing and shouting and pushing each other good naturedly. A game is starting, but it’s not any that Locus recognizes. There’s a basketball, some chalk, and several jump ropes tied together to form one long rope.

For a moment, Locus just watches. They’re freshly out of school; many of them are still carrying their backpacks. It’s been a long time since Locus has been near children. They’re not common in a warzone, and it’s been years since he visited Siris and Megan and their children.

He turns his attention to the next store. This one is selling used books. Locus browses, looking to see if there’s anything interesting.

It’s a soldier’s habit, watching the children out of the corner of his eye. The noise ensures that he can’t quite forget them, and some older instinct makes him not want to. So he sees it the second it happens.

One of the loudest girls, wearing a bright yellow shirt, trips over something. Stumbling, she falls onto her hands and knees right in the middle of the street, in front of oncoming traffic.

Locus moves without thinking. He charges forward, grabs her by the arm, and pulls her out of the way. The car screeches to a halt, right where she had been moments before.

“Fuck!” The girl yells. Her hands and knees are scraped, and her eyes are wide with fear.

“Are you alright?” He asks. He realizes that he’s still holding her arm and drops it.

She stares up at him, and he’s struck by how young she is. For a moment, she’s perfectly still, and he wonders if she’s staring at his scar, before she bursts into tears, shaking from head to toe with the power of her sobs. Shock, he realizes.

Locus has no idea what to do. In the war, tears were to be ignored. A moment of weakness. But this isn’t war. This is a child, who could have died in the middle of a road while playing a game.

Awkwardly, he places a hand on her shoulder. “Is there…” he struggles, trying to figure out what Siris would say here. “Is there something I can do? Where are your parents?”

She shakes her head, still crying. “Can I walk you home? You need to clean those cuts.”

She manages to nod, her nose dripping. She takes one step and cries out, falling over again. Locus manages to catch her, helping her sit down.

Locus checks her ankle. “It’s sprained,” he says. “We might need to go to a hospital.”

She shakes her head. “No hospitals, Dex says,” she says, her voice shaking.

Locus nods. “Very well,” he says. He certainly knows what that’s like. It’s not his place to ask questions, but perhaps there’s something else he can do. “I… I can carry you home, if you’d rather not walk.”

She gives him a big smile, even if it wavers a bit. “Piggy back?” She asks, almost eagerly. “Cuz you’re suuuuper tall and I bet you can see forever, so it’ll be way better than Dex!”

Locus blinks, then realizes she’s recovering and resuming her natural... vivaciousness. Maybe this is more shock. But he lets her climb onto his back. She waves goodbye to her friends, who seem oddly unconcerned with her nearly dying, has Locus collect her backpack from a nearby stoop, and then they head out.

She directs him towards the worst part of town, far away from the tourist traps. Locus had wandered here the night before, half searching for a fight. He hadn’t found one then. Six foot three of former soldier is hardly a tempting target for muggers, no matter how desperate.

The house she tells him to stop at is old and kept in just good enough repair to not draw eyes or commentary.

She gives him the key out of her backpack, and he unlocks the door. The inside is exactly the same as the outside. It would be cleaner, Locus suspects, if the inhabitants had more time, but there’s an air of desperation here. They’re cutting corners, pinching pennies. As he sets the girl down on the couch, he realizes everything she’s wearing is brand new and clean, in perfect contrast to everything else. Whoever is looking after her is doing a good job.

He fetches the first aid kit from the bathroom, and sets about wrapping her ankle and cleaning the scrapes on her hands and knees. She chatters the whole time, telling him about the rules of the game they’d been playing and about how stupid tourists never looked when driving down that road anyways.

“I’m Kaikaina,” she adds, when Locus finishes putting the bright pink band aids on her palms.

“… Sam,” he barely catches himself before he says Locus.

She grins up at him. She’s so young, he thinks. So small, so trusting. She doesn’t know what he did during the war, doesn’t know anything about him.

The door was opened. “Kai! I told you to lock the door, for fuckssake—who the fuck are you?”

“Shut up, Dex,” Kaikaina yells back. “This is Sam! He helped me get home!” She stuck out her leg. “I fell,” she adds.

“Dex” is a few years older than Kaikaina. About sixteen, he thinks. Kaikaina has happily disclosed that she’s eleven.His hair is long, and his clothes are in much worse shape than hers, but they have the same face, the same eyes. He’s wearing a uniform of some kind—probably fast food. “Great, thanks, you can go now.”

“Deeeeex,” Kaikaina whines. “He saved my life! The car was totally gonna hit me, you can tell cuz the lady’s bra was halfway off and she had her hands down the guy’s pants! But Sam pulled me out of there and it’s totally fine!”

“Wait, what?” Dex says, and Locus isn’t sure if it’s in response to the detail about the driver or the discovery that his sister had nearly just died.

“It’s fine,” he says. “I should get going.”

Dex squints at him. “You’re a tourist?”

Locus shrugs. “I’m… recently discharged.” His lease is long run out back home, and his things are still in storage, but he doesn’t know if he should even think about going to get them. They feel like they belong in a life long before, a simpler life.

“Where are you staying at?” Kaikaina says.

Locus blinks. “I spent last night at the Aloha Inn.” He’s been drifting around. He alternates between single night stays in various hotels or just sleeping on the beaches. He’s been here two weeks now, trying to figure out where he’s going next.

She wrinkles her nose. “That’s a sex place!”

He frowns at her. “How old are you?”

She sticks her tongue out at him. “I know things!”

Dex stares at him for a long moment. He’s hostile, untrusting, a complete contrast to his… sister, Locus decides.

Kaikaina kicks him with her not-injured foot. “Do you want to stay for dinner?”

Locus stares at the two of them, at this house. He doubts that the two of them can afford feeding him. “I should get going,” he says.

Kaikaina pouts at him, her bottom lip trembling. “Please?”

Dex and Locus share a moment of eye contact, and Dex’s shoulders slump. “Yeah. You should… stay.”

Locus ends up sitting on the floor playing poker with Kaikaina while Dex fixes dinner. Locus quietly makes a note to leave some money in the couch when he leaves. He can afford it for now. He’s just drifting anyways. There’s nothing left for him.

Kaikaina is good at poker, and Locus loses all of the M&Ms that she’d produced from a cupboard to her faster than he’d lose money to Felix. He doesn’t complain, just helps her to the kitchen table when Dex announces that dinner is ready.

It’s simple; rice and vegetables, but it’s well made. Dex is good at cooking, clearly, even without too many ingredients or much time. There’s no sign of any plate for a parent, or expectation of one. The house is clearly set up for two people, but Dex is also clearly too young to be legally looking after Kaikaina by himself.

Even just letting him be here is a risk for these two, Locus realizes. His presence threatens everything. Kaikaina might not realize it, but Dex certainly does. No wonder he doesn’t want Locus here.

“How long were you in the army?” Dex asks, trying to look tough while he cuts up his vegetables. He’s evaluating him, Locus recognizes. Fishing for information, trying to see who it is that he’s  allowed into his house and to be near his sister.

Locus frowns, and tries to do the math. “… nine years,” he says. Seven, technically, but there were also those years he had been with Felix and Siris, also years stained in blood.

Dex frowns at him. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-eight,” Locus says.

“And you just got out?”

“Two weeks ago.”

“Where’d you get that scar?” Kaikaina asks. “It looks really cool.”

They hold him down, their language strange and scraping to his ears as they rip off his helmet. They’re laughing at him, but they’re also furious at him. He killed three of them before they caught him, this is payback as much as business.

One of them activates a plasma sword and presses it against his face. They’re playing with their food, drawing out his death.

The plasma cuts into his skin, burning as it cuts, and Sam can’t stop the scream of pain they rip from his throat as they cut the two intersecting lines down the center of his face in a mockery of his helmet.

“Sam? Sam!”

Locus shakes himself out of his reverie. He tries to judge how long he’d been quiet and still, lost in the memory. At least it was a quiet one. He can’t imagine Dex would be looking at him in concern if he had lashed out.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I should go.” He gets to his feet, shame burning through him. It was foolish of him to try to pretend to be ordinary, even just for these few moments. He is far too broken to be near children. Siris had the right of it.

“Do you still have your room at the Aloha?” Dex asks.

Sam shakes his head, too tired to lie.

Kai frowns. “It’s way too late to get a room for the night,” she says. “You can’t just leave!” Her eyes are wide and watering, but Locus refuses to fall for this a second time. They were lucky that his mind only wandered. He’s seen the bruises on Felix after his worse episodes. He refuses to hurt these two.

“I’ll be fine,” he says.

Kai turns to Dex immediately. “Dex,” she says urgently, tugging on his sleeve. “Deeeeeex.”

“You should stay,” Dex says abruptly. “We’ll make up the couch for you.”

Locus shakes his head. “I’ve… imposed on you long enough.” He bolts for the door, and neither of them are fast enough to stop him. They’re children, while he is a soldier. A machine, made to kill, and nothing more.

But now he’s not, but he still doesn’t fit, not anywhere, but especially not in that small house with the two of them.

It’s only when he is settling down for the night, on the soft white sands of one of the beaches about a mile from the small house, that he realizes he forgot to leave money.

Grif knows that Sam is still around, even if he doesn’t see him. Someone left groceries on the porch, and it certainly wasn’t Mom. And some days, when Grif is walking too or from work, he feels like somebody is watching him. Kai says the same thing.

He knows some soldiers come home fucked up—Mom’s said some things. And some of her boyfriends were like that. They weren’t the worst of her boyfriends, but some of them were pretty bad. But he doesn’t know what to do about Sam. Kai really likes the guy, and well… Grif guesses that he’s not all that bad. He’s pretty quiet, and anyone who likes Kai and saves her from a car can’t be completely terrible.

Things are tight this week though, so he can’t exactly complain about the groceries. He’s not sure how a guy who’s sleeping at shitty motels or on park benches (he’s asked around; a guy like Sam tends to stick out) can afford groceries like that, but Grif doesn’t ask.

Kai is the one to find him. He looks worse than he did last time they saw him; he’s got a traces of a beard now, and he looks just a little dirtier and less put together. He’s wearing the same clothes, too, which Grif counts as points for his “homeless” theory.

Kai’s already made up the couch for Sam, and Grif doesn’t say anything, just nods at Sam and goes to start dinner.

Sam spends the evening playing cards with Kai again, and the night on the couch. He screams at night, but luckily Kai sleeps right through it.

But when they wake up the next morning, Sam is gone. The couch is neatly made, and there’s signs that he used their shower. There’s money on the counter too—not much, but Grif puts it in the jar anyways, because every penny counts. Kai cries, and Grif resolves that next time he sees Sam, he’ll punch him.

Sam shows up that night though, in new clothes and cleanly shaven, and wordlessly hands Grif a container of takeout from one of the better places in town.

Grif doesn’t know what to make of Sam. He always is gone in the mornings, but he’s always there for dinner. He puts money in the jar, and it’s starting to drive Grif crazy, because this isn’t supposed to have lasted this long. He’s a tourist. He’s supposed to go home.

But Sam doesn’t ever talk about going to the mainland, or even another island, or going back to space. He never takes money out of the jar, just puts it in.

Nobody stays this long; not Dad, not Mom, not any of Mom’s boyfriends. He wants something, clearly, but Grif can’t figure out what it is. He doesn’t look at Kai (or Grif, for that matter) in the weird, creepy way some of Mom’s boyfriends have. He’s never hurt them or stolen anything from the house (Grif’s checked).

It’s too good to be true, and Grif knows this even more surely after the day he catches Sam driving away those kids who had been picking on Kai. Something in Grif has to relax, just slightly at that. Sure, he’s not going to stick around, but at least he knows that Sam won’t let anything happen to Kai.

But Sam isn’t getting anything out of this. There’s nothing in this for him. There’s no reason at all why he would care, let alone stick around.

So one day when Kai’s at a friend’s for a sleepover, and Sam has shown up with a paper bag full of fresh fruit (he works at a green grocers now, Grif’s finally figured this out, that’s where the money and the food are always coming from), Grif snaps.

“What do you want?” Grif demands.

Sam stares at him, confused. “I… I don’t understand.”

“You want something!” Grif says, pointing at him. “You keep… you act like you care but we both know you’re going to take off to do something else, because there’s no way you’re staying here forever!”

Sam looks perplexed. “Do you want me to leave?”

“I—it doesn’t matter!” Grif snaps.

Sam shrugs. “I don’t want anything,” he says, and he sounds the way he does when he talks about the war.

“Great, then when do you leave? Because Kai’s getting attached, do you have any idea how much she’s going to cry when you leave?” It’ll be worse than the last time Mom left, Grif’s sure of it. Kai’s used to Mom leaving by now. Sam has stayed for two months now, and it’s going to break her heart.

“I don’t have anywhere else to go,” Sam says. “I... like it. Here.”

Grif stares at him for a long, long time.

“You’re,” Sam clears his throat. “You’re skipping school.”

“We need the money,” Grif says automatically.

But it’s not true, not anymore. Sam’s paycheck… helps. A lot. Grif could probably afford to not take the hours during the school day anymore.

“You’ll leave soon enough,” he scoffs. “We’ll need the money.”

Sam doesn’t protest, so Grif feels pretty justified.

“You need to go to school,” Sam insists. “School—school is important.”

“It’s not like I’m good at it,” Grif rolls his eyes. He turns around, expecting the conversation to be over. Sam brought hotdogs home the other day, and they’re the kind that Kai can’t stand. That’ll be good enough for the two of them.

“How about a deal?” Sam asks instead. Grif stops up short.

He squints at Sam. “What kind of deal?” A thousand scenarios run through his head, and the bad ones all make Grif freeze up, because Sam is big, and Grif can’t make him leave if they need to get rid of him.

“You don’t skip school as long as I’m here,” Sam says. “When I leave, you can start again.”

That’s... unexpected. But he pauses, thinking about it. It might be nice not to have to be on his feet all day as well as after school. And... he likes school okay. Even if he’s not great at it.

Grif rolls his eyes. “Fine,” he says. “I guess a few weeks of school won’t kill me.”