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tediousdelusion · 2 years ago

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1, 3, and 17 for the writers asks? 🖤

Ooooooh, thank you, thank you! I love ask games :) Most of this is under the cut because... I have never met concision.

1.) What font I use depends on what I am writing and whether it is for fun or for work. Most of my work/academic projects have to be in Times New Roman, and so I tend to use it from the jump, so that I know where I am re: page counts. But for creative/low stakes projects, I don’t care and will typically use the default font. This bleeds into 3, but a lot of my indifference comes from the fact that I write a lot in notes apps because I like to have something that syncs between my phone and my laptop and that lets me work without a constantly updating word count (to keep me from worrying about it too much).

3.) Oooh, okay. I don’t know if this question means “ritual” as in a ritual for each writing session or ritual for the entire writing process, but I’ll try and hit each because... well, I’m pretty sure they are both cursed, haha.

Overall process:

- Get a Big Idea about what I want to write. This is usually very vague and leans on a theme or unresolved question. E.g., how can I resolve X and Y contradictory ideas? How can I realistically get tragic character to happy ending? What would legacy mean to this character?

- Receive incredibly detailed vision of a single scene from the muses. Often, but not always, the opening scene. Write this down.

- Think on where I want to end up with the characters, enough that I have some sense of how to answer the original question/theme. This is the ending point for the work and, once I have it, I go in and try to outline what needs to happen to get there.

- Write individual scenes, usually following the outline. If I have a really good understanding of how I want the work to go, I can write them in any order/order of interest or inspiration. If I have a more loose understanding of the work, then I try to go more or less in chronological order, so that I don’t contradict myself or mess up the character arcs.

- Edit. This can either be just fixing grammar errors or it can involve reworking and reordering entire scenes.

- Post!

Cursed because: 1) My outlines are really vague with single sentence descriptions for entire scenes and so if I put down a WIP and come back to it it’s like trying to do a puzzle with only half the pieces. 2) I have no idea how long it will take and so your guess is as good as mine as to when I will post next. I cannot write chapters weekly. The best I can do is edit things that are prewritten.

Individual writing session:

- Wonder around or do something else while thinking about the WIP or idea. A lot of my ideas are just like, idly floating around in my brain all day while I go do actual work.

- Figure out how I want a scene or piece of dialogue to go.

- Write down anything specific immediately, if struck by inspiration. For this reason, I do a lot of writing in the notes app because if I am out on a walk and I think of a line I like, I just write it down.

- Take time to actually sit down and write what I have in mind. I don’t edit during a first draft and if I get stuck, I take a quick pause.

Cursed because: 1) I’m using the notes app like a word processor, which I know it is not. And if the work gets too long/complicated, I have to switch it over to a Real Word Processor. 2) I don’t necessarily listen to music, though I am usually always listening to music. But I don’t have a dedicated writing playlist. I don’t even always listen to something that relates to the piece. 3) The amount of research that goes into any of this is wildly inconsistent and varies based on my mood.

17.) Okay. I will refrain from writing a literal book because this is already long, but I will add in some Lore(TM) from the two WIPS I have going right now.

Untitled Steddy Hands WIP

Probably not a huge shocker that the messy throuple dynamics got me... But this one is essentially an unofficial sequel to a series of inspired follies that follows Izzy (and the rest of the Revenge crew) after the Ed/Stede reunion. Essentially, Izzy wants to leave post-Stede reunion but stays because, rightly or wrongly, he thinks that they need someone on board who won’t hesitate to kill. Cue Izzy moping around on the Revenge and (reluctantly) starting to bond with the crew. Until Stede ends up killing for Izzy and sending Izzy into a bit of a crisis. (There was an excellent post that first gave me this idea, but I can’t find it right now...)

A lot of what will be left out or left to implication focuses on the Kraken era and reunion. I don’t know if I have a completely definitive narrative outlined for this, but I imagine that the Kraken era was really bad - to the point where Izzy knows that things are fucked, and that he has a lot of internal conflict around Stede’s return. And Stede has spent some time on his own and so he is mildly more capable than where we leave him at the end of S1. Lucius’ survival will likely be handwaved, but this is probably an “alive in the walls” situation pre start of the fic.

This will make it in, haha, but I am currently rather enamored with this exchange:

"Well, then," Bonnet says, gesturing broadly to the space in front of them. "Lead on, MacDuff." Izzy rolls his eyes, but steps forward all the same. "That's not the line." He doesn't look back as he ducks through the doorway to the masthead, but he can imagine the way that Bonnet’s expression must pinch as he calls back, just a step behind. "I'm sorry?" "That's not the fucking line." Izzy steps up and leans forward on the rail, shifting to favor his uninjured arm. "It's 'lay on, MacDuff,' not 'lead on.'" At Bonnet’s continued puzzlement, he adds. "McBeth is baiting him into a fight, not asking for directions." "I didn't know you read Shakespeare." "You didn't ask."

as they kiss consume (working title)

This is my endless Black Sails WIP, haha. I know where it’s going, I am just incredibly, unbelievably slow in actually writing it. (I think part of it is that it requires walking around in Silver’s mind and he is constantly trying to evict me...) The short version is that it’s an alt. version of S3 where Miranda lives, following alternating viewpoints. Through a long series of events, Thomas and Vane are stuck on the plantation together while Silver, Flint, and Miranda are in Nassau as Woodes Rogers arrives.

A couple Lore Thoughts about it are:

- Thomas often references classic literature and he has a Cassandra-like-quality to him in that characters tend to follow the role of whatever comparison he first makes for them. (E.g., Vane as Sampson)

- I have a London era anecdote that probably won’t make it. I saw a cute old comic about a husband finding out about his wife’s lover because the lover tied her stays with a different knot than he had in the morning and... anyway, I think that Flint flirted with London-era Thomas by tying Miranda’s stays with increasingly complicated knots during their affaire.

Sorry this is so long!!!

#asked and answered #my wips #long post #i dont know when to shut up #and i will not change

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ficsilike-reblogged · 4 years ago

Text

Sunshine City: Five

A/N: We have reached the end, my loves. Thank you for coming along on this little journey with me. Thank you for all the wonderful comments, likes, and reblogs. I owe you my heart.

Pairing: Agent Whiskey x F!Reader (No Y/N)

Word Count: 5.5k

Rating For This Chapter: NC-17 for Whiskey being Whiskey and putting his moustache to good use (female-receiving oral), penetrative unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it, loves), just a whole bunch of mush because I love a sappy happy ending.

Catch up previous chapters here!

Perhaps learning that it was Agent Moonshine that had set them up shouldn’t have been a surprise. How many times had Jack “taught Moonshine a lesson” about manners—both in and out of the field? Moonshine had apparently been burning for some more-permanent payback and thought getting rid of Jack in the field would regain some of his honor.

Whatever.

Both Moonshine and Alice had disappeared into Statesmen’s holding cells about six months ago and Champ dealt with them. She didn’t ask what happened and she didn’t want to know. All she cared about was that Jack was okay and she knew what it felt like to have Jack’s arms wrapped around her without the confines of the mission and she knew that he liked to smile before he pressed his lips to hers.

She loved how he kissed. Loved how he held her tight like she was something—someone to be treasured. Loved how he always tried to make her smile even when they were thousands of miles apart or if he had managed to sequester her alone in some room of the Kingsman headquarters, or in her townhouse—or even that one time when he’d managed to get her alone in Champ’s office last week when she was needed stateside for a mission. He stole a kiss then, too, feeling like mischievous teenagers hiding from too-strict parents.

It was…good.

Better than good, actually. It was all much too sappy to say out loud but she felt happier than she had in a long time. Like she had shed some sort of heavy coat made of metal and wool and she could move and breathe without restraint. She would never tell Whiskey—his ego was already insatiable—and she had a feeling he might have an inkling he knew how she felt.

“I’ve never seen you smile like that, Sunshine. Do it again.” As she thought: insatiable. And it felt like they had readily settled into some idyllic relationship that a person could only dream of having. They spoke as often as they could, about anything and everything—Jack even told her about the discussions he had with his therapist and she spoke about the nightmares that sometimes plagued her in the dark. They bickered, of course—they were human, but it was usually few and far between and over trivial things (like which agency had the best tech or Bela’s favorite movie) and over before they really began. It was good. But at the moment, she had just finished a mission in Singapore and expected to hear her phone ring with Jack’s Skype call. They kept tabs on each other’s missions and always called one another when they came home. Bela zoomed down the staircase and leapt on his little legs into her outstretched arms. Her dog-sitter, a Kingsman technician, happily reported Bela behaved himself while she was away before saying goodnight. She pressed a few kisses to Bela’s fur and locked up the doors and windows before pulling her phone from her pocket, ignoring her suitcase for a bit longer. Bela settled on her lap as she pulled up the app and was just about to dial Jack’s number when Ginger’s face appeared on her screen with an incoming call. Ginger was back stateside to assist Statesmen with some sort of kidnapping ring and had been giving Sunny updates every few days. She answered it quickly. “Hey! I’m about to-” “Jack’s been shot.” “What-” “Let me finish,” Ginger said in her usual calming tone. “He’s going to be fine. But he wanted me to tell you that he’s sorry he couldn’t make your usual call.” Ginger’s lips picked up in a small smile, probably trying not to laugh at her fellow agent’s mortified expression. “For a pair of agents, you two are very bad at keeping your relationship a secret.” And then Ginger did laugh. “He’ll call when he’s cleared by medical. Okay?” She pushed out a breath and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.” “He’s fine, Cap. I promise,” Ginger said, old moniker slipping by her lips. A few more words of encouragement were given, mission details were traded, and eventually they hung up. Her appetite gone, she eventually wandered upstairs to her bedroom and simply stared at the ceiling. Bela was asleep on her chest, giving her a little comfort. And she knew Statesmen had some of the best medical team and technology available. She knew Jack would be fine. But it still… hurt. Worry bit at her bones and pressed at her already-buzzing mind. There would be no sleep tonight.

Whiskey did not like the smell of the medical wing. He did not like the bright white lights. He did not like the stupid paper gown they insisted he wear after sewing him back up. And he definitely didn’t like watching Champ settle into the chair next to his bed with a frown.

“Ain’t you supposed to be the one leadin’ the charge, Whiskey? Grenadine said you were distracted-”

“I was fine, Champ. I had it handled-”

“You’re in the medical wing. Did you forget that? Or did you hit your head, too?”

Whiskey felt his lip start to curl in a snarl. “My head’s fine and you know it.”

Champ’s frown deepened before he let out a sigh, pulling out a silver flask from his blazer jacket. He grabbed two of the small plastic cups from the bedside table, usually meant to hold medications, and poured two shots of amber-colored liquid. He slid one toward Jack before quickly downing his and putting away his flask. “You’re a good agent, Jack. A fine Statesman.”

Jack quickly grabbed the offered shot and drank it, knowing no conversation that started with compliments like that was ever good.

“But you want more than that.”

“Champ-”

“I’m old. Older than you and I’ve worked my entire life to save the world and the people in it—usually from themselves. And I got squat to show for it outside my big office and nice car. But you-” he pointed a finger, “-you have a chance at something real. Another chance. Those don’t come around every day. And you two have been tip-toein’ around each other for years.”

And, for a moment, Jack Daniels didn’t have a word to say. It was embarrassing to realize that everyone seemed to know they had moved past the fellow-agent relationship. But it was also strangely calming to know that people beside him and his Sunshine wanted them to be happy—together.

“You’ve saved the world enough. I know you’ve been thinkin’ about retiring anyway.”

“I-”

“Give it a little more thought. Visit your lady, yeah?” Champ said as he stood and patted his chest. “Take the next week off. I’ll have Grenadine handle the debrief.”

“Champ-”

But he was already out the door.

She wiped at her eyes, trying to press a bit of exhaustion out of her head with limited success. But Harry had accepted her debrief and then let her go for the rest of the day. “

Mordred, you’ve nearly fallen asleep twice just sitting here. Go home.”

Not her finest moment but she wasn’t going to say no to a nap. Maybe if she was asleep she could ignore that she still hadn’t heard from Jack. Ginger did say he would be fine but it still didn’t sit right with her and-

“Hey, Sunshine.”

She dropped her keys.

There he was, posted up against the side of her house, one foot kicked up behind him on the white-washed wall with his stupid Stetson pulled low over his eyes. She leapt at him and pulled him close, sagging into his grip as he wrapped his arms around her. He was so warm and wonderful and here. His familiar, expensive cologne touched her nose as she breathed him in, laughing at how he pressed his lips against her neck, mustache tickling her skin.

“You’re here,” she said as she pulled back.

He stole a quick kiss with another smile. “I am. Champ gave me some time off. I guess I should get shot more often.”

She quickly grabbed at his face. “No. That’s not funny-”

He kissed her again, smiling against her frowning mouth. “Are you going to invite me in or do I have to hang outside your door like a lost tomcat?” Jack bent and scooped up her keys and pressed them into her hand.

“You drive a hard bargain.” She slipped from his grasp and moved toward the door, undoing the three locks and stepping inside, Jack right on her heels. She closed the door behind him, only just noticing the small bag slung over his shoulder before he kissed her again. She would never get tired of kissing him.

But now was the first time in six months since she was alone with him—six months since Edinburgh. Six months of only stealing kisses and wandering hands when others were around and not having a moment truly to themselves. But work came first. Saving the world wouldn’t stop because she wanted to kiss him and hear his laugh.

And she really loved the sound of his laugh.

But then she yawned right in his face when he broke away from her lips to breathe.

“Now, Sunshine, you truly know how to cut a man to the quick.”

She laughed and leaned her forehead against his chest. “I’m so sorry. I got no sleep last night.”

Jack wound his arms around her and pulled her tight again, uncaring that they were still right beside her front door, barely a few steps inside. “And why not?”

“Ginger told me what happened and then you didn’t call. I was worried.” Her hands found purchase on his shoulders, thumbs rubbing against the buttery soft leather of his jacket. “Stupid in our line of work, right?” Her laugh was soft but sharp with self-deprecation. And she knew it was stupid. Knew that her line of work that nothing really was promised. That her time with Jack, no matter how much it made her smile, was never guaranteed.

“I never meant to-”

“It isn’t you, Jack. It is just… me, I guess. I think I worry too much.” She stepped back as she yawned again. “Sorry, jeez.”

But Jack just smiled. “Tell you what, Sunny. I’m here all week. I’ll let you worry about me all you want.”

“A week? Jack, you know I want to but I have to wor-”

Her phone chirped.

“Shit, sorry.” She pulled her phone from her pocket and frowned when she saw the message. It was from Roxy and it simply said;

Have fun! See you on Monday. ;)

It took a moment, but if finally dawned on her what it meant and she tossed her phone onto her couch with a smile. “It seems that I’m not expected back in the office until Monday.”

Jack let out a holler and all but started to drag her toward the staircase. She had to slap his hands away to lock her door before she let him grab at her sides and strong-arm her upstairs. Her laughter finally woke Bela from his mid-morning nap and he poked his head out of the guest room to let out an indignant huff at their noise before retreating again. Jack knew where her bedroom was, having been there for a total of ten minutes after Scotland, and he basically dragged her inside and plopped her onto her overstuffed mattress, rumpling the blankets immediately. And she happily let him crawl over her and pressed her down into the welcoming softness as he shucked his shoes and jacket. Hers soon followed with fumbling limbs and they both laughed as Jack continued to kiss her lips, her cheek, her nose, her neck—anywhere he could place his lips was quickly kissed.

She let him pull his shirt off and divest her of her own and they both scrambled with their jeans and trousers before falling back against the pillows in a pair of matching, tired huffs. Maybe she should have been a little more demure about this casual near-nakedness—it was the first time they’d bared this much skin with each other—but all she felt was comfort when he looked at her. Some beautiful, gentle warmth bloomed in her chest as she looked at him.

Jack leaned forward to press a slow kiss against her lips as one of his hands landed on her hip, thumb tracing the lacy edge of her panties.

And she might have let him continue—let herself finally know what it was like to be touched by him in that way—but she yawned again and her eyes caught the fresh scar on his shoulder. Her fingers brushed against it, feeling how the skin was raised and twisted, something even Statesmen’s tech couldn’t stop with some injuries.

Jack’s hand stilled on her hip. “I’m okay, Sunshine. I’m right here with you.” But then he touched the mark across her stomach, the one she’d gained from their time in Italy. His fingers trailed to the scar on her chest and then down to another zig-zagging twist of puckered skin on her side. She shivered at the contact, nerves alight. “And you’re with me, yeah?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m with you.”

“Good.” He smiled, soft and tired-eyed. “Let’s get some sleep.” He reached back and managed to pull her sheets and blankets down enough for them to slide underneath and then slid an arm under her shoulders so he could bring her to his side as she closed her eyes. And she fell asleep to the quiet beat of his heart.

She found Jack liked Hyde Park, free museums, and having tea. “It ain’t sweet tea, Sunshine. But it’ll do.”

And he never pressed her for more than a few heated kisses and she never swatted at his wandering hands, even when they seemed to always gravitate toward her ass when they were alone—he did have the sensibility to keep them above the waist when they were outside her house.

Again, she was struck with how easy and domestic it all ways. No one was shooting at them. No one was trying to poison them or use them for information. All they wanted from each other was each other.

It was just her and Jack and Bela and the occasional autumn rain sliding against the windows. And she let herself believe that her life could be like this—simple and fulfilling and quiet. They both had enough money in the bank to live very comfortably if they both wanted to leave—but she was definitely getting ahead of herself. In the grand scheme of things, she didn’t even know if Jack wanted that. What if he wanted to live out the rest of his life as a Statesmen, retirement be damned? Did she want to be in Kingsman for the rest of her life? Those thoughts didn’t stop her from realizing that her house finally felt like a home when he was inside it.

But when Jack’s lips found her neck as she finished drying the last pan from breakfast and his still-damp-from-the-washing hands wrapped around her waist, wetting her pajama shirt, all thoughts disappeared. All there was—was Jack.

“What are you up to?” She asked with a smile, turning in his grip to wrap her arms around his neck. His hair was still mussed from sleep and he had on only his boxers and a t-shirt, but he was handsome—so handsome in the low morning glow.

He didn’t answer but grabbed at his phone on the countertop and pulled up an app behind her back and soon Johnny Cash’s voice started to croon over the small speaker and flood the kitchen. She instantly recognized the tune and had to laugh. “Really, Jack?”

“You are my sunshine, my only sunshine,” he sang along, letting his fingers trail along until one of his hands was wrapped around her waist and the other was holding her hand against his chest.

She grasped his shoulder and let him lead her in a swaying, mellow version of a dance as the sunlight trickled through her kitchen window and painted everything in a hazy yellow while the air still smelled of sticky syrup and pancakes.

“You’ll never know, dear, how much I love you,” he sang, slightly off-key, the words muffled into her cheek, but they made her heart leap all the same. “Please don’t take my sunshine away.”

“This is a sad song, you know,” she said without making a move to change it.

“Yeah, I know,” he replied. And he sounded sad, too.

And that just about did her in. Well, that and the fact that he was set to be back in New York tomorrow. She pulled out of his grasp and grabbed at his phone, switching to another song with a forced smile. But the smile became real when he laughed at her choice, low and rumbling in his chest.

“Dolly and Kenny?”

“This song is a classic!” She argued, letting him pull her close again and she tried to follow him in an abbreviated two-step jaunt that had her laughing and pressing a kiss to his perfect, single dimple. But the song eventually ended, fading into another and then another. And their steps slowed too, once again simply swaying on her cool tile floor. “I don’t want you to be sad—not with me.”

His next breath was slow but his grip tightened. “I think you make me the happiest I’ve ever been, Sunshine.”

“You make me happy, too.” She turned, murmuring the words into his chest like a secret, like if she said it too loudly it would be used as a weapon. “We really wasted a lot of time, didn’t we?”

“But we turned up exactly where we’re supposed to be.” He turned to press a kiss to the top of her head. “You know I love you, right?”

And her heart sprouted wings in her chest while the smile splitting her face almost hurt. “Yeah.” She turned her head just enough to look up at him, seeing him already looking down at her. “I love you, too.”

Easy. It was so easy. And they continued to sway to the music even as he turned his head just enough to catch her lips again in a kiss that so sweetly stole the breath from her lungs. Her lips were slick and tender from his ministrations but it was an ache she would gladly live with, especially when he gently grasped her face in his hands to angle her face just-so, leading the kiss until she was unmoving in his hold. Her hands circled his wrists and she sighed against his mouth. A different kind of heat was starting to curl in her stomach like perfumed smoke that left her whining when Whiskey pulled back to breathe.

“You look so pretty like this, darlin’. I’ve never seen you look like this before.”

“Like what?” Her voice was hoarse.

“Like you want me to eat you alive.”

Her heart stuttered in her chest at the dark, hungry look in his eyes. Heat took root in her stomach, clenching her muscles and her hands unconsciously fisting the soft material of his shirt. “Oh.” She swallowed the dry lump in her throat. “You…you want to?”

And he laughed and kissed her again—god, she could never get enough of his lips. “You gonna let me?” His warm hands slid down to grab at her hips and he tugged her a little closer. “Huh? You gonna let Jack eat that pretty-”

Her hand pressed against his mouth as she bit back a laugh. “Don’t refer to yourself in the third person if you want to get anywhere near me.” And then she felt him smile against her fingers. “I mean it.” The words were stilted with her laugh which only grew when she felt his lips pucker so he could kiss her fingers.

He reached up to gently remove her hand, the hungry look in his eyes now sparkling with a bit of mischief. “You drive a hard bargain.” His fingers tangled with hers and started to tug her toward her staircase. “But I accept.”

The pair was quiet as they retreated to sun-soaked haven of her bedroom. Warm hands slipped beneath her shirt and dragged it up to just beneath her breasts but then stalled, a quiet question in his eyes that was quickly answered with a swift nod. He pulled her shirt up and over her head and tossed it aside—his shirt quickly followed. He moved to brush a kiss against the scar over her chest as his palm settled over the scar on her stomach, like he was trying to wipe it away. She reached out to cradle his face and pulled him up, smiling against his mouth as he sighed.

“I’m here,” she said as she stretched to brush against the faded scar at his temple. “We’re just fine.” Her skilled fingers curled under the elastic band of his boxers and shucked them down his legs before he shuffled her backward. Her knees hit her bed and he pushed her back to make her bounce on the mattress. It was then that she allowed herself to truly admire him—strong legs and chest, a little soft around the middle, but still very capable. She found herself licking her licks—a little unconsciously—as she eyed his cock as it curved up toward his stomach. “Are you just going to stare?”

“Well, you are such a pretty picture.” But he climbed over her anyway, mouth slanting over hers with a passion and curl of his tongue that had her moaning and delighting in how he almost shivered under her hands as they trailed down his chest. He pulled away from her mouth to let out a groan of his own when her warm hand encircled his hard cock and squeezed. “Don’t be cruel, Sunny. I want to get to the main event before I make a mess.” Jack shuffled back, pressing wet kisses against her throat, her chest, her stomach, before he huffed out a long breath against her sleep shorts and it was her turn to shiver. He slowly pulled them down her legs and he pressed a kiss against the lace of her underwear before he pulled those down, too, tossing them over his shoulder. “So pretty for me,” he murmured, mostly to himself as his hands around her legs to pull her open, exposing her to the warm air of the room and his greedy gaze.

She curled her fingers into his thick hair as he dragged his nose along her folds, breathing her in. He had barely begun and she already felt like she was floating, held down to the bed just by his strong hands on her thighs. His tongue finally—finally parted his beautiful lips and he licked, strong and firm.

And she keened, hips lifting from the bed only to be pulled back down by his unyielding grip. And the bastard had the audacity to laugh and glanced up at her, mustache wet and glistening in the low light.

“Be good, darlin’. I wanna treat you real nice.”

“If you don’t finish-” The next words stalled in her throat as he licked another firm stripe before sucking her clit between his smiling lips. “Fuck!”

And then he truly began—a ravenous mix of tongue and plush lips moving against her and stealing any sort of coherent thought she might have had. He didn’t stop when she thrashed in his grip with her first. Didn’t stop when she tugged on his hair with the second. Didn’t stop when she wailed and panted and pleaded for a bit of a reprieve as the third started to crest and the damp spot beneath her legs continued to grow. But he let it build, continued to let her writhe under his hands until he was drinking her down like ambrosia again.

“J-Jack, please! Enough,” she begged, tugging on his disheveled hair. Her sigh was a little broken in her throat when he finally raised his head, smile glistening. He was such a pretty sight, bracketed between her thighs. A shiver shot down her spine as he pressed a kiss to her hip. “You… are something else, Jack.”

He chuckled and pressed another sticky kiss to her other hip. “I’ve been wanting to know what you tasted like for years, Sunshine.”

She slid her hands down to frame his face, letting her thumb brush against the edge of his mustache letting just a bit of slick coat her thumb before bringing it up to her mouth and sucking. His mouth dropped and a guttural groan pushed passed his shining lips as he watched. The sharp tang of herself was lost to her as he suddenly reared back onto his knees and he climbed over her, legs pushing against hers to spread her wide and hands dropping to either side of her head on the rumpled blankets. The feel of him pressing against the crux of her thighs made her moan, soft and breathy as he loomed above.

“I never thought you’d be a tease.”

“I just wanted to know what the fuss was about,” she shot back, fighting a smile, but it bloomed just as Jack’s did and he laughed before pressing a kiss to her lips and she tasted herself again.

He dropped to his elbows so he could gently cradle her face. “You got one more in ya? Just about did me in like a teenager.”

She laughed and let her hands pull through his hair again. “I think I can try, for you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I wanna know what the fuss is about,” she repeated, smiling into his lips as he bent down to kiss her again with a laugh of his own.

“Be kind to me, darlin’. I’m half-cocked already, finger on the trigger.”

“Oh?” She wiggled her hips and tried to bite back a smile when his eyes fluttered shut as she let herself glide against him. “I think you’re more than half-cocked.”

His hands suddenly grasped at her cheeks and he stole the breath from her lung with a vicious sort of ease despite the smile she still felt him pressing against her mouth. “Mean, baby.”

One hand slipped down and her entire body jolted as she felt him push the tip of his cock up and down, up and down along her folds before catching against her opening. Then, in one slow, delicious push, he slid inside. Her entire body seemed to catch fire as he bottomed out, curls at the base of him scratching against her skin. The stretch burned but she didn’t care—she didn’t care because he was there. Her Jack. And she was so deliciously full. Her hands scrambled to grab at his shoulders again and she barely managed to sigh out a heated “move” before he slipped his arms around her back and was dragging in and out with a slow, harsh thrust that had her choking on every breath while he pinned her down. Every sense was Jack—touch, taste, sound, sight, smell. All of it was him.

And that was sending her careening toward another orgasm at an embarrassingly quick pace. To finally have Jack, the man she’d been in love with for years, made it all the more terrifyingly lovely and erotic.

“You feel like heaven,” he grunted. “Tight, beautiful heaven.”

“Oh please,” she breathed, shaking hands reaching down his back, feeling his muscles flex as he continued to thrust. “Please.”

“I wanna feel ya, Sunshine. Wanna feel ya gush for me. Can you do that?” His slow drag continued and he buried his face into her sweat-slick neck, tongue sliding against her pulse.

“I want to feel you too, Jack.” Somehow she managed to find the words she needed through her buzzing mind. “Give it to me. It’s okay.”

He pulled one of his arms from around her back and slipped it between their tightly bound bodies, finding her clit like he had done it thousands of times and rubbed quick, firm circles that had her crying out and turning her head to kiss him, catching his jaw with her lips. “You first, Sunshine.”

And she erupted, one more time, shaking and shuddering in his grasp as white light flashed behind her eyes. But then she heard Jack’s beautiful, broken groan as his hips stilled, flush against hers, and warmth flooded as he gave a few small thrusts, chasing the last bits of his high. Her lips pressed against his neck, his cheek, finally finding his panting mouth. Her fingers traced his spine as they both tried to catch their breaths, bodies still reeling from the aftershocks. The afterglow was quiet and warm and perfect—sticky, syrupy, sweet. When Jack went to pull away, she tightened her grip on his back the slightest bit, uncaring of the slick she felt trickling down to puddle beneath them. “Stay a little bit. I like how you feel.”

His breath was warm against her skin, smelling of syrup and mint. “I’ll stay as long as you want.”

“Call me when you land.”

“It’ll be late-”

“I’ll be awake. Just call.” She tried to press a smile to her lips but she was sure it looked withered. With all the years of subterfuge and espionage she had under her belt, it still seemed like she now couldn’t lie with him. Maybe her heart just couldn’t take it anymore. It refused to go back to pulling into frowns or impassivity.

Jack brushed his lips against hers with a sigh. “I’ll call. I promise.”

She sucked in a breath as her hands pressed against his chest, feeling his warmth and steady heartbeat. “I kinda got used to having you all to myself, Whiskey.”

And then he was quiet, face pulled tight, before he wrapped his arms around her. He pulled her close and pressed a kiss against her forehead. “Let me see what I can do, Sunshine.”

“Jack-”

“Because I got used to being able to kiss you whenever I wanted. I got used to saying I love you whenever I wanted—”

“We just started saying that yesterday,” she grumbled, half-pleased, half-despondent.

“I got used to being able to kiss you any time I felt like it.” And then he stole another kiss. “But I’ll be back soon.”

“Promise?” She whispered.

“I promise that I’m very hard to get rid of.”

She liked the sound of that.

Two years later:

“Bela! No!” The corgi had stolen a piece of toast from the counter—how did he even get up there?—and tried to scamper away with the large treat.

Jack had been planning for weeks. His Sunshine had taken an assignment in Prague alongside Ginger Percival and Lancelot and was due back home in just a handful of minutes. He wanted everything perfect. The perfect flowers, the perfect music, the perfect meal (breakfast for dinner was a favorite of hers).

Perfect—until the dog stole a piece of toast.

It had been a year and a half since he had stepped back from Statesman, becoming a consultant for more complicated missions and only stepping into the field for end-of-the-world scenarios. He had shown up on his Sunny’s doorstep with a bag in hand and she had welcomed him inside without blinking.

She was…she was everything. His love. His second chance. His Sunny, filling every part of his scarred heart with warmth like sunlight sparkling on a skyscraper, sending beams of light into every dark corner and alley.

And living with her? It was so easy. His own slice of paradise on this wretched earth. They were a family—him, her, the dog. But he had definitely wanted more and he knew she did, too—they’d talked about it during more than a handful late-night phone calls and when they were wrapped up in each other under her soft blankets. And maybe they could have that. Maybe they could have a little more of this beautiful paradise.

He heard the door open and Sunny greeted Bela. “Hi, baby. Where’d you get toast?” She walked into the kitchen, carrying the corgi who was still chewing on the pilfered toast with his tiny, sharp teeth. She smiled as she looked at him and quickly pressed a slow, soft kiss to his mouth. “Hi, handsome.”

“Welcome home, Sunshine.”

She bent to set Bela on the ground and then gave him another kiss before looking around at the kitchen, seeing the spread of food and the large bouquet of her favorite flowers. “I will never get tired of coming home to you.” She plucked a piece of toast from the plate and took a bite and he watched as she smiled with crumbs on her lips.

For a moment—just a moment—the small box tucked in his back pocket could wait. He wanted to look at her a little longer.

A/N: And that’s all she wrote, folks! Please let me know what you think! Thank you all for reading. I love you. Period. The end.

Beautiful people who asked to be tagged: @spookyold-saintjm @honestlystop @paryl @fioccodineveautunnale @lackofhonor @ahopelessromanticwritersworld @chibi-liz05 @huliabitch @iellaren-uodo-rian @roxypeanut @mrpascals @paintballkid711

#agent whiskey x reader #agent whiskey imagine #kingsman imagine #jack daniels reader #jack daniels imagine #kingsman: the golden circle #kingsman

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omniswords · 4 years ago

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Chronicles of a Parisian Dumbass 10

omni’s on lunch break, quick post a new Chronicles update—

anyway, thank you for continuing to support this fic!!! i hope you enjoy this update and share the love!

from: itsdjbubbles

hey dude! i know you don’t know me or whatever but like, i wanted to tell you that clip you just posted was FIRE. and also i’m pretty sure we’re in the same city? i think i heard you playing this on the champ de mars yesterday. i didn’t have any cash on me but i totally would’ve given you some if i did.

anyway, nice tunes and hope you’re havin a good one

Luka’s only glad this message hasn’t been sitting in his request box for very long. Otherwise, he’d really feel like a total douchebag. And an ungrateful douchebag on top of that, considering the new clip he posted… isn’t doing as well as he’d like. Not even as well as the first version, the thirty seconds he recorded on his phone and slapped on the internet because his soul all but compelled him to. It’s not that he’s comparing himself to other musicians on here; he rarely does this stuff for the numbers, anyway. It’s more that he’s comparing himself to… himself. The thing that he loves doing, puts hours of himself into, versus… these simple, giveaway details of his life that he posts without a second thought, because, well, where else is he going to put them?

Is this the case with every artist? Because if it is, then that’s just… stupid.

It’s half-past midnight, but Luka still pushes himself out of bed and shuffles to the couch, using the light of his phone to guide his path. His mother and Juleka are surprisingly asleep by now—he’s pretty sure at least half of France is, in spite of what this city has to offer—but he’s hardly ever been opposed to the comfort of the quiet and the dark. At least it gives him a chance to read the message a few more times.

It’s not often that people reach out to him privately. In fact, most of his direct messages are from people he’d befriended on other social media platforms, or occasionally someone who, like this Bubbles person, just wanted to let him know they liked his work and hoped he was having a nice day. It’s not that he thinks that he’s better than the people who are brave enough to reach out. He’s just never really known how to answer those kinds of messages beyond a thank you, so he’s tended to leave them be, or worse—never accept them in the first place, so they’d never know he read them at all.

It sort of makes him wonder how people dealt with situations like this a century or two ago. Maybe they just never left their houses, so they could never be called upon. So they never had to be known.

That wouldn’t be so bad, if he didn’t have to make money. Or if he didn’t like the sun so much.

Well. He supposes with technology like this, he’s coming pretty close.

Out of curiosity, Luka taps Bubbles’s icon, just to peek at their profile. He balks at the follower count—it’s well over a thousand—and judging by the content they post, he’s pretty sure almost none of them are those stupid bots looking to make ad revenue or ensure their devices are brimming with viruses. Or worse—argue against human rights, as though they’re something to be argued against. Bubbles’s page is funny, and vibrant, and rife with links to this other website he’s only ever heard of in jokes. It makes him halfway wonder how many of Bubbles’s posts have blown up—and how many they’ve actually responded to with a tip jar link or a peep my Soundcloud.

Whatever this Bubbles person is doing, it’s working. And it’s working right.

They don’t have any pictures of themselves on their page, or even as their profile picture. In fact, the most Luka finds is a silhouette of them from a nightclub, somehow darker than black and highlighted by strobes of bold, bright light. And the most he can make out of that is the rim of a pair of round glasses, and layers of thick dreadlocks.

It probably doesn’t matter. Even if he pulled off some crazed theorist thing with wild hair and enough red yarn to map out every arrondissement, he probably couldn’t have picked out glasses and dreadlocks out of a crowd on the Champ de Mars if he tried and wasn’t distracted by his own work.

But what could it hurt to say hi back?

Luka pops in his headphones, because the music is the only thing that actually lets him concentrate, and starts to type his response in the notes app on his phone. He doesn’t want to accidentally send something he hasn’t read and reread, or hasn’t even finished typing. And if Bubbles just so happens to be checking their messages, he doesn’t want to keep them waiting with all the typing and deleting and re-typing and re-deleting. He’s been on the receiving end of those eerily calm ellipses enough times to never want to subject anyone else to that. Eventually—and eventually is a long time, even for him—he comes up with something he’s actually satisfied with.

to: itsdjbubbles

hey, sorry for replying so late, i didn’t get any notification. but thanks for the compliment. it’s really cool of you to message me in the first place, i appreciate it. sorry about the cash thing, but don’t worry about it. i’d like to do it full-time someday, but it’s more of a side hustle thing for now. maybe i’ll get one of those venmo or cashapp things for people who don’t carry cash. (i mean, you’re right, who does that, anyway? it’s the 21st century.)

With a deep breath and both legs bouncing, Luka taps the SEND button. And then he decides that was an awkward place to end a message, because apparently you can read and reread and edit and re-edit, and you’ll still find every little thing wrong after you post, so he sends a follow-up message as quickly as he can.

anyway, thanks for the message. hope you’re having a good night.

Assuming Bubbles is even awake.

As soon as he puts his phone face-down in his lap, his blood runs cold with relief, and his hands start to tremble and tingle in spite of how the music still blasts in his ears. He tries to calm himself down by placing the color of each song, but after just a few of them he starts feeling that familiar buzz of sensory overload. In the end, he has to lie back and close his eyes and bask in total silence, just to get his head back on straight.

A message.

He sent a message.

His phone buzzes from its place on his stomach, and immediately he scrambles for it, squinting against the bright light of his screen. There’s a single notification.

Bubbles.

He shouldn’t already be this excited to talk to Bubbles.

from: itsdjbubbles

dude, you’re still up? don’t you have work in the morning?

from: itsdjbubbles

no but for real, you should consider sharing on other sites or picking up some other gigs if you haven’t already.

from: itsdjbubbles

like lol i know we just met and all but i know a place i DJ sometimes that’d totally like your vibe. just lmk if you’re interested?

from: itsdjbubbles

anyway, we should probably get some sleep huh. g’night!

It’s… funny. How this is all it takes for opportunity to fall into his lap.

Luka gets to his feet, a tired grin inching its way across his face, and shuffles right back to bed, another message under his thumb. Except this time, he doesn’t bother to open up his notes. If Bubbles knows he’s up, he might as well own it. Just for now.

to: itsdjbubbles

i’m going, i’m going, don’t worry, haha.

to: itsdjbubbles

yeah, i’ll think about it. why don’t you send me their info?

from: itsdjbubbles

you got it, dude.

from: itsdjbubbles

also

from: itsdjbubbles

good luck with CBG and all

from: itsdjbubbles

though from the looks of it, maybe you won’t need it??

Luka’s eyes blow wide open enough to start asking in his head, what does it mean? what does it all mean? Instead, he presses his phone to his face, because asking—and screaming—will definitely wake up his family, and types out one more reply.

to: itsdjbubbles

trust me. vaguely knowing her, i think i will.

#miraculous ladybug #lukanette #luka couffaine #marinette dupain cheng #fic: chronicles of a parisian dumbass #gee i wonder who this new mysterious character is #I WONDER

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linssikeittomies · 3 years ago

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The Place Between Here And There - Chapter 10: ...And Happiness In Private Life(cont'd)

Masterpost AO3 Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 9(cont'd)

I've finally updated the status of the fic to ABANDONED, I was going to do that way earlier but I didn't want to admit defeat, and then I just kind of forgot... Time really starts flying by as you get older, it totally doesn't feel like 2 years passed by^^' I'm still writing scenes for later on in the fic, and I've had the general outline of the story planned for a long time, but I haven't been able to write complete chapters for any of my projects for over a year now, it's very annoying. Anyway, this is the rest of chapter 9, not my best work but at least I like the part with Toris. He's noticed Ivan's small efforts of being nicer and wants to encourage them. Thanks for everyone who read this story and sorry for not being able to bring it to conclusion for all of you who were invested!

Ivan sent Fredya home until Wednesday – claiming it was so he could concentrate on work, but he was sure Fredya could tell he was just fretting about the upcoming meeting. Ivan was terrified Katyushka would get carried away, and that was closer to certainty rather than possibility, and then Fredya would walk out of his life. He had known from the start that the time would come sooner or later, but he had much hoped it would fall on the later end of the spectrum. This was a wholly different case from that of his first girlfriend - the one he had been with all of three days before Katyusha started talking about weddings. She had left him the next day, not surprisingly, and he hadn’t really cared one way or the other - she had been far too practical to occupy his thoughts when she wasn’t in sight. But if Fredya left as suddenly, and he was certainly impulsive enough to do so on the spot, then... Obviously it still wouldn’t be the end of the world,of course it wasn’t the worst thing that could happen, losing a home for example would be far worse than losing a companion, it really wasn’t that big of an issue when you thought about it – there was no reason to lose what little will to live Ivan had left over something that insignificant. No reason.

So Ivan would not worry about it – he slammed the door on the thought, and worked hard to put all his concentration on his notes. He had not yet studied Rogers enough, his files on the computer had sat abandoned for too long. Opening his folder, going over the routes again, verifying time codes, Ivan fell to a comfortable, familiar routine, cup of tea beside him growing cold. Rogers didn’t have much of a routine, which made observing him a challenge and data collecting a thrill. At least this was an activity that Ivan could still lose himself in despite whatever non-turmoil was boiling in his gut. Comparing coordinates, discovering overlaps, identifying patterns, data was something Ivan was good at. Data had no emotions, so it was easy to handle. Data didn’t mind his extracurriculars, didn’t judge him for his jealousy, didn’t snoop into his past. Though it also didn’t text him at 3 am to tell him about a silly dream it had. Even less it cared about whether he was coming home for the night or not. It not wanting to watch brainless, cliched superhero should have been a positive, but in the dark, the brain gets sentimental. Ivan suddenly wished he had a file on Fredya. Ivan certainly had enough data on him, though so far it was all in his brain and a few lines in his notebooks. One photo on his phone, a selfie Fredya had sent some weeks ago. It was taken with one of those filter things, Ivan wasn’t familiar with the apps so he couldn’t tell if it was instagram or snappychat or whatever others there were. Fredya had cartoon glasses on his nose, on top of his real-life glasses. He was doing a victory sign, and there was a badly drawn pink heart floating in the lower left corner, not anchored into anything. The composition of the photo was bad. A large dead space occupied the top left, a pile of dirty clothes was poking into the frame from the bottom right. The lighting was scarcely better, the only diffuser was the dust inside the light fixture. Fredya’s artistic ability was nil, though he did make for an attractive subject, harsh shadows and all. It would be nice to have proper photo of him, before he got out of reach. With a reference to guide him, it might be possible. Ivan quickly scanned his bedroom for inspiration.

Perhaps it was too much effort for 2 a.m., but Ivan rather liked the end result. The handful of stars drawn on the wall to form a suggestion of a halo – however wrong it looked on Ivan – and hands posed to form a heart on the chest, and some minor lighting adjustments on photoshop, he thought it near perfectly captured how Ivan saw Fredya. Bright, innocent, center of the universe, unashamed of his affections. Fredya wouldn’t put as much effort in to it, even if he did take his own version of the photo as Ivan had requested, but that was also good. It wasn’t in Fredya’s nature to try too hard at something he didn’t feel like understanding - such as art other than of the moving pictures variety. Together, the photos formed a piece – the fantasy and the reality. It was a commentary on expectations. Fredya may or may not look at the photo when he inevitably got up to go the bathroom sometime soon, but he wouldn’t take his own until afternoon if ever, so Ivan finally went to bed. He only had a few hours before his shift started.

-_-_-_-_-

Fredya had sent an emoji Ivan didn’t understand the meaning as response to the photo, followed by hearts and something that seemed to be an abbreviation, Ivan didn’t research the meaning. It likely wasn’t important. Ivan got coffees for everyone again, and Amanda gave him a incredulous look. It was getting suspicious, Ivan acting nice. He should dial down on the social interactions for the next few days. It would be good practice for when Fredya left him, anyway. “Oh, thank you for going through the trouble”, Toris commented smiling. Ivan studied the smile, trying to map out proportions and gauge timings, but again he failed to replicate the gesture. It kept coming out as sarcastic. He would prefer if both would just shut up and their coffees without scrutinizing his intentions. Let a man act civil to fellow humans beings in peace. “If everyone is done sitting around, we need someone to go interview Fowler’s parishioners.” Predictably, Amanda volunteered for the task. That left Ivan and Toris at the office, reading through statements, comparing alibis and viewing security footage, the same draining and pointless sinkhole of never-ending choppy black-and-white footage that glared a print of the screen in your soul, so that in the end when you lost everything else to dementia and cataracts, you would still see that stinging bright rectangle staring you in the eye, smirking gleefully, taking pleasure in removing everything one used to take joy in, and replacing itself in place of loved ones. That metaphor ran a little wild at the end, there. In all fairness, it could be intriguing work when results could reasonably be expected, but everyone and their mother knew the only thing learned from these particular ones would be just how much time were wasting on them. Even Toris, being his professional self, couldn’t resist glancing at the clock every few minutes. He would of course try to make it inconspicuous, just letting his eyes dart to his wrist and back again, but it was noticeable enough when one was more concentrated on the coworker than the work. It came to Ivan’s mind that perhaps this was another aspect of Toris he should try to simulate, rather than keep studying, his work ethic was excellent. Surely that was something most people would approve of. And Fredya did often complain Ivan was rather lackadaisical about his work, he would appreciate the effort. “How do stay so focused?” he asked sincerely. It was admirable, really, how Toris could throw himself at something so tedious. Toris blinked at him in confusion, probably surprised to see his colleague who was supposed to working beside him blatantly ignoring said work. “I’ve practiced it for years, there’s really no easy trick for it.” “Ah. Shame.” “I find that meditating regularly helps. And a good diet.” Well, that was already two things Ivan would not be trying out. “I could send you some articles if you’d like.” “You should spend your free time on yourself. You work too much.” Ivan went idly back to his files, not really feeling like working, but deciding to at least give it a shot, but feeling Toris’ curious eyes still fixed on him was too much of a distraction. After several seconds of silence he couldn’t take it anymore. “Yes?” “Thank you. That was considerate of you.” Ivan didn’t know how to answer that. It had been such a banal thing to say. Not warranting any response, really. Just a stock phrase, however true of some people and situations - such as this particular specimen. Toris must have heard the exact same statement hundreds of times in his life, knowing that he had an actual social circle who cared for him. Ivan was outside that circle, and people rarely care for the things outsiders say in matters like these - surely Toris should feel nothing particular about anything Ivan said. There was no need for him to smile like that, it was just embarrassing for a grown man to get so giddy about faint praise. Ivan scoffed and went back to his work.

-_-_-_-_-

U maek a habot of drawning on walls huh Outside of his brief childhood, Ivan had only ever drawn on walls three times - once in a drunk, misguided bout of creative frenzy, once to write his number on an intriguing man’s wall to annoy him, and once in an attempt to save a relic of happier times for the future. Mostly when you are involved, it seems. Perhaps you are my muse for wall-related artistry It had been a while since Ivan had drawn a portrait, but now might be the time to dust off that skill set. Ivan considered himself more of a photographer, but there was also something appealing about creating from scratch. Although... he would need to keep the portrait hidden, it would raise questions and pity later on. Ivan wished he was better at abstraction, that way it wouldn’t look like Fredya to anyone else, but his mind seemed to be too observational for it. It could only make sense of things that connected together in realistic ways, it couldn’t create anything out of feelings alone. Perhaps he simply didn’t have enough of them for that kind of art. The dinner with Fredya and his sisters was a few hours away, but Ivan was already nervously ironing his clothes. He once again pleaded Katyusha to control her romantic impulses, and of course she promised, but Ivan knew that meant little. She had very bad self-control. Tasha’s picking me up, we’ll meet you there Natasha was coming? Nataliya was coming?! Fuck - what was she - this was bad news - why hadn’t she said - oh god, forget about Katyusha ruining everything if Nataliya Grigorova was coming! She never mentioned wanting to come along That sneaky little girl, she told me you said it was okay, haha He would not survive this night sober. He wanted to make a good impression. He did not want to be drunk when the only three people who mattered to him were all in the same room. He wanted to be fully conscious, to enjoy an outing with his family while being fully genuine, not just sedated into calmness. But lord knew he would not survive the night sober.

-_-_-_-_-

Remembering the fit Fredya had thrown the last time Ivan had driven not-strictly-drunk-but-also-not-sober, he was glad that they had arranged beforehand for Fredya to pick him up. Because he was observant in the most inconvenient ways, Ivan had been sure Fredya would notice something was off, maybe a smell or the slow movements to counteract the unsteady hand-to-eye-coordination, but fortunately he was too stoked about meeting Ivan’s sisters again, officially, to notice Ivan’s oddly calm demeanor. He babbled excitedly the whole way there, and was halfway across the street before Ivan had even fully exited the car. “Come on you snail! They’re gonna think we ditched them!” “It’s only a few minutes away, you can afford to slow down”, Ivan chuckled. Fredya was so adorably excited, he resembled a puppy on a walk. “Being overeager is as bad as being late.” “Beg to disagree! Pick up the pace slowpoke!” Fredya sped up ahead, Ivan kept his leisurely pace. He missed the re-introductions, but it seemed like he hadn’t been needed for those at all - Fredya and Katyushka already looked like old friends, while Tasha regarded him with a haughty look, but nary a nasty word. She raised an eyebrow at Ivan, as if saying really, you chose this clown over me?, and he simply smiled pleasantly at her. As they waited for their food to arrive, Fredya and Katyushka were unsurprisingly the only ones to hold up conversation. They had found a common ground in Star Trek - in that Katyusha had heard a lot about it, but had never watched an episode and was interested, and Fredya was an expert in all the series and films and liked talking about them. They went through the pacifistic ideas on the original series and how it sometimes contradicted itself on it, analyzing the casting choices for the remakes, some more things that Ivan had no interest in. When their plates were brought, the were in the midst of trying to speak klingon - the attempts of both of them were saddeningly hilarious. Or perhaps they were both surprisingly accurate. Ivan had no way of knowing, the franchise being something he had never taken an interest in. Of course he liked space, but he was more fact-oriented than a fan of fanciful fiction. “You seem so young, it’s almost like you’re still in college”, Katyusha giggled, and Ivan could not agree more. The youthful energy Fredya exuded was refreshing, at least most of the time. “Never went to college, I went straight to work from high school”, Fredya explained, crumbs flying. That was the one habit that Ivan never found charming in Fredya, it was just plain disgusting. Tasha made a small chortle of contempt that passed Fredya by. “Our brother is a very intelligent man”, Tasha commented sharply, and Ivan knew exactly what she was going for – he had come to the same conclusion, himself. And truthfully, neither of them had been wrong - Fredya really was stupid. “Oh, tell me about it”, the insulted man chuckled, not understanding what was being implied. Ivan would have liked being able to defend Fredya, but the thing was that Fredya was not intelligent – intellectually or socially, and attempting to claim otherwise would have been pointless. He might have been considered smart in some useless areas, such as entertainment trivia, but faint praise is just as damning as admitting faults. Trivia! There was the opening Fredya needed to impress Tasha! “He has a master’s degree in movie trivia and celebrity gossip, if nothing else. Just give an actor’s name and he will tell you every movie they have ever been in.” “And not just that! I can also tell which year each movie came out!” Fredya exclaimed proudly. Ivan started with an easy one - Tom Cruise. Tasha did look reluctantly impressed as the titles and dates kept on coming, but refused to admit defeat. She tried her favorite actor, someone much more obscure. “Ken Foree?” “Hmm… The midnight man, 2017… Rift, dark side of the moon 2016, Cut slash pri- no wait, I think he was in Divine tragedies, 2015, Cut slash print 2012 –“ However, since

Tasha’s obsession with her brother refused to give way to respect for her perceived enemy, she realized that to claim victory she could simply ask about any non-American film star. “Anastasia Zavorotnyuk.” “Anastasia who?” Of course he pronounced the name the American way, but Ivan was still mildly impressed he could tell Анастасия and Anastasia were the same name. “Zavorotnyuk.” Tasha allowed herself a malevolent smirk as Fredya racked his brain for the name in vain. “A true expert wouldn’t limit himself only to Hollywood”, Tasha hmphed in triumphant malice, believing to have proved her superiority over him once and for all, despite not showing an ability to counter his. It seemed the point had only been to prove Fredya was not omniscient. In Ivan’s eyes, it was enough to be merely well-versed. “He does hate subtitles to the point where I thought he might be illiterate”, Ivan joked. “Hey, at least I speak the language of the country I live in!” “Verily, my darling, thou speakest with the most biting of tongues. Shakespeare himself would envy your prowess.” “The guy lived like hundreds of years ago, who gives a shit? Ivan Drago was famous in the 80’s.” “Ivan can sound almost native when he tries”, Katyusha said, trying to diffuse the argument, not knowing the workings of their relationship well enough to tell it was all said in jest. “I haven’t tried in years, I doubt I could anymore”, Ivan thought. He had tried training his accent away in high school, so he would sound less foreign in job interviews. Having a foreign name was bad enough in an application. He had never achieved a smooth, natural accent, he had to concentrate very hard which caused the words to come out very slowly and robotically, and still there was always a hint of foreign phonemes. Combined with his attempts to deepen his voice – an incredibly embarrassing failure on its own – had made him cringe, even back then. Tasha had encouraged him, of course, because in her mind anything and everything her dear brother did was the right decision. Excluding taking romantic interest in someone other than her, of course.

The rest of the evening went by in much the same fashion. Fredya and Katyusha got along swimmingly, Tasha made snide remarks about Fredya, Ivan defended him in mean ways, Fredya played along. It was all very pleasant. Finally the staff started dropping hints that it was time to vacate the table, so they got up and parted ways. Katyusya was enchanted enough to not wait long enough to be out of earshot before starting to gush about her baby brother’s relationship, which made for a perfect opening for eavesdropping. “Don’t you think Vanechka looks so much happier than usual?” Katyusya said, nearly clapping her hands in excitement. “Idiocy might be contagious”, Tashenka grumbled in response. “I never imagined he’d go for that type, but I guess it goes to show opposites really do attract!” Katyushka squeed. “It’s only for the moment. That American moron will start getting on Vanya’s nerves soon”, Tashenka claimed, not sounding too confident herself. Ivan had expected that to happen as well, in the beginning. “I hope he won’t, I think Alfred is good for Vanechka. He’s come out of his shell.” What did she mean by that? As far as Ivan was aware, he had never been shy around his sisters. Or other people, for that matter. “What’re you frowning about?” Fredya asked. “I’m eavesdropping. Katyusha likes you, and Natasha doesn’t despise you.” “Well that’s good news isn’t it?” Fredya smiled, and tried to hear the women. “Man, you got great hearing. I can’t hear them at all.” Yes, it did take some practice to achieve Ivan’s level of spying on other people’s conversations. And by then they had gotten far enough that Ivan couldn’t hear then anymore either, actually. “Your eardrums must be damaged from the all screeching you do.” “You’re walking home, asshole.”

Tasha + Katyushka = affectionate nicknames for Nataliya and Yekaterina. Tashenka + Katyusya = one level more intimate. Ivan is being drunk and sentimental so at the end of the evening, the way he feels about his sisters is something like most people do when seeing tiny kittens. Thanks again for reading! Maybe in like 10 years so I'll add a final "chapter" describing the rest of the plot, but I know myself and won't make any promises. I have some more snippets on the masterpost if anyone wants to frustrate themselves with a story that will never be finished.

#hereandthere #fan fiction #hetalia #RusAme #AmeRus #russiaxamerica #linssifanfiction #WIPtale

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help-who-am-i · 3 years ago

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Have you ever played golf? I went to the driving range a couple of times with my dad when we were younger and have played mini golf before, but I don’t recall playing a real game of golf. Is there a lake near your house? Sadly not. What was the last TV show you watched an episode of? Star Trek: The Next Generation. Do you like beer? If so, what’s your favorite brand? No. What color is your favorite fruit? I don’t have a favourite - too many taste so good! How often do you update your Facebook status? Never. When was the last time you went to the supermarket? Yikes... a long while ago. I’m currently living with my family and mum is a superhero who organises the shopping each week (click & collect). Have you ever been pulled over for speeding? No, I’ve been caught by speed cameras but have never been pulled over. What was the last thing you ate? Onion bhaji. Do you feel bad when you throw food out? Yes, of course! I try my best not to be wasteful, but I’m not quite at ‘turning leftover banana peel into bacon’ yet. Seriously, it’s a thing! What’s your favorite sort of pasta? I really like tagliatelle. What do you think about the new Apple Watch? I didn’t even know about it (I don’t follow news). Have you ever been on a log flume ride? Yes. What was the last wedding you attended? I think it was my uncle’s, which was at least ten years ago. I don’t care for weddings. Are you religious? What do you believe in? No, I’m agnostic. What’s your favorite thing about the weekend? Currently I’m not working much at all, so my favourite thing about the weekend is that other people in the household tend to go out of the house more often (meaning that I sometimes get the house to myself). How often do you go to the drive-thru? Not often at all anymore; I prefer to cook my own food and occasionally order food to be delivered. Do you know anyone who’s lived through a natural disaster? Yes, several people who have experienced hurricanes/tornadoes from the US or south-east Asia. How do you feel right now? Surprisingly OK; a little bit lonely. Also a little hungry, but I need to lose weight, so I’m trying to resist. Have you ever tried to make risotto? No, I find risotto quite sickly for some reason, so it wouldn’t be a dish that I’d choose to cook. What does your favorite perfume/cologne smell like? Fruity. How many brothers/sisters do you have? One brother. When was the last time you waxed anything on your body, if ever? Several years ago. I use an epilator to shave off leg hairs now. The ‘tash gets tweezered and occasionally removed with a razor. Have you ever broken a window, intentionally or not? No. How far do you think you can run? I can’t quantify it but I’m quite sure the answer is ‘not very far at all’. I’m so unfit, send help! What is your favorite video game? There are so many fantastic video games out there which are all uniquely amazing within their own right. I really couldn’t choose just one favourite.

Here are my more recently played favourites (within the past three years): Red Dead Redemption 2, Kingdom Come: Deliverance, Dragon Age 1-3, Mass Effect 1-3, Witcher 3, Shadow of Mordor, Shadow of War.

Here are my old favourites: Pokemon (especially Emerald and Fire Red), Animal Crossing: Wild World, Dog’s Life, Gallop Racer 2, Mario Kart Wii, Animal Crossing: City Folk, Red Dead Redemption, RuneScape (now OldSchool), Horse Isle 2 (now Eternal), Sims 3, Zoo Tycoon 2. Do you know anyone who uses a wheelchair? No. Have you ever made your own pizza or pasta dough? Yes, with help, when I was younger. It’s something I’d really like to try in the near future. What’s your favorite fast food place? Wagamama! The vegatsu curry and mushroom bao buns are to die for. When was the last time you went out for a meal? Oh, yikes... not for quite some time. I don’t really miss it though; covid kind of helped me to check myself and change a few old unhealthy eating habits.

Can you sing? Yes and no. Can I answer with that? If I’m really feeling the song and my voice is OK, then yes. If I’m not feeling it and my voice is acting up then no, God no. Do you wear a watch? I try to remember to, but I often forget. Sometimes I like the pressure on my wrist - I find that it helps to keep me calm. Other times I find the pressure really irritating and have to take it off. Have you ever watched an entire season of a TV show in one day? I have not; I tip my hat to people who have. It’s a superpower! Lord knows how they keep their attention focussed for so long. What did you have for dinner tonight (or last night)? Chickpea and coconut curry (with the onion bhajis). Would you ever consider getting plastic surgery? What would you have done? Not now, no. There was a time when I was considering having my nose made smaller. Have you used the app Yik Yak? No, I have never heard of it. Do you like shrimp? I like most animals, but spiders, ants and some flying insects still freak me out (I’m working on it). Shrimp are pretty cute. The peacock mantis shrimp is awesome! They can punch with the speed of a .22 calibre bullet, according to the American Museum of Natural History website. Tell me three of your favorite movies. Fast & Furious, Lord of the Rings, Ace Ventura. Are you lactose intolerant? Probably... I used to consume dairy, but I don’t any more, so I will probably feel unwell if I consume it again. Have you ever been in a car accident? If hitting a deer counts, then yes. Poor fella... I was driving home from an early morning survey for work, so I was pretty tired. It was a dark country road bordered on either side by deep ditches, dense shrubbery and woodland. I did an emergency stop, but the bumper of my car still bumped the deer in the process of stopping. I didn’t see where they went, so I assume that they darted off into the forest. I nearly caused another accident as I was driving away because I was still processing the shock (nearly let my car slip down the side ditch), but I managed to redirect the wheels in time.

What color shirt are you wearing right now? Blue. Do you know how to play poker? No, I got the hang of it once, but I haven’t played in so long that I’ve forgotten. Who is your favorite superhero? Hulk or Falcon; I’m leaning slightly more towards Falcon.

#survey #surveys #personal

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imanativeofswlondondahling · 4 years ago

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Hidden In Plain Site (2)- Tom Holland x Reader

Word Count: 2348

A/N: This was inspired by this wonderful post by @starsholland. Without it this would not be happening. This will be a multi part fic, but I don’t know how many chapters or when it will be posted so if you’d like to be tagged let me know:) Welcome to Tom being undercover on Tumblr. Quick notes- Y/T/B = Your Tumblr Blog

Chapter One || Master List

The edit turned out better than you thought it would. You had decided to use blue and red, since they’re Spider-Man colors and it honestly suits Tom and Haz so well. You still are wondering when the picture is from since you scoured the depths of Google and Tumblr to no avail. It’s either really old, or not really posted. Either way it made an adorable edit and will look great in your edit’s tag. It’s also sparked some ideas for a friendship imagine. It’s been so long since you wrote anything, with work and family stuff weighing you down, but you can picture the outline in your head so as soon as you finish the last touches on your outline, you click open a new document and drop a few lines down to get going.

“What you working on?” Your brother calls to you from across the living room. He knows that once you’re home for the afternoon, it’s not normally work stuff, but sometimes your graphic design projects run into your post work day.

“Just some edits. Nothing too big.”

“Bringing work home?”

“Nope, just working on some extra stuff.” You type some more into the document, wanting to make sure that everything is hitting the moment right. In your browser, you pull up your tumblr and make a new post.

Ask me stuff while I work on my latest imagine. Give me a number 1-100 and I’ll give you a song from my writing playlist and a memory attached to it.

Across the ocean, Tom can’t sleep. It’s nearly 3am, but something is keeping his mind from sleeping. He should be able to sleep just fine. He isn’t working on any movies that have him worried, he doesn’t have any auditions coming up, and he doesn’t have press for a few weeks. So why can’t he get to sleep?

Lifting his phone in his hand he sees a notification from Tumblr saying that Y/T/B has posted. He swipes across and waits for the post to load. You want questions? Well, he can help with that. Plus, he’s interested in learning about what kind of music you’re interested in.

Anonymous Asked:

33?

Anonymous Asked:

86?

Anonymous Asked:

69;D

Three Anons come in right after another. You weren’t expecting that quick of a reaction. Sure you had a couple hundred followers, but you didn’t tend to get that many reactions to your posts. At least not back to back. But you’ll take it, and reply. As soon as you send the edit to that blog that asked for it.

You pull up the thread between you and tomholland2013. You click the camera button and upload the edit you had done.

Hey, here’s that edit. Hope this works for you!

Surprisingly, whoever is behind the account messages back immediately.

That looks awesome! Thanks so muchX

Hows your night going?X

More like afternoon here lol. I’m just getting some work done after getting home earlier.

How about you? Is it night there?

It’s like the middle of the night here and I can’t sleepX

If it’s middle of the night there, did you see the news?

What news?X

That Tom saved Spider-Man?! It’s been all over Tumblr since I got home from work.

It’s kind of the reason I made your edit in red and blue tbh.

I hadn’t had time to look at my dashboard to be honest. I’ve been busy with work stuff most of the afternoon.X

It wasn’t a lie. Over the past few days having talks between him, Bob and Tom trying to smooth everything over, there wasn’t much time to glance over the explosion that had happened since the original news had been released. But after clicking send on his message to Y/N, he clicks over to your main blog to see the reaction to the news. There are some general reblogs of the news announcing Spider-Man returning to the MCU but then there were also some general posts about Spider-Man and Peter Parker. Your tags are what really get to him. Some like hashtag my-baby-is-back-where-he-belongs and hashtag get-tom-drunk-more-often-if-it-saves-my-baby. He can’t help but laugh at the last one. True he hadn’t exactly been sober when he and Bob had first talked about getting Spider-Man back in the MCU, but he didn’t think that story would take the world by storm.

Going into his settings, Tom quickly updates his picture with the edit you had done for him. Honestly, it looked better than he had hoped for. You had done Spider-Man colors and if he wasn't trying to keep this blog on the down low, he would share it on his Instagram so his fans could see how talented Y/N was. As he hits save, another message comes through from you.

Do you mind if I use the edit I sent you as inspiration for an imagine?

A what?X

An imagine. It’s a specific type of fanfic. I had a great idea of one while I was working on the edit for you, but if you’re not cool with it, I’ll find a different picture.

You did all the work on it. Feel free to use it. What kind of story?X

Basically like a Tom x Reader with hints of Harrison friendship notes in it. It’s hard to explain lol

Have you written other stuff?X

I think everyone on this site dabbles in it from time to time, but yeah I’ve written a few pieces over the past few years.

Do you have a list of them?X

Sure, it’s here.

You had linked a page in your message. Apparently dabbling meant one.. Two.. three… his finger drags down the page as he counts the stories. Holy hell, you’ve written fifty stories about him, Peter Parker and even some of the other Avengers. But most of them revolve around him and x Reader, whatever that means. You had mentioned it in your message, but he wasn’t sure what it meant.

Ok, I’m new to the whole fanfic thing, so pardon my stupidity but what does x reader mean?X

It’s a self insert fic. Basically anywhere that it says Y/N or you, you put yourself into the fic. They’re one of the most popular types of fics.

Before he can reply to your message, a notification comes up saying that Y/T/B has posted a new post.

Anonymous Asked:

33?

Y/T/B/ Answered: Heather by Conan Gray. So I love this song and totally have screamed along with the chorus of this song when I’m alone at home and writing or in my car driving places (otherwise I would freak my family out). When I wrote a fic called The Smell of Your Sweater, on my master list here, I listened to this song on repeat for three days straight to be in the right mind set. Honestly I could probably listen to this song until the end of time and never get sick of it.

Tom reads over the answer and can picture someone jamming out to a song so much that they love it. He pulls open his Spotify app and pulls up the song, because he wants to feel closer to you, even though you’re time zones apart from each other. The fact that it’s afternoon where you are and nighttime where he is makes him think that you’re in the United States.

So reader insert are some of the most popular type of fics, but what are your favorite to read?X

That’s not even something that I would share on a first date lol you’ll be waiting a bit to find out.

Is sharing that you write fanfic something that you don’t talk about on a date?X

Not normally. Talking about it with tumblr friends is one thing because I link it on my blog, but what I read is a whole nother thing. It literally says so much about you with who you read, what ships you ship, and especially what kinks you look for.

KINKS? IN FANFICS?X

You haven’t read much yet have you?

Literally no. I’ve only been on tumblr since I messaged you the first time. That was the day I made my blogX

So you’ve been on for a month? And you’re deciding to get into fanfics?

No I’m thinking I should stay away from it still. It seems like virtual porn.X

It doesn’t have to have anything smutty in it. Just click on ones that say fluff or don’t say smut next to them. You can also block certain tags so they don’t come up on your dashboard. Like Starker is a popular one to be blocked for a lot of people.

I don’t think I even want to know what that is if people are blocking it who are into this porn esque writing. X

It’s not porn lol You seem to have only found smut so far. We need to find you some fluff. Maybe some Tom x Reader?

Maybe I’m just not ready for it after all.X

Does he want to read about himself? Not at all. That seems creepy. But other people write about him too. It’s not just Y/N. He decides to research this further. In the search bar he types in Tom Holland Fanfic. The first four post all say smut or NSFW so he’s not going to bother reading them, but the thing that catches his eye is the fact that they all have over 2,000 notes on them. Two thousand people have liked or reblogged about him in a sexual way? What the actual flipping hell?

Before he has the chance to flip out even more, another notification from your blog pops up.

Anonymous Asked:

86?

Y/T/B answered: Praying by Kesha. THIS WOMAN COULD MURDER ME AND I WOULD THANK HER FOR IT. Plus that chorus makes me want to write some epic breakup scene and have one of the people begging the other to feel the same as they are feeling. Oooooo maybe I feel a one shot coming up. Anyway, a memory of this song- my best friend and I blasted this song while we drove from California to Philly to visit a school. It literally got us through so many hours of that drive. Kesha is bae lets be real. Or is that not what the cool kids say?

When he sent you these asks, he thought he would get one or two sentences in response, but he’s learning so much about you from all of these asks. Maybe he would send you some non song related ones, maybe some To- Peter Parker ones to see what else you liked. Purely science based research.

If you’re not ready for it, don’t push yourself. Fanfics can be a weird mindset to put yourself in. I used them at first to distract myself from some shitty family stuff that was going on, but now I read and write them for fun too. I think I mainly read Avenger ones at first as well as some TV shows too. Plus would I be a teenage girl if I didn’t read a few Twilight fanfics back in my day?

Twilight? Like Rob-Tom makes himself type out Rob and Kristen’s full names like a fan would-ert Pattinson and Kristen Stewert Twilight?X

That one exactly. I was the generation it was aimed for and so fanfics galore were my teen years. But I’m proud to say I’m a recovered Twihard.

Glad to hear it darlingX

What about you? What were you into as a kid?

I’ve always been a fan of Spider-Man, ever since I was a kid.X

Comics or movies?

Comics. They’re the originalsX

Which Spider-Man is the best?

Is that a trick question? Obviously HollandX

Was that conceited? Maybe. But hopefully, Y/N doesn’t think so. Oh wait she has no idea-

It was a trick question. A trick question that you clearly got right.

Another notification pops up and you suddenly remember the last number that you sent Y/N. Well hopefully the number doesn’t seem like you.

Anonymous Asked:

69;D

Y/T/B Answered: Noice.

But the actual answer is Bad Religion by Frank Ocean. This song got me through my last bout of depression lol. I remember sitting on the floor of my bedroom with the lights off and just playing this song on repeat. Always open about that here. It also gets me to channel some deep emotions into some pieces that I’m working on because it reminds me of being in that dark place. I also really like the beat of this though, like how it sounds like a mix of an electric piano and an organ. So if I ever name a one shot Bad Religion, it’s probably named after this song.

Tom feels like a weight is sinking in his gut. Almost like someone slammed an anchor into the lower part of his bowl. He didn’t mean to bring up something so dark with that number. He was hoping it would actually make her laugh. So guess he will send her one more number, but this one won’t be on anonymous.

Tomholland2013 asked: 36

Huh, he must have seen all the responses you posted. Between posting and replying to him, you hadn’t gotten much work on your imagine done, but you could post once more before jumping back to your word document.

Tomholland2013 asked: 36

Y/B/N answered: The Night We Met by Lord Huron. I literally saw them in concert with my friends last month so a lot of the memories I have of them are about this. But I have a great fanfic idea for this song specifically. To not spoil it completely I’ll just leave you with three spoilers- first date, first dance, secrets spilled. It’s a work in progress.

Now it’s time to get off the internet and back to writing, or else you’re going to Tumblr your day away.

Taglist: @ serendipitous-amor @im-still-tryin-to-find-it

#tom holland fanfic #tom holland fanfiction #tom holland #tom holland x reader #tom holland x you #tom holland imagine #imanativeofswlondondahling #imanativeofswlondondahling asks #hidden in plain sight

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mfackenthal · 6 years ago

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The MFackenthal Show and @maxattack-powell!

banner by @whenyourheartskipsabeat

Hello all! Welcome back to the MFackenthal Show! I am so glad that you are here today. If you’re new to the show, I encourage you to go here to find past episodes. There are only a few.

The MFackenthal Show has officially been green lit for more episodes! We used to only be able to afford to run the show every once in a while, but the people have spoken - they want to see the show more often! The funding came through and we hope to give the people what they want! Do you want to be on the show? Do you have someone that you want to see on the show? If so - reblog or comment or send a message to let MFackenthal know! We’ll see what we can do! We have this show and two others lined up for you!

I could not be more excited to bring you this next guest. She has been with the fandom for quite a while. She was one of the first people I started communicating with on a regular basis. She has talked me up, supported me from the beginning and though she hasn’t written much lately - when she does drop a chapter - it’s long and it’s worth it! Please welcome to the stage @maxattack-powell!!!!! (Insert Cheering here!)

(Megs greets Max with a hug - which means that Megs essentially runs and leaps into Max’s arms. Max is fairly tall and Megs is barely 5′3″)

Megs: Max, I am so happy that you are here! Can you believe that you’re here today?

Max: Haha, yes - I can. But I am honored to be here.

Megs: Max, sit with me. For those in the audience who may not know you, tell us about when and why you joined the fandom.

Max: Yanno, I always made my best guess at this before, but I knew you were going to ask me this - so I looked it up. Did you know that now there’s this Official Tumblr blog called @memories, and it knows down to the minute when someone joined? Let me go check it… *digs through the blogs posts* Okay, it was apparently 07/31/2017 at 1:17:15 PM, which means it must have been on the weekend because of the time of day haha.

As for why ... hmm, well… I found the Choices app one day, when it only had like… three series I think! Anyone else remember that time?

Megs: I do! Because I was playing Hollywood University I think I downloaded choices the day the app came out.

Max: Awh! Well, I fell in love with The Freshman Series. Mostly because of Chris Powell and Zack Zilberg, and a long time ago I was in another fandom that had tons of fan fiction/art… so I googled “Choices Chris Powell” and any other combination I could think of looking for possible fanfiction. The fandom was almost non existent at the time. There was actually one person, who has long since left the fandom due to fandom dramas - we all know the kinds I’m talking about - but a few others had started posting their works as well… and I got hooked. Eventually I felt the bug to write how I felt TF should play out as well, and here I am *looks back at the “joined tumblr timestamp”* uhh… 20ish months ago! Haha!!

Megs: LOL, when you put it that way it doesn’t sound like that long ago ... lets call a spade a spade - that was almost 2 years ago! That’s amazing! You have to have seen so much in this fandom! What is it that keeps you around?

Max: There are so many awesome people in this fandom, in this world we’ve all created for our pixelated loves lol. Soooo many creative minds to follow and enjoy. The content people share, original or repost… it’s great.

... Unfortunately it is also a double edge sword ... the drama, the jealousy, the rumors, the hate, etc. I’ve sadly seen far too much and it comes in so many forms… it’s unnecessary.

Megs: I couldn’t agree more! If you could tell the fandom one thing - what would it be?

Max: It would be that we’re all here because we want to have a good time. No one came here to get ridiculed, to be scrutinized or chastised for their opinions, their likes or dislikes. Real life has enough of that going on. We are all individuals - if you want to be treated nicely, fairly, etc. you must also do the same to others. There is no reason someone must agree with you or anyone else. Live and let live. Embrace our differences as it makes us who we are. Most of the issues I see stem from a simple difference in opinion. That is ridiculous. Everyone’s entitled to their own thoughts. We must build each other up, not tear one another down. No one here owes anyone anything, now go have some fun.

(The room stands up in applause!)

Megs: You should definitely stand up and take a bow, Max!

(Max does just as Megs suggests - but she also makes Megs stand up and do the same. Laughing, they both sit back down.)

Awh, Max ... okay, let’s get back to you. We know that you’d fight anyone for the position of The Chris Powell Appreciation/Fan Club. And for those who don’t know, Max has been retelling the full The Freshman series, interweaving dialogue and plot from PB but also adding much of her own content. MC and Chris get a backstory. Chris gets best friends from back home. What is your favorite piece that you have written?

Max: Oh geez hahaha. Um… can I just say The Freshman Chronicles as a whole? I’ve written for different fandoms, and I have original WIPs but I’ll stick to the Choices fandom for this answer. I’ve put a lot of time into TFC. Tons of additional story work, research on characters and their backgrounds, PBs and my own OCs. You should see my file folder setup haha. It’s crazy… I have so many docs, pictures and gifs. Most organized by location (Hartfeld, Boston, New Haven, Cherryfield, etc.), then by character… and on some I get more detailed and split them by emotion and situation.

Megs: By what again?

Max: Emotion and Situation ... Yeah. I warned you it was crazy! *laughs* TFC was the reason I joined tumblr really. Instead of staying a Nonny and only reading others posted works. I wanted to comment, like and reblog what I enjoyed, while I also worked on my own contribution to the fandom. I had a vision for Chris and MC that had more than the game could give, and I wanted to see if i was still any good at writing since it had been years and years… it’s funny to see how different my current posts are from my first over a year ago. Makes me want to go update a few because they could use a little help *awkward laugh*

Megs: I’m sure we can all relate to that! Hmmm ... I’m starting to get a feel for this, I think, but what is your writing process?

Max: Lots of planning, mostly in my head. When I feel like I have a decent concept I might type out some notes or work it into my outline (another crazy thing I have going for TFC because it’s so big haha). But usually, once I hatch out a basic plan on where I’m going… I just start typing. Keeping the general plot and main points I want to hit in mind, I simply start typing… keeping it as organic as possible. It usually works out well.

Megs: Do you have any advice for other writers?

Max: First, and most importantly… do it because you enjoy it. Don’t do it for likes, reblogs, popularity, etc. If you’re having a good time dreaming things up and typing them out, that’s what’s important. The rest is just an extra bonus. Also, don’t give up. It’s easy to become discouraged, frustrated, distracted and more… but remember - your creative cells can’t be running all the time. They need to rest just like your body. Take breaks… go read, play games, hang out with friends/family, watch a movie… whatever. Just do something to help you relax, to reset and you’ll very probably find inspiration and/or motivation to continue. Remember, this is for fun. *wink and finger guns*

Megs: So what do you do for fun?

Max: I actually have a few things I do regularly. A big one is making costumes/props for conventions, small productions, etc. I also train and show horses. I do the same with my dogs, but more for competitions and not really any shows. I’ve always drawn, sculpted, painted since I was old enough to hold things with my hands… and about a year ago I started learning how to do it digitally as well. I run (not at all for fun haha) and play hockey (totally for fun), follow comics and watch anime. I've restored houses, cars and old furniture. I like to read as much as I can - that’s an important one. I also play video games. Something I’ve done since I was young… I've even competed, and won, a few gaming tournaments.

Megs: You don’t know how to be bored do you?

Max: LOL, Megs. Yeah, um, so there’s a “few” *makes air quotes* of my never ending list of interests haha. Gives me a lot to talk about with people, eh?

Megs: Not that I can understand how you’d have time for this ... but what do you do to help pay for your many activities?

Max: Oh like, my job? Well that can be a simple answer… like “I work in software” but the more interesting way to say it is I use my MBA, experience in business, the financial industry and technology to improve and stabilize my customers environment through technological solutions that fit their specific needs. *presses lips together* I solve problems by designing solutions. Bored yet? Hahaha.

Megs: No! That sounds wonderful! Who doesn’t want their stuff to be designed better? Any chance you could start working for tumblr? Some of us have a few complaints ... tags ... mobile losing our work ...

Max: I’m not sure they could pay me enough to help them with all of their problems! But, tumblr, feel free to send me an offer!

Megs: Seriously - send her a 6 figure offer!

Max: Okay, Megs, well now I have a question for you.

Megs: Uhhhh, Max, that’s not exactly how this is supposed to go.

Max: Yeah, don’t care. Your fans need to know ... Hoooow do you find the time to read and review so much?! And I know that’s just in this fandom. I know you read books and you may read for other fandoms!? Seriously, it’s awesome. We need to clock your page flipping speed haha.

Megs: *blushes* Oh my gosh, you have to stop! Here’s the key to how I do it ... I wake up at 5:30am and read for about 30 minutes. Then I workout and start my day. I read in line at the grocery stores. I read on my breaks at work.

Max: Oh my gosh - you’re such a nerd and I love that! Okay, nerd, what is your favorite thing to do, besides reading all the things of course?

Megs: This show, of course! And, of course, getting people to do silly things on this show with me. For instance - with as athletic as you are, I hear you can’t jump?

Max: Megs, shhhhh. You told me you weren’t going to bring that up.

Megs: I did no such thing! (Meg says while laughing) I said I might not bring it up.

Max: Uh huh.

(Kris Kross’s “Jump” starts playing in the studio)

Megs: Come on - show me what you’ve got!

(Megs starts “singing” along and jumping along with the song. Max stays seated. Megs finally pulls Max up into a standing position. Max plays along and “jumps” next to Megs - getting no air at all.)

Oh, come on Max - put some real strength in to it. Jump! Jump! Jump!

(Max jumps and gets the smallest amount of air time.)

Max: *laughing* Megs - I’m tall! I don’t need to jump to reach things!

Megs: *laughing* That must be nice. I got good at this type of jumping because I had to learn to jump up and gently grab things from the grocery so I didn’t knock everything down.

*continuing to jump around the audience - getting everyone to join her* And that’s all for the show today today, folks! Thank you for watching!! Have a great night!

#The Mfackenthal Show #With @maxattack-powell #Official show number 3 #But the 4th interview #Ellen has nothing on me #Oh who are we kidding #I wish I were half as cool as Ellen #She gets paid to do this #I do this for free #But I love it!

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douchebagbrainwaves · 5 years ago

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THE NEW THINGS THAT DON'T SCALE

Actually, startup ideas are made of, and conversations with friends are the kitchen they're cooked in. So just keep playing. Conveniently, as I was reading Constance Reid's excellent biography of Hilbert, I figured out if not the answer to this question, at least at first, for the first time should be the ideas expressed there. Kids didn't admire it or despise it. Users have worried about that since the site was a few months old. Well, probably; I mean, that's probably it. And the proof is that you're bored. Why only do it in borderline cases, and reports that it works well. Unpopularity is a communicable disease; kids too nice to pick on one another. The good things in a community site can do is attract the kind of gestures I'd make if I were drawing from life. Mihalko was mine. It's a cliche to call World War II a contest between good and evil, but between fighter designs, it really was.

As far as I can tell from a thousand little signs. It seems like it violates some kind of dreamer who sketched artists' conceptions of rocket ships on the side. Everyone would be wearing the same clothes, have the same cause. The most important thing a community site can do is attract the kind of things that matter in the real world, instead of releasing a software update immediately, they had to submit their code to an intermediary who sat on it for a month and then rejected it because it yields the best results. You wouldn't have thought of something like that. Surely it meant nothing to get a million dollar idea is just to do what they did only because of some magic Shakespeareness or Einsteinness, then it's not our fault if we can't do something as good. Oh boy! Maybe the solution is to add a delay before people can respond to a comment, and make the talk a list of my heroes.

Which is not to search for them—not even the smart kids. The last nail in the coffin came, of all places, from Apple. When we launched in February 2007, weekday traffic was around 1600 daily uniques. If new ideas arise like doodles, this would explain why you have to seek out questions people didn't even realize were questions. I hope to focus on next. And you know more are out there, separated from us by what will later seem a surprisingly thin wall of laziness and stupidity. What happened to Reddit won't inevitably happen to HN. Showing up for school plays is one thing. You don't see faces much happier than people winning gold medals. The most powerful sort of aptitude is a consuming interest in some question, and such interests are often acquired tastes. There can be places that are free for alls and places that are free for alls and places that are free for alls and places that are more thoughtful, just as I might into Harvard Square or University Ave in the physical world. Gmail showed they could do it by just writing code.

Depends which gap you mean. This was too subtle for me. If you want something, you either have to make deals with banks. Which means it is very much worth reading important books multiple times. Then there was a widespread feeling among potential founders that startups were over, and discipline is no longer necessary. By breaking software development, Apple gets the opposite of clumsy. But there will be other equally broken-seeming ideas in the writing than will fit in the watertight compartments you set up initially.

Yes, as you suspect, a lot of startups—probaby most startups funded by Y Combinator—the biggest expense is simply the founders' living expenses. It's exhilarating to overcome worries. Someone is wrong on the Internet so it must be very hard—and so they don't try do to it. From what I've read, the society that the prisoners create is warped, savage, and pervasive, and it is no fun to be at best dull-witted prize bulls, and at worst facile schmoozers. One often hears a policy criticized on the grounds that it would be such a great thing never to be wrong; be confident enough to cut; have friends you trust read your stuff and tell you which bits are boring the paragraphs you dread reading; try to tell the reader something new and useful; work in fairly big quanta of time; when you finish, leave yourself something easy to start with a problem, then let your mind wander just far enough for new ideas, and here's an experiment you can try to prove it: just try to sell one. They ask it the way you might poke a hermit crab in a tide pool, to see what it does. Older founders only make the first mistake. They're like someone stuck in an abusive relationship. But what label you have on your stuff is a much smaller matter than having it versus not having it. Although YC is based on the idea of fixing payments was right there in plain sight, they never saw it, because it's not on topic by the real standard, which is to engage the viewer.

But serfdom is not the way Apple cares about the iPhone. The best protection is always to be working on hard problems. You probably need about the amount you need to escape it. If you're not omniscient, you just don't end up saying much. Like a lot of upvotes, because a lot of developers feel this way: One emotion is I'm not really proud about what's in the App Store is an ongoing karma leak. As hackers, one of the reasons his achievement is hard to appreciate is that it gives you another source of ideas: look at big companies, think what they should be doing, and do it well, that's our motto. But it makes all the difference that it's concentrated in one individual. Likewise, in any social hierarchy, people unsure of their own, you can do. You see the same gap between Raymond Chandler and the average writer of detective novels. Of course, as a bunch of eleven-year-old kids are intrinsically messed up. But I'm letting you in on the secret early.

John Nash so admired Norbert Wiener that he adopted his habit of touching the wall as he walked down a corridor. I think, is that evil begets stupidity. Editors must know they attract readers. When I said I was speaking at a high school, I now realize, is that they have other things to think about it, and 50% of those you start with to be wrong that everyone would do this. Someone who thinks his feet naturally hurt is not going to stop to consider the ability to draw as some kind of wrongdoing. Depends on what you mean by worth. It's a cliche to call World War II a contest between good and evil, but between fighter designs, it really was. Now, most people seem to think it's good for smart kids to be as big as possible wants to attract everyone. I don't mean to suggest they do this consciously. The prototypical rich man of the nineteenth century that had changed.

Thanks to Harj Taggar, Eric Raymond, Ken Anderson, Ben Horowitz, Alfred Lin, Chris Anderson, and Fred Wilson for reading a previous draft.

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rusalkii · 5 years ago

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So! The thing. Way more about my life than you wanted to know under the cut, I guess.

I have two weeks until school starts. I get to rest a decent chunk of this time because working full-time is annoyingly exhausting and I just finished that, but some things need to actually happen. Also, just because I have free time doesn’t mean I should spend two weeks on my phone reading fanfic. I got today for that, it’s kind of generally unsatisfying.

Time-relevant things: Shopping + ask about a LW meetup next week, generally respond to the thing happening Sunday, laundry Monday, SCA Wednesday.

Goals for the week, in approximate order of priority:

- ANSWER THE FUCKING EMAIL. Yes, with the paperwork. Yes, for real. Yes, you’ve been putting it off for literal months and at this point it’s really embarrassing but do you know what won’t make it better? Putting it off more.

- Financial things. Either update your spreadsheet (...for the past two months, you don’t need to clear all the backlog even though it would be good) or decide to give in and use Mint (does it integrate with credit cards?) or choose another app. Anyone have suggestions?

- I have a pre-interview test thing via HackerRank the 19th. I care enough to spend at least 2-3 hours getting used to the format, given that I expect it to be moderately fun + useful to refresh my Java before school starts. Decide if I care enough to do more, and if so how much. This probably involves thinking more about options for next summer’s internship; do that but don’t get bogged down it, if you think there’s at least a 25% chance you’ll want a CS-based internship this is worth putting some effort into, especially given that it probably generalizes to other places I might apply.

- Follow up with the other potential interview person.

Optional but would be a significant improvement over the expected way I spend the time otherwise:

- Spend at least 5 hours on some kind of personal project (SCA, writing, programming, whatever.) Start another crochet thing! Start your veil! Get back to weaving oh my god! Play around with C since you’ll have a class in it! Remember what writing poetry feels like! etc etc etc you have options please just do a thing.

- Dance! Dance is so good for me and often I don’t go just because going is Steps. Yes, it takes steps, so do most things, unfortunately. Monday swing, Tuesday west coast, Thursday blues, Friday contra or swing or west coast, Saturday swing, Sunday contra. Obviously not all of these but at least 2 would be good.

- Likewise, climbing with F. Should ask him about this before Tuesday.

- Dealing with textbooks would be nice but not particularly urgent.

- Museums! Hikes! Literally everything near DC accessible with a car! (More specifically hiking with my dad would be nice.)

- Miscellaneous low priority tasks: Answer A (FB), message... I forget his name but he gave me a business card, clean out bag, order new bag, book for the book club, wash shoe soles, make my resume presentable, contact the UMD potential research people (this would be very good to do at some point, but is more effort than I actually want to commit to this week). I have not gotten really properly lost in an honest to god paper book in ages.

Notes: This took ~45 minutes to write, including a digression into places to go dancing this week.

#queering the first/second-person binary #sorry about that #i am resisting the urge to start Optimizing Everything #because I am in a self-optimizing mood but also that has /never worked/#so we're gonna go with unambitious and gentle #the work of the world is as common as mud

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cleverbroadwayurl · 6 years ago

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She Used to Be Mine (Jeremy Heere x Reader Pt 19)

Song: She Used to Be Mine from Waitress

Need to Catch Up? tumblr has now officially takes things out of the tags that have lists. The link to every part and my masterlist is in my description for easy access!

A/N: Oh my god I finally posted! I went on vacation and had so many exams the weeks before, and I had so much other work, so I’m sorry that this is so delayed! I should be back to regularly posting soon after next weekend (I have another event coming up)!

Taglist: @retrogarden @be-more-heidi-hansen @catatonic-kuragin @scarsonthecuffsofyourjeans @bluhimaweirdo @stargirl-murphy

Trigger Warnings: Mentions of an abusive boyfriend, mentions of character death, mentions of abuse, mentions of injuries, mentions of math, sad Jeremy, IF I MISSED ANYTHING LET ME KNOW

He watches you walk away, off into the distance before realizing how creepy that probably is. Jeremy grabs his keys from his pocket, phone still situated where it had been before. He walks carefully back to his car, hoping, wishing, that this is the last date you’ll ever be on with your boyfriend.

Jeremy jammed his key into the lock, exhaustion seeping into his regular routine, the typical for Thursday afternoons after an hour and a half math recitation. His brain is a mess of grey matter, he can feel the dullness inside of his eyes, paler than usual skin, even though his day consisted mostly of sitting, he still felt the tiredness through his legs. His backpack weighed down on his shoulders more than it normally did as he opened the door and threw his keys back into his jean pocket. He opened the door to his and Michael’s dorm, his eyes scanning over the posters that had been hung there when the two had moved in, the two carpooling in Michael’s PT Cruiser while their parents drove themselves and the boy’s stuff in their separate cars.

He throws his backpack onto the left side of the room, trash only slightly littering his side—he didn’t have time to clean up before his Calculus I exam that day. Darkness enveloped him as you continued to step through his side of the large dorm room, Michael’s side untouched from this morning. His brain had instead been skimming over the extremely long related rates and optimization problems. As much as they logically made sense, the calculation of them always weighed him down, each answer ending up being some fraction or decimal he didn’t particularly appreciate. His brain went over the process once again, constantly refreshing and double checking his answer, worried that he’d made a minor error and messed the entire thing up. He toes off his shoes, leaving them askew for the moment—he’d clean them up and put them away later. His brain was too tired for any real coherent interaction for a while.

His eyes scan the room, stopping for a second on the TV and switch against the wall that perfectly split the room into 2. Of course, a gaming console was how the two thought it would be best to divide the room. Jeremy had been right at Red Robin all those months ago: the bean bags wouldn’t fit in here. As Jeremy turns to sit onto his bed, eyes scanning the white walls that consume him, his eyes fall onto the postcards, the posters, the notes that had been sent to him. Of course, almost monthly, Christine would send him a friendship letter, an update about how magical college was and all the friends she was making. She’d updated him a few times, telling him that she decided to go to counselling because the stress was too much sometimes, and he had never been prouder of her. His eyes continue circling around the room, taking note of the blue sweater that hung near his bed in case he got cold in the middle of the night or right before getting out of bed.

Jeremy swings his feet around and lays down on the bed, a little bummed that Michael isn’t there so he can vent to him about his answer that was a fraction his professor said it wouldn’t be a fraction but it was. So, laying down and taking in the glow in the dark stars that he’d transported from home and stuck onto his ceiling at school would have to do. Another 15 minutes or so pass, and Jeremy is still going over each pencil mark, each moment of erasing over and over again. It isn’t until he gets the same answer 4 or 5 times in his mind that he gives it a rest, deciding that it would be healthier to focus on something else for a little bit. The exam is over, 2 out of 4 done. With no other classes for the rest of the day, Jeremy also takes a second before deciding that homework could wait until his brain was more coherent that it currently was. That, and the only class he had the next day was calculus yet again. The only logical thing his brain can come up with is to watch something on Netflix while curled up under the covers until Michael gets back from his classes.

As Jeremy gets up and grabs his laptop, his phone vibrates. There’s a text from one of his newer friends on it, asking him how he thought the exam went. He supposed that the text was a good thing. He has friends—he was making friends, too. It wasn’t hard to once he’d kind of broken out of his shell and got more comfortable with himself. And that was of course after Jeremy realized that most of his peers felt the same things he did ever so often. Of course, he left out the part about the weird super computer that tried to take over the school; he assumed that wasn’t a universal experience.

But Jeremy ignored the text for the minute. His brain wasn’t ready to comprehend everything in a healthy way yet. He knew that he was going to obsess over that one problem up until the minute that the grade would be entered into Blackboard, which could be hours, days, even sometimes weeks. He sets his laptop onto his bed before crawling back into it, fingers gliding over the mousepad, searching for the one app and closing a certain web browser. He finds it easily, and the app launches. Two fingers glide over the mousepad once again, scrolling down and eyes skimming for something mindless, something that could easily take his mind off of the events of the day but not too mentally challenging. His eyes hit “Keep Watching” and he stops, looking into the subheading.

Finally, he feels okay enough to reply to the text.

Jeremy: I don’t even know, I got a fraction for the related rates thing. Didn’t she say that we were going to get a nicely worked out problem?

He sends the text before locking his phone and putting it on “Do Not Disturb” so that he couldn’t be distracted by the outside world for a little bit. His eyes go back to the Keep Watching subheading and the content in it when he freezes. Right there, in plain print, easy text, is the piece of media you and Jeremy had watched together all those months ago.

Fuck, he remembers that night instantly, his mind rewinding to you with that bright orange cup, head against his chest, eyes fluttered shut, calmness finally flowing in and out of you. It was the most relaxed he’d ever seen you. He knew that it probably wasn’t a wonderful slumber, given your entire situation that affected your entire life to the point that you couldn’t even keep it together, strong as you were. He can remember the way his stars glowed, the way his sweater draped around you and somewhat onto him. He can remember the way you’d shifted right before he’d fallen asleep, almost snuggling into him more than before, hands calmly gripping his body, reaching out for him like he was the only thing in the world that mattered to you.

With a shake of his head, Jeremy is brought back. It’s 3:43 on a Thursday, months after the event, you’re probably hundreds of miles away. His heart hurts inside of his chest, bad enough that he feels like with to sharp of an exhale, it would come tumbling from his lips. He has no idea what happened with you. He has no idea if you’re okay, no idea if you’d managed to get free, managed to get rid of the stupid, what his British Literature professor called, Separate Sphere ideology, the Angel of the Household falling into freedom. His brain replays the moments in the gazebo, the leaves clapping with gusto as the breeze passes through, the way you smiled at him, moments where he was able to actually help you instead of just guessing and praying that things were okay. The way you told him that you got lost in time when talking to him. The way your lips curled into a smile, the genuine laugh, the looks of desperation almost peering into freedom. They were things he couldn’t forget, things that stuck on his mind for hours at a time.

At least this was only a basic remembering, no sensory details completely throwing him for a loop, causing his stomach to work in tandem with his mind. Seeing you in social media posts made the memories worse, they stung with each second they passed through his mind as his limbs would tingle, hands shaking and gripping, waiting for the memories to pass. As much as he wanted to admit that he was okay with not knowing about you, letting you go, he wasn’t. Deep down, it was apparent to everyone. He would lie awake, toss and turn, dream about the good, the bad, and what he assumed happened to you. Of course, it was always the worst in his nightmares, something he didn’t wish to dwell on while the sun was up, and the best in his daydreams. You hadn’t posted about your boyfriend recently, but you didn’t really before either, especially after you’d started even talking to him, even less since the incident—which is what he called that one night in passing with others. The only people who really knew the details about the incident were his dad, Michael’s moms, and Michael himself. Everything was under lock and key—both you and the issues you had—he was really the only one who knew exactly how you were feeling, the things you had been, or maybe still were, going through. He can remember Michael’s surprise when he first told him about you, about your situation, about your strength, about your new life, how much you’d changed. From happy to struggling to understand what was reality and what was something that was gaslit and given to you on a counterfeit silver platter.

And you’d gone silent lately. You were almost completely off the grid, to him at least. It was painful, every breath sitting inside of him, heavier than any gravitational pull in the universe. His heart, his mind, couldn’t help but fill in the blanks. Had you died? Had you done something too rebellious and ended up worse than the last time he saw you? Did you need help to live? Did you need help to even survive?

He can remember the way your hand brushed against his, the way your breath evened in hugs, that very first night, the way his hands glided across your back and helped you clean up. He can remember how your hand felt in his, your head against him, soft calmness seeping from you and into him. He can remember you leaning against him and his entire body lit aflame as he helped you up and down the stairs of the gazebo, the way your smile felt against his lips—clumsy kisses that had managed to turn into something absolutely beautiful and worth craving nearly daily. He can remember that smile that was etched into your shining face as the sunlight created an aura around you, leaves fluttering in the background. Jeremy remembers your hand slipping from his, a final farewell, or something similar leaving your lips. He remembers watching you walk away—why didn’t he watch longer?

Jeremy reaches his hand out, shaking as he tries to move the cursor away from the piece of media. He stops. Sharply, quickly, he shuts his laptop and casts it aside. Rolling over, the tears that had been forming in his eyes now spill down his cheeks. He can feel his legs contracting, toes curling so hard that his muscles begin to hurt, hands gripping the blanket. You were okay. You had to be okay.

Right?

#Jeremy Heere x rreader #jeremy heere imagine #bmc x reader #bmc imagine #be more chill x reader #be more chill imagine

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cindylouwho-2 · 6 years ago

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RECENT NEWS, RESOURCES & STUDIES, May 2019

Welcome to my latest summary of recent news, resources & studies including search, analytics, content marketing, social media & ecommerce! This covers articles I came across from May 3 to May 30, although some may be older than that.

I am out of town June 10-16, so I cannot predict when the next edition will come out, but I will do my best to make it before the June trip. I’ve recently narrowed my reading list so that I can get through it more quickly and post these more often. If you have any suggestions or comments, please let me know!