#they may not talk about personal things but they’ve had HOURS of drunk debate about the ethics of deforestation and ebooks vs print

[mrghostrat]

"You know what else i get a week without? Your red fucking pen." This made me think about a math teacher i had in highschool that whenever she gave us back our tests the first thing we saw is that she had writed everywhere "WRONG." "NO." "INCOHERENT." "NO! NO! NO!" in red ink So now all i can imagine is Aziraphale writing everywhere things like "Crowley wtf is this." "???" "STOP USING *insert connecting word here* SO MUCH" and so on lmao

YOU UNDERSTAND MY VISION

can’t remember if it was written in the post but i must clarify that crowley exclusively uses whatever the latest tech and software is (high end laptop, ipad pro with $300 magnetic keyboard or some shit, unnecessarily expensive word processors with every possible bell and whistle he doesn’t actually use)

which means aziraphale has to print out his wips when he wants to read whole chapters at a time, because he’s a creature of habit and likes reading books on paper <3

and really, the notes are helpful! aziraphale is extremely well read, and a fantastic editor!! (which crowley will never admit before his fifth glass) but his stupid anachronistic little habits drive him up the wall, especially when he’s a snobby minimalist and aziraphale presents him with a redwood tree worth of loose leaf papers and crowley just GLARES at him like

[lillupon]

AEV Chapter 21 Bonus: Canon-divergent AU

If you’ve been following me for a while, you may have seen me blabbing about Wonwoo getting pregnant in this fic! I actually debated for a long time on whether or not male omegas could conceive. If male omegas could not get pregnant, it could be another reason why they occupy the lowest rung in the societal hierarchy. Anyway, I scrapped that idea because there’s something very thrilling about Mingyu knocking Wonwoo up—in particular, while he is still Wonwoo’s student.

But then I thought: Maybe alphas are more virile and omegas are more fertile during their cycles. They didn’t use protection while Mingyu was in rut. So, despite Wonwoo being on the pill, he gets pregnant. He doesn’t find out that he’s pregnant until he and Mingyu have already broken up. He keeps the child. Names her Jeongyeon.

I imagine Mingyu and Wonwoo reconnecting in the same way they did in chapter 20. Wonwoo reluctantly cuts their first meeting short, but this time, not with the excuse of being hungry and having to do more work later:

Wonwoo slips off the table and stretches his arms over head. The vertebrae between his shoulder blades pop satisfyingly. “I’m sorry, Mingyu. I’d love to chat more, but I have to run.”

Mingyu also slides off the desk. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you this long.”

You can keep me for as long as you like. Wonwoo doesn’t voice the thought out loud, but it embarrasses him just to think it. Things have changed. Now, Wonwoo is just one face in a sea of thousands, just one person out of many who loves Mingyu. “Don’t be sorry. I really enjoyed catching up with you and hearing about what you’ve been up to.”

Mingyu smiles at him. “You don’t have to spare my feelings.”

Wonwoo laughs softly. “I’m serious! I would have liked to talk more, but I, ah—I need to go pick my daughter up from daycare.”

The smile freezes on Mingyu’s lips. His throat bobs as he swallows. It’s a beat before he recovers. “I’m sorry for keeping you from your family. I didn’t realise you had a kid and a mate now.”

Wonwoo shakes his head. “It’s just my daughter and me.”

“Oh,” Mingyu says. “Your mate…”

“Not in the picture anymore.”

“I’m sorry,” Mingyu says. Stiff. Awkward. Cautiously curious, he asks, “Did they uh… You know… Kick the bucket?”

Wonwoo’s laugh is genuine. Kicking balls rather than buckets, he wants to say. “No, they’re alive and well. We just went our separate ways.”

* 

Mingyu’s heart falls out the bottom of his stomach when Wonwoo says that he needs to go pick his daughter up from daycare. They had spent the last two hours chatting and laughing. Mingyu had found himself falling all over again. Charmed by this beautiful man with his beautiful smile. 

Of course someone else had been captivated too. He had steeled himself for this before he walked through the doors of Carat Elementary, that Wonwoo might belong to another person now. The mental preparation does nothing to ease his disappointment. 

His heart is saved from its death throes by the words It’s just my daughter and me. It valiantly climbs up to his chest again. It still hurts, but with a different sort of wound. Wonwoo had loved someone enough to have a child with them, but they had walked out.

How could anyone do that to Wonwoo?

Mingyu feels like a gormless and clingy puppy. He trails after Wonwoo as the omega goes to his desk to pack up his belongings. Falls into step beside Wonwoo as they exit through the school doors and head to the parking lot.

Mingyu waits until Wonwoo’s car has pulled out of the parking lot before leaving himself. 

Chaeyoung returns home for reading break. The Kim family all take a trip down to the hot springs for a week. Mingyu had been looking forward to spending time with his family for months, but now that he is actually here, all he wants to do is return to the city. See Wonwoo again. 

As soon as Mingyu is back in the city, he visits Wonwoo again. A lot of people won’t date single parents, but Wonwoo having a kid changes nothing for him. The years they spent apart have not diminished his feelings for Wonwoo. Mingyu still pines, still wants to provide—not just for Wonwoo, but Jeongyeon as well. He just has to figure out whether or not Wonwoo is interested in dating someone. More specifically: whether or not Wonwoo might be interested in dating him.

Meanwhile, Wonwoo is struggling to figure out how to break the news to Mingyu. He wonders if he should bring it up at all. It’s a huge secret—perhaps even more so than the clandestine affair between student and teacher. It’s a secret that can destroy the budding friendship that is starting to bloom between him and Mingyu. Mingyu will feel betrayed, lied to, Wonwoo knows. He doesn’t know if he can withstand losing Mingyu a second time.

It weighs on him, every time they meet. Almost to the point where he feels sick when he sees Mingyu smiling at him, sweet and tender. To make matters worse, Jeongyeon, normally a shy and quiet child, has imprinted on Mingyu like a duckling. It’s as if she knows Mingyu is her father. It hurts Wonwoo’s heart, to look at the two of them playing: Mingyu sitting hunched in a too-small plastic chair, daintily holding a tiny teacup between his forefinger and thumb; Jeongyeon pouring Mingyu tea, sharing with him plastic pastries. This could be his, for real, but he’s so scared. 

They’re both falling deeper and deeper for each other, and they both know it. But as quickly as they had crossed the line years ago, they’re more hesitant now. 

It comes to a breaking point when Mingyu invites him for a day out. An afternoon at the art gallery, where the current exhibition features one of Wonwoo’s favourite artists, followed by dinner at a restaurant along the waterfront. This is different from all the other times they’ve spent in each other’s presence. Wonwoo knows this because he had caught a whiff of the nervousness in Mingyu’s scent before it was swiftly buried, and because Mingyu had said, “I was thinking, it might be just you and me.”

So Wonwoo drops Jeongyeon off at Dahyun’s house that day. He showers and spends an hour rifling through his closet before deciding on a simple turtleneck and dark jeans. He works some product into his hair and spritzes on a bit of cologne. He feels embarrassed for trying so hard, until he opens the door to greet Mingyu and is instead made speechless. He is floored by how gorgeous Mingyu looks. A sweater with a deep v-neck, the colour of red wine. Tucked into thigh-hugging navy trousers that make his legs look a mile long.

Now Wonwoo fears he hasn’t tried hard enough. Except Mingyu quells that worry with an awed, “Wow. You look great.”

If Wonwoo had any doubts that their outing was a date, those thoughts are dispelled in the first two minutes: Mingyu opens the passenger door for him. Wonwoo ducks into the car, wanting to tease Mingyu about it, regain some sense of normalcy. Except the old-fashioned gesture has him giddy and tongue-tied like a young omega being taken out on their first date. 

Fast-forward to the tail-end of their date. By the waterfront. Night has fallen. They had had a late dinner in a floating restaurant. They exit the boat, arms brushing. They stroll up the dock, making their way to the main wharf. Beneath Wonwoo’s feet, the wooden planks sway as a gentle tide ebbs and flows. He had two glasses of red wine with his salmon. Not quite enough to get tipsy, but he finds himself listing towards Mingyu, as if he is drunk. He flounders over his own feet, bumps into Mingyu’s side.

Mingyu reaches out to steady him with a hand on his low back. “Careful,” he says. Keeps his hand there.

All this reciprocated flirting and touching. Wonwoo feels like he’s been turned inside-out, his most vulnerable feelings on bright neon display for Mingyu’s eyes.

Victorian street lamps line either side of the wharf, glowing a warm orange that penetrates through the dark. Mingyu steps up to the railing and leans his weight against it. Wonwoo joins him. Together, they gaze out at the dark waters.

“I’m mad,” Mingyu says, except he sounds anything but. His voice sounds like it has been pulled taut, turned rough and brittle.

Wonwoo turns to Mingyu. Mingyu’s profile is thrown in shadow, and yet it still makes Wonwoo ache. He’s so handsome. “What’s wrong? Why are you mad?”

Mingyu doesn’t respond. 

“Mingyu?” Wonwoo tries again.

Quietly, Mingyu says, “If it had been me, I never would have left you and Jeongyeon.”

Ahh, I’m really captivated by this AU of AEV, but I feel like it would need another 30k-40k words to do it justice. I literally came up with this entire scenario so I could have Mingyu say that cheesy-ass line, hah!

CLICK HERE TO READ THE CONTINUATION BY AN ANON 

[thoughts-on-bangtan]

Let’s talk about ‘Friends’ by BTS

by Admin 1

Friends is the subunit song by Jimin and Taehyung (co-written and co-produced by Jimin) from Map of the Soul : 7 which was released in February 2020. Interestingly enough, the Korean title is actually 친구, a word that is only used for friends of the same age, which is how ARMY figured out that it had to be their subunit prior to the release of the album.

On a very surface level, Friends is about the bond between Jimin and Taehyung recounting different little stories over the years, including the now famous dumpling incident which was first presented to us as a conflict that merely took up a few hours. Actually though it was a conflict that grew big enough that Jimin and Taehyung barely spoke to each other for two weeks and it culminated in Jimin getting drunk with Yoongi and then meeting Taehyung at a park at 4 am to make up. Yes, the same park at 4 am that Taehyung and Namjoon sing about in 4 O’Clock. That song, like many suspected, really was about Jimin and Taehyung as well.

But, while Friends might seem simple and fun on the outside, especially due to the upbeat melody and anthem like chorus, I think there is far more to it than meets the eye. Stella Jang, who co-wrote the lyrics, said in an interview with K-Pop Herald that BigHit sent her an email which contained the song as well as long stories about Jimin’s and Taehyung’s bond and based on that she was supposed to write short lyrics. She also had a friend, who is an ARMY, help her truly understand the depth of their bond. That alone to me shows that this goes far deeper than most might assume, and others wish for it.

Hello my alien We’re each other’s mystery Would it be why it’s more special

This verse for me is very interesting, especially since Jimin reclaims a nickname that people used to call Taehyung by which he hated. Instead Jimin turned it into something endearing, something that now belongs to them instead of others. It’s also noteworthy that that specific line is in English, not Korean, and he says my alien, so basically telling the listener that he takes some kind of claim over Taehyung, connects them in a way that anyone would understand, and unmistakably highlights that he’s the only one to call him like this because Taehyung is special to him, much the way you’d call someone dear to you/someone you love by an endearment such as ‘my darling’ or ‘my love’. 

More below the cut:

The mystery part could refer to the early days of their friendship, the times when they were just getting to know each other and trying to figure out their dynamic and each other in a more general sense. We know they almost instantly became friends, stuck to each other and spent a lot of time together, despite constantly getting in little fights, but perhaps those struggles were what made the end result that much more special to them. Interesting to note is also how Jimin once said that when he saw Tae for the first time he experienced many different emotions (he didn’t specify which ones though), and how to this day he remembers Tae only wearing those red shorts and snapback and how even then he already looked like an idol/celebrity. 

But the line could also refer to something more recent, or something more overarching, like a secret about themselves that only they know about, that they share and guard together.

Someday, when these cheers die down, stay hey Stay with me by my side Forever, keep staying here, hey

and

Someday, when these cheers die down, stay hey You are my soulmate Forever, keep staying here, hey You are my soulmate

These two might just be the most important parts of the song, and the ones that seem to be the hardest to swallow for some. This is basically Jimin and Taehyung asking each other to stay together forever, even when (or especially when) their careers will be over and BTS won’t be such a main and overarching reason for them to stay by each other anymore, so to speak. It implies that what they have is something they want to last forever, that it reaches far beyond them just being two best friends inside a group, but that they are rather two people who found ‘their person’ in each other. They know they’ve found something one of a kind, once in a lifetime, and want to hold on to it, to each other. It’s also them proclaiming and reminding everyone once again that they are soulmates, that this isn’t just something ARMY made up, some shipping agenda or anything like it, but that it is truly the title they see most fit for each other, that it basically feels like their bond was destiny and they were always meant to be together. You are my soulmate is also in English, something that every listener will understand, something so important they specifically made it this way so you wouldn’t need to look up translations from Korean to get it.

Sidenote--somehow soulmate has become a very debated term in connection to vmin so lets look at the definition for soulmate that wikipedia gives us: A soulmate is a person with whom one has a feeling of deep or natural affinity. This may involve similarity, love, romance, platonic relationships, comfort, intimacy, sexuality, sexual activity, spirituality, compatibility and trust. Most of these are rather connected to the most traditional way in which people imagine soulmates, as in two people destined for each other, lovers perfect for one another. Of course there are friendship type soulmates, but those are far more rare in peoples minds. The point I’m getting at is that Jimin and Taehyung never defined which type of soulmate they are, and until I saw non-vminies have a fight about how they’re definitely just platonic ones, I never even really saw the word soulmate in connection with ‘platonic’. In a way you could argue that both sides are right, that they are both friendship soulmates but also romantic ones as well, their bond encompassing both. But in the end, of course, that’s something only they can confirm yet I thought I’ll mention it anyway.

Like your pinky, we’re still the same I know your everything We must trust each other Don’t forget Instead of an obvious thank-you, you and I — let’s promise that we won’t fight tomorrow, for real

These lines may seem so simple, short and sweet, but I think there is a lot of meaning to them, a lot that’s written between the lines and potentially only something they understand the true extent of. I know your everything is another reminder that they are each others secret keepers, each others closest confidants, their person to go to and laugh or cry or celebrate with. Jimin and Taehyung have something that is rare, one of a kind, and it’s something beautiful that should be regarded with respect and wonder since it’s close to a miracle that they met and formed their bond in such a manner. After all Jimin is from Busan and Taehyung from Daegu, chances are, if BTS hadn’t happened, they might’ve never met, though looking at everything BTS have said about each other, they seem to believe they were all destined to meet regardless if as members of BTS or as normal people. The same most likely would’ve also have been the case for Jimin and Taehyung, and Friends is a beautiful piece of proof of that.

Many dismiss Friends as just a song about their friendship, but I think once you truly think about the lyrics and the thoughts that must’ve gone into it, you might change your mind. Even more so when you take into account what Namjoon said about Friends in his MOTS:7 vlive, how he wouldn’t even dare try writing any of the lyrics because he could never, ever do them justice, and how just thinking about the bond Taehyung and Jimin have, he gets goosebumps. That alone already says a lot, implies a lot of different things, very deep and (in my opinion) potentially more than just friends type things. There was also a moment during Bon Voyage 3 in Malta where Namjoon and Seokjin were at a restaurant together and somehow they brought up Taehyung and Jimin and both just shook their heads at how they are just--something, something apparently meaningful enough neither dared to voice it.

Friends might not be something you’d call a traditionally romantic or love song by any means, at least sound wise, but I’d argue the lyrics tell a completely different story, one of a bond that binds two souls, that combines friendship and love (both the love you have for a cherished friend, but also the one you feel for a romantic partner, I’d argue). The song, as well as 4 O’Clock are far more than meets the eye, you just have to be open and willing enough to see it.

After all Taehyung did say: “95z is love.” The biggest clue of them all.

(Lyric snippets taken from 친구 (Friends))

[sunnypogue]

coho!rafe + the video (blurb)

big thanks to scout for helping me map this out!!

warning: NSFW. 18+, some dubious consent issues with the video. (it’s necessary to note that rafe sending this video to himself without consent is NOT okay. like a very big violation of privacy. however, this is fiction, so...just know I don’t condone that shit in real life!) also, please use protection. xx.

--

“Bro, watch your fucking elbows!”

“You watch your elbows, fucker!”

Your head darted back and forth as the teammates shot insults at each other from their respective sides of the beer pong table. You were supposed to play the winner, but at the rate this game was going, you wouldn’t be playing anytime soon.

“Hey,” A hand rested on your shoulder, voice grabbing your attention, “we up soon?”

You shook your head, “Dumb and dumber over here have been arguing about the rules for the past 10 minutes. I don’t think they’ve sunk a cup yet.”

Your pong partner laughed, “Well, just yell when someone loses. I’ll be over -”

“Cameron! Get your ass in here, Matty just said we couldn’t shotgun these claws in one go!”

Rafe’s head turned towards the kitchen, where his defense partner (and resident dumbass), Luke, was holding two jumbo mango White Claws next to his head.

“Oh, fuck you Matty - shit, Y/N, come film this.” Rafe grabbed your arm, dragging you behind him. “I need proof so I don’t have to keep chugging shit at parties to prove my idiot teammates wrong.” 

You watched with a wry smile, your phone camera capturing as Rafe stabbed the cans with his house key, before shotgunning the seltzer, Luke finishing immediately after him, letting out a huge burp.

“Oh, fucking gross, Luke.” You yelled, ending the recording.

“Alright - fuck this! Someone come play Jonesy in pong with his fucking weird ass rules.” A voice boomed from the other room, where the now defunct BP game was happening. “I’ve never had someone talk about elbows so much, you fucking boner.”

You made eye contact with Rafe, grinning as he wiped the remnants of white claw off his lips. 

“Pong?” You mouthed, pocketing your phone, before making your way into the living room, Rafe close behind.

-- 

A few hours later, you were posted up on the couch, one of the stragglers at the hockey kickback, listening to Matty and Jonesy debating the merits of wearing a cage versus a bubble. Bored, and a little drunk, you pulled your phone out, intending to thumb through your instagram stories to drown out the sound of Matty yelling about how a bubble made you look like a “fucking bitch boy,” when your phone was snatched clean out of your hand.

“Hey!” You yelped, swinging an arm out to grab your phone, which now sat comfortably in the palm of Rafe’s hand.

“Hey!” He mimicked. “Gimme your password, I need to airdrop that video to myself.”

You rolled your eyes, “Okay, turn it around.”

Rafe pointed your front camera at you, letting FaceID flick your phone open. “Thanks.”

You waved a hand dismissively, standing up from the sunken-in couch. “I’m gonna pee, just don’t go anywhere with it. Stay here.” You gave him a pointed look before wobbling your way to the upstairs bathroom (the only one that was bound to have toilet paper at this rate.)

Rafe took your spot on the couch, fumbling through your phone with drunken accuracy (or at least, that’s what he’d say when you found out he posted a selfie to your insta story), trying to locate the video you had taken earlier. He maneuvered his way to your “Videos” tab, eyeing the most recent one. However, the finger holding the phone accidentally touched the top of the app, sending the screen to the very top of your extensive video collection. Rafe groaned, going to thumb his way back down, when he noticed the screencap of a particular video, nestled at the top corner of your phone. 

If anyone asked, he clicked on it to confirm that his eyes weren’t playing tricks on him, that he wasn’t seeing things - because there was no fucking way this was on your phone.

When the video loaded to full screen, Rafe almost dropped the phone. Apparently, his eyes weren’t deceiving him. You had a video, a full, one minute, twenty three second video, of (whom he was assuming was) yourself, bent over someone’s bed, getting fucked by someone with a massive fucking cock. 

Rafe’s thumb hit play before his brain could stop him. He watched, wide eyed, as this random dude fucking railed you, cock practically splitting you in half. Watched as he held your hands to the base of your back, watched as you took it so fucking good.

And then a voice broke his reverie.

“Cameron, dude - you good?” Jonsey leaned over, apparently finished with his bubble v. cage argument. “You’ve been staring at that phone for like, a while.”

Rafe jumped, turning the phone over on his knee. “Yeah, just airdropping something. Service sucks in here man.”

He waited until Jonesy’s redirected his attention elsewhere, before he turned the phone back over, airdropping himself the video of you getting railed.

You returned to the couch minutes later, a sleepy smile on your face. “You get it?” You asked, extending your hand for the phone. 

Rafe slid it back to you, “Yup - thanks.”

--

A couple nights later, Rafe was on his bed, head propped up by a couple of pillows, the video of you pulled up on his phone. He had watched it so many times, it was practically burned into his memory - the sounds of you taking it, the way you tilted your cunt to get it deeper, the way you would respond when he’d smack your ass, or pull your hair - it was addicting, seeing you like this. Rafe had never thought he’d see you, his sweet, little friend, getting fucked within an inch of your life.

It made him think about all the ways he’d fuck you - better than whoever the fuck took the video than you. Rafe thought about it constantly - fucking you in the shower, hiking your leg up to spread that sweet little cunt, fucking you in the car, pulled over on the side of an abandoned road, bent over the side of the passenger seat, hands holding on to the center console as Rafe fucked into you, door open. Rafe thought about fucking you the same way you were fucked in the video, relentlessly pounding his cock into your cunt, pulling you back onto his cock when you were close to finishing, spanking you when you begged to come - just filthy.

Rafe was so lost in thought, he didn’t hear the knock on his door, or the small creak as his door opened, or the little voice going, “Rafe?”

Rafe didn’t notice anything until you were standing at the foot of his bed, looking at him quizzically. “What are you doing?”

Rafe jumped, phone flying out of his hands. “Nothing - nothing. What the fuck are you doing here?”

You rolled your eyes. “I texted you that I was coming to grab my accounting book. I still haven’t read for class tomorrow.” You looked around the room, trying to eye the massive red textbook. “Why are you so sweaty? It’s like, 50 degrees out.”

Rafe shrugged. “It’s hot in here.”

You gave him a look. “No, it’s not, but okay weirdo.” You moved to grab his phone, now laying face up at the foot of his bed, screen dim. “Sorry for scaring you. Here’s your - ” You stopped, registering what was paused on his screen.

Rafe grabbed the phone from your grasp, realizing you may have seen a bit too much. “The book is over there.” He pointed at his desk, attempting to deflect.

You just gaped at him. “Is that - fuck, was that - ”

“It’s not what it looks like.”

“Was that me?” You finally finished your sentence, arms crossing in front of you. “Was that - where did you get that?”

Rafe slowly stood, holding his hands in front of him as if to not startle you. “Look, I’m not proud of this but - ”

“How did you get that?” You whispered, still in shock. “I thought I deleted all of those.”

Rafe looked down at his feet, sheepish. “I accidentally saw it on your phone when I was airdropping shit at Matty’s last weekend. I - I don’t know why I airdropped it to myself, but fuck. I’m fucking glad I did.”

You looked at him. “Rafe, what the fuck! That’s so fucking embarassing for me - delete that!”

Rafe grabbed your wrist that was reaching for the phone. “Why the hell is that embarrassing for you? Y/N, that is literally the hottest fucking shit I’ve ever seen. You - you’re fucking gorgeous, you know?”

You matched Rafe’s heated gaze, staring at him as he kept his grip on your wrist. “I’m literally getting fucked by my ex in that video, Rafe.” You bit your lip, cheeks flushing from remembering the contents of that particular video. “How the hell is that hot for you?”

Rafe pulled you closer. “Because I’ve never seen you like that - you’re always so reserved around me. To see you unedited, raw - just fucking taking it like that. How would that not be hot for anyone?”

You blushed, looking away. “I - I don’t - ”

“I’d like to see you like that, in person, if that’s alright with you.”

You gaped up at him. “What?”

Rafe grinned, teeth nearly glittering in the dim light of the bedroom. “I’d like to fuck you. Better than your ex. Is that alright with you?”

You found yourself nodding - you weren’t sure what world you were currently existing in, but if it was a world where Rafe Cameron (aka the boy you had been harboring a crush on since you met him freshman year) wanted to fuck your brains out after watching a video of your ex-boyfriend fucking your brains out - well, you weren’t complaining.

You let Rafe pull you in for a kiss, let Rafe slide your sweatpants off, let Rafe slip his cold hands under your sweatshirt (causing you to squeal, not expecting the temperature change). Rafe let you tug his shirt off, let you run your hands over his defined shoulders and arms, let you palm his cock through his boxers. It was soft, sweet and exploratory.

Until it wasn’t.

When Rafe tweaked your nipple, you responded by sinking your teeth into his bottom lip - just enough to bruise. He pulled away, a glint in his eye, hands going to slide your sweatshirt off, leaving you completely naked. 

“You wanna play that game?”

You slipped your thumb between your teeth, biting down softly as you walked to the edge of his bed. You went to bend yourself over the mattress, forearms propping your chest up, hair swept over your shoulder. “Why don’t you come over here and find out?”

Rafe growled, taking two steps over to where you were positioned, before sliding his cock out of his boxers. He grabbed his length, jacking it a couple times as he rubbed the head against your clit, leaving a trail of precome in its wake.

“You want it, baby?”

You nodded, leaning back into his cock. Rafe tutted, pulling away completely, smiling when you let out a soft whine. “Words, honey. You gotta tell me.”

You turned your head, looking Rafe dead in the eye. “For fuck’s sake Cameron, get in me.”

Rafe laughed, tapping his cock on your cunt a couple of times, before slowly sliding in, letting you get used to the stretch. You groaned, walls clenching around his length, hands gripping the bedspread as you let your body adjust. Rafe kept his long, slow slide going, until he was balls deep, pelvis snug up against your ass. He was still, just for a moment, before rolling his hips, letting his cock nudge up against your g-spot. You moaned, head dropping to the comforter. You hadn’t felt this full - well, since your ex.

“You good, babe?” Rafe asked, chuckling a bit at your reaction.

“God, Rafe - fuck me.”

Rafe leaned forward, prying your hands from the comforter, tugging them gently behind your back. He swatted at your ass twice, loving the way you tilted into the sensation, before grabbing your hair, pulling you up just enough to get your chest off the bed. 

“This okay?”

You nodded as best you could with his hand in your hair. “I swear to God, Rafe, if you don’t move right now I’ll - ”

“What? What are you gonna do?” He taunted.

You whined, rolling your hips against his cock, which was still stuffed deep in your cunt. “Rafe, please.”

Rafe chuckled under his breath. “Fuck, I could get used to hearing that - hold on, pretty girl. I’ve got ya.”

[blackbloodunderthemoonlight]

Lovecraft Country (2020) S01E01 “Sundown”

James Baldwin debates William F. Buckley (1965)

“Good evening,

I find myself, not for the first time, in the position of a kind of Jeremiah. For example, I don’t disagree with Mr. Burford that the inequality suffered by the American Negro population of the United States has hindered the American dream. Indeed, it has. I quarrell with some other things he has to say. The other, deeper, element of a certain awkwardness I feel has to do with one’s point of view. I have to put it that way – one’s sense, one’s system of reality. It would seem to me the proposition before the House, and I would put it that way, is the American Dream at the expense of the American Negro, or the American Dream *is* at the expense of the American Negro. Is the question hideously loaded, and then one’s response to that question – one’s reaction to that question – has to depend on effect and, in effect, where you find yourself in the world, what your sense of reality is, what your system of reality is. That is, it depends on assumptions which we hold so deeply as to be scarcely aware of them.

A white South African or Mississippi sharecropper, or Mississippi sheriff, or a Frenchman driven out of Algeria, all have, at bottom, a system of reality which compels them to, for example, in the case of the French exile from Algeria, to defend French reasons from having ruled Algeria. The Mississippi or Alabama sheriff, who really does believe, when he’s facing a Negro boy or girl, that this woman, this man, this child must be insane to attack the system to which he owes his entire identity. Of course, to such a person, the proposition which we are trying to discuss here tonight does not exist. And on the other hand, I, have to speak as one of the people who’ve been most attacked by what we now must here call the Western or European system of reality. What white people in the world, what we call white supremacy – I hate to say it here – comes from Europe. It’s how it got to America. Beneath then, whatever one’s reaction to this proposition is, has to be the question of whether or not civilizations can be considered, as such, equal, or whether one’s civilization has the right to overtake and subjugate, and, in fact, to destroy another. Now, what happens when that happens. Leaving aside all the physical facts that one can quote. Leaving aside, rape or murder. Leaving aside the bloody catalog of oppression, which we are in one way too familiar with already, what this does to the subjugated, the most private, the most serious thing this does to the subjugated, is to destroy his sense of reality. It destroys, for example, his father’s authority over him. His father can no longer tell him anything, because the past has disappeared, and his father has no power in the world. This means, in the case of an American Negro, born in that glittering republic, and the moment you are born, since you don’t know any better, every stick and stone and every face is white.

And since you have not yet seen a mirror, you suppose that you are, too. It comes as a great shock around the age of 5, or 6, or 7, to discover that the flag to which you have pledged allegiance, along with everybody else, has not pledged allegiance to you. It comes as a great shock to discover that Gary Cooper killing off the Indians, when you were rooting for Gary Cooper, that the Indians were you. It comes as a great shock to discover that the country which is your birthplace and to which you owe your life and your identity, has not, in its whole system of reality, evolved any place for you. The disaffection, the demoralization, and the gap between one person and another only on the basis of the color of their skin, begins there and accelerates – accelerates throughout a whole lifetime – to the present when you realize you’re thirty and are having a terrible time managing to trust your countrymen. By the time you are thirty, you have been through a certain kind of mill. And the most serious effect of the mill you’ve been through is, again, not the catalog of disaster, the policemen, the taxi drivers, the waiters, the landlady, the landlord, the banks, the insurance companies, the millions of details, twenty four hours of every day, which spell out to you that you are a worthless human being. It is not that. It’s by that time that you’ve begun to see it happening, in your daughter or your son, or your niece or your nephew.

You are thirty by now and nothing you have done has helped to escape the trap. But what is worse than that, is that nothing you have done, and as far as you can tell, nothing you can do, will save your son or your daughter from meeting the same disaster and not impossibly coming to the same end. Now, we’re speaking about expense. I suppose there are several ways to address oneself, to some attempt to find what that word means here. Let me put it this way, that from a very literal point of view, the harbors and the ports, and the railroads of the country–the economy, especially of the Southern states–could not conceivably be what it has become, if they had not had, and do not still have, indeed for so long, for many generations, cheap labor. I am stating very seriously, and this is not an overstatement: *I* picked the cotton, *I* carried it to the market, and *I* built the railroads under someone else’s whip for nothing. For nothing.

The Southern oligarchy, which has still today so very much power in Washington, and therefore some power in the world, was created by my labor and my sweat, and the violation of my women and the murder of my children. This, in the land of the free, and the home of the brave.And no one can challenge that statement. It is a matter of historical record.

In another way, this dream, and we’ll get to the dream in a moment, is at the expense of the American Negro. You watched this in the Deep South in great relief. But not only in the Deep South. In the Deep South, you are dealing with a sheriff or a landlord, or a landlady or a girl of the Western Union desk, and she doesn’t know quite who she’s dealing with, by which I mean, that if you’re not a part of the town, and if you are a Northern Nigger, it shows in millions of ways. So she simply knows that it’s an unknown quantity, and she wants to have nothing to do with it because she won’t talk to you, you have to wait for a while to get your telegram. OK, we all know this. We’ve been through it and, by the time you get to be a man, it’s very easy to deal with. But what is happening in the poor woman, the poor man’s mind is this: they’ve been raised to believe, and by now they helplessly believe, that no matter how terrible their lives may be, and their lives have been quite terrible, and no matter how far they fall, no matter what disaster overtakes them, they have one enormous knowledge in consolation, which is like a heavenly revelation: at least, they are not Black.

Now, I suggest that of all the terrible things that can happen to a human being, that is one of the worst. I suggest that what has happened to white Southerners is in some ways, after all, much worse than what has happened to Negroes there because Sheriff Clark in Selma, Alabama, cannot be considered – you know, no one can be dismissed as a total monster. I’m sure he loves his wife, his children. I’m sure, you know, he likes to get drunk. You know, after all, one’s got to assume he is visibly a man like me. But he doesn’t know what drives him to use the club, to menace with the gun and to use the cattle prod. Something awful must have happened to a human being to be able to put a cattle prod against a woman’s breasts, for example. What happens to the woman is ghastly. What happens to the man who does it is in some ways much, much worse. This is being done, after all, not a hundred years ago, but in 1965, in a country which is blessed with what we call prosperity, a word we won’t examine too closely; with a certain kind of social coherence, which calls itself a civilized nation, and which espouses the notion of the freedom of the world. And it is perfectly true from the point of view now simply of an American Negro. Any American Negro watching this, no matter where he is, from the vantage point of Harlem, which is another terrible place, has to say to himself, in spite of what the government says – the government says we can’t do anything about it – but if those were white people being murdered in Mississippi work farms, being carried off to jail, if those were white children running up and down the streets, the government would find some way of doing something about it. We have a civil rights bill now where an amendment, the fifteenth amendment, nearly a hundred years ago – I hate to sound again like an Old Testament prophet – but if the amendment was not honored then, I would have any reason to believe in the civil rights bill will be honored now. And after all one’s been there, since before, you know, a lot of other people got there. If one has got to prove one’s title to the land, isn’t four hundred years enough? Four hundred years? At least three wars? The American soil is full of the corpses of my ancestors. Why is my freedom or my citizenship, or my right to live there, how is it conceivably a question now? And I suggest further, and in the same way, the moral life of Alabama sheriffs and poor Alabama ladies – white ladies – their moral lives have been destroyed by the plague called color, that the American sense of reality has been corrupted by it.

At the risk of sounding excessive, what I always felt, when I finally left the country, and found myself abroad, in other places, and watched the Americans abroad – and these are my countrymen – and I do care about them, and even if I didn’t, there is something between us. We have the same shorthand, I know, if I look at a boy or a girl from Tennessee, where they came from in Tennessee and what that means. No Englishman knows that. No Frenchman, no one in the world knows that, except another Black man who comes from the same place. One watches these lonely people denying the only kin they have. We talk about integration in America as though it was some great new conundrum. The problem in America is that we’ve been integrated for a very long time. Put me next to any African and you will see what I mean. My grandmother was not a rapist. What we are not facing is the result of what we’ve done. What one brings the American people to do for all our sake is simply to accept our history. I was there not only as a slave, but also as a concubine. One knows the power, after all, which can be used against another person if you’ve got absolute power over that person.

It seemed to me when I watched Americans in Europe what they didn’t know about Europeans was what they didn’t know about me. They weren’t trying, for example, to be nasty to the French girl, or rude to the French waiter. They didn’t know they hurt their feelings. They didn’t have any sense this particular woman, this particular man, though they spoke another language and had different manners and ways, was a human being. And they walked over them, the same kind of bland ignorance, condescension, charming and cheerful with which they’ve always pat me on the head and called me Shine and were upset when I was upset. What is relevant about this is that whereas forty years ago when I was born, the question of having to deal with what is unspoken by the subjugated, what is never said to the master, of ever having to deal with this reality was a very remote possibility. It was in no one’s mind. When I was growing up, I was taught in American history books, that Africa had no history, and neither did I. That I was a savage about whom the less said, the better, who had been saved by Europe and brought to America. And, of course, I believed it. I didn’t have much choice. Those were the only books there were. Everyone else seemed to agree.

If you walk out of Harlem, ride out of Harlem, downtown, the world agrees what you see is much bigger, cleaner, whiter, richer, safer than where you are. They collect the garbage. People obviously can pay their life insurance. Their children look happy, safe. You’re not. And you go back home, and it would seem that, of course, that it’s an act of God that this is true! That you belong where white people have put you.

It is only since the Second World War that there’s been a counter-image in the world. And that image did not come about through any legislation or part of any American government, but through the fact that Africa was suddenly on the stage of the world, and Africans had to be dealt with in a way they’d never been dealt with before. This gave an American Negro for the first time a sense of himself beyond the savage or a clown. It has created and will create a great many conundrums. One of the great things that the white world does not know, but I think I do know, is that Black people are just like everybody else. One has used the myth of Negro and the myth of color to pretend and to assume that you were dealing with, essentially, with something exotic, bizarre, and practically, according to human laws, unknown. Alas, it is not true. We’re also mercenaries, dictators, murderers, liars. We are human too.

What is crucial here is that unless we can manage to accept, establish some kind of dialog between those people whom I pretend have paid for the American dream and those other people who have not achieved it, we will be in terrible trouble. I want to say, at the end, the last, is that what concerns me most. We are sitting in this room, and we are all, at least I’d like to think we are, relatively civilized, and we can talk to each other at least on certain levels so that we could walk out of here assuming that the measure of our enlightenment, or at least, our politeness, has some effect on the world. It may not.

I remember, for example, when the ex Attorney General, Mr. Robert Kennedy, said that it was conceivable that in forty years, in America, we might have a Negro president. That sounded like a very emancipated statement, I suppose, to white people. They were not in Harlem when this statement was first heard. And they’re not here, and possibly will never hear the laughter and the bitterness, and the scorn with which this statement was greeted. From the point of view of the man in the Harlem barber shop, Bobby Kennedy only got here yesterday, and he’s already on his way to the presidency. We’ve been here for four hundred years and now he tells us that maybe in forty years, if you’re good, we may let you become president.

What is dangerous here is the turning away from – the turning away  from – anything any white American says. The reason for the political hesitation, in spite of the Johnson landslide is that one has been betrayed by American politicians for so long. And I am a grown man and perhaps I can be reasoned with. I certainly hope I can be. But I don’t know, and neither does Martin Luther King, none of us know how to deal with those other people whom the white world has so long ignored, who don’t believe anything the white world says and don’t entirely believe anything I or Martin is saying. And one can’t blame them. You watch what has happened to them in less than twenty years.

It seems to me that the City of New York, for example – this is my last point – Its had Negroes in it for a very long time. If the city of New York were able, as it has indeed been able, in the last fifteen years to reconstruct itself, tear down buildings and raise great new ones, downtown and for money, and has done nothing whatever except build housing projects in the ghetto for the Negroes. And of course, Negroes hate it. Presently the property does indeed deteriorate because the children cannot bear it. They want to get out of the ghetto. If the American pretensions were based on more solid, a more honest assessment of life and of themselves, it would not mean for Negroes when someone says “Urban Renewal” that Negroes can simply are going to be thrown out into the streets. This is just what it does mean now. This is not an act of God. We’re dealing with a society made and ruled by men. Had the American Negro had not been present in America, I am convinced the history of the American labor movement would be much more edifying than it is. It is a terrible thing for an entire people to surrender to the notion that one-ninth of its population is beneath them. And until that moment, until the moment comes when we, the Americans, we, the American people, are able to accept the fact, that I have to accept, for example, that my ancestors are both white and Black. That on that continent we are trying to forge a new identity for which we need each other and that I am not a ward of America. I am not an object of missionary charity. I am one of the people who built the country–until this moment there is scarcely any hope for the American dream, because the people who are denied participation in it, by their very presence, will wreck it. And if that happens it is a very grave moment for the West.

Thank you.”

[cognacdelights]

A Note To Society

This is something that I’ve been debating whether I should post or not. It includes things which are very, deeply personal to me and is not something that I share with many people. 

This sleep-deprived, chaotic ramble includes some of my most personal and deepest of thoughts, feelings and personal experiences. Please don’t feel obliged to read this, or all of this. 

At the end of the day, I am still a person with feelings, so please, if you so choose to read, please be kind. 

Trigger Warning: Sexual harassment. Sexual assault. Mental health. I haven’t edited this so there may be spelling/grammar mistakes. 

So, as I’m writing this it’s 6am. I have a lot of things on my mind following a very triggering conversation with somebody earlier this morning and need to get this off my chest for the sake of my sanity, and my own mental health. This post contains very personal details of events that have happened to me over the years and therefore I only feel comfortable sharing this on a platform where I can remain somewhat anonymous (providing I decide to post this at all); I am still dealing with these events and so choosing who I share these details with within in my close personal relationships - which is currently limited to a very small number of people - is very important to my mental health.

I am twenty one years old. I’m twenty one years old and I have a long list of events and situations where I have been taken advantage of, sexually harassed and/or sexually assaulted by a man. I’m twenty one years old and have more individual instances of negative and harmful experiences with the male gender than positive. I have a generalised anxiety disorder, caused by a particular instance of harrassment that has completely changed my way of life. I’m twenty one years old and flinch when a man touches me - whether I’ve known this man for years, or just met them; whether I am comfortable around this man, or not; whether I am anticipating the contact, or not. I’m twenty one years old and have not only endured a long list of instances where I have been violated, but have also had my experiences joked about, invalidated and completely disregarded.

The first instance where I was taken advantage of was when I was 15 years old. I didn’t have many friends during my final two years of school and spent most of my time with a boy in my year. Everybody had come to the conclusion that me and him were “a thing” despite me putting them straight. So, when he invited me to a party at his house, and to spend the night with what I assumed would be a large group of us who couldn’t go home drunk to their parents, I accepted. Obviously, I lied to my parents about where I was going and who I was with - as most other people would have done. So when I got to his house (which was at the time about an 45 minutes to an hour by car from my house), I was confused to see nobody else there - and there be no sign of a party. He had lied to me about the whole situation to get me to his house. There was in fact a party... the night before. So when I asked people about the party at “unnamed boy’s” house, they all knew exactly what I was talking about. Not having a good relationship with my parents, I didn’t feel as though I could come clean about the situation and decided that I had to go through with spending the night at his house. He pressured me into drinking from quite early on and by the time it had come to sleep, I was very drunk. I don’t remember exactly what happened between the time we started drinking and going to sleep, but I do remember that he let me sleep in his bed and he had made a bed up on the floor. However, when I woke up the next morning, he was in the bed with me. It was only a single bed and he had trapped me against the wall so couldn’t get out. I was terrified. I had pretty much no recollection of what had happened and just wanted to go home. I felt uncomfortable and violated. The following Monday at school, I had heard my name being whispered, had people staring at me and laughing at me. The boy had taken pictures of us in bed together, sent them around to people and had told them I had slept with him. I felt disgusted. I still do. It was to the point that I felt as though I had to move to a completely different area to continue my education after leaving school at 16, instead of staying at my original school to do my final two years of education. (Sixth form/college years).

The second notable incident which I remember was when I was 17. I was on the train home from a friend’s 18th birthday celebration and was quite obviously drunk. I remember this incident the most vividly and in explicit detail, despite being drunk. It was the night of the Manchester United vs Manchester City derby and the train was packed with football fans. There were no seats so I had to stand by the doors, and being drunk, I had to hold myself up against the railings beside the doors. A man, who was bordering twice my age, wearing a blue pin stripe suit and brown court shoes was drinking excessively on the train behind me. My train journey lasted 19 minutes - and for 15 of those minutes (yes, I counted down every painful minute until my stop) this man had himself pressed up against me, his hands underneath my skirt trying to get into my knickers, thrusting his semi-hard dick into the back of me, his lips on the back of my neck where his stubble rubbed against me so roughly it left a rash, and at one point had me pressed against the train doors. I tried to get away, but I was drunk and he was stronger than me. I told him to let go, but he refused. I was on a PACKED train with at least twenty to thirty other people just casually watching him do this to me. His friends laughed and cheered him on. Nobody, no other man, no other woman, even stepped in to help. They all just watched him do that despite my obvious attempts to get away, and my quite vocal pleas for him to stop. I can still smell his aftershave. To this day, the smell of Dior Sauvage makes me vomit. It gives me anxiety attacks. It took me three years to get back on a train. I even told somebody this time about what had happened, but I was told that I probably just misunderstood him; that I shouldn’t have been drinking; that I was being dramatic, and exaggerating the situation. These words came from my own mother. Do you know how dmaamging that is to a person when their own mother doesn’t believe that they’ve suffered this very frightening trauma? I had panic attacks before this, but had only really encountered them during exams, but after this I was diagnosed with a generalised anxiety disorder and now have to take daily medication to manage this. I was placed on the CAMHS waiting list, but due to this being so close to my 18th birthday, I never received my counselling because the waiting list was at least six months for my area.

Another significant event that happened was when I received my A Level results. It was a Thursday, and Thursday nights are student nights in my local town. That means free entry, 75p drinks and good music. Me and my friend went out to celebrate. We were only an hour into our night out when we met two other boys around our age, maybe a few years older. They bought us a drink, and within fifteen minutes I couldn’t see straight. I don’t know for sure, but I am almost certain that my drink had been spiked. I couldn’t even stand up straight. So one of the boys took me to the bar area and we sat at one of the tables. He pulled me into his lap and I by this point I was so out of it, I had my head on his shoulder. To anybody else, we looked close. Like we were a couple. His hands went under my dress and he shoved his fingers into me. I was in shock. I couldn’t even speak. My mind was screaming for him to stop, for my body to move but I couldn’t. I physically couldn’t do anything because of the state that I was in - I felt helpless as I let it happen. I was sick shortly after from both whatever was in my drink and the shock of the situation, and the bouncers kicked me out. He told them I was with him and that he would make sure that I would get home safe. I was incoherent, nothing I said was making sense, so they just let him take me. He shoved me into a taxi and gave them an address, but by some miraculous chance the taxi that he had shoved me into was one of the regular companies that I use. The driver knew me, he knew that wasn’t my address as he’d driven me home a countless number of times before and took me to my actual address. I refuse to think about what would have happened if I hadn’t have gotten into his taxi. To those day, that taxi driver takes me home free of charge every night out, or at least sends someone he trusts to take me home if he’s working the switchboards. I am very, very thankful and grateful for this man and his awareness.

Another significant event that happened, happened last year. I was 20 years old. I was visiting a few friends who had loved to London for university, and we had decided to go on an impromptu night out to the local nightclub. After a night of drinking, it was about half an hour before the club was supposed to shut. It had gotten to the point where it was too warm for me and another friend to handle, so we had decided to wait outside for our friends the short while until it closed. A boy that I had danced with earlier that night came up to me and had asked where I was staying. I explained that I was staying with friends, and he asked me to go back to his. I said no. He was very upset by this and continued to try and persuade me to go home with him, getting increasingly more aggressive with each rejection. Eventually, he shoved me against the wall and pinned me against it, holding my hands above my head. He shoved his hands into my jeans and tried to get down my knickers. I managed to kick him, to which he then punched me in the face repeatedly. He yelled disgusting names and disgusting things in my face, and spat on me. His friends, a huge crowd of people and several security guards/bouncers watched him do this to me. Again, not one person jumped in to help. I was visibly shaken by this, I had a severe anxiety attack and was in a hysterical fit of tears for quite some time after this. The one bouncer that actually acknowledged me told me that if I didn’t sort myself out that I would be a matter for the police, that I would be arrested for being drunk. No acknowledgement of what he has watched happen to me at all.

At 4am this morning I was sent an unsolicited dick pic through Facebook messenger by a man that I wasn’t even friends with. I didn’t know who he was, and when I confronted him about how I was obviously uncomfortable with this and informed him how it was in fact a form of sexual harassment and that he could be prosecuted for this if I do wish to take this matter to the police, as it is a crime, he proceeded to make fun of me. He insinuated that I was “psycho” and “crazy”, he laughed at me for not wanting to see his dick and proceeded to call me “boring” for not tolerating his behaviour. This may not seem as traumatising as the previous experiences I’ve gone on to discuss, but his obvious flippant, nonchalant attitude towards the matter of consent, his blatant disregard for my discomfort in the situation and just overall complete lack of respect for me as a person, and as a woman, has just brought about a flood of anxiety, suppressed trauma from my previous experiences and just a general and overwhelming surge of frustration and anger that people think it’s okay to treat a person in such a way.

I, as a woman, feel as though I have no respect, dignity or power. I feel as though I have been robbed of all of this by a countless number of men and several people close to me who should have been on my side. I feel as though my thoughts, feelings and experiences have been invalidated, mocked and just plain disregarded on a whole number of levels. I feel as though I have been forced into a society that excuses such behaviours, accepts such behaviours and in some circumstances encourages and praises such behaviours. I have been silenced on multiple occasions, and I am sick and tired of my voice not being heard when I speak out about the topic in general. I shouldn’t have to put up with a man forcing himself on me, but I do. I, we, live in a society where rape culture is still very much alive and ultimately thriving within the male population. It sickens me that these men and their behaviours are being passed off and excused by the “boys will be boys”/“that’s just how boys are” bullshit. It also disgusts me that I, we, live in a world where I have to justify being a victim; my sobriety does not determine my consent, my clothing does not determine my consent and my “reputation” does not determine my consent. That goes for any situation. Physical or virtual. The worst thing is, those situations I described previously are merely just the most notable, traumatic ones that I have faced - there have been an uncountable number of other situations. Some were so passive I didn’t even realise they were a sexual assault at the time. Some were more blatant. The point is, men need to be educated on rape culture, rape myths and their acceptance and the prevalence of this behaviour. We, as women, should not have to be taught to minimise the risk - we should be teaching men that this behaviour is unacceptable. The fact that I don’t know a single woman who doesn’t have a story of some form of sexual assault or harassment from a male is absolutely disgusting. It’s frightening.

Of course, I must acknowledge that sexual assault can happen to anyone; anyone can be a victim and anyone can be a perpetrator regardless of gender, age and other factors. I am merely speaking on my own personal experiences and am using these tired, early morning ramblings as a way of rationalising my anxious thoughts, expressing my frustrations towards my injustices and releasing such thoughts from my mind in an attempt at peace. I also acknowledge that there are people who have faced much worse circumstances than I have, and my heart truly goes out to them and anybody else who has been affected by sexual assault and harassment. It had permanently scarred me, tainted my view of the world and forced me into a different way of life, but I cannot imagine or even begin to process how somebody who has experienced much worse than me must feel, must think, must have to adjust themselves to accommodate the trauma.

[curiosity-killed]

a bow for the bad decision: 26

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(on ao3)

Theirs is a quiet walk. Lan Sizhui carries himself with his usual cheerful serenity, but both the other Lans are subdued, strained. Lan Jingyi’s shoulders are as hunched as they can be without breaking his posture fully, and Lan Zhan has a pinched look to his eyes like he’s fending off a migraine. Wei Wuxian should apologize, he knows. He shouldn’t have gotten so drunk and he shouldn’t have started it and he shouldn’t have let Lan Zhan kiss him — but the apology catches in his throat and sticks. Lan Zhan probably doesn’t even remember it, and at least that might save him some face. How mortified would he be to find out he’d acted on impulse in a vulnerable moment? It’s one thing for him to have once had feelings for Wei Wuxian, for the boy he used to be, but now? Wei Wuxian can’t stand the thought of his rejection, of being passed over for his own ghost — or worse, Lan Zhan feeling some obligation, some duty to Wei Wuxian. It’s better if they just pretend it never happened. He turns his thoughts to the safer parts of the night instead.

“Lan Zhan, whatever happened with the other Wen prisoners? The ones Chifeng-zun and Jiang Cheng were relocating?” he asks. All Wen Ning and Wen Qing’s clan were burnt to ash in the flames of Wei Wuxian’s pride, but maybe there are distant cousins, maybe there’s some family they can still find. It’s the least he could possibly do, a pitiful apology. Lan Zhan looks somewhat pained, and after receiving a small nod, it’s Lan Sizhui who answers. “There are six Wen resettlement camps, Senior Mo,” he explains. “Two in Qinghe and Yunmeng each, and one in Gusu and Lanling. We passed the one in Gusu when we stayed near Moling.” Lan Jingyi huffs out a derisive noise. “Moling Su’s best boast is that they were chosen to manage a camp,” he scoffs. “As if they’ve done anything but whine for help when fights break out.” “Jingyi,” Lan Sizhui scolds. “Moling Su?” Wei Wuxian echoes, looking to Lan Zhan. It’s been a long time since Madam Yu forced them all to memorize the minor sects of each region, but the name doesn’t sound at all familiar. Lan Zhan’s expression has tightened, eyes narrowing in the start of anger rather than just pain. “Ah they are a smaller sect started after the war by a former outer disciple of the Lan sect, Senior Mo,” Lan Sizhui says. Wei Wuxian’s eyebrows shoot up. He glances sideways to find Lan Zhan’s lips thinned, taut disdain across his face. “What did he do to get kicked out?” he demands. After the burning of Cloud Recesses, the Lan sect had hardly been in a position to eject healthy cultivators. While they’d suffered fewer casualties than Yunmeng Jiang, more of the elderly and very young had survived than those of fighting age. “Su She made his choice during the war,” Lan Zhan says, heavy with finality. Frowning at him a moment, Wei Wuxian debates pressing for more before deciding to let it go. Lan Zhan has always hated gossip, but this seems more serious, more personal. “May I ask why you’re interested, Senior Mo?” Lan Sizhui asks. “Is it because of the Gh— erm Wen-qianbei?” “Is the Ghost General really going to lead all the Wens in a rebellion to take over the world?” Lan Jingyi blurts out. Wei Wuxian recoils. “Wen Ning?” he says. “Wen Ning is as gentle as can be. He’d never lead a rebellion. Where are you hearing such things?” Despite his earlier reticence, Lan Jingyi seems to have overcome his hangover in pursuit of this bizarre conspiracy. He glances only briefly at Lan Zhan before launching in. “There have been all those rebellions in resettlement camps and now that the Ghost General is back, people are saying how they’re going to start a new war,” he says. “That after being kept prisoner for so long, they’re going to revolt and get revenge.” “Lan Jingyi,” Lan Zhan reprimands. “Do not speak rashly.” Lan Jingyi shrinks in on himself, ducking his head.  “ “Sorry, Hanguang-jun,” he mumbles. Turning this information over, Wei Wuxian feels a jolt of alarm. If people think Wen Ning is leading some rebellion and he’s seen in Yunmeng Jiang robes, where Wen Qing is the sect leader’s wife— “Lan Zhan, has there been any trouble with Jiang Cheng and Wen Qing marrying?” he asks, urgent. “Anyone who opposed it?” Lan Zhan frowns slightly, looking at him as if he can’t quite follow the jumps Wei Wuxian’s made. “It was a private ceremony, I am told,” he says. “I heard of no objections.” “A private—?” Wei Wuxian recoils, briefly distracted. Jiang Cheng had a private wedding? Jiang Cheng? They’d spent hours as kids going over all the details for shijie’s wedding, but it wasn’t like they never talked about Jiang Cheng’s. As sect heir, he would have been expected to have a formal, political affair — doubly so as a young sect leader. Wei Wuxian can hardly picture him having some subdued ceremony. Tilting his head in question, Lan Zhan reaches out his hand, almost touches Wei Wuxian’s elbow before retreating. Always almost. Wei Wuxian swallows and shakes his head. “I’m not sure,” he says. “I think there might be something else going on.” Worry wrinkles Lan Zhan’s brow, but he only gives a slight nod of acceptance. Wei Wuxian’s grateful for it, even as he tries to juggle each of the puzzles he finds in his lap for the rest of their walk. The dismembered corpse, his own resurrection, Lan Zhan’s insistent kiss, and now the Wens again. He’s uneasy with all these floating pieces, these unstrung beads rolling around in his mind. Somehow they must connect, but the strings tying them elude him. That night, when Lan Zhan has left to check the area around their camp, Wei Wuxian finds himself sitting alone across the fire from the Lan juniors. Fidgeting with the edge of his sleeve where it peeks out from under his bracer, he hesitates. After turning it over, trying to piece together Jin Ling’s comment and the haze-soft memory of the night before and those older memories, the ones a little faded by time and dying, he still doesn’t have an answer. So. Who better to ask than the upstanding disciples of Gusu Lan themselves? “So,” he says, leaning back on his hands, “what does your headband mean anyway?” Lan Jingyi’s eyes widen, eyebrows flying up so fast, Wei Wuxian wants to tease him about them escaping. Even in the fireglow, Wei Wuxian can see the way his whole face goes white before flushing, his fugitive eyebrows slamming down into a scowl that would impress even Jiang Cheng. “How dare you!” he snaps — and oh, that’s actual anger, not just indignation. “How can you treat Hanguang-jun so callously? After all he’s done for you and you—” “Jingyi!” Sizhui pleads, reaching out a hand. Wei Wuxian can’t move. He’s pinned by this child’s righteous anger. Zewu-jun’s words come back to him from another life, from the morning they left for Qinghe. His ribs are splitting backwards, a bone-and-blood butterfly splayed open over an aching cavity. “How can you be so thoughtless,” Lan Jingyi continues, raised up like he’s going to walk over and punch Wei Wuxian. “When he’s already lost his chosen one and now given you such an honor and you throw it away like—” Wei Wuxian is in an icy cave, bowing with a ribbon around his wrist. He is in the library listening to the tale of Lan An founding the sect with his beloved. Wei Wuxian is standing on a mountain of corpses and Lan Zhan is pleading with him and Wei Wuxian can only watch in horror as his own lips shape steel-sharp lies. “I would rather die—” He is on his feet, bolting, before he has thought of escape. Behind him, there’s a sudden cut off and muted noises of protest. He doesn’t listen. His feet carry him from the fire, past the last line of trees, to the edge of the creek. They stop and he is left holding himself together like the raw edges of a mortal wound. Closing his eyes, he forces himself to play out the memory once more, in meticulous detail. The shields, the lightning-scarred tree, the start of the end. The thrum of the Seal, all cruel delight as it climbed over him, hand over hooked hand. Lan Zhan begging. Jiang Cheng. The Seal. The end. He doesn’t feel like vomiting. He doesn’t feel like anything. He has been emptied, wrung out, pummeled by the currents of his own choosing. His heart is a bruise, a stab wound, the oily hollow where once was a golden core. If the night folded around him, pressed him down to his essence, he would crumple like paper beneath the weight of it. He sinks down, the knuckles of his thumbs pressed to his lips as he stares into nothing. “Senior Mo?” Lan Sizhui’s footsteps are quiet as he approaches, like someone approaching an injured animal, a fox caught in a snare. “Senior Mo, are you alright?” he asks. He stops at Wei Wuxian’s side and then crouches slowly, as if to put them on the same level or make himself less imposing. Good kid, Wei Wuxian wants to say. He flashes a smile instead. “I’m fine, I’m fine,” he says, dropping to the grass as if sitting were intentional and not the result of the ground dropping out beneath his feet. “Did little Lan Jingyi have more to tell me?” Lan Sizhui sits more delicately, folding himself down and neatening his robes around him. He casts a glance back toward the fire, a worried pinch in his brow. “Um. I—I used the silencing spell on him,” he admits, a little sheepish. He lifts his gaze to Wei Wuxian and firms his voice. “He shouldn’t have said those things to you, Senior Mo. They were rash and unkind.” And true, though these little Lans surely can’t know. How many times has he hurt Lan Zhan? How many of those scars on his back are Wei Wuxian’s doing? “We both are…a little protective of Hanguang-jun,” Lan Sizhui explains after a moment. “He has been like a father and brother to me, and Jingyi has been my close friend since childhood. Hanguang-jun is more than capable, of course, but—” “Sometimes people forget there’s a Lan Zhan under all that Hanguang-jun?” Wei Wuxian suggests. Lan Sizhui’s brow furrows a moment in thought before he nods a little. For a moment, he fidgets with the edge of his white sleeve, running the embroidered hem between his fingers. “For as long as I can remember, Hanguang-jun has — has carried a sadness with him,” he says, carefully, like he’s not quite sure how to say it. “He doesn’t talk much about it, but when I was young, I asked and he said he lost someone dear to him. But he’s been so much happier with you around, and I think Jingyi worries that you might…” He trails off, brow wrinkled and hands knotted around his sleeve. Exhaling, Wei Wuxian feels an ancient weariness settle in his bones. “Might run off and hurt him?” he says. Lan Sizhui winces in apology, bless him, and Wei Wuxian waves it off. Leaning forward, he rests his arm over his knee. Silence settles around them, the creek a gentle melody in the night. “So you’re Lan Zhan’s ward, then?” he asks after a bit. Giving a firm nod, Lan Sizhui finally smiles a little. It’s small and reflexive, like the thought is enough to bring him contentment. “My parents passed away in the war,” he explains. “I had a very bad fever when I was young, so I don’t remember much from before, just — just flickers.” Wei Wuxian nods absently. He pictures Lan Zhan toting around a little kid for only a moment before he’s reminded of a-Yuan, of his little clinging hands, and he flinches away. “Hanguang-jun has always answered my questions about them,” Lan Sizhui continues, though he sounds absent, almost as if he’s thinking aloud. “I—I don’t want to disrespect my parents but I also— ah, I’m sorry, Senior Mo, I shouldn’t be bothering you with this.” He almost starts to bow, and Wei Wuxian laughs, reaching out a hand to tousle his neat hair. Lan Sizhui blinks up at him, a confused smile still pulling up his lips. “It’s alright, little Lan,” he says. “Sometimes you need to talk things out.” The smile softens into a breath of laughter, and Wei Wuxian grins before bringing his hand back to fiddle with his flute. “I lost my parents when I was young, too,” he says after a moment. “I don’t remember much, but I remember my mother telling me to remember what others do for you, not the things you do for others. Only when people don’t hold so much in their hearts will they be free.” The words have never had much of an image attached, only the sensation of warmth, a gentle hand. When he thinks of his mother, he thinks of laughter and a buoying joy bright in his chest, a flicker of black hair and pale robes. “Being grateful for the life you have isn’t disrespecting your parents,” he says firmly. He draws in a breath before going on, saying what he’d never been told as a kid. “And wanting to know about where you come from isn’t ungrateful to your Hanguang-jun. No matter what you learn, you’ll still be who you are.” Lan Sizhui looks up at him with those big brown eyes and for a moment, there is something so familiar, Wei Wuxian’s heart nearly seizes with it. Then, he smiles, and he looks like Lan Sizhui, not Wen Ning, not a child Wei Wuxian condemned to death in a bid to save. “Thank you, Senior Mo.” He pauses, a funny smile on his lips, before he shakes his head. “I don’t know what it is, but there’s really something familiar about you. Like I know I can trust you.” His heart gives a funny lurch at that, and Wei Wuxian brushes it off with a laugh as he stands and offers Lan Sizhui a hand. “Who knows,” he jokes, “maybe I’m your long-lost cousin.” They walk back to the fire together to find the tents already set up for the night. The silencing spell seems to have worn off Lan Jingyi or been removed, though he only casts a sullen look at Wei Wuxian and doesn’t speak before retreating into the juniors’ shared tent. Lan Zhan watches Wei Wuxian and Lan Sizhui approach with a searching look, almost like he’s trying to read something in their steps. Lan Sizhui salutes and turns to his tent, and Wei Wuxian grins a little at Lan Zhan as he opens their own tent to admit him. Like giankun pouches, the tent is larger on the inside, providing enough space for a sleeping area as well as a small desk on which Lan Zhan’s guqin now rests. The giankun pouches full of their mysterious friend are contained in a protective array outside the tent’s boundaries, a small precaution. “He’s a good kid, that Sizhui,” Wei Wuxian says. Pride and pleasure curl the corner of Lan Zhan’s lips just-so, his gaze dipping down as if to hide it. Fondness aches through Wei Wuxian’s chest, and he finds himself cataloguing this moment as if he can imprint it on his patchwork memory and never lose it. If he’s wrong, if this is all a misunderstanding, at least he’ll have this moment. Drawing in a breath, he tugs the dizi from his belt and spins it through his fingers as he turns toward the interior of the tent. It’s just tall enough to stand upright, barely high enough to keep Lan Zhan from brushing his head against the ceiling. “Hey, Lan Zhan,” he starts, twirling the dizi down to his smallest finger and then back toward his thumb, “there’s something I should tell you, I guess. Not that you have to do anything or even — I don’t expect anything, I mean, and I could be totally wrong but well.” He flicks the flute around the back of his hand, picks up the pace. “That time you came to Yiling, I really wanted to kiss you,” he says, and he can feel his cheeks flush hot even as his heart hammers in his chest. “And during the war, every time you were mad at me, I wanted — well, not just kissing. And probably back in the Gusu library, but I don’t think I really knew it yet. Um. Anyway, I just figured—” He waves his hand absently as he paces. He still can’t lift his gaze to look at Lan Zhan, just watches the flick-flick-flick of the flute in his hand. The more he says, the more he feels like an idiot. Why would Lan Zhan want him? After everything, after all Wei Wuxian has done — he was just drunk that night, lonely and sad for something lost. “I guess, I thought you should know maybe,” he says. “Not that you have to say anything or do — we can just pretend this never happened and—” “Wei Ying.” When did Lan Zhan get so close? His eyes are so intent, pupils wide, and his lips parted slightly. He reaches out, stills Wei Wuxian’s hand. “I also — wanted that. In Yiling. In the war. In Gusu.” He pauses, gaze flicking down to Wei Wuxian’s mouth as he wets his own bottom lip. He swallows. “Now.” Oh. Oh. Wei Wuxian stares, gapes, a moment before he surges forward, catches Lan Zhan’s collars in his hands. It’s better without wine, better to feel Lan Zhan’s hands clutch at his back, his lips part in a soft gasp against Wei Wuxian’s. Lan Zhan crowds close, presses to Wei Wuxian almost desperately, and Wei Wuxian drags him in, holds him tight. Lan Zhan wants him. Lan Zhan wants him, not just the boy he used to be, his equal on an orthodox road, but him, as he is now and through everything. The knowledge sends sparks curling through his veins, the golden surge of a butterfly talisman winging down to his toes and back up. He realizes he’s laughing only after he’s started, and Lan Zhan pulls away with a puzzled look. A smile tugs uncertainly at his lips. “Wei Ying?” he asks. “It’s good,” Wei Wuxian promises. “It’s really good.” He is suffused with it, giddy with shocked delight. He never thought— By the time he understood what he wanted, it was long past too late. He’d never hoped he would get another chance. He pulls Lan Zhan back in, and he goes willingly. He’s not sure if they’re actually any good at this — his first kiss was only a few days ago, after all — but it feels good. It feels right, to have Lan Zhan kissing away his laughter, to curl his hands back into Lan Zhan’s hair. They part, panting a little, and Lan Zhan rests their foreheads together. Wei Wuxian can’t stifle the smile pulling at his lips, all delight and a hint of smugness. He’s responsible for this, for Lan Zhan’s flushed cheeks and unsteady breath, for the way his careful composure has been unwound. Closing his eyes, Wei Wuxian breathes in sandalwood and warmth and holds a little tighter. “Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan says, his thumb tip rubbing light over Wei Wuxian’s cheekbone. “Wei Ying.” There’s something helpless in his voice, and when Wei Wuxian opens his eyes, he finds tears in Lan Zhan’s. Alarm jolts through him, and he pulls back enough to take in his whole expression. “Lan Zhan, Lan Zhan,” he soothes, brushing the tears away with a careful hand. “I’m here. I’m right here.” Lan Zhan manages a slight nod, and Wei Wuxian wraps his arms around him, pulls him close. He goes willingly, curling into Wei Wuxian as if he can hide in his shoulder, in the circle of his arms. Tightening his embrace, Wei Wuxian hooks his chin over Lan Zhan’s shoulder and swallows hard. “It’s okay,” he says. “It’s okay, Lan Zhan. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.” Lan Zhan makes a soft noise into his neck, little more than a vibration. His hands clutch at Wei Wuxian’s back like he’ll disappear if he lets go, like this will all turn out to be a dream. “You’ve been carrying this for so long, haven’t you, Lan Zhan?” Wei Wuxian says, his heart aching. He guides Lan Zhan’s face from his shoulder, and his heart hurts with the raw grief in his eyes. Oh, Lan Zhan. Wonder is a strange sensation amidst all the hurt, disbelief that someone like Lan Zhan should feel so much for him. He leans in, kisses the tears from his cheeks. “You’re not alone, Lan Zhan. I’m not going to leave you, I promise,” he says. “I’ll go back to Gusu with you or take you home to Lotus Pier or we can just wander for the rest of our lives, but I’ll be here, okay? They’ll have to drag me away.” There’s a wrinkle in Lan Zhan’s brow, and as he turns his face away, Wei Wuxian catches a tightening in his expression like pain or shame. He lifts his hand to Lan Zhan’s cheek and turns him gently back. “It’s alright,” he soothes. “It’s alright to cry, Lan Zhan. You don’t have to hide. You wouldn’t scold Sizhui for tears, would you?” He tilts Lan Zhan’s head down to press a kiss to his forehead, and he’s not as irritated by having to lean up as he has been before. It feels as if the world is settling once more, like the stitches are starting to sink in. He gives another gentle kiss to Lan Zhan’s lips before pulling back to check in. Lan Zhan’s eyes flutter open, and they’re still wet, but the cracks are starting to heal. “Wei Ying, there’s something—” “Hanguang-jun! Senior Mo! Help!” Raw panic floods the juniors’ voices, and Wei Wuxian barely has time to think before he’s snatching his dizi from the floor and bolting out the door. Lan Zhan follows close behind, his guqin in hand. Outside, white fabric flutters to the ground like ragged petals. The giankun pouches are tatters, the array broken from the inside out. Reassembled, the headless corpse lunges after the juniors in a roiling cloak of resentment. Wei Wuxian lifts the dizi to his lips and plays a short, shrill command. The corpse pauses, straining. Tendons stand out along its grey-green flesh, its torso twisting between the juniors and Wei Wuxian like it can’t decide which target it wants first. “Put out the fire! Scatter!” Wei Wuxian orders. “He’ll take whatever head he can, so stay out of reach. He can’t hear or see, but he’ll feel your qi or if you create a breeze, so go slowly.” The kids’ faces are bone-white in the moon shadows, but they give stiff nods and obey without complaint. A spark of spiritual energy from Lan Jingyi extinguishes the fire, and the corpse whips toward the bright flare of qi. Wei Wuxian plays a high, rattling trill suffused with enough resentful energy that Lan Zhan breathes in sharply at his side. Closing his eyes, Wei Wuxian draws in a breath and pulls. With most spirits or corpses, the song is part of the spell. It lures them in with promises — of revenge, of blood, of peace — and so they’re distracted from the resentment winding entrapments and commands around them. It’s more delicate work, more secure, and takes less of a toll on the caster. Their headless friend, however, isn’t so easily distracted. The song is only the vector now, the side effect of his intent. He unspools resentment into a fine black thread and loops it around each of the five segments, tugging the corpse in. The threads snap at the corpse lurches forward, shaking them off. Gritting his teeth, Wei Wuxian drags up thick cords of it, lets that scouring sand in, and forces it into hooks and barbs to dig into the corpse’s limbs. “Wei Ying?” He opens his eyes to flash a reassuring grin, but Lan Zhan tenses, breathing in sharply as his eyes widen just-so. Ah, right. It’s not like Wei Wuxian’s ever seen his own reflection doing this, but he remembers Jiang Cheng’s horrified looks, the whispers of cultivators recoiling from bloodred eyes. He turns back to the corpse, files down his senses till their fixed solely on this quarry. It’s full of resentment, more than Wen Ning even, and it swings its right hand in the same motion over and over: a clenched hand, raised high, slashing down. He wishes briefly for Chenqing, for the way her own resentment tugged on that already in beasts, but he doesn’t have time to think about it now. The resentment sinks in at last, starts siphoning some of the energy off the corpse, and Lan Zhan starts in on the harmony of suppression. The corpse bucks and writhes, its arm swinging out in ever more aggressive sweeps toward Lan Zhan’s stronger yang energy, and Wei Wuxian can feel the strain start building at his temples, the queasy ache of his lower dantian from the resentment he’s channeling. All at once, there’s the clear sound of a xiao. Its melody lilts and curls through the night, fitting neatly into Lan Zhan’s playing as if it were shaped to match it. Wei Wuxian breathes out a sigh of relief, shoulders easing as the three of them suppress and subdue the corpse. Lan Xichen’s face is drawn, pale, as the corpse finally sways and drops to its knees, hands limp at its sides. Lowering the dizi, Wei Wuxian watches him a moment. “Zewu-jun, do you know this corpse?” he asks.  He swallows, tight, and gives a short nod. His eyes don’t leave the headless body disassembled on the grass. “Mm. Then I do as well,” Wei Wuxian says, stepping carefully toward the seething remains of Chifeng-zun. “Xiongzhang?” Lan Zhan’s voice is gentle, his gaze worried as he turns to his brother. Lan Xichen gives a short shake of his head, as if breaking out of some trance, and then kneels to help place the pieces into new bags. His touch is gentle, almost reverent. Wei Wuxian’s stomach clenches at the motions. “Zewu-jun, Hanguang-jun has kept you informed of our travels, hasn’t he?” he asks. Lan Xichen gives a slight nod, still shaken, as he cinches shut the bag containing the left leg. He sets it down gently onto the grass, like the finest teacup or a newborn rabbit. “The person behind all this knows the secrets of the Qinghe Nie’s saber halls, is close to the Gusu Lan sect and has a…complicated relationship with Chifeng-zun,” Wei Wuxian says, as gently as he can. “I believe he may have something to do with the recent troubles in the Wen resettlement camps, as well.” “He wouldn’t do something like this,” Lan Xichen says, firm. “I saw — Back then, I saw Nie Mingjue suffer qi deviation before my own eyes. These recent events have all happened to you in the last month. During that time, he has been discussing matters with me each night.” Wei Wuxian pauses, fiddling with the dizi in his hands. He respects Lan Xichen, knows too keenly what cause the sect leader has to doubt him. He doesn’t want to press too hard, and yet— “What if he used a teleportation talisman?” he suggests. “No. He has shown no signs of cultivating such a technique, and besides, that takes a great deal of spiritual energy,” Lan Xichen refutes. “We night-hunted just a day ago and he was in perfect condition.” His voice is even and firm, but there’s a thread of something trembling through it, like fear or regret or grief. Part of Wei Wuxian twists a little with guilt, at exposing Lan Xichen so abruptly to the evidence of his friend’s gruesome butchery. “He may not have gone himself,” Lan Zhan points out. “Wangji, you believe you know Wei-gongzi and so you trust him. Likewise, I believe I know a-Yao and so I trust him,” Lan Xichen says, brittle, beseeching. “I have allowed you your judgment, can I not be permitted the same? Must my loyalty be so much cheaper than yours?” Lan Zhan’s eyes widen, and he takes a breath to speak, but Wei Wuxian reaches out, stills him with a touch to his wrist. Closing his eyes, Lan Xichen draws in a deep breath. “There is to be a discussion conference at Carp Tower concerning the Wen settlements,” he says, carefully even. “Perhaps if you two were to join me we could clarify the situation.” Dipping his head slightly, Lan Zhan relents. With his eyes downcast and chin tilted just-so, he looks almost shamed; across the broken body of Nie Mingjue, Lan Xichen seems to ease a little from his bowstring tautness with the concession. His gaze scours Lan Zhan briefly, and when he speaks again, there’s almost a note of apology in his tone. “Jin-furen asked that I deliver this to you, as well,” he says, reaching into a sleeve. The letter he reveals is neatly folded on creamy paper, and Wei Wuxian sits up at the sight of it. Shijie? Lan Zhan takes the letter with a slight bow of thanks, and Wei Wuxian watches hungrily as it disappears into one sleeve. They gather the giankun pouches together and return to the original camp where Lan Sizhui and Lan Jingyi have restarted the fire. They look a little shaken, still, but relax at the sight of them. “Ah! Zewu-jun, you’re here!” Lan Jingyi bursts out even as he lowers into as deep a bow as Lan Sizhui. At the sight of them, Lan Xichen’s shoulders ease fully and his smile finally seems honest. “Jingyi, Sizhui,” he greets. “I hear you have been of great assistance to Hanguang-jun and Master Mo.” He settles in by the fire as the two juniors hurry to sit with him, Jingyi already scrambling to tell him of their adventures. For a moment, Wei Wuxian watches with a funny fondness. Would it have been like this with his own juniors, if things hadn’t gone so wrong? Would his shidis and shimeis have been in such a rush to impress him if he hadn’t turned his back on them? There’s a light touch at his elbow, and he looks up to see Lan Zhan nod toward their tent in question. Smiling, he takes the offer and follows Lan Zhan into the quiet. Setting his guqin down on the table, Lan Zhan pauses, the fingertips of one hand still resting against its wood. Candlelight casts soft shadows across his face, his hair hanging down enough to block most his expression. It doesn’t hide the tension of his shoulders. Swallowing, Wei Wuxian reaches out to brush his fingers against his arm. “I worried you, didn’t I,” he says. He’s not really expecting an answer, but the soft hitch in Lan Zhan’s breath is more than enough. Flattening his hand against his shoulder, Wei Wuxian uses that to draw Lan Zhan back in. It’s an echo of their earlier position, but there’s no heat here, just the steady comfort of holding each other and knowing they’re both alive, here, together. After a long moment, Lan Zhan takes a deep breath and lifts his head. “Would you like to read your sister’s letter?” he asks. Fear and excitement trickle through Wei Wuxian’s chest like water droplets between branches. He takes a deep breath before nodding. “Yeah. Yes,” he says. “You can play Clarity for me after, if you want.” There’s so much terrible fondness in Lan Zhan’s gaze at that, like he can see right through Wei Wuxian to all the soft, stumbling bits at his core. He doesn’t say anything, only folds down beside the table and draws Wei Wuxian along with him. It’s a short letter, but the sight of shijie’s handwriting is enough to nearly bring Wei Wuxian to tears. His heart seizes, an erratic pang. Lan Zhan holds the letter so that they can read it at the same time, with Wei Wuxian pressed up close to his side. Dear Lan Wangji, I hope you are well. I wish to thank you and your companion for assisting Jin Ling and Jin Mu during the Dafan Mountain Hunt. It would be my honor to invite both of you to Lotus Pier in appreciation. Warmly, Jiang Yanli Wei Wuxian reads it back over again before he breathes out something like a laugh, a little wet. Leaning his shoulder into Lan Zhan’s, he can’t help smiling as he looks up at him. “Hey Lan Zhan,” he says, “what do you think about visiting Yunmeng after all this? I never did get to show you around.” Lan Zhan smiles, slow and small in the curl of his lips and the warmth of his gaze, and Wei Wuxian thinks alright. Thinks I’m going home.

[bitterlemonwater]

Would you ever consider writing something with Stephen Strange and Peter? 🥺 The rarepair is truly lacking and I feel like you could make something perfectly smutty out of post-Endgame taking Peter under Stephen's (magical) wing, or doctor AU

Endg*me who? I don’t know her. Smutty non-powered doctor au (that’s much more of a club au than a proper doctor au) it is. I’ve only written Stephen x Peter once before so?? Hope you like it anon bby

Peter’s age is unspecified, Strange has post-Sorcerer Supreme facial hair bc I said so, hand jobs, non-graphic but explicitly mentioned violence (Peter gets mugged in the beginning), clubbing, inaccurate medical procedures?? i’m not a doctor and have never worked in a hospital lol. 5k

—-

Peter wakes up in a hospital bed. 

He remembers leaving his apartment. He remembers zipping his wallet into one jacket pocket and slipping his phone into the other, his hand wrapped around it. He remembers turning all the right corners and dodging a cyclist and sniffling in the chilly weather. 

He doesn’t remember why or how he—

Oh, no, wait. Yeah. He remembers that.

The three thugs that had caught him by the hood of his jacket and yanked him into a murky alleyway between two run down hole-in-the-walls, both of which were closed for the night by the time Peter finally had time to run his errands. Milk and printer paper from a 24/7 Target hadn’t seemed like they would be a problem, but. That’s a sketchy neighborhood in New York, he supposes. 

He’d handed over his wallet without a fight (because contrary to popular belief, he doesn’t actually have a death wish) and was giving up his phone when May started calling him. 

Apparently the buzzing and loud ringtone (what? He has unfortunately selective hearing—sometimes it just gets tuned out and he needs volume to catch his attention) and potential red alert freaked the guys out, because one swatted his phone out of his grip and before he could raise his hands in surrender, someone decked him in the face.

And now he’s in a hospital bed. 

The window shades are half opened but there’s no light coming in, and the light in the room is off, only a dim lamp illuminating everything—so it must still be nighttime. Hopefully the same night, but Peter won’t push his luck. 

His head throbs like hell and he sits up slowly. The chair beside his bed keeps his shoes and jacket in reassuring view, but other than that, he’s been blessed to keep his regular clothes on. (Definitely the same night, then. Maybe he’ll only have been out for a few hours?)

For a few minutes, Peter just sits still on the bed, breathing, rubbing his temples. He really hopes he doesn’t have a concussion. This one hospital visit is going to suck to pay off—especially if he was brought in by an ambulance—and he’d rather not add follow up appointments to the bill. 

It’s not long before a nurse stops by. He turns on the lights and it makes Peter cringe, but not as awfully as he’s heard concussions usually make bright lights. There’s still hope, then.

The nurse asks him how he’s feeling and if he’s in any pain, then takes down his information, explains that he’s only been out for three hours and that it’s currently one in the morning. Peter tells him about getting mugged and he responds by saying they’ll have an officer come down to talk to him after he is released from care. 

The nurse finishes by asking if there’s anyone Peter would like to call. Peter debates saying no, but he can already hear May yelling at him if he tries to walk himself home after this, so he gives them Ned’s number and lays back down. 

“Alright. Doctor Strange will be here look you over in a moment.” The nurse says. Doctor Strange? Doctor, Strange. Strange. Why does that sound familiar?

While the nurse gives him two pills for the pain, Peter tries to recall where he’s heard that name before, wracking his brain and only coming up with incomplete thoughts and almost-resurrected memories. He knows he’s heard that before. He just can’t figure out where.

He’s already decided to awkwardly ask the doctor if they’ve met before when the door opens again.

In steps a man half turned away from him, tall and not quite broad but definitely fit and muscled under his white coat. He’s wearing pale blue scrubs and has a stethoscope around his neck, clipboard in his hands. His hair is brown with the slightest bit of grey, that much Peter can see, with killer cheekbones.

It’s not until the guy finishes whatever quiet conversation he was having and turns towards Peter, uncapping a pen and finally facing the younger that it clicks. 

Shit.

Three weeks earlier

Usually after a rough week of classes and work, Peter is exhausted. He’s tired and he just wants to sleep for fourteen hours, then have food delivered directly to his bed so he doesn’t have to get up for a full twenty four. 

This week it is the opposite. He’s keyed up and anxious to do something. He feels a little detached from himself, and he wants to do something outrageous. He wants an adrenaline rush that will take all his extra energy with it once it fades.

MJ suggests partaking in a protest somewhere, but a quick search tells him there aren’t any nearby that night, and not that Peter doesn’t feel just as passionate about good causes and taking action, but standing with a sign and chanting with a crowd isn’t really the thrill he’s looking for to vent how wound up he is. 

Ned suggests clubbing. Peter likes that idea a lot better. 

He loses his best friend within the first twenty minutes they spend at the bar. It’s not too high end that it actually requires an entrance fee, but it’s a respectable enough place that they definitely wouldn’t have been able to afford more than two drinks.

Which is why they got plenty tipsy before they went into the club. 

Which is why after attractive strangers keep buying Peter shots and sweet bubbly things (as if he can’t handle his liquor, but whatever, he won’t say no to free alcohol) he’s hammered. 

Not black-out wasted, of course. Peter knows his limits well enough to know exactly when he’s having fun, but not too clumsy or cloudy to get in real trouble. But he’s definitely drunk. Definitely, definitely drunk.

Normally Peter isn’t the type to be comfortable in a crowded club full of sweaty bodies, everyone in short dresses and tight button ups that show off all the round and firm parts.

On that note, he hadn’t really had much for a “sexy” outfit other than a blush pink satin t-shirt that MJ said made him look “fuckable” and fitted black chinos. 

But normally Peter doesn’t feel like he’ll explode if he doesn’t find some way to work off pent up nerves. So when girls put their hands on his shoulders and roll and sway their hips, and random guys grab him by the waist and pull his ass flush to their fronts—he laughs and grinds back. 

He flits between partners for the better part of an hour, really only stopping to get free water from the bar or have various old fashioned, rocks, shot, and cocktail glasses slid his way—or to go to the bathroom.

He sees Ned a couple times, always across the room with a girl practically melting into him. Ned’s always had a better sense of rhythm than Peter, but that’s the nice thing about club music. 

You don’t really need rhythm. You just have to move and you’ll either fit the song anyways or someone else will help you along. 

He only takes a few sips of each drink he’s offered, and some he does refuse with a cheeky smile about not getting drunk, even though he’s very drunk already.

Peter’s just left a man (and a half empty glass) at the bar, one who’s already bought him two very sparkling blue drinks and who definitely watches his ass each time he walks away, when he runs into someone. Literally, bumps into them, and though they’re barely thrown off balance and Peter is mid not-sexy-at-all apology, the person steadies both hands on his waist. 

They’re nice hands. Firm but not uncomfortably possessive or rough, pliable enough to move with the way Peter shifts and sways without letting even an ounce of space get under his grip. 

“Hello there,” the man says. Peter looks up and sees a goddamn devilishly handsome face, well trimmed facial hair and piercing grey-green eyes. Probably mid 30’s. Sharply defined cheekbones and jaw. Hot. 

“Hi,” Peter giggles. Giggles like a ditzy idiot, but the man doesn’t seem to mind. 

“You’re a pretty little thing, aren’t you?” He says, and he rakes his gaze up and down Peter’s body in the most shameless way. Peter grins and bites his lip, not shying away from eye contact when the man looks up again. 

“You’re not too bad lookin’ yourself.” 

The man grins, then tugs Peter forward by the waist. Peter doesn’t hesitate to grind forward, one hand on the guy’s chest and the other rising to a tall shoulder, swaying and stepping into the man’s space. 

It earns him a pleased smirk, and the guy drags him closer, walks him back into the messy crowd so they can dance. 

He’s hot, ok, and Peter’s been getting groped and felt up for the last hour and a half, so when he feels a sizable bulge press against him and moves flush with the solid body in front of, beside, behind him—sue him, he gets hard. Really hard. 

Really, really fucking hard. 

As in, he needs to get off in the bathroom right fucking now. 

“Having fun, baby?” The guy asks. His mouth is right next to Peter’s ear, hips rubbing against Peter’s ass, and one hand reaches down to boldly cup Peter’s clothed dick. 

Peter whines and nods, pulling off the guy, fully intending to abandon ship and jerk off in a hopefully not too gross toilet stall. The man grabs his wrist as he steps away, but doesn’t drag him back or try to guide him elsewhere. He just follows Peter through the crowd, landing them both in the bathroom. 

When Peter turns around with the goal of seductively asking if the man wants to help him out or not, he’s met by plush lips rushing to his own. The guy tastes like hard alcohol, like whiskey and bourbon and nothing like the marshmallow vodka Peter and Ned used to get tipsy or the sweet bubbly things Peter’s been offered all night. 

The man walks them through the bathroom door and locks it behind them, as if there aren’t stalls they could easily slip into. For some reason the lights are actually dimmer inside the restroom and the music has no problem slipping through the crack under the door, deafening outside but loud enough to mostly cover up the wet sounds of their kissing.

Peter kisses him hard and messy, wrapping his arms around the guy’s neck and grinding forward, trying to get some friction on his aching cock. The man smirks into the kiss, nipping at Peter’s bottom lip and licking from the bottom of his chin back into his mouth, one hand venturing downwards to cup his erection again.

The man’s hands are so steady, nothing sloppy or uncoordinated about him. He doesn’t tremble or slip up at all, doesn’t hold too tight, doesn’t move to fast but he doesn’t slow down for a second to let Peter breathe. He rubs at Peter’s dick through his slacks, fingers mapping out the shape and digging his palm right where the tip is, making Peter keen into the kiss. 

It doesn’t take long for the guy to get tired with feeling him up over his pants. He unbuttons the chinos easily and tugs down the zipper, slipping his hand under Peter’s boxers too. 

His hand isn’t particularly cold or hot but god does it feel good, having smooth, solid skin to rub against. The man strokes him with purpose a few times, not teasing him or trying to draw out any more of the moans that Peter graciously supplies. Flicking his wrist over the head, cupping and squeezing his balls, tight but not too tight, easing the way with precome. 

And then he stops, just holding, and with a desperate moan Peter picks up where he left off, grinding into the man’s fist, thrusting his hips up and forward into the friction.

He gets close embarrassingly fast (or it would be embarrassing if he could care), his legs shaking and arms tense and abdominal clenched as pressure and pleasure quickly pool in the pit of his stomach.

Peter whimpers into the kiss, all tongue and want, threading his fingers in the older man’s brown (possibly black? It’s dark in here) hair while he’s squeezed tightly against hard muscle by an arm around his waist. 

“Gonna-”

“Do it. Come on, baby, wanna see your pretty face when you do,” the man cuts him off. Peter nods, just nods and bites his lip and lets his head fall back, baring his neck and face to the world (or, really, just to the man jerking him off) as he tips over the edge. 

He moans so loudly that if someone was waiting on the other side of the door they’d hear him over the music. He doesn’t care, though. It’s one of the best orgasms he’s ever had, the build up and being pushed over by such dexterous hands with that deep voice groaning and whispering praise in his ear. 

He soaks his already precome-ruined boxers with release and slumps against the man, needing a second to breathe and collect himself. The guy lets him lean for a few moments, but then turns him around, drawing Peter’s back against him and pinning the smaller man between himself and the counter. 

It’s probably a gross counter, classy bar or otherwise. Peter doesn’t care. He folds his arms on it and rests his forehead on the backs of his hands, letting the man behind him grind into his ass. 

Bare, if Peter picks that up right, the hardly audible shuffle of a belt and zipper, the much more defined feeling cock rubbing against him. He doesn’t care about that, either. If his ass gets stained by this gorgeous Greek god’s come, then he can just borrow Ned’s jacket to wrap around his waist when they leave. 

Will it be embarrassing? Yes. Will Ned let him live it down? Not likely.

Will it be worth it? Yes. 

And it’s not that he’s not present and interested, but he’s definitely a little floaty and the songs outside get caught swimming in his head, and he has a feeling it takes the man longer to come than Peter thinks it does.

Either way, when the guy does climax, he pulls away from Peter and catches it in his hands, washing it away in the sink beside the younger’s nearly collapsed body. 

“You ok there?” The man asks. Even shouting over the music, his voice sounds soft and gentle. Peter nods. 

“‘m fine. Better than fine. That felt great, erm, thanks,” he laughs, standing straight and looking at the guy again. The man smiles at him and pecks his cheeks, then his lips, then smirks. 

“Made a mess of your underwear, though,” he quips.

Peter groans and wiggles around the guy, stealing some paper towels to try and clean up inside his pants (which would have been awkward and a little confusing, as for how much modesty he should take, if the guy didn’t plaster himself to Peter’s back once more, hook his chin over Peter’s shoulder and watch so intently that Peter started to get hard again) before zipping and buttoning back up. 

“I’m Stephen, by the way. Doctor Stephen Strange.”

Peter raises an eyebrow. “Doctor? Wow, that’s really impressive,” he drawls, not really believing the man. One of the first guys to buy him a drink had also claimed to be a doctor, but a few minutes later when his girlfriend showed up, she happened to mention his job at a grocery store. 

Not that Peter has anything against grocery store employees. Ned worked at Walmart before getting into his field and Peter has probably worked at every convenience store and gas station in Queens. 

(And not because he couldn’t hold one down, but because he needed five jobs at once over the summer to be able to pay for his first year of room and board.)

The guy just smiles, not confessing to being a liar but not taking offense that Peter implies he is. “What’s your name, sweetheart?” 

Peter hums. “Peter. I’m a photographer,” he winks at the man and unlocks the bathroom door. Stephen guides him by the wrist (and it would almost be annoying that he doesn’t hold Peter’s hand properly or let him walk on his own, if it wasn’t hot as fuck) back to the bar.

In place of ordering, Stephen just holds up two fingers towards the bartender. She nods at him and turns to grab two shot glasses, and Peter doesn’t have time to unpack why she knows what he wants. 

“Photography, huh?”

“Yup.”

“Sounds riveting.”

“Oh, it is. Nothing as exciting as taking pictures of other people doing exciting things.”

“Oh, I’m sure.”

“Doctor, huh?”

“Mhm.”

“Are you a real doctor?”

“I am.”

Peter swivels on his bar stool, staring the man down. It would be more interrogating and honest to his attempt to read the man if simply looking at Stephen didn’t make his lips twitch in a smile. “Where’d you go to school?” 

“Pre-med in NYU. The rest is a secret.” Stephen winks. Peter narrows his eyes but doesn’t say anything else. 

“So, is that Peter with a last name?” Stephen adds as the drinks are delivered to them. Honey colored with no bubbles and perfect circles of ice in each. Peter takes a sip and lets it roll around his mouth.

“How do I know you’re not a serial killer?”

“I told you I’m a doctor.”

“Perfect cover story,” Peter raises, making an exaggeratedly suspicious face. Stephen laughs at him, probably not because he’s actually amusing but because the man is also drunk. 

“Ok, what about Peter with a phone number?”

Peter can’t stop from smiling. A phone number? Like, a ‘we could totally hook up again and get further than a hand job in a bathroom’ kind of phone number? He tries to keep up the game of not acting as enthusiastic as he is, though. “Well, since I still don’t know if you’re a serial killer, maybe you should give me your number.”

“Really? After I got you off like that?”

“Well, actually I got me off, thanks,” Peter muses cheekily, “but… yep. Precautions.”

That earns him a fond laugh. “Alright, alright. ‘Precautions’. Here,” Stephen snatches a napkin from under his drink and a pen from over the counter of the bar, confirming Peter’s theory that they man is definitely a regular. 

“So you come here often?” Peter says. He realizes the joke a second later than Stephen does and blushes at his own cheesiness while the man shakes his head and laughs. 

“I do, yes.” 

“Hmm. Doctor’s salary and you go to bars that don’t overcharge you for everything? Sounds sketchy.” Peter quips. Stephen rolls his eyes and hands over the napkin, ten numbers in way too nice handwriting bleeding through.

“A friend of mine owns the place. I like to support her now and again.” He explains. Peter nods, accepting the reasoning. 

“That doesn’t explain why you have nice handwriting, though.” He continues, examining the napkin. Stephen laughs at him. 

“I’m taking that as a compliment.” 

Peter grins back.

They talk for almost an hour, broken up by breaks to dance or get more drinks—which are just water, for Peter. He knows when he’s hit his limit, thankfully—and by the time Ned is falling over Peter’s shoulder, leaning against the counter and saying he’s ready to go home and lament about the girl he’s just fallen in love with, Peter thinks he likes Stephen Strange quite a lot. 

He says so, as he’s leaving, and waves the napkin with the man’s number for emphasis. Stephen just grins, tilts his head and raises his glass and shouts over the crowd that he expects to hear from Peter soon.

It’s only when Peter decides “soon” can totally be three in the morning of that same night that he realizes he somehow managed to lose the napkin. 

He’s upset, but not devastated. Just disappointed. Ned tells him they can both get over their narrowly claimed soulmates (i.e. the girl he danced with all night who was leaving to go back to Germany the next morning) by having a star wars marathon and ordering take-out. 

Which, yeah. Was a pretty good remedy, and after a few days, Peter completely (or, mostly completely) forgot about Stephen Strange.

Present time

Peter’s brain stops processing. God, just the sight of the other man makes him antsy to move, having to consciously stop his hips from shifting. He wants to kill the awkwardness. “Uh-”“Peter.” Stephen beats him to it. He cringes slightly.

“Um, h-hi. Hi? How, uh, how are you?” 

That gets him a slightly confused, if amused, eyebrow raise. (Killer cheekbones and those lips Peter assumed he’d never see again) “The question is actually how are you, seeing as you’re the one in the hospital bed.” 

“Oh! Right, right. I’m good. Fine.” This is too awkward. This is kind of painful, actually. 

“Mhm,” the doctor couldn’t sound less convinced, “How’s your head? I’m sure the nurse told you, they did an emergency CT scan when you were first brought in, and you don’t seem to have any injuries beyond the couple of scrapes on your face and side. Let you keep your clothes on since the worst of it might be a minor concussion. Let’s check that over though, yeah?”

Peter just nods slowly. Stephen comes to sit beside him, using another chair opposite the one housing his jacket and shoes. 

He watches as Stephen writes in a few boxes on the paper on his clipboard, but all Peter can think about is that those careful, nimble hands had given him one of the best orgasms ever. 

“Are you in any pain? Any sensitivity to light, headache, confusion, dizziness? Are you nauseous at all? Any memory loss?” 

Peter responds dutifully to the questions. He has a slight headache, and the lights bothered him when they first turned on but overall he’s feeling a lot better. An ache on his whole left side, but he assumes that’s from how he fell and landed when he got knocked out. 

Stephen writes down all of his answers, checking and marking boxes. When he’s done, he sets the clipboard down and beckons Peter closer. He listens to the younger man’s heart, checks his eyes with a light, and peels off some bandages that Peter hadn’t even noticed on his cheek, reapplying fresh gauze and tape with a new layer of antibiotic cream. 

“Well, I’d say you’re in the clear for a concussion, but you’ll definitely need to take it easy for a week or so. Lots of fluids, lots of rest, as low stress as you can manage. No rigorous physical activity. You’re a lucky kid, Peter Parker.” 

Peter cringes, then lets his head loll to the side. He’s tired and the pain medication is making him a little loopy and he’d rather think about anything else than what his bill is going to be for all of this. 

“Well shit. You know my last name now. Hope you don’t serial murder me.” He hums. He reaches for his jacket and slips it on. Stephen has the decency (especially impressive considering he probably thinks Peter ditched him) to humor him.

“Still on about that? I thought you’d be convinced of my authenticity by now. I’ve got a white lab coat and everything. I’m wearing scrubs.” The man says, whispering scandalized at the end. It makes Peter giggle. He’s a little amazed, actually.

The man he met at the bar was nice, sure, but he’d also very clearly had the goal of getting into Peter’s pants. It’s odd to see the same man, who’d later taken such a serious, confident tone at the club still being playful.

“Speaking of, I thought you said you were a surgeon? Very impressive, very renowned, etcetera. Why are you giving me a… non, surgical check up?” Peter asks. He looks longingly at his shoes, kind of wishing they would just float over to his feet without him having to put them on.

Stephen doesn’t seem off put by Peter’s phrasing. “All of our neurologists are swamped at the moment. They called in some off duty general practitioners to cover, but a personal friend of mine, Christine, was supposed to see you and couldn’t, so she asked me.” He leans back in his chair, then, studying Peter in the same shameless, confident way (albeit, not in the lustful way) he had at the bar. 

“I must say, I certainly wasn’t expecting to see you here. Or again, at all.” His tone lilts, pressing Peter to explain why he never called after they hit it off (and got off). 

“Yeah, about that,” Peter mumbles. He grabs his sneakers but doesn’t put them on yet, figuring it would be rude to get up or turn his back while he’s explaining. “I’m sorry. I was honestly going to call you but, I uhm..” 

“Lost the napkin?”

Peter winces, then nods and hangs his head in defeat. “I lost the napkin.”

Stephen laughs, sitting forward again, and it surprises Peter. On the rare occasion he’s seen someone he’s (intentionally) turned down again, they’ve usually been… a lot more aggressive and unhappy. 

His confusion must show, because Stephen looks at him, all sharp features and unapologetically confident and somehow just soft enough to be sincere. “I figured it was something like that, considering you had a pretty good incentive to contact me.” 

Peter narrows his eyes, but it’s not real heat. “‘Pretty good incentive’ he says. My, you’re just full of yourself, huh? That’s gotta be some kind of doctor syndrome or something. There was a Criminal Minds episode like that.” Stephen groans at his response. 

“Criminal minds?”

“What? It’s a good show!” 

“It’s completely unrealistic. Every episode has the exact same plot.”

Peter gasps, offended. “They do not!” Stephen looks unimpressed.

“There’s a bad guy, he’s killed people in a particularly gruesome way and now he’s kidnapped some poor girl. Time crunch. He’s a white man between his 20’s and 40’s, one of the ‘agents’ has some dramatic personal tie, there are hints at a subplot, Reed says something quirky and beats them all at cards on the plane. Sound familiar?” 

Peter gapes at him for a solid three seconds before composing himself, crossing his arms and huffing. “It’s still entertaining..” he pouts, petulant. Stephan rolls his eyes but chuckles at the display. 

“Well, I’m sure it will keep you plenty entertained while you get your rest. And hydration. But try to steer clear of the strawberry daiquiris.” He says, smirking as he reorders the papers on his clipboard. Peter relents, sighing, and turns to put on his shoes.

“‘s not like I picked ‘em out and bought them all..” he grumbles quietly.

When he slowly rises from the bed, Stephen is still there. Standing on the opposite side of the cot, staring at him. Peter feels his cheeks flush and dear god, he cannot get hard thinking about the last time they were alone in a room together. 

He’s trying to think of some way to diffuse the tension, ask about leaving or paperwork (or the bill, dear god), the police report he needs to file or about his friend picking him up—but Stephen beats him to it. 

“Would you like to have dinner?” 

Peter stares. What was that?

“Huh?”

“I said, would you like to have dinner?” Stephen repeats, patient and unflinching, nothing modest or humorous to lighten the air. 

Peter stutters, then wets his lip and bites it, then shifts from foot to foot before nodding. 

“Yes. I’d like to have dinner with you.”

Stephen smiles. “Great.” He steps around the bed just as Peter does, bringing them closer together. “Now, technically I have your whole file right here, and I could just get your phone number off of that. But that’d be wholly unprofessional of me.”

Peter snorts, having to step back and cover his mouth so he can laugh at the man’s utter brashness. “Yeah, you’re completely correct. That would be very unprofessional. And probably illegal, I think.”

“Oh, definitely illegal.” 

Peter giggles, but then Stephen is handing him the pen he’d been writing with. Peter takes it, still grinning, yet furrows his brows in confusion. “I don’t have any paper.” 

Stephen smirks. Then he holds out his hand, palm up. When it clicks what he’s requesting and Peter snaps up to look at him, there’s a very calm, controlled smile, carefully containing a wild amount of self-satisfaction on Stephen’s face. 

“So I don’t lose it.” 

Peter rolls his eyes so dramatically it hurts, but he takes Stephen’s hand, reluctantly flattered, holding it steady in one of his own and writing with the other. Though it’s more like the older man’s one palm holds both of his stable with how unwavering it is. 

When he’s finished writing his number, he hands the pen back. “Make sure you don’t wash that hand,” he quips. Stephen hums, waving an arm past to guide Peter out of the room. 

“I promise I’ll take good care of it. The nurse will deliver your paperwork to the waiting room, and there will be an officer there as well. You’re very welcome to stay until your ride arrives.” He says. Before Peter can answer, the man is swooping down, planting a gentle kiss to his temple, and then before he can react, Stephen is disappearing down the hallway. 

Peter waits in a mildly comfortable chair and picks up his packet, report and bills and prescription of rest, all in a daze. He’s still in it when he files his report with officer Rogers and when he gets in Ned’s car around two thirty in the morning, answering a million questions and finally tipping his head back against the seat, relishing the dark and the busy quiet of New York late at night.

Two days later, after he’s got a new phone and a new wallet (and a loan in May’s good credit name to pay for his hospital visit), he gets a text that threatens to buzz out of the pocket which barely manages to muffle it.

Unknown: Dinner, Thursday. 8 o’clock. I’ll pick you up. Sound good?

Peter grins and makes a new contact.

You don’t know my address though?

Stephen: I’m sure you’ll tell me.

Fair enough. I can do Thursday at 8.

Stephen: Perfect.

Then, a moment later:

Stephen: Wear that pink shirt again, and I’ll let you pick the venue. Deal?

Peter blushes even though there’s no one there to see it, biting the inside of his cheek not to smile dumbly at his phone. 

Deal.

[daisyxbuckley]

Christmas is my FAVORITE holiday, besides Halloween of course. So when I saw that @galaxy-mindsxx had this beautiful prompt list I knew that I needed to participate. So Lex’s 25 Days of Prompts is open! From December 1st to December 25th I will be posting prompts from this list with different fandoms. If you would like to see one written then please message and tell me! Again thank you so much to Faith for letting me use your list.

If you’re unsure about a fandom, just ask! 

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1. Person A and Person B wanted to make a gingerbread house, except Person B keeps eating all the candy they both bought and Person A debates over whether or not they should buy more or just finish eating the gingerbread.

2. Person A is having a snowball fight with their friend/sibling and they accidentally hit Person B with a snowball instead. The main problem is that the snowball had a lot of ice in it and now Person A and B are at the hospital.

3. Person A and Person B got drunk at a mutuals Christmas party and they both thought it would be funny to “set up” everyone they thought looked cute together by moving the mistletoe around, except now everyone’s done it to them.

4. Person A watches their mutual friends teach Person B how to skate, to which they’re reminded of a baby deer. It’s from this where Person A realizes they may just be a little in love with Person B.

5. Person B catches Person A singing their favourite Christmas song and now Person B keeps trying to start a duet of “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” with A everywhere they go.

6. Person A works at one of the hot chocolate booths on Main Street for the towns/city’s Christmas Parade and they’re rather concerned for the fact that Person B has come up for their third cup of hot chocolate in the past half hour.

7. Person B’s parents wanted to host a Holiday Party but they left it up to B to decorate so they call Person A for help because B doesn’t even know how much garland is supposed to go on a Christmas tree.

8. Person A and B always argue, but they’re at a good friends Christmas party and they have to remain somewhat civil and—is that mistletoe???

9. Person A and B’s mutual friends organized a Secret Santa and Person B suspiciously got Person A. Their friends help B pick the perfect gift.

10. Person A and Person B (a mysterious stranger who looks incredibly sad and alone) are stuck in a snowed-in airport with both of their flights delayed.

11. Person A invited Person B over to watch Christmas movies ‘cause it’s officially socially acceptable to. Miraculously however, it’s the first snowfall of the year, and Person B can’t stop staring at their best friend.

12. Person A and B’s friends are all going to a ski lodge for the week. All is good and fun until everyone realizes that they all have to share rooms, and somehow, A and B got paired together.

13. They just released the new Christmas Rentals at Family Video and Steve is in charge of stocking them. But after seeing you outside trying to catch snowflakes on your tongue he accidentally knocks over a shelf. The stores a mess, but Steve only cares about talking to you. (Specific to Steve ‘cause I felt this was too cute of an idea to not do.)

14. Person B gets drunk and won’t stop singing Christmas songs at the top of your lungs. Luckily, Person A thinks they’re cute.

15. Person A and B’s friends take them sledding and since the two of them are both competitive af, they challenge each other to a sled-race.

16. Person A and Person B decide to bake Christmas cookies and they kind of have a “moment”. Person A gets nervous and throws flour at B’s face, triggering a food fight.

17. Person B’s best friend convinced them to write a letter to “Santa” of what they wanted for Christmas. Except, Person A now has B’s letter and…Person A is Person B’s greatest wish.

18. Person A invited Person B to help them decorate their tree and B’s shocked that A has this many ornaments.

19. Person A works as an elf for the town’s/city’s yearly out-door “North Pole Festival” and Person B keep smiling at A for a reason unknown to them.

20. Person A teaches Person B how to wrap presents. Correction: A teaches B how to wrap presents properly.

21. Person A and B attend their friends Christmas Party and the way B is looking at A makes them feel things.

22. It’s Person A and B’s first Christmas as a married couple, and Person A has a special surprise for B.

23. It’s Christmas Eve and Person A’s car breaks down in the middle of a snowstorm. Luckily, they’re practically in front of their best friends house/apartment. A decides to stay there the night and the two of them watch Christmas Specials all night.

24. Person A and B go Christmas tree hunting together. It’s fun, but extremely frustrating because Person B has their eyes on the biggest tree in the lot which A guarantees will not fit in their apartment. (Just imagine that scene in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.)

25. This Christmas marks Person A and B’s fourth anniversary of being together. At their Christmas Party, B plans on giving A a gift that they hope A will say yes to.

26. No one will take Person A to drive around and look at the Christmas light displays, so A asks Person B to come with. A spends the whole time looking at the displays, but Person B seems to be focused on something else entirely.

27. Person A brings Person B home for the holidays and B is panicking because they’re trying to make the best impression.

28. It’s a snow day, so out of boredom Person A and B decide to play a joking game of making the other blush/speechless with Christmas pick-up lines. Needless to say however, neither of them are joking.

29. Person B isn’t a huge fan of Christmas because they always end up being left alone. So, Person A goes all out to make sure this Christmas is the best.

30. Person A and B are neighbors and throughout the past week, every day, Person B asks if they can “borrow” Person A’s sugar; and A can’t tell if B is simply making a shit ton of cookies, or if they like A.

31. Person A needs a date to their family’s Christmas Dinner and Person B just happens to be at the right place, at the right time.

32. Person B tries to bake Person A’s favorite Christmas cookies, except B calls A over because B burnt them all and they don’t know what to do.

33. (This one is Steve specific.) It’s the first year that Hawkins High is trying out Candy Grams. You’ve gotten a few from your friends, however it’s the excessive amount of candy canes from a “Secret Santa” that truly confuses you.

34. Person A and B are hanging out when the power suddenly goes out and they’ve long since finished their hot-chocolates and they’re both cold so Person A offers to cuddle. For warmth. Obviously.

35. Person A and B are helping decorate their work place. Except the two of them get a little too carried away with the tinsel.

36. (Steve specific, again.) Steve and Robin work another job during the holidays to earn a little extra money. It sucks though because wrapping presents isn’t fun. Until you burst into the store on Christmas Eve with bags full of presents that need wrapping. Steve thinks you’re cute, though, so he doesn’t quite mind.

37. A friend of Person A’s family is having a Christmas wedding. Person A isn’t that interested until they spot a Groomsman (Person B) who has great hair and won’t stop drunkenly singing Christmas songs at the after party.

38. Person B finds Person A’s secret stash of Christmas presents. A lot of them are for B, and A can certainly tell Person B is having a hard time trying not to take a peek.

39. Person A and B’s friends arrange a get together with them at their local diner. Except, the two of them are there before them, and there’s a huge snowstorm that traps A and B and a few patrons in and so Person A and Person B have to try and amuse themselves.

40. Person A and B get slightly tipsy off the eggnog while they’re decorating A’s tree and some sober thoughts are shared through drunken words.

41. Person A and B are best friends who just happen to be neighbors. There’s a house decorating contest going on in their neighborhood, and the pair are determined to beat each other.

42. Sword-fighting is fun with candy canes…until someone’s gets stabbed in the arm.

43. It’s Christmas Eve, and as you read “The Night Before Christmas” to the party, Steve internally laments on how grateful he is to have you. (Steve specific.)

44. Person A and Person B’s families have been friends forever. A would always go to B’s house for Christmas Eve but the one time A and B got into a huge fight and thus the tradition stopped. Now, the tradition is being started up again and holy shit, when did Person B get hot?

45. Person A’s best friend rigged the Secret Santa so now they have to get B a present. The worse part? Person A has a huge crush on Person B.

46. Person A and B work as elves at “Santa’s Workshop” in the mall. It’s Christmas Eve and instead of cleaning up, A and B play around with the wrapping paper and bows.

47. It’s Person A’s best friends yearly Christmas Party and she just drunkenly dared A to kiss the cute, mystery stranger under the mistletoe by the end of the night. And Person B just so happens to be the cute, mysterious stranger.

48. Person A and B go on their first date to the skating rink. The only problem is that A is terrible at skating and keeps falling on their ass. B still thinks Person A looks cute though with snow falling on them.

49. Person A burns their tongue on hot chocolate and Person B’s first instinct is to spray a shit ton of whipped cream into A’s mouth to “soothe the burns”.

50. Person B got caught up with work on Christmas Eve and now there’s a possibility they won’t be home in time. But it doesn’t end up as bad as A thought. Actually, it ends up being one of the best Christmases of their life.

51. The Christmas Song Prompt (Wild Card). Pick any Christmas song as your prompt and I’ll write something around the basis of the song. This is the only prompt I will do multiple of, as long as they are different songs.

[lovemesomerafael]

El Amor Todo Lo Puede      Chapter 32:  All In

Source:  @barbaoutfits 

Chapters 1-31

The hotel ballroom was crowded with people wearing expensive suits and cocktail dresses.  Drinks were flowing as they always do at a professional function with an open bar.

Rollins leaned over to mutter into Laura’s ear.  “Don’t look now, but Mr. Tall, Dark, and $2,500 shoes is checking you out.”

Laura rolled her eyes. “Staring like a dog in heat.  How romantic,” she quietly responded.  They turned back to the conversation of the group they were standing with.

“Look, all I’m saying is that judge was wrong.  Our search was legit,” Carisi was saying.

The woman next to him took the bait, and they were off on a debate of the 4th Amendment in which neither Rollins nor Laura had any interest.

Laura sighed.  “Has it been an hour?  Can we go now?”

“Thirty-five minutes.”

“That’s it.  I’m calling the ACLU.  There has to be an exception to mandatory work events for people who can’t drink.  Because alcohol is the only possible way to survive these things.”

“Lemme tell you, it’s not helping that much,” Rollins responded drily.  “We could network, I guess.  Kill some time.  Maybe enhance our careers.”

“Uh-huh.  Cuz I’m just dying to become a white-shirt.  Can you see me in those administration meetings? I’d have Dodds in a chokehold and be banging his head against the conference table in about five minutes.”

Rollins held up her empty glass.  “Well, I hate to do this to you, Parker, but I’m going to get a refill.”  

As Amanda moved off toward the bar, the man who had been openly admiring Laura walked over.  

“I’m Adam Watson, new head of Public Affairs at One PP.”  He held out his hand, and she shook it.  “I’ve been in NYC for two weeks now and the only people I’ve met are old men. I decided to introduce myself to you so that I can say I know at least one beautiful woman in the city.  Help a guy out?”

“Hmmmm.”  Laura took a sip of her drink.  “Not terrible, but a little on the cheesy side.  Also, just bordering on sexist.  Wanna try again?”

He laughed.  He did have a very nice smile, and nice laugh lines at the corners of his blue eyes.  “Uh…  how about simply, ‘Hi, I’m Adam Watson?”

“Better.”  She said, and shook his hand again.  “Detective Laura Parker, SVU.”

“Ah.”  He nodded.  “So, basically the exact wrong person to try that line on.”

“Basically.  But I’ll overlook it because I know like five people in this room, and they’ve all deserted me.”

“You’ve got me beat. I think I know three.  Mind you, I’ve been introduced to probably 50% of the people here, but I���ve already forgotten all of their names, and I’m going to be expected to recognize them when I see them again.”

Laura laughed.  “You mean I’m not the only one who doesn’t want to be here?”  

“Detective, 95% of the people in this room don’t want to be here.”

She laughed.  “Well,” she said, clinking her glass with his. “Misery does love company.”

He moved closer to her, encroaching slightly on her personal space, but he didn’t touch her.  “Looks like you could use a fresh drink.  Can I buy you a refill?”

“At an open bar.  Chivalrous.”  They both chuckled sociably as they turned toward the bar area.  

There was a mass of people crowded around the bar, jostling and trying to catch the attention of one of the bartenders.   “Stay here,” Adam told Laura as they approached the edge of the crowd.  “I’ll take on the mob.  What are you drinking?”

“Pellegrino with lime.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Well, that’s no good.  Sparkling water isn’t going to soften the edges of this command performance, is it?  I’ll see what I can do.”

“No, thanks. Pellegrino is perfect.”  

He winked at her and waded into to the melee around the bar.

A soft but scornful voice beside Laura’s ear said, “You do realize that wink means ‘I’m not listening to you, I’ll never get you back to my place if you’re sober’?”  

She turned her head to grin at Rafael.  “Cynic. 20 bucks says he comes back with Pellegrino.”

“50 says he comes back with whiskey.”

“You’re on.”

They turned to face one another.  “Man, I’m glad to see you.  Liv is requiring all of us to show the flag for at least an hour.  I’m only forty minutes in and I already want to slit my wrists.  Twenty more and I might end up starting a fistfight, just for something to do with my hands.”  

Rafael laughed, smiling at her in a way that sent hot shivers through her.  “Promise you’ll give me a heads up so I can get a good seat. And if you’re taking requests, may I suggest Rita Calhoun could use a good ass-kicking?”  

“Uh-oh.  What’d she win now?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.  I’d rather talk about how pretty you look tonight.”

Rafael actually thought she looked better than pretty.  Stunning was closer to the mark.  The simplicity of her black dress accentuated her curves, and the low-cut back showed enough skin to make Rafael’s hands itch to caress her.  The dress was exactly long enough to be appropriate, and not one millimeter longer.  He had seen her from across the room and admired her legs as she walked with that yahoo in a cheap suit now getting her a drink.

“Thank you.  You’re just not used to seeing me in drag, is all.”

“Tonterías.[1]  I have excellent taste.  If I say you look great, you do.”  

“You look even better than usual, yourself,” she replied, a little shyly.  The suit he was wearing, one she’d never seen before, was a beautiful worsted wool featuring a green stripe that made his eyes even more dazzling.

At that moment, Adam Watson returned, holding a small tray over the heads of the crowd.  When he brought it down, Laura and Rafael saw that he had, indeed, brought her sparkling water.  He had also brought two shots of tequila.  

“Here you go,” he announced. “Pellegrino for your thirst, and tequila for the pain.”  He looked quite proud of himself.

Laura looked at Rafael and saw the smirk she knew he would be wearing.  But it was tinged with something unpleasant.  “Laura,” he said, “You don’t drink, do you?”  There was an edge to his voice.

“No, I don’t.”

“Do you mind?”

“Not at all.”

Rafael picked up the shot and tossed it back without bothering with the salt and lime on the tray. “Thanks, guy,” he said to Adam with an obviously fake smile.  He put an arm possessively around Laura’s waist and steered her past Adam Watson.  

He led her to a table about halfway across the room.  “You owe me 50 bucks.”

“Technically, I don’t. You said he’d bring whiskey.  But you do owe me 20, because I said he’d bring Pellegrino.   Which, by the way, I didn’t get to drink before you whisked me away like the Secret Service.”

“I’ll buy you a case. Who is that slimeball?”

“New head of PR at One PP. Which means both of us are probably going to regret what you just did.”

“I doubt that very much,” Rafael snarled.  

Laura squinted at him. “You OK?  He’s just some flirty dude at a cocktail party.  Why aren’t we just making fun of him?”

“I’m surprised you’re not more annoyed.  Guy tries to force alcohol on you…”

“That might be a little overdramatic.  C’mon, you know I can handle him.”

“Knock yourself out,” Rafael snapped.  “I was just trying to do a good deed.”

“And you did.  Thank you.  But it wasn’t necessary.”  

“Yeah.  Whatever.”  He tossed back the rest of his drink.  “Then you’re on your own.  You can probably still get that Pellegrino.”

As she watched him stalk off across the room, Laura wondered whether the motion he’d lost to Rita Calhoun today had gotten under Rafael’s skin, or whether this was an extension of the feelings he’d been having a few nights before.  She made a mental note to call him when she got home and ask if he wanted to talk about it.    

She turned around to look for a familiar face in the crowd, and almost immediately caught Adam Watson’s eye again.  He was looking at her, and still held her drink.  He raised it up to her in invitation.  Not wanting to be rude, she walked over.

“Thank you,” she said. “Sorry about that.  He’s um, protective of my sobriety.”

Adam ignored the mention of Rafael as though he didn’t exist.  “Sobriety, huh?  Good for you. How long?”

“Over eight years now. But you don’t want to talk about that.”

He again stepped just a little too close.  “Actually, I’d enjoy talking about you.  Let’s go see if we can find a quiet table where we can do that, shall we?”  

Laura would rather not. His manner was a little oily for her, and she had no intention of sharing any kind of personal information with the new head of Pubic Affairs for NYPD.  “I have a better idea.  Why don’t we see if we can find the rest of my squad?  They’re here somewhere, and…”

“Please, don’t make me meet any more people whose names I won’t remember.”  He smiled down at her, putting an arm around her shoulders and pulling her toward a table.  “Besides, I’m sure they can’t be as beautiful as you.  I’d rather spend some time getting to know each other.”

She mentally rolled her eyes and decided she was going to have to find a way to extricate herself gracefully from this situation.  This guy was definitely sleazy, but neither she nor her SVU colleagues needed the new brass to start out with a grudge.   She let him lead her – drive her, really – toward a table.  Seriously, he was good looking, she guessed, but did women really respond to this bulldozer treatment?  

He pulled his chair too close to hers and leaned in, touching her hand.   She could smell some kind of spicy aftershave and something else – maybe a hair product.  He put his face in front of hers and looked her square in the eye.  “So.  Who is Detective Laura Parker, hmmmm?”  She almost laughed.

Laura caught Rafael glowering at them from across the room, and knew she would have to explain at some point how this had happened.  She spent the next twenty awkward minutes trying to back away from Adam Watson, and out of the conversation.  She realized that he was not only obnoxious but actually fairly drunk.  Her patience ran out when he put a hand behind her head and tried to pull her in for a kiss.  “I have to tell you, Laura,” he breathed tequila into her face, “I haven’t been able to look away from you in that dress.  The way it hugs your body and shows off those perfect tits –“

Laura pulled away from him, but he grabbed her wrists.  “Listen, let’s get out of here.  I have a town car waiting for me, and I’d like to get you in the back seat and lick -“ His speech ended in a high-pitched squeak as Laura took the fingers of his left hand into a very particular grip.

“Mr. Watson, you and I have to work together.  And that means that you will speak to me with respect.  I understand that you’re drunk, and I’m going to assume that you would never act this way under normal circumstances.  I’ll forget this ever happened.  But, if you ever talk to me like that again, I’m going to break your fingers one by one.”  Her expression had been as hard as her words.  Just as suddenly, however, she favored him with an overly-sweet smile as she dropped his hand.  “With all due respect, of course.”

She didn’t wait for a response.  She got up and walked rapidly away, immediately scanning the room for Rafael. She was looking forward to hearing him laugh when she told him what had just happened.   The first familiar face she saw was a junior ADA who had handled a few motions and arraignments for SVU.  

“Hey, Suneetha, have you seen ADA Barba?”

“Yeah, he left about 10 minutes ago.  Looked like he was in a foul mood, too.”

“Thanks.”  

What did that mean? Rafael couldn’t think…  He knew her better than that.  As soon as Adam Watson tried to give her a drink she had told him she didn’t want, any possibility of even friendship between them had ended.  Rafael had to know that.  Although, to be fair, he did have the right to be a little miffed that he had tried to rescue her from a jerk, only to see her head right back to said jerk.   She had been planning to call Rafael anyway. She decided she would need to begin the call with an apology, or at least an explanation.    

Fin signaled her from a stand-up table a few yards away, where he was chatting with some people – clearly cops – she didn’t know.  She spent the next hour in a surprisingly pleasant conversation with them.

Fin dropped her at her building around midnight.  She was exhausted from trying to act appropriately in front of the NYPD brass and city legal dignitaries at the event.  She’d much rather have been with him, chasing some suspect down a crowded street. She was also a little concerned because she had texted Rafael and received no response.

From the street outside their building, she had seen that his lights were still on, so she assumed he was still up.  Besides, they often texted each other late at night.  As she waited for the elevator, she decided to try another text to see whether he would talk to her.  

Laura: You left without saying goodbye.

10 minutes later, when she had dropped her coat and purse on the couch in her apartment, he still hadn’t responded.

Laura: If you’re not speaking to me, it really only works if I know that.

That got him to text back.

Rafael: It’s late.  Go to bed.

Laura: I’m coming up.

He might have answered, but she didn’t wait to find out.  She grabbed her keys and took the stairs to his apartment, still wearing the dress she’d worn to the cocktail party.  

When she knocked quietly on his door, she initially heard nothing.  Then, his muffled voice came through the door saying, “Use your key.”  He didn’t add, “if you must,” but she heard it anyway.

He had changed his immaculate suit for a dark green polo shirt and jeans.  He was in his kitchen, in the process of slamming dishes none too gently into the dishwasher.  He looked up at her, but didn’t stop what he was doing.

“I don’t know why you’re here,” he told her.  “It’s midnight.  I am not mad at you, I left because I wanted to, and everything’s fine.”

“Uh-huh.  And that’s why you’re doing your best to smash those plates to bits.”  

“Really?  You’re going to criticize my kitchen abilities at this point in the conversation?”

She stepped to him and put a hand on his arm.  “Rafael. Please.  I can’t stand it when you’re mad at me.  Will you let me explain what happened at the party?”

Rafael sighed and turned toward Laura.  “There’s no need.  I’m not mad at you.”

For a moment, they just stood looking at one another.  

“I threatened to break that PR guy’s fingers, you know.  I shut him down, and I wasn’t nice about it.”

“Yeah, but why?  What was the point, Laura?” He turned his back, resuming his noisy work.

“He was a dick.”  

“OK, that guy’s a dick, but maybe the next guy won’t be.”

“Stop it, Rafael.  There’s no ‘next guy’.  I’m not having that conversation again.”  

“Laura, you could do better than me.  And that is a conversation I’m not having again.”

“I don’t want to do better. I want you.  Deal with it.”

Rafael slammed the dishwasher shut.  “I’ve been dealing with it!  Look what you’ve done to my life!  I was doing just fine until you showed up.  Now I’ve got you texting me nonsense all day, you’re on my couch every night, I’m leaving work early when I could be getting things done, I’m tripping over your kicked-off shoes everywhere…  I can’t think straight!  I haven’t had a moment’s peace since the day I met you!  So why don’t you do us both a favor and take ‘no’ for an answer?”

Laura’s shock showed plainly in her face.  She stood, speechless, confusion and humiliation robbing her of her senses.  

“Laura, I…”

“Stop.”  She managed to choke out in a small voice.  She put a hand on his arm and tried valiantly to paste a small smile on her face.  “Please, you don’t have to say any more.  I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…  I can be… blind sometimes.  I didn’t…  I thought… I’m sorry.  I really am.  Good night.”

She straightened her spine and held her head high as she stepped, working furiously to maintain her dignity, out of his kitchen.  Rafael thought he could actually feel the pieces of his heart tearing apart as she left the room.

He went after her.  “Laura, no… Don’t go…”

“It’s late, I’ll see you at work,” she said, her voice beginning to break free of her control.  

He reached her as she got to the door.  As she tried to pull it open, he stepped behind her, reached his arm out past her and put a hand on it, keeping it closed.  She stood, facing the door, in the small space between his body, the wall, and his arm.

“Please.  Don’t go.  I’m sorry…” Rafael spoke softly, his voice gruff, fighting with his own emotions.  He moved his body just a bit closer to hers, testing to see whether she would tolerate his touch.  

She felt immobilized by her own conflicting desires to flee from him in shame and to throw herself into his arms and beg him to love her.  Without words to express any of that, all she could do was stand, forehead pressed against his apartment door, traitorous tears welling in her eyes and escaping to slide hotly down her face.

He risked another half step toward her, lowering his arm and wrapping it lightly around her waist.  She could feel his face next to hers, his mouth just beside her ear.  “Don’t leave me.  Please,” he whispered, leaning his head on hers.

“I’m sorry f-for leaving my shoes here,” she choked, leaning just a bit back against him.

“Oh, God, Laura-“  He turned her to face him, placing a hand on either side of her tear-stained face.  “Everything I just said was a lie.  Do you have any idea what it does to me when I come home and I see those little holey tennis shoes next to my couch?  They make it possible for me to start to believe you’re real.”  He kissed her messily as she sniffled.

“I think about you all day long.  I’ll be meeting with some asshole talking about unspeakable crimes and I’ll get a text from you with some stupid thing Carisi said, and I just want to start singing. I hardly ever stay late at work anymore because I can’t stand to be anywhere but where you are.  And it scares the hell out of me.  You know it does.”  

“I know,” she sniffed.  “It’s OK.”

“No.  It’s not.  I lost it just now because halfway is no good for either of us.  I need to be in or out.”

Laura’s face lost all color except for flushed areas on her cheeks from crying.  “Rafael, don’t-“

“Laura, I’m saying I’m in.  The minute you started to walk out that door I knew I could never let you go.  Who am I kidding?  I’ve been in this whole time.”

Leaning down, Rafael tilted his face toward Laura’s, taking a long time to touch his lips to hers to let what he’d said sink in.  When she tilted up to him and tightened her arms around him, he pressed his mouth more firmly to hers, deepening the soft, light kiss just a little. 

“Are we OK?”  He asked.

“We’re OK,” she whispered, moving to continue the kiss.    

He began to kiss her more deeply then, pushing her gently back against the door.  She returned his kisses with growing intensity, her arms winding around him as tightly as his around her.  Soon they clung together, pressing their bodies together as though they couldn’t get close enough. 

He realized, in some dim recess of his mind, that he wanted to move them somewhere other than this corner of his small, dark foyer.  But he didn’t want to do anything to break the spell, anything that might make her change her mind and want to leave again.   Only after a very long time, when he felt her relax against him and heard her begin to breathe soft moans of pleasure, did he take a step backward. He moved away from the door, tentatively pulling her with him while they kissed passionately, almost desperately.

He took his time, needing her to want to stay.  It was working.  She shivered as he ran his hands down her sides and the bare skin of her back in the low cut dress, her own hands enjoying the contours of his muscular shoulders and upper arms.  He thought he felt her initiate a step then, and within minutes they were standing, locked together, a few feet inside his living room.  He felt her hands move to his chest, sliding them slowly down his torso in a maddening caress.  She stopped moving and drew in a sharp breath as she felt him effortlessly lower the zipper on the back of her dress.  He ran his fingers lightly up the bare skin of her back from the bottom of the zipper to her neck.  They both felt her skin break out in goosebumps.  Such undeniable evidence that she was enjoying what he was doing ratcheted up his arousal a few more notches.  

He kissed slowly down her jaw and began on her neck.  When he heard her breathy moan, he slid his hands up her arms until he reached her shoulders, hooked his thumbs on the straps of her dress, and pushed them off her shoulders.  As the straps slid down her arms, the dress slithered down her body, pooling on the floor.

“Smooth,” she breathed.

Rafael began with his hands on her hips and glided them slowly up her sides.  “For half that damned party, I was working out how I could get this dress off of you.”

“I thought you liked my dress.”

“I like it even better now,” he said, leaning down to scoop her up in his arms.

He carried her easily into his bedroom and set her gently on the bed, then pulled off his shirt in one motion as she playfully kicked off her shoes and moved over to make room for him.  He lay down on his side next to her with her arm behind him, and immediately reached over to pull her to him.  They made quick work of his pants and her panties.

Immediately, she tried to pull him over on top of her.  He chuckled down low as he kissed her, and stayed where he was, lying on his side.  He propped his head up on one arm, placing his free hand on her shoulder and running it slowly down her chest, across her breast and stomach, to her hip.  “Relax,” he murmured, dipping his head to give her a sweet kiss.  “We have all night.”  He took a very long time to simply look at her, drinking her in as she lay there next to him, entirely exposed to his eyes. 

“’Ño, Laura, eres tan hermosa.”[2]

She found lying there, simply allowing him to admire her nude body, the most erotic thing they had done thus far.  His eyes sparkled in the half-light, his expression hungry and appreciative.  But she wasn’t going to be able to lie still for long.  As he slid his hand back up to her breast, she couldn’t help but arch her back, pressing into his hand.  Laura moaned and squirmed beneath him, feeling every touch of his hands and mouth like a jolt of lightning to her core.  He cupped her breast, using his thumb to tease her achingly hard nipple as he leaned over to use his lips and tongue on her other breast.  “Rafael…”

She tried to turn toward him.  She wanted him inside her, now.  He wasn’t having it.

“Shhhh… Just let me…”

“I want to touch you.  You made me wait so long-”

“And I’m gonna make you wait even longer,” he said, kissing her fondly.

He used his hands and mouth to worship her breasts for so long that she could feel her wetness beginning to actually drip down the inside of her thigh.  When he began to slide one hand down her side to her hip, he heard her breath catch.  From the way she shifted her pelvis, he guessed his caress was having the intended effect.  He slowed the movement of his hand, prolonging her anticipation.  

Laura was becoming desperate.  He was deliberately teasing her.  Fuck, he was good with his hands, and his lips, and his tongue…  She cried out as he finally ran a finger between her lower lips. He began a slow, thorough exploration with his fingers while he continued nuzzling her breasts.  He smiled to himself as he felt her begin to move her hips and heard her whimper.  He took his time teasing and caressing her with his fingers before finally, slowly slipping a finger into her.  She cried out again.  He began a maddeningly slow rhythm, sliding his finger deliciously in an out of her dripping passage, as he moved up to recapture her mouth with his.  He relished her hungry response over prolonged minutes of deeply intimate kissing.  She began to rock her hips wantonly, unable to control her moans, as he deliberately teased her with the tip of a second finger for long moments before giving in and sliding the second finger inside of her.  

Finally, she couldn’t stay still any longer.  She rolled toward him, throwing a leg over his.  She kissed him, immediately taking control, exploring his lips and tongue with her own, while she reached down and ran her hand up first his leg, then slowly across his buttocks, before sliding it down his hip to caress his cock for the first time.  His lips became nearly motionless as his entire attention became focused on what she was doing to him.  His groan sent jolts of electricity through her.  The idea that it was her causing Rafael Barba to make that noise was overwhelmingly exciting.  

She had known, from their frustrating but delicious experiences on the couch, that his cock would be superb.  Now, finally past the barriers of his clothing, she reveled in being able to see and fully touch him.  She wanted everything all at once.  She pushed herself up on one hand so that she could explore his chest with the other, stroking and nuzzling haphazardly in her excitement.  When she bent down to lick the tip of his cock, the movement of her body made her intentions clear.

“Mi cariño,[3] you need to stop that,” he growled.

“And if I don’t?”  She whispered wickedly.

He took her by the upper arms and guided her back up the bed, then rolled them over so that he was lying on top of her.  “Then I won’t be able to do what I want to do to you.”

“You mean what I want you to do to me.”

She wrapped her arms and legs around him, laughing softly and moving her hips in a way he couldn’t resist.  As he entered her, he groaned gruffly, “Eres una hechicera, ¿cómo tienes ese control sobre mí? Algún día podré decirte que no.”[4] She gasped in answer. 

Neither of them were able to prolong things longer than a few minutes.  Rafael was beyond thinking, overwhelmed by the sensations – both physical and emotional – he was feeling.  He reveled in the hot wetness of Laura’s body gripping him as he moved in and out of her. Laura had already been impatient to feel him inside her, but the sheer ecstasy of Rafael’s size stretching and filling her exceeded even her expectations.  He pushed into her, withdrawing almost completely, then joyfully entering her again.  He wasn’t going to be able to last much longer, hearing Laura cry out her excitement and feeling her rock her hips in time with his pumping.  Her arousal was his.  He lifted up onto his elbows so that he could look down at her face. Seconds later, she cried out his name and arched her back.  He wanted to stay with her through her orgasm, but that was more than he could take.  She was still bucking and shaking as he felt his own overwhelming climax burst upon him.

Many minutes later, Laura felt him roll them over so that they were lying side by side, holding one another.  She was too spent to open her eyes.  She wasn’t sure whether she felt better physically, with all the endorphins and other hormones swirling through her, or mentally, knowing that she had just – finally - had mind-blowing sex with Rafael.  It had been too fast, but she would take care of that in a little while.

Rafael cradled her to him.  She felt him lift his shoulder to tip her head toward him and kiss her forehead. He held his lips to her face for some time, thinking that the smell of her shampoo would make him horny for the rest of his life.  He found he was smiling to himself.  Had it really been that long since he’d gotten laid, or was she really that special? He knew it was both.  Go slow, my ass, he thought.  

He felt much, much more than a blissful, post-sex haze.  He tried to stay completely in the moment and think only about this woman he held, who had slipped so blithely past all his defenses.  He cared far more for her than he wanted to, and he would much have preferred not to be that vulnerable.  In his more confident moments, he reminded himself what they’d been through together and the complete trust he had in her as a result.  But that was his body.  This was his heart.  Still, it was too late now.  He had no choice but to trust her, because he knew, without a doubt, that he was in love with her.

“So that happened,” he finally managed to say, still trying to catch his breath.

“Holy shit,” she panted.

“Yeah.”

“When I regain the power of rational thought, I’ll try to form a sentence about how great that was.  But for now…”

“Holy shit will do,” he chuckled, kissing her forehead through her hair.

“But, are you… OK?”  

He replied in a more serious tone, and put a hand to her cheek.  “I’m way better than OK.  When we get under the covers, I’ll be perfect.”

“Now there’s a double meaning I really like the sound of.”

“Don’t end a sentence with a preposition.”

Laura sat up.  “Seriously? At this moment, what you have to say to me is, ‘Don’t end a sentence with a preposition’?  What is wrong with me?  How am I naked with you right now?”

Laughing, they slipped between the crisp, cool sheets of his bed to cuddle together.  

Rafael knew he was smiling in the dark like an idiot, and he couldn’t have cared less.  Laura had her eyes closed, enjoying the sensory experience of breathing in Rafael’s scent, feeling his muscular shoulder under her cheek, running her fingers lightly over his chest to savor the softness of his chest hair.  

She was dimly aware of a sense of awe underlying her post-coital bliss.  He was so much more than she’d imagined – more tender, more skilled, more sensual and romantic.  And they hadn’t even started.

They dozed together, sated and happy.  Rafael woke a while later, distantly curious about what time it was, but didn’t have the energy or inclination to move enough to look at the clock.  He felt Laura stir against him and heard her sigh happily.  The idiotic smile was back on his face.

“Hypothetically, if I said you rocked my world tonight, how insufferable would you be about it?”  Her voice was languid and dreamy, with a tinge of amusement.

“One to ten?”  He asked. She loved the rumble of his voice in his chest under her ear as she snuggled into him.

“Sure.”

“Well, my baseline’s about an eight, so…”

She squeezed him as she laughed, kissing his chest, then lifted up so she could kiss his lips.  She didn’t say anything, just looked at him with a satisfied smile.  

“Ven aca,”[5] he whispered, sliding his hand up her bare back and pulling her to him. She kissed him back, deepening the kiss and running her hand over his chest.  When she felt the kiss change, she slowly let her hand drift down his chest and abdomen, until her fingers lightly traced over his cock.  She could feel the first stirrings of arousal in him, and tenderly fondled him while they kissed.

“I know that was fast before,” she murmured provocatively against his lips, “but what I lack in patience, I make up for in perseverance.”  He thought he had never known a woman who challenged him so often to kiss and smile at the same time.  

As he grew harder, she moved to kiss his jaw, then his neck, and shifted her body to scatter a long, meandering line of kisses and soft nips down his chest and abdomen.

He groaned again, low in his chest, when she took him into her mouth, softly exploring his balls with her fingers.  The musk of him, and of their lovemaking, was intoxicating.  He was soon grinding his hips and gulping air, moaning heatedly, which inspired her to do everything she could think of to pleasure him.  She spent long minutes stroking him, sucking and licking him, following his movements and his cries to establish the rhythm he wanted.  Fuck, it was hot to hear Rafael so undone, and to know that it was her giving him such gratification.  When he began to fuck her mouth wantonly, she knew he was close.  She continued to suck him, running her tongue up and down his shaft and around the head of his cock until a cry and a salty jet in the back of her throat told her that she had given him the pleasure she’d been aiming for. She paid close attention to him as he rode his orgasm to its completion, moving with him until she had drawn out the last shudders.  

He was still breathing heavily as she crawled back to his side and cuddled up to him, throwing an arm and a leg over him as she kissed his chest.  He fell asleep with his nose buried in her fragrant hair.

It took Laura a few blinks to realize where she was when she awoke.  When she did, her stomach did a little flip and she scooted closer to where Rafael lay behind her with his arm over her.  She felt him kiss the back of her hair.

“Hi,” she muttered.

He nuzzled the back of her neck.  “Did I wake you?”

“I don’t think so.  How come you’re awake?”

“I had a nice dream.”

“About?”

“About you.  Turns out it was real.”  She felt him chuckle behind her.  It felt wonderful.

“I had the same dream.  It was nice.”  She turned over to face him and put her arm over him, pulling as close to him as she could.

“Laura…”

“Hmmm?”

He didn’t answer.  She looked up.  

“Rafa?”

“The waking up part is really nice, too.”  He kissed her long and slow, and began to make love to her again.  

[1] Nonsense

[2] Fuck, Laura, you’re so beautiful.

[3] My sweetheart

[4] You’re a sorceress.  How do you have such control over me?  Some day I’ll be able to say no to you.

[5] Come here.

[bruciewayne]

as long as you want to

set in iron man 2, rhodeytony, hurt/comfort, 2.2k, on ao3

- for @iron-man-bingo

Certificate of Marriage

This certifies that

James Edward Rhodes

AND

Anthony Edward Stark

were united in marriage in the city of Las Vegas, in state of Nevada

36 Hours ago...

“Can I ask you something personal?” Tony asks, looking up at Natalie. She nods, a small and controlled movement and carries on dabbing concealer on his face. “If this was the last birthday party you were ever going to have, what would you do?” For him, it’s not really a question of if anymore, is it? But Natalie doesn’t have to know.

He’s debated telling Rhodey and Pepper, but that would just make the whole ‘dying’ part harder, before, when the toxicity was lower, there’d been no point in worrying them, when a cure was on the horizon, except now, his boat’s pretty much sunk, so there’s no point lighting a flare if no-one’s going to come in time.

He really, really should tell Rhodey. The first person who cared for him, out of choice, his first real friend, his first love (not that he knows, because that would be too much for him), god, fuck he should tell him, he deserves to know. But he can’t. It feels like the ultimate defeat.

Natalie stops pressing the beauty blender against his face and looks him in the eye.

“I would do whatever I wanted to do, with whoever I wanted to do it with,” she says, softly, holding his gaze. Tony swallows and breaks eye contact.

So he goes to Vegas.

(He didn’t take a single syllable of her advice. He wants to spend the night marathoning Star Wars with Rhodey, but he can’t be with Rhodey. Not now. It’ll be better for everyone. It’s better if he just pushes everyone away, just push and push until he doesn’t have anyone, but by that point, he’ll be dead anyway.

A man who has everything… and nothing.)

He gets there with the suit, it’s faster and results in fewer questions than the jet. And it’s a chance to show it off, which is always a plus. It might make getting back later harder, but in all honesty, he’d rather go out in a crash in the suit than the slow and painful end the palladium promised.

He lands, secures a room, opens a tab and gets as much alcohol in his system as possible while still being able to bet and mess around. He supposes that the palladium changed his tolerance, which was a shame in many ways, but now it just meant that he could get drunk faster.

He doesn’t know what he’s even doing, everything’s a blur. It’s the last birthday he’s ever going have and he won’t even fucking remember it.

Happy 40th birthday to him.

Whatever. He takes another shot and goes to roll the dice, but some guy stops him. Some guy with 2 heads? Rhodey! Oh fuck.

“Yeah, fuck,” he grumbles, voice just about getting through to Tony, “you’re coming with me.”

Tony knows that because of the whole ‘Iron Man’ thing he’s been fitter than he’s ever been in his life, but he’s still no match for Rhodey, so he’s very easily manhandled… somewhere. Easily, only in his eyes. For Rhodey, it was the farthest thing from ‘easy’, Tony kept trying to hug him, which he’s rarely opposed to, but now, it was just causing a general hinderance. He must be further gone than thought.

Eventually, they get out the casino and Rhodey gets in the Iron Man suit (he refuses to let Tony anywhere near controlling it when he’s this drunk, if he can’t drive a car, he can’t fly the suit).

“Colonel Rhodes,” JARVIS greets, after the mandatory retinal scans.

“Hey JARVIS,” Rhodey always made a point to interact with Tony’s ‘bots. He has a soft spot for Dum-E. (He pretends it’s not because he was the very first person he showed him to.)

“Take care of my creator, would you?” JARVIS says, and Rhodey doesn’t know if Tony’s truly mastered giving AI emotions, but he seems to speak profoundly, as if he were passing on a baton. There’s something Tony’s not telling him. But that’s not a priority right now.

“I’ll try my best.” For as long as he’s alive, he’ll always try to take care of him, always love him. At this point, it’s been so long, he doesn’t know if he can do anything else.

He grabs Tony and flies them up to his suite, they land on the balcony. He pushes him on the bed before getting out of the suit to JARVIS wishing him, “Good luck, Colonel.”

“Ooh I wouldn’t be oppos’d t’ this,” Tony says, well, slurs, really, head lolling - he’s been in Vegas for about an hour, maybe, Rhodey has no idea how he got this drunk already, but Tony’s always been good at defying his expectations. Rhodey thinks nothing of it, Tony’s just... like that. Platonically.

“Tones, I’m gonna get you some water, okay?” Rhodey says, pushing him so he’s leant against the headboard and tugging his shoes off. He goes to find a bottle of water (there’s one in the minifridge, nestled behind mini bottles of whiskey and cognac) and by the time he’s back, Tony’s on the verge of tears, body drawn into a small ball in the corner of the bed.

“Hey, hey, Tones, what’s going on,” he says, gently, coming next to him and kicking his own shoes off, he puts the water bottle on the bedside table and sits on the bed next to him. He wraps an arm around him, Tony’s terrible at asking for affection, but after all these years Rhodey knows, almost intrinsically, when he wants it.

Tony looks up at him with teary eyes and Rhodey feels his heart breaking for him.

“Rode- Rhodey… I’m,” he swallows, “I- this, fuck this’s hard, I--”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, you’re gonna be okay, yeah,” Rhodey can’t listen to him try to force something out, so he pushes the water into his hand and rubs his back until he finishes it. Tony winds his arms around his waist and tucks his head into his neck.

“I’ll, I shouldn’t tell you like, like this, I- tomorrow. Promise,” Tony mumbles into his neck.

“Okay, okay, Tones, sleep, yeah,” Rhodey says, easing them down so they’re actually lying down and pulls Tony further into his arms, “sleep.”

Tony’s out like a light and Rhodey is staring up at the ceiling until the sun starts to filter in, holding the man he loves.

In the morning, well, afternoon, really, Tony wakes with a start. When he set out last night, he had half expected to end up naked in a stranger’s bed, but as soon as his other senses start to filter in he realises that, while he’s not in his own bed, it’s not a stranger with him. And he’s fully clothed.

“Hey,” Rhodey says, softly, running his hands through Tony’s hair.

Tony groans and buries his head back into the pillows. Right away, he can’t remember much of last night, he knows that he set out with the intent to get shit-faced, and he remembers arriving in the suit, but past that is just a blur. It should come back. Tony’s not too sure that he wants it to come back.

Usually, this is when Rhodey laughs. This time, he murmurs something about getting Advil and water and being back in ten. He untangles himself, much to his disappointment and goes. Tony falls back asleep.

When he wakes up again, there’s a packet of Advil and a couple water bottles on the nightstand, so he swallows two with a bottle of water before taking in the rest of the room. Rhodey’s out on the balcony talking to someone on the phone, but when he notices that Tony’s awake, he hangs up and comes back in.

“Hey, how are you doing?”

“Eh,” Tony replies, which translates into ‘it feels like an anvil fell on my head, and the light hurts a little’, so all in all, not as hungover as he thought he’d be. Rhodey gave him water last night. Which means that Rhodey was here last night. Which means, he probably said something.

“You want to order food or get picked up?” The iron man suit isn’t even in the question.

“Food.” He’s not really up for sentences or words longer than a syllable right now, and ‘picked up’ often means a disapointed Pepper, Rhodey and Happy. Now, it may even mean a disappointed Natalie.

“Breakfast?”

Tony manages a smile at that, “Yeah.” The only problem with breakfast is that food will ease up the hangover and clear up his brain, which means that he’ll remember what he did. Or said. Fuck.

After they’ve eaten Tony still isn’t sure of what he said last night, but he does know that there was crying involved on his part. He so rarely is the melancholy drunk.

‘I’m dying’ rang loud in his mind, it should be easy to say, 2 words, 3 syllables, but he can’t force it out and instead makes a promise he doesn’t know if he can keep.

Liquid courage indeed.

It comes easily this time. Maybe it’s the sober-ness, the lack of urgency. Rhodey still has his arm around him and they’re stretched out on the bed, the plates, empty, on the floor. He’s feeling relaxed.

“I’m dying,” he says, simply. It’s not a weight off his chest (ironically), it’s defeat, it’s admittance.

Rhodey stiffens up next to him, “How long...” do you have left? is the rest of the question, but he can’t bring himself to say it, hell, it hasn’t even really settled in that Tony’s dying.

“A month left.”

Rhodey doesn’t know what to say, so he pulls him into a hug, holding him tight, as if he held tight enough, death couldn’t take him. He knows Tony, he knows that he wouldn’t speak like this, wouldn’t admit defeat, if he hadn’t tried everything he could think of already.

“Important month?”

‘Then this is an important week for you, Stark, isn’t it?’

Tony could give a one-liner, and then they’d have a heavy talk, but on the other hand, Rhodey makes some incredibly valid points, in that, yeah, this is an important month for him.

So he kisses him. If he doesn’t like him then he only has a month of embarrassment anyway.

Rhodey kisses back. It’s sweet and languid, like they’ve been doing this for aeons already, like they should’ve been doing this for aeons.

“Marry me?” Tony says, breathlessly, when they pull away, a smile brightening his face, and fuck Rhodey had missed that damn smile.

“Are you still drunk?” He can’t get his hopes up, but just before Rhodey’s about to start his ‘Don’t get your hopes up for Tony’ speech, the very man in question eases out of bed, sticks his arms out and walks in a perfectly straight line.

Rhodey grins. “Let’s get married!”

On the way to a courthouse (Tony got them bumped up so they wouldn’t have to wait), Tony asks Rhodey, “How long?”

“You remember when you made Dum-E, when you showed me?”

“That long?”

“Yeah.”

Tony rolls his eyes, “I can’t believe that we could’ve been married for decades already.” There’s more that they could’ve said, should’ve said, about how long they’ve loved, why they’ve kept quiet, but that seems irrelevant now and in the moment.

“Better late than never, huh?”

The smile on Tony’s face is ridiculously sappy, he knows that, but he can’t find it in himself to stop it, “Yeah.”

The ceremony is short and quick. They’ve waited over 2 decades, any more would be lost time. They’re both smiling so bright, because none of it feels real, none of it ever seemed tangible, but now it is. And they only have a month left.

They’re back in the hotel, in the exact same positions they were in before they were married.

“Rhodey, I was serious, I, I only have a month left,” Tony says, breaking the silence and bursting their bubble. He doesn’t want to go back to Malibu, if, when, he goes back, everything’s going to be so, so much more real, now, in Vegas he can pretend that his problems don’t exist

“Tony, if there’s anything you can do, it’s go against the odds, regardless of those odd--”

“Yeah, but this time, Rhodey, I don’t know if I can,” Tony interrupts, he sits up, turns himself to face him and unbuttons his shirt, revealing the extent of the poisoning. “Look me in the eye and tell me I can fix this,” Tony challenges, he’s angry, but he’s also begging, he doesn’t want to die, he wants to, he has to, live. For Rhodey.

“Do you want to?” Rhodey challenges back, voice barely above a whisper.

Tony doesn’t answer.

“Tony Stark, do you want to live?”

“Yes.”

Rhodey pulls him into a hug, “Then you will, baby, you will, this isn’t your last birthday, you are going to celebrate you 42nd and 3rd and 4th until you’re old and grey and even then, that damn heart of yours is going to keep on beating, as long as it needs to, as long as you want it to.”

-

iron man bingo masterpost

[codeprint]

giant rambling drablle for the crowns verse with @rexcrystallis while i try to get my mojo back

There are three lies Prompto Aldercapt Izunia has told himself across the years. Lies for his own good and for the good of his people.

The first is that he is Iedolas Aldercapt’s biological son. Born and bred for the crown when the Emperor’s health was failing, as a last ditch effort to secure the throne. Verstael Besithia, bastard half-brother to the Emperor as he was, had no qualms about foraging the birth certificate and backing up the story. Saying that he adopted the child to protect the boy, that the wedding was done in secret and his claim to the throne was true and genuine - though they didn’t believe the latter. The people would not accept the bastard of a bastard to rule them, but with no other option to turn to, they would accept a bastard of their divine emperor to continue the bloodline.

This lie is most commonly accepted as false. But without papers to prove it, without definitive proof that the child is not Iedolas’ - and with the Emperor’s own dying words being a claim to the boy as his own - they have no proof.

The second is that he is sick with a blood defect leading to a poor immune system and a heart disorder. That the reasons for his frequent hospitalizations is simply a byproduct of anemia and low blood pressure, passing the discoloration of his skin off as poor circulation and bruising from falls. The plague doesn’t hide itself in him as it does Ardyn, leaving him bedridden and coughing blood and miasma when it flares up. The people buy it, for what else can they think it would be? They’ve never seen someone suffering from the plague live so long, and the Prince lacks the madness that those afflicted with the scourge have. He may be ill, and he will surely be gone long before his time - but he is sunshine upon their dark land, and most love him for it.

Most. Not all. He’s sick and he is dying. Tabloids rush to speculate on how long he’ll live - will he see himself crowned at twenty-one? Will he drop dead in a ceremony, or slip away gently into that good night? Or will he fool all of them and survive well past their wildest dreams?

Photographs of the prince attached to oxygen and IVs circulate. They precede him when he visits Lucis, when watchful eyes track his movements and note the frailty of his build. Noctis Lucis Caelum escorts him personally to the hospital by chance, and through that chance they become friends.

His physicians recommend he summer in Lucis, to build his immune system in a warmer climate. This secret is kept well, for he has no outward signs of the starscourge - only shredded internal organs that heal themselves so long as he’s given time to rest. Noctis may question, but there is little to suggest that this is anything but a set of terrible genetic disorders from a child born too late in both his parents lives.

The third lie - the third lie is the most important of all.

Prompto tells himself that he is not in love with Noctis Lucis Caelum.

This is the most convincing lie, the most secretive one. One he doesn’t even allow himself to consider. Noctis is the first friend he’s had outside of immediate family and those who were paid to attend to him. The first person to both understand his struggles, and the first to not underestimate him for his health. He’s a worthy opponent in all games, in conversation and debate, and a trusted confidante unlike any he’s ever had.

Ardyn warns him to keep his wits about him.  To not trust blindly, to not give himself completely to a smile and a kind word - and he does his very best to. They keep in touch, they arrange visits, they stay up all night on the phone - he becomes familiar with the soft sounds of Noctis’ snoring, and finds them lulling him to sleep even when his body aches so badly he wants to die. He goes to university in Lucis for a semester to study engineering and design and there’s scarcely a day they aren’t apart.

These secrets are an invisible wedge between them, but he isn’t fool enough to think Noctis doesn’t have secrets of their own. Being best friends does not mean that you’re entitled to all of the other. It means you’re privvy to whatever they wish to give.

He doesn’t know who starts it. Only that they’re both drunk and a little high on the floor of their dorm, a breath too close. Too comfortable.  He is not in love with Noctis but Noctis’ touch feels grounding in a way nothing else does, and he is not in love with Noctis but he aches when they’re apart and calls him each morning to say good morning, and each night to say goodnight. He does not sleep until he hears the sleepy voice on the other end, complaining of how he never remembers the time difference.

Spring break starts tomorrow and they’ve talked of going to Altissa, or of visiting his cousins - but talking gets sidetracked by one of them leaning in too close and the other kissing. Prompto is inexperienced and bumbling, Noctis is smooth and practiced. It escalates quickly, one thing to another until they’re tangled in the sheets and sweating. Years of unspoken want culiminating in a drunken fuck on a too small cot. A scandal behind closed doors.

He is not in love with Noctis Lucis Caelum.

But their fingers are threaded together. Foreheads pressed together, panting as one. Prompto slides his arms around Noctis’ neck once their grip relents and drags him into a crushing kiss.

They don’t say I love you. They can’t. They’re monarchs, the last of their respective lines as it stands, this isn’t permitted. Ardyn may not want to arrange him a wife, but the morning after he and Noctis thumb through the packages of potential brides that have gone ignored. Prompto’s half in his lap, trying not to mock the sour-faced princess who billed herself as adoring of all people while they rifle through her social media and find disparaging comments about the both of them.

“You’d think they’d learn to use an alt,” he laughs, fingers threading through his friend’s hair while the Lucian kisses his neck. “Seriously. Can you imagine being caught dead posting duckfaces with #saynotonilfs to your official account?”

They take a selfie for their instagrams (Prompto takes it, Noctis poses as if he hasn’t a care in the world) and settle for Altissa. Days on the beach, nights spent applying aloe-vera to sunburned skin and kissing new freckles where they form. They fuck and kiss lazily, wake up with teasing and good natured ribbing, and continue on as if nothing had changed.

Because it hasn’t. Not really. He feels no differently, no more strongly - he puts it aside, allows himself to believe that this is normal. That this is college fun, the kind Aranea has been insisting he needs to have. They go back to Lucis at the end of the week. 

They do not stop having sex.

It becomes an affair once Noctis becomes engaged. There’s a pressure to spend more time together even through the courtship, though now they’re no longer college students with all the time in the world. Niflheim loathes the lack of progress under this new Emperor, they see him as weak willed as he is weak bodied and they threaten him with death every other day. He turns up at the party twenty-five and exhausted, but within seconds of being in Noctis’ presence he’s rejuvenated. When they disappear from his bachelor party up to his rooms, no one so much as bats an eye. Straddling him, his suit half undone and his mind fogged with drink, he bends down to draw Noctis into a deep, passionate kiss.

“Marry me instead,” he says, half-joking against his lips but suddenly realizes that he means it. He’s drunk, he’s tired, and so is Noctis. “Noct, you should be marrying me instead.”

It’s impossible. A king and an emperor of wartorn lands, diametrically opposed - destiny demanding that they fight. Prompto is a heathen who doesn’t bend a knee to the Six and fights against their destiny merely by being alive, and Noctis is their chosen one meant to bring it all to order.

They can’t.

Noctis pushes him off. Prompto doesn’t resist. They sit in the silence of the room together, it changes from tense and angry to something softer. A quiet yearning.

“I love you,” Prompto says quietly. A confession as much to himself as it is to his friend.

Noctis doesn’t say it in turn, he tilts his head and strokes a hand down his pale cheek. Conveys it in the look in his eyes, and the tenderness of his gaze. A faint smile - you just now realized this?

They don’t talk. They simply stay like that through the night, thinking how much easier life would be if they could tell the other all they knew. All they wanted. 

Noctis’ wed the next day.

That doesn’t stop them from allowing themselves small pleasures.

They still meet. They do not stop the affair. But adulthood relegates these meetings to a handful of times a year, never for long. There may be no war, but that does not stop the world from being cruel. They say the words more through gestures than aloud, one afraid to be overheard, the other afraid to admit it - interchangably, inarguably, always.

The second lie comes undone next.

Niflheim is starving and the Gods have forsaken it. They loathe Ardyn and loathe his progengy for attempting to foster peace where they want war and corruption. Prompto spends long hours in the laboratories he was born in, coughing into rags and working tirelessly to solve the problem. To find a means to bring spring back to his homeland, and to keep the people fed in the interim.

And to stop the plague.

It’s little surprise that he collapses. That Ardyn finds him unconscious on the floor when he’d missed a meeting, gagging on blood and miasma and unresponsive to the touch. The Emperor is not yet thirty, but time is running short. His own research cannot benefit someone who was born with the curse embedded into the fabric of his being, and all Verstael’s attempts at cloning were not to make one immune. Only to make them last long enough to be useful.

He’s crossed that peak.

Without a miracle, he will die.

A call is placed to Lucis. Ardyn - who for all his willingness to tolerate Noctis, never dared to speak to him or look upon his face - on the other end, not Prompto. He heads off Noctis’ complaint of the time with the news of what he found. How they found the Emperor. Conveying that Prompto has taken a turn for the worse, and he should come to see him off.

Or to use what the Gods gifted him to buy them all enough time to defy their cruel plans.

[overplannedbutunnamednpc]

This week’s ask meme Monday theme is “I make my friends do math” SO start at the top and answer prime numbers until you 1) run out of characters 2) run out of prime numbers or 3) lose interest. STEM boy

:(

but i’m still doing it. randomly rolling starting with pcs, then npcs, then stopping

1. What’s one experience your character had that made them very afraid? Isaac: so i don’t know how much i’ve said on here about what isaac’s experience in hell actually Was Like. and i think I’ve used the word “puppet” before, and I think that was what it was like. she doesn’t remember a whole lot about it, because for the most part, she just wasn’t there. if she really tried, i think she could remember specific things, but she doesn’t Like To. it’s remembering when you had no choice or control, when your body wasn’t your own and you had to smile and laugh for things with too many hands and tails and teeth. a devil full ass remade her as a tiefling, grew her horns slowly but surely through the skin of her cheeks, up and through and out her eye sockets. like. shits fucked. now that she has her brain back, shes Very afraid of the thing that did that to her.

2. What is your character’s happiest memory? Nyxi: her patron probably had a kid while she was working with her and oh my god...... thinking about her and that tiny small little baby while her patron recovered....... knowing that no she wasn’t the one to give birth to them but they’re going to be, like their siblings have been, just a much a child of hers as theyve all been. she loved all her kids, of course, but there was something special about holding that baby in the first few hours of their life, watching them grow up and helping them with that growth. she’d probably rank those first few hours among the happiest of her life, for sure.

3. What’s one skill your character really wishes they had? Sarril: hmmmm. the ability to heal, maybe? I think that’s the kind of skill he would like. there’s just something nice about like. even if you get too angry and go too far there’s still a way for you to make it right, you know?

skipping 5 bc I don’t care for it overmuch

7. Have they ever encountered someone they really wanted to kill? Zephyr: no. like does she dislike a lot of people? sure! but she’s been mostly a stay-in-the-ivory-tower kind of person, and as such hasn’t really made any enemies. rivals, sure, yeah, and I doubt she made many friends before she entered into the academy. but she doesn’t want to kill anyone. (yet.)

11. What was something they struggled with greatly and how did they overcome it? Legacy: hmmmmm. I think legacy struggled a lot with like.... Mattering, if that makes sense? I think she got her Powers rather early in life because her grandmother looked at her immediately post her spouse dying and went “yeah she’s old enough” and came by like “yo adore whats up. want some cool Spells (eventually) and also to be my grandchild” and legacy, then adore, then 9 years old, said “boy WOULD I!!!!!” and then she spent the next eight or nine years really struggling with what to do with them? she’s got spells at this point and all she’s done is work in a print shop. at some point she turned to petty crime because she was good at lying her ass off, and then eventually she got a sword and went to Adventure because she straight up didn’t know what else she wanted to do. it’s only now that she’s kind of figuring out that like. yeah she does kinda like adventuring? even more when there’s people around her.

13. Does your character have anyone that they really care about, to the point that they would give their life for them? If so, who are they and what is your character’s relation to them? If not, do they wish they did? Is there anyone they wish they could build such a relationship with? Zier: so like......... yes and no? zier sucks. zier sucks big time. and I think the closest thing he has at least at the points i’ve played him, are MAYBE one of his little siblings. like yes he’s meant to be making them paranoid and selfish. but also maybe he has a little sister who’s just always been a bit too soft for his family. and maybe he remembers that he’s the only boy in his family because his oldest sister killed the other one. so maybe he’s a little protective but very good at pretending like he isn’t. maybe his littlest sister knows better than to trust him even if she’s soft, so he’ll never have much more of a relationship with her than that. and maybe he wishes that it was different. and maybe he knows better.

17. How was their childhood? Did their parents treat them fairly? Did they have any really good friends? Kenny: kenny had a very nice set of parents and I think I said in game that he had a little brother but I also think he might’ve been an only child? idk. but this ask doesn’t ask that!!! his parents were very fair. maybe a little lax but only because kenny was a pretty Good Kid. and I do think he kind of sees them through rose colored glasses now that theyre gone but they were pretty good. his tragic backstory focuses on Losing them. in addition, I think he did have some really good friends! he’s a charming boy and pretty friendly, and it was a decently small village. I think he found some other folk his own age and they played together when they were young and that translated into proper friendship as they got older.

19. Have they ever lost a loved one? What happened to them, and are they the same as they were before they lost them? Ecstasy: okay so. I made it semi canon that when she got the reapers hand, it may or may not have made her shoot her best friend point blank to devour her soul when it got hungry. I am canonizing this. this did happen, and it was the reason ecstasy started taking rogue levels instead of fighter levels. she like. got back to using guns? but she handed over her hugely cursed but also HUGELY powerful gun to her fuckbuddy’s friend without much of a fight, I’ll tell you that much.

23. Does your character know any languages apart from their native language? What one would they like to learn? Glade: lemme look at his character sheet. okay he only knows common and orcish. he uses common a lot more than he uses orcish, but orcish was his first language and now that he has red he uses it a lot more, trying to have her pick it up as a language too. and this is a predictable answer but still true: if he had much time to learn a language, he’d learn infernal. he knows a few words because he’s married to a tiefling, but he doesn’t have the bloodline-given understanding of the language like they do and he would Like To Know What His Wife And Two Year Old Are Giggling About, Please.

29. If they could change just one thing about themselves, what would it be? Endurance: so. like. I don’t know if endurance would change anything about herself??? actually no she would. she would love it if she were more decisive. like, relentless decided to fall and decided to claw her way back to amaunator’s side, and endurance like. isn’t like that at all. I think a lot of her regrets are still tied up in “should I have turned lent into the crownsguard” and because of the violence that happened, she shouldn’t have. but like. she REALLY hates how unsure she is about the circumstances surrounding it, you know? she didn’t heal her, she didn’t really try and stop it until it was too late, and she hasn’t accepted that she was passive in those circumstances. at least if she were more decisive, she thinks she would have already made peace with the things she did pre and post lent’s fall.

31. How patient is your character with others? Do they find it easy to handle people that try and bug them, or hard? Iris: very patient. she’s a princess and also deals with motherfuckers unlimited Literally Constantly. she’s SO patient. however. she also takes no shit. if someone is trying to bug her, then she will not attempt to deal with it. her ability to have Diplomacy means that she can rather easily and relatively politely just go “you are not having this conversation with me in a respectful manner. if you can stop deliberately prodding me for a reaction, we can continue with what we are discussing. if you cannot or refuse to respect me and my time here with you, then I am stopping the conversation here. which option would you like?”

skipping 37 as well

41. Where do they live? What is that place like, do they enjoy living there? Kiya: kiya likes highgrasp! she probably likes it more than any other place she’s lived. it’s a nice city, it’s a clean city, she likes the ocean, and she likes the job she got there. not much to complain about!

43. What are they like when they’re drunk? Don’t be a prude and tell me they’ve never been smashed before. Coriander: zephyr and coriander are the Same when drunk. Loud and Intelligent. coriander also may be a Horny drunk but that may be because she just likes talking about her spouse and thinks (rightly so) that they are Sexy. she will get on her construct to be eight feet taller than most opponents and she will Debate them about magical theory whether they want to be a part of the conversation or not. Fucka You.

[uswe]

Fic: Superman

Apparently I go here again. FML.

3k of outsider POV roommate shenanigans, now on AO3.

Josh has been emailing his roommate off and on over the summer, since they got their assignments, and he’s got a good feeling about this. Stiles seems like a good dude, and they’ve already got a pact to be running buddies so they don’t put on the Freshman 15. Even better, Stiles is bringing both the microwave and the mini fridge, so Josh doesn’t have to ship that stuff all the way from Wisconsin.

Josh arrives at the dorm first, probably because his flight had left Chicago at a truly grotesque hour of the morning. It was a good thing, though, because all of them had been too tired and cranky to cry at him leaving. He’s not sure how they’re gonna set up the beds - loft one? loft both? bunks? - so he just puts down his duffle bags and starts unpacking his clothes to put in one of the closets. He’s not normally super neat, but this is a brand new start and stuff, so here he can, like, not have a floor covered in dirty sweats.

By the time his roommate shows up, Josh has his laptop set up to automatically connect to campus wifi and he’s found the closest spot for lunch.

Stiles bursts in with a duffle bag strapped across his chest and a microwave in his arms. “Dude!”

“Hey, man,” Josh says, rising to offer to help. But in behind Stiles comes a Latino dude with a tattoo on his arm and two boxes of stuff, and behind him are two girls carrying a mini fridge in a box. Stiles obviously has everything well in hand.

“Oh, hey, you haven’t done anything with your bed yet. Are you planning to loft it? Because I’m totally lofting mine for the futon to go under it, but if we did yours too we could put the bean bag chair and the fridge under that and have, like, an actual living room for when people come over.”

“I wanted to see what you wanted to do,” Josh says, and sort of waves awkwardly to the other people crowding into their room. “Uh, hi.”

“Hey,” says the other guy, balancing the boxes against his chest so he has a free hand to extend to shake. “I’m Scott, and these are Malia and Kira.”

Stiles takes the boxes and sticks them on his desk. “Right, I’ll grab the lofting stuff, if you wanna grab the futon from Malia’s truck, Scott. I’ll help with getting the frame when I get back.” Stiles emphasizes ‘help’ like he thinks Kira and Malia will try to bring it in and hurt themselves.

Malia rolls her eyes.

Josh takes the opportunity to volunteer, “I can go get the stuff, since you’re providing, like, everything else, dude.”

“Awesome,” Stiles says. “We’re gonna have everything kickass before anyone else has even unpacked.”

“Think you’re behind the curve - Jae-yoon and Julio at the end of the hall both had their moms here most of the morning getting their room set up. I think they have Glade plugins in every outlet.”

Stiles makes an impressed face. “Fair enough. Guess I know where I’m gonna go when our room smells like dirty socks and Cheetos.”

They get everything in their room in a few huge chaotic piles, but once Malia’s truck is empty, Stiles’ friends look around and seem to wipe their hands of it. “I don’t want to help with any of this,” Malia says, and Josh kind of admires her bluntness.

“Yeah, yeah,” says Stiles, and opens his arms for a hug. He gets a hug and a kiss on the cheek from both girls and a really tight hug from Scott while Josh stands around awkwardly.

They finish their goodbyes and troop out, leaving the room feeling even emptier than it had been before Stiles arrived with all of his stuff. Stiles rubs his hands together and says, “Okay, let’s get started.”

Setting up the room doesn’t take that long, but by the end of it Josh is feeling kind of inadequate. He ran cross country, okay? He’s pretty in shape. But his roommate has to be way more into upper body stuff or something, because he pretty much effortlessly holds the beds in place while Josh gets the lofting bits in place, and they’re really not that light.

Their RA taps on the door while Josh is finishing up putting together the futon frame and Stiles is stocking the fridge with Red Bull. “Hey, guys, floor meeting at 7, okay?”

“Yeah.” Stiles looks at his watch. “We should grab dinner first, then. You said you knew the dudes down the hall?”

They pick up Jae-Yoon and Julio, and Julio stares at Stiles in what Josh can’t tell is lust or envy. Josh doesn’t have very good gaydar, and Stiles is built enough that it could be either. The group of them hits up the dining hall, and they end up swapping high school stories as they eat. Jae-Yoon had done Forensics and a whole bunch of theatre and music stuff, and Julio was apparently his class president as well as a member of the Debate club and on the baseball team. Josh would feel kind of inadequate with just his cross country and working at the florist, but he’s mostly impressed by having scored cool friends, and Stiles is in the same boat, since he’d done lacrosse and cross country and that was it. He reaffirms that Stiles will be his running buddy, but then it’s way more interesting to talk to Jae-Yoon. Stiles is funny and all, but his life is kind of boring.

-

Running with Stiles makes Josh feel ruffled and out of shape, because the dude’s fast, and he doesn’t get tired, and he doesn’t seem to care if he’s working so hard he’s sweating buckets by the end. He makes Josh feel inadequate, which is ridiculous. Josh has medals for 5k runs.

“Dude,” he says the first Friday, “can we go slower? I am not nearly awake enough for this.”

Stiles immediately slows to a more manageable pace. “Sorry.”

Josh just nods, still getting his breath back. “‘s all good.”

When they get back to the dorms, Stiles hits the shower immediately. Josh drinks water and lets himself cool down, though, which is why he’s the only one there when Julio pops in. “Hey! I got invited to a house party tonight, she said I could bring people. Wanna come?”

“Sure! What time? Should I bring Stiles?”

“Like ten? And sure!” Julio pops back out.

Josh grabs his stuff and heads to the shower, takes extra time so that he’s sure to smell nice. It’s gonna be his first college party, which is really cool.

-

Stiles may actually be the most awkward person in the room, which is kind of embarrassing. He’s got a drink in his hand and his back to a corner wall and just keeps staring twitchily at everyone. Josh turns with the girl he’s talking to so he doesn’t have to watch his roommate. He feels kind of bad, because you’re supposed to look out for your roommate or something, but it’s Josh’s first college party as much as it’s Stiles’, and he doesn’t want to get a reputation for being weird. He drinks, maybe too much, but Stiles makes sure he gets home okay, and then makes him drink two bottles of water, which is mean. Josh tells him that. “You’re mean.”

“Shut up,” Stiles says, but he doesn’t sound mad. He’s on his laptop, talking to people. People back home, probably. Josh talks to people back home, but not as much as Stiles. “I have to go out again. You gonna be okay on your own?”

Josh flops his head back to stare at the bottom of his bed. “Lofts are hard.”

Stiles sighs. “C’mon, buddy, let’s get you into bed.”

Josh kicks his shoes off, which is really hard, and manages to stand on the first try, which is because he is coordinated and not at all because he can grab the bedframe. Stiles shoves him into his bed with way less difficulty or help than Josh would expect, and Josh wants to make some kind of comment on how strong Stiles is, but his pillow is comfy.

-

In the morning, a red-headed goddess of wrath is scraping a nail file directly across his brain. Josh peels his eyes open and determines that only a small portion of that is metaphor. He whimpers a little. The goddess doesn’t look up from where she’s sitting cross-legged in Stiles’ bed, wrapped in his comforter like a tent even though it’s plenty warm. “There’s a water bottle propped on the step.”

Josh fumbles for it and drinks two thirds of it before he comes up for air. “I’m Josh.”

“I know.”

That’s not how things are supposed to go. Why does Stiles have to have people who are as weird as he is? “What’s your name?”

Stiles comes back in, obviously fresh from the shower and with an almost equally fresh bruise on his face. Josh blinks at him, because he hadn’t had that last night. The goddess sticks her nail file back in her purse and stretches her arms demandingly towards Stiles. “I’m not climbing down from here.”

“Yeah, sorry, Lydia,” he says, and how is he this much less twitchy than usual in front of a girl like this? If Josh had the option to trade in being okay with the population at large and super flustered with really hot people for the opposite like Stiles apparently has, he’d totally do it. Stiles takes Lydia’s arms and swings her out of his bed in some kind of smooth move that doesn’t even end up with his comforter on the floor, and Lydia’s just wearing what looks like one of Stiles’ T-shirts and an Ace bandage on her ankle. Josh sticks his face back in his pillow. Everything is too much. She’s so pretty.

“Good to see your roommate adventures are going better than mine,” she says dryly, and he thinks it’s some sort of dig, maybe, but can’t bring himself to be offended. If he’s offended it’s just more stuff in him that he’ll probably puke up soon. “Josh, if you can be showered and dressed in half an hour, you can come to breakfast with us.”

The idea of a shower involves way too many steps, and he turns his face away from the light. “Is breakfast aspirin and a swift death?” he asks his pillow.

Stiles pats his arm. “I’ll bring you back a Gatorade.”

-

Stiles is as good as his word, and even better, brings the redhead back with him. They sit on the futon under Stiles’ bed, and she’s basically in his lap. They look at something on his laptop together, and Josh is deeply envious: he’s only had a girl draped over him like that when both of them were already super drunk.

The redhead leaves later in the day, Stiles driving her back to wherever she came from. Josh guesses Stiles’ hometown: it’s only a couple hours away, and Stiles is way squirellier around all the people he’s met here. Josh is pretty sure he’s Stiles’ favorite, and Stiles still gets weird a lot of the time.

The autumn starts to wax red, though it does so slowly, and the temperature doesn’t change much. Josh is a little disconcerted. He’s still used to having real seasons, all four of Winter, Spring, Road Work and Oktoberfest. But he’s got classes, and then another couple parties the next weekend, which is an even better way to mark time than seasons. He and Stiles go out looking for a party on Thursday night, but then Julio lets them know about a cool one on Friday. Josh actually gets to touch a girl’s boob on Friday, which totally makes up for the fact that his roommate lurks in a corner at both parties like the most socially awkward DD. It’s not even like anyone drove.

It’s actually kind of a relief when Stiles disappears and Josh can pay attention to the stuff that’s actually fun.

When Josh wakes up, Stiles isn’t back, but he shows up later to join Josh on his sad, hungover run. At least he doesn’t give Josh any flak for being slow. He does drop him off back at the start of their loop with a pat on Josh’s sweaty shoulder. “I’m gonna do another loop, yeah?”

Josh groans. “Are you even human?”

Stiles’ mouth twists, then he smirks. “More than you, today. Little bit too much Jaeger?”

“Little bit, then a lot.” Josh shrugs, comfortable with his bad decisions, then goes in to shower.

Stiles continues to disappear at weird times, and Josh wouldn’t even notice, except, well: weird. It’s not like Josh is at home all the time. He’s got class, and a study group, and he’s joined the bowling club. But all his shit is, like, scheduled, and he never gets texts at 8am or 11pm that make him run out the door.

Josh doesn’t ask, but he does look up one time, and his face must be kind of interrogatory, because Stiles shrugs and says, “Some of the people from home are having separation anxiety.”

Josh nods. “I mean, like, feel free to bring the hot ones back here.”

Stiles laughs. “Sure thing, dude.”

Stiles only brings someone home once, and it’s the girl who helped him move in, the one with the truck: Malia. Stiles ends up sitting with his head in her lap as all three of them watch Brooklynn 99 on Josh’s laptop. She looks at him with such obvious affection that Josh kind of wonders whether Stiles is dating Malia or Lydia or both of them, or was. But Stiles says he’s single, so Josh can’t, like, ask if that’s single-as-in-single or single-as-in-sleeping-with-everyone-but-casually. It seems super rude to ask.

Midterms are basically hell - way tougher than high school. Josh feels kind of like shit, but Stiles looks it, too, and Josh is strangely cheered by that. Plus in the one class he shares with Stiles, the intro art history they’re both taking for GenEd credits, Josh hasn’t been reduced to cornering their TA. Like, their TA is strange and pale and doesn’t look like he’s seen sunlight in approximately fifty years, but he also doesn’t seem like enough of a pushover to let Stiles out of the paper they have to turn in.

Josh teases him about it, but Stiles looks at him blankly. “Oh! No, uh, I actually handed that in already. It’s other stuff that’s kicking my ass. No, Mark and I just, uh, know some people in common, and I wanted to talk to him about it today after class.”

“More stuff from home?” Josh is pretty used to that by now, and is kind of torn. On the one hand, he kind of wishes he was closer to, like, anyone, and not reduced to facetime like once a week. On the other hand, it makes him feel kind of adult that he’s moving on and making new friends. Not supernaturally hot friends, but new ones. Which is what college is for, right? Plus Josh has gotten even more in shape, running with Stiles, so he’s adulting successfully or something.

Stiles shrugs. “Yeah. ‘S chill, though. It’s not gonna be a thing. Anyway, see you later.”

“Later,” Josh says, and turns his attention back to his own paper.

It’s almost Halloween by the time midterms are well and truly over, which means even more parties. Josh feels kind of bad ditching Stiles for some of them, but, like, Jae-Yoon basically told him not to invite Stiles, and then it was easier to just, like, go with Jae-Yoon sometimes. It wasn’t like Stiles ever had fun at parties anyway. And Stiles seemed all strung out even after midterms, so, like, he probably needed to focus on whatever.

Halloween itself is a Wednesday, but Stiles was gone all the night before. Josh doesn’t blame him, because he skips class to start the day at a costume party and then just kind of goes from party to party with a big and ever-more-trashed group. He’d gone to Madison for Freakfest his senior year, but actually being in college is way cooler. He went to his Thursday morning class still kind of drunk, then stumbled back to the dorm to sleep it off. Stiles was there when he got there, passed out shirtless on the futon. He’s got a giant bruise on his ribs, but Josh doesn’t have the - the brain? brain to think about it. He chugs a bottle of water and leaves his jeans on the floor and crawls into bed.

Later that night, Stiles actually shows up at a party without Josh even hinting about anything. Josh is kind of, like, proud of him, especially since the first time he sees Stiles is when Stiles is doing a keg stand, not lurking in a corner making everyone uncomfortable.

Later, Stiles even comes up and throws an arm over his shoulder. “Josh! My man! We survived another Halloween. Isn’t it great?”

Josh claps Stiles on the back. “Yeah, totally. My hangover was pretty epic, but hair of the dog is, like, one hundred percent the thing.”

Stiles basically cackles at that, which - Josh isn’t that funny, but whatever makes Stiles happy is a good thing probably. Stiles wanders off, but finds Josh at the end of the night, and they stumble back to the dorm together. Stiles, Josh thinks, can be a pretty cool roommate.

[rudderless-in-an-ocean-of-stars]

in your eyes (i find my salvation), chapter four

Find it on Ao3 here:

http://archiveofourown.org/works/11225808/chapters/25083762

iv. we’ll drown together in this sea of sorrows (no one ever taught us how to swim)

Lucy Lane does what she does to protect people.

It’s what she has always done, what she has been raised to do, the one thing she learns from her father that she doesn’t wish she could scrub from her brain.

This We’ll Defend.

It’s the army motto, and by the time she’s old enough to talk, she’s heard it enough to have committed it to memory.

(So what if no one defends her from the toe of her father’s boot or the back of his hand? She’ll learn to defend herself- and everyone else- when she’s older.)

She grows up in the shadow of her sister- pretty, perfect Lois.

(Lois will never know the way it feels to be hit by a parent, to pick herself off of the ground tasting blood in her mouth from the weight of their father’s fist.)

Model student, model daughter, model everything.

Lois’ mother, their father’s first wife, died in childbirth.

Lucy’s mother took off before she was even a month old, dropping her daughter off on the doorstep of the man she’d spent a single night with nine months ago and fleeing back to her native Dominican Republic.

It was hard enough taking second place to her older sister in their father’s heart, but harder still to grow up as the sole mixed-race child in a white neighborhood.

She doesn’t know much about her mother, aside from the fact that she was of Lebanese-Dominican descent and the source of most of Lucy’s looks.

Oh, sure, Lois had gotten her fair share of teasing for having a half-sister who looked nothing like her, but Lucy was the one who actually had to face the reality that most of her peers thought her less simply by virtue of her heritage.

She fights tooth and nail to make a name for herself that isn’t Lane.

Lucy skips a grade, joins activities like debate club and Model U.N., signs up for track & field in the winter and lacrosse in the spring, and fills the rest of her time volunteering around the community.

People begin to call her an overachiever.

(So what if the real reason she has so many extracurriculars is so that she can avoid going home? What happens behind closed doors is nothing they’ll ever know.)

She snaps at anyone who dares to call her ‘little Lane’ and hones her claws until people get the message that she isn’t someone to be trifled with.

By the time Lucy enters high school, she’s already a prime candidate for the National Honors Society.

Four years later, she graduates valedictorian, breezing through her AP classes and ending her senior year with a 4.8 GPA.

When they call her to the stage, it’s no longer under the shadow of her older sister’s accomplishments.

(So what if she has to spend three hours covering up the bruises that her father’s latest drunken rampage has left her with? Lucy’s always had a knack for makeup anyway.)

She ends up graduating from West Point with a Bachelor’s Degree in Science in a single year as opposed to four, thanks to those A.P. courses and summer programs she took. At nineteen years of age, she just might be the youngest person to leave West Point for reasons other than expulsion.

From there, she’s commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army with five years of service ahead of her. She works hard, gets her J.D and LL.M degrees through accelerated online courses as she rises through the ranks, because even if she doesn’t believe in her father, she believes in the one good thing he managed to teach her.

This We’ll Defend.

Lucy passes the bar exam with flying colors and becomes one of the youngest JAG Officers the Army’s ever seen at the age of twenty-two, three years into her five-year contract with the military.

She’s stationed stateside at this point, the legal attaché of her father’s staff, living on the army base just outside Metropolis.

This is no coincidence- Sam Lane’s personal vendetta against a certain Kryptonian means that as long as she’s part of her father’s team, she’ll likely spend all of her active duty waiting for Superman to step out of line.

This is how she meets James Olsen.

(She’s twenty-four and full of fire and he’s the first person who doesn’t mind the fact that she’s made of steel and flames.)

Like every other good thing in her life, it ends with the aid of her always well-meaning sister, and she requests a transfer out of her father’s unit so she can spend the next four years buried in the depths of the military, hoping that James everyone will stop looking and finally write her off as lost.

She’d only signed a five-year contract for active duty, but military service means a minimum of eight years, and gladly agrees to spend the three years she could be in the inactive reserves (I.R.R.) in the field where she belongs. The Army lets her, partly because she’s Sam Lane’s daughter, but mostly because she’s one of the best damn officers they’ve ever seen.

Lucy spends those years in places that are hot and dusty and full of I.E.D.s and by the time she returns to the states and moves to National City, she’s earned the rank of ‘major’ and enough scars to last her a lifetime.

Now she’s twenty-eight, one year out of service and a member of the group they’ve affectionately nicknamed the ‘SuperSquad’, utilizing her law degrees as the head of Legal Affairs at CatCo, and there’s nowhere else she thinks she’ll ever want to be.

She’s still as fucked up and broken as ever, but she has found herself a home in this city, in these people, and she’ll be damned if she ever gives it up.

There are times when she looks in the mirror and can barely stand the fact that she’s missing so many pieces of herself, but she’d lost most of those pieces long ago, before James and before the Army, so it’s a burden whose weight she’s used to carrying.

No one else in her newfound family is exactly whole either, so she knows they’ll never mind.

Lucy Lane does what she does to protect people.

Especially the people she loves.

So when she goes to Lena Luthor’s office and tells her to keep her distance, she reminds herself that it’s all to keep Kara safe as she tries not to cry at the sight of the other woman’s face when it crumples at her words.

(She’s sure that her own face might have once mirrored Lena’s, during the early days of her youth, when the concept of abuse was still new to her and she hadn’t yet learned how to hide her emotions away.

It proves to be an exercise in futility, in the end.

No matter how deep she managed to bury her emotions from the world, she never could quite manage to do it well enough so that she would be as unfeeling as she made herself seem.)

Afterwards, she does her best to drink herself into oblivion because she still hurt someone, and even if it was to protect another person, the pain she’s caused is still another tally mark in her ledger.

It’s for this very same reason that on military holidays, or whenever she gets congratulated for her time in the Army, she goes out and downs a shot for every life she ever took overseas.

May will always be a very rough month for her.

Surprisingly, she’s only ever gotten blackout drunk on one spectacular occasion- her first Memorial Day in National City.

To this day, Lucy doesn’t think she’s ever seen James as angry as he had been, then.

She’d managed to keep a lid on her drinking for the first few months after her discharge, or, at the very least, make sure James wasn’t aware of the full extent of her nighttime habits, but Memorial Day had fucked that up on an epic scale.

Now, she finds him waiting up for her more often that she doesn’t.

Which is why he’s currently having a one-sided staring contest with her as she guzzles down a glass of water for the headache she knows she’ll have tomorrow if she doesn’t hydrate.

“Nothing’s wrong,” she says, but they both know it’s a lie and the words leave a bitter taste in her mouth that all the water in her glass can’t wash away.

Just like blood, she thinks, and something beneath her ribs gives a painful little twinge at the thought.

“Lucy, please.” He’s pleading now, and she’s just so, so tired-

“I feel like my father,” she confesses lowly, lets the words slide out in a whisper nearly as broken as she is, leaning heavily on the edge of the marble countertop that stands between them. “I don’t want to be like my father-”

Her throat closes up around the words she longs to say and she shatters right then and there, ten at night and in the kitchen of apartment they share, the home they’ve tried to build for themselves.

She shatters-

Please don’t let me be him.

-but, as always-

Never, Lucy, never. You are nothing like him.

-he’s there to put her back together again.

(And that, that is why Lucy Lane will never stop loving James Olsen.

He is the first person to see her for what is, not who she pretends to be, the first to not shy away from the fact that she’s far from perfect, and that ‘normal’ is something she’ll never be.)

For the first decade of his life, Winslow Schott Jr. is proud to bear his father’s name.

Until his father kills six people with a bomb disguised as a teddy bear, and he finds himself being sent to live with his distant relatives just after Christmas, the holiday he will quickly grow to hate because of the massacre he will never be allowed to forget.

He drops the ‘Jr.’ then, shortens ‘Winslow’ to ‘Winn’ and tries to pretend like he’s never been called anything else.

His eleventh birthday passes, and he lets the date slide by without reminding anyone because he has court to attend next week and he doesn’t have the stomach to celebrate anything, let alone the day he was born to a man who would become a killer.

He discovers the wonders of alcohol in high school, when one of his friends throws him an unwanted party for turning sixteen. He spends every birthday after that somewhere dimly lit and vaguely warm, where he tries his best to replace all the blood in his veins with alcohol so that he wouldn’t have to be related to the man who murdered with such terrible, terrible ease.

The years pass, and Winn is careful to keep himself in check- he’s never been quick to anger, but then again, neither had his father, and the man had gone on to massacre six people with a bomb hidden inside a teddy bear, of all things.

Even feeling the vaguest hint of irritation is enough to fill his veins with a paralyzing fear that this is it, that he is going to snap and go down the same dark path as his father.

So he does his best to stay calm, stay sane, no matter what.

Bullies tear his homework out of his hands, and he doesn’t allow himself to do anything but walk away.

A teacher accuses him of cheating when his test scores for the district’s latest computerized assessment outstrip every other student in the state, and he denies these claims in front of the principal with nothing but neutrality in his veins.

A decade slips by, and he graduates from M.I.T. at the top of his class, gets a job at CatCo Worldwide Media, and the world seems like it has decided to let Winn out from under the shadow of his namesake’s crimes. For the first time since he woke up to the sound of sirens outside of his house, Winn finds himself hopeful that he’ll be able to live a life untainted by the gruesome memory of the deaths of half a dozen people.

Then he wakes up one morning and turns on the news just in time to learn that his father has broken out of prison and gone on another killing spree.

He just barely manages to get to work on time after nearly having to fight his way through the dozens of reporters waiting outside his apartment building.

Cat summons him into her office, takes one long look at him, and slides a crystal bowl of candy across her desk. He sits down, coming close enough to see that the bowl is filled with Skittles, not M&Ms- his favorite, not hers- and that’s all it takes for him to finally let go of the tears he’s been holding back since he switched on the television.

CatCo covers the story without a single mention of the Toyman’s son.

She calls him into her office again, just before he heads home, and tells him that he doesn’t have to worry about anyone bothering him from then on.

Rumors spread like wildfire among the employees of the media circuit that confirm his suspicions about the fate of the reporters she’d curtly informed him wouldn’t be seen again.

He doesn’t know how she does it- and he knows well enough not to ask- but every single reporter who had stood out on the steps of his building and harassed him to near tears is jobless and black-listed by every serious media outlet by the end of that week.

It doesn’t stop him from scrubbing his skin raw in the shower for a week afterwards at the memory of their probing questions and taunts, the worst of which being an offhanded comment about the ‘family resemblance’, but it helps.

Winn confesses all of this- every single repressed emotion, unspoken thought, everything- to the one person who understands exactly what it feels like to lose someone so close to their hearts.

It’s not James- everyone he’d ever loved is still living.

Nor is it Maggie- her parents had kicked her out simply for being gay, there was no love lost between them.

It’s not Kara and Lucy either.

Kara and Lucy have both lost parents, just not the way that he had. Lucy had never known her mother, and she’d never loved her father. Kara hadn’t had the chance to know her parents at all, let alone love them. She loved what they could have been, what they could have had, but she was robbed of the opportunity to love them for who they were.

But Alex- Alex had loved her father, just like Winn once loved his.

She knows how it feels to have that love torn away.

So Winn confesses everything to Alex, who holds other people’s secrets just as well as her own.

Later that year, and every year after that, Father’s Day will roll around and Alex Danvers will show up on his doorstep with a bottle of butter liquor in hand and a sardonic smile plastered across her features.

They cry and they rage and so what if Alex nearly puts her fist through his living room wall one year; they are coping and this is how.

Sometime after the booze has run out and they’ve run out of tears to shed, they’ll curl up together in Winn’s bed, an embrace fostered out of their shared agony and a desire for the simple comfort of human contact. He’ll have his head tucked under her chin, face pressed against her neck as he struggles to control his hitched breathing. Alex will wrap an arm around his shoulders and allow him to curl his arms around her waist and squeeze as hard as he can until he falls asleep.

The first time they do this, the first time they gather to wallow in this misery they have in common, it takes Alex the better part of an hour and nearly half a bottle of tequila before she can choke out a tearful confession of her own about just how alone her father’s death had made her feel, still makes her feel.

Winn’s father isn’t dead but he might as well be, so he reaches out with a boldness he’d almost forgotten having and pulls her across the couch to let her stifle her sobs in the cotton of his favorite Firefly shirt.

He meets Kara first, falls head-over-heels for the beautiful girl with the beautiful soul. It never goes anywhere, though, and his infatuation fades with time as their friendship solidifies into something bright and strong.

But he grows to love Alex just as deeply, if not more so.

Kara is a light, a shining beacon of strength and hope and heart, but Alex is safe port in a dark sea, and sometimes what he needs is a harbor in the darkness, a chance to greet the shadows he’s spent most of his life in and Alex understands this in ways that no one else can.

Kara has fallen into the shadows, but it has never stained her soul the way it taints theirs, and for that, Winn and Alex are glad. Kara’s light is the very definition of strength, and it’s something they all pray she’ll never lose.

She is the sun, and they, the night that makes the fills the spaces in between. This is the balance that pulls them all together and keeps them from falling apart.

He would do anything for them, and they for him, so when Alex calls him in the morning and tells him he has Cat Grant’s blessing to work from Kara’s apartment, he goes.

A/N:

Most of this chapter was erased before I could post it, and the rest is still being salvaged from the remains of my notes.

I’m really sorry. :(

But I didn’t want to make you guys wait until I had everything back, so I decided to split the chapter in half (it was a loooong chapter anyways) and this is it.

I hope you enjoyed, regardless.

Please feel free to let me know what you think of this fic- like it? Love it? Hate it? Drop me a comment down below.

[literaphobe]

Hi! My native language isn't english but I would like to take part in the team effort to reach 100 fics until the end of 2017 !! I would like some ideas if you could tell me some!

YES I AM HERE FOR THIShere are a bunch of fic ideas for dianetti i thought of- and i haven't even touched AU ideas yet. Pls write dianetti fic?? Let's use the hiatus period to bring the number of fics in the Rosa/Gina tag on AO3 to 100 okay These aren't the best ideas but i tried

Jake meets Rosa in the academy, and they become good friends. Gina decides to visit Jake at the academy to see if there're any hot people worth her time in his group. She finds one. It's Rosa.

Gina accidentally texts Amy for the first time, thinking that she's texting Rosa for the first time, because she got drunk. Amy tells Rosa about it, and Rosa's surprised because Gina didn't seem to know anyone existed apart from herself, so she confronts Gina about it.

Gina and Rosa get drunk, watch basketball, and then....

How Gina finds out that Rosa's into old movies AKA they watch movies together, and somewhere along the line Gina realizes there's a pattern to Rosa's suggestions. But it doesn't matter to Gina what they watch as long as Rosa's tipsy enough to drunkenly drape an arm around her shoulder or use her boob as a pillow. What? Rosa's hot, sue her.

Just like how they had a huge debate on which pie was better, what other petty things can you think of that Gina and Rosa disputed over which got so big most of the precinct got involved?

Someone calls Gina out for drinking Rosa's coffee/other food/drink item. This leads everyone to the realization that Gina is the only person that can/has ever gotten away with drinking/eating Rosa's food/drink.

After Rosa and Amy put in better security measures in Gina's apartment, Rosa teaches Gina how to use a gun so that she can protect herself. Except Gina's hella reckless and eventually Rosa has to wrap her arms around Gina's to guide her shooting. Oh wait, that was Gina's plan all along?

Babylon. Anything regarding it. The story of how Rosa told Gina about her secret bathroom? How Gina and Rosa decorated Babylon together? Did they go shopping together for weird crystals and scented candles and 3-ply toilet paper to make Babylon the sacred place it is today?

"Forget your ex with meaningless sex." How Gina offers this to Rosa every time a relationship of Rosa's goes to crap. How it gets harder and harder for Gina to offer said "meaningless" sex because over time it means something to her and it hurts even more each time to see Rosa get together with someone that isn't her after that, the only source of comfort being that they might break up and Rosa would yet again crawl into her bed over shared bottles of wine and lots and lots of tears that Gina secretly sheds but Rosa's too drunk to remember.

When Rosa finds out about Boyle and Gina hooking up, she gets grossed out. And also very jealous.

Gina wills Rosa a statue of two jaguars making love because she sees it as a representation of them; or what they could've been. Rosa finds this out when she asks Gina why the hell she left Rosa anything in her will in the first place.

"I was insulting her. You know, flirting."

Gina follows Rosa home after giving her the "Rosa's Gonna Make This Flu Her Bitch" care package, because despite her fear of getting infected by Rosa's germs she finds herself strangely overcome with worry. Rosa catches Gina following her home but she's too sick to stop her. Gina feeds Rosa sips of hot cocoa and bites of crackers (from the care package she made) and she even tucks Rosa in her bed so she can sleep. Gina ends up with the flu- but when Rosa returns the favor and takes care of Gina it's all worth it.

Gina and Rosa getting drunk together, because Amy's not the only one who becomes a bit of a pervert after a few drinks.

Gina and Rosa teaming up to achieve a common goal, and how they slowly realize they enjoy their little plans and talks and banter more than taking down whoever they're up against. Okay, maybe both alternatives are equally satisfying. But then sometimes when Gina's describing a ridiculous idea Rosa gets this strong urge to kiss her. Which she acts on.

Gina invites Rosa to go to Beyoncé's concert with her, since she has more than one ticket. "What? These tickets were my birthright, but we took Terry and Amy down together."

How Rosa deals with Gina being gone when Holt gets transferred to PR and Gina follows him; Because Babylon's just not the same without Gina, all those hours they spent hiding out there together, taking a break from being in the presence of losers- it all seems so far away and Rosa misses Gina a bit too much, the world seeming duller when Gina's not there to light up the room.

Rosa and Gina unconsciously spending the entire day of the funeral together, neither of them willing to admit how much they've missed each other.

Gina and Rosa dressing up in matching costumes for that Halloween prank they play on Charles. They may or may not end up going trick or treating together in said costumes after getting drunk on Halloween night.

Gina and Rosa facing off in an illegal dance competition in an abandoned subway tunnel.

Alternatively, Rosa wins an illegal motorcycle race in which Gina's love is the prize.

Rosa being very very worried about Gina during the hostage situation in the store, a bit too worried. Gina's not complaining though. "Hey Amy gave Jake a kiss for not getting killed in that store. Don't I get one too?"

When Rosa and the perp spend an hour "complaining" about Gina, Rosa realizes the dude's a little hung up on her. Rosa can't blame him, she has a little thing for Gina too. Who knew it took watching Gina slamming a few tables and her talking about Gina for an hour to realize it?

Gina and Rosa lock Amy in the back of her car for 47 minutes; 17 minutes longer than they actually needed to. What did they do during that time?

When Holt hires Gina to direct a video about their precinct starring himself and Rosa, Gina tells Rosa she has to sit on a wheelchair as if she's riding a horse. "This is weird. Stop telling me to spread my legs wider." "That's only because I know you can spread them wider, Rosie."

When Rosa starts dating Pimento, Gina gets a perfect view of the guy who temporarily takes over Jake's desk. She hopes that if she glares at him enough, he'll go away and stop dating Rosa like a jackass.

Gina runs away with a drugstore cashier on the night of Rosa's bachelorette party. She's tired of pretending to be happy about the love of her life marrying someone else, and sue her, but that drugstore cashier's a splitting image of Rosa.

Gina may or may not have spied on Rosa while she did yoga. "I can see you, Gina." "Good, I've been here for an hour- was starting to think you're a bad detective." "You've been standing there for two hours. And I'm a great detective." "Oops, busted. Why didn't you call me out earlier?" "I wanted to see how long my ass would keep you interested."

When Gina falls and supposedly knocks out her two front teeth, Rosa gets very worried. Too worried.

Gina and Jake help Pimento find his grandmother's earrings, except everything keeps going wrong and he sees it as a sign that Rosa and him aren't meant to be. Gina encourages this, because she doesn't want Rosa and Pimento to get married- oh wait sorry that's exactly what happened in canon.

Gina gets run over by a bus, and this devastates Rosa to no end. In which everyone realizes Rosa's in love with Gina before either of them do.

Rosa's desk faces Gina's head on. She stares at Gina more times in a day than she'd like to admit.