#unless the point of it is ''these people are all assholes''

[yardsards]

me when i see the "they constantly bicker and tease each other but really do genuinely love each other" trope in romantic couples: ew. cringe. boring. they should break up tbh

me seeing almost the exact same trope between friends: hahaha, classic.

[stormyoceans]

LINE READING SO DEVASTATING I NEED TO DIE ABOUT IT

[giantkillerjack]

Uh-oh! You are like, SOOO awkward!!

You're so awkward that it is occasionally mildly uncomfortable for people!

You're so awkward that sometimes people are confused by you and then there are awkward silences!

You're so awkward ...... that ultimately no one is harmed!!

Oh damn!!! What a vile crime you have committed! What an unforgivable thing it is to make a fellow human briefly confused!

Why, if *I* were ever briefly confused and kind of uncomfortable as a result, I'd be devastated.... by the absolute net zero change in my happiness and health! - From which I might never recover!! Yes indeed! No punishment can ever be enough for you!!

So you better absolutely hate yourself for it.

Better be SO MEAN to yourself about every single missed social cue so you don't forget your horrible crime! Meaner than you'd ever dream of being to someone else for the same thing! This is YOUR responsibility!

You need to show the world that you KNOW you are bad by punishing yourself constantly! After all, think of all the people who BENEFIT from you punishing yourself! - No, really! Think about it! Think about who benefits from your pain.

Think of alllllll the definitely-good people that your definitely-necessary self-torment definitely helps! I mean, you can't just cut off their definitely-life-sustaining supply of your suffering, right?? Sure, everyone else has a breaking point, but you're probably the only person in human history who doesn't, right? Best not to question it probably. Sure, it's a symptom that billions of people with trauma have had, but who knows? You could be a one-in-seven-billion exception. Anything's possible!

Instead, better just accept that idea that bullies carry like guns in holsters - the idea that people who have trouble with social cues deserve to suffer. Better carry on the burden they placed on you until you drop. Aid the cause of the callous by enforcing shame and suffering upon yourself extra hard; try your best to do their work for them. They're very busy.

Better not recognize that you need patience and kindness to heal from your trauma. Better not find out that it was trauma rather than personal weakness filling your head with self-hating thoughts. Better not find out it wasn't your fault.

Better not find out that awkwardness is not inherently harmful or unkind, and, in fact, the people who act like it is *are the ones enacting harm and being cruel.*

Better not get righteously angry when you realize just how much unnecessary damage this has done to you. After all, if you get mad, you might realize you deserve better. You might even feel brave enough to DEMAND better! You might build boundaries that keep you safe! You might make other people think they deserve to feel safe too! And we obviously can't be having that, so...

Better not show yourself even a little kindness a little bit at a time.

Better not make a habit out of it after all that practice.

Better not get confident.

Especially if you can't first wipe out every trace of awkward. (And you probably never will. Because people who experience absolute social certainty at all times tend to be insufferable assholes that enforce the status quo. And you just don't have the stock portfolio for that.)

Better not be confident and awkward because then you might confuse and delight people

- you might accidentally end up making other people feel less shame for their social difficulties

- you might make isolated, traumatized, and shy people feel like they deserve to be included in social situations

- you might even make them feel they can be themselves around you

- you might start loving the effect you have on a room

- you might enjoy conversations more

- you might forgive yourself and bounce back from shame more easily and frequently

- you might come to enjoy some of those moments of harmless confusion you cause because NOBODY expects the Confident Awkward, and that can genuinely be an advantage in social situations

- you might stop apologizing so much.

- you might find that socializing is like a video game: it requires practice but also a safe space for it to be fun and positive.

Or if you can't become assertive and confident, better not remain awkward and shy and quiet, and then love and forgive yourself anyway!

Why, it would be carnage!!

In either scenario, you run the risk of finding out that it's not your fault that safe spaces full of kind people can be really hard to find, create, and nurture. You could end up building a skillset that helps you do those things if you're not careful!

If you start giving yourself even the tiniest amount of grace at a time, you will find that you've accessed a gateway drug with extreme long-term side effects:

- You might realize that it was never your fault that it took so long to like yourself.

- You might realize that you were always worth talking to, even when you didn't like yourself and communication felt impossibly difficult.

- You might realize that you'll still be worth talking to even if communication becomes harder as you age and/or experience disability.

- You might come to know that you deserve to be heard even on bad days when words come slow and blurry.

You might discover that you were always deserving of kindness, first and foremost from yourself.

So. As you can see, it's FAR too much of a risk to start granting your awkward self free pardons for your many heinous and harmless crimes. Better to just leave it there.

[orcelito]

Hm. I guess I'm a bit bummed that trump didn't die, since it'd fix a whole lot of my worries, though I'm not like... Like Logically, I can see why it might affect voter turnout in the election, but I also don't really understand people insisting this means he's basically won the election. The man's still a fucking idiot. Project 2025 still exists. I'm still going to do the thing I was planning all along - show up to the polls in November and vote against him. Why is everyone acting like everything's so different now?

Just fucking vote against him if you're able to. It's that simple.

[reinemichele]

I swear I'm trying to type out the thing about my brain but I'm really not sure how much detail I feel comfortable going into... I used to be so open on here, but then uh, I had several big falling outs with friends and a couple of them started stalking me, so I left my blog on queue since 2014 and then stopped posting from 2016 to 2020. The only place I felt comfortable making posts relating to my personal life or mildly dissenting fandom-related posts was on a locked twt account with only 20-40 people on it.

Anyway, I'm Trying

[todayisafridaynight]

INCREDIBLY FUNNY that I refused to settle for just saying "bread" but yes it was those! So in that sense, the lavish bread physics are integral to conveying how important the little things were in getting him through prison. Still, for the sake of the drip…...... perhaps sacrifices are needed...

But yeah, I'm thrilled you noticed those things about the evolution of Jo's design, too! It's super interesting to think about in terms of storytelling, I don't think you're inarticulate in saying that at all. Speaking of, I also just look up "holder" to find prev asks at this point lol

Jo and Ichi's dynamic is also a major topic of interest for me (as we've seen). I think a lot of what's going on with them is definitely some variation of "old habits die hard." That's natural when you form that kind of uneasy coexistence. But like you mentioned, it's also telling that Jo picked up the nickname in the first place, because I went back through the entire script, and it really is the case that only Arakawa, Masato, Jo, and the people who raised Ichi call him that. It's reserved for his family.

I think this line about Aoki (that I completely forgot about before looking at the script again lol) may also shed some light: "A long time ago, I knew him as the young master. He knew me as Ichi." Because they all do that, don't they? Ichi still says Captain, Boss, and Young Master, Jo still says Boss, Ichi, and Young Master, Aoki still says Dad and Ichi.

Even though on paper these relationships should've dissolved with Ichi being expelled, Masato becoming Aoki, and Jo taking over as second patriarch, to one another, they're all still who they used to be. And as an aspect of how they communicate, the "learned language" that forms in families, it stands out when they're all on the same page with the terms they choose to use.

This line from Ichi also stood out to me: "But my aniki taught me different. He said whoever makes the first move is the victor. The guy with steel balls wins." Like, that's clearly Jo, right? For one thing, the "flavor" of aniki is different from Captain, of course--one is directly an appointed post, and one is more open to interpretation--but it also clearly shows that Jo's imparted his "philosophy" to Ichi in some ways.

I think, to a degree, it's one of those holdovers from RGGO that wasn't fully implemented. Because they're more or less the same in RGGO in this regard, but RGGJo does outright say it makes him weirdly happy that Ichi still calls him Captain, so that's a clearer indicator and makes the idea feel more "complete."

With what I said before about their "learned language," too, the Arakawa Family has this way of saying goodbye that's specific to them, and I really miss it in Y7. It is referenced briefly, but it's not a "thing" like it was in RGGO. It's kinda like how The Gang in It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia greet each other with "Hey-ohhh!" LMAO idk but. I Enjoy. But that's also why it stood out to me that LaD8Jo greets Ichi the same way as Y7Jo and RGGJo.

ALSO that is so sick the author of Soliloquy saw your art…… incredible……….. + as an aside since I was reminded, it's very true that sometimes people seem to "fill in the blanks" with tropes, and my favorite is honestly when it's both funny and offensive. There was this whole "phase" (and to everyone's credit it was short-lived) of playing Mine up like this Huge Misogynist because he's not attracted to women, and it's WILD to recognize that he's gay but still pull up homophobic tropes for funsies.

Like I was mad at the time mostly on account of the mischaracterization (because come on, even if you've only seen Y3, he is still uncharacteristically soft with Katase… not that he wasn't INSANE for The Slap, but it also wasn't at all rooted in the same things as say, Nishiki slapping Reina might've been.) But it was funny. Perhaps not in the way it was intended to be, but it was funny. And, you know, that's why I'm happy to stay in my own little corner as well.

You coulda just said bread it's ok 😭 I WAS right though it WAS a carb......

On the subject of language though, it's def something I picked up on (if my last ask wasn't any indication lmao)! It's a real neat detail and something I think helps push that 'family' theme Y7 has going on (or at the very least demonstrates how despite the times changing, they still have those bonds with each other whether they acknowledge it or not), it definitely being a case of picking up a habit/term from family.

About tropes in fan works though, I can't act like I'm guiltless of it LMAO so I don't have too strong of a leg to stand on when it comes to criticizing it (and I can't lie, sometimes I do find playing into the trope funny if it's at least based on something from the text and it's just exaggerated For The Bit yeah). However I do think the strangest thing was linking misogyny and Mine (I made a post rambling about it but deleted it like. .3 seconds later) because nothing he does in either Y3 nor RGGO is explicitly misogynistic? In the slightest? And as we talked about before he's considerably pretty respectful towards women? Again, he surely did slap a little girl, but it wasn't because she was a girl you know (still cringe to do but if we're gonna talk about it let's do it right please and thank you). As you say though, pushing that trope onto Mine just feels like perpetuating the harmful stereotype that gay men hate women, and in cases like that then I can't really take the piss out of it without having a weird taste in my mouth.

[scientia-rex]

When I was in ninth grade I wanted to challenge what I saw as a very stupid dress code policy (not being allowed to wear spikes regardless of the size or sharpness of the spikes). My dad said to me, “What is your objective?”

He said it over and over. I contemplated that. I wanted to change an unfair dress code. What did I stand to gain? What did I stand to lose? If what I really wanted was to change the dress code, what would be my most effective potential approach? (He also gave me Discourses on the Fall of Rome by Titus Livius, Machiavelli’s magnum opus. Of course he’d already given me The Prince, Five Rings, and The Art of War.)

I ultimately printed out that phrase, coated it in Mod Podge, and clipped it to my bathroom mirror so I would look at it and think about it every day.

What is your objective?

Forget about how you feel. Ask yourself, what do you want to see happen? And then ask, how can you make it happen? Who needs to agree with you? Who has the power to implement this change? What are the points where you have leverage over them? If you use that leverage now, will you impair your ability to use it in the future? Getting what you want is about effectiveness. It is not about being an alpha or a sigma or whatever other bullshit the men’s right whiners are on about now. You won’t find any MRA talking points in Musashi, because they are not relevant.

I had no clear leverage on the dress code issue. My parents were not on the PTA; neither were any of my friend’s parents who liked me. The teachers did not care about this. Ultimately I just wore what I wanted, my patent leather collar from Hot Topic with large but flattened spikes, and I had guessed correctly—the teachers also did not care enough to discipline me.

I often see people on tumblr, mostly the very young, flail around in discourse. They don’t have an objective. They don’t know what they want to achieve, and they have never thought about strategizing and interpersonal effectiveness. No one can get everything they want by being an asshole. You must be able to work with other people, and that includes smiling when you hate them.

Read Machiavelli. Start with The Prince, but then move on to Discourses. Read Musashi’s Five Rings. Read The Art of War. They’re classics for a reason. They can’t cover all situations, but they can do more for how you think about strategizing than anything you’re getting in middle school and high school curricula.

Don’t vote third party unless you can tell me not only what your objective is but also why this action stands a meaningful chance of accomplishing it. Otherwise, back up and approach your strategy from a new angle. I don’t care how angry you are with Biden right now. He knows about it, and he is both trying to do something and not doing enough. I care about what will happen to millions of people if we have another Trump presidency. Look up Ross Perot, and learn from our past. Find your objective. If it is to stop the genocide in Palestine now, call your elected representatives now. They don’t care about emails; they care about phone calls, because they live in the past. I know this because I shadowed a lobbyist, because knowing how power works is critical to using it.

How do you think I have gotten two clinics to start including gender care in their planning?

Start small. Chip away. Keep working. Find your leverage; figure out how and when to effectively use it. Choose your battles, so that you can concentrate on the battle at hand instead of wasting your resources in many directions. Learn from the accumulated wisdom of people who spent their lives learning by doing, by making mistakes, by watching the mistakes of their enemies.

Don’t be a dickhead. Be smarter than I was at 14. Ask yourself: what is your objective?

[heylinfanclub]

Tbh when my brother sends me a ‘Hope you’re doing okay 😊’ I understand how my father felt when HIS BROTHER only sent him ‘thoughts and prayers’ when he was getting cancer diagnosed like. GET WITH THE FUCKING PROGRAM. BEING ALIVE IS A CHALLENGE NOW. DONT REMIND ME WHAT EASE I DONT HAVE. I WILL KILL YOU. SEND ME SOMETHING WORTH BEING OKAY OVER RIGHT NOW. MY FRIEND SENDS ME PICS FROM THE ZOO. YOU DONT OFFER SHIT. FUCK YOU.

Hhhh sigh. It sucks cause I know on some level they mean well. But all it seems like is a cop out to actually being any kind of GENUINELY, PHYSICALLY, EMOTIONALLY, MENTALLY, COMMUNALLY supportive. YOUR FUCKING POLITE-GREETING-CARD PLATITUDES MEAN NOTHING TO ME. YOUR SYMPATHIES ARE STRAIGHT TRASH.

[thegladelf]

I just saw someone call someone else a "30 books in 30 days" type (derogatory) and I'm sorry to tell you that some of the smartest and deepest readers I know on BookTube have tried the 30 in 30 challenge.

The amount of books someone reads doesn't make them a good or bad reader. Their willingness to engage with the text does.

[lastoneout]

Saw a post talking about this and didn't want to derail it, but like, honestly, at this point, I'm becoming less and less tolerant of people acting like straight/cis passing privilege is a real, very serious thing that needs to be taken into consideration every time someone speaks on queer issues bcs I swear to god the only time I ever see it actually brought up is when someone is trying to deny someone else a seat at the table. Like first it was used against bi+ people to explain why we're not queer unless we're in a same gender relationship, and then it was used to shit all over ace and aro people for not being "visibly queer", then they turned on nonbinary people who "look cis", and now I see people throwing it at trans men for some reason like???? This is legit becoming an exclusionist dogwhistle to me. Any merit to this concept is completely obliterated by assholes who are so addicted to playing oppression olympics they're meticulously crafting pokemon type advantage charts to categorize all the gays based on who actually has "real" problems and who doesn't, it's agonizing.

Like putting "straight/cis passing privilege" up on the shelf next to "comphet" until people can learn how to use it in a way that doesn't invalidate someone else's queerness.

[magicalmanhattanproject]

Okay, so with Quackity Studios tweeting about adding new people and the need for tolerance and patience with people who don't speak English, let's just take a second and have a chat about what that's gonna look like.

First: you will hear things or read things on the translator that hurt or offend you.

This is inevitable. Do not immediately post about it. What you need tolerance for is hearing things that hurt or offend you and what you need patience for is figuring out of malicious intent was present or if this is a hill worth dying on right now.

As an example, we're pretty sure at this point that Korean is gonna be the next language added. The second person pronoun in Korean sounds a lot like the n-word in English. The n-word in English, if you're not aware, is like the single most offensive slur we have. It's not something that you want to hear unexpectedly. But also, if we get Koreans, they're gonna be using the word for "you" and English speakers are gonna have to be able to tolerate that.

On the other side of things, Korean has a complex system of honorifics and addressing someone without an honorific would be considered very forward and intimate at least if not very rude. None of the QSMP languages have honorifics though and only French really retains formality* so no one else is going to address them with honorifics unless they specifically explain it to people and walk them through it. That will probably be weird and uncomfortable for them and they're going to have to be able to tolerate that.

*Spanish and Portuguese do technically have formal vs informal but it's disappearing quickly in both of them.

These natural cultural clashes and pain points are going to be harder to overcome since we also know that at least some of these creators won't speak English at all so they can't just switch to English to helpfully explain things to us easily in a way we understand. We're going to have to deal.

So here's the thing: just because there can be cultural miscommunications and mistranslations, that doesn't mean that people can't also be assholes. How do you distinguish between the two?

Step One: Assume good faith. Assume that everyone in a given encounter is trying to communicate respectfully and compassionately and that a failure to do so can be overcome

Step Two: Don't get involved. Especially not in Twitch Chat. Two or more people trying to communicate through a language barrier does not get easier when they're also trying to wrangle hostile viewers.

Step Three: Are you sure you heard what you thought you heard or saw what you thought you saw? Did the translator fuck up? Is it a word that just coincidentally happens to sound like another word? If this is the case, the streamers can ask for clarification or use another tool and get it cleared up. Keep watching and see if they do.

Step Four: If they did say what you thought they said, are the streamers handling it? We had a thing a while back where Bad called some friends, including Bagi and Etoiles, uncultured because they didn't get a reference he was making and Etoiles was like "bro I'm French" and Bad apologized. That should have been the end of it, but I had to see people arguing about it for weeks. The problem was solved in 10 seconds.

Step Five: If the person is doubling down, are you sure this is something you can fix by yelling about it on Twitter or Tumblr? Would it be better to let people who actually know them talk to them behind the scenes? Pierre made a few missteps in the beginning of the server, Quackity said they had a chat, Pierre hasn't misstepped since. It's just easier to sort things out in private, one on one conversation than yelling at someone in public.

In short: it's fine to take note of behavior in case patterns start to emerge in it, but yelling on social media about how so and so is the worst person possible is not constructive.

[pedrospatch]

fall into temptation | one

Jackson! Joel Miller x Preacher’s Daughter Reader

series masterlist

summary: Of all the women to catch Joel Miller’s attention—it just had to be one of the goddamned preacher’s daughters.

warnings/tags: 18+ ONLY, MINORS DNI. SLIGHT PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION OF READER, mentions of her hair which she can put up into braids as well as her style of clothing. despite the nickname Joel gives her, it does not speak to her body type or size. AGE GAP (reader is in her 20’s and Joel is 56, i know, i know but this is self indulgent because my birthday is next month idk just let me have this one) canon language, canon violence, several mentions of religion, terms pastor and preacher are used interchangeably here and there, mentions of the bible and religious symbols (cross), innocent/virgin reader, very brief scene of attempted sexual assault, no explicit smut (yet). asshole Joel, protective Joel, hints of softish dom Joel (if you squint). reader has two sisters, the only physical description for them is their hair, which they can also braid as well as their style of clothing.

MOODBOARD FOR AESTHETIC PURPOSES ONLY, NO MENTION OF RACE OR BODY TYPE.

word count: 8.4k

Jackson, Wyoming

Fall 2024

Joel had seen him around the community before. 

He’s an older man in his late sixties or possibly his early seventies with thinning, snow white hair and silver, wire rimmed glasses that always seemed to be perched on the tip of his pointed nose. He was a good, kind man from what Joel could gather—offering up warm smiles and friendly waves to anyone who happened to cross his path, stopping to greet and say hello to familiar faces. The hem of his starched white shirt is tucked into pressed black slacks and even from where he stood across the road near the horse stables, Joel noticed the book clutched in his right hand, old and bound in supple, worn black leather with the words Holy Bible etched into the cover in flaked gold lettering.

Jacob, he thinks his name is. Or was it Josiah?

Something biblical—a name fit for a man who was so fucking clearly devoted to the big man upstairs.

Joel knew his own name was a biblical one, but he was the furthest thing from a man of God. After all that he’d done in the past twenty years, there was only one place he was going and that place wasn’t exactly known for its pearly gates or sweet cherub angels playing harps.

Joseph? Was that it? 

He couldn’t be certain.

Not that Joel really even cared to know his name. 

It’d been a couple months since Joel arrived back in Jackson with Ellie after Salt Lake City and the truth of the matter was that he preferred to keep to himself whenever it was possible. Joel had zero interest in getting to know the people of this settlement, not unless he had to for the sake of patrol duties—and that’s only if he hadn’t been able to weasel his way out of getting assigned with a partner who wasn’t Tommy or Maria, the only two people in the whole fucking community Joel could stand being around. Minus his kid of course, but even he and Ellie could really only take each other in small doses lately. Perhaps it was their tense, strained relationship that was to blame for the fact that Joel Miller walked around this place with a standoffish attitude and a permanent scowl plastered on his face. 

Most people were smart enough to scamper off in the opposite direction when they saw him coming. He was never offended by it. It’s what he wanted. He wasn’t here to make friends.

In fact, the closest thing he had come to a friend outside of his brother’s wife was Esther, the woman Maria and Tommy had tried setting him up with when he first got back to Jackson. He wouldn’t go as far as calling her a friend, either. That’s a little too generous. Friend? No, more like a good fuck when he couldn’t drown his bitterness with Seth’s barrel aged bourbon and he was in need of a different kind of distraction.

But there was a reason this particular man piqued his curiosity. Actually, there were three reasons he managed to garner Joel’s attention and all three of those reasons were trailing behind him in an orderly, single file line, each one more fucking gorgeous than the last. He was positive he’d never seen them around before—because how could he possibly forget the faces of the most beautiful women in this town?

They’ve gotta be sisters, Joel thought to himself, his hand resting on the neck of the horse that he’d ridden out to patrol that morning, a dark, chestnut mare named Willow. Although he was supposed to be walking her inside the stables and back into her stall, he found himself far too distracted. While the three women weren’t identical to one another, the similarity in their traits such as hair color and their skin tone confirmed his suspicions that they were related. They all styled their hair in neat halo braids and wore slightly different color variations of the same getup—pressed, long sleeved blouses tucked into knee length floral printed skirts and worn, leather oxford shoes.

Clutching the brown leather strap of his rifle in his opposite hand, Joel leaned himself against Willow and squinted against the bright afternoon sunlight in an effort to get a better look at them. 

The first two were slightly on the older side. If Joel had to take a shot at their age, he would guess the women were in their thirties—a man of fifty six, he still had about two decades on them, easy. Joel let his gaze shift, his dark brown eyes flickering to the last one. His breath audibly hitched in his throat and part of him wondered just how fucking dumb he had to be to be drawn to the youngest one of the three. It couldn’t be fucking possible—you couldn’t be that much older than your mid twenties, if that. 

Joel’s grip on the strap of his rifle tightened. 

All three of you were beautiful beyond words—why the fuck did it have to be you who held over his interest?

“Take a picture,” Maria remarked with a tiny laugh. She dismounted her horse and peered at Joel over the black stallion’s back. “It’ll last longer.”

She’d led that morning’s patrol, her first time back on duty since she had given birth to her son in the spring. Joel had returned to Jackson right on time to meet his one month old nephew, Noah. 

He cleared his throat and shrugged. “Just tryin’ to figure out what their deal is, that’s all.” He paused, then remarked, “Didn’t know polygamy was a thing around here.”

His comment must have struck a nerve in his dear sister in law—fiercely protective of the people who were under her leadership, Maria hadn’t found the sister wives implication the slightest bit amusing. 

“Watch it, Joel,” she admonished, shooting him a warning glare. “He’s the town’s pastor and those girls happen to be his daughters. So let’s keep our wise ass cracks to ourselves, shall we?”

His daughters? He almost couldn’t believe it. Surely the girls must have taken after their mother because they sure as hell didn’t get their good looks from their old man. They hardly looked anything like him.

“Pastor,” Joel repeated with a small hum. He then remembered her pointing out an old church house back during the winter when she’d given him and Ellie the grand tour of the community. “So he ain’t got a real job like the rest of us?”

Maria rolled her eyes. “His job is a real job, Joel. It might be hard for you to believe, but there are still a lot of people of faith around here,” she explained to him. “He provides them with comfort and with hope—”

He snorted sharply through his nose. “Hope?”

“Yes, hope,” she snapped at him. 

“Hope for what, Maria? That things will go back to fuckin’ normal? That the end of the world is temporary?”

Maria crossed her arms over her chest, jutting her chin. “Some people never lose hope, Joel. There’s a lot of people who need this man and he serves a much bigger purpose than what you’re giving him credit for.”

“And what about the girls? They have it easy too? Do they just stand there lookin’ pretty on Sundays while their old man reads verses out loud from the most useless fuckin’ book known to man?”

“If you must know, they work in the schoolhouse,” she answered, tossing him another glare. “They’re teachers. The oldest one, she teaches Ellie’s class. The middle one, she teaches the primary school aged children and the youngest? She takes care of all of our little ones. She prepares our preschool kids for her sister’s class by teaching them numbers and basic literacy. Shows them how to start counting, reading and writing, things like that. She also helps run the commune’s daycare.”

“At least they have real jobs,” Joel mumbled under his breath. 

“What was that?”

He feigned innocence. “Nothin’. Nothin’ at all.”

“That’s exactly what I thought.” Maria pointed her finger at him. “Come on, let’s get these guys back into their stalls. It was a long ride this morning, I’m sure they could use some rest.” Taking her stallion by the reins, she started leading him over toward Logan, one of the stable hands who helped take in the horses coming back from patrol. 

Joel took Willow’s reins in his hands—but before he could even think of moving another muscle, he glanced up and saw the preacher leading his three daughters past the stables and right past Joel. His self control faltered. All that he could do was stare at you, his eyes fixed on you so blatantly that one of your sisters had taken notice. Grinning, she turned back towards you and lifted a hand to her mouth. She used her palm to shield her lips from Joel’s view and whispered something to you over her shoulder.

Shit. 

He’d been caught gawking.

He thought about making a beeline for the stables but it was too late. 

Perplexed by whatever it was that your older sister had just said to you, you gave her an odd look, but then followed the subtle nod of her head. 

Glimpsing over in his direction, your lips parted in complete surprise and you came to an abrupt halt in the middle of the dirt road when you found your gaze meeting that of the much older, rugged man standing there with a gun slung over his shoulder.

Unsure of what else to do, Joel simply offered you a polite nod of his head. The gesture was innocent enough but it startled you. He could tell by the way you let out a small gasp and turned away from him, your eyes falling to the ground as you scurried to catch up to your father and sisters like a spooked little mouse. 

Joel couldn’t help but shake his head and laugh.

“Is the preacher aware that his precious little daughters pay frequent visits to The Tipsy Bison at such late and ungodly hours?” Joel quipped. He gestured to a booth nestled over in a corner of the dimly lit bar with a subtle jerk of his chin. “S’gotta be the third or fourth time I’ve seen them here in the last couple of weeks.”

Tommy’s eyes followed his brother’s gesture. “Oh man, not again,” he said with an exasperated sigh. He shook his head. “Those girls, they ain’t got no fuckin’ business hangin’ around this place and much less at this fuckin’ hour. But the middle one, she’s a whole lot of trouble.” He paused, just long enough to nod at one of the three sisters, the one who was wearing her hair loose around her shoulders, twirling a lock of it around her finger as she made flirtatious fuck me eyes at the group of drunk patrolmen sitting a few tables away. “She’s somethin’ of a rebel, that one. Likes to drink a lot, get herself involved with things that she ain’t really supposed to be messin’ with. She’s the one who convinces the other two into sneakin’ out and comin’ to the bar when their old man goes to sleep.”

Joel chuckled in disbelief. “You fuckin’ serious?”

“As a heart attack. And then there’s the older one. I know she likes to drink too, but she’s a lot calmer than the other one. Ain’t gotta worry about her all too much, y’know? She tries to be the chaperone—it don’t always work out that way, though. Her halo ain’t exactly perfect either.”

“What ‘bout the youngest one?” Joel asked in the most nonchalant tone he could possibly muster. “Where does she fall on the scale between angel and devil?”

You’re carefully perched on the edge of the booth, your pretty features twisting in disgust with every sip of the rich, amber colored liquid in your glass. Unable to stomach the burning alcohol, you set it off to the side, abandoning it in favor of a glass of water instead.

“Her?” Tommy grinned, leaning back into his chair as stated, “Oh, she’s an absolute angel. She’s just ‘bout the sweetest fuckin’ thing you’ll ever see in your whole damn life, big brother. She’s gotta be the kinda girl who all the little birds and woodland critters sing to when there ain’t no one around,” he laughed. “She’s real good. Too good. Wouldn’t surprise me if the lord sent her down from heaven himself.”

Joel tossed him a skeptical look across the table.

“She really as innocent as she seems?” 

“I don’t think she even knows what it’s like to hold another man’s hand,” his younger brother laughed again and reached for his beer, taking a generous swig. 

Joel hummed softly and lifted his glass of whiskey to his lips. The mere thought of you being so pure and so innocent—untouched by anyone else—caused something to stir deep in his lower belly. 

“She’s the old man’s pride and joy,” Tommy continued, breaking into his train of thought. “Kind. Polite. Behaves. Doesn’t get herself into any kinda trouble—I mean look at her, she can’t even choke down a glass of whiskey. She’s just too good of a girl.”

Joel proceeded cautiously with his next question. “Any of them taken?” 

Surprised, Tommy raised his eyebrows. “Joel, don’t fuckin’ tell me—”

“No, I ain’t interested,” he interjected, rolling his eyes. “Just a curious motherfucker, that’s all.”

He didn’t seem too convinced by Joel’s answer. “They’re all single from what I know. To be honest, there ain’t a whole lot of men around here their old man would approve of,” he remarked. “Don’t get me wrong, he’s a nice man and all, but when it comes to his daughters, he’s real strict. Not that controllin’ has done him much good, though.” He lowered his voice as a fellow patrolman walked past their table. “The middle one’s fucked her way through this entire town and then back again. She even made a pass at me while Maria was pregnant with Noah, if you can fuckin’ believe that.”

Amused, Joel snorted into his drink. Ballsy. “How goddamn drunk was she?”

Tommy ran a hand through his jet black curls. “Wasted. Oldest one ain’t exactly the Virgin Mary, either.”

“And the old man doesn’t know?”

“Nope. Ain’t nobody gonna snitch on grown women in their thirties.” Noticing the amused expression on Joel’s face, he adds, “By the way, just in case you haven’t figured it out, this stays between us, Joel.”

He smirked. “Which part?”

“All of it. And take it from me, those girls? S’best you keep your distance from them,” he warned as he stood up from the table. He picked up the blue denim jacket draped over his chair, shrugging into it. “Don’t go gettin’ any dumbass ideas, alright?”

“Look, if the wild one makes a pass at me, I ain’t gonna turn her down. S’not like I’ve got a pregnant wife at home.”

“Joel, I fuckin’ swear. If you even think ‘bout it—”

He held up his hands to stop him. “Relax. Was just a joke.”

“Right. M’sure it was.” Tommy snorted. “Listen, I gotta get back home. Don’t wanna leave Maria on her own with the baby for too long.”

“How’s she been holdin’ up?”

“She’s been so tired. Jugglin’ motherhood, runnin’ this place, and bein’ back on patrol duty. I keep on tryin’ to tell her to slow it down, but she just won’t listen to me.” He let out a small sigh and waved a dismissive hand. “But anyway. If you’re all good to head out, I can walk you back to your place since it’s on the way to mine?”

Joel looked down at his glass, still half full. “I think I’m gonna hang back for a while longer. I’m on the roster for evenin’ patrol tomorrow, s’not like I’ve gotta be up at the ass crack of dawn.”

“Suit yourself.” Clapping him on the back, Tommy bid him goodnight and started towards the door. 

As soon as he was gone, Joel looked over towards your booth. He watched as you whispered into the ear of your eldest sister who nodded her head in understanding. You stood up and said something else to her, then spun around on your heel, long skirt flowing along with the movement. Head down, you hastily made your way across the bar, being careful so as not to bump into anyone along the way.

You were leaving. Alone. 

In the middle of the fucking night? While drunk morons poured in and out of the bar?

She’ll be just fine, he tried to convince himself. 

Joel frowned to himself, gripping his drink tightly in his hand as he scanned the room.

Sitting at a nearby table was Kent, some idiot he’d been stuck with a time or two for patrol. He clocks the smirk that crossed the younger man’s face, his eyes following you all the way to the door. Leaning forward over the table, he whispered something to his buddies, his smirk widening. His comrades, all who looked and behaved more like teenagers rather than grown men, lifted their beers to him, nodding in encouragement. Drunk off his ass, Kent drained the rest of his own beer, slamming the glass bottle down onto the table before clumsily stumbling to his feet. 

Joel momentarily froze as soon as he realized what was happening. 

Kent was going after you. 

Joel’s lips pressed together into a tight, thin line.

Setting his drink down, he stood up from his table and slipped on his jacket before following suit.

Joel stepped out of the bar and into the night, the chilly evening air nipping at his face. He took a look around. 

You were nowhere to be seen. Neither was Kent. 

That couldn’t fucking be good. 

“Where the fuck did you two go,” he muttered to himself under his breath.

That’s when he heard it. 

The sound of muffled screaming coming from the side of the building. Joel didn’t hesitate. Following your smothered cries for help, he whipped around into the dimly lit alley nestled in between the bar and the commune’s mess hall. You’re pinned underneath Kent with your skirt bunched up around your waist. One of his hands was covering your mouth while his other hand clawed its way up your bare thigh. 

“Aw, c’mon now, sugar,” Kent slurred his words together. “It’d be a fucking shame to let someone as cute as you stay a fucking virgin. Don’t be coy—I know you’re just like your stupid slut of a sister. She’s got no trouble spreading her fucking legs for me, y’know.”

Red.

It was the color that flashed in Joel’s mind. It was all he could see as he went up behind Kent, letting his hands reach for fistfuls of his leather jacket. He lifted him off of you with ease, slamming him hard against the brick wall of the mess hall. Pulling him forward, Joel slammed his body into the wall once more, knocking all the wind out of his lungs. 

“Miller, what the fuck are you doing!” Kent gasped out, frantically pawing at the older man’s hands in an effort to break free. “Get the fuck off me!”

“Takin’ advantage of an innocent girl?” Joel hissed at him, tightening his grasp on the collar of Kent’s jacket. “Think that makes you a fuckin’ man?”

Though he was still intoxicated, the sheer terror of being caught in Joel Miller’s hands sobered him just enough that he started sputtering an explanation. “I wasn’t fucking taking advantage of her! Her and her whore sisters were making eyes at me and the guys all fucking night! She fucking wanted it! She asked me for it, couldn’t even wait long enough to get back to my place—”

The lie came straight through his chattering teeth. The same teeth he would be picking up off the ground in the next minute or two. 

Joel knew he didn’t need to ask. Still, he turned to you, his rage only intensifying when he took in the sight of you lying there on the ground, the hem of your light blue floral skirt hiked around your waist. 

“That true?” He questioned you. “You wanted it?”

You stared at him with wide and fearful eyes.

A single tear slipped down the side of your face.

“Answer me, darlin’,” he prompted. “You wanted this?”

“No. I didn’t.” Your voice was small, barely audible.

But he’d heard it loud and clear. 

“She’s lying!” Kent tried to tell him. “She’s—”

Joel delivered the first punch, a blow so hard he’d felt the younger man’s nose crack underneath his curled fist. He struck him again and again, the blows coming in harder and harder, turning Kent’s face into a bloodied pulp.

If Joel didn’t get a grip, he would kill him. Part of him wanted to fucking kill Kent for putting his hands you—and more so for accusing of you wanting it. Pathetic fucking bastard. 

Holding Kent up by the throat with one hand, Joel pulled his switchblade from the back pocket of his jeans with the other. Fingers curled tightly around the hilt, Joel held up the knife into Kent’s view. He had left his eyes purple and swollen, but judging by the pitiful little pleas for mercy, it was clear that he could still somehow see the sharp blade being held an inch or so away from his face. 

“If I ever catch you anywhere near her again, I ain’t gonna be so fuckin’ generous,” Joel growled warningly. “I ain’t gonna let you walk away next time, boy. That understood?”

He nodded. “Un—Understood.”

“Good.” Joel released him, stepping backwards as he fell to the ground. “Get the fuck outta my face. Now.”

Kent managed to scramble to his feet and staggered off, disappearing from the alley. 

Chest heaving, Joel inhaled a deep breath through his nose, then exhaled it through his mouth before turning to you once more. 

Petrified, you still hadn’t moved a single muscle.

You looked fucking terrified. Whether it was from Kent’s assault or the way Joel had nearly beaten him to death right in front of you, it was hard to tell.

Crouching down beside you, Joel caught your subtle flinch. He proceeded to move slowly as he reached for the hem of your skirt. Delicately, he gripped the soft, flowing fabric and pulled it down into place. Joel then held his hand out to you. 

You hesitated for a split second, but accepted his hand and allowed him to help you up to your feet. 

“You alright, little dove?” The nickname had fallen from his lips before he could even think to stop it. 

“I think so,” you replied, nodding your head. You’d started to tremble and even though it had nothing to do with being cold, Joel took notice of it and he shrugged out of his camel colored jacket. He gave it to you, draping it over your shoulders. The scent of him instantly enveloped you—a mouth watering masculine mixture of clean soap, woodiness, and musk. It was far more intoxicating than the scotch you had tried back inside the bar. He didn’t utter a word to you as he wrapped his jacket around your body, both of his hands pulling gently at the lapels to bring them together in front of your chest. That was when you glanced down and saw he’d injured his hand. You gasped lightly. “Are you okay?”

Maybe it was the adrenaline, but Joel hadn’t even noticed that he’d split his knuckles wide open. Giving it a light shake, he assured you gruffly, “M’fine.”

Without thinking it through, you gingerly grabbed Joel’s hand, holding it in both of yours. “It doesn’t look like nothing,” you countered. You inspected it as best as you could in such poor lighting. “You’re bleeding.”

“Trust me, I’ve had a whole lot worse,” he deadpanned.

Ignoring his remark, you asked, “Can you move all your fingers for me? Just to make sure that it isn’t broken?”

Joel felt a strange warmth radiate in his chest. 

Fucking hell, Tommy had been right about you. 

You really were too good.

“Darlin’ I already told you m’fine—”

“Please?”

That word, and the way you’d said it, sent a shiver up the length of his spine.

Joel started wiggling his fingers in your palms. He winced slightly at the soreness. More than that, he knew his cuts and bruises would be all the fucking proof Tommy and Maria would need to know that he had been the one who rearranged Kent’s face. 

“See?” He spoke after a minute as he continued to move his fingers up and down. “Ain’t broken.”

“Let me clean you up,” you offered. Looking up at him, you cradled his hand as if it were a fragile baby bird you wanted to take home and nurse back to health.

“That really ain’t necessary.”

“You just saved me from—it’s the least I can do for you,” you insisted. Seeing him open his mouth just to protest again, you cut him off. “Please?”

There it was again.

Christ. That word sounded too good coming from those plush, pretty lips of yours. 

Joel sighed out in defeat. “Alright then,” he relented. “I s’ppose there ain’t no harm in lettin’ you clean me up a bit, little dove.”

Pleased that he had finally accepted, you carefully let go of his hand and took a step back, beckoning for him to follow you. “Come with me,” you said to him. “I know somewhere private we can go.”

When you came to a stop at the old church house, Joel shook his head and took a step backwards. 

Puzzled, your brows knitted together. “What is it? What’s the matter?”

He backed away further. “I ain’t goin’ in there.” 

You tossed him an amused glance. “It’s a church.”

“Yeah, I know that. I ain’t exactly a man of God.” 

You couldn’t help but giggle. “So? What does that have to do with me taking you inside to clean your hand up for you?”

Shuffling his weight from boot to boot, Joel shrugged. “Just don’t think I belong in there, that’s all.”

“Do you think you’re going to melt if you step foot inside?” you teased him. After a minute, it became apparent that he was being serious about it. Joel’s discomfort about going inside the church wasn’t some kind of joke on his part, it was real. “Don’t be silly. It doesn’t matter that you’re not a man of God. That doesn’t mean that you’re going to explode or burn into a pile of ashes for going inside, you know.”

“After all the terrible shit I’ve done?” He looked up at the building, shaking his head again. “I just might burn, little dove.”

You bit back a small smile. You’d already grown to be quite fond of his sweet nickname for you. 

“There’s a first aid kit inside I can use to patch you up,” you told him. “It won’t take long, I promise.”

His lower lip rolled in between teeth as he thought it over. “I ain’t too sure about this—”

“It’s only going to take me five minutes to get your hand cleaned up and then you can leave. Okay?”

You were as stubborn as you were sweet. How the fuck was he supposed to say no to you?

Reluctantly, Joel finally agreed to it. “Okay.” He followed you up the creaking, wooden porch steps towards the double doors. He’d just started to wonder how the two of you were even supposed to get into the building after hours when you leaned down, lifting the old mat on the floor to reveal a set of keys. Unable to help himself, he scoffed, “Serious?”

“Doesn’t everyone keep a key under their mat?” 

“Yeah at their fuckin’ house. Not their church.” 

“Well to be fair, this is kind of like a second home. I spend quite a bit of time here,” you confessed.

Joel raised an eyebrow at you. “So much time that you’ve decided to keep a set of keys under the mat?”

Sheepishly, you nodded. “Sometimes when I can’t sleep at night, I’ll come here alone and sit with my thoughts for a while.” You shrugged. “Maria let me have the spare set of keys. She knows I come here and so does the rest of the council. I trespass with their full permission,” you kidded with a small grin. 

Unlocking one of the two doors, you stepped over the threshold and waited expectantly for Joel. But he stood there, making no move to join you on the other side. 

“This place gives me the fuckin’ creeps,” he admitted. 

You laughed. “It’s only the outside that’s creepy, I promise.”

Grimacing, Joel finally walked inside, his back and shoulders stiff with tension as he stepped into the place of worship. 

You closed the door and flipped on the lights, then opened a second set of double doors with another key from the ring. 

“Whoa.” He was pleasantly surprised. For as old as this place was, the interior of the church was quite nice. He could tell that it had been well cared for in its lifetime—the former contractor in him had little choice but to appreciate the high ceiling, the large windows, and the satin finish of the white paint on the rustic, wooden panel walls. 

There were a total of twelve pews, six on each side of the church. There was an older, antique piano in pristine condition nestled over in one corner of the room and in another, there was a large chalkboard propped up on a wooden easel, biblical verses that had been the focus of the congregation’s previous gathering still scribbled across it in white chalk. 

“See?” You nudged his arm with your elbow. “This isn’t so awful, right?”

“S’ppose it ain’t all that bad,” he muttered. 

Your eyes twinkled with pure amusement, adding, “And you didn’t burn into a pile of ashes.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Joel grumbled out in response. “Can we just get this over with so I can get outta here?”

You tossed him a playful little eye roll then nodded towards the pews. “Go ahead and just have a seat anywhere,” you instructed him. “I’ll be right back.”

You disappeared down a short, dimly lit corridor.

Letting out a heavy sigh, Joel slowly made his way down the aisle holding his injured hand against his chest. Now that the adrenaline had started wearing off, it’d started throbbing with pain.

There was an altar at the front of the church—if he could even call it an altar. 

It was a plain oakwood table with a white fair linen cloth draped over it and nothing else. 

Above it, bolted onto the wall, was a wooden cross.

He averted his eyes, turning away from it. 

Of all the shit to be intimidated by in this world. 

A fucking slab of carved wood. 

Joel’s attention shifted over to the chalkboard. He squinted at it, silently reading the verse to himself.

God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability. 1 Corinthians 10:13

“But with the temptation, he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it,” you recited the rest of the verse from behind him.

“No offense darlin’, but it sounds like nothin’ but a whole lotta gibberish to me,” he remarked to you over his shoulder. 

“No offense taken, Joel.”

Whirling around on the heel of his worn boot, Joel blurted, “How did you know my name?”

“You’re Tommy Miller’s brother. Everybody in this town knows your name.” You held up the white tin box in your hands. A big, red cross had been spray painted onto the lid. You sat down in the first pew and patted the seat right beside you. “Come sit.”

He sauntered over and dropped down next to you, watching as you opened up the box and started digging through its contents. “You know my name,” he stated after a few seconds of silence. “Sure would be nice for me to know yours.”

Smiling politely, you told him your name.

Joel repeated it. It rolled almost too sweetly off his tongue.

“S’real pretty, little dove. Just like you.”

His compliment nearly knocked all of the air out of your lungs and for a split second, you have to remind yourself to breathe.

Cheeks burning, you murmured a small thank you and plucked a bottle of saline solution from the kit along with a piece of clean cotton. You tried not to think about the way his eyes were fixed intently on you as you unscrewed the cap and poured a bit of the liquid onto the cotton. “It shouldn’t sting,” you reassured him, reaching for Joel’s injured hand. It was rough and calloused, a stark contrast against your own soft and smooth. You set his hand down on your knee, a strange sensation fluttering in the depths of your lower belly when the warmth of his skin seeped right through the fabric of your skirt. 

Comfortable silence fell over the both of you like a curtain as you started cleaning the blood off of his knuckles and his long, thick fingers. 

“You really believe in all this stuff?” Joel spoke, his question echoing off the bare walls of the church. 

You continued dabbing at his cuts, thinking it over in your head for a moment.

“I honestly don’t know,” you admitted.

Your answer took him by complete surprise.

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

“I have always been taught to believe in God, Joel. It’s all that I’ve ever known. I grew up in a religious community,” you explained to him, making sure to keep your eyes focused on his hand. Tossing aside the bloodied wad of cotton, you picked up another piece adding more saline to it. “After the outbreak, things changed, of course. I couldn’t imagine how He could let something like this happen. When we lost our mother to infection about five years ago, I stopped praying. I finally stopped holding onto the ounce of hope I had that He would make the world right again. I refused to believe in God. Sometimes I still do,” you confessed quietly.

“You said you spend a lot of time here. Why come to church if you’re not even sure you believe in any of this shit anymore?”

“I’m always here because there’s still a part of me that thinks there’s a chance for me to believe again. When I told you I come here when I can’t sleep at night, it’s true. It’s my time to be here completely alone, the time that I use to mend my broken relationship with God. Or at least, I’ve been trying to mend it.” Taking a little glass pot of homemade antibiotic ointment one of the women in the town made and traded, you took off the lid and scooped out some of the salve with the tip of your finger. You applied it carefully to his cuts and continued, “But lately, the more that I try to pray and talk to Him, the more foolish I feel. It’s just not working. It hasn’t been working for a long, long time.”

“Then why keep tryin’ if it ain’t workin’ anymore?”

“Because I don’t really have much of a choice.”

“Your old man?” Joel guessed, wincing slightly as you went over a particularly sore spot on his hand, right over the torn up knuckle of his index finger. 

“Mhm.” You nodded. “My father never lost faith in Him. He knows how I feel, but he refuses to let me give up on God. He won’t ever let me miss church or go to bed without reciting my nightly prayer. He won’t let me abandon our faith. Not until the day he is cold and buried in his grave.”

“So what I’m gettin’ is that he forces you?”

You finished applying the ointment and wiped the remnants lingering on your finger off on your skirt.

“Force is such a harsh word. I wouldn’t say that—”

“He’s forcin’ you,” Joel said, flatly. 

“Joel—”

“You can twist it however the hell you want, sweet girl,” he cut you off. “But if you’re tryin’ this fuckin’ hard to make yourself believe in somethin’ just for the sake of appeasin’ your dad because he can’t or won’t accept how you really feel ‘bout all this, well I hate to break it to you, but you’re bein’ forced.”

Your eyes widened ever so slightly at his words. 

You had never thought about it like that before.

Placing the lid back onto the pot of ointment, you put it back into the first aid kit and then set the tin box down onto the floor. You sat back and clasped your hands together in your lap, not knowing what else to say to him. 

He was right, after all. 

Joel’s fingers lightly squeezed your knee. “Hey.”

You brought your gaze over to meet his. “Hm?”

“Can I ask you somethin’ ‘bout your dad?”

“What is it?” 

Joel chose his words carefully. “Has he ever—he ain’t ever done anythin’ to hurt you, has he?” he asked you, earning himself a perplexed stare. He continued to elaborate. “What I mean is, he ever put his hands on you or anythin’ like that?”

Oh. That’s what he meant.

“Never,” you assured him quickly. “He would never lay a single finger on me or my two sisters.”

He gave your knee another squeeze. “Just needed to make sure of it, sweetheart. Back in the day, I used to hear and see awful things on the news ‘bout—”

You were quick to cut him off. “Look, my father isn’t perfect, but he’s not like that. He’s a good man who only wants what is best for us. He’s strict and he can be tough, but it’s only because he cares. He just doesn’t want us running down the wrong path.”

“The wrong path?”

You shrugged. “Life here in Jackson is decent, but there’s a lot of temptations he doesn’t want any of us falling into. He wants to protect us.”

“By controllin’ you.” 

It had been a statement, not a question. 

Giving him a wry smile, you assured him, “Joel, it’s really not as bad as you’re making it sound. I could be a whole lot worse off than this, you know.”

There was another short bout of silence.

Joel’s dark eyes fell to your blouse, noticing how a couple of the top buttons had come undone. 

He caught the slightest glimpse of the soft curves of your breasts—all it had taken was just a peek at them for his cock to twitch against the zipper of his jeans.

Don’t you get hard in a fuckin’ church, Miller.

His gaze wandered down a little further and that’s when he caught sight of the cross hanging from a delicate gold chain clasped around your neck.

Joel expected the sight of it to calm the straining in his jeans. Somehow, it only made it worse. 

“Earlier, when we were standing outside,” you had started to say, “You said you might burn if you came inside the church because of all the terrible shi—things that you’ve done.”

“S’right.”

You peered at him with curiosity. “So what exactly have you done, Joel?”

Joel leaned back into the pew, shaking his head at you as he finally pulled his hand from your knee. 

“You really don’t wanna know, little dove.”

“Why not?”

His answer was honest.  “Don’t want you to be scared of me.”

Angling your body towards him, you placed one of your hands on his thigh. Your fingers burned right through the dark blue denim of his jeans.

Joel’s lips parted slightly, taken aback by the bold move and the sudden shift in your demeanor.

Were you the same girl who’d nearly had a fucking heart attack a couple of weeks ago when Joel had nodded at you back at the stables? 

“I’m not scared of you,” you murmured, softly. You gave his leg a squeeze, pulling your plump bottom lip between your teeth. Between that and the wide innocent doe eyes that you were giving him, it was taking every last ounce of strength Joel had inside him to keep a straight face, to pretend you weren’t driving him absolutely wild with desire.

He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d felt such an incredible need to have someone. 

Want, sure. 

He had wanted Tess. He had wanted Esther. 

But Joel didn’t just want you. 

He fucking needed you. 

And he didn’t know why.

“I’m not scared of you,” you repeated, trailing your hand further up his thigh, setting a fire neither one of you would soon be able to contain. 

Joel leaned forward, bringing his face dangerously close towards yours. His warm breath fanned over your lips. It was still laced with bourbon. “You sure ‘bout that, darlin’ girl?” 

You tried to answer him in the steadiest voice that you could muster, but it was impossible for you to hide the effect this man had on you. 

You breathed out a shaky, “I’m sure.”

Lifting his uninjured hand, he reached up to tuck a loose lock of hair that had fallen out of your braids behind your ear. As his hand fell away, the palm of it grazed against the silkiness of your cheek. 

Though brief, the contact sent an electric current through each and every last single nerve ending in your entire body. 

Exhaling sharply, your eyelids fluttered closed. You nearly whimpered out his name. “Joel?”

“What is it, babygirl? What do you want?”

“I—I want you to kiss me.” 

Joel leaned in even closer, stopping only when his mouth was less than an inch away from yours. 

You heard him chuckle softly. 

“Y’know, I’d expect better manners from a good girl like you,” he tsked lightly, his nose skimming near the corner of your mouth. Closer. “What’s the magic word, little dove?”

“Please.”

“S’much better.”

Your heart pounded with anticipation.

It was almost too much for you to handle. 

Joel closed the remaining gap of space, capturing your lips with his own. He remembered his brother talking about you at the bar—how he had told Joel that you had never even held a man’s hand before.

It occurred to him that he was giving you your first kiss. Him. Joel Miller. The town’s resident asshole and a man who was well over twice your own age. He was the one giving you your very first kiss. 

The guilt suddenly started to creep in, sinking into his bones.

What the fuck had he been thinking? 

And what about you? 

Where the fuck had your common sense gone?

Probably ran off together with Joel’s.

“Sweetheart,” he murmured, pulling away slightly in an attempt to stop it from going any further. He tried again, mumbling against your lips, “We gotta stop. This ain’t right—”

You were having none of it. 

None. 

Clutching fistfuls of Joel’s denim shirt, you swung your leg over his thighs and straddled his lap. Your knees rested on either side of him on the bench. 

“Please,” you nearly pleaded. “Just kiss me. I want it—I want this. I promise you that I do.” You placed both of your hands on his broad shoulders, sliding them around him as you slowly sank down further onto his lap. “I want this, Joel.”

Suddenly, he realized that you were asking him for more than just his kiss. 

Now he knew for sure that all common sense had left that pretty little head of yours. 

“Baby, y’need to think real hard ‘bout this—”

Desperate, you uttered one final, “Please.”

Joel bit back a groan. How could he deny you? 

He couldn’t. Simple as that. 

“You sure ‘bout this?”

Your fingers toyed with the curls at the nape of his neck. “Yes. I’m sure.”

“C’mere then, darlin’ girl.”

Joel cupped the side of your face in his large palm and tilted his head up towards yours. Your mouths fused together and although he tried to be gentle, it was proving to be much too difficult—how could he be gentle when you were practically clinging to him? Holding onto him with fervor as if you’d been holding onto dear fucking life itself? 

Temperatures rising, you quickly shrugged out of his jacket, letting it fall to the floor behind you with a soft thud before wrapping your arms around him once again. You melted against him as your mouth molded to his in a perfect fit. 

His teeth nipped at your bottom lip, silently asking for permission to explore the cavern even further. 

Eagerly, your lips parted, granting him access. His tongue slipped past them, meeting yours in a slow and sensual heated dance. 

You breathed him deeply into your lungs, a little moan vibrating at the back of your throat. 

Joel’s hands went to your waist and he yanked the hem of your blouse free from your skirt. 

“Can I feel you, baby?” he asked, breathlessly. His mouth abandoned yours and he began to trail hot, open mouthed kisses underneath your jawline. 

Dazed, all you could do was nod in reply and utter, “Mhm.”

Joel’s hands slipped under your blouse and he slid them up the length of your sides. “Fuck, you gotta be the softest fuckin’ thing,” he cursed against the delicate, tender flesh of your neck. His lips latched onto your pulse point, suckling at the skin there as his fingertips dug into your hips. He needed to feel more, but he forced himself to wait. The last thing he wanted to do was make a wrong move or move too fast and scare you off.

“Joel,” you mewled his name. “Joel, I need—”

You trailed off, moaning when his mouth released your skin with a loud, wet popping noise. 

“Tell me, sweet girl. Tell me what you need and I’ll give it to you,” he promised. “Anythin’ you need or want, I’ll give it to you. Just say the fuckin’ word.”

“You, Joel. I need you.”

His hips involuntarily bucked upwards and you let out a startled gasp the moment you felt his bulge, hard as a rock, brush against your clothed cunt. 

Tearing away from him, it suddenly hit you. You’re in a church, straddling a much, much older man in a pew—and if that wasn’t sinful enough, the warm and slick arousal pooling between your thighs only proved that you were ready to fall into temptation, give into the lust and give your body to Joel. But it was none of those things that worried you. It was something else. 

You pulled yourself out of his arms and jumped up off his lap, nearly tripping over your own two feet.

“Darlin’ are you—?”

You didn’t even hear the rest of his question.

Knees trembling, you somehow managed to make your way up to the altar. Heart pounding and head spinning, you planted both of your hands firmly on the table and steadied yourself. Part of you hoped that Joel would just get up and leave. But a bigger part of you hoped he wouldn’t. 

Joel rose to his feet. “Listen, ain’t nothin’ wrong if you changed your mind, alright?”

“I didn’t,” you choked out. “That’s—that’s not it at all.”

“Then what’s the matter?”

Embarrassed, you tried to explain yourself. “I have never done anything like this before. I’m a—”

You couldn’t even bring yourself to say the word out loud. 

“You’re a what?”

Blazing heat flooded your face. “Joel, please don’t make me say it,” you groaned. “For the sake of my sanity, don’t make me say it.” You heard the sound of his brown leather boots as he walked up behind you, one heavy footstep after the other.

“Turn around, sweet girl.” 

Joel’s command was firm but still gentle. 

Swallowing dryly, you obeyed and did as you were told. He stood close and you found yourself at eye level with his chest. 

“Look at me.”

You tried, but couldn’t. 

“I said, look at me.” Joel gingerly took your chin in between his thumb and index finger. He lifted your face, forcing your gaze to meet his own, timid and submissive meeting bold and dominant in a sweet and tender exchange. “Never known the lovin’ of a man, have you little dove?”

He backed you up against the table, pinning you in between it and himself. Planting both of his hands on either side of you, he caged you in and brought his chest flush against yours, pressing your bodies together.

Close, but somehow not close enough.

Joel lifted his hand to your cheek, cradling it in his palm. His thumb swept over your quivering bottom lip.

You reached behind you, clutching at the fair linen as you tried with every fiber of your entire being to remind yourself that you were standing at the altar where your father preached and delivered all of his sermons to the faithful people of Jackson. 

The very same altar where your father encouraged you to kneel and pray in effort to mend the broken relationship you had with God. 

You couldn’t help but to think if you were to get on your knees tonight, it wouldn’t be for prayer.

“I asked you a question, darlin’.” Joel’s voice broke into your train of thought. “Need you to be a good girl and give me an answer, alright?”

“My father loves me,” you stammered out in reply. “He loves me and my sisters—”

“C’mon, babygirl.” He chuckled and shook his head at you, lightly pinching your cheek. “That ain’t what I mean and you damn well know it.”

Sighing softly, you finally answered, “No, Joel.”

“No, what?”

“No, I’ve never known the loving of a man.”

Joel slipped the tip of his thumb between your lips and leaned into you, his hardness pressing against your upper thigh. Even through all the clothes, you could feel every inch of him. “Do you wanna know how it feels, baby? What it feels like when a man makes you his own?” 

You nearly moaned around his finger. “Yes.”

“Yes, what?” he prompted, pulling his hand away.

“Yes, please.”

“I can show you.” Joel paused. “But not tonight.”

You stared at him in disbelief. Both of you were so clearly riled up and he was going to take a pass?

He almost laughed at your expression. 

“C’mon, don’t give me that face.”

“But Joel—”

“Just don’t wanna rush it, not with you,” Joel said in a tone so soft it nearly threw you for a loop. “M’gonna need you to be real patient for me, just for a little while, alright? You think you can do that, little dove? Think you can be patient for me?”

Your answer came without an ounce of hesitation.

“Of course,” you breathed.

You would wait an eternity for Joel Miller.

[lisenberry]

141 when they find out reader has been crying:

(an earlier brain worm had me expanding this to all of them)

Price: He pulls you into his office and shuts the door. It barely closes before he turns on you, crossing his arms and looking down with his chin tucked against his chest. He rocks back on his heels once, twice, while he waits for you to spill.

You can only blink up at him, willing your tears not to fall while he's watching you so intently.

"What is it, sir?" You finally chance the use of your voice, but instantly regret it. Your miserable croak isn't hiding anything.

"I can't help you if you don't tell me why you've been crying." His tone is gruff, like sandpaper over rock salt, but his eyes soften imploringly.

For a minute, you want to tell him everything, but instead you just give in and cry harder. For a moment, he looks disappointed, but he simply pats you awkwardly on your shoulder and grabs a box of tissues from his desk drawer.

He motions to the sofa in the corner where you sob quietly for a half hour more while he finishes his paperwork. He doesn't know what's going on, but he's not going to let you do it alone.

Ghost: It doesn't matter where you hide, he finds you. The kitchen? He's in and out three times. Tea, a spoon for his tea, another tea. He crowds your space each time, no matter where you stand. Forcing you in circles as you try to keep your face averted.

For a silent man, he manages to make as much noise as possible to distract you to the point of almost asking him, "What the fuck, Simon?"

You finally move to a bathroom stall, but before long you hear the door open and two large boots stop just beyond the door. You know it's him by the size alone.

You hold your breath for a beat, and then two, so long that you wonder who is going to give in first. You know you've got about 3 minutes before you pass out. But just as you're about to stand up and face him, he turns and leaves without a word.

Exactly ten minutes later, he finds you in the rec room, dragging someone by the neck. It's not until Ghost kicks the man's knees out from under him, forcing him to kneel in front of you that you realize who it is. Some asshole from the other team who was giving you a hard time in training this morning.

With Ghost's knee pressed painfully between his shoulder blades, he grits out, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry! It won't happen again!"

He's not the reason you're crying, but watching his face turn ten shades of purple does make you feel a little better.

Gaz: He keeps his distance and hates to see people cry because it always makes him cry, too. He doesn't know why. Movies, talk shows, commercials, they just get him right in the feels.

But every time you look up, his golden eyes meet yours, glistening with empathy. You simply shake your head at him and go about your day, until eventually, you get a text.

You mad at me?

-No, I'm fine.

You sure?

-Yep.

Fucking xxxx again, innit?

Of course he'd be the one to guess right. He paid the most attention, listened when you talked and remembered every detail. To be honest, he'd been the one you confided in the most for that reason.

He took your silence as a confirmation.

I hid some ice cream in the freezer. Unless Soap got to it first.

Soap: You head back to the kitchen again in search of the contraband ice cream, hoping it's the good mocha chip flavor you love, only to find Soap has beaten you to it. He innocently scoops out the last bite before seeing your face crumble and guiltily tosses it into the sink.

"Och, shit. Was that yours?"

"No, it's okay." Could this get any worse?

After dealing with these four, you just give up and slink back to your room.

"You know what you need?" He charges you before you can get any further.

"No, Johnny, don't!" Not one to listen, he pulls you up over his shoulder in one swoop and fireman carries you out to the gym.

"We're going to sweat it out, yeah? Always makes me feel better. Whether it's fighting or fucking is up to you."

You finally laugh at the absurdity of it, for the first time all day.

[qqueenofhades]

I would like to... gently shake the people going 'Dick Cheney/Alberto Gonzalez/[insert neoconservative architect here] endorsing Harris is entirely and only a bad look for Harris' because that's not the point. And like, I get feeling weird about it (I've been unimpressed with Dick's backpedaling since Liz Cheney got primaried), but: Trump is proving too extreme for THE PEOPLE WHO MADE HIM POSSIBLE. This is their consequences. THAT'S the point.

Look, this is what I think about it: I fucking hate Dick Cheney and all the architects of the Bush Junior neoconservatism-early-aughts-War-on-Terror-Patriot-Act-No-Child-Left-Behinding Republican Party that laid the groundwork for the Tea Party and then for Trump. If there was any justice in the world, Dubya would be at the Hague for a war crimes tribunal and not allowed to sit in Texas painting dogs and enjoying a quiet retirement. But he was fortunate to be the president of the most powerful country in the world, and America doesn't obey international law unless it feels like it, so that's what we get. (And yes, someone asked Dubya if he was going to endorse in 2024, following Cheney, and was told, no doubt with much pious handwringing, that "President Bush retired from presidential politics many years ago." But he's still raising money for MAGA Senate candidates in Pennsylvania, evidently. Fuck you, George W. Bush. Kids these days don't say it enough.)

However, since literally the entire pre-Trump establishment Republican party is now deciding that Trump is too insane, fascist, and dangerous even for them, I'm not surprised but still annoyed that Online Leftist Logic (TM) has translated that to "Harris must secretly be an early-noughties hard-right neocon Republican and that's why they want to vote for her!!!" Most if not all of them have said that they openly disagree with her policies but are voting for her anyway because she is the only way to maintain American constitutional democracy. And yes, we're all shocked that DICK FUCKING CHENEY, architect of the Iraq War and the Patriot Act, felt that there was in fact a line of fascist government overreach that he wasn't willing to cross, but if that's the case -- if even these completely terrible warmongering corporate assholes are like "uh Trump is too bad even for us to support," then you should, I don't know, maybe listen to that. But as ever, I search for logic in vain.

Likewise: Harris has made zero policy concessions to these Republicans and she never went fishing for Cheney's endorsement specifically. She didn't suddenly declare Iraq a totally okay and normal thing in order to get Cheney and his warhawks on board, and yes, Old Dickhead probably has no small amount of personal motive to get back at Trump considering what he did to Liz. But that's the thing where apparently political motives should only ever be pure, moral, and Perfect, and taking the right action for the "wrong" reasons is still disqualifying because you weren't thinking enough pure moral thoughts while you did it, or something. I don't give a fuck why Cheney decided to vote for Harris, because I don't respect his opinion and can't foresee myself ever doing so. But because we are in an unprecedented historical moment where even DICK GODDAMN CHENEY thinks that Donald Trump is too dangerous to ever have power again, I will thank him for doing that and that alone and then tell him to hit the f'n road if he thinks he deserves a scrap of credit or Democratic policy concessions for it. He doesn't. He sucks. But he's still making a choice that we need to see made at this moment, and people who don't get that, as usual, can STFU.

Basically: Cheney's endorsement is not directed at you, and it's not intended to move voters who already fit your profile and therefore think, like I do, that Cheney can eat shit. It's directed to all the career-Republican-politician types who can see him doing that and decide that they can do the same thing. Hell, we just had 17 former staffers of Ronald Reagan announcing their Harris endorsement (in addition to the 200+ Bush, McCain, Romney alumni who already signed on and all the ex-Trump officials at the DNC) and going so far as to insist that Ol' Ronnie Raygun himself would have supported Harris. Now look. I hate Ronald Reagan more than any other twentieth-century president. The degree to which he ALSO laid the groundwork for incredible damage to America cannot be overstated. But because I am not an idiot, I can see that this does not mean Harris has suddenly turned into Reagan in her policies. So. Yeah.

The other thing to note here is that Harris has seen the advantage in cultivating a bipartisan coalition and making a cross-party case for voting her to preserve American democracy. Now, a lot of the Republicans have said that they are going to stay Republicans and they want to purge their party of Trump and MAGAism, they are trying to buy time for that transition to happen by voting for Harris, and while I have never voted for or agreed with a Republican in my whole life, I actually think that's a good thing! I don't WANT to fear the end of American democracy every four years because the Republican Party has become a screaming shitgibboning insane vehicle of American Gilead while inciting stochastic terrorism against Springfield, Ohio and everyone else who doesn't bow down to Trumpist Dear Leader and his KKK alt-right Elon Muskified supporters! I don't WANT this howling fascist conspiracy-theory-puppet-of-Vladimir-Putin black hole of violence to be just what we have to accept as the center-right (except you know, now far-far-far-far-can't-see-it-with-a-telescope-right) party in America! I would prefer it if we had a functioning democracy again where both parties were engaging in fair competitiveness and good faith and had the basic premise of making people's lives better, even if they disagreed about how to do it! I would REALLY like it if we could go back to the days of disagreeing about taxes and foreign policy and social welfare -- you know, NORMAL THINGS -- instead of Commander Vance and the Project 2025 foot soldiers trying to install a theocratic fascist dictatorship! I WOULD LIKE THAT A WHOLE LOT!

That said: I have pretty much reached my limit with asking people to vote. I have done it for 8+ years (since before Trump was elected the first time) and I'm done. Either you know the stakes of this election at this point, or you're so blindly and stupidly committed to misunderstanding them that there's nothing I or anyone else can possibly do to convince you. I still see people posting a lot of stuff from the bad-faith anti-democratic leftist cranks and arguing with them endlessly and... why? Why? Why are you giving them the oxygen and exposure that they crave, and which is giving them more attention than anyone else is giving them? Block them. Mute them. STOP ENGAGING WITH EVERYTHING THEY SAY EVEN IF YOU'RE TRYING TO REFUTE IT. It's not going to work, and at this point, it's not remotely conducive to winning this election. The Great Myth of the Undecided Voter (TM) is another one that, I hope, can finally bite the dust, and the actual undecided voters who are out there are not the ones posting dirtbag leftist bullshit about Harris on The Website Formerly Known as Twitter. This election is now completely down to a numbers game: who can make their identified voters turn out to vote. So please. Spend your time and energy on reaching those folks, who might want to or have said they will vote but need a push or extra help to make sure they do.

That being the case, if lifelong Republicans want to vote for Harris and help defeat a Trump dictatorship, they're actually being more helpful for the cause of American democracy than every single shrieking Online Leftist out there, and maybe they should think about that. I'm amused at how they still think they can make demands of the Democrats, because -- when your entire plan from the word go has been "I'm not voting for the Democrats and there's nothing you can do to make me!!!" -- why are you surprised that they don't take your thoughts and opinions into account? That's the basic simplest Democracy 101 version of how electoral politics works. If you have removed yourself from their voter pool and laugh and scoff at any suggestion that you should enter it, then they're not gonna listen to you or think that they should make policy to appease you (which is good, because most of these people are fucking nuts). That's why they're blowing a gasket disowning AOC, still one of the most left-wing members in the House, because she wants to actually win and make real changes in society and has reached a happy-ish marriage with the Democratic party, instead of virtuously losing her seat and becoming irrelevant like some other members of the Squad who got primaried out this year. And the Democrats have accepted many of AOC's views as mainstream policy! She didn't change, but she stayed in the party and worked with it, and the party as a whole is moving to where she was all along. But because any hint of compromise or working to get results, rather than just posting self-righteous screeds on the internet, is Bad, she had to go, I guess. Or something.

Anyway. That's the that on that. If you want to win this election, target and talk to the people who have already identified themselves as likely or possible voters, they just need that extra push to become definite voters. I'm over the anti-democratic hypocritical leftist cranks as much as I am the screaming shitgibboning racist-mob-inciting fascists. If it takes some Republicans gritting their teeth and getting on board the "let's save American democracy" boat with me, then fine. They're actually willing to do the smallest tiny thing to make that outcome come about, and that means, for right now, they are the enemy of my enemy and I'll accept their help. After that, I would in fact like it if we had a sane center-right party again, once Trump is in jail and we can fumigate the MAGA rot. It's up to them.

[inkskinned]

no, but really, we need to talk about the casual objectification that has become the fallback discourse of the internet: if you're pretty and dressed nicely, you're a slut. and if you're even vaguely outside of their body standard, you're fucking disgusting.

too-frequently, people position sex workers as being "the problem". they sneer you're addicted to pornography, you don't know what a real woman looks like. but real women are in pornography. the real bodies on display are not the issue here: the issue is that other people feel extremely confident when commenting on someone's physique.

2000's super-thin is slowly worming its way back into the public ideal. recently i saw someone get told to "go for a run", despite the fact she was on the thinner side of average. not that it would ever be appropriate to say that: but it's kind of like sticker shock when you see it. people think that is fat? holy shit. do they just have no idea about things?

but what are you going to do about it? that's the problem, right. because chances are - you're a normal person. we can say normalize carrying fat on your body, but we are not the billion-dollar diet industry. we are not the billion-dollar fashion industry. we are just, like. people. who are trying to make content on the internet, without being treated shittily.

as someone who has been on both sides of things: you are treated better when you are thin and pretty. this is statistically correct. i am not saying that you cannot be bullied for being thin; i'm saying there are objective institutional biases against certain bodytypes. there are videos of men and women who lost weight all saying: i now know for a fact exactly how much worse you're treated. in the comments, some asshole inevitably says something akin to you deserved to be dehumanized when you were fat.

which means that ... the easiest thing to do is be pretty and thin. it is the path of least resistance, because of course it is, because any time you post a picture of yourself without a thigh gap, someone immediately comments something like you need to try a diet.

the other half is also dehumanizing though, huh, just in a different way. when i put on makeup and nice clothes, i am told i slept my way to the top as a professional. do you know how many women in STEM have told me they purposefully dress to "unimpress" because they already struggle to be taken seriously and if they're ever considered pretty - it for some reason takes away from their authority.

so they make it seem like it's your fault. you, existing in a body - it's your fault! if you didn't want shitty comments, don't have a body. they position us against each other like chess pieces; vying for male attention we don't even need.

and i can be an authority on this unless you think i'm fat and unattractive. when i am pretty and thin, i'm an activist. when i am just a normal person who makes a good point: i am immediately dismissed. nobody fucking believes you if you're not seen as attractive. you literally lose value. you cease to exist.

but the whole time, it feels like - is anyone actually grounded the fuck in reality? the line of "pretty and thin" keeps shifting. nobody seems to understand what "a normal weight" even looks like, because it's not something that exists - you cannot tell a person's health by looking at their body. even if you think you could tell that, even if you're sure a person is dangerously overweight - people are not your dolls. they do not need to be dressed up or displayed properly to soothe your aesthetics. you aren't concerned for them, you're stealing their agency. you don't get to say if they're "allowed" to take pictures and post them on the internet - you don't get to tell them how to exist.

people hide behind "the obesity epidemic" without any actual qualifications. they crow things about "normalizing unhealthiness".

but it's bullshit. i have visible abs. there is a pair of parallel lines on my body, even when i'm relaxed; where my obliques meet my abdominal wall. i am proud of this because it means i'm strong, because i overcame an eating disorder only to be ripped as fuck. it is genetic and physical luck that i even get any definition, i'm pleased as punch.

but it does mean that my abdominal wall sticks out a little bit. the other day i posted a video of myself dancing, and, for a moment, my shirt slipped. you could see a little bit of my stomach. i was cartwheeling to the floor. moments before this, i'd had my foot over my head.

a guy slid into my DMs. a row of vomiting emojis prefaced: you should really lose some weight before you think about dancing.

i stared at it for a long time. there was a time when i would have been triggered by this, where it would have encouraged me to starve myself. i would have ignored the fact i'm flexible, agile, good at jumping: i would have lost the weight for a stranger's passing comment. i would have found myself and my body fucking disgusting.

and for what? to please what? because why? so that he can exist in this world without an unchallenged eyeball? what would my self-hatred even accomplish? usually i write paragraphs. obviously. on this particular occasion, in this body i've been at war with for ages: i just felt exhausted.

it shouldn't be even worth saying. it shouldn't be hard to explain. all of this emotional turmoil when he cannot even comprehend the most basic truth: i am not an object on display for him.

[vivwritesfics]

Set The World On Fire

Chapter Three

Lando Norris had been incredibly angry when they met. Incredibly angry, but sweet enough to help her. Turns out he just needed somebody to talk to, somebody to be there for him.

He was easy to fall for, and that put her in a world of danger

Mafia AU

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She missed her alarm the next morning, but that was the consequences of staying up all night, texting.

When she woke up, she was a mess. Hair all over the place, imprint of her sleeve on her cheek, and very late for work.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck!" She cried as she climbed out of bed. She raced into the bathroom and worked on fixing her hair as she cleaned her teeth. She attempted to throw her pyjamas into the hamper as she ran back into her bedroom.

It took her five minutes to get dressed, another three get her get jewellery in. She did her makeup as quickly as she could and ran out of the door, heading to her office.

At three minutes past nine, Y/N walked into her office. She could feel the eyes on her as she walked over to her cubicle and sat down.

Her phone vibrated against her desk. She picked it up and checked it. I've got dinner with that asshole and his dad tonight, Lando had texted her. No good morning, he was straight to it. She liked it like that.

Y/N logged into her work computer before she replied. You should put salt in their drinking glasses.

She didn't hear from Lando for the rest of the morning. She worked quietly, slowly, still tired from the night before.

At her lunch break she checked in her bag but, of course, her lunch wasn't there. No, in all of her rushing around, she'd left it at home. "Fuck," she hissed as she pulled her jacket over her shoulders, placed her bag on her back, and ran down to the nearest shop.

She had just twenty minutes to buy and eat her lunch. If it came to it, she could eat at her desk, but those whose cubicles joined to hers wouldn't be happy. She had no time to check her phone as she bought a meal deal from her local corner shop.

As soon as she was back at her desk, she pulled out her phone and checked her messages. A message appeared on her lock screen and she rushed to open it.

Salt is in the drinking glasses Will keep you posted

Both of the messages were from Lando. She smiled fondly as she typed out her response.

***

Lando's day job didn't often allow him a moment to text pretty girls. He was essentially the head of the Norris family, but he was also 'The Enforcer'. It was his job to go around to businesses that paid the family for protection and scare them into paying.

And, if they couldn't pay, it was Lando's job to deal with it. He loved it, loved watching the fear in people's eyes as he cracked his knuckles. There was always a point, usually when he pulled out his gun, where the fear left their eyes and they accepted their fate. It was rare that it had to get that far, but Lando had felt another mans blood on his face far too many times.

He was a monster, and he was proud.

This was where he was on his way to when he began texting Y/N that morning. He was pissed, he'd just found out he'd be hosting the dinner with the Sainz family and he wanted to kill something.

She'd given him a good suggestion, one that would start an all out war, though. Lando couldn't say that to her, not unless he wanted to scare her off.

So Lando took some time to think of his response. He climbed out of his car and walked into the small, family owned bakery. It was time for The Enforcer to do some enforcing.

He didn't come out of the bakery covered in blood. As soon as he had walked in all other customers had left and the Matriarch of the family had run to get Lando the money he was owed. She pleaded with him, said they needed the money to live, but Lando pocketed it and left. Not before leaving a pretty nasty 'warning' on the face of the baker, the father.

Lando climbed back into the car and pulled out his phone. He sent a response to Y/N and sat back in his seat, allowing himself to be driven home. His response was a lie. He wasn't going to attempt to put salt in Sainz's glass, not unless he wanted to die.

Before she could respond, Lando sent one more text. Come to the club tonight - i have a feeling i'm gonna need a drink

She agreed quickly, the text coming through as Lando left the car and walked up to his house. He walked quickly through the house, heading up towards the room where his father was currently laying, currently dying.

"Dad," he said as he sat in the chair beside his bed. Lando fished the money from the bakery from his pocket and presented it to his father. "Dunn's Bakery paid up," he said as his fathers frail hand reached for the money. "They shouldn't be late again."

His father counted through the money and handed it back. His lifted his hand to his mouth and coughed, his entire body moving with the force. "I have one last job for you before you take your sister to Spain," he said.

Lando sucked in his breath. He was dreading taking his sister to Spain, to marry Carlos Sainz Junior. If he was lucky, this job his father was going to give him would take weeks, would let him put off this trip to Spain.

"HC Publishing hasn't paid their rent yet," his father said. Lando nodded his head and stood up. He put the money back into his pocket and walked out of his fathers room.

***

The dinner with the Sainz family came and went. As soon they had left Lando went to his car. He sat there for a moment, looking up at the windows of his impressive house, looking at his sisters window as she closed the curtains and turned out the light.

Lando started the engine and drove away from the house. He headed towards the club, driving much faster than the speed limit. But Lando was a damned good driver, getting there in one piece.

As soon as he was parked out the back of the club, he texted Y/N to come and meet him. He made his way into the club, waving to the girl dancing and heading straight over to the bar. "Hey," he said to the bartender as she immediately poured him a whisky, never with ice. "There's gonna be a girl coming in here. If she looks lost, can you tell her to come to the back office? She knows where to go."

With that, Lando headed to his office. It was a mess, pillows from the couch on the floor and paperwork spread everyway. He put the whisky down and began clearing up the paperwork. Only some of it was meant for him, the rest for the manager to complete.

He tidied his liquor cabinet and put the cushions back into the couch. He sorted through his desk and made the office look more presentable.

Thirty minutes later the door to his office opened. "How did the salt go?"

Y/N strode into the office. She had her bag slung over her shoulder as she walked into the room and sat on the now presentable couch.

Lando stopped tidying and turned towards her. "You got here quick," he said, holding his whisky towards her. But she shook her head, frowning at just the smell. "I had to swap the glasses for clean ones," he said as he pulled open his liquor cabinet and poured her a weak gin and tonic. "My dad would have murdered me if I actually did it."

"Next time," Y/N said as she gratefully took gin from him. "Or you could put vodka in their glass instead of water," she proposed, head tipped towards him.

Lando laughed. "Do all of your plans involve putting something in someone's drink?"

"You're not ready for my other plans, Lan," she said, his tone teasing. Fuck, Lando hadn't been prepared for that. He almost choked on his whisky as she laughed at him. But the laughter stopped as she sipped her gin. "But how was it."

The smile dropped from Lando's face. He finished his whisky and placed the glass down onto his desk. "It was... okay at first. But then we got into business and then I was trying to do everything to keep my sister as protected as possible."

"Protected from what?" She asked as Lando joined her on the couch.

He shook his head. "Doesn't matter. I just want to make sure she's gonna be taken care of when she's married." She offered him her gin and he gratefully took it, having some before passing it back. "My dad is really sick," he said as soon as he swallowed the gin. "We're gonna lose him soon and I wanted to make sure she could come home for his funeral. If they don't let her I'm gonna fly where myself and get her," he said, cracking his knuckles.

Y/N took her gin from him. She stood and walked over to his liquor cabinet, putting a little more gin into her drink and handed it back to Lando. "Come on," she said. "We're getting you drunk."

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