#top things to do in montreal

[the-physicality]

Sorry did I say Boston is going to 3 pride nights? I meant 4

[grinleysspa]

i am once again thinking about how much i love living in canada while also dreading having to deal with actually complicated immigration shit after i graduate :(

[the-offside-rule]

Lando Norris (McLaren) - Two Hands pt. I

Requested: yes

Prompt: this ask

Warnings: tensionnn and Im making this a two part series

Part 2

The sun was barely peeking over the Hollywood skyline when Y/n arrived on set, coffee in hand and a spark of excitement in her step. The concept for her and Tate McRae’s new music video, Two Hands, had come together beautifully, sleek visuals, a sultry tone, and a storyline that mirrored the tension in their song. Y/n adjusted the strap of her dress as she walked onto the music video set, the sound of crew members shouting instructions filling the air. Tate McRae was standing off to the side, scrolling through her phone. She looked up and waved, her usual bright smile lighting up her face. "Hey, you made it!" Tate greeted as Y/n approached.

"Yeah, traffic was insane, but I'm here." Y/n replied, setting her bag down on a nearby chair. "What's the plan for today?" Before Tate could answer, a familiar voice cut through the air. "Y/n?" Her heart dropped as she turned around to see him. And there he stood, hands casually tucked into his hoodie pockets, his signature grin plastered on his face.

Lando fucking Norris.

Her breath hitched at the sight of him, his familiar mischievous grin lighting up as he looked her up and down. "It’s been a while." He said, striding toward her. Y/n froze, coffee nearly slipping from her grip as her mind flashing back to the string of nights they’d spent together during last season. Miami. Montreal. Silverstone. Austin. Vegas. Each memory was vivid and unshakable, and now here he was, standing on the set of her music video like it was the most normal thing in the world. "Uh, yeah, it has." She replied, attempting nonchalance.

Tate, always attuned to Y/n’s moods, sidled up beside her. "Y/n? You good?" She whispered. "Can we- can you come with me real quick?" Y/n asked, dragging Tate along to the other side of the parking lot. "Dude. What’s wrong?" Tate asked. "What's wrong?" Y/n hissed back. "What’s wrong is that Lando Norris is here, and I wasn’t told he’d be in this video." Tate smirked. "He’s the cameo. PR gold. You didn’t know?"

"No!" Y/n exclaimed under her breath. "And, oh my god- jesus- Tate, we’ve slept together!" Tate’s eyes widened before her lips curled into a sly grin. "Oh my god! Like a one might stand sorta thing?" She chuckled. "More like five seperate nights." Tate raised an eyebrow. "Five? Wow, okay, overachiever."

"This isn’t funny." Y/n groaned. "What are we supposed to do now?" Tate sighed. "It’s a little late to change things. He’s already here. Besides, we’ll just cut his scenes later if it’s too weird. PR can spin some excuse for why he’s missing in the final cut." Y/n groaned but nodded reluctantly. "Fine. But if this blows up, you owe me."

♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡

The shoot began smoothly enough. The video was set to showcase Tate and Y/n doing what they do best; giving their fans an iconic music video, with a storyline involving sleek cars, night drives, and bold choreography. Lando's role was to add a touch of glamour as a cameo, driving a papaya McLaren around the streets at night.

The day progressed faster than Y/n anticipated. Tate was her usual cheeky self, keeping the mood light despite the awkward tension simmering whenever Lando was around. The big moment came as the crew prepped the McLaren for a scene where Y/n would ride in the passenger seat while Lando drove through neon-lit streets. "Just lipsync the lyrics while he drives." The director instructed. "We’re going for sexy but understated." Understated. Sure. Y/n climbed into the car, her heart pounding.

The beat thumped in her ears as the car accelerated. She turned to Lando, his hands confidently gripping the steering wheel. His smirk was still there, but something new flickered in his gaze as her lips curled into the sultry line: "I want them all to see, you look good on top of me." Lando’s jaw tightened, his eyes darting to hers as she sang. "At this time, at night I need. Not one, not three." Y/n caught the way his lips twitched, almost imperceptibly, and then, he bit his lip.

Oh, so we’re doing this?

Fine. If he was flustered, she’d make it worth his discomfort. Y/n leaned in, her hand sliding up to tangle in his hair as she pulled his face toward her. Their eyes locked, her lips barely brushing his ear as she whispered the lyrics. "Just your two hands on me. Like my life needs saving." His breath hitched audibly, and for a split second, she wondered if he might slam on the brakes. "Let 'em all know. Can you do it like that?"

"Cut!" The director’s voice crackled through the radio. They broke apart instantly, and the silence that followed was deafening. Y/n avoided his gaze, fixing her hair and pretending nothing had happened. When she returned to set for the dance break, Tate was waiting with her arms crossed and a knowing smirk. "You two looked awfully comfortable." Tate teased, bumping Y/n’s shoulder. "Almost like you’ve done it before."

Y/n shot her a withering glare. "Shut up."

♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡

The buzz of the set hummed around Y/n as she sat on the sidelines, watching Tate film her solo dance scene. The spotlight followed Tate’s movements, her fluidity captivating, but Y/n’s focus wavered when she caught a glimpse of Lando approaching out of the corner of her eye.

Damn it.

"Fancy seeing you here." Lando said, casually sliding into the chair beside her. His voice was light, but his eyes held an intensity that made her pulse quicken. "It’s not like I had a choice." Y/n replied flatly, crossing her arms. "I have a job to do and you just so happen to be here." He chuckled softly, the sound low and familiar. "Still, feels like fate."

"More like bad luck." She shot back, keeping her tone cool even as her stomach fluttered. Lando leaned in slightly, his cologne teasing her senses. "You’re as sharp as ever." He murmured, a smile tugging at his lips. "I missed you." Y/n snorted, more out of defense than amusement. "Missed me? Please. You missed me in your bed, maybe." His grin faltered, replaced by something more serious, more vulnerable. "To be fair, you never gave me the chance to miss you anywhere else."

The weight of his words hung in the air, and Y/n’s breath caught in her throat. She turned to look at him, his face so close she could see the faint stubble on his jaw. He wasn’t joking. "Look, I know this is...complicated. But I want to see you. Away from all this; no racing, no music videos, just us." Y/n blinked, stunned. Her lips parted to respond, but before she could form the words, Sean, the choreographer, clapped his hands loudly from across the set. "Y/n! Let’s go! Dance break!" She exhaled sharply, grateful for the reprieve, and turned on her heel. "Duty calls." She said briskly, walking away before Lando could reply.

As she approached the center of the set, Tate intercepted her, her eyes twinkling with curiosity. "You okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost."

"I’m fine." Y/n lied, waving a dismissive hand. Tate’s smirk told her she wasn’t convinced, but she didn’t push. Instead, she gestured toward the floor. "Alright, let’s get this over with. Sean’s in full perfectionist mode." Y/n nodded, forcing herself to focus as Sean began shouting instructions, his energy bouncing around the room. She positioned herself in front of the camera, her muscles tightening in anticipation.

The music started, the beat pounding through her body, and she threw herself into the choreography, letting the rhythm drown out the lingering tension in her chest. But as her feet moved and her body swayed, her mind betrayed her, replaying Lando’s words over and over like a melody she couldn’t shake.

Just us

[bunnys-kisses]

dutchman's tongue

max versappen

cw: oral/fingering (femme receiving), afab!reader, loosely translated dutch and french (it's been a while since i spoke it), doggy style, unprotected sex,

bunny says: congrats on the win last week max! it's good to make use of my ability to speak/write in dutch and french (although a lil rusty!)

max had a way with his tongue. growing up in belguim there are three official languages but the two being french and dutch. you found his linguistic talents very interesting.

a lot of the time it was quite comically, he'll know the word in english, but somewhere along the way of thinking it, it'll get translated into one of the other languages we spoke.

"that thing." he snapped his fingers. he squeezed his eye shut to think of the word, "come on."

you looked at him, not even know what he was thinking.

"chou-fleur."

"cauliflower?" you replied.

he nodded, "yes!" he smiled at you. you had picked up a rough estimate of the other languages he spoke. while your conversations were mostly in english, you tried to impress him with your own linguistic abilities.

he smiled and kiss the top of your head, "good job, schatje! i am so proud of you." then took you by the cheeks to kiss them.

but also max was good at other things with his tongue. you found out early on in your relationship that he quite enjoyed going down on you. he loved your thighs around his head as he lapped and finger-fucked your pussy.

it was the morning after the canadian grand prix. it was cloudy and cool out, the window to your hotel room was open. you laid in a mess of pillows and blankets with your lover. you were laid next to him.

last night was fun, montreal was the city to be if you wanted to party. but the morning after you felt tired all over. max's nose was in your hair and basically snoring in your ear. you rolled over and got closer to his side.

you yawned and lifted your head to gaze down at him. you reached out and cupped the side of his face with affection. he was the winner after all, it was no strong feat given how the weather was.

"good morning." you said as you leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. his soft skin against your lips made your heart leap.

his eyes open slowly, his tongue was loose when he said, "goedemorgen, mijn schat." his hand reached for you and patted the side of your face. he looked more tired than you did.

"i guess we had some fun last night."

he nodded and yawned, "we did."

you kissed the side of his face and got up out of bed. the exhaustion hung heavy on your shoulders as you got up. but you weren't up for long as max took you by the wrist and brought you back into bed.

"max!" you yelped but were soon met by cuddles from your boyfriend. his arms wrapped around you middle and his nose dipped into your neck.

"où penses-tu aller?" his asked slowly, his hands started to touched your nude body, "j'espère que tu n'essayes pas de t'enfuir, mon amour?"

you looked behind you to glance at him, "are you trying to seduce me?"

"i am simply asking where you are going, my love. i am hoping you aren't running away from me." he rested his chin on your shoulder, "we have the whole day to ourselves."

"no we don't, you have to do interviews." you recalled.

he groaned, "and i can't stay all day in bed with you."

"nursing a hangover."

"no, no." he kissed your cheek, "to be so close to you." his cock pressed against your back, "you looked amazing last night, all dolled up for me. you were beautiful, mon amour."

you reached over, with max still clinging to you, and looked at your phone, it was still early enough. you put the phone down and turned in his arms so you were facing one another. you placed both hands on his bared chest and leaned in for a kiss.

"we have two hours before you have to get ready. i can get you something for your head... or i can give you head?"

he grinned at you, those blue eyes looked into yours. he replied, "actually, i was thinking i could... go down on you inside." he winked.

"max."

"i got all the celebration i wanted last night. i want to give you something in return. for being there, always." he let go of you and with your help got between your legs with your thighs around his head.

he rested his chin on your stomach and gazed at you. you tried not to feel self conscious about the angle of your face. but he continued to gaze at you like he had hearts in his eyes.

"i probably have the worst double-chin right now."

he shook his head, "who cares, you're still the most beautiful woman in the world." he rubbed his face against your abdomen like he was trying to his scent all over you. sometimes he'd do this thing where he'd ramble in dutch or french, he knew you weren't exactly catching what he was saying.

he started to speak about something in french as he got between your legs, your thighs now on his shoulders. the softness of them were against his ears as he leaned in to your cunt.

"et puis je t'ai vu dans les tribunes, les cheveux au vent. et je savais que je devais gagner. ce serait la seule façon de te rendre fier, mon amour. je te vois et je perds toute notion du temps. rien d'autre ne compte sauf te voir." he rambled before he lined his tongue up with your slit, he gave you one last look as he said, "je vous aime." then gave your pussy as sweet kiss before he started to lap at your sex.

you felt heat in your cheeks as he held your thighs on his shoulders. his tongue continued to pleasure you as you squirmed on the bed. he was keeping you pinned to him.

"ah, ah, ah." he said, "stay still." then continued his movements against your cunt. you could feel the burn in your cheek the more pleasure raced up your spine.

your breathing started to get heavier. pleasure coursed through your body the more than he pleasured you orally. you could admit easily that he was rather impressive when it went to going down on you.

you knew he was still running on the high of the race, his own head was racing as your thighs clenched around his head. you gripped onto his dark hair and moaned loudly.

"tu aimes ça, mon amour ? est-ce que tu aimes la façon dont je te fais plaisir?" his own cheeks were stained pink as your wetness clung to his chin.

"oh my god." you groaned, "why does it sound so fucking hot."

he kissed your inner thigh and looked up at you, "because you know how good i am with my tongue." then dragged his tongue across your inner thigh that made your toes curl.

he kept one hand on your left thigh and the other hand between your legs. he began his motions once more but this time adding his fingers. he sank them easily into your hole as he played with your clit against his tongue. occasionally his front teeth grazed against it and you moaned louder.

the rush of pleasure continued to course through your body, the more he played with you. he occasionally looked up at you to get a good look at the expressions you were making.

he gripped your thigh with love as he felt your cunt clench around his fingers inside of you.

"please, max!" you whimpered as you pressed your thighs closely around his head. you panted and moaned, the pleasure was overwhelming.

and he kept pleasuring you, he kept at it. with an endurance and focus that let him with the race the day prior. his cock throbbed between his legs, pressed against the bed as he focused on your pleasure.

"max, fuck."

"blijf stil, mijn liefste." he said softly, switching up the languages to see how you'd react.

it didn't take long before pleasure washed over you. your body clenched as the rust hit your brain and pooled in your stomach. with tugged on your hair and kicked out your legs before you felt the hit of it all.

you laid there on the bed and he pulled his head from between your legs and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. those blue eyes gazed at you with such affection.

he got out from between your legs, "not it's time for my turn, mijn liefje." he rested on his heels and looked down at you, his cock stood at full attention.

you looked at him, with lust in your gaze. you let your lover turn you onto your hands and knees. your face was buried in the pillow with your ass in the air.

"my love." he said with a heat in his voice. your cunt was on full display to him. the rush of blood to his cheeks was noticeable as he got behind you. he stroked his cock a few times to the sight of your slick pussy.

"please, max." your blood was rushing which was only making your hangover more prominent.

"i have you, my love." he said as he slowly sank his cock into your pussy. he soon took hold of your hips and nudged his cock up against the back of your cunt. right up against your cervix.

"shit." you groan.

the angle of his cock inside of you felt amazing. you clawed at the covers and arched your back. you panted into the pillows.

"you like that, don't you? you love that, my love?" he groaned, his tongue was loose in his mouth, "Ik denk de hele tijd aan je op de baan. Ik had een droom toen je rok omhoog vloog toen ik voorbijreed." he chuckled.

you whined, "c'mon max."

he took you by the hair and yanked your head a little back as he closed the gap between you two, "i said. i had a dream that i drove by during the race and your skirt flew up. and they all got a good look at those sweet panties you wore." he chuckled a little more as he kissed your face. he could feel the heat in your cheeks.

his thrusts were fast and aggressive, the pleasure bloomed in his chest as he moved. he watched you grip at the covers with your back arched.

"shit."

"fuck."

"i know, my love." he said between pants.

your brain felt like mush from back to back pleasure. you panted wildly into the pillows. your back arched further as max pressed further into you. he bent you into angles that were uncomfortable butt he pleasure that raced through you cancelled out the feeling.

"please, max."

"ik heb je." he said with a reassuring voice the more he fucked you. your ass jiggled from the force of his thrusts. he felt the sweat drip down his neck and down his bare back as he fucked into your.

"i love you." you murmured into the covers.

"i love you too." he said with such softness in his voice as if he wasn't balls deep inside of you. he loved you so much, he loved how you felt against him. you felt like a dream.

"please, max." you moaned as you tried to cover your mouth with your hand so you wouldn't disturb the neighbours next door.

"i want to hear you, my love." he said softly, his voice still in your ear, "i want to hear it all."

"but next door." you said.

"doesn't matter. i won the race. i can fuck my girl whoever i want." he purred as his pace became erratic, your eyes felt like they were going to roll back into your head as you moaned into the pillows. he said, "I want them all to hear you."

oh max, ever the romantic.

you whimpered into the pillows as you felt the pleasure come to a head of the second orgasm of the morning. you didn't have an awful lot of time left before he had to get ready. but by the stagger of his thrusts, you knew he was close as well.

"that's my girl." he said.

"please, max."

"mijn liefje." he said with a bit of tension in his voice as the warmth of sex clogged his head.

the angle made it feel like he was in your stomach which caused you to choke out moans.

the bed hit against the wall as he moved against you. with a few more hard thrusts, you both came at the same time. his groan was low and heavy while your moan was high pitched and had to be covered up by the pillow.

he loved when he finished inside of you, it made his heartbeat quicken. that he marked you inside and out. he slowed down and rested back on his heels as he cock slipped out of your used hole.

he pushed hair out of his face and panted heavily. you felt like heaven. you soon laid next to one another, he pulled you into his sweaty arms.

"mijn liefste, ik hou zoveel van je. jij geeft mij het gevoel dat ik een winnaar ben." he kissed the top of your head as you laid there together.

you got comfortable in his arms and smiled against him. the rush of climax was still in your head as you clung to him.

you said to him, in the bit of dutch you knew, "Ik hou ook van jou, max."

he chuckled and kissed you once more. <3

[sophsbookstore]

Somebody Come Get Her

Lando Norris x driver!reader ｡･:*˚:✧｡

Masterlist can be found in navigation!

Word count: 1,627

“I'm literally fine!” She is not fine. Infact Y/N is the drunkest she's been in a while.

After placing in the points at the Montreal Grand prix, while simultaneously celebrating her friend's second place win, Y/N decided that getting absolutely wasted in Montreal was the best thing for herself to do.

“Y/N how many shots have you taken?” A concerned Lando Norris questions his best friend.

“This many.” Y/N says, holding up two middle fingers in front of Landos face.

Lando tried to hold in his laughter, Y/N wasn't a big party girl. Sure she would always accompany the rest of the grid out to parties after races, she usually doesn't drink that often, going a little crazy once a season, but never this crazy.

“I'm going to get you some water, please don't drink anything while I'm gone, okay?” Lando scolds Y/N. “Can I trust you won't do anything stupid?”. When the girl gives him a thumbs up he takes it as his sign to move, quickly walking to the bar, Y/N books it to the other side of the club, spotting a small group of wag’s sitting together.

Not even thinking twice she bolts to the other side of the tight Montreal club, speed walking as fast as her designer heels can take her. Lily Z spots her, not really the party girl herself notices Y/N practically falling over herself trying to get to them.

Laughing, Lily taps one of the girls on the shoulder, they all turn to face Y/N instantly getting up and running to the girl with drunken excitement.

“Holy fuck you guys are so hot.” Y/N blushes, giving each girl a compliment before finding Lily in the back of the group. Y/N clings onto the Australian for dear life, Lily doing her best to hold half of Y/N’s body weight.

The girls walk back over to their couch in the VIP section of the club, all of them talking over one another while house music blasts throughout the small room. Back at the bar Lando is constantly looking over his shoulder, trying his best to find Y/N, making sure she stays near him.

Just as he thought, when the bartender finally hands him his drinks she's gone. “Of course she's gone.” Lando scolds himself for thinking that she would have actually stayed.

Placing his hand over the top of her drink, Lando aimlessly walks around the club, trying to find Y/N so he can take her home. Back at the couch the girls are starting to move to the dance floor, all of them going crazy for the international house music being played on the speaker.

As Y/N spins around, her eye catches something in the middle of the club, a pole. The pole is placed in the middle of the club, sitting atop an LED podium. Throughout the whole night many people have drunkenly got on it and sloppily spun around. “Look!” Y/N shouts, all the girls following her line of vision to the pole.

“I need it!” before anyone can say anything Y/N sprints to the empty pole, practically jumping onto it before spinning around. The sudden movement of the pole triggers the people around to stare at the girl. For being absolutely wasted Y/N managed to do pretty well for herself, random girls at the club shoving money in her bra as her friends and random patrons cheer or record on their phones.

The sudden cheering alerts Lando, a big crowd of people move toward the center of the club, Lando turns, seeing what he feared most. Knowing this was going to be a PR disaster for Y/N if the videos got out he abandons her drink on a random table, moving quickly through the crowd covering any camera he can in the process.

“Excuse me, pardon me, sorry.” Lando says to complete strangers before making it to the base of the pole. Without a second thought he grabs her arm, pulling her into him. Drunk off her ass Y/N collides into Landos chest. “Come on, I'm taking you home.” Lando snakes his arm around Y/N’s waist, moving the two of them closer to the door as another girl jumps onto the pole.

“Why did you do that? I was having so much fun.” Y/N pulls away from Lando, folding her arms in front of herself, trying to get some stability.

“Y/N come on, you're too drunk right now.'' Lando puts his hands on his hips, the both of them knowing she has no chance in this fight.

“I'm staying, that's final.” Y/N turns away from Lando, walking back to the big group before suddenly she's swept off her feet. Lando kneels down next to Y/N grabbing her waist once more before throwing her over his shoulder.

Holding onto the back of her knees, Lando pulls his keys out of his pocket as he walks toward the exit of the club, eyes following the pair as they walk away. “Damn Lando, why didn't you ever say anything about this dumpy back here?” Y/N giggles, her face against his lower back.

Lando laughs, carrying her all the way to his car. He holds the door open for her, helping her into the front seat before buckling her in. Lando quickly moves to the other side of the car, typing in Y/N’s hotel a few blocks away, before starting the car and driving off.

“Oh shit!” Y/N shouts, pulling the money out of her stuffed bra. “I'm rich!” She cheers, throwing the money all over Landos car.

“Where did you get all of this?” Lando says, picking up a twenty from the dashboard.

“People just kept giving them to me, I ate.” Y/N shrugs. Lando smiles at the girl, Y/N turns her attention to the window beside her, resting her head against the glass as her eyes start to shut.

Lando plays some soft music to help Y/N fall asleep, within seconds she's out. The drive doesn't take long, about fifteen minutes, when Lando parks he takes a minute to admire the girl beside him, carefully tucking a loose hair behind her ear to wake her up.

Y/N stirs in her sleep, Lando whispering for her to wake up as he goes to her door to help her out. With a combination of alcohol and sleep deprivation it's a miracle Lando got Y/N to her room, avoiding eye contact with guests and staff on his way to the elevator. 

Lando lets the both of them into her room, helping Y/N into bed before placing Advil and water next to her bed. “You're so hot.” Y/N whispers, her glassy eyes stare at Lando.

“You're so drunk.”

“It doesn't mean I can't point out the obvious.” Y/N shrugs, closing her eyes and pulling the comforter close to her body.

“I'll see you in the morning, Y/N.” Lando smiles, setting up a “bedroom" for himself in the living room.

Lando spent the whole night thinking about Y/N, her dancing at the club, what she said before she went to bed. Lando has liked Y/N ever since they joined Formula 1 together, the two have always been inseparable, an iconic duo in motorsport. 

CLACK! “Fuck!” The sound of something falling, quickly followed by a semi quiet swear, wakes Lando up.

A shirtless Lando moves his head toward the sound, his gaze falling upon Y/N wearing a tank top and plaid pajama pants. The pair look at one another, Lando notices her wet hair and beautiful bare face.

“Goodmorning!” Y/N gives lando an awkward smile.

“Good Morning to you too.” Lando gets off the couch, stretching before walking over to Y/N, the girl's eyes looking him up and down before the two become face to face.

“Be honest, how drunk I was last night.” Y/N grabs a banana off the counter.

“Honest?” Y/N nods, wanting to know what stupid thing she did. “There was a pole at the club, it may have gotten a lap dance from a certain female driver.”

Y/N drops her banana, her face getting hotter by the second as she covers her mouth in shock. “No I didn't.'' Lando decided that he wouldn't tell her about how many strangers filmed the whole moment. “Please tell me that was it.”

“You told me I’m hot, which boosted my ego an unhealthy amount.” Lando laughs.

“Oh, that's not that bad.” Y/N shrugs, picking the banana up off the floor. “You are.” She starts unpeeling the banana, taking a bite out of it before going to get a cup of water.

Lando was shocked, too stund to speak. Y/N turns around laughing at Lando’s expression. “What, you seriously didn't know?”

“Know what?” The man quickly asks.

“I've had a crush on you for the longest time, I thought it was so obvious!” She finishes the water, throwing away the remainder of her breakfast.

“You gotta be kidding me.” Y/N stares at Lando, trying her best to read his emotions. “I've had a crush on YOU for the longest time!” Lando explains, both their smiles getting bigger and bigger.

“Well then what the hell are we waiting for!” Y/N steps closer to Lando. “Can I kiss you right now?”

“Always.” Lando replies, taking Y/N face in his hands before kissing her passionately.

“Finally.” Y/N says as the two pull away from one another. “But seriously, remind me to never drink in Canada again.”

[disneyprincemuke]

what happens in vegas * fem!driver

in their defence, there should not be chapels so readily available to drunk people

pairings: mick schumacher x fem!driver, logan sargeant x fem!driver, sebastian vettel x fem!driver, oscar piastri x fem!driver

notes: hi guys i told u i didnt forget about vr, i was just a little mentally blocked from it huhuhu

(series masterlist)

she takes another shot, stumbling slightly as she hisses when the taste of alcohol finally hits her. she giggles when mick’s arm comes up to steady her slightly, leaning forward to giggle with her after she’s almost fallen to the ground.

“mate,” she says excitedly, grabbing his arm with a wide smile. “thanks for coming out with me tonight! stupid logan got a stupid date.”

“of course,” mick mutters, nodding. he puts his shot glass down on the table and slumps his shoulders. “is there anything else to do here besides drink? this can’t be the only thing vegas is good for.”

she shakes her head and licks her lips. she plants her hand on his shoulder and climbs onto the high seat of the bar, dropping herself into the seat. her eyes widen as she feels herself leaning back slightly, snorting when mick firmly grabs her arm to steady her once more. “we should just keep drinking.”

mick looks around the bar with flushed and puffed cheeks. realistically, they shouldn’t be drinking as much as they are. but she had made a good point when convincing him to get drinks with her at one of the bars on the strip — the day starts late, so why not grab some drinks and make the best out of their time in vegas?

it was a good argument. while they tried reeling liam and oscar to come with them, their girlfriends were in town for the race, which left them both in the bar together.

and logan had simply scored himself a date specifically tonight. which prompted her to curse at him, rambling about how he’s ditched them on an important date.

which then prompted logan to fight back, screaming at her about how they never agreed to do anything together tonight.

sebastian outright claimed that he did not want to take care of a small drunk girl that had the ability to disappear in 0.5 seconds so he chose to sit tonight out. it made her sulk a little bit, but when mick reminded her of the bar they were heading to, she was immediately all smiles and sunshine once more.

she slams her palm down on the slab of the counter top. “mate. do you want to go for a walk and see what else is on the strip?”

“can you even still walk straight?” mick grins, turning to her slightly with his shot glass held up to his lips. she nods enthusiastically, a hand on the back of his seat as she climbs off hers. “are you going to show me that you can walk straight?”

“yes, yes!” she shrieks with her arms in the air. “look at me.”

“heel to toe.”

“yeah, yeah. i know how the sober test works. remember montreal?”

“yes, i was there.”

“okay, whatever. watch me,” she giggles, waving her hand in the air to catch mick’s attention. before she starts walking, she looks up again. “can you even walk straight?”

“yeah, duh?” mick hops off his seat, wobbling when he plants his feet on the ground. “i’ll even show you.”

“ugh, copycat!” she shrieks, shoving him back.

they erupt in giggles when mick stumbles back, grabbing her shoulder to stable himself. “okay, let’s go for a walk.”

mick grabs her arm and yanks her towards the direction of the exit of the bar.

“mick schumacher!” she shrieks, stumbling forward to grab the tab from the table. “we haven’t paid yet! hold on!”

“oh.” mick pulls her into his body, arm slung around her shoulders lazily. “i got the bill tonight.”

“yeah, okay,” she mutters to herself, wrapping her arm around his torso. “let’s go for a walk by the strip? i’m in the mood for some ice cream.”

“i feel like having pizza,” mick mutters, tapping her shoulder lightly. “pizza then ice cream?”

she hums, leaning her head on him. “hawaiian pizza? i know you don’t really like it but–“

“i can’t feel my face.” mick fishes for his wallet in his back pocket. “i’m just hungry — i don’t care what pizza it is.”

“oh, nice,” she nods proudly with a smug grin. “we should hang out more.”

come to the strip!!! 💗💗💗

oscar tilts his head as he wipes his mouth on the towel. he steps out of the bathroom and pops his head into the room. “babe,” he voices out. “did you get a text from mick?”

“yeah.” she lifts the phone the show oscar. “it doesn’t sound like he sent the text.”

“you reckon they’re immobilised from drinking so much?” oscar giggles, crawling on the bed over to her. “should we go to them?”

lily hums, opening up her arms to receive oscar. he drops himself right next to her and rests his head on her stomach. an arm wraps itself around lily’s waist. “if you want to.”

oscar hums. “i don’t think so. i kinda want to go and sleep.”

a hurried knock lands on the door, making oscar lift his head and look at lily. “are you expecting company?”

lily raises an eyebrow. “i grew up in the uk. i don’t have friends out here, oz,” lily hums, rubbing his back.

another knock lands on the door. “open the fucking door! i know you’re inside!”

“what?” oscar screams, climbing off the bed. he drags his feet to the door, glancing at lily with an eye roll. “i thought you were on a date!”

“didn’t mick text you?” logan asks, appearing out in the hallway with a jacket over his shoulders. “that’s so not mick! we need to go!”

oscar steps back, blinking blankly at logan. he’s already in a different set of clothes than oscar last saw him in. he’s in a pair of sweatpants and a random sweatshirt he knows for a fact that came from her, because it’s got a picture of hello kitty in a racing helmet.

that’s in contrast to his proper date outfit from when he left the paddocks.

“what? mick is definitely taking care of her,” oscar snorts with a laugh. “don’t worry about her, mate.”

logan pushes past oscar. he looks at lily. “what did mick text you guys?”

lily hums, resting her head on the headboard of the bed with a giggle. “ask us to come to the strip. with lots of heart shapes.”

logan throws his head back, pulling at his hair in frustration. “no, mate!” he screams. he bends down to the ground and grabs oscar’s jacket, shoving it into the australian’s chest. “let’s go! get dressed!”

“are you jealous or something?” lily laughs softly, tearing the duvet off her legs. “i’m sure her and mick are doing fine.”

“no!” logan screams, waving his arms into the air. “you’re not listening to me! the text they sent me is different!”

“what do you mean?”

“dude,” logan sighs tiredly, hurriedly shoving oscar towards the door. “they’re at the chapel — they have plans to get married.”

lily has never run out of the hotel so fast in her life. not out of concern for the situation their friend has gotten herself into; just for the simple adrenaline of a bad decision made in vegas while drowning in alcohol.

logan leads her and oscar through the vegas crowd.

lily squeezes oscar’s hand. “do you really think mick is so drunk that they’re getting married in vegas?”

oscar shrugs. “i really don’t know. we know he’s got that big crush on her, but would he really take advantage of her being so drunk like that?”

“i hope not,” lily mutters. “maybe they’re just as wasted as one another?”

“it would be funny.”

“would it, though?”

oscar shrugs again. “we’ll see.”

“you guys,” logan stops momentarily to turn and beckon them forward, “walk faster!”

lily lets out an airy breath, throwing her head back. “logan, relax. i doubt mick took advantage of her,” lily voices out, walking slightly faster to catch up to him. “he’s a good guy!”

“i don’t care. let’s go.”

they find the chapel fairly easy, logan pushing the doors to the reception area with a mission in mind. “who’s in there right now?” he asks, heading straight for the table with a woman standing behing it.

oscar and lily follow behind him slowly, quite unsure what they’re truly doing here. she’s an adult now — she should be able to stand behind decisions she makes.

especially ones that are made when she’s drunk.

“oh, hey! what are you guys doing here?”

oscar tilts his body, looking past logan. there sebastian sits on the couch with a bag of chips in his hands, leaning back with his legs spread on the ground.

“mick texted you?”

“no,” sebastian shakes his head. “mick called me. told me he was gonna marry my driver and be a full-time wag.”

“they’re inside right now?” logan whirls around, pointing at the closed doors that lead to the makeshift chapel in the building. “why didn’t you stop them?”

the older man shrugs, shaking his chips to get another in his mouth. “they have to learn their lesson.”

“seb!” logan cries, throwing his head back and his arms into the air. “her mother is going to kill you!”

sebastian shakes his head, tilting the bag towards the group of them. “she was called before they walked into the chapel.”

oscar laughs, taking a chip for himself. “really? what did she say?”

“she said good luck with the married life,” sebastian laughs.

“am i the only one who isn’t okay with this?” logan raises an eyebrow with his hands on his hips. “seriously! she’s getting married! they could be signing the papers right now that makes it official around the whole world!”

“lighten up,” lily laughs, rubbing his arm. “i’m sure they’ve got a logical explanation for everything that’s happening.”

the large and grand doors open, high pitched gigges filling the room. “oh, hey! you guys came!” she shrieks, arms linked with mick as they stumble out into the common area.

“dude! what are you doing?” logan screams, throwing his arm into the air. “why are you– no! what were you thinking?” he turns to mick. “come on!”

she stares at logan, smile disappearing she drops mick’s arms. “what?”

“why did you get married? what are you doing?”

mick snorts. “free pizza,” mick shrugs, eyes half open with a smug grin.

“what?” oscar laughs, dropping himself on the couch next to sebastian. he clutches his stomach. “you got married for free pizza? you guys are getting paid millions a year and you’re getting married for free pizza?”

“no, no,” she slurs, crossing her arms in the air. “the thing is–“

she looks back at mick, giggling as mick comes up to pull her into his body. “okay. the story is–“

“tell the story faster!” logan screams, begging them to quicken up the storytelling. “come on! what does free pizza have anything to do with you getting married? in vegas?”

“relax, dude,” mick sighs with a sloppy smile, waving a hand in the air. “it started when we went to this ice cream parlour earlier to get her rocky road.”

she giggles, her hands coming up to cup her cheeks. she taps her fingers against the skin with a giggle. “this guy proposed to this girl in the ice cream parlour — it was so cute!”

“okay?” sebastian raises an eyebrow. “how did this bring us here to the chapel?”

“and they got two free pints of ice cream!” she screams, throwing her arms in the air. “i wanted free ice cream!”

“dolce and gabbana don’t sponsor you so you can pull crap like this for two free pints of ice cream!” logan drops his head into his hands. “i still don’t see how any of this led to you getting married!”

“so i proposed to her in the ice cream parlour jokingly,” mick explains exasperatedly, rolling his eyes jokingly. “with a zip tie we found in her purse, but still.”

“oh, my gosh!” lily squeals, stepping forward to clasp her hands together with the girl. “do you have pictures?”

mick beams. “i do! i asked this random lady inside to take a video of me proposing to my ‘long-term girlfriend’ as a surprise!”

he fishes for his phone in his back pocket, immediately typing away on the screen. he whimpers, pouting his bottom lip out when logan snatches the phone from his hands.

“the story!”

“don’t you wanna hear our backstory as a couple?”

“not really.”

“i’m curious, actually.”

“so my ‘girlfriend’,” mick squeezes her shoulder, “and i grew up together! neighbours, actually!”

she sighs dreamily, resting her head on mick’s arm. she links arms with him and closes her eyes. “classic story of falling in love with the girl next door.”

“wait,” sebastian says. “if he proposed to you inside the ice cream parlour…”

lily tilts her head, looking around. “where’s the ice cream?”

“oh, we snuck into the paddocks and put it into the freezer in my driver’s room,” she giggles, throwing her head back. she leans back lazily, prompting mick to drop his hand to push her back to his feet.

logan steps forward and grabs her arm, yanking her up. “finish the damn story!” he turns to mick again. “seriously, have you both lost all working braincells that you decided to get married in vegas? in vegas? while you’re shit faced drunk?”

“yeah, so after we left the parlour, we went walking by the strip and we walked past this shop that sells pizza,” she explains. “they give free pizza away to newlyweds!”

“you did all this for free pizza?” logan asks, sitting next to oscar on the couch. “i’m gonna be on the news.”

“she suggested that we go to that chapel we walked by — this place — and then go back to that pizza restaurant with all of you to celebrate our… ‘marriage’!” mick laughs. “free pizza, anyone?”

the group stare at the pair in silence: logan showing his distaste for their antics with a scowl, oscar with an amused grin, sebastian still eating his chips and lily simply holding her hands in excitement.

sebastian shrugs, pushing himself off the couch. “convinced me.”

“as long as she doesn’t force me to eat hawaiian, then i guess,” oscar throws his arms into the air. “do they give out drinks too?”

“yeah!”

“really? and everyone is okay with this?” logan asks, narrowing his eyes down as he looks at sebastian. “you’re okay with this?”

sebastian shrugs again. “i’m not her manager or anything — i’m just her race engineer. sometimes grid dad. not tonight, though. all of this happened while i was sleeping tight in my hotel room.”

“oh, lighten up,” she giggles, tapping logan’s shoulder. “i’ll get you a whole pizza for yourself later. don’t be a party pooper — it’s my wedding night!”

— bonus

"alright, wife," mick grins, walking down the hallway of her hotel room floor. "i will see you tomorrow for our fight that will lead to our separation."

"okay, husband," she giggles airily, stopping right by her bedroom door. "i had fun being married to you, mick! i wish it could last longer than this one wonderful night."

mick laughs, stepping back with a grin. "don't forget to drink some water."

she doesn't answer, just grins at him as she taps her card onto the reader. she hears the lock whirl around before she pushes the handle down to open her door.

she takes a deep breath and turns around with a smile. "do you wanna come in for some coffee?"

taglist: @wcnorris @treehouse-mouse @laura-naruto-fan1998 @mindless-rock @leilanixx @ironmaiden1313 @angsthology @cherry-piee @christianpulisic10 @elliegrey2803 @cashtons-wife @sadg3 @a10vely-yutazen @mellowarcadefun @glitterf1 @megatrilss1885 @peqch-pie @gentlyweeps-world @woozarts @darleneslane @inejismywife @meadhgbcavanagh @2bormaybenot @love4lando

[sweetestcaptainhughes]

that’s my man

Word Count - 7200

Summary: Cole loves to train, and it’s no secret that’s how he’s number three on the Grind ‘24 list. But it’s also no secret that in the summer he loves taking his girl with him to the gym. But what happens when the new check-in doesn’t get the memo that Cole is in fact taken. 

Warnings: jealous girlfriend, easily embarrassed boy, talks of different kinks, VERY sub male, dom female, praising kink, thigh riding

Author's Note: I don’t know a lot about lifting, but I know enough to write this. Also if you're someone who goes to the gym regularly. They are doing a full-body day because you can fight me on it but it’s actually better as far as recovery time. As per usual, I was too lazy to do a full grammar edit, so sorry in advance. Anyway, thank you for reading as always. 

Masterlist

One of your favorite things to do in the summer was go to the gym with your boyfriend. Honestly, you don’t know what it was that made it your favorite summer activity. Maybe it was because you knew Cole cheered you on like no other when you beat a PR. Maybe it’s because he’s one of the only humans who you truly trust as your spotter knowing that man will injure himself before anything happens to you. Maybe it was that somehow he always wears the same damn white snapback and tightest shorts he has. Maybe it was because you loved being able to tease him in between sets. Maybe it was the fact that you were able to just stare at him while his muscles tensed to lifting the heavy weights. If you were being honest with yourself it was probably a mixture of all the above that made you happily jump your ass in the car before him when he asked if you wanted to come. 

This time was no different when Cole walked into the kitchen and hugged you from behind as he asked if you wanted to go to the gym with him. You happily agreed, especially since you couldn’t go the other day with him due to your work schedule. Quickly nodding your head yes, you ran upstairs to get some leggings on, crew socks because you liked lifting in socks, and a random Montreal crop top with 22 on the sleeve. Once you were done, you threw some vans on and went downstairs to meet Cole in the car. He already had the AC blasting and music on. As soon as you buckle your seatbelt, he is pulling off and handing you your water bottle he filled up. “Here you go Mamas” he shyly says, rarely does he call you by that name and whenever he does it makes himself blush. Deciding to reward him for the pet name you reach over and lightly kiss his cheek. 

“Thank you, baby boy.” you can’t help your smile grow as his cheeks get even more red.

It’s like time escapes you and before you know it Cole’s parking the car.  Both of you are shuffling out of the car. Cole waits for  you at the back of the car and flexes his hand, you know he wants you to hold his hand but he won’t say it out loud. A large part of you loves how shy he still is even after almost a year together. Slowly you reach for his hand that isn’t holding your water bringing it to your lips and leaving a small kiss. “Happy baby?” you ask shyly, he didn’t have to answer you already knew the answer. As you watched his cheeks stay that light red color, and smile shyly down to you.

Once you're inside you hear someone call Cole’s name, you turn your head to see it’s a girl you don’t recognize behind the desk. Cole starts to walk over, pulling you automatically due to your interlocked fingers. “Oh hey Chesley, nice to see you again.” Cole starts to make small talk with the girl and you can’t help but notice how she stands dipping over the counter trying to put her breasts on display. As if that’s not already too forward, she lightly touches Cole's upper bicep as his arm rests on the counter. 

“I’ve been great, I’m so glad to see you again… you know after the other day.” Her voice makes your stomach hurt.

“What was the other day?” you ask even though you know ignoring this girl was probably for the best. The little jealousy that started to brew in your gut couldn’t help but want answers.

“Oh you know when you were working the other day. That’s when I met Chesley and you know how the locker room door gets stuck sometimes y/n/n, well she didn’t know how to get it unstuck and she had to use the bathroom” you nodded your head yes but your eyes never left the girls as she wouldn’t stop staring at you “- and I was the only one here so I helped her.” Cole sounded like he had no idea what he just walked into and he probably didn’t. “Oh wait let me introduce you guys - Chesley this is my girlfriend Y/N, Y/N, Chesley.”  

“Hi nice to meet you.” you say your other hand is going to wrap itself around Coles arm that was still holding your hand. Not caring if it came off bitchy when you didn’t extend your hand especially since she hasn’t stopped batting her eyelashes at Cole since you got here. 

“Hi. oh Cole well if you need anything I’ll be here. I know last time you forgot your water.” The way she said it slipped like it was some secret between them. But it did cause your face to wrinkle in confusion because it didn’t make sense.

“Water? Baby you never forget your water.” you say turning to him.

“I know, but I was leaving as my mom was calling and I guess I got distracted.” His cheeks are still a soft pink from earlier in the parking. You couldn’t help but smirk at how easily embarrassed Cole gets sometimes. As you glance back to the girl, you see her smirking thinking she’s the reason for Cole’s blush, and something twists in your stomach. 

“It’s okay because I let him drink from mine. Plus you earned it shoving that door open after your… Hard workout” As she reached up to touch his arm again. Cole must have finally realized what was happening and pulled away. He really isn’t big on physical touch from people he doesn’t know and the fact he pulled away makes you smirk.  

“Well we're gonna go see ya” you don’t even pretend to be nice as you pull Cole away. You can feel her eyes following you to the turf as you put one earbud in, put on your playlist, and shove off your shoes. 

“Hey mamas, do you want me to spot you first?” he asks as he sets his water down, as you shake your head no. Handing him the other earbud and he quickly puts it in his ear. 

“It’s okay Cole you can go first today, I need to stretch anyway.” Cole can tell by your voice that something is wrong but decides not to push it. He walks over to the barbell that’s on the floor, adding the proper amount of weight while you finish your dynamic stretching. As you look up you can see Chesley starring at Cole while he sets the bar. 

Possessive isn’t a word you would normally use to describe yourself but as you feel your jaw set with her watching your boyfriend shamefully as he bends down to make sure the weights are fully locked in. Something about this girl shamelessly staring at his thighs makes you want to claim Cole, mark him as yours even though she already knows he is. You glance over at Cole as he moves the bench to behind the bar, knowing that means he’s decided to start with hip thrusts. Cole starts his set of twelve reps, slowly raising his hips each time, you can’t help but let your mind wander as you finally start to make your way over to him. Once he’s done with his first set he sits up shoulders resting against the back of the bench, the bar rolling stopping barely mid thighs. You come up to him from behind, separating your legs so they’re on either side of him and sit down on the bench. Your hands remove his snapback teasingly put it on yourself. “Hey give it back.” he says in a fake annoyed voice. His head tilting back so he can see you with a pout on his lips. Both of you know however that his announce and pout are fake and that he likes when you wear his clothes even if it’s just a simple hat. Your fingers lightly scrap at his head, his body automatically relaxing under your touch. His hands move away from where they were resting on the bar, to moving to the sides of your calves pushing you closer to him as he sinks into your legs. “Feels good love.” softly closing eyes, letting himself get lost in your comfort for a few seconds. Although you love this little moment you're having, the jealousy in you, can’t help but glance up at Chesley, as she quickly averted her eyes as you make eye contact. 

“Alright my time for my set.” you say as you remove your fingers from his hair and place his hat back to keep his hair out of his face. As you find both you moving around the gym, you still find the girl’s eyes following your boyfriend. Later when you were benching you could feel her eyes like a bad itch on your skin. Cole being your spotter could feel you start to slip as you were doing reps until failure. 

Cole hand was right there ready to help you if you felt like you needed as you finished one last rep. But once he saw you second guess the last pushup he didn’t give you a choice. “I got you baby.” as he gently helped you lift the bar to lock it in the stand. 

“I am proud of you know, you realize you just benched as much as Luke does. AND you got more reps in than him the other day!” with a small chuckle. 

“Yeah well he’s barely been in the gym all summer so nothing to celebrate.” you mumble annoyed at yourself.  As you watch your boyfriend bend his head over the bar to look at you, slightly frowning at your pout. 

“Okay so he’s a lazy fucker we knew this. But do you want to hear the lecture about how insane it is that you're a girl and your muscle density isn’t-” you pull Cole down with a smile on your face and kiss him upside down.

“What’s that for?” he mumbles, not fully pulling away. 

“To shut you up but also thank you.” you mumble as you pull away you see Cole’s cheeks bright red and as you sit up you see Chesley looking at you both from the check-in desk again. 

This isn’t your proudest moment and you're not sure if it’s you being frustrated that your spotter actually had to rescue you or just Chesley staring all morning at your boyfriend. But you decide at that moment, to turn on the PDA even more which is wild because you and Cole never have this much PDA in general. It’s almost impossible to find pictures of you online together kissing or even cuddling because you both respect your privavy and like keeping intimate moments private. Slowly you started with little touches as Cole set the weights on the rack for himself. He was so focused on what he was doing barely even noticing at first. But as you glanced up you could tell she took notice and you couldn’t help the smirk on your lips. 

Eventually, Cole did catch on to the fact that you would let your fingers ever so slightly graze his arm, or touch his thigh after a set. Everytime, he did you could feel him getting more shy and almost twitch away from your touch in shock. His cheeks looked like a lobster shade of red almost permanently from all the small touches you left behind. 

Later as you were doing jump ups, making sure your ass was on full display for Cole. He got embarrassed when you put your ass practically in his face instead of easily going from the other side. “Sorry Coley” you whine out as you turn around and see the almost permanent blush on his face from today. Once you jump down from the box, take your hand and lightly rub it down his chest and slowly bite your lip trying to look innocent. His dick twitching in his compression shorts between all the touches and now you are looking at him with that look in your eyes.  

“Hey are you okay, love. You’ve been off since we got here.” he asks suspiciously. The gulp he let out didn’t go past you. Part of you started to feel bad for doing this to your boyfriend all morning, but you also didn’t want to hear his reaction to your insecurities about the new girl. 

“Yup peachy.” trying to make your voice a normal tone but failing miserably. He gives you that look that tells you he knows you're lying. But before he can open his mouth you sigh. “I might… be a little jealous.” you barely whisper as you hide your face with your hands and shove it into his shoulder. Naturally he wraps his arms around you, tightening his grip unconsciously as if it was the most natural thing in the world to hold you. 

“Jealous of who?” he whispers, trying to keep his voice down to have a private moment despite being in a semi crowded gym. It wasn’t often you felt insecure or jealous and Cole knew that you probably didn’t want others to hear about you having an off day.As he looked down at you, finally you felt like showing yourself to him and  you removed your hands from your face. 

“The new girl, she won’t stop staring at you and yeah I know you're hot. But I’m literally right here! She could at least pretend to respect me.” With each word your voice raises to more of an annoyance. 

Cole shyly smirks “ okay let her” as he dips his mouth to your ear. “She’s not the one who’s made me hard right now.” You tilt your head up to him and take your hand to caress his check. 

“Oh yeah?” you can’t help but tease him a little.

His mouth finds your ear again, “ yeah you have me almost begging you in the middle of the fucking gym how badly I need you.” He doesn’t bother removing his face from the crock of your neck, pressing his hard on to your thigh. 

“Oh yeah.” your hand goes to the nape of his neck pushing closer. You hear him make a sound of agreement. “What do you want me to do baby boy?” At this point you should probably stop considering you're in the middle of the gym but you wanna see how far Cole is willing to go before he whines to go somewhere else. 

“I just need you please, you can use me however the fuck you want I don’t give a fuck. But if I could choose I’d have you ride me as you used my cock to get yourself off. When my mouth plays with your boobs and you play with my hair while you tell me how good of a boy I’m being for you mamas.” Cole usually isn’t so forward with what he needs especially in public and it makes you drip at the thought of claiming him. 

“Imma grab my shoes okay baby. Can you be a good boy and go to the car and wait?” you can feel him shake his head yes. “Okay good I’ll drive us home baby. I know you don’t wanna get caught by one of the boys as I’m fucking the shit out of you in the car.” You can hear him grunt as he pulls away from you pulling down the ends of his shorts trying to hide his hard-on. He backs away and turns towards the wall where you discarded your slip-on vans earlier and your water bottle. By the time you turn away Cole is already gone and you can’t help but smirk as you know he’s probably already in the car waiting for you with the AC already blasting. 

You quickly make your way out of the gym but can’t help but hear Chesley try to get your attention. “Oh Y/N you're gone so soon! Is Cole not feeling well? He usually spends hours here… with the boys.” Trying to control your breathing but honestly you wanted to clock this girl but knew that Cole loved this gym, you took another deep breath. “Guess you don’t have the stamina that he does.” Her voice sounding like the scratching of nails on a chalkboard, although you control yourself not to hit her, your mouth isn’t as easily convinced. 

“Actually Sarah was it? We just decided to get some cardio done at home instead. Cole didn’t think the owners would like it if we fucked in the middle of the turf.” Your voice comes out so sweet and innocent pretending that you have no idea why Cole would see anything wrong. You smiled as her mouth fell open, “well see ya around” as you walked out of the gym and quickly made your way to the car. Opening the driver's door you let yourself get settled in the seat, purposely not looking in Cole’s direction. You grab your airpod case and put your airpod away realizing that Cole already put the other one away. 

As you adjusted the seat and mirrors to be able to drive home you could feel Cole’s eyes burning into the side of your face. Finally you decide to give him a little attention, “thanks for listening so well baby.” as you take your right hand off the wheel and put it on his thigh slowly moving your hand up and down. All of the teasing must have gotten to Cole more than you thought because he softly buckled his hips trying to get you to put pressure where he needed it most. “And just when I compliment you for being a good listener you try to be a brat.” Your mouth making a ticking noise of disapproval as you turn onto the highway heading back to Cole’s place. 

“Please, i’m sorry” you can hear the pleading in his voice even though your eyes are 0n the road. It kind of hurts your heart a little denying Cole when he didn’t do anything wrong. 

“I know baby boy, it’s okay, I’m not mad” you say as your hand inches closer to where he needs it. Coming up on your exit, both of you realize you're only ten  minutes away from his place. “What do you need?” you ask softly as your hand gently goes over his bulge and gives a light squeeze. His one hand was going to squeeze your wrist, the other that was leaning against the window flexing as he leaned his head back. 

“I - I na need” you could tell Cole was getting overwhelmed and for once you were grateful you were close to home so he didn’t get too worked up before he could have his release. 

“Do you want me to help you cum?” you ask, your hand still not removed from the bulge that as you glance over makes you squirm from how uncomfortable it looks like it is, Cole shakes his head no quickly.

“Nnn, no. I want you, I wanna taste you mamas.” His words have more of an effect on you than he even realizes. But sadly it logically doesn’t work if you're driving and Cole knows that too. 

“Baby we're five minutes from home now okay and then you can have me I promise.” The hand that was on his bulge moved to his face and squeezed his cheek. The pout on his lips makes your knees feel weak. He shifts in his seat so that he can lean over so that his head is resting against your upper arm. Both of your hands now on the wheel for the first time this entire drive. It takes everything in you not to pull the car over and just take care of him right here but being so close to home it just doesn’t make sense. 

“I know.” you hear Cole mumble, although you're not looking in his direction, you suspect that his eyes are closed and that he’s pouting. Removing your right hand from the wheel you find one of his and put it under your crop top. His head lifts up as he feels his hand move under your shirt. 

“Mamas?" he asks in a questioning tone probably thinking about how obvious it looks to the people we pass as I turn into his neighborhood. 

“It’s okay baby, you got tinted windows.” That's all it took for Cole to unbuckle his seatbelt so he could shift in his seat fully to face you. He dipped head under your crop top and you could feel him push up at your sports bra desperately as his mouth closed on your right boob and sucked. His right hand going across your chest to squeeze the other one. “Fuck bubs. Hmmm..” one hand busy turning on your street, while your other hand goes to press Cole’s head deeper into your chest. His mouth is swirling and sucking hard on your nipple now. Wanting him to know that he’s doing a job you let out a small moan. He moans in response with your nipple in his mouth, the feeling going straight to your core. “Coles were home” you whisper, quickly removing your hand to press the garage remote. Driving into the garage and parking. Cole still hasn’t moved from under your shirt but now that the car is parked at least you can let yourself get lost in the feeling. 

Throwing your head back against the headrest and closing eyes. Your hand going under your shirt to pull at Cole’s hair, not sure where his hat disappeared to but grateful you were able to touch his hair finally. After a minute or so you became antsy to go inside. “Cole baby, it’s time to go inside.” you say in a semi-serious tone. All you hear from Cole is a grunt that you can assume means no as he squeezes your boob not his mouth harder. “Come on baby, we gotta go inside, you're acting like a brat bubs. Don’t you like being a good boy.” knowing exactly what to say for Cole to remove himself from under your shirt and start to move finally. As he pulls away, you catch him in a needy kiss, biting his lip by surprise easily taking control of the kiss. Deciding that you need to move away before you end up not leaving the car. Both of you rush out of the car, Cole running around the hood to meet you picking you up unexpectedly makes you chuckle as he sits on the hood of his car, quickly stepping between legs. He connects your lips again but quickly you take control of the kiss, Cole moaning in response. He pulls away after a minute to catch your breath, and he pulls on your shirt, refusing to use his words. 

“Baby you know you have to use your words. What do you need bubs? You gotta tell me.” you say slowly encouraging Cole to use his words instead of pouting. He also knows when he uses his words 90 percent of the time he gets what he wants. But when he’s in this state of mind, of needing to be taken care of. He tends to struggle with using his voice, which actually turns you on even more but you will never admit that to him. 

“Can I take it off mamas?” softly pulling at the fringe at the end of your shirt. He looks up in your eyes and you shake your head yes. He quickly grabs your shirt and rips it off the top of your head. Quickly making contact with your chest leaving soft wet kisses and soft bites everywhere but not hard enough to leave a mark. The feeling makes you lean your hands back to give him more access. “I wanna taste you.” he whimpers as he continues his attack on your chest slowly moving up to your neck. 

Quickly you move your arms that were extended behind you to around his neck, crossing your legs behind him. “Take me upstairs, first baby boy.” you demand.

“Okay my love.” As he picks you up and turns you both so he can carry you up the few garage steps and into the house effortlessly. Both craving each other, you lean in and continue to deepen your previous kisses, quickly feeling more desire for eachother then before. Cole can’t stop whimpering as you pull at his small hairs at the back of head as he enters the bedroom. He softly places you on the bed, without breaking contact with your kiss. Both of you kick your shoes off as soon as you make contact with the bed. He slowly pulls away sitting up on his knees to catch his breath asking, “can I please eat you out now mamas.” 

Cole usually doesn’t whine for this long, he also usually doesn’t have to wait this long for what he wants. As much as you want to to edge him on and push his limits. The idea of him sinking when he never has before makes you nervous. “Okay baby go ahead.” The smile on his face makes your stomach warm with anticipation. Lifting your hips, you help Cole take your leggings, underwear and socks off. Deciding to take your sports bra off as well. 

“Wait bubs, you gotta take something off too” reaching forward you pull his shirt above his head. Slowly you scoot up on the bed to give him more room to lay down. Leaning against the headboard as Cole dips his head down giving you wet kisses, lightly nipping your soft skin on your stomach as he makes a trail to your pussy. Moving your legs to make more room for himself, keeping his hands on your thighs making sure they stay further apart to give him more access to your core. Slowly he dips his head down and looks up at you waiting for your direction. One of your hands is going to move the hair out of his face, “go ahead baby.” 

That’s all it takes for him, to shove his mouth in your folds licking up and down as if his mouth had been in a drought for days and this was his first sight of water. He closed his eyes enjoying tasting you after begging for it for so long. His hands pressing down on your thighs pushing you closer to you. The hand that wasn’t playing with his hair, going to your boob to play with your nipple. “bubs feels good, always such a good boy for me.” you softly coo your encouraging words to your boyfriend. He decides to put your attention on your clit, moaning as he hears your breath catch in your mouth. The sensation going straight to your core, feeling yourself being worked up. Deciding that if you were gonna cum off of his mouth you needed a new angle. Pushing his face away, he got the message and pulled away, not without a small pout on his lips. 

“Lay down on your back.” your demanding  tone leaving no room for argument. Quickly he laid down beside you, his head resting against the pillows. His leg twitching in nervousness not going past you, as you smirk down at him. Sitting on your knees beside him your hand goes to lightly go over his bulge in shorts. Knowing that it was mean but not caring as the idea came to you. “Bubs you're wearing too many clothes, I’m gonna take your shorts off.” Your fingers moving up to his lower stomach, pushing down in the start of his v-line making him whine a little in response. Then returning your hand to his bulge and giving a light squeeze, Cole bulks his hips in response not caring if he got punished for it. “Babyboy wait, then once you're undressed, I am gonna sit on your face and use your mouth to get myself off.” As you slowly start to pull at his shorts and boxers he lifts his hips automatically to help you. His brows frown, wanting to know what happens next. 

Barely over a whisper he asks “ then what?” 

“I’m gonna tease you, and suck you off until you're begging for me to ride you and let you cum inside me.” Lightly take your pointer finger and trace the vein that’s so visible on his dick. “Do you think you can handle that bubs?” you ask as you start to sit, getting ready to swing your leg over his shoulder. 

“Ahmm.. yeah mamas” 

“Good boy.” Finally, swinging your leg, before you lower yourself all the way down you ask “remember the sign if you need a break right.” making direct eye contact with his hazel-gray eyes. He shakes his head and with that you sit down, your hands resting on his chest for stability. Slowly you start grinding on his face. Cole’s hands go to the back of your thighs, kneading the flush there slowly creeping up to your ass, pushing you even closer to him. Quickly you find your pace, rolling your hands as Cole’s long tongue goes in and out of your core. The pleasure slowly starts to build, you increase the speed of hips rolling, basically just grinding on his face. 

“Yeah right there baby. Don’t stop.” you encourage him. Your nails starting to dig into Cole’s chest, the little bit of pain Cole felt going straight to his dick. His hands are scratching down the back of your thighs. Starting to feel the familiar coil your stomach straightens to tighten. “Fuck I’m gonna cum, don’t fucking stop.” His nose starts to nudge at your clit, as Cole pushes you down making you sit completely on him. That being the final act being enough for the tight warm feeling your stomach to explode. “FUCK fuck I’m coming Cole. fuck” repeating it like a prayer, Cole only mildly slowing down his actions licking up all your juices as you work yourself through your orgasm. Finally, parting from his mouth you crawl down to his boxers.

“Did I make you feel good?” he shyly asks. God how you loved this man, and how he always needed to be reassured that he made you feel good. 

“You did so good baby” you softly tell him, as you straddle him. His hands go to your hips pulling you closer as you bend down so your chest is flesh with him. Starting at his most sensitive spot on his neck, immediately getting his breath to catch in his throat. Smirking as you do kitten licks, finally putting your mouth on the spot and sucking making sure to leave a bruise. “Gotta make sure I mark you so that girl knows you're taken.” The jealous feelings from earlier today slowly rising in your chest again. 

He squeezes his hands on the flesh of your hips at your words. “Mark me everywhere, cause you're the only one who I ever want to see me like this for the rest of time.” His cheeks immediately became bright red, you know that he didn’t mean to confess so much and it was in the heat of the moment. But you can’t help the butterflies form in your stomach. Kissing his cheek giving him nonverbal comfort for his confession. 

Moving on you make your way down his chest, leaving hickies on the center of his chest. Licking down each of his abs, up and down and up again. Then softly biting each ab, probably leaving bite marks, Cole doesn’t seem to care as his moans grow into groans at the pleasure. “Ppp ple- please mamas.” almost as if he’s crying out.

Glancing up at him, you see how overworked he’s getting. “I taught you better than that bubs, use your words.” Your mouth doesn’t leave his lower stomach as you make eye contact with him through your lashes. 

Cole takes a few seconds to collect himself as his hands up and down your shoulder blades, something you know he does when he’s feeling a lot of things and needs to ground himself. “Mamas it hurts.” he whines out taking another ragged breath. “Can you please help me cum.” He begs and you swear you could never say no to him when he asks so politely. You shake your head yes, and you kiss down the side of his v-line. Quickly making your way down, you leave little love bites and kitten licks up both of his thighs alternating between the two. Moving his legs so bent and open more giving you more room to down properly between them. Cole is a whimpering, moaning mess at this point. Each sound from his loops turning you on more and more. Finally making it his almost red tip, softly kissing and licking it between the slit. Cole automatically bulking his hips. Taking your hands you push down on each of his hips so he can’t move them any more. His heads going to your hair and you know that it’s going to be a matted mess but the end of this. 

Taking your tongue, you start at the base and lick down the same vein you were teasing earlier. Then going back to kiss each of his balls which you know he would describe as ‘blue balls’ if you asked him. “Fuck mamas, feels so good” his eyes squeezed shut from the pleasure your finally giving him as your mouth puts the tip in your mouth. Softly sucking, slowly taking more and more until your softly choking. Cole usually isn’t this vocal in bed but you're loving how much he always moans and grunts when you take him in your mouth. His fingers threaded in your hair, as you moved the pace of your mouth. Cole never dares to push your mouth down, scared that he might accidentally hurt you since he knows he’s bigger than most. “Augh I- I am close” he whispers and he starts moving his hips unconsciously. Deciding to quicken your pace to help him cum faster, within minutes he’s crying out in pleasure and curse words as he shoots his cum into you. Continuing to suck until he comes all the way down, and tries to wingle out of your grasp scared over getting overstimulated. Finally you pop yourself off of him, a huge smile on your face as you look up on Cole as he looks properly fucked out, that glow on his skin as he pulls you up to his face. Softly he brings you into a kiss “Thank you mamas.” he whispers once he pulls away for air. 

Kissing his neck softly, as he arms tighten around you. Sitting up stranding is lower stomach, you have a devilish smirk on your mouth. “no love I don’t think I can” Cole says knowing where your brain is going without you even saying it. 

“Oh I think you can, but if you insist I know how to give you some rest while I still get what I want.”  your voice is cheekily teasing as you pull Cole to sit, sitting fully in his lap. 

“What?” he softly asks his forehead resting on your shoulder. 

“I'd rather show you.” as you move your leg so you're straddling just his right thigh. Taking your left hand resting it on his cheek to turn his head in your direction. Moving your head to crain of your neck, as you sit fully on his thigh grinding down. Bending down slowly whispering in his ear “what if I just use you again to get off, it wouldn’t be the first time I use your thigh.” His hands tightening on your hips, his grip so tight you would be shocked if you didn’t have little bruises on them later. He hums in response as you softly kiss the hickies you gave him earlier in the crook of his neck as you continue to softly grind on his thigh. “What do you think, you wanna watch me use you as I use you to get off. I’ll let you play with my boobs. While I use you to get off, I’m not evil bubs.” Softly moving down to the spot between his collarbone and neck biting hard as he groans in his pleasure. 

“Fuck. Please” he mumbles as he softly puts his left boob in his mouth tightening his grip on your left hip. That’s all it took for you to roll your hips at a faster rate, alternating between rolls and purely grinding down on him. Breathing between both of you becoming uneven again, as you glance down to softly tease Cole’s cock as it’s already getting hard again. Cole softly bites down on your nipple, removing his mouth to hiss as you continue to softly tease him. “Do you want me to stop, I don’t know if I can get off watching you hard on. I'd rather be riding you.” letting you confess out quickly, your intrusive thoughts taking over as you slip off his thigh fully straddling him again teasing him with your hole. 

“Yeah I need you mamas please.” as he rests his forehead. “Wanna feel your warmth mamas.” You softly kiss his pouty lips, as your core clench at his words, pulling away from kiss whispering yes. Sitting down on him getting used to him, throwing your head back in your mouth at finally feeling full. Cole starts making little kisses on your chest and down the valley on your breasts as you start to bounce softly on his dick. “I wanna make you feel good please.” as he looks up at you silently asking if he can continue his attack on your breasts. 

“Go ahead baby boy.” that's all it took for him to put your nipple in your mouth, his hand kneading your other one, flicking and pinching the hard nipple. His hand on your hip shows the first sign of dominance from him today, by helping you keep an even pace. All that can be heard is your soft moans and skin slapping. Cole takes the hand that was kneading your boob to your ass kneading the flush until you're sure it’s bright red. His mouth going to your other boob deciding it needs attention. “Ugh ugh Cole fuck, you feel so good. You always fill me so well.” you voice is low, filled with your lust for the man you love. Your hand slips between the two of you to give your clit attention, rubbing small harder than normal circles on it. Your other hand moves to his hair, threading your fingers through his dirty blonde hair pulling at the roots. Cole’s mouth opened slightly at the pressure and groaned. 

“Fuck bubs. You feel so fucking good, swear your dick was built for me.” His hand on your hip helps you fasten the pace. His hips help meet your thrusts, making him hit your g-spot with every thrust.  All you can do is moan as you feel your entire body on cloud 9 from the pleasure you're feeling. “Augh augh fuck baby, your always so good for me.” you slur out due to the pleasure you feel from the start of your lower stomach tightening. 

Cole removes his head from your breast to ask “mamas i- i am gonna cum.”

“No” you demand. “Wait for me. I’mm close wait for me. Will let go together bubs.” leaning your head back as Cole leaves wet kisses down your collarbone, quickly removing the hand that was on your ass and lightly slapping it. “FUCK.FUCK. YES YES YES” you scream. Cole going back and slapping your ass a few more times, you can feel yourself about to let go.  “Let go baby, it’s okay.” 

That’s all it took for Cole to lean back and moan in pleasure as he shot his cum filling deep in your pussy and you let go. Both not stopping your thrusts until you come completely now. Cole just holds you for the first time today, kissing down the top of your shoulder while you catch your breath. “I love when you use my body.” he softly admits. 

“Oh yeah” your head softly setting into his neck. Although you can’t see him you can feel him shake his head. His fingers lightly ghosting up and down your back as he leans back so he’s laying down still on top of him. 

“You're the only one who I’ve ever let dominate me.” he admits, your head lifting up in shock.

“What?” The confusion is clear in your voice.

“You heard me mamas. You're the only one I feel safe enough to give that type of control to.” He admits his cheeks become a light pink as he lets his words sink. 

“Thank you baby. I love you.” as you leave soft kisses all over his face. Slowly you lift your hips to remove yourself, but his hands stop your hips. 

“No, we stay like this. I like being close to you.” Turning your bodies so you're both on your sides as he looks directly into your eyes waiting for a response. 

“Okay” you lightly let out, shifting again so you're on your back, Cole’s full body weight on you, as he settles between you. As your legs come up behind his back and hold him there. His face hiding in your breasts, softly kissing the valley of your breasts as he lets out a light thanks closing his eyes. He looks so comfortable you can’t help closing your eyes, your hands playing with his hair. Sleep almost grasps your consciousness. Cole's voice brings you out of sleepiness for a moment. 

“Mamas.” in a questioning tone to see if you're still awake.

“Hmmm” still not bothering to open your eyes.

“For what it’s worth, I like when you get possessive over me.” His tone is as if he’s listing a well known fact, as he snuggles deeper into you as you can feel him pulling a blanket over the both of you. The laugh that escapes your mouth is contagious as you feel Cole’s chest rumble above you. 

“Okay baby I’ll keep that in mind, let’s get some sleep.” you let out, little did you know Cole was already letting out little snores before you could finish your sentence.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Supervised AI isn't

It wasn't just Ottawa: Microsoft Travel published a whole bushel of absurd articles, including the notorious Ottawa guide recommending that tourists dine at the Ottawa Food Bank ("go on an empty stomach"):

https://twitter.com/parismarx/status/1692233111260582161

After Paris Marx pointed out the Ottawa article, Business Insider's Nathan McAlone found several more howlers:

https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-removes-embarrassing-offensive-ai-assisted-travel-articles-2023-8

There was the article recommending that visitors to Montreal try "a hamburger" and went on to explain that a hamburger was a "sandwich comprised of a ground beef patty, a sliced bun of some kind, and toppings such as lettuce, tomato, cheese, etc" and that some of the best hamburgers in Montreal could be had at McDonald's.

For Anchorage, Microsoft recommended trying the local delicacy known as "seafood," which it defined as "basically any form of sea life regarded as food by humans, prominently including fish and shellfish," going on to say, "seafood is a versatile ingredient, so it makes sense that we eat it worldwide."

In Tokyo, visitors seeking "photo-worthy spots" were advised to "eat Wagyu beef."

There were more.

Microsoft insisted that this wasn't an issue of "unsupervised AI," but rather "human error." On its face, this presents a head-scratcher: is Microsoft saying that a human being erroneously decided to recommend the dining at Ottawa's food bank?

But a close parsing of the mealy-mouthed disclaimer reveals the truth. The unnamed Microsoft spokesdroid only appears to be claiming that this wasn't written by an AI, but they're actually just saying that the AI that wrote it wasn't "unsupervised." It was a supervised AI, overseen by a human. Who made an error. Thus: the problem was human error.

This deliberate misdirection actually reveals a deep truth about AI: that the story of AI being managed by a "human in the loop" is a fantasy, because humans are neurologically incapable of maintaining vigilance in watching for rare occurrences.

Our brains wire together neurons that we recruit when we practice a task. When we don't practice a task, the parts of our brain that we optimized for it get reused. Our brains are finite and so don't have the luxury of reserving precious cells for things we don't do.

That's why the TSA sucks so hard at its job – why they are the world's most skilled water-bottle-detecting X-ray readers, but consistently fail to spot the bombs and guns that red teams successfully smuggle past their checkpoints:

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/investigation-breaches-us-airports-allowed-weapons-through-n367851

TSA agents (not "officers," please – they're bureaucrats, not cops) spend all day spotting water bottles that we forget in our carry-ons, but almost no one tries to smuggle a weapons through a checkpoint – 99.999999% of the guns and knives they do seize are the result of flier forgetfulness, not a planned hijacking.

In other words, they train all day to spot water bottles, and the only training they get in spotting knives, guns and bombs is in exercises, or the odd time someone forgets about the hand-cannon they shlep around in their day-pack. Of course they're excellent at spotting water bottles and shit at spotting weapons.

This is an inescapable, biological aspect of human cognition: we can't maintain vigilance for rare outcomes. This has long been understood in automation circles, where it is called "automation blindness" or "automation inattention":

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29939767/

Here's the thing: if nearly all of the time the machine does the right thing, the human "supervisor" who oversees it becomes incapable of spotting its error. The job of "review every machine decision and press the green button if it's correct" inevitably becomes "just press the green button," assuming that the machine is usually right.

This is a huge problem. It's why people just click "OK" when they get a bad certificate error in their browsers. 99.99% of the time, the error was caused by someone forgetting to replace an expired certificate, but the problem is, the other 0.01% of the time, it's because criminals are waiting for you to click "OK" so they can steal all your money:

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ema-report-finds-nearly-80-130300983.html

Automation blindness can't be automated away. From interpreting radiographic scans:

https://healthitanalytics.com/news/ai-could-safely-automate-some-x-ray-interpretation

to autonomous vehicles:

https://newsroom.unsw.edu.au/news/science-tech/automated-vehicles-may-encourage-new-breed-distracted-drivers

The "human in the loop" is a figleaf. The whole point of automation is to create a system that operates at superhuman scale – you don't buy an LLM to write one Microsoft Travel article, you get it to write a million of them, to flood the zone, top the search engines, and dominate the space.

As I wrote earlier: "There's no market for a machine-learning autopilot, or content moderation algorithm, or loan officer, if all it does is cough up a recommendation for a human to evaluate. Either that system will work so poorly that it gets thrown away, or it works so well that the inattentive human just button-mashes 'OK' every time a dialog box appears":

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/21/let-me-summarize/#i-read-the-abstract

Microsoft – like every corporation – is insatiably horny for firing workers. It has spent the past three years cutting its writing staff to the bone, with the express intention of having AI fill its pages, with humans relegated to skimming the output of the plausible sentence-generators and clicking "OK":

https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-news-cuts-dozens-of-staffers-in-shift-to-ai-2020-5

We know about the howlers and the clunkers that Microsoft published, but what about all the other travel articles that don't contain any (obvious) mistakes? These were very likely written by a stochastic parrot, and they comprised training data for a human intelligence, the poor schmucks who are supposed to remain vigilant for the "hallucinations" (that is, the habitual, confidently told lies that are the hallmark of AI) in the torrent of "content" that scrolled past their screens:

https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3442188.3445922

Like the TSA agents who are fed a steady stream of training data to hone their water-bottle-detection skills, Microsoft's humans in the loop are being asked to pluck atoms of difference out of a raging river of otherwise characterless slurry. They are expected to remain vigilant for something that almost never happens – all while they are racing the clock, charged with preventing a slurry backlog at all costs.

Automation blindness is inescapable – and it's the inconvenient truth that AI boosters conspicuously fail to mention when they are discussing how they will justify the trillion-dollar valuations they ascribe to super-advanced autocomplete systems. Instead, they wave around "humans in the loop," using low-waged workers as props in a Big Store con, just a way to (temporarily) cool the marks.

And what of the people who lose their (vital) jobs to (terminally unsuitable) AI in the course of this long-running, high-stakes infomercial?

Well, there's always the food bank.

"Go on an empty stomach."

Going to Burning Man? Catch me on Tuesday at 2:40pm on the Center Camp Stage for a talk about enshittification and how to reverse it; on Wednesday at noon, I'm hosting Dr Patrick Ball at Liminal Labs (6:15/F) for a talk on using statistics to prove high-level culpability in the recruitment of child soldiers.

On September 6 at 7pm, I'll be hosting Naomi Klein at the LA Public Library for the launch of Doppelganger.

On September 12 at 7pm, I'll be at Toronto's Another Story Bookshop with my new book The Internet Con: How to Seize the Means of Computation.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/23/automation-blindness/#humans-in-the-loop

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

--

West Midlands Police (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/westmidlandspolice/8705128684/

CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/

[chukys-mouthguard]

look but don’t touch

2.7k words

featuring -> arber xhekaj x female reader (florian xhekaj also included)

genre -> angst, fluff, suggested smut - bar fight with protective arber standing up for his girlfriend when a drunk man tries hitting on her

note -> not proofread, been trying to get this posted for daysss, and wanted something up for y’all since it’s been a bit :)

The evening's plans weren’t anything crazy; a night out at the bar with Arber, Florian joining as he was still in Montreal competing for a possible roster spot. The opportunity to hangout with Arber and Florian was never one you’d turn down, as Florian had become your best friend next to his brother of course. Plus, anytime you got the two Xhekaj boys together you were surely in for an exciting night.

“Now boys, let’s just keep this a peaceful night out okay?”

You had each of the boys on your arms, joking as nights out with them usually resulted in some sort of drama. Both of them rolled their eyes as they reassured you that all the previous times weren’t their fault, because why would they ever admit to starting a fight? Only ever admitting to finishing them.

The bar was one you and Arber frequented, liking that he wasn’t usually recognized and you were able to enjoy a night out without loads of fans crowding him. Florian, being a younger guy in the organization, didn't have much of a following, so he passed as just another average Joe among the crowd of people. Though sometimes you wished they’d get recognized a bit more to get some free drinks out of it to lessen the hurt when you checked your tab at the end of the night. But if you had to weigh the pros and cons, you would choose them not being recognized over free drinks any day.

It gave you the freedom to dance with Arber and do as much PDA as you pleased. Not having to worry about cameras in your faces or people running to Twitter to share things about the two of you.

Arber ordered the first round of drinks, he and Florian both opting for beer while you preferred your go-to Tito’s and lemonade. Which Arber made sure to get with light ice and a slice of lemon, exactly how you liked it.

“Thank you baby.”

You smiled up at him as you traded him your card for the drink, the usual routine for nights out when Arber didn’t want to be recognized. He’d always pay you back for whatever the tab was the next day, but some nights he just preferred to avoid the chance of the bartender looking at his card and recognizing his name.

“Promise we won’t go too crazy tonight sweetheart.”

Arber smiled as he kissed your head, his hand lightly tapping against your ass playfully as you just shrugged sipping your drink.

The three of you found a high top table off to the back of the bar, enjoying people watching and just enjoying your drinks. Never being dance floor people when it was the three of you, especially considering Arber and Florian were brothers. The last thing you wanted was to be grinding on Arber while staring Florian in the face.

“Arber, your fight is getting ready to start.”

Florian gestured towards one of the flatscreens hung behind the bar. A UFC fight that Arber had been looking forward to all week long was being previewed. He smiled from ear to ear as they showed his choice to win getting ready to head to the ring.

“That’s my boy, he’s gonna win by a knockout. I’m calling it now.”

Bringing his beer to his lips you just shook your head, never much of a UFC fan, though you’d watch occasionally along with Arber.

As you finished off your first drink, your eyes went wide as you heard a familiar song begin to blare through the speakers.

“Florian, you’re kidding, we have to.”

Turning to Florian, his beer bottle frozen against his lips, you smiled like a fool as you waited for him to realize what was playing.

“Oh my god, no way. Let’s go!”

Florian chugged the rest of his beer before he took your hand, following you through the crowd as you found a spot for the two of you.

Charli xcx’s 360 was blasting throughout the bar, a change of pace from the typical music they played, but you and Florian didn’t mind. The song being one the two of you constantly sang together and were obsessed with. Arber simply watching was a smile as he laughed at how ridiculous the two of you were.

He’d never had to question Florian with you, knowing that your relationship was strictly friendly. If ever just the two of you, Florian even would act as your boyfriend to keep you safe from any drunk idiots that would try to have their way with you. So Arber didn’t bat an eye when your hands held his or your arm wrapped around his neck as you jumped up and down to the beat. Knowing it meant nothing, recognizing you were safe with his brother, he headed to find a seat at the bar to watch the UFC fight.

The song had come to an end and you were in desperate need of a drink, Florian staying behind to chat someone up on the floor.

“Tito’s and lemonade please.”

You smiled at the bartender as you found a spot comfortably next to Arber, seeing his eyes fixated on the UFC fight, but his hand lightly grazed yours to acknowledge you next to him.

“Can I get that for you?”

Your smile faded as you looked to your right, a drunken man smiling from behind his beer bottle as he gestured towards your glass.

“No, it’s okay. Honest.”

He chuckled as he scooted closer to you, glancing over his shoulder before he leaned in to whisper to you.

“You know, I saw you on the dance floor. And I think you really should find yourself an older man. That boy surely doesn’t know how to please you.”

Now you were the one laughing, knowing he’d meant Florian. The man clearly oblivious to the fact of who your boyfriend actually was, because if he knew he wouldn’t dare make a move on you.

“Trust me, you don’t want to go there, okay?”

“What, that punk is gonna do something? He probably couldn’t even land a punch. Get you a real man who can actually defend you baby girl.”

Shaking your head you glanced towards Arber, his eyes focused on the UFC fight but his jaw was clenched. Letting you know that he had overheard everything, but so far he felt you were handling your own.

“I’m just warning you, making comments like that, it’s not gonna end well for you.”

“What’s that punk gonna do about it huh?”

The man leaned in, his hand reaching for yours as his face was inches from you. The smell of alcohol on his breath repulsed you as you leaned back. Arber immediately turned to catch the moment, an arm wrapped around your waist as he pulled you into his chest.

“He’s not gonna do shit, but I will, how about that? You feeling tough now, big guy?”

A slight smile came across your lips as you could see the regretful look on the drunken man’s face as he realized he’d likely bit off more than he could chew.

“Hiding behind your girl huh? Very big of you. You weren’t opposed to sharing her on the dance floor, how about sharing her with me for the night. I promise I won’t bite, unless she likes that.”

A disgusting smirk came across the man’s lips as he reached out to tuck some hair behind your ear, Arber immediately standing up as he moved you behind him. Florian running from across the bar as he’d caught the tail end of things, making sure you were okay before he’d joined Arber. The two of them staring down the drunken man and his friends.

“Don’t you fucking touch her. I’ll put you on your ass in front of everyone in this bar and show them what a fucking loser you are.”

“You and your little sidekick here?”

The guy chuckled, looking at Florian and immediately underestimating him as he looked like an eighteen year old that you’d dragged along to be your designated driver.

“What’s the deal here huh? You guys both banging her? Or does he do the work and you just watch?”

Before Florian could spew his comeback, Arber’s fist connected with the drunken man’s jaw. Sending him stumbling into the arms of his friends as he grabbed at his face.

“God dammit Arber.”

Florian rolled his eyes, wishing that Arber would’ve left things alone. You tried to reach for Arber and pull him away, the last thing either of these boys needed was to get in trouble for a bar fight. That surely would jeopardize a roster spot for them.

But before you could get Arber’s attention, one of the drunken man’s friends sent Florian stumbling to the ground with a right hook.

“Fuck.”

You cursed to yourself as you knew things would surely be escalating from here, Arber never one to back down from a fight. Especially when Florian was involved. He didn’t even bother looking at his brother, knowing he’d get back to his feet and be fine, he’d taken worse punches in his day.

You kept your distance, not wanting to get in the middle as Arber grabbed the drunken man by his shirt, landing a right hook as the man’s friends tried to get in on the action. Florian quickly stepped in and pulled them off of Arber as you watched security quickly making their way over towards the chaos.

“Florian, grab him, we gotta go. Now!”

Florian wrapped his arms around Arber’s, pinning them behind his back as he pulled him away from the group of drunken men. The three of you heading for the door before security could get close enough to identify you, disappearing into the crowd as they had turned their attention to the men left bloody at the bar.

While you appreciated Arber standing up for you, it was a series of events you knew could’ve and should’ve been avoided. The idea of him and Florian jeopardizing their positions with the team because of a dumb bar fight was something you hoped wouldn’t become a reality. Hopefully you’d left the bar before anyone was able to identify the boys or worse take any photos or videos of the altercation.

The drive back to you and Arber’s shared apartment was quiet. Florian lectured Arber a bit which was an interesting change of pace, simply telling him he can’t be so impulsive, regardless if the guy was out of line or not. You knew you didn’t have to say anything to either of them, but you’d still take the opportunity to give Arber your two cents when you were alone at home. Which he was trying to calm himself down for so that he didn’t blow up on you or impulsively react negatively towards you.

“Alright, ice that hand a bit. Try to clean up as best you can, coach is surely gonna ask about that tomorrow. Y/n, you have my permission to give him hell in there.”

You laughed as you rolled your eyes, climbing from the back seat of Florian’s truck as you wrapped an arm around Arber’s.

“How about you worry about hiding your black and blue jaw Florian? Good night!”

You smiled at him as you pulled Arber towards the doors of your apartment building. His expression was anything but amused, his pulse still beating a bit fast as he was trying to relax but the whole event had him furious.

The ride in the elevator was quiet, his hand holding tight to yours as his thumb traced circles over your skin. Usually the only thing he could muster when he was angry, never able to be cold towards you completely.

He headed right for the bathroom once inside the door, knowing you’d follow and pull out a first aid kit to assess the damage while also giving him shit. But he never took offense, he knew it was wrong to be getting in bar fights, no matter if he thought it was warranted or not.

“So, we’ve got cut up bloody knuckles. A nice black eye forming here, a slight cut lip. I’d say it’s not the worst I’ve seen you walk away with.”

A soft smile appeared on your lips as you began to dig through the first aid kit. Arber watched you as he clenched his fist, trying to ignore the pain he felt. His anger finally subsided, an apologetic look in his eyes and you looked up at him. Your hand moving to tilt his face away from you as you cleaned up his lip.

“I’m sorry, I know you’re mad.”

You sighed as you shook your head, digging back through the kit as you turned your attention to his hand.

“I’m not mad Arber, I just don’t think you two needed to get wrapped up in something like that. I mean, you have to set an example for Florian. And bar fights, that’s an easy way for you to lose your spot and for him to earn a bad reputation right out of the gate. I just, I need you to think before you throw a punch next time.”

Arber winced as you cleaned his knuckles, trying to maintain his tough guy image despite the pressure against his cut up skin with the alcohol soaked gauze.

“You want me to just sit back while a guy disrespects you like that? Puts his hands on you? Fuck that. He opened his mouth so I had to put him in his place.”

His frustration began to slightly build up once more, replaying the words spoken by the man in his head along with the image of him touching you. Arber took a deep breath as he knew it was no use getting worked up over it all again.

“Or, you could’ve simply given him your two cents, and walked away. Because now how are you and Florian going to explain these bruises to the coaches tomorrow? You two fought each other drunk?”

He watched as you packed up the first aid kit with a sigh, his hand moving to tuck some hair behind your ear behind caressing your cheek.

“I’m sorry, I know you were trying to stop things from getting to that point tonight. I just can’t help that I love you so much. The sight of another man touching you, or hearing them talk to you like that asshole did, just made my blood boil.”

Your eyes shifted from the first aid kit to meet Arber’s, seeing the apologetic look in his eyes as he smiled softly.

“I’m happy to know you love me so much you’d fight someone for me, but as much as I like the sight of you a little roughed up, I prefer you without a scratch on you babe.”

Your hands tangled in his hair as you moved to stand between his thighs while he sat on the edge of the bathtub.

“Oh come on, you love me with my battle scars.”

His hands slid up your thighs, resting on your ass as he playfully smacked it, biting his lip as he stared up at you.

“Mmm, I do love them. Except they make it a little hard to kiss you when your lip is busted.”

Arber licked his lip, gauging the size of the wound with his tongue.

“I think we could manage not to make it any worse. Plus, I think I deserve a little thank you for being your knight in shining armor tonight don’t you think?”

You rolled your eyes as you shook your head, Arber’s hands moving from your ass to your hips as his fingers dipped below the hem of your shirt to tickle your skin.

“You sure you don’t want to call Florian? Since apparently you guys share me?”

You laughed as you headed into your shared bedroom, discarding your top before climbing onto the bed. Arber playfully gagged as he followed behind you, one hand caressing your cheek as he kissed you, the other working on the button and zipper of your jeans.

“Baby, if you’re trying to turn me on, don’t ever fucking mention my brother getting to do anything sexual with you. We both know I’d never share you with anyone let alone my brother.”

[cupidbedsy]

𝘂𝗻𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗲𝗱𝗹𝘆 | 𝘵𝘻11 ୨୧

➪ summary: y/n has a shitty day and the cherry on top is that she forgot the keys to her and cole's apartment. but funnily enough, someone answers her knock

➪ warnings: reader has a shitty day, breakups, crying

➪ word count: 1.4k

➪ file type: fic - reupload

➪ sunny's notes: i got this idea from tiktok or at least the main part of it but yeah. i don't have much to say except enjoy the fic :) oh! i might also be getting the cole and hughes brothers fics out tonight so be on the look out for those

© cupidbedsy (sunflower-lilac42) ; do not copy, repost, or translate my work and designs on any other website or here

tz11 masterlist || nhl masterlist || taglist || navigation

While living in Canada, she had expectations that she would never see Cole’s friends unannounced. However, when one of his friends was Trevor Zegras, she should’ve known to expect the unexpected. 

It had been a long day in general, her boss gave her more paperwork to do, she spilled coffee on herself, and on top of it all, she and her boyfriend had been fighting and this had been the last straw for him. He broke up with her in the middle of the day, through text, when he knew she was still working, leaving no time for her to argue with him, to say anything to save them.

That’s how she ended up where she was now, her jacket wrapped tightly around her as she slowly trudged through the wet and cold of Montreal. Sludge was everywhere causing water to seep into her brand-new shoes and her socks, leaving her feet freezing.

The hallway to their apartment felt longer than it usually was. It felt like it took her ten minutes instead of just one to walk down it. Reaching into her back pocket to grab her keys she realized that they weren’t there. Fucking flying fantastic.

She raised her hand and knocked on the door, in hindsight, she didn’t know why. Cole was wherever he was, his location the last thing on her mind, so the apartment was empty. The knock came out as low as her energy level was. And, to her surprise, a minute later someone opened the door, and it wasn’t her brother. 

Trevor stood there, his hair slightly messy and face a little flush from whatever he had been doing (testing the durability of the siblings’ couch by jumping up and down on it). His lips were turned upwards into a grin but they quickly flipped down when he realized she was shaking and her mascara was painted down her cheeks.

He ran a hand threw his hair before she spoke, “Trevor? W-what are you doing here?”

Usually, she was good at remembering things people told her but it seemed like those skulls were lacking as of recently. With Cole playing for Team USA she had the apartment to herself, to do things as she pleased. But, the text that Cole had sent her a few days ago slipped her mind, the text that explained to her that Trevor was visiting and needed a place to stay.

Trevor said nothing in reply to her question, pulling her into his arms. His right hand wrapped around her waist and his left arm came up to her head, his hand holding it tightly to his chest. And that was all it took for her to break down, tears staining his off-white hoodie.

He turned around and kicked the door closed with his foot before lifting her up to carry her to her bedroom. She wrapped her legs around his waist, a habit she had fallen into over the last five years. He tried shushing her, her sobs breaking his heart but his efforts were in vain. She kept crying, but now her head was resting on his shoulder. As Trevor sat her down on the bed, he kneeled before her, brushing the hair out of her face. He desperately wiped at the tears that continued to fall down her cheeks.

When she stopped briefly, Trevor took her face into his hands, “What happened? Did someone do something to you?”

She had never heard his voice that stern before, and if she was honest, she couldn’t decide whether she should be scared of it or attracted to it. She only blinked at him in response and he sighed. His thumb rubbed under her eye, mascara now covering his finger. He pouted a little before kissing her cheek, “Please tell me what happened sweetheart.”

Trevor was always one for nicknames. He always called her honey, or baby, or sweetheart, or princess. But they never meant anything, not to her. It was harmless teasing, however, for whatever reason, this felt different. This one felt more real, like he was saying it to her, for, her. It felt different because all of those other times he said it, he called her a stupid little nickname, they were laughing, having fun, being idiots. And now she was here being vulnerable in front of him, crying, no bawling in front of him, breaking down as he cupped her face. 

Her breath hitched at the nickname, now that she had returned to crying Trevor didn't know if it was because of that or because of the nickname. 

After a while, her cries finally stopped. She stared at him straight in the eye before looking back down. She didn’t answer, she didn’t know how to answer. Everything had been so much that she didn’t know what happened today or what had happened yesterday.

Trevor urged her once more, his tone still stern but a little softer now and he allowed the desperation to be heard. He removed one of her hands from her cheek to hold both of hers, resting them in her lap, “Please y/n.”

“Everything.”

“What do you mean, princess?”

“He broke up with me. My boss hates me. I have a shit ton of paperwork. I spilled coffee on my favorite jacket. I ruined my new shoes. I forgot to text Cole good luck.”

Despite her listing a multitude of reasons for her to be crying, Trevor was still on the first one. His mind was still trying to figure out how Chris had broken up with her. She was everyone’s dream girl, okay maybe she was just his dream girl, but still. She was beautiful, she was kind, she was smart, she was adorable, she was everything anyone could ever want. 

Trevour thought he could cry right there when she pulled away from him to scoot back so her back was flush with the headboard. She curled into herself and Trevor frowned at the action. Standing up, he walked over to the side of the bed so he could sit in front of her. 

She reached out to hold his hand, giving it a slight tug and Trevor immediately knew what she wanted. So once again, he moved, now sitting next to her while she lay on top of him. In any other situation, she would’ve been embarrassed, if she had been making fun of him and he pulled her onto his lap, her cheeks would’ve heated up instantly. 

Yet all she wanted, all she needed was comfort. Her mind was completely focused on something different, multiple things. Being cuddled up with Trevor was the furthest worry in her mind. He rubbed her back up and down as she wrapped her arms around his torso, feeling content for once today. 

“I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For staining your hoodie.”

He kissed her head, “It’s okay. I needed a new one anyway.”

“What are you doing here?”

“Cole didn’t text you?”

“He probably did but I don’t remember.”

“Well, I came to visit my favorite girl.”

She lifted her head in confusion, “Who?”

He only rolled his eyes before kissing her forehead again, “You, you dork.”

“Why would you want to see me?”

He sighed before lifting her off his lap so she was sitting in front of him. He grabbed ahold of her hands, one in each of his, before locking eyes with her, “I know this isn’t the best time to tell you, y/n/n but I really like you.”

“You, Trevor Zegras, like me, y/n Caufield?”

“Of course I do. Why wouldn’t I?”

“Because I'm me.” She shrugged, not really having an answer for him. 

He furrowed his eyebrows in confusion, “That’s exactly why I like you. Because you’re you and nobody else compares.”

“Trev…”

“I know, I know. You and Chris just broke up and you’ve had a long day. God, I’m such an idiot, I shouldn’t-”

He was interrupted when she placed her lips on his. It took a moment for him to register but once he did, he melted into the kiss, bringing a hand up to rest around her neck, his thumb brushing a piece of hair out of her face. His other hand wrapped around her waist and pulled her back onto his lap. Her legs wrapped around his waist before pulling away, resting her forehead on his. 

“I like you too.” He smiled and kissed her gently once more.

© cupidbedsy (sunflower-lilac42) ; do not copy, repost, or translate my work and designs on any other website or here

[the-physicality]

.... it was like 2 minutes.... i really thought she was going to be the interview of the week but it was a headlines announcement

[random-ikea-drawer]

ok so i love les miserables

AND I JUST GOT TO SEE IT FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE NORTH AMERICA TOUR (more specifically Montreal! (yes i flew to an entirely different country to see it)) and i am incredibly attached to enjolras and grantaire so here are just things i saw that made my nails dig into my thighs <3 (not just enjoltaire)

oh my dear months old source of no big sad

this is 90% incoherent rambling (SPOILERS)

- Grantaire had long hair and a long coat i think that deserves its own point

- During Red and Black, Grantaire did the old “Don Juan” with the bottle right in Enjolras’ face (he was not impressed)

- In this same song, Enjolras got really close to R’s face during “don’t let the wine go to your brain”

- Again, in Red and Black, when they tossed Grantaire’s bottle to Enj, teasing him, Grantaire grabbed the bottle in a… way… when he was giving it back to him

- Same song 😭 Grantaire was bouncing on a guy’s lap during the first few verses

- In DYHTPS, Grantaire pulled Gavroche aside away from the students crowding Enjolras (this broke my heart, he clearly loves him and doesn’t want him to be in a war)

- “Glad to do a friend a favor” with a very suggestive hand gesture

- In the “dogs will bark flees will bite”, Grantaire pointed a finger at Enjolras, the former getting real close putting his weapon between them. They got REALLY close

- Gavroche pulled the middle finger at Javert lmao

-Eponine fucking died (i knew that already, seen every bootleg and version available, still hit hard)

- During Eponine’s death Gavroche ran onto the stage, closely followed by Grantaire being held onto by Enjolras

- Gavroche tried approaching Eponine (that’s his sister bro :()) but was stopped and held onto by Grantaire. When she died however, Grantaire quickly bent to hug Gavroche, man the grief was so clear with them both.

- After she died, everyone cleared to their positions but Enjolras and Grantaire, seemingly for Enjolras to try and comfort him, but decided against it quickly and pushed past him. Grantaire placed his hand on his chest in mock offense 😭

- When the attack was about to start, Grantaire mocked and toyed with tied up Javert. When Enjolras called for hold, Grantaire threw his arms around Javert with a “yep!” and cue the battle starting immediately when that happened

- During Grantaire’s verse during Drink With Me, it’s back to Enjolras and Grantaire being center stage. Enjolras approached him, held onto his arm and with the same hand moved up to brush R’s hair, which lead to him breaking off the contact and rushing to the other corner of the stage.

-He was followed by Gavroche, who hugged him from behind and then they both fell asleep next to each other :((

- Gavroche fucking died (i knew he did still heartbreaking) and was caught by Enj, who handed him to Grantaire

- During the Gavroche solo, Grantaire stood center stage looking to the crowd, not even flinching when the gun sounded, only turning around when Gavroche was already at the top of the barricade

- He tried shaking him awake :(( then set him down and stared at him :((

- That was until Marius fell, Enjolras rushing to check on him, making Grantaire rush to his side

- R grabbed onto Enj and they both held the back of each other’s necks,, from my angle it looked like their foreheads touched but idk if they would do that but MANNN

-Enjolras fucking died first (no wtf :(( )

- Grantaire fucking died last (BRO.)

- Everyone fucking died bro

- Except Marius and JVJ of course

- Mr Thenardier, instead of singing “This one’s a queer but what can you do”, sang “This one’s a queer, I’ll try it to!” and dipped a guy in the wedding 😭

- The “to love another person is to see the face of god” line always makes me emotional just :((

that’s it haha hopefully y’all enjoy the ramblings, ty for reading this far, i seriously recommend going to watch it if you can it’s truly the most amazing thing i’ve ever seen man 😭 may be biased but i’m serious

[goldsbitch]

That one call overseas

part 7 to That one Christmas flight

summary: Now that we don't talk.

warning: pure angst this time, cheesy af, swear words I guess, cliche probably, typos most definitely

The hole Y/N dug for herself was getting deeper with each day of no contact with Lando. Gone was her ability to contain her emotions within herself. Her friends were getting concerned. Their ever so calm and easy going friend turned into an impulsive, unreliable and even slightly rude menace.

Teresa was the one who kept patience with her in the worst days, as only the best of friends do. When Y/N got kicked out of a bar for the first time in her life for her comments in lousy bad Italian on a random couple in the late hours of their Friday night, Teresa walked her home and screamed Hits Different with her at the top of their lungs to ease the atmosphere. And once they were home, she listened to Y/N rant about how she would never ever call the asshole who does not even bother to text her again. Teresa also stopped her from throwing his hoodie away, knowing that the following morning would hurt just a little more.

When Y/N woke up the following noon, she took a hard look in the mirror. This was getting ridiculous. She swore to herself and all of her roommates that no more alcohol and no more Lando desperation. It's a crush - it'll pass. One day this will be a nice story to tell the kids she'll have with some Antonio, the accountant or Ignacio, the lawyer. Not Lando, the racer - and that was ok.

//

Lando was off to Montreal and things could not be more busy for him. New updates to test, again, as his frustration grew. He only wished to be finally at the top podium, which seemed to always slip in between his hands. His mind, of course, was clouded by the thoughts of Y/N. At first he thought ashamed of himself for not reaching out and appearing like an asshole - but he somewhat expected her to break the silence. He started to second guess every aspect of the time they shared together. Perhaps she did not have as great time as he had, perhaps he acted like an asshole, or perhaps he just was not good enough for those who were not under the F1 charm spell. Not good enough for her. He finally resorted into doing something he tries to avoid as much as possible - looked at the fan pages and comments to boost his ego up. It only led to him feeling more shameful and pathetic than when he started. He kept her necklace and brought it with him. For all it was worth, he had an amazing memory to look back at, no matter how delusional he felt doing that.

The paddock was a great place to be at when searching for a distraction, so he made sure to spend as little time as possible alone and surrounded himself with people. He even walked to the stands often than he usually would, searching fans and giving photos out, smiling a little to extra on all the girls who looked remotely close to Y/N. Who knows, he might pick up someone like that at the end of Montreal ride. Why not. Nobody was stopping him.

He went to the race with all he had, fully prepped and focused. However, red flags, poor strategy choice had him finishing way below the targeted place. To his luck, Oscar was on a roll of luck and finished way better compared to Lando - and of course that everyone compared. Debrief meetings like that drown the soul more than usually.

Influx of all the journalists was overwhelming that day. The interview fatigue hit hard and after few of those, Lando felt that based on the questions he was asked, everyone thought of this race like a massive fail for him. His own answers continually worsened.

"Why do you think this week has ended the way it did?" asked one of the more prominent interviewers.

"Well, you know how it is. Sometimes the week just does not go the way you'd wish, even if last weekend it seemed like we're on a track to something good. One things affects the other and getting out of that rut is challenging."

"Are you talking about the updates, or something different?"

"Yeah, something like that. But as they say, when life gives you lemons, right. Make lemonade...or limoncello for a rainy day, ey?"

"Well, we hope to see the cheerful Lando soon and ideally at a podium too!" Lando knew the interviewer was only doing his job and technically she was not doing anything wrong, but he could not help and for a split second let his face do a look, that was certainly not appropriate for someone who was so used to media and knew he had to be smart around them.

He was in no mood to watch a celebration of Oscar or to get wrapped up in the post race chaos. Once he felt free to leave, he did, putting his phone on don't disturbe mode and went for a walk around the city with his headphones on, to dwelve in some sad tunes and solitude of his own thoughts.

//

Y/N asked Teresa to punch her anytime she looked like she was about to search Lando news. Her roommate refused to do that as it would be a full time job, but did help her set up some tags to block. Saturday was a success, however once Sunday evening and race time rolled in, Y/N knew she was absolutely not ready to try and ignore it. So instead they made a girls evening in about it. The idea was to replace real memories with Lando for race watching and distance him. They were trying... So they sat together with their study books to combine distractions. Y/N was explaining the race rules, avoiding any personal remarks about Lando. To her own disappointment, he was not featured a lot as there was not much really going on for him during the race. But maybe it was for the best. It really felt alienating, seeing his face on the screen, a character in the story of F1, so far removed from the unfiltered smiling face she had burned in her memory. The mood in the apartment was calm, maybe a little mellow. There was a weird calmness in Y/N, as she knew for a fact that he was busy. Knowing that she will definitely not get any text and that he was not ignoring her was soothing for the soul, even if for just few hours. At the end, the girls had way better time than expected, Teresa taking the initiative to comment on all the rest of the drivers and ranking them based on looks and vibes. She became a Leclerc girl all the way in.

"Right, that's my cue to go to the bathroom," Y/N stood up as the post race interviews rolled in. That would be too much at the moment.

"Love the drama vibes you give off. I'll watch it and let you know if there was anything alarming," Teresa assured her.

"Doubt that," was the bitter response she received back.

Once Y/N came back, she returned to her friend sitting with a puzzled look.

"What?!" all the pent up emotions took the stage, all the hard worked stillness gone as if it was a dream.

Teresa sat in silence, looking bluntly at the screen.

"What??!" Y/N repeated impatiently. "Ugh, forget this charade. I'll just watch it." This all felt like she had passed the test, but hadn't learned the lesson at all.

"Yeah, maybe you should. Interesting, his voice is higher that I imagined," Teresa replied as Y/N became to rewind the stream. They sat in silence, as they watched post race Lando in his tiredness, obvious annoyance and visible dark circles under his eyes. A shock went through Y/N at the word limoncello.

"Y/N, it must a coincidence. He's just been to Italy, so the connection was there...means probably nothing," Teresa said quietly as she watched her bewildered friend.

"Limoncello. Name a more Italian drink...What the fuck?? Is he joking right now? What is this?"

"Y/N, he has no idea you're watching, remember?"

"Yeah, I don't care about that. Makes it even worse actually." She replayed his interview once again.

"Ok, that's it - I'm taking this away from you," Teresa ordered after she saw Y/N going for a third round of the interview. "Do you wanna talk about it, talk it through?" So they went on to the kitchen, cooked some pasta while Y/N went on a rant where she let all her thoughts let loose.

//

"Honestly, fuck him. I don't need the mess he brings into my life. I can find great sex on every corner in this city!"

"Yeah, you go girl!"

"You know what, I'm gonna call him!" Y/N turned directions again for 17th time that day.

"Yeah, I kind of thought you would," Teresa sighed tiredly. "And I think you should, the worst thing you might get is a peace of mind...eventually."

"Yeah, I'm gonna do it! Now!"

She dialed his number. The phone rang for the first time. The second and third. With the seventh dial, she hung up. The girls looked at each and Teresa went for a hug.

"He might be busy with some racing stuff?" Teresa said in a tone which suggested that she herself had a hard time believing.

"I'm so stupid," Y/N whispered.

//

Of course he would miss it. Obviously. Because that just what seems to follow him and this girl around. It was deep evening over at her timezone, but still ok for a late night talk. He called back. What was he even planning on saying? He had no idea. When she did not pick up, he called for a second time. She picked up his facetime call and to say his heart skipped a beat would be an understatement. His heart triple jumped. A face appeared in low light. She smiled.

"Hey you," he opened with. The word honey almost slipped his tongue, but he was not sure how it would be received on the other side of the line.

She waved and gestured him to be silent. Lando was bewildered.

"Where are you?" he whispered, trying to unsucesfully figure out from her background. Again, he was met with a shush. Well, this will be real fun, Lando thought, slightly annoyed.

"Wait, you have me in your earbuds...so you need to be silent, not me!" Y/N frowned and nodded. She got up from where she was sitting and started walking.

"Well, since I have some guaranteed no interruption time, let me fill your ears with a story! There once was a beautiful girl, who talked so much and was so obnoxious that the city decided to ban her from speaking. Luckily, she found the most handsome guy in the town to keep her company with his wit, charm and great looks. To reward him for his services she sent him-"

"Ok, you can STOP now," she exclaimed, as she walked down the stairs.

"Where the fuck are you at this hour, young lady. Someone should seriously keep an eye on you!"

"Yeah, well, I sometimes think the same - and then I'm suddenly sitting in some random hotel room hundreds of miles away from where I was supposed to be," she winked at him. "No, I was at the church."

"Oh...you religious? Wait, are the churches still open?"

"Yes, silly. It's Italy, one always is. And no, I'm not religious per say."

"Oh, well then it makes perfect sense that you're hanging out in churches at midnight, yes."

"Yeah, you know. One gets bored."

"Ok, weirdo," Lando laughed.

"No, I like to go there to clear my head. There is some magic in the architecture and in the old walls," she explained. She really did go to get her head clear, to think it out. "Oh, and one day, I'd like to fuck in like a really old building. Not church exactly, but like I dunno. Our university halls are making me super hot sometimes." She had no idea why this was the first thing she'd pick as a topic. God, she felt lame.

"Well, that would be a hard thing to decline, if you're offering."

"Cheeky as ever, are we?"

"Obviously. So, tell me. Whats up? It's nice to see you by the way. I wanted to tell you that before you shushed me down so politely."

"Aw, nice to see you too, man." Lando would prefer to be called differently. "Some school stuff, completely blew my Monday's presentation, so that was fun."

"You should have studied in the weekend, hmm!"

"Yes! I should have," she had a hard time keeping the smiles in, "Anyway, otherwise it's been pretty much a lot of nothing."

"So you called me because you're bored and not because you wanted to talk to me?" He knew he was pushing it. But desperate times... She hesitated and shot him a strange look he could not decipher.

"Did you know we also have leaning tower here in Bologna?" Y/N panned the phone to show him one of the two towers in the city centre. She was walking around with no apparent destination. "Have you been here?"

Lando smiled weakly. There was a strange frustration regarding the distance he felt towards her. Not the physical miles. "Yeah, I've been there once." His Bologna trip was not exactly a great memory. Maybe this call had been a mistake. The last thing he needed now was to feel strange. He showed her the park he had been walking in.

"I'm in Montreal! Have you been?" Y/N also felt some strange vibes coming through this dry conversation

"No, but sounds fun."

"Not really. There has been a lot of pressure at me lately. I'm starting to hate it. Can't say it to anyone, nobody seems to get it." He looked off to Y/N from the start of the phone call. She took few breaths to triple check that she really wanted to break the elephant in the room. It somehow seemed like a "now or never" situation.

"Saw the race today." Lando paused. He suddenly felt the most vulnerable he had ever felt with her. Did she know him from the first moment? Was she lying? He had a hard time gathering out a response. She felt that, so she started blabbering. The cat was out of the bag, so what the hell.

"I broke our rule after we met. Not immediately! But I just...it felt nice meeting you. And I had no idea about racing beforehand. I overheard your name once and I was like "there can't have been two sets of parents naming their child Lando in this century". She looked at his puzzled face. "I'm sorry." Range of emotions floated through Lando, who was particularly sensitive today. It was only a matter of time when she'd find out who he was, he knew the day had to come at some point. But there was a part of him that wanted him to be the one to tell her. To tell his side of the story first, before she could get it elsewhere. He only had to trust her that she wasn't lying from the start. Very few people liked him for him and not "the racer Lando Norris".

But then again, who was he judge? He practically stalked her down - no, not practically, he actually tracked her down. Why did he do that? Because he was wonderstuck too. He liked her. So that meant that she liked him too. Sense of pride took over.

"Don't say sorry. You look too cute doing that," se said feeling braver now and less like a teenager with a crush. "Nah, it's ok. Wanted to spare you of the NDA, but I guess too late now." The more he came to terms with the fact he was not an enigma anymore, the more confident he became. "I mean, I was the one to find you even though you're not exactly famous, so..."

"Yeah!" she said as if she forgot that. "See, bordeline creepy," she laughed, obviously feeling relieved that he hadn't hung up the phone. "But, it's you, so I guess cute?"

"I'd say it's a little problematic on both parts, so we're even, honey."

She laughed. The looks they shared were a little more intimate than their previous looks. A sense of warmth washed over Y/N.

"It's funny. Do you know when I was in Bologna?"

"Ha, I do actually. My friends saw you at a bar."

"Yes...That's not exactly a coincidence. I wanted to "bump" into you accidentally."

She bit her lip down and closed her eyes. Took a deep breath and replied: "Do you know what was also a massive fail?"

He shook his head.

"I was at Imola. I wanted to "bump" into you accidentally."

Silence followed, as the two idiots took the new information in. Butterflies flying all over Bologna and Montreal.

"I think it's time we stopped dancing around and start being clear with each other or we'll start to look really stupid," Lando stated after a moment.

"Agree, Lando."

"Great, Y/N. I want to see you again soon."

"Me too."

They talked for another hour. Chatting lightly around about this and that, heart racing, not pushing more boundaries anymore that night, as the leap felt big enough to hardly swallow for them at the time. Y/N had final exams so the next weekend was a no go for her. But they agreed she'll come over to Spain, as he calendar was clear until the summer. Apart from seeing each other, confidentiality was a big thing for both of them. They barely knew each other, even if it had felt differently every time they talked.

Y/N was unable to relax that night, as the line "I can't wait to kiss you again," which Lando said instead of a goodbye, burned in her mind with the brightest of all flames. Some people were never destined to be friends.

part 8

__________________________________________________

Tagged all those who like to suffer: @prudyhoo @anuksunamon @sagestack @esquerkaren @ushygushybaby @ilove-tswizzle @thehufflepuffavenger1  @superlegend216 @mehrmonga @lovely-blackinnon @mylifeihate1029 @lausdigitaldiary @tswizzleismother @goldenharrysworld @llando4norris @classiclitfreak  @ophcelia @leclerc13 @starmanv @k4r1402 @biitch-with-wifi @drunk-teens-doing-drugs 

[annieqattheperipheral]

At 1hr 21min:

Started typing... Kept typing lol here you go, natemac interview recap:

Nate still has to go train at sid's gym

So nate makes batherson come to his gym

Vail camp: used to have them, paused for covid, better and chill, no one knows them (tried them before in toronto and montreal), not busy. Training at 9000ft. Afterwards do treatment or golf.

Attendees: mcdavid, marner, sid, skinner, hall, tysbarrie, matty tkachuk, bennett, hanifin

McDavid: i don't see him much, I've gotten to know him thru these. I'm like a kid watching him, it's just fun

Matthew Tkachuk: "and he's doing his thing 😂"

Cale's wedding: "i shouldn't say a showman but when he gets into his moods he's a fun guy. likes to dance, have a good time, when his wife's around, definitely loosens up more and it's just the boys around"

Went to Wimbledon this summer. Did not wear a top hat

Lighter recovery training both this and last summer: just trying to take miles off his body is key. Light gym days "is that it, Andy?" But feels good now

Cale: "first nhl game, aggressive and calling for pucks, to do that at 19yo is impressive. The confidence that he has. Quieter off the ice. Super sure of himself on the ice. He's special. He'll be the best defenseman ever"

A bit about why he works with his sports psychologist and will always continue working with her "we're so dialed in on our body, why is no one taking care of their mind" "the minute you think you're good, you're not"

Is offended that "ball hockey players claim nhl players can't play ball hockey. is that true?" ("I've rollerbladed my entire life!!") (I need to see fanart of that btw pls ☺️)

Idiot boys tell him it's on feet not on rollerblades (chiclets cup talk "what is the chiclets cup?")

Nate asks who the best ball hockey player in the world is. Answer: "nose face killah" "who?" "he looks 20x uglier and a big nose" and Nate responds "so he's got like my nose" they all compliment his nose😌

Nate redirects the convo to roller hockey

On sid's $8.7: in July he told him "you're not gonna sign for 8.7 are ya c'mon. and he was like ahh idk I'll see" he's taking less to be team friendly

Sid still grinding in the summers. While Nate had his recovery summer he looks like a joke in comparison to sid

The pressure of being captain for team canada for upcoming 4nations & Olympics must be part of what's driving him

"he doesn't look 37 in any way" Yandle: he doesn't have any kids. Nate: must be it! Must be the key

Landy: feels like 10yrs when he last played and lifted the cup. Misses him

Mikko: "he's shockingly big. Says he's 6'3", seems like he must be 6'5". His head is this fuckin big"

"old school. Stretches for like an hour a day. The most flexible guy"

Avs "get so many national games. Know we're not the biggest hockey market but mikko should get more recognition. Super underrated"

Cal ritchie: he did the whiffing thing at vail camp. Everyone thought he whiffed and then he did it again. Nate tried it to do it today, can't do it. Awed by what the kids can do

Nate can't do the Michigan either

His trainer has trained a lot of downhill skiers, you have to be fearless, so training in the pool relaxes your mind. Keeps mum about what he does in the pool. No he does not wear a speedo😞

Lehky's dad vs. mikko: "mikko had a 4 or 5pt game, was fired up, said that to media, then apologized to lehky like 3min later. They're really good friends"

Went to Europe this summer: no one really knows me in america, especially there. Like being off grid, wake up to no texts bc of time change, super relaxing

Was tempted to go to worlds last season (omg what!!!!) avs were out 2nd round. Sid was bugging him and schenner about it (biz: "if you go I'll go kind of thing?" 'Yea")

They were all going to go but nate pooped out "played 105 games, lost to Dallas, was devastated"

Cogs: met him thru Andy at vail. Lit up when it was brought up about trading for him in '22. He is management now. Around the rink, always in the gym, hands in his pockets, walking around, talking to guys

"isn't he good at impressions?" "Yea he's a great storyteller he's so good"

"the league is evolving really quickly right now so it's good to have a bridge" like cogs who recently played bw team and mgmt

Communication is better in the league. Players aren't terrified to talk to GM like he was as a rookie when seeing sakic. Thinks it's important for players to know where they stand. Old school players think fear can be good, yea sure, but you can't scare ppl into playing well for over 8mos, 82 games. Prefers this new way

Mitts: super comfortable, quieter, came to a team where he knows nobody, he looks great, expecting an awesome year from him

Faceoffs: lmaaooo still saying he needs to practice that. Hurts his wrist when he practices them. Needs to be around 52. Was at 46 last season

No league bonus$ for winning the Hart

MacKinnon Crunch cereal released in 2021. It was frosted flakes + he picked the flavour, he liked it! (I NEED TO TRY THIS)

Tim hortons: sidnate want to do an ad with marchy where he messes up ppls orders and they sit him down to teach him what to do (omg they're coming up with sketches lolll) "Marchy needs to be nicer on the ice to be more marketable" 💀

Bedard: hard worker, on the ice 1.5hr after everyone, ice is so snowy can't even move on it

Preseason games, re: all these preseason injuries: doesn't agree with veteran rule (how many mandatory games they have to play) but important for prospects and rookies, you need to be able to evaluate them, they can look good in practice but different story in games.

For vets, you want to play hard, show a good example "played one last night, lost 6-1" and" you see the doughty laine injuries and it's like i could throw my season away for a glorified practice essentially is all it is"

"You're in your game jersey but it doesn't mean anything"

"it's a fine line, i like playing them, 1 or 2, i don't need 6"

Teams are making $1-3mil per preseason game (probably only leafs habs etc)

Listens to a lot of podcasts, likes learning (about self-help, longevity, recovery, nutrition, etc), always has since he was a kid. Liked going to Popeyes (nutrition supplements chain store, like GNC) with his dad looking at protein powders etc lmao

"idk I'm just into it. Definitely love learning, there's a lot i don't know. I feel like a dummy listening to these guys"

Asked about "policing food". He laughs. Omg the laugh is sooo lmaao. On whit saying rumours of him strangling lehky last season for eating a snickers "nooo. Stop it. Stop it. That's not true. (*laughing! laughing!🙃 *oh we are having fun!*)"

"Trying to mellow out a little bit. Definitely see some shit i get mad, try to keep it to myself. ... Eat what you want but when you're at the rink ... I just think the least you can do as a pro athletes is be in shape."

On how nhl of the past, players would be drinking pepsi in-between periods: "a little sugar during a game isn't too bad, it's all good" (i swear his voice is different at this part bc he is internally combusting😂)

4nations/team Canada: Wants McDavid & Sid 1c/2c. Doesn't think they've played wing, doesn't want them to

Himself 3c or wing. Has played wing at other national events. Doesn't love left wing. Prefers right

"should i tell sid to play wing?" Paraphrased: you're Ted Lindsay & MVP, still at his gym, you gotta get something out of this

"he could be 50yo and I'd still slide over" 😏

"nova scotia line (sid, nate, marchy) would be pretty cool at Olympics or this feb (4nations)"

Marner: "he looks awesome... You hear all this negative stuff and then you get on the ice with him you're like how could anyone be negative about this. Admire how good he is, bc ppl chirp him a lot. Him and McDavid were flying around together in Vail"

[hockeyluvrr]

Hi can you please write about Cole caufield something like cute and cuddly if that makes sense 💀 and can you make it fall themed thank you so much 💕

of course! I loved this request so much, I think it turned out so cute! Thank you for requesting, hope you like it! 🫶🏻

MASTERLIST

Autumn Nights || cc13

word count : 1006

gif not mine!

The autumn sky had already been painted in pink and orange hues by the time you and Cole made it back to his apartment, arms full of groceries and a pumpkin Cole insisted on buying. The day had been the perfect fall day, the air brisk but with a hint of sun in the sky. The both of you had spent the day snuggled up in thick jumpers as you wandered the streets of Montreal, looking through markets and occasionally stopping in coffee shops to warm up.

As you entered the apartment, you both smelt the faint smell of vanilla from the candle that was burning that morning. You dropped the groceries you were carrying onto the kitchen counter and turned to see Cole tugging off his beanie, his hair a perfect case of messy hat hair. He caught you staring and grinned in a way that made his eyes crinkle, making your heart skip a beat.

“You’re staring,” he teased playfully.

“I’m just admiring my adorable boyfriend,” you mutter, matter of factly, unpacking the groceries as you do.

Cole steps closer and wraps his arms around your waist from behind, his chin resting on your shoulder. “Oh yeah?” He teased slightly.

You roll your eyes at his tone but lean back into him anyway. “Yeah, yeah. Be helpful and put these away, would you?”

“Only if we can make those caramel apple slices tonight,” he bargains as he unwraps himself from around you with a kiss on your cheek. He reaches for the groceries to help put them away. “I’ve been thinking about them all day.”

“Of course you have,” you laugh, shaking your head.

By the time all the groceries were put away, it was dark outside, a light drizzle beginning to tap against the window. You and Cole had changed into comfier clothes, him in sweatpants and a hoodie, you in one of his old Habs hoodies and pyjama pants.

The two of you made quick work in the kitchen, slicing apples and melting caramel, the air quickly filling with the sweet, sugary scent. Cole occasionally sneaked bites of caramel and toppings when he thought you weren’t looking, making you playfully slap his hand away from the food a few times.

“If you keep eating all the toppings and caramel, there won’t be any left for the apples,” you scolded lightly with a small smile on your face.

“Hey! I’m just making sure it’s good,” he feigned innocence, popping another spoon of caramel into his mouth. “Quality control.”

“Yeah, sure it is.”

Eventually, everything was finally ready. You loaded a plate with the caramel dipped apples and made your way over to the couch, where Cole had already set up a few blankets. He quickly joined you, carrying two mugs of hot chocolate.

“This is so cozy,” you say as you settle down on the couch, pulling a fuzzy blanket over your lap. “We should do this all the time.”

Cole hands you a mug of hot chocolate before settling down right next you on the couch, pulling the blanket over his lap as well. “We could make it a thing? Fall movie nights, caramel apple slices, all of it.”

“You’d seriously watch cheesy fall movies with me every weekend?”

“I’d do anything if it meant getting to hang out with you,” he muttered. You would have rolled your eyes at that if he hadn’t said it in such a soft, sincere way.

The night wore on and the both of you had put on a cheesy rom-com, the kind the both of you loved to make fun of but secretly loved. Cole had gradually moved closer and closer until you both ended up laying on the couch, Cole’s head resting on your stomach.

While watching the movie, you absentmindedly ran your fingers through his hair as he placed a gentle kiss on your wrist every now and again. Cole gave you a gentle squeeze as he mumbled, “This is nice.”

“It is,” you hum as you glance down at him. “I like it when you’re all cuddly.”

“I’m not cuddly,” he protested even though he snuggled closer to you. “I’m tough and intimidating.”

“Oh right, I forgot,” you mutter in a teasing tone. “You’re Cole Caufield, tough hockey player, but also a total sucker for cuddles.”

He pretended to be annoyed by scrunching up his nose, but couldn’t keep the grin off his face. “I’m just keeping you warm,” he said. “It’s my duty as your boyfriend.”

“Well, you’re doing a good job,” you say softly, leaning down to kiss the top of his head. “Ten out of ten, baby.”

You both carried on watching the rest of the movie in comfortable silence, the soft drumming sound of the rain that had pick up now filling the silence slightly. Eventually, Cole shifted slightly so that he could look up at you, his eyes soft and a little sleepy. “Hey,” he said softly. “I know I probably don’t say it enough, but I’m really glad I get to be with you like this.”

“Me too,” you mutter softly, your heart melting a little at his sincere tone.

He gave you a lopsided, boyish grin before he leaned up to kiss you. The kiss was slow and sweet, the kind of kiss that just makes you forget about everything. You melt into the kiss slightly, relishing in the feeling of Cole pressed up against you.

When he pulled back, he rested his forehead against yours and placed a soft kiss on the tip of your nose. “So…same time next weekend?” he asked softly, with a small grin.

“Only if you promise to bring more of the cheesy lines,” you tease, already nodding.

“Oh, I’ve got plenty of those baby,” he smirked slightly. “Like…wanna get some coffee? Cuz I like you a latte.”

You groaned at his words, but couldn’t help the wide smile on your face. “You’re ridiculous.”

“And you love it.”

“Yeah,” you mutter softly, nuzzling your nose against his. “I really do.”

[86espresso]

summer went away, still the yearning stays ✰ cc13

sum ; friends to lovers but they’re not stupid

warnings ; fluff, making out 🔥

request ; yes

🩷 ; thank you for requesting I hope u like it :) this is so rushed im sorry

wc ; 926

You knew nothing would ever top the sunsets at the lake, but there was something surreal and beautiful about watching them while leaves rusted and crisped and fell around you, and you were on the rooftop of your apartment building, overlooking downtown Montreal.

You knew that fall was a quieter, slower time than the bustle of the rest of the year. Yes, it signaled the start of school, work, and sports season, but there was nothing like walking in the park while it rained leaves and crunching them underneath your feet, hand in hand with Cole.

Oh, yeah, Cole.

You first met him when he was leaving his apartment that was two floors down from yours, clad in a suit for some reason, and you gave him a small wave while heading to your first little job in the city, having just moved there for your studies.

And you just happened to be working in Bell Center, where Cole played hockey.

He was making his debut that same night, and you caught a glimpse of him in the halls where he gave you a smile and a nod and you returned it, basically a silent ‘good job on your first day’.

Eventually, the two of you noticed that you practically had the same leaving times, and got to chatting, exchanging names and numbers, him walking you to your car before heading to his own, offering each other rides back home from the arena if the other didn’t have one, buying coffee for two to hand to each other when you reached work, just a whole series of events leading to sleepovers in each other apartments, watching movies, cooking each other dinner, bonding over being new to the team, and finding comfort and solace in a place farm from home, with each other.

This lead to him introducing his new best friend to his friends in Michigan over the summer. It went by quite normally, sparing the fact that Cole’s hand would linger on your bare shoulder for longer than it should, he would look at you as if you were the only person ever even though the people he hadn’t seen in months were right there, and he had this tendency to be affectionate with you, even if it was all casual. And you’re a smart girl; you knew that there was no way that was casual.

The final nail in the coffin was Cole’s friends looking at him weird every time he brushed his lips against your temple, or when he tenderly traced your jaw before offering to carry you up the stairs when he noticed you nodding off against his shoulder. That’s how you knew you weren’t delusional. But wow, did it do something to your heart. Every time the sun hit his beautiful flow-y hair, and lit up his face in a pool of gold, you felt something stutter in your chest. His little touches felt like fireworks that went from his fingertips into your skin. And he’s a smart boy; he knew you felt something, too.

Regardless, you inhale deeply, watching cars go by at a distance, zooming back forth with cares in the world that had nothing to do with yours. A minute later you heard footsteps.

He always knew where to find you.

You look up to see Cole, dressed casual just like you, lighting a blunt and sitting down next to you. You fell into comfortable silence with him, watching the blunt roll over his lips before he pulls it out to let out a puff of smoke. He turns to you, and instead of giving it to you in your hand, he presses it against your lips.

You give him a show, maintains eye contact while wrapping your lips around it and using the corner of your mouth to blow out the smoke. His lip twitches, he’s amused.

You go back and forth with the roll until Cole speaks up.

“Y’know,” he starts, “My favorite part about getting back to work, after all the chilling over the summer, is knowing that you’ll be here too. With me.”

He’s never been afraid of saying sweet things to you, but this was new. It ignited something within you; the small part of you that wanted him as something more grew at an astronomical rate. You realized that you really, really wanted him that way.

“Cole-” You whisper, “that’s- why’re you-?”

You turn to look at him and notice that he’s scooted closer to you. Very close. The steady thrum of your heart caused by the blunt started to quicken and intensify. The way he looked at you was just so full of unspoken words that he was dying to tell you and you lived for it. You didn’t have time to dwell over your awkward stuttering when he grabbed your chin between his thumb and forefinger.

“Can I kiss you, please?” You muster a nod and he connects your lips in a warm embrace. His hand moves down your your neck and your cup his face in yours. Your lips mold gently against each other, memorizing and basking in the taste of your blunt on the others’ tongue.

You start breathing in short puffs through your nose, not yet ready to pull away even though you were breathless. Cole does it for you, hoarsely chuckling and resting his forehead against yours. You open your eyes to see him already looking at you, lips swollen and red. Eyes bright and electric.

The new season sure was going to be his best.