#they keep roping me into fucking social media shit and i HATE IT

[youvebeenlivingfictional]

.

[wandamaximoffsbadgirl]

My Favorite Pet

Touch Me (1)

BDSM Preformer!Fem!Reader! X subby! Wanda

Summary: You've hit your limit when you can't find a partner to click with at work until a new plaything comes along.

Warnings: 18+ MDNI!, obviously BDSM themes at play, collar leash play, exhibitionism and voyeurism, pet play, pet names (R is referred by W as Mommy, W is referred by R as pet and plaything along with amor) degradation, praise, R uses strap on W, rope play, vibrator use, edge play, aftercare

Word count: 4.5K

A/N: I loved writing this, and I still have more I want to do with this, so if you like it, there could be a part 2 in the future

Having all eyes on you was something you normally dreaded. You hated knowing that people were looking or staring at you. Normally you’d want to be invisible, but not now; not on stage. Fuck did it feel good to have people watching you get degraded or degrade someone else. To toy and tease, bending to your pleasure. 

You stood above him, cold as you played through your scene; distant. As soon as it ended, you were gone, far away from him and everyone else. Of course, though, he yells after you are trying to get you to stop. You hate it when anyone yells at you, but more specifically, men. 

“What the hell is wrong with you, Y/N!?” He asked as you stopped. Everyone around had their eyes on you, and you shook in place. “Well? What the hell was that? There was nothing behind that! No feeling. No emotion! How are we supposed to give them a good show when it’s all fake?” 

You kept walking, ignoring him and his words. It didn’t matter to you anymore. They’re all the same, and none of them are satisfying to you. 

“Fuck this I’m done. Find yourself a new stage partner!” you started running until you went out the back door, out of breath as you fall down. 

How are you supposed to keep this job when you can’t work with anyone here? You can’t do anything else. This is all you're good at. You are not going to go back to being a teacher again. You loved that, but this was on a whole other level of making you happy and paying the bills that’s for sure.

“Y/N/N?” You hear the familiar voice of your best friend, Kate, call out to you. You look up at her, and she realizes the tears in your eyes. “Oh Y/N, what happened?” She sits down next to you, the warm summer night air feeling good on your skin.

“I can’t work with any of them. There’s no feeling behind it and none of them want to work with me if I can’t do that, but I haven’t been able to do that since…” you shake your head trying not to think of bad thoughts, back to your last partner, well your last partner before Kate. You feel her arms wrap around you, pulling you close. 

“Listen to me. She’s nothing. Got it? She’s a shit person, and she doesn’t control you.” You nod slowly, choosing to think of the better times with Kate. You sniffled a bit, and Kate held you tighter. You and Kate had dated for a bit, but you two realized you were better as friends.

“You’ll be okay, let’s go home.” She got up, pulling you up with her. 

You hadn’t been to the club in a week even though the manager keeps calling you to ask if you want to do a performance. You can’t though…nobody wants you as their partner. You can’t put emotions into something that you have no emotion towards. 

You're lying on Kate’s couch with a blanket pulled up to your chin and scrolling on your social media. You've been staying here instead of your house because you didn’t want to be alone. Kate’s wife, Yelena, is pretty amazing, too. The three of you get along really well. She’s at the end of the couch with your feet on her lap as she watches something on TV. Your phone buzzes again, and it’s your manager, Natasha, who is Yelena’s older sister; you sigh and get Yelena’s attention before answering it. 

“Yes Tasha?” you asked, sounding exhausted even to yourself. You shifted onto your back and looked at Lena, who raised an eyebrow. Mouthing ‘Sestra?’ Which you nod to her.

“Can you come tonight? I need you to help out with a new girl. She’s going to be starting tonight. She’s a year younger than you and I think it’d be good for both of you.” You sigh again, not really wanting to go out tonight, especially not there where you have to dress up and put on a show. 

“Domme or sub?” you ask, noticing Yelena’s smirking.

“Sub it seems.” Submissive boys are fun to play with, but girls are always a lot more fun to play with.

“Alright…what time?” you could hear her perk up.

“The usual time. Five to close.” You sigh again. After not being there for a week, you were not looking forward to a nine hour shift.

“I’ll be there, no promises on how good I’ll be.” You let her know and hung up. You closed your eyes, and Lena spoke,

“We going to the club tonight?” Lena wiggled her eyebrows at you. As if doesn’t visit her sister every night or work on the back end of the business with Kate.

“Yeah there’s a new girl they want me to show her the ropes, literally.” you both laugh at the pun as Kate comes in the front door.

“What’s so funny?” She asks setting her keys down in the bowl they keep by the entry way.

“Y/N’s gotta show a new girl the ropes.” Kate’s expression falls.

“You two are idiots.”

“We’re your idiots though~” you say and get up with a smile. “This could end up being a fun evening.” 

You had Kate and Yelena take you back home so you could go choose an outfit. It was simple enough, just a red silk button-up with a black tie and a black button-up vest and some black dress pants as well as a pair of black loafers. You checked yourself over in the mirror and slicked your Y/H/C hair back. 

Your phone vibrates multiple times in a row, and you know it’s Kate. You smile and roll your eyes as you grab your phone. Five new text messages from her. 

≈≈≈

The club was always so quiet before hours as the three of you made your way inside past Bucky the bouncer who always loved to see you. Familiar faces on you, some happy and others not so much as you made my way to Tasha letting her know to send the new girl to your room and then headed there. Kate and Yelena stayed behind, grabbing a drink from the bartender, Scott.

You were putting the finishing touches on your make-up when there was a knock at your door. “Come in.” you called, when the door opened you looked through your mirror to see probably the most beautiful woman you had ever met, auburn hair, piercing emerald green eyes that you could see from across the room, she wore a short black dress with a red leather crop jacket, she wore knee high ripped stockings, and ankle cuff boots, the make-up around her green eyes was dark and smoky in a way that reminded me of high school.

“Hi you’re Y/N, right?” She asked and fuck she has an accent which is your biggest weakness. You love accents of all kinds and most of them turn you on. 

“Yes that is me. I unfortunately wasn’t told your name, just that you’re new and would be my new partner.” She smiled at you.

“Wanda. Wanda Maximoff.” She told me.

“Wanda...” You tested the name on your lips. “Beautiful.” You smiled and noticed her blush. “Come here.” You beckoned, and she finally stepped in, sauntering over to you. “Spin around.” She does as told, spinning slowly as I looked her over, drinking up every inch of her. “Stop.” you commanded as she faced you again. “Kneel.” She got down without a word of protest, “Such a good girl.” You smirk. “Now tell me, is there anything I should know about you, Wanda?” you ask and she pulls out the forms that everyone has to fill out of their kinks, hard limits, soft limits, and some personal questions mainly about health issues that your play partner should be aware of, allergies, and if you have any STDs. The last question is about safe sex which Wanda takes birth control much like myself. Not that you ever actually do it with the guys.

As far as tastes go, Wanda and you are pretty much on the same page with your likes and dislikes, which makes you smile. “I can work with this.” You tilt her chin up using your fingers. She had been looking at the floor this whole time, “Now for my own personal questions for you, Wanda. Which name do you like better, pet, puppy, kitten, baby, or something else entirely?” You ask her.

“Pet is always a good one for me. I tend to have Doms that tell me what I am, why does it matter which I like best?” She tilts her head to the side so innocently. 

“I want to get the best reaction out of you. The whole performance is you. All eyes on your reactions, and they need to be genuine. No form of play is good if you don’t follow one simple rule.” You tell her, and she tilts her head the opposite way. You lean down slightly, so you're eye level with her. “I may be the Domme, but you are in control of the whole scene. You’re the one who holds control over all of it.” You tell her, and she looks so confused. 

“What are you talking about? I’m not in control at all. You control me. You tie me up, you degrade me, you turn me into a dumb slut because you’ve fucked me until I can’t even think how am I in control?” you bite your lip at the idea of everything she just said to you, soaking it in and remembering it for your performance. 

“Safe word.” You start, “You hold all of the control because you hold the safe word. The thing that will end everything. Make me stop dead in my tracks and make sure you’re okay. Make sure you are safe.” You're looking into the deep emerald eyes, and she’s staring back into my own Y/E/C ones. “You really never had a good Dom who took care of you, did you?” You tilt your head.

“They took care of me in the way that mattered.” She tried defending, but I knew she didn't have a leg to stand on in this aspect.

“Aftercare.” You state simply, and she looks at you with her face contorting in confusion.

“What?”

“Have you ever had aftercare?”

“I...what is that?” Your heart sinks at her response.

“How many Dom/sub relationships have you been in?” 

“Seven.” She swallows hard. Seven BDSM relationships and not one of them took care of this girl?

“Aftercare is what you do when the scene ends. This is where the Dom makes sure that you come back from subspace in a safe way and not crashing back; it can have bad effects on your mental and physical health. I always have my subs tell me what they like best, for me personally when I’m the sub I tend to ask for cuddles and I can just scroll on my phone watching tiktok and YouTube shorts that I can share with my partner. I’ve had subs that ask for cuddles and words of affirmation, I’ve had baths after a scene is done, surprisingly I even had one that just wanted to always go for a walk in the park after.” ypu shrug, “Everyone is different. What is something you think you’d like to do?” You ask, and she thinks for a moment.

“I really enjoy cooking, and I’m always hungry after sex. I’ve always just cooked by myself, making a meal for my Dom.” She confesses.

“Well then, after we finish our performance, you and I can go back to my place, it’s only a few blocks away, and we can cook dinner. Does that sound good?” She blushes and nods. You cup her cheeks, brushing the pads of your thumbs across her cheeks, loving the feeling of her smooth skin beneath your tips. “I’m going to take care of you, Wanda. We have a long night ahead of us. While others perform until it’s our turn, luckily they saved us for last, we’ll be going around the club and introducing you to our clientele. I’ll introduce you as my pet or plaything. You have no name to them, at least as a sub. Well, even as a Domme, I shouldn’t have a name, but they all know me out there, so they call me by my name.” You let her know, and she’s listening intently. 

“Yes...uh...”

“Miss, Mistress, Master, Sir, Mommy. Whichever you prefer. I love all of them.”

“Yes...Mommy.” you smiled at her, running your fingers through her hair. 

“My good baby.” I haven’t felt like this since her. It's been so long since you thought you'd never feel like this with a partner again. “How about we get you all dressed up,  pretty girl. As much as I love this outfit you’ve chosen. I’d like you in something a little different.” You smirk, and she nods happily, ready and willing to follow. 

You get her dressed in a red lace lingerie set with black accents and roses over it, along with garter belts and a pair of black thigh highs. You get her all fixed up and dolled up. “There’s a pretty girl.” You put your thumb and middle finger on either side of her chin. “I can’t wait to have you screaming later.” You tease as you grab a little lacey red and black collar for her to match that you put on her, a little tag hanging from it that says ‘Property of  Y/N/N’ 

“Y/N/N?” Wanda questions.

“My nickname. It feels more personal than one that has my Domme title. Besides, I have like six that I rotate through. My nickname is always permanent.” You explain, and her biting her lip and blushing doesn’t go unnoticed by you. 

≈≈≈

“Y/N, Miss. Romanoff wants you on stage for a solo.” MJ, Natasha’s ‘assistant’ tells me, you internally and externally groan, rolling your neck. You're about to throw a tantrum when Tasha rounds the corner, giving you her signature look.

“Yeah, no. I’m having none of your attitude after ghosting us for a week. You’ll go up there, and you WILL have a good time. You’ll show your pet just how much fun solos can be. Do I make myself clear? Unless you want a punishment tonight?” Tasha asks, and it just makes you want to groan more. She grabs your face tightly, nails digging in, making you hiss. You aren't in the head space for that as you pull away. 

“Okay Tasha I get it. I’m not in a sub state of mind, so can you lay off.” You bite at her. Tasha was your oldest friend. Older than Kate and who you met in high school. Tasha and you go back to diapers, which is why she puts up with your bullshit at times and other times knowing when you need to be put in your place. Tasha and you have fucked around, you have for years, it was always a good time when you needed to not think for six or more hours.

“Then act like it. I set up your Playlist.” 

“Okay fine. Let’s go, pet.” You tug on the leash that is attached to the collar around her neck. When you get in front of the stage, you turn to Wanda. “Sit.” She sits front and center on the floor. “Good girl. Watch me.” 

“Who’s ready for some good entertainment!?” You call out, you're back to the crowd as they roar back as ‘Hey Look Ma, I Made it’ starts playing, and you're taking over the stage. Suddenly, you're a whole other person. Captivating everyone, locking eyes, you dance and sing around. Next plays ‘Lying is the Most Fun a Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off’ and you smirk, looking at Wanda as you crawl over to her. So long as you don’t pull her up on the stage it’s still a solo performance. Tasha doesn’t have rules about involving audience members so long as they don’t come on the stage.

You fuck with her almost the whole song as you move around, touching yourself, moaning out as the crowd roars, money finding it’s way to the stage as you practically get yourself off in front of them. As the song crescendos, you feel an orgasm rack through your body as you lock eyes with Wanda, watching her squirm, thighs so tightly pressed against each other, and you smirk at her as your performance ends. Collecting your earnings and bowing as you get off the stage, grabbing Wanda’s leash and pulling her. 

“Let’s go. Now.” You pull her back to your dressing room, locking the door behind you. “Strip. Now.” She seems taken aback by it as you start taking off the little clothes you had left after your performance. She starts doing the same, and once you're both undressed, you push her back onto the bed in your dressing room. Moving yourself between her thighs, which are covered in her juices, you can smell her, and you feel hazy from how good she smells. Without asking you dive right in, letting your tongue swipe over her folds as she moans out, you moan out at how good she tastes, so fucking sweet,

“Ah! M-Mommy!” You flick both your tongue and your eyes up at her. Watching as her face twists in pleasure, expertly working your tongue over her and sucking on her clit. “Please...”

“Please what?” 

“Please fuck me.” you smirk at her words.

“Oh you can do better than that pet. Go on, beg for it.”

“Please Mommy fuck me with your fingers! Please fill me up with your fingers and make me cum until I can’t think!” you do as asked and push two fingers inside making her moan out as she grabs your hair, rutting against your face as you lay your tongue out flat for her to ride against as you pump your fingers in her. “F-Faster..Harder...” She’s whimpering and so you add a third finger making it a little harder to move as her walls clench around your slender digits. 

“Oh good girl, so tight for Mommy. Are you going to cum from Mommy’s fingers?” 

“Yes Mommy!”

“Did you enjoy my performance pet?”

“Yes Mommy!”

“Did you want to touch yourself when you saw me like that?” 

“Yes Mommy! I wanted to touch myself. I wanted to crawl on stage and eat you and please you and...ah...Mommy.” Her words sent fire to your core. 

“Cum.” you tell her and moments later she’s unraveling in front of you. A moaning, whimpering, mewling mess. “Good girl...so good for Mommy.” you lick up what you can off your face, moaning once more at the taste as you move up, brushing your thumb across her bottom lip, “Open.” She opens her mouth allowing your fingers inside as she looks you in the eye, cleaning them. “Mmmm fuck...” you felt that familiar feeling in your chest as your eyes bore into each other, the feelings she was sending through you. You knew what this was and you don’t think you've ever fallen faster.

“More?” you laugh a bit at her request.

“Oh you’ll get plenty during our performance, pretty girl. Don’t worry Mommy’s going to take good care of you.”

≈≈≈

When Wanda stood, she was taller than you, which meant on stage she'd be kept on her knees. You made sure she had on knee pads since we'd be performing for over an hour. 

“Hello out there to all you lovely people! Welcome to the last performance of the night here at The Red Room!” Of course, there were some people making disheartening noises. “Don't you worry my pet and I will make sure that this is a performance you can go home later and think about while you fuck yourselves!” you call out as you get things ready. “Now my pet is new. It is her first performance tonight. Shall I go easy on her?” A roar of no's came from the crowd. “Well I'm glad it's not up to you. I'm going to give her everything she wants and needs. When I'm done with her she's going to be a dumb slut with no thoughts.” you make a clicking noise with your mouth, signaling Wanda to come out, crawling as she makes her way to me. Before your performance you told her to keep her eyes on you unless you told her otherwise. Mostly to help with her nerves. When she got to your legs she nuzzled into them. Yoi ran your fingers through her hair. 

“I'd like everyone to meet my new pet to those who didn't get the opportunity earlier. She's a sweet little plaything, and I'm going to break her so good before your eyes tonight.” You look down at Wanda and smile as you grip her hair, pulling as she mewls. You loved hearing her sounds. She looked up at you, eyes already blown with lust just from the eyes on her. 

You get her up on the bed we have up on the stage. It has this amazing bathroom blanket for any messes that are made, which is amazing. 

“Strip.” She does as told, taking off her lingerie set you put her in, leaving her in only your collar, you smiled down at her. “Tão bonita.(So beautiful)” You speak in Portuguese, which throws her off momentarily, not knowing what you've said to her. 

You grab the ropes and start tying her up expertly. Doing your signature pentagram harness, whispering as you tighten the ropes down her arms, “Are you comfortable?” 

“Yes Mommy.” You smile and kiss her neck, nibbling and making sure you mark her up. She's yours. No one else is taking her from you.

You have her kneeling for you, back arched perfectly as the vibrator sits against her clit and you pound into her with your 8 inch strap. “Who are you?” you ask, grabbing her hair, pulling her against your chest. 

“Mommy’s dumb little cock slut!” She cries out. You’ve been edging her for just about an hour. Every time she's come close you stop everything and whisper sweet nothings in her ears. All the makeup she's put on is ruined and staining her cheeks from the tears in her eyes. “You look so cute when you cry, amor.” 

“M-Mommy please…can't take n’more. Cum Mommy?” She was begging and mewling as you left marks over her back. You push all 8 inches back inside, bottoming out as you push her face down into the mattress. 

“My fucking slut wants to cum?” you ask.

“Yes! Yes, Mommy! Please! Please, Mommy! Wan’cum on Mommy's cock!”

“Go on slut. Cum all over my cock.” Wanda cums on your command, shaking intensely as she squeezes so tight it's hard to move, but the friction is enough to get you off. “F-fuck!” you moan out as you bottom out inside her and rutt against her as she collapses beneath you. Completely engulfed in subspace as I slowly pull out of her. 

“Thank you, everyone. I hope you enjoyed my pet's first performance and any further tips are always appreciated.” You say with a bow as various customers and clients leave us tips on the stage. You leave Steve, who cleans up the stage between performances to clean it up as you untie Wanda, the rope marks deep in her skin, more marks from me. You toss aside the strap after the curtain has closed and pick Wanda up. She's taller than you, but you're strong enough to do this much as you take her back to your dressing room. Laying her down on your bed as you grab comfy clothes of sweatpants and a baggy shirt for her. Throwing leggings and a sweatshirt on yourself, not bothering with anything else for us besides shoes. “Let's go to my house, amor. Can you walk?” You ask, and she nods, but almost falls when she tries to stand on her own. “I've got you. Come on, let's go get you that aftercare.” You have your arm around her waist as you walk out.

You set Wanda up on your countertop as she figured out a recipe to make and you counted out your tips dividing it in half.

“Here you go, amor. Your half.” You hand it to her, 

“How much is it?” She asks, eyes coming off the screen as she looks at the wad I'm handing her.

“$750. Don't expect it every time. Our performance was new, and people were excited. I've had nights where I only make $50. Either way, though, just remember that there's always tomorrow.” You tell her.

“Y/N?” 

“hmm?” 

“How long have you done this for?” She asks, and you notice how she is now coming back fully as she looks around your penthouse. 

“10 years.” 

“How old are you?”

“28. I've been doing this since I was 18. Natasha and I go way back to being in diapers. Our parents were friends growing up. Tasha is a few years older than me and established the club while I finished up high school. Once I turned 18, she let me join the club.” Wanda nodded, listening.

“How many-”

“Too many. I'd rather not think about that, okay, amor?” You had cut her off. You didn't want to think about past partners. All you wanted was her at this moment. 

You move between her legs, kissing gently over the marks you've left on her neck. “I only want to think about you right now.” You admit against her neck, and you feel her relax.

“I'm okay with that.” You smiled against her neck. 

“How about we make some pasta? I've got a carb craving right now.” you ask, looking up at her. Though I'd be dominant all night, looking up at her from between her legs just felt right. 

“Sounds good to me.” She cupped your cheeks and leaned down, pulling you up so your lips met, and you melted a bit. She was perfect.

The two of you were curled up on your couch watching sitcoms. You had found out they were Wanda's favorites. You were lying down. You were laying on her mainly because she pulled you in this way. “Shhh I wanna hold you.” Had been her response, and you didn't argue with her. Laying here with your head on her chest, hearing her heartbeat as she gently scratched my scalp eventually lulled you to sleep.

[onlyangel4]

the very first night. dr3. smau.

newly weds!daniel ricciardo x reader

after getting married daniel and reader take a trip down memory lane on their social media reminiscing about when first started dating

author's note: the maths doesn't exactly add up with where daniel was racing at what time please ignore that, this is just a fictional piece of writing

faceclaim: melissa roxburgh

part two

taylor swift series masterlist.

y/ninsta posted a story

written: we are incredibly hungover post wedding day but i had an idea and i was wondering if you guys would like to see some unseen moments from when me and danny first met and started dating

user1 replied to your story: yes please !

user2 replied to your story: i would like nothing more

user3 replied to your story: oh my god this would be perfect

user4 replied to your story: yes please mother

this story has 128 replies

y/ninsta posted a story tagging danielricciardo

written: since that was an outstanding yes, i have managed to rope my husband (can't believe i'm saying that) into posting somethings as well

y/ninsta posted a story tagging y/bff

written: many of you know that danny and i met in 2014 at the british grand prix, my best friend is british actress y/bff and she was invited to redbull hospitality. i still have this picture of baby us from that day.

danielricciardo posted two stories

story one written: since my wife has decided to take a trip down memory lane here is a picture of me from the day that we met

story two written: this man is technically who introduced me to my wife. seb and i were walking down the paddock when y/n accidentally walked straight into seb and fell on the floor, i helped her up and then we just started talking and we hit it of. we exchanged numbers and continued texting and calling every day.

y/ninsta posted a story

written: due to my busy acting schedule in the usa and danny's constant travelling we did not actually meet in person again until six months later at the american grand prix. danny had invited me there and then after the race he asked me on our first date. this is what i wore to the grand prix, i remember trying on my entire closet before deciding on this.

danielricciardo posted two stories

story one written: and this is what i wore to our first date

story two written: and this is the first picture i ever took of my now wife, i sent this to my best mate and told him that i was going to marry this girl someday

y/insta posted a story

written: those of you that were about way back then will remember that we actually managed to keep our relationship secret for two whole years. that was until tmz began consistently photographing me leaving daniel's hotel room on race weekends

danielricciardo posted two stories

story one written: so sky sports hard launched us (before that was even a thing) with a set of photographs that made it look like i was fucking my wife's brother and not y/n

story two written: seriously what the hell were we thinking y/n looks like our third wheel

y/ninsta posted a story

written: after the shit show of an initial hard launch i dragged danny to a film premiere and then everyone believed that we were dating and not that he was shacking up with my brother

y/ninsta posted a story

written: now this image has never been seen by the public before. this is from the day abigail was born five years into our relationship. this picture still makes me cry to this day.

danielricciardo posted a story

written: this was the first time abi joined me in the paddock, she hated it, y/n had to take her back to the hotel

y/insta posted a story

written: this is still my favourite picture of daniel and a three year old abi

y/ninsta posted a story

written: we haven't ever told our engagment story because it is not very exciting but we were on a family holiday in spain and danny made abi run over to me saying "mommy mommy come quick" and the bam i found danny halfway down the beach on one knee

y/insta

liked by danielricciardo, landonorris, maxverstappen and 1,234,532 others

tagged: danielricciardo

y/ninsta: that is enough reminiscing for one day. i just got the first pictures back from the best day of my life

view all 38,726 comments

danielricciardo: i can't believe after ten years you are now my wife

y/ninsta: me too husband

landonorris: that was the best wedding ever

y/ninsta: we ricciardo's sure do know how to party

maxverstappen: p had the best time with abi

y/ninsta: them dancing together was the cutest thing

charlesleclerc: that picture of abi looking at your dress is so sweet

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[sonicteam-aj]

I'm sorry (goodbye)

I don't really enjoy posting on social media or even using it at all. The only reason why I exist is because one of my friends roped me into making an account (I won't say who, but just know that). Being the Tumblr noob I spawned in as, I did the only thing I am good at: reposting random memes and doodles I find on the web. Everyone has to start somewhere, can we all agree on that at least? However, I was stupid to think that that was the right way to go about becoming well-known around the Tumblr community, and that it would hurt people if not offend. Once I started receiving comments about being a jerk to other artists and not asking permission to repost their art, I got scared and booked it, and looking back at this now, this was the dumbest way to resolve this issue (I'm not saying have one now).

In short, I feel deeply remorseful and guilty for committing these rude actions and will probably cease to exist on Tumblr anymore. It was fun being here for a good 2 days before pulling dumb shit, like receiving 19K notes on a single post within a month (holy fuck, calm down people lol). In any case, I am out of ideas on what to do here and have given up. Thank you for teaching me a few things along this treacherous ride, and hope to do better in the future. I guess that's all from me, so keep doing great work in whatever you're striving for, and take this as a learning lesson so you don't become a hated member from Tumblr like I have succumbed to.

Take care :)

[venusjaynie]

stranger things social media au part 3

this is eddie's party (which he threw at steve's house) and the aftermath of it !

cw: mentions of alcohol consumption and hangovers. steve being a jealous little shit in the comments

series masterlist

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b.hargrove

Liked by nanceewheeler, heather_helloway, itsbuckleybitch and others.

b.hargrove: omw to harringtons to reclaim my crown as keg king

View comments.

johnnybyers: broooooo why is tommy hagan staring at your ass

↳ b.hargrove: no why are you actually right

↳ johnnybyers: lowkey sus

↳ y/ns.priv24: calm down among us

stevie.h: watch yourself hargrove. coming for your crown fr

↳ b.hargrove: id like to see you try harrington

↳ y/ns.priv24: stop flirting with my boyfriend bitch

↳ b.hargrove: HOW IS THAT FLIRTING

y/ns.priv24

Liked by nanceewheeler, johnnybyers, willthewise and others.

y/ns.priv24: beer pong but make it cider (cause nancy and i hate beer and the boys would clearly do anything for us including changing their favourite game)

View comments.

johnnybyers: the things we do for you girls

↳ y/ns.priv24: you love us

↳ johnnybyers: only sometimes

thefreakmunson: it was worth it cause i got to see you drunk off of 3 ciders

↳ y/ns.priv24: and 2 vodka lemonades

↳ stevie.h: and 2 tequila sunrises. c'mon munson keep up

↳ thefreakmunson: sure sure

willthewise: i'm telling mom you got drunk. she's gonna kill you

↳ y/ns.priv24: sorry kid that doesn't apply to me now that i'm 21

↳ willthewise: oh yeah. damn

b.hargrove: never changing the rules of beer pong for you guys ever again. find your own drinking game

↳ thefreakmunson: if you don't like the new game throw your own party then hargrove

↳ b.hargrove: shut up

stevie.h

Liked by y/ns.priv24, thefreakmunson, argyledude and others.

stevie.h: reckon i've got enough jello shots?

View comments.

y/ns.priv24: i call every single green one.

↳ stevie.h: baby youre such a lightweight youll be hammered after 3

↳ y/ns.priv24: i didnt ask?

↳ stevie.h: so petty

↳ y/ns.priv24: you love it

↳ itsbuckleybitch: get a room lovebirds

nanceewheeler

Liked by johnnybyers, thefreakmunson, itsbuckleybitch and others.

nanceewheeler: me and j xx

View comments.

y/ns.priv24: i think i deserve some credit for these amazing photography skills

↳ nanceewheeler: we appreciate your fantastic photo skills

↳ johnnybyers: nance is right. thank you for being amazing at photography (after i showed you the ropes) baby sis

↳ y/ns.priv24: youre more than welcome big brother

itsbuckleybitch: cuties

↳ nanceewheeler: ily

willthewise: jonathan you look drunk in this hahaha

↳ johnnybyers: hahahaha youre right

↳ argyledude: "look" sure thing bro

↳ y/ns.priv24: argyle when tf did you get insta

↳ argyledude: ive always had it. just prefer to stalk than to comment baby byers

↳ y/ns.priv24: valid. also will is baby byers

↳ argyledude: oh shit yeah you're right

itsbuckleybitch

Liked by b.hargrove, stevie.h, y/ns.priv24 and others.

itsbuckleybitch: these wimps should be grateful that they're friends with me and y/n cause eddie bought 2 six packs and thought it would be enough for everyone

View comments.

y/ns.priv24: me and rob supplying the good stuff (aka vodka) as per

↳ itsbuckleybitch: what would they do without us and my ID honestly

thefreakmunson: shut up guys i bought 3 six packs. that's 18 beers

↳ itsbuckleybitch: thank you for doing the math for me. i'm afraid i would've struggled if you didnt

↳ thefreakmunson: fuck you

madmaxx: can you save me some pls

↳ y/ns.priv24: yeah but don't tell billy

↳ b.hargrove: byers i swear to god if you give my little sister vodka ill kill you.

↳ y/ns.priv24: "little sister" aw you never call her that

↳ b.hargrove: i'm serious. do not give that kid vodka.

↳ y/ns.priv24: billy obviously i'm not going to give your sister vodka. that would be ridiculous (sorry max)

↳ madmaxx: ugh billy you're so annoying

---------------------------------

the aftermath

---------------------------------

itsbuckleybitch

Liked by y/ns.priv24, b.hargrove, itsbuckleybitch and others.

itsbuckleybitch: he woke up looking like this

View comments.

y/ns.priv: lookin sexy as ever baby

↳ stevie.h: youre so wrong for taking this pic

b.hargrove: man that keg challenge really took you out

↳ stevie.h: i know

thefreakmunson: jesus you're hanging wtf you only did the keg challenge

↳ stevie.h: have you ever done the keg challenge??

↳ thefreakmunson: not necessarily no but i know 2 people who have

↳ y/ns.priv24: i think you mean 3?? me steve and billy??

↳ thefreakmunson: HA you haven't done it don't play w me you don't even like beer

↳ b.hargrove: nah man she has. it's terrifying. she beat my record first try

↳ thefreakmunson: 😧

y/ns.priv24

Liked by nanceewheeler, itsbuckleybitch, willthewise and others.

y/ns.priv24: much needed hangover cuddles from nance

View comments.

nanceewheeler: i'm always here for hungover cuddles 🫶🫶

↳ y/ns.priv24: love you

stevie.h: where's my hangover cuddle :(

↳ thefreakmunson: "where ma hug at 🥺"

↳ y/ns.priv24: EDDIE LMFAO

↳ stevie.h: 😐

b.hargrove

liked by stevie.h, thefreakmunson, nanceewheeler and others.

b.hargrove: me and y/n on the mandatory hangover cure coffee run

View comments.

itsbuckleybitch: i better get my venti vanilla iced latte

↳ y/ns.priv24: dw bbg it's otw

↳ stevie.h: 'bbg' go fuck yourself what do you think this is

↳ b.hargrove: god someones jealous

↳ y/ns.priv24: sorry stevie. i can call you bbg if you want ;)

↳ itsbuckleybitch: yeah no lets not

thefreakmunson

thefreakmunson: shut the fucking blinds

View comments.

nanceewheeler: you could also just sleep somewhere else?

↳ thefreakmunson: i wish i could, but i cant. well... can but... wont. should, maybe, but... shornt...

↳ johnnybyers: wtf are you even saying

↳ thefreakmunson: what part of shornt dont you understand

↳ y/ns.priv24: yeah you no longer have netflix priveliges

↳ thefreakmunson: NO

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ugh these are so fun to make

[kgescoba]

I’ve been on and off with my physical and mental health for years. And its more and more frustrating each time. I am tired, tired, and tired off my bullshit. This first half of the year has also been one of the worst for me. I’m kinda tired of just wallowing in my own pity tbh. Feeling bad and horrible about myself and then doing fucking nothings. I’m ridiculous for that honestly. But it changes today. I can’t keep this pity party going. I’ve always been so good at everything else like academics, cleanliness, responsibilities but for some reason I’m always my last priority when I should be my top priority.

My friends and I are going in a trip in January 2024 hopefully and I’ve set my first few goals to hopefully be completed by that time. Since its August, that gives me roughly 6 months to get shit done which I believe is a decent amount of time to get many things in order if I stay consistent and disciplined.

Honestly speaking many of my goals are for superficial reasons but they are also for my health. I think goals can be for both reasons and people shouldn’t feel bad if their goals are just because they wanna look better honestly. If you’re bettering yourself in anyway and its for you then i always so go for it but sometimes the internet can be very judgmental sadly. I believe in my goals and that they will better me in many ways. I’m going to do everything in my strength to manifest them and make sure they come to life.

So what are my goals? Well theres many and in different points of my life.

First off, and my most important is mental health/selfcare. I have been having the worst year and part of that is my own depression and self-pity. I need to work on that very much. While theres no specific goal for this one per say, I want to take a bit of time everyday to help myself relax and soften my mood. This could be done in many different ways. Some of the things I plan to do is to do morning yoga/pilates, daily diary entrees in my journal, 30 or more minutes of daily readings, and hot girl walks. Also, my other goals will likely also help my mental well-being too which is a plus. Mostly tho, I know I will be in a better place mentally by the time we go on our trip. I also plan on being on social media a lot less. Comparing myself to others in different positions as me is not beneficial to me and the way I see myself. I’m opting to use social media that I feel helps me more and that would be my Pinterest, lemon8, my ipad tiktok acct, and this tumblr. I’m setting limits and getting off anytime i feel overwhelmed.

Next goal is ofc more physical health/activity. My goodness am I not well in this category. I lose breathe by walking up like three steps and it is honestly so embarrassing to me. I am young and I should not be this tired at my age. My specific goal in this aspect is that I will lose 30 lbs by the time of my trip with my friends. I know that the time frame I have set for myself is more than enough. To attain this goal I will be obviously being more physical. I have decided that I will be going to the gym 4 times a week and do cardio everyday. Ofc I will have rest days but I still plan on going on walks or doing a bit of jump rope those days. I will be weight lifting too. It is not going to be an like weightlifting weightlifting but I do believe it does help greatly in a weight loss journey. Next, I will also be changing my eating habits. While I don’t eat “bad” food, i do have bad eating habits. I miss meals or only eat once a day, or drink coffee for breakfast. I also don’t drink enough water. For me, the best way to help myself here is by cooking more at home and actually having lunches or breakfast ready for me to grab and go. I hate calorie counting so I will not be doing that as I feel it sets me back most of the time. But I will be eating intuitively, making sure i add more veggies and stop buying so much takeout. I do like planning my meals as well and I love grocery shopping.

Moving on, next goal is working on my financial things. Imma be honest, I am broke af. I work a minimum wage job and I am full-time in Uni. I also love shopping like omg. I see something cute and I need it. Realistically tho, this overconsumption is not good and I need to stop that. I have so many things that I know I do NOT need more. I don’t need clothes or shoes or bags or stationary or plushies NOTHING. I quite literally have everything I need to be content. So I will definitely start controlling my spending and make wishlist. I also recently invested in a nespresso to hopefully save some money on buying coffees. Making my own meals will also help not break the bank. I want to start saving atleast $30 per check and send it into my savings. I also want to pay off my credit cards. I think I have about $1600 in credit card debt right now and I am sure I can pay that off in no time if I set my mind to it. My method of paying it off will be taking $50 every time I get and paying that to the card with more interest while paying the minimum amount for the other card until I finish the first one. I used this method to pay off my chase card and it worked wonders so I know I can do this. This method ensures that I am atleast paying off $100 a month to one of the cards. Once I am out of card debt, I’ll have funds that are just for myself.

Lastly, we have skincare. I unfortunately have back acne and some dark spots on my face. I really need to fix that. Changing my eating habits and getting more physically active will definitely help this goal, but I also want to strictly start sticking to my skin and body routine. I do have a skincare plan that I have seen help me but I do not stay consistent. Unfortunately sometimes I don’t shower or do my skincare and it does set me back. So from now on I will be following my routines strictly. I have an app that sends me reminders of when I should be doing my routines and as annoying as the notifications will be, it will help me. That way can attain clearer and healthier skin.

Now the biggest issue is making sure I stay disciplined. Its gonna be my mind set that needs the most work. I’m helping myself by reading self-help books and listening to some very useful podcast. I am also going to do everything confidently with NO DOUBTS in my head. I don’t care what my parents or siblings are gonna say. They can suck it. Not only that but I know that all my cute besties and my sweet boyfriend are going to support me through this because they always are. They’re my rocks frfr and they help me in so many ways without even knowing it. I am going to change and I am becoming the best version of me. No one can take that away from me ever. While I plan on keeping this private, I will share this with one specific bestie cause she is the most helpful in keeping me consistent teehee.

I love myself the way I am but I know I can and will be better in every way.

08.13.23 gaby

[i-need-air]

Hello I really like your hybrid au especially with kirishima

I was wondering if I can request one with kirishima hybrid where reader gets kidnapped because someone from the old ring wants revenge and kirishima is looking for them

Wow, I took some time with this because it was hard to place Kiri in such a situation. I hope I gave it justice. This is not my usual fluff since it's a darker theme, so yeah. Hope it was worth the wait though! Enjoy and tell me if you liked it!! 💕💕

Word count: 4k [ I... I got carried away... and I still feel it's short 💀 ]

Warnings: kidnapping, blood, mentions of abuse, guns, Kiri's past being f'd up, insults [?], hint towards assault;

[ Masterlist ] [ Main Hybrid!Kirishima HCs ]

× this man is all about safety

× asks you to send him a message whenever you arrive safely at home or wherever you're going

× it's super-sweet and really helpful; your well being is everything to him after all

× yet one evening you didn't arrive on time

× no message, nothing

× he was waiting and paying attention to time since he wanted to suggest going out to watch a movie, but you didn't arrive

× one hour later he finds himself frowning at the clock, tapping his foot in wonder

× he sent you a message; the fact that it send but you didn't receive it unsettled him more, to which he decided to call— "The phone you're trying to reach is disconnected or no longer in service."

× did you run out of battery? was that even possible?

× what seals the deal is a DM he receives from a throwaway account on social media he was so active and known on.

× "We've got your little toy. You know where to find us, Red Riot. Come alone or they die." and attached was a pictute of you, on the floor, possibly unconscious, hands tied behind your back.

× a collar was placed by your side; he knew what it was.

× his blood ran cold, a freezing shiver electrified through his spine as he jumped out of the couch, terrorized and more importantly raging mad

× Red Riot: a name he tried to forget; a name people shouted at him in praise as they put bets on his head; a name he's been given as he fought friends and foes; a name that brought back pain and suffering. A name he didn't want to taint his new life with.

× he did not take any time to leave the house in a hurry, his eyes burning with unshed tears.

× Kirishima didn't know where his friends were, so he found himself on his own, outside your apartment complex, taking a deep breath in; he could find you; he had to find you even if it was the last thing he did, yet he had to do it alone.

× he spotted your car in the parking lot— in a blink he was by it's side, just spotting your belongings inside and the car-keys still in

× uncontrollable rage took over him as he still sniffed your scent in the air.

× you've been here and because of him, now you weren't; you're gone; you've been attacked too, the window smashed and blood running down the door

× he sniffed again, noticing how it wasn't your blood— relief didn't come since he did recognize the other scent; his dealer.

× "You fucking mutt!" he growled above the red-haired man chained to the wall, fist closed readied to make impact.

× Kirishima growled lowly, remembering.

× "You fucking made me lose ten fucking grands because you didn't want to finish that fucking beast!" his screams could be heard throughout the hallways.

× He got inside the car.

× "You and your fucking group, you think you're too good to fucking follow MY ORDERS—" a crack could be heard as the punch collided with the hybrid's jaw, yet it did little to no damage to him. Curses followed, making the man almost chuckle, yet chose not to, knowing the damage it would bring. "YOU PATHETIC PIECE OF— I FUCKING BROKE MY HAND, SHIT!" he yanked him by the hair with his other hand, pulling hard. "I'm gonna make you regret the day you were born." And if it weren't for his improvised family, Kirishima would've been regretting that day anyway without his assistance.

× He sped off, fingers whitening on the steering wheel because of his harsh grip. Tears now ran freely on his cheeks with no conscious attempt made to be stopped.

× Only two places haven't been raided by the Hybrid Protection Services came to mind, deemed as abandoned yet for those that knew the insides, the buildings were definitely used mostly as hideouts and for special occasions

× few escaped from being detained by the police, yet word came to him that the bastard, Mawler as he liked to call himself, was caught; it didn't seem to be the case and as he drove, Kirishima could only think he'd make the fucker regret the day he was born; a bitter laugh left his lips, hating himself for a moment. Although the image of a friend came in his mind, imagining him slapping his back in a poor attempt to motivate him. That's what he would say too.

× the self-hatred washed off; for you he'd do anything.

× he rushed to the first location; it used to be a club with an underground arena, in which he himself fought in countless times

× his neck itched as he gritted his teeth; the memory of the electric collar they had to have on while almost killing each other made him want to vomit

× a deep growl left his frame; gutural, dark, menacing; they wanted the Red Riot? it seems they forgot where he really got that name from;

× he only saw blood on the way there.

× he parked not too far but tried to keep a low profile although his big frame didn't help in a stealth situation. Kirishima knew he's in for trouble, but what else could he do?

× —

× you blinked, blinded by the light that shined harshly in your face

× "Would you look at that, fellas? Guess who's wakin' up?" you had no time to panic, just flashes of the quick encounter just by your house appearing in your mind as a boot collided with your stomach, making you wince in pain

× What was going on? What the hell happened?

× "Aww, don't make that face..." someone mocked. "Save it for when Red Riot comes along, baby." he whispered harshly at you, venom in his voice.

× you muttered "—Riot?" in daze, placing your knees as close to your chest for protection; your head hurt badly, a throbbing pain coming from the back of it.

× laughed echoed around you; "He didn't fucking tell you? How much of a fucking BEAST he was?!"; other voices joined in... two more voices, but you couldn't be sure

× memories came back at you; how you were arriving late but decided to not send any message since you were driving; parking, gathering your stuff, the sound of crystal breaking—

× but nothing else;

× "You don't fucking know what your piece of shit of a mutt even did before acting like a perfect little boyfriend, didn't ya?" the same venom filled voice came closer to you, giving you the chance to finally see his ugly scowl and to imprint his stupidly face in your mind;

× were they talking about Kirishima? Your Kirishima? He never really got into detail about his previous life yet made it clear he was forced to fight for the entertainment of others— did they fucking think he had a choice?

× yet you remained silent; it seems Kiri knew you'd be there and your concussion didn't really help you to think straight and form any plan;

× something could be heard outside, a crash of some sort and everyone stood still for a good second.

× "He—... He's here already?" one of them whispered. A clicking made you freeze. You snapped your head up in terror, only knowing that sound from movies, a sound so scary you really didn't think you'd hear it in real life; guns.

× "I fucking send that message 20 minutes ago..." Ugly Scowl said, taken back in surprise. His eyes, dark and void of goodness snapped on you, an unsure smile painting over him. "I wanted to have some fun with ya."

× your body couldn't control the shiver that ran through it, from head to toes, and he noticed, turning his uncertain smile into a sadistic one; your face was probably a dead giveaway too.

× but Eijirou was there and deep down you knew there was nothing to fear; except for the guns.

× the red-head wasn't dumb, he knew this world a million times better than you, so he must've known; with a flood of nervousness piling up in your stomach, you blinked the stinging feeling in your eyes away and hoped for the best.

× "Go check that fucking sound, retards!" he then screamed, two sets of footsteps rushing at his orders; it seemed he was the "boss" of whatever the hell this small group of pieces of shit was and hated your boyfriend's guts.

× should you talk? should you not? what's the best possible outcome out of this?

× your wrists stung, locked harshly with what felt like a rope; in a poor attempt to move your fingers to feel if you could, in an ideal world, free your hands, the man caught your movements instantly; he yanked you by the neck, lifting you off the ground with no difficulty and that's when you noticed he was strong, muscular, big; his frame wasn't as massive as Eijirou's by any chance but massive enough to make you reconsider any attempt to escape. "Don't even fucking think about it, dear."

× his breath, foul and heavy, hit your face and you almost gagged; he was watching you, observing your face in search of something. Through a nod he hummed at himself.

× "Not bad, Riot." his nose hit your cheek as he breathed you in and a whimper left you, guts screaming danger; he snickered. "It's okay, I like them when they cry." he mocked your tears in a heavy whisper, which you didn't notice until he pointed them out.

× a snap could be heard from inside the building, possibly on the floor above; were you underground?

× the disgusting man by your side lifted himself up, throwing you on the floor like garbage. He lifted his gun and narrowed his eyes towards the stairs.

× "Be good and maybe I'll keep you for myself after I hunt your mutt down." he said between gritted teeth. You just started praying for the man you loved, still trying to figure out a way to at least hide before this scum used you as a threat more than he did already.

× —

× Kirishima watched them from the shadows; his breath was heavy yet silent, his enhanced vision saw the two low-life mobs he sometimes noticed following Mawler whenever he went; he took in consideration their stance; of course they'd bring weapons—

× his mind drifted to one of his trainers, EraserHead, and on the few moments of aloofness he let himself have around the younger ones put in his charge; "Humans are easily fooled—" he'd grin lazily. "And very easy to scare."

× with determination like he's never had before, he grabbed a rock; if he had to reach you, he'd have to do the only thing he was never good at: being stealthy.

× he rushed to the left of the back entrance, hidden behind a beaten up car as he threw the small rock in the opposite direction and in any other situation he'd find himself amused, EraserHead's words on replay in his mind. One of the guys almost jumped in place at the sound, gun fastly jerked into its general direction with trembling hands.

× with no second to spare, he entered the building, his speed impressive—

× no sound was made, but what helped him greatly was that one of them started talking into the nothingness; "We know you're there, you bastard!"

× the other one was now searching inside the building, yet his head turned towards his companion outside; sadly for the poor idiot, it only took a punch in the jaw to immobilize him and knock him out entirely. He took the guns from the now unconscious body and put them in his belt and pocket, yet had no intention to use any.

× the second one left outside was still talking a whole monologue, making the man sweat drop; was this Mawler's plan? he wasn't known to use his brain much...

× yet he wasn't as easy to take down as Kirishima wanted it to be; he turned around, probably uneased by the lack of response of his partner, suspicious and more on the edge; he could feel it, his nervousness, his fear; another bitter grin appeared on Eijirou's features.

× "Jackal?" his voice hid fear behind it.

× they definitely knew the damage he could do and the hybrid was glad they did, wanting them to be terrified, his predator instincts washing over.

× he jumped on him, kicking the pistol out of his hands in a heartbeat and making him stumble backwards, losing his balance; it happened in a blurr, old feeling of being in the ring, fist to fist, tail low and ready to pounce. He was in his element once again and God, he hated himself when he let go of all the pain and broke his arm, the sweet image of your smiling face as you burried yourself into the same arms he hurt people with always in the back of his mind.

× before he could realize, the other woke up from the knockout; he heard rushed steps towards him and a snapping sound. The blabbering idiot was on the ground now, breathing but beaten to a pulp and everything stood still for a good second.

× he got hit? in the back of his head? With just one glance he saw a broken wooden plank and blinked stupidly; did he seriously think—?

× Kirishima grinned and in an instant he grabbed Jackal's head and smashed it into his knee.

× —

× you could hear his steps; you knew it was him; heavy yet trying to conceal them poorly; your man was walking around the floor above and you sniffled your nose at the thought.

× he was absolutely massive and nothing about him was silent; gentle, yes, but silent? laughable. Even in this horrendous situation you closed your eyes lovingly at the thought. He's here.

× "Those damned fucking useless pieces of shit—" Oh, yeah. Him.

× the barrel was suddently pointed at your head and any thoughts you had abandoned your brain completely

× utter terror overwashed your senses in every way as you stared at it with wide eyes

× "Let's see if he fucking likes this—"

× —

× the only way down for the public was the stairway; not even those useless guards knew the hidden entrance his friends and him used once; they had to come back though, the guilt and knowledge that if they're found to be gone would make Mawler execute everyone else.

× a low window painted black that led to a storage room behind the filthy bathrooms and the place they'd be kept in cages; he ran on the first floor, approaching the stairs before jumping on the dusty metal bar, now completely silent and praying his poor attempt at a bait worked.

× in no time he was outside again and in even less of a second he found himself by said window leading to the underground arena.

× —

× "Maybe if I hurt you a little bit, he'll come to his senses." He grinned, gun's safety lever clicked, now pointed at your stomach.

× you saw your vision blurr and you really, really wanted to say something but didn't know what to; your lips trembled and you bit them in the hopes of showing at least some courage before getting shot but you couldn't help closing your eyes.

× the sound was so loud; an obnoxiously loud bang shook the room or maybe just shook you to the core, then warmth engulfed you wholly.

× it gripped into you so strongly yet no damage came; "I got you, baby." came as a whisper in your ear and just as you snapped your eyes to see his red, sweet, gorgeous red eyes look at you tenderly, he was gone.

× nothing was said; just a rush of screams and silence; your kidnapper tried to shoot again or so you saw but he was jumped on instantly; that's when you noticed Eijirou was growling like a wild animal and was covered with blood.

× he was like a hurricane, like a bulldozer, like an unstoppable force that destroyed with no mercy; covered in red and splatters due to his constant attacks just painted him with more of it;

× you were looking at Red Riot and your stomach dropped; this is what he was made to be and you cried when he did not stop beating the man underneath him.

× "Baby, stop—" you'd whisper, really trying to get up and barely making it to stay in a seating position, kinda desperate; and he indeed stopped at your plea, froze actually.

× the poor devil under him was groaning, gargling whatevers but it didn't matter; he was looking at you, shocked and you could see the fear in his eyes...

× was it bad that it didn't matter to you? as long as he didn't kill them, as long as justice got to them and furthermore kept Kirishima by your side forever, it didn't matter to you; it was instant, that thought.

× but as he stood there frozen, taking in your nerves and sudden relief, your crying face filled with worry; you took him in too... how his back was getting soaked in blood, running through his shirt down, and down, leaking...

× he got shot for you;

× "Please, leave him, help me and—" he turned a little, ashamed yet mute.

× like a scolded child, unsure; he was bleeding but he was scared of you; he had a hole in his back but he was hurting for your reaction.

× you sniffled again, getting on your knees, pain striking in your stomach but ignoring it; "Eijirou, come to me, please."

× and he did, all so gracefully, so fast and without a single wince; as if he knew pain more than he should've.

× your hands were instantly freed

× his silence killed you inside, it really did. This man, this amazing creature that beamed like the brightest star in the sky was now somber, dull...

× your phone was thrown on the floor as they tampered with it and you rushed, with trembling hands and uncertainty at his attitude to call the police; he was still to say anything, just staying on his knees in front of you, head low and teary eyes.

× he just muttered the location when they asked you about it but that's it; the operator asked questions yet you didn't care to answer them, just saying you need an ambulance too before closing the call to crawl towards him, taking his torso into your arms careful not to touch the wound on his back.

× he then cried harder into your neck, almost falling into your embrace, accepting it but his hands didn't move to touch you, laying unmoving on his sides.

× "I'm so—" he hiccuped. "I'm so sorry, [Y/N]." His frame was shaking more and more;

× "I love you, Eijirou." It's all you could say. Really, your brain just screamed for you to tell him that, as if you felt it's what he needed to hear the most.

× guilty; blaming himself; putting himself down;

× he shuddered into you as your hands, tired and sore, reached for his sweat soaked hair to stroke it gently.

× "You came for me. You saved me. Thank yo—"

× "Don't! It's all my fault—" his voice broke for a second, hands turning into fists and the only thing grounding him was your scent invading his nostrils. "You're hurt because of me..."

× you cried with him too, gluing his head more into you, peppering his face with shaky butterfly kisses.

× "It's not your fault, it was never your fault, Eijirou." you shook in place as you reassured him. Word by word, sentence by sentence, you let him know he's just as much of a victim being chased by his past, a past he was forced to have; he came for you, he rushed to save you, he took a bullet for you and yet again, he acted like it was nothing, as if the pain of putting you in danger was greater than any damage he could take.

× his hands encircled you and for the first time since you saw him after waking up to this nightmare, he winced in pain but did not let you go. Instead, he pressed your body into his, fearing you'd dissapear.

× you asked him if you should cover the wound, not really knowing what to do for now; you'd have time to talk, you'd have time to reassure him again and again and again, but now you had to make sure he was fine.

× he shook his head, feeling his nose tickle your neck in the process; "Leave it, I've taken worse." And with that statement you cried harder.

× the police sirens could be heard in the distance, accompanied by the ambulance one...

× —

× so much time passed; so many hours without sleep; police station, explanations, Kirishima almost getting arrested in the spot and being incarcerated, hospital, lawyers, more questioning...

× everything was explained, everything kinda settled for the never-ending day, knowing it wouldn't be the last time you'd have to visit said police station, already sure you'd follow Kirishima there without hesitancy to make sure he's treated correctly, but for now... home.

× the bullet didn't reach any vital organ even if he was hit square in the back and for a normal human it would've meant a hit in one of the lungs, but not for a hybrid—

× still, it didn't hurt less to see him in that state;

× your car was sealed and taken away as evidence, so a taxi home was your only way there.

× hands locked and much, so much to talk about ahead of you but one thing sure

× "I love you." You squeezed his hand, catching his attention, loving how his lips curled in a small smile, not as bright as usual, but still, his smile.

× "I love you more." Was his usual response yet this time it was shy, not looking into your eyes but somewhere behind you, out the window. You frowned and shook his hand to catch the attention fully.

× "No. You don't seem to get it." You led his big, strong, scarred hand to your lips, kissing the back of it softly. "I love you, Kirishima Eijirou. So much."

× the car ride was silent as he took in your words and you couldn't help but enjoy the way his eyes widened, now having his full attention as his cheeks reddened slightly, knowing he's been caught putting himself down.

× he let out a breathless chuckle, so small but with it his shoulders fell in relief. He nodded, watching his hand holding yours and gulped, your words repeating in a loop in his mind.

× Eijirou was so easy to read, so transparent and honest and it warmed heart to ser him accept your words, words you've said countless times before this incident and without a doubt in the future until they engraved permanently in his heart.

× he chuckled again at your expression, catching your gaze and holding it until a smile broke on his face, this time big and warm, just like him. The smile you wanted to see all along.

× he cried again through it, passing his free palm over his eyes for a second; "You're my everything, [Y/N]." he'd pull you into his chest, inhaling your scent. "I love you." he squeezed you close.

[everywhereallofthetime]

Some Girl ... Part 15

Word Count: almost 1.8k

Warnings/Notes: A few cuss words. Overzealous, disrespectful fan, Shawn trying to be a sweetheart anyway. Brief mentions of Camila.

// * // * //

Monday / July 26th

At 9:03am Monday morning, Charlotte was at the front desk chatting with Jaime, her office assistant, when Ethan came rushing in, apologizing for being late. Charlotte waved it off and told him that it happened to the best of them. She then led him to the studio they would be starting in.

While they warmed up, Charlotte learned that Ethan was the single dad of a 15-month-old baby girl. The reason he was late, he felt the need to explain, was because he had his daughter over the weekend and he needed to drop her off at daycare on his way. She didn’t want him to go, so he gave her an extra few snuggles to try to comfort her.

Charlotte smirked. “She already knows she has you wrapped around her finger.”

“She absolutely does,” he chuckled. He showed her his home screen on his cell phone, which was a picture of her.

“I have a six-month-old son,” Charlotte offered with a smile of solidarity, showing him the photo of Sebastian on her own phone home screen.

They chuckled at the fact that they were ‘those kind’ of parents; showing photos of their kids without asking others if they even wanted to see them.

It was a nice jumping off point for them to connect and start getting to know one another on a more personal level.

On a professional level, Ethan was about 25 pounds heavier than he wanted to be. Charlotte reminded him that he would be trading fat for muscle, so his overall weight might not change much, depending on how muscular he wanted to be. She didn’t believe in weigh-ins except with their first session and again at their last. She told her clients to mark their progress with measurements, not the scale.

Aside from that, he was an absolute dear and very, very attractive. He had the darker skin of someone with mixed heritage and short dark hair, but his eyes were a beautiful sea green.

Ethan was also somewhat flirtatious. Charlotte had a feeling he was holding back and couldn’t help but wonder if it was because of Shawn. He had, after all, first met her when Shawn was standing beside her.

If she wasn’t so unsure of where she and Shawn may be heading, she would certainly be flirting back.

// * // * //

Charlotte was saying goodbye to Ethan, and how she was looking forward to their next session that Thursday, as her newest potential client was arriving.

Jetta was petite and cute, with blonde hair and dark eyes. Charlotte thought they might be close in age, but not in maturity. She had an air about her that said she was spoiled rotten and used to getting whatever she wanted. She hoped she was wrong in her presumption, this was only their initial meeting after all, but she was more intuitive than most people.

Nonetheless, Charlotte flashed a warm, professional smile in greeting. She then brought Jetta back to her office to begin their consultation. She was a no-nonsense trainer, not the coddling type. She was about to learn if Jetta had the disposition and dedication that she needed to be one of her clients.

After a straight-forward conversation with Jetta about the kind of commitment she would need to be successful, Charlotte could already tell she was wavering. Still, she showed Jetta the studios and equipment, and they had a brief workout to get a feel for each other.

When their time was almost up, Jetta excused herself for the washroom while Charlotte made a few notes, which ended with: Probably won’t be back...

// * // * //

Charlotte headed toward the front office, where she and Jetta were supposed to reconvene, and found Shawn chatting with Jaime at the front desk.

“You’re only supposed to flirt like that with me, Mendes,” Charlotte teased.

“I’m practically married already. It doesn’t count,” Jaime giggled.

“You aren’t married yet.” Shawn made the gesture of holding a phone to his ear and winked at her, mouthing ‘call me’.

“And he calls me ‘trouble’,” Charlotte said to Jaime, chuckling. She then gave Shawn a playful shove and said, “Go warm up. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

Before he could make it to the door which led the way to the CrossFit studio, he was intercepted by a slightly overzealous Jetta.

“Hi! Oh my God! I’m a huge fan!”

Shawn was always unfailingly polite and full of gratitude. He flashed that brilliant smile of his. “Thanks!”

“I didn’t know you worked out here!”

“No one knows that I work out here, and I’d kind of like to keep it that way.” He said so in a way which asked Jetta not to say anything without actually asking her not to say anything.

“Sure, absolutely. I watched your Live last night.”

“That’s great! I hope you liked it.”

“Of course I did! I’m so excited for new music from you.”

“It makes me happy to hear that.”

“Can we take a selfie?”

“For sure, but then I’ve gotta go.”

Jetta handed Shawn her phone and posed beside him, standing as close as she could. As soon as the shutter clicked, she stated, “I’m glad you and Camila finally broke up.”

Shawn felt immediate dizziness fill his head. “Oh,” was the only response he could manage.

Noticing how he stiffened beside her and how red filled his cheeks, she quickly added, “It’s just that I never thought she was right for you,” as if that would make it better.

Charlotte felt the need to step in and end things. “I’m sorry, Jetta, but Shawn is here for a session and we should really get started.”

“Sure. Yeah, all right.”

Charlotte could see the very moment everything all came together in Jetta’s mind.

“You’re ‘starlit_charlotte’! You posted the basketball video!” Jetta turned back to Shawn. “She’s the friend you were talking about in your chat!” She looked from him back to Charlotte, and again at him. “Are you two together?”

“We’re friends.”

Jetta’s focus remained on Shawn and Shawn alone. “If you aren’t dating her, do you wanna go out sometime? With me? Here,” she said, shoving a business card into his hand.

Quickly glancing at it, he could see that it listed all of her social media accounts and usernames.

She placed her hand on his forearm and flashed him what she thought was her sexiest smile. “Feel free to slide into my DMs.”

Shawn tried to stay cool and cordial but he was ready for her to get out of his space, and he hating feeling like that around his fans. “It was nice to meet you, Jetta, but I really gotta go. We’re running late.”

“Oh! Okay, sure,” she grinned, oblivious to Shawn basically telling her it was time for her to go away. “See you around!”

Not if I can help it, Charlotte thought to herself while she did her best to smile pleasantly. She turned Shawn away from Jetta, placed her hands on either of his hips, and pushed him through the door. Over her shoulder, back to Jetta, she said, “Give me a call if you decide you’d like to start training and we’ll work out a schedule.”

// * // * //

Charlotte handed Shawn a jump rope. He started skipping and, after he found his rhythm, murmured, “I’m sorry, babe.”

“You never need to apologize for stopping for your fans, and for being kind, even when they don’t deserve it. If it had been me, it would have meant the world to me if you took time to talk to me and take a selfie. I’m sorry. You looked like you were beginning to get overwhelmed and I reacted, but it was wrong for me to butt in. I know you’re perfectly capable of handling things on your own. After all, you’ve been doing this for years.”

“In this case, you weren’t wrong. Sure, she was a fan, but I am also your client and we had a scheduled session that has now started ten minutes late. As my trainer you had every right to call attention to that.”

“Sure, but as your friend, I want to be supportive of you, and I want your fans to like me. It will make your interaction with them a lot easier if they do.”

Shawn shook his head as if in disbelief. “She was...excitable, eh?”

“She was rude,” Charlotte said frankly.

“I’m sure she didn’t mean to be.”

"You are too good for this world,” she sighed. “She insulted Camila and your relationship with her right to your face, babe. It was disrespectful.”

“I wasn’t going to be impolite back at her... She might be your newest client.”

“First off, no one would have blamed you, least of all me. And no. I don’t want to train her, and I hate saying that about anyone. Until she saw you, I had a feeling she wouldn’t have been back. Now that she knows you work out here, with me, she will be. I’ll see if Lina will take her on.”

“I wonder if she’ll say anything to anyone.”

“Of course she will. And I wouldn’t put it past her to embellish the story of your meeting. ‘He’s even more gorgeous in person!’ At least that wouldn’t be an embellishment. ‘He was flirting!’ She won’t bother to add ‘with the office assistant’. A business card for social media. Like, really? Is that a thing now? I’m only 23. Should this not surprise me?” Shawn started giggling. “‘I gave him my number and he said he’d slip into my DMs!’ She’s cute though; she’d be easy to believe. At least she caught you pre-workout and not when you were all gross and sweaty. Although, I don’t know, she might’ve liked your sweat and post-workout stink.”

Shawn was having difficulty catching his breath; it was hard to laugh and jump-rope at the same time.

“So much for subtly and slowly, eh?” he said between chuckles.

“More like clearly and quickly,” she giggled. Shawn opened his mouth to say something but Charlotte immediately shut him down. “Don’t you dare try to apologize again. Do I have to remind you of our conversation last night?”

“Okay, fine.”

“All right then. Twenty squats.”

“I fucking hate squats,” he groaned, dropping the jump rope.

“I can always make them buddy squats,” she threatened. “Come on, babe. They’ll make your ass look great.”

“You must do a lot of squats,” he smirked.

She rolled her eyes but still blushed. “Your charm will not get you out of having to do them,” she snickered. “Let’s go. Shit stuff first, then fun stuff. You know the drill.”

// * // * //

Part 16

[duhragonball]

Disinterpretation

I finally finished the Sarah Z video about “pro vs. anti”.   It’s pretty long, and I ended up watching it in chunks over several days, but I think it’s worth watching, especially if you’re sort of partially connected to online fandom, but not enough to be aware of all the lingo. 

As I expected, the whole thing was vague and confusing because the people involved in the conflict made it vague and confusing.   In theory, the full terms would be “pro-shipping” and “anti-shipping”, but it seems like it’s more about particular kinds of ships that could be considered controversial.  But that’s a slippery slope, and apparently the whole conflict mutated into both sides deciding that every hypothetical relationship between fictional characters is either equally valid or equally dangerous.  

Long story short, it’s just purity culture, which was what everyone on Tumblr was calling it around 2012.  But now, if you’re a sane person who genuinely asks: “Who gives a fuck about Voltron?”, these people will jump your ass and accuse you of being on the side of their enemies.  “Children have died over the importance of Lotor/Hagger!   Your callous indifference proves that you yourself must have murdered children!” 

I think what Sarah Z really hit upon in this video was that media consumption has become so ingrained in our culture that people feel like it has to go hand-in-hand with our morality.   That is, it’s not enough for me to watch Star Trek, I have to justify Star Trek as evidence that I’m a good person.  Maybe this is where the expression “guilty pleasure” comes from.   Conversely, it’s not enough for me to not watch Dr. Who, I have to somehow convince everyone that Dr. Who was invented by the devil.

I’m pretty sure the Reylo ship has a lot to do with this, since it’s kind of understood to be a dark, problematic concept, and fans either embrace its flaws or recoil in horror because of them.   Star Wars itself is a dumb story about space wizards, so people try to give the debate more weight by linking it to freedom of self expression and/or enabling real world harm.   Suddenly it’s not enough to just think two actors would look cute making out instead of fighting.   Now it’s this battlefield for the soul of civilization or something.

I grew up in the 80′s, when “concerned parents” and grifters would accuse the Smurfs and metal bands of promoting satanism and witchcraft.   I used to hear stories of teens going out into the woods in the middle of the night to do occult stuff, and all I could ever think about was: “Why would anyone bother wandering out in the woods in the middle of the night?”  Which is why “concerned parents” turned their attention to things that were closer to home, like Saturday morning cartoons.   It had nothing to do with the content; it was just about finding a safe, accessible target for their hysteria.   Some people want to go on a crusade without leaving the house, so they pick a fight with Papa Smurf instead of confronting the real evils in the world.  Even as a kid, I knew this was a con, because I’d watched the show for myself and knew it was too saccharine to be threat to anyone.

The pro/anti folks have tried to disguise this with a lot of terminology.   I wondered why they seemed to reluctant to use the full terms “pro-shipper” and “anti-shipper”, and it’s probably a couple of things.   First, the word “shipper” is basically an admission that this is pointless bullshit that doesn’t matter, and they’d like to avoid that connotation.   Second, they seem to have decided that this goes beyond shipping itself, into practically anything else they want it to involve.  It’s all part of the con, which is to make you believe that it’s “us vs. them”, and you can be part of “us” by curating specific attitudes about Steven Universe.

Seriously, “about Steven Universe” is such an incredible punchline.  You can make anything funnier by adding those three words to the end of a sentence.   “Do not interact if you blog about Steven Universe.”   “Hey, what’s up, YouTube, this is SSJ3RyokoLover69, and this is going to be kind of a serious video about Steven Universe.”   “Mrs. Johnson, the results of your biopsy are in, and I have some bad news about Steven Universe.”   It’s a fucking kids show.   “Oh no, all the characters look like the characters in all the other kids shows!”   Yeah, that’s because it’s a kids show.   Marvin looks like Garfield, this isn’t new.

The common denominator here seems to be that both sides try to wrap themselves in the flag of vulnerable groups: impressionable minors, trauma survivors, harassment victims, etc.   The “pros” want to protect those people so that they can feel free to explore weird subject matter on their own terms, and the “antis” want to protect the same people from being exposed to weird subject matter that they might not want to see.   It’s all about establishing a moral high ground.   Back in the day, it was called “sanctimony”. 

But people get roped into this, because at their core, people want approval, and this stupid conflict offers them a sense of community.  As long as you support the cause, whatever it may be, you’ll have this online friend network that appears to support anything you do.   But if you deviate from their norm, you’ll be cast out.    Does this sound familiar?

To use a more familiar example, I still sometimes find people clamoring about Gochi vs. Vegebul.   I’ve never understood this, because both ships were canon, and I never saw much direct evidence of a war between them, but people would still talk about how crazy the Vegebul shippers were, and how crazy the Gochi shippers were, and it was like some huge thing going on just over the hills.   It’s the same idea, since the idea that you could like both or neither never seems to occur to anyone involved.   I never gave a shit, because I used to see the same dumb agendas in the Harry Potter fandom.

Okay, so let me take you back.  It’s 2005 through 2011, and I’m hateblogging all seven Harry Potter novels, because fuck you, that’s why.  The funny thing I encountered was that occasionally fans seemed to want to pretend like my bashing of certain characters was proving them right somehow.    They were like “See?  He hates Ron Weasley too!  That proves that Seamus Finnegan is the coolest guy ever.”   The Slytherin stans would do this all the time, because I would constantly take the piss out of the Gryffindor characters for being self-important dopes.   I think they just liked hearing it from an outside perspective.   But I had to keep reminding them all that I hated all of them.   Every character from Harry Potter sucks ass. Voldemort was my favorite, but only because he was the one guy who wanted to kill all of the others.   But he sucks too because he failed. 

And the shippers were the same way.   I’d say something shitty about Ron, because Ron sucks, and some smartass Joss Whedon fan would be like “Yes!  Boost the signal!  That is why Harry/Hermione is the best ship!”  And I’d be like “No, Harry and Hermione suck at least as bad as Ron does.  They’re all terrible and I hate them.”   I really do think there was some sort of Stockholm Syndrome going on with Harry Potter books, where everyone secretly knows they suck, but the fans sort of latch on to one or two characters and go like “Well, he’s not as shitty as the rest.”   Like finding spaghetti in the trash and picking out the meatball with the least amount of lint on it.   Then you’d go and start a flamewar with some other starving person over whether your meatball is shittier than theirs.  This is what people mean when they say to read another book. 

Anyway, the big thing I picked up from Sarah Z’s video is “disinterpretation”, a term coined by MSNBC columnis Zeeshan Aleem.   The Twitter thread is worth a read, but the short version is that he once remarked that a Julia Louis-Dreyfus routine wasn’t very good, and someone got mad at him for insinuating that women are incapable of being funny.    They just took his dissatisfaction with one performance by one comedian as being a universal condemnation of women comedians in general.  And this sort of thing is all over the internet.   Everyone sees what they want to see and then they take it as permission to overreact.  

I ran into this myself a while back, because someone saw who I interacted with on Twitter and decided that they’re all bad guys and if I have any interaction with them, then that makes me a bad guy too.   At the time I tried to play it cool, but the more I think about it, the more it ticks me off.   And over the course of that conversation, it was said that I don’t talk about myself much, and that’s kind of funny, because all I ever do on social media is write long-ass blog posts like this one.  I don’t expect anyone to memorize them, or even read them all the way through, but when I write all this stuff and someone goes out of their way to say they don’t know anything about me, the message is that they just didn’t pay attention to what I was saying, and they didn’t bother to try.

So I’m a little jaded from that, because I got called out for a bunch of stuff I didn’t even do or say, and apparently that’s just a thing that happens.   People will reject you for completely arbitrary reasons, not because of anything you actually said or did, and you’re left thinking you made some terrible mistake.   Except, no, I’ve seen it happen to other people, people a lore more conscientious than I am, and if they can’t satisfy the bullshit purity standards, then I never stood a chance.   If the game is rigged so I can’t win, then I’m not going to play.  

And it’s that same condition that probably draws people into these online holy wars, because if you declare yourself for the pro or anti side, at least then you’ll have a posse backing you up.   Only they don’t support you, they support your willingness to support them.    Once your commitment to their agenda wavers, even in the slightest, they will turn against you.   

Sarah Z suggests that both sides of the war drop the pro and anti terms, since they lost all meaning long ago.   But that just invites a new set of useless terms to perpetuate the same cycle.   Her more useful advice is for fandom people to broaden their horizons.   She got a lot of flak for tweeting “Go outside” once, but the ironic thing is that it’s sound advice.   I had lunch with my mom yesterday and it was just nice getting away from things for a while.   People need to do that more often, and unfortunately it feels like it’s harder to do than ever before.

But “go outside” isn’t just a literal thing.   It can mean going beyond your usual haunts, reading the same books, watching the same shows, rehashing the same conversations.   I think the reason this stuff always revolves around “shipping” is because there seems to be this deep-seated compulsion to pair fictional characters off like this, and for a lot of folks it’s the only way they can consume a story, so they do.   And they do it lot, and there’s a lot of them, and they do it the same way every time, and lo and behold the same old conflicts start up.   So maybe “go outside” should mean “go outside of that cycle once in a while.”   Just a thought. 

[petri808]

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26

*Note and question for readers at the end :)

Lucy’s eyes flashed wide as her emotions swung drastically from her own distress to the blood still dripping down Natsu’s cheek. “Shit! Shit! Shit!” She scrambled away from him, stumbling on her knees to right herself as she looked quickly around the room for any fabric. She grabbed a towel off the kitchen counter and rushed back, dropping to her knees as she pressed it to the wound. Tears renewed in her eyes. “Look at what she did, this is so bad! It’s gonna leave a scar for sure! Oh god,” her eyes flit back and forth rapidly from his face to his body, “and your side too! This is so bad!” The tears flowing down her cheeks were a mixture of emotions. Lucy lifted his shirt, flinching, fingers curling into the hem in anger as she sees the jagged wound on the side of his abdomen. If it had gone just a little deeper, he wouldn’t be sitting there with her and that really set her off! “You should’a let me beat her senseless! Look at this! She deserves to be in the same pain she put you through!”

Despite the physical pain, Natsu was trying desperately to keep his girlfriend from losing it again and seeing the wound was only riling her up further. He gently moved her shaky hands away from his side to push his shirt down again. “Lucy, it’s okay, really, d-don’t work yourself up, please? What’s important is we made it.”

“But still! This wasn’t fair!”

“Shhh, baby, it’s gonna be okay...”

“No, it’s not! Stop saying that!” Lucy snapped back. She wasn’t an idiot. She could see the pain in his grimaced features which only made her even more furious. “This will never be over. Those scars won’t go away! I’m gonna have nightmares, I know it! So, don’t you tell me it’s gonna be okay!”

Her emotions were in full throttle mode as she then flailed her bound wrists at the milling officers. “And will somebody get these damn ropes off me?!?!” One of the men cut her loose as she continued to scream and cry.

“I hate her! I hate her for what she’s done! I-I’ve never hated anyone before, but right now I just wanna... I just wanna...”

Still holding onto his side, Natsu used his left arm to pull his girl into a tight hug. He knew exactly what words were on the edge of her lips, but his current priority was calming her down and agreeing would only fuel her anger. “Lucy shhh,” he cooed in a soft tone, “it’s okay, baby it’s okay...”

“It’s not! It’s not!” Once again, Lucy slumped against him as another wave of hysterical sobbing racked her body. It wasn’t okay! She’d been kidnapped and almost killed! Her boyfriend was seriously injured all because Touka couldn’t except reality. None of this was okay! She couldn’t take much more of these roller coaster emotions. Sadness, anger, relief, they continued to alternate in her mind. Leaning back and fixing him in a narrowed and pained glare. “I thought I was gonna die— Natsu I just can’t stop thinking about that! Die, do you understand?!” Her chest heaved with every word. “I was so scared... so scared—,” her hand unconsciously moved up to cup around the front of her neck as if still feeling the sensation of the knife pressed against it. “I-I don’t even know how I kept myself from losing it... I just kept thinking, I gotta get out of here, I-I gotta figure out a way to save myself. And when she raised the knife—.” Her words cut off mid-sentence and eyes drifted to the spot they’d been standing in as if her thoughts halted in remembrance.

“Lucy,” Natsu cradled her cheek, pulling her gaze back onto him, “you are so much stronger then you give yourself credit for.”

She rolled her eyes in an exasperated sob. “If I’m so strong, then why am I crying now?!”

His eyes softened. “Because you can. You did what you had to stay alive and now you can let it all go. Baby, it’s okay to let it out. Let it all out and cry as much as you need to, cause I’ll hold you for as long as you need it.”

Lucy paused her words and simply cried for several minutes against his chest. She didn’t feel strong, and how was he staying so calm?! But oh, how she needed the reassurances. Deep down she knew he was just trying to help, knew what he was saying was the truth, but even if she’d wanted to stop thinking about these things, she couldn’t. The night played out on an endless loop in her mind’s eye. What could she have done to avoid this? Was there anything she could have said to stop Touka? She didn’t know if it was her heart or her head trying to tell her no, that nothing would have changed the woman’s plans. But once the dam had broken, her mind just wasn’t ready to fully let go. It was too angry about everything, even feared just how angry this was all making her feel. Lucy didn’t like it one bit. Ugh! What was Touka turning her into?!

“I wanted to kill her, Natsu... does that make me bad just like her?”

Those words whispered out by Lucy as she rested her head on his shoulder, stunned Natsu, but he could understand the reasoning. In such a heated moment when instincts took over, it’s either kill or be killed and he could admit to himself, if he’d had the chance, he would have done so too. But Touka had proven to be a a lot tougher then she looked. Perhaps the woman was running on the same anger that now plagued his girlfriend? It was perfectly clear how both he and Lucy were going to need therapy after this if they were to get back to a normal life, but he also needed to cling to hope, to make sure Touka didn’t succeed in ruining the rest of their lives.

He kissed her temple. “It’s normal to feel that way, but you’re not a killer,” Natsu reassured Lucy in a soft tone. “That’s just not who you really are.”

His words seemed to work for the time being as the woman quieted enough for the medical workers who’d arrived to start their job. The wound to Lucy’s neck was quickly cleaned and bandaged, but Natsu’s injuries were much more severe. The EMT’s cleaned and stapled the cheek and side wounds, but he’ll need to be taken to the hospital for scans to ensure it didn’t knick any internal organs, as well as to better suture the wounds.

A flurry of more officers had descended to start an investigation, of which Gajeel took the lead. And there was a wealth of information in the apartment to document. As they’d already learned, Touka was a former schoolmate of Natsu from high school who had reams of pictures, print outs from social media, even personal information on Natsu as well as Lucy that they would need to figure out how she’d somehow obtained. The woman hadn’t been kidding about stalking the man for years.

Once the officers had arrived, everything became a blur for Lucy who felt pulled in multiple directions all at once. She was so overwhelmed by the flood of information and experiences that her mind was shutting down, body numbed in an adrenaline stupor. Medical personnel were trying to work on Natsu and attend to her superficial neck wound, while detectives were asking them questions about the ordeal. When they’d tried to separate the couple to interview them, Lucy wasn’t having it, clinging harder to the man so they’d given up.

No, she’d knocked me out, so I don’t know how she got me here. Yes, I woke up bound on the floor. Yes, she’d kept the knife to my throat most of the time. Yes! Most of the time! How long... how the fuck should I know?! She moved it briefly to think! No, I don’t know how long I was unconscious, does it really matter?!

Any strides Natsu had made at calming her down went out the window. Lucy’s whole body was shaking in anger as she cradled her head to block them out. She was seriously about to have a mental break down right then and there. “Can everyone give me some fucking breathing room?! We told you this was fucking serious, but you didn’t believe us!”

Natsu too, had grown frustrated by the pointed and emotionless questioning. Here they’d just been through a harrowing ordeal, and these police offers were victimizing his girlfriend for a second time! He snapped at one of the detectives to stop traumatizing Lucy. “The woman was seconds away from being killed, have some fucking compassion!”

That’s when Gajeel, who’d had his hands full directing everything, finally stepped in and told the other detectives to cool it for now, growling at them to remember they were the victims. “You fuckers worry about collecting physical evidence. I’ll deal with the interviews once they’re cleared by the doctors!” He then redirected back to the couple. “Levy’s gonna meet you two at the hospital, then once the doctors are done, you’ll come to my office for an interview. It’s gonna be rough, not gon’ lie, but I’ll try to make the process as easy on you as I can.”

“Thanks, man,” Natsu expressed a sincere gratitude to Gajeel who simply nodded back and directed the EMT’s to take them to the hospital.

Lucy helped Natsu to his feet and the couple are guided downstairs to the awaiting ambulance. As they pass by the other apartments, it’s obvious the whole incident had drawn the attention of residents or neighbors, who peered through windows or tracked with eyes the couple walking by. It was creepy, irritating, calling upon what little reserves she had to not stop walking and snap. She wanted to scream, mind your business! Till she realized if they hadn’t done so in the first place, maybe someone would have caught onto Touka’s behaviors sooner. Did the woman really have no friends? If anyone had visited the apartment and saw the Natsu collage plastered all over the wall, it would have raised eyebrows in the least. Or maybe... no one cared... it’s not a stretch to think any friends Touka has are just as crazy as she is. Not even the police cared enough to take them seriously. Why? Because it’s just too strange for a woman to be so mentally unstable? Probably chalked it all up to a lovers triangle gone wrong. What if?! What if?! What if?! Lucy’s mind was starting to race again with thought, after negative thought pulsing through faster then she could process them.

Her hand started tightening on Natsu’s as they sat side by side in the ambulance causing him to look over and question her. “Lucy, you okay?” His worried tone growing with each second. Her body was shivering yet tense, head shaking no, eyes wide but glassy, and breathing growing labored in rapid bursts. The EMT sitting across from them watching the events unfold, reached out to take Lucy’s wrist. She flinched but doesn’t pull it back. After a few seconds of silence, the man let go and warned that her pulse was racing.

“Miss, you’re having a panic attack.”

Question for readers below:

There was 4 more chapters planned, but depending on how things play out I may need to add more as needed. While the major things I wanted to hit upon were planned out in advance, I never know where the characters and stories will take me lol.

A question for any readers who see this note is: How much of Lucy's recovery from this ordeal would you like to see or should I delve into? It would lengthen the amount of angst, but also add to the growing relationship and bond between Natsu and Lucy.

Thoughts? Comment in the notes :)

[garthups]

the maze, part I

Part One of the story! Very excited to post this. -Leslie

I kept the car running in park while the shitty vents sputtered, trying my hands warm. Your Love by that band from the eighties was playing in the distance. I have a love-hate relationship with these roped off grassy parking lots, where there aren't actual spaces, just car anarchy. Take any spot you can find and let’s all hope that some semblance of a parking lot comes together. Sure there’s something inherently egalitarian about it, but they remind me of being scared to park when I was learning to drive. I was always positive that my Camry was too far over, and I’d brace myself for the crunch of metal on metal. 

The familiarity of coming to the maze made parking in the lot easier, and I didn’t have to reverse and drive into the same spot over and over again to be satisfied. My friends and I came to Hudler Farm every October for the autumn corn maze. Sometimes we’d take caramel apples in and chaunk through them while meandering.

 Fuck, that was always so fun. High school seems like a lifetime ago though. All it takes are a few hundred miles, and staggered midterms, and suddenly you talk to the guy in the dorm next to yours who gets drunk on natty seltzer more than the people who got you through your mcr phase.

 None of us got together last year, which was a bummer, but out of the blue Lottie messaged Sam and me. I watched the shadowy families walk by in the dark, my hands weren’t getting any warmer though. The idle LEDs were dim enough that I could see outside. A little boy running after his parents tripped and fell in the mud. I stifled a chuckle, because kids falling down is hilarious, and tried to screw with the vents, but they were already all open. Piece of shit car. When I looked up, the boy was still splayed out on the ground, shivering. Both his parents kept walking though. I scrunched my brow. I started fidgeting with my seatbelt, but my hands didn’t have much feeling in them. People were just walking around him, like he wasn’t there. 

“WHAT’S up dog!” My door exploded open.

“JESUS fucking god Lottie, I--” She took her spot in the passenger seat, laughing her ass off.

“Sorry sorry sorry, wow Phoebs I got you pretty good huh?”

“I mean yeah I’m just so ready to get killed in this parking lot. Hey I think that kid hurt himself out there pretty bad.” I breathed, still shaken.

“What kid?”

“That one.”

“Oh that one, sorry it’s dark, so it took me a sec. Yeah let’s go help.” Honestly, I could never stay mad at Lottie. Seeing her new dreads in person made me miss the big buns she wore in high school. We slammed the doors shut, and stepped onto the ground covered in too-damp leaves. Two guys beat us to him though, and they were helping him up.

“Oh wait, is that the kid you meant?”

“Lottie, why would I be talking about a kid that isn’t sprawled out on the ground.”

“I thought this one was playing snake or something. Anyway, let’s go meet Sam’s friend!”

We walked over to the boys, Sam’s friend was getting the kid back on his feet. Sam’s friend was a good head taller than he was, which wasn’t saying too much. The guy gave off an eagle scout vibe though, so his height was probably pretty important to him. Maybe camp counselor would have been closer. He was gently reassuring the kid.

“Feeling better? Okay, better go catch your folks, and make sure not to stay too far behind them, bud, okay?”

“Good call man, I thought he was just playing snake.” Sam glowed.

“Sup fuckers!” Lottie sang. The boy turned around, he looked about nine, so Lotties curse made him bust a grin. From the looks of it he scraped his cheek pretty bad. He dashed off. Sam’s friend laughed nervously since Lottie broke the unspoken rule of swearing in front of kids.

“Hey dudes! It’s so awesome to see you!” Sam laughed. “I told Matrix everything about you, so there’s no need to divulge any information to him. Don’t trust this guy with any more embarrassing stories about yourselves.” Matrix waved shyly, and I rolled my eyes.

“That’s cool. You know we called Sam “Shrimpy” all of sophomore year because his hair got all curly and he dyed it red?”

“Thanks Phoebe, that is something I like people to know about me.” Sam said while subconsciously making sure his hair was still a tight buzz cut. Matrix smiled a little.

“You must be Lottie?”

“It’s great to meet you! Lets get some apples.” 

The four of us were waved through by the teen collecting tickets. The entrance to the maze had a little banner raised up on two poles and a chair with an admissions person. Next to the entrance was a main pavilion with a tiny shop and some picnic tables out under the roof. Lots of families were congregating there, buying souvenirs and farm t-shirts. Thankfully this wasn’t one of the maze theme nights according to a big promotional calendar that outlined all the dates. Lottie groaned when she saw that they added alien night and we hadn’t bought tickets.

“Like what does that even mean though. Are there aliens in the maze? Do they scare us?” Sam said eyeing the kettle corn buckets.

“Yeah I mean, it’s probably just like zombie night and mermaid night where you just get like jumpscared by teens in costumes. Freakin aliens though! Imagine!”

“Uhh did you say they do a mermaid night here?” Matrix said.

“Dude I never told you about that! You’re looking at the three scariest volunteer mermaid teens that Hudler farms has ever known. We were unholy legends flopping after scared families.”

Sam and Lottie were wide eyed crowding around Matrix, telling him all about the glory days. Made me pity him, his bud probably had a whole different energy at college.

“They’re fucking with you! Why in god’s name would a corn maze have a mermaid night.” I finally shouted. Lottie pouted.

“Boooooo Phoebe! How dare you!” I wrapped my face up in my scarf to escape guilt. 

We all mostly ate our caramel apples under the pavilion just so we could give Matrix the rundown of the maze. The Hudler farm maze has these eight checkpoints which give you special tickets. 

“We don’t leave without all eight. Got it? Dee oh en tee. I don’t give a fuck if we die trying.” Lottie said through a mouth of caramel and nuts. It felt surreal having my friends here again. After all, the limited exposure I had to them was social media. I lived vicariously through the photos they posted of new friends.

There was a sign in the pavilion that gave us a rough idea of where all the checkpoints in the maze were. I resisted the urge to take a photo in order to preserve the challenge that the maze posed. Probably didn’t need it to beat our best time. I was the only one who hadn’t finished their apple for traditions sake. Hopefully the caramel wouldn’t freeze though.

“Ok so let's remember to hit that cluster of checkpoints in the northern corner first. We're gonna take a lot of rights and then keep going on that long stretch forward.” I strategized.

“I’ll eat that apple if you’re not going to Phoeb, you know I’m psyched that they got pink ladies this year instead of grannies smiths.” Begged Sam.

“I did a few youth group trips to corn mazes, so this isn’t my first rodeo guys don’t worry!” Matrix added.

“That’s cool.” Phoebe said straight faced. I wanted to laugh, but didn’t want to hurt his feelings.

Before I could respond, I saw it. I inhaled slowly as I took in the scene before us. The moon was thin and most of the lights were under the pavilion itself, but I felt like I should’ve noticed something so wrong before.

“Why is the all corn so fucking tall.” The question, er -- statement hung in the air for a few seconds while the maze came into view for everyone else. Corn stalks get surprisingly tall late in autumn, maybe like ten feet. This stuff though. It was like, way way way too tall. And not irregular. So, regular. The maze looked like it could have been a trimmed hedge. All the stalks stretched up and up, reaching out for the sky, each of them trying to escape from the ground. I suddenly was at a loss, something so ordinary was wrong in such an obvious way. Finally, Lottie broke our silence.

“Shit.” Great. I mean, she wasn’t wrong.

“That’s amazing. God is it this tall every year? That’s the tallest corn I’ve ever seen, must be 30 feet! Maybe more.” Finally Matrix had found something to be upbeat about.

“Ahh no man. It’s like normal usually. Lottie are you feeling alright? Do you want to take a sec before we head in.”

Matrix jumped in. “Nothing to be worried about. I’m sure it’s just like GMO’s or something. Gotta up the yield. They should seriously lead with that in the advertising though. Corn jungle! Towering Corn! Feast your eyes ladies and gentlemen on the worlds first corn metropolis!” He broke the spell on Lottie with his campy broadcaster voice. She joined in: “Keep your dame close as you delve into the mysterious corn caverns, where the CORN DRAGON DWELLS.”

Matrix Chuckled. “Well I don’t know about that. Hard to deliver on a corn dragon. But look I’m sure it’s fine, everyone else doesn’t seem to mind.” It was true, the usual fare of families and teen groups were venturing into the maze without concern. I watched the family from the parking lot get a safety flashlight from the teen working the entrance. I breathed in through my teeth.

“For a second I thought you actually made jokes, scooter. You’re right, it’s probably just a good year for tall corn. We can go.”

“Phoebster, you good?” Sam nudged me. It honestly took me a second longer than Lottie to take in all the explanations. It was such a weird thing to be off in such a significant way. Must have been some primal instinct of being afraid of the dark. The corn stalks were darker than the night sky around them; I tried to catch glimpses through the stalks but they blanketed out the stars. 

“Yeah sorry about that guys. I’ll remember more of the strategy once we’re in the maze. Let’s blow through this thing!” 

We went into the maze.

[studyingsocialism]

Accepting Authority as an Anarchist

I had a pretty interesting conversation with my roommate recently in which we talked, in one way or another, about authority. He seemed very confused by my praise of the times I’ve been in this team sport or another. “If I feel the obligation towards my coach and teammates, then I’m much more likely to stick to the workout program or whatever.” This seemed to really surprise him. “But, you always talk about how you dislike authority. The government, the police, hell, professors sometimes.”  And I took a pause. At times, I can struggle with the wording of what I want to say, but after a moment or two, I managed to come up with a rebuttal.  “I think the difference is simply on whether or not I view the transaction, for lack of a better term, as being beneficial to me, or at least, beneficial enough to keep going on with it.”  And while that may seem kind of selfish, I think that it was a good stepping stone in my self-analysis. It isn’t just that the thing has to be beneficial to me. Because there are plenty of things that would probably be very beneficial to me, but which I cannot or will not presently do, such as say, deleting all social media. Sure, I would probably have more peace of mind, but I can’t, in good conscience, abandon the world to its own devices. I feel the need to stay up to date with events in the off chance that I may be able to help here or there. But anyway.  I am currently working on losing a bit of weight. It isn’t that I think health and slimness are the same thing. They aren’t. But it’s getting to a point that my obesity is becoming a hindrance to the things I want to do in my every day life. I’ve been healthy and obese at the same time before. I’ve been unhealthy and skinny before. But I’m looking to try out the one combo I haven’t yet: skinny and healthy. So lose weight I shall.  So, we were talking about my desire to lose weight, and I told him: “tell me what to do. Tell me what to eat. Remind me to exercise. If I have you breathing down my neck, I won’t be willing to break the rules.” This is what sparked the previous exchange about my dislike for authority.  But I really think that the key idea here is that, as an anarchist, it is not that I hate authority. Rather, I have a passionate dislike for being roped into things I didn’t agree to. I loved being in wrestling, because I was losing weight, managing to be healthy (I wasn’t going to starve myself to make weight or anything like that, fuck that), and I felt the support of a team. When I worked for the Bernie Sanders campaign, the gentle pressure I felt from my superiors was coercive, but in the best way: It helped me meet my goals and get shit done, without being and anxiety overload.  Hell, when I’m in the bedroom, sometimes I get subby as absolute fuck, and bow to the authority of my partner(s). And it makes me melt.  But if ever there is a time in which I am approached by the police, citing some bullshit law they made up because they want to detain me for my BLM mask or any of my communist/anarchist/antifa/leftist apparel, they’re going to meet every facet of resistance that I can muster.  We have every right, and every obligation to question and challenge authority, as We are the ones who grant them authority. The police have power because, collectively, we have agreed that they should. The same goes for politicians. For the administrators of our schools and so forth.  We have an amazingly strong sense of societal imagination, to come up with all these far flung ideas like paper money and corporations which don’t really exist but also are some of the most powerful entities in our collective conscience.  We must question all things about our society moving forward, but especially authority. Authority such as the state, the military, etc. must prove to us that they deserve to have such privilege and power over us. And if they cannot, in good faith prove that to us, then we must strip them of their powers. It is the only possible course of action. 

[reisabrisingr]

My thoughts on the Dean Ambrose situation.

I may be wrong, but this just doesn’t make sense to me. I’ve been a wrestling fan too long to believe that WWE would announce that Deans contract isn’t getting renewed.

WWE has never done this in recent years, even going back to last year when Neville walked out and left his contract to expire, we all knew yet WWE never announced it until it did.

Just last night on Raw it looked like we were going to potentially see a storyline building between Hunter and Dean. Dean has given so much to this company, up until last year Dean was the one on the main roster who had competed in the most matches.(house shows,TV and PPV’s)

Dean has done almost everything there is in WWE, except win a rumble and headline Wrestlemania. He was the first member of the shield to become a grand slam champion and the longest reigning US champion.

WWE has been booked around Ambrose,Reigns and Rollins. It’s obvious that those three guys are who the McMahon’s can call upon and are always on TV. They’ve always been sure to call on those guys and make sure that they aren’t forgotten.

There’s always been so much hype between the three shield guys. Dean is a multiple IC champion and multiple tag champ. He’s held the US title, money in the bank contract and WWE championship.

He’s a part of the most popular stable of this century, if not the entirety of the WWE.

He’s gained two lifelong friends,his brothers and his wife from this company, and when the shield was coming up they had control in what the shield was gonna do.

I just don’t see how in 7 years, Dean doesn’t have more control now than then.

We all know Dean is so intelligent when it comes to his charector.

Yeah, this recent run from October has been shitty. But how in three months could he just decide to leave? Why not just sit down and talk to Vince and explain how he’s feeling? If it was a simple character change or more character control he was wanting, do you not think Vince would do that to keep one of his top guys? Of course he would. Someone like Zack Ryder or Curt Hawkins(ily boys) I don’t think he would. But fucking Dean Ambrose? Of course he would. The guy is a top draw and part of The Shield.

Deans spoken before about how he’s glad he got out of the Indy’s because of what his Moxley charector had to go through just to be Mox and how he couldn’t do that now.

I think this is a work, especially because of what happened on Raw last night, with him getting in Hunters face and just being ruthless and not caring. Then the potential pipe bomb that was cut off by Nia Jax.

If Dean was going to throw a pipe bomb and stayed in the ring longer than he was meant to, they would’ve sent Nia out during commercial or he would’ve cut one during commercial.

WWE wouldn’t have announced him leaving so soon, espically with Wrestlemania coming up where they need their top guys to build storylines around and sell tickets. Out of WWE’s main roster, their top draws are Becky, Daniel, AJ and Charlotte. On Raw it’s Seth,Dean, Roman, Finn, Ronda and Brock.

Ronda and Brock are draws for the casual fans. The ones who just tune in because they know who they are.

There’s Roman, who unfortunately can’t be a mania this year and potentially next. He was the face of the company and will be again. I want my big dog back more than ever.

There’s Daniel who everyone loves, because how can you hate the guy? He was everyones number one for so long. Hell, the evil vegan is even starting to get over.

There’s Charlotte,Finn and AJ who people love just for their pure wrestling ability and how well they work in the ring.

There’s Becky and Seth, who rn is everyone’s favourite, they’re at the top of their games and are getting that treatment or else fans would riot.

Then there’s Dean, the guy who has fought and fought and fought for his entire life, to get to where he is. Who was hooked on drugs and lost his first chance at the WWE because of it, then he changed up his act. He shouldn’t have made it, but he did. The WWE gave him that chance and he proved everyone wrong. The fans love him.

WWE would be silly to loose him and to announce it on social media where everyone knows, espically with All Elite Wrestling just being announced. It’d be like Vince just being like,”there’s one of my top guys, go take him.” He isn’t that stupid.

I think it’s a work, I think it’s leading up to Dean bringing out more mox, where he doesn’t care who he hurts, who he insults, he’s telling the truth and he’s gonna fight for what he wants.

Like him saying to HHH,”you didn’t believe in him back in Florida when we were riding in a $500 car. You just thought he was some hot shot, but I believed in him!” Hello, why would this new Dean charector admit to believing in Seth when he’s meant to hate his guts? When he demanded a match from Hunter and when he seen hunter walking away, just to follow him threw the ropes and be like,”Do you need to ask for permission from your father in law?” Dude, that’s totally just to get a reaction from Hunter and to wind Hunter up. It’s a typical feud starter what they did.

I think this is leading up to something at Mania, I think it’s to somehow bring out more of the Dean we know Jon can create and portray. Why would he give up 8 years with a company over 3 months of a character he doesn’t like? It doesn’t make sense.

I think their plan is to get rid of this Dean that’s a germaphobe by introducing more pipe bombs, more attitude towards athourity figures and just beating the shit out of people. Cause what are they gonna do? Suspend him? Fire him? Dude will be “leaving” before mania so what’s the point?

I think they’re going with the storyline of Dean Ambrose being pissed he doesn’t get what he deserves, he’s been treated like dirt and always been a third when it comes to Seth and Roman. Vince has always believed in Roman, HHH’s first NXT baby is Seth and Hunter will always have Seth’s back. Hunter was the reason Dean lost the shield the first time around. And he never got the pay back for that. Seth and Roman have both versed HHH at Mania, why not have Dean do it as well.

They said they were bringing in a new era into WWE, what better way to do it then have it feel more real by having Dean Ambrose of all people cutting loose and being Mox? To have a hardcore match at Mania against the creator of the attitude era and the guy who we all wish could’ve been a part of it.

What if it’s just a way for WWE to slowly say goodbye to the PG era by having Hunter and a more ruthless Ambrose going one on one at Mania?

I just, i don’t think WWE would announce it so soon. Especially with a star like dean.

I could be in denial, but I won’t believe this until I see it with my own two eyes.

I don’t think Dean would show up in another wrestling company either, he’s far too loyal for that shit.

Also, adding this in because idgaf and my shield heart called for it. Do you really think he’d give up his wrestling soulmate and best friend, his brothers? They’ve got an unbreakable bond. They’ve all said when they retire from wrestling they wanna do it together in a last shield triple threat. That’s how much they care about each other, they joined the main roster together and want to leave it together.

They’re the boys who all held the wwe title on the same night,I just don’t see this bond being broken because of something as little as a charecters development.

[softboywriting]

Falling For You | Shawn Mendes Fic

Summary: You’re Shawn’s personal assistant and after a misunderstanding with fans he get the idea that you could be his fake girlfriend to avoid being roped into a messy publicity stunt with a girl he doesn’t like. The thing about that is, both of you have feelings for each other that are less than fake and acting on them while pretending brings out the truth.

Word Count: 11k

| Masterlist in Bio |

The moment you check into your hotel room and get settled Shawn is knocking on the door that joined your rooms. You open it and roll your eyes at him because you figure he’s just up to his usual shenanigans. He always did this when hotel rooms had shared doors. You think he secretly liked the idea of sharing a room even though he always insisted he hated sharing them.

“Yes? How can I help you?” you ask in your most formal voice, teasing him.

“Can you do something for me?” Shawn asks as he pulls his ring off his finger. It’s the one with the two overlapping feathers that he had gotten in Japan last year. He never took it off. Not even to shower as far as you knew.

Your eyes go to his hand and then to his face. Okay this wasn’t a joke, he was seriously asking you to do something for him. “Yeah, what’s wrong?” you ask as he holds his hand out with the ring in it.

“I want you to hold on to this while we’re doing the press tour here.”

“What?” You look down at his ring and he back up at him. “Shawn, you never take that off. What’s going on? Did something happen?”

Shawn pushes the ring into your hand and curls his fingers over yours. “Last time I was in Europe for a while I ended up losing my other one. Remember how fucked up I was?”

You shake your head. “I wasn’t here for that. I do remember you telling me you lost it though. But are you sure? I mean if you never take it off then how could you lose it?”

“Please,” Shawn says softly, squeezing your fingers a bit. “Just humor me and hold on to it.” You sigh and agree to do as he asks. If would give him a piece of mind what would holding on to it for a few weeks hurt?

_______________

Four days. That’s how long it took before fans noticed his ring was missing from his hand and that it was on a chain around your neck. You thought nothing of putting it on a chain you picked up in a corner store for a couple bucks. You just figured it was safer on you than sitting in your luggage in the hotel. Big mistake.

First, fans noticed it was gone from Shawn’s possession. That sparked a huge discussion across multiple social media platforms. You had seen everything from theories that he lost it, gave it to someone, or left it at home. Shawn didn’t bother to address the topic as it wasn’t that big of a deal to him. He knew where it was. That was what mattered.

Then...then you were pulling off a hoodie you had been wearing because it was getting pretty warm that afternoon and you happen to be wearing a v-neck shirt that showed the necklace. For some reason a couple fans snapped pictures of you and someone pointed out that you had the ring. It shouldn’t have been a big deal. You were his personal assistant, you had his things on you all the time. This wasn’t anything new. Hell, you carried his wallet and his phone sometimes, it wasn’t a big deal.

But to fans that ring meant something. It meant something that you had it and you were wearing it around your neck. That ‘something’ was that you and Shawn were hooking up. Which was not the case at all, but try telling that to an irrational fan who thinks Shawn owes them his loyalty. Go on. Try.

So here you are now, standing in Shawn’s hotel room with Andrew and Geoff parked on the small couch near the window while Shawn laid out on the bed with a pillow over his face.

“This is insane,” Shawn groans. “Why is this such a big deal? It’s just a ring! She’s just wearing it to keep it safe like I asked her!”

“Yes, we know. You’ve told us at least a dozen times now,” Jake says with an eye roll. “Have you tweeted about it yet? Maybe if you explain the situation...”

Shawn pulls the pillow from his face and cuts Jake a glare. “As if that would help. I hardly think tweeting anything will calm down ravenous fans.”

“Then just take it back and wear it,” Andrew says as he flips thru his phone, reading more theories and things of that sort. “She won’t have it. Problem solved.”

“Yeah but then you’ll open a whole new can of worms. People will just think he took it back to calm down the drama. They’re still going to think we’re dating...fucking...whatever they think we’re doing. The damage is done,” you sigh defeatedly.

“So we just wait it out?” Jake asks.

“Yeah pretty much,” you shrug and sit on the bed next to Shawn.

“Well, I’m done worrying about it then. Ignore it and it will go away right?” Jake says as he and Andrew stand up. Andrew just sighs and shakes his head as he agrees half heartedly. “Let’s go get dinner. You guys wanna come or do you want us to get anything?”

“I’m good,” Shawn grumbles and you just shake your head. The two of them leave and as soon as the door clicks closed Shawn grabs the back of your shirt and pulls you back to lay beside him. “What if we were a thing?” he asks.

_______________

Rolling onto your side, you just stare at Shawn. He couldn’t be serious. The idea of the two of you being a thing makes your heart race and you don’t know why. Sure you’ve had a crush on Shawn before, who hasn’t? But you put it in the past, putting your job before that nonsense. You made sure not to mix your feelings with your work. Shawn and all the guys on his team and all of his friends were off limits. No way no how. You were not going to get messy like that.

“You can’t be serious, Shawn.”

Shawn rolls on his side to face you and suddenly your heart skips and you wish it wouldn’t do that. “I don’t mean like for real. I mean just for show.”

His words make your heart sink, but in a good way? Or was it a disappointed way? This was already going to be bad. Shawn should just stop talking. Him and his sweet smile, soft eyes and gentle words would make you do almost anything. He had to be stopped.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea for like a thousand reasons. Why would you want a fake girlfriend?”

Shawn sighs, rolling back on to his back. “Andrew and Justin want me to get involved with this girl Cailey. Remember that dinner meeting I had to go to a few weeks ago? It was about the two of us pretending to date or something. It’s supposed to help me stir up interest for the new album and she benefits by getting attention for her modeling career and stuff.”

“Are you serious? Shawn, didn’t you say no?”

“I tried to. I mean I told them I didn’t want to do it but her manager was pushy. We’re on the verge of a decision and it’s out of my control. I don’t like her though, I don’t even want to be around her. She is actually the worst person ever.”

You reach over and lay your hand on Shawn’s chest. “It’s not a good idea. Andrew isn’t going to buy it, and I sure as hell don’t think Justin will. They’re going to know it’s not real.”

“I can convince them. We can convince them. Please, I’ve never asked for something so important before, I need this.”

“I could lose my job. I-I don’t know Shawn...”

Shawn grabs your hand and holds it over his heart. “You’re the only one who can help me. The interest is already there, the suspicions from fans and media. We just have to supposedly slip up and kiss in public or something and Andrew will think we were just lying to him. I’ll make sure you don’t lose your job.”

You curl your fingers into his shirt and he looks at you, eyes begging you to say yes. You take a deep breath and close your eyes as you lean into him and press your head against his shoulder. This was so goddamn risky, but you weren’t going to standby and watch him suffer a PR stunt for months on end with a girl he didn’t like.

“Please,” Shawn whispers and you relax your hand against his chest.

“Alright. Fine. We’ll do this, but you really have to help me sell it. I want the whole nine yards, the whole girlfriend experience with the one and only Shawn Mendes.”

Shawn chuckles and runs his hand through your hair, bringing your head closer so he can kiss the top of it. “You got yourself a deal. I promise I’ll keep you safe if it all goes to shit.”

“You better.”

“I promise I will.”

You let out a sigh and lean back to look at him just to see he’s smiling like an idiot. “So what do we do first?”

“You wanna get dinner? I think being together without the team might stir up some more rumors. Why not start now?”

“Seems innocent enough, but do you think Andrew will just get pissed we went out among the current rumors.”

Shawn sits up and crawls off the bed. “That’s what I want. I want him to be annoyed but suspicious. Then we can ‘accidentally’ kiss in a few days or something and really get Andrew to buy it.”

You get up and grab your shoes from where you toed them off by the door earlier. “When you kiss me you better warn me, and no tongue.”

“What! Oh come on you can’t ask for the whole girlfriend experience and forbid tongue,” Shawn chuckles. He walks over to you and stops you against the wall beside the door. “We have to sell it, y’know?” he says as he makes a lewd licking motion inches from your face.

“God you’re gross,” you laugh and he grins.

“What? You think my tongue is gross?”

You shrug and slide away from him to grab the door handle. “I think you’re gross in general.”

“Oh yeah? Why don’t I believe that for one second?”

You open the door and head out toward the elevator and Shawn follows close behind you. “I don’t know, maybe because you’re a weirdo? You’re totally gross.”

Shawn pushes you as you step into the elevator, causing you to stumble forward. “Hey!” you yelp and he walks you against the back wall. Just like that, he’s up against you, pinning you in with his forearms on the wall behind you, face leaned down only inches from yours. His breath is hot and your heart is racing. It was too real. There weren’t even people around. What was he doing? Why was he doing this?

“Save it for the cameras,” you mutter, swallowing thickly. Your eyes dart between his mouth and his eyes as you try to read him. Either he was a really good actor or he was actually turned on and really wanted to kiss you.

The bell dings on the elevator, signalling your arrival at the lobby. Shawn leans in and you think he’s about to kiss you but he doesn’t. He licks your cheek and pushes off the wall to run out of the elevator and into the lobby. You’re left standing there with a wet cheek and a heart that was about to explode. A second passes and you snap back to reality just in time to rush out of the elevator to see Shawn waiting for you by the doors looking smug as hell. If this was Shawn’s idea of a fake relationship, you were screwed.

_______________

You and Shawn found a diner that served some local dishes and each of you tried something you could hardly pronounce. Both dishes ended up being really good and you were pleasantly surprised. Dinner wound down and it didn’t seem like anyone had noticed the two of you, which was the goal of course. So Shawn suggests going for a walk, saying there was a park not too far away that he remembered driving by on the way to the hotel when you all arrived.

So here you are walking side by side as the sun goes down and basks the budding trees and soft grass in a golden glow. Spring in Sweden was absolutely gorgeous, if not a little chilly in the evening.

Shawn bumps his hand against yours and you bite your lip, looking the other way at a tree that had little white flowers all over it. He does it again and you twitch your fingers against his. It’s permission enough and he slides his hand into yours. It’s warm and you find your fingers sliding into the spaces between his.

“No one is around,” you mutter and he squeezes tight.

“You never know when someone will appear.”

You swing your hand and he chuckles. “I think you just like holding my hand.”

“Nah, I’m just trying to sell our relationship.” He grins and lifts your arm up and spins you around out in front of him. You twirl around, ducking under his arm and he pulls you back in close.

“I’m kind of cold,” you say with a small shiver.

“I can fix that.”

Shawn drops your hand and steps back to take off his denim jacket he has on over his pink hoodie. You reach for the jacket and he shakes his head, dropping it on the ground to pull his hoodie up and over his head with both hands.

“This will be warmer,” he says passing you the hoodie and picking up his jacket to put back on.

You slide your arms in and pull the soft pink fabric over you head. It’s a little loose on you but it’s warm, very warm. Shawn was like a furnace and you had no idea how he didn’t over heat every ten minutes when he wore layers.

Shawn looks past you and you turn to look at whatever he was staring at. There is a small group of girls standing by some trees nearby with their phones out. You look back at Shawn and he’s smiling, knowing everything was falling into place.  

“You can come over here!” Shawn yells, waving at the girls. They giggle and jog over, chattering excitedly to themselves as they approached. You step back, staying quiet as they fawn over Shawn.

“Can we get a picture?” they ask and Shawn smiles.

“Yeah, of course. Here, give me your phone,” Shawn says and takes the first girl’s phone. He angles it so you’re in the background and snaps the picture. He does this for each girl, making sure you were visible in almost every photo. He was such a little shit. He knew exactly how to play this game and you were almost shocked at how good he was.

A couple of the girls keep glancing at you and then talking quietly. They weren’t even discreet. You knew they were talking about you. Shawn finishes signing one girl’s phone case and looks over at you just as one of them asks, “Is that your assistant?”

“Yeah, she’s great. She keeps me on track and out of trouble,” Shawn chuckles, motioning for you to come closer. You do and he puts his arm around your shoulders. “She’s the best.”

“Is that your hoodie?” someone asks and you look at Shawn for an answer.

Shawn doesn't answer and instead he just grins and thanks the girls for being such great fans and says the two of you have to go now, that it was getting late. With that the two of you walk away and the girls go the opposite direction.

Once you’re out of earshot, Shawn leans down and whispers, “How long before Andrew sees those pictures do you think?”

“Oh god, less than a day.” You laugh and shake your head. “He’s going to kill us.”

“Probably.”

“We’re really doing this huh?”

Shawn pulls you close and rubs the top of your head, messing up your hair as you approach the rental car the two of you were using to get around the city. “We’re really doing this,” he says with a chuckle and you nod. You sure were doing this.  

_______________

A few days pass and no one says anything to you or Shawn. Everything goes on as it usually did. You think Andrew just missed the pictures or something, or maybe he just didn’t care. Either way it’s bothering you and it’s all you can think about. So here you are, sitting all alone in the lounge at an after party for some european awards show that Shawn performed at and stress drinking a rum and coke.

The place was crawling with celebrities and usually you’d be near Shawn politely socializing, but you just can’t be bothered tonight. It was fine, you weren’t looking for a new client anyways, so socializing wasn’t top priority for you anymore. You could just sit and worry until Shawn was ready to leave.

“Hey, what are you doing over here all alone?” Shawn asks as he plops down on the loveseat beside you, interrupting your thoughts about how you were going to lie about your relationship with Shawn when someone inevitably asked.

“Avoiding people,” you laugh as you take a sip of your drink. You look around and shrug. “This just isn’t my scene anymore, you know that.”

Shawn leans his head against your shoulder and you lean your head against his hair. He smells like cologne and the floral scented product he used to style his mess of hair. It’s nice. Comforting.

“Do you wanna get out of here? I’m sure no one will notice if we slip out the back.”

“You really think no one is going to notice? I’m pretty sure people will think it’s strange that the guy who just put on an amazing performance just up and disappeared.”

Shawn shrugs and grabs your hand, standing and hauling you up against him. “This isn’t really my scene either, I don’t know these people that well.” He looks around the room and shakes his head. Almost everyone he knew was busy or had already left for another afterparty. “Alright, here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going sneak out the fire exit behind the bar and if anyone asks I’ll say I wasn’t feeling well so my assistant took me to the hotel.”

“This will never work,” you giggle and he just grins like a kid.

Before you know it you’re being pulled through the crowded after party and toward a door labeled emergency exit that was behind the bar counter. Shawn pulls you through the little opening on the bar without the bartender even noticing because he was too busy trying to get some girl’s number. Thankfully there isn’t an alarm on the door because you’re sure Shawn didn’t even consider that.

The second Shawn pushes the door open and the two of you step out into the alley behind the event center, you get soaked. It’s pouring rain and your dress clings to you as the water soaks in quickly causing little rivers to run down your arms, into your cleavage and down the back of your dress. You may as well have just stepped into a shower fully clothed.

Shawn runs out into the middle of the alley and puts his arms out with is head back as he spins in a circle. He yells into the night air and it’s swallowed up by the roar of the downpouring rain. You can’t help but laugh and he looks over, grinning like an idiot because he know you’re laughing at him.

He really is a sight to see. His hair is plastered to the sides of his head and forehead. The light gray suit he was wearing was dark charcoal gray now as it has become fully soaked, and you just know as soon as Lydia, his stylist, comes to pick it up in the morning that he’s going to get yelled at.

“It’s pouring! What are you doing!?” you yell over the increasingly loud thunder that rumbles in the distance.

Shawn splashed forward and grabs your hands, pulling you out into the middle of the alley and you step in a puddle that covers your shoes and you squeal as the cold water rushes over the tops of your feet. Every inch of you was soaked to the bone, and Shawn looked about as happy as a pig in mud. He lifts up some of your hair off your shoulder and smiles. To have him look at you like that...it made the line between a real and fake relationship pretty blurry.

“You look like a drowned rat.”

Your jaw drops. If anyone could ruin a moment it was this guy.

“Oh as if you look much better!” you scoff, running your hand through his hair and shaking it, just to watch the rain smooth it back down on his forehead immediately. “You look like a mop that’s been put up to dry in a rainstorm!”

Headlights light up the alley entrance a few feet away and you turn to look and see if it was someone coming down the roadway. They were just stopped at the stop sign on the corner before turning left down the alley adjacent. It was a reminder that someone might find you out there, and that you should get going and stop dilly dallying in the rain.

“We should call a cab or something,” you mutter as you attempt to wipe the water from your face but it’s no use.

“Let’s get somewhere dry first. I don’t think my phone is waterproof,” Shawn says as he pulls his very wet phone out of his very wet pocket. “Yeah, no, this is busted.”

You start to open your purse but immediately close it upon seeing what the rain has done to Shawn’s phone.

Shawn pockets his phone and walks toward the entrance of the alley. He looks up and down the street for any sort of shop that was still open at this time of night. Of course everything was dark but the streetlights.

You walk up behind him and take a look too before suggesting going back inside.

Shawn shakes his head, taking a few steps down the sidewalk. “Hell no. We’re going to the end of the block, I think there was a McDonald’s up that way when we were driving here.”

Shawn comes back and puts his arm around you and the two of you head down the street. It’s not far before the next cross street and sure enough, Shawn was right. There was actually a McDonalds a little ways down on the cross street. Leave it to him to know exactly where food was but not to know what time he had to be anywhere or literally anything actually important.

You roll your eyes at how unbelievable he was and the two of you head for the bright parking lot.

You push open the front door of the building and Shawn hurries in after you. You’re dripping all over the floor, leaving a small river as you head to the bathrooms, waving politely to the employee at the counter who gives a sympathetic look. Shawn ducks into the men's room and you head into the ladies to do whatever you could to get dry.

Almost twenty minutes later and you we some semblance of dry. You had ended up stripping down to nothing in the handicap stall so you could wring your dress and underwear out over the toilet to get most of the water out of them. You had a moment, standing there on the cold floor, your dress hanging on the assistance rail beside you, that you look down and realize you’re wearing nothing but his ring on the chain around your neck.

There’s some sort of symbolism there but you can’t put your finger on it. You push the thought aside before you allow yourself to get too caught up in it. You had to focus on getting dressed and getting dry. Afterall, you were naked in a McDonald’s bathroom in a foreign country. There were bigger issues at hand then a ring on a chain.

You put your clothes back on and toss your tights in the trash, giving up on them completely. You set your shoes up on the small counter under the air hand dryers and turned them all on. A few twists of your hair, wipes of your face with surprisingly not crappy paper towels, and you were almost presentable as a human being again.

When you exit the bathroom Shawn is at the front counter ordering. He’s in his slacks and his black button down. You spot his jacket hanging on a nearby chair along with his socks and you take a seat until he comes over.

“I got us some chicken sandwiches and fries. I hope you’re good with that,” Shawn says as he sinks into the chair next to his wet jacket. “If not you can get whatever you want, I have my card.”

“No, chicken is fine,” you laugh, shaking your head. “Did we actually just leave an upscale after party to come to a McDonalds in Sweden at midnight?”

Shawn grins big. “Sure did baby.”

You snort, leaning back in the chair and shaking your head in disbelief. “How did I ever get stuck with you?”

Shawn leans forward and props his head up on his chin. He really has to stop looking at you like that. It wasn’t good for your heart. “Well, I think you applied for a job with your agency and then they sent you to Andrew who interviewed you and-”

“I know how I got the job!”

“Well maybe if you knew you shouldn’t have asked,” he teases with a smirk.

You roll your eyes and look out at the rain coming down in droves across the parking lot. It didn’t seem to be letting up anytime soon. “I guess I meant, how did I get so lucky to get to be your assistant and stuck with your wild and crazy ways. I’d worked for two other people before and they were just boring as hell. All I did was sit around all day and make and remake schedules.”

“You were meant to work with me,” Shawn smiles.

He reaches across the table and hooks his finger through the chain around your neck. He tugs it toward himself and you lean forward, not wanting it to break. You’re so close, his eyes are on your lips and yours are on his. The tension is thick and your throat feels like it’s closing up as your heart is about to burst.

“Our food is ready,” he whispers, grinning as he drops the necklace and stands up to go to the counter.

You sink back into your seat and stare at his empty chair. He couldn’t do this. You couldn’t do this. If he was going to play with you; tease you, whatever this was that he was doing, when no one was around to see, then you were going to call off your deal. You couldn’t have your emotions played with. Not by him. Not like this.

Shawn sits back down, setting the tray of food on the table before you and you look down. It looks good enough, although you’re not sure you feel like you can eat, but you manage to consume a little of the food while you talk about how tomorrow afternoon the two of you and Andrew have to catch a flight to Paris.

You chuckle to yourself at that. Paris. The city of love. Also the city of no paparazzi. You were going to have to work even harder to ‘expose’ this fake relationship now. God...it felt like it wasn’t going to work, like everything was working against you, but maybe that was okay...maybe it wasn’t meant to be like this. Maybe things weren’t supposed to work out.

_______________

The rain let up enough that you and Shawn could run out to the car you called for to take you home. There was only one ride service in the area you were in that ran late in the morning and they charged an arm and a leg too. Thankfully Shawn had no problem with paying the steep fee but you sort of felt bad for anyone who needed a ride so late. It seemed unfair that they jacked their rates up for late night driving...which made you wonder if the driver was just upcharging because he recognized Shawn. In that case. What a dick.

It’s nearly 2am when you arrive at the hotel. Shawn grabs your hand in the lobby and your heart beats double time as he drags you to the elevator. Again, no one was around to see this show of familiarity. You clench your jaw. You had to say something sometime right? But maybe not yet.

Shawn drops your hand in the elevator and you look over at him as he watches the floor numbers creep higher and higher. His profile is astounding. You look away, down at the floor.

Why did everything have to change? Last week you were content being his assistant and bossing him around at meetings and shows. You were perfectly happy that you had put aside the little (huge) crush you had on him when you first started, and he had to go and ruin it by asking you to be his fake girlfriend. Which, by the way, didn’t seem so fake now. At least not for you anyways. When this was all over you were going to be so fucked. So completely fucked because it wasn’t going to end in some fairytale romance. Shawn was not actually going to fall in love with his assistant. That didn’t happen. Life wasn’t a Hallmark movie, but damn you wish it was.

The moment you get to your room door and open your purse you realize you don’t have your key card. You had switched purses for the event so you would match your dress. The key card was in a pocket in your other purse.

“Guess what,” you groan and Shawn looks over as he pushes open his door.

“Hmm?”

“My keycard is in the room.”

Shawn pushes his door open with a grin. “Come on in then,” he bows, waving his arm out into the room dramatically. “Madame forgetful.”

“You’re a jerk,” you laugh.

You push him in the chest and he just chuckles, letting out a little oomph as his back hits the door.

Shawn walks in and goes over to his suitcase and starts undressing. He tosses his jacket on the back of a nearby chair and starts stripping down quickly, wanting to be rid of the still damp clothes. He stops as he gets his pants undone and looks over to where you’re standing transfixed by the bathroom door.

“You alright? You’ve seen me undress before?”

“Yeah...no, um...” You look away from him because your mind was starting to wander and that could not happen. “I don’t have any clothes is all. They’re in my room and I can’t get in? I’d like to be dry too.”

“Oh, right. Hold on.” Shawn leans over his suitcase and digs through it for a moment. He fishes out a shirt and a pair of boxers. “These might fit you?” he offers, holding them up.

It wasn’t like you had a choice. It was his clothes or your damp cold ones. The latter seemed far worse for sleeping.

You take the clothes and go into the bathroom, pressing your back against the door. You close your eyes and take a deep breath. You had to remember you were his assistant. Not his real girlfriend. This meant nothing. Wearing his clothes was a necessity right now.

You start to change and you try not to think about the fact you were going to be wearing his clothes, more particularly, his boxers, or that you were going to be sleeping in his bed. You scoff to yourself as you set your purse on the counter. Your phone and one of the check in forms that you had the door code to the building written on falls out.

The check form... from the check in desk!

You could just go to the lobby and ask for a new key card. That was if someone was down there, and even then they were probably trying to snooze. You feel like you’d be an asshole if you went down there so late.

You bite your lip and look over at Shawn’s clothes on the hook where you placed them when you walked in. Your clothes are on the floor in a heap by the bathtub. Well, you were already undressed...you may as well just stay with Shawn and not bother the nice front desk person so late at night.

Sighing, you pick up his shirt and pull it on before you slide your panties down and off. You catch sight of yourself in the mirror. His shirt sits at almost your mid upper thigh, just enough to cover your bare bottom half.

What if you walked out there like this?

No.

You turn around and grab the boxers off the counter. Shawn might push the boundaries with all his out of sight attentions but you weren’t going to do it too. The last thing you needed was for this ordeal to go any farther and end up with both of you making a mistake that couldn’t be undone.

Shawn knocks on the door and you snap out of your thoughts, jerking around at the rapt knocking. “Hey, you okay in there? You’re not like sniffing my shirt and getting off or something are you? Because as weird as that is, it’s kind of hot and-”

You open the door to find him leaning against the doorframe with a smirk on his face. He knew what he was doing, and he always loved to tease you before this started, but now he seemed to like to make it far more sexual. The little shit.

“You aren’t funny.”

“You’re mad because I found out your dirty little secret.”

He leans in and you think he’s going to say something really dirty that is going to make you flush like a tomato. He grins and you are about to push past him, wanting to avoid whatever his mind would come up with when he whispers against your ear. “Go pick out your side of the bed. I have to pee, now move.”

_______________

You wake up to the sound of snoring. Deep but soft rumbles coming from behind you. You’re warm, too warm. Shawn has his arm around you and you’re pulled back against his chest, legs tangled with yours.

“Shawn,” you whisper and he stirs, snoring coming to a halt.

His arm tightens around you and he buries his face in your hair. His hand slides up and down your stomach under his shirt you’re wearing and it makes you shiver. You know he’s asleep, and he’s been alone for a long time, and that he must crave the physical intimacy as badly as you did these days. So you try not to blame him for the cuddling and you try not think too far into the cuddling.

“You’re skin is soft,” Shawn mumbles against your head. Maybe he wasn’t as asleep as you thought.

“Thanks, but remember what I said last night?”

He groans, slipping his hand out from under your shirt as he rolls onto his back. You made it very clear that you were not allowed to cuddle if you were going to sleep in the same bed. Obviously unconscious Shawn paid no mind to that what so ever.

“We have to get packed, it’s almost nine in the morning. Our flight leaves at noon for France.”

“You’re ice cold,” Shawn says with a smirk. “I know you want to cuddle longer.”

“Shawn, come on.” You roll your eyes.

His arm snakes around your waist and he pulls you against his side. “Don’t act like you don’t love it. I distinctly remember waking up at six this morning and you were all over me.”

“I was not!”

“You were too.”

Shawn reaches over and grabs his phone off the nightstand. He brings up a photo of the two of you in bed. The light is low and soft from the windows and you’re curled up with your head on his chest, your hand over his heart. It’s sweet, intimate...weird. Wait a minute.

“Why did you take that picture!”

“Well, I figure if Andrew doesn’t say anything by the time we’re done in Paris, then I’ll accidentally post this to instagram. Nothing says relationship like some sweet cuddles, and you are really selling it.” He turns the phone so you can see the photo again. “Look at your little hand over my heart and my hand in your hair as I kiss the top of your head. I mean it’s perfect and-”

“You better delete that as soon as Andrew calls off the deal with Cailey. I mean it. I don’t like when people take pictures of me and specially not when I’m sleeping, you creep.”

“I prefer the term boyfriend.”

“Fake boyfriend.” You snort and push away from him, throwing the covers back. “Get yourself dressed. I’m going to the lobby to get a new room card so I can pack and we can get to the airport.”

“No breakfast?”

“You can get something on the way.” You stop at the mirror on the back of the bathroom door and you tie up your hair.

Shawn puts his arm over his face and you roll your eyes.

“You better not be going back to sleep.”

“I’m not.”

“Then what’s wrong? Get up, get moving. Come on.”

“You look really good in my clothes, that’s what’s wrong.”

You swallow hard and turn away toward the door. You leave without another word and head to the lobby to get a key card.

Paris was going to be the last stand. If nothing happened in Paris then you were calling this whole thing off and Shawn was going to have to stand up to Andrew and Justin alone on the Cailey ordeal. You couldn’t go on with Shawn saying things like that behind closed doors. This is not what you agreed to. You agreed to pretending around other people, not pretending around each other.

Your greatest fear is that Shawn was pretending when it was just the two of you so that you could really make it look convincing when you were together. But even worse would be Shawn actually falling for you, and all his actions weren’t pretend. Both thoughts made your heart ache.

_______________

Paris. A beautiful city with grand architecture, art and culture. A place where romance was around every corner. The city of love. How ironic.

You stare out the window of the van you're riding in to the hotel from the airport. The plane ride had been fairly short, only a few hours, and Shawn was seated near Andrew the entire time. Thank God.

However you weren't so lucky to be seated away from Shawn now. He was right beside you while Andrew and Geoff sat in the seats in front of you. You knew you were being cold and distant toward Shawn, not having spoken since this morning, but it's what you decided was best. If you were going to feel something for him then it'd be easier if it were feigned annoyance and not a heart wrenching crush.

Shawn bumps his hand against yours on the seat and you pull away. He chases, placing his hand right next to where you've placed yours on your leg. He wasn't going to make this easy for you.

You glance down and then over at him. He's not even looking. The little shit. He is staring out the window with a smile on his face. You inch your hand away, turning your attention back to the passing shops and cafes.

Shawn clears his throat and you know he wants you to look over, but you won't. Not getting your attention that way, he opts to slide his hand up your thigh to meet your hand once more. This time he hooks his pinky with yours so you can't pull away so easily.

This gets your attention. You side eye him and he's grinning at you. The way he was grinning would make you think holding pinkies was the most risque thing to do in the back of a van.

Honestly he was too cute and you could feel the icy barrier you put up around your heart already start to melt.  So much for that plan.

Shawn holds your pinky the entire ride to the hotel and you just let him. He was going to find away to be touching you anyways, may as well let him.

Checking into the hotel is a nightmare. The clerk, while speaking English, had a very thick accent that Andrew struggled to understand. When he finally sorted things out, you find out that one of your rooms was already booked and there was an error in the online booking agent.

Geoff suggests finding a new hotel but Jake and Andrew don't want to do that because they'd chosen this one specifically for it's security.

“I'll share with Shawn,” Jake says and Shawn groans.

“No offense Jake, but you're the heaviest snorer I've ever met. I'd never get any sleep.”

Andrew sighs, knowing this couldn't be easy.

“I can share with Shawn. Then you can all have your own rooms. I don't mind. ” You shrug and look at Shawn. “It’s not like I haven't had to share with him before. Remember the flooded hotel a few months ago?”

Shawn throws his arm around your shoulders and pulls you against him. “We can get a rollaway bed for you just like before. It'll be fine.”

Andrew looks skeptical but agrees to the arrangement. You and Shawn exchange looks when he turns his back. Both of you know he's suspicious now. Perfect.

_______________

Shawn wants to go out for lunch and you know he won't bother inviting Andrew or saying anything to Jake before the two of you leave. It feels so bad, sneaking out of the hotel to galavant around the nearby shopping district. You can't say you don't love the thrill of it though.

Shawn reaches for your hand, bumping against it a few times for permission before he goes for holding it. You give in quickly, knowing what he wants and he threads his fingers between yours.

You know that this is going to be your last outing together before Shawn is booked up for the rest of the Paris promo. He has a fashion gala, a pop up merchandise event, a performance with a local radio station and an interview with another radio station.

You squeeze his hand and he squeezes back. It was now or never. Whatever happened on this outing had to be big and attention grabbing. You don't dare ask yet, but the way he's looking at you says he might have a plan.

_______________

The two of you can't settle on a place for lunch which ends up with you walking around a small park nearby until one of you caved.

Shawn still has his hand in yours as you walk along a rose bush lined path. The park was gorgeous and in full view of the Eiffel Tower. Everything felt like a dream and you didn't ever want to wake up.

“Crepes are such a classic lunch. I don't know why you don't want to get those,” Shawn says, continuing your lunch debate that lead to the walk in the park. He really wasn’t budging on the crepes idea.

“It sounds heavy,” you sigh, it’s only the third time you’ve said this.

Honestly crepes sounded pretty good but your stomach was in knots. Nerves were getting the best of you and you can't take it any longer. Shawn was going to do something and you needed to be prepared. You were going to have to ask him what his plan was.

“You could get a plain one or just ham and ch-”

You stop, placing your hand on his chest and he stops mid sentence. He looks down, covers your hand with his and you can feel his heart racing just like yours. You pause, just a moment, taking in the slight intimacy before you speak.

“What are we doing?”

“We're walking in the park and debating lunch?”

“No.” You close your eyes. “I mean what is the plan for our outing? What are we going to do to get caught?”

Shawn stares at you for a moment, as if he had forgotten that you were just out on a lunch date for appearances. He seemed to forget a lot that you weren’t his real girlfriend, but you did too.

“I don't have a plan?”

“You have to have a plan.”

“I don't. We'll just make it up as we go.” He curls his fingers around your hand that's still on his chest and he brings it up to kiss your knuckles. You flush and he grins, knowing he caused that.

“How about we skip lunch and get some ice cream? It would be far more romantic to eat ice cream in the park. “

Shawn pulls away, hand still in yours as he starts running toward the other end of the park. You stumble along with him, giggling and struggling to keep up.

“Shawn! I'm going to fall! Your legs are too long I can't keep up!”

“I’ll catch you!” Shawn laughs, doubling back to scoop you up and spin you around a few times while you squeal to be let down. “I promise I’ll catch you whenever you fall.”

“Psh, you are such a mushy softie.”

Shawn places you down in front of the ice cream vendor cart and kisses the top of your head. “Sorry, I’m so soft.” He pokes his firm belly and makes a bleh noise. “I’m a regular stay puft marshmallow boy.”

You roll your eyes and step up to the cart. Shawn throws his arm around you and tries to order in French. It’s embarrassing.

“Deux Chocolat?” you say pointing at the chocolate ice cream. The vendor smiles and scoops, announcing your total in English and you thank him as you hand Shawn his little dish.

The two of you sit on a little bridge that goes over a creek that joins two ponds in the park. It faces the main street and the two of you remain in a comfortable silence as you watch cars and bikes and people with pets pass by.

A group of people nearby seem to be noticing you and Shawn. They’ve got phones out, failing to be discreet as they snap pictures of you. Your heart races and you elbow Shawn, nodding to the crowd. Shawn scoops up some of this ice cream and holds it out for you. “Open up,” he grins and you roll your eyes. “Open. Come on.”

You open your mouth and let him feed you, giggling as your lips close over the icy treat. “It tastes just like mine,” you say and he scoops another bit. You laugh as he makes airplane noises and ends up getting chocolate all over your lip and chin. “Hey! Watch where you’re putting that!”

Shawn parks his spoon in his cup and grabs your chin, swiping his thumb over the mess. He’s looking at you, eyes locked with yours. His lips part and you struggle to breathe as he leans in. “I’m going to kiss you,” he whispers, voice hardly audible. Just like that, his warm lips meet yours and he licks the ice cream from your lip. His hand goes into your hair and you lean into him, dropping your ice cream in the creek as you grab his face.

Making out in public wasn’t something you ever wanted to do. It just wasn’t something you were totally comfortable with, but Shawn...well...he was an exception. Besides. You needed to get people’s attention. You needed rumors to spread. What was more rumor confirming than making out in public?

Shawn breaks the kiss, rolling his forehead against yours. “I don’t want to pretend anymore,” he says quietly.

“W-what? Was the kiss that bad?” you whisper in return.

He closes his eyes and shakes his head a bit. “The kiss was perfect. You're perfect.”

“Shawn, you're just lost in the moment.”

“I'm not,” he says as he leans forward and kisses you softly. He kisses between words as he says, “I've never been so happy in my whole life than I am when I'm with you. I just had to open my eyes.”

You pull away this time and he chases your lips a bit before settling on bumping noses. “When did you know it wasn't pretend anymore?”

“As soon as we started. My brain got the green light to make you mine and I couldn't stop it. I wanted your attention all the time, I didn't care if someone was watching or not.”

Shawn moves back and pulls you in front of him so you're between his legs where he's sitting on the edge of the bridge. He tucks your hair behind your ears and wraps his arms around you.

You bring your arms up and grip the back of his shirt, burying your face in his collar. “This feels unreal. I never thought you would actually do this. You're like a Disney prince, you can't be real.”

“I am real, and you're my princess. Now, come on princess, we have some rumors to confirm,” Shawn chuckles and stands, lifting you up so your legs are wrapped around his waist. He walks you past the crowd of fans with the biggest smirk as he bumps his nose with yours. It's one of the first times you've seen him practically ignore fans, but you couldn't be happier.

_______________

The moment the door closes to your shared room, Shawn presses you against the wall and kisses you hungrily. Your hands go to his belt and he bites at your lip for encouragement.

“Shawn?!” Andrew yells through the door.

You halt, fingers freezing on Shawn's zipper. Oh right. Andrew didn't know yet. If you didn't answer then he would just go away?

Shawn makes a shushing motion and creeps away from the door, taking your hands to lead you to the bed. Andrew knocks again and you feel sick to your stomach. Shawn's phone buzzes and you reach around and pull it from his back pocket.

“Its Andrew. He said he knows we're back. Answer the door.”

Shawn growls and goes to the door, ripping it open and glaring at his manager. “What? We went for lunch.”

Andrew steps in and Shawn walks over to you. He holds his phone up with a picture of the two of you kissing. “Let's talk.”

After ages of discussion, an agreement is made. Shawn would still have to walk the red carpet tomorrow at the KIT Fashion Gala with Cailey, and he would have to appear on the talk show she co hosted in a few weeks. But they wouldn't be selling the relationship angle now that you as Shawn were very publicly an item.

You and Shawn spend the rest of the day in bed, lazily kissing and exploring each other while discussing what you wanna do as soon as you get home from the press tour. Mostly he wants to show you Toronto and Pickering, introduce you to his friends and family, and fuck you senseless but that last part didn't require being back home.

_______________

Lydia and her team show up early the next morning to get Shawn fitted and dressed for the gala. You're up when they come knocking on the hotel room door and Shawn isn't, so you answer.

“Oh my God the rumors are true!” Lydia squeals as you open the door dressed in Shawn's tee and your underwear.

“Yeah, surprise!” You laugh and Lydia gives your cheeks air kisses as she and her team haul in a bunch of racks and cases.

“You two are adorable. He couldn't have chosen a better woman,” Lydia gushes as she starts to unpack.

Shawn sits up in bed and runs a hand through his sleep mussed hair. “You trying to steal my girl, Lyd?” He laughs.

“I got a girl, but if you want to share...”

“Oh you know I'm not good at that,” Shawn says as he stands and stretches, giving you a great view of that glorious ass of his. “Shower and a shave first?”

“Of course, wouldn't want your stink on these fresh suits.”

Shawn feigns hurt and you giggle.

Lydia unzips a few of the carrier bags and glances over at you. “What are you wearing tonight?”

“Me? Um, just one of my regular dresses probably?”

Lydia shakes her head and goes over to the second rack her assistants rolled in. “No, you're not going to be dressed like the assistant. You're Shawn Mendes’s girlfriend, you have to show up in something nice.”

“But I don't think anyone is going to care what I'm wearing. I'm not on the red carpet.”

Lydia laughs and holds on to the rack. “You're kidding right? He is not actually walking with Cailey is he?” You nod. “Well fuck that little tart. You're wearing this.”

She pulls a long black v neck sleeveless dress. There's a little jewelry set hanging with it on the hanger. You stand up and go over to it, running your hand over the front of it. It's got a little thin white belt around the waist with a little gem encrusted detailed feather as the clasp.

“This is too nice. I'm not sure I can wear this.”

“You can and will. Come on, try it on.” Lydia tugs at your shirt and you turn your back to her and pull your shirt off. “You don't need a bra, here,” she says passing the dress to you off the hanger.

You step into it and Lydia zips the back up. It's just a hint loose along your bust line. You turn and Shawn steps out of the bathroom in his boxers, scrubbing his hair dry with a towel.

“Hey Lydia, I was thinking...wow,” Shawn says dropping his towel and looking you over. “You look stunning.”

“It's just a dress,” you giggle, smoothing the front down.

Shawn crosses the room and grabs your hips, running his hands up and down your sides. “It's a damn good dress. Are you wearing this tonight?”

“Yes, she is,” Lydia answers for you. “And your suit will match.” Shawn looks back as Lydia pulls a black suit down that has black silk accents. “I was thinking we do a black suit with a floral button down under it. I've brought several options.”

“Let's get to it then,” Shawn smiles, looking down at you and kissing your head. “Tell me your favorite and I'll wear it okay?”

“Alright.”

“Perfect. Andi and myself will work with Shawn, Dana you help fit that dress to her and we'll get this show on the road,” Lydia says and claps her hands together. It was going to be a long day.

_______________

The KIT Gala was just like every other event you've been to with Shawn. Loads of famous people, douchebags with cameras, no so douchebag professional photographers, constant blinding lights and fake conversations. It's just another event.

That's what you tell yourself anyway. You've got nerves like never before. You've never been Shawn's girlfriend at an event before. You've never been paid any mind until you put that ring around your neck and everything kicked off.

You touch the ring, it's on a long chain that dips into your dress that's layered with a few other simple chains to complete the look Lydia picked out for you. Shawn had insisted that you keep holding on to it, and you would.

The car stops and Shawn slides his hand off of your thigh. “This is my stop. I guess I'll meet you inside,” he says heavily.

You give him a weak smile, knowing he doesn't want to go out and walk in with Caliey. The door opens and Shawn takes a deep breath, stepping out and the crowd gets a little louder. You smile, glancing around at the people taking photos from beyond barrier gates. It was never dull going places with Shawn.

A moment passes, just a quick second and you realize the car should be pulling away now. Shawn is out but the door is open still.

“Give me your hand,” Shawn says, leaning into the car.

“Shawn no, I'm not getting out here. Go meet Cailey.”

“Babe, get out. I'm not walking with her. You're in an Armani dress and decked out in more diamonds then I can count. I'm walking with you.”

You grab Shawn's hand and scoot across the seat. “Andrew is going to be pissed,” you laugh softly.

“He shouldn't have let me ride with you then,” Shawn smirks and you stand beside him, scooting to the side so the door can close.

The second that the press realize who you are, they go wild. It's a million questions a second, photographers yelling to look from every direction. Shawn threads his fingers through yours and walks you to the first stop along the long red carpet.

Endless photos and poses later and you and Shawn reach the entrance of the building. You look back and see Cailey walking alone, posing in the most over dramatic ways and you roll your eyes. She's in a long while dress that really just washes her out and you're glad she didn't walk with Shawn. It would have been a horrible match.

“You doing okay?” Shawn whispers against your ear as you step into the quiet building.

“Yeah, just a little bit overwhelmed. I'm glad it's over though. Did you see Cailey?”

“Oh yeah, she looks pissed.”

“Well I mean you ditched her.”

Shawn pulls you aside and grabs both of your hands. “I want nothing to do with her. I don't care what Andrew said, Cailey and her team would spin some story out of us being together any way they could. I wouldn't let that happen, I love you too much to let you get stuck in drama like that.”

“You love me?” You ask, not sure if you heard him right.

Shawn is silent, realizing what he just said.

“Shawn, you said you loved me.”

“I do. I love you. Oh my God.” He grabs your face and kisses you softly. “I absolutely positively love you.”

“I love you too,” you giggle, unable to contain yourself. How long had you wanted to say that to him, lord only knows. “I love you so, so, much, but is now the best time for us to be confessing this?”

Shawn looks around like he'd forgotten where the two of you were. There's a couple reporters with their phones out nearby but you can't be bothered.

“Can you do something for me?” Shawn asks with a grin and you say sure. “Will you hold on to this ring for me?”

Shawn slides his rose gold pinky ring off his finger and grabs your hand. He slides it over your ring finger and brings it up to his lips to kiss it softly.

“Shawn, what in the world...”

“It's a promise ring.”

“Shawn this ring is like eight hundred dollars, this is not a promise ring.”

He leans forward and presses his forehead against yours. “It is today. It’s to remind you that I love you and this isn't a dream, even though it feels like it might be.”

“You're such a sap.”

Shawn shrugs and slips his arm around you as Cailey passes by, giving a nasty look in your direction. You just grin, so smug that Shawn has your whole heart and you have his.

“Come on, let's go get dinner and then get yelled at by Andrew. The sooner this is over with, the sooner I can get you out of that dress.”

“Shawn!”

“Don't think I won't rip that dress open in the car. I've waited long enough for you,” Shawn smirks and you slap his arm as he walks you into the huge dining hall of the event building.

“Fine. I won't rip it. But as soon as we're alone together, I wanna see you in nothing but my ring on that chain around your neck.”

“I think I can manage that.”

Shawn leans down and kisses your cheek, giving your jaw a little nip that sends a rush of heat over your whole body. “Good girl,” he says smiling against your skin and you know that this was only the beginning with a whole new Shawn you had yet to explore and you know you'll be falling in love with over and over again.

[spine-buster]

I Thought You Might Be Mine (Ricochet) - Part III

May 31st, 2016 On a bullet train, somewhere in Japan

Iris never saw Trevor so attached to his phone in the two and a half years she had known him.  They were nearing the end of the Best of the Super Juniors tournament, and just a few days before, he’d had a match with Will Ospreay.  And good God almighty, was it a match.  Everybody was talking about it on social media.  Hundreds of gifs were being made of the match.  Everybody had something to say about it – good or bad.  It was probably the most buzz either men had received for a match in their careers.

Trevor was his own worst critic but in the hours that followed the match he was glued to every social media and wrestling site available on the internet.  Even Fox News had picked it up.  He didn’t really care about random news outlets and their opinions on it – he made that perfectly clear to her.  What mattered to him instead was the opinion of the wrestling community.  Vader had already voiced his extreme displeasure with the match, comparing the two men to high school gymnasts.

“You know, I keep watching the gifs,” she said, trying to get his eyes away from the screen.  What she said hadn’t been a lie.  She saw them being posted all over Twitter and Instagram and loved reliving the feeling of seeing it all live.  “They’re fucking awesome.”

Trevor temporarily ignored his phone to look at her.  Unlike most other time he looked at her, when she knew she had his undivided attention, she knew his mind was elsewhere now.  “What have you been reading?”

“The same things that you’ve been reading,” she rolled her eyes.  “Websites don’t change their content just because a wrestler reads them.”

“Vader keeps going off about it,” he grumbled as someone on the train bumped into him on their way to the washroom.  He let her have the window seat because he was a gentleman, even though he hated aisle seats.  “Keeps talking about changing the business.  I’m sorry I’m capable of more than just Vader bombs off the second rope.”

Iris couldn’t help but smirk at his attitude.  “Yeah, when are you gonna add that corkscrew to your 630, anyway?” she huffed.

He gave her major side-eye.  “Don’t you start too.”

“I’m joking Trev!  Jesus,” she defended herself.  “You’re really hung up about this, aren’t you?”

“Wouldn’t you be?”

Iris didn’t know what to answer with.  Trevor was probably one of the most hardworking people she knew, and he always told her she was one of the most hardworking people he knew outside of wrestling.  If thousands and thousands of people decided to shit on her job performance, she’d be pretty pissed off too.  “Listen, Trev…it’s like people who shit on teachers,” she began.  “If they’ve never worked with kids or teenagers before, their opinions are horseshit and completely irrelevant because they don’t know what it takes.  It’s the same with wrestling fans.  Unless they’re wrestlers too, on the same grind as you are, do their opinions really matter?  And, like, the people that do matter, like Chris Jericho and Stone Cold Steve Austen…they liked it!”

Trevor considered her words.  “I guess I never thought of it that way.”

Iris chuckled.  Of course he hadn’t.  If he had, he wouldn’t be obsessively checking his phone.  “Did you like it?”

“Yeah.”

“Did Cameron like it?”

“He loved it.”

“Then that’s all that matters, right?”

Iris watched as slowly, almost painstakingly slowly, a smile appeared on Trevor’s face.  After two and a half years of being best friends, she knew how his brain worked.  She wished he knew how his brain worked.  “You always find these ways of bringing the most basic logic into things that just makes sense all the time.  Why can’t my mind be like yours?”

“One of us has to be neurotic, Trev,” she joked.

“Nah, I mean it.  You’re not even in wrestling and you get wrestling.”

“It’s because I hang out with too many wrestlers.”

For the first time in what seemed like days, Trevor locked the screen on his phone and dedicated all of his attention to her.  “One day I’m gonna forget my head in the morning and not know what to do, and you’re just gonna swoop in and save me.”

Iris shook her head.  “No you won’t.  You’ll learn and you’ll grow.  You won’t need me – you don’t need me.  At least not as much as you think you do.”

“I don’t know about that,” Trevor shifted in his seat, smiling.  “You’re the only person in this world who keeps me sane, Iris.”

She didn’t know what to say.  What could she say?  She knew she was important to him, just as he was important to her.  She’d be lying if she said he didn’t keep her sane most of the time too – every time she’d remember she lived a four hour flight away from her boyfriend; anytime she remembered she lived a fourteen hour flight away from her family and friends; anytime when, despite her happiness in Tokyo, a sneaking feeling of loneliness would creep up on her and all she would have to do was text him and he’d make her feel not alone.  

She linked her arm through his and laid her head on his shoulder, not bothering to use the wall like she had intended when she begged for the window seat when they first got on the train.  Trevor’s arm rested along her body, his hand on her thigh, as she felt him lean his head on hers.  

She would miss this.

June 7, 2016 Sendai, Miyagi, Japan

When Trevor heard a knock on his door at 11:30 at night, the night that Will Ospreay was crowned the first Englishman and the youngest-ever winner of the Best of the Super Juniors, he didn’t know what to think.  He assumed it to be one of the guys but then he thought about how tired everyone was and how they were probably all already sleeping.  Then he thought it would be Matt or Nick, surprising him, maybe even Akira.  But when he opened the door and saw Iris, he was thoroughly shocked.

“Can we talk?” she asked quietly, her voice barely above a whisper.

“Of course,” he answered automatically, moving away from the door to let her in.  He watched as she entered the room and walked towards his bed, moving to sit down but then deciding against it.  She looked down at the floor and started pacing.  He was getting worried.  “What’s up?”

She looked up at him.  “Can you come here?”

He did as he was told.  He could feel the nervous energy radiating off of her and he started to become nervous too.  “What’s wrong?”

“I’m…I’m leaving.”

“You going back to Tokyo already?”

“No,” she shook her head.  “Trevor…I’m leaving Japan.”

Of all the languages she spoke, ‘I’m leaving Japan’ were the most foreign words to ever come out of her mouth.  He couldn’t believe what he’d just heard.  He couldn’t understand them anymore than he couldn’t understand French, or Italian, or any other language she knew.  “You’re what?”

“I can’t…I don’t really believe it either…but yeah,” she mumbled out.  “I’m leaving New Japan.  I’m leaving Japan.”

“What the hell?” was all Trevor could muster.  It wasn’t exactly polite but it was all he could say.  In his mind, it’s what the situation called for.

“Ryder…he got a job in New York City.  A promotion.  He’s moving in about six weeks --”

“Six weeks?”

“He’s going to be in New York City and I’ll be based in Orlando.  I’ve been hired by the WWE.”

Now Trevor really couldn’t believe what he was hearing.  “H…hold on,” he huffed out, sitting on the bed in pure confusion.  If he continued to stand he probably would have fallen over from shock.  “Start from the beginning.”

Iris took a deep breath.  “About six months ago, a position came up at Ryder’s work that he’s been dreaming about getting for years.  So when he applied and they interviewed him, they basically put him in the position temporarily to see if he could handle it.  And he passed with flying colours.  So when he finally got hired, they told him he’d have to move to New York City.”

“Just because Ryder’s going doesn’t mean you have to go,” Trevor said.

“I know.  But then, around that same time, Nick heard from Matt, who heard from Chris, who heard from Rami…anyway, through the grapevine, I heard that the Performance Centre was hiring for a position similar to mine, for all the international recruits they have and anticipate getting.  Ryder thought I should apply, because then that would mean we would both move to the States…and I did.  New Japan gave a sparkling reference.  And lo and behold…”

Trevor was happy for her.  He really was.  He knew he wasn’t exactly acting like it, but he was happy if she was happy.  He just knew how much she adored living in Japan and how much she loved her work here.  He couldn’t help but wonder to himself that if the job hadn’t come up in WWE, if Iris would have followed Ryder to New York City or if she would have stayed in Japan.  He wanted to think she would have chosen to dump Ryder and continue living her dream, but that was all heresy now.  Because that meant, in some small fraction in his mind, if she chose Japan over New York City, it meant that she chose him --

“It’s just that we’ll be on the same damn landmass again,” Iris said, wiping a tear, obviously referring to Ryder.  Trevor nodded his head, despite his previous thoughts wishing she would leave him.  “We’d be in the same country.  It’s only a two and a half hour flight.  We’d be able to see each other more often…”

“Hey, c’mere,” he said, reaching out for her hands and holding them in his.  He looked into her eyes and saw how red they were becoming and wished she would stop crying.  He hated seeing her cry.  “I’m proud of you, okay?  I’m so proud of you.  And I want you to be happy.  I’m just shocked.”

She sat down on the bed beside him, turning to face him immediately.  “I know you know how much I love Japan,” she said.  “But I couldn’t bring myself to tell you any earlier.  You were so wrapped up with the Ospreay match stuff and the tournament as a whole and I didn’t want to derail you.  It wasn’t a good time.”

“It’s never a good time to tell me you’re leaving Japan,” Trevor commented, causing Iris to smile slightly for the first time that evening.  He rubbed the backs of her hands with his thumbs tenderly.  “But he’s not taking you away from me.  You’re…you’re not being taken away from me.  Instead of Japan being our thing, the States will have to be our thing now.”

She let out a small chuckle.  “Japan’s always gonna be our thing, Trev,” she said.  “Unless you get signed at the PC.  Do you want to come too?”

Trevor snorted, leaning forward to hug her.  “I’m gonna follow you wherever you go,” he said as their bodies were entwined with each other’s in their embrace.  “You’re never getting rid of me.”

Neither were quick to let go of the hug.  Iris wasn’t quick to lose the warmth of his body on hers, and Trevor wasn’t quick to lose the intoxicating coconut smell of her hair in his lungs.  It was Iris who chose to move closer to him, practically sitting on his lap and nuzzling her face into the crook of his neck.  They stayed like that for a while; Trevor beginning to realize and understand the ramifications of her new job and big move; Iris beginning to realize how much different the next stage of her life would be in comparison to where she was now.  

“Can we lie down together, Trev?” her voice filled the void.

His favourite thing in the world.  Was he really going to say no?

Without saying a word, they moved their bodies further onto the bed, never letting go of one another.  Trevor lay down on his back while Iris moved to lay her head on his chest, resting a leg between his.  He wrapped both his arms around her, pulling her close.  

“Trev?”

“Mhm?”

“I’d never want to get rid of you,” she said softly.

“I know.”

“Japan’s been really special to us, huh?” she asked.  “We’ve made so many amazing memories here.”

“Damn right we have.”

“Can you promise we’ll make amazing memories in Orlando too?  Or wherever we find ourselves together?”

Trevor kissed her forehead, leaving his lips against her skin.  “I promise.”

@wrestlewriting @wrasslin-x @thegenericluchadora@thewriterformerlytaggedas@fan-fiction-galore @anerdysouthernbelle @spot-of-bother @amaranthine-reign@baleesi @flnnbalor @smuppies@sarahmatthews7 @daintymissdevitt@newjapan @corey-renee @running-ropes @balorsomega @karleedaniels27@kazuchika @ileana0300 @alexahood21@ohcristimhookedonhavocimsodunne@fembxt @heelturn-timesten@kaitlynwwefan @50shadesofadamcolebaybay@50shadesofkennyomega@chasingeverybreakingwave @thyestean-feast @thecandicej @devittsbalor@sp00kylesley @danahart @sietefinns@kaydee-kayyyy @powerbombshell@swedish-strong-style @blondekel77@irish-newzealand-idian-dutch@nickysmum1909 @houndofjustice-imagines @wwesmutdonedirtcheap@wweximaginesxd @indywrestlinglover-life @mandi512 @kakakatey@ourscratcheddreams @sleeplessandcynical @badame124 @thevixeniris@fabulousrockstar @lunatic-sambrose @writing-reigns @caramara3

[getthebutters]

Keep Going After January: Top 10 Exercise Routine Longevity Hacks

So, you started working out on January 1. Good for you! I know a lot of people will give you shit for starting in Jan but fuck them. Start when you want to start. But let’s talk a bit about how to keep you on track past January, prevent burn out and streamline your idea of what this is supposed to be like. It’ll help, I promise.

 Ensure you’re comfortable

The #1 reason I hate working out is cause I get sweaty and hot. But I’ve learned how to make it a shit ton more comfy, especially as a 420lb guy. Check them out: Exercise & The Fatty: Top 20 gym tips for comfort & success

 What’s your reason for doing this? Make it tangible.

Both times I’ve decided to start working out successfully, I had other things going on in my life that made working out necessary. Essentially, I needed to have more endurance and strength to accomplish another goal. This time, The Butters growth (including enjoying the benefits of that) and the desire to toss around large men in bed. I’m just being honest.

Maybe you want to feel more confident in the face of stairs, ride dick longer, give birth easier, construct your body of art, support the weight of your tigo bitties, get out of bed earlier, or even scare people slightly when you shake their hand. Whatever the reason, it’s gotta be tangible and fun. It’s gotta be something personal and actually achievable. Not only achievable but exciting every time it happens.

 Don’t make this about weight

Notice I didn’t mention weight loss in the above tip? Weight loss is slow and boring. If you’re working out right, it’s likely your weight loss will be a little delayed, but you’ll feel more functional and healthier sooner.

 Overcome gym intimidation

Even though you probably won’t recognize it immediately, a lot of your apprehension is the result of deep-seated intimidation. Most people don’t really know anything about their body or the gym – jumping in can be a lot! Unfortunately, you can’t make this easier except to admit it and coach yourself through it.

Try watching natty or not videos on YouTube. Find out how many people are on steroids or in other ways manipulating their image for profit. This will make you feel a lot better about yourself and your capabilities.

Read More: Doing What’s Best For You Doesn’t Always Feel Good

 Recognize you’re weaker than you think but also stronger!

You’re gonna be humbled your first few times in the gym. Your form will be trash. You’re gonna be sweaty, weak, and questioning why you’re doing this. But there will also be moments where you surprise the fuck outta yourself.

When I followed the plan given by my basic Planet Fitness trainer, I found that while I couldn’t lift very much, my muscles respond very well to stress; I got bulky and strong super quick. They call that newbie gains but I’m 6 months in and it hasn’t slowed down. I was super intimidated by the gym at first, but I’ve also found that I’m very good at intuitively training myself. I’ve only ever worked with the trainer four times. But I keep making great progress and it encourages me to continue

 Avoid the urge to post on social.

Often, we get in the gym and want to post about it for an ego boost or encouragement. Unfortunately, social media is an exhausting place sometimes. This should be a personal, private experience. Record yourself, yes - That’s very good for monitoring your form. But keep the videos off social media and yourself safe from being deflated by low likes and views.

 Keep it fun

Look, what’s the point in doing anything if it isn’t fun? You’ll find me on the elliptical, smith machine, rope pull or literally anywhere else rocking the fuck out. The music, dance, and physical exertion makes it fun for me. But I also enjoy testing myself. Can I lift this, how many reps can I hit, how perfect can I keep my form, how long can I hold this? This is actually where I find a lot of the challenge that keeps me engaged throughout the work out. Since it’s me challenging me, and I hate being told what to do, it’s more fun. Although I can push myself too hard sometimes.

Switch it up

The best way to keep your exercises fun and interesting is to simply change up what you’re doing. I’m 7 months in and have changed my focus 3 times. Right now, I’m working on my glutes, hips, and balance. I started working on shoulders and chest. Then I moved to cardio and max weight/effort. I started trying to impress myself but now I’m actually just working towards a physical goal.