#which means i need to wait for the next time this fish's window and the lancet's window line up without leaving

[kite33]

i have entered: jail

[lolabangtan]

sideshow | jjk

You’re a successful cam girl in need of a hot guy with a big cock, and you think you’ve found your match.

Word count: 9k

Warnings: smut, dub-con fantasy.

# cam girl!reader, coffee shop AU, mutual pining, hand job, oral sex (female and male receiving), squirting, face sitting, restraints, unprotected sex, face-fucking, dacryphilia, overstimulation and post-orgasm torture, teasing/degradation, cream pie, cum play, recording kink, dub-con role play, they’re so cute *sobs*

A/N: let’s not ask about this and enjoy it without wondering where the inspiration came from.

You’re always staring at him. When you’re in line waiting for your order, chatting with someone else when he’s nearby, or even when you secretly spot him working as you pass by the window – you’re always staring at Jeon Jungkook.

Your friends mock you for it whenever they get the chance. It’s almost as if you, the sexy, mysterious girl who records herself for a living, having such a silly, wholesome crush on someone was the most amusing thing they’ve ever heard. But a guy like him, so kind and hot and funny, is worth it, and you won’t deny it.

But being honest, they’re right by showing their surprise. You just don’t come off as the kind of girl who’d fall for a guy like him.

Apart from being kind, hot, and funny, Jeon Jungkook is also extremely popular while still being down to earth. An endangered specimen – if there’s ever been one before. He’s got his tattoos, and his adorable dog, and his decent schoolwork managing skills, and his outstanding talent at any sport to ever exist. And in the meantime, you sometimes catch him staring back, so your mind has to work twice as much to fish for an excuse. You just think it’ll be better in the long run.

Because honestly, people always talk. They point at you, make comments, or ask creepy questions. Surely Jeon Jungkook, with his brilliant future, doesn’t want that just because his cock might get hard with one of your videos.

In a way – a stupid, pointless way – you’re always staring at each other.

“You could try and talk to him one day, you know. Maybe then you’ll see there’s literally not a single thought behind those silly doe eyes.”

You can’t help laughing at Seokjin’s words, almost choking on your coffee. “Isn’t that a bit mean? I thought you liked him.”

“And I do!”

“Hm, look at the time.” You check your phone before putting it back into your purse. “I’d better hurry if I don’t wanna keep my sister waiting. We’ll talk later, okay? And I will not approach him just because. I really don’t need any gossip about me.”

Well, you’re just stressed. You need some money for your Spring break trip to the beach, but you aren’t exactly thrifty. Actually, you’re quite the opposite.

So, you’ve come up with an idea: charging for requests and uploading them to your website. The answer from your subscribers was immediate and increasingly positive, with only one problem.

The most voted idea was a POV, which sadly required another person to join you. Someone with a big, nice cock if it’s possible. You’d ask Seokjin, but he’d never let his almost little sister-like friend suck his cock and give him four orgasms in a row. And it’s not something you’d do either in a world where you weren’t desperate.

You’re not going to lie, there’s only one person you’d want to do that video with – and he’s walking out into the backbar right now.

The two of you stop at the same time as you walk past each other. Not noticing his presence next to you, you keep looking at the poster with the newest sweet additions to the menu and sigh with satisfaction at the fact that you’ll be able to keep enjoying your good old butter croissants.

Then you turn around.

“Oh, shit— sorry! God, I’m so clumsy! Let me help you.”

You squat down to pick up the broken pieces of glass scattered on the floor. When you look up, you’re met with the sight of a staring Jeon Jungkook bent in front of you.

“I’m sorry,” you manage to repeat.

His lips twitch as if he wanted to say something, but the man keeps quiet as you hand him back his stuff. You can’t help looking down at his muscular arms, covered in black ink. Although Jungkook remains impassive and cool, here you are, practically malfunctioning – while he’s probably wondering why the cam girl hasn’t left yet.

“Just— be careful. Don’t cut yourself.”

He does look like a bunny, now that you think of it. A really hot bunny.

Fucking shit, you can’t help it, can you? To stare, to drool, to picture your hands stroking down his chest, kneading the flesh. You love ripped guys, especially when it doesn’t get over their heads. You’d eat him up in a second, pinky promise.

“Sorry,” you say again, standing up. “I wasn’t looking.”

“Y/N! Are you okay?”

Namjoon rushes up to you, breaking the strange silence between you and Jungkook. He sees the mess and starts to pick up the broken pieces, asking you to step back just in case. With a nod, the youngest offers to go and fetch a broom, and Namjoon thanks him.

Your friend lets out a laugh. “Only with my homeboy, huh?”

“Hm?”

“You only get like this with Jungkookie,” he explains. “The rest of the time, you’re a merciless succubus.”

“Shut up, he’s gonna hear you,” you groan.

Namjoon starts wiping the floor, and you help him by picking up the plastic bag.

“Do you think he likes you back?”

You shrug. “I guess he might be attracted to me, but I don’t think he likes me... in that sense. I don’t care, though – it’s not like we’re a match or something. I’m probably just attracted too.”

Jungkook comes back with the broom and cleans the floor while you look around in a poor attempt to avoid his eyes. You don’t notice the way he looks at you, nor the pent-up frustration with which he grips the stick of the broom, his lips twitching again.

“Well, I, uh— I’ll leave you to it. And sorry again, I wasn’t looking.”

With that, you rush out of the coffee shop and run down the street until you reach the number you were looking for. Taking out your keys, you open the door and walk in, going directly to the second floor.

When you get into the flat, the storm unleashes:

“God, I was so worried! You should’ve told me you’d be running late.”

Like always, visiting your older sister comes with a nagging and a steamy cup of coffee. You’re enjoying both of them sitting in her kitchen.

“You’re exaggerating,” you groan.

“Yeah, sure, it’s not like any of your creepy fans could ever doxx you or something and kidnap you.” With a raised eyebrow, you stare at her over the mug. “Hm, okay, just build the habit of telling me if you’re gonna be late, okay?”

“Okay.”

“So” – she turns around with a grin and leaves her mug in front of you – “who is this Jungkook guy and why haven’t you asked him out already?”

Your face turns a bright red. “How do you know about—? Fucking Jin...”

“Come on, you’re usually bolder. You really like him, don’t you?” At your shrugging, your sister chuckles. “You’re entitled to like people, you know that, right? And hit on them, and ask them out. Just because you had a few bad experiences—”

“It’s just not gonna happen,” you blurt out. “You know why? First, because he’s not remotely interested in me. And second, because I know, I just know how this is going to end if I do,” you continue, your face growing warmer. “And I don’t care about all the nice guys out there because, in the end, they’re all the same; dicks with an excuse of a brain.”

“You want to have sex with him, don’t you?”

“Uh, yeah?”

She laughs again. “Then try the opposite! You think he’d only be interested in the shagging? Go shag. And then see if he stays.”

You bury your face in the palms of your hands, thankful for the chilly contact. The skin cools down, and a sigh escapes from your lips.

“What if he says no?”

“Then he doesn’t want to fuck. That’s uncommon for a man so, one point for him.”

Ah, yes, your sister and her logic; it’s utterly stupid and yet, you always fail to rebuke her absurd reasoning. It’s almost a talent, you think. Maybe that’s why she’s a lawyer.

“Well, I do have a plan,” you murmur.

Her eyes brighten immediately. “Then go for it, tiger! He’s super cute, and super hot! Better get your heart broken by a ten if all men suck.”

The coffee shop is almost closing when you arrive; you had asked Namjoon who was closing tonight so, when you heard it’d be him, you rushed out of your sister’s place to get there in time. This is a one-time chance.

You spot him behind the window, wiping a cup.

There’s a sigh coming out from his mouth when the door jingles open. The common frustration of having a last-minute customer.

“Hey.”

“Ah— it’s you,” Jungkook says with a soft voice, and you frown. “I-I mean, I thought you were some annoying random, sorry… I don’t mind making you a coffee.”

Oh, that was nice. Very nice.

You quietly take a seat at the counter. “Thanks.”

“Uh, so…” You’re lucky Jungkook isn’t facing you, turned from you instead as he turns on the coffee machine. Otherwise, he’d notice your red face and the eagerness with which you listen to him as he stutters, “I-it’s pretty late— for a coffee. Do you have to stay up late tonight?”

“Not exactly.”

Finally, Jungkook turns around and hands you the coffee, looking pretty much puzzled.

“I was wondering if you’d like to work with me,” you finally let out, and your chest feels weightless for a second— until you come back to earth and realise that you’ll have to hear an answer.

He’s looking at you in complete silence.

Maybe he really doesn’t know that you’re a cam girl? Maybe he’s just thinking about what your job could be and how could the two of you possibly work together. Or maybe he’s just zooming out, who knows? It wouldn’t be the first time.

“Do you want me to, uh, e-edit a—?” Jungkook gets cut off by his own coughing as his cheeks turn red. “Sorry, edit a video... for you?”

Ah.

Of course he knows.

He knows, so there’s a chance he might have watched one of them. Maybe all of them. Perhaps Namjoon told him about it, or perhaps he thought you looked familiar and asked him. In his mind – and that’s what makes it awkward, and not the fact that he’s probably watched you naked or touching yourself – he knows what you work for, and every single interaction is stained with that.

“Uh— not... Not really.” You don’t notice, but Jungkook holds his breath, and his heart starts beating faster. “It was more along the lines of making one together.”

Your heart is beating fast too.

“Me?”

Well,  I’ve been told that you’ve got a big cock, oh, and because I have a crush on you.

You shrug. “Thought you could use the money, and you do have a nice body— your face wouldn’t show, though.”

“I, uh...”

“Just asking if you were down!” you blurt out then, stepping back. “Of course, it’s up to you. I understand if you’re not comfortable with us, uh, having—”

“I-I get you,” he laughs. Now his face is as red as a strawberry.

In silence, you stand there, waiting for an answer. However, it seems like neither of you is functioning properly at the time, so you clear your throat with your heart clenching painfully in your chest and let out a shaky laugh:

“Of course, it’s too weird, so, uh— forget I said anything. Thank you for considering it, have a nice day!”

You rush out of the café, but his voice stops you:

“Wait!”

You turn around and look at him; he looks positively embarrassed, even more than you, although it’s understandable – probably due to the circumstances – so, you wait, breath hitching, for him to continue.

Jungkook looks away. “I— I didn’t say no.”

“You don’t have to give me an answer now,” you rush to clarify. “That’s my number.” You hand him a business card, which he seems too afraid to check. “Call me… if you’re interested. I’ll leave now, thank you for your time. And— uh, nothing. Bye.”

“Bye…”

By the time you leave the coffee shop, your heart is beating so hard that you think it could be a stroke. Your cheeks are boiling hot, and you struggle to walk down to the bus stop while your legs wiggle. You did it, it’d done – you’ve already asked Jeon Jungkook to film an erotic video with you for your page.

You don’t get any signs of life from Jungkook until two days later, at two in the morning.

Namjoon told you that they had met some friends for a drink after closing time, so you’re not surprised that he’s up so late. He also tends to go to bed late when he stays up playing console games.

[Saturday, 2:17 AM] Unknown: Hello, Y/N.

[Saturday, 2:17 AM] Unknown: It’s Jungkook.

[Saturday, 2:18 AM] Unknown: I have been thinking about it and, if the offer still stands, I accept.

Your heart immediately somersaults the glowing letters on your screen. Reality fell on your shoulders, and you finally understood that you would be filming that video with Jeon Jungkook. Maybe you could ask him out on a date later, but it’d be tomorrow’s you’s nuisance to worry about rejection. For the time being, you’re going to get on with the script so that you can send it to him as soon as possible.

[Saturday, 5:43 AM] You: Cool, I’ve attached the script. Just let me know if there’s anything you don’t feel comfortable with or want to change. When are you free?

[Saturday, 5:44 AM] You: Of course, we’ll go through your limits before filming.

Jungkook’s reply doesn’t arrive in time for you to read it; as soon as you’re done with it, you plummet into your bed and fall asleep, totally exhausted.

[Saturday, 5:49 AM] Jeon Jungkook: Looking forward to it!

[Saturday, 5:49 AM] Jeon Jungkook: I mean

Jeon Jungkook has deleted this message

Jeon Jungkook has deleted this message

The bell goes through your head like a nail. Your mouth is dry and your body trembles, but you get up to open the door in the hope that it’s not Jungkook behind it.

After you had sent him the script, it took him a while to answer. Then, after three hours, he only answered ‘okay’ and asked you when you would be meeting. You agreed on the day and time, and here you are, turning the doorknob with your heart beating through your chest.

“Hi, come in.”

You step aside, and Jungkook walks into your small flat; it’s cute and cosy, with the golden light coming in through the windows. His black clothes soak in it as you watch him get comfortable and, for a second, it feels like he’s coming over for a date, just to hang out. It feels nice, that small, minute, short second.

“Want anything to drink?”

“Yes—” Jungkook clears his throat. “Yes, please. Water’s good.”

You come back with two glasses of water and sit in front of him on the couch, determined to calm down your nerves.

“Okay, so, I understand that you read the script, right?” you ask, and he nods instantly, perhaps too quickly. “Uh, so… is there anything you’d like to change? Anything you don’t feel comfortable with?”

Jungkook glances at you only to look away in the blink of an eye. He’s biting his lip again.

“No, hm, everything sounds good so far. I mean— t-there’s nothing I don’t like, like… there’s nothing that turns me… off.” He eventually gets discouraged to keep talking and gulps down the glass of water in front of him. “Sounds good, you know, with the angle you suggested.”

“Nothing at all? Are you sure? I wrote a lot of things.”

He keeps avoiding your eyes. “Yeah, I’m cool with it… And I brought the test results.”

“Good,” you murmur and take the papers as he hands them out to check them. “All clean, that’s good. I’ve got mine too, and I’m on birth control, obviously.”

“Cool.”

“I liked your suggestions for the plot, by the way.” Maybe it’s better to give Jungkook some praise for his effort, that way he will relax a little around you. “A bit wicked— but in a good way. Did you get it from a movie?”

He turns red in a second, and you have to press your thighs together. “N-no, I— it just came to my mind. I can add the effects later.”

You nod slowly and clear your throat.

Once the both of you have gone through every single detail of the script, you’re half turned on, half mortified. It’s almost as if your brain hasn’t fully processed that you will be doing all of this with Jungkook in an hour, or maybe even earlier.

“It’s okay if you’re nervous,” you say, hoping your voice doesn’t come off shaky. “And, well, we can stop at any moment, okay? We’ll just stop everything, no hard feelings.”

“Thank you…”

You give him a robe and show him the bathroom, where he gets changed and washes up only to return to your bedroom; that’s where you record everything, but there is a tarpaulin covering the whole wall, including the window. This way, and with a VPN, you make sure you keep your affairs decently hidden.

You’re also wearing a robe when Jungkook walks in, revealing the sight of your cleavage.

You walk up to him. “All good?” you ask. “Do you want anything? A glass of water? Viagra, or an energy bar?”

Jungkook stares at you, a bit surprised, or taken aback by the joke. You turn around in shame, with an apology on your lips, before you notice the way his cheeks turn red and an amused smile creeps to his own.

“A glass of water’d be great, thanks.”

When you return from the kitchen, you’re also bringing along a bunch of papers. “Here are the test results, I’m all clean. Thank you” – Jungkook hands you his own results, and you skim-read them – “I’m also on birth control, in case I didn’t tell you already, so feel free to, uh…”

“O-okay, gotcha.”

Luckily, he doesn’t make any faces as you shut up, discouraged; why are you acting like an idiot who has no idea what she’s doing? He’s probably regretting it already.

You have prepared the props for filming in your room; your bed, which you insisted on buying with a bar headboard, is already set with the ropes, so all that remains is to tie the victim with them. You’ve done the same with the foot of the bed, as well as the POV camera that’s fitted just above his head. He’s wearing a shirt and a pair of sweatpants, and you’ve put on a shirt that shows your nipples through and a pair of panties that are a bit too small so that your folds are marked.

What can you say: you consider yourself a meticulous creator.

“Okay, so I think everything’s ready. You can lie down now; I’ll take care of the rest.”

When Jungkook is finally lying on the bed, you straddle him to fasten the ties around his wrists and ankles.

It’s weird to feel his warm body beneath you after pining for him for so long; you can feel his thighs tensing and flexing under your ass, how he shifts on the mattress, looking down at your hands and how they skilfully tie him to the bed headboard. His eyes burn wherever they land, you fear you might be getting a bit of stage fright.

“How are you doing?” Jungkook murmurs a ‘good’, looking up at you. “Cool… Then we can get down to business.”

Holding your breath, you lean into him to turn on the camera and, as soon as the red light appears, you realise you’ve been holding it for too long and let out a deep sigh. Time to get into character. Don’t think about it, Y/N.

You look down at him; Jungkook stares back, waiting for you to get on with the script.

Faking a wicked smile, you bend over him and dive on his neck for a kiss, being as loud as possible, slurping and groaning. He shivers beneath you, and you feel yourself already getting turned on just by having him at your mercy like this. After all, this is supposed to be erotic.

Suddenly, Jungkook fixes your knee on his crotch and moves it a bit to the left, taking you by surprise.

“Are you awake, sweetheart?” you ask, pretending you aren’t surprised.

As you wait for a response, you bend down to leave a trail of pecks down his jaw and neck, peppering kisses on his shoulder now, as Jungkook stirs beneath you again.

“Uh… w-where am I?” he asks as he stares down at you with a pitiful frown. “Who are you?”

You let out a giggle. “I was hoping you’d recognise me, but I guess I need to be humbled… I’m the girl of your wet dreams, baby.”

“I-I don’t know what—”

You attack his lips this time, delving for a deep kiss. Jungkook eventually closes his eyes and gives in to your kiss, uttering a meek whimper against your lips and pulling at the ropes to no avail. When you move away, you sit on his crotch, happily surprised.

“Oh, what do we have here? Someone’s waking up, look.”

Before he can say anything, you pinch his tip over his trousers. He twitches again, leaking precum, as you can tell from the way a wet patch appears in the fabric.

“I’m sure it’s small, so tiny I wouldn’t even feel it,” you snicker, “but I’ll use it anyway, maybe as a plug for my butt.”

Jungkook whines, feeling himself getting even harder. “I-it’s not small—”

Honestly, when you dropped by the coffee shop and asked him to work with you on a video, he couldn’t believe it. It had always remained a fantasy, and he feared for a second that someone had ratted him out about his crush on you. ‘Someone’ as in ‘Kim Namjoon’, of course.

Jungkook has spent many hours thinking of different ways to ask you out on a date. Ever since he met you, he’s grown obsessed with you and your personality, charm, beauty, and confidence. When he started to notice you getting shy around him, a small flame of hope lit up inside of him, but why would you be into a guy like him? Yes, he isn’t bad looking, but surely, you’d be more into big, strong, sexual guys, wouldn’t you? Real men who had lots of experience in bed.

On the other hand, Jungkook becomes such a mess every time he’s around you; he drops things, he’s unable to form a coherent sentence, and you never seem to be too interested in talking to him for more than five seconds.

Now, is Jungkook in love with you? Before, he would have denied it, that this was just another crush. But now that he’s so close to you, that he can feel the sweat on your skin, that he’s one with you, he has to ask you out. Otherwise, he’ll never be happy again.

Especially now that the feeling of you straddling his lap and playing with his cock is ingrained in his memory.

“Let me go,” he barks, suddenly remembering that he has a script to follow. “I— I won’t tell anyone if you let me go now.”

You lean into him and stroke his cheek. “Why would I?”

Sucking his bottom lip into your mouth, you silence any possible reply from him and kiss him hard against the mattress. Your ass ruts against his cock mercilessly, almost by instinct, eager to feel his whines die in your mouth.

Your hands find their way beneath his shirt. With eager fingers, you brush his nipples and, hearing him whimper, keep pinching them as he stirs, fleeing your touch but at the same time seeking it. You chuckle and tease him for it, and Jungkook can only close his eyes with the genuine wish that he won’t come too soon, or at least before you get the footage you want.

You keep humping his clothed cock, now visibly hard and standing proudly against the fabric of his sweats. Between kisses, you tell him how well he’s doing.

“Let’s make a deal, shall we?” you suddenly say.

Jungkook struggles to peel his eyes open. “W-what deal?”

“If you manage not to cum before me, I’ll let you go,” you continue. “You will be totally free.”

“And— if I do?”

Shit, you forgot about this part. What happened if he came…? You can think of the paragraph and the page, but you really can’t remember the rest of the lines, shit. You totally suck at this—

“I’ll milk your cock dry until you beg me to stop – and only then will I think about it.”

Jungkook stares at you in shock, and for a second, you fear that your impromptu response has gone too far. But then you feel something hard rubbing against your pussy, and you realise that he is unconsciously humping you, twitching and getting bigger and harder.

“You’re fucking nuts,” he cries out.

But you only giggle in response, shoving your hips together as if you were actually riding him. You let out a loud moan, too exaggerated to be true. The constant pressure of your pussy against his crotch makes him arch his back, desperately trying to hold his own whines and grunts to save you the satisfaction of proving you right.

“Look at you! You poor thing,” you exclaim in laughter. “I’m gonna fuck your virgin cock until you pass out.”

Jungkook goes still.

“Oh, thought I didn’t know?” you ask, tilting your head to the side.

“I—”

You bend down and bite on his neck only to soothe the sting with your tongue. “You thought I didn’t know you’ve never been touched before? You’re popular, but women terrify you, don’t they? You see them and only notice their hard nipples through their shirts and their tight pussies peeking from under their short skirts, and that makes you nervous; if they’re nice to you, you’re not interested. If they’re mean, you spend all day imagining them spanking you or sitting on your face… Don’t lie, you’re a sicko who wants a woman to spit in your mouth and fuck your cute little cock. Do you call them mommy in your fantasies? A mean mommy with a fat ass to hump your pathetic dick and huge tits to suck on.”

“S-shut up,” Jungkook cries out. “Shut up, shut up— you have no fucking idea, y-you don’t know shit—”

“I’d show you my tits and you’d come on the spot,” you laugh.

“S-stop lying!”

“Jesus, you’re gonna burst your pants from how hard you’ve got, sweetheart. And I’m nuts? At least I’m not getting hard just because a girl is making fun of me.”

You start bouncing on his crotch, laughing. The constant pressure of your ass against his cock makes him squirm, spilling out an amusing mixture of insults and plaids for mercy. His cheeks are warm with a blush of embarrassment and arousal.

“No wonder no one has ever touched this cute little cock!” you chirp, finally shoving your hand into his pants. “I bet you spend all day locked in your room, watching porn or hentai or whatever losers like you are into. Fucking into your own hand like a bitch in heat. Thank goodness you live alone, because you would live in constant fear of your mom finding your dirty comics or the huge amount of dry jizz all over your plushies and pillows.”

“I— I always clean up after myself,” he whimpers in the sweetest voice possible, and you wonder if he’s actually being honest.

Time to find out. “Yeah? You don’t fuck into your pillow thinking it’s your crush’s wet pussy and leave it full of your cum with the pathetic feeling that you’re filling her up?” you grunt, getting riled up. The thought of Jungkook wanting to do it to someone else makes your blood boil.

“Y-yes!” Jungkook finally cries out. “Shit, shit— I always fuck my pillow thinking it’s you!”

The woman was too stunned to speak.

“Fuck, it— it always leaks out, I’ve always got so much cum saved up for— for you, mommy. I imagine it’s your pussy I’m filling up, want to milk my cock into your cunt until you’re happy.”

The ache between your legs worsens, and you have to rub your thighs together to ease the pent-up arousal; you’re dripping, could simply sit on his pretty cock and ride him until he’s a crying mess – but this has got way out of hand, you need to get the video back on track.

And you shouldn’t think about why he immediately thought of you when you brought up his crush.

You lean on him and spit on his lips, making him yelp. “Yuck.”

“M-mommy, please—”

“Ugh, shut up.”

Raising your hips off him, you take off your panties; indeed, they are ruined and soaked with your juices. Their only use is to gag Jungkook, and there they go, straight into his mouth.

He has to close his eyes when the scent of your arousal reaches his nose.

It takes him a couple of seconds to process that you’re naked now, at least from the waist down. Only your breasts are covered behind the thin white fabric of your tank top. It’s too small, so the sides of your tits stick out, and the neckline is too wide and barely covers your nipples.

Now, his eyes wander down to your pussy; glistening and dripping wet, Jungkook notices the way you rub your thighs together from time to time.

Kneeling over him, you sit on his chest and lift up your shirt, trying not to care that you’re leaving a trail of your juices across his skin. You’re right on top of the camera, and it really looks like Jungkook’s point of view. So, you grab his head and push it between your tits.

“Slow, dummy babies don’t get to suck on mommy’s boobs, darling. Hurry up.”

His eyes locked with yours, Jungkook opens his mouth to suck on your left nipple as you cradle his head. The contact sends shivers down your spine. Still bound to the bed, he struggles to turn his head and reach closer, eager to flicker his tongue around your sensitive nub.

“That’s it, baby, so good,” you groan.

He shifts to your other breast, and you allow him, too hooked on the pleasure to question his intentions.

Jungkook flicks his tongue with eagerness, hunger, almost desperation. His hips buck into the air, and his restrained cock keeps leaking precum, a wet patch appearing on the fabric. He sucks on your nipple like his life depends on it, unhinging his jaw to reach what he can’t touch.

Shit.

You’ve gone off script enough as it is.

You push him away, and he whimpers. “Well done, sweetheart,” you groan, “but mommy has other plans for you.”

Taking off your shirt, you’re now fully naked on top of him. Jungkook’s eyes roam around your figure and drink it up the sight of your bare body on top of him like it is water and he’s dying of thirst.

It’s time for the good shots, so you turn around so that your dripping folds are right in front of the camara – and right on top of his face, but that’s just a little gift for you. You’re facing his crotch, and with eager hands, you pull down his pants and underwear at the same time, letting his big, red, leaking cock spring up against his stomach. It’s the prettiest cock you’ve ever seen, and your mouth waters just at the thought.

Meanwhile, Jungkook has been struggling with the tempting sigh of your pussy right above his head. It tickles his tongue, makes his lips twitch; he can only think about ravishing your cunt like a madman.

It’s practically instinctive when his neck is stretched upwards. You said you were okay with oral. In fact, you enjoyed it. The script is just something to guide you as to the plot; the rest, it can go as it comes up. That torture you promised him wasn’t scripted either, but it’s made his cock hard as if he was in heat. And, if you don’t like it, you can use the safeword too.

Just a bit more while you keep playing with his cock in your hands.

His tongue is already out, like a dog. That’s pretty much what he feels like right now, desperate to fuck your pussy with his mouth.

Shit, you’re dripping.

“I wonder if you can get even harder,” he hears you ramble.

As you get comfortable on top of him, your hips are getting closer to his reach. Your ankles rest under his forearms, you didn’t notice he could lick you for at least a few seconds.

Jungkook doesn’t stop to think and delves his tongue into your pussy, proceeding quickly to suck and lap at your clit. Your juices soak his face, but that only makes his erection grow. Your clit reacts instantly, throbbing between his lips.

“What the— s-shit, Jungkook, what are you—” you manage to moan.

Your first instinct is to push your legs away, but Jungkook is pressing down with his forearms and, by the time you think of moving your hips away, you’re already melting with pleasure. His tongue is quick to lick your clit over and over, relentlessly, as you thrust back. Using his forearms again, he pulls you by your legs so that you’re practically sitting on his face, bent over him, grunting his name.

Saliva runs down his chin. Your taste on his tongue has shoved him into a thoughtless state, he’s only thinking about making you come. His tongue parts your lips and fucks into your entrance with wet, sloppy strokes.

Jungkook lets out a whimper. “Fuck, as good as I thought it’d be,” he cries out, his voice muffled by your folds. “Mummy got dripping just from playing with me, so fucking m-mean—”

You arch your back and thrust back against his tongue, feeling the tension in the pit of your stomach.

He’s got your ankles well locked, and you’re still torn between control and pleasure, so you simply squirm on top of him while Jungkook keeps ravishing your pussy now that you can’t close your legs – nor do you really want to.

But shit, he’s going to make you come if he keeps this up. And, if you do, the deal is off, and the video is over. You’d love to squirt all over his face and force him to drink it up, but you’ve got other plans for him and for you so, as much as you’re loving getting tongue-fucked by this bratty little shit, it’s time to stop him.

“My baby really wanted to lick mummy’s pussy, didn’t he?” you blurt out with a laugh, and his cock twitches, a drop of precum rolling down from his tip.

“W-what?”

“How was your first cunt, sweetheart?” you continue. “Better than your hand, huh? Better than the sad, pathetic hole you make in your stuffed animals to stick your dick in and think it’s me.”

A tear of embarrassment rolls down his cheek. “T-that’s not—”

“Let me return the favour.”

While Jungkook, in a desperate attempt to make you cum, keeps licking and sucking your pussy, you keep yourself decently composed and let a trickle of saliva drip onto his tip. Before he can say anything else, you’re engulfing his cock until your nose is pressed against his pubic bone.

“F-fuck!”

You try to fight a wicked smile with his cock around your lips.

Jungkook’s hips twitch, but that only makes the tip of his cock bump into your throat, ripping a sob from him.

You start bobbing your head up and down; he pulls at his restraints, his head turning to his sides as two thick tears of pleasure roll down his cheeks. Guess this probably is his first time being deep-throated, so better ruin it for everybody coming after.

Fortunately, his bratty tongue is too busy crying and moaning to pay any attention to your pussy, so you sit on his chest and get momentum.

His cock feels hot in your mouth, leaking precum. It’s salty as it mixes with your own saliva running down his shaft. Jungkook is sweating all over, his head spinning like he’s having a fever; after all, the wet heat of your mouth around his cock is too much to handle. It’s coated in your spit, sending waves of pleasure down his spine, making his toes curl, his throat sore from grunting and sobbing. You hollow your cheeks and swallow around him, the vibrations of your moans only worsening the pleasure pooling in his lower back.

“Fuck!” he cries out again. “Of fuck, p-please—!” Jungkook can’t even properly thrash with his feet as they’re tied to the bed as well. “So good, so fucking good!”

You pull the foreskin back to expose the head and dip your tongue into the slit, savouring the taste of his arousal. For a second, you wonder if he’s never really got proper head or if he’s just very sensitive, but you shove the thought to the back of your head and keep going.

“Got anything to say about that misbehaviour from earlier?” you ask, licking down to the base.

“Dunno—”

“Ah, yes, you do.” Your voice comes out soft, too soft. It sends chills down his back. “You grabbed mommy’s ass and ate her pussy without permission, remember?”

Leaning on his thighs, you manage to turn around to face him. You notice his red face and dilated pupils, and he notices your slick, swollen lips.

To your surprise, Jungkook smirks. “But mommy loved it, didn’t she? I almost made her cum—”

You shut him up by swallowing down his cock again, even if he is right; only a couple of minutes more and you would have come all over his face. But you haven’t, and that’s all that matters. Now you have to make him cum so that you can start torturing his spent cock until he’s crying for you to stop.

Jungkook may be used to keeping it down at his shared flat and know how to be quiet, but you can always tell when a guy is close, and you’re surprised at how much he’s been holding it. From how swollen and purplish his cock looks, how much he’s leaking, and the way it reacts, throbbing and twitching at your touch, he must have been on edge for a while.

“Are you a masochist, perhaps?” you ask, rather to yourself.

Your hands find his base again and start pumping him, both of them. The contact feels kind of dry, though, despite his arousal dripping through your fingers, so you bend down and spit on the head again.

“I wouldn’t be surprised, really,” you continue, jerking him off like it’s just one more chore. “A crazy chick ties you to the bed to fuck you and the first thing you do is get a hard-on. No wonder only your plushies are willing to let you hit it— though they can’t really say anything, can they?”

With a shaky gasp, Jungkook bites his lip and closes his eyes; he needs to stop either seeing or hearing you if he wants to hold on any longer, but your breasts are right in front of him, covered in a glistening layer of sweat, your erect nipples that he just had in his mouth, your pussy radiating heat and dripping down your inner thighs. If only you would sit on his cock and ride him until you cum and scream with pleasure, choke him, spit in his mouth, use him like he uses his poor childhood stuffed animals.

Then this torture would be over, he would climax inside you and stuff you with his cum, til it’s dripping. And the next torture would begin.

“Come on, the last test. If you pass it without cumming, I’ll let you go, okay, sweetheart?”

Your voice snaps him out of his thoughts; suddenly, you’re straddling his lap, the tip of his cock brushing against your folds. The brief pleasure, more like a feeling-induced fantasy turned into a touch, makes him shudder and take a deep breath.

“This” – you yank off his shirt, buttons popping out – “off.”

Raking your nails through his hair, you yank it and force him to look at you in silence. His chest heaves and falls as he stares into your eyes.

Your thumb strokes his bottom lip. “It’s a pity that such a pretty face belongs to a pervert like you.”

“I’m not a pervert!”

“Yadda, yadda,” you mock him, tilting up his chin to get access to his jaw and bite him. “Whatever, I have no interest in your pathetic excuses – if you weren’t a pervert, you wouldn’t be hard right now.”

“I-it’s a biological response!” Jungkook insists.

“Hm, yeah, sure. Then you won’t mind if I don’t fuck you, right—? What’s more, you’ll be glad.”

To add weight to your words – and torture him a little in the process – you start moving your hips up and down against his cock, rubbing him with your folds. He twitches between your inner thighs, and you keep circling and undulating your hips over his tip, every now and then pretending you’re going to finally sit on him. His head penetrates you for a second, and you fuck yourself on it, one, two, three thrusts until you decide to press your ass against it.

“Just imagine if I let you fuck my ass,” you laugh. “Just think about it, sweetheart.”

“It’d be s-so tight,” he blurts out, “around my cock! Shit, I wish I could— I wish I could eat your ass, and then your pussy, and then fuck you open with my cock—”

“Fuck—”

You find yourself grinding on his swollen tip, rubbing your clit against his sensitive skin, too turned on by his words; yeah, you’d like him to eat your ass as well. Jungkook is trying to muffle the whimpers coming through his lips, but the pressure is getting heavier.

Moving in a quick thrust, you sit down on his cock. He works you open as it disappears into your body, a moan leaving your lips. Your fingers dig into his shoulders for leverage, hips setting a pace as you bounce on his cock. It massages your inner walls, with sounds of smacking flesh, working thigh muscles as you melt at the shocking waves of pleasure.

“Ngh—” Jungkook lets out a whimper and pulls at the restraints. “Fuck! Oh, fuck—”

Your skin prickles, your clit rubbing against his pubic bone. It’s dripping, the ache between your thighs expanding while you chase your climax.

Jungkook pants, head bumping against the headboard, victim to the rolls and thrusts of your hips. Your tits are bouncing right in front of him, their round shape and hardened nipples so, so tempting, making his mouth water while his cock throbs and twitches between your walls. You clench around him, and he whines again. His nerves feel on fire, and the sight of your bare figure fucking yourself on his cock only worsens it.

Your hand slithers to pinch one of your nipples. Playing with it, arching your back, you let out a huff and roll your hips in undulating waves, cunt engulfing him over and over and soiling it with your juices.

You feel his tip bumping against your sweet spot when Jungkook suddenly cries; two thick tears roll down his cheeks, and you bend over to kiss them clean.

“Slow, s-slower, please, go—” he sobs, face red. “Shit! I’m— fucking hell, go slow! G-go slow!”

As he pulls at the restraints in pure desperation, his hips buck into you, jerking and trembling like he’s got no control over them. Jungkook is begging you to slow down, but the blazing way he’s fucking up into you, trying to reach your breasts and suck on your nipples again, wanting to get rid of the restraints so that he can grab your ass and pound into your dripping pussy only fuels him.

“Shut up, little bitch,” you grunt.

Before he can say anything else, you shove your nipple into his mouth and hover over him, your core aching at the wet pressure of his tongue around your hardened buds. You pull at his hair, and his eyes suddenly roll back.

He grows harder inside of you. “Oh fuck, oh, n-no, fuck, stop!” he cries out. “Shit, stop! Slow, slow down—!”

Only when you feel him going still on the mattress and the sweet feeling of hot cum filling you up do you understand he just came inside you.

You keep bouncing on his cock, and Jungkook’s seed eventually gets pumped out of your insides by his own cock. It leaks down your inner thighs and pools on his lower stomach, but you only lean onto him to bite on his neck while he sobs at the painful yet glorious feeling of your pussy milking every last drop of his yummy cum.

“Oh, baby,” you coo with amusement, scratching down his chest, “you just made this so much easier.”

Overstimulation kicks in when you resume bouncing on his spent cock, careful not to let him slide out of your cunt; Jungkook sobs and grunts as he writhes on the bed, pulling the restraints.

You grab his chin and spit into his mouth before you kiss him hard. Your teeth leave small bites on his lips and chin, peppering short kisses to swallow his sobs, embracing him to restrict his squirms. He’s crying so prettily into your lips, you want to eat him up.

“Please, p-please—! Hurts!”

Sucking the flesh of his neck, you let the red mark blossom. “A deal is a deal, sweetheart.”

Deal or no deal, you ride him chasing your climax, sweating and melting into him. Your clit rubs against his pubic bone, and the coiling tension in the pit of your stomach tightens. Jungkook writhes beneath you, and his toes curl in a poor attempt to let out a little of the pleasure that pushes him towards another orgasm. The sight of his cum dripping down your legs mesmerises him, your pussy engulfing his cock over and over again.

Fuck, you look so hot right now; he’s going to explode in a heart-shaped puddle of pleasure, he can’t stop the tears either. It’s torture, the best kind, how you’re touching him, stroking his skin, licking down his lips to his sweaty chest, playing with his hair. There’s almost a certain sense of affection in the ways of your hands.

“Please,” Jungkook cries out.

“Fuck,” you moan, closing your eyes. “Baby, you’re gonna make me come~“

Your words make his heart stop for a second. They fuel a fire in his abdomen and raise goosebumps all over his skin, and Jungkook sucks in a sharp breath as the pain starts to mix with the tortuous pleasure.

You keep bouncing on him, ass striking against his hips at a brutal pace. “God! Shit, shit, baby, I’m gonna cum, fuck!”

“Please!” he begs.

The ache between your thighs makes your core tighten, your muscles burn, your sweat is boiling on your skin, dripping down between your breasts.

With one last powerful thrust, the tension snaps, and suddenly you’re bursting out in an explosive orgasm, squirting all over him. You scream out, squishing his cock with your dripping walls, moaning his name and burying your nails in his chest. The shockwaves grip your body, and you ride out your orgasm with slower rolls of your hips.

“Fuck, baby,” you let out in a weak breath, “you made me spill myself all over you.”

When you finally peel your eyes open, you notice Jungkook staring down at the pool of fluid on his lower stomach. His pupils are so dilated that they merge with his irises. You can feel his cock twitching inside you, and his hips are bucking into you subconsciously.

“M-mommy—”

You’re too exhausted to be careful not to drop on top of him and leave a feverish trail of kisses down his neck, holding his face and brushing your lips together, swirling your tongue around his.

“Mommy,” he calls again.

“Yeah…?”

“I’m—” Jungkook lets out a whimper when you shove your hand between his legs. “I’m c-close.”

“Again?” you ask with a hint of mockery in your voice.

He pouts and closes his lips in embarrassment, but the way his cock throbs and twitches as you circle the tip of your index finger on his cock feels too good to stifle his noises. You have such cute hands; he’d die just to see them covered in his cum.

You move down his body in a trail of kisses and nibbles, enjoying the smell of his skin, so warm and intense. The room smells of sex, and it turns you on so much that your mouth salivates.

“Let me take care of you.”

Scooting between his legs, you stroke up and down his Apollo’s belt as he arches his back into the touch, desperate to come. His cock pressed against his tummy, you grab it and spit on it right before dipping your tongue into the slit. Jungkook pants in surprise and squirms and, making eye contact, you part your lips around his cock and swallow around it.

Jungkook whines and tries his best to hold his hips still, but the feeling of being engulfed in your wet heat only engorges the tension in the pit of his stomach. Don’t cum, don’t cum, don’t cum, not yet, he chants in his head.

Sucking and bobbing your head on his cock, you enjoy how he responds to your touch; Jungkook is burning all over, writhing, twitching between your lips at the suction.

“Fuck,” he gasps, “y-your mouth—”

You don’t bother to reply and simply hum around his cock, and the vibrations send shivers of pleasure down his spine. His eyes stare at your lips, darkened and wet with saliva so, using hands and lips together, you start sucking his tip with sloppy strokes of your tongue and suction from your lips as your hands play with his balls. Jungkook lets out a breath moan, increasingly agitated and desperate.

Then you slide him out of your mouth, and he stares at you a bit confused – until he sees the way you just hover over him with your mouth wide open above his tip and gets it. Shyly, Jungkook bucks his hips into your wet heat, letting out a muffled moan.

“You— you can’t be for real—” he whines.

You tilt your head in silence, waiting for him to shove his cock into your mouth again.

He starts fucking your mouth with desperate thrusts, hitting the back of your throat. Tears make his vision blurry, and a wave of heat spreads under his skin. He’s half ashamed, half turned on just at the very thought of him having to fuck your face to cum while you stay there, hovering over him with your mouth open. The grip of your tongue around his cock is heavy and wet, you’re so mean to him, just letting him jerk his hips like a bitch in heat.

“I’m gonna— fuck!” Jungkook lets out a grunt and a desperate gasp, fighting the restraints and fleeing your mouth; but you grab his ass again and bury his cock into your mouth until your nose is pressed against his pubic bone, and you hollow your cheeks, fucking him between your lips. “C-coming! Slow, s-slow down, I’m— oh fuck, please!” he sobs.

His hips stutter, and suddenly he’s spilling himself into your mouth, dissolving into pleasure with a choked sob and your name on his lips. It’s bitter, but Jungkook’s contracted face, with two thick tears soaking down to the corners of his lips, and red cheeks makes it all worthwhile.

You help him ride out his climax with your hand wrapped around his cum-stained cock, but soon Jungkook is writhing beneath you and bursting out in tears of actual pain, and you let go of him.

Lying eye to eye, he watches you lean onto him and open up your mouth; a pool of cum rests on your tongue, and he doesn’t hesitate to open his mouth and lets you kiss it back into the source system, massaging your tongues together and rolling them over each other. A drop of white cum rolls down the corner of his mouth, but you’re both too busy making out naked on top of each other to care about it.

“We’re gonna have so much fun tonight, sweetheart,” you whisper.

After a pause, you get up and reach the camera to turn it off; suddenly Jungkook snaps out of something like a dream, and he remembers that you’re actually working. A feeling of shame and sadness washes over him, and he's so exhausted both mentally and physically that he feels the urge to cry.

“Okay, I turned it off.” You rush to undo the restraints on his wrists and massage the red marks with your thumbs to get the blood circulating again. “Does it hurt? I’ll get you something for the marks.”

In a thoughtful silence, he shakes his head.

“Good.”

You turn around and lean on his legs to undo the knots of his ankles as well, and Jungkook closes his eyes, taking a deep breath. His heart is still trying to burst his ribcage open and get out of his chest, and now that the frenzy of the video is over, a dread falls over him; what is he going to do about you now?

“Uh, Y/N?” he asks, unsure.

Smiling, you look up at him with the rope in your hands. “Yes?”

Courage.

“Can I… take you out to dinner some day?”

“Don’t laugh!” you exclaim, laughing. With a napkin, you wipe away the milkshake foam that stains your chin and the corners of your lips. “It’s not funny, you should have told me earlier. I’m sure everyone has noticed.”

The terrace where you are sitting is practically deserted except for a few tourists and a couple of birds circling over your food. With the sun shining brightly above you, you prop yourself up on your elbows as your tummy aches from laughing so hard, and Jungkook glances at the menu with a growing smile.

“I didn’t know you cared so much about the opinion of three people and seven birds,” he jokes.

“Hey, it’s eight birds, sweetheart. And the tourists are carrying a camera,” you insist, grabbing the menu from him with a playful frown, “what if I come out in the background looking like Father Christmas? I’d never get over it.”

“Then Father Christmas had a glow-up – when he was a kid, he’d just eat the biscuits and leave. Anyway, should we order to share or is it every man for himself?”

“We’d better share, I want to try it all,” you murmur as you take a sip from your drink.

Jungkook frowns. “You’ll get a tummy ache like last time.”

“You don’t have to remind me!” With a giggle, he takes the menu again. “It was so embarrassing, on our first date on top of that.”

He scoops to the other side of the table and steals a kiss from you, letting you cup his face and deepen the contact. “Okay, just order anything you want,” he says, sliding the menu back to you. “I’ll eat what you can’t fit in your tummy.”

You thank him with a short peck on the lips, and Jungkook returns to his seat.

“Oh, by the way,” you say casually, stirring your milkshake with your straw, “I have some good news and some bad news, which one do you want first?”

He frowns. “Well... The bad one, I guess?”

“The bad news is that I can’t use the video we made because you can hear us saying each other’s names. The good news is that it means we can make it again.”

Don’t hesitate to like, reblog, and leave some feedback if you liked it! It’s always good and encouraging to know what you think <3

“Sideshow” is copyright ²⁰²³ Lola Bangtan, all rights reserved.

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[tangledinink]

whoa, i wrote a thing. the first chapter of my tmnt "sorry, teenage mutant what now?" au is live on ao3, or can be read below the cut!!! complete with sketchy title card and dumb chapter title. do i have any real experience writing fics??? no!!! am i gonna do my best anyway!?!? yes i am!!!

“Did you drink all the milk AGAIN!? Dude!—"

“What?! You know I need an exact milk-to-rice-chex ratio in order to enjoy my breakfast, Leo!”

“Have any of you seen my dance bag? It’s not where I left it!”

“Why do you need it, anyway? Isn’t dance on Thursday?”

“Leo, today is Thursday.”

“What? No, it’s not. If it was Thursday, then my American Literature essay would be due, and I haven’t even started it yet, so there’s NO WAY—“

“If my toaster is destroyed, I will be making whichever child is responsible pay for the replacement!” The warning rang out over the general chaos of the morning.

“Oh shoot—“ Yoshi could hear the frantic scrabble of a belated attempt to rescue the burning pop tart, which Yoshi could smell from all the way in the living room. Parked in his reclining chair, the TV playing in front of him, he munched contentedly on his own breakfast which he had acquired earlier before his teenage sons descended upon the kitchen. He was not much of a ‘morning person,’ but it was a necessity if he was to eat in any sort of peace in the mornings.

This was a typical morning in the Hamato household.

Yoshi was used to it by now. The bickering, the bumbling, the hectic last-minute "wait I forgot something's--" it was all just a part of the routine. Sure, it had been a bit exhausting at times when they were all still children, and he had to scramble about like a madman each morning to ensure they had everything they needed to get where they were going. But at this point? He could more or less just ignore them and allow them to work things out by themselves, only occasionally needing to step in and offer a bit of guidance. He had always been a bit of a... Hands-off parent, for better or for worse, but he was fairly certain that he had finally found the rhythm of things over the past several years. Not that that made him a perfect parent by any means, there had certainly been plenty of occasions--

"APRIIIIILLLLLL O'NEIL!!!" The battle cry and hearty thud of his poor front door put a sudden end to his narration, and, though it happened near every day, he startled in response, just barely avoiding dropping his tea.

"April!" He bellowed from his chair, turning just enough to peer into the kitchen, where his honorary fifth child (as if he needed any more…) and next-door neighbor had just appeared. "How many times must I tell you?! If you break my door, I will--!"

"Aw, c'mon, Yosh, you know I gotta make a bold entrance at the start of the morning, or my mojo is gonna be off for the whole rest of the day! Besides, I haven't broken the door yet, and it's been how many years?"

“Bah! Haven't broken my door yet, maybe, but what about my bed frame? Or my printer? Or my third-favorite koi fish figurine?!"

"Oh, you wanna play that game now?" O'Neil countered, narrowing his eyes behind scarlet frames, crossing her arms across her chest and cocking one hip to the side. "Okay, then, how about my window? Or my mom's antique vase? Or my literal entire bathroom--"

"Okay! Okay, enough!" Yoshi spluttered with a dismissive wave of his hands. Dammit. The fact he was technically responsible for his sons’ occasional partaking in light property destruction was still, in his opinion, the most unfair and annoying part of parenting. "Fine! Break down the door for all I care! Burn the entire place to the ground! See if I do anything about it! Teenagers..." He muttered with a scowl, shaking his head and returning to his program, an exaggerated scowl on his face. The kids, to their credit, knew well enough by now not to take his rants and mumblings too seriously and quickly re-engaged themselves in whatever gossip and chatter they had previously been wrapped up in.

Yoshi smiled just the tiniest bit, listening with one ear as Donatello explained to a devastated Leonardo that it was, in fact, Thursday, bringing up evidence on his cell phone, and Raphael and April pulled Mikey's dance bag out from inside the oven, where he had forgotten it for the third time this past month.

This was not where he had imagined his life would take him when he was young. Not even close.

He would not trade these moments for anything at all.

By the time his television show was ending, he was just finishing off his tea and shoveling the rest of his bagel into his mouth. Game shows, he had found years ago, were an excellent means of timing routines, and he had it to a science by now. He pulled himself to his feet, stretching and cracking his back loud enough that his children yelled at him from the kitchen, before shuffling his way into the kitchen to begin the work of chasing the teenagers out the door.

"Alright, come on, shoo shoo! You are all going to miss the subway and be late!" He scolded, occasionally swatting at a stray child with his sleeves. "And do not forget anything, because I will not bring it to you!"

"Dad--" Leo began, his eyes blown up huge and pleading. "I don't feel well, I'm pretty sure I've got, like, a tummy bug, or something? Sooo, I should, like, probably stay home--"

"You are not skipping school just because you forgot to do an assignment." Yoshi immediately responded.

"What?! Noooo, Daddy, please, I'm really sick!"

"I was not born yesterday." He scoffed, shooting his son an unimpressed look. "And I have seen you do assignments in far less time! Besides, I'm sure April and your brothers would be happy to help."

A chorus of groans rang from around the table.

“Enough bellyaching! Come on, out of my house! Let's go, chop chop! Anyone who stays home today will be giving me a pedicure!”

That threat always worked. On cue, everyone fell into action. The boys gulped down any remaining breakfast still left uneaten, (whether it was theirs or not,) in between conversations, TikTok videos, and, in Leo's case, loud mourning about the day of the week. Donatello began to long process of buckling up the seventeen different straps on his chunky boots, Michaelangelo passed out lunches to each of his family members, narrating his culinary decisions as he went, and Raphael hurriedly tossed bowls, spoons, and plates into the dishwasher with clatters and clunks.

"I can't find my eyeliner pen-- Nardo, did you steal it? Did you go through my bag?! You DID, didn’t you!!! I am going to delete all of your Minecraft save files--"

"What?! I cannot believe you would make such an accusation, I would never stop to such petty thievery--"

"Mikey, hurry up and grab your skateboard if you're gonna--"

"OW, Dad, Donnie pulled my hair!"

"Oh, what are you, five?"

"HEY, both of you knock it off because Raph makes ya!”

"Wait, did we have a quiz in geometry today--? Because I did not study!!! Raph, this note had better be a joke--!"

After a few final moments of mayhem, Yoshi finally managed to get all five high schoolers out the door, closing the door firmly behind them with a loud sigh.

He loved his children. Truly, he did. But thank god for school.

Grumbling a bit to himself, he got to work straightening the remaining mess left behind. His sons were more than old enough to clean up after themselves and help out around the house, but that still didn't necessarily mean they did it particularly well. Maybe by their late twenties, they'd start to figure that out, if they were anything like their father. He swept up spare crumbs and wiped down the table, putting cereal boxes away in the pantry where they belonged and closing cabinet doors left open.

Boys.

Truthfully, he had very little room to complain and he knew it. Compared to the first four years of parenthood, things were a breeze. Sure, there was still plenty of work to do, but aside from the occasional exhausting day or difficult conversation, he could practically just put things on autopilot by now. He could hardly imagine how his younger self used to get through each day.

Well, perhaps he could, because, if he was being completely honest, he didn't really "get through" most days back then as much as he was bodily dragged in and out of them. But he had realized long ago that lingering on his past shortcomings was not in anyone's best interest.

With school, extracurriculars, friends and neighbors, babysitters, and a shit-ton of parenting classes on his side now, in addition to the general concept of the passage of time, given that his children were no longer children and now teenagers, he had at his disposal something that he had not had even a scrap of for years before "the move."

Free time.

It had been nearly ten years since "the move." Ten years since he and his sons had donned these disguises and bodily forced their way back into society on the back of lies and forged paperwork. Or, well, he had forced his way back into society. His children were just along for the ride-- and new to it all.

Not that you would be able to tell now, he thought to himself, smiling ever so slightly. Ten years… They had lived this way for a long time now.

It had been so long… Some days, he nearly forgot that he was anything but a man.

--------

"Donnie, here, it's your turn."

Donatello sighed loudly, pausing in whatever he was doing on his phone, (Scrolling through Twitter? Purchasing uranium off the dark web? They were equally likely,) but accepting the laptop shoved into his hands anyway.

"Why am I getting the impression that my turns are longer than everyone else's?" He questioned, his brows pinched with gentle annoyance as he glanced at the other four, all piled together on the subway. There wasn’t enough space for all of them, but even finding a couple of open seats was a near miracle this time of day, so they could make do. Stacking Mikey on Raph's shoulders and denying Leo a place to sit, seeing how it was his American Literature essay that they were taking turns writing, did the trick.

"Because you're the smart one," Leo said, his arms wrapped around the nearest subway pole, leaning so he could read over their shoulder. "This is the consequence of referring to yourself as a 'genius' all the time."

"I'm pretty sure I've always made it very clear that I'm a man of science, not literature." Donnie quipped in reply, even as he hunched over the screen, his fingers tick-tacking across the keys.

"Hey, I'm helping too! That whole third paragraph is mostly me." April protested, crossing her arms and slumping against Donnie, purposefully jostling them a bit in retaliation.

"Me too!" Mikey chirped from atop his brother's shoulders, slumped forward to avoid smacking his head on the roof. "I changed all the punctuation to fourteen-point font to make it longer!”

"Smart." Donnie hummed, not looking up, in such a tone that it wasn't quite clear if he meant it or not. Mikey beamed at the praise nonetheless, a bright grin lighting up his face as he crossed his arms over his brother's forehead.

"Look, it doesn't have to be good. It's just gotta be three pages before third period." Leo said. "I mean, Donnie could also always just hack into the school's gr—“

"Hey!" Raph barked. "We all agreed that that was for emergencies only!"

"Okay, okay, fine!" Leo sighed, a bit of sulkiness saturating his voice, holding his hands up in mock surrender. He reluctantly accepted the laptop when it was passed back over to him, propping up a knee to balance it on and hunching over to type.

"I thought Mikey set up that whole system with you. With the reminders and that agenda app and everything?" April questioned, glancing up at Leo curiously-- perhaps suspiciously.

"He did. I've just been..." He paused, hesitating in his words for just a second. "Busy."

"Oh no." April groaned.

"Not again." Donnie sighed.

"Who is it this time?" Raph asked, quirking a brow.

"What! I have noooo idea what you guys are talking about--"

"Leo."

"Okay, fine. Chase DeFerro." Leo muttered, his eyes immediately flicking to the side to avoid the inevitable reactions of his family.

"Chase DeFerro?"

"The same Chase DeFerro from five months ago?"

"Didn't you two have, like, a horrible break-up?"

"Didn't you block him on, like… Everything?"

"Didn't you say, and I quote, "If I ever have to even see that nasty bitch again in my entire life, it'll be too soon, and I swear to god I'll chop off--"

"Okay, okay! Hey, come on! That was five months ago. Things are, like, totalllyyyy different now!" Leo insisted.

“You said that about the last, like, three guys you’ve dated,” April said, unimpressed.

"Leo, have you ever stopped to consider that, perhaps, your need to constantly be in some kind of a relationship may have some kind of deeper connection to your own feelings of self-worth and the way that you assign value to--"

"Whoa there, Doctor Feelings! Chill! It's not that deep!" Leo scoffed, shooting Mikey an annoyed look. Ugh, he knew he shouldn't have brought it up. "Seriously. I'm just bored, okay? Quit trying to read into it."

"Bored?" Raph echoed, looking at the other with big eyes. "Leo, you can't treat love like it's a game like that! Come on!"

"It's not love, Raph, it's high school dating." Leo scoffed, giving a dismissive wave of his hand. “Anyway! Look, I'm only, like, fifty words short and then I'm home free. Who's got the next turn?"

"Fine." April sighed, rolling her eyes. “Only because your girl here writes a killer BS essay conclusion. But you owe me. Hand it over."

True to her word, the last-minute literature assignment was wrapped up shortly, and the remainder of the train ride was instead occupied by chatter and gossip, discussing upcoming tests and assignments in school, rumors circulating the hallways, and plans for weekends and far-off holidays. On the occasion it got too loud to hear each other properly, they’d sign to each other instead, and then switch back once it quieted down once more. The five scrambled their way off the subway when they arrived at their stop, making their way up the stairs and back to street level.

Leo inhaled deeply as he hopped up the final few stairs, his sneakers giving a satisfying thud on the concrete below them with each step. He had no complaints about the subway, (well, no more than the average person, anyway,) but there was always just something especially refreshing about getting to breathe fresh air after spending any amount of time underground. Even if the fresh air was New York City air. Call him crazy, but he'd never get tired of it.

The group began the final length of their journey, closing the three-block gap between the subway station and their high school-- most of them on foot, Mikey on his skateboard, though he was less skateboarding and more standing on his skateboard and hanging onto the back of Raph's shirt so his older brother would drag him along. Leo wondered absently if he could get away with that, too, before April's voice finally snapped him back into reality.

"You busy after school today?"

"Until six!" He replied, stretching his arms back to lace his fingers behind his head as they walked. "Dee and I have gymnastics."

“Next competition is tomorrow.” Donnie hummed, not looking up from his phone. "So we're getting in the extra hours."

"You know we've got a rep to uphold!" Leo sing-songed, his mouth stretching into a wide, smug grin. "Gotta keep that flawless record for the rest of the season."

It was very well known, to anyone who ran in such circles, that the Hamato Twins were all but sure to take the top two places in any gymnastics meet that they showed up to-- it was just a question of in what order they would do so. Of all the various sports that they participated in, gymnastics was just about the only one where it was truly a coin flip. The only other two extracurriculars they shared were swimming, where Donnie consistently took first place, and martial arts, where they both knew Leo was more likely to come out on top. But gymnastics? It was anybody's guess, and they flip-flopped from first to second just about every other event. For just a moment, Leo caught his twin's eye-- coz he knew he was thinking the exact same thing right now.

Coz he knew they both wanted to win.

Coz they both wanted to rub it in the other's face.

(Of course, they both also knew that the only reason they got to have this little song-and-dance to begin with was because Mikey was still in the age bracket below them. Wouldn't everyone be just so delighted to finally see the Hamato Twins usurped in the coming season... By another Hamato.)

“And Raph has work… Ugh! Y’all are too damn busy!” April huffed, leaning her head back and wrinkling up her nose.

“I’ve got a little bit of time.” Mikey chimed in, leaning over just enough to offer April a grin. “I don’t gotta be at dance until four. I was gonna go work on that mural I’ve got going up north. Wanna come?”

“Beats sitting at home doing homework.” April reasoned, giving a shrug. “I’m in!”

“Shweet!”

Leo smiled a tiny bit. Though he did, in fact, have complete confidence in his little brother’s ability to traverse the city safely, it was still kind of nice to know he’d be with someone else. If, for no other reason, then to know that Raph would now worry about Mikey at least 80% less during the coming evening.

“Alright,” Speaking of worrisome older brothers, Raph began his typical pre-school speech as they approached the front entrance. “No one be late. No one skip class.” Who, him? What was that pointed look for? He would never… Get caught more than once in a week. “And no one get in any trouble. Don’t do anything Raph wouldn’t do.”

“Yes sir!” The four of them barked in reply as they approached the entrance of their high school. Mostly, they were all just making fun of him. But Leo figured humoring him wouldn’t hurt, especially if it helped him chill a little bit. Raph had always taken his role as “the biggest brother” pretty seriously, ever since they were really little, though Leo wasn’t exactly sure why. He was always the one in charge whenever their dad wasn’t around, and Leo suspected he had a hard time ever completely dropping that mindset.

I mean, don’t get him wrong, Raph was just as capable of fucking around, goofing off, and getting into shit as the rest of them, for sure, he just sometimes wished he could… Relax a little. It wasn’t like anything bad was gonna happen, but Raph always kind of just had this air to him like he was expecting enemies to leap out from behind the corner and attack them at any moment. Like he always had to protect them all. Which Leo could get, sure, but, like… Wouldn’t it be kind of cool if someone did try to start some shit with them or something, just so that they could see the look on their face when they totally kicked their ass? Leo could only imagine it’d be pretty hilarious.

The five of them went their separate ways, parting with various promises to see each other at lunch, after school, at home, etc. April and Raph went one way, Mikey went another, and Leo and Donnie split off in a different direction still, heading towards the East Wing.

And as they cleared the corner, Leo whipped around to face Donnie, stabbing them in the side with a spare elbow. “Last one to homeroom gets second place at gymnastics tomorrow!” He declared, immediately taking off down the hall.

“Wha— Leo! This is unfair, I’m wearing platforms! You know I’m wearing platforms!” Donnie shrieked in protest, even as he broke into a run behind him.

Leo whooped in reply, throwing himself over the railing of the nearest staircase, knowing his twin brother was right on his tail.

-----

“Come on! Harder!!! SHOW ME WHAT YOU GOT!” Raphael roared, pumping a fist in the air. “LET’S GO! GIVE IT TO ME!”

The gaggle of six-year-olds in the water in front of him, all clinging to the pool wall, giggled loudly in response to his over-the-top encouragement, kicking their legs even harder in a flurry of limbs and dousing him in chlorinated water.

“Whoa, whoa, okay! You gave it to me! I surrender!” Raph chuckled, holding his hands up to shield himself. “Alright, alright. Good job, team! You did great today. Okay, let’s wrap up—“

“Raph! RAPH!”

“What?”

“Raph, we gotta do the ferry!” Penelope, the loudest of his students, insisted, her face all screwed up with determination. The other four children nodded along fervently. “We can’t get out until we do ferry!”

“Oh, RIGHT. Ferry. Sorry, Raph almost forgot!” He chuckled, thunking his own forehead with the butt of his palm, feigning forgetfulness, as if he hadn’t always intended to do their usual wrap-up game. Class ended with a game of “Ferry” every time, without fail, especially given that he touted it as the ‘reward’ that they had to work for each week by following directions and working hard. He shifted slightly in the water, turning his back on the kids still clinging to the wall. “Okay— hop aboard”

The five elementary schoolers squealed in delight, launching themselves off the pool wall to clamber over the teenager instead, climbing over his broad shoulders and hanging off of his arms. Raph gave a soft little ‘oof,’ at the impact, though it was mostly for show, snorting softly in amusement as Penelope all but climbed on top of his head. Reminded him of Mikey.

“Okay— GO!” She shouted once she was sure all her cohorts were fully boarded, the whole group buzzing with excitement despite the fact that they did this every week. Raph gave a soft hum of acknowledgment, slowly setting off on their lap around the pool. In the shallower end, where they started, he didn’t even really have to swim at all— He could just walk with his body lowered enough in the water to give the illusion of swimming. Or, more precisely, the illusion of ‘ferrying.’

“Welcome everybody to Penelope’s Ferry Ride. I’m Penelope, the tour girl. Over there’s the Empire State Building.” Penelope narrated happily from her perch, gesturing to the bleachers. “And over there is the Statue of Liberty.” The pool noodles. “And over there’s the Milky Way. And that’s the, uhhh, the Big Bridge…”

“Wait, how long’s this ferry ride? Raph didn’t sign up for no world tour!” Raph protested teasingly, to which Penelope sharply shushed him before continuing her narration. The other children bubbled with laughter at her increasingly ridiculous tourist attractions and descriptions. Reminded him of Leo and Donnie.

Raph chuckled softly to himself as he moved into the deeper end of the pool, transitioning into an easy breaststroke to keep them all afloat on their way. It was, admittedly, a bit more difficult to swim with five kids on his back than it was on his own, but Raph was a strong swimmer. This was no problem. Besides, it’s not like he was in a rush or anything.

Honestly? This was his favorite part of these lessons. No worrying about everyone paying attention or being involved. No worries about anyone wandering off when he had them all on top of him and undoubtedly accounted for. No stressing about remembering the lesson plan or rules… He could just swim. He knew it sounded dumb, but sometimes, with all the kids piled on top of him like this, he felt like some sort of big plodding swamp creature, floating lazily down the river with the world on his back.

He took his time about it, but he eventually made his full lap around the pool, coming to a stop by the stairs and gently chasing the kids off of his shoulders.

“Alright, come on, squirts. Ferry ride’s over.”

“Nooo!” Penelope whined, clinging to his head. “One more lap! PLEASEEE!”

“Hey, come on, you know the rules! If you don’t listen to Raph, you don’t get a ferry ride next week!” He warned, slowly peeling her off of his back. “Go on. Get outta here.” He insisted, though fondly, smiling a bit as she huffed and scowled… But she got out anyway, joining the rest of the kids running to their parents, all with towels in waiting arms, listening to the children excitedly chatter about what they learned today.

Raph smiled just the tiniest bit. He remembered when they had been that small, taking swim classes here. He, Donnie, and Leo had all been thrilled to take to the water, adoring each and every lesson.

They all loved it— Except Mikey. He recalled listening to his littlest brother scream bloody murder as their father attempted to coax him into the water, trying everything from reason to bribes to threats of consequences.

“You don’t need to like to swim, Michelangelo. But you need to be able to.” He remembered his father saying. “I need to be sure you will be safe if you ever end up in the water by yourself.”

If anyone asked, he’d tell ‘em that he took the job just to make some extra pocket money. But, at least a little bit, that was kinda why. He liked the idea of helping to keep people safe. Even if it was just teaching kids how to doggy paddle.

Doing all the small talk at the end of the lessons with the parents was definitely his least favorite part, however, and he always found himself kind of stammering and stuttering his way through it. After some short, “Oh, yeah, she’s doin’ great!” and “For sure, perfect behavior’s!” tossed at some parents, he was, thankfully, able to duck away into the office, his own towel flung over his shoulders to try to avoid tracking water everywhere.

“All done?” The office receptionist, Jessica, chirped in her usual friendly demeanor, glancing over at the other as he entered.

“Just about. I just gotta clean up as soon as the kids are all gone and we’ll be done.” He replied, ruffling his hair dry.

“Did you remind the parents that we’re closed next week?”

Raph froze.

“… Uhhhh…”

Jessica sighed a bit, glancing over her shoulder to give him a look. “I reminded you before the lesson started!”

“I know! I just— Raph forgot, okay? I can only hold so much stuff in my brain at one time before stuff just starts to fall out! I was thinkin’ about swimming stuff!” He defended. “‘Sides, it was your job to remind me to remind them! So obviously we both dropped the ball.” Jessica didn’t look quite convinced, but Raph was pretty sure his logic was solid. “Can’t we just, like, put up some flyers and send out an email and all that junk?”

Rolling her eyes, Jessica turned back to her computer and began to type. “Yeah, yeah… Can’t really do flyers, but I’m working on that email.”

“Why not? Just put a sign up on the door.”

Jessica looked over at him again, raising a brow. “You haven’t heard about the paper shortage?”

Raph blinked slowly.

“… The what.”

“Yeah! It’s a whole thing. I dunno, I guess there are, like… Paper thieves or whatever robbing all the paper stores and stuff in the city? We haven’t been able to get any new orders in for a few weeks now.” She explained.

“Paper thieves?” He echoed, incredulous. “And they... steal paper.”

“Yeah. They steal paper.”

“Who the heck steals paper?”

“I dunno! I just saw it on the news.” Jessica shrugged. “I guess the police are working on it or whatever.”

“I guess.” Raph said, shrugging a bit, though he still couldn’t help but find the whole thing a bit amusing. I mean, come on. Paper thieves? It was only paper. -------

"Dadddd!" Mikey called as he swung his way into the door, kicking his shoes off into the general direction of the pile where shoes were typically kept, tossing his duffle bag to the side. He'd come back for it later and put it away, he swears. "I'M HOMMMEEE!"

It had been a long day, in between school, painting, and dance practice, so it was almost nine by the time he got home, but he didn't really mind. He liked being busy! If he didn't have stuff to do, it was just, like, all the energy would build up and up and up in all his limbs and his body and his chest like something sticky and hot about to boil over, condensation gathering at the top of his skull, and then he just went kinda crazy. That makes sense, right? He was pretty sure his brothers were kinda like that, too, so he figured it was probably mostly normal. He sometimes wondered if that was why their dad let them sign up for so many after-school activities. The only downside was the limited time leftover to tackle homework and personal projects. Walls weren’t just gonna paint themselves, after all!

"What's for dinner?" He shouted across the house, shucking his backup off and beginning to unpack, collecting his various textbooks and notepads.

"Oh, since you were not home, Michelangelo, I have had no choice but to cook for our family--"

"Dad."

"But do not worry, my son, I am making the most delicious meal--"

"Dad."

"Boiled liver and onions! You boys' favorite! With chopped earthworms, yum yum yum!"

"DAD! You're not funny!" Mikey yelled, even though there was laughter in his voice. Their dad did this bit every time, and he hated how it was always kinda funny.

"Pizza is on the table." His father called back, and Mikey let out an excited cheer.

"YEAH BABY! That's what I was hoping you'd say!" He shouted, hopping up to his feet and beelining it to the kitchen. His brothers had clearly already done a round, based on the empty boxes and missing slices, but he knew they wouldn't dare leave him without his fair share. That's youngest child privilege. They knew damn well that he’d cry at them.

"How was school today, my son?" Dad always asked about school first and everything else second, every time.

"Id'was gooh'." Mikey mumbled, in between the pizza slice already hanging out of his mouth, piling several more slices onto his plate. "We're readin' th' O'ssey--"

"Orange, I cannot understand anything you are saying."

Mikey spit the half-chewed pizza slice back out onto the plate, which earned a really fun look from Dad, and he grinned.

"Sorry! We're reading the Odyssey in English class, which is fine, I guess, but it's kinda a lot to get through, so we're translating it to, like, real human words, annnndddd we gotta do a group project presentation thing, and I like all the people in the group project but you KNOOWWW how group projects are." He reported, rapid-fire, giving a dramatic sigh. "Oh! And I got my Algebra test back and I got! A seventy-nine!"

"Oh! Very good, Mikey. I am glad your studying paid off." His father replied with a small smile, and Mikey beamed. "And how was dance?"

"Awesome! I killed it, as per use'." Mikey said proudly, puffing out his chest a bit. "Miss Vega said that I just gotta tighten up my turns and I'll be all ready to destroy the competition next weekend!"

"Excellent. Good job, Orange." His dad said with a chuckle, patting Mikey's shoulder before making his way back into the living room, no doubt to reunite his butt with his beloved reclining chair and put on some TV series that no one else in the family appreciated. Mikey grabbed three more slices of pizza while his dad’s back was turned, and then scampered off, heading deeper into the apartment.

Considering they lived in New York City, they lived in a pretty spacious abode. Mikey couldn't remember a time in his life when there wasn't lots of room to stretch out and run and jump around. He remembered, back when he was really little, some of the hallways being big and long enough to even echo-- though he sometimes wondered if that had just been his imagination. Some of the stuff they would make up back then was pretty wild. Their dad had bought this big old brownstone apartment way back when they moved into Brooklyn, buying up the entire building so that they had all four floors, plus the basement, to themselves. Mikey recalled, vaguely, all the renovations that had gone into it when they first moved to New York, adjusting the fixer-upper into something where four very active children could be raised without feeling cramped. The building was tall and skinny, slotted neatly in with the rest of the city, and Mikey had always loved that. This meant it they had the perfect hallways for running back and forth through, and there was a surplus of staircases for him to slide down or jump over. The hardwood floors were perfect for both Tokyo Drifting and dance practice. They each had gotten their own rooms as they grew as well, with himself and Raph on the second floor, Leo and Donnie on the third, and their father taking the master bedroom on the ground level.

But the best bit was the basement. Lovingly dubbed "The Lair," their dad had designated it the hub for childhood shenanigans, (and now, teenage activity,) from the get-go, all but sacrificing the space to his sons from the moment they moved in. The house was technically his, sure, but the basement was theirs, like, for real for real. Arcade games and consoles lived down here, hooked up to the big TV on the wall and surrounded by beat-up beanbags. Raph's weight-lifting equipment was in that corner there, and Donnie's bigger, more mechanical projects were over there by the stairs, (with the yellow tape and the "do not touch" signs.") This big wide open space here with the mirrors on the walls and the punching bags mounted on the ceiling was perfect for both martial arts, acrobatics, and dance practice, depending on which kind of matting they laid out. And, best of all, the Lair was the one place in the house where their dad had reluctantly conceded that, yes, Mikey. You may paint on the walls.

The Lair was typically the best bet for finding any of his brothers, especially if they weren’t holed up in their rooms, and Mikey did think about heading down there, too… But, as very tempting as it was to hang out with brothers first and do math worksheets later was, he was pretty sure he could get through his homework in, like, thirty minutes, tops, and just get it all out of the way. Plus, this way, he didn't have to worry about anyone else making any grabs for his dinner.

With this in mind, he tromped his way up the stairs, nudging his sticker-adorned door open and dumping all his stuff on his desk, immediately shoving the previously-abandoned pizza slice back into his mouth again. He flipped open his textbooks, switched his speakers on to fill the space with some chill lofi beats to study to, and nudged his desk lamp awake as he settled in to get to work.

His workload had been pretty light recently, with way fewer teachers than usual handing out paper worksheets and questionnaires to bring home, so it didn't take him very long to get through all the assignments and readings. (Also, lowkey, it was times like these that he was, like, wow. Thank god for Adderall.) He was nearly done with the last of his work when he suddenly paused.

Dang. Artistic inspiration was truly a cruel but wondrous mistress. Okay, homework later. He scrambled for his phone, rewinding the song playing over the speakers. Ooh, yeah, okay-- That bass? Oh, hell yeah, this was really good! He could absolutely see the movement in his mind's eye-- he could picture the way the color swooped along with the beat and brightened along with the melody. Oh-- and what if he added some black outlines? What was the title of this song again...? Maybe he should look up the artist. He wondered if this would be better as a direct homage to the artist, (maybe the title up on a wall, in big curved block letters, yellows popping along the edges to pull it into the foreground, and that red in the center to sink it in--) or if this should be a more narrative piece. It made him think of that one movie that they watched two weekends ago-- with the spy and the watering can factory?! And this one line, about the lightning, he could just see the way he could paint a figure to answer that directly. Was it too ambitious to do a zig-zag line of action? Oh, but if he had the leg out like that...

He flipped the page of his notebook, his pencil skritching feverishly on the sheet as he moved to put these thumbnails into reality while they were still ticking through his mind in a slideshow. He paused only to command Spotify to play the song on repeat, his tongue stuck out of the corner of his mouth and his eyes narrowed. Ohmigosh, yes! This would be perfect. He couldn't believe he had never thought of this before. This song had been on his playlist for how long? He had just kind of been spacing out until now, but suddenly, he was so excited about this project.

And it would be the perfect excuse to use those metallic spray paints he's been hoarding! He practically vibrated with excitement, thumbing the paper with a grin. Oh, that would look amazing. Just a bold streak of shimmery color, bursting out from the composition, like an explosion, he could see it so clearly--

Half a thought later, the spiral-bound notebook in front of him burst into flames.

[ next ]

[cecilysass]

Negotiation

Read on AO3 | Tagging @today-in-fic

They’ve been debating which case to work on next week so long that the car windows are all Rorschach test splotches of fog.

There’s a moment’s lull in conversation. Mulder reaches into the console, fishes out his bag of seeds and pulls it apart. His eyes lock on twin silhouettes in trench coats moving through the mist about twenty feet outside their car.

“You know, I hear they’re more than just partners,” he offers in a conversational tone.

“Who?”

“Gillis and Perez,” Mulder says, cracking open a sunflower seed, gesturing out the front windshield. “That’s the water cooler gossip, anyway.”

“Spending a lot of time at the water cooler, Mulder?”

“I’m in the know, Scully.”

They’ve been waiting in the car outside a row of weather-battered warehouses for two hours, part of a coordinated raid that hasn’t gotten its go-ahead yet. There have been days of briefings and prep, but something seems to have gone to shit, because they’re sitting positioned with practically the entire Bureau twiddling their thumbs. Dressed for action with no place to go.

Mulder suspects they’re probably not really necessary in this operation, which is about the size of the invasion of Normandy. They’d probably not be missed if they drove off and went to pick up some hamburgers.

But they’re nothing if not team players. And besides, this isn’t so bad. Scully sighs next to him, and he subtly glances at her. She’s leaning back against the seat, the soft arch of her neck exposed and her lips slightly parted. There are worse ways to spend an evening.

He turns back to watching Gillis and Perez through the front window. They’re dutifully walking the perimeter of the closest building.

The two agents don’t look overtly romantic, he decides. If it’s true, they’re discreet. They do walk side by side, very little distance between them, but they don’t touch one another. Gillis is a tall woman, so she stands almost at Perez’s height, and their heads keep arching towards one another to talk.

He wonders what they’re talking about. It could be anything—the raid, the weather, their favorite sexual positions.

Scully’s eyes track them, too, seeming to note every possible tiny physical clue.

“Hmm,” she says slowly and thoughtfully, “I admit, that’s interesting.”

“Interesting that it’s an open secret and there don’t seem to be any repercussions?”

“Yes,” Scully says, pushing back against the seat and stretching out her limbs like a cat. “And interesting in other ways, too.” She reaches down and, peeking first, helps herself to some of his sunflower seeds, her small hand slipping into the bag’s interior without crackling the wrapper.

Mulder makes an affirmative humming sound. “I thought so, too.”

“I mean, on some level it’s perfectly understandable,” Scully adds, placing some seeds between her lips, her eyes still focused out the window where the pair have disappeared around the corner. “They’re both very attractive. It’s hard to date in this job. People have needs.”

Mulder glances at her warily again. Jaw working on his own handful of seeds, he doesn’t answer right away, cautiously processing this statement. “Sure,” he says mildly. “I guess you’re right.”

And then the car is quiet, only the sound of cracking seeds and the rustling of the bag as he reaches for more.

“Actually,” Scully says casually, “it makes me think that we could do something like that.”

Mulder turns to her. “Something like what?”

“What Gillis and Perez are doing.”

“What?” He blinks rapidly. “Are you being serious?”

“Yes,” she says. Staring out the front window, she certainly appears serious, if a little uptight.

“You’re teasing, right?”

She looks down and carefully smooths the dark pants she wore for the raid, as if she has just noticed many sudden wrinkles. “If you don’t want to, fine. I was just raising the idea.”

“Raising… the idea,” he repeats, bewildered.

“Okay, Mulder,” she says with a small sigh. “I get it. It’s out of the question.”

“I’m just shocked that you would bring it up like … that you would just … it’s unexpected.”

“Let’s change the subject then. How do you like the Knicks this year?”

“I mean…” Mulder runs his hands down the sides of his face, dragging his cheeks. “What are you suggesting, exactly? How would you see it working?”

Scully’s eyes flash to his. “I’m not suggesting something in particular. It would be open to negotiation.”

“Open to negotiation,” Mulder says, shaking his head in disbelief. “Jesus, Scully.”

“What’s your concern exactly?”

“So this would be a ‘meeting needs’ kind of deal,” he says, using finger quotes. “A ‘taking care of basic urges’ situation.”

“That’s one possibility,” she says brusquely.

Mulder’s head twists rapidly back towards her. “What are the other possibilities?”

“Well,” Scully says. Her face changes color. “It could be a little more traditional than that, I suppose.”

“Traditional like what?”

“I don’t know, Mulder,” she says, throwing her hands up. “It would be open to negotiation. Is there an arrangement you would prefer?”

“To be honest,” he says, “I’d prefer not to have an arrangement at all.”

“Then we certainly don’t have to discuss it any more.” Her lips draw tightly.

“No, no,” he says, and he reaches out to place his hand on hers without thinking. “That came out wrong.”

“Mulder,” she says, stiffening under his touch, “let’s just gracefully drop it, okay? I regret bringing it up.”

“I just don’t want an arrangement,” he repeats meaningfully. “I don’t want a negotiation.”

“I get it,” she says shortly, jerking her hand out from under his.

“No,” he says. “No, you don’t.” He takes a deep breath. “It’s not that I don’t want … what you suggest. I’ve thought about it. A lot. Maybe too much.”

Scully’s mouth twitches at the corners as she apparently absorbs this. “Okay,” she responds. A pause. “Then why not?”

Mulder rubs his temples aggressively.

“I don’t think I could do it without … all of it. I mean, that’s not strictly true. I could do it. I’m only human. But I think it would end … really badly.”

“End badly how?”

“I don’t know about you, but to me sometimes it seems like things are too complicated between us already. This would be upping the ante. I’m pretty sure I’d always be wanting the whole thing.”

She’s confused. “What do you mean by ‘all of it?’ The ‘whole thing?’ We could negotiate that, if you wanted it. Make it part of the arrangement.”

“Scully,” he says in a fond, exasperated tone. “You can’t negotiate being in love. You know that, right?”

He thinks for a moment she’s not going to respond.

“And that’s what … you want?”

“Well, it’s probably not something I’m going to have a ton of willpower about, so don’t test me,” he says with a rueful hitch in his voice. “But in my experience, it’s a bad idea to enter into a sexual relationship with someone you’re in love with if they’re not in love with you.”

Scully is very still, apparently reacting to the implied revelation. He steels himself for more.

“I admit, I’ve done it in the past,” Mulder says. He’s proud of how calm he sounds. “I might even be prone to it, whatever that says about me. It’s ended in spectacular fucking heartbreak. You think it will work out, that you’ll convince the person, and it feels real. But it’s not. And in those cases, it wasn’t like…” He breaks off. “Well, it wasn’t like this partnership. Which, as I hope you know, is ... already different from most other kinds of relationships. I just think this would be a lot worse. More painful.” He hesitates before saying the last word. “Devastating.”

They don’t say anything for a moment. Scully has a strange, almost dazed expression on her face.

“Gillis and Perez,” Scully says, gesturing to where they’d walked around the corner. “Is that a meeting-basic-needs situation?”

“I have no idea,” Mulder says. “Maybe. Or maybe they’re one another’s soulmates. I don’t know. Water cooler didn’t cover that.”

She nods once. He hears her toying with the edge of the sunflower seed bag.

“For what it’s worth,” she says, after a moment, “I didn’t bring up the meeting-basic-needs idea. You did.”

Mulder’s brow furrows. “Did I? I thought you mentioned ‘needs.’”

“I used the word ‘negotiation,’” she continues, in her precise work voice. “Which doesn’t really reveal anything about the feelings of any of the parties. It just means parameters would have to be agreed on in advance.”

“I guess,” Mulder says doubtfully.

“I don’t know if it would be as risky as you’re thinking,” she adds with finality. “It seems to me that you’re making some faulty assumptions.”

“I don’t think I am,” Mulder says stubbornly. “I know myself pretty well, and I know my feelings.”

“Yes,” she replies, “but you don’t know mine.”

A pause.

“No,” he says in a different tone. “Now that you mention it, no, I guess I don’t.”

“It never occurred to me that we would have an arrangement without … attachment. I suppose I took the attachment for granted.”

“Attachment?”

She nods shortly.

“And by attachment, you mean…?”

She bites her lip and rolls her eyes. “Mulder.”

“That embarrasses you, Scully? Talking about feelings?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Just a little hard to believe when you were propositioning me for sex a few minutes ago.”

“I wouldn’t describe it as propositioning you for sex,” she says huffily.

“No? Come on. You were basically like: let’s negotiate a contract and take your pants off, Mulder.”

“That’s not what I was like,” she replies, flushing.

“I know what I heard.”

“I was only trying to say that maybe we should talk about this option … that we don’t ever talk about,” she says tightly. “That we both think about.”

“Scully—”

“An option that’s literally sitting right in front of us. That Gillis and Perez chose for themselves.”

He squirms in his seat, then pulls in a long, slow breath. “Yeah.” He’s not looking at her. “You’re right.”

“You were the one that made me sound so…” She composes herself. “You were the one that took feelings out of the equation.”

He steals a careful look at her. “I’m sorry.”

She doesn’t respond, and she’s looking away from him, but he suspects, from past experience with the various cadences of her voice, that she’s got tears in her eyes.

“I should have realized you had some protections up, too, Scully,” he adds roughly.

She looks down at her hands.

“Scully,” he tries, gently, “just to be clear in negotiation here—are you saying that … it might be possible for you and me to have a relationship where both parties hold equivalent feelings?”

She lifts her head, and there are indeed tears pooling in the corners of her clear blue eyes. “Don’t you know me at all? Haven’t you been paying any attention?”

He reaches over and takes her hand in his. Her small fingers feel gritty, like the salt coating his sunflower seeds.

“I thought I was paying attention,” he says. “But then you go and do something really, really surprising.”

“I thought I was being logical,” she says primly, looking down again.

He places a finger under her chin and tips her face up. “Very logical,” he says in a low, playful voice. “Nothing says logical like initiating a relationship with Fox Mulder.”

[accidentally-in-fictional-love]

🤔⛵️🥰 please 🫶

Wooden Treasures - Romantic Wojchek Headcanons

Warnings: Bit of angst because it's Wojchek, it's like a requirement.

Notes: Some romance with my jolly sailor bold? You guys are spoiling me Q//w//Q This ended up being a bit of a broken up drabble since it's hard to write romance for someone who's away for so long, so when he is around that's when the true headcanons start 😊 I hope you enjoy~ 💗💗💗

You meet him in the most unromantic way possible, while he's coming ashore to check cargo and you're passing by completely distracted. You bump into him as he's in the middle of his inspections, the payment for his cargo knocked out of his hands and onto the dock, the coins spilling every which way and into the water. The look he gives you is nothing short of loathing, and you end your first meeting gathering everything up and reimbursing the rest, plus a little extra for the trouble.

The next time you see him he's returning, and since there's no rush you introduce yourself and offer to maybe buy him a drink to make up for last month, but he doesn't even remember you, the moment so inconsequential once the money was handed over that he concentrated on the voyage and pushed you right from his mind. He does hesitate at turning you down though, and while it still isn't very romantic while everyone drinks and talks and sings around you, you learn his name is Wojchek and that he prefers to drink outside rather than inside.

His next voyage isn't for a week and a half while they restock and buy new livestock, so you end up seeing him quite a bunch while you go about your day. He sticks to his ship, preferring to sleep on board instead of renting a room on solid ground, and you learn that when you're closing your window in the morning chill and see him stretching on deck. You almost call to him but don't, preferring to watch as he breathes in the sea air, his hair even more disheveled as he pulls his suspenders over his shoulders and heads for the dock. You invite him out to breakfast instead with the excuse that you were just on your way, and he seems almost fond of you as he asks if you'd want to eat on deck with him while the sun rises.

By the time the first week was almost over, he'd seen you so many times that he'd remembered your name, and you learn that he wasn't just distant, he was just so used to moving around that he never bothered remember anything outside of his crew. You don't realize how important this made you to him until he was the one asking you to dinner, but not at one of the many seafood places lining the docks, but instead on the Demeter while the others were out. He doesn't use any of their growing supplies, they needed to save them after all, instead buying rarer things from the import section of the open market nearby, using them to make you something from his home country to share. You don't realize it's an actual date until he lights the lamps as the sun starts to set, a candle on the makeshift table he and the others had carried up on deck just for this, and he tells you all about the recipe as you enjoy the meal he'd made just from memory.

He's very self-sufficient, living on the sea had made him grow up fast, but it also means he was now a jack-of-all-trades, from cooking, to mending his few clothes once it became unavoidable, to even repairing the ship. He loves working with his hands, this becoming apparent when you find a handcrafted wooden sculpture of a fish waiting for you on your doorstep the night after your date. There's a lot of care put into it even though he would've had to work fast, the next one coming a couple days later when you step out to visit the market before the morning rush. This one is of a bird, and it sits in your pocket as you do your shopping and feel him there with you.

He can only stay for one more day, the new cargo coming earlier than expected and allowing them to make even better time, and while you knew it was coming you hoped you'd at least have a couple extra days to get to know him better. As he tells you this on the docks he seems different than before, the serious, stoic sailor who'd made you want to jump into the water to avoid his rage now replaced with the man asking if you wanted to have one more dinner together before he had to go. Again he cooks for you as you invite him into your home, only this time he teaches you what to do as he chops and simmers, helping you commit this part of him to memory so when he left you could make it on your own and remember him. When it's over he kisses your hand and wishes you goodnight, and you almost don't let him go as he heads back to the Demeter in the dark.

You meet him on the docks the next day, unable to bear the wait without one last goodbye, and this time he presses a new sculpture into your hand with a kiss to your forehead and a promise that he'll return to you spoken in his native tongue.

You don't hear from him for weeks until they reach their destination, someplace far away that you can't even place without visiting the library and looking over their hand drawn maps of the world, and you count the days and memorize every word on the page until you can see the stars with him.

He sends another letter when they make an emergency stop halfway home, one of the animals they'd brought on board had gone rabid and caused quite the panic, and it was only through a miracle that no one was hurt. In it, because it'd been over a month by that point, he confesses to you how much he missed seeing your face in the morning, how the sunrise used to be the only thing that warmed his heart, it replaced by you and your laugh instead. He promises that even if they can't return for long, he still wants to hold you in his arms, otherwise it'll be hard for him to leave again. You make the recipe he taught you that night, but it doesn't taste the same without him sitting across from you.

His sculptures find a permanent spot on your windowsill so you can wake up and think of him as soon as you see them, and when the wind knocks one over you finally notice the words you can't translate carved into the bottom of each.

When the Demeter finally pulls into port, you race down the stairs and through the duplex door straight to the docks, the commotion of other returning ships doing their best to stop you until you trip and crash into a bunch of people. The hands that catch you are strong and steady, and you instantly know it's him before you even look up and see him. His eyes are tired from the delayed return but the smile he gives you holds so much that you make sure he makes good on his promise as you throw yourself into his arms.

He only has a few days before he's gone again, this just another small stop on the way to their next job, but he really does make good as he finds you the moment he's done with his tasks. He needs to find a bigger crew to take care of this one, the cargo much bigger than the usual hauls, and as you walk together you joke that maybe you'll come along this time. He doesn't joke with you, something in his eyes telling you he wants you to be serious, and you actually consider it as he almost kisses you goodnight on your doorstep.

You're only able to see him again before he leaves, your eyes on the Demeter all night in case they need to leave early, your chair pulled up to the window as you watch for any sign of movement. When they start moving around you get dressed and rush out, but there isn't any time to say goodbye as the sails are lowered and the ship starts to leave. You call for him as your heart aches, and before it pulls away you see him appear at the end, and he points behind you as his voice gets lost on the wind. You turn to find a box waiting for you by your doorstep, you'd run right past it, and when he disappears from sight you find all the others letters he was never able to send along with over ten new sculptures, each one different and sporting the same text as the others on the bottoms, and you just hold them and pray that he'll return to you faster this time.

You space out the letters, one per day until he can send something new, and you miss him as he tells you about how beautiful the sea looks when the sun is low and it shines like gems, but how it's nothing compared to what he sees when he looks at you. He shares more recipes with some, stories from in his past in others, but the final one you can't read as it's entirely in polish, and the next day you go back to the library to see if you can translate it yourself.

The wait doesn't feel so long as you pour over your books, slowly recognizing the words until you can chip away at the last letter piece by piece. He sends a couple more but you hold off on reading them until the whole thing is finished, and it's rough and badly translated in some places but you still understand that it's a confession about how he thinks he's falling in love with you all the same, the page filled with everything he loved about you and why for the first time in his life he wanted to stay. You cry as you read the last sentence about how maybe someday he'll have the courage to tell you this himself, since he knows you can't read it, and how he wishes he could have more time with you the next time he comes to port. You file away each one lovingly into a drawer, the new sculptures joining the rest, and finally you understand as you read the words on the bottoms: Kocham cię. "I love you."

You space out the new letters but they're more closed off than the last, no more secret messages for you to translate as he talks about how he wished you could see the shorelines of the places they pass, how you would love the quick stops they make at those coastal towns, but nothing else. You blame yourself for not leaving sooner, even though you know that you never would've been able to read his confession before he left, and you start on your own to give to him when he returns.

It takes almost 3 months this time but finally the Demeter returns to port, and you let him work as you watch from your window, his letter sealed and waiting beside you as you rest against the sill. You wait until you see him glance towards your place, and you catch his eye as he hurries towards you, his letter in your hand as you take the stairs two at a time until you're opening the door and he's there. He reaches into his pocket to grab something for you but you hold out your letter first, and he just stares at it before coming inside to read it. You wait as he struggles a little with your amateur translation, but it must still make sense because when he's done he's holding you to his chest and speaking to you in words you still don't understand, you can only read them, and you tell him this before he finally kisses you.

For once he doesn't go back to the Demeter as he cooks one of the recipes he shared in his letters with you, delicious and new smells filling your home as he tells you about their upcoming voyage. They'd been hired to transport cargo all the way to London, so he'd be gone a long time again, but there was a bonus pay waiting for them there if they made good time. You ask him what he'd do with his share as you grab two plates, and he answers in polish again but doesn't translate this time no matter how much you beg him to. He spends the night for the first time, and you whisper for him not to go as you fall asleep in his arms.

You receive no letters as the weeks drag on, your worry increasing with each passing day that you don't hear from him, and you know something's wrong when a storm hits you as you're coming home, all of your sculptures knocked to the ground as the wind and rain invade your living room. When you're on the docks heading to market you finally hear what happened, how the Demeter ran aground and was shattered against the rocks when it reached London. You froze in your tracks right there, your knees giving out as the word that there were no survivors shoots right through you and makes you break down right there.

Your collection of gifts from him becomes your treasure, each one valuable to you as you move the sculptures from your sill to your dresser. They line up in front of your mirror, guarding you as you sleep alone each night, each letter memorized again and again until your tears make the letters smudge. You force yourself to leave them alone, you can't lose the way he loved you so soon, his confession still unspoken as you wish you could still feel him laying there with you.

A few months go by before you start to move on, your sea view no longer beautiful as you walk along the docks in order to reach the market. A ship had pulled in around the time you left, the sailors all piling out to hurry for the bars, but you just ignore them as you try not to look. They all brush past you as you just try to get by, your chest hurting with each one that makes you stumble until you finally trip and fall, crashing hard into someone with a bag slung over his shoulder. You both fall to the ground, his bag tearing on the old wood, and you just barely get out an apology before you see the wooden sculptures sprawling out beside you. You take them all in before looking up at the person you landed on, and you can't stop your tears as you see him there, wincing, bandaged, scarred, but alive. You can't speak as he explains that he jumped overboard before the crash and it only just saved him, but everyone else was lost in the storm, he didn't know who else made it. You'll care later but you don't now as he's the only important thing to you, and you kiss him before helping gather up everything he made you while he was recovering. There are no letters though, and he admits that he didn't want to hide behind the ink any longer as he meets your eye, and before he can say anything else you tell him you love him, his hand leaving his pocket at the same time. You stare down at his hand as he tells you he spent the last of his money on this before he boarded the ship to come back to you, and you translate his final mystery sentence from months ago in your head as you lovingly pick up the ring sitting in his palm.

[f1-stuff]

Mallorca AU please :)

Hii ❤️ (previous shared bit) and an 880-word snippet for you :

They run back to Carlos’ bike, yelling and laughing as the rain quickly goes from a light misting to what Charles would describe as a downpour.

“We can’t ride your bike in this!” he insists, even as Carlos swings his leg to straddle the seat.

“What do you mean? It’s just a bit of rain,” Carlos shouts. His joke is punctuated by another rumble of thunder. “Get on - hurry.”

Charles doesn’t waste time arguing, although he does laugh at the ridiculousness of the situation as he once again climbs onto the handlebars. He fumbles around, sliding a bit on the wet metal, but Carlos helps to balance him like last time, a hand at his waist that somehow exactly aligns with Charles feeling a bit short of breath. And then, they’re off, Charles squinting against the rain, as Carlos maneuvers them onto the road.

He seems to know where he’s going, despite Charles’ rather pathetic description of where their villa is. So Charles just holds on and blinks water from his eyes.

“I am like your windshield,” he yells, over his shoulder. “Blocking all the rain.” Carlos laughs at his back.

“Thank you, very helpful,” Carlos teases.

It takes them, probably, five minutes or so to get to the nearest bus stop. Charles hadn’t known that was where they were headed, but luckily Carlos isn’t crazy enough to think they could bike all the way to the house in this rain. He thinks Carlos might leave him now, but when he sticks to Charles’ side as they wait for the bus, huddled underneath the small covered bench, Charles feels inexplicably warm. 

Even more so when, as the bus pulls up, Carlos climbs on with him, managing to fit his bike inside with minimal effort, which speaks to him having potentially done it before, as well as talk to the driver about the stop they need and how much it’ll cost. He fishes the amount they need from his pocket, ignoring Charles’ attempt to protest.

“You can cover me next time,” he says. And it makes Charles feel even warmer - the promise of ‘next time’.

They sit side-by-side for the ride, which must be about a half hour or so. But Charles can’t be sure because his eyes quickly start to get heavy, lulled by the hum of the bus’ engine and the rain pattering against the window. He doesn’t decide to close his eyes, but he wakes up some time later to Carlos’ hand gently shaking his knee.

“Almost there,” he says softly, very close to Charles’ ear. Which is also when Charles realizes his head is resting on Carlos’ shoulder. 

He sits up straight, his cheeks hot. Carlos just grins.

“Sorry,” he says, on reflex.

“It’s alright,” Carlos replies, and he sounds like he means it. 

Still, Charles stares pointedly out the window as he waits for his face to stop flushing, until the bus is approaching their stop and Carlos stands to make his way with his bike to the door. They step out into the rain once again, waiting for the bus to pull away before Carlos gestures for him to climb back on the bike.

“It’ll be faster than walking,” he says, over the sound of the rain.

Carlos pedals as fast as he can, Charles giving him directions once he recognizes where they are. But they’re still soaked by the time they pull up to the gates of the villa. Charles crows in victory as he jumps off the bike, Carlos laughing as he watches him punch in the code.

They hardly wait for the gates to open a sliver before they’re pushing through and running toward the covered porch. Carlos lets the bike fall to the ground as they take cover, both of them catching their breath. Charles looks in amazement at the rain that’s bucketing down.

“Do you want to come in?” he asks, thinking it’s hardly smart for Carlos to ride home in this weather.

“I can’t. It’s Sunday and my family has this tradition,” Carlos says, waving his hand in the air. “Sunday night dinners.” Charles nods, something like disappointment settling in his stomach.

“Do you want a ride?” he asks. “Come on, you can’t go on your bike.” Carlos just shakes his head.

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll take the bus back.”

Charles chews on his lip, not wanting to accept Carlos’ solution but not sure he’ll be able to convince him otherwise. Ultimately, he just doesn’t want to say goodbye yet. But he thinks it would sound pretty pathetic (and strange) if he insisted on driving Carlos for that reason.

Carlos laughs, then, surprising Charles out of his thoughts. “You are so wet,” he says, reaching up to smooth Charles’ dripping hair off of his forehead.

Carlos’ breath tickles his face, and he realizes just how close they’re standing. He’s close enough to see the freckles on Carlos’ nose and cheeks, the water beading along his skin, the parting of his lips. Close enough to feel the heat radiating off of him and the heaviness of his gaze as their eyes meet. Carlos’ hand lingers in his hair by his ear. Charles swallows, his tongue feeling suddenly heavy and thick in his mouth.

He doesn’t know why it still surprises him when Carlos kisses him.

And that's all you get... 😏

WIP Wednesday

[ithinkyouhealedmyheart]

30 Days of November

taglist: @myloveforhergoeson @partiallypearl @inkameswetrust (you really liked the idea)

12. Gloomy

The last thing Ashlynn wanted to do in the rain was walk home from work. The weather app on her phone had lied to her, and she hadn't packed an umbrella in her backpack. She also needed a warm coat. Watching the world from the cafe window, she frowned. The sky was grey, and rain pattered down in an erratic rhythm. No light would peek past those clouds.

"Can't you ask your boyfriend to pick you up?" Mark asked, wiping down the counter for the twentieth time. Some Karen had thrown her cold drink at him for some stupid reason.

"Boyfriend? I don't- Carlos is not my boyfriend." She furrowed her brows and crossed her arms.

"The fact he spends every other day here in the same spot by the window says otherwise." Her boss chuckled and took off his patron. "Or, I could drive you home."

"I appreciate the offer, but I'll wait out the rain."

"Ash, it's going to rain all day," Mickey said. Her hair was braided with various colors; she was sporting a rainbow.

"Okay, then I'll walk." Ash sighed and tugged her backpack tight on her shoulders.

The bell was atop the door, and she didn't turn to look at who entered the cafe. The dark-haired girl was focused on the steady rain. She could hear it tap against the gutters and rattle down the side of the building. It was louder than anyone expected but could quickly fade into the ambiance.

"Or, I could drive you."

Her ears perked, and she turned around. At the same time, he always arrived after work at Rocque Records and was the helmet-wearing singer from the boyband Big Time Rush. Carlos Garcia. Ash jumped and whirled around.

"Technically, it would be Logan driving you because I don't have my permit yet, and you would probably be squished in the back with me and James..." Now that he said his inside thoughts aloud, he started thinking it through.

It was a sweet gesture, and at this point, she would take anything instead of walking across town in the rain. Okay, across town was an exaggeration, but it was still too far to walk. She had her license but needed to get a car. The option was to ride in a car with her boss, who was more like a father figure than anything, or squish into the backseat of a BTR mobile with James and Carlos. The first option seemed comfortable, but she would have to wait for her boss to get off work; the second option would mean she was squished between two guys in an already cramped car, but it was better than waiting around and doing nothing.

"Okay."

Carlos had been rambling while she was weighing her options. He stopped mid-sentence and stared blankly at her. He was dumbfounded and maybe a little speechless. The boy floundered like a fish out of water, staring at her while she stuffed her apron into her backpack.

"I think you broke him," Mickey snickered.

"Okay!" Carlos squeaked. He couldn't contain the smile on his face. "Let me just go-" He tripped over himself as he practically ran out the door to inform his friends their seating situation would change.

Mickey snorted and laughed behind her hand. Ash chewed at the inside of her cheek. Sometimes, Carlos was like a puppy. He was so excitable and happy but also eager. It was almost like he worshipped the ground she walked on. From the window, she watched him talk to his friends. He wore a hood instead of his signature helmet, which she should have noticed when he walked in. His hands waved frantically as he presumably got his friend to move over and make room. Next thing she knew, she was squished between Carlos and James in the backseat, holding her backpack on her lap.

The brunette to her right was checking his appearance in a handheld mirror, and to her left, Carlos gave her puppy eyes. She swore there were little hearts in his eyes. But, for now, they were friends. It wasn't that she was afraid he would hurt her, but she wasn't sure if she could handle a romantic relationship. Carlos understood this despite how big of a crush he had on her.

When they go to the PalmWoods, Carlos removes his jacket and uses it like an umbrella to cover Ash from the rain. She is only an inch taller than him, so it isn't all that hard. Their proximity made her blush, but he dropped the jacket and shook off the water once inside, accidentally getting water on the carpeted floor. Thankfully, Bitters wasn't around.

"Hey, do you want to watch a movie?" Carlos asked quietly. He was half expecting her to turn him down, as most girls did. She most likely wanted to go out with James.

"Only if we watch Grease. It's my favorite movie to watch when the weather is gloomy." Ash cracked a small smile. Carlos' face lit up.

"Okay, yeah. We can watch whatever you want!" he exclaimed, trying to keep himself from quite literally jumping for joy. She followed him when he practically ran off to the elevator with a pep in his step.

Mrs. Knight and Katie weren't home because they were off doing something most likely related to girl things. All four guys were entitled to the apartment, but Carlos kicked the four of them out. Kendall and James weren't phased because they had prior plans to hang out with their girlfriends, but Logan had been in the middle of his math homework. Instead of moving, he sat down in the hall and worked away on his laptop.

"So, what is Grease?" Carlos pulled up one of the RCM-CBT streaming services to look for it on the television.

"Well, it's a musical..." Ash knew well that his favorite types of movies were action movies, but when he didn't react adversely, she let out a breath, which she didn't know she was holding.

"It's a romance movie?" Carlos didn't scrunch his face up or fake gag. That was how he reacted to his friends. "Why do you want to watch a romance movie with me?" He quirked a brow.

"It's perfect for rainy days." Ash avoided his gaze.

Carlos started the movie and stretched his arms across the back of the couch. Ash sat beside him with a platonic distance between them, but the more the movie played, the closer she scooted to his side. Until she was cuddling against him.

The energetic boy tried to hide the fact he was crying, but she reached for the tissues on the coffee table and handed them to him. She had seen this movie about a thousand times. She remembered how she cried the first time watching it. Beauty School Dropout was her favorite song. Carlos blew his nose and tried to keep it together. He didn't want to seem weak, crying in front of her, but he couldn't help it.

[lestappenforever]

Let Them Sing (I'll Make You Scream) - The Monza Lestappen fic

Two things:

This fic was never supposed to exist, but ever since the appearance of my lovely Monza anons earlier this week, I haven't been able to get this idea out of my head.

I'm posting the full fic on Tumblr for the first time ever because it wouldn't have existed if it wasn't for the anons. You can find the fic on AO3 here.

Monza anons, this one is all for you. ❤️

(And the lovely @f1writingbyme for coming up with the title.)

---

“Max,” Charles breathes, his fingers tightening their hold on the blond strands.

Max hums against him, his tongue and two fingers quickly driving the Monégasque towards the edge of insanity as they work him open. Max’s other hand around his cock tightens its hold, wrist flicking deliciously as he reaches the head on the next stroke.

Charles shudders, pushing his head into the pillow as his eyes roll back into his head.

The Dutchman crooks his index finger, brushing against Charles’ prostate, drawing a breathless keen from him.

And yet, all Max is able to hear is the many, many singing voices from outside, their song forcing its way through the closed windows, through the closed balcony doors, penetrating Max’s mind when all he wants to hear is the beautiful noises he knows he can draw out of Charles.

“For fuck’s sake,” Max hisses as he pulls back, his tongue and fingers slipping out of Charles.

The Monégasque groans his protest, forcing his eyes open to look down at Max between his legs. But Max isn’t looking at him, too busy staring at the balcony doors with narrowed eyes. The firm set of his jaw is enough to let Charles know that Max is clenching his teeth together, which he always does when he’s frustrated.

“Will they shut the fuck up if you go out there?” he asks, finally moving his gaze from the balcony doors to Charles.

There’s a flush on his cheeks and his lips are glistening with saliva and lube. His hair, where Charles’ hands are still curled, is sticking up in every direction. There’s irritation — anger — in his eyes that looks like a raging storm on its way to wreak havoc on whatever stands in its way. It shouldn’t make Charles’ dick twitch with want, and yet, that’s exactly what it does.

“Why? Are they distracting you?” Charles asks, a smirk tugging at his lips.

Max pinches the inside of his thigh, hard. “The fact that they’re not distracting you is a little concerning.”

Charles shrugs. “What can I say? I like being worshiped.”

“I know,” Max agrees, leaning in to nibble at the inside of Charles’ other thigh, sending a full-body shudder through him. “I’m kind of trying to worship you here. So get your ass out there and give them a little wave so we can get back to it.” He slaps Charles’ thigh playfully for good measure.

Charles snorts, lifting his leg and gracefully moving it over Max’s head so he can roll to the side of the bed and get to his feet. He hastily gets dressed, foregoing boxers, and makes his way to the balcony, unlocking the door and pushing it open.

Max rolls onto his side on the bed, watching as Charles steps outside and listening to how the Tifosi crowd waiting below the balcony fucking roar at the sight of him. It makes the Dutchman roll his eyes because the love the Italian fans have for Ferrari — for Charles — is borderline ridiculous. It’s unlike anything Max has ever seen anywhere else, and it’s everything Charles deserves. He deserves to have fans as devoted to him as the Tifosi, and Max sees how much it means to him. Hell, his post-qualifying interview that very same day and how Charles needed to stop midway to take it all in before barreling on in Italian proved just how much it means to him.

Does Max believe that Ferrari deserves Charles? At the moment, absolutely not. But there is no denying that Charles deserves this.

He watches as Charles waves to the crowd — watches as the Monegasqué fishes his phone out of his pocket to capture this moment, their devotion — and he wonders what the crowd would think if they knew that their Il Predestinato had been spread open by Max Verstappen’s fingers and tongue mere minutes before. Wonders what they would think if they knew that as much as Charles is enjoying their attention, he’s probably thinking about how badly he wants to get back into that hotel room and have Max fuck him until he can’t even remember his own name, let alone remember what the Tifosi refer to him as.

Smiling, Max wraps a lube-slicked hand around his dick and starts stroking himself slowly, watching Charles from the back as he gazes down at the crowd. A full minute passes before Charles glances back at him over his shoulder, and that soft, adoring smile is quickly replaced by something else as his eyes follow the movement of Max’s hand on his dick. Something primal. Something urgent.

Max winks at him.

The Monegasqué’s cheeks flush a lovely shade of pink before he turns back to the Tifosi, giving them another few seconds of his attention before he waves them goodnight and retreats into the hotel room, shutting the balcony doors behind him and drawing the curtains. He’s naked and on the bed, straddling Max’s hips in a matter of seconds.

“Not distracted anymore?” Charles asks as he reaches behind himself and gets Max’s hand out of the way, replacing it with his own around the base of the Dutchman’s cock.

Max’s hands come up to grip Charles’ waist, sucking in a sharp breath as the Monegasqué manages to stroke him despite the slightly awkward angle. “They’re not as loud anymore,” Max says, sounding slightly out of breath as his fingers sink into Charles’ soft skin. “The power of Il Predestinato.”

Charles huffs a laugh and shakes his head, but he doesn’t argue. After all, you can’t argue with the truth: the way the crowd had stopped booing Max almost entirely ahead for his post-qualifying interview when Charles motioned for them to stop was proof enough of the power he holds with the Tifosi.

As Charles positions the head of Max’s cock against his entrance, Max squeezes Charles’ waist.

“If only they could see you like this, baby,” Max purrs, watching with awe as Charles lowers himself slowly onto Max’s aching cock. A soft moan escapes him at the warm tightness that surrounds him.

Charles gasps, eyes fluttering shut as he sinks down further, his body taking Max’s length and girth with ease. Max’s hands move from his waist to Charles’ hips, holding him in place once Charles is fully seated on Max’s cock, keeping him from moving back up.

“If only they knew that their precious Il Predestinato lets Max Verstappen fuck him every chance he gets,” Max goes on, watching as Charles bites his bottom lip in a futile attempt to hold back a moan. “How do you think they’d feel about that, Charles?”

Charles braces himself with his hands on Max’s chest as he slowly raises his hips, aided by Max’s strong hold on them. He doesn’t stop moving until the head of Max’s cock is only barely still inside of him. And he stays like that, hovering above Max.

“Would you like to go out there and find out?” Charles asks, his voice cracking slightly on the last syllable. He watches the way the Dutchman’s eyes turn darker with desire. With need.

“No,” he says through gritted teeth, as Charles slides back down agonizingly slowly, making Max’s head spin. “I’m the only one who gets to see this side of you.”

Charles hums, clenching around Max’s cock teasingly and drawing a bitten off moan from the Dutchman. Outside, the tifosi are still gathered outside the gates, singing their hearts and lungs out. Although Max was right about them having gone a little more quiet now, their chants and songs and screams are still loud in the room. He leans down, letting his lips brush against Max’s. “Think you can make me drown them out?” he whispers.

In the blink of an eye, Charles is the one on his back on the bed with Max kneeling between his legs, his hands on either side of Charles’ head and their faces mere inches apart. When he speaks, Max’s breath ghosts over Charles’ lips.

“You think I can’t?” he asks, and Charles knows there’s only one right answer to that question.

But, the right answer won’t get him the Max Verstappen he so desperately wants tonight. So Charles gives the wrong one, lying through his teeth.

“No, I don’t think you can.”

And, well, Max Verstappen has never been one to back down from a challenge.

He claims Charles’ mouth in a kiss that is every bit as frantic and desperate to prove something as Max feels, tongue and teeth doing everything in their power to steal every breath from Charles’ lungs as Max’s hips immediately take up a damn near brutal pace. And when Max pulls away from Charles’ lips in order to grab onto his hips to really start fucking the Monegasqué with vigor, Charles can do absolutely nothing except for hold on for dear life and letting the intense pleasure overtake him.

And when Charles comes with a scream that is loud enough to drown out the screams of the tifosi, Max is dragged right over the edge along with him.

The tifosi can scream the name of Ferrari’s golden boy all they want, because two-time World Champion Max Verstappen is the only one who can make Charles Leclerc scream his name in bed whenever the fuck he wants.

And if that makes Max feel more superior than winning any race or any championship ever has, then, well… That’s nobody’s business but his own. (And Charles’.)

[toyybox]

Spiderwebs #37: Volta

Masterlist

· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

The next hotel didn’t have a free breakfast, nor did it have a chandelier. It was evidently cheaper than the other two, but it was passable. They were spending most of their time outside, in any case, so the only things they really needed were the beds.

Heather was standing by the newspapers. Jackie was standing by the corner-store’s window, watching people gather at a bus stop across the road. It was a bright and cheery January day. The sky was clear. Someone was feeding pigeons on the street, scattering seeds at a flock. This was a new city. Olympia. A majestic name, though he found it similar to Bellevue and Seattle and Redmond. Even if it was slightly colder. 

“Excuse me, can I take a look—“

Someone was trying to reach the chips aisle. Jackie stepped aside. “Sorry.”

“Hello. Enjoying the view?”

“Oh, it’s you.” Heather was standing beside him, looking smug. “View’s alright.”

“Take it in now, because we’re not staying for long.” She handed him the newspaper in her hand. “First article, third page.”

It was The Olympian. How creative. He folded the thin pages over until he arrived at the third one, where he was greeted by a very interesting sight, indeed.

“Missing Seattle exterminator’s car found near Deschutes river,” he read aloud. “Matthew was an exterminator?”

“Yes, he kept going on about nests. Keep reading.”

His gaze flicked a few lines down. It wasn’t a long article, only two paragraphs. “They think he was mauled by a bear?”

“It’s because they haven’t found the body yet,” she said with a concerning amount of pride. “The police have basically given up.”

The second paragraph was just a list of bear safety reminders. “I don’t understand why Matthew got his own article.”

“What? He went missing. That warrants an article.”

“I went missing—“

“Shh,“ she cut him off, glancing at the stranger picking through flavours of chips. “Keep it down, alright?”

He rolled his eyes, but his next words came in an urgent whisper. “It’s just that—what’s so special about Matthew, huh? I didn’t get an article. Where’s my name on the back of a milk carton? Why do they kick up a fuss about him going off the map, but not me?”

“Hey, I think you’re special.” Heather was in a good mood today, he noticed. “Besides, Matthew was an exterminator. There aren’t many good ones in Washington anymore. They all charge ridiculous fees, too.”

Also, Matthew had a wife and three kids, according to the article. They were probably expecting some sort of report. But that was neither here nor there. Dear old Mattie was sleeping with the fishes now, which was something Jackie had managed to one-up him on. “I’m surprised you came all the way out here to hide the car.”

She waited for the stranger beside them to pass before replying. “I’m thorough. Didn’t want it traced back to Seattle.”

“Is that why we came here? Returning to the scene of the crime?” He leaned forward. “Feeling guilty, are we? Seeing Matt in your dreams?”

“Yes, asking me if I have cockroaches in my attic.” She plucked the newspaper from his hands. “Olympia has great parks, too. But that’s irrelevant. Do you realize what this means?”

He shook his head.

“We can go home now,” she replied in a sunny voice. “The cops aren’t after me. We don’t have to hide out in hotels anymore.”

“Oh.” Going home. Away from the blue sky, the city, the raspy winter air and the gray crusts of snow. Back into the basement. A concrete box. A locked door. Waiting a lot, and sleeping to pass the time. Home sweet home. “That’s great.”

“Isn’t it?” Heather didn’t realize what she was saying, what she was telling him. Because she wasn’t the one who had to trade their freedom for a single room. To her, home meant she had all she ever needed. His perspective was resigned to the back of her mind, only relevant when she needed a list of symptoms or a number on a scale. She was ignorant, and therefore happy. She was thrilled.

“How long are we staying here?” he asked.

“Just the night.”

He bit the inside of his cheek. It wouldn’t do to get worked up. Trying to explain his discomfort would either get a dismissive wave of the hand or, worst case, an angry look. “Great.”

“Yes, the drive back home might take a few hours.” She didn’t notice a thing. “Traffic, you know. I’d like to get started early.”

They walked around and talked for a while. Jackie tried not to dwell on it. He thought he could be happy like this. Heather was good to him. Maybe he felt a bit restless sometimes, but he always had a companion and a roof over his head.

The problem wasn’t Heather. He loved Heather. He enjoyed her company. That was a given. The problem was Jackie. He was still a lab rat. He was still an object of study. 

No, that wasn’t it either. He would be content helping her in scientific research. What did a few drugs matter, when given such a blissful life? The problem was the house—yes, the house, how didn’t he see it before? Too many bad memories there. Too much bad blood. It stained him in its shadow and creaked as it shifted, like the crackling of thunder after lightning, old concrete and wood on the verge of splitting apart, an old hag of a house. In reality, it was probably quite new, but it felt ancient to him. A haunted house of sorts. Impossibly weathered and crawling with spite. 

Being locked in the basement was painful. For the lack of a better term. Agonizing. It was helpless inertia. It was anger with nowhere to go. So the feeling clawed and gnawed and ate him up, like a stomach empty of food, acid bubbling at the back of his throat. He wasted away. He went into decay. A corpse. A carcass. Immortality had little use when the hours turned into days which turned months which turned into years, unbearable and all the same. 

It was that memory that haunted him. He thought he could be okay if he was still allowed to leave, from time to time, but that was unrealistic. Heather barely let him touch the windows—out of safety concerns, of course, not any kind of senseless cruelty. Still, he didn’t want to go back to that. He didn’t want to go back. 

Just a child crying I don’t want to go home, throwing a fit over what couldn't be helped. This was ridiculous. He was getting anxious over nothing. So he forced the thought to die off. He was not home yet, at least. He was on a bench in a park in Olympia, with Heather, and everything was going to be okay.

• —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

She smiled, a little nervously. Her eyebrows were the tiniest bit tense. “Christ above. What are you looking at?”

He was startled out of his trance—he sat up, lifted his head off his hand, stopped gnawing at the inside of his lip. “Oh, sorry, were you saying something?”

“Yes, I was just talking about the weather.” She scrutinized him, while he tried to look as content as possible. “Are you feeling okay?”

He nodded with all the energy he could muster. “I’m feeling great, why?”

“It’s just… you’ve been glaring at nothing for five minutes, at least. Is something wrong?”

“No.”

“Jackie,” she said softly, leaning in a bit. “Be honest. I can tell that you’re upset.”

“I’m fine. Leave me alone.”

She gave him a wounded look.

He sighed, rubbed at his face. “Sorry. I think I’m hungry.”

She looked less wounded. This was a problem she could fix. It was an issue of biology, her specialty. “You should have said so. I saw a restaurant near the hotel.”

“Cool.” Being able to order food from a restaurant, going to parks, watching the passersby with their cute little dogs and their webbed umbrellas. He tried to ignore the dread, but this was all making him feel worse.

He remembered what Heather said, about her death. Being free to go. It wouldn’t last forever. He would be free one day. He hated her for it. Making him love her, then making him grieve, dangling the promise of freedom after completely gutting him. Bait on a hook of immeasurable loss. He hated her, he wanted her dead, he wanted to never talk to her again, and he wanted her to hold him and tell him that everything would turn out okay. He imagined stabbing her until she finally shut up. He wanted to cry into her shoulder. He loved her so much; he knew he wasn't safe; he thought the tension would break him before the drugs ever could. 

This wouldn’t last forever, he knew that, but it was happening now. How could he live forty or fifty years locked away? He was not a god. He could not exist without any attachment or desire. He was a mortal in the wrong body. An entire lifetime would pass him by, restless and spiteful, while he rotted underground. Maybe that was a brief volta to the divine, but he was only a man. 

He loved Heather on condition, he thought. When she was kind, when she let him pretend to live a normal life. Because this was really all pretend. Playing house. It would fall apart the second he decided to contradict her. After so long alone, hearing her voice was all he ever wanted, but that happiness was starting to fade. His insistent thoughts of love and kindness grew lethargic, a little less enthusiastic. 

• —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

He thought of telling her. The day came to a close. He curled up in bed, underneath the blankets, staring at the ceiling. 

She wouldn’t care. That would hurt more than anything, somehow. Jackie just wanted to be taken seriously. Or she’d tell him that it was a necessary precaution, that they could keep living in hotels, and end the conversation there. If she panicked, he might not be able to bargain with her any further. Telling her would only make it worse.

So, what? What was he suggesting? Escape? He would play the Houdini again. It wasn't impossible. He didn't want to risk calling the police, not when he was always near her every hour of the day. Someone as careful as Heather would notice. And there was not a chance he was attempting murder again. But he could walk out. Just… walk out the door. Disappear.

And go where, exactly? Go live on the street? Find money, how—beg? Steal? He had no money to start with, no driver’s license, not even a health card. More importantly, would he really abandon Heather like that? Their trust was already shaky. That would break her heart in two, if he just up and left. She would never let him outside again. The cost of failure was high, and if she decided to punish him for disobedience, it would most certainly be painful.

The only other alternative was going back home. He’d go back to that cage, waiting, sleeping, eating sometimes, waiting for the drugs to wear off, asking to follow her upstairs just to exist in another room. The door was wide open if he wanted it. He could leave at that very moment. It would be so easy to leave. If he was unhappy after that, then it would be his own fault, his own choice to stay and keep his head down. 

But Heather!

What about Heather? She’d get over it. Oh, she’d mourn over the loss of her friend—and also her key to immortality—but there were plenty of other fish in the sea. If she wanted someone else to torment, then she only needed to walk down the street and point her gun. He would miss her, too, but he was used to being alone. It was nothing new.

But… Heather.

She was standing in front of the bed, furrowed brows and tight, straight mouth. “Do you feel sick?”

“I can’t get sick, remember?”

“Yes, but you could have…” She hesitated with the words. “Are you cold?”

“I’m fine, Heather. I’m completely okay. I’m just tired.” 

He continued staring at the ceiling. She left the topic alone and began packing her things.

It was something he wasn’t used to. To be cared for. Something as simple as a question made him nervous. It was an unfamiliar concept. Jackie couldn’t remember his mother at all. Jackie’s father was a subject better left alone. His sisters were either dead or missing. His friends from work probably forgot he existed. His neighbors probably didn’t know he existed in the first place. Heather was the only person in the entire world who gave a damn about him. To lose that would be difficult. Loneliness was always difficult after the warmth of company. But what good was company when it came at the cost of his humanity, his identity, his self?

Exactly. It was a question of humanity. He was not her equal partner, if they were being blunt about it. If Heather wanted to flay him alive, he really did not have a say in the matter. His personhood and choice was stolen, and now it belonged to someone else. Kindness be damned. Love be damned. Those didn’t change the facts of the situation. It wasn’t like his input mattered to her. He had to be nice and sweet and charming regardless of anything she did, or risk losing a few comforts. 

He loved Heather, but love had nothing to do with this, so… that was it, then. His decision was already made. Escape attempt number… two. Or three. Jackie couldn’t remember. But the numbers were for scientists. This was nothing more than sleight-of-hand.

· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

Taglist:

@theelvishcowgirl @lthrboy @whumpy-wyrms

@yassifiedinformation @creppersfunpalooza

@vidawhump

[atrwriting]

chapter two -- the wolf and the dragon (aemond x you)

super original title right

captain 'barely proofreads' reporting for duty with another chapter

as always, warnings: no smut (sorry i know), violence, sexism, alcoholism

you fell into a routine soon after the arrangements were made: wake up, work your normal business hours, politely kick out all of your employees after closing duties were finished, and retreat to your apartment so the targaryen brothers could do what they pleased with your business downstairs. it proved rather difficult to ignore the louder screams, but from a peak out of your bedroom window you realized men were never carrying a body over their shoulder. you considered that a win. busted and bruised men walked away from your building, aegon and aemond usually left after a drink or two, and while you probably should’ve felt wary… you didn’t. you would breathe a sigh of relief at every sight.

there were times where you would venture out from your bedroom late at night in search of the comfort that the sting of jose cuervo down your throat provided you when you couldn’t sleep. you tried not to, as you were a firm believer in curiosity killed the cat, but some nights proved more difficult than others.

“my brother told me you liked to venture out late at night,” a tired and raspy voice spoke when you found yourself downstairs in the bar one night. “never thought i’d make the acquaintance with smiley face pajamas.”

aegon targaryen. you sighed.

“you’ll be waiting a bit on the pajamas,” you spat. “after hours visitors means i am completely covered. when i’m in search of a night cap, that is.”

he smacked his tongue against the back of his teeth. “damn shame. stark women are always a sight. mean, but always a sight.”

“i’m quite pleasant when i’m not being bothered,” you grumbled, grabbing two glasses. “poison?”

“beer, doll,” he rasped. “i’m about as bothered tonight as you always seem.”

“not something stronger?” you genuinely asked. “you look like you need it.”

he shook his head. “business to take care.”

“damn shame,” you sighed. “you’re nicer when you’re drunk.”

he chuckled. “next time.”

you fished out a cold bottle before pouring yourself tequila. aegon’s gaze was far away, even though he stared at the top of the bar. the wood was cracked and worn and it definitely didn’t deserve as much attention as he was giving it, which meant he was in another world.

“do you need to talk about it?” you ventured.

he was still before a small smile was brought to his lips. “pillow talk is reserved for post-sex. and… sweetheart, you don’t want to know.”

you shook your head. “you and your brother are so cryptic.”

“you studied law, right?”

you narrowed your eyes. “how did you know about that?”

“jimmy loved to talk about you,” he laughed, trailing off. “but, anyway… you of all people should know that if you’re kept in the dark, no one can charge you with being an accomplice.”

“aiding and abetting is still floating in the air,” you snapped.

"only if they can prove it," he quipped.

suddenly, a loud crash was heard from below your feet. you immediately jumped, but aegon didn’t move a muscle. your gaze snapped to him, but he remained unbothered.

“should we…”

“no,” he stated. “my brother will take care of it.”

that’s when you heard aemond’s loud scream. you both ran for the basement door.

it was stupid to follow the sound of the scream, but you couldn’t help yourself. if you got in front of aegon, that meant he couldn’t stop you because he was more worried about his brother than making sure the small bartender didn’t see what secrets were hiding in her basement. barreling down the steps, you both looked around the room trying to catch your breath.

“fuck—“ aemond gasped.

aemond was wrestling with an unknown man in the middle of the floor. the man had a piece of tape lingering on his forehead, and one piece on his cheek, meaning aemond had tried to dull the man’s senses. discarded ropes were on the flood, a chair has been thrown to the ground, and you immediately gasped before throwing yourself into the fight.

the man was on top of aemond, holding him down by the throat with his knees pressed into aemond’s shoulders. his intent to kill was so strong — and probably also the pain from the torture he had endured minutes before — that you successfully hopped over the man and wrapped your forearm around the man’s throat, having his chin rest tightly in the crook of your elbow. you yanked his weight back, holding his throat in your grasp. he struggled against your hold, but no one's strength could last for that long when their air supply was cut off. headlocks were your favorite.

“fucking bitch — where did you —“

you weren’t very strong, but aemond had done a number on the man before that he gave away easy when you hauled him off aemond and to his feet. he was struggling against your forearm, but there was no strength or adrenaline left in him to try and kick our your legs. kicking him in the back of his knee, coupled with the loss of oxygen, he fell to his hands and knees on the hard cement. you held him in place before aegon had finally stepped in, smacking the man upside the head with the handle of his handgun.

“thank god you had the next move because i usually flip the channel before a poor asshole gets knocked out,” you breathed heavily, placing your hands on your hips.

aegon eyed you quizzically, genuinely confused. “and miss the best part?”

you rolled your eyes.

aemond got to his feet and immediately cast daggers at his brother. his face was red, bloody, severely bruised, and his glare seemed hazier than usual.

“you let her down here?” aemond bit.

aegon shrugged. “smiley’s fast.”

aemond was seething, “you let her best you? more than once?”

aegon quirked an eyebrow. “i wasn’t the only one bested it seems. you don’t look well, brother.”

“come upstairs,” you ordered aemond. “we need to reset your nose.”

“it’s not broken!” aemond grunted, casting a glare your way.

you rolled your eyes. “i can tell it is. aegon can deal with… him.”

aegon let out a sigh of discontent before he muttered how he should’ve taken the vodka over the beer. you went up the stairs as aemond followed reluctantly behind you.

“whiskey or vodka?” you asked, grabbing your kit from under the bar and gesturing him to sit down at one of the stools.

“tequila,” he stated.

you nodded before pouring him a glass. “what happened?”

“don’t ask.”

you sighed. “...alrighty then. how’s the pain?”

“it’s fine.”

“not a man of 'tmi,' are you?”

“nor a man of many words,” he spat. “especially when you knew you weren’t supposed to be down there.”

“seeing as though aegon looked worried, i figured it was allowed.”

“it’s never allowed. you know better,” he spat as you disinfected his wounds.

“yeah, well…” you sighed, trailing off. “your eye socket is okay… but under your patch is bleeding. can i… check?”

he swallowed thickly and paused. he nodded reluctantly.

you removed his eyepatch and set it down on the bar next to you. he was sure to have a black eye in the morning, even if only a sapphire jewel rested in his socket. what remained of his eyelid was split, but nothing too worrisome.

“first time i’ve ever seen you get got this bad,” you sighed. “usually you walk out untouched.”

“and it will be the last time,” he said through gritted teeth, like a warning.

you chuckled, lacing his patch back on. “mad a girl got him off of you?”

he grabbed your wrist suddenly then and glared at you. also a warning.

you sucked in a sharp breath as you stared back at him, frozen. his angry eye remained on you as you tried to shrug off his hold, successfully getting out of it before returning to your work.

“was only joking,” you grumbled. “finish your tequila… i have to reset your nose.”

with his eye still on you, aemond slammed his tequila and placed the glass back down on the bar. he swallowed thickly and gestured for you to continue. your jaw tensed as you reached for the side of his face with one hand, his nose in the other, and snapped it back into place in a swift movement.

“fuck-!” aemond grunted through gritted teeth, leaning closer towards you in pain.

“all better,” you said, pressing gauze underneath his nostrils to catch any stray blood. “you’re a bleeder, aemond, jesus…”

he ignored you. “where did you learn to do this?”

you swallowed. “bartenders should.”

“came in handy,” he sighed, reaching for the stray tequila bottle and pouring himself another glass. he finished his pour quickly before pouring another. “saved me a trip to our shit doctor.”

you chuckled. “do you need pain meds?”

he shook his head. “tequila is fine.”

he went to get up, but his shoulders were swaying. you immediately grabbed him by the arm to steady him. “tequila is fine, but it’s strong… sit down.”

reluctantly, he sat back down. “i need to make sure aegon doesn’t need help.”

“there’s only one way to get out of that basement,” you reminded him. “we’ll hear either him or that guy running up it, hopefully not the latter, if they need you. you should rest. you’re no use to anyone like this.”

aemond didn’t respond, and you didn’t think it was right to push it. you left him at the end of the bar with his glass and his tequila, and passed him a cup of water. you turned on the frier and started making chicken tenders and fries to curb his drunkenness. as you both waited for aegon, you tidied up the bar as he sat there quietly. through his injured eye, his gaze was trained on the bar. his exhaustion and annoyance was obvious, and you hoped it wasn’t being worsened by the tequila.

unlike his brother... he wasn't nicer when he was drunk.

the frier signaled it was done, and you immediately retreated behind the bar to the kitchen. grabbing his food and condiments and going back to him, you served him his food.

“you should eat. tequila’s deadly on an empty stomach.”

he picked up a fry. “so is no sleep. aegon needs to hurry up.”

“do you want me to check?” you asked.

“no,” he grunted. “he’ll be up soon.”

you busied yourself once more, hoping to pass the time. aemond ate silently, and thankfully finished his food. you threw in more food for aegon, thinking he probably would want a bite to eat after he came up — and his own bottle, but that was a different story.

aegon came up shortly after you had plated his food, and the man from before left out your front door without acknowledging anyone. the two brothers didn't bat an eye, let along glance in the unknown's man direction as they let him leave. you eyed the door curiously, and then the brothers, and threw your hands up in annoyance.

“you knocked him out with a glock!" you stated with eyes trained on the both of them.

aegon shrugged. “these for me?”

you shook your head in disbelief. “y-yes… here’s your vodka. why is he allowed to just walk out of here?”

“killing is messy,” aegon settled calmly. “he won’t cause trouble after this.”

“why’s that?” you demanded.

“we’re a team of two, sweetheart,” he reminded, shoveling food in his mouth and washing it down with vodka. “we have no need for an accomplice. and, right now: i’m a team of one. on that note, i need to get laid, so i’ll be off... unless you’re willing to take one for the team, sweetheart.”

you scoffed. “i’m not a member, as you just reminded me — so, no, find another victim."

he winked before walking away. “aemond, i’m taking the car.”

“drop me off first?!”

“nope,” and he left.

aemond sat and stared at the door, and then also shook his head in disbelief. he muttered a few insults under his breath as you contemplated your next move.

“i’d drive you, but i’ve been drinking,” you said.

he ignored you.

you shifted from one foot to the other uncomfortably. “you can… crash here… if you promise that was the last visitor of the night.”

he looked up at you and narrowed his eyes. “and why would you let me do that?”

“seems like you don’t have another ride,” you shrugged. “also, scary men are less scary when you’re nice to them. you’re grumpy.”

“i’ll pass.”

you rolled your eyes, sighing. “i’m off then. goodnight aemond.”

you didn’t expect him to come up. you really didn’t. you figured he had found a ride, called some broad, overstayed his welcome and kept eating chicken fingers downstairs, or aegon had busted a nut too quickly and came back around to apologize to his brother. actually, scratch the apology. probably just finished his dick appointment and picked up his brother.

no matter what happened, you didn’t expect him to come up that night. so what did you do? you planted yourself on the couch and watched sitcom reruns. there wasn’t much else to do at 1am when it was difficult to fall asleep at a normal hour, and you were too frightened to venture downstairs and find another nightcap. so you laughed along to chandler bing, and tried to drift off to sleep.

emphasis on tried. you were comfortable, snuggled up in your favorite blanket and cute pajamas, and exhaustion was about to take you when you heard your front door knob began to twist.

fuck.

despite your dream like state, you immediately jumped up when the intruder showed himself.

aemond targaryen.

you threw your hands up in anguish. “i was about to go for a knife!”

he pursed his lips. “my apologies.

you sighed, retreating to a defeated stance with your hands on your hips. “take the bed in the other room.”

his brow furrowed. “i’m not taking your bed from you.”

you rolled your eyes. “a woman in hospitality doesn’t let guests sleep on her couch. plus, i’m watching television.”

“fine,” he replied with reluctance, stepping into your living room. “then i’m watching bad sitcoms too.”

[vinceaddams]

Top Five: thrift/secondhand/opshop finds?

Ooh, that's a good one! I have so many cool thrifted things. There's a big Value Village about a 20 minute walk from work, and I try to go there at least a couple times a month. 'Tis one of my few non-essential indulgences, and oh how I wish I had more room to store fabric and put cool decor in! (All the prices I'm saying are in Canadian dollars.)

1. Wool fabric! This is multiple finds, but I'm lumping them all into one. I think they're all 100% wool, and if any are blends it's still mostly wool. The burn tests results were all very wool-like. All of them are from Value Village except the navy blue in the middle, which was from a small hospice thrift store. That one was $4 for 6 metres!!

The bright teal on top is stretch knit, and I think it's merino. I'm thinking I'll make Regency inspired long underwear with it. The plaid is really long and narrow, and I think it's handwoven? The visible edge there is the full width, and there's probably enough for 3 waistcoats.

The beige and fuchsia will probably - wait, is that how you spell fuchsia?? Weird. It looks wrong. I always thought it was fuschia, but spellcheck is underlining it in red. Anyways, the beige and fuchsia will probably end up being overdyed. The one with the little woven diamond pattern is going to be a waistcoat, because the brown wool one I wear everyday right now really doesn't fit me anymore. (I'm going to make a youtube video of that project. Haven't started it yet, but I really need to!)

I have had a couple of deceptive fabrics that I thought might be wool at the store, but turned out to not be. Usually I'm pretty good at telling from touch though. Wool is so expensive to buy new, so finding any amount of yardage secondhand is pretty exciting.

2. This wonderful candelabra. It's solid brass and was $4. It's a modern reproduction, but very similar to some mid 18th century styles, and I love it. I've found some other nice candleholders there, but this is by far my favourite. Look at that elegantly curving S shape!

This picture is from before I cleaned it with some Twinkle copper & brass cleaner, and it's shinier now and has two beeswax candles in it.

(The next time I had alcohol after this I got really excited about my shiny candelabra, and went on the hardware store website and left a very positive review for the brass cleaner, because it honestly impressed me.)

3. Full length vintage mink coat for less than 20 bucks. It was marked as 21, but I had a coupon, so it came to $19.50. I think the reason it was cheaper than usual is because of the huge faded patch on the side.

It looks like there's sunlight hitting it, but there isn't, it's nighttime, that's just fading. I think it must have hung next to a window for quite a while. Other than that it's in pretty good condition, save for a tiny bit of stitching coming undone in the lining. I mean to eventually use it as the lining for a mid 18th century fur lined coat! The very dark brown one on the closet door behind me is a similar coat from the same thrift store, and it was $35, which is still an absolute steal for so much lovely fur. It's got a bit of moth damage at the hem, but is otherwise good.

4. Someone's really good button stash.

This was spread out over 4 bags, but definitely all came from the same old person. There was such a high percentage of Good Stuff in there, I was astounded!

Usually you look at the bags of buttons and maybe see a few mother of pearl and some nice metal ones, and have to decide if it's worth buying the whole bag just to fish out the good ones (and re-donate the rest because I already have more than enough plastic buttons that I rarely use). But for these ones the good stuff was half the bag!!

Dozens of Victorian glass ones, including a matched set of 15, and even more mother of pearl! And see the little ones in the lower right corner? They're from button boots!

Absolutely incredible day, I love to hoard beautiful buttons like a dragon!

5. Silver plated sugar bowl from 1880.

This was $6, and I almost left it there, but ended up getting it because the handles looked cool. "They look rather Art Nouveau" I thought, "perhaps it's from the 1900's". But nope! (I do not know things about historical dish styles) When I got home and looked at it properly I realized it has a personalized inscription:

"Le to Min Oct. 25th 1880"

Who were these people?? I wish I knew, but alas, sugar bowls can't talk. There are numbers scratched into the bottom and the inside of the lid, so I think it was pawned at some point.

The above picture is from when I was polishing it, and it turns out a fair amount of the plating has worn off, which is why the bits around the designs are so dark. Someday it would be nice to look into getting it re-plated, but I can't be spending money on that sort of thing right now.

I've gotten quite a few silver plated dishes from there (which I use to keep sewing stuff organized on my table) but this is almost certainly the oldest one.

It's hard to narrow it down, there are so many! My shiny blue carnival glass candy dish (which I use for candy) and the smaller one (which I keep my cufflinks in). My beautiful blue ship plate. (I actually have a pretty big stack of plates now. I always look at the collectibles, but most of them are unappealing, I just go for the monochrome transferware, which doesn't turn up super often.) That nice big piece of ikat that I fixed the fringe on and now have as a table cloth on my nightstand. The little brass medallion with Charles Goodyear embossed on it. The late Victorian fashion plate of two ladies, who had unfortunately been cut out and glued to velvet, which I sent to @marzipanandminutiae. The leather scraps, the fur collar, the multiple wool felt hats I want to re-block, the huge cone of olive green thread that turned out to be 100% silk...

I also usually grab embroidery floss when I see it, because the price of new skeins has gone up a ridiculous amount, and you can get a nice collection of it for a tiny fraction of the cost (as long as you use it for stuff where you won't need to match more of a specific colour). It's great to share with friends who do embroidery too! I gave a huge bag to @leegoguen when I went to visit them last weekend.

I don't always find interesting things there, but the chances of finding something good increase the more often you go! For every nice bit of wool there's like 100 pieces of scratchy garbage, but the nice wool does come along eventually if you fondle enough fabric.

[salamanderinspace]

How Many Holes Make a Grave Digger?

short Good Omens season 2 fic. On Ao3 also.

(full disclosure: I didn't watch episodes 5 and 6.)

Elspeth tried to "be good." She went to a more reputable inn for the night, but only ordered corn porridge--that's what a good one does, yeah? Good and virtuous ladies don't make themselves fat on roast in the middle of the week. She only took one pint and turned in early. In the morning, she had a wash--something she never enjoyed, what with the cold and the damp creeping in her ears and making her feel all moldy.

When she went down to pay, she gave the barman a guinnea, and waited for her change at the bar. A lot of sad sacks were strewn around at midday, out of work and out of hope, burying themselves in ale. Some looked at her a little too long. Too too long, in fact, as the barman didn't return. "Oi!" she called. "My change, sir?" He didn't come out. What does a good and virtuous young woman do? she wondered. Certainly not go jumping over bars and making demands. She looked around, and as she did, luck would have it, she saw someone pass out the window. A constable. She ran him down, catching him on the sleeve, at which he drew his baton.

"What's this?" he barked.

"This innkeeper is jacking me for my change, sir," Elspeth explained. "I paid him a guinnea and he went in the back."

"Oh yeah?" He looked her up and down. "And where'd a rat like you get a guinnea? Found it in the gutter, didja? Run off or I'll take you to the station."

He seemed to mean it, so Elspeth did as she was told. She kept the rest of the money close, after that. She thought of going to a lawyer but couldn't be sure he wouldn't do just the same. No--she needed to look like a credible lady, first, so she went to a shop and ordered a dress. "Can't I just wear it out?" she asked.

"I've got to order the fabric," the tailor lady huffed. "And it'll take time to do the adjustments. You never bought a dress before?" She looked suspicious.

"Me mum handled all that," Elspeth lied. "Before she passed." The fib was automatic, and the urchin kicked herself after. Lying wasn't "being good," was it?

The lady said to come back next week, so it was another week sleeping in the gutter. Without Wee Morag to watch over her, Elspeth couldn't rest but in short snips, for the danger of men lurking. She developed a cough. In a week she fetched the dress and paid the hefty price for it, and with a hefty tip, the tailor let her have a wash there. "You're not going to ruin it with your filthy streaks," she said, but she looked sympathetic.

Elspeth went and got a bite to eat. She felt desperately sleepy, after, but still had nowhere to lay her head, and she figured she should go straight to a law office. "I'm here to buy a farm," she announced, after waiting on the hard chairs in the waiting room. Her dress was too warm in some places and too cool in others. She couldn't slouch properly in her chair, either, as that would pull on the laces.

"And your husband?" asked the law man, without looking up from his letters.

"Dead," Elspeth said. Another lie.

"Sorry to hear it," he said, not sounding sorry. "Well, what's the property in question?"

"Was hoping you'd help me find one."

"Were you?" He looked up at that, and raised a brow. "That can be a time-consuming matter," he said. "My hourly rate--"

"Yeah, I can pay," she answered.

"Very well. Come back next week, and we'll look at a few properties."

That bit went as smoothly as one could hope. Most places were out of Elspeth's price range, and she had to settle for a very wee lot with only a few sheep and chickens established. "Will you be needing to hire day labor?" the lawyer asked.

"Ah, no, I've got it," Elspeth said. She signed the papers and the lawyer left her with a bill. The house on the land was small and dark--no windows. The only nice thing about it was that she could hunt and fish at her leisure--though she'd have to teach herself how to do the fishing, as she'd never had a proper pole for it.

The days were long and lonely and hard. The lies came often. Merchants who wouldn't do business with an unwed woman. Merchants who tried to take her for twice the value of their goods. The money ran out before winter and she was forced to creep into the neighboring manor's coal-cellar and take a little, just a little, to get through. She imagined herself as a miner, digging for ores. Sometimes there was pretend and sometimes there were lies and it all ran together.

She'd imagine Wee Morag with her. Would talk to her, make jokes, even share a touch or two. She began to wonder, after all she'd seen with the two strange men in the graveyard and their dark magick, if spirits were a great deal realer than she'd thought when she was hawking corpses. She'd never seen a ghost, after all, not until … whatever those men were. On her market days she dawdled at the occultists' stall, and eventually struck up a conversation.

And her cough never really went away.

The days were a river of sameness. The same chores, the same dark and damp. She planted crops, which got blight and died. Paying the doctor for a bad lambing wiped out her savings. The sun rose and set and she drank and slept and it started to feel like there was very little reason not to go and get another vile of laudanum.

And if there was nothing to lose. What could it hurt to..?

That's how Elspeth found herself under the full moon, with the occultist and his eleven apprentices. The smell of charcoal and goat's blood, of briars and late-season lavender. The crisp air of October. Her heart beat with the chanting, the initiation. She called out to Wee Morag and felt her return. She swore herself to her Dark Master. She was no longer alone. She would never be alone again.

And she would never "be good."

[awigglycultist]

Incorrect quotes except it's really just mine and @indigos-shits-and-giggles Hatchetfield rp characters & ocs and also @peterstankoffski & @atty-goldstein at one point and also this has been in my drafts forever so over half of these I put in here were months ago

Toby: I only have two emotions: exhaustion and stress. And I'm somehow always feeling both simultaneously.

~~~

Arche: Yeah, I don't like people

Sunny: Oh, well now that's not fair Arche. Have you met all of them?

Arche: I've met enough of them. People. What a bunch of bastards!

~~~

Toby & Ted: *accidentally set the kitchen on fire*

Ted: We need an adult!

Toby: Ted, you are an adult!

Ted: We need an adultier adult! Get Kurtis!

~~~

Pete: You need a hobby

Ted: I have a hobby!

Pete: Hitting on Gary Goldstein isn't a hobby

~~~

Lily: Arche and I were crossing the street, and this man drove by and honked at us

David: What did you do?

Lily: They chased him to the next red light, and reached into his window, and-

Arche: *walking in* Who wants a steering wheel

~~~

Jas: A decision had to be made

Toby: And you fucked it up!

~~~

Arche: Do you always have to attack me with your words?

Neptune: Would you prefer me to use a brick?

~~~

Jas: I made lightly fried fish fillets for dinner

Alice: Jas, It's 1:15 am, what the fuck

Jas: Do you want the lightly fried fish fillets or not

Alice: Well, I mean yeah

Jas: So come downstairs while they're still hot

Alice: Wait, you just made them?

Jas: Yeah, I wasn't tired so I decided to make lightly fried fish fillets

Alice: Say lightly fried fish fillets one more time Jas

~~~

Kidnapper: I have your partner

Sunny: What? I don't have a partner...

Kidnapper: Then who just called me a lowlife bitch and spit in my face?

Sunny: Oh my god, you have Neptune

~~~

Alfie: You’re kind of a pushover, aren’t you, Lily?

Lily: …I’m sorry

Alfie: See!? That’s exactly what I’m talking about!

~~~

Ted: Look, I'm glad everyone's on the same page

Ted: But it's the last page in a book titled "we're all going to die".

Jas: That's not even clever

~~~

Arche, to Sunny: You have room temperature IQ

Sunny: What's room temperature IQ?

Toby: 73°

Sunny: Oh, okay

Sunny: How much is that in IQ?

~~~

Ted: Don't stay up all night, Toby. Last time you got this sleep-deprived, you tried to eat your own shirt

~~~

David: Knock, knock

Neptune: Who's there?

David: Boo!

Neptune: Boo who?

David: Why are you crying?

Neptune: I'm not crying

David: Hello notcrying, I'm Mr. Anderson

~~~

Ted: How the hell are you still alive?

Toby: Honestly, I'm just as confused as you are

~~~

Ted: I didn't drink that much last night

Pete: You were flirting with Gary

Ted: So what? He's my boyfriend

Pete: You asked if he was single

Pete: And then you cried when he said he wasn't

~~~

Sunny: Welcome to my very first vlog, in which I try different hair products!

Sunny: *sprays hairspray in their mouth*

Sunny: Well, right off the bat I can tell you this one is not very good

~~~

Wesly: Self-care is suppressing all your trauma until it comes back and hits you in the face with the force of 7 very large trucks.

~~~

Arche: I wouldn’t wish that upon my worse enemy!

Arche: Unless of course. . We’re talking about my enemy, Neptune. Fuck you Neptune, you know what you did!

~~~

Jas: I’m in love with you

Toby: We called off the prank war last night at midnight, dork

Jas: I know

Toby: Ah. Okay. Um. Cool. Neat. Very cool. Cool. Cool. Coolcoolcool-

~~~

Neptune: I’m in love with you

Sunny: We called off the prank war last night at midnight, dork

Neptune: I know

Sunny: Ah. Okay. Um. Cool. Neat. Very cool. Cool. Cool. Coolcoolcool-

~~~

Neptune, in a high voice, holding Barbie: Hey, Ken! I was thinking about going back to school and starting a career!

Sunny, in a deep voice, holding Ken: Nonsense, Barbie. You’re staying home and having my kids

David, walking back into class after printing out papers: What the fuck are you guys doing?

Neptune: Playing systemic oppression

~~~

Sunny: Look, I know you think my judgement's clouded because I like Neptune a little bit

Arche, holding Sunny's notepad: You doodled your wedding invitation

Sunny: No, that's our joint tombstone

Arche: My mistake

~~~

Wesley: I don’t think the therapist is supposed to say ‘wow’ that many times during their first session with a client, but here we are

~~~

Arche: Could you guys at least try to see this from my perspective?

Sunny: *crouches down*

Lily: *kneels down*

Neptune: *sits on the floor*

Arche:

Arche: I hate all of you

~~~

Alfie: ATTENTION: I HAVE BREACHED CONTAINMENT.

Alfie: DO NOT PANIC, I AM SIMPLY GETTING A SNACK.

[teenagegoldrush]

The Bonfire

words: 9,337

MASTERLIST Season Two

A/N: I do not claim to, nor do I own Outer Banks; the concept, characters, plot, etc

DAY NINETEEN

Sarah spent the night at Tannyhill, deciding it was best to stay and grieve with her sister and Rose.

Rafe was let out of prison, on account of Ward taking the fall for everything Rafe did, and although Ward was gone, it still felt like there wasn’t quite enough justice.

Because he took the coward’s way out.

(Suicide is not the coward’s way out. In the case of Ward Cameron though, it was.)

Nobody really spoke much the rest of the day.

They all went back to the Chateau, and retreated to their own little corners of the house.

John B shut himself away in his room, Pope decided to fish, and Kie laid on a hammock.

JJ and Andy sat in silence in the guest room. Eventually, they all just went to bed.

The next morning, spirits seemed to be lifted. Granted, nobody was upset that Ward had died, they more felt sorry for Sarah.

JJ was fishing off the dock, Pope and John B laid out on the Pogue, Kie sat beside Andy on the dock.

The group was waiting for Sarah to show up. “I mean, he deserved it, right?” JJ asked, casting his line out.

“Are you joking?” Kie scoffed. “Of course he deserved it.”

“Never seen anyone blow themselves up before.” Pope sighed.

“Kinda hope I never have to see it again.” Andy nodded, swinging her legs back and forth.

“Cross it off the bucket-list.” JJ said from behind them.

“JJ!” Andy scolded him.

“But it sucks for Sarah…” He said, trying to erase his previous statement.

Kie got up, shuffling over to sit beside the boat, where John B was laying. “Are you okay?”

“It’s not me I’m worried about.”

To the rest of them, that was John B’s way of saying he wanted to be alone. So they all got up, JJ pulling up his fishing line, and retreated back to the Chateau, where a mid-afternoon nap was awaiting.

Pope, pulled his backpack out of (seemingly) thin air, and started working on homework. Kie and Andy laid down on the couches in the sunroom, and JJ disappeared somewhere inside.

When Andy awoke, it was dark. Kie was no longer on the couch, and it was quiet.

On her phone, there was two texts from JJ.

Went home to grab some clothes. be back later :)

don’t miss me too much

She nodded to herself, sending a thumbs-up.

Through the open kitchen window she could hear one of the showers, which meant somebody was in one.

Andy got up, walking outside. Nobody was in the hammocks, or in the hot-tub. The twinkle lights weren’t even on.

But she could see a figure, down by the boat, presumably John B, as that was where he was all day.

She walked across the yard, and down the dock, and sure enough John B was still laid out on the Pogue, but now with Pope beside him.

The two were on their backs, staring at the night sky.

“Got room for another?” Andy said, announcing her presence. John B turned his head, nodding.

Pope patted the space beside him, and she climbed onboard, laying down.

The three of them laid in silence, listening to the sounds of the frogs and crawdads around them. “I don’t get it.” John B said quietly. “I don’t.”

“Love is five minutes of pleasure for a lifetime of pain.” Pope sighed.

“What happened…?” Andy asked, needing to be caught-up.

“Sarah decided we needed to take a break.” John B replied, not taking his eyes off the sky.

“Oh.” Andy said. “Well, I mean, things did move pretty fast with you guys. And her dad just died… I think she just might need some time alone?”

John B nodded, not wanting to admit that Andy might be right. “So, you and Kie? What’s going on? Tell me everything.” John B nudged Pope with his knee.

Pope sighed. “Well, she just wants to be friends.”

Andy winced. Kie hadn’t updated her on the latest happenings of her and Pope. And that was a big miss.

“Death blow.” John B shook his head.

“I didn’t even see it coming.” Pope replied.

“I’m sorry man.” John B patted Pope’s shoulder. “And how ‘bout you, D? Never thought you and JJ would be the only ones with a stable relationship.“

“Ugh-“ Andy groaned, sitting upright. “Semi-stable. We’ve only tried breaking up like six times in the past four days.”

“Doesn’t matter, you’re still together-“ John B was cut off by a can of beer flying past his head and into the water.

“Hot potato, hot potato!” JJ cheered, throwing another at John B as he sat up. “That was my bad, terrible aim- And one for you!” He threw one to Pope, who also sat up.

“You want?” Pope asked, offering his beer to Andy.

What the hell? Andy shrugged, taking it from his hands.

“Ah, here Pope.” JJ threw another to him. “So what’re you guys doing down here? Having a good cry?”

Pope looked at John B, who looked at Andy. “Cry?” Pope asked, playing it cool.

“Cry? What are you talking about-“ John B scoffed.

“We don’t cry.” Andy shook her head, cracking her beer open.

“You know it’s not your fault, right?” Kie said, taking a hit of a joint.

“You think she’ll come around?” John B replied, toying with the beer in his hand.

“Yeah.” Kie nodded. “She’s one of us.”

John B’s face turned up in a smile. “Hm…” He nodded. “Sarah’s a Pogue.”

He kept nodding, thinking to himself. “She’ll come around. She’ll come back to me, right.”

“Right, John B… Back to earth now bud.” Andy snapped her fingers a few times.

“I was just thinking. I’m gonna do a backflip.” John B nodded, snapping out of his thoughts.

“Oh, so you’re a like a gymnast now?” Andy asked, taking a sip of her beer. “You’re lying.”

“You won’t!” JJ laughed.

“Oh, I won’t do it?” John B challenged him.

“No, no you won’t!”

“Hold my beer, that you already dropped!” Before Pope could react, John B threw his beer at him and backflipped off the boat, proving them all wrong.

“No shit!” Andy laughed, taking another sip of her drink. “I’m going next!”

She set her beer down, kicking off her boots and quickly undressing.

“Oh, so now you’re going next, what’re you gonna do?” JJ chuckled, trying not to make it seem obvious he was watching her undress.

“I dunno. Something really cool.” She pushed past Pope, standing at the tip of the boat.

John B swam away, waving his arms to her. “Show us what you got!”

Andy laughed, settling for a double backflip, just to show John B that he was inferior to her (at least, in the world of gymnastics).

She hit the water, her body going cold. “Holy shit, it’s cold!” She squealed, reaching the surface.

Pope, Kie and JJ were cheering. “A double backflip?” Pope laughed.

“She sure showed your ass!” JJ clapped his hands. “That’s my girl!”

Andy turned to John B, grinning at him. “I showed your ass.”

He shook his head, splashing water at her. “Don’t splash me!” She laughed, splashing him back.

The two swam for a few more minutes, the others sitting on the dock. And when it got too cold, they used the ladder on Pogue to climb out.

Andy left her clothes on the boat, sprinting past her friends and to the house, where it was significantly warmer.

She and John B hadn’t planned that very well; no towels. She wasn’t even in a bathing suit, just her bra and underwear.

The seasons were changing, and it was certainly not warm enough for night swims anymore.

Andy ran through the house, and into the guest bathroom, where she quickly stripped out of her wet clothes and jumped in the shower, the warm water running over her body.

When she finished her shower, she was shocked to find her clothes missing from the bed, where she had laid them out earlier in the day.

Wrapped in her towel, she padded out into the hallway, hearing her friends raucous from the living room. “Which one of you assholes took the clothes?”

All four of them turned to her, smiles on their faces. “I’m not hanging out in my towel all night, so somebody either gives me the clothes or I lock myself in my room.”

John B stood up, two beers in his hand, and walked over to her. “A shot-gun for your clothes.”

“It’s an even exchange!” JJ grinned.

“I am literally naked! And you want me to shot-gun a beer?” Andy scoffed, swatting at John B.

He waved the beer in front of her. “I know where your clothes are…” He teased.

Begrudgingly, Andy tightened her towel around her chest, snatching the beer from his hands. “You’re ass is getting beat when I get dressed, understand?” She narrowed her eyes at him.

“Pope, count ‘em down.” JJ nodded, watching them.

“Three, two, one!” Pope nodded.

Andy cracked open her drink, John B had already poked holes in them. She held one hand under her chin, to catch the falling liquid, and the other on the can, as she swallowed as fast as she could.

This time, she finished significantly sooner than John B did, crushing the can and throwing it at him.

“Ha! Give me my fuckin’ clothes you little bitch!” She laughed as he sputtered the last of his beer, both cans falling to the floor. “I never lose!”

Kie got up from where she was sitting, handing Andy her clothes. “And to correct you, that’s actually my shirt.” JJ nodded, taking a sip of his beer.

“Oh well you weren’t around when I picked it out, so… Snooze you loose.” She shrugged, turning and walking back to the bedroom.

She smiled to herself as changed into her sleep clothes, one of JJ’s shirts and some sweatpants.

Tonight was feeling like normal. Like how it was before Sarah, and before the gold. It felt good.

When she joined her friends back in the living room, Kie had a beer waiting for her, and a spot next to JJ on the couch.

The Pogues drank themselves to sleep that night. Playing stupid card games and building a tower of beer cans, reinforced with random duct tape.

Andy had never felt happier.

DAY TWENTY

Andy was awoken the next day by Pope, poking her in the cheek with a pair of his sunglasses. “Up. School. Thirty minutes.”

Andy groaned, covering her face with her arms. “Why?”

Pope tugged on her leg. “Um, because you’ve skipped two full weeks in a row now. You need to come back.”

Andy groaned again. “But it’s a Friday. Who the fuck goes back after skipping for two weeks, on a Friday?”

“You do.” Pope pulled her off the couch and fully onto the floor. “Now get dressed.”

Andy leaned her head against the couch, glaring at Pope. She begrudgingly got up, shuffling sleepily to the guest room, where she managed to find a clean-enough outfit for school, brushing her teeth, and then rejoining Pope and Kie in the kitchen. “

What are they doing?” She asked, pointing at JJ and John B, who were both still asleep on the pullout.

“They’re coming with.” Pope nodded, grabbing the tower of cans and walking over to the bed. He smacked John B in the face with it.

“Hey!” He hit him again. “We gotta go to school man. We have a geometry test first period.”

“Is John B even registered for school?” Andy asked Kie, leaning against the kitchen counter. “He was dead like a week ago-“

Pope turned to JJ, smacking his face lightly with his hands. “Get up, JJ!”

The kid didn’t move. Pope turned to Andy now. “Is he alive?”

“How should I know?” She sighed, walking over to him.

John B sat up, pulling on a random sweatshirt.

Andy shoved Pope aside, climbing on top of JJ, sitting on his lap. “Yo! Wake up man, Pope’s making us go to school!”

JJ’s eyes barely opened, just enough to see that Andy was sitting on him. “What a view-“ He smiled, but Pope interrupted him, throwing JJ’s boots at them.

“JJ, shoes, now. Let’s go!”

Andy rolled her eyes, rolling off of JJ. She met John B in the kitchen, tossing her backpack at him. “Carry that, would ya?”

“What are you doing today?” He asked Kie, almost fumbling the bag in his arms.

“Um, I’ll meet up with you guys later.” She shrugged, sitting down at the kitchen table.

“This way, out the door!” Pope ushered them towards the door, grabbing the keys to the Twinkie on the way out.

“I’m starving, I need some pizza-“ JJ mumbled, still half asleep.

“Nope, you missed breakfast.” Pope dragged him by the shoulder of his shirt outside.

John B was already laid out on the bench in the Twinkie, Andy’s bag discarded on the floor. She curled up beside her bag, using it as a pillow.

Pope shoved JJ inside, he flopped himself onto the seat next to her, immediately going back to sleep.

Pope started the van, driving them to school.

“He’s totally gonna sleep through ya’ll’s test, just so you know.” Andy mumbled, closing her eyes and trying to get a few more minutes of sleep before they got to school.

They reached the school just as the homeroom bell rang, they could hear it from the parking lot.

Pope dragged JJ to his feet, and John B actually carried Andy to the front doors, dumping her onto her feet at the top of the steps.

Pope made them walk JJ and John B to their homeroom, to make sure they actually made it there, and then the two of them went to their’s.

“Miss Kane, nice to finally see you again. Hope everything’s alright.” Their homeroom teacher, Mrs. Wagner said, as she took attendance.

“Yup, very nice to be back.” Andy yawned, barely staying awake to make it through homeroom.

“Yo, are you gonna be okay til third?” Pope asked, nudging her with his shoulder.

“Yes, yes, Pope I’ll be fine.” She nodded, trying to wake herself up.

“How much did you have to drink last night?” He rolled his eyes, scribbling something down in his notebook.

“Apparently, more than you.” She mumbled, rubbing her eyes.

Pope shook his head. “Well get your shit together because you’ve got a full day ahead of you-“ He was cut off by the first period bell ringing.

"See you in Sunn’s.”

Andy nodded, grabbing her bag and standing up. “Yeah, you enjoy your quiz bub.” She exited the room, turning the opposite way of Pope and heading to the art room.

Mr. Braddock wasn’t fazed by Andy’s sudden appearance, he simply told her the latest project they were working on and let her to it.

Second period English, they simply had a free reading period, and Andy took that as code for “free nap period”, so she slept, and then she was off to third period with the boys.

The three of them greeted her outside the door of her English class, JJ practically latching onto her as they walked down the hallway.

“Did you know the bonfire was tonight?” JJ asked, head leaning on her shoulder.

Andy shook her head. “Uh no, how would I know that?”

“Well John B got a special invitation to the bonfire.” JJ nodded towards John B. “Yvonne Gordon gave him a cute little note.”

“Yvonne Gordon?” Andy snickered. “Nobody even knows about you and Sarah yet, why would she give you a note like that?”

“Beats the shit outta me.” John B shrugged.

“Well regardless of the circumstances, that’s a solid invitation, so we’re going.” JJ said.

“As if we need an actual invite to attend?” Andy shook her head as they walked up the steps towards Mr. Sunn’s room.

Coincidentally, he was waiting outside the door.

"Ah, Mr. Heyward, Mr. Routledge, Mr. Maybank, Ms. Kane, just the kids I wanted to see.” He stopped John B by his shoulders, smiling sarcastically.

“Wish I could say the same-“ JJ groaned.

“Ha-ha.” Mr. Sunn rolled his eyes. “I have a question of the historical nature for you guys.”

Mr. Sunn lead them past his classroom and into his adjoining office. “I digitize documents for the Maritime Museum- please JJ, don’t look so bored.” He nodded to JJ, who was staring at the ceiling.

“Anyway… In return, I’ve been given access to the archives. And I found this.” Mr. Sunn dug through a shelf in his closet, pulling out a box.

“A box.” John B said.

“More than a box.” Mr. Sunn grinned, sitting it on the desk in front of them. He opened it, revealing something, very old, in a plastic bag. “Go ahead Mr. Heyward, just be careful with that.”

Pope picked up the bag, opening it and pulling the item out.

“It’s a diary?” Andy asked as Pope held the notebook.

“The author’s unknown.” Mr. Sunn replied.

Pope opened the diary, and on the first page was a drawing of wheat, the same as the symbol on the gold, and the letter he received from Limbrey. “No shit.” Andy whispered.

“This is a sample of a letter from Denmark Tanny.” Mr. Sunn placed a piece of paper on the desk beside the box. “Compare the handwriting.”

Andy leaned over JJ’s arm, looking at the loose paper and the notebook entries. The handwriting was identical.

“It’s Denmark Tanny’s diary.” Pope said, running his fingers over the pages. He turned the page, opening it to a little drawing. “It’s Captain Limbrey.”

Pope sat down at the chair behind him, he began to read from the book. “August sixth, 1829-“

“That’s the year the Royal Merchant went down.” John B said.

“Thought ya’ll might find this interesting.” Mr. Sunn smiled, content with his explorations and discoveries.

“Thank you so much for this.” Pope answered, still reading. Andy could tell he was already getting attached to the diary.

Mr. Sunn nodded. “It’s important to know your own history.” And with that statement, he left the office, leaving them to examine the journal for themselves.

“Oh my god-“ Pope all but gasped at something he was reading. “It’s the Cross of Santo Domingo.”

Andy rushed to look at the book, peering over his shoulder. JJ and John B flanked to either side of them, also looking at the little drawing. “It was on the Royal Merchant.”

Well, there was another piece of the new puzzle. Why was the Cross of Santo Domingo so important? Duh, it was on the Royal Merchant.

After a few more minutes of reading, the quartet joined the class next door, and not without getting a few strange looks.

They trudged through the rest of the school day. Andy went through fourth and fifth period alone, rejoicing when lunch came, so she could join the boys in examining every little detail in Tanny’s journal.

Sixth, and seventh period were less of an annoyance, as she shared them both with Pope, and eighth (P.E with all the boys) period came and went, and this time John B drove them home.

“Oh my god, going to school is exhausting.” Andy groaned, flopping onto the couch in the sun room of the Chateau.

“Agreed.” JJ sighed, sitting down on top of her legs.

She managed to wiggle them out from under him, propping them on his lap as Pope read aloud from Tanny’s journal.

“August fifteenth: set sail from Port-au-Prince on calm seas. Came upon the Spanish ship San Jose, on fire. The entire deck was aflame. And we could hear the screams from the men trapped below. The Spanish captain cared only about one thing, his valuable cargo - the Cross of Santo Domingo and countless bars of gold.

Once the cargo was onboard, we went to help the crew, but Captain Limbrey ordered us to pull bayonets and not to let any of the Spanish crew onboard. He robbed them and left them to die.”

“What a piece of shit.” Andy mumbled, her face smushed against a pillow.

JJ flicked his lighter open and shut. “So it didn’t go down off Bermuda?”

Pope handed John B the letter. “And it was a Limbrey stealing shit again.” Kie sighed.

“This diary proves that both the gold and the Cross of Santo Domingo were both on the Royal Merchant.” Pope replied.

“Why didn’t we find it in the well then?” JJ asked. “I mean, if Denmark was able to get the bedazzled cross off the Merchant and to shore, why didn’t he just hide it with the gold?”

“Because it was too big?” John B shrugged.

“Think about it.” Andy rolled over onto her back.

“Hypothetically, if you were gonna hide a million dollars, and a brand-new Baja- Hypothetically, would you put the cash and the boat all in one storage unit, or would you put them in two different units, at two different buildings, so if you get robbed of one, you’d still have the other? Logic, J.”

Pope looked at her with amazement, the actual logic of her statement, settling in his brain. “You’re right.” He nodded. “He had to hide it somewhere else.”

“Yeah, but where?” Kie asked.

“Right before he was hung, Denmark said he buried the treasure at the foot of the angel.”

“I thought this was about a key?” JJ questioned.

Kie brushed him off. “Right, so what’s the connection?”

“”The path to the tomb, begins in the island room.”” Pope recited.

“But what is the island room?” Kie asked again, growing agitated.

JJ rolled off the couch. “You know what helps me figure shit out?”

“Many o’ things-“ Andy nodded.

“Smoking beers and drinking weed. The ideas just pour out of me.”

“I hope they’re not as good as “smoking beers and drinking weed.”” Andy laughed, swatting at his legs with a pillow.

He ignored her, yanking the pillow from her hands. “If we just sit here and try to figure this shit out, we’re not gonna get anywhere. But, if we get creative, and go to this bonfire tonight, maybe we’ll figure it out.”

“Well, I just got disowned by my parents, so I’m an official member of the nothing-to-lose club.” Kie shrugged.

“I’ll do anything to not have to go home to my dad.” Andy also shrugged.

“Pope?” JJ asked.

Pope shrugged. “But we’re so close.”

JJ played with the tower of cans. “Look-“ He set it down. “Think about how much you could think if you just gave your brain a rest?”

Pope looked around the room, at John B, then Kie, and Andy, as they all smiled at him, silently begging him to join in on their revelry.

It didn’t take much convincing. “Okay, fine.”

“Ha!” Andy cheered, jumping up from the couch.

“We gotta get goin’ boys!” JJ yelled.

“And shotgun before we go!” Kie agreed, the group standing up and going inside to change into warmer clothes for the impending evening.

Andy dug through the closet of the guest room, searching for one of her jackets. “Yo, Kie wants to do a group shotgun before we go- What’s up, whatcha lookin’ for?” JJ flopped down on the bed.

Andy sighed, turning back around. “I thought I left one of my jackets here at the end of spring but I apparently didn’t. I really don’t wanna stop at home to grab one either-“

“Oh, you can just wear mine.” JJ rolled off the bed, shrugging his jacket off and holding it out to her.

Andy narrowed her eyes at him, her lips turning up into a smile. “JJ Maybank, did you just offer me your jacket?”

JJ rolled his eyes, shoving it at her. “I did it for you when you got dress-coded in school too, it’s not that big of a deal.”

Andy smiled, shrugging the corduroy jacket over her. It was pretty oversized, the sleeves going a few inches past her finger tips, and the ends of it hanging well over her thighs.

“It’s just nice, s’all.” She shrugged, rolling up one of the sleeves.

JJ stepped forward, rolling up the other one. “Yeah?” He nodded, proud of himself.

“Looks pretty cute on you. Like when a toddler wears one of their dad’s t-shirts-“

“Oh my god.” Andy groaned, shaking her head.

“But it’s nice.” JJ nudged her knee with his. “I like people knowing you’re with me. You wear my clothes, it’s like a thing.” He shrugged.

“So this is you laying your claim on me?” She questioned, jokingly.

“Not like that!” JJ groaned, swatting at her arm. “Just be serious, for like one minute?”

Andy nodded, her smile still remaining on her face. “Yes, sorry, I’ll be serious.”

“This wasn’t part of a whole big plan or anything, but… you wearing my jacket to the bonfire tonight?” Andy nodded, encouraging JJ to continue, she could tell he was getting nervous about something.

“I figured this could be our “official” first party as a couple? Ya know, since we never even really officiated anything, and not everybody knows…”

Andy couldn’t help but smile, her cheeks heating up. JJ wanted to go to the bonfire as an “official” couple. “We’re in it now.” She shrugged, leaning into him.

She could feel his body relax; obviously he had been anxious about actually asking Andy to be his official girlfriend, considering the fact that he never really did.

“Hot damn!” JJ cheered, wrapping his arms around her body and squeezing her tight. “Can’t get rid of me now.”

Andy rolled her eyes. “Wasn’t planning on it slick-“

“Hey guys, you ready yet, we gotta drink before we go!” Kie practically ran down the hall to them.

“Oh-“ She grinned, stopping in the doorway. “Hm… Sorry to break this up, but we’ve been waiting like ten minutes for ya’ll.”

“Wipe that grin off your face or I’ll smack it off.” Andy said, jokingly, JJ letting go of her.

Kie slung her arm around Andy’s shoulder as they walked down the hallway. “What’d I interrupt?” She whispered, so JJ couldn’t hear them.

Andy shrugged. “Just JJ finally asking me to be his girlfriend.”

“No shit!” Kie smiled. “So ya’ll are street-official now.”

“Better than never putting a label on it.” Andy replied, letting go of Kie as they entered the living room, a beer for each of them waiting on the coffee table.

“About time!” John B groaned, jumping up from the couch. “Let’s go, everybody up, get a drink.” He was referring to Pope, who sat patiently on the couch beside him.

Each of them grabbed a beer, passing around John B’s house key to pierce the bottoms of their cans. “Lord of Tannyhill, would you do the honors?” JJ asked, bowing down to Pope.

Pope shook his head. “‘Kay. Three, two, one-“ He never really finished because they all began to drink.

Andy could barely contain her excitement as she gulped down the liquid. Everybody was home, and it was Bonfire night.

She was gonna go with her friends, and her boyfriend (!), probably get drunk, and then do absolutely nothing tomorrow. The good life was back.

She and Pope finished at the same time, high-fiving when they realized they were the first ones done.

John B and JJ were next, only finishing a split-second apart, and Kie was last. She usually was.

“Ya know how terribly irresponsible it is for you to drive now?” Pope asked, as they all walked out to the Twinkie.

“It’d be terribly irresponsible for any of us to drive right now bro.” JJ said, only slightly mocking Pope.

John B climbed into the van, JJ sitting shotgun, and the rest of them in the back. “Pope, relax, it’s only one beer. Anyway, I’ve driven with more than that in my system before.”

“You’re a nightmare.” Pope groaned, leaning back in his seat.

John B blasted music the entire ride to the pit, him and JJ jamming out in the front.

Andy and Kie messed around, playing footsie and playing hand-football with a little piece of paper they found in the back.

“Alrighty ya’ll, ready to return to the land of the living?” John B asked, parking the van.

“Ready as we’ll ever be.” Kie sighed, rolling onto her feet. Andy followed her, then Pope.

JJ stood beside the van, stretching his arms out, preparing for a night of his favorite sport: partying. Andy tucked herself under his arm, and John B walked around to join them, slinging his arm around JJ’s shoulders.

“The terrible trio, back in action-“ He grinned as they entered the party. Somebody immediately handed him a solo cup. “Oh my god, I missed you so much.”

John B took a sip, handing it to JJ, who also took a sip, and then handed it to Andy. “What is it, cause if it’s nasty, I’m not drinking it.”

JJ frowned, practically shoving the cup at her. “It tastes like it’s straight fireball, just finish it.”

Andy rolled her eyes, taking a small sip from the cup. He was right, it was literally straight cinnamon whiskey.

“Damn amateurs.” She downed the rest of the drink in one sip.

The trio continued their way through the party, dodging Kooks and Pogues alike, until they made it to where the coolers were.

“A-ha!” JJ let go of John B and Andy, ducking down to pull two beers from one of the coolers.

“You-“ He pointed to John B. “Forget about Sarah for the night. I understand you’re upset and shit, but her father blew up right in front of her. So just give her a minute, alright? And in the meantime, you and me, shotgun right now.” He handed John B one of the beers.

Andy raised her eyebrows, tapping on the empty cup in her hands. “I say go for it-“

“Hey derelicts!” Someone shouted, scaring the shit out of all three of them.

They turned, seeing Yvonne sitting up on part of the stone wall just behind them.

“Hey, there she is.” JJ sighed, looking back at John B. “That’s all you. We’re outta here. Goodnight-” JJ snatched the cup out of Andy’s hand and they dipped.

“Let’s go get this shit filled up, right?” JJ pulled her through the crowd, towards the opposite end of where they just were, looking to find the Kook coolers that were stocked with hard liquor.

“World’s worst employee, is that you?” Andy heard someone say. She turned around, seeing Matty pushing through the crowd to reach them.

She waved him over. “I thought that was you.”

JJ turned around, seeing Matty. “Matt, what’s up?”

“JJ, how you doing man?” The two of them shook hands, as if they were old friends. “What are you guys up to?”

Andy grabbed her cup back from JJ, waving it in front of Matty’s face. “Tryna find where the Kooks are keeping the hard shit. Need a refill.”

Matty’s eyes lit up. “Well, you just so happen to be in luck, because Cara let me use the budget bonus for the week to buy some shit for tonight- Follow me.”

Andy, now followed by JJ, weaved through the crowd again, following Matty to where his cooler was, of course, being guarded by some of his friends.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. Was all Andy could think, when they approached the cooler, and none other than Miller Daniels was sitting on top of it.

During the summer between freshman and sophomore years, Andy had a not-so-secret and technically illegal, fling with Miller, which pissed everybody on the Cut off, including her friends.

They had never spoken about it, and hadn’t seen each other since he left for college.

“Do my eyes deceive me, or is that Andy Kane coming towards me?” Miller asked, kind of asking Matty, and kind of asking Andy.

She nodded, smiling politely. “In the flesh.”

She silently hoped that he wouldn’t stand up and give her a hug, as it was the usual polite thing to do after you hadn’t seen someone in awhile, but lucky for her, he just waved.

Beside her, she could feel JJ tense up, his grip tightening on her hand. “Maybank, ‘sup?”

JJ shrugged. “Nothing much man, just here and there.”

Matty caught the vibe, shaking his head as JJ and Miller were practically in a silent battle for domination. “Found Kane in the crowd and she’s looking for a refill. Told her I got the good stuff, so get up so I can get her a drink, alright?”

He pushed Miller out of the way, digging through the cooler.

Matty mixed her a drink, and Andy didn’t care what it was. “Maybank, you want anything?”

JJ shook his head, raising the beer in his hand. “Nah Matt, I’m good, thanks though.”

Matty nodded, closing the cooler and handing Andy her cup. “You need anymore, just come back over here. What’s mine is your’s.” He winked to her.

“Just promise me you’ll start showing up for your shifts again soon? I can’t handle my sister’s fucking whining when you don’t show up.”

Andy nodded, taking a sip of her drink. It was good. “Mhmm. I’ll get right on that.”

She and Matty rolled their eyes at the same time. “Thank you Matty, I’ll see you around.”

JJ couldn’t seem to drag her away from them fast enough. “Miller, what a dick.” He grumbled, searching for literally anyone else to talk to.

“He didn’t even do anything, just calm down.” Andy shook her head.

“Yeah, okay.” JJ snapped back, spotting a few of his co-workers from the hotel setting up a pong table. “You play pong?” He turned to ask her.

“Well yeah, I’m a great pong partner.” She shrugged. “Only if you chill out though. Stop tensing up over every little thing that happens.”

JJ rolled his eyes again. “Andy-“

“Knock it the fuck off or I’ll make you hang out alone.” She shoved her cup at his lips. “Drink some of this, we can get another one then.”

JJ took a sip of the drink. “Right, anyway, pong?” His tune changed the moment she threatened to leave him alone.

JJ sweet-talked one of his co-workers to convince them to let him and Andy play against him and a friend.

She and JJ shared her drink, and obviously, a few beers, and completely dominated three games of pong.

Andy overturned her cup, frowning when she realized it was empty.

JJ was celebrating their win, with a few Pogues he knew from school, so Andy didn’t see the harm in slipping away and having Matty make her another drink.

Miller’s face lit up as soon as she entered his eye-sight, Matty nowhere to be found. “Kandy-Kane, back so soon?” He smiled at her.

Andy shrugged, overturning her cup again. “My cup runneth empty.” She approached the cooler, looking around. “Where’s Matty?”

Miller shrugged. “Think he’s tryna sweet-talk his way into a rando’s pants. Whatcha want?”

“Something- Anything.” She shrugged. “I can do it myself, it’s no big deal.”

“I dunno Kane, Matty gave the first one on the house, but this next drink might cost you.” He tilted his head, seeing if she was catching his vibe.

“Hm…” She hummed, contemplating what he really meant. “What kind of payment are you thinking, because I really only have like thirty cents to my name right now.”

“How ‘bout a little kiss? For old times sake.” Miller shrugged, tapping his cheek.

Andy narrowed her eyes at him. “Ah, in that case, I think I’m gonna have to pass on the drink. Since we’re gatekeeping liquor now…”

She turned on her heel, attempting to walk away, but Miller held onto her wrist.

“Now, c’mon, where’s the Kane I used to know? She’d usually offer more than just a kiss for a drink-“

“Well this Kane’s gone through some shit and realized she’s worth more than kissing her ex for a fucking drink- So let go of me.” She yanked at her wrist out of his grip and turned to walk away.

Miller shook his head. “You’ve gone soft, Kane! Spending too much time on Figure 8? Or did Daddy finally break you down?”

Andy’s mouth opened in shock, she didn’t even know why she was giving him a reaction.

Anger and alcohol surged through her as she turned back around, stomping over to the cooler. “Wanna say that again to my face, this time?”

With a shit-eating grin on his face, Miller nodded. “I said, you’ve gone soft. Did your Daddy finally get to you?”

Andy knew exactly what was coming next.

See, Miller knew her before she decided fighting her way through life was the best option, so he never even saw what was coming.

Andy reeled her arm back, sending her fist straight into Miller’s cheek. The impact sending him backwards off the cooler and on his ass in the dirt.

“If you ever lay a hand on me, or threaten my integrity again, you’ll be six-feet under instead of just knocked on your ass, do you understand?” She spat, towering over him.

Miller sputtered on the ground, blood running down his face and onto his neck. “What the fuck!” He shouted, now drawing attention to them.

Suddenly, Matty, JJ, and all his work friends, and a handful of others were crowded around them.

“Yo, what’s going on?” Matty shoved through the group, JJ right behind him.

“D, what happened?”

Matty pushed past Andy, helping Miller to his feet, and JJ pulled her backwards, into his side. “Don’t waste your time with her, Maybank, she’s a fucking prude.”

“What the fuck did you say?” JJ immediately let go of her, stepping forward to him. “That’s my girlfriend you’re talking about-“

Andy couldn’t help but grin when JJ said that, her heart fluttering, despite the current circumstances.

Matty let go of Miller, placing his hand on JJ’s chest. “JJ, it’s not worth it man, you’re both wasted. Just get outta here.”

“I’m not wasted, man. I can tell right from wrong perfectly fine.” JJ wasn’t backing down.

Matty looked over JJ’s shoulder, silently begging Andy for help. As much as she wanted to see JJ beat the shit out of Miller, it would end up ruining the night for the rest of their friends.

She rolled her eyes, tugging on the back of JJ’s shirt. “C’mon, let’s just go.”

JJ whipped around. “You seriously just wanna let him talk shit on you like that?”

Andy shrugged, smiling slyly at Miller, from behind JJ’s shoulder. “Well you know it’s not true. He’s just mad he could never get that far with me.”

She winked, more at Miler than JJ, and slid her hand into his, flipping the middle finger with her other hand as they walked away.

As they pushed their way through the crowd, Andy could feel JJ lightening back up. “You all good?” He asked, squeezing her hand.

“I can handle myself J.”

“That’s not what I asked.” He stopped, staring at her. “Are you okay? He didn’t hurt you or touch you at all?”

Andy shook her head. “Not a finger.” She shrugged. “He was just being a dick, and I was sick of his shit. Besides, it was a long-time coming anyway.”

JJ’s frown slowly turned up into a smile. “Good, cause seeing you handle your own shit like that was hot as fuck-“

JJ was cut off by another commotion, from right by the fire. Andy stood on her toes, peering over the tops of heads to see, none other than John B and Topper, almost nose-to-nose.

“Well that’s our boy.” She shook her head, standing back on flat-feet. “Let’s go.” She pulled JJ towards the raucous.

“You wanna start some shit right now?” Topper shouted at John B.

“Do I wanna start some shit?” John B repeated, almost challenging Topper.

“They all know what happened last time!”

Andy let go of JJ’s hand, stepping between John B and Topper. “Howdy- Howdy boys, what’s going on?”

Sarah also stepped between them, shoving at John B. “Just get out! Just go!”

Andy did a double-take at Sarah, the fire from Miller not fully burnt-out yet. “Oh, so Sarah Cameron gets to decide who stays and goes at an island party? Is that right?”

Sarah rolled her eyes, holding Topper back. “Don’t even start Andy, you don’t even know what this is about.”

“It doesn’t take much to put the pieces together.“ Andy shrugged, hand on John B’s arm.

Sarah almost laughed, almost. “How drunk are you right now?”

“What does me drinking have anything to do with this? You don’t decide who stays and who goes, so fuck off!” Andy let go of John B, stepping forward to Sarah.

John B grabbed her arm now, pulling her back. “Yo, no!” He pulled Andy to his side.

“Just get out of here, quit looking for problems where there is none.” Sarah snapped, turning back to Topper.

“He started it Sarah!” John B shook his head, trying to reason with her.

Out of nowhere, Kelce showed up, pushing past Sarah and Topper and standing nose-to-nose with John B. “Hey! She don’t want you anymore, bro!”

John B laughed, not fazed by Kelce’s scare-tactics. “Shut the hell up.” He rolled his eyes, turning, and pulling Andy with him.

“What’re you gonna do, John B? Kill me like you killed Sheriff Peterkin?” Kelce snapped.

John B beat her to the punch, literally. Before she could even react, John B had turned back around, whacking Kelce in the face and sending him stumbling back into Topper and Sarah.

Topper stepped in next, shoving John B and wrestling him onto the ground. Now a crowd had formed, and somehow pushed Andy and Sarah back together.

“Look what you did now Cameron.” Andy shook her head as Sarah watched them in shock.

Sarah didn’t retaliate, she simply watched as her ex boyfriends fought each other.

In the crowd around them, it had turned into a full-blown mosh pit, everybody seemed to be fighting each other.

From over Sarah’s shoulder, Andy could see Yvonne pushing through the crowd, probably looking for John B.

From the movement of the people, Sarah got shoved into Yvonne, and Yvonne shoved back, knocking Sarah onto the ground below where John B and Topper where.

“Sarah!” John B screamed, noticing as she hit the ground.

Andy, despite being pissed that Sarah just argued with her, decided to take her frustrations out on Yvonne instead, pushing past the few people that separated them, and shoving at her from behind.

“What the fuck?” She snapped, whirling around to see Andy.

“Don’t fucking touch her!” Andy snapped, punching Yvonne right in the face. Unfortunately for Andy, Yvonne was also an experienced fighter, so the fight was nothing if not fair.

The pair wrestled, eventually landing down where Sarah was still sat on the ground.

Yvonne landed a particularly hard blow to Andy’s mouth, a metal taste erupting on her tongue. She was at a disadvantage, laying on the ground.

Yvonne straddled her, holding her hair in one hand and reeling her other fist back so land the finishing blow.

But Sarah reacted faster, standing up and using all her strength to push Yvonne off of Andy. Kie showed up too, shoving Yvonne again when she tried to stand back up. “Move bitch! What’s your problem!”

Kie turned to Sarah, whose chest was heaving with anger.

“You alright?” Sarah nodded. Kie then turned to Andy, helping her off the ground. “You good? You’re bleeding.” Kie patted her own lips.

Andy used her palm to wipe her lip, her hand coming back red. “I’ll be fine.” She mumbled, spitting blood from her mouth onto the ground.

Above them, Pope ran up to Topper and John B. “Guys, we gotta go!” Kie called to them.

JJ jumped down from the wall, going to help Pope. “Get the hell off me!” Topper pushed back at Pope, who was pushed into another person, who began beating on him.

JJ was having a hell of a time reaching Topper, who still had John B pinned on the ground.

Andy shook her head, of course she’d have to do it herself. “Andy, don’t! It’s not worth it!”

Andy brushed her off, climbing back up the small wall to Topper.

She grabbed the back of his shirt with one hand and his arm with the other, using all her strength to pull backwards.

“Back off Kane! It’s not your fight!” Topper struggled against her, still holding onto John B but not landing anymore punches.

“JJ, a little help here!” John B croaked, still laying under Topper.

JJ finally arrived, taking over for Andy and putting Topper in a choke-hold, pulling the two of them fully onto their backs.

John B jumped up, pulling Andy with him, and quickly going to help Pope out of his fight.

Kie had climbed up the wall, holding Andy back from joining in with JJ and Topper. “Guys, we gotta get out of here, come on!” She shouted.

Andy wriggled herself out of Kie’s grasp again, first going to JJ and Topper.

JJ still had him by the throat, holding him still. “Hey, no!” JJ groaned, struggling to keep Topper still, and seeing Andy approaching.

Andy waved him off, punching Topper in the face. That’s for John B, bitch.

She stumbled as Pope and John B flanked either side of her, also sending a few precautionary blows to Topper so that JJ could let go of him, unharmed.

“You good? You good?” JJ quickly asked Pope and John B, who both nodded furiously.

“You good?” He looked at Andy, whose lip was still bleeding.

She nodded. “Right!”

They all jumped down the wall, practically sprinting back to the Twinkie as people yelled at them now, pissed that they had started fight club.

“Go back to the Cut!” “Get outta here Pogues!” Were just a few things Andy heard.

Everything was moving in slow motion as she ran, the alcohol finally catching up with her.

JJ couldn’t help but laugh, scooping her up in his arms and running, carrying her like a toddler on his shoulder. “C’mon slowpoke!”

John B barely waited to make sure everyone was in the van before taking off. “Well that fucking sucked!” Andy groaned, holding a hand to her lip.

“You kicked some serious ass though.” JJ shrugged, tossing her a cold can of beer he salvaged from the party.

She took it, holding it to her face. “It was a little unexpected.”

Kie scoffed, sitting up from her position on the floor. “Was it?”

Nobody really responded.

It really wasn’t unexpected. Wherever they went, trouble seemed to follow.

Nobody spoke the entire ride home. Andy tried to focus on not throwing up, her stomach feeling funny after thinking about how Sarah defended her, even after they argued.

At the Chateau, Andy flopped onto the couch in the sunroom, never wanting to move again.

“C’mon babe, we’re gonna make smore’s.” JJ tapped her forehead, making her get up. “Damn, Yvonne really got you good.”

“Yeah well I was the last one standing so I consider that a win.” She mumbled, following him out to the fire that Pope and John B had started.

JJ laughed. “You never lose a fight.”

“I’ve had more black eyes in the past month than I’ve had in my entire life!” Pope was saying as they approached the fire.

Kie laughed, holding a smore in her hand. JJ sat down on a chair, and Andy sat in one beside him.

"That was building up for years.” He said, reaching into the bag for a marshmallow. “Rumble in the jungle.”

He winced as he grabbed a stick, placing the marshmallow on the tip of it. “Fuck that’s hot! Who used this last?” He grumbled, holding it out over the fire.

“Hey-“ John B nodded to Andy. “Did you really stick up for Sarah?”

Andy shrugged, reaching across JJ to grab a piece of chocolate. “Course I did. She’s not a real Kook.”

John B seemed confused for a moment, before shrugging. “Right.”

“Tell that to Topper.” Pope mumbled, taking a bit of his smore.

Andy leaned back in her chair, munching on her slice of chocolate.

Beside her JJ assembled a smore, dropping it as soon as he picked it up, waving his hand. Andy laughed.

“Mhm, that’s hot!” He winced, the smore falling apart on his plate.

Andy continued laughing, covering her mouth. “Stop laughing at me, that shit hurt!”

Across the fire, John B smiled, leaning over and grabbing Kie’s hand, bringing her smore to his mouth. “I just want one bite, that’s all-“

“What are you doing- No stop!” Kie gasped as the remaining bite of her smore was knocked to the ground.

“Well you’re not having any of mine either.” JJ teased, as his smore still sat unassembled on his plate.

“I spent the last of my money on that!” Kie said, in fake shock.

“Well you’re not having it!” While JJ argued with Kie, Andy quietly leaned over, reassembling the smore and taking it off the plate.

Pope watched her, trying to contain his laughter as she motioned for him to be quiet.

“I don’t think you’re having it either…” Kie smiled, nodding to his plate.

JJ looked down, mouth opening in shock at his empty plate. “Hey, what the shit!” He looked over at Andy, whose mouth was full of smore, and laughing at him.

“Snooze you loose-“

“Hey, hey, shush!” John B was bent over, picking Kie’s discarded smore off of the ground. “Somebody’s here.”

They all quieted, turning to look over at the chicken coop, where John B was staring.

Andy internally groaned. Shockingly, she had had enough conflict for one night, and just wished to finish her JJ's smore in peace.

“You don’t think Topper would?” Kie asked, sitting her stick down.

JJ stood up. “Wouldn’t put it past him.”

“You have your gun?” She asked, standing up too.

“Oh, now she wants the gun?” JJ snapped, pulling Andy up by her arm.

“Oh now you don’t have the gun?” Kie fired back. “Isn’t it your secret weapon?”

“Hey, shut up!” Pope snapped, breaking up their argument.

“Goddamn, now she wants the gun?” JJ muttered holding an iron rod in his hand, as the five of them crept towards the chicken coop.

“No, shut up!” Andy whispered. “The stick’s gonna be fine.” JJ glared at her, following Pope.

“Hey, who’s out there?” John B called.

“You Kooks better not try anything!” Kie added.

“Who’s there?” JJ yelled. Intimidation, was definitely not their strong-suit.

A rustling came from behind the coop, and from out of the bushes, Limbrey’s brother came, hands held in the air. “How ya’ll doing?”

“Oh, it’s this piece of shit.” Pope nodded.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.” JJ shook his head.

“Lovely evening we’re having.” He still held his arms up, walking towards them. “Look, I don’t hold a grudge with any of y’all, alright? But this can go hard, or this can go easy.”

“Enough with the niceties and just tell us what the fuck you want.” Andy snapped, already growing tired of his game.

He lowered his hands, narrowing his eyes at her. “You know what I’m here for.”

The key.

The real key.

Andy shook her head, playing dumb. “Let me show you a little demonstration. You see that swing right there?” He pointed to the swing attached to the tree beside them.

“I got the best bow hunters in the Army Rangers with me, hidden.”

“Oh yeah?” JJ grinned, lowering the rod.

None of them believed a word this guy said. Not especially that they were about to be hunted by a pack of Army Rangers.

The man whistled, and suddenly, an arrow flew past JJ’s head, piercing the tree behind them.

Everyone tensed up, shit was real.

“Now, they’re out there. And they’ll stick every single one of you, just as I say so.” He walked past them all to Pope, who was at the back of the group.

JJ clenched his jaw, raising the stick again, to strike him in the back of the head, but he was too fast.

He whistled, another arrow landing in the ground just between JJ’s feet.

Quickly, and for his own safety, Andy leaned over, snatching the rod out of JJ’s hands and throwing it on the ground.

There was no way out of this one.

“Now, I’m not gonna give you a countdown, or any bullshit like that.” He nodded to Pope. “I’ll simply just whistle.”

Pope looked at each of his friends, knowing there was literally no other option but to give up the key.

He pulled it out of his pocket, clutching it in his hand. “This key belongs to my family.”

“I’m losing my patience with you Pope.” The man laughed.

Pope held the key out, and he plucked it from his fingers, satisfied that he beyond-scared-straight five teenagers. “You did the right thing kid. Knowing when you don’t have a choice is an under appreciated talent.”

“Yeah, especially when there’s a grown-ass man bullying you and your four teenage friends.” Andy snapped.

The man laughed, whipping around and lunging at Andy, pushing her up against the tree. “You’re on my nerves now Andy!” He snapped, nose-to-nose with her. “You kids simply have to learn when and where to get involved!”

“If you don’t get your hands off her right now, I’ll cave your head in.” JJ clenched his jaw, holding the iron rod in his hands again.

“I’ll take every single one of those arrows.”

The man took one more second to contemplate, before letting go of Andy. “Easy there.” He nodded to JJ, holding his hands up again. “Ya’ll have a good night.”

He whistled one more time as he walked back down the driveway, signaling to his little minions that they were off the hook.

Nobody said anything until he was out of sight.

JJ dropped the iron rod, pulling Andy into a hug.

“I am so sick of this shit.” Pope gasped, chest heaving from anger.

Andy poked her head out from JJ’s chest, watching as Pope stormed off towards the dock.

Kie shook her head, heading into the house for the night.

John B went back to the fire, busying himself by cleaning up the remnants of their smore’s, and JJ decided it would be best for them to go to bed for the night, pulling Andy in the house.

Kie was laying on the pullout when they passed her, heading straight for the spare room.

“You know, I should really be mad at you, because your big-ass mouth got us into a lot of shit tonight.” JJ snapped, aggressively kicking off his boots.

Andy scoffed, sitting down on the bed. As if JJ’s mouth hadn’t gotten them into shit before.

“But honestly, I’m just impressed that you managed to handle your shit every single time.” He finished, throwing his jacket onto the floor outside of the bathroom.

“Are you sure you aren’t mad, because you’re giving off some really heavy vibes right now…” Andy winced, bracing for impact.

“No.” JJ sighed, running his fingers through his hair. “I mean yes, I’m mad but not at you!”

He groaned. “I’m fucking pissed that we keep getting shit on over and over again! Nothing can ever be easy, nothing can go our way! It’s ridiculous!”

Andy nodded, completely understanding JJ’s frustrations.

“Hey.” She stood up, grabbing his face with her hands. “I trust Pope. Shit happens, and we’ll find a way out of it. Let’s just sleep on it.”

JJ seemed to immediately calm down under her touch. “Sleep on it?”

“Whatever you want?” She shrugged, turning so he would sit down on the bed.

“Whatever I want?” His eyes lit up, realizing what the said. “

The door is locked.”

“Exactly.” She grinned, pressing her lips to his.

The damn cross could wait until the morning.

Tonight was about fun.

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@chaoticsteverogers @secretwilliams @writingjjfics 

[palialaina]

....it's so nice to know that I am not the only one who does a thing in panic mode.

Though I suppose, being fair, Reth brought this one on himself.

Berryyyyy......

I did... a thing. And now I don't know what to do with myself. You know Reth and I have been talking a lot lately, and the other day I told you I thought he was cute. But I'm really not the kinda person to do things on impulse. I'm the take my time and think about things sorta person. And he's only just started telling me what's really up with him, and more than anything I just wanted to be a friend that he can trust.

.....but as he was kinda joking around he told me I could flirt with him or give him a heartdrop lily if I wanted to. And so I said okay and then...did. It's not that I didn't mean it, because I did, but I think I was taken aback at myself just as much as he was, but he asked if I was really sure and then said he was gonna take the gift before I changed my mind. And then we both got awkward and said we had to get to work and ran off. I.... don't know what to do with myself now??

Anyway, if Reth comes looking, I'm not here. I'm hiding in a hole somewhere.

Help.

-Lark

I honestly can't say if this is better or worse than what happened with me and Jel. But it makes me feel a little better? (Though I suppose Reth being far more forward than Jel made it easier to shove something at him immediately.)

I tabled my dinner party idea (for the moment, we're gonna try and all four of us get together next week. Squee!), brought macarons and other new cooking recipes over for Lark, and we spent a few hours going back and forth about which one of us is more awkward. And we're kind of decided we're siblings, or maybe we were in the place we were before.

I like that. Having them as a sibling.

But that was definitely a fun letter to get. At least we can both agree that we have very terrible ways of starting relationships...

Less dramatic news, my entire house smells of fish, and I am entirely blaming that on the trout dinner. It's so hard! And catching rainbow trout takes forever... but it is kind of nice to just sit and catch fish. I think I understand a little more why Einar likes it. But I still think I prefer my garden.

Oooohhh.... I wonder if I can use all the fish I don't want as worm food?

I may have to try that. I was catching a lot of dace between my two rainbow trout.

Fortunately, I have mostly covered up the scent with blueberry pie. I used up all my blueberries, but you know what? Totally worth it. Mmmmm~ I absolutely remembered this recipe without any help at all. Maybe I was some sort of baker in the other life? Reth's soups and the other dishes confuse me, but sweet like the macarons or the blueberry pie aren't so bad!

I have one more room to add to my house after the living room's done, but making it is a little tricky. I don't need a full sized room for a second bathroom (I'm shy about people walking through my room! It's silly, but... that's more my space than the rest of the house, I guess...) so maybe just a hallway sized spot with no windows will be okay? Or maybe two, and it's just a really long bathroom?

I'll have to think on it. But I swear, every time I earn some money up, this house eats it. I will be glad when it's done, I have so many other things I want/need to buy.

....no, brain, we don't need to make a guest room for Lark to sleep over in. And no power in the world could convince Jel to stay the night, no matter how much I'd like that.

I had the whole table laid out earlier, before Lark's letter arrived. It's a shame it'll all have to wait, but oh well. I can make it again next week. If they show up.

I hope they do. I really want to have a tiny dinner party with the people I like best. Both romantically and not.

[magevivika]

Touch

A Short Story by Vivika.

Consciousness came reluctantly after hours of turning over to ignore the sunlight intruding through the gap between curtain and window frame. The blankets barely covered one leg at this point but it still felt like a trial to push it off. Not because the effort required much exertion but because the act was a precursor to forcing yourself to leave the comfort of bed. But you did. You got up and ignored the discarded food wrappers and cans as you fished up a pair of pajama pants and a t-shirt to slough on in case the neighbours saw through the window. It wasn’t for the benefit of anyone else, of course, because you lived alone. Very alone.

The hallway is as you had left it, in similar disarray, with abandoned laundry and an empty can that was carelessly kicked from somewhere. Your hand slapped the door for balance and to open it as you stumbled across the short few steps from bedroom to bathroom. Once relieved you paused before the sink to wash your hands and caught a glimpse of yourself in the mirror. Instant regret set in when you saw your unkempt self and you physically cringed at your own image. You turned away in disgust as you wiped your hands on the thighs of your PJs rather than on the crusty feeling hand towel.

You staggered into the kitchen to make for the fridge and then remembered, once you’d already opened it, that there’s nothing in there but some condiments. With a grunt of annoyance and a gurgle of protest from your empty stomach you turned to the cupboard next to the fridge to find that the peanut butter jar had already been wiped clean. Not even a streak remained. The jar clattered into the sink as you sighed and glanced toward the front door as though your scowl was intended to punish the world for forcing you to venture into it. But wait…there was always…

Your eyes turned to the phone left charging on the counter. Your fingers grasped it quickly and snatched out the cable to free it for your swiping thumb. In seconds, you had a menu of delivery places. Ah, but what to choose? You didn’t feel like any of it. It all just tasted like greasy, soggy, salty mush.

But your thumb kept scrolling the list, swiping up for more options, as you were in the habit of doing. And something caught your attention that you had never seen before. A smiling woman’s face. What was this? Why would a restaurant or fast food place have a face instead of a dish icon? Curiosity made your thumb tap before you could even decide to tell it to. Your eyes searched the words, few though they were, over and over to figure out their meaning. It read: 'Whatever you need, I will bring to you, all you need to do is to ask.'

This had to be a scam, right? You thought about just closing the listing and ordering pizza again. Pizza was a safe choice. You can never go very wrong with pizza. Even bad pizza is still pizza. But you scrolled a little further out of habit and there were reviews. Five-star reviews. You read the first one: 'It seems weird but I’m happy I chose to try it out. If you’re curious then do it.' The next review was equally unhelpful in explaining what service was being offered. 'Changed my life. 5 stars.' These were paid reviews, right? A third review read: 'Everyone should try this. She’s really great.' You felt an uncomfortable smirk curl your lips but at the same time a building anticipation in your stomach. “Fine. Why not?” You found yourself saying aloud as you tap the button to order. Your details are already saved in the app so there’s no more to do than confirm your CCV number and hit ‘confirm’. You laughed out loud and tossed the phone, which clattered across the counter in its protective case, before slouching down on a chair at the dining table.

You don’t know when you drifted off again but you lifted your head from your arms on the table at the sound of someone knocking on the door. And you wondered for a second who it was before you remembered the strange order. You smirked again at the thought that you were either about to be robbed or have your ‘life changed’. You pushed up from the table and your feet barely felt the crust in the carpet or the sticky area in the linoleum any more on your way to the door. When you looked through the peep-hole you saw the same face from the icon in the app: a pale, round yet feminine face with a gentle smile framed by short black chin-length hair and a pair of wide green eyes. She waited, while you watched her, patiently as though the delay was of no concern at all. You couldn’t see what she was holding but her hands seemed to be by her sides.

You stand back and frown even as your hand was moving to unlatch the door as if your body had already made the decision for you. You found yourself opening the door and speaking in a voice hoarse with disuse. “Uh, hey. Are you from…?” Your mind blanks on the name of the listing but the woman’s smile brightens and lights up her jade eyes.

She spoke your name as though you were an old and precious friend then explained. “Yes, I have come to help. May I come in?”

You found manners automating your actions as you stood aside to beckon her in then closed the door behind her. The woman looked around briefly, her attention not lingering on any of the clutter or dirty surfaces, then she nodded to you. “May I serve your meal here?” She nodded toward the table. It was relatively bare and you found yourself nodding in agreement. It was at this point that you noticed her bags. She had one over her shoulder, a big tote bad about as wide as two of her, and a smaller case with a zip closure. She set the large tote on the table and withdrew an insulated case. You watched as she laid out a tall insulated container along with some boxes the size of restaurant take home containers. She poured out a cup of something from the beverage container then picked it up to offer it to you. “Here. This will help.”

Her smile warms your whole body from the chest outward and your hands lifted to accept the cup without thinking. The steam rose from the surface of the greenish clear liquid and you almost hesitated to ask what it was but something in her gently encouraging smile reminded you of how thirsty you felt. The drink was just hot enough to soothe your throat without burning at all. The flavour was balanced, a little sweet with a deep savoury component, without being too rich. You found yourself finishing the small cup in one go and offering it back to her with the hope she would refill it. She accepted the cup and gestured to the chair. “Please.” She invited you to seat yourself, in your own home, and a flush rose in your cheeks. But your feet moved regardless. This was so strange, you thought, but it wasn’t bad. It was actually kind of nice.

You received more of the drink and then the meal was revealed. You could not say you had eaten anything like it before, not exactly, but it reminded you of something. It was more of a feeling than a flavour. If you had to describe it you would have said hearty and nourishing but not heavy. Nutrition was not something you would normally have cared about but you felt so much better after eating it that you could only explain it that way.

You were so consumed with your meal that you didn’t notice she had left the room. Once you were done eating and had finished off the drink as well she approached the table again. “I have prepared a bath. Please.” She gestured toward the hallway that led to your bathroom. The colour drained from your face at the thought of this stranger seeing the undiscovered varieties of mould and mildew in your filthy bathroom. Out of a sense of mortified silence you got yourself to your feet and marched down the short hallway to see what you had to face.

This wasn’t the same room you had seen earlier today. The foul smells were replaced by a light citrus and vanilla scent. Every surface was clear and shined cleanly in the candlelight. She had made up for the burnt-out bulb by setting out a half dozen candles in jars around the small space. The bubbles in the bath glistened as they reflected the light. You turned back to see her in the hallway smiling as she had since she arrived. “There are toiletries and towels for you here.” She gestured to a small folding stool that you knew wasn’t yours that held an open case of items and on the towel rack above the bath were white fluffy looking towels. She had even hung a clean hand towel on the rail by the sink. “Please take your time to enjoy the bath. I will be out here.” You could only nod and watch as she closed the door quietly to leave you with your bath.

Alone, in this foreign looking yet familiar room, you stared at the bath for a moment as your mind attempted to catch up to everything that had just happened. After a few moments you have given up and you instead chose to indulge your curiosity by picking up one of the bottles from the open case. Your eyes scan the words briefly, hypo-allergenic and unscented, and you thought that made sense if she hadn’t known if you have any sensitivities. You found yourself feeling itchy, your hand went to your scalp to scratch, and you felt a sudden urge to clean your body thoroughly in a way you hadn’t felt in a long while.

You dropped the bottle back into the case with the others then pulled your t-shirt over your head only to stop. You looked around the room for somewhere to put your dirty laundry, you never bothered to get a basket for that purpose, and you felt almost as though you would be making the freshly cleaned floor dirty by dropping your stinky t-shirt on it. A half second of mental struggle later you decided just to put your clothes on the floor by the door so you’d have to see them when you left. That would work, right? The rest of your clothes quickly followed and your attention turned to the bubble bath that had been drawn.

A smirk curled your lips as the thought that you hadn’t had a bubble bath for a very long time popped up. Was it childish? Well, maybe, but you felt for a moment that you didn’t care. You wanted to be clean. You lifted your foot to step in and found the water hot but not scalding. When you put your other foot into the water you felt the temperature was perfect and you lowered yourself into the bath without further delay. The bubbles were very lightly scented but not in an overpowering way. The heat of the water melted the tension in your muscles. First your legs relaxed and then you felt yourself sink down to the chin. You hadn’t noticed before but there was a little rolled towel on the end of the bath and you were able to easily tuck that behind your neck for extra comfort. It did not occur to you how tight your muscles were. It felt, weirdly, like it was actually pleasant just to be in your body and to be alive. It was a surprising feeling in how unexpected it was but it wasn’t unwelcome. In fact, you welcomed it without hesitation that you would have expected of yourself. The relief was heady. Your eyes closed and you breathed into the feeling.

When you opened your eyes again you were still in the quiet of the bathroom, the candles flickering gently and reflecting off the bubbles and the water, and you felt as though there was nothing else in the world you needed to be doing at that moment. Your task was here, in this bath, to enjoy and to get clean. The itch returned and your hand lifted to scratch your scalp. You could do something about this, you decided, and reached for the case right next to the bath.

Shampoo was easy to find and you did not even think of the hesitation or heaviness you would usually have felt in your limbs at the idea of washing your hair. You simply wet your hair, lathered up with the shampoo, and rinsed before the effort registered in your mind. You decided on a second lather and rinse, since it had been a while, though this time you took the time to massage your scalp with your fingertips. It felt like your frayed nerves were being soothed by the action. After the second rinse you added some conditioner and let it sit like the instructions suggested.

Various aches and pains you had been ignoring were slowly easing themselves. Pain from improperly kept toenails, strain from repetitive movement, and muscle tension from sitting or lying in the same positions for hours were all melting seemingly like magic. You felt so good that a laugh suddenly burst from your mouth, a sound of pure joy, and you hummed happily as you relaxed back again for a moment. You splashed water on your face and the bubble bath didn’t even sting your eyes. After another few moments of enjoying the feeling of deep relaxation you felt curious to check the case for more products. A body wash caught your eye and you found yourself sitting up to take it and wash thoroughly with the gentle gel.

Once the conditioner was rinsed out it seemed like a good time to complete the bath. As nice as it was, the water was finally starting to cool off, it wouldn’t stay so comfortable for much longer. When you stood up to reach for the towel there was almost a surprising sense of equilibrium, you felt balanced, and you didn’t slip or sway as you felt you had often been doing of late. It felt odd, unfamiliar, but also good to stand firmly on your feet that way. The towel was as soft as it had appeared to be, you realized when you grasped it, and just as fluffy too. Drying off felt as good as getting clean. Even better was the fact that you had a whole other dry towel to wrap yourself in afterwards.

You seated yourself on the edge of the bath and peered into the case again. There were a surprising number of items in there: nail clippers and files, toners and moisturisers, even little clear ache patches. The idea of grooming this way often felt pointless - who would even see you? You don’t leave your home much at all and the cashier at the corner store doesn’t care what you look like. But today you felt able to tackle these tasks. You find further relief from discomfort once your nails are trimmed. Your skin is soothed by a light moisturizer that doesn’t leave it feeling oily. Even that stubborn red patch on your chin you had been poking waiting for it to surface is addressed with a patch. You didn’t know if it would do anything but at least it reminded you to stop poking it and making it worse.

The conditioner you had used on your hair made combing it a breeze and when you set the comb down on the counter after finishing you looked into the mirror. The person who looked back at you wasn’t the one who had shied away earlier that day. Was it the candlelight? They say that candlelight is pretty flattering. But, for some reason, it doesn’t hurt to look at yourself in that moment.

Whatever the case, you were clean and wanted to keep that toasty feeling from the bath so the next step was to get dressed again. You opened the door and stepped out into the hallway to take a few steps into your bedroom. It was only upon entering your room that you noticed something and had to glance back into the hallway to do a double take. There were no cans or wrappers, no dirty laundry, the hallway was cleared of clutter. You realised, belatedly, that there weren’t sharp bits in the carpet poking your bare feet. A temptation to peer down the hallway into the living room and kitchen area was tempered by reminding yourself you weren’t alone. It was probably better to get dressed first.

Back in your bedroom there’s a pair of pajamas and socks folded neatly on your freshly made bed. The clutter was gone from this room too and your belongings had been dusted, the carpet vacuumed too, and nothing looked out of place. You felt a frown crease your brow as you wondered why it didn’t bother you that someone had been in here without you. But it was a relief. Overwhelming tasks that had seemed insurmountable, too big to tackle alone, had piled up over time into a complete disaster. All that weight was lifted. It felt like a clean slate.

As you had dressed you found that the socks were very soft without being too thin or too warm. The pajamas were a little bit big, she couldn’t have known your size, but they were surprisingly comfortable despite a little extra room. Without thinking you found yourself scooping up the used towels and your dirty clothes from the bathroom then carrying them into the living area.

Somehow this part of the apartment was also free of clutter and the carpet looked freshly vacuumed too from the way the carpet pile was showing streaks. Your head turned automatically to the door as it opened and the woman from earlier stepped through with a big tote bag on her shoulder. “How are you feeling?” Her voice and expression seemed to hold genuine warmth as though she was glad to see you. There was none of the fretting worry that tied a knot in your stomach.

Your head bobs agreeably as a smile tugs at the corners of your mouth. “Good. Thanks. Thank you-” You remembered she was carrying a big bag and moved forward. “Can I hel-” But you had forgotten your arms were full of dirty laundry.

Her smile brightened and she gently shut the door behind herself with her foot then nodded to another big tote on the floor beside the table. “Laundry to be cleaned can go in there. This isn’t heavy. You can sit down, if you like, and I’ll make you a drink. Just tell me what you’d like.”

Your instinct to resist rose for a moment before you nodded then walked over to put the dirty laundry in the bag where she had instructed. It felt odd to take a seat at your table, freshly cleaned though it was, when a perfect stranger was filling your cabinets and fridge with food. She moved without hesitation, though, as though she had lived here for years and knew where everything went. You found your mind wandering as you wondered about this person who you had just let inside your home and was now taking over. Did she do this often? How did she do all this? Wasn’t she getting tired? She’d done a lot of work in a short time. Time. You looked at the clock on the oven which normally blinked all zeroes since you hadn’t bothered to set it since the last power outage. It was set and it showed six in the evening. A whole afternoon had passed since she had arrived.

But before this realization could settle in you found your favourite hot beverage set in front of you on the table. She sat across from you with a cup of her own. “Enjoy.” She said, softly, with a gentle smile then nodded to your drink. You felt yourself nod in return and picked up the cup. There was a brief silence as you both enjoyed your drinks. Then she caught your eye again. “The last item for me will be to bring your clean laundry back, it is currently drying, and then you will return to your life. You deserve to have an environment that is comfortable to live in. When I have left you will be the one to provide this for yourself. Do you agree?”

Her tone made the words sound like an invitation rather than a lecture. Your head nodded quickly as you felt a desire to keep things the way that they were now. Even when you looked around it was as if your eyes went on and on with all the clear space and it was a mental burden relieved. “I agree.” Your eyes shifted back to her face as you gave another earnest nod. “I feel like I can do it, now. Thank you. I, uh, don’t know how much all this costs…?”

Her lips formed an easy smile as she shook her head. “You are only charged for the meal, which was the amount in the app, as all else is complimentary.”

Tension that had returned to your shoulders thinking about cost melted at her honest reassurance. Even though the kindness was appreciated you let the question come out regardless: “Why did you do all this?”

Her lips parted to show her teeth as she breathed a laugh then she simply shrugged. “Was it not needed?” Her hand rested gently over your own and you felt a tingle up your spine. It had been a long time since someone had touched you. “You need not answer that.” Her soft skin was warm and she squeezed your hand gently before releasing it to wrap around her own cup once more. You nodded to her comment then continued to savour your drink. You were curious about her, about this whole situation or service, but a feeling of contentment made you decide not to voice any further curiosity.

Once the cups were empty she stood and gathered her big bag. “The items I left in the bathroom are yours to keep. I have stocked your fridge and pantry with some basic items that are simple to make with the means available to you. I will return shortly with your laundry as it should all be clean and dry now.”

You stood and nodded to her explanation. Your eyes draw to the cabinets and fridge, despite them being closed, as she mentioned the food. When you looked back to her, she was turning to leave, and your hand lifted. “Wait!” She turned back to look at you and your call to her felt overly dramatic so you lowered your hand and gave an awkward smile. “If I need you again, if I really need help, can I order again?” You didn’t want to think about how your face looked in that moment, what expression you must have been wearing, but her own gentle smile did not waver for a moment.

“You won’t. You won’t need me. But, yes, you can always ask for help again. Everyone needs help from time to time.” She bows her head briefly in a gesture that conveyed to you respect, acknowledgement, and encouragement in equal measure when coupled with her smile. Then she turned to leave and you did not stop her.

When you heard a knock at the door and went to answer you found only the clean and folded bags of your own laundry. However, once you had carried the bags to your room and unpacked them into your drawers and closet you would find a note. It reads simply: ‘Thank you for letting me help.’

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