#the shop is still in progress but i want to show the designs! :)

[sangled]

costume au charms... coming soon

[lokisprettygirl]

Rain to his Fire (Modern! Daemon Targaryen x Female Reader) (Non Canon 80s Au) (18+)

Read chapter 3 here // Series Masterlist

Chapter 4

Summary: Things heat up between you and Daemon.

Warning: 18+, smutty scenarios, crude language, discussion of mental health (it's a fic based in a mental health facility), mention of physical assault, the fic would contain several mentions of several disorders like mpd, did etc, if something triggers you don't read, smoking.

“American avocet…nope” you mumbled under your breath as you flipped through the pages of the book All birds in the world. You often didn't find yourself in a library so this was new for you as well. You were trying to match the feathers Daemon had given you with an existing bird but so far you had failed to accomplish your goal, and not to forget that you were still hung up on the letter A and it would take weeks to finish researching the book.

At first, the thought of simply asking Daemon what type of bird the feather belonged to had crossed your mind. But then you remembered that he believed himself to be a dragon, and he'd continue to claim that the feathers belonged to him.

You folded the corner of the book to bookmark the page as you didn't want to lose the progress, then you got up and placed the book back on its designated shelf.

As you approached the librarian Corlys he gave you a small smile and you couldn't help but feel sheepish.

“Finished reading?” He asked you so you chuckled, Corlys knew your mother really well, most of the older employees did so he was really always kind and warm to you.

“Ummm can I ask you a question?” You asked him with a tinge of hesitation so he looked at you curiously, his brows raised in anticipation.

“Of Course..anytime dear”

“Uhhh you have been around here for decades so I was wondering if you knew anything about this area habituating exotic birds around here because I found this feather on my window and it made me curious” you gave him the black streaked feather Daemon had offered to you as an apology, of course you didn't tell Corlys the truth. For some reason you didn't want to show him the pure silver one he had placed in your palm last night, it just seemed too precious.

“Let me see” he mumbled under his breath as he pulled up his glasses to inspect the feather and you could tell he was confused,

“I would have said that it resembles a pelican but you won't find them here, besides it's too large to be a pelican's. Are you positive that it's a genuine feather and not a decorative item?”

He asked you and you didn't really have an answer for that because honest to god you didn't even know where the feather had come from or if it was genuine or not.

“You can buy these in shops?” you asked him with a puzzled look on your face so he smiled.

“You can buy anything these days” you nodded as he said that before you mumbled a good day to him and stepped out of the Library.

As you entered your room, the first thing you did was open your drawer to look at the silver feather again. It was soft to the touch and didn't feel fake at all. You couldn't stop thinking about Daemon and his mysterious ways. You felt like he was messing with you and must have bought these feathers to add to his mysterious image. Why didn't you think of this in the first place? Perhaps a part of you just wanted to believe that he was something special, something that was too good to be true.

It was your day off so you hadn't really seen him all day, not even a glimpse. After what he had done last night and as much as you had enjoyed him touching you like that, you were afraid he'd make a habit out of it. So when you laid down in bed at night, your ears remained perked for any sign of movement outside your door but fortunately you didn't hear anything.

And unfortunately it did make you feel a bit disappointed.

As you entered Daemon's room the next morning, you noticed that he was still sleeping. Wanting to turn on a lamp, you reached around the bed and felt something under your feet. Looking down, you saw a pile of hair matching Daemon's hair color. At first, you thought he had cut his own hair, but then you realized that his hair was still the same length as it was yesterday. You were confused and couldn't understand where this hair had come from. It was long, at least 12 inches, which could easily be used to make a proper wig.

Every other day this man had something in his store to mess with your head.

You were in the middle of collecting the hair from the floor when you heard him roll around in the bed and turn on his back, as his eyes met with yours, he raised his non-existent eyebrows and gave you a smile.

“What is this?” You asked him as you picked up a lock of the hair so he rubbed his eyes,

“Well good morning to you as well lady” he mumbled in his groggy ‘I just woke up’ voice so you sighed and got back to cleaning.

“Don't get up if you're not wearing clothes underneath the sheet” you warned him so he chuckled in response.

“Yes mam, anything else?”

He asked you politely but your mind was still confused about the long silky beautiful hair you had found just now.

“What is it? Daemon? What is this?” You asked him again, agitation visible in your voice so he propped himself on his elbows and stared at you. You could see his abs flexing as he craned himself up but this wasn't the time for you to get distracted, there was no time to get distracted by a patient anyways.

"It's my hair... they grow longer when I am able to fully shift into my natural form which I did somehow last night. I have to cut them off with my own nails afterwards.” he mumbled as if he hadn't said the most unbelievable thing ever so you stared at him for a moment in complete disbelief. What were you expecting anyways?

“Okay ..why can't you just keep the hair, why do you have to cut it?” You asked him a follow up question instead of dismissing him like you had done previously so he smiled.

“It's a bit of a hassle..look at it” he told you nonchalantly.

“You're a weird man Mr. Daemon–” you mumbled in disbelief so he chuckled in response.

“Bonkers..innit?”

As you took the broom to the other side of the room you found a few more feathers and sighed. At this point, you had narrowed down the possibilities to two main scenarios. One theory was that he purchased these items beforehand and he was just playing a cruel prank on you. The other possibility was a lot more outrageous to consider. What if he really was a dragon or humagon or a Draman? That would explain the feathers, the hair, and so many other things that didn't quite add up.

But that was just crazy, right? You sighed and shook your head, trying to dismiss the thought from your mind.

Later on, Daemon was taken to see Doctor Lisa for their session. He couldn't believe that Vis had allowed it, but he had a feeling that the bastard was watching from the other side of the mirror. He was then escorted to the middle of the room and was told to sit. A guard cuffed his hands behind the chair while Doctor Lisa took a seat just a few feet away from him.

“You can leave Jacob” Lisa said to the guard so he nodded before he left the room to just two of them.

“So Daemon, good afternoon, how are you feeling?” She asked him as she gave him a warm smile so he chuckled in response.

“What is this, what's going on?” Daemon questioned her so she gave him a comforting smile again.

“You have been making good progress and I just wanted to speak with you about how you were feeling”

She mumbled politely so he looked at her up and down, his gaze intense, piercing into her soul as if he was trying to read her intentions.

“How am I feeling while I'm cuffed like a criminal? You tell me darling, how am I supposed to feel?” Daemon spoke, with a rough and husky tone, almost challenging her. His sharp eyes peered intensely at her, making her squirm in her seat, for a psychiatrist she sure seemed easy to manipulate.

“What's bothering you the most right now?” His lips puckered as she questioned him,

“Come closer and perhaps I'll humor you” he leaned forward to stare at her and she opened her mouth to say something but she felt at loss of words, there was something about him that made her speechless, the glint in his eyes made her uncomfortable but also drew her in..

“Doctor Vis told me that you have always had trouble with your sense of identity and-” before she could finish her sentence he had cut her off,

“Uhhuh when did he tell you that? While he had you bent over his desk this morning or???” he continued, his eyes flashing with anger. Lisa flinched at his words, taken aback by his sudden outburst.

“Daemon you're being inappropriate” she intervened but he cut her off immediately.

“Mmmm but I'm speaking the truth. Am I not? You're married but here you are fucking another man and at the same time so willing to spread your gorgeous legs for a patient sitting in front of you-”

He was amidst his contempt-filled speech when he was dragged up from his seat and punched right in the face but instead of cowering down he let out the sort of laughter that made Doctor Lisa scared. Quickly, Lisa grabbed onto Vis's arms, trying to calm him down as he stood over Daemon, his fists still clenched in anger.

“Let it be.. he's not well, it's not his fault” she said to him so Vis glared at him as he called in the guard to take him away.

“Everytime I think he's making progress he goes on and does something like this” Vis said as Daemon was taken away from the therapy room but Lisa seemed upset with Viserys instead. How did Daemon know of their affair?

“What? He must have seen the wedding ring and made a baseless assumption, that's what he does, he's very observant..always has been” Vis clarified to her but she was so furious that she walked away from him.

As you stepped out of room 390 after cleaning, you noticed Jacob dragging Daemon to his room. As they came closer you realized that his cheek was bleeding. What had he done now?

As soon as Jacob was gone, you looked around carefully before entering Daemon's room. He was already on the bed with a towel pressed against his bleeding cheek, his eyes closed and his body tensed up, clearly in pain.

“What happened?” You asked him as you approached him so he looked at you sharply. His eyes seemed dark and brooding, moments of such intensity always gave you a weird sensation in the pit of your stomach.

“Why do you care?” He asked you so you shrugged in response.

“Because you're bleeding and I'm concerned about your well being as a patient” you told him so he chuckled in response.

You watched in shock as Daemon got up from his bed, tossing the towel into the corner of the room before approaching you like a predator. Instinctively, you took a step back, your heart racing as you kept moving behind until you had hit the wall.

As Daemon reached closer to you, his fingers wrapped around your waist, and he placed his head between the crook of your neck. You could feel the blood from his cheek smearing against your skin, but that was the least of your concern. The proximity was affecting you in more ways than one, and you weren't sure how to react. You were on duty, after all, and it would have been inappropriate to touch him.

But then he seemed so hurt and distraught, his breathing heavy as he sniffed you constantly, you remembered him telling you that it was calming for him, your scent. What was this man made of? You had never met anyone as animalistic in his approach as Daemon was.

And to prove your point further he let out a purring noise as you curled your fingers around his neck and scratched his scalp. You had never heard a man purr like this, how was he doing it?

“Calm down..” you mumbled softly so he pulled away and glared at you as let out a small growling noise, using the sleeve of your cardigan you wiped the blood off his cheek before you grabbed his forearm.

“How can I be calm when my thoughts are filled with images of you in compromising positions” he smirked as he spoke so you rolled your eyes even though his words made you feel aroused.

“Come with me” You dragged Daemon by the arm as you led him out of his room and down the hallway. As you passed by the other patients and colleagues, you noticed their shocked expressions. You didn't care, though,he was hurt and in need of medical attention, you didn't care about whatever he had done to receive this treatment.

As you reached the clinic on the second floor the nurse took one look at him and made him sit down to patch up his wound.

“Are you hurt as well?” She asked you as she looked at the blood on your neck so you shook your head and asked for a medical wipe to clean the blood and you constantly felt his eyes on you, he kept staring at you and a part of you wanted him to look away, you didn't like it when he was looking at you like that as if he wanted to devour you whole.

Once he was patched up, you asked him to walk with you, it was lunchtime and you had to be in the cafeteria for your duties but on the way you bumped into Dr Vis instead and it instantly raised your blood pressure up, and definitely not in a good way.

“What is going on here if I may ask?” He questioned you, his voice strict and tone authoritative.

“The patient seemed wounded so I took him to the nursery” you answered him so he smiled but his smile never felt genuine, it never really reached his eyes, everytime you looked at him these days you felt a sense of foreboding wash over you.

“Where are you taking him now?” he asked as he crossed his arms behind his back like a school teacher.

“Cafeteria..it's lunch time for patients” he let out a small laughter as you answered him.

"No need for that. His lunch privileges are revoked for the day, and he will spend it gardening instead," Dr Vis declared, his tone firm and unrelenting. You looked at him in disbelief, not understanding why he was being punished so severely. "Once you have completed your duties, I want you to supervise him as he plants hundred hydrangea seeds in the back garden," Dr Vis ordered. "Any less than that and he will not be served dinner tonight," he warned, his eyes still locked on Daemon's as if he was taunting him

“Why me?” You asked him and that made him turn his head towards you

“Pardon me?” He glared at you so intensely that you didn't want to elaborate and question as to why he wanted you to watch him suffer when a guard could have done this job more appropriately.

“Nothing..I'll be free in an hour doctor” you mumbled politely so Doctor vis gave you a smile and watched you walk past him and Daemon..

“You really think I'd make your life easier while you're acting up?” He asked Daemon as he grabbed his arm to lead him to the back garden.

You turned to see Daemon one last time before he was escorted away, his gaze fixed on you with a mixture of confusion and hurt. You took a deep breath and made your way to the cafeteria, feeling a sense of unease settle over you. You couldn't shake the feeling that punishing a man of that size for so many hours without food was cruel and not to mention extremely inhumane..

Once you were free of your duties, you went to the pantry and wrapped up a sandwich carefully before placing it into the pocket of your cardigan.

As you reached the back garden, he was on his knees digging small holes for the seeds and it made you want to hug him and comfort him. You looked around and didn't find anyone else there, not even Dr. Vis.

“Why are you being punished?” You asked as you sat down on the nearest garden chair so he looked your way and took a few sniffs “Asks the one breaking the rules herself”

You looked at him confused as he said that.

“What do you mean?”

“That sandwich in your pocket can land you in big trouble darling” he mumbled as he got back to work so you sighed. How was he able to just guess these things? Perhaps he had some sort of psychic intuition or maybe he was just observant like that.

“What did you do?” You asked him again so he chuckled in response.

“Pissed off someone and got punched”

“Why do you do it Daemon, it's not going to make your life any easier?”

“I can't help it, when I feel something.. I say it.. subtlety isn't in my nature”

As he spoke, a realization dawned on you, he was really honest and straightforward, even if it got him into trouble.

“Don't you miss your family out there?” You asked him a personal question so he shook his head

“Why not?” you questioned again hoping to get more information about his life before he got here.

“Lost mum when I was 4, father was never around, older brother raised me but I'll never satisfy him, I'd never be what he wants me to be” his voice sounded heavy with sadness and perhaps under different circumstances you could have offered him a hug.

“I'm sorry, I know what it's like to lose a parent” you mumbled as you picked on your nails again so he turned his head to look at you.

“Your mother wouldn't want you to fuel that nasty habit”

And you stopped picking immediately

”She worked here, didn't she?” He asked you so you nodded in response, he must have heard about it somewhere.

“How did she die?” He asked you so you sighed, you never liked thinking or talking about it.

“She died here.. heart attack they said”

“And you believe that?” He asked you so you looked at him confused

“What else should I be believing?”

“I don't really know yet”

“You're so strange you know that” you couldn't help but smile.

“Is that a bad thing?

“No ..it's not” he gave you a warm smile as you said that. You watched as he spent the next hour diligently planting 100 hydrangea seeds. After he was finished, you had to report it to Dr. Vis before Daemon was allowed to go back to his room and rest.

“Eat this, there's still time for dinner” you passed him the sandwich so he looked at it with a mixture of gratitude and curiosity before taking a bite and savoring the flavor.

Later that night as you finally got in bed you had even more puzzling questions than you had a day before. The feathers, the hair, how he was so intuitive, how he was burning so hot all the time, nothing made sense to you. There was something wrong with him but you weren't able to figure it out.

You had almost drifted into sleep when you heard a knock on your window and your heart went still. As you sat up you couldn't really believe your eyes, Daemon was on the other side of the window, standing so daringly on that narrow ledge. He was absolutely crazy, you couldn't even deny it anymore.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” You asked him as you pulled your window up and pulled him inside carefully so he won't fall down to his death.

“Everything” he mumbled as he cupped your cheeks and you froze in your spot, how did he even get up here? Sure you lived a floor up but one would have to know how to walk on walls to directly reach the window.

“How did you get up here?” You asked him sternly so he placed his forehead on yours to calm down, his jaw clenched in anger in frustration.

“You ask stupid questions darling”

He pulled away from you and walked past you so you glared at him.

“Stupid? Is it stupid for me to want to know how you climbed up a floor and ended up outside of my window in the middle of the night?” You crossed your arms so he tilted his head as if to mock you.

“It's common sense really which you don't seem to have or perhaps denying it all makes you feel normal about yourself”

You glared at him in bewilderment as he said that.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” You asked him so he approached you and grabbed your hands on his own before he locked them behind your back, you were starting to get used to how physical he could get with you.

“Denying the truth makes you feel sane, it makes you believe that you're different from these people you tend to all day long. Am I wrong, hmm?” He asked you so you looked up at him

“Are you calling me crazy?” You asked him so he snickered in response.

“No no no no..I'm merely suggesting that perhaps you're gullible, only capable of seeing things from a shallow perspective, despite my numerous attempts to show you the truth”

“And what is the truth? That you're a half fucking dragon?” your voice raised in a mix of anger and confusion.

For a moment, you thought he was going to lash out at you as his grin faded into a scowl. Instead, he answered calmly,

“Perhaps i am”

“Then show me, become one, right here right now” you challenged him and his jaw clenched

"It's not that easy," he snarled, his jaw clenched in anger.

"Why not?" you pressed him, your voice shaking with frustration.

"It's not," Daemon repeated, his tone barely above a whisper, as if he were ashamed of his inability to show you the truth.

"Well, then you need to stop with your bullshit," you snapped, your anger evident in your every word. "And stop coming into my room like this, you'd make me lose my job,”

Your breaths were getting heavier as you spoke angrily, it was part anger and part your close proximity with him.

“Is that what you really want? Want me to leave you alone?” he asked you with irony dripping from his voice.

“Yes” you mumbled sharply so he let go of your arms and instead of using the window he used the door to step out, he didn't give a fuck about being caught honestly.

Next morning you didn't even attempt to clean his room but when he didn't come out for lunch or tea time in the evening you couldn't stop yourself from checking up on him.

So, after taking a shower and changing into a dress, you cautiously made your way to his room and knocked twice on the door before stepping inside.

As you entered the room, you found him sitting upright on the bed in the darkness like a creep, with the only light coming from the bathroom. He had his elbows placed on his thighs, his chin situated on his clasped fingers and he was staring into the bathroom even though he was clearly aware of your presence

“I thought you didn't want to see me anymore” he mumbled as he kept staring into the bathroom so you approached him and stood in front of him, blocking the only source of light, you kind of looked like an angel to him with the glimmering shine of light surrounding you.

“Go downstairs, it's dinner time” you mumbled softly so he looked up at you and smiled.

“I'm sorry I got so ..heated last night” he mumbled softly as his eyes raked over your figure, your shift was over and he noticed the green dress you had worn, he brought his hand forward and ran it over your shin so you stepped back a little as his touch sent a shiver down your spine.

Despite the tension between you two, it felt like there was an unspoken bond that had developed over the past few days.

“Can't stay away from me can you?” he asked, smugness palpable in his voice. You could feel your hands clench into a fist but definitely not from anger.

“I'm just worried about you as a patient” you mumbled softly, almost seductively, he was such a bad influence on you.

“Mmmhmmm” he mumbled as he trailed his fingers up your bare skin but as soon as he had touched your bare thigh under the dress, you slapped his hand away.

“You're being inappropriate” you looked him in the eye as if to warn him but as his hands went under your dress again you involuntarily placed your hands on his shoulder, fingers digging into his flesh, eyes rolling back into your head.

“I have been inappropriate with you since the very first day” you let out a moan as his fingers danced back n forth, caressing your soft flesh near the inside of your thighs, his touch almost made you want to lose it all, every nerve in your body felt altered.

Your opened mouth and the look on your face only turned him on beyond belief,

He placed his other hand on your waist and pulled you closer to his face and then he pressed his nose against your clothed intimate area, your fingers curled around his neck as you let out a deliciously tortured moan that you had been suppressing all your life.

“Ohh you smell good enough to eat darling”

He breathed in deeply and let out a growl as your arousal filled his senses, fingers trailed under your dress again and this time he caressed the back of your thighs, his fingers moving upwards slowly to caress those plump cheeks but he was holding back. It took everything in him to not throw you onto his bed and make you belong to him, he had to control for your own sake.

He wanted to ruin you very slowly, more and more every passing day, make you so desperate that you'd beg for him to touch you.

Suddenly the intimacy of the situation was too much for you, and you felt the tears welling up in your eyes, that's when you backed away from him, pressing yourself against the wall so he got up and approached you. He didn't want you to feel afraid of feeling things, he didn't want you to be so scared of feeling intimacy.

“Calm down sweet girl” he mumbled as he grabbed your chin to make you look him in the eye.

“I can't..I can't breatheee” you mumbled quietly so he kissed the tip of your nose,

“You can..keep looking at me”

“No this is wrong ..it's so Wronggggg..I'm being so bad and so wrong” he could tell that you were feeling overwhelmed so he cupped your cheeks and caressed your cheek with his fingers.

“Shhhhhhh darling shhhhh” he whispered as he wrapped his arms around you and finally pulled you into a hug, a proper hug, his body felt hotter than the sun as you got on your tip toes and placed your head between the crook of his neck, but it did calm you down a little. You had never been embraced this way so you couldn't even decipher what you were feeling in the moment. Once your breathing had calmed enough you pulled away from him to look at him.

“What's bothering you more, the fact that it's forbidden or just the idea of being touched by a man?” He asked you as you pulled away slightly, his thumb ran over your cheek as he wiped your tears, he found you adorable when you acted this way, the urge he had felt to protect you that night only became stronger in that moment.

You couldn't bring yourself to answer immediately, feeling your mouth go dry but then you responded meakly.

“Bothhhhh”

“When was the last time you touched your cunt darling?” You raised your palm up to plant it on his lips as he asked you such a dirty question like that.

“Shut up ..you can't talk to me like that” you had intended for your voice to come out as a warning but then it sounded as if you were teasing him instead.

“What about dirty movies hmm? Ever seen one? Ever watched a man fuck a woman? Or a woman sucking a man's cock?” he mumbled as he grabbed your hand and placed it on his bulge, your heart almost stopped beating at the gesture, he was so..hard and huge, it made your head spin.

“Please Daemon” your voice barely came out in a whisper so he smirked in response.

“Why are you so timid hmm? Did you get caught? Mumma caught you touching yourself as a teen?” You slapped him lightly on the cheek so he snickered.

“Once she did..but that's not the reason” you told him honestly as you didn't want to play games, you didn't know how to do it. Him on the other hand, you couldn't tell if he was really interested in you or just plain bored. His gentle touch felt both soothing and alarming at the same time, like he was trying to lull you into a false sense of security.

“Tell me the reason then” his voice was firm as he questioned you.

“I don't feel it..i have never felt sexual attraction before” he looked at you as if he was not surprised but at the same time he seemed curious.

“To a man?”

“To anyone.. I don't feel attraction, i don't picture myself kissing anyone or doing other things with them..i haven't done it all my life” you had never told anyone about this, and you knew you shouldn't have been revealing such personal things to him, a patient nonetheless, but you couldn't help yourself, you were so painfully aroused right now that it hurt.

“Then what do you think of when you're grinding your pretty cunt against a pillow at night? Hmm?” His breath was hot against your face as he murmured and you were only able to moan in response.

“You haven't thought about anyone in your life..Until I got here, you have been thinking about me since then and I know that” he mumbled confidently so you shook your head even though you looked stupid doing it. You had to control yourself, you knew you had to.

“You're so full of yourself” you mumbled like a bratty child, making him smirk

“Uhhhuh and don't you want the same? Don't you want to be so full of me as well?”

“No.”

“Very convincing..Fucking is in human nature darling, that's how we have evolved, and you want to get fucked i know” he told you as he brushed his thumb over your lips “But that's not enough for you is it? It's not.. you want to be loved, you want to be swept off your feet and serenaded, you need a man to show you what romance feels like” you couldn't help but smile genuinely as he said that.

“Too bad you're a dragon”

As much as he wasn't expecting the quip when he was trying to seduce you he did appreciate the humor.

“Half dragon. Half man. Don't fool yourself sweet thing”

You got on your tip toes and kissed his bruised cheek before you pulled yourself out of his grip to leave his room.

On the way out you noticed that the bars on his windows were pulled apart, making you stop in your tracks and you turned around to face him once more. You knew he was strong, but only someone with a level of superhuman strength could have done that.

“Make me believe that you are what you think you are, if you care about me, make me feel it, if you think my eyes are closed then open them for me, if you want me to be your friend and believe your truth, show me the truth, show yourself to me” you said to him confidently and a smile curved the corner of his mouth.

“Aren't you afraid I'd drive you as insane as I am?” You chuckled as he said that, there was a touch of threat and intimidation in his voice.

“You scare me but I like it Daemon” you gave him a sultry smile before you finished your sentence “That's what I think about when I'm pleasuring myself at night”

😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏

Taglist

@anukulee @ammo23 @littledark11 @stupidthoughtsinwriting

@daenny-t

[2010sbunny]

♡ 2010sbunny’s Guide

To Mcbling

Brands♡

PT. 1/?

All the mcbling babes are known for their hot and fabulous fashion style. From flare yoga pants to a hot pink tracksuit, mcbling fashion is a big staple in fashion history. Of course you don’t have to have name brand clothes to be a mcbling babe, but if you have the money and want some name brand clothing, by all means buy it! Don’t forget you may also run across some of these brands while you thrift!

Juicy Couture-

Founded in 1997, Juicy Couture is a staple fashion brand in the mcbling scene. Tracksuits in all different colors, daydreamer bags, and several different slogan tees are what Juicy Couture is mostly known for. Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton were two icons who were known for their love for Juicy Couture 💋! Juicy has its own website but please keep in mind that their clothing style and bags have had a major change (they were modernized 🥲). You can also find their modern bags and clothing in stores like Ross and Burlington! If you want to find vintage Juicy, I recommend you look on online secondhand shops like Depop, eBay, Vinted, etc!! It’s kind of hard to stumble across Juicy in in-person thrift stores but it’s possible!! (I still hope to stumble across it someday 🙏)

PINK-

PINK by Victorias Secret is Victorias Secret’s clothing line. It’s mainly known for its beautiful fold over yoga pants. The designs on the yoga pants range from animal print to rhinestone galore 💋. They brought some fold over yoga pants back, but nothing beats the original designs. You can find the originals on online secondhand shops or in-person thrift stores. I personally have gotten mine from Plato’s Closet, but keep in mind that Plato’s Closet is lowkey expensive for it being a thrift store 😭! PINK also had very cute short sleeve and long sleeve shirts that many mcbling babes cut to make off the shoulder tops! If you’re a hoodie typa gal, I recommend you buy their hoodies as well because they definitely were and continue to be the bomb.com 💋. PINK’s sweatpants were also very cute and comfortable! If you would like to buy yoga pants from the designs Victorias Secret brought back, you can find them in store or on their website. Here’s the link dolls 💋🩷:

Baby Phat-

Baby Phat was made by Kimora Lee Simmons (a true fashion icon). Kimora’s fashion shows were very iconic, and will always be remembered. Her fashion line gives more of a 90s-2000s vibe, but her jeans can spice up your mcbling look 💋. Her bottoms are super cute, and always have the iconic cat logo. Her puffer jackets are also a staple piece, and you can especially wear them in the winter for an ice princess look! You can find her pieces on online secondhand shops and you may find them in the thrift if you look hard enough!! (I’m talking even in the cracks of the Jeans section). Her bags are very cute as well, but if you’re going more for a mcbling-style bag, I recommend juicy couture or any other mcbling bags. The Baby Phat online store is currently still a work in progress, but you may still receive emails and a reminder when it’s done!

Miss Me-

Following the mention of jeans, Miss Me jeans are a brand of jeans that were very popular then and honestly still are now. Their rhinestoned designs on the back pockets are TO DIEEEE FOR. They come in all different cuts, fits, and rises (low rise, mid rise, high rise). You can find many Miss Me jeans at Buckle (either in store or online), but be aware that they are highly expensive (over $100 for ONE pair). You may find a pair in an in-person thrift store but they are pretty hard to find. Don’t let that stop you though, as you may find a pair or more the next time you go thrifting. Many 2010s celebrities wore Miss Me jeans and many mcbling babes wore them as well. If you wanna shop for Miss Me jeans that are less expensive, you can look for them on eBay, Mercari, Depop, etc.! The 2nd pic of the Miss Me’s is by my jwoww @brattygalfriend 💋. If you would like to buy some from Buckle, here’s the link 💋:

Ed Hardy-

Ed Hardy is known mainly for its bags, hats, shirts, and jeans. Kim K rocked Ed Hardy A LOTTTTT during the mcbling era. Ed Hardy is still around and unlike a lot of other brands, has stayed true with their designs 💋. You can find Ed Hardy is places like Burlington, Ross, maybe even Marshalls! Ed Hardy has its own online store where it’s prices aren’t too pricey (honestly depends on your price range). If you would like you can of course buy Ed Hardy pieces from online secondhand shops (I KNOWWWW IVE MENTIONED THIS A LOT), or you can find them in in-person thrift stores. I honestly think the Ed Hardy brand will live on 4eva 💋.

End Notes-

Thank you so much for reading if you did 🩷. This was my first ever long blog so I hope you liked it 🤭. I decided to make this a series obvi because I <3 mcbling fashion and I would love to showcase a ton of different mcbling brands. If anyone has any suggestions on which brands I should feature next please lemme know dolls 🙏. Please make sure to stay hydrated, rested, and full ♡!

PS: Pls give credit if u use!!

Remember this is YOUR world

and we’re all just living in it,

XOXO, 2010sbunny 💋

[neylo]

Becoming Marshal of France - Part one: The annoying but necessary shit

@cadmusfly is a bad influence and a terrible temptation. I want you to know that you have succeeded.

Since I was a kid, I loved the feathered hats, the colourful shiny uniforms and the overall vibe of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century. Apparently, it wasn't a phase.

I am a cosplayer and I love myself a good challenge. And now here it is. I am to make the ultimate entry for the Napoleonic fandom of Tumblr and make my own marshal uniform. I cordially invite you all to join my journey and perhaps, get inspired!

Let's start with the tunic.

Disclaimer: Reenactors, chill, I am not a millionaire - I can't, unfortunately, afford the expensive replicas of the buttons etc. I do not intend to participate in any kind of reenactment activity, and therefore I can't promise 100% historical accuracy. I would love to. But right now I can't.

Note: I use the metric system. It is nice, it is logical, and you should implement that too, Americans!

Before you start:

Step one: find the appropriate fabrics. Are you looking for dark blue? Great start. Now, it's time for some research. Napoleon's Marshals book by Osprey Publishing has done a great job describing the details. You can basically choose your own preferred material: Silk, velvet or linen. Congrats! For a whole-ass marshal tunic, you will need 2-3 metres of fabric depending on your size.

You will also need lining. I recommend linen lining and viscose lining for the sleeves.

Step two: Assess your insanity. There are multiple uniform patterns, each for a different occasion (source):

If you have three years of free time and unlimited supplies of goldwork threads, you can do the grande tenue - the first picture. I would advise you not to. But if you want, there is actually an extant one you can draw your inspiration from. It belonged to Ney. If you are going for this, you will indeed be the bravest of the brave.

Petite tenue is more subtle with less embroidery. Still, difficult as hell.

Tenue de campagne is the one I am going for. I don't like commitments. You will only need to embroider the collar and the cuffs + some stuff on the back. That is doable. That is what I am doing.

Step three: The pattern. The thing is, the patterns of the era were almost the same. I simply butchered my civilian coat pattern and changed it for a single-breasted one with a standing collar. Do you want help? I will share the pattern with you.

This is how my thing looks at the moment.

Step four: Embroidery. What is this shiny thing on the Marshals' uniforms? This is a kind of embroidery called "goldwork" and you need special metallic threads for it. They are not exactly easy to find, but Etsy is your friend. There are multiple US shops, and there is also EmbroideryMaterial shipping worldwide from India. They have a great selection and very agreeable prices.

For the Marshal tunic you shall need two kinds of threads:

The French wire (lol, it is really called like that!)

The Japanese thread (a thread wrapped in a thin gold plate)

You will also need small gold sequins.

I will show you the embroidery progress when my threads arrive. Before that happens, we need to design the embroidery. No worries, someone did it for you. That someone was actually me:

That's it for today.

Stay tuned for more posts.

[cal-daisies-and-briars]

I just saw a Zero to Hero buck edit on TikTok and i can’t help but think of Eddie’s first impression in Things We’re All Too Young To Know so I am craving more from that Universe lol ⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️

HELL YEAH!!! Love that you remembered that. It was important to me haha.

1k for TWATYTK!:

---

Eddie spends a minute sort of fuming before walking back into to the empty nursery, where Buck is still stewing over his laptop, comparing design ideas to their actual space. 

“How’d it go?” He asks when Eddie joins him. 

Eddie could get into it. He maybe should. This could very well impact Buck when Helena does come to meet her granddaughter. But his mother just lashed at an old wound. So Eddie reverts to an old defense mechanism. He avoids it. 

“She doesn’t need more than one grandparent, right?” Eddie jokes wryly instead. “Bobby is more than enough, I think.”

“In my experience he makes up for several absentees, yeah,” Buck says. “So, it went super well?”

“Oh, just great,” Eddie sighs. 

“Want to talk about it?” Buck asks.

And again… Eddie really should. 

“It’s not even worth talking about,” Eddie says. “I am far more interested in your nursery progress.”

Buck grins and turns the laptop screen towards him. 

“I think I’ve got a plan.”

🗲🗲🗲

Buck settles on green. 

Soft, easy greens. Nothing too vibrant. Like a forest on a summer day. Something that makes him think of the few things he does miss about Pennsylvania. 

It’s not just personal preference guiding his decisions, either. There are a lot of good reasons to surround his baby daughter with green. It’s pretty neutral. It doesn’t feel like shoving any sort of gendered expectation at her. And! It’s science-backed. Buck did some research into the human brain and color perception, and apparently green is the most relaxing color. It’s her bedroom. She should be relaxed! 

He gathers ideas of little leaf and blossom patterns he could stencil onto the walls and gets a palette together. 

“I think I could do interior design,” he tells Eddie when he finishes showing him. 

“This took you over a week to settle on,” Eddie reminds him. “I think actual designers have deadlines and clients to impress.”

“Okay, buzzkill,” Buck frowns. “Do you like the green?”

Eddie smirks. “I do like the green. What do we need to do?”

“Shopping trip on our next day off?” Buck asks. “We can get everything we need and slowly chip away at it?”

Eddie nods. “Sounds good to me.”

Buck grins. If their biggest issue between now and the baby being born was nursery colors, and he just solved it, he’s feeling pretty darn good.

☆☆☆

It’s one of their last calls before that day-off shopping trip. 

Honestly, it shouldn’t even be memorable. It’s the kind of call they get a lot. False alarm type scenarios from people who are scared. This time it’s a pre-teen claiming she set her house on fire. She didn’t. She burnt dinner and the smoke alarm went off. But Dispatch doesn’t know that obviously, and sends the 118 anyway. 

It brings Eddie right back to being a kid. Something he didn’t really need this week. 

The girl - maybe eleven - was home alone cooking breakfast for her little brother. Eggs. The eggs burnt in the pan, the smoke detector did its job, and one thing led to another. She called 9-1-1, frantic. When they arrive, she’s crying on the front lawn, arms wrapped around her little brother’s shoulders. 

By the time the 118 is ready to leave, the parents both show up. In individual cars. Bobby explains what happened, assured their kids are fine, and that the house is a little smoky, but otherwise okay. This should be a moment of relief. 

It is apparently not. 

The parents immediately burst into argument, riddled with accusations. 

“You should have been here, Sandra!”

“I asked you for one morning, John! One! You are never here!”

“One morning to get your nails done! I had a client meeting!”

“To get my nails done with my cousin I never see! And it’s Saturday! I was on Mom-duty all week!” 

Eddie has to walk away. He feels nauseated. 

“Those poor kids,” Hen exhales, seeing Eddie’s tense expression. 

“Yeah,” Eddie exhales. “Poor kids.”

🗲🗲🗲

Buck’s not going to say anything, but Eddie could use a bit of an attitude adjustment on the day they go shopping for nursery stuff. Like, okay. Buck gets it. Home Depot isn’t the most fun part of the excursion. Certainly not as fun as shopping for cute, soft baby stuff. Though, it’s not like either of them dislike this sort of thing. Buck’s pretty excited about shopping for paint under the right circumstances. And these are great circumstances! The best, even!

But Eddie is just sort of checked out before they even get in the truck. Short, clipped responses and empty stares. And, okay… Buck sort of gets it. He’s been taking over all the nursery planning entirely. Actually, all the planning. He took his clipboard mentality and steamrolled it and maybe he hasn’t given Eddie enough input. Maybe Eddie has been annoyed about this. Buck knows he can be annoying. It would be great, though, if maybe Eddie just said that. Instead of, what? Becoming completely disinterested in the process? They’re only doing this once, and Buck wants it to be memorable for both of them.

It all sort of comes to a head over paint chips.

“I think I like Salamander,” Buck says, holding a paper sample up for Eddie to see. “But should we go with something lighter? Like Cabbage Leaf?” 

And, yeah. Okay. It all sounds sort of silly. But the way Eddie sort of stares at the paint chips with dead eyes, like it couldn’t matter less? It makes Buck want to scream a little. 

“Or, you know…” Buck continues. Because he’s trying here. “There’s a more blue-green tone? Like Country Weekend?” 

“Whatever you like best, Buck,” Eddie says. 

Okay. Fuck not saying anything.

“Do you just not give a shit… Or?”

Eddie recoils a little like he’s been smacked. 

“What?” He demands. “Why the hell would you ask that?”

Oh, great. They’re arguing in front of the Behr Paint display.

“Because I’m trying to make this feel important and you aren’t giving me any energy back!” Buck sort of huffs.

[ronearoundblindly]

Threadbare (2)

Steve Rogers x Fashion Designer!Reader

Part Two: Strain Curve (see previous or series)

IMPORTANT: I forgot to mention and link that this started with an anon ask, so I should give them credit for the idea. Here's where this all started! Additionally, Richard Fisk is an actual Marvel character and the son of Kingpin. All that is straight out of the comics (and animated shows), down to the horrible color choices.

Summary: Steve shelters you from Fisk while attempting to hide the truth from Tony. He's not a great liar...but how much of this is really fake?

Warnings for fluffy fluff of the 21st-fluffery with a teeny bit of angst, 100% idiots in love! Also a quick disclaimer about me knowing exactly diddlysquat about fashion design. I binged 'Next In Fashion' and so this is the best I got lol... WC 4066

You watch Steve blush at your attempted smile. He paws at the back of his head before gathering another confession.

“Actually, I do have—I mean, yes, I wanted to see you, but uh—“ he rushes over to fetch a paper bag he must have stashed as he snuck in behind the cops “—I did have a reason to come.”

In the bag, you find three shirts, and your smile turns more genuine.

“Of course, you did. How romantic.”

You’re still awash with adrenaline; there’s no filter to keep your teasing at bay. You can barely pick up that you said anything anyway.

Steve shrugs, looking down to take back the shirts as Abby returns with a glass of water for you. “Not my best move.”

You chug the water, loudly, unable to regulate how desperately you need it. Abby gently pries Steve’s shirts from his tense arms.

“Right.” Steve rolls his shoulders out, straightening and clearly falling into Captain mode. “We need to get you somewhere safe. I just have to make a few calls and—“

“Don’t tell Stark,” you blurt, hand instinctively grabbing the wrist that holds his phone ready. “I’m sorry. That sounded like an order, just…please don’t tell Mr. Stark.” Tony can’t know that Fisk has been using you as a tailor as well. He can’t. 

Alarm and curiosity flicker behind Steve’s blue eyes, but he hides it well immediately. “Ok. I’ll—” he makes no move to take his arm back “—think of something.”

“And I have three clients left…for the day.”

Abby tsks you from behind though it’s the truth. The empty glass rattles on the tabletop with your faint tremor.

Steve thinks for a prolonged, squinting moment. “After work then. I’ll pick you up.”

You run off adrenaline and butterflies the rest of the day, and yes, whatever liquids or snacks Abby and Dominica (when she returns from her errand) put into your hand along the way, but mostly it’s the fluttering anticipation of Steve that floats you through.

And then he’s back and it’s already dark outside.

“Oh shit,” you burst, politely showing Mr. Chen out while Steve waits his turn to get in the door. He says nothing, but Captain America lowers his head in disapproval at your curse. “I’m sorry. I lost track of time. Let me grab some things.”

You race up the stairs to the apartment over the shop. Your clientele and brand used to be small enough that you could keep those two sides of life separate, but slowly, your work has crept into your living space. Now you survive from a dresser, a hanging rack, and a Murphy bed that doubles as a small desk when it’s upright against the wall.

Not much of an existence, but it’s very practical.

You’re shuffling around with an overnight bag and a dump tote to grab mostly work things and two changes of clothes. One of your assistants can bring you more stuff if/when necessary, but it feels presumptive to think you’ll live out of a safe house for long.

“So…working to live or living to work?”

You jump at Steve’s deep voice from the open doorway. He looks around at the hodgepodge of work benches and mannequins lining the walls.

“It’s a fluid and evolving situation,” you admit, sweeping several binders of fabric swatches and sketch pads into the tote. You eye a work-in-progress on one of the dummies and decide against trying to take it. Too bulky.

In order not to keep Steve waiting, you hand over the tote and head to the car, texting Abby and Dominica instructions the whole drive. Steve assures you that you’ll still have wifi and freedom to communicate, so you don’t have to clear fittings and consults off the books. It simply won’t be wise to invite welcome clients into where you’re staying.

Admittedly, that’s very generous considering you could have been looking at a blackout, witness-protection level of hiding.

You’re still on your phone when Steve opens your car door, and you shuffle with your duffel, his feet at the edge of your periphery to follow. It doesn’t register that you walk down a long hall. It doesn’t register that there’s an elevator ride and another voice. It doesn’t register that you’re looking at a kind of hostel-esque apartment inside another building until you ask if there’s a space you’ll be able to spread out for work.

Steve glows with pride that he thought of that and walks you to a conference room…surrounded by glass…overlooking a 30-story high view of the city.

You’re in the Avengers Tower, formerly Stark Tower.

“Wait, he’s not supposed to know.”

Steve gets your confusion right away. “Tony doesn’t, but without filing paperwork stating the reason you need a safe house, this was the best—“

“Sheers!” the booming voice of one Tony Stark reverberates across 360 degrees of windows. “I thought it might be you.”

“Might be me for what?” you ask as innocently as possible.

“As Capsicles’ first, of course.”

Steve hangs his head while his pal claps him on the back.

“First use of his guest pass that is. Granted, I’ve been saying for years we need an in-house tailor, but no takers…” Stark fake-punches Steve’s shoulder. “Way to break the ice, buddy. I’m proud of you. What happened? You noticed you’re both workaholics and needed your girl…closer to get closer, did you? Good call.”

Steve shoots wary eyes your way, silently praying you ignore that remark or maybe checking you’re okay with the implication. The way Stark says ‘your girl’ as if he’s heard it several times before though…

“Something like that,” you shrug. 

“At least he finally asked you. I kept telling him to shit or get off the pot.”

“Language,” you hiss quietly.

The men look a little shocked for a split second before slowly turning to each other, a silent conversation passed in the empty space over your head. Whatever just happened seems to have really convinced Tony because a wry smile flickers beneath his sinking, pale sunglasses. Yes, of course, Tony Stark is wearing sunglasses at night, just as, of course, Captain America is willingly deceiving Stark to be your fake boyfriend. 

“Romeo,” the building’s namesake coos. “Training them young, I see.”

Steve’s jaw and neck tighten, a raging flush creeping up his pale skin, but he doesn’t argue. Stark buys the ploy, which is great, but in reality, Steve doesn’t even have your personal number.

Tony lifts his hands in surrender and starts retreating to the door. “Look, I hate to take credit—“

“No, you don’t.”

Incredulous, sagging eyebrows dip below his frames. “—but I am very, very good.” He points a finger back and forth between you and Steve. “You’re welcome.”

He tries to peek under a pile of sketches atop your work tote, and you rush to slap your hand down. Stark might see the other designs you’re working on, and just like he can’t know about Fisk, he can’t know about those.

“Fine.” Tony puts his hands up again. “I’m going.”

Steve steps to your side, apology loud in his eyes, and asks if he can make you tea or something stronger, ya know, because Tony has that effect on people.

“Yeah—“ you stare off toward the elevators where Stark remains lurking “—he’s still there,” you whisper.

Steve huffs a laugh and shifts to bridge the mere inches left between you, his hand gently landing on your upper arm and planting a kiss on your forehead like a breeze.

“Better make it look good then.”

Turns out you need tea and food.

You’d been so reliant on your assistants for nourishment that you forgot dinner. Steve sees; he has it covered. Instead of winding down after a trying day, however, you get a rush of energy, and you can’t squander the chance to make crucial adjustments. Every minute counts in the lead-up to Fashion Week.

“May I join you?” Steve asks, ready to walk away with his meal in hand should you prefer. “I won’t take up much space.” He looks down at his shoes and up the two inches above his head to the top of the doorframe. “Ok, much more space,” he corrects.

“You wanted to leave me alone?”

He bites back a smile and shakes his head, settling into the least cluttered corner.

He chats excitedly as you both eat, but after failing to pry some answers about Fisk from you,—‘are you often threatened by clients?’ and ‘can you steer him in another designer’s direction?’—Steve slips away to grab his own art supplies.

You’ve barely looked up until you get a surge of inspiration and search for your colored pencils under the pile of templates. How did they get all the way over there? Since when are red and grey so worn down? Weren’t you needing to replace both blues soon?

“Those in your way? I can move them?”

Steve stops sketching, holding a yellow pencil, the only color missing from the tin. That’s when you realize. He uses the same brand of pencils you do—tools made of quality materials but nothing overly fancy.

“No need,” you marvel. “I just mistook them for my own.”

Steve sweeps a large hand out in offering. “Mistake away.”

You can’t help it. You chew your lip to calm your grin. He’s simply a very giving man who enjoys simple things. It’s refreshing.

“Or we could trade? We seem to use the opposite colors the most.”

“Right,” Steve laughs, “I went on a tear trying for Sam’s suit in-flight. Never turned out.” Shaking his head dislodges a lock of hair, so he runs his fingers through the strategic coif.

“Hmm,” you hum absently, engrossed by his picturesque appearance, “my drawings are more like guidelines for my imagination. No need to be precise.”

“A sentiment I’ve heard many times before.” He slides the tin closer to the midway point between you. “I just want to do beauty justice, which sounds pretentious but…

“Point is—“ Steve lifts his gaze to you with a soft shrug “—use whatever you like.”

You thought your work habits were grueling, but poor Steve flits around at all hours of the day and night with workouts, training, meetings, and missions. He mostly gets to do drive-by waves of ‘hello’ as he travels the building past your glass bubble, always with a smile, always with a tinge of something else. He’s an easy man to read: you can tell when he’s fatigued (in spirit though, not body), you can tell when he’s irritated from stress, and you can tell when he wants to linger but has to go.

It’s incredibly cute. Steve Rogers is just so damn cute.

You continue with business as usual as best you can, video calling during consults and the most critical fittings. Clients aren’t exactly happy with your absence, but they don’t dare complain when the alternative is waiting another month for you to schedule in person. Besides, there are oftentimes you step away from routine appointments to focus on creating new lines.

Dominica is allowed to walk right in with any of your requested supplies since she’s delivered to Stark several times before. She stays for a few hours to touch base. She assures you that Tarik is no longer unnerved by the police car that sits at the curb outside the atélier’s front door. Apparently, Abby takes the cops coffee a couple times a day.

All in all, it’s going well.

One day, you think Steve is showing up for one of your ‘sketch sessions’—where he sits in his own chair somewhere around the huge oval table and quietly works alongside you—but not today.

“They…it’s…” Steve plants his feet on the carpet across from you and looks behind him nervously. Anytime other people are near the room, he walks right over to you to kiss your cheek, a show to keep up the appearance of actually being a couple, but it’s late enough that no one is around. “We do movie night—we’re doing movie ni—we’re watching a movie if you’d like to join?”

You’re tempted to tease him, ask ‘where’s my kiss’ or something that makes that fiery blush creep up Steve’s face, but you grin back. “Sure. I could use the break.”

Honestly, no, you should be hammering out some details for the lapels of this blazer, but ehh, you’re also tired of staring at the same damn jacket.

Of course, this means the lot of them save you and Steve seats beside each other on a couch. You two have only ever sat in chairs in front of or separated by a table, so figuring out how to curl up next to the man you are not dating is an adventure in micro-expressions. You share a look that lasts about two seconds but contains a forty-five-minute discussion of how far is okay to take this and agree that you want to keep up the charade.

Thus, Steve lifts his arm to drape across your shoulders, and you lean into his chest.

It’s a good fit, good enough that you wake up two hours later not knowing what the movie was about and starting to sweat from being so close to his very warm body.

Maybe it’s the eye convo or maybe napping directly on him tells Steve how comfortable you are with him, but either way, he changes to giving a kiss on the cheek or forehead every instance he sees you, no exceptions.

After a week of remaining on the same floor of the same skyscraper and doing nothing but working, sleeping, and movie-sleeping, you’re at your wit’s end, longingly staring out the window at the city below.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Steve asks as he enters the conference room. Forehead kiss this time. His lips feel soft and warm as they ghost over your skin.

“Stuck,” you mutter.

His hand smooths across your back. “Well, how do you normally get unstuck?”

“I go for a walk through the park.” You know you can’t go outside, but it’s difficult to wrangle every bit of bitterness at your captivity. You appreciate all Steve is doing to make it so Fisk can’t get to you, but you need fresh air.

Steve sighs like he’s mad at himself before spinning around the room. “Right.” He grabs your hand. “Come with me.”

In the elevator, Steve explains that in keeping with the eco-friendly intent of the new clean energy tower, Tony made half of the rooftop a greenhouse and the other half a garden. The walking paths are all moss-covered, but there are no benches. Just outside the elevator doors are folding chairs, and Steve grabs two.

On separate chairs with no table in sight, you two watch the sunset on the other side of the building from your work room. You take in a big breath of the chilly air and shiver, completely content to experience freedom away from climate control, but Steve rushes back into the greenhouse to retrieve a blanket from the stack beside the chairs.

“Here ya go,” he stumbles, leaning to tuck the fabric around you. “I should have brought us tea or something,” but when he makes to leave this time, you take his hand.

“You’ll miss it.” He’s probably seen the view from here a million times before, but you don’t want him to go. “Stay,” you say in a whisper.

Steve visibly softens, shoulders dropping, eyes alight. “Yeah?” He sits again and looks at the nearly cloudless sky. “Yeah.” He slouches to get comfy in the small and unsupportive chair, but he looks so at home bathed in the warm pink light. “Each time’s a bit different but—“ he turns to you, smiling “—this one’s better.”

Since the sunset sit-down, Steve makes a point to pry you away from the work area when he has time to hang out with you. The couch isn’t actually far away from the conference room, but it does mean you get to sit together, your feet in his lap while he reads a book, listening to his commentary on the author’s points or sketching aimlessly for fun.

The whole thing feels like a bizarre vacation, some alternate reality where your home life intersects with superheroes. Tony Stark may have been a sometimes-client, but he never let you attempt anything more custom than a three-piece suit. 

You’re not complaining; it’s just weird that Captain America is so average when his uniform comes off. He sinks his face into his palm when he’s sleepy. His yawn is outrageously adorable for how big the man is. He absently holds your ankles steady in his lap when he shifts on the cushions. His eyelids droop, and he repeats paragraphs when he can no longer keep his place on the page.

Steve Rogers could not be more normal, and for this reason, you find him extraordinary.

He gets dressed every morning while you’re there, no sweatpants, no workout wear—or, what did Sam call it? Athleisure? That’s not a word, right?—except for when Steve is actively working out. He thinks it’s too on-the-nose to wear your designs in front of you for days on end, but that limits his options significantly, considering how much of his wardrobe sports a Tovarich label. Good jeans and a black sweater will have to do because today he’s playing model.

It seems the mannequin Dominica hauled in for you isn’t close to the right proportions for your client so Steve volunteered, rewarded immediately with a gorgeous, toothy smile that made his heart thump against his ribcage.

Steve’s chatty but can’t help it.

There was one conversation a few days ago that unlocked so many memories he thought he’d lost.

While he peeked at a few of your sketches, you asked him about clothing in the 40s, and he took your notepad to doodle a bit. Steve drew a common dress from memory to show you girls he grew up with, the pleats and cinches in their exact spots because—now that he has your full and rapt attention—he thinks it’s important.

He’s had to recall maps, battle maneuvers, building layouts, and evil plans more times than he can count; no one’s ever asked him how his mother styled her hair or which shoes she wore to work at the hospital.

They’re just shoes, but Steve sat misty-eyed describing how Ma tied her laces a very specific way, the way she taught him to, the way he still ties them to this very day. He hadn’t thought of why in so long, and ever since, little details keep flooding back.

“Buck used to never tuck in his shirts,” Steve laughs as you nudge his arms higher to check his range of motion in the shoulders. “He’d fix the front half and leave a tail out in the back.”

You chuckle at that. “Unacceptable for proper ol’ Stevie,” you muse.

“No, it was not—“ he drops his head in shame “—and I’d remind him every time.” Steve spins, prompted by the pull of your hands at his waist. His face is on fire, but he promised to help you. He just has to ’suffer’ through your touch, he supposes.

How horrible…

“Sharp dresser, were you? Not a hair out of place?”

“Yes, ma’am, or…at least for my size I was.”

You’re deep in thought, pulling the bottom hem to check how it lays at his hips, checking the lining before buttoning him up. “These might be too flashy,” you mumble. “Gosh, I hope he likes this color.”

“Why not? It’s stunning,” Steve jumps too eagerly at the chance to praise the barely purple fabric. It’s that kind of illusion hue that might look black, navy, or its true shade in different lights.

“And the buttons?” you prod.

He tilts one of the stamped, dark nickel rounds to see the embellishment. “I’d consider that a signature touch of the Tovarich brand,” he beams.

Your elation is contagious until an ear-splitting alarm sounds overhead. You’re so startled you spring backward into a rolling chair and topple to the floor.

Steve scrambles to help you right yourself while the wailing screech continues, but he knows that noise.

Emergency.

He has to go.

You’re holding your elbow, flashing him a thumbs up, and Steve feels terrible yelling to ensure you’re okay.

Agents race past the glass walls, and he really has to run so off he goes, jacket still on.

An incredibly long seventeen hours later, Steve is returning to his room only to notice you’ve fallen asleep at the conference table. He’s pleased there is no bandage on your elbow, so the fall was no worse than bruising, but he refuses to leave you there.

Slowly peeling your face and hands from your drafting paper, Steve wrestles your flopping arms and limp legs into a solid hold to carry you to your own room.

You don’t wake up, not fully, only enough to grip the shoulder strap of his shield harness as he gently lowers you onto the unmade bed. Luckily, your MO is to kick off your shoes when concentrating on work, so once you release the leather attached to him, he pulls the covers over you.

He kisses your temple. “Night, Button,” he whispers like a secret, and for now, it is.

You simply sigh and turn deeper into the pillow.

Steve purposefully finds you at breakfast to ask if you’d want to get lunch with him. Yes, it would just be in the cafeteria on the lower levels, and yes, you two have already shared many meals, but in his mind, this is the actual ask, the question of ‘will you go out with me’ instead of just ‘are you hungry at this reasonable time and may I be hungry in your vicinity.’

It’s stupid, he knows. He’s anxious for your answer anyway.

Steve has a very love/hate relationship with having you essentially trapped in the Tower. On the one hand, you’re starved for interaction and the choice of your surroundings. On the other hand, he gets you all to himself. He’s ashamed of how much he enjoys that perk. Somewhere deep inside, he hopes whatever Fisk is after is never resolved, but that’s wishful—and terribly selfish—thinking.

Just in case going on a deliberate date with him isn’t offer enough, Steve can return your client’s jacket. He hung it in his locker when changing into the tactical suit. It’s safe, but he’ll get it after his debrief. That’s a good excuse. That’ll work.

You’re happy and excited, only making him more nervous, but it’s progress. He’s done ‘round noon after the long meeting scheduled to start in, yikes, fifteen minutes, and you quickly agree. Steve floats on cloud nine, bouncing his foot until dismissed so he can rush back up to you.

He isn’t expecting to see Tony in your bubble.

“You don’t know me, Stark. How dare you!” Your face twists in fury. “Screw this,” you shout, frantic in grabbing your essentials from the table. “I don’t answer to you. I don't need this. Someone else will get my things.”

Steve doesn’t understand why you won’t meet his eye or speak to him as you barrel past. He’s too stunned to follow you to the elevator, it feels imposing to race down and corner you in the lobby, but he marches up to Tony with wide eyes.

“What the hell happened?”

Tony waves him off, cagy and dismissive, rushing off upstairs to his lab, and Steve almost asks if this is about Fisk. If it’s not and he blabs, then you’ll definitely be angry at him. If he grills Tony too much, there might be something that gives away that Steve lied about having a significant other as his guest for two weeks. If Steve admits that he doesn’t even have your number, the jig is 100% up.

But he knows you have his number, he knows he still has a jacket you’ll want back, and he knows one thing he’s incredibly good at.

So Steve waits, ready to apologize, ready to grovel, ready to yell at Tony for whatever. He is just ready and waiting.

@supraveng @1950schick @patzammit @whiskeytangofoxtrot555 @bucky-fricking-barnes-reads @fallinallinmendes @deandreamernp @shelbygeek @rogersideup @eyebagsanonymous @darsynia

[Next Part]

[Light Masterlist; Main Masterlist; Ko-Fi]

[sculkapologist]

I have plenty of other projects I should be working on BUT then Mochi started building a shop to fill in the huge wall of dirt between the greenhouse and the boardwalk by the water, and I became CONSUMED with the need to join in and decorate a bunch of tiny houses.... SO!! TOWNHOUSE TIME!! You can also see buildings that Boo (the lime green)and Mochi (the grey and prismarine shop) have been working on in that first image… there's still a bunch along the boardwalk that's under construction, too. I built three townhouses and decorated the upstairs of mochi's shop, many more images under the cut!!

The blue townhouse was the first one I made, with the exterior inspired pretty directly from mechitect's townhouse design tutorial.

it's pretty simple! It's when I started to discover alcoves are interesting with these tiny buildings, since you're sort of dependent on what the house next to you is doing. Oh, also, that painting is one of my custom maps.

The pink townhouse was a little more ambitious - this one has a little kitchen, an aquarium idea I got from klay_designs_mc on instagram and TWO tiny bedrooms (one for the grownups and one for the kids), which may seem very straightforward but actually i took a great deal of psychic damage arranging them to fit in this little 8x8 space

we have some kind of resource pack on our realm that makes every mob drop mob heads occasionally, and I just really like sticking them on shelves as like... some kind of toys or figurines or plushies.

Anyway, while I was excitedly showing my progress to my friends, Mochi asked if I'd be willing to decorate the upstairs of his flower shop -- the building next to my blue townhouse. He wanted it to be a living space above the shop, and mentioned that the large windows might be nice for a kitchen, and other than that left me to my own devices.

TREMENDOUSLY PROUD OF THIS ONE TBH...!!! bed design was inspired by a bluenerd tutorial, and the little hearts are as always inspired by my fav builder CroissantCat, though honestly my entire minecraft portfolio should just have "inspired by bluenerd and/or croissantcat" on the first page. (the lamps are those mob heads again btw -- you can do this with the existing skeleton heads, but if you HAVE glow squid heads like... WHY NOT USE THEM)

anyway at this point I had obviously completely lost my mind, so my third townhouse has an upstairs, a basement, a home office, AND a bathroom. (it wasn't going to have a bathroom originally, but Boo saw the downstairs and gasped in excitement b/c he thought it was a bathroom, sO LIKE.... OBVIOUSLY AFTER THAT I HAD TO ADD A BATHROOM)

watched a WHOLE BUNCH of blendigi Modern Interior Design tutorials for ideas here, including some armour stand crimes to make THAT INCREDIBLE OFFICE CHAIR???? but im still very pleased with my decision to use the one Long Painting as a TV screen lmao

there were actually a whole bunch of planning scribbles for this... it started out with just a little layout of 3 possible designs for townhouse facades, and then turned into MANY floorplan attempts as I tried to figure out how to fit everything I wanted into these smaller spaces:

Anyway, I think that's everything!! Thanks for joining me on this tour of my townhouses lmao, hopefully this has sated my craving for interior design for a bit!!

[hurlumerlu]

Trust the process.

a short THK fanfic

Turkish baths have their uses. They’re factory-like in ways he can’t quite explain, and suffocating, both literally and metaphorically – every room quick to make the doors disappear if you turn your back on them – but they have their uses. Kant should probably find a kinship with the place.

"So?" The captain asks.

"So I’m making progress," Kant replies. Sweat drips down his face, slow and unpleasant.

Why people sweat for fun is entirely beyond him: he’s rarely keen to do anything if the AC isn’t on, and his over-reliance on snake brand powder has his little brother calling him grandma and Bison nuzzling into his armpits – Bison likes the smell. He hasn’t said so, but he’s a show don’t tell kind of guy.

"That means you don’t have anything."

"It means I have his trust."

"So I heard."

Something icy slithers into the steam room, sliding up his spine, around his throat. He clears it, best he can: "You bugged the tattoo shop."

It’s not a question, not an accusation either. It’s nothing.

"For the biggest case of my entire carreer? Of course I bugged the tattoo shop. Don’t get all precious on me now."

Kant lowers the arm that had, without his imput, raised protectively to cover his chest.

"I must say, though," continues the captain. "Little Bison’s not quite what I expected."

Of course he’s not. His outfits seem almost designed to bring other scenarios in mind, of authoritative hands forcing young delinquents to confront their own inocence. Kant’s not opposed to that kind of porn, he’ll jerk off to anything, but he’s been the delinquent often enough that the whole thing has lost its mystique. Bison’s warm, awe-struck eyes at Kant’s pain, however? That’s something else.

And the captain heard.

No.

Listened.

"So what is this, exactly, Chris? Do you regret not taking me up on my offers, now that you’ve heard me moan?"

Kant’s on his feet, which is a bad idea – it doesn’t do well to tower over the man who has you by the balls. He hadn’t been too proud to beg when he had been caught red handed, wrist-deep in the wires of some billionaire’s car. He’d offered every services he knew how to perform, plus a few he had yet to learn. The captain had other plans for him, and not enough appetite to use and strong-arm him, but it still hangs between them, at least on Kant’s side: a distant, detached sort of shame. He hadn’t looked directly at it in years.

"Don’t be absurd," the captain sighs. "I’m worried about you."

It’s a new one, but Kant isn’t stupid: he knows a threat when he hears one. "Why?"

"Will you sit down? I don’t want a crick in my neck."

"You know I could do that kind of job with my eyes closed."

"I asked you to sit down."

The captain has the most unnerving gaze. It’s too soft, like his voice. He never, ever sounds unkind. Kant sits

"You think this is the first time I fuck a mark? I have it under control."

"But it can be intoxicating, can’t it? This level of trust."

"It’s what I do. On your orders, it’s what I do."

"I know."

"So what’s different?"

"You tell me," the captain almost smiles.

"Then I'm telling you: nothing’s different. You just hadn’t seen how I work before. If I don’t give a real part of myself, how can I expect anyone to take the bait?"

"Is it what’s happening?"

"You know I’m doing this for my brother." It’s the single dirtiest thing he’s ever done, bringing the kid into this. The cold feeling around his neck turns oily and viscous. Sweat. It’s just sweat. "You think I’d throw away his future for a pretty piece of ass?"

There’s a hand patting his tigh, right before the captain gets up.

"Alright, Kant." He always pronounces it can’t. "As long as you’re careful. Let’s say I trust you for now."

[cirilla-fiona-riannon]

A Gentleman Boyfriend

Translations may not always capture the exact nuances or tone of the original text. Expect grammatical errors.

Blank, ageless, and suspicious blogs will be blocked.

Kicho: "Change your perspective."

Mai: "Kicho?"

He emerged from the trading post and looked at both of us.

Kicho: "I believe Motonari is trying to convey something along those lines."

Motonari: "What? You were eavesdropping?"

Kicho: "I heard your argument through the window."

Mai: "Sorry."

(We shouldn't have argued in front of the trading post, especially with customers coming and going.)

Feeling apologetic, I lowered my voice and asked Kicho.

Mai: "But what do you mean by changing perspectives?"

Kicho: "It means not just thinking about what to sell but considering the perspective of the wearer or the buyer."

Kicho: "Normally, that's what you do."

Mai: "The wearer or the buyer一ah!"

His words helped me realize something.

Mai: "You're right. I've been so focused on what to sell that I've neglected what the wearer would appreciate."

(I might've neglected the important aspect of how to make the wearer happy.)

Kicho: "By thinking about what would make the person wearing it happy, you should be able to create something that truly represents you."

Mai: "Okay, thanks! You really understand me."

Kicho: "I'm not sure if I completely understand you, but I always strive to."

(Kicho...)

Having a supportive lover was really reassuring.

Motonari: "Hey, how long are you going to keep showing off?"

(Crap! I forgot that Motonari was here.)

Kicho: "Motonari, you're here for business, right?"

Motonari: "Of course. I didn't come here just to tease her."

Kicho: "I thought so. Let's talk inside."

He took Motonari and started returning inside. However, as he was leaving, he gently brushed the back of his fingers against my cheek.

Kicho: "I look forward to seeing the designs you create."

Those words lightened my mood, and the stiffness that had settled in my heart began to melt away.

(Right. I should rethink my ideas again!)

(Considering the perspective of the wearer and the buyer...)

(I just need to make something I want to wear and something I want to give as a gift, right?)

I immediately started sketching in my notebook, letting my imagination run wild.

(I should also jot down things that might serve as inspiration.)

I started writing down recent memorable experiences.

(During our negotiation, Kicho held my hand and led me to sit on the sofa.)

(And the gentle way he touched my shoulders and cheeks.)

Mai: "If I were to walk beside a wonderful partner like Kicho, what kind of dress would be perfect?"

Ideas for designs naturally came to mind.

Then, I suddenly heard the sound of a bell ringing from outside and was startled.

Mai: "Whoa! It's already this late!?"

Without realizing it, I'd become engrossed and had drawn several designs.

(Wow, I've made a lot of progress today.)

With a sense of accomplishment, I looked at my sketchpad, and my notes about Kicho caught my eye.

(Weird. Ideas keep popping into my head whenever I think about him.)

(I think I'll continue making notes about him for a while.)

Kicho: "Mai, I'm coming in."

Mai: "Kicho!?"

(I can't let him see these notes!)

I hurriedly put my notebook face down on my desk.

Mai: "C-Come in."

Kicho entered the room and briefly glanced at my desk.

Even though I'd hidden my notebook, the ink and brush were still out.

Kicho: "Were you working on something?"

Mai: "Um, yes. I was just brainstorming some ideas."

Kicho: "I see. It's good that you're working hard, but you should consider going to the bathhouse soon."

Kicho: "They're about to turn off the furnace."

Mai: "O-Okay. I'll get ready and head there."

He nodded and left the room.

Mai: "Phew."

Feeling relieved, I reopened my sketchpad, full of several compliments written about him.

(I can't let him see this. It's too embarrassing! I need to keep it a secret!)

The next day--

I was out shopping with Kicho in town.

Mai: "There seem to be more people than usual."

Kicho: "It's probably crowded in the market, too. Be careful not to get swept away in the crowd."

Mai: "Got it."

Passerby: "Move out of the way!"

I turned towards the voice and saw a cart forcefully rushing through the crowd.

Kicho: "Mai."

(Whoa!)

Kicho placed his hands on my shoulders and instinctively positioned himself in the middle of the road to shield me.

Mai: "Thank you for protecting me."

Kicho: "I just acted on instinct. It wasn't anything special."

He took my hand and interlocked his fingers with mine.

Kicho: "If I'm going to protect you from the crowd, I might as well do it this way."

He firmly held our intertwined hands in a lover's grip.

Kicho: "Don't let go of my hand."

My heart started beating faster as we held hands and gazed at each other.

Mai: "Okay, I won't."

I replied in a slightly trembling voice, and he responded with a gentle smile.

Kicho: "Thank you."

He lifted our joined hands and placed a tender kiss on my fingertips.

(He's incredibly kind, yet he never imposes himself on me.)

(This delicate balance is what makes him a true gentleman.)

I decided to make a note of this in my design book.

The next day, while I was sketching until late at night, I heard a voice from behind the door.

Kicho: "Mai, can I come in?"

Mai: "Kicho?"

I closed my design book and went to greet him.

Mai: "What's wrong? It's already late."

Kicho: "I noticed the light in your room has been on for a while, so I thought you might be overworking yourself."

Kicho: "I brought some tea and snacks. How about taking a short break?"

I looked at the tray and saw a tea set and some rice crackers.

Mai: "Wow, it looks delicious. The tea smells wonderful, too."

Kicho: "I'm glad I found something you like."

He placed the tray on the table, poured tea into the teacup, and offered it to me.

Mai: "I can do it myself!"

Kicho: "We may not have much time to share tea, but please allow me this."

(He's so kind.)

Mai: "You've done so much. Please let me return the favor next time."

He suddenly stood up and gently touched my cheek.

Mai: "Nn..."

Then kissed my lips.

Kicho: "You don't need to thank me. This alone is more than enough."

(Just with a kiss?)

Kicho: "Of course, looking at your face is also soothing."

Mai: "........."

(I'm so lucky to be loved like this.)

At that moment, the snacks and my thoughts about my designs faded into the background. I felt the urge to embrace him, but he gently stepped back.

Kicho: "I'll leave before I become a distraction."

Kicho: "Make sure not to overwork yourself."

Mai: "Okay. Good luck with your work, too."

(Why is he so cool?)

I touched the spot where he had kissed me and watched him leave.

(As expected, talking to him sparks my creativity.)

(I should also jot down today's events while I'm at it.)

Work progressed smoothly, and my compliments about him in my notes doubled in number.

Several days later, I was with him, visiting Darren's mansion.

Maid: "Please, have a seat. The master will be with you shortly."

We were led into a room and had to wait for a while.

Kicho: "It's finally time. How confident are you?"

Mai: "I've prepared several designs that I think are good."

Mai: "I hope there's something Darren will like among them."

As I was about to take out my designs, I noticed something.

Mai: "Huh?"

(No way. Why?)

Part 1╎Part 2╎Premium End╎Epilogue

[legendaerie]

Hey y'all! Just a little status update:

💙 We made $166 each for Doctors Without Borders and The Trevor Project with sales of the Ratiorine pins and stickers in July! We still have lots available on BigCartel!

💜 I've been working on my fic for @martingalezine as well as a couple pinch hits for the Haikaveh Gotcha for Gaza, and the sequel to Miasma (which should hopefully start being posted in September)

🩷 I'm also making great progress on my Dr. Ratio cosplay, a modification/upsizing of the Uwowo Cosplay collab piece, and have recorded some video of the outfit and my modifications so expect that possibly this month or after--

❤️ Windblume! I'll be down in Dallas for this Genshin fan convention this month and in the area/possibly attending San Japan the following weekend if I feel up to it. Come say hi if you're attending and grab a free sticker of the Ratiorine charity design!

🧡 I do plan on extending my social media hiatus for another month as I've been hard at work improving my physical and emotional health and not getting trapped scrolling for hours gives me so much more time to do things like cook, clean, work out, and make things. I'm still always delighted to get asks, replies, and messages but I think I'm going to transition more to just posting updates on projects/my life on here and less reblogging.

💛 Tomorrow will mark my first full month on testosterone gel. It's not something I've talked about much, but it's a careful experimental little step in my journey towards making my body a more comfortable place to live in.

💚 Lastly, I really want to finish a full draft of my novel ADITEP by the end of the year. I've written a few hundred thousand words in false starts and backstory and scrapped scenes and I want to be able to sit down, figure out who these characters are, and finally tell their story in a cohesive manner. Ideally I'll shop the manuscript with @duckprintspress (who are also featuring me as an artist in an upcoming anthology) but to do that I have to have something to show off. So!

Much love to you all! Make sure you're registered to vote, drink water, and tell the people in your life you love them (including yourself!)

[itsbenedict]

Games I Played In 2023 And Whether Or Not I Thought They Were Good (Part 1/4)

Once again, a year has passed, and I spent a considerable chunk of it on video games! Here's what I thought about [e: some of] the ones that I played.

1 - [2] - [3] - [4]

Potionomics

This game is- well, I've never played a Recettear game, but apparently it's a Recettear knockoff? You run a potion shop, and you hire adventurers to go into dungeons to get ingredients for your potion shop, and the whole thing's on a timer where you have to pay off a big debt by the end... apparently there's a formula it's aping that I'm unfamiliar with.

But it's very fun- it's got two main unique mechanics, one of which is a potion-brewing minigame about balancing ingredients in certain ratios which is challenging- and the other of which is an STS-style deckbuilder card game where you haggle with customers in lieu of combat. Both systems have a lot of depth and interesting options and I enjoyed them a lot.

Other standouts: the cast of support characters you can rank up social links with are great (love love love the coffee-addled workaholic moth girl and the comic relief cat pirates with a surprisingly dark backstory), and the fully-animated 3D character portraits are really fun and expressive.

Nitpicks: the time system having one time block reserved for the hour it takes to go home after visiting town is... an awkward choice (holdover from the Recettear structure they're aping?), and lategame you kind of cap out in potion-making capacity and it becomes kind of tricky to progress. Also the story's kinda predictable and the villains who don't later become party members are paper-thin.

Horizon: Forbidden West

God this game pisses me off.

Horizon: Zero Dawn, its predecessor, was a fun open-world game about hunting robot dinosaurs and uncovering the surprisingly elaborate story behind why there are robot dinosaurs. I enjoyed it a lot!

Forbidden West has everything Zero Dawn had... and also mountains of tedious cruft to pad out the game's runtime which all infuriates me to no end.

The story is still quite good! And the robot dinosaur fighting is still quite good! Those are the important parts, and they nailed them... but I have complained at my friends for hours about the bafflingly bad design choices that plague every other aspect of this game constantly. It's... there's so much, I want to like, make a video going into the details, but in short...

The cool and versatile weapons from the last game have been split up into piles of slightly-different weapons with different elements so you have to carry around and upgrade ten times as much crap and are forced to spec into a build that locks you out of effective experimentation

Every little noncombat action in the game has some very realistic and pretty AAA graphics animation that takes too long and wastes your time constantly during basic gameplay and kills flow dead

The very cool procedural climbing mesh thing... gets arbitrarily turned off in inexplicably oiled-up puzzle ruins that very badly want you to push a crate around in every way it's possible to push a crate around in order to waste the maximum amount of your time

Cooking "system" which is the most comprehensively useless thing anyone probably spent dozens of hours implementing in their video game

Item wheel that contains every consumable item in the game regardless of whether you currently have any and is basically unnavigable during tense situations like, say, combat, when you need it

So many repetitive sidequests about some poor fucker who went missing and might be in danger and is every single time dead to a bunch of robot dinosaurs obviously. Lot of missions designed to kill time rather than show you something cool or have interesting story.

There's a lot to like and it's super cool but god there's so much to be mad at. Respects the player's time 0%. I'm gonna go off about this more later for sure.

Disco Elysium

Oh my god, this game. It's... really something. You might be familiar with it from memes on Tumblr, about its comically inept slash deranged protagonist and his partner with the patience of a saint- but it's doing so much more than I expected from the out-of-context screencaps.

Like- yes, it's fucking hilarious. I love that about it. But it's also this incredibly detailed work of worldbuilding that creates this whole setting that's doing... some wild stuff. Like, you've maybe heard it's very political? Well, it is, but about weird alternate universe sci-fi politics that sort of halfway resemble our own, and it's thought through all of these invented social dynamics. And it's got a great sense of atmosphere- it knows when to be funny and when to be solemn and how to blend the two for maximum effect. It's a dark comedy, but it's all built on a dead-serious reality and a really effective story.

And- it is a murder mystery game about solving cases! It works very well on that level! It manages to be open-ended and let you solve things in a variety of different ways using this complex RPG stat system of creatively-designed psychological stats, while making sure the central whodunit (and a bevy of fascinating satellite mysteries) stays on track. Extremely good on a game design level.

(also some shit happens in this game that i was not at all expecting and can't even go into without spoilers, but- but holy fuck, the way this game opens up and the things it manages to hide in plain sight... just mind-boggling. incredibly impressive.)

Tunic

Speaking of hiding things in plain sight- neither this nor Disco Elysium came out this year, so I can't call either of them GotY, but... if they had, I'd have a hard time deciding.

Tunic is incredibly clever. On the surface, it's an isometric soulslike thing with a low-poly Zelda-y aesthetic... but there's not just the surface. There's layers and layers to this thing. The first layer it hits you with is that most of the game's UI is in a made-up rune script, which you have to learn, which is a fun challenge and caused me to spend a few hours making a tool to catalogue and decrypt the damn thing- though I eventually learned to sight-read it. But that's just- that's like, the tip of the iceberg, the most obvious twist to what this game is.

There's, like... I don't want to spoil what there's like. The whole thing is about peeling back the layers and figuring out which seemingly arbitrary aesthetic choices were secretly meaningful, and seeing how the game transforms as you figure out the different sorts of secret structure layered on top of each other. It's actually best compared to The Witness, although there's still a pretty meaty and challenging action-adventure game to tackle while you're uncovering the hidden patterns and deepest lore. It's a fascinating intellectual challenge and highly recommended to anyone who likes giving their noggin something to chew on.

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

Man, so... this game is very impressive, but it's in a weird place due to some awkward design decisions and cut corners.

This is a direct sequel to smash megahit Breath of the Wild... sort of. It's very weird what it's doing. It really wants to be a self-contained thing, to the point of throwing out major setting elements and story concepts from BotW entirely so it can do its own thing... but on a mechanical level, this is the same game, with some very cool new mechanics and a cool-ish new story bolted on.

(Said story... it has one extremely cool plot twist that's also a gameplay twist, delivered effectively in a nonlinear way that creates this great sense of dawning comprehension. Otherwise... kind of a nothingburger. Ganondorf is boring and has no coherent motivation, there's no explanation or real plot relevance to the [spoilers] that seem like such a central thing, and... the whole thing revolves around a technologically advanced precursor civilization that's completely different from the technologically advanced precursor civilization established by the last game, of which all evidence has been meticulously scrubbed from the world to... I guess avoid confusion? The one huge central plot beat really works, and the rest is... low-effort nonsense.)

So, mechanically... the developers made this very odd choice to... have the game take place in the exact same map from the first game, except warped and remixed by geologic upheaval just enough to force the environment designers to redo every bit of landscape more or less from scratch. Like, all the same recognizable locations, but a step to the left. In theory, not a bad idea- but then they layer on top of that a threefold expansion to the world.

TotK has three world maps- Hyrule, the sky (full of floating islands now), and a third spoilery area that's the same size as both of those. The game's economy is thus weirdly trifurcated- crucial resources are located in all three areas, so you need to go up and down and up and down a lot. And so is the game's content- there's a roughly comparable amount of stuff in BotW and TotK, but TotK splits it across three maps, making each area feel largely empty, with a lot of wasted space.

This effect is especially noticeable in Hyrule, which... if you've played BotW, you won't really find anything new there. It's all the same places with a few tweaks, so there's not much sense of discovery if you played the original. There's a bunch of landmarks and areas that exist purely because they were there before and it'd be weird for them to disappear... except now instead of some secret or loot there, there's just nothing. Wasted space. And both the sky and the other new map are pretty homogeneous and unrewarding to explore once you've seen the four or five types of things they have to offer- they're mainly made up of recycled assets.

TotK is... I think strictly better than BotW, with more content and more fun core mechanics, but it's a worse experience than BotW if you played the first one. If you haven't played BotW, Hyrule will still be fun to explore, and you probably want to jump straight to TotK.

-

I'm... gonna have to break this post up to get to the 21 other games I played this year, otherwise it's gonna be stupid long and take forever. Stay tuned!

1 - [2] - [3] - [4]

[cidthesquid]

Closing the Book on Fashion Forward! (Mini Review+Personal Story) Post #5

[Previous Post]              [First Post]            [TrendSetter] Yes, yes, I'm aware, this is the 3rd “I've finish Style Savvy FF" post! But This time it's for real, I completed the (spoilers) event, and I've even transferred my save off the emulator for long-term storage on the game cart! [My adventure spanned from 11/04/23 - 12/26/23]

Here are my last few outfits! (mini-review to follow!)

Overall, had a ton of fun with this game! It was one of the most memorable gaming experiences I've had in years. But it was not without it's hiccups, the most obvious being how events are handled, At times you'll have to wait for the correct person to pop-up to progress the plot, and sometimes they just refuse to show up. The Real time clock is a neat addition, with a season system for fashion shows, shop inventory, and for some slight weather features. it's FAR less strict than in games like animal crossing, but it can make unlocking some content really annoying, since you have to wait a real-world day for shops to refresh, and some in-game locations are locked out for different based on the time. But it by no means hampers you from enjoying the game's core loop. (Nigh owls rejoice) I could also complain about unlocking colors and hairstyles and makeup, as they all feel pretty random without a guide. But again these are all just extra. The core gameplay loop of managing inventory, designing outfits, and matching style to your customer was absolutely top notch! Even on my last day, I ended up coming with at least two new ones when I thought I'd exaused all options. The only snag with this, is after a fashion show, everyone will get excited about the theme, and will demand that you only make outfits in that specific style for multiple days afterwards, so that can get a little repetitive. But other than that, the core designing has been more fun than I thought possible! (Personal story relayed to SS, after the break!)

Alright, well since this will be my last post for a little while, (I'll take a short break before starting trendsetters) I figured I'd talk a little about why Style Savvy means soo much to me. (It's SUPER long, and get's a little personal, but you've been warned!) In short, I've always been a bit self-conscious about how I present myself in games. I'm a guy, and generally only play as guy characters designed to look as much like me as possible, Not because it's more 'immersive', or that that's because I'm most comfortable with, but because it would mean less 'uncomftable questions' from others, Yet I'd still get comments such as "that doesn't look like you", why'd you choose that.. weight/height/ hairstyle/skin tone/etc, that's not accurate"!

And that, mixed with many offhanded comments about how others chose to dress their characters, (and the possible reasons why they chose 'a specific outfit', applying a negative connotation to even the idea of a guy playing as a female character) It kinda enforced in my mind, that even wanting to play as a cool, cute or even sassy female character was just creepy in some way. So for a long time, I just avoided it my making all my main characters as close to myself as possible, but even having a female side/alt directly based of an existing TV show/game character would still cause some sarcastic remarks, so I just stopped using them in any multiplayer games, and stuck with my main. Eventually i stated playing Final Fantasy XIV and made my standard character, but the friend that introduced me to the game decided he had no interested in playing the start of the game again, and the few others I planned to play with were always busy, so I decided to make a female side character, and came up with a design I liked and ended up playing as them a lot, while waiting for others to be free. In Final Fantasy, I picked up crafting, and started making my own armor and clothing, and for the first time, I was actually designing outfits for an original female character! and began really enjoying the various outfits I could make, and mixing pieces for new looks It still felt kinda weird, I'd never cared about how other people designed or dressed their characters, but it still felt 'wrong' for me somehow, (Like I was enforcing my own will on them, deciding how they dress. as silly as it sounds) The compromise was making a few alt characters, giving each a style an personality, and just sticking to only designing within "what they would actually wear"

That allowed me to be much more comfortable designing in various styles, but I still felt a little weird making specific styles, as I was worried about how it would be precived by other players. ...And eventually 'Fashion Dreamer' released it looked interesting, looking it up online introduced me to 'Style Savvy', So I gave Fashion Forward a Shot, and fell in love with the game. It let me designed outfits my and other characters, but removed all the previous sources of anxiety! I did not have to worry about anyone else's feelings, no one in the game cared about who I was or how I looked in real life, I was not taking away anyone elses control, they decide they want to look cute/cool/feminine, and I'm just helping them achieve their goal. I could look however I want, and it would never bother anyone or make them feel uncomfortable. The people in the world were all very nice and friendly, and while they may be fake, the positive improvement the game has had on my live has been very real! The game may not be a teaching tool, but I still feel I've learned a fair bit about the basics of fashion and outfit customization. and I feel more confident in not just my designs, but how I feel about making characters in general! ...I mean to a point. I did completely redesign my avatar when I started posting here, as I was worried about what people would think, of my working with an avatar that appeared to be of a different race, ....despite me never posting any IRL pics... ...But, baby steps, I have to start somewhere! Click here for my bonus post: Fashion Forward x Final Fantasy XIV (Click here for my blog of playing through my Style Savvy TrendSetters!) --- Thanks Syn Sophia, this game has truly changed my life for the better! :)

[ae-azile]

Progression - Chapter 30 Preview (Part 3!)

I wasn't going to share another preview, but since it is Pride Month and Thailand legalized same sex marriage, it felt appropriate to share this scene - which can sort of stand alone, even if you don't follow this particular story but love ArmKhun. 🙂

Scene/One-Shot under cut:

Tankhun had planned a private laser show on the beach!

“We can still watch the laser show,” Arm says, sounding like he is incredibly nervous, “I don't see why we wouldn't. I didn't realize you planned something like that. I just…This morning, you said you wanted tonight to be low-key. I didn't realize you planned a surprise of some sort. So I planned this because…because I love you. I never thought falling in love was in the cards for me. I just didn't. But I have had feelings for you for years, and they have only grown stronger since we got together and…was this not good enough? I had them decorate a secluded bridge over a koi pond with your favorite flowers and tea lights. There is a string quartet playing the song we first slow danced to. Did I do something wrong?” 

“Yes!” Tankhun says accusingly, putting his hands on his hips. Arm’s expression immediately looks crestfallen and Tankhun would normally feel TERRIBLE for making Arm feel that way, even for a second. 

But Arm beat him. He came up with this beautiful proposal with just the right amount of romanticism and intimacy. Even if Tankhun still had the opportunity to one up this, he wouldn't be able to. The laser show was supposed to be private and fun. Tankhun was going to play dumb and act like it was a surprise for him too. Songs that had meaning to them were to play before the daunting question spelled itself out across the sky. It had been incredibly expensive to come up with and make happen within forty-eight hours, and it isn’t even going to happen. 

“You…” Tankhun tries to explain, then lets out a groan, pulls the box out of his pocket, and waves it in the air, “You ruined MY proposal! It is scheduled for midnight. That is just in twenty minutes, and you beat me! Do you know how long I have been carrying this ring? Almost nine months! You could have developed a healthy baby in your womb during that time, and don't say that isn't possible! You’ve ruined my proposal with your perfect one, so you get to be knocked up with our child in this scenario and not point out the flaws in my logic! I want a girl! Accept!” 

When Tankhun finally calms down enough to take in his boyfriend's demeanor once more, he sees that he's holding back a laugh. He thinks this catastrophe is funny. 

“Arm!” Tankhun says, stomping his foot once, “Stop.” 

“I'm sorry,” Arm says quickly, then steps closer, “If I had realized you were going to propose to me, I would have just let you do the honors. It was very daunting and stressful to plan this out.” 

“And you think I didn't have the same experience?” Tankhun asks, “You should have given me a head's up! I would have cast my plans aside and geared myself up for such a beautiful moment!” 

“You’re the one who should have given me a head’s up!” Arm says defiantly, “You’ve had a ring for longer. I only got this one right after Kim moved back into the compound.” 

Tankhun looks at Arm sullenly, “You have only wanted to marry me half the time I’ve wanted to marry you?” 

Arm lets out a groan and steps closer, “Of course not. I was fooling around with different designs for months. I wanted something that would represent your taste and personality. I was looking at different shops online, visiting stores during my free time, and making calls. I finally decided on an online store when I looked into customer reviews, but even then, I spent a long time trying to figure out what would work for you! You can be picky, Khun! And I wanted to get something you would love but would still compliment mine if I designed one for myself because I want everyone to know we belonged to each other. I know I said I didn't mind that your family didn't know back when we were keeping this a secret from them, and that was mostly true. Your reasons for keeping it from them for so long were valid. But I knew that I would face them - or even approach them alone - if you said yes. I love you, Khun. I love how smart and charismatic you are, how devoted you are to your brothers. You love my sisters and nieces like they're your blood, and I love that about you too. I love how you treat your fish like they're your children and how creative you are in so many different ways. I especially love how strange, dramatic, and demanding you can be-” 

“I have never been strange, dramatic, or demanding!” Tankhun says shrilly, only for Arm to take his face in his hands. 

“You are. And if you suddenly stopped being that way, I would hate it. I love everything about you and want to marry you because you're it for me.” 

Arm lets his hands drop at that point and Tankhun lets the words sink in. While he is still slightly frustrated his proposal plan was derailed by Arm’s proposal plans, that was a beautiful declaration of love. A bit of a ramble at times, but Arm is more introverted than he is and was never on the debate team like Tankhun was. And even though Tankhun has the skills to make a beautiful speech, he supposes he would also be flustered if the situation was reversed. 

The situation could have easily been reversed if Arm had just waited a little longer. But Tankhun does appreciate the effort he has put into this. 

“Let me see the ring,” Tankhun says, then realizes that sounds slightly demanding and is proving Arm right, “Would you please show me the ring?” 

“You don't have to ask. I was going to show you when I got down on one knee and you interrupted me.” 

“You took me by surprise!” Tankhun says, then lets out a sigh and pushes the box back towards Arm, “I'm sorry I ruined your proposal. But to be fair, you ruined mine first. Take two!” 

Arm stares at him in bewilderment, “Huh?” 

“It means try again. Sheesh, Arm! Don't you watch any of the behind the scenes clips I send you for the dramas we binge?” Tankhun says, then pushes on Arm’s shoulders, “Go on. Get on one knee. I’ll be quiet this time, I promise!” 

“You promise?” Arm asks cautiously but slowly starts to lower himself to the floor of the bridge. Once he is fully in position, Tankhun nods in approval and Arm takes it as a signal to go ahead. 

“Tankhun,” Arm starts as he looks up at him, “I’ve cared for you since the first day I met you and loved you since that day my biological father unexpectedly visited the compound to bug me about money and you punched him so hard that he fell into the pool-” 

“That was five years ago!” Tankhun cuts in with surprise, but then lets out a laugh, “That was really funny! I punched him in front of all the guards! Even Chan laughed and…Sorry. I interrupted. Continue.” 

Arm smiles a little, then pulls the box out again, “I’ve loved you a little more and more each day - both the good ones and bad. I didn't think it was possible to love someone more, but when you made your feelings known too, I felt emotions I had never experienced. They were terrifying, exhilarating, and a comfort, and I will cherish you and what I feel for you every single day for the rest of our lives. Will you marry me?” 

When Arm shows him the ring, it's beautiful. It's a rose gold band with a larger inlay of a dark green stone, and a smaller one underneath that is white. It will stand out, but still be sleek and subtle, just like Arm’s is. 

In fact - other than the inlay colors - it looks a LOT like the one Tankhun made him. 

“Did you order that from this site?” Tankhun asks, pulling out his phone to look up the site in question.

Arm leans in to look at it, “How did you know?” 

“I had to pay so much in shipping costs just to get them to do yours!” Tankhun says, “I can't believe they profited so much from our love!” 

“Malai helped me out with it. She has embassy connections from her old job and access to an address they would freely ship to,” Arm says, “I didn't have to pay for the ridiculous fee they were asking for that way.”

“Ugh, I should have asked around!” Tankhun says, “I thought about it, but I didn't want word to get back to Pa and-” 

“Tankhun, you still haven't answered.” 

Tankhun gives him an exasperated look, “Well, of course it's a yes. I literally planned a proposal. You thought there was a chance of me saying no? You're so silly, Arm. You know, for someone so smart, you can be unsure of the undying and unconditional love myself and others have for you and-”

Before Tankhun can finish, Arm is back on his feet, slipping the ring onto Tankhun's left ring finger, and pulling him in for a deep kiss. Tankhun fully returns it as he wraps his arms around his boyfriend's shoulders and pulls him closer. 

His fiancé’s shoulders. Because that is what Arm is now. His fiancé. 

“So you talked to Malai about this and she didn't tell me even though we are going to be lawyers together,” Tankhun says with a sigh, “Did you tell the rest of your sisters?” 

“Just Hansa,” Arm says, still holding him close, “I figured Nalin and Preeda would bombarde me with different suggestions on how to ask you, which would just overwhelm me more. But other than Malai and Hansa, I told Pol.” 

Tankhun feels a jolt of annoyance, “I told Pol! I can't believe he knew we would have conflicting plans to propose to each other and he just let it happen!” 

“To be fair, he risked pissing both of us off if he would have said anything.” 

…That's true. 

“Did you ask Pa or Kinn for their permission?” Tankhun asks. 

Arm shakes his head, “It's your decision. Not theirs. I don't think either of us need their permission for this. We are our own people.” 

Tankhun grins at that, brings him in for another kiss, then cups his face, “I only told Pol and Nam at first, but I ended up telling Kim and Kinn on weed brownie night. Everyone approves.” 

“Even Kinn?” 

“He was much more supportive than I thought he would be,” Tankhun says, “Granted, that brownie hit him hard. He was concerned about having cancer. He thought there was a freckle on his nail bed, so I suppose his impending doom made him prioritize his concerns. It turned out to be speck from a marker when your nieces begged him to color with them. All of that worrying for nothing! But the few people who do know have been very supportive.” 

“Good,” Arm murmurs, “I'm glad.” 

“Me too,” Tankhun says gently, then kisses him once more. He could stay in this moment forever. 

Except…

“The laser show will start any minute!” Tankhun says with a shout as he breaks off the kiss, then presses his finger against Arm’s chest, “This didn't happen, okay? This proposal can re-enter your mind after I propose to you, but for now? You have to pretend to be surprised.” 

Arm bites back a smile, “Ah. Of course. So you said there was a good view of the beach over this way?” 

Tankhun preens under Arm’s willingness to play along, “I did! I can't wait to show you. I just thought of it a few minutes ago, but it's a new moon tonight. The sky should be dark and the stars will be easier to see. Oh, look! A string quartet! I wonder why they're here?” 

And while he hears Arm break character by laughing at the remark, Tankhun lets it slide. As soon as they are on the blanket and the laser show starts, complete with songs and impressive graphics, Arm is sucked in. And despite having a general idea of what the show is made up of, Tankhun finds himself sucked in as well. When the words, “Will you marry me?” are made up with a group of lit up drones, Tankhun lets out a sound of delight before sitting up. 

“Look at that!” Tankhun says, pointing at the sky, “I wonder who that is for?” 

“I wonder,” Arm says. When Tankhun glances down at him, he is taken aback when he sees tears glistening in Arm’s eyes. 

“Are you crying?” Tankhun asks, then glances up at the sky, “Is it that bad? I went with both privacy and technology, which are both things you like-”

“I loved it,” Arm says, his voice gruff, then quickly wipes his eyes, “And I'm not crying.” 

“Lies!” Tankhun declares, then claps his hands, “I moved you that much! So? Does that mean yes? Or are you not sure?” 

Arm squints at that, “Why do you think I wouldn't be sure? I just proposed to you less than ten minutes ago-”

“Shhh!” Tankhun says, hushing him, “Remember our agreement. That particular memory is wiped from our minds until my proposal has passed and we can make both proposal stories fun and sweet anecdotes to tell our seven daughters later.” 

“Seven?” 

Tankhun huffs, “I was robbed of sisters, Arm! There are plenty of reasons I call Kimberly by what should have been his name. I would have been a wonderful older brother to girls and I got younger brothers instead! Let me be a girl dad! I was cheated!"

“I am sure Kinn and Kim are both very grateful that things worked out the way they did.” 

“They better be,” Tankhun says, “So what do you say? Seven daughters? I was thinking one who is biologically yours, one who is biologically mine, one who is a surprise, and four adopted.” 

“...I am not opposed to having all girls.” 

“I didn't think you would be,” Tankhun says, “It suits you, being outnumbered by your sisters and nieces. Let's add onto the count-” 

“But I think we should only have two.” 

“Six.” 

“Three?” 

“Five!” 

“Four,” Arm says with a pointed finality. And even though four is technically closer to Arm’s original number than Tankhun's original number, he will accept it for now. There could always be a surprise twin or triplet that will pop up in their future surrogate’s pregnancy, or a group of several sisters who deserve to have the same home with two loving parents, or-

“Can we focus on the engagement and wedding planning before we have babies?” Arm asks, “We can look into egg donors or adoption websites as soon as we get back from the honeymoon, but-” 

“You need to say yes first.” 

“Hm?” 

Tankhun sighs, “You got on me about not giving you a clear answer to your proposal to me, but now you are delaying giving an answer to my proposal! It's rude, Arm! Not to mention hypocritical. We can only be engaged if you say yes.” 

“Even though you said yes to me already?” 

Tankhun raises an eyebrow, “You really need to learn how to roleplay. We shall add it to our sex lives and practice in the bedroom.” 

Arm sputters at that and while Tankhun genuinely enjoys making him this flustered, he wants a real answer. 

“Do you need to see the ring before you say yes or no?” Tankhun asks, pulling out the box again. It's only when he flips it open that he realizes how dark it is. 

“I don't need to be able to see the ring to tell you yes,” Arm tells him. 

“Fine, but hold onto your answer until you see it!” Tankhun says dismissively, “I worked really hard at designing it and I'm proud of it! I think you will really like it!” 

As Tankhun turns on the flashlight from his phone, Arm looks down at the ring and his smile gets wider. 

“It's a very nice ring. I love it.” 

“Good,” Tankhun says with a nod, then takes it out of the box and has it ready between his fingers, “You can give me your answer now.” 

Arm holds his left hand out and lets Tankhun hold it, “Yes. I will marry you.” 

Tankhun finds himself smiling ear to ear. And maybe - just maybe - there are tears in his eyes too. 

[cerealmonster15]

hiiii i'm still in my twst sims binge era

i was gonna hop over to diasomnia and let it run in the bg while i draw vfx studies but i dont swap til it's the middle of the night bc my sims are always not at work if i do it midday so we're still in the fish dorm for now

why do they always pick the retail shop for a date!!! at least this time i dont see vil or agnes crumplebottom around to get mad lol

they seem to be doing just fine autonomously lol good for them, being romantic on the street curb

my partner walked in and started talking to me for a while and i forgot about them and left it running through but it looks like they had a good time

azul was also still out at the retail shop and it was 8am and he has extremely low energy so i think he just stayed there. all night.

well im sure he can figure it out. i swapped to diasomnia and of course malleus was LATE TO WORK because i didnt swap over early enough lol

malleus seems to be developing several beefs with people but at least his relationship with neige and i guess azul has survived fhdsgkjfs. his hatership with leona also transcends universes <3

also sebek apparently works in business like azul and i dont know why. his lifetime goal is a body builder aspiration too so like idk if i put him in business or if story progression did it, or maybe i had a sim tell him to follow his dreams and it randomly chose business lol. actually i have silvers job as athletics but his lifetime want is to be a friend of the animals so maybe i should have him try that vet thing i think i can do. actually yeah fuck it sebek quit your business job join the athlete's career NOW!!! but um theyre too poor for silver to buy a vet clinic lol i didnt cheat money for them like i did heartslabyul [i built heartslabyuls house from the ground up and everyone else i was like FUCK IT just move into a premade house i dont LIKE designing houses!!!!!!]

um. i had silver invite cater over bc he had a want to embrace him, but then he went to the bathroom right after, and cater just let himself in and walked right over to silver, while he was Still Using The Bathroom. i think caters trying to give himself a pep talk or something in the mirror actually like

boys what is going on here. hello.

cater's son showed up at malleus' work ALONE!!!!

it's ok tho malleus cured him :]

and then he got a promotion YAAAAY i need them all to make more money so silver can buy a vet clinic lol

😨

😰

OKAY. well. maybe having them buy the goth's household with no cheated money was a bad idea LOL i could cheat them some to pay it but.... maybe ill sell some excess items ... i need to play this household more so they can earn more money....

i also had to turn their lights to auto lights bc i think they were just using electricity everywhere constantly kljsdfhksldhg boys please....

NOOOO NOT THE MORTALITY LESSON AGAIN malleus still hasnt come to terms with that in the source material!!!!!

anyway idia called and challenged malleus to a duel let's see who dies. usually it's the sim im actively playing as lol

damn LOL.

silver is close to a promotion but hes gotta level his charisma....hmmm decisions to make...

okay bye im gonna go play ryuji game now!!!

[nicohverse]

June Update- Physical Merch, Live Events, OST Additions

 The physical rewards have arrived! And if you're somebody with a physical reward tier, you have until 07/01/2024 (July 1st) if you'd like to add anything to your shipment: Whether Entropic Float related or otherwise, use the code ADDKICKSTARTER on my etsy store for free shipping (domestic or international!) to have items sent with your rewards package. Packages with additions will be shipped right away after purchase, the rest will ship out on 07/01 ~ Though, everything is ready to go, so if you already know you don't want to make any additions, just let me know and I'll get your package in the mail!

If you don't currently have physical rewards but see something you'd like in my shop, including this NEW Entropic Float merch printed for reward fulfillment (extras available while supplies last!) Just please don't use the coupon for free shipping, since it'll be an all-new package. US Shipping is free with a purchase of $35+, International with $70+.

I've mentioned Entropic Float Apparel coming in my next clothing drop- Apparel ships separately, and is always free shipping anywhere, so don't worry about waiting for that. And let me know if there's any kind of apparel you'd really love to see! Current plans are for logo shirts (the same design available on Redbubble, but higher quality working with a manufacturer), PJ Pants based on what Ame wears in the first game, and the T-Shirt that Touko wears in the Beloved Ghost DLC- But I'm happy to add suggestions if you've got your heart set on something specific~

The OST for Beloved Ghost is also now available on youtube, added onto the end of the OST playlist! With a new album cover, too. Beloved Ghost and EF2 are going to share this art, to distinguish their new tracks from those of the first game. There are nine new additions to the soundtrack now! Some of them might sound familiar even if you haven't been able to play the DLC yet- Dreaming Of Delights and Dreaming Of Destruction were the feature tracks in my yanderejam 2023 entry, and GHOUL GROOVE already appeared as the main menu theme in EF2's demo!

As for progress on EF2 properly? Well... To be perfectly honest, I've barely been at home this month, and when I was, I was mostly sorting out the shipment and getting etsy listings up, so I don't actually have any smooth new assets to show you right now. I've been working on a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff! Planning out puzzles, plot moments, brainstorming in the car about how to code the randomization processes. There's a lot I can do when I'm not at my home computer, it's just not stuff that I'm really able to... Show off progress on visually.  Oops. 

The upside is that most of what I've been doing away from home is work! Lots of it! My day job is a bit unconventional, so I should note that the hours I'm scheduled and paid for are typically longer than the hours I actually spend at work, but on paper I worked 60 hours last week and am scheduled for 70 next week. Even knowing that's more time than I actually work, it's shaping up to be a lot, considering my health... But it's alright. Working harder on a given month just means I can afford more time off to work on the game in a different month, and I thrive in sprints of focus.

 The other upside is that I should be able to create quite a few visual assets in the last couple weekends of June, but I wanted to get this update out sooner rather than later for the sake of anybody who wants to take advantage of free shipping with their reward package.

Finally, I also have a few live events coming up! You can come say hi at my artist table (Nico's Fan Niche) if you're attending Springfield Comic Con, Connecticon, or Terrificon this summer. I'll also be at Otakuthon as an attendee myself! As you can imagine based on that lineup, my July update probably won't be too exciting either (Especially with artfight going on- Add me! I'm Nhitori!) but of course, I'll still have some fun stuff to share with you all.

Thank you, as always, for reading!

[0nlythrowharrybeaux]

Young American - Part 10

Hey friends, thank you for your patience! Chapter 10 is kind of a fluffy and emotional breakthrough for these two. Next chapter is the first date and some smutty-smut!

Series Masterlist

WC: 5.8k

The holidays had felt really long for Y/N. Her family was very big on traditions and being together and making memories and so she definitely missed that part of things. Her mom had sent her a text wishing her a happy holiday but that was about it. She did have fun with her aunt Julie and her friends, but this was different and she felt like a baby for it but she did cry when she went to bed and when she was able to talk with Harry the tears flowed again, though that was largely because she missed him and she was about to get her period so she was very sentimental and he just looked so cute and cozy in his hoodie. They had only talked on FaceTime on the 26th and on new year’s eve, he was so busy catching up with family and friends, out of everyone she understood the importance of that. Other than that, they were texting constantly, which was fine by her.

It did bum her out when Harry informed her that his flight was cancelled due to some bad weather, but he was going to make the best of it by extending his stay by a few more weeks; they did FaceTime for that conversation and one other time when he was showing her some new designs he was working on. But he informed her that after chatting with Auree and seeing that he had no clientele scheduled for January he took a few more clients at Eddie’s shop in London so that he could try and recover what he’d spent on travel. After all, he still had rent and bills to pay whether he was living in LA or not, so he needed to make money any way he could and if that meant taking more clients in London while he was there he would do that. He and Eddie would be flying in together actually, since he wanted to come and see how everything was going. They would be arriving in a few days and so Y/N was spending lots of time with her friends from school, the shop, and Julie because she knew that once Harry was back he would likely steal her away to make up for lost time. 

Y/N had been doing most of the walk-ins now that Harry was gone and it was giving her tons of time to practice. Auree was doing a lot of her supervision and she was very impressed with her progress. Most of the things Harry had been focusing her attention on were near perfect now that she had the opportunity to execute those styles and techniques. She even did her first realism piece, it was a small scorpion, but it had been a challenge none the less and it turned out perfect. She had also been working on ways to bring her tattoo up to the standard that she wanted it to be, but that was in the evenings before she went to bed.

“Hey, daydreamer!” She heard Rosa’s voice and snapped out of her head and watched as she and Vy chuckled.

“What?” She asked with a giggle.

“Don’t look so bummed, Harry’ll be back in a few days.” She teased and Y/N rolled her eyes.

“I’m not bummed, I was just thinking.” She said, “I frown when I’m thinking.” She explained.

“Thinking about missing Harry.” G added in with a smirk from across the studio, he was currently tattooing a client.

“Oh shut up and mind your tattoo.” She said which made him and his client chuckle as Rosa came over to her.

“OK, but I’m not shooting into the dark when I say that you miss him, am I? You miss him at least a little tiny bit.” Rosa said and Y/N felt her face flush but Rosa didn’t say anything, she didn’t need to, it was all in her eyes.

“No, you’re not.” She admitted and Rosa winked which made Y/N snigger. 

“Even I miss him! He’s quite wonderful when he’s not being a dick.” Vy said as she came over to join their little gab session at the drawing station.

“Yeah, he is.” Y/N smiled.

“So, I’ve been dying to ask but everyone told me to leave it alone.” She said glancing at Vy who rolled her eyes, “When he whisked you away when you were having a bad day, what did you do?” She asked with a suggestive grin and Y/N shook her head.

“Not what you think, you horny little cretin.” Y/N said through some laughter and Rosa cackled loudly and Vy smacked her arm.

“Don’t get crazy, you don’t want to startle G and make him mess up! The guy is getting his kid on his arm.” Vy scolded Rosa who then glanced back and mouthed an apology to G who was already glaring at her.

“And to answer your question he took me to the beach. We just got some fresh air and drew a little bit-”

“Each other?” Rosa interrupted to ask and Y/N glanced down for a second.

“It wasn’t the plan, but yes.” She said and this made Vy and Rosa coo softly and for poor Y/N’s face to heat at the attention these two were giving her, “Then we went to these sand dunes and Harry ate shit.” She chuckled as she recalled, “I mean, I did too, but his fall was funnier than mine. And then we went home.” She shrugged as she finished her story.

“Home, huh?” Vy asked and Y/N bit her lip for a moment before looking at Vy.

“You know what I mean.” She said and Vy smirked.

“I’ve been dying to ask, he kissed you at my party didn’t he?” She said and Y/N rolled her eyes.

“No. He was drunk as fuck, I had to drive us home!”

“Home… there it is again. Almost like you…share a home?” Rosa teased and Y/N rolled her eyes yet again.

“Yes, we shared my house that night because I had no idea where he lived and he completely passed out before he could put his address in the damn GPS.” She explained, that was very nerve-racking for her but he had been so sweet and cuddly that night.

“And you shared the bed?” Rosa asked.

“I made myself a little bed on the floor.” Y/N said and Rosa glanced to Vy.

“I don’t think she slept in it.” 

“Me neither.” Vy grinned and Y/N groaned again as they teased her.

“You two are making a whole lot of nothing into something.” Y/N warned.

“Oh please, Harry has had a crush on you for ages!” Vy said and Y/N shook her head.

“Whatever. The point is that we’re good now.”

“Real good, if you asked me.” Rosa smirked suggestively.

“Well good thing I’m not asking.” Y/N jabbed back making the girls laugh softly.

“We’re just teasing you. It’s just cute how you get all flustered when he’s being all sweet and soft with you. And well, it’s sweet to also watch him with you, it’s like you can do no wrong.” Vy said and Rosa nodded along in endearment.

“He is rather sweet when he’s all soft like that.” Y/N admitted, “He really is so fucking sweet, he just needed a minute to get acclimated, you know?” She said and they nodded in understanding.

“Well, I’m glad that it all worked out.” Rosa said with a smile.

“I still choose to believe there’s something going on.” Vy hummed.

“You keep telling yourself that, Vy.” Y/N giggled.

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

Harry was really anxious to get back to LA; he felt that he had been gone too long. It had been over a month that he’d been gone and he missed Y/N like crazy. He had talked to his family all about Y/N, he was extremely sweet on her and when Harry was fancying anyone he was just above and beyond adoring with that person.  His mum had expressed to him that it was great to see him that way because she hadn’t seen it in a while; after his last relationship ended Harry had kind of stopped dating and just gave himself a break from love, he just hooked up with people. She did appreciate Y/N fretting over him in that video of him at the sand dunes and she even said that it was good that the person he liked was looking out for him like that. All in all, he was more than confident in pursuing more with Y/N.

Currently, he was texting with Julie, plotting a little romantic dinner for he and Y/N when he got back. He would likely see her at the shop first, but he wanted her to be surprised when afterwards they immediately went off to have a nice and quiet evening alone. He was eager to get back to her and back to LA, he felt reinvigorated; he never intended on staying in London for so long, but it really helped him get back into the groove and to regain the confidence he had lost with how slow things had been for him in LA. He was able to see a walk-in from LA who had actually been wanting to get tattooed by him and had no idea of his relocation, he just happened to be on vacation, but now that he knew that Harry was in LA he assured that he would recommend him to friends and also get in touch to brainstorm on a big back piece the guy had been wanting to do. This was very thrilling and he just felt like things were finally looking up.

**********

Y/N had literally been counting down the days and today was the day that Harry would be back. The longer she was working in the shop the less she needed to start coming in so much earlier than everyone else as she mastered the tasks better. She had found ways to speed up set up in the mornings and typically turned up at 9am now, but she knew Harry was an early bird so she showed up around 8:30 on this particular day and decided to design pieces while she waited for him to arrive. It was nearing 9:15 when she heard the back door open and she perked up.

“Baby?” She heard Harry’s voice and she shot out of the stool and rushed to the entrance meeting him right by the lounge and he dropped his bag down as she rushed into his arms. Her legs circled his hips as he spun them around a few times before she grabbed his face and kissed him deeply.

“I missed you. So. Fucking. Much.” She said between kisses and he smiled against her lips.

“Missed you too, baby.” He said before blindly sliding his bag into the lounge with his foot and walking them over to the counter and setting her on it as they parted for a moment to take each other in after so long. She immediately smiled as she took in the little clip on the top of his head holding his hair in place. He’d done it before, but it looked so long now.

“Your hair’s getting long…” She cooed, “And look at this!” She giggled as she ran her thumb around his mouth to feel his rather full mustache and slightly sparser beard on his chin and jaw.

“Forgot my electric razor and I didn’t see the point in buying a new one, but I know it needs to go s-”

“Mmmm, it doesn’t have to…” she said with a small smile, “I’m kinda digging the mustache.” She said before biting on her lip and he grinned.

“Really?” He asked in slight shock and she nodded, thumbing over it again.

“S’kinda hot. In like a dilf-y kinda way.” She said lowly and he chuckled.

“If you really like it I can keep it for a while. Gets a lot thicker than this.” He said and she smirked.

“Say “it gets a lot thicker than this” again.” She teased and he rolled his eyes at her teasing, “Please, daddy?” She whispered with a grin and he groaned and kissed her hard before breaking the kiss dramatically.

“Not the time nor the place.” He warned her lowly as his hands slithered up her thighs. He loved how she was playing with the curls at the back of his head, he missed that a lot.

“Sorry, sorry…” she hummed, “But can you kiss me again?” She asked and he smiled.

“Course I can.” He whispered before dipping down again and capturing her lips against his. Like always, they got lost in their kiss and were consumed with the things they felt for each other as if the entire world was created just for them two to exist in it. The taste of his tongue against hers and the scent of his cologne and himself were all like a vortex that dragged Y/N away from reality. It was the same for him, everything about her was like a siren song to him, he had tunnel vision when he was around her and he couldn’t care less, especially when they had been apart for a more than a month at this point. It was absolute bliss to be in her arms once again. To feel her lips on his. To-

“Well, good morning to you two!” They heard an enthusiastic greeting and Harry immediately pulled his lips from Y/N, but her body close, their hearts were beating hard and fast at the scare as they both turned their heads towards the door and saw a smirking Vy leaning against the doorframe.

“Jesus, Vy-” Harry started, but she was quick to interrupt him.

“I knew something was going on!” She laughed pointing to Y/N who groaned in embarrassment as Vy laughed, “Rosa and I were grilling her about you the other day.” She said to Harry.

“You guys need to stay in your lane.” Harry grinned and Vy scoffed.

“The lounge is everyone’s lane, you two.” She winked and Harry rolled his eyes again as she came in further as Harry helped Y/N down from the counter.

“Please keep this to yourself until we figure this out, Vy.” Harry pleaded lowly.

“Of course. I love secrets.” She hummed with a grin as she put her bag in one of the lockers and Y/N giggled. Harry hugged Y/N from behind as she reached up to the cupboard to get the coffee grounds to make a kettle of coffee. Vy walked past them to the leave the lounge with a smug smile.

“You may proceed you little horn-balls.” She teased and Y/N laughed as Harry flipped her the bird and Vy cackled as she walked out.

“Quick, a bit more before everyone else shows up.” He said as he flipped her around and their lips met in a few playful kisses until they heard the heavy back door opening up and he hurried to grab his bag from the wall by the entrance of the lounge where he had kicked it to. Y/N continued setting up the coffee maker and soon Rosa was shrieking with excitement as she stepped in and saw Harry putting his bag in a locker.

“Harry!” She cheered with joy and hurried over to hug him and he chuckled as he hugged her back.

“Rosa, great to see you.” Harry greeted her and she smiled brightly.

“H, the amount of girls who have come back for more walk-ins asking for you…” she said and he shook his head.

“Fuck that, tell ‘em I’m taken.” He said and her eyes widened.

“Wait. What?! You’re taken?!” She asked in shock and he chuckled nervously, just realizing his blunder as Y/N bit her lip and continued with the coffee.

“Like tell them that I am to ward them off, you know?” He recovered quickly and Y/N held back her laughter as best as she could.

“Oh! Yeah, good thinking. I wear a fake wedding ring when I go out sometimes.” She confessed and he hummed.

“Hmmm…maybe I’ll shift one of my rings over.” He mused and she nodded before she walked over to Y/N and hugged her from behind.

“Hey, girl!”

“Hey, Rosa.” Y/N smiled, leaning her head against Rosa’s as she rested her chin against Y/N’s shoulder, “Want some coffee?” She asked.

“Yes, please.” She said and let go, “G pulled up when I was coming in, so add some for him too.” Rosa informed and Y/N hummed in understanding.

“So Harry, any plans tonight? We should celebrate you coming back, right Y/N?” Rosa said cheerfully and Harry cleared his throat.

“Oh, no plans. Just resting, I’m a bit jet lagged.” He said and Rosa sighed.

“C’mon, H! At least dinner!” She insisted, “Tell him, Y/N!” Rosa said, hoisting herself up onto the counter where Harry had settled Y/N on not even ten minutes prior.

“Yeah, that would be nice, H. We can all go out to eat with Eddie too.” She said and Rosa smiled wide.

“Yeah! Exactly! OK, let me catch Vy real quick, she always knows the best places to eat!” Rosa said and rushed out of the lounge.

“Baby,” Harry said coming up to Y/N, “I don’t want to go out with everyone tonight.” He said lowly and she turned to him as he leaned on the counter beside her.

“Come on, everyone’s so excited to have you back!” She said with a hopeful smile and he groaned.

“I’m tired and I would rather it be just us tonight.” He said quietly.

“Well after dinner we can go to yours or mine and spend the evening together? They just want to do something nice, H.” She insisted again and he groaned and decided to just say it.

“Baby, I have plans for us tonight.” He said lowly and she turned to him with a small smile.

“Oh.” 

“Yeah, it was supposed to be our first date. I don’t want to reschedule. It was supposed to be a surprise but that’s ruined now.” He said bitterly and she tutted.

“Oh, we can get out of this. Just go out and tell ‘em you’re super jet lagged and we can do it on Friday or something.” She said he nodded.

“Right. I’ll be back… but if Rosa pouts we might be moving our first date, she’s really convincing with that pout, makes me feel so bad.” He huffed.

“I’ll beat her up.” Y/N joked and he chuckled before heading out of the lounge. Thankfully, Vy had his back and said she actually couldn’t do tonight, she probably knew that he wanted to do something with Y/N first. She agreed when he suggested they go out on Friday and that was that. When Harry went back into the lounge G and Y/N were chatting as they always were and he greeted G with a big hug as well.

“My, my so affectionate.” G teased and Harry tutted as he pulled away.

“It’s just been a while, OK?” He mumbled lowly and G shot a knowing grin to Y/N who was already smirking. She was about to join in on teasing Harry when they heard the back door swing open and Eddie’s loud and cheerful voice resonating through the shop.

“Good morning, artists!” This made Y/N smile and she turned around, seeing him walking in with a big box of pastries, “Oh, look at you all!” He said excitedly as he set the things down.

“Hey, Eddie.” G smiled as they hugged briefly.

“Hey, mate!” Eddie smiled excitedly and then he turned to Y/N, “And look at you! You look more grown, I hope Harry hasn’t been stressing you out too much.” He joked as he stepped forward and Y/N hugged him as well.

“Not anymore.” She joked and Eddie chuckled.

“He hasn’t been mean or a grouch, has he?” Eddie asked with a grin and Y/N glanced over to Harry who was also grinning.

“Not recently.” She said with a giggle and they both glanced over to Harry, who shook his head at her.

“I’m a god damned dream and you know it.” He pointed at her and she laughed quietly.

“More like a walking nightmare.” G muttered making them all chuckle at Harry’s expense. He didn’t take offense to it, he knew that he could be grumpy and moody, and now that G was kind of a friend and Y/N was well…more than that, it didn’t bug him to get called out as much.

“Well, I’m glad to know LA hasn’t changed him.” Eddie said, “Now, I want to see what you’ve been working on and added to your portfolio.” Eddie said to Y/N and she nodded eagerly.

“Yeah, c’mon I’ll show you!” She said with excitement and they headed out of the lounge to her station. Harry followed behind them, eager to hear what Eddie thought. They were looming over her station as she pulled out the portfolio of her work when Harry walked up beside Eddie.

“And the master joins the pupil.” He said to Harry with a smile.

“I think she’s the master, Ed.” Harry said and Eddie’s eyebrows raised.

“Oh really?” He hummed in excitement as she blushed a bit. 

“Here, you can look through these.” She said handing him the folder with her bigger and newer designs. Eddie was rather impressed as he flipped through it. Vy came up as he looked through everything.

“Fuck, you’re really good.” He said as he started getting to the end of the folder, “Soon you’re gonna be tattooing artists too.” He chuckled.

“Welp, that one’s already been crossed off the bucket list actually.” Vy spoke up and Eddie glanced to her before quickly looking to Y/N who scoffed.

“Coloring in your flowers doesn’t; count, Vy.” Y/N sniggered.

“I wasn’t talking about my touch ups, I was talking about Harry! That’s his thigh on that page there, is it not?” Vy said and Eddie glanced to Harry, whose cheeks were now going pink.

“Really? No fucking way! You only get tattooed by Chri-”

“Well, the artist had a cool design.” He shrugged interrupting Eddie.

“That’s sick, mate.” Eddie said with a smile and turned to Y/N.

“How’d he take it?” He asked with a grin.

“Like a champ.” She assured with a smile, “It was my first big one so it took me a little longer than it would now, but he sat through it, was really patient with me-”

“I almost cried at the end. I looked down.” He said to Eddie and Vy who chuckled, “but she’s really good. Very pleasant to get tattooed by, wouldn’t mind having another round with her.” He hummed with a smile and briefly glanced to Y/N who was just buzzing to hear this.

“That’s great to hear! And I mean… if H got tattooed by you and he’d do it again I think that you’re ready for whatever gets put in front of you.” Eddie said and her smile dropped.

“Wait. W-what?” She stammered.

“I think he’s trying to tell you that you can tattoo whatever you want now.” Harry said with a small smile, his eyes, so full of pride, met her own.

“Oh my god…” she said softly as the news soaked in, “OH MY GOD!” She then shouted in excitement and hugged Eddie who laughed happily and hugged her back.

“You’re so fucking good, you have to know that. We can talk more about what milestones you need to accomplish in this next phase, but at the rate you’re going I think we can have you as a full-time artist by the summer.” He assured her and she bit her lip back to suppress the huge smile that wanted to break out on them.

“Holy shit…Well, thanks to Harry for all his help and guidance.” She said to Eddie and glanced to Harry who shook his head at her.

“S’all you, love. I just gave you a few tips.” He assured and she sighed in satisfaction.

“Thank you so much, Eddie. For everything. For ummm, taking a chance on me.” She sighed happily.

“Darling, I knew you were worth the wait.” He assured her and she wanted to cry and just inhaled sharply. She felt so giddy and tingly all over, she wanted to scream and laugh and cheer because her dream had just come true. Sure, she wasn’t a full-time artist yet, but she was good enough that she was given the green light to tattoo whatever pieces she wanted and that was a huge deal.

“Well, if you guys don’t mind I have to make a call to my aunt.” She said and Eddie smiled.

“You go on ahead.” He assured her and she grabbed her phone from her station and slipped out to the back to call her aunt. 

She was just catching her breath for a few seconds, letting it all sink in when the door opened and she saw Harry peek his head out and she smiled when their eyes met and she signaled him over with a movement of her head and he slipped out and immediately hugged her tight and she started to cry tears of joy.

“Oh baby,” He soothed her quietly, “I’m so proud of you.” He praised as he squeezed her tight.

“I can’t believe this.” She sniffled as she unburied her face from his chest and glanced up to him.

“I can. You’re fucking brilliant, baby.” He said with a smile and reached up to carefully dab her tears away with his hoodie sleeves.

“Hardly.” She chuckled through her crying and he shook his head at her modesty, “This has been my dream. It’s all I’ve ever wanted to do and I’m just so happy that I’m so fucking close.” She sighed contently and he kissed her forehead.

“I just see the way you work and how much you love it, like you were born to do this, Y/N. I can’t picture you doing anything else and I saw that from the day I started working with you. I know I gave you a bit of a hard time every now and again, but well, we’ve covered that before…” he said a bit bashfully and she smiled.

“Thank you, H. For all the feedback and your help and advice, I couldn’t have made it this far without you. Seriously.” She shook her head and he tutted.

“Oh please… you would’ve been perfectly fine. You have the the innate skills as an artist.” He said and she smiled.

“Well that may be, but I wouldn’t be where I am now if it weren’t for you and everything we’ve been through.” She said and he bit on his lip as she spoke, “You make me push myself and aim higher! You make me want to be better and I love that.” She smiled and he just leaned in and kissed her gently.

“You make me want to be better too.” He said against her lips, “But you make me want to be better in every way possible and I… love that too.” He confessed and with tearful eyes she tiptoed to connect their lips once again in a passionate and emotional kiss. Just when Y/N thought she couldn’t feel any happier, Harry would always come in and challenge that. Her heart felt so fulfilled as smiles overtook their lips, making their kiss a little messy, but it wasn’t really an issue as they made some space between them.

“Oh, I need to call my aunt!” She said and Harry nodded, allowing her to pull her phone from her back pocket before she dialed Julie, putting the call on speaker phone so that Harry could hear too. It rung a few times before she picked up the call.

“Hello to my favorite niece!” Julie sang and Y/N smiled along with Harry upon hearing this.

“Hey, I’m here with Harry. I’ve got some news.” She chirped and immediately her aunt started screaming in joy and Y/N laughed, “What’re you screaming about? I haven’t even said anything yet!” Y/N laughed and Harry did too as Julie stopped.

“I’m just assuming he finally asked you to be his girlfriend and I got carried away.” She laughed.

“Yeah, not yet.” He said and Y/N narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously.

“Yet?” She asked and Harry smiled and nodded.

“Yeah, it’ll come.” He said.

“Hopefully before I die of old age?” Julie said and they both chuckled.

“Yeah, don’t worry.” He said and they all laughed.

“OK, well what’s the big news?” Julie questioned.

“I can tattoo whatever I want now! So if you want your piece done-”

“Oh my goooood!” Julie cheered happily before Y/N could even finish and she and Harry laughed as Julie whooped and congratulated her on reaching a new milestone, “Yes! I definitely want to have you work on my tattoo! When can you officially start?” She asked after settling down a bit.

“Eddie’s in town, so I assume he might just do some observing this week to ensure that I have sufficient mastery over the techniques I’ve been learning?” She glanced to Harry in question and he nodded to confirm that, that was a very likely scenario, “So maybe a week or two?” 

“Oh my god, OK! Yes, whenever, you let me know.” Julie confirmed and Harry draped his arm over Y/N’s shoulder and pulled her into his side.

“Thank you so much for helping me and supporting me with this, Julie. You have no idea how much it means to me that you’re going to be the first large piece I get to do.” She sniffled as her eyes welled up with tears again and Harry kissed her head for a little bit of comfort. He knew what this meant to her and it was absolutely amazing that both she and Julie were going to have this opportunity.

“I told you I would be around for when you got to tattoo.” Julie said with pride and this made Y/N’s lip quiver, “I love you, kiddo. And I am so fucking proud of you.” She said and Y/N sniffled once more before speaking.

“Thank you, I love you too. I just wanted to share the news.”

“Thank for sharing, you made my day.” Julie responded, “I’ll see you two later at the house?” She asked.

“Briefly. I am going to whisk her away for the evening.” Harry cut in and Julie cooed.

“Awww, so first date is tonight?”

“Yeah, thanks by the way for your help.” He said and Y/N glanced at him in shock and he grinned at her.

“Anything to make my favorite niece happy. Well, I’ll see you guys later, OK?”

“See you!”, “See you later!” Y/N and Harry chimed in.

“Yep! Love you guys, bye!” Julie signed off and then they hung up the phone and Harry was grinning like he’d just been given a blue ribbon or something.

“What?” Y/N asked with a giggle .

“She said “Love you guys”, which means she loves me, right?” He asked and Y/N giggled.

“I supposed she does. Don’t take that lightly.” Y/N warned and Harry shook his head.

“Oh, absolutely not!” He smiled as he looked into her eyes. 

They were both thinking the same exact thing - that they loved each other. It had been months of their slowly growing relationship and despite the initial challenges of it all they were drawn to each other at am impressive rate, like magnets who so obviously belong together and are drawn together regardless of any barriers in their paths. It was on the tip of her tongue, telling Harry that she loved him too, it wasn’t just a Julie thing. She felt that her whole heart was bursting with everything she felt for him, she didn’t know how much more she could take before she exploded. And well, Harry knew what he felt but he was still a bit afraid to say it. The pain of his past had scarred him sufficiently to make him be more cautious with expressing an emotion as big and complex as love.  But it was unmistakable that, that’s what he indeed felt for Y/N. With every glance, every smile, every touch, every kiss, every precious and perfectly mundane second they spent together made the feeling grow and grow exponentially and it felt so good but so scary at the same time. Like when you’re doing something risky, you feel so invincible for doing it, but you are aware that one wrong move and you could be pretty damaged for a while.

“What?” She asked as he continued to look into her eyes and he shook his head.

“Nothing. I’m just so proud of you and I’m so happy for you. You really deserve this one.” He hummed before hugging her close again, “So I was thinking that after we go on our date you can stay the night?” He asked and he felt her nod into his chest.

“Yeah.” She confirmed and he smiled.

“OK. So we can go our separate ways after work and get cleaned up a bit and then I can pick you up?” He suggested.

“Yeah, that sounds good. Now how fancy are we going?” She asked.

“It’s not fancy at all actually. I mean, you can go fancy if you want, but you don’t have to.” He assured.

“OK. I’ll wear a nice top.” She said and he chuckled.

“OK, then I will too.” He agreed and she giggled as he wrapped her up in a big bear hug, “I missed holding you.” He hummed as he squeezed just a little bit more and she smiled.

“I missed you squishing me.” She hummed happily, “You’re so warm and you smell like heaven. Hadn’t seen you in person for so long I even forgot how hot you are.” She complimented him and he was soaking up her praises and compliments easily with a grin on his face.

“You forgot? I could never forget…” he said and she smiled.

“I mean to say that it’s far more striking in person, your attractiveness.” She said and he chuckled.

“Yeah, that is true… for you too, by the way.” He teased and she rolled her eyes at his playfulness but then she inhaled deeply and relaxed in his hold.

“Wish we could stay like this all day.” She whispered. He barely heard it, but the words made his skin raise with goosebumps as he too felt that being with her like this, alone, feeling her tucked against his body, it was absolutely perfect.

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