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hxney-lemcn · 4 years

Text

Seven Stages (Pt. 4)

Word Count: 2.7k

Pairing: Five Hargreeves x reader

Fandom: The Umbrella Academy

Warning: Season 2 spoilers, death, violence

Main Master List | TUA Master List

Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five

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Once we got to Sissy’s house I couldn’t help but stare in awe at the unnatural weather. Snow littered the yard and a tunnel of energy formed into the sky coming from the barn. The trees bared no leaves showing how this must’ve been happening for a while now.

“You think what ever is inside is causing the cold front?” Diego asked as we all exited the car. I mean it was obvious whatever was happening in the barn was causing the strange weather.

“Well the correlation is high,” Five stated. I feel like sometimes he says bigger words just to make himself seem smart. I mean don’t get me wrong, he is the smartest person I’ve ever met, but still. He could’ve said something simpler than that.

“Sissy!” Vanya shouted out. “Sissy!”

Sissy cocked her gun and pointed it at us, “Get back!” I mean a shotgun won’t do much to us but I understand where she’s coming from. “All of you, just get the hell back!”

“Sissy!” Vanya shouted once again holding a hand out. Klaus raised his hands up making me laugh to myself silently. Five was ready to do something if need be and so was Allison. I had my hand over my pistol which was strapped to my thigh. “Hey! Hey! What’s wrong?” Vanya asked with genuine concern.

Carl,” Sissy replied, looking over all of us nervously.

“What did he do?” Vanya asked.

“He’s...” Sissy said shakily. “He’s dead. Harlan tossed him aside like a rag doll, same way you sent those policemen flyin’. What did you do?”

“No,” Vanya said breathlessly.

“What the hell did you do to my son?” Sissy asked, I could tell she was really scared, and someone who is scared with a gun never mixes well.

Lightning hit the barn and Diego started to walk forward, “We don’t have time for this.”

“Where do you think you’re going?” Sissy asked aiming her gun at him.

“To help your son,” He responded holding out a hand like Vanya did earlier.

“Look Sissy,” Vanya said trying to calm her. “I found my family. These are my brothers and my sister, and our family friend.” Sissy looked at us all, slowly lowering her gun.

“Ma’am,” Luther said with an awkward wave and smile.

“Where you lyin’ to me the whole time?” Sissy asked.

“Of course not,” Vanya said honestly. “Look, I didn’t know who I was. But now I do. And we’re not the monsters that they say we are. We did not kill the president. We are not terrorists. We’re not here to hurt anyone.”

“Then...” Sissy panted lightly. “Who are you?”

“The only one who can help Harlan.”

Sissy finally trusted us and let us into the barn. Inside was a kid who was stuck in a ball of energy that he seemed to be creating. He wasn’t seem to be responding to anything Vanya said. So she stepped into the spinning energy ball. I stood next to Five who was standing in a defensive stance, ready to help his sister if need be. Poor man never relaxes. On the other side stood Klaus who...where did he...?

“Uh...guys?” Klaus asked, standing on the other side of the barn looking out at the field.

“What?” I asked out already making my way over to him.

“Oh fuck me,” I whispered noticing the handler and another person standing next to her.

“What, who are they?” Klaus asked.

“One’s the handler,” I started.

“And the other’s Diego’s girlfriend,” Five finished for me. Diego has a girlfriend?

“Lila,” Diego said. “That’s my ex-girlfriend.”

“What?” Klaus asked genuinely surprised.

“You know what? Doesn’t matter now,” He said still staring at the two.

“They both look angry,” I spoke out rocking on my feet slightly.

“Yeah.”

“Our brother has that effect on people.”

“We’re going to go out there and find out what they want,” Five said motioning me and him. “You guys stay with Vanya and the kid.”

“I’m going with you too,” Diego said. “Come on.” With that the three of us walked out to the Handler and Lila.

“I love that smell of fresh country air,” The Handler spoke up with a chuckle. “Don’t you darling?”

“It makes me want to vomit,” Lila replied grouchily.

“What do you want?” Five asked, wanting to get this over with.

“To watch you suffer,” Lila spouted making me stand in a more defensive position. Over my dead body will Five suffer any more than he already has.

“What about me?” Diego asked like a puppy and it was clear he still liked her.

“You’re not even worth my wrath,” She responded like that was the stupidest question asked. I would’ve high fived her for being strong but right now she was my enemy and I’m sure she also did something to Diego.

“Easy,” The Handler smiled with a warning tone. “We’re here on official business.”

“What business is that?” I asked keeping my hand over my pistol once more.

“As head of the commission, I’ve decided to eradicate the criminals responsible for the assassination of the former head of directors,” The handler said calmly. I looked at Five who looked even more on edge now which answered my question on what the fuck happened there.

“Yeah right,” Diego said. “We didn’t kill the board.” Diego obviously hasn’t realized that Five did yet.

“That’s not entirely accurate,” Five said nervously.

“You didn’t tell them?” The handler asked, she seemed to be having too much fun with this. Five shrugged and she continued, “Oh Five.”

“Five what the hell did you do?” Diego asked. Is...is he really this dumb?

“What I had to do to get my family home,” Five replied and I felt my heart break a little. “Until someone regened on our deal.” He had to kill again, and the deal obviously didn’t work out or they would be in 2019 at the moment. The handler probably had something to do with it and at that moment I wanted to tear her to shreds even more than I did before.

“Somebody wouldn’t have regened if somebody could’ve met a simple deadline,” The Handler countered, making it seem like Five was at fault.

“You set him up to fail,” I spoke up with a glare.

“He set himself up to fail, friend,” She smiled condescendingly and I almost launched myself at her if I didn’t know any better. “You and your brothers and sisters,” The Handler faced Five once more. “Kinda a running theme of your little life, isn’t it?” She had the gull to laugh.

“He didn’t fail in finding me,” I said crossing my arms.

“It won’t matter in the end,” She shrugged.

“Dude, I can’t believe you killed the board of directors,” Diego whispered to Five. “You have no idea how messed up the commission is right now.”

“Messed up?” The Handler asked. “Who’s saying that?”

“Everybody,” Diego glared. “Christ even the janitors think it’s going to shit!”

“That’s not all he killed,” Lila chimed in. “Her too.” She looked at Five and I with a glare.

“What are you talking about?” I asked confused. I haven’t killed anyone since I left the Commission.

“Don’t play dumb you prepubescent piece of shit,” She growled and Five stood slightly in front of me.

“Enough,” The Handler said. “The point is that you all are going to die today.”

“Oh, well I don’t like your chances,” Diego stated. “Eight of us, two of you.”

“You know? You’re right,” The handler agreed, clearly something up her sleeve. “Let’s change that.”

With a snap of her fingers people from the commission started showing up. Hundreds of people all surrounding her and pointing their weapons at us. Five staggered back slightly, clearly fearful of what will happen to us all. My heart started beating rapidly and the hold on my pistol tightened.

“What should we do now?” Diego asked.

“Fight and die now, or run and die later,” I breathed out shakily.

“Either way we’re food for the worms,” Five agreed.

“Preference?” Diego asked looking at the both of us.

“Wouldn’t mind breathing air for a few more minutes through the old wind bags,” Five shrugged and I let out a strangled chuckle of agreement.

“Let’s get this over with shall we?” The Handler asked looking at her wrist, did she even have a watch? She lifted a red flag and I shouted out ‘run’ while we slightly tripped backwards.

We all ran towards the barn and the sounds of people shouting followed us. They started to shoot while we were running for our lives. Five grabbed me and Diego and blinked us towards a red tractor. We took cover behind the big wheel.

“What now?” Five shouted over the sound of bullets ricocheting off the metal.

“We blink into the house man!” Diego shouted back.

“Okay,” Five mumbled softly and tried to blink us into the house, but it wasn’t working.

“What?” Diego asked.

“He’s out of fuel!” I replied, joining the conversation. “He’s too tired.”

“Go, I’ll...” Diego trailed off. “I’ll cover for you.”

“Diego what are you...?” Five asked as Diego stood up.

“Just go!” Diego shouted stopping the bullets from moving. Five grabbed my hand and dashed towards the house, taking one last look at Diego. Opening the house door he let me enter before following. I went under the table, Five joining me. He held me to his chest in a protective manner as something outside blew up. Bullets were nonstop firing into the house, the only safe spot being where we resided. All I could hear was bullets and Five’s heavy breathing. I felt tears prick my eyes, ‘This is it’.

The sound of energy bursting emitted and suddenly the firing stopped. Five lifted his head from my neck and looked around, as did I. We hesitantly looked out the widow to see everyone dead...besides the Handler, Lila, and his family. Vanya was floating in the air, a bright beam of energy showing from her chest. Suddenly Lila floated up in the same manner, same glowing energy, and I brought Five with me back under the table.

Luther crash landed in the living room. Five and I stared wide eyed at him for a second before rushing over.

“Luther, you alright?” Five asked worriedly.

“Oh, I think I swallowed my tongue,” Luther muttered out.

Five rolled his eyes, “Luther, if you swallowed your tongue you wouldn’t be talking, you big moron.” I rolled my eyes at how Five’s demeanor changed so quickly.

“Come on, to your feet,” I said gently grabbing his hand and helping him up. He stumbled back slightly dragging me with him, Five right behind me just in case.

“Hey what the hell was that?” Luther asked. “What was that?” Luther held onto Five’s shoulders to stabilize himself.

“She must’ve redirected,” I responded as Five looked back out the window. “Vanya’s energy wave.” I clarified.

“Yeah I know,” Luther said. “But how?”

Some bricks started to fall and Five looked up with wide eyes, “Watch out!” Five pushed me and Luther out of the way as bricks fell on top of him. I felt my stomach drop and the world around me seemingly blurred. I fell to my knees in front of the pile and started brushing away the bricks. Luther helping me.

Lila blinked into the house and I glared up at her, tears threatening to fall from my eyes.

“What are you?” Luther asked.

“A bitch,” I choked out. My throat felt like it was closing, but I had to keep my emotions under control.

“Someone who want’s to kill your brother and his little girlfriend,” She replied nonchalantly. I grabbed my pistol and aimed it at her.

“Well that’s understandable,” Luther said with a shrug. “Diego can be a lot to handle.”

“She’s talking about Five,” I grumbled, keeping my weapon trained on her as she made her way to Luther.

“Him too,” Luther agreed. “But unfortunately, they’re family, so you’re shit out of luck.”

Luther went to punch her and she held his fist. I analyzed what she was doing like a Hawk. I couldn’t shoot because that would endanger Luther and I only have six bullets to spare.

“How is this possible?” Luther grunted out.

“Gotta believe in yourself big boy,” Lila mocked as she threw him out of the house. Lila glanced at me but decided she needed to deal with the super family before taking on normal me. I let out a breath as I realized what is going on with her. She’s super, she can use people’s powers against them. I went back to the brick pile and started digging for Five once again.

He can’t be dead, I mean he’s Five. Five the smart mouthed bastard who just couldn’t die. He couldn’t. He won’t. Not under my watch. I found blue in the pile and kept moving bricks. Suddenly Five sat up looking around. He looked at me and looked over my entire, for the most part, unhurt being. I helped move more bricks so it would be easier for him to get up.

“Don’t do that again shit-heel,” I muttered out, once again almost crying.

He brushed a stray tear away, “I’ll try not to.” We walked over to the opening that Luther left.

“Looking for us?” Five asked shrugging his shoulders slightly. I quickly wiped some blood from his lip as she called him a turd. “Let’s dance.”

Five blinked and Lila did too. Shit I didn’t tell him that she has powers too. I ran into the house where they started to fight.

“Five don’t blink!” I shouted but he ignored me as he continued. I fought where I could. Landing a few square punches, her doing the same. She grabbed a pan as Five was still trying to figure out how Lila could do what she could do. Five blinked out of the house, as did Lila and I ran out try and find them. I saw the rest of the Hargreeves out by the red tractor and ran over to them.

“Where’s Five?” Diego asked as I panted.

“I don’t know,” I breathed out. We all decided to go to the barn then, since that could be the only place left. When we got there they were talking about some kill order. Yet all I could focus on was the knife she aimed towards Five. I was about to go in there, or better yet shoot the bitch, but Diego stopped me.

“She never cared about your parents,” I chimed in entering the barn after getting Diego off of me. “She was looking for you. I was also confused on why she came on that mission with us.”

Lila looked back at me, confusion and hurt showed on her face, “Why?”

“Cause you’re one of us,” Diego spoke up behind me, patting my shoulder, glad I didn’t immediately kill her. “The Handler stole you Lila, just like our asshole father took all of us.”

“No,” Lila denied. “It’s not the same thing.”

“You’re right,” Diego agreed. “Because he didn’t have our parents murdered. Listen to me Lila. You were born October 1st, 1989, the same day as all of us.”

“Stay back!” Lila threated as we all were circling her. We backed up defensively as Diego continued to try and calm her down. Luther even joined in to try and gain her trust but she just faked gag.

“All right I tried,” Luther said rolling his eyes.

“You’re right, we have to kill her,” Five said wildly. I can tell all this stress was going to snap him. Yet I kind of agreed with Five, having someone this unstable with those type of powers was dangerous on the loose. Five and I got closer to her but Diego stopped us.

“Five! Hey Five, (y/n)! Stop,” Diego shouted making us look at him. “I got it.” Five stopped and so did I, and once again Diego tried to get her to trust us. She looked at us all and I smiled gently, hoping it would ease her into the right decision. Right as it seem like she was going to agree the world seemed to stop.

Bullets shot into us all and I felt myself gasp as I felt my body become riddled with them. I fell backwards as I continued to gasp for air. My only thought at the moment was Five. I turned my head slowly to look at him and if I could at that moment I would’ve let out a sob. Seeing him riddled with bullets made the pain 10x worse.

I grabbed his hand weakly as my last thought ran through my head, ‘I love you’.

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#tua #the umbrella academy #five #five x reader #five hargreeves #five hargreeves x reader #fivehargreeves #fivehargreevesxreader #tua x reader #x reader #xreader #the umbrella academy x reader #five imagine #five hargreeves imagine

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moro-nokimi · 4 years

Text

March 9, 2010

AN:

TW: Joke about alcohol, death of a loved one, guns, pregnancy, vomiting to be safe, crimes against children.

I got my timeline all fucked up, sorry for that. You'd think that I'd be able to keep track of all that, considering that Raye and Naomi would be the same age as my mother... Whoops.

Yes, they are that couple where Everyone Can See It. See my post about Umi Ga Kikoeru vs. this fic and the relationship dynamic.

ffn.online

Smirnov whistled. “What are you wearing, Misora? Come on, it’s March, and you’re wearing leather?”

“It’s my bike clothes. Give me a moment before you talk my ear off,” Naomi replied. She was surprised that the lack of caffeine and sleep had left her semi-coherent.

“You own a bike?” Sheridan said. “Sounds like you’re more of a rebel than we thought.”

“It’s not rebelling to own a motorcycle, Sheridan. What are you doing in here anyways, Smirnov? Need a hangover remedy?”

“Ha ha, Misora. No, check your work email.”

“If it’s a joke, I’m asking to be reassigned.” She pulled off her jacket and reached for her laptop, then opened her work email.

“Agents Misora, Sheridan, and Smirnov:

You all are being recalled to Washington D.C. I expect to see Agent Misora in the briefing room at 10am sharp on March 12. Plane tickets are being mailed as of now.

Best wishes, Director Mason”

She whistled. “For whatever reason we’re being recalled, it’s probably confidential.” She scrolled down. “It takes an hour to get from here to Narita, light traffic at best. It’s probably best that we get going in an hour.”

“But what would he want with you alone?” Sheridan asked.

“Beats me. But right now, I think we should just get packing and all that.”

“Nope, just you,” Smirnov said. “My stuff’s ready to go.”

“Good to hear. I’ll be a bit. Grab me some breakfast while you’re down there, will you?”

“Sure.”

⁂

“So, who has any ideas as to what Mason’s thinking?” Sheridan asked as they boarded. Naomi hit her on the forearm. “Keep quiet. For all they know, we’re just a bunch of tourists visiting. We can discuss this later.”

“It’s technically later right now,” Smirnov said. “So, anyways--hey!”

“Pay attention to what I said. If someone who has access to Kira knows that the FBI is--was--in Japan, then all of us are at risk. Which means the both of you need to shut up until we’re in the car with Mason.”

“I was only joking around! You didn’t have to hit me that hard!”

“Even a joke can get someone hurt. The both of you should know better by now.”

“All right, all right.” Smirnov huffed.

Naomi Misora has never had the habit of sleeping on flights. As her colleagues dozed, she stayed wide awake.

Sometimes, I wonder what would’ve happened if we hadn’t met, she thought.

“Naomi, please, don’t you want to start a family someday?” Audrey said.

“Sure, but on my own time. I’m not unfulfilled--I’ve got a great job,” Naomi replied.

“But no boyfriend.”

“Oh, look at that, I’m choosing not to date a man, the world is ending. I’ve got nothing to lose by not dating.”

“You can say that when you’re 40 and don’t have any kids.”

“More reason to spoil yours, right?”

“Do I really need that much help, Director? The both of us know that I’m perfectly good at my job alone,” Naomi contested.

“Sure, but you’re lacking in base knowledge of firearms--which Agent Penber has,” Director Mason said.

“While that’s nice, Director Mason, I don’t need the help.”

“You can say that when you can’t ID the gun or caliber at a crime scene,” Raye said. They were friends in the academy, but apparently the fact he knew he was useful had inflated his ego to the size of Jupiter.

And there she was, at the stalemate. Either she accepted the help and continued on her job, or she continued to go the route of arrogance and end up crawling back to him. Fine.

“Fine,” she said, jerking her head outside of the Director’s office door. “Come on, jagoff, I’ll show you the ropes.”

“I’m not a rookie. I joined when I was 23,” he said, as she walked him to the unit’s office.

“I'm aware of that, you dork. You haven’t worked in this unit, so you’re a rookie. Jesus, you're 24 right?”

“25 in a month. Shouldn't you know this?”

“It's been a while, go easy. And it's nice to know.” She stopped at her desk and pulled up photos from the latest crime scene--exhibit B showed at least a clip of bullets. “Show me what you know.”

“Excuse me?” he said, both eyebrows raised.

“I know you're a good agent, but I don't know about you as a firearms specialist.”

He narrowed his eyes and leaned over the desk, clicking through to the body and then back to exhibit B. “That’s at least a clip of a 10 millimeter Auto.”

“Stats?”

“Six inch barrel, an average of 546 foot-pounds per square inch of energy. Velocity. This cartridge was used in the Miami shootout seven--dammit, eight--years ago. After that, the FBI issued new cartridges--this one--to each agent in Hostage Rescue and Special Weapons and Tactics teams.”

“So you could easily say that this person has connections to the FBI. At least, these specific branches.”

“Mhm. Against something like a .40 Smith and Wesson, the .40 has better recoil, and it’s better for both civilian and law enforcement use. Not for the 10 millimeter, though.” He stood straight. “What's that tell you?”

“I think you’ve given us a new lead. Don’t go letting that get to your head, though.”

“You’re letting it go to your head,” she said.

“I am not!” Raye replied. “Okay, maybe a little, but still.”

“Either way, it’s going to your head. Call in the interrogation team for me, I’m gonna go grab lunch.”

“Hey! I’m not your errand boy!”

“Sure, but you’re still doing your job. I’ll be back in five minutes.”

“I better get something,” he said.

“I’ll see about that. You're not very imposing, you know.”

She returned five minutes later indeed. “So, what’s going on right now?”

“He did actually have a connection to the FBI--cousin, I think. Poor dude’s probably agonizing over it. Where’s my food?”

“In the breakroom. You can tell me more when you get back.”

“You could’ve at least brought it back.”

“I already tried, but I couldn't balance anything for shit. And I could eat a whole person.”

He sighed through his nose. “Dahmer. I’ll be back.”

She shook her head. "The one time my coffee takes precedence and you compare me to a serial killer."

"Oh, does it suck?" he asked. He smiled and she felt like she got punched in the chest.

She blinked as the plane landed. “Wake up, we just touched down,” she said.

Sheridan groaned. “Have you been awake this whole time? Dude.”

“It’s not like I haven’t stayed up over a day before. Wake up Smirnov for me while I grab our luggage.”

“I never pegged you for the guy who liked to cook,” Naomi said, leaning on the doorframe.

“My mom made sure,” Raye replied. “As for my dad, he just taught me the German and Russian stuff. And I’m a tad sick of takeout.”

“I can’t say I blame you for that. I gotta give a high five to your mom, though, you’re a stubborn bastard.”

“Hey! First of all,” he said, pointing the tongs like a weapon, “I took to it rather nicely. And second of all, I resent that statement.”

“You can take it. What are you making anyways?”

“Spaghetti. Not what you expected, hm?”

“Not really.”

“I won’t introduce you to the German and Russian stuff yet. Kinda heavy, if you catch my drift. Our favorite food is potato. Wait, no it isn’t. Either way. Do you wanna help?”

“Nah, I’m good.” She hopped up onto the counter anyways. "But tell me you can make Japanese."

“Oh, so you’ll stay around and potentially get in the way but not help? Tch. I see how it is. And of course I can, what kinda mother do you take mine to be?”

“Hey, I could’ve just left, but I decided to grace you with my presence. And I don't know her, dork.”

"Watch it, I might take that as flattery."

"Get a room already!" Suruga said.

"Shut up!" they shouted.

“Naomi?” Sheridan said, snapping her fingers inches from Naomi’s nose. “Dude.”

“Sorry, I spaced out for a second.” She pulled Sheridan’s luggage down and handed it to her, then Smirnov’s, and then her own.

“Yeah, lack of sleep does that to you.”

She inhaled. “Come on.”

⁂

“Glad to see you, Director,” Naomi said. “Is this a matter you can discuss as we ride to HQ?”

“And you as well, Misora. Unfortunately, I cannot. This is to stay confidential, between the people I summoned, so Sheridan and Smirnov cannot hear as well.”

“Understood.” The ride lapsed into silence. She said, “Is it related to Kira?”

“Yes.”

She settled into her seat, desperately trying to keep her eyes open until she got into her hotel room.

“I see some familiar faces,” Director Mason tried.

March 12, 2010

Naomi wiped her hands on her slacks as the door clicked closed. She could count at least ten people.

Immediately, whispers started.

“No, kid, he doesn’t mean you,” a blonde woman said to her colleague. She rolled her eyes.

“The Bureau handed me over to the Agency, you know,” her colleague replied. “And he knows my dad. Of course he means me and a handful of other people.”

“Sometimes, I wish I didn’t know your tragic backstory.”

Mason cleared his throat and stepped aside to reveal…

A teenager. Playing with robots.

“This is N. He’s L’s successor. The both of us hand selected all of you for your respective skills, from both the CIA and FBI. This is the organisation known as the Special Provision for Kira.”

“And what if we don’t believe that?” one man said, crossing his arms.

“Tucker,” Naomi said, “don’t be stupid. What reason would Mason have to lie about that? Use your head.”

“After the original L died, he was replaced,” the teenager said. “The L that we all know of is a front put up by the Japanese Task Force.”

I wish I could be surprised, she thought. Their styles are too different.

“Fine, fine, I believe you,” Tucker said.

She shook her head.

“As you were saying, N?” she said.

“Thank you. As you all know, the Kira case first appeared in 2003--six years ago. I trust that you all know the basics of how Kira first appeared and what his MO was.” N pulled up his--Gundam?--transformer and using it as a puppet, and said, “But, as the case progressed, Kira had went on a two week hiatus. Then, all of a sudden, it was white collar criminals that were being killed in addition to the typical criminals. The MO had changed.”

“So then the weapon changed hands,” Naomi said.

“Correct. Then, after roughly five months, Kyosuke Higuchi--the Kira behind the crimes--had dropped dead after a car chase that brought down even my predecessor, who was famous for having never shown his face. The killings stop for one week. Then, they pick up again. The MO had changed--back to the original MO, but then murdering bank robbers and the like. The weapon had changed hands again.

“The day after the killings resumed, my predecessor had died, and was replaced by the Japanese Task Force, who did not want to cause alarm.”

“So can we assume that Kira had accomplices?” the blonde woman asked.

“Indeed. If you all remember, there was the Sakura TV incident.”

“What happened?” McEnroe asked.

“The Second Kira had made a broadcast on Sakura TV, which is known to be your typical yellow journalism hotspot in Japan,” Naomi informed him. “She held the entire station hostage, and called out to the original Kira.”

“She?”

“Women’s speech patterns vary from men’s. I don’t remember how, but it’s rather different. Where do we go from here, N?”

“That’s a good question, Naomi Misora. From here, we’ll be moving to headquarters in New York, downtown Manhattan. I’ll probably get into contact with the Japanese Task Force, and then we can share information back and forth.”

Somehow, she didn’t think that he was telling them the whole thing.

“Meeting adjourned,” Mason said.

Sheridan and Smirnov were waiting outside the door, and ambushed her just as soon as she got out.

“So, what was all that about?” Smirnov asked, one arm around her shoulder.

“Get off of me,” she said. “It’s confidential for a reason.”

“Aw, come on! It’s not as if you’re a civilian.”

“It’s still confidential, Smirnov. I’ll hear none of it.” She ducked under Smirnov and Sheridan, and said, “I’m going to ask the Director about possible arrangements for my apartment and… other things.”

“Of course. Don’t keep us waiting!” Sheridan called.

She scoffed and rolled her eyes. “Director, a word?”

“Of course,” Director Mason said.

“I’m going to have some issues moving my things across country. See, my apartment is in Los Angeles--my--” she swallowed and forced herself to say it, “Raye’s brother is currently staying there, and I need a couple days to transfer the lease and move all of my things out, as well as make arrangements for therapy and the like.”

“Take as much time as you need. The building won’t officially be finished for another couple months. September, at least.”

“Oh, that’s later than I thought. Well then. Thank you for answering. I’m going to go and arrange a flight.”

She walked out of the building, and narrowed her eyes at Dunleavy asking a civilian for her phone. She made note of it and climbed into her car. She’d barely buckled when she almost backed into someone.

“You know, it’s usually considered good form to check your mirrors,” the blonde woman from earlier said.

“Sorry about that. I haven’t had much sleep,” Naomi said, after pausing for a second. Wow, she is… really pretty.

“Mhm." Halle nodded. "I look forward to it. You’re a legend.” Halle smiled.

She leaned onto the wheel and said, “I don’t know about legend. Though, I don’t think this organization needs one.”

Well done, Naomi, already venting to a woman you don’t know. Scratch that, barely know.

“You’re not known as one for no reason, Misora. I’ll see you around.”

Naomi nodded, and made sure to check her mirrors before backing out this time. She fell face first onto her hotel bed with a sigh.

“Totally blew that,” she muttered, peeling off her jacket. Her phone buzzed. “What’s up, Adrian?”

“Nothing much. Sorry that it’s taken me so long to call. I’d wish you a happy late birthday, but…”

“It’s bad luck. I know the superstition. Sorry, you were saying?”

“Anyways, I just wanted to ask, since this apartment’s lease is coming up, are you going to renew it?”

She swore. “When is that?”

“The 27th.”

“Gotcha. I’m going to renew it. By the way, you and your wife are going to need to move out sometime--I’m heading back to LA. I can stay with your parents for a while, but I’ll need to get back into my apartment before I lose my mind.”

“Naomi! Why do you never tell us these things…”

“I’m in DC right now, actually. I hadn’t learned that I was going to be coming back to DC until the ninth, so I couldn’t have told you and your family.”

“That’s fair. And confidentiality laws. Anyways, when are you going to head back here?”

“A day or so.”

“That’s not a lot of time to pack.”

“You won’t have to, not for a while. I’ll transfer the lease over before I leave, and then you and your wife will officially be renting it, not me. That’s when I have to move to New York.”

Adrian whistled. “You sure do move around a lot. Though, I remember Raye did that too. Comes with the job, I suppose.”

“Yeah,” she said. Somehow, it didn’t hurt as much when he says it.

“Where in New York, out of curiosity?”

“The Big Apple, actually.”

“You’re shitting me.”

“I am not. How’s your wife doing?”

“She’s all right. End of the seventh month--officially at 28 weeks, now. Are you planning on being the gay, spinster aunt?”

“Bye, Adrian.”

⁂

“I’m sorry mom and dad couldn’t make it. They’d love to see you,” Michael said. Naomi climbed into the car. “And, of course, Adrian and Laney are in the same boat.”

“What’s going on with Laney?”

“Morning sickness is back and worse than ever.”

She winced, though she had yet to experience that. All plans of it had went out the window when he died. She pursed her lips and forced all thought of Raye from her mind.

“Yeah, after her bout with HG the first time… Anyways, I heard you had to move to the Big Apple for work. Tell us how it is.”

“Providing I can get a chance alone, ha.”

“Trying to remain busy?”

“Busy as I can get, yeah.”

He tapped out the beat to the lyrics of All Apologies. “It’s weird to realise that you’re outliving your oldest brother.”

She smiled wryly. “I was all of six weeks younger than him. It’s weird to think I wouldn’t have died six weeks after.”

Michael was silent. The only resemblance that him and Raye bore was the cut of their eyes and their stature. Beyond that, it was hard to tell they were brothers at all.

“Naomi… You are in counseling, right?”

“I’m not suicidal.”

Scratch that. Same personality.

“You’re depressed, at best.”

Raye scowled. “I don’t like this guy.”

“Then kick the damn door down and let’s be done with this,” Suruga replied.

Even a glance at his face, cool but barely restrained anger boiling beneath the surface, could’ve told you his thoughts. He braced himself against the brick a la Rorschach in The Watchmen, and with one quick, almost stablike jam of his heel by the doorknob, it burst wide open. The children in the house recoiled from the door.

“Oh, Jesus,” Gardner muttered. “Raye, go upstairs with Naomi and search the house.”

Gardner's knees popped as he knelt to talk to the kids. Naomi cast an anxious glance behind her and followed Raye up the stairs. He was muttering darkly under his breath, about what he’d do to the guy if he weren’t with the FBI.

“Don’t beat the dead horse here,” she muttered, not intending the pun of the perp’s display name on the dark web.

“It won’t be a dead horse until he’s dead or in prison forever,” he replied. The clack of the slide being jerked back punctuated the statement. If he did do something rash, she wasn't keen on holding him back.

“Yoohoo, Naomi? Anyone home?”

She blinked. “Sorry.”

“He is the worst kind of person, and I’m not even a little sorry about saying that. Making snuff films of children,” Raye muttered, rubbing his temples.

“Agreed. Children are the one thing you should have restraint on,” Suruga said. “But at least we're not talking, like. Fetal abduction.”

Always the optimist.

"Dude, don't. I'm already sick to my stomach." (And he was looking a little on the green side.) The ME passed him a can of flat ginger ale.

“It just, uh… reminded me of a joke I made. By accident.”

Michael shrugged. “All right.”

⁂

“So, how long are you going to be in California?” Nana asked.

“With the rent as is? Good luck,” Michael said.

“Oh, I know, it’s horrific. Luckily I make a decent amount of money each month, so I can make rent. And if I can’t, then I have lots of money in savings.”

“Or you could board with someone.”

She shrugged. “Maybe. Once we get to know each other I can ask. I wouldn’t feel comfortable encroaching on a stranger’s space.”

#tw alcohol #tw death of a loved one #tw guns #tw pregnancy #tw emetophobia #tw crimes against children #vd.writing #long post #the entirely italicized parts are flashbacks #naomi has a lot of those. i love one traumatized lady <3

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laytonsartblog · 5 years

Text

How To Solve Everything

Little Spaces - Ch.2

Ch.1, Ch.2, Ch.3

Warning: This story contains violence, gun related violence, gang related violence, starvation, hypothermia, dysfunctional family themes, dysfunctional domestic themes, poverty, and homophobia/transphobia. Read with caution and at a good time for you. Take care of yourself.

Logan has a schedule he dedicates his life to.

First, to wake up at five am.

Next, is to get in the shower without a bucket. Why without a bucket? Because he's damn rich.

Y'see, when you're one of the most successful people in the country of Loríses, running a multi-billion dollar corporation on affordable apartment living and clean energy resources and steady bank loan agreements, well... you can afford some time.

That, and clean water.

Once that's all done and good, Logan likes to relax and have a nice breakfast in his humble top-apartment as he watches the news from the table.

The time didn't really matter when he woke up or finished eating because he never booked (or more accurately put, was forced to book) a meeting or council accommodation or ribbon cutting or something before eleven am.

Breakfast was his only sanctity; he made sure to have plenty of it.

With the news and breakfast over, Logan would head out to work with his classic polo and tie with a briefcase in hand, then spend about eight hours basically running around heading between business meetings and stock readings and introductory openings and apartment gatherings and- well, you get the picture.

Without a hitch, Logan'd get home at around seven-thirty pm, have some sort of dinner out with colleagues he really didn't care for, and get home to either sleep or do his favorite kind of work; charity work.

In the charity work's case?; he wouldn't get a wink of rest.

Today, Logan woke up like he would any other day, perhaps a little later than he thought he would, but that was due to his one am adoption centre charity bidding auction last night.

When he went to check his phone for any messages from his secretary for the day, he found only two from the uptight woman:

You have the day off, Mr.Corbett.

Have a nice day.

Logan looked on in confusion.

I have the day off? Why? he texted back.

His secretary immediately responded with a simple,You haven't used your vacation days at all for the past year, Mr.Corbett. If you don't use them by the end of September, you lose them. I took liberty of letting you off for the next week.

Logan was about to fight back and tell her he's coming into work anyway, but he found she's a bit faster with her hands.

You need it, Logan.

Go visit that old lady down the street, in the bookshop. Her name is Mrs.Tamry. She's my mother's sister and owns the place. She could use some company today.

Logan groaned. He wasn't moving the stubborn woman and that meant he actually had to take care of himself. Woe is he.

Logan grumpily put the phone to his bedside table before face-planting onto his bed. He groaned some more, kicking his feet and punching his hands into the pillows. Perhaps childish, yes, but Logan was never really raised to do much else than work. He didn't know what else to do.

Logan remembered the Mrs.Tamry from his secretary's messages a few minutes after his tantrum and sighed as he flipped over on the bed, rolling out of it.

After a shower he went over to his closet and picked out something a little more casual- a flannel and finer jeans -before stuffing down some toast to head to this bookowner.

Logan would admit that the bookstore part of the old woman was interesting; he's loved being read to and reading stories ever since he could recount the ABC's. It was one of the few pastimes he could be shown doing in public: his public advisor had once told him it made him look both gentle and intelligent, and the ladies would love it. Logan had just told him that he didn't care about the ladies and continued on his way to his office.

Logan finally made his way to the shop. He rolled his eyes at the name: "Book-Ends and Seller's Beggining." It was charming, if not a little corny, and Logan wasn't sure if this was really worth his time, but then he saw the little old lady through the glass sitting by her lonesome and let out a breath of air.

Dammit. Why do I have to feel so guilty?

Logan pushed his way through the tall glass doors and looked his way around, noticing the high bookshelves and neat working stations. It seemed grandma kept up with the times as Logan noticed a small table with a few charging stations attached to it, and a couple of teens doing their homework while plugging their phones in nearby. A stack of laps for rent stood on a shelf near the station.

Logan heard the old woman laugh hoarsely behind him.

"Well, now I wasn't expecting such a dashing young man in my shop so early in the morning!" Mrs.Tamry teased, still laughing. She got up from her weaved rocking chair and instead shuffled her way over to a flustered Logan. "Got some good bone structure- although the hair could use some work. A working man, hmm?"

Logan stammered at the guiding, touching hands and expert eye. "Yes ma'am, I- I am a businessman," he squeaked out.

Logan was used to just saying nothing while out in public, or worse, hosting everything and never getting a break. Having this conversation, if not an awkward one, made him sweat bullets. It was unknown territory.

"A businessman, huh?" Mrs.Tamry sang. She looked him over a few more times, noting the sweaty palms and pale face, before hollaring over to the kids in the corner, "Does this man look familiar?"

The three in the corner; a smaller, but colorful child, a tall but scraggly young fellow, and a boy with a star for his shirt all turned their heads.

The colorful kid snickered. "Nah, he looks too nervous to be any big shot I've heard of," they chided.

"Yeah, and what would he be doing here of all places if he was?" the scraggly lad questioned.

"Hey, knock it off!" the boy in the star shirt huffed. "The guy's probably super sweet and here to pick something up for his wife where they'll read fairytales to their kids and it'll be really damn cute!"

The colorful child started laughing hard; so hard, in fact, that they started tearing up. The scraggly kid did the same. The star boy just crossed his arms, looking to Logan with a much more innocent view.

Logan was sweating so profusely he was afraid he was going to faint. Mrs.Tamry just watched with a crooked smile at their imaginations.

"I am right, huh? You're just a nice guy!" the star boy asked, leaning in. The other two troublemakers got themselves together enough to lean in too, giggling.

"Yeah, tell us! Who are you?"

Logan couldn't stop himself before he even knew what his brain and mouth were going to say.

"I-I'm gay."

Well that was certainly new.

Logan realized what he said and covered his mouth with his hand, shock covering his entire face. Oh now you've done it, he roared at himself, you've told three kids and an old lady you're a disgusting pansy!

But the yelling and the chastising and the kicking-him-out-of-the-store never came. The other children looked to him in absolute glee, and the old woman just snickered.

"So what, dude? I'm like... mega gay too," the boy in the star shirt joked. He easily smiled at Logan.

Logan couldn't tell if he was being encouraged, or if he was doing the encouraging to the boy.

The other two children looked between eachother before looking to Logan. "We're non-binary. We use they/them pronouns. Could you please use them?"

Logan just barely managed a nod, his nerves in overdrive. He just outed himself and now these brave kids were coming out to him too? It was a hell of a thing to wrap around his brain. "O-Of course I will," he managed through chattering teeth.

Logan turned to the old woman last. He expected her to throw him out at first, but now he realized that she knew all this time. Now he looked to Mrs.Tamry in fear. The fact she could figure something like that out so quick was something Logan wasn't prepared to deal with, shock after shock being ran into him in the past ten minutes.

"Young man, you realize that this establishment has a 'We Accept You' sticker on the front, right?" she giggled, patting his shoulder despite him being a tree and her a stump.

Logan looked back to the glass and saw a mirrored version of that sticker on the door; clear as day.

Logan slumped his shoulders. "Oh."

Mrs.Tamry took his shoulders and guided Logan over to a seat, sitting in the one next to him with a sigh. "Ooh, that feels much better on my back."

Logan just stared at her, sweating and shaking and why had I not fought my secretary on letting me work-

Mrs.Tamry clasped a hand on top of his fussing one and smiled gently. The wild side of her had been turned down, and now something much more sweet laid itself out to the scatterbrained gay.

Logan felt himself calm down just a little.

"Now now, I've been told by my niece that her boss was coming in today to spend his day off. I'm to assume that's you, right?" she gently asked. The hand on Logan's softly rubbed it's thumb against Logan's knuckles.

Logan calmed down just a little more.

His tongue managed to unstick itself from the roof of his mouth enough to let out a small, "yes."

He didn't know why he was so freaked. Usually when he got this nervous he'd just bury it down like he had been for the past thirty something years but in this place, it felt like no matter how hard he tried, he was forced to feel everything he was feeling. Logan did not like it.

Mrs.Tamry sighed and used her other hand to tap a gentle rhythm in Logan's arm, giving him something to hold on to.

"Y'know, I didn't expect such a good man like you to be holding back so much fear. I could feel it as you stepped through that door," Mrs.Tamry commented, trying to make small talk.

Logan avoided her eyes. "Well, I haven't got much of a place to let it out."

Mrs.Tamry kept the rhythm on his arm while she hummed.

"Well that simply isn't good!" she preached. "Tell you what, if you're feeling so scared and trembling like you are now, you can always come to me, y'hear?"

Logan nodded a little. He could feel himself slowly relax, coming down from being so flustered and flabbergasted.

New places, new conversations- in which he made actual conversations instead of one-sided invites -new people, new ideas, new everything! It made his brain go into overdrive and his nerves alight. Usually he was able to handle it, bury it deep for later, but here? It seemed he couldn't stuff the feelings down.

Maybe it was Mrs.Tamry's wild but motherly approach, or the bookstore's inviting nature, or the teens he talked to earlier, but either way, Logan just sighed.

He was okay. He was safe. He was okay.

Mrs.Tamry pulled Logan up and rubbed his back while she headed him in the direction of the laptops.

"Why don't you do yourself a favor and find a game to play or- or a messaging site to talk to someone!" Mrs.Tamry then giggled cheekily. "It seems you don't have many friends, so now's a time to start!"

Logan took a seat next to the three teens with an awkward smile and a wave as he opened up the laptop. It was a little out of style, but it seemed fine enough as Logan booted it up.

"We never got your name, sir," the star boy asked politely while Logan logged in.

"Yeah! Like for example I'm Joan and that's Talyn, and he's Thomas, so now you know us!" the newly named Joan called out, tipping their beanie like a celebrity.

Talyn nodded along, playing with their colorful hair. "Homework is getting boring, we wanna know you!"

Logan turned to the three kids with a reserved smile as he signed up for a messenger site called GetAlong.

"My name is Logan Corbett."

Taglist

@amazable01 @vara-albion @sonicrainicorn @artist-of-the-moon @sparkedawg @unnipanda623 @kiibo57415 @anxious-sunflowe @thatonenerdphotographer @romanthestarstruckqueer @angels-and-dreams @midokiya @nedandn30 @chaosboitm @felicianoromano @supersoftsupersleep @icequeenoriginal

#sanders sides #sanders sides fanart #logan sanders #economic crisis au #economical dystopian #economic crisis #dystopia #dystopian #homophobia #tw homophobia

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danfanciesphil · 5 years

Text

too high (can’t come down) by @danfanciesphil

Suspending himself 7,000 feet above the rest of the world seems likely to be a sure-fire way for Dan to escape normality, and isolate himself for the foreseeable future. The Secret of the Alps, a small hotel tucked into the side of the Swiss mountains is too niche for most avid adventurers to have heard of, making it the perfect place for Dan to work as he sorts through his problems. Unfortunately, privacy is a coveted thing, and as Dan soon finds out, the hotel harbours one guest who values it more than most.

Rating: Explicit Tags: Enemies to lovers, snow, mountains, skiing, hostility, slow burn, secrecy, longing, repression, nobility, classism, cheating, eventual sex

Ao3 Link

Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen Chapter Seventeen Chapter Eighteen Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty (Final Chapter!) *NSFW*

[Three Months Later]

‘...on Friday, Philip Lester (formerly Novokoric) spoke at the Refuge Centre for Domestic Abuse Victims, where he opened up about his own experience with emotional marital abuse. Since his scandalous divorce from Sir Nikolai Novokoric of Switzerland, Lester has become a dedicated philanthropist, using his notoriety which arose during the controversial coverage of the split to spread awareness about domestic abuse, LGBTQ+ discrimination, homelessness, poverty, and many other important global issues. This Tuesday, Lester is expected to appear at the United Nations conference to discuss Third World Poverty…’

The folding seat beside Dan’s is wrenched down, and a young woman with badly-dyed pink hair plops into it, holding a Starbucks cup and an Urban Outfitters tote bag stuffed with books and papers. Dan lowers the lid of his laptop to shift some of his stuff out of the way of her feet.

“Is it just me or does it get more rammed in here every week?” the girl says. Dan stares at her in mild dismay; usually he projects such a cold, unfriendly aura that nobody dares sit within two seats of him. He’s seen this girl in a few classes before, but he can only barely remember her name. It’s something like Ramona, or Rowena... Or maybe it’s neither. She turns to Dan, brandishing a strong, confident smile. “I’m Roshina.” Ah. Neither. “You’re Dan, right? The guy who dropped out and then... dropped in again.”

She tips her head back and cackles for a second, then begins pulling various things out of the tote bag. Dan grimaces, staring at the little cacti prints decorating the bag. What is it with hipster girls and succulents?

Whilst he’s not thrilled that he’s apparently earned a reputation amongst the student body as the notorious failed quitter, he hasn’t the energy to challenge her on it.

“Guess so,” he replies in a mutter.

He opens his laptop again, hoping it might signal to her that he’s busy, and not up for a conversation. Of course, every line of the article is like having someone plunge a fresh, thin needle into his chest, slowly stitching the word ‘fool’ into his skin. But his need for information about Phil is as urgent as his need for water. He can’t look away.

“Ooh, I love that guy,” Roshina says, leaning in towards Dan to read the article as well. She leans her elbow on the back of his seat, the coffee in her hand hovering close to Dan’s nose; it’s something chai-spiced. Dan recoils as subtly as he can, pressing himself into the opposite edge of the chair.

The article includes a photo of Phil behind a podium, his glasses on, wearing an impassioned expression, mouth open halfway through some dramatic statement or other.

“If I were as famous as him and I’d just, like, lost my hot rich husband,” Roshina says, loudly, right into Dan’s ear, “I’d have no shame. I’d be applying to Big Brother or Love Island. Just shows there are some blokes willing to do the decent thing after all!”

Dan cannot imagine why Roshina thinks he’d care what she might hypothetically get up to in her fantasy version of Phil’s life. He imagines Phil sneering at this girl’s audacity, saying something snippy and derisive like: ‘And if I were as vapid as you, I’d perhaps rethink my decision to pursue a career in the legal field, as it’s highly unlikely anyone’s going to hire a solicitor with bubblegum pink hair.’ It makes Dan smile, just a bit, and then in the next second, he’s back to being a bitter old maid.

“I wouldn’t give him too much credit,” Dan grumbles, eyes stuck to the photo of Phil, spewing some boring line about domestic abuse like he didn’t need to be practically dragged to his own divorce settlement by the cuff of his ear. “He’s probably getting a buttload for all these appearances.”

She snorts at him, rather loudly and obnoxiously considering this is, as far as Dan remembers, their first conversation. “Don’t you read Perez Hilton? He keeps zilch. All profits from his public appearances go to the charity he’s promoting at the time.”

Dan throat suddenly feels very dry. All profits? What’s he living on? He scrolls down the page a bit more; Roshina jabs at his screen suddenly with a short, green fingernail. She’s pointing to another article advertised at the side of this one, with the headline: ‘Give and Thou Shalt Receive: Phil Lester spotted with Possible New Man’.

“Click that one!” Roshina squeals excitedly. “It was just posted!”

Dan is about to tell Roshina in a clipped, irritable tone that he would rather pick up her fluffy pen and drive it into his eye, but she’s already batting his hand away, apparently oblivious to social etiquette. He’s trapped in his seat, forced to watch as she clicks the baiting link. A photo pops up at once, taken through an open car door, of Phil crammed into the back seat with Martyn and a ‘mystery’ person. Except it’s not a mystery-person. Not to Dan, and not to the author of this article, who has, to their credit, obviously done their homework.

Dan shifts uncomfortably as Roshina laps up the photo, eyes round and gleaming. He feels nauseous, and the smell wafting from her latte is not helping. Not that anything helps the sickness that sits at the bottom of his belly perpetually nowadays. Ever since he re-enrolled, courtesy of his doting and quietly ecstatic parents, Dan has been off food, off socialising, off anything much except sitting in his room scrolling through the endless media cycle of Phil-related articles.

“Says here this dude used to be Nikolai’s photographer!” Roshina exclaims. Dan says nothing. He doesn’t want to entertain speculative notions that just because PJ, who used to work for Nikolai, has been papped in Phil’s proximity, that it means they’re dating. Even the idea of it has Dan gripping the hard plastic of his armrest to staunch his wave of paranoia. “PJ Ligouri is a UK-based photographer that jumped ship from Nikolai’s press team alongside his former PA Cornelia Dahlgren. The latter is currently dating Martyn Lester, Phil’s older brother. Suspicions of PJ’s involvement with the younger Lester were first aroused when he was noticed photographing Phil’s appearance at last month’s Climate Change Festival-”

Dan slams the lid of the laptop closed so suddenly that Roshina squeaks, yanking her fingers away just in time. “Battery’s low,” he mutters, folding his arms across his chest. He sinks down in his seat, intending to stay that way until the lecture starts, letting the white noise of Roshina’s indignant voice keep his intrusive and unpleasant thoughts of Phil and PJ, and all the things they might be doing, at bay.

“Hey,” Martyn says, “it’s Corn for you. She wants a private word.”

Phil frowns, not looking up. “Tell her I’m the wrong brother to call for that sort of thing.”

“She says it’s pretty serious,” Martyn says, ignoring him.

Phil lets out a frustrated sigh, letting the open file he’s been reading fall to the couch cushion beside him. The Red Cross have sent him a buttload of information that he needs to know inside out before his address at the United Nations conference later today. He’s been back and forth with the Red Cross for weeks through phone calls and emails trying to get up to speed, but there’s so much to know in such a short space of time. He has to look like he’s dedicated to this project, and he is, but the UN invited him last minute - he hasn’t had a lot of time to prepare.

He’ll have even less time if Cornelia keeps pestering him about schedules and meetings or whatever this is about. Of course, despite her constant bothering, Phil would lick the soles of her comfortable-but-cool sneakers to keep her around. She’s a scarily good Press Agent, Phil has no idea how Martyn ever took her on back when they were rivals. They work much better as a team, sharing the role for Phil on a voluntary basis, whilst working a few other part-time jobs.

“Something about a girl with blue hair?” Martyn prompts, and Phil’s heart skips.

“Hand it over.”

“Say please to your big brother,” PJ scolds from the other end of the couch, though he doesn’t look away from his phone screen, which he’s been Skyping his girlfriend on for the past half hour. He angles the phone at Phil, pulling his headphones out of the jack; Sophie’s round, sweet face fills the screen. “Soph, tell him to use his manners. You’re a lady.”

“Use manners,” Sophie says, then pulls up her nostrils to look like a snout. “But I’m no lady.”

Phil smiles at her, but his heart is pounding too violently to give her a proper response. He holds his hand out for the phone in Martyn’s hand instead. PJ plugs his headphones back in, voice lowering.

“Hey, Corn,” Phil says as soon as the phone is against his ear. “What’s up?”

“Hey,” Cornelia says, then clears her throat. She’s not diving straight in to whatever she has to say, so Phil immediately knows this is a sensitive topic. He stands from the uncomfortable sofa he’s sat on, moving over to the window, as far away from Martyn and PJ as he can get in this tiny room. “So, Mona Kemp just contacted me. You remember her? From The Secret of the Alps hotel.”

Phil rolls his eyes. “Yes, I remember the manager of my prison cell, funnily enough.”

She clears her throat again. “Right. Yeah. Well, apparently they’ve just rented out your suite for the first time since you left.”

Phil waits, but Cornelia seems to need prompting. “Uh huh…”

“And the new guests, um, found something.”

The tiny workers controlling Phil’s brain are suddenly thrown into uproar, frantically combing through his memory for any inkling of what incriminating item he might have left in that godforsaken place. His jaw clenches so hard he can feel a twitch, but he stoically stares through the glass pane to hide his panic from the other people in the room.

“Oh?”

“It was like a… recording device?” Cornelia says, and Phil wishes he could see her in the flesh, read her expression to know how bad it is.

Although they’re both technically in the same building, the United Nations Headquarters are impossibly huge. She’s downstairs somewhere amongst the thousands of behind-the-scenes worker bees, making arrangements with press and security for the conference. It’ll be hours before she finds her way back up to this bare, lifeless green room they’ve been given use of.

His eyes flutter closed, picturing Dan, stood defiantly at the foot of a four-poster bed in his wrongly-buttoned shirt, his soft cheeks pink from exertion, spewing garbled information about a thieving girl with blue hair, and how she’d recorded him arguing on the phone.

“Mona seemed to know who’d put it there somehow, I don’t know,” Cornelia continues in a harried voice. “She said it was the daughter of some family that won a holiday up there. Anyway, obviously this device is a serious breach of privacy, and I’m sure that if you wanted to press charges-”

“What’s on it?”

“Hm?”

Phil pinches the bridge of his nose between his forefinger and thumb, conscious of saying too much in case he alerts Martyn, who is already at maximum stress level, and probably listening right behind him. The seams of Phil’s head are bursting, still crammed with straggles of information about water filtration systems and monthly overseas school supplies. He can’t take this in right now, can’t be bothered to give an annoying fangirl brat with an inflated ego the time of day. And on top of that, he cannot listen to Cornelia pretend she hasn’t already listened to that recording, whatever it is, from start to finish.

“What’s on it, Cornelia? Don’t play dumb.”

There’s a pause; Phil looks over his shoulder and catches Martyn’s eye. He immediately tries to busy himself with meaningless tasks, neatening files and shoving PJ’s lighting equipment into the corner of the room. Phil turns back to the window, shaking his head. Martyn is just as much of a dirty snoop as his fiancé is. They’re made for each other.

At last, Cornelia speaks. She sounds like she’s moved somewhere with less people in the background. “There’s a few. They’re… mostly x-rated.”

A deep, dizzying flush sweeps down Phil’s body, and he feels his mind threatening to fold inwards on itself. Thanks to a herd of mediation and personal response trainers that Nikolai had him spend weeks with years prior, Phil is able to keep himself relatively calm. He breathes in through his nose, out through his mouth, and stays quiet for a minute whilst he thinks of something to say that will help the situation.

“Send the recordings to me,” Phil instructs after a moment. He keeps expecting a sudden surge of anger to well up inside of him - at the blue-haired girl, at Nikolai, at Dan, at himself even - but all that floods through him is a deep, swirling melancholy, dappled with peaks of intense regret. “And for the love of God don’t show anyone else. Especially my brother.”

“Okay, boss.”

“And tell Mona thank you for… being discreet.”

He doesn’t need to check that Mona had quickly and quietly taken the recording device down with a crisp, dismissive explanation to the new guests. He also doesn’t need to check that she hadn’t listened to them herself; Mona is an honest, rule-abiding woman, and would never dream of such a thing. He should send her a fruit basket one day. ...When he can afford fruit baskets again.

“I will,” Cornelia assures him. “What do you want to do about the girl?”

“What girl?”

“The blue-haired girl. She could have really messed things up-”

“Don’t do anything,” Phil says sternly. “She wants attention. Notoriety. Don’t give her any.”

“Got it.”

“Just send me those recordings. Then get rid of any copies you or anyone else has, for God’s sake.” He hesitates. “Perv.”

She giggles. “Sounds to me like you’re the perv, mate. Not sure I’d have let someone blindfold me on the first shag, he must’ve been really into you-”

“Fuck off, Corn,” Phil says tiredly, no venom in his voice, then hangs up.

He goes back to his case files with a weight in his chest. They’re suddenly a lot harder to take in.

The bed Phil currently calls his own is far less luxurious than the one he used to sprawl out in when he was a resident of The Secret of the Alps hotel. It’s barely even a bed, really, as it pulls out from a couch, but Phil never bothers folding it away, as he’s only ever in here to sleep. Sleep is what he should be doing right now, in fact, but there’s no way he could drift off right now, not after hearing what he’s just heard.

Phil stares at the battered play button on the audio player window that’s open on his laptop, which balances on his knee. If he clicks it again, it will be the fifth time he’s heard the final recording Cornelia sent over, which is far too many times to be reasonable. She certainly hadn’t been wrong in her description of the audio. X-rated is possibly even a little demure.

He worries his lower lip between his teeth, hand long ago having reached beneath the covers to ease some of the intense pressure between his legs. He shouldn’t click play again. The other person in this recording is long gone, and his quick exit was more than enough of a message that he doesn’t want to be found. There’s no point in torturing himself with Dan’s ghost. His... incredibly hot ghost. His fingers press more insistently against his crotch.

Just then, an email from Cornelia pings up in the corner of Phil’s screen. He whips his hand away from his pyjama trousers, feeling very weird about doing any such thing whilst his sister-in-law-to-be is contacting him. To distract himself from the urgent pulses of arousal coming from beneath the covers, he clicks the email.

From: Mona Kemp To: Cornelia Dahlgren

Fwd: Phil Lester

Dear Ms Dahlgren,

On my first attempt to send over the recordings, it appears the hotel’s rather dated computer system failed to include this final, rather short one. I’ve attached it in this email. Once I’ve confirmed you have received it, I shall dispose of the recordings altogether.

Please send Mr Lester my sincerest apologies again for the atrocious breach of privacy. I no longer have his contact information, but he is welcome to get in touch with me for a formal apology, and we would be more than happy to compensate him with a free stay whenever he might choose to return.

Sincerely,

Mona Kemp Hotel Manager of The Secret of the Alps

Upon reading the line ‘free stay whenever he might choose to return’, Phil lets out a loud snort. Poor Mona. He’ll never tell her, but he’d have to be dragged back onto that cable car kicking and screaming. Even then, he’d probably beg Kaspar to hurl him out of it before they reached the summit. He’ll see how he feels about another trip up there in a few years, perhaps with time his stint there won’t feel as traumatising.

He clicks the attached recording, readying himself for yet another auditory reminder of his sordid, expletive-riddled, excruciatingly hot fling with Dan. There’s a crackle as it begins playing, and Phil turns up the volume, straining to hear anything more than a few vague rustles. This doesn’t sound like the other recordings. Perhaps the device had just picked up Phil talking in his sleep or something.

And then, he hears Dan’s voice. “Phil?” It’s quiet, but clear as a bell. “Phil.”

Phil sucks in a breath. It’s not that three months have wiped the memory of Dan’s voice from his mind, but when he hears it echo through his eardrums, it’s usually the words he spat in that last argument, when he’d announced he was leaving, as if Phil wouldn’t give a damn. He hasn’t thought of Dan’s softer, sweeter voice in some time. He’d forgotten how Dan could sound, at times, without the strain of lust or fury warping his vocal chords.

Then there comes a muffled ‘thump’, followed by a grunt of pain.

“Wha?” Phil’s voice says.

Phil clicks pause and checks the timestamp for the recording. It reads 02:01am on 14th April. That’s the day Dan left. Early in the morning. How come he can’t remember this?

His heart thuds, coming to the gradual realisation that he’s listening to a conversation he’s never heard before. One he never even knew had taken place. Had Dan come to say goodbye to him after all? Has Phil been living under the impression that Dan had snubbed him, ran off without a word, when really…

Phil sits up straighter, turning the volume up to the highest level. He clicks play again.

“Did you watch the stream of your fave giving his rousing speech at the UN?” Roshina asks as she settles herself into the seat beside Dan’s again.

Silently, Dan begs her to sit literally anywhere else, but her mind is apparently closed to telepathy. He wonders if she’d believe he’s suddenly been struck totally deaf. Unlikely, but it might be worth a try if it meant he didn’t have to talk about Phil again today; he’s only just stopped crying for long enough intervals to make it to class.

“Yeah, uh, think I saw some clips on Twitter,” Dan replies, aiming for the sweet spot between vague and already-up-to-speed.

In truth, he watched it start to finish, at 1am because of the time difference, hunkered over his laptop in bed, tears streaming down his face.

“God, wasn’t he marvellous?” she sighs, hauling a load of books and pens she won’t use out of her tote again. Yes, he was. “He can hold a room for sure. I think it’s ‘cause you can tell he’s passionate about this. ” She grins at him. “Or maybe it’s because of his deep, sexy voice. D’you think?”

Dan stares back at her, wondering if she genuinely expects him to respond with words. “Uh...”

Luckily, she doesn’t seem too bothered about Dan agreeing. She pulls out her phone and begins cycling through her social media apps with the concentration of an atomic physicist. “Oh look,” Roshina exclaims just when Dan thought he might get a moment of peace, “our man is trending.”

Dan digs his fingernails into his palm. Don’t look. Just don’t look. “Can I see?” he asks, hating himself.

She angles her phone at him. There are two hashtags pertaining to Phil. The first is #AmazingPhil. The second is #PhilsUNSpeech. Roshina clicks the first, and scrolls slowly down a timeline of people enthusing about Phil’s fiery yet intelligent speech which he gave at the United Nations headquarters yesterday afternoon, about the poverty crisis in several African countries. He seems to have really knocked it out of the park, judging by the response he’s getting. Dan drinks the raining compliments down greedily, trying to glean, selfish though it may be, what Phil’s mental state might be right now, in reaction to all the sudden attention directed his way. One particular tweet catches his attention.

@nikolaischmikolai: saw #amazingphil at the airport after the conference! such a cool guy, didnt get a selfie cos he was in a hurry to get his flight but he signed my ticket with a Muse quote! #inspiration

Back at the airport, Dan notes. Already jet-setting off to his next glamorous public appearance. It won’t take long until people start throwing money at him for all this ‘charity work’. They’ll give him a Netflix documentary series, or a book deal, or any of the other wank that just gets handed to celebrities.

“Lucky guy, seeing him IRL. I wonder what he’s like in person,” Roshina ponders, scrolling through more tweets.

“An emotionally stunted, obnoxious adrenaline junkie with no filter on the silver spoon stuck in his gob,” Dan mutters, before realising he said that slightly too loud. Roshina is staring at him oddly. He shrugs, pinkening. “I imagine, anyway.”

Thankfully, before Roshina can respond, Professor Warren calls the class to attention, flicking the PowerPoint to the title page, which reads, ‘Marital Dissolution: The Litigation of Separation and Divorce’. The irony is stifling.

Sleep is closing in on Dan from all sides. He’s trying to resist the urge to slip into blissful unconsciousness, but Professor Warren’s baritone voice is making it so difficult to stay alert. His eyelids sag, then shut entirely. It’s just as the waves of promised unconsciousness are beginning to draw him out into that sweet, deep void that the door of the lecture hall opens with its hideous squeak. Dan frowns, inching down further in his uncomfortable chair to try and get away from the noise.

“Excuse me,” a loud, plummy voice calls, interrupting Professor Warren mid-flow. Dan frowns harder; the voice is instantly grating, as if it knows to burrow straight beneath Dan’s skin. It skims along the shores of his half-dream, splashing through the shallows in the distance, but Dan is too far out to be reached. “Is Dan Howell in this class?”

Dan’s eyes snap open.

“Young man, I am in the middle of a lecture!” Professor Warren replies in his gruff, incredulous voice, the one he uses in seminars to pick on students who haven’t done the reading. Dan’s been on the receiving end of this voice rather too often. “I must insist that you wait outside until-”

“I’m sorry, Professor, but this can’t wait,” the voice says, even louder. “Dan Howell? Dan, are you in here?”

A slight Northern tinge is detectable beneath the upper-class overtones. Chills course down Dan’s arms. This cannot be happening. He sneaks a glance at Roshina; her mouth is a round, pink circle, eyes bugged out so far it looks almost cartoonish. He looks left and right, noting that several people are also turning his way, alight with excitable intrigue. It’s no use. He’s going to have to confront this... situation. Dan sits up just enough that he can peer through the shoulders of the people in front of him, to the short flight of stairs that lead up to the lecture hall door.

It’s beyond surreal, to take in the sight of Phil, here, in this dingy light-less hall, looking exactly the same as ever, but somehow startlingly different. He feels as though the image of him has smacked sharply into the back of his head. In the next moment, Dan realises that Roshina has literally smacked him.

“You know him?!” she hisses, incensed. “Why didn’t you say?”

Phil lets out a suffering sigh that makes Dan’s teeth grit together. He’s gazing out across the rows of students as if he were surveying his Kingdom. Dan hunches over, trying to hide. There must be a hundred people in here, thank heavens. Suddenly, Roshina has her green-taloned claw on his upper arm; she hauls him up with surprising strength, though he does his best to struggle free.

“Dan,” Phil calls out a second time to the general room, ignoring the fact that Professor Warren looks to be on the verge of spontaneous combustion, “I kind of know you’re in here. Could you just… I need to talk to you.”

Dan swallows, feeling the back of his neck prickle from how many eyes are on him now. Phil isn’t wearing his glasses; perhaps he’s blinder than Dan assumed he was, as Roshina now has him in a vice grip, ensuring he stays bolt upright in the chair.

“It’s just dawned on me who you are, young man,” Professor Warren says then, cold, “and I’m sure in your world this kind of disruptive behaviour is tolerated. But this is an academic setting, not a press interview. Please leave my lecture. You may speak with whomever you like in an hour.”

“Dan, I know you’re in love with me,” Phil says, with a sweet, butter-wouldn’t-melt smile. “I think we should talk about that, maybe.”

Cheeks furiously flaming, Dan looks down at his folding desk covered in meagre study tools for some kind of murder weapon. The best he has is a laptop charger, which he might be able to fashion into some kind of lasso and choke Phil from afar if he really tried. Stifled snickers erupt behind people’s hands, and practically everyone is staring at him now. With little other option, Dan shoots to his feet, stuffing everything in his bag. He doesn’t give Phil the satisfaction of meeting his eye, but as he’s finally shut his gob, Dan reckons the dickhead has spotted him at last.

Bag slung over one shoulder, Dan forces his way past Roshina’s fishnet-wrapped knees, then past a few other amused students to the aisle. He stalks down the stairs as quickly as possible, head down. He can sense Professor Warren’s disapproving glare on him; this little stunt will not earn him any favours, and he’s already on the Prof’s list of ne’er-do-wells. Once he begins the climb of stairs towards the hall doors, Dan finally lifts his head to aim his icy expression at the infuriating human that has inexplicably decided to saunter in and humiliate Dan like no time at all has passed. The corner of Phil’s mouth is lifted just a tad. Dan had honestly forgotten, what with all the heartache, just how punchable he is.

He says nothing, just grabs Phil by the upper arm and marches him up the remainder of stairs, then through the doors. Once they’re outside the lecture hall, which opens directly onto the main outdoor campus, Dan lets go of Phil like he’s burning, and strides across the tarmac, feeling the burn of mortification stinging him from all sides. Of course it’s raining, Dan thinks as he walks, the scent of rain-soaked concrete misting the air.

It’s not long before he hears footsteps hurrying after him. “Dan, wait!”

Furious, Dan stops in his tracks and whirls around. “What are you doing here?”

Phil comes to an abrupt halt in front of him, eyes round. He blinks at Dan, mouth parted; for a moment, Dan is equally dumbstruck. Seeing him so close, after months of only glimpsing him through a screen, is disconcerting. Was he always this stunning? Did Dan really somehow grow used to the vivid, swirling blue of his eyes?

“I… could ask you the same question,” Phil says after a while.

The annoying non-answer immediately slaps Dan back from gooey-ville. He gives Phil a withering look. “I’m a student here.”

“Thought you dropped out.”

Dan grits his teeth again. How is it that Phil always knows to pick at the very knots Dan doesn’t want to unravel?

“Well, I dropped in again.” He folds his arms across his chest. To his utter dismay, a smattering of the students milling around the campus plaza have begun to look up from their phones and tablets. There’s a lot of pointing and murmuring going on, presumably because ‘Amazing Phil’ has appeared out of the blue to fight with some normie. “Why’d you have to announce to the entire hall that I’m ‘in love’ with you?” Dan demands, pointedly using air quotes to convey the ridiculousness of that concept. “I have to finish out the year with the people in there.”

“Actually, you don’t have to do that.”

“Don’t start.”

“What?”

“Don’t start with the whole ‘you gave up on giving up’ thing. I know, okay? I’m back exactly where I was before we met, hating every aspect of my life. But we can’t all be famous charitable heartthrobs.”

Phil smirks, his lowered eyelashes catching tiny droplets of rain. “Heartthrob?”

“Oh my God,” Dan says, one hand coming to his damp forehead, “what do you want?”

An actual crowd of people is forming around them, seemingly oblivious to the fact they’re all steadily getting soaked. Dan wants rather badly to bolt far away from this spot. But that would mean leaving Phil behind, again, and annoyed though he is, he just can’t wrench himself away a second time, not when he’s only just reappeared. Phil shifts, pulling his smart jacket tighter, eyeing the people gathering around them. Several of them have unsubtly pulled out their phones to film this exchange.

“I had this dream,” Phil says, inexplicably.

“That’s great, Martin Luther King,” Dan says dryly, “I’m sure your doting fans would love to hear all about it, so just look into one of these nice people’s lenses and remember to speak clearly-”

“I had this dream that you crawled into bed with me,” Phil interrupts, continuing as if Dan hadn’t spoken. An eruption of titters spills from their group of onlookers; Dan has to close his eyes and breathe to stop himself from stepping forwards and kicking Phil in the kneecap. “In the middle of the night. And you asked me to give you a reason to stay with me.”

Immediately, the backs of Dan’s eyes strain and ache, pushing tears into his ducts. He wills the rain to fall harder, to disguise his reaction in case he can’t keep the tears from spilling over.

“And in my dream,” Phil continues, “I couldn’t think of a reason. I just thought... you must already know how much I like you. I’d told you so many times that you were constantly on my mind. I’d done stupid, reckless things to be with you for just a few hours. I’d left my husband. But there you were, in my dream, asking me for something more. I couldn’t understand what it was you wanted me to say. I didn’t have anything left. Nothing I could think of that might stop you leaving.”

The rain is soaking through Dan’s t-shirt, sticking it to his skin. He shivers, trying to let the alien words fold into his drizzled, muddy mind.

“It’s too late for this,” Dan points out, toeing the tarmac with the tip of his trainer, watching the light grey slabs slowly pinpricking with dark circles. “And it was just a dream, like you said.”

“I’ve thought of a reason, though.”

Dan’s eyes lift. He wants to say he doesn’t care, that their brief attempt to grasp at the wisp of some connection that sparked between them was doomed from the start. The chance has passed them by - they’re no longer up a mountain with only each other for company, they’re back in the gritty rainy reality of their starkly different lives.

But he also aches, body and soul, to know that reason. The thing Phil never said, that Dan has imagined him saying every day since. God help him, he yearns to hear it more than he yearns for oxygen in his next breath. So he says nothing, lips pressing tight.

“I was really lonely,” Phil says, grimacing as a fat raindrop strikes his pale cheek. “I spent three years in a far off retreat nobody knew about, cut off from everything I’d known. The cold of that place, along with the isolation... I think it seeped into my bones. I just went numb. I forgot how to feel anything.”

Dan looks away, casting his gaze around the people on the periphery of this strange conversation, all of them listening intently, so ready for some dramatic story to add to their social media timeline.

“And then you came,” Phil says, apparently oblivious to the entourage. “Like you’d been flung up the mountain by mistake. You had no more clue why you were there than anyone else. And you were so…” he heaves a sigh, running fingers through damp, dark hair. “So fucking annoying.”

A ripple of laughter goes up around them; Dan chokes out a cough of indignation. “Isn’t this supposed to be a reason you wanted me to stay?”

Phil smiles, showing the barest hint of teeth. “You got on every single one of my nerves. It was like you’d specifically been planted there to piss me off. Everything about you was just… so frustrating.”

Dan cocks a suggestive eyebrow, because it’s decidedly his turn to embarrass Phil after the many things he’s inferred about Dan so far. On camera. “There were occasions where Louise had to pull me aside and cool me off so I wouldn’t beat you with your ski pole. So don’t think it was one-sided.”

“But that’s just it,” Phil says, taking a teensy step closer. Dan’s backpack strap is sodden, and his face is misted with moisture, but he can’t seem to make himself move an inch, because Phil - god damn him - looks fucking incredible all wet, in a Mr Darcy-emerging-from-the-lake sort of way. “You made me feel things again. Sure, most of the feelings were anger and exasperation, but it was still better than the void that was there before.”

“Wow. I don’t know what to say. This is all so romantic,” Dan says scornfully; their audience titters, and Dan feels a small surge of pride that this time they’re laughing with him. “Are you getting to some kind of point?”

“Yeah,” Phil says, laughing. “I was so alone, and I owe you so much.”

Dan snorts, turning on his heel. Enough. “That’s a line from Sherlock, you dick-”

“Hey, I’m fucking about, I can do better,” Phil pleads, grabbing his arm. Dan thinks about pulling away, but he settles for just turning to glare some more, very aware of Phil’s touch, how his warm, wet fingers feel even through the soggy material of his t-shirt. “How about…”

Phil is really close to him now, his deep thinking cutting a crease between his brows. The rain has deflated his quiff, making it stick to his forehead. Somehow, even with a makeshift emo fringe, he looks infinitely radiant. Dan imagines that in comparison, he resembles a drowned rat, his hair frizzed and unattractive, and it’s all being caught on film, which is fantastic. Phil drops his voice to a murmur, presumably so it can’t be picked up by people’s shitty phone mics.

“Arguing with you every day, up in the heavens of fucking nowhere…” Phil shrugs, smiling. “That was the most fun I’ve ever had.”

A droplet spills from Dan’s left eye, and he wipes it away, furious with himself for allowing it to leak out. “Wow,” he chokes out. “You must have been really bored up there.”

Phil nods, eyes trained on Dan’s traitorous smile. “Is that... your way of saying you don’t hate my guts?”

Dan feels himself tense. Phil’s hand is still on his arm, and his thumb strokes gently over the damp skin just below his sleeve. “You know I can’t provide you with, like, champagne or- or um, suites in fancy hotels or…”

He trails off, because he’s allowed himself to look into Phil’s eyes properly for the first time; they really are so many separate shades of blue. There must be dozens of colours in their depths. He’d have a job naming them all.

“I’ll settle for the occasional kiss between battles,” Phil replies.

Dan splutters softly, cheeks warm against the shivering rest of his body. His eyes flit to their audience, several of whom have their hands over their hearts and mouths.

“Not here,” Dan replies, taking a hasty step backwards. “Let’s, uh,” he glances around for a break in the crowd, “let’s go somewhere… less here.”

He turns before Phil can answer, pushing through a throng of camera-faced people, letting Phil find his way to catch up. They get halfway across the campus main square before Phil says coolly, “not to ruin the theatricality of this moment, but where are we going?”

Dan looks at him, then stops in his tracks. Crap. “Y-you can’t come back to mine.” He blushes, fidgeting. “I’m… living with my parents. At the moment.”

“Hmm,” Phil says, dithering. “Not ideal.”

“Where are you staying?”

Phil hesitates, and Dan has to prod him in his damp ribs to make him answer aloud. He sighs eventually. “Susan.”

Dan’s eyebrows shoot towards the rainclouds above them. “Your plane?”

“Yeah. S’all I’ve got to my name right now, pretty much.”

Dan nods, considering this for all of about five seconds. He can already sense that they’re beginning to be followed. Dan grabs Phil by the wrist. “She’ll do.”

Considering what a smooth, relaxed pilot Phil is, Dan is genuinely baffled by how terrifying he is as a driver. Phil has parked Susan on some farmland about two miles from campus; the owner of the plot had recognised Phil’s plane when he’d landed it in the local airport and practically jumped at the chance to offer him a place to stow it - presumably to earn himself some bragging rights for bestowing his hospitality on a semi-celebrity.

This suspiciously good samaritan also gave Phil use of his truck for the day, as the farm is in the middle of nowhere, and Phil needed a way to get to Dan’s university campus. The truck is an old, squeaky thing caked in mud; as far as keeping a low profile goes it does a grand job, but it doesn’t reek of safety. For most of the journey, Dan is clutching the ceiling handle, shrieking whenever another car comes the other way as Phil careers them down narrow country lanes at sixty miles per hour.

Eventually, after Dan has come worryingly close to crapping his pants, they reach the field where Phil’s plane is sat, less shiny than Dan remembers her, but just as intimidating. The rain is easing up, but it’s left the green countryside dripping and muddy; Dan is not particularly looking forward to trekking across the wet grass.

“I’m literally never getting in a car with you again,” Dan states vehemently, legs shaking as he steps out of the truck.

“Wimp,” Phil says dismissively, slamming his door closed. The sound echoes around them, bouncing off the trees that fringe the field. “I’m just a little rusty. There’s less traffic in the sky.”

As his heart settles back into its normal rhythm, Dan shuts his own door and follows Phil across the grass to the plane. Phil presses a button as they approach and a short set of steps protrude in a neat glide from Susan’s door.

“Missed you, babe,” Phil says, hopping onto the first step before it’s completely extended.

Dan blanches, nearly slipping on a patch of wet grass. “Uh, what?”

Phil looks over his shoulder, amusement coating his expression. “I’m talking to Susan.”

“Oh. Yeah. I- I know.”

Phil laughs and ducks inside the plane. Dan looks around at the vast, endless fields that surround them, startlingly green and lush from the burst of rainfall. There’s nothing for miles aside from a tiny farmhouse in the distance; they’re alone together again. It’s a different kind of deserted expanse to the snow-covered mountains, but a familiar sense of isolation hovers in the air.

Susan’s sleek interior has changed since Dan saw it last. For one thing, what little floor space had been at the back of the plane has been largely taken up by a pull-out bed. It’s unmade, the covers rucked and creased, which in the cramped area makes the whole place look messy. Phil shimmies around the bed to a what looks like the counter of a small bar, opening a neat pull-out contraption that reveals a sink. There’s a kettle too, which Phil holds under the faucet.

“Uh, so you live here? Permanently?”

Phil nods.

“Jesus,” Dan mutters, toeing the empty red bull can on the floor near the bed. “Quite the fall from grace. How are you coping without 24-hour maid service?”

“S’not so bad,” Phil says with no apparent hint at insincerity. He kneels on the bed and leans over to grab the red bull can, which he then throws into the bin, rather stylishly. “At least here I’m not in debt to anyone.”

“So you own the plane, then?”

Dan sits gingerly on the bed, mainly because there is nowhere else to sit apart from the two seats in the cockpit, and he can’t even look in that direction without blushing. It seems both long ago and entirely too recent that he was sat there with Phil knelt before him, high above the peaks of the Swiss mountains. He seems to remember, from his last visit, more seating in the back here, but as he studies the bed he’s perched on, he realises that this is the seating, folded out into a small double bed.

“Yeah,” Phil replies, pouring boiling water into mugs. “Nikolai let me have this and the ring.”

Dan’s eyebrows raise. “You’d think he could’ve spared a couple of… million.”

“I’m glad he didn’t, actually. It would’ve detracted from my trustworthiness, I think.”

“You mean about all the charity stuff you’re doing?”

“Exactly,” Phil affirms, lifting both mugs and carefully sitting on the bed beside Dan. He hands one over, and Dan takes it. He doesn’t particularly feel like tea, but then he is wet and slightly chilly from the rain, so it will probably help chase the cold from his bones. “So.”

“So,” Dan echoes.

They lapse into silence, blowing on their scorching drinks. Eventually, Dan abandons his, knowing it will be too hot to drink for some time. He places it carefully on the shelf beside the bed. “I need to ask you something,” Dan says.

“Yes, the theories are right, I am naturally ginger.”

“What?”

Dan shakes his head. “Not... what I was gonna ask. It’s about that dream you mentioned.” He hesitates, heart squeezing tightly. “Did you... remember anything else about it?”

Strangely, Phil shifts away from him. It’s a telling movement, and even though Dan’s not been around him for some time, he’s ninety percent sure that the expression Phil’s features are forming is something like ‘sheepishness’. He squints at the older man as a gut feeling blooms that he’s going to want to throttle him within the next few minutes.

Phil swallows tightly, placing his own mug on the floor. “Well. I don’t really need to, um. Remember.”

“What d’you mean?”

Phil grimaces, seeming wary of Dan’s reaction, then reaches beneath the bed, drawing out a Macbook. “This is Martyn’s old one,” Phil says when he catches Dan’s raised eyebrow. “Nik kept mine.”

A wave of sympathy washes over Dan from head to toe, swiftly followed by a surge of anger for Nikolai Novokoric. Phil opens the Mac and clicks around a bit, then turns to Dan, clear concern dressing his face.

“So, you remember that girl? With the blue hair?”

Ten minutes later, Dan is sat in gobsmacked silence, his own confession of love reverberating through the air. No use denying it now. “That little fucker.”

Phil winces. “Yeah. Well, anyway, Mona and Cornelia destroyed all the copies.”

Dan’s eyes bulge. “Except this one!”

“Well yeah,” Phil says. His mouth twitches, and Dan zeroes in on it. “But… I reckon I’m allowed to have one.”

“Oh, do you?”

“It’s sweet.” Phil nudges him with his elbow. “And, y’know…”

“No, please enlighten me.”

“It’s… pretty hot.”

Dan’s frown deepens. “That’s a strange choice of adjective.”

“Well, maybe not the part where you bear your soul to me in a largely embarrassing midnight confession,” Phil says, so Dan hits him in the arm, “but the other recordings-”

“Other recordings?!”

Phil pauses, caught out. “Oh. Uh, yeah. From what I can gather the recording device began recording any time it picked up noise, so there are a few…”

He trails off, and Dan buries his face in his hands for a few seconds, then takes a deep inhale, straightening up. “Show me.”

“Not sure this is the best time-”

“Phil, that’s a recording of me doing a variety of explicit deeds. Fucking play it to me.”

Phil hesitates, scanning Dan’s face, then shrugs, pulls up a different recording, moves the play bar to the middle, and hits the space key.

“Kiss me,” Dan’s voice says, husky and breathless. “Kiss me and then fuck me.”

Regret, regret, regret- Dan lunges for the laptop, slamming the space bar. Unfortunately, he manages to press another key as well, and a different recording pops up. Before either he or Phil can do anything to stop it, Nikolai’s voice is pouring from the speaker.

“...my God, don’t tell me you actually top in this-”

Phil slams the lid of his laptop shut smartly, two pink spots appearing on his high cheeks. “I’ll delete these, I think.”

Dan’s fingers push into his temple, massaging the spot. “So good of you to hang onto them until now, you wanker.”

Silence falls, and for a moment the tension is taut to the point of being unbearable. Then, Dan hears a quiet, barely audible giggle. He looks at Phil, incredulous, and immediately upon seeing the creases of laughter around his glinting eyes, feels a swell of laughter bubbling up in his own chest. The tension snaps, and they let their streams of laughter spill out. Phil cards a hand through his hair, reaching for his tea again.

“Y’know,” Dan says, eyes glazed as he watches Phil’s plump, pink lips seal over the rim of his mug, “you’ve already lured me into your…” he gestures to the plane interior. “Den. Kind of redundant at this point to play it cool.”

Phil looks at him quizzically, sipping. “What do you mean?”

“Well, as you have clear, recorded evidence of my unfortunate attachment to you right there,” Dan says, stretching out on the bed a little more, settling into the familiar atmosphere of mildly absurd, irritation-fuelled hysteria, “and I willingly endured your death-defying driving skills, then followed you into your plane in the middle of nowhere, it might be a reasonable assumption that I’m, like,” Dan waves a hand in the air between them, “D.T.F.”

Phil chokes around a mouthful of tea. He places the mug down sharply, eyes wide. It makes Dan laugh, and he leans back onto his hands. As it turns out, having every last scrap of his dignity laid out before them both is rather empowering. He has nothing left to hide, no reason to be coy, and it’s now up to Phil whether he takes advantage or not. Dan really hasn’t anything else to lose, at this point, sad though that thought might be.

“I didn’t want to assume,” Phil objects, scandalised, “I’m trying to be a gentleman!”

Dan nods gravely. “By playing me audio recordings of me asking you to ‘kiss and fuck me’?”

Phil’s mouth opens, as if he’s about to retort, but at the sight of Dan’s smirk, he closes it again, a laugh escaping. “If I do one of those things now, can you pretend I waited until, y’know, a respectable amount of time had passed?”

“I could pretend I had a sudden urge to shuck off my wet clothes,” Dan suggests with a hand thrown across his forehead for emphasis; he’s enjoying the unusual sensation of having the power over this situation, and as usual when he feels even a lick of power, his theatric flair rears its head. It doesn’t matter that his heart doubled in speed as soon as Phil hinted at physical contact. “And then,” Dan continues, voice as dramatic as if he were addressing a theatre-ful of patrons, “as you’re finding me a spare shirt to cover my immodesty, you can’t help your gaze lingering on my bare skin - you try to stop yourself, but your hand reaches out of its own accord to stroke across my chest - my breath hitches, and-”

Phil dives across the bed, pinning Dan to the mattress and kissing him. “Hmm,” he mumbles into the seam of Dan’s lips, “I forgot you never shut up.”

Dan’s arms come up to wind around Phil’s neck, a zing of pure joy ricocheting through his body as his familiar weight settles on top of him.

“I haven’t forgotten that you’re ten times more tolerable to listen to when you’re naked,” Dan says, turning his head to urge Phil to kiss along his jaw. “Please comply.”

Phil chuckles, leaning up to pull his shirt off. “Better?”

A punch of air leaves Dan’s chest; his hands spread themselves over Phil’s toned stomach, re-learning the crevices either side of his belly, the smooth curvature of his hips.

“Much.” His index fingers trace the line of hair that leads from Phil’s tummy button beneath the waistband of his trousers. He pulls at the waistband impatiently. “Even better without these though, I reckon.”

Phil sits back on his haunches, positioning himself on top of Dan’s thighs. “Yeah?” he asks, already sliding the zipper down. Dan’s cock pulses, still trapped by his jeans. Phil is putting on a show, but Dan no longer has the ability to call him out on it. His eyes won’t unstick themselves from the sight of Phil shimmying his trousers down his thighs, revealing a pair of black boxer briefs so tight that they might as well be nonexistent for all they manage to conceal. “How’s this?”

Dan shoots him what he intends to be a withering look that probably doesn’t come across very menacing. “I don’t remember you being this vocal.”

Phil smiles, using Dan’s shoulder to steady himself as he peels the trousers off entirely. “Shut me up, then.”

Not needing to be told twice, Dan grabs the backs of Phil’s thighs and manoeuvres him back until he’s sprawled on his back. He pulls off his own t-shirt, getting more impatient by the minute to entwine himself in Phil as deeply as possible; he’s been starving himself of this, for months, and now he wants to feast. As soon as he’s free of his t-shirt, Dan begins pushing his lips against the miles of bare skin covering Phil’s upper body. Phil’s breathing goes strange and stuttery, and his hand loses itself in Dan’s hair.

“Fuck,” he whispers as Dan seals his mouth over a nipple, “I’ve missed you.”

“Still talking to Susan?” Dan asks with a snort, and Phil smacks him lightly in the back of the head.

“Susan doesn’t talk back nearly as much.”

In response, Dan chooses to trail a line of kisses downwards, through the valley of Phil’s pectoral muscles, over the plane of his stomach, nipping gently at that tantalising rivulet of hair slicing through his pelvic region. When he gets to the boxer briefs, he pauses, lifting his gaze as he tucks his fingertips into the waistband.

Phil makes a sort of choking noise as their eyes meet, which is pleasant to hear. “Lift,” Dan tells him, and when his hips rise, pulls them off in a flourish. Dan had thought the thick, gorgeous shape of Phil’s cock was deeply ingrained into his memory, but even the image he’d conjured up in the dead of night, when he couldn’t stop himself from indulging in nostalgia, had been lacking in the exquisite detail of reality. He takes hold of the base in one hand, letting the warm, pulsing flesh push all thought from his mind. “I missed you too,” he says, and Phil whimpers.

Dan takes his time blowing Phil, letting him glide in and out of his mouth as he lifts his head and sinks down again and again. Phil’s body slackens, sinking into the hard mattress so totally that it’s as if he hasn’t relaxed once in all the time that’s passed since they last did this. The sensation of Phil atop Dan’s tongue is comforting in its thickness, stretching his lips wide, reminding him of how it feels to be so open. He would like for Phil to know this, wants to share the intoxicating power of utter vulnerability. He pulls off, suddenly alight with an idea, and sits up, crawling over Phil’s spread body until his face hovers above Phil’s.

“You know what Nikolai mentioned,” Dan begins, testing the waters.

Instantly, Phil’s hands stop wandering over his back. “Are you seriously bringing up my ex-husband right now?”

Dan chuckles, then sweeps a tongue over his lower lip, tasting Phil there, salty and sour; Phil’s eyes fall to the movement with obvious interest.

“I’ve just been thinking,” Dan continues, determined to persevere with the thought if it could lead where he hopes it might. To soften the blow of blindsiding Phil with Nikolai’s name, Dan dots a few light kisses over his jaw. “When we… did things before. Were you just indulging me, because I suggested we try it a certain way, and it was my first time?”

Phil arches his head backwards, wordlessly encouraging Dan to move his lips to his neck. “W-what do you mean? It was always amazing with you.”

“Hmm,” Dan says, sucking gently at the spot right below Phil’s ear. “So you never wanted to do it a different way? Like…” His hand, which has been resting on Phil’s hip, trickles over his thigh, dipping into the cavern between Phil’s legs. He lets his fingers wander even lower, past the swell of his balls. He watches Phil’s face intently, trying to gauge the reaction, and presses the tip of one finger to the tight, puckered entrance at his rear. “This way?”

For the first time, Dan is able to witness the crystal blue of Phil’s irises thinning and nearly disappearing entirely, swallowed up by the black holes widening in their centres. It’s not until Dan removes his finger that Phil is able to summon a response.

“I- I don’t have much of a preference,” he whispers, stammering. “Is… is that something you’d want to try, or-”

“Phil,” Dan interrupts, feeling the smile teasing the corner of his mouth as he sees through Phil’s poor attempt at nonchalance, “do you want me to fuck you?”

Phil is quiet for a moment, but Dan holds his gaze, one eyebrow cocked, hopefully looking far more in control of himself than he feels. The elbow he’s using to hold himself up begins to tremble, threatening to give way, but he holds steady, needing to hear Phil speak the words.

Then, Phil nods, just once. “Yes.”

Dan smiles, leaning in to seal their mouths together. The eagerness with which Phil responds conveys his excitement, and Dan lets him twine their tongues together, allows Phil’s arms to draw him in around the neck. After a few minutes however, Dan’s self-control is reaching its very peak, what with Phil’s cock trapped between their bodies still, and the anticipation of what it might be like to slip inside of him lurking so tantalisingly on the horizon.

Dan unwinds himself carefully, sitting up and reaching for the button of his own jeans. “Do you have, um, stuff?”

His question prompts Phil into immediate action; he sits up, peeling himself off the bed in order to stagger over to an overhead cupboard, which he reaches up to open. Dan’s fingers stumble on the zipper of his jeans, attention ensnared by the sight of the lean, naked body in front of him, stretched out in a delicious long line of pale, pure skin, hiding terrains of thick muscle, tightened by years of diligent workouts. His cock strains against the fly of his trousers, imagining what it might be like to bury himself inside of such a temple; his fingers work frantically to open the zip. Eventually, Phil finds what he’s looking for, and throws a bottle of lube and a four condom packets onto the bed.

Dan picks a few of the foil packets up, eyebrows raised. “I’m flattered that you presume so highly of my stamina, but-”

Phil shuts him up using the method he seems to be realising is the most effective - jumping back on the bed and kissing him hard. “Thought we could take it in turns,” Phil growls into Dan’s mouth, because obviously he’s intent on driving Dan to the brink of insanity.

A strangled noise escapes Dan’s throat, and he pushes Phil backwards until he’s astride him again, back to pulling off his jeans, which thankfully goes a lot more smoothly this time. He slides his underwear off too, then reaches for the condom packet, ten steps ahead of himself; Phil’s hand on his arm makes him pause.

“Woah, uh, it’s not my first rodeo but I’m probably gonna need a little prep before-”

“Shit,” Dan mutters, throwing the condom aside for a moment. He shakes his head, blood thrumming in his ears, and smooths his hands up Phil’s gorgeous thighs. “Sorry. Okay, what do I do?”

Phil sits up, reaching for the lube, and un-pops the cap. “Want me to do it?”

Dan snatches the bottle from him. “Fuck right off.”

He pours some of the gloop onto his fingers, remembering how, when they’d done this before, Phil had warmed the substance before letting it touch his skin. He copies the action, coating his hands with it, then looking to Phil for further instruction. Phil opens his legs wider, allowing Dan to fit himself between them.

“Have you ever done this to yourself?”

“Only since you did it to me,” Dan admits before he can stop himself.

Phil grins, unsubtly conveying his thoughts around this, and Dan only barely resists the urge to flick him in the balls. “Same thing, then,” Phil says.

“Will it hurt?”

Phil eases himself back down onto his elbows. “Doubt it,” Phil answers in a soft sigh. He lets out a little moan as Dan’s fingertips press against him. “Fuck. No, I don’t think this is gonna hurt at all.”

Dan’s fingers slide into Phil as easily as if he were pushing them into warm bread dough. The walls of hot, soft muscle close in around him, drawing each finger deeper as he adds them one at a time. Phil murmurs vaguely bossy commands, telling him to scissor and stretch, but half the words are lost to his groans of bliss, each one making Dan shudder more violently than the last.

“Ugh, Dan,” he says, voice desperate despite it seeming like barely any time has passed. He has one hand wrapped around the back of his right thigh, holding it up to allow Dan better access. Dan moves closer, brushes Phil’s hand away and lets the crook of Phil’s knee drape over his shoulder. “Fuck,” Phil mutters, but doesn’t protest. “Y-you can stop now,” he urges, but Dan keeps on, wanting to be totally sure. Phil seems so tight, so impossibly tight, and whilst it is maddening to picture thrusting inside of such tightness, the thought of hurting Phil without meaning to is terrible enough to keep Dan stretching with his fingers, just in case. He changes the angle just slightly when his wrist threatens to cramp, and Phil swears, louder than he has so far. “Fff-uck. Do that again.”

Dan does do it again. He does it many more times, pressing the pads of his fingers to that same spot until Phil is writhing against the covers, until his gasps sound more like gurgles, until his hands are scrabbling at Dan’s wrist to pull his fingers free.

“Fuck, Dan please, I’m ready, I’m ready,” he garbles.

For a long moment, Dan is too hypnotised by the wrecked, flushed mess that’s become of the Adonis-like man sprawled out naked before him to react. He stares at Phil’s reddened, slick lips, puffy from where he’s been biting them.

“Dan,” Phil chokes out, desperate.

The sound of his name slaps Dan back into coherence. He pats the space around him, searching for the condom packet he’d thrown aside before. It seems to elude him for a while, but eventually he finds it, and rips the packet with his teeth. Thankfully, condoms are a part of sexual experience that he is not out of his depth with, as Beth had insisted on him using at least one, sometimes more, whenever they slept together.

He rolls it on with ease, thankful for the many opportunities he’s had to practice for this moment, and takes hold of Phil by the hips, dragging him forwards with a sharp tug, until the head of his cock is aligned with Phil’s slick opening. Phil is staring at him in amazement, and Dan doesn’t blame him - he’s exuding a confidence born purely of adrenaline, and it’s making him into someone unrecognisable, someone composed and assertive. Someone hot.

“Ready?” he asks; his shaky voice somewhat shatters the illusion.

“God, yes,” Phil replies, apparently not noticing.

Dan inches his hips forwards, letting the head of his cock press past the outer rim; Phil’s head tips backwards, a sigh of ecstasy spilling from his throat. His hand releases its grip on the covers, and he brings his long fingers to wrap around his cock.

Even the sight is intoxicating. Ignoring all other sensation for now, Phil looks maddeningly good this way; Dan’s hips almost lock in place, just watching him feel. The thin branches of Phil’s neck bones are protruding beneath the skin, mottled from where Dan has nipped and bitten. His puffed chest is rising and falling rapidly, his shoulders trembling, misted with a sheen of rainwater and sweat. He ducks his head again, meeting Dan’s eyes, and Dan remembers he’s supposed to be moving, that he is supposed to be the one in control of this. He doesn’t feel very in control, suddenly, too shaken by the onslaught of sensation attacking from all angles.

As if he’s gleaned these concerns from Dan’s mind through osmosis, Phil says, “wait,” and Dan pauses, terrified he’s done something wrong. Phil sits up, glazed and sluggish, then pushes Dan backwards with a hand against his shoulder.

“What’s wr-”

Dan lands back on his tailbone, and suddenly Phil is astride him, piled in his lap like a huge, gorgeous, naked gift. He angles himself without needing to look, keeping his eyes locked on Dan’s the whole time, and sinks himself back down onto Dan’s cock, lips parted, eyes fluttering. A moan pours out of Dan’s throat as the unexpected bliss crashes over him, as the sensation of slick, hot, closeness grips him by the soul. He is buried inside of Phil’s pure, angelic body, as far as he can get. It’s agony, because Phil has gone still, letting himself adjust to the intrusion. Dan’s head falls against Phil’s chest, trying to keep calm when he wants so badly to shout at Phil to move even slightly, would trade everything he owns for the relief of it.

And then, miraculously, Phil does.

“Fuck,” Dan whispers, brokenly, as Phil’s hips begin rolling forwards.

His fingers dig themselves into Phil’s arms, and he buries his face deeper into Phil’s chest. Phil’s arms wind around his shoulders. He lifts his hips up until Dan almost slips out of him entirely, then spears himself back down with a shudder.

“God, Dan,” Phil groans, speeding up the pace. He uses his grip on Dan’s shoulders to keep steady, bouncing up and down in Dan’s lap faster and faster, barely letting Dan gasp even a snatch of air. “Dan- Dan, would you touch me?”

Delirious, Dan mentally berates himself for not having the common sense to do this before now. He reaches clumsily between their bodies, barely holding himself together, and closes a fist around Phil’s cock, which is hot and rigid to the touch. He pumps his hand in time with the thrust of Phil’s hips, and in less than a minute Phil is crying out, biting down on Dan’s neck so hard that Dan wonders if he might bleed. Phil’s come splashes Dan’s chest and stomach, coating his hand, and all Dan can think is how he wishes he could taste it.

Dan doesn’t last much longer after that, as Phil doesn’t so much as stutter in his rhythm. He manages to push his hips upwards a few times, to make the most of this miraculous moment, locked together with Phil in the most intimate possible way. As the tip of his cock presses once again into that spot that makes Phil weak, Phil jerks and gasps in his arms. That’s the moment that Dan is unable to hold on any longer. He squeezes Phil’s arm, groaning into the crook of his neck as he feels his own release fill the condom, a hundred white-hot stars scorching over his skin in a brilliant, blinding shower.

For a minute after, they don’t move, draped over one another in various ways, just reorienting themselves as they float back to this dimension. Dan pushes his lips against Phil’s damp skin in a way that doesn’t feel chaste enough to be kisses. Eventually, Phil leans backwards, slowly lifting himself off Dan’s lap, letting him slip out. With a shaky, fumbling hand, Dan pulls off the condom, putting it carefully on the floor because he’s too spent to dispose of it properly just yet.

In the next moment, he feels damp fingers around his wrist, and then Dan is being pulled, until he’s flat on his back, Phil’s arm stretched out beneath his neck. They both stare at the ceiling, listening to the sound of their own gradually slowing breaths.

Dan rolls onto his side towards Phil, trailing fingers up his ribs, then into the cavern of his underarm, twisting the snatch of hair there between his fingers. He’s sweaty, and it’s still confusing to Dan that it doesn’t gross him out; instead, the musky, heavy scent of Phil’s perspiration is intoxicating, makes him want to bury his face in Phil’s shoulder and lick the moisture from his skin. So he does.

Phil turns to peer at him, amusedly. “Perv.”

Dan smiles, not caring that it seems peculiar, because he knows Phil doesn’t really care. “Was it okay?” Dan asks, as if he isn’t fully aware of how beyond incredible the last half hour had been for both of them.

“Amazing,” Phil replies, rolling onto his side to kiss him.

“I don’t think I’m as good as you at… that.”

Phil’s mouth twitches, and he leans back to stare into Dan’s eyes. His pupils are returning to a more even size, though they’re still taking up most of the space in Phil’s irises. The ring of azure around them glimmers brightly.

“Wouldn’t sell yourself short, mate,” Phil says. “I had a very good time.”

Dan snorts, mostly at Phil’s use of the word ‘mate’. “So you prefer it, then? Being like… the one who… um.”

“Bottoms?”

Dan’s only response is a mortifyingly quick blush.

Phil laughs, prodding Dan’s red cheek with his finger-tip. “I mean it. I don’t have a strong preference for either way.”

“It’s just Nikolai seemed so, like, surprised when he found out-”

“Dan,” Phil says, already grimacing, “I’m only gonna address this once with you, because I don’t particularly want you thinking about this in detail, but having sex with Nikolai is a very different experience to having sex with you. And not in a good way. Could you ever imagine him being as considerate of my preferences as you’re being right now?”

Dan’s nose wrinkles. “You have a point. So… you’re good with either? Top or bottom?”

The flame in Dan’s cheeks is fanned even saying the words. “Hmm,” Phil says, then leans in to kiss Dan again, harder this time, knocking him backwards until he’s on his back again. “Think I might need a reminder of what it’s like to top again. Y’know, just so I have all the evidence before I make up my mind.”

“Jesus, you’re more of a horn-dog than I remember,” Dan laughs, though he’s already winding a leg around Phil’s to pull him closer.

They’ve been holed up in Phil’s tiny living space, at the back of a stationary plane, mostly naked, for almost twelve hours. They’d napped for a while, but now they’re awake, watching an episode of Parks and Recreation because Phil has never seen it and Dan simply cannot allow anyone he associates with to not get his references to the show.

Somewhere in the middle of one of Leslie’s rousing speeches, Phil’s phone beeps. It’s not the first beep they’ve both pretended not to hear, and it’s perhaps for this reason that now Phil sighs and reaches for it, his other arm around Dan’s shoulders, fingers tickling idly across his upper arm. He frowns at the many messages filling the screen, scrolling through a few, then placing the phone upside down on the bedside shelf again. The amusing dialogue of the show loses its potency; Dan waits, breath held, for the inevitable.

“I’m gonna have to get back to work soon,” Phil says, just as Dan predicted. “I kind of… ran off on Martyn and Cornelia and PJ after the UN thing.”

“I figured,” Dan says, already resigned. “It’s okay. It was, um. Good to see you, and stuff. Weird without all the snow and altitude. But good.”

“Come with me,” Phil says. From the way he has the offer so readily at hand, Dan knows he’s been holding it back for a while. He pretends he hasn’t heard, instead focusing on the screen, where Leslie has just fallen into a giant pit. Relatable. Phil nudges him beneath the blanket with one foot. “Dan, did you hear me?”

Dan sighs, struggling out of Phil’s embrace. They should have talked about this sooner. Now they’re going to fight, and one of them’s going to hurt the other, and then they’ll split apart again for an indeterminably long bout of miserable, awful separation.

“I heard you.”

Dan runs a hand through his still-damp hair. They’d had showers a while ago in Phil’s tiny closet-shower. Though it would have been extremely nice to have stood beneath the spray together, there was no possible way they could both fit, so they took it in turns. Dan had gone first, and when he’d emerged, Phil had made more tea, and produced a packet of biscuits. He’d given Dan a robe - stolen from The Secret of the Alps, he noticed - for him to dry off and set him up with the laptop to watch Parks and Rec until he’d cleaned himself of the evidence of their debauchery too. It had been wholesome and unusually soft behaviour; entirely too easy to fall into, and forget that their circumstances didn’t allow for such kind, sweet interludes without a price.

“You don’t even want to be a lawyer,” Phil says, like it’s as simple as that. “Just think it over a bit more-”

“I did that,” Dan snaps, then checks himself, breathing deeply. If he can avoid getting upset and defensive, that would be ideal. “I already did the freaking out and running off to re-evaluate my choices. It didn’t work. You were there, you know it didn’t work.”

Phil shuts the laptop, cutting off the peppy American voices of the Parks and Rec cast. “What exactly didn’t work, though? What did you expect to happen up there?”

Dan laughs humourlessly, gesturing between them. “Not this.” He winces. It came out meaner than he intended it to. “I mean, obviously I’m glad I met you and we dragged each other into a destructive pattern of secretly bonking behind closed doors...”

“Heartfelt,” Phil replies; even though it’s sarcasm, Dan can tell without looking over at him that he’s smiling.

“..but, even you have to admit it probably wasn’t the smartest decision on my part. Or yours, come to that.” Dan picks at the thin, messy bedclothes, frowning. “I don’t think I’m very good at the self-reflective stuff. S’just better if I crack on, stop fantasising that there’s some dream career waiting in the wings somewhere.”

“Having a job that makes you happy isn’t a crazy fantasy, Dan,” Phil says. He makes everything sound so easy. Dan kind of misses that about him, dangerous and seductive though it is. “You could come with me. We could work it out together.”

“Come with you where?” Dan asks, turning to him incredulously. “No offence, mate, but you’ve got no more clue than I have right now. You have no money or plans, you said it yourself. It’s very admirable, all the charity stuff, but what’re you gonna do when the public grow bored of you without all the divorce drama? How are you gonna fund your humanitarian schemes?”

Phil shrugs, a composed, slightly amused smile gracing his features. He looks entirely unbothered by these questions, and Dan is suddenly so envious of his ability to shrug off anxiety that it makes a spurt of anger shoot through his chest. He rolls his eyes, throwing the covers off his legs. He’s about to get up, to find his clothes and put an end to this brief day-cation from reality, when Phil’s hand on his arm, gentle and cautious, gives him pause.

He waits, the warmth of Phil’s fingers draining the frustration from his bones, easing the tension in his body. Phil shuffles closer, hands sliding to rest on Dan’s shoulders, then rubbing gently, thumbs digging into the knots of taut muscle. It's so glorious that Dan sinks back into him, immediately slackening, his mind abruptly washed of every concern that had just been plaguing it.

“Has anyone ever told you that you think too much?” Phil murmurs into his ear.

“I get the feeling you’re about to,” Dan retorts, then feels a satisfied sigh slip out as Phil digs his clever fingers in deeper.

“I’m going to Africa,” he says in a low, soothing voice that Dan knows is probably one he’s been trained to use in stressful situations, but works so well that he can’t be bothered to protest. “There’s a cluster of villages in Kenya that need a lot of help. Installing water filtration systems, building schools, that sort of thing. That’s where I’m going next.”

“Oh. Right.” Dan’s shoulders tense up again. Africa. Could he be jetting off further? “How long f-”

“You should come with me,” Phil says for the third time. His hands become still on Dan’s shoulders. “I’m serious. We could use you out there.”

Dan rolls his eyes, though Phil is behind him and can’t see. “As convincing as that is, we both know I have the muscles of a cooked noodle, so I doubt I’d be much use to you-”

“It’s not always about physical labour,” Phil interrupts, like he’s prepared this argument months in advance. He’s too good at debating, that’s the trouble. Dan’s never stood a chance trying to last in the ring with him. “You’ve got other hugely beneficial skills, I’ve seen it myself. You can fix pretty much anything you put your mind to. That’s kind of extraordinary.”

Dan blinks, not sure how to react to the unexpected praise. “Well... I don’t know about ‘anything I put my mind to’-”

“Even so, you’d probably have a hell of a lot more clue than I would,” Phil points out, and Dan has to admit, although he’s never witnessed Phil attempt to repair or even patch up anything beyond his own fragile ego, he doubts very much that he’d be particularly skilled at it. He tries to imagine Phil with a spanner in his hand, tightening the joins in the municipal pipe under the blaring, scorching African sun. He has to hide his bubble of absurd laughter.

“I’m not a fan of the heat,” Dan protests, weakly.

Whilst this is true, and he’d deliberately chosen the destination of his last runaway attempt to be the opposite of somewhere hot, Dan can feel his soul yearning for the adventure. For being with Phil, daily, their perpetual bickering exacerbated by the blazing sun, and then soothed by the cool night air, locked away in some dark room they’d built together, free to kiss each other’s sun-blistered skin all night long. His fingers itch for the fantasy, and he clenches them into fists, knowing he shouldn’t dare to so much as want it.

Phil places a kiss to his shoulder, then leans away. “Yeah, you’re right,” Phil says, making Dan’s heart sink. “I mean, when you’re so passionate about law, a little sunshine seems laughable doesn’t it?”

Dan rolls his eyes, but a laugh escapes anyway, so he turns to whack Phil in the arm. Phil lets him, then catches him by the wrists, holding Dan’s gaze. “I think you could be happy. I think we could make each other happy.”

One of Dan’s eyebrows arches. “I think we’d drive each other bonkers.”

Phil smiles. “Same thing, I reckon.”

Dan shakes his head, knowing in every cell of his being that this is completely mental, to abandon his life again for a man who infuriates him daily. But he also knows, perhaps even more strongly, that he’s as in love with Phil as he is exasperated with him. “If I leave again… I won’t be able to come back.”

Phil squeezes his hands around Dan’s. “No,” he agrees. “Me neither.”

Dan chews his lip, though his resistance has more or less melted away. “Are you only offering to take me with you because you feel sorry for me?”

“Yeah,” Phil says, teasingly. “I’m rescuing you from a life of paperwork and office parties.” A smile breaks across his gorgeous face, making his eyes soften, crinkle at the sides. His voice drops into its rare tone of sincerity. “Dan, I’m asking you if you’d come with me. Because I watched you attempt to ski away from me up a hill and fall straight down it, and somehow managed to fall tragically, pathetically in love with you in the same instant. I want you to come. Because don’t really fancy trying to stay away from you anymore.”

Dan’s not sure how it happens really. One minute, he’s in a lecture hall with the most annoying girl on the planet talking his ear off about succulents and her hot personal tutor, and the next he’s in the front seat of a fully-fuelled plane, beside a stunningly handsome philanthropist-slash-ski-enthusiast-slash-pilot, headed for a continent halfway around the world. He hasn’t told his parents where they’re going yet. Phil hasn’t told the public, or Pj or Cornelia or Martyn. It’s all a bit ‘up in the air’. They’ll tell anyone who needs to know when they land again, when the intense rays of sun are soaking into their pale skin, flooding their veins with Vitamin D.

Dan reaches across the chasm between his and Phil’s seats, letting his hand dangle invitingly until Phil notices and takes it, rolling his eyes and telling Dan he’s a “right sap”. But he threads their fingers together anyway, angling the yoke towards the sky, and Dan leans back in his chair as the clouds zoom closer, welcoming the oncoming oblivion. A wild thought swims at him from nowhere, as if it fell straight out of the Heavens:

He’d be just fine if they never had to come down.

The End.

(Yes, there will be an epilogue. Stay tuned for updates about that!)

#too high #enemies to lovers au #phan #phanfic

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holyfuckthisfishcandrive · 4 years

Text

Broken Glass Diamonds; Chapter Two

Word count: 2460

Warning: A bit of swearing, talk about death

Description: Roman spends his second day at the hotel and makes a friend.

Chapter One AO3

Chapter two

When Roman came down for breakfast the next morning the old lady was wearing a fur coat a la Cruella De Vil with three cats all over her and the punk couple had abandoned their half finished food in favour of making out with eachother. Roman decided to watch the cats and not the punks this time.

Just as he finished his second toast Julian plopped down on the chair next to him making Roman jump.

"When the fuck did you get here?" he blurted.

"Doesn't matter," Julian waved off and put a piece of paper onto the table infront of Roman.

"What's that?"

"Schedule."

"What schedule?"

Julian raised an eyebrow at him.

"Your schedule. So you know where to be and when for the first two weeks. After that the schedules will be hung up on the blackboard but none of you know where the blackboard is yet so I get to play mail man. Yay."

"Oh," Roman said feeling a bit stupid.

"You gonna drink that coffee?" Julian asked pointing at his cup.

"Er... No? It's even worse than the stuff my brother makes which is quite a feat cause he does it without coffee powder. I'm not even sure this can legally be called coffee," Roman gave the dark liquid a little swirl or at least tried to. He had expected it to move like water rather than chunky honey.

"Can I have it?" Julian asked.

"Did you listen to a single thing I said?" Roman shot back.

"Yeah, and you said that you weren't going to drink it," the teen shrugged and began drumming on the table with his nails. "So can I have it? Please? She won't let me get anymore for myself."

He gestured at the young woman who had distributed the food the night before and now kept watch over the breakfast buffet.

"Why not?" Roman asked confused.

"Some bullshit about how 'twenty cups are too much' and 'that stuff will kill you'. So, can I have yours or not? I need it!"

"You've had twenty cups already?"

"Twenty-two. Not the point."

Roman stared at Julian for a few moments. He was aware that other people were different but he knew from experience that he himself was vibrating with energy after just two cups of coffee (though that might also be because he rarely drank it in the first place) but the teen infront of him looked far from energised. In fact Roman wouldn't be surprised if he were to pass out from exhaustion at any moment.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"If never been okay for once in my life," Julian replied deadpan.

Roman slid the cup over to him and picked up the schedule while the teen downed the coffee in one glup.

"What time is it?" he asked, seeing that he was supposed to be somewhere at 8:45.

"Half past eight, time to get the fuck out of here. Good luck," Julian jumped up and fled out of the room with one glance back to the food counter.

Roman turned to see the young woman come over to his table. Now that she was close enough he could read her name tag too. Sarah Miles.

"Did you give him coffee?" she asked.

"Uh, yes."

Sarah sighed.

"If one of his mum's asks I am so throwing you under the bus, just so we're clear," she said pointedly and shuffled back to the buffet.

Roman watched her go and decided to unpack that later. He had fifteen minutes to get where ever he was supposed to go and depending on whether the elevator decided to work or not he'd probably have to hurry.

On the schedule it just said garage as meeting point and after a quick stop by the counter Roman had found out that apparently whoever had written it had no idea what the difference between a garage and a basement were.

So he took the elevator down.

It slowly came to a stop and for the first time in the time he had used it a few strained notes of a melody came out of the speakers. It reminded him of something one might hear in a horror movie. Was this the beginning of one and he was some stupid guy who just ignored all the red flags until some masked psycho either kidnapped him or stabbed him?

The elevator stopped and opened just enough for him to get his hands through and push the doors open. As soon as he was through it went up again.

Roman found himself standing in a giant hall, at least the size of three football fields, with a group of people. The other applicants. He could feel their eyes on him, seizing him up and there was a hostility in the air. In here every one wanted to achieve but only few could. Everyone was a rival.

Roman kept his head high as he walked away from the elevator. He couldn't show weakness. Suddenly he was glad that Julian had insisted he kept the clothes and he understood why the teen had told him that they'd tear him apart.

"Hello!" a voice cut through the room. Roman looked up startled and noticed a young man, standing on a podium. "Everyone should be here by now, so, let's begin! My name is Thomas and I welcome all of you to this years T.L.I.H. program!"

Compared to the tense atmosphere among the applicants Thomas' cheery mood seemed out of place.

"There are a lot of you though and my job is to water it down quite a bit until next month, so I'm gonna have to be a bit hard on you. If you can't keep up, that's perfectly fine. Listen to your bodies and when you can't, you can't. Just getting where you are now is an impressive feat and there's no shame in quitting."

Roman caught a few angry whispers. Apparently he wasn't the only one who couldn't allow himself to fail.

"Let's start with one of those good old ice breaker games so I can get to know you a little bit," Thomas continued. "Everyone who wants to become a hero; do fifty push-ups!"

The entire group obliged as a unit.

Thomas chuckled. "Yeah, that was expected. Believe it or not last year I actually had one who didn't. A bit weird to sign up if you don't want to become a hero, right?"

Nobody answered him.

Roman could have, the push-ups weren't too bad but he decided to save his breath. This was only the beginning after all.

Somewhere to his left someone dropped down, panting.

"Are you alright back there?" Thomas asked. "Like I said, there's no shame in quitting."

The guy sat up slowly, gasping for air, while all around him people finished up and stood up again.

Thomas jumped down from the podium. "Everyone who has a driver's license; twenty jumping jacks, please!"

Roman watched most of the others jump. There were only a handful of people standing still like he was.

He watched Thomas saunter over to the guy that was still panting and quietly talk to him until the guy nodded and stumbled towards the elevator. He was extremely bony, with absolutely no visible muscle and Roman wondered how he had expected to pass in the first place.

His eyes landed on a chubby person near the back and he wondered how quickly they would fail.

"Now, everyone who thinks pineapple doesn't belong on pizza! Fifty seven sit-ups!"

Thomas went on like that for a long time, asking the most trivial questions, but when he finally stopped he was the only person in the room that hadn't broken a sweat.

Except for the guy at the beginning nobody else had left.

"Take a little break everyone. Drink something," Thomas sat down at the edge of the podium and gestured over to a few water fountains, that Roman could have sworn hadn't been there before. "That was interesting! And now will probably be your only chance in a while to ask some questions, so if you got any; Shoot!"

"Who the fuck are you?" someone yelled.

"Language!" the cubby dude Roman had expected to quit scolded.

"Yeah, no excessive swearing please. And to answer your question, I already introduced myself, didn't I? But maybe you want more details," he leaned back on his arms a little. "My name is Thomas Sanders, I have a superpower and some of you might have already heard of me under a different name, that I'm sadly not allowed to tell you. Secret identity, you know?"

"Why did you send that guy earlier home? Maybe he has a power that makes up for the fact that he's not top fit?" someone else asked.

"Oh-kay, that's a bit more serious," Thomas took a breath. "Because, you see, it doesn't really matter what your powers are. Hear me out! For most abilities there are ways to neutralise them. Heck, I know some who's ability is to block powers! What I'm getting at is that you'll need to be able to be heroes even without superpowers. That's what this program is for. We can't let people who aren't prepared out there. Too many have died because they went into the fight without preparation, thinking that they could just make up for it with their powers."

The group had fallen silent.

"A few were lucky and made it but it's too high a risk," Thomas concluded. "I told that to him as well and he chose to go home. I didn't send him away. That's not how this works. This training is for you to train. To learn. But if you can't, you can't and that's perfect alright. It's better to give up and be a bit disappointed in yourselves than dead. You signed up for one of the most dangerous jobs there is but you still have the chance to back out. Whether you take that chance or not is your choice."

Roman looked around the group. A few looked unsure, some determined, others conflicted.

Was this seriously new to some of these people? Had they never read a newspaper or listed to the radio? There were less reports on hero deaths these days, thanks to the hero organisations but they still happened from time to time.

"Anyway," Thomas clapped his hands together, "I hope everyone took the opportunity to drink cause we still have some stuff to do before I can release you for lunch! Who wants to show off their abilities in hand to hand combat a bit? And no, no powers until I say so!"

When Thomas announced that it was time for lunch, hours later, Roman was drenched in sweat and holding a pack of frozen blueberries against a bruise on his cheek.

As it turned out the 'chubby dude', who had introduced themselves as Patton, was strong enough to lift him in the air and slam him down on the mats again. They had apologized repeatedly and had gotten him the blueberries and a water bottle, so Roman guessed they were cool.

This time, with all the candidates present, the dining room was filled to the brim. It was still pretty quiet, with most people out of breath, exhausted or simply so hungry that they didn't want to waste any time on talking. Roman fell somewhere in the middle of the categories.

Patton sat down next to him.

"It's weird to see this room so full," they said.

"Yeah," Roman found himself agreeing before their words fully registered. "Wait, you've been here before?"

"Of course! I've been staying at the hotel since yesterday afternoon!" Patton smiled brightly.

"So have I," Roman said flatly. "How come we didn't meet during dinner or breakfast?"

Patton shrugged. "Dunno. When did you eat? I was told that dinner started at nine but wasn't sure till when so I came at nine."

"I was told that it'd start at eight," Roman frowned. "I ate at eight."

"Hmm," Patton made with a frown. "I understand if you'd rather use your break for something else, but... Wanna try and find out what's the deal with that?"

"Sure, why not?" he shrugged. "I'm pretty sure the afternoon is going to be exhausting too, so there probably won't be a point in showering now and I've got nothing better to do."

After finishing up their meals, Roman and Patton decided to start in the lobby by the counter.

Julian sat in his spot, feet on the counter and a laptop that looked like it had been stolen from a junk yard and upgraded with car parts on his lap.

"Hey there, kiddo!" Patton greeted leaning on the counter.

"I'm like two years younger than you tops," Julian responded, not looking away from the computer screen.

"We had a question, Count Woe-lav," Roman rolled his eyes.

"I'm hacking into government files for my brother, come back when I got what I- Never mind! He owes me," with a swift movement he closed the laptop and turned to face them. Roman could see the exact moment that he realised what he had said in his eyes. "I... was not doing anything illegal. I promise... My brother is a very honest and... er... law following man and so am I, it's what our mothers - may they rest in peace - should they ever die - taught us to be... Uh... How can I help you?!"

Roman contemplated whether they should do something about the confessed crime but Patton apperently decided to just roll with it.

"We were just wondering why we were told different dinner times," they explained.

Julian raised an eyebrow. "What do you think happens when a few hundred superpowered young adults are left unsupervised in a small room for an unspecified amount of time?"

"Ah, okay, that makes sense," Patton nodded to themselves.

"Well, thanks for the help, Julian," Roman stuffed his hands in his pockets.

The teens made a face.

"Don't call me that. That's just a random ass name to pick!"

"It's on your name tag," Roman frowned.

"Doesn't make it my name," the teen spat. His phone buzzed and he picked it up, in a clear dismissal.

"Thanks, kiddo," Patton called over their shoulder as they lead Roman back to the elevator.

"Sure thing, Dad," Not-Julian answered, too quickly to have thought it over.

"Let's do something fun with the rest of our break," Patton suggested once the elevator had closed and grinned at Roman in a way that made it impossible to decline.

"You got something special in mind?" he just asked and smiled right back at his new friend.

"Dunno, you pick something!" they rocked back and forth on their feet.

#sanders sides #roman sanders #patton sanders #character thomas #nonbinary patton #background virgil #remus mention #deceit mention #tw food mention #my writing #platonic royality #all the world will bow down series

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scrthaddct-blog · 5 years

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Just A Few Moments @ Main St Station

I was waiting for my heroin dealer’s coke dealer.

John, my heroin dealer, could be relied on to have heroin 90% of the time. Other dealers were 50% on a good week. So I liked John, and tried to give him my business whenever possible. Sure, it was a mission to get to Main St from College and Bathurst, especially since my other dealer was at Howard Park and Roncesvalles, but I owed that guy $30 from two months ago and hadn’t gotten around to paying him back, probably because I’d recently gone back to blow after a long layoff. I hadn’t quit heroin or anything, and in fact had already grabbed a few points from John, but I wanted some coke too because I liked to be awake for the heroin high. Usually John would have everything ready at his apartment, which was eight minutes east on foot, but today his dealer was late so we were waiting together in that vast atrium below ground level but above the subway platforms

I typically saw John two or three times a week but our meetings were terse affairs, a few kind words during the exchange, meaningless banter or some grumbling about the Way Things Were. but today his dealer was two hours late and we were swiftly running out of common ground.

John was older than fifty and probably bound for the penitentiary. He’d been busted twice the previous autumn, with heroin both times, heroin containg fentanyl because all heroin these days contains fentanyl, but the cops inexplicably charged him with possession of carfentanil with intent to distribute, a crime that carries a mandatory prison sentence.

This all happened during the opiate crisis when fentanyl was in the news all the time. There were few facts but plenty of hysteria and misinformation. If a person in pain is administered an appropriate dose, fentanyl is a highly effective and safe painkiller, but carfentanil is lethal to humans at any amount, even a dose as infinitesimal as a grain of salt. I’d been buying and enjoying John’s heroin for over three months when they grabbed him, and there was simply no fucking way it contained carfentanil. That shit is for rhinoceros surgery, and John wasn’t a fucking zoologist. He was, unfortunately, an ex-convict with numerous prior offenses, making prison all but guaranteed. His trial kept getting pushed back and he didn’t know how to feel about it. On one hand, it delayed his inevitable incarceration. On the other, his lawyer was an addict and John was paying him in heroin.

“Motherfucker’s costing me a fortune,” he growled, pacing up and down. He was always pacing, like he was subconsciously rehearsing for jail. He had miraculous energy, John did, up at seven-thirty in the morning to head to Queen Station and sell to his nine-to-five clients, fanning out around town between ten and three, hitting the injection sites and miscellaneous workplaces (like mine...can’t tell you where, sorry). If you wanted drugs from him after three, you had to head up and over to Main St, where John was shooting up and making flaps for the following day, finally nodding off around midnight. He never stopped, John didn’t.

Another thing: he looked wildly different in age every time I saw him. And I don’t mean he was rapidly aging. He’d look thirty-five one day, like a senior citizen the next, then in his forties the next. It was fucked. I never asked him about it, though I wanted to. John was a unique guy. A fireball. Even when he looked old, he never stopped radiating fierce vitality. The thought of him behind bars made my chest feel funny. It wasn’t right to put him away like that, to stomp on someone so alive.

As we passed our second hour of waiting, I began to fidget. John had regaled me with detailed descriptions of seemingly every street fight he’d ever fought in, or watched from a safe distance, and I was bored. I didn’t doubt the veracity of some of the stories; we met at Yonge and Dundas one summer day and he was limping badly, his face covered in fresh cuts. But he was in a good mood. He swore he’d won, despite being outnumbered, a number that no doubt changed each time he told the tale to somebody.

He could lie sometimes, and he ripped me off a few times when I started buying blow because I actually thought a gram was $200, since a gram of heroin is $200, but after I’d bought three grams from him I learned that a gram of coke was in fact $100 and he’d been overcharging me by a criminal 100%. I didn’t pursue the matter, but the next time I told him I wanted blow, I made sure he knew I intended to pay $100 per gram moving forward. I still liked the guy. And it was my kinda fault for being so ignorant anyway. I wasn’t going to find a better dealer. I wasn’t. As I said, John always had heroin ready to go, but it was more than that. When you’re an addict, you get this exaggerated fondness and respect for your dealer. I can’t explain it. Maybe it’s a form of Stockholm Syndrome. Doesn’t matter. Point is, I liked him. He was like the cool uncle you only see every other Christmas, the one your Mom insists you stay away from because he has a “checkered history” and always smells strange and musty, like he spends a lot of time gardening.

“Dumb motherfucker,” John muttered.

“Your lawyer?”

John looked at me like I was stupid. “No! My coke guy!” He was still pacing. He was on something, but it wasn’t heroin.

“Has he texted?”

“Only like...fifty times. Said he was leaving Broadview an hour ago. Then he said ‘just a few moments’ a half hour ago.”

I frowned. Broadview Station was twelve minutes away. But I knew John well enough to know that he would take any criticism of his coke dealer’s lateness as a criticism of him, John, an attack on his judgment of character. I had to sound diplomatic, almost neutral. “Is this guy… reliable?”

“Of course,” John narrowed his eyes at me. “He never ghosts me. He...oh! There’s one thing I should tell you.”

“Okay.”

“He kinda has this thing.”

“Okay…?”

“Uh…”

“Just say it.”

“He kinda thinks he looks like Robert Plant.”

I blinked. “What?”

“He thinks he looks like Robert Plant.”

“So...what am I supposed to do about that?”

“If he brings it up, just agree with him.”

“What?”

“Or if he asks you if you think he looks like anybody, tell him he looks like Robert Plant.”

“You want me to tell a grown man that he looks li-”

“YO!” a voice bellowed.

We looked. A man with sopping wet hair was grinning at us - well, at John - from the top of the escalator. He hopped off with an awkward lunge. Behind him a young woman was cresting the moving steps, sipping a bottle of Nestea and wearing some kind of sweater with a single sleeve.

“Hey!” John called back.

The cocaine dealer was wearing a wrinkled black and blue ski jacket he was keeping unzipped. Actually, “wearing” is too generous a verb for how he wore the jacket. The thing was hanging off him, almost like it was alive and trying to get away because it found him disgusting. He looked familiar, though, and as he got closer I realized something astounding. Astounding and...confusing.

The man looked exactly like Rod Stewart. Not Robert Plant, not even a little bit. But he looked every bit like Rod Stewart.

I turned to John in amazement. “Did you mean Rod Stewart?”

In a flash, John grabbed my arm and twisted it behind my back. He was not play fighting, he meant it. He sidled over to me and said through gritted teeth: “Robert. Plant. Okay?”

I nodded, terrified, and John released his grip and turned to greet our company. The man - Rod Stewart...I mean Robert Plant - hadn’t seen the scuffle. He was preoccupied with the young woman, who was nodding at everything he said but obviously not listening and obviously bored. As they approached I saw that she was wearing gauze on one arm, a hastily prepared cast of some kind, flapping wildly from that weird subway wind tunnel effect.

Rob motioned at them to follow us into the corner of the vast concourse, the corner with the bank of payphones. Nobody else was down there except for a busker in the very middle of the room. The guy seemed to know just three songs that he played over and over and over. As we were waiting earlier John had gone over and requested some Led Zeppelin but the dude shook his head, a pretentious I’m-the-artist-and-you’re-not gesture, and resumed his turgid trio of dirges. I didn’t recognize the songs and neither did John. They must have been originals. They were atrocious and also indistinguishable from one another. People passed him hurriedly in ceaseless procession, but nobody tossed coins and none of them gave us a second glance. It was a perfect place to buy or sell drugs. Yes, the omnipresent eye of the camera followed our movements, but does anyone actually monitor those things?

John had already taken his scale out of his backpack when I joined him at the payphone bank, Rod Stewart and his friend arriving moments later. He was still talking at her, and you could see from his body language he was bragging about something, something he considered an achievement of magnitude. You could see she was too tired to hate him. She would wear him down, over time, with her vast indifference. She would outlive him and inherit his empire. Or not.

Rod Stewart surreptitiously tossed a big bag of coke at John, who immediately got to work. relieved to have something to do with his hands, just relishing the task. I hope one day to love my job even half as much.

“Cover me,” John said over his shoulder. “All of you. Pretend you’re on the phone.”

Rod Stewart and his partner ignored him, which made me feel like I couldn’t. I had to show them whose side I was on. There were four phones, so I picked the one farthest from the wall, farthest from the booth John was using to weigh the coke. I figured Rod Stewart would use his bulk to hide John from the steady stream of people heading for the escalators. But instead he did nothing. He just stood there like the asshole he was proving himself to be.

Feeling stupid, I picked up the phone and turned my back to John. Rod Stewart and his companion were still oblivious to the world around them, only now the young woman was speaking, berating really, and I realized she was a mail order bride. She was growling at him in a foreign language, Romanian maybe, something Eastern European probably, when she looked at me and instantly softened and smiled and for just a second I believed her before realizing she was only trying to make Rod Stewart angry and jealous.

He turned and saw me and visibly balked, rearing back with a sudden jerk, and I realized he hadn’t noticed me until that very moment. (I was doing a lot of realizing that afternoon, a thought which was itself a realization, I realized.) Here we go, I thought. Once again, having waited too long somewhere with someone, I have found myself in a circumstance of imminent violence. All because I like drugs because they help me forget I’m me. I don’t like being me. I don’t like me at all. Lots of people don’t like me, for good reason. I “borrowed” money to buy drugs, I stole, I cheated, I lied. And I’m sorry for all of it. But I swear on everything I’ve ever loved that it didn’t feel like a choice. It really didn’t. I was on autopilot. I had one directive: Get drugs. And I did everything I could to fulfill that directive.

Does that mean I deserve a beating? Probably. But if I have to die a drug related death, can’t it be closer to downtown? One of my old home stations? (That’s the station nearest your place, which is probably self-evident so sorry for explaining.) I’ve moved many times, though rarely by choice. You get kicked out of places a lot when you’re a drug addict. In my case, not for behavior. I don’t drink all the beer in the fridge or stagger home at 3 AM and play loud music. I just have a tendency to spend the rent money on drugs. I spend all money on drugs, a standing policy that has brought me here, staring at an angry man who looks like Rod Stewart and wants to hit me. He is breathing slowly and glaring at me, just staring and not moving.

One must adapt to the highly fluid circumstances endemic to the purchase of hard drugs in low quantities. Rich people don’t have to put up with this shit. They buy in bulk. There is a delivery service here in Toronto, possibly fictional but whispered of in hopeful, reverential tones, that offers every drug ever. Anything you wish, right to your door. One former dealer of mine (dead from OD) told me the minimum order for this mythical service is 5k. My Roncesvalles-Howard Park man snorted at that figure and insisted it’s only 2 grand. John insists it’s $10 000. Imagine that. Having the kind of money to order any drug you want, or might want later on. That’s the life I liked to tell myself I deserved, not a life of evading marauders and ersatz-Rod Stewarts, waiting for my heroin dealer to weigh out a fucking gram of coke, after already waiting two hours before that for my heroin dealer’s coke dealer who looks like Rod Stewart but thinks he looks like Robert Plant whose companion from Eastern Europe has an injured arm he was obviously responsible for to show up and WHAT THE FUCK IS TAKING THESE PEOPLE SO LONG

YOU ARE DRUG DEALERS! DEAL DRUGS!

As the big galoot gaped at me, taking in my presence and blurting random vowels, John daintily picked a large rock of cocaine from his bag, not mine or his own, snorted it, and winked at me.

I couldn’t help it. I laughed one of those sudden laughs that sounds like a bark, further confusing an increasingly agitated Rod Stewart until John, turning back to his scale with a studious frown, like he’d been there the whole time, said casually over his shoulder, “that’s my boy I told you about. He’s with me.”

Just like that, like pressing enter on a password in a video game, Rod Stewart nodded and backed off.

Saved by John. What a guy. He’s with me. A wonderful phrase. Uttered by my dealer without forethought but nevertheless filling the father-sized hole in me, a warm sense of belonging, of mattering, spreading through my lower region...or else I was sicker than I realized (despite all the realizing going on elsewhere) and needed either heroin or a toilet very soon.

But even if the feeling was gastrointestinal distress, it didn’t diminish the sweetness of John’s sentiment. I was with him. I was not with Rod Stewart. I grabbed the phone because John told me to, making my allegiance plain, and it felt good to have John reciprocate. I decided to snort some H right then, to sustain the warmth inside me, when four police officers - Toronto Police, not Transit Cops - materialized seemingly out of nowhere at the bottom of the escalators and sized us up.

There was nowhere to run and they damn well knew it, and they knew we knew it, so they were taking their time, as police like to do when they know they’ve got you, like a cat toying with its prey. Taking pleasure in the kill.

More than a little belatedly, Rod Stewart and his friend from Eastern Europe picked up their respective phones and began nattering nonsense as John hurriedly swept the cocaine crumbs away and stuffed all three bags of it, his own, mine, and Rod Stewart’s, down the front of his pants. If we aren’t arrested, I thought, ask John if he’s wearing underwear.

Taking a deep breath, I grabbed my phone, closed my eyes and murmured an agnostic prayer, which goes please please please please please please please please please until someone tapped me on the shoulder.

Expecting a looming cop, all sarcasm and accusation, I was flabbergasted to see John grinning and pointing at the cops, all four of them, standing in the center of the room, interrogating the talentless busker, who was sputtering and kinda scared, and in that moment I forgave him his crimes against music and loved him for being my diversion. Our diversion.

The TTC has a recorded announcement that plays over the speakers inside every single station, something about reporting misconduct or felonious acts. I can only remember the ending: If you see something, say something.

We watched as the cops led the guy out of the station, his body language dramatically changed, gone from confident musician to sniveling inmate. He shot a helpless glance at me as he got on the escalator. I gave him a soft wave and a kiss. I’m an asshole.

“Poor fuckin loser,” Rob Stewart said, shaking his head.

“Here,” John handed me my bag, mercifully free of pubic hair, and I went home and snorted coke and heroin in alternating increments all night and into dawn until both were gone and I went to sleep and when I woke up I felt empty and lonely and depressed so I crawled out of bed and tried to figure out the quickest way to get drugs again.

I did not thank what or whomever I’d prayed to.

#mainst #heroin #cocaine #TTC #robertplant #rodstewart #easterneurope

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mickminehan · 6 years

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Five Percent Of The Time

Something I realised about myself this year, is that I like to describe myself as a version of me that only exists for about five percent of any given week.

This version of myself is manic in temperament, extroverted and ambitious. This version of myself wants nothing more than to talk, party, fuck, chase dreams and build an empire. This version of myself is competent, confident and full of energy. I’m sick of saying “this version of myself”, so from now on, let’s just give him a name and treat him like a separate person.

Anyway, BigDickMick92 is the one who I tell people about when they ask what I’m like. He’s the one who answers questions on personality tests, fills out my Tinder bio and sets the standard of being I feel I have to live up to. Did you catch the last one? That’s the kicker.

Throughout the other ninety-five percent of the time, I’m a very quiet dude. I spend most of my time alone. I don’t much care for light conversation or excessive noise. I leave people on “read”, procrastinate heavily, overthink constantly and hate myself for not being BigDickMick92.

See, I have this internal dialogue that I go through every day. The phrasing has changed over the years as my values have shifted and I’ve learned a lot of fancy new words since I was fifteen, but the core tone of the conversation is always the same. Why are you like this? Why can’t you summon the competence and energy you’re SUPPOSED to have? How are you still so quiet and ineffectual after so many years of concentrated personal development?

It’s funny, I read somewhere that you should talk to yourself like you would talk to someone you care about. I think the person who thought of this didn’t consider how much of a dick I can be. If my friend is quiet and ineffectual, my first instinct is to tell him to cut that shit out and stop being a pussy. It’s taken a hell of a lot of self-reflection to realise the hypocrisy in that sentiment, and I try not to do it anymore, but that’s still my first instinct.

And I’m not actually ineffectual by any measure. The years of personal development have changed me in incredible ways, and I’m actually more competent than I ever thought possible. Just this year, I’ve made incredible strides in my understanding of social dynamics and spirituality, achieved lots in my studies and landed the most established and high-paying job I’ve ever had by a - huge - margin. But still, in my quiet moments, when I’m un-showered and under-slept, watching The Office for the twentieth time and waiting for the weeks fifth order of McDonald’s to arrive, I can easily forget the stronger elements of my history.

If you were hoping for some kind of revelation here, I’m sorry that I haven’t reached one. I’m still trying to decide what to do about this split in my personality. Maybe I should accept the ratio as a part of my character, and try to work within those parameters? Maybe I should try to incrementally shift, making BigDickMick92 the six, seven or eight-percent version of myself? Maybe there are an equal number of positive attributes I could inspire from ninety-five-percent Mick that I simply haven’t manifested because I spend all my time hating on him?

If I ever figure it out, I’ll be sure to write down how I did it.

#Journal #Mick Minehan #personal development #competence #confidence #procrastination #anxiety

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hellyeahomeland · 6 years

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“Paean to the People” | Directed by Lesli Linka Glatter

“Paean to the People” picks up right where “All In” left off. Carrie and Anson are speeding through the streets of Budapest Moscow Budapow. In this opening shot, their car is the only one on the bridge, adding to the feeling of just how on their own they are, without diplomatic cover, as they try to distract Yevgeny long enough to get Simone on that plane.

The arrangement in this shot!! Everyone whose face is visible is serving so much face. Simone is like, “don’t look at me.” Bennet (with facial hair!) is like, “are you fucking kidding me?” Doxie (with some pretty great side eye) is like, “I am NOT getting stuck in Budapow.” And Ms. Pink Scarf is like, “What am I doing here again? What is my job?” You and us both, Pink Scarf. You and us both.

Let’s give a full round of snaps to Sandy this season. She brought the sassy realness and Russian know-how the whole dang time. This show needs all the female energy it can get and this shot of her pulling out the chair for Clint’s “time out” is incredible. We’re not sure if she’ll be back for season eight, but if she won’t, we will miss her so.

Both Carrie and Anson know what’s at stake in this mission but in this moment, it’s Carrie who has to convince Anson how far she can and will go. We hate to say it, but the moment of recognition shared here between them screams “America First” when Quinn tells Carrie to get in the car and stay down. If seven seasons of Homeland have taught us one thing, it’s that these people all follow the same code: Get in. Get down. Shut up. Mission over self.

IJLTP.

We will hand it to the Homeland props department for getting the birthday right on Simone’s fake Carrie Mathison passport (it’s April 5, 1979). But!! Her middle name is spelled Anne, not Ann.

Simone spent a lot of time obscuring her face from the Russian officials in that car, but this glimpse of her expression after she asks Saul if he’s really going to leave Carrie--the Carrie who CLIMBED A FUCKING ROOF LIKE TWENTY MINUTES AGO TO GET TO SIMONE--in Budapow. That is a pursed lip and evil eye if we ever saw ‘em.

...And, of course, the guilt is written all over his face.

We are CACKLING at the dude in the white jacket in the background. We are not sure if he is just a really bad extra or some random stranger who saw Claire Danes in a Budapest train station and needed to share else he was met with a chorus of “pics or it didn’t happen” from his friends.

Sara and Doxie have the same birthday (November 4), which further solidifies that he is her forever man and the best Carrie Angel of them all.

We talked about the strong “America First” vibes above and the whole sequence of Carrie running through the train station is giving us heavy “The Smile” vibes, too. After seven seasons, it’s difficult for some moments not to feel like explicit callbacks from earlier episodes. After all, maybe looking at a mirror in a crowded marketplace is just Carrie’s favorite American spy woman move. But this shot, and Carrie’s smile later, are so specific that we think the homage is intentional.

IJLTP, II.

Real talk though, you really get a sense of the loneliness of the office here, as Beau faces away, back to the camera, surrounded by those heavy curtains.

Lesli Linka Glatter is a choreographer by training and she’s talked before about the diligent preparation she does before directing a Homeland episode. In sequences like these--filmed, acted, and edited with such specific clarity--that training and preparation come through loud and clear. Every shot has a purpose and we’re exposed to all angles of the action. It really is like a dance.

Here, the slow reveal of Yevgeny coming around the corner ratchets up the stakes as Carrie waits, a sitting duck in the locked room.

And here’s our duck. What’s so great about thrilling and suspenseful action sequences like this is the human moments they’re contrasted with. We can see the fear in her face as she contemplates whether to go down in a blaze of glory. She’s not made of steel. She may only have seconds left to live. She may be a hero but she is not a superhero.

Yevgeny delivers a BudaPOW (sorry, we couldn’t resist) with his punch to Carrie, but her moment of defeat is quickly transformed into one of triumph with the news that Saul and his “package” have achieved lift-off.

This smile, guys. Damn. Claire Danes is in a class all her own.

Delirious, glorious laughter. When was the last time we saw Carrie laugh?

It doesn’t last long, of course. The first rule of Homeland is that if Carrie smiles, shit’s about to get fucked up. “At least she had this moment,” we all whisper quietly to ourselves.

The shots of Saul looking down from his window at the city of Budapow--Carrie in it God knows where, the proverbial needle in the haystack--are powerful. He has left her there. And now he has to get her back.

We love this shot of everyone arrayed out like this, watching Simone’s testimony in The Room Where It Happened. Though we would like to point out that it’s hard to take Bennet seriously without facial hair. Dude, it’s 5 o’clock somewhere. Get on it! (Also there are so many VESTS this season! We count two in this shot alone.)

IJLTP, III.

This is the sequence of shots after Keane says she’ll do everything she can to get Carrie back. There was some chatter about going to Anson first (looking pensive), then Saul (looking sorrowful), and finally Max, who looks the most doubtful and suspect of them all (and, of course, almost hidden behind the others in the back). Sara actually thinks closing with Max is the most powerful. He’s been by Carrie’s side, through thick and thin, all seven seasons of this show. And after the trauma of losing Quinn last season, it’s easy to see how history may be replaying itself for him, this time in agonizing slow-motion.

So many “Pilot” vibes. This show loves playing with reversals and bookends, and having Carrie be the prisoner now is one of the most stinging of them all.

Sara would just like to say that she even looks beautiful in a Russian prison.

The book Carrie’s reading here is called Where Avon into Severn Flows, which is actually a short story by the American writer Harold Frederic and part of his book The Deserter and Other Stories: A Book of Two Wars.

Here is the opening paragraph of the story:

“A boy of fifteen, clad in doublet and hose of plain cloth dyed a sober brown, sat alone at one end of a broad, vaulted room, before a writing table. The strong, clear light which covered him and his work fell through an open window, arched at the top and piercing a stone wall of almost a yard's thickness. Similar openings to the right and left of him marked with bars of light a dozen other places along the extended, shelf-like table, where writers had now finished their day's labor, and, departing, had left covered horns of ink and cleansed utensils behind them. But the boy's task lagged behind fulfilment, and mocked him.”

It’s easy to see the parallels. Carrie is held in a Russian prison, also dressed in plain, ill-fitting clothes. She sits in a broad, vaulted room with a plain writing table nearby. Carrie might have won the battle, getting Simone back to the United States, but here in this cell, her success must feel fleeting and the irony of her current circumstance mocking.

Some major “There’s Something Else Going On” vibes here. (Sorry, we’re just gonna point out all our vibes.)

We’re just gonna call this pose from Costa Ronin the Yevgeny Lean (#IJustLikeHowHeLeans). On a more serious note, some credit needs to be given to Ronin, who brought Yevgeny to life and made him feel like a fully lived-in person. His habit of leaning back, feet propped out before him, is just one small example, but it’s representative of the care and attention he put into crafting such a three-dimensional portrait of one of the most interesting villains in the series’ history.

IJLTP, IV.

And that IJLTP shot of Carrie, alone in that Russian prison with the stakes (i.e., her mental health) now clearly defined, is followed by the rather astounding hero’s welcome that awaits Keane back in the West Wing. This reminds Sara of those tunnels that sports teams would form after a game for everyone to run through. And now Sara wishes Keane had run through the tunnel, high-fiving everyone.

It’s Tie Color Time! Note that Beau is now back to the blue tie, having resumed his position as Vice President.

Talk about sweet karma. The scene between Paley and Keane is remarkable for a few reasons. First, Paley does all the talking. Keane doesn’t even give him the respect that comes with a response. He lowers himself to his knees, literally begging for her mercy.

Keane is often shot from below, highlighting her stance and power. But here, it’s a point-of-view shot. We see what Paley sees: this woman, whom Saul once claimed could not “rise above her own vindictiveness,” closing in on him, a bird of prey who’s finally made her catch. And then she spits in his face.

The Washington Monument, which sits due east of the Reflecting Pool, adds great dramatic effect to this beautifully shot (and scored) moment after Keane leaves her meeting with Paley. Despite the monument’s great size, in these shots its height matches Keane’s, which is likely intentional.

As the monument was being completed. Joseph R. Chandler, a Freemason and member of the House of Representatives said:

“No more Washingtons shall come in our time ... But his virtues are stamped on the heart of mankind. He who is great in the battlefield looks upward to the generalship of Washington. He who grows wise in counsel feels that he is imitating Washington. He who can resign power against the wishes of a people, has in his eye the bright example of Washington.”

As she drives back through the DC streets at night one last time as President, she’s clearly at a crossroads. History has its eyes on her. (We will also continue to make ALL the Hamilton references.)

We’re not sure if this moment was scripted or if it was a choice by Claire in the moment. Either way, what’s happening? If she praying? Thanking God? Carrie’s relationship with religion and atonement has been basically nonexistent since the show devoted attention to it in season five. We wonder if, like Brody before her, she may be discovering--or rediscovering, as it were--it while in captivity, a salve for her inevitable isolation.

A few things to note from this headstone:

It’s the tenth anniversary of Andrew’s death.

Are we really meant to believe Keane is old enough to have had a kid in 1979? Elizabeth Marvel was born in 1969, which means she’s playing at least ten years older than she actually is. Sara does not buy this, but whatever.

Andrew is born mere weeks before Carrie, which in hindsight kind of shifts the relationship between Keane and Carrie in season six. Carrie really could be Keane’s daughter, and if Carrie indeed did see her in some small part as a mother figure, it frames her conflict with Saul last season--and the battle for Carrie’s loyalty--in an even sharper light.

This is just a gorgeous light, the rows of headstones filling the bottom half of the screen and the large, overgrown tree framing Keane in the top half. It’s her figurative “moment alone in the shade” (figurative because she’s not really in the shade, but y’all catch our drift).

Again, it was impossible to properly capture the moment when Carrie congratulates Aleksandr through anything other than a gif. The quiver in her voice, her attempt at a forced smile. After this moment, the lighting in the room shifts--she is literally forced to see the light, as the direness of her circumstances are fully revealed.

This is the last time we see Carrie before the “seven months later” coda, so now’s as good a time as any to talk about the truly tremendous work she did this season.

From the opening episode, Claire took us on the tenuous, tumultuous journey of Carrie’s war with her own mind and the battles waged within. Every episode, every moment was brought to life with exacting precision. Sometimes we loved her, and sometimes we hated her, but Claire’s commitment to every moment never wavered, whether it was seducing Dante, having nightmarish visions of her bloodied daughter, or inching her way across that GRU roof.

The throughline of this season of Carrie’s mental health makes this moment and the final scene land with even more crushing weight than they otherwise would. When Carrie experiences a breakdown so harrowing and frightening, she goes to extreme lengths to restore her own sanity. In the last three episodes of the season, we see just how invaluable that sanity is--her mind is both her greatest asset and greatest liability.

Carrie knows here what’s about to happen. She stares, eyes wide open, almost as if she’s glimpsing into the future at what lies before her. There’s no safety net this time, no pills or ECT to pull her back or hit the reset button. But for as much as she knows that she’ll lose her mind (in every sense of the word, it turns out), there is also great uncertainty, looking into “the bottom of a black hole with no walls.”

Something we find super interesting about this sequence is just how many perspectives LLG gives us of Keane’s speech, whether it’s Wellington’s from inside the Oval, Saul in his office, or Yevgeny in Budapow. Again, LLG’s choreography background comes shining through. For almost the entire speech, we see her presidency--and what turns out to be its final moments--through everyone’s lens except her own.

LLG doesn’t shoot Keane center-frame, without some extra filter of a screen, until the very end of the scene, after the speech is over. Keane talks earlier about wanting to speak directly to the American people, from the heart, but what we actually get is everyone looking at screens, at the filtered version of this woman and her office, a metaphor if ever there was one for her short-lived presidency.

As her speech (which, like Washington’s Farewell Address, focuses on the need to not let political parties and divisions tear apart the country) nears its end, we do see Keane center-frame. But, again, it’s a shot of her center-frame on the screen, and her appearance is somehow altered and filtered.

(A quick note about her wardrobe: Keane starts the day grieving for her son at Arlington, and she keeps on the same black clothing during her speech, a signal of the impending end of her presidency. The dangling earrings are also an interesting choice, and an unusual one for Keane, who usually wears studs or conservative-looking hoops. Like Carrie in “Species Jump,” this is as close as she’ll get to “letting her hair down,” and the unconventional jewelry choice conveys the peace she’s found with her decision.)

And now the lights come down on Keane and her presidency, in every sense of the word.

The dynamics of this scene remind Sara of the end of “The Choice,” when Saul sees Carrie in that hall of dead bodies after thinking she’d died in the explosion. They shared a moment of recognition at the end of that scene, standing in stark contrast to what unfolds here.

Here’s our first good shot of Carrie, and there’s a lot to take in. The swollen face and unkempt hair are startling, to say the least. Under her bulky black coat she’s wearing white (you can see a peak of her shirt here but her pants--not visible in this shot--are also white), indicating she’s been in an asylum.

The season opened with Carrie running on a treadmill, athletic and strong, the buzzy chords of jazz blaring in our ears. It ends with our heroine on the complete opposite end of the spectrum. She’s feeble and unsteady, running away from the Russian guards and straight past Saul. We hear jazz again, but it’s slower and somehow weightier.

As Saul gently brushes the hair from her face and looks into her eyes, calling her name, she is seemingly unable to recognize him. Her eyes dart from side to side, up and down, but his remain steady on her, and we can see (and share) the concern and devastation etched on his face.

She’s searching, and so is he.

#homeland #homelandedit #paean to the people #lesli linka glatter #*#in the director's chair #by: sara #by: gail #vibes on vibes on vibes

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deathtrapnest · 7 years

Text

Come A Little Bit Closer You’re My Type of Man

fandom: Guardians of the Galaxy pairing/warnings: Yondu x Reader self insert author’s notes: this is 110% @dynamate‘s fault

summary: explicit Yondu x Reader. There's a bar fight, Yondu makes a dad joke, and I stole a line from To Have and Have Not.

also on AO3

It had started- as all good things do- with a bar fight. A bar fight in the middle of Knowhere.

“You owe me money, scumbag.”

Those words were an old familiar friend, and you could feel your flight or fight response momentarily kick into high gear but for once they weren’t directed toward you.

The offender was a species you didn’t know but looked approximately like a lumpy boulder with a ponytail and a face. Not pretty. Though maybe he had a good personality.

And he was cracking his knuckles menacingly, standing behind a centaurian in a leather trenchcoat.

You’d recognized the uniforms. Ravagers. As soon as they’d walked in the door you’d figured trouble would be following soon after. And especially when the centaurian leader (identified as such by the way his cohorts seemed to throng around him) was carrying himself with enough swagger that even you sort of wanted to fight him to knock the surly, slightly menacing, but fully self satisfied, smirk off his face. He had blue skin, gauged with scar tissue and dark red eyes.

He sipped his drink and turned around innocentally, his eyes going up and down Big Ugly. A grin spread across his face, all sharpened teeth, some of them metal and jagged.

You knocked your drink back, already itching for this to turn bad. It had been approximately 45 minutes since your life had last been in danger and you were starting to get bored. What was the point of coming to a planet with one of the highest crime rates in the galaxy if not the excitement? You bounced your leg, watching the exchange go down from your seat a few feet away.

“Glock, you old son of a bitch” the blue ravager said amiably to the eight foot tall monster who was staring him down like he was about to eat him. You took a moment to appreciate the harsh, throaty, tone of his voice. “The last time I saw you? Lemme remember… you were fading into the distance with the Nova Corps halfway up your asshole”

The living boulder made a guttural roaring growl from his belly and took a lumbering step forward. “You left me to die out there and ran off with the loot!”

“So I did!” the ravager chuckled, still calm as ever, and raised his drink, grin spreading wider so that the light bounced off his metal teeth.

The big guy grabbed the front of his jacket and shook him once. “Today’s the day I make you sorry”

The smile dropped off the ravager’s face but he still regarded the attacker complacently, flicking his coat back and putting his hand to a holster strapped to his hip. “I bet you won’t.” he said, gripping something thin and red in his hand.

You tipped back on your barstool to try and see what it was, watching all this as eagerly as a sports match.

Big Ugly grabbed Blue by the wrist before he could draw fully whatever weapon he had.

But the centaurian smirked, chuckling to himself. He calmly turned to the skinny, scruffy looking peon beside him and said “hold my drink” depositing it in his hand before rolling his shoulders once, and slamming his forehead directly against Ugly’s, knocking him back three feet with impressive force.

Aaand we’re off, you thought.

The bar erupted. There was never need for much instigation in these type of establishments- you knew from experience.

Broken glass, the smell of spilled booze, fists flying, the thud of bodies hitting the floor and punches landing, a missing tooth sailing past your ear. This is the life.

You picked up a bar stool and broke it over someone’s head. They dropped. In the chaos you supposed drinks were free now and quickly grabbed a bottle from behind the bar (the bartender was a tad preoccupied- some species with tentacles was wrapped around his head and he’d wildly tried shooting it off with a pistol with no effect other than sending bullets ricocheting off the walls and further escalating the chaos) and sucked it down.

Blue menace seemed to have been following a similar line of thought. You saw someone take a swing at his head. It missed- probably because the attacker was a little distracted by a bright red arrow flying through his skull before he could land the punch. Blue guy deftly caught the drink the other man had been holding in his fist before he hit the floor with a death rattle groan. He threw it back in one sweep.

It was hard not to keep your eyes on the blue ravager, even amidst the crowd. The arrow he was controlling zipped through the throng with precision, leaving a streak of red in its wake. The man controlling it sat back casually on the only bar stool remaining upright, thighs spread and arms balanced on the bar behind him, felling any foe before they got close enough to touch him. His lips were pursed in a whistle that you could hear faintly, its own melody among the shouts and rabble.

You preferred a bit more of a hands on approach. Someone had broken a bottle over the back of your head and frankly that was just rude, so you grabbed the someone or something by the tusk and slammed its head against the bar, shattering the wood.

You were feeling rather happy about your work until the red arrow whizzed past your ear. You whipped around and saw it pierce through the chest of a man behind you, who had both hands raised above his head holding an axe that had been seconds away from coming down on you. Needless to say that was no longer in the cards with blood pouring down the front of his shirt and a sort of dopey ‘hey what happened?’ look on his face as he crumpled to the floor. You turned to blue guy and raised the drink in your hand amiably. “Cheers for that, man!” you shouted at him. He raised an eyebrow at you and grinned, mouth full of jagged edges and metal. He raised his own drink back with a nod in your direction. Then it was back into the fray for both of you.

Then someone had to escalate the situation by pulling out a ray gun. And that’s just unsporting. You dropped to your hands and knees, crawling as you saw others drop to the ground and your eye level around you. You made it to the bar and saw blue guy already stooped underneath it, occasionally poking his head up only to duck back down to narrowly miss a blue shot of energy from frying the red mohawk right off the top of his head.

“Fancy meeting you down here” you said, imitating his pose and curling your knees up to your chest.

“The drinks are bad but I keep coming back for the atmosphere” he shot back, both of you shouting over the unruly noise of yelling��and the ‘pew pew’ of that idiot’s ray gun.

“I just want to clarify” you said with a wince as something shattered above your head “I’m not a coward. And I’m not down here because I’m hiding. I’m pretty sure I dropped something on the ground.”

“Was it your dignity?”

“That must be it. It’s small enough that it’s going to be hard to find in this mess”

“Well, Not-A-Coward. I’m Yondu.” he peered over the edge of the bar. “And I’m sick of this dude.”

He unfurled his fingers from the arrow he was holding and it levitated into the air on silent command. He whistled through his teeth and it sprang to life, darting up over the bar. You didn’t see it happen but you heard the shout and the thunk and then there was no more ray gun firing. A few people cheered. The fighting raged on with renewed vigor and liveliness. You exuberantly kicked a Krylorian in the chest as you pulled yourself out from under the bar. Yondu was fighting bare fisted in addition to his arrow, you saw him elbow someone in the nose with admirable panache.

It was distracting and you took a roundhouse kick to the face for your pause. Yondu laughed at you. Dick. While he was laughing someone smashed a bottle against the side of his head. Sometimes karma works fast.

The bottle smasher was about seven feet tall of grimy purple scales and had an extra eyeball on his chin. Yondu had to tilt his head back to make eye contact even with the bottom eye. That looked, to you, like a two person project.

“Scuse me” you said as warning before clasping Yondu firmly by the shoulder and pushing down to propel yourself up to jump on the bar. That afforded enough height to smash the flat of your fist down on Big Guy’s head with a ‘thump’ that sounded like an instant concussion in your semi-professional opinion.

“Do I look like a jumping off point to you, boy?” Yondu snapped at you over the din.

“Yeah” you replied easily.

He muttered something under his breath. The three eyed giant was still on his feet, eyes rolling around dazedly. Yondu wolf whistled and the arrow swirled around his head. The giant batted at it like it was a fly he could catch and for his troubles, the arrow sliced right through his palm and he stumbled away screeching.

Yondu shouted over his shoulder at you “Well while you’re back behin’ the bar see if anyone’s gotten to the cash register yet!”

“I’m like two steps ahead of you!” you were shoving handfuls of money into your pockets and tucking a bottle of something that looked expensive into your coat.

The arrow flew back into Yondu’s hand and he leaned over the bar to leer at you, propping his chin on his fist as if there wasn’t utter chaos reigning down from all sides. “Wanna get out of here and head someplace a little more upscale?”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Behind the dumpster in the alley outside.”

“You really know how to make a guy feel special, don’t you?”

It took some maneuvering but Yondu whistled a happy tune as he lead you out and his magic arrow covered you, leaving senseless bloodshed in its wake and letting you both stroll out the back door at your leisure.

The general smell of smoke in the air that pervaded the city like a cloud covered up any dumpster smell. Which you were grateful for. Because you were going to have to do a lot of breathing through your nose when your mouth was preoccupied with Yondu’s.

You smashed your lips against his, biting against the chapped, rough, skin as he opened his mouth to you, swirling his tongue around yours. You felt the sting and familiar taste of your own blood as your tongue slashed against the jagged edges of his teeth. You liked it and did it again, the harsh pain of the laceration making the hair on the back of your neck stand on end. He sucked the red that spilled off your lower lip.

You had him grasped by the front of his jacket, his back against the outside wall of the bar. You thrust one leg between his thighs, satisfied to feel an erection straining against his leather pants. You pressed your hips together and slid up and down slowly as you continued locking lips.

“You know how whistle, don’t you, boy?” he growled as you pulled away for air. His voice was even deeper then and he knotted his fingers in the hair at the nape of your neck and tugged you downward, until you were on your knees in front of him. He smirked. “Just put your lips together- and blow.”

You worked open the front of his pants eagerly and did just that, sucking down his length in one go, opening up the back of your throat to him and wrapping your tongue around the base of his cock.

There were two small, red, fins that wrapped around his testes that were fluttering slightly. You sucked one of them between your lips and felt his pulse in it, thrumming. He seemed to enjoy that from the sound he made in reaction.

Your hand fisted around his cock- which was as blue as the skin of his face, but a bruised purple at the tip. You sucked on it, moving your head up and down and gripping his thighs to balance. It hurt your newly injured tongue but you were too caught up to mind much.

As you pulled back you let your teeth scrape lightly against his shaft and heard a satisfying yelp that quickly turned into chuckle as he dug his fingernails hard into the back of your neck in retaliation. “Easy there, darlin’. Don’t damage the goods.”

You hummed in the back of your throat and rubbed your hand over your own crotch, needing some attention there while you worked.

The back door to the bar burst open. Yondu’s cohort, the skinny, dirty looking one stumbled out and landed face first, regurgitated some blood and possibly a tooth, and looked up blearily to see you with Yondu’s dick poised an inch from your mouth. He gave a thumbs up. Yondu gave him a thumbs up back. Then he picked himself up and threw himself back into the bar, the sound of shouting and glass breaking faintly becoming clear before the door closed behind him.

“Where were we?” you said innocently. You smirked affectionately at the purple cock head bobbing against your mouth. “Oh, right.”

You swallowed him to the base again, exhaling through your nose and stretching your lips wide enough that drool and a bit of leftover blood dripped down your chin. He made a satisfied groan above you.

“We’re going to want to clear out of here before that fight dies down” you said, slightly out of breath when you pulled away after a few firm sucks. You stood up and shoved your pants down to your knees, turning around and bracing one hand against the wall.

You were no blushing virgin and not much prep was needed, especially with his cock lubricated with your spit. Yondu pressed into you without ceremony and you groaned at the initial burning stretch.

Your fingernails dug into the brick wall and you grit your teeth as you felt him push in until he was filling you to the hilt. His arm wrapped around your waist, pawing at your front, rubbing across your pelvis before taking a firm grip of the shape of your genitals. Then you felt his tongue slide wetly across the back of your neck leading to a harsh bite at your earlobe, drawing blood from where the sharp tip of his teeth broke the skin.

The whimper that escape your mouth was shamefully undignified when he slowly drew out of you again before thrusting back with full force until his hips slapped against your ass and forced you crotch further against his palm.

You could hear that he was enjoying this as much as you were, could feel the sharp exhales of hot breath on the nape of your neck as he started rocking into you at a brutal rhythm- shallow, quick humps intermixed with slow, drawn out ones that drew back until you could feel his cock head pressing against your rim before he stroked back into you. If you were never able to sit down again, it would still be worth it.

Yondu’s hand was equally merciless on you, his grip bruising and his palm calloused against the sensitive skin as he pinched and stroked at you until your head was swimming with no other thought than the mix of pleasure and pain.

When he growled “come for me, boy” you did just that, eyes rolling into the back of your head and knees immediately sagged beneath you, your whole body going limp. The only thing keeping you upright was his hand on your now hyper sensitive genitals and his cock still inside you, rubbing up against the only part of you that wasn’t numb and hazy with satisfied pleasure.

He gave a last few jerks before you felt slickness and heard the grunt and satisfied chuckle as he pulled out, now limp.

You needed a moment to catch your breath, turning around with your back to the wall but your pants still around your ankles. Yondu was smirking, eyes slowly looking you up and down like he was satisfied with his work.

“We’re on our way to a big score. Could use someone like you.” he said casually as you hiked your pants up and buttoned them close. “Good money to be made. But it’s gonna be dangerous. And very illegal.”

You shrugged one shoulder. “Sounds like my type of job.”

He grinned back at you.

#yondu x reader #yondu self insert #guardians of the galaxy #yondu udonta #gotg2 #gotg #yondu imagines #my fanfic #dynamate

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