#which fair enough i still stand by my cancelled wife

[ufonaut]

there's literally so many directions you could go with kendra that didn't get explored in her previous solo that mostly consisted of chaykin's special brand of misogyny but jesus christ at least chaykin's special brand of misogyny made for a readable story lmao

[midgardianweasley]

hiii i love your fics so much omg! anyway, i have a request that i've been daydreaming about that haha: nat and r get into a really big fight about smth (anything but cheating pls my heart won't be able to take that) and r kind of shuts down, and wanda & carol become super protective of her and follow her everywhere making sure she's ok. (and they're also glaring at nat any chance they get) but then nat comes into r's room one night and apologizes and they make up and snuggle and its soft hours

thank you so much! and of course lovely! here you go<33

Priorities

Natasha Romanoff x fem!reader

Summary: Natasha has been missing date nights, leaving Y/N embarrassed for the final time. When confronted, an argument unfolds, but can they come back from it?

Word Count: 4.6k

Warnings: some swearing, some self-neglect

Message/ask if you’d like to be added to the taglist! <3

“Another drink, miss?” The waiter in a smart, black tux asked you for the second time this evening, a part of you felt that it was out of pity as you sat alone at a table for two, and had been for the last two hours.

You were supposed to be meeting your girlfriend tonight for date night, you got all dressed up, makeup applied and hair styled perfectly, which had taken forever, only to be stood up. You wouldn’t have overly minded if this was a first occurrence, you would’ve brushed it off and rescheduled for another night. Which is what you had done, two missed date nights ago.

This was your third night of sitting alone in a crowded, candlelit restaurant as couples around you glanced over with a sympathetic gaze, which had only made you feel worse. Your girlfriend should be here. ‘Natasha should be here’, you thought. You looked up at the kind waiter, giving him a gentle smile before shaking your head.

“No, thank you. I think I'm calling it a night.” You spoke as you hurried to gather your things and get out of there as soon as possible, trying to hold back tears that you refused to let fall, not in front of all of these strangers. You hated this. You hated feeling so exposed. So vulnerable. You couldn’t help but feel anger bubble inside of you, thoughts of Natasha being the only thing currently plaguing your mind, most along the lines of; ‘What was her excuse this time?’ ‘Who is she with instead?’, but, there was one in particular that you couldn’t help but focus on.

‘She promised.’

You hadn’t realised you were crying until you were in the taxi, catching a glimpse of yourself in the rearview mirror when the driver had adjusted it slightly to see the cars behind you, in the process, you’d also caught her eyebrows raise in concern and it wasn’t long before she started conversation.

“You okay back there?”

You laughed somewhat bitterly, but it wasn’t towards her. “Nothing I can't handle.”

Your response didn’t seem to settle her worry as she turned quickly and shot you a sad smile before returning her eyes to the road.

“Boy troubles?”

“Girl.” You rubbed your face, trying to rid yourself of any tear stains that may be lingering and messing up your once really pretty makeup. Not that it really mattered at this point.

“Ah, been there.” She held up her left hand, showing you the shimmering diamond on her finger. “The wife and I have had our fair share of arguments and fallouts, some of them included a situation like this one.”

“Crying in the backseat of a taxi?”

“Crying in the backseat of a taxi.” She laughed lightly, making you smile for the first time tonight.

“It had always worked out though, we’ve never been stronger.”

“Congratulations.” You looked towards the woman “I hope I could be so lucky.” You mumbled, though still loud enough for her to hear. You were mad at Natasha, more disappointed really, but you still loved her, dangerously so. She could stand you up for another 50 dates, and you’d still be head over heels. Angry, but your love would never falter.

“I’m sure you will be. If there’s one thing I've learned over the years, it’s that things have a way of falling into place eventually.”

Pondering her words, you looked out of the car window and noticed that you were pulling up to Stark Tower. It wasn’t long before the car came to a complete stop, the woman turning round to you and beginning to speak again.

“You’ll be okay. It’s obvious you love her, okay? Speak to her. I’m sure it’ll be alright.” She looked at you with nothing but kindness in her eyes, which you did your best to return with a smile. You reached into your purse, handing her the money owed, plus a tip.

“Thank you for the help.”

“Don’t worry about it, go get her.” She winked as you got out of the car and watched her drive away, quickly taking yourself inside to avoid freezing to death as the cold wind blew harshly. Kicking your heels off, you set off with one task at hand. Talk to Nat.

__________________________

“Hey, have any of you guys seen Nat?” You addressed some members of the team who were hanging out in the Kitchen, fixing themselves a snack or just conversing with one another. The second they looked up and took in their appearance, you could’ve sworn their faces paled and saddened slightly as if they knew what had happened.

“I think I saw her head off to train a while ago, but I'm not sure if she’s still there.” Carol replied, her face morphing into one of seriousness. She knew about the missed dates, having found you one night looking completely defeated in one of your nicest dresses and heels. She, alongside Wanda, who had found you both later that night, had spent their night comforting you and reassuring you that she probably hadn’t meant it. They didn’t know what to do, they’d never seen you look so sad before, no matter how much you told them it was okay, the pang in their chest for their best friend hadn’t ceased.

You nodded, quietly thanking Carol and wandered off in search for your girlfriend.

It didn’t take long, she was still training when you’d walked into the gym, sweat practically pouring off of her. Your heart softened briefly when you saw her, her fiery red hair tied back into a ponytail with loose strands all over the place, wearing a black t-shirt, grey sweatpants and a deadpan face as she attacked the dusty punching bag with such force that you’re surprised it hasn’t flown off of the chains yet.

She hadn’t noticed you had walked in, still giving all of her focus to her punches. Maybe she just hadn’t heard you?

“Hi Nat.”

Nothing.

“Nat”

All you could hear was the furious rattling of chains, still not getting a response from the redhead. With a sigh, you decided to try another approach. You stepped closer to her, still keeping a little distance, and leaned forward to tap her shoulder, instantly grabbing her attention. She flung herself around, arm still in midair, her closed fist almost coming into contact with your face.

You don’t know what you expected when she turned around and finally acknowledged your presence, but you definitely didn’t expect to be met with a scowl.

“Seriously? in the middle of training? I could’ve hit you.” She huffed as she turned back to her previous position.

“Sorry. I just wanted to come in and talk to you.”

“About?”

You paused, expecting her to look at you again, but she didn’t.

With a small sigh, you continued. “you missed date night again. I waited for you, but you were a no show.”

“Right, yeah, date night” she muttered, seeming to be unfocused as her eyebrows furrowed and her head kept darting around the room, looking anywhere but at you. “I’ll make the next one.”

“This is the third one you’ve missed this month.” You said firmly, wanting her to understand that this can’t keep happening, of course cancellations or rearrangements were bound to happen sometimes, but she’s just not showing up and then leaving you in the dark as to knowing why.

“I told you, i’ll make the next one.” She walked over to the bench, picking up her water bottle and taking a swig of water, looking directly at you, you look back at her and she just looks so, unbothered.

“I don’t believe you, Nat. You say you’ll make it up to me and then I sit there again, hoping that you’ll be there this time, but you don’t turn up. And now I come back and you’re just training. Could it not have waited? Was that seriously more important?” You raised your voice now, all the anger and frustration you’d felt earlier coming back up to the surface.

You just wanted an explanation, or something to justify how she was acting, but she gave you nothing, not even an attempt, only adding fuel to the fire.

“Why are you getting so annoyed? You should know better than anyone that this is my job.”

“I just explained that to you! Which is more than what you’re giving me right now.”

“Okay, fine, forgive me for not making everything about you for a minute.” She spat bitterly towards you, her temper starting to go as the discussion became more heated.

“Seriously? That’s how you’re seeing this?” If you weren’t so unbelievably irritated, you would’ve laughed at her response.

“You’re being selfish. So I missed a date or two, you’re blowing this out of proportion once again, it’s infuriating.” Selfish?

You raised both your hands, as if in surrender. It was one thing to ditch you, it was another thing to then insult you for speaking up about it. With a tight lipped smile, oozing with sarcasm, you decided that you’d had enough.

“I don’t need to listen to this.”

She shrugged her shoulders, adjusting the gloves she’d just put on. “Then don’t, i’m busy anyways.”. This time, you did laugh.

“What a fucking surprise.”. And with that, you turned on your heels and walked out, hearing the echo of punches fill the room once again, every one feeling like a punch to the stomach.

Maybe these are things falling into place, just not the place you’d hoped.

________________________

You were still in bed at noon the next day, unable to bring yourself to get up and face the world. You didn’t need to worry about anything in the confinement of your bed, even more so considering it wasn’t the bed you shared with Natasha.

After speaking, well, arguing with her last night, you went straight to your shared bedroom, gathered some clothes and your essentials, and slept in your old room that you used to stay in before the two of you started dating. It felt wrong. You always spent your nights with a warm feeling of love washing over you as your girlfriend pressed kisses all over your face, tangling your limbs together in the process.

It wasn’t the same. You felt cold, a type of cold that no heating or blankets could solve. You lacked a weight on your waist, fingertips stroking the skin that was exposed due to your top riding up slightly. Instead, the only comfort you had was the small bear you’ve kept for the las year. It was one that Natasha had given you after she won it at the funfair on your third date, and you could never bring yourself to part with it, remembering how happy she looked when she handed it to you, and the butterflies you felt just from seeing her look so pleased.

The bear was a little worn and torn now, it had been ripped in a couple of places, now replaced with a little sewn on patch of material that didn’t exactly match the shade of brown, and one of the eyes had started to fall off, but you liked that it was different. The assassin had tried to offer to replace it and buy you a new one, but you’d always refuse, insistent that you would keep that bear with you for the rest of time. Even now, when the two of you weren’t speaking, you still held onto it with a death-tight grip.

A knock on the door snapped you out of your daydream.

“Y/N, open up, It’s me.” A familiar voice shouted through. Carol.

“And me!” Wanda.

You heard some muttering outside of the door, something along the lines of Carol suggesting they break the door down, immediately being told that it was unnecessary by the Sokovian. Feeling pretty against the idea of having a doorway with no door, you called out for them.

“Guys, it’s unlocked.” You were quiet, but it was clear that they had heard you as the faint talking stopped altogether and you heard them walk in and shut the door behind them with a ‘click’.

Wanda was the first to approach you, kneeling down beside the bed so that she was at eye level with you, pulling the bed covers down a little to uncover more than your forehead. Once she could see your eyes and nose, she sent you a warm smile.

“Hi sleepy. It’s noon.”

“I know.” She frowned when she heard you speak, your voice raspy from your crying through the night. She hated seeing you like this, she loved both you and Natasha, and it hurt to see you so sad because of the woman you adored.

“We should go and eat something, it’ll help.”

“‘M not hungry.” You pressed your head further into the pillow, the last thing you wanted to do was eat, your stomach already feeling like it was twisting with every minute that passed.

“C’mon, i’ll make you your favourite.” the blonde winked, leaning against your wardrobe.

“Your special pancakes?”

“With extra whipped cream.” She sang, playfully trying to encourage you to leave the bed. You had to hand it to her, she knew you too well.

WIth a brief look between the two, you rubbed your eyes and threw the covers off dramatically, sighing and ensuring that they knew you didn’t approve of this. They knew you were joking, even if you weren’t, all they cared about was making sure you were okay, knowing that when you felt like this, being left alone allows you to neglect yourself and get really low. They don’t mind if you dislike them for a little while, as long as you are looked after.

“There we go! Well done.” Wanda stroked your back and led you towards the door where Carol held it open for you.

“No breaking it down behind my back.” You shot towards her, slightly amused at the guilty look on her face as she realised you’d heard her quarrel beforehand. Shaking her head, she nudged you out of the door, and the three of you made your way into the kitchen.

_______________________

Carol had stuck to her promise of preparing a sweet treat for you, a stack of fluffy pancakes sat in front of you, topped with whipped cream and two cherries on top. You ate slow, still a little cautious of how stable your stomach felt. You could see your two friends talk with one another, not wanting to stare and make you uncomfortable, but occasionally looking over silently to check in on you.

You were feeling pretty content as you sat at the counter, munching away with the two avengers for company. It was only when you heard a voice that you could recognise anywhere.

“Hi guys.”

Not daring to look up, you ket your eyes focused on the food in front of you, hoping that if you just stay quiet, you’ll be invisible to the human eye.

“Hey Nat.”

“Hi.”

Wanda and Carol replied, wary of any interaction between the pair of you that could unfold into something neither of you wanted or that would lead to any regrets.

You lifted your head slightly, able to see the daggers Carol was throwing at Nat, not impressed with her being in the room. You both had always been quite close, often talking about life before becoming superheroes that protect the planet, in her case, planets. In the process, she’d found herself having a soft spot for you, wanting to protect you from anything that could bring you harm. Which you were grateful for, but her glaring was terrifying sometimes, you were more grateful for the fact that her powers weren’t in her eyes, otherwise you would’ve definitely become single five minutes ago.

You could see Natasha out of the corner of your eye, she was filling up the bottle she used for when she was training, her eyes weren’t on what she was doing, instead, she was trying to subtly look up at you through the hood of her eyes. You subconsciously took the opportunity to really take in her appearance.

Her hair hadn’t been tended to since you last saw her, half of it was hanging out of her ponytail, most of it falling in front of her face. Her eyes looked glassy and bloodshot, like she had been crying recently and you could’ve sworn that was your t-shirt she was wearing. The sight sent a wave of sadness over you, wanting nothing more than to leap over the counter and pull her into your arms and tell her things were fine, that the two of you were fine. But you stayed seated, too nervous to make a move.

You didn’t know it, but she regretted speaking to you last night, instantly realising what she’d done after she came back to her room to find it empty and half of your stuff gone. She knew immediately where you’d gone and would’ve gone through to talk it through with you, but she didn’t think it would help. She wanted you to have your time and space before approaching the situation.

With that, she tightened the lid on her bottle, sent you an apologetic smile and walked out of the room, leaving behind an awkward atmosphere in her absence.

“You alright?” Wanda asked

“Yeah, yeah no I'm okay. I’m feeling a little tired though, I'll catch you guys in a bit, okay?” You stood from your seat, not giving either of the two a chance to stop you as you walked out and back to bed. What a day.

_______________________

Hours had gone by now and you were back wrapped up under your bed covers, still clinging onto your bear. You hadn’t bothered to change, you went straight to bed after walking in the door. You’d managed to get some sleep earlier, not a lot, but it was something.

You tossed and turned, trying to find any way of being comfortable so your body could rest and your mind could shut off, but it was deemed to be impossible. All you could think about was your argument with Nat, and how she looked so upset earlier. The thought alone triggered the waterworks again, this time, you didn’t even attempt to stop them.

Only a couple of minutes had passed before there was yet again, another knock on your door. You rolled your eyes, really not wanting any more visitors, you were grateful for the help, but you really wanted to be alone.

“Guys, I’m fine! It’s late, get some sleep.” You called out, waiting to hear retreating footsteps, but they never came. Huh. That’s weird? You brushed it off quickly, assuming that it must’ve just been too quiet to hear, which you wouldn’t put past you due to all the sniffling you’ve been doing in an attempt to silence your crying.

You were wrong. The person at your door hadn’t walked away. They also weren’t Wanda or Carol. Instead, it was who you least expected to be in your room at god knows what time at night after the events that had unfolded recently.

“Hi.” The redhead whispered, worrying that if she spoke any louder, you’d be able to hear her voice shake with nerves, or the huge lump in her throat that wouldn’t budge.

You froze on the spot when you realised who it was, not entirely sure how you were gonna play this. Realistically, you might as well just see what it is she wants, it couldn’t hurt, could it?

“Hey.”

Her footsteps were practically silent but still felt deafening as she stepped closer to you, cringing slightly at how tense and forced all of this felt. It was her fault, she knew that, she hoped you did too. She didn’t want you blaming yourself for her actions, although she couldn’t say anything if you did, she was the one who had insulted you and planted the thought in your head, and she felt every fibre in her body beg for you to forgive her.

Approaching with caution, she walked up to the top of the bed, kneeling where Wanda had been earlier, but unlike Wanda, she didn’t reach out for you. She didn’t feel she had the right. Not now. She quickly took note of your eyes and how they were drooping and red, just like how hers had been earlier, which is how she could know in an instant that you had just been crying. She felt like a knife had gone through her chest at the sight, knowing that she had done that to you. She’d let you down so much that it had brought you to laying in bed alone and crying.

You mumbled something incoherent, completely muffled by the covers that were blocking your mouth.

“Sorry, I couldn’t hear you through the cover, could you tell me that again?”

You looked down a little, debating on doing it or just asking her to leave this conversation for another day. ‘But, she was already here, so you may as well get on with it.’ you thought, and with that, you tugged the covers down a little, letting Natasha see your full face now, unable to stop a tiny hint of a smile creeping up on her face. Your nose was runny, your eyes were puffy, and your face was flushed, but that didn’t change the fact that she still believed you to be the most beautiful woman she’d seen.

“Has something h-happened?” You hiccuped, noticing the frown take over her features as she maintained her eye contact with you.

“Yeah. i was a complete idiot.��

“Nat-”

“No, no, please. I want to explain. I need to explain. Please?” She pleaded, not caring how desperate she might’ve looked.

You paused for a minute before sighing gently, nodding at her and giving her a non-verbal go ahead to continue. She took a deep breath, looking away for a second then looking back at you before you could even blink. You could see her hands tremble a little, and while you were upset with her, you couldn’t leave it alone. You reached your hand out from under the cover and held it out to her, offering it for her to hold. She grabbed it without hesitation, squeezing it gently as a single tear fell, gathering the courage to say her next words.

“I have no excuse for what I did. There is nothing I could say that would make my actions plausible or acceptable, I shouldn’t have treated you like that or said what I did, and I understand if you can’t forgive me, or don’t want to. But I needed-, no, I need you to know, I'm sorry. I’m so sorry, Y/N. You deserve better.”

More tears had fallen down her face at this point, her thumb not ceasing in their circular movements on the back of your hand. She didn’t know if this was going to be the last time she felt your hand in hers, so with every circle, she was savouring the moment, no matter how badly she wished it was under different circumstances.

You shuffled a little so you were in a more upright position, hoping that it would make speaking easier. You’d taken in every word, and while you were hurt, extremely hurt, you saw how remorseful she was. Her face showed no sign of humour or like she was lying. You could always tell when she was lying, her eyebrow always twitched a little, which you would always be in stitches about when she tried to say she didn’t eat your last cookie and her eyebrows would be moving like mad. They were as still as stone when she was speaking this time.

“You really hurt me, Nat. I didn’t think I was asking for much, just some time with you, that was all. And you left me every time, for work and with no notice. It was embarrassing.” She nodded in acknowledgement as she listened. “A-and then to come back and witness you being so, so, hostile, with me, I didn’t understand what I'd done.”

She gulped audibly before speaking again. “You hadn’t done a thing. Not a thing. I-I threw myself into work, into training. The last mission, I was sloppy, I wasn’t on my A game, it almost ended up with other people seriously hurt. So I thought-” She took a shaky breath in. “I thought, if I trained harder, It would mean I would be better for the next mission. But I disregarded everything else on the radar, including you, and then I got so mad at myself for it that I ended up taking it out on you instead. You don’t have a selfish bone in your body, and it was out of order for me to ever say so. It was wrong, and I don’t think I can apologise enough.`` She gave you an apologetic smile, tears streaming down her face steadily now.

“You know, when I came home from the restaurant, I had this driver.” You smiled. “Nice woman, she’s got a wife. She was telling me that it wasn’t easy for them. They had their ups and downs, their fights and bitterness. But they always found their way back to each other.” You whispered so softly that if there was any other noise in the room, Natasha wouldn’t have heard a word.

“And, when we argued, I really didn’t think we were going to be able to come back from that. I thought that maybe our time had expired.” You sniffled, your own tears trailing their way down your cheeks. Without thinking, she wiped them away, her palm pressing onto your warm cheek as you nuzzled into it, still finding comfort in her touch.

“I don’t want us to expire, Nat.”

There it was. There was the sentence that turned silent tears into fully body wracking sobs, your hands instinctively going to pull away and cover your face, instead, Natasha brought herself up to sit on the side of your bed, hastily bringing you into her chest and her free hand combing its way through your hair.

She rocked you back and forth, letting you get everything out of your system, no matter how much it hurt to hear.

“Shh, I’ve got you. I’m so sorry, moya lyubov.”

Your sobs soon died down with Nat’s help, sobs turning into faint pants with how tired you were and how much energy it had taken out of you. You looked up at her softly, as she smiled down at you.

“I love you, Natty.” You murmured, the words making the assassin’s heart grow fonder for you, if that was ever possible.

“I love you more.”

“Can you stay with me tonight? I can’t sleep without you.”

“Of course. Anything for you.” She leaned over you, bringing the blankets back up and over you, catching a glimpse of some brown fur among the darkness. She knew exactly what it was. She picked up up with the blankets and handed it to you, happiness overtaking her as she saw your eyes light up at the teddy she won for you.

“Thank you.”

“No, thank you, Detka.” She pressed a kiss to your temple before settling down, holding you tight in her grasp, refusing to let you go for anything or anyone, not that you were complaining, you’d missed this.

Nothing had to be decided tonight, there was no rush for discussion. Sure, there were still things to talk through and work out, but that can wait. All that mattered right now, was that Natasha was there. She was holding you in her arms and you felt every ounce of love and apology she could give you. And that was enough for now.

taglist: @natashas-favourite-knives @wandaromanova @wvnda-maximoff

[hephaestiions]

flood.

for the @drarrymicrofic prompt: flood. this is decidedly not a microfic, i am an embarrassment to the community. it is also once again, 3.08 am, so i have no idea how much sense this makes and no patience to wait till morning to post. here goes.  

TW: parent death, hospitals, seizures (non-graphic). 

The day Mother dies, things keep happening one after another.

Draco has a vague understanding— distant and loose, sand through his fingers in Santorini— that things happen one after another everyday. But knowing something all your life doesn’t really compare to the brutal moment of understanding it, really understanding it, for the first time.

For one, Mother died. Her heart gave out after one last seizure that Draco wasn’t there to see. He’d gone down to the cafeteria for a breakfast muffin, which in retrospect didn’t taste good enough for the price he paid. But then again, the last seizure couldn’t have looked very much different from the first or the twenty seventh or the one before the last, by which point Draco had lost count and sensitivity to the vision of his mother’s body curling in on itself over and over. Repeat a word enough times and it stops making sense and all that. The Mediwitches arranged her to look peaceful— possible finally— folding her hands and shutting her eyelids, stretching the skirt of the paper thin Mungo’s gown across the width of the bed like massive butterfly wings in an exhibit, polka dots and all.  

Within three hours, the solicitor sends a letter so oily that Draco compulsively washes his hands after reading it, the curling letters of venerated father’s dutiful wife aftereffects he can’t blink enough to rid himself of. The Mediwitches bring him document after document, three separate Healers pop by to offer their effusive condolences and the patient in the room next to Mother’s comes in to tell him that he had been a very good son indeed, to be so patient in his her dying days. She says it with a trembling lower lip and too-bright eyes and Draco gets the distinct feeling there is someone out there who ignores the memories of a sweet old lady with a walker she can’t quite wrangle into submission while going about their business. There’s a part of him that sneers. There’s a part of him that says fair. A third part says, I wish and Draco has to physically grip the armrests of his uncomfortable chair to not smack himself in the temple.

He smiles at the old lady, kisses her hand and signals behind her back for a passing Mediwitch to take her away.

Pansy pops up at noon in a navy suit Draco suspects she borrowed from Blaise. “I have a conference in the evening,” she says, and Draco nods. “I’ll cancel it,” she adds, and Draco shakes his head.

“It’s all under control, I assure you,” he tells her and she snorts, loud and rude and comforting, in his face.

“I assure you,” she repeats, mimicking him. “Draco, I am not your supervisor.” A few seconds of staring ensues before she tacks on, “I just don’t want you to have to do this alone.”

“I’m not—” he blurts out, before realising he is, he very much is, he has been for a week and a half, and cuts himself off. “It’s under control,” he repeats.

“So he hasn’t been around?” she asks, looking about as though expecting someone to spring from the aggressively artificial bushes in the lobby. “The bloody arsehole.”

“It really isn’t—” his chest feels tight with the intercrossing wires of too many aches, “—his place anymore.”

“Is that what you’re telling yourself?” she asks because she’s a cow without manners.

“My mother just died. I haven’t been telling myself much, I didn’t have the time.”

Pansy doesn’t have the grace to look chastened. “How long have you been here?”

“Not for very— oh.”

“Draco?”

He blinks at her. “Four days, I believe. That’s, oh. That’s quite a while, isn’t it? I thought— I hadn’t— realised.”

“Oh, for fuck’s—!”

He looks down at himself, clothes he can’t remember changing into, hands that won’t stop shaking though he can’t feel them, feet that feel swollen and raw.

“Go home,” Pansy says. Her palm against his cheek is warm and smooth and Draco notices, for the first time in a long time, how much he wants it to be large and calloused. “Darling, Draco, go home.”

“It’ll be empty.”

He hates it when her face goes that pinched. “I’m cancelling the conference.”

For a moment, Draco wants to give in. Go home with her, let her fuss and make him soup and peel him an orange and stay up the night with him, pouring out glasses of red. But he can’t.

“It’s under control,” he says again, and hopes she won’t push. She doesn’t, because she’s Pansy.

—

The first thing he notices is that the wireless is on, something about the Glasgow Cathcart by-election turnouts crackling through the speaker. Draco spends a prolonged moment wondering if four days of sleeping around pain potions has done osmotic damage to his brain. Labour holds, Draco hears before the rest is cut of in a sputter of static. The silence in the room is oppressively heavy. Harry’s hair looks messier than ever.

“Who told you?” Draco asks.

Harry’s brow crinkles. “Told me?”

“My mother—” Harry looks concerned. Draco feels wrong-footed. “No one told you? Why are you here?”

“Narcissa—?”

“She’s— No one told you. You’re— she died this morning. Heart failure. I was at Mungo’s.”

Harry’s expression goes from concern to shock to horror to a sort of complicated blankness so pathetically fake that Draco wants to shake it off. He doesn’t, standing by the Floo instead, awkward and uncertain. Harry’s here. Harry didn’t know Mother died but he’s here. Which brings him back to—

“Why are you here?”

“Because I couldn’t stay away,” Harry says, like it’s simple. He shrugs. “I tried and I couldn’t, so I came here, but you weren’t there. And I thought I’d leave, but then it looked like you hadn’t been here in a while, so I—” he breaks off. “I, well. I cleaned up. There was dust everywhere, and the post was piling up and I looked in the kitchen and you didn’t have any food, so I— Oh, God, Draco, God, are you crying?”

Draco blinks, and yes, he is in fact crying, that is what the burning in his eyes was all this while, his face is wet with it. Once the tears start, they don’t stop, soaking the skin of his throat with rivulets of salt water. Harry couldn’t stay away. Harry checked his post. He’s here.

His knees buckle and Harry’s over in a flash, holding him up and close, whispering sorry, sorry, I’m so sorry in his ear.

“I didn’t see her,” Draco says, muffled into the fist clenched in Harry’s shirt. “When she died, I was— I wasn’t there. I didn’t see her, she died alone. Merlin, I spent four days in Mungo’s and she still— she still died alone. Harry, I—”

And there, there’s the hand threading through his hair, curving around the side of his face. He’s missed this, fuck, every lonely moment sitting in uncomfortable chairs while his mother wasted away before him, he’s missed this. He allows himself to remember her now, pale and still and small, remembers the old forgotten lady in the room next to hers, remembers the terrible breakfast muffin that left crumbs all down his front and the Healer’s drawn face when she told him. Harry pulls him closer still.

Mother’s dead. Mother’s dead. The dam breaks.

[ijenoyou]

New dad.

jaehyun!dad x reader.

summary; kyu, your son, isn’t too fond of the idea of jaehyun being his new dad.

MASTERLIST.

requested. send one if you want to!

warnings; angst, fluff, sad jaehyun :( mentions of johnny, mentions of death and trauma so if you don’t feel comfortable reading this i recommend you not to reas this •ܫ•

notes; i’m a sucker for jaehyun as a dad lmao so i rlly enjoyed writing this :D also remember english isn’t my first language sooooo ignore if there’s any mistakes.

It was no secret that Kyu had a hard time adjusting to Jaehyun being his new dad. But still, it’s been almost six months since you officially became Jaehyun’s wife and your son would always neglect the idea of having a new parent which made Jaehyun feel upset. 

He didn’t tell you anything about it but you could see it in his eyes everytime Kyu would reject Jaehyun’s effort.

“Please Kyu-ah.” He begged chasing the little kid all over the house. “Y/N is waiting for us and I still have to bathe you.” Kyu ignored his dad’s words and continued to hide from him.

Jaehyun lost sight of him and huffed. His phone began to vibrate and he took it out of his back pocket from the pants he was wearing, Jaehyun saw your name on the screen and he immediately broke in cold sweat.

“Hey baby, I wanted to call to know if you’re already on your way here.”

Jaehyun’s eyes started to prick with hot tears and cleared his throat.

“About that... Kyu hasn’t showered yet.” He said while trying to search for him at his room.

You didn’t say anything for a few seconds. “Is everything okay?” You asked with your voice filled with concern after noticing the way he sounded upset.

After hearing you, he started to let himself cry. Jaehyun let out some hiccups making your own eyes start to fill up with tears. You didn’t like hearing him like that. He rested his back against your home walls and slided down, then he rested his forehead against his knees.

“I’ve been trying so hard for Kyu to like me.” He said. “I know I could never reach the level Johnny had with him but—“

“I canceled the dinner.” You interrupted him. “I’ll see you at home baby, hold on tight.” He nodded even when you couldn’t see him, you ended the call and he let a shaky breath out.

He stood there for a few minutes in complete silence until que heard glass breaking followed by a cry that came from downstairs. He got up to his feet as fast as he could and ran towards the kitchen, when he arrived he saw Kyu on the floor holding his left foot with tears running down his chubby cheeks. Jaehyun walked towards him and saw that a wine glass fell and made a tiny cut in Kyu’s skin. He tried to get near the six year old but when he decided to place his gaze on Jaehyun’s face he tried to move away.

“Kyu stop, I have to clean you.” He tried to hold his little arms but Kyu slapped his hand.

“No!” The kid cried. “I want appa! My real dad.” After he heard what Kyu said he couldn’t help but to start crying again.

Jaehyun tried to ignore what the little boy said and tried to reach for him again.

“Kyu!” You shouted when you saw what was happening. “Are you okay?” You asked while kneeling down to see his cut.

Jaehyun turned around to face you. “I-I don’t know what happened, I’m sorry I couldn’t take care of him.” He spoke and you bit your lips trying not to break down in front of your son. “I tried helping him but he won’t—“

“Because I don’t want you to!” Kyu suddenly screamed. “I want my dad back.” He cried into your arms.

“Don’t say that! Jaehyun is your dad.” You scolded him with a firm voice and took him between your arms while standing up with Jaehyun following your actions.

You went to the bathroom and placed your son on the sink, you examined his injurie and saw that it wasn’t bad, just a tiny scrape. You cleaned it and added a cute bandaid that has spiderman designs all over it. You turn your head to the door and saw your husband with a sour expression on his handsome face, you sighed making him put his attention on you.

“Wait outside honey, I’ll talk with Kyu.” You said with a gentle smile.

“Okay.” He answered and before leavening he placed his eyes on Kyu who was looking at the floor waiting for your harsh words. “Don’t be too hard on him.” He tried to smile but failed.

It amaze you. The way he still wants you to be soft with Kyu after all the horrible things he said to him. When you were sure Jaehyun left and couldn’t hear you, you took your son by the shoulders and made him look directly at you.

“Kyu-ah.” You called his name out. “I told you to be nice to Jaehyun, he’s your dad and you should respect him because he loves you.” You explained while patting his head and he sniffed trying to control his tears.

“I miss him.”

You stopped breathing for a moment. It’s also hard for you, Johnny was your first love, your first kiss, your first everything and losing him was the worst feeling you have ever felt. Not even the delivery pain could be compared to what you felt when you got the news of his death.

“I miss him too but you have to accept he’s no longer with us baby.” You hugged his tiny body and he nodded. “I know it’s hard for you because you lost your best friend, I know you don’t see Jaehyun as your dad but it wouldn’t hurt to give him some respect.” You said softly trying to make him understand.

“I guess it wouldn’t.” You smiled at that.

“Now, you’re going to apologize to Jaehyun for all the stress you’ve been giving him.” You poked his sides and he laughed. “He loves you so much and I do too Kyu-ah.”

After talking with him, you placed him back on his feet and began searching for your husband. You found him at your shared room, sitting at the bed while looking at something in his hands that you couldn’t see since his back was turned. You knocked on the door frame and he looked over his shoulder.

“Kyu wants to speak with you.” You said and he nodded, you pushed his tiny body towards Jaehyun and Kyu went up the bed and sat next to him. “I’ll go make dinner, come downstairs when you finish.” You gave a smile to the both of them and closed the door behind you.

Kyu noticed that Jaehyun had something on his hands, it looked like a pouch to him.

“What is that?” He asked grabbing Jaehyun’s hand and took the ‘pouch’

“Uh? That’s my wallet.” He explained and showed him the inside of it.

Kyu saw some cards and some wons but what grabbed his attention was a picture of him. He took it out of the sleeve that had the picture in and analyzed it.

“It’s me.” He said with a tiny smile and Jaehyun nodded.

“I have your mom too.” He then took out a polaroid of you that he took way back high school years.

Kyu’s eyes started to shine when he saw you, he took the polaroid in between his fingers. Jaehyun could see the love Kyu has for you and that made him feel warm inside. After looking at the pictures the both of them went silent.

“I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to be sorry Kyussi.” Jaehyun spoke softly and patted his back. “I was once like you.”

“Really?” Kyu asked with a surprised voice.

“Yup, my mom also remarried and I didn’t like the idea, so I spent most of my teen life being rude towards my stepdad.”

“Oh.”

“But.” Jaehyun placed his arm on Kyu’s shoulders to bring him closer. “Y/N was the one who helped me rethink the situation and I realized that it wasn’t fair to my mom.”

Kyu placed his tiny arms around Jaehyun’s neck making his eyes go big in surprise, he didn’t expect that from the tiny kid.

“I know nothing can change the love you have for your dad but I want you to know that I love you so much and in the future, if you want of course, maybe you could see me as your dad too.”

——————————————————————————

You were quite worried about the conversation your two boys were having upstairs. But that feeling vanished when you heard them running downstairs while laughing.

They took a sit at the table next to each other, you placed their food plates in front of them and smiled.

“I take this as a good sign.”

“Yeah.” Your husband smiled, showing his cute dimples.

“Mom! Did you know that he played for a basketball team when he was younger?” Your son asked while moving his feet in the air since he wasn’t tall enough for him to touch the ground when sitting.

“Of course baby!” You replied with happiness. “And let me tell you, he was the best one on the team.”

[barbasbodaciousbeard]

If You Love Someone, Let Them Go: Part 2

Summary: Since starting with SVU, Sonny hadn’t kept much terribly close to the chest. The squad knew about his family, growing up on Staten Island, the classes at Fordam. What was hidden was why he didn’t date. Sonny Carisi was also separated from his childhood sweetheart, a separation neither ever took to divorce. They had the same haunts. They’d grown up neighbors. Their paths crossed every few months, and divorce talks would turn into reminiscing would turn into a night spent together, sometimes sex sometimes just talking until the early morning. It always ended with one of them waking up alone however. How will that change when the squad finds out?

Pairings: Sonny Carisi x Original Character,

A/N: Ayyy, I’ll probably be posting these as I write them because I kind of like them. 

Part 1

November 2013

When Victoria stepped into the bookstore she’d always frequented when she and Sonny first moved into the city, she didn’t expect to see him standing in the back. It felt wrong to see him out and about; being caught off guard was a reminder she didn’t know his schedule anymore. All she did know was that it was late enough he’d just left a night class, given he was in the city. She hadn’t seen him since he left the apartment the morning she left. Had he called? Once that she answered. She told him she felt like he didn’t want her there, and he told her that was stupid, of course he did. When she hung up, she didn’t hear anything else. Bella told her he didn’t seem to get it, discrediting the suggestions his sister knew were the problems. The youngest sister was the closest with Victoria, and she wasn’t willing to give up her confidant with Tommy not out yet. That meant Bella went between her brother and his wife, trying to get them to fix it. Sonny’s birthday had been weird enough without her; she wasn’t ready for the holidays.

“Victoria,” he exhaled when he saw her. Victoria didn’t like seeing that it looked like he wasn’t doing that well. When he wasn’t in front of her, she could pretend he was happy and healthy in their apartment on Staten Island. He certainly hadn’t slept much and was lurking the aisles this close to closing in the city. His hair was shaggier, his face had a few days worth of stubble, and his eyes had dark circles. It had only been three months, and it felt like any scabbing of the emotional wound had just been torn off in one fell swoop. Something had made him pull away, she’d known. He needed to tell her why, and she hated knowing leaving didn’t help. She hadn’t really expected it to, but she thought it might prompt him to talk to her. In all the time they’d known each other, they had been able to intuitively figure out what was wrong, watch the other and piece things together. Because of that, neither of them knew what to do when the other one couldn’t just figure it out.

“Dominick,” she nodded, shifting awkwardly. Both of them could see the glint of the other’s ring, relaxing ever so slightly not to be the only one wearing it.

“We oughta talk, huh?”

“Straight into it?”

“I don’t know what else to say to you. Which is weird.”

“Yeah. We could go to the park?”

“Okay. Do you want to get coffee or anything on the way?”

“Yeah,” she nodded, teeth pulling at the skin on her lips. She followed him to the street. They fell into step together easily, but the silence was heavy. There was too much that needed to be said, and neither of them knew how to say it. 

“Starbucks or bodega?”

“Starbucks. I need hot, but not coffee.” He nodded, pulling the door open. Before she could say anything, he ordered her usual non-caffeinated order with his. When Victoria tried to protest, he shook his head, paying and going ahead to wait for her hot chocolate with his tea in hand. Saddling up to his side, she offered a quiet “Thanks.”

He nodded, watching her as she grabbed her drink. She didn’t look different than the last time he saw her, but it suddenly struck him that she didn’t look well. What upset him about that was the realization she’d looked like this, a look he knew meant she was hurting, for a while before she left. Her hair was in a haphazard braid, she didn’t have the make up she normally wore to work, she hadn’t bothered to take the apron off for her walk home. He led her to the nearby park, and they again walked in silence. It was foreign to him to be so close to  her and not know what to say. They’d been married seven years, and he’d known her since he was five. He’d known her for twenty-two of his twenty-seven years, and now he was just staring at her. When he found an empty bench, he sat, and she settled beside him. It was hard to see her again, but he was grateful when she still sat close enough her arm brushed his. They both watched the empty patch of grass on the other side of the pathway, neither able to look at the other.

“Why?” he finally asked, and she winced at how small his voice sounded. When she was there, she knew something was wrong, but she hadn’t heard him sound so defeated before. 

“I didn’t feel like you wanted me there.”

“That’s bullshit, Victoria.”

“When was the last time we did something together before you left? And I mean not just breakfast and dinner or rushed sex when you got home late.”

“Probably only like a month.”

“Four months. Easter with your family. I kept asking for dates or a movie night- anything- but you’d cancel or just never follow through.”

“Work was just busy. And then with classes I needed to take OT.”

“So over the course of four months and maxing out on OT, you couldn’t miss one evening? You missed my birthday. You missed celebrating the bakery. Something was bothering you and you wouldn’t tell me. You stopped telling me you loved me, Sonny.”

“No I didn’t.”

“Yeah. In May.”

“You were putting shit on a calendar?” he asked, and she could feel him bristling. He was getting frustrated, and she was fighting tears. She didn’t know how tears would impact this conversation. Could they be rational? Would he feel bad or angry? Beside her, realization was hitting Sonny that she was right. He wasn’t keeping work from her in a healthy way, and he’d fucked up. Royally.

“No, but you start to notice.”

“How long did you feel like I didn’t care?” he asked, and he was shifting from angry to hurt. She could see his neck tightening, his hands running over his thighs as he processed what he was hearing. Bella had already told him all of it, but he’d assumed she was overanalyzing. Sticking her nose in where she didn’t need to be. Instead, she’d realized what he couldn’t.

“Since my birthday. So almost a year now.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” 

“I never saw you, Dominick. That didn’t feel like a before work or on the phone conversation. Plus, it felt so whiny. Having you realize you missed my birthday should’ve been enough. I figured Gina, Teresa, and Bella would be giving you enough hell. And then I left thinking you’d listen to that. And you called and I tried to tell you and you called it stupid. What was I supposed to do from there?”

“It is stupid. I always want you in our home. You’re my wife, Victoria.”

“You weren’t showing it, Dom.”

“Apparently.” He watched her, hating the tears that were slipping out of the corners of her eyes. She looked tired. More than that. She looked defeated. Without thinking, he cupped her cheek, thumb brushing her tears away. His heart fluttered gently when she closed her eyes and leaned into his touch, but it also struck him suddenly how long it had been since these casual moments of affection. She was right. Easter was probably the last time, and that made Sonny want to march right off the nearest pier. Sure, there were things he needed to share with her, but did he have to stop playing with her fingers or coming home for dinner? 

“I do love you,” she whispered. “I’m not stupid. I know something else was wrong. I couldn’t figure out what, though. And you won’t tell me. Dom, just because I figure most things out on my own, doesn’t mean I can figure them all.”

“Nothing was wrong,” he lied, and he knew she could tell he was lying, just like she’d known when they drove to the cabin upstate for his birthday a year ago. Just like last year, she didn’t press him on it, but this time he could see it was out of resignation instead of kindness. He hated that more, he thought, because she was accepting that he wasn’t going to tell her what could fix their relationship. Instead of opening up, he pressed a gentle kiss to her temple, thankful when she clung to his side. 

“I love you,” she repeated, voice desperate as her hands fisted his sweatshirt.

“I love you too, Tor. I always will.”

That night found him in her bed after they’d stayed in the park later than they should’ve. It was already dark when they arrived. She fell asleep easily, clad in only his undershirt, but Sonny found himself staring at the ceiling as his thoughts raced. He never had to try with her, and apparently that had stopped working, and he wasn’t even paying enough attention to notice. It wasn’t fair to her. He’d done too much damage, and he wasn’t sure what to do about it. He wasn’t even aware of how badly he’d messed up. There was more he hadn’t gone into with her. 

He’d been on homicide the last year. No one knew when the change happened, and the cases they caught stuck with him because it seemed most of them were women. What got to him was the way they’d been cleaned up, dressed, and carefully placed. The moment he saw them, he knew they were looking for a boyfriend or husband. Their faces haunted him more than anything else. They’d accepted what was coming. There was probably a history there. Whenever he found the partners, there would be 911 calls, and neighbors who weren’t even surprised. It was why he’d started applying to work with special victims. 

It would’ve made sense to talk to Victoria about how he was feeling, but she was so good and so removed from the darkest parts of people he saw on the job. He wanted to keep it from her, not give her that burden. There was also a part of him that thought he’d be tainting her when he told her. Maybe he wouldn’t give her the details, but she’d start waking up in the night like he had been. As time marched on, he’d figured out how to start managing the feelings, but he wasn’t sure if he was managing the feeling or just not exposed to it. It was so easy to lie and say nothing was wrong because then he didn’t even have to consider bringing the darkness he saw into her world. It was probably selfish, but it was also something he felt like he couldn’t control. Would she think he was weaker? Would she be haunted just by the stories? Would she be afraid whenever she saw couples bicker?

 Instead of telling her that, he slid out of bed, dressed, and left before he had to tell her about that part. He left a note by the coffee maker.

You deserve better, Tor. I’ll love you always. -Sonny

When she woke up, Victoria knew he was gone. Even when things weren’t perfect, she’d always wake up with his arm slung over her or his face buried in the crook of her neck if he hadn’t left yet. Something told her if he planned to call, he’d have said goodbye before leaving for work. She also couldn’t smell cooking or coffee, so he wasn’t in the kitchen. When she brewed coffee, she found his note and felt stupid for having thought he may stay. She got her phone off the nightstand, scrubbing her eyes. 

I’ll love you always too, Sonny. Do we stay separated? Or do you want a divorce?

He was at the precinct, taking the lull in activity as an opportunity to read for class. That’s what he was telling himself at least as he read the same sentence again and again. When he saw her text, his heart beat faster. Some part of him had expected to get served in the next week or so since he’d left. Instead, he got this text in mere hours. All he knew was he wanted her to stay his wife. Once there were papers, he had to accept what he’d ruined.

I don’t want a divorce.

Me either.

Okay, so just a separation?

Not like a legal one. I can pay my part on the health insurance. And you saw I have a place. So we just pay our own bills.

Don’t worry about the insurance. Talk later?

Sure, Dom

She wasn’t surprised when they didn’t talk. Instead, she continued like she had been, not taking her wedding ring off but starting her own life and coming home to an apartment void of Sonny. It would be the first holiday she could remember that she wasn’t at the Carisi’s house, and she was dreading going to Rachel’s for Thanksgiving more than she had been. She’d ask questions that Victoria didn’t have the answer to, and the answers she did have were more convoluted now.

[mldrgrl]

Wise Up

by: mldrgrl Rating: PG Summary: Scully needs someone to take her home after dental surgery.  Pre-Millennium.

He came back from getting coffee to find her mid-conversation with her mother.  She gave him a glance over her shoulder when he put the to-go cup quietly on her table and then lowered her chin so that her hair obscured her face.  She switched her cell phone from one hand to the other and he shuffled to his own desk pretending to give her privacy.

“It’s fine, Mom,” she said.  “I promise.  I’ll just try to get it rescheduled until after the new year.  No, I...no, I don’t need...Mom, it’s fine.”

He sipped his coffee and opened a file, but kept his gaze higher than necessary to keep her in his periphery.  She pinched the bridge of her nose in silence for the next ten seconds and then she finally lifted her head.

“Mom,” she stated.  “I have to go, I need to finish a report.  I’ll reschedule for January.  As for Thursday, don’t worry about it, you just feel better.  I know.  I know.  I love you too.  Bye.”

Scully disconnected her call with a deep sigh that Mulder pretended not to notice.  He was burning with curiosity, however, and it was only a matter of time before he would ask.  He just had to wait for the right opportunity.

“I’ll be right back,” she said.

He nodded as she stood and rubbed the back of her jaw a little.  He’d noticed she’d been doing that a lot lately, but hadn’t said anything about it.  She left without her coffee, her jacket, or her satchel, so he assumed she was headed to the ladies’ room.

Only minutes later, she was back, and he was sipping his coffee and reading email.  She stayed standing, lifting the lid of her own coffee and blowing across the top.  He gave her a sideways glance as she paced in front of his desk with a pensive expression.

“Thanks for the coffee,” she said.

“A few dozen more and I might make a dent in what I owe you.”

“Mm.”  The left corner of her mouth twitched into a half-smile.

He thought he might have an opening.  “Everything alright?”

“Fine.”

He thought wrong.  He nodded and clicked open another email advising an early release tomorrow for administrative personnel due to the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday.  He’d be surprised if he saw anyone but his own shadow at work tomorrow.  Even Scully had taken the day off.

By the time he opened and deleted three other emails, she was still pacing by his desk, so he tried again.  “How’s your mom?”

“She’s…”

“Fine?”

“She has the flu, actually.  She called to tell me that she didn’t think she’d be up for Thanksgiving this year.”

“Oh.”  Mulder sat back in his chair.  Now he was the one pulling a pensive expression.

“It’s fine,” she said, quickly.  “I wasn’t actually…”

He raised his brows in question and she shook her head dismissively.  He swiveled from side to side in his chair and tapped a pencil against his chin as he looked at her, which he knew made her nervous.  It worked.  She shifted her feet and suddenly couldn’t decide if she might speak or drink her coffee.  Her exasperation was palpable.

“I have a dentist appointment tomorrow,” she blurted.  “Well, I was supposed to, but now I have to cancel.”

“Why?”

“I’m having a wisdom tooth removed and Mom was supposed to take me.  I was going to use the long weekend to recover.  She has the flu now, so…”  She shrugged and finally took a sip of her coffee and then rubbed her lips together.  “They don’t let you leave on your own after anesthesia.  So, I have to reschedule.”

“I can take you.”

“No, Mulder, I can’t ask you to do that.”

“You’re not asking.  I’m offering.  I can take you.”

“I don’t know…”

“It’s not like I’d be getting much done here by myself anyway.”

“I thought you always accomplished so much with me out of your hair.”

He smiled at her.  “I just tell you that so you don’t feel guilty about leaving me on my own.”

She snorted softly.

“So, what time do I pick you up?” he asked.

“Don’t you have plans for Thanksgiving, Mulder?”

He got up out of his seat and walked over to her, extending his hand.  “Fox Mulder,” he said.  “We’ve obviously never met before.”

She bashfully lowered her head a little and hesitated for a few beats.  “I need to be there by 9:15,” she finally said.  “It’s only about ten minutes away from my apartment.”

“The Skinman’s gonna have a heart attack when I submit my request for time off.”

And that’s how he ended up sitting in a dental surgeon’s office splitting his attention between vintage copies of Reader’s Digest and anxiously checking his watch every five minutes.  Occasionally, he would get up and inspect an elaborate fish tank taking up half the wall in the waiting room to watch the yellow tangs and clownfish pass from side to side.

It was nearly noon when the nurse came out to collect Mulder.  “Your wife is ready for you,” she told him.

“Oh, um…”  He tossed the Reader’s Digest aside and decided it wasn’t worth it to explain his relationship to Scully.  Instead, he followed her to a tiny, all-white recovery room at the back of the office where his partner was curled up on a cot with her eyes closed.

“Miss Scully,” the nurse said, shaking her gently on the shoulder.  “Your husband is here to take you home.”

Scully opened her eyes and stared blankly at the woman standing above her.  She sat up slowly with the nurse’s help and then Mulder crouched down and put a hand on her knee.  Her right cheek was puffed up, full of cotton swabs that poked out of the corner of his mouth.  The size of her pupils caught him off guard, so dilated her eyes almost looked black.

“Muller,” Scully murmured.  “My mowf ish mishing.”

“Your mouth is missing?”  He chuckled softly and rubbed her knee.  “Certainly not the whole mouth.”

“She might be a little loopy until the anesthesia wears off,” the nurse said.  “The tooth was impacted and took some work.”

The thought of it made Mulder cringe.  He helped Scully into her jacket and then to her feet and she swayed into him, leaned against him for support.  The nurse handed him a small white bag with painkillers and instructions, which she rattled off to him as he escorted his partner slowly down the hall.

“Take the gauze out when you get home,” she said.  “Don’t let her prod the jaw or use mouthwash for at least a week.  She’ll probably want to sleep for a few more hours, but by the time she wakes up, she’ll be in a fair amount of pain.  Give her one of the painkillers immediately, and then as needed, but no more than four in 24 hours.  Ice packs will help with the swelling and the pain.  She might feel lightheaded or woozy the next couple of days and that’s normal.  No exercise for the next week, no drinking through a straw, and no eating or drinking at all for the next two hours.  And then soft foods and room temperature liquids are fine.  The pamphlet there has all the information you need.”

Mulder nodded along, suddenly nervous about the responsibility he’d volunteered for.  He’d never had dental surgery and had no idea the amount of recovery involved.  Maybe he should have let her reschedule the appointment so her mom could take care of her, but then again, he struggled to imagine Scully’s mom, as slight as she was, getting her daughter out of the office when Mulder was practically carrying her down the hall to the door.

It took some time, but he managed to get Scully into the car and buckled in.  She turned her head towards him when he got in and gazed at him like she had just awakened from a pleasant dream.

“You’re susha good driver,” she said.

“Well, thank you,” he answered, latching his seatbelt.

“Even whener losh and dunno whereer at.”

“Lucky for you, there’s no chance I’ll get lost from here to the apartment.”

“Are we goin’ to your parparmen, Muller?”

“I’m taking you home.”

“Mm home.”  

Mulder started the car and that was the last thing Scully said until they arrived in front of her building.  He would look over at her at red lights and she was still turned towards him, her eyes half-open, blinking slowly.  When he parked the car, she turned her head and her brows came together with a deep frown.  He helped her out of the car and she took baby steps across the lawn, leaving footprints in the thin layer of snow that covered the green.

Her face contorted as though she was in great pain and he stopped with her at the foot of the stairs up to her front door.  “Muller,” she whined.  “Thish isna wherer coush lives.”

“No, it’s where your couch lives.”

“I can’d shleep on my coush.”

“Good thing you have a bed.  Come on, almost there.”

It was slow-going up the stairs.  She took them one at a time, making sure both feet were planted securely before moving forward.  By the time he got her through the door, she was sagging against him again and he considered just picking her up and carrying her the rest of the way.

“Home sweet home,” he said, unlocking her apartment door.

“Where’sh the dog?” she asked, blinking up at him.

“What dog?”

“My dog.”

“Queegqueg?  He uh…”  Mulder paused.  It probably wasn’t the best idea to let her know her dog had been eaten by a lake monster three years ago.  “Queegqueg isn’t here right now.”

“Queegqueg.  Thash a weird word, Muller.  Queeeeeeequeeeeeeeeeeeg.  Queegquegqueegquegqueegqueg.”

He put the bag of painkillers and nurse’s instructions on the table in her kitchen while she tried to wrap her head around the odd word.  “Yeah, I always thought it was a weird name for a dog, too.”

“What dog?”

“Your dog.”

“I dun have a dog.”

Mulder raised his brows.  “Okay, let’s get you to bed.”

Scully sighed a little and let Mulder lead her towards the bedroom.  He sat her down on the bed and then knelt in front of her to unlace her tennis shoes.  He wondered if he should try to coax her into getting into some pajamas, but figured it might be more trouble than it was worth.  Jeans and a sweater should be comfortable enough.  He got both shoes off her feet and then remembered the gauze needed to come out of her mouth.  

“Can you…?”  He gestured to her mouth and she followed the wag of his finger until she turned cross-eyed.  “We need to get those cotton balls or whatever it is out of your mouth.”

She opened her mouth for him and tipped her head back a little.  If he didn’t know she was drugged up before, he definitely knew it now.  A sober Scully would’ve insisted on gloves and sterilizing and sanitizing the entire room before letting him near her mouth.  A sober Scully would’ve insisted she was fine and could do it herself.  Gingerly, he plucked out the saliva and blood-soaked pieces of cotton from the inside of her cheek, trying not to let his squeamishness show too much or  get in the way.  It wasn’t lost on him that if the tables were turned, she would do the same for him, and more.

When he was sure he’d removed all the gauze, he took it into the bathroom to dispose of, not looking at the little pile of gore in his hand.  He shivered and then washed his hands with the soap that Scully had been smelling of lately, which he definitely wasn’t going to complain about because it made her smell so good.  It made the night he’d ‘taught’ her how to play baseball even more memorable.  He thought it might have been a new lotion or bath gel, but it turned out it was hand soap the whole time.  Or maybe she had a whole set of it lurking in the bathroom.  He dried his hands and peered at the bottle.  It was simply called: Almond.  He would buy her another bottle or a dozen for Christmas.  He liked it.

Back in Scully’s room, he found her poking at her cheek with the pads of her fingers and he took her hand away from her face to stop her.  “You can’t do that,” he said.

“Can’t feel anything.”

“It’ll wear off soon enough.  Let’s get your coat off and into bed.”

“We can’t.”

“Can’t what?”

“Go to bed.”

“I don’t see why not.”  He started to unbutton her coat.  “You have the day off, tomorrow’s a holiday, and then you-”

“It’s against the rules.”

“I’m not familiar with any rules that prohibit adults from taking post-surgery naps.”

“The FBI says so.”

“I haven’t read the handbook in awhile, but I don’t think this’ll warrant an official reprimand in your permanent record.  If it does, I’ve got your back.”  He struggled to get her arms free from the jacket and she was no help.  Just looked solemnly up at him while pouting her bottom lip slightly.  He finally pulled the jacket loose and then reached behind her to turn down the bed.  “Time to break some imaginary rules,” he said.

“I want to,” she whispered.  “I really want to.  But…”  She winced and then reached up to cup her jaw.

“Hurting?”

“Kind of.”

“Okay, stay put.”  He turned to leave, but was stopped by a pull on his back pocket.

“Where’re you going?”

“To get you an ice pack.”

“You’ll come back?”

“I promise.”

“Promise, promise?”

He traced an ‘x’ against his chest.  She let go of his pocket and raised her hand up to him, all her fingers folded down except for the pinkie, which was crooked slightly.

“Pinkie swear?” she asked.

He chuckled and then hooked his pinkie finger with hers and gave it a shake.  “Lay down,” he said.  “I’ll be right back.”

Afraid she might try to stop him again, he hurried out of her room for the kitchen.  While there, he read over the instruction pamphlet on the table and checked her fridge and cupboards to see if she had any soft, bland foods, in case he might need to call out for delivery later or run to the store.  He found some yogurt and cans of soup and figured that would be sufficient.  What he couldn’t find, however, was an ice pack.  He searched her freezer high and low, but found nothing.  He decided to make do with a package of frozen corn wrapped in a tea towel.

He’d hoped to find her asleep when he came back to her room, but she was still awake, albeit drowsily staring up at the ceiling and rubbing at her jaw.

“You have to stop doing that,” he said, taking her hand away from her face.  He gently placed the makeshift icepack against her cheek and sat down next to her to hold it in place.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

He squeezed her hand.  She turned her head slightly and then closed her eyes and sniffed a little.  She looked up at him.

“You used my soap,” she said.

“Had to wash my hands earlier.”

“You like it don’t you?”

“It smells nice.”

“I noticed that you’ve been breathing me in lately.”

“If I have, I’m-”

“So, I went back to the shop I got the soap from and bought the lotion and the shower gel as well.”

“Oh.”  The first thing he thought was that he was right.  She did have a whole set lurking in her bathroom.  The second thought he had was that she’d just admitted she was wearing it for him.  Heat flooded his chest and tightened it, followed by a flutter low in his abdomen.

“You okay, Mulder?”

“Sorry, Scully, maybe I’m coming down with something?”

She struggled for a moment to sit up and the icepack slipped out of his hand and from her face, landing in the space between them on the bed.  She grabbed his head with both hands and pulled his towards her.

“Scully, wha-?”

“Checking for fever,” she murmured, resting her left cheek against his brow.  “You are a little warm, but I think you’re fine.”

“Not very scientific.”

“Some things are better than science.”

“I’m going to need you to repeat that when you’re no longer under the influence.”

“I haven’t been drinking.”

“You’re not exactly sober.”

She let him go and laid back down.  He retrieved the icepack and rewrapped it in the towel that came loose.  She waved him away when he tried to put it back on her cheek so he reached over to set it on her nightstand.

“I want to break the rules with you,” she said.

“Finally succumbing to my bad influence, are you?”

“I’m afraid though, Mulder.”

“What’re you afraid of?”

“The end of the world.”

“You don’t need to worry about that.  We’re gonna save the world together.  I promise.”

She shook her head.  “Our world, Mulder.  The world of you and me.”

“You’re gonna be stuck with me for a long, long time, Scully.”  He chuckled and raised his hand up, folding his fingers down and keeping his pinkie up.  “Pinkie swear.”

She grabbed his finger loosely with her own.  “I’m sorry I’m so sleepy.”

“You’re drugged up, partner.”

“Oh.”  She rubbed at one eye with the back of her hand.  “You won’t go, right?”

“I’ll hang with you until you kick me out.  You’ve got HBO, don’t you?”

“Even if we can’t go to bed?”

“What?”

“You said you wanted to take me to bed.”

“Oh.  Oh.”  He almost laughed.  Now her talk of rules made sense.  Except, what she said, what she’d been saying, was that she wanted to break those rules.  With him.  “Scully…”

Her eyes closed lazily and she took a deep, slow breath, exhaling with a sigh.  “I love you, Mulder.”

“Oh brother,” he whispered.  He sat absolutely still for the next few moments as that warm, fluttery feeling washed over him again.  He touched her shoulder and then leaned closer to her, watched her breathe slowly and evenly.  “You’re the only one I want to break the rules with too, Scully.”

Even though she was caught in sedated slumber, he was pretty sure she knew how he felt.  And he was definitely going to get her that almond soap for Christmas.

The End

[amyscascadingtabs]

we’ve found a love to cross the ages

Jake and Amy celebrate their third wedding anniversary.

(happy anniversary, jake and amy 💕)

read on ao3

~

Even though he’s only seven months into the joys of parenthood, Jake is starting to feel like he’s got the key points of it down. He’s mastered several valuable skills to near perfection - for example, how to best change a diaper without getting peed on, how to heat up bottles of pumped breastmilk in complete darkness, and how to feed yourself with one hand while you're holding your baby on the other arm. He’s learned that his son is objectively the best and most magical person in the entire Universe, and that he would do anything and everything to make sure his son is safe, happy, and loved. He's learned that the last part is a feeling that grows exponentially, strengthening by the day.

  Most of all, however, Jake has learned that babies do not care about your plans. They don’t care if you're exhausted from your work shift and craving a night with more than four consecutive hours of sleep, they don’t care that it's the fifth time you've changed shirt today because of various baby-related stains, and they certainly, as proved obvious in the case of this particular night, do not care if it’s their parents’ third wedding anniversary, for which they had been planning a proper date night with fancy attire, dinner reservations, and Broadway tickets. At the very least, Mac doesn't.

Jake supposes it’s not technically his son’s fault. Double-sided ear infection, ruptured eardrum on the right, had been their pediatrician’s judgment when they took Mac there this morning, following a night of so much crying that in the end, their son wasn't the only one whose ears were seriously hurting. Amy had ended up staying home with him for the day, whilst Jake had spent his workday downing a dangerous amount of coffee to not incidentally fall asleep if he as much as leaned against a wall for a second too long, and they had ended up canceling the date plans. Mac wasn't his usual happy self, it wasn't fair to hand Charles a feverish baby for a night, and neither of them really had the energy to dress up for dinner at a restaurant when running on less than two hours of sleep. Date night - officially canceled.

“Well,” Amy groans as she confirms the babysitting cancellation with Charles over text for a third time, assuring him that yes, they would be okay, and yes, they would call him the next time they needed a babysitter. “This wasn't how I had planned for tonight to go.”

“I don’t think it was anyone’s plan,” Jake tries to comfort her from a distance as he starts on his n-th lap walking around the kitchen table while bouncing Mac in the Babybjorn. Through a joint and arduous effort, they’d finally managed to get their son to take some baby Tylenol without spitting it out, and half an hour later’s worth of crying, he was finally dozing off. “Least of all Mac’s, I bet.”

Amy pouts, watching her son with the same worried gaze that Jake recognizes from times in his life he’d rather forget - a car outside a farm in Pennsylvania, a filled courtroom, the nights after he came home and the nightmares kept them both up. “I know. It breaks my heart to see him like that - I wish there was a way I could just take that pain from him, because he doesn’t even understand it, you know? I’d much rather suffer myself than see him doing it.”

“I know what you mean.”

“Yeah.” She sighs. “But I’m also sad about not getting to celebrate our wedding anniversary. I was going to wear a dress, and do my makeup, and get to hang out with just you for several hours and spend ninety percent of that time talking about how much we miss our baby, but still. I wasn’t planning for sweatpants and a sick baby.”

“I know, Ames.” He stops behind her on the kitchen chair, quickly pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “Me too.”

“I’m just so exhausted,” she mumbles, pulling down the sleeves of her grey NYPD hoodie and resting her chin on her hands. “He slept for two hours, so I tried to do some work, but it’s riddled with typos, and I could swear there’s a dangling participle in there somewhere. Imagine if I’d sent that to Holt! I need a nap, and I need to pump, because he’s been glued to me for the entire day but he’s barely wanted to eat.”

“You could combine those things?”

Amy snorts. “I wish. If I’d figured out how to pump while asleep, I would be so efficient. But no.”

  She lets out a yawn, and as much as Jake can feel his own exhaustion like a dull, weighted blanket on top of him, relentless despite the caffeine he’s tried to combat it with, he only needs to glance at his wife to know her day’s been worse. Sure, policework is tough, but he knows from experience exactly how much more demanding a full day of caring for a sick, fussy, baby can be. Jake loves his wife, but she’s categorically useless at letting herself rest sometimes.

“You can go to sleep for a bit,” he tells her, nodding when she raises an eyebrow. “Or pump, then sleep. Whatever you need.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. Mac’s sleeping, and you’ve taken care of him the entire day. I’ll take him for a couple of hours, and you get some sleep, okay? You need it.”

“Rude,” she grimaces, but there’s an air of relief over her when she stands up, brushing her lips against the stubble on his cheek - shaving’s becoming less and less of a priority for him these days. “But okay. I love you.”

“Love you, too,” he whispers, and she gives him a knowing smile before heading towards their bedroom.

  He had been looking forward to their anniversary date, too. Not for the reasons Amy seems to believe; Jake loves her in fancy dresses and makeup, but he loves her just as much when she hasn’t washed her hair in two days and she’s wearing pajamas with milk stains and baby spit-up on it. He had been looking forward to spending some child-free time with her, but not because he prefers it over an evening at home with her and Mac. No, he’d really just been longing for a chance to show his tired, hard-working, champion of a wife how special she is to him, how much he loves her, and the life they have built. A proper date had seemed like the perfect way to do that, whereas a night at home with their sick baby did not seem nearly as strikingly effective, but Jake figures that shouldn’t mean it’s impossible.

“Come on, Mac,” he whispers, stroking his thumb over his son’s still-rosy cheeks. “Let’s see if we can surprise Mommy.”

  The living room is far from what Jake would categorize as messy, but he knows it’s already at a level that would bother Amy, so he starts by cleaning. He rinses the used water glasses, places a used muslin blanket in the laundry, folds the knitted blanket over the side of the armchair. He finds a number he knows he wrote down in his phone once, an Italian place that Charles recommended and which does delivery, and orders them dinner all while bouncing on a yoga ball to soothe Mac when he starts whimpering in the middle of the call. He closes the curtains, dims the lights, and finds the battery-operated tealight candles they’ve resorted to ever since Mac started trying to crawl, spreading them out on the dinner and couch tables. He puts on a Spotify playlist with piano music and finds a bottle of white wine he’s not sure when they bought, but which looks fancy enough for a date night.

It’s not much, he thinks, not when he has neither flowers nor a card nor a fancy anniversary gift to present - he’d thought to buy the first two things after work, then ended up rushing home to help Amy with Mac - but it’s something.

  Judging from the gasp she lets out when she comes into the living room, and the puzzled look she gives him as she realizes, it seems that Amy agrees.

“What’s all this, babe?”

“Well, I thought…” He scratches his neck, shrugging as he looks to the makeshift table setting on the dinner table, “even if we can’t go out, and even if we’re in our sweats, that doesn’t mean we can’t still have a date night for our anniversary. I’m sorry it’s not much, but… I thought it could be nice.”

“Jake, this is…” She shakes her head, looking around at his improvised decorations. “Wow.”

“You like it?”

“I thought we were just going to eat frozen pizza in bed,” she says. “Seems like I was surprised.”

“Surprise,” he grins, and it makes her laugh.

  They eat their dinner one at a time, because Mac begins to cry if they as much as attempt to put him to sleep on his own, but it’s still great, and Jake makes a note to text Charles a thank you for the recommendation. After dinner, they dig out a tub of salted caramel ice cream from the freezer, and the whole family snuggles up together on the couch as Mac eventually accepts a bottle, drinking the whole thing in Jake’s arms before he passes out again.

 It’s far from the most glamorous or ambitious date night they’ve had. Jake thinks back to their very first official date as Amy leans her head on his shoulder and closes her eyes, remembering to the haircut and suit and the Kamikaze shots needed to kill the initial awkwardness between them. He’d been so nervous before that date, deathly afraid to mess things up and scare her away, scared to love too hard and scared to love too little.

He hadn’t known it then, but it hadn’t been long before he’d started feeling the first sensations of something both ever-changing and permanent; a safety he hadn’t known before, but instantly craved more of. It had lingered, and it had grown, and it had brought him more happiness than he could have ever imagined that morning all those years ago when he kissed her for realz in the evidence locker and she kissed him back. Kismet, happenchance, or an amalgamation of the two - somehow, they found each other, and found the things in each other that made the work of building a relationship worth it.

Jake’s never needed fancy, anyway, he thinks as his eyes grow heavier and he lets them fall closed for a second. Life gets considerably less fancy when you have a baby, it’s part of the deal, and they’re always tired now. There’s less time for just about everything, and most days their topics of conversation circle around logistics and their baby ninety percent of the time, but having the safety of every day with her, with Mac, with his family - it’s more than Jake dreamed he would ever get, better than he ever thought he deserved.

  “It’s weird to think he wasn’t here the last time we celebrated our anniversary,” Amy says, playing with the curls near Mac’s neck and using her newly acquired, already finely tuned, mom-reflexes to put in her son’s pacifier before he even notices that he spat it out. “It feels like he’s always been.”

“He was growing inside of you,” Jake corrects her. “But yeah. From a tiny little bump to a fully-fledged human. Or fully-fledged baby, at least.”

“Yeah.” Amy smiles. “You know, there are some days when I miss going out on nice dates, or sleeping through the night, or looking a little more put together than this,” she gestures to her uneven messy bun and oversized pajama pants, “but even on the hard days, like today, it’s still better than when he wasn’t here. So I guess, even with the canceled dinner, this is still my favorite anniversary.”

“I know. I think it’s mine, too.”

“Would you have guessed?”

“Guessed what?”

“Three years ago, when we got married - would you have guessed that this is how you’d celebrate your third wedding anniversary?”

“I don’t know,” he confesses. “Maybe? I don’t think I ever thought that hard about it. I knew I wanted the rest of my life with you, and then, well, you know how I felt about kids for a while; I wasn’t sure about the rest. But now… I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else than here.”

“Me either,” she whispers.

“Would you?”

“Mm-hmm?”

“Would you have guessed this?”

“Oh,” she says, pursing her lips and scrunching her forehead. “I hoped, I guess? I dreamed. But this is better.”

Sitting up straighter, she kisses him. It’s a little clumsy with Mac preventing them to get too close to each other, and it’s over way too soon when he starts whimpering and Jake is up on his feet again, bouncing his son slightly until peace seems to be restored.

 “We’ll schedule another date, right? Once he gets better?” Amy asks as Jake tries to sit down again, Mac seemingly back asleep in his arms. “I know you say you don’t mind, but I really do want you to see me in something other than sweatpants at some point.”

“Sweatpants are like, my favorite outfit of yours,” he mumbles, and she gives him a surprised look. “But yes, definitely. Make-up anniversary date, as soon as our baby is healthy again.”

“Yeah. Happy anniversary, babe.”

“Happy anniversary.” He gets an idea, and even though he knows it’s risky when Mac literally just fell asleep again, he lifts Mac’s little fist anyway, imitating a voice that’s supposed to be their son’s before pretending to answer him. “Happy anniversary, mom and dad - why, Mac, thank you so much!”

  Amy rolls her eyes at him, but she chuckles. Jake thinks that some things, no matter how much everything else changes, stay exactly the same.

[popculturebuffet]

The Critic Valentine’s Day Double Feature (Pilot/Sherman, Woman and Child)

Vivia Jay Sherman! Viva Quebec! Viva Valentine’s Day! And Viva WeirdKev who as happens for a good chunk of my content payed for this wonderful double feature for one of my favorite shows.  The Critic was created by Al Jean and Mike Reis of The Simpsons fame, a comedy team supreme. While I knew the two wrote for the simpsons, more on that iin a minute, I had no idea just how many classics the two churned out: There’s No Disgrace Like Home, Moaning LIsa, The Telltale Head, The Way We Was, Stark Raving Dad (Sadly tainted by it’s guest star being a horirble monster but that’s not their fault), Mr. Lisa Goes to Washington, the treehouse of horror segments The Bart Zone and Clown Without Pity (The second of which may be my favorite treehouse of horror segment), and later coming back to write the story for one of my all time favorites Round Springfield and to outright write the classic “SupercalfragalisticexpalliDOHcious”.  And to his credit Jean would later go on to write some classic post-golden age simpsons episodes during his tenure as producer: Lisa’s Sax, Mom and Pop Art, and Children of a Lesser Clod, which is notable if nothing else for this gag. 

So yeah the guys are legends and were right to start their own show under Simpsons producer James L Brooks over at ABC. The show followed the adventures of film Critic, Jay Sherman, a parody of film critics with high brow tastes, impossibly high standards, and a huge opinon of himself, having won the pultizer at least once.  Despite this he was also constnatly spat and shat on by society, divorced, lonely, depressed and eats like a thousand pigs combined in some horrific science accident. And given the last three parts describe me, as well as my profession of b eing a critic, naturally I love the guy and this show. I’ll get into his cast as we go as the first episode does an excellent job of introducing the entire cast so there’s no sense repeating myself.  But the show’s style I can and will talk about: It’s basically Golden Age, i.e. season’s 1-10, simpsons, but with more pop culture refrences and movie parodies, since the show would often feature multiple on Jay’s show coming Attractions and took place in the celebrity hot spot of new york and was a love letter to the city.. and sometimes a hate letter but only when those digs at the city would be funny, which to be fair depsite never having been to or lived in new york most really are. That’s the series key asset: while a LOT of the jokes haven’t aged well as a lot of the celbreity refrences are dated as are some of the movie parodies, most are hilarious wether you get what their making fun of or not and to me tha’ts a good parody: where knowing what their making fun of HELPS, but you can laugh regardless. The show had the charm and pace of the Simpsons while having it’s own unique style and cast that was just as charming and I love it dearly.  The show sadly only lasted two seasons, with ABC canceling it after one, and Brooks having it moved over to FOX, which was a good idea and lead to what’s probably my faviorite simpsons episode, a Star is Burns. Ironically despite you know, the show being created by two simpsons writers, backed by one of their producers and perfectly in line, creator Matt Groening was against the idea, publicly ranted about it to the press, and generally was an ass about it. Look I love the guy and even Brooks, Jean and Reiss were all nice enough in thier criticsim of the guy, but sitll very much understandably pissed off. .and i’m with them. 

It gave what’s again, my faviorite episode and what is not a “30 minute add” but an episode that easily stands on it’s own and also you know, pokes fun at itself for being a crossover a few times. You don’t need to see the critic to enjoy it, and episodes most iconic gags, Boo-Urns, Man Getting HIt by a Football, Senior Speilbergo, all don’t involve jay. And again the shows were not at all dismilar: While the critic was it’s own thing it still had the simpsons sense of humor and pacing so I saw it more as a petty rant against having a crossover in general more than a legit critcisim. Especially since Groening had no such complaints decades later with the family guy crossover after both shows had all tehir talent surgically removed and had the gall to NOT remove a cheap shot at Bob’s Burgers. And yes i’m still bitter about seeing that in a promo for the special, Bob’s Burgers is fantastic, to the point that now, in a fabulous case of history repeating itself, it’s got it’s OWN show like the critic made by talented former crew members using a similar but sitll throughly unique comedy style , The Great North. My point is that controversy pisses me off, and The Great North is spectacular go watch it while you read this. 

So yeah the Critic is awesome, me and Kev are both fans, and there are plenty of romantic episodes abound as the show digs into Jay’s love life quite a few times and has episodes about his son’s first love, his boss finding a wife towards the end of the series, his parents rekindling their spark and in what’s easily my faviorite episode, his sister dating a grunge rocker. So there was no shortage of choices but the choice made was brilliant.. and i’m not saying that because i’m being paid to, as my review of splatter phoenix’s first episode in darkwing duck and woops should show, paying me does not guarantee that I have to LIKE what your paying me to review. But here I did and he pointed out the first episode of each season, with season two being a soft reboot that while keeping the premise and supporting cast changed a few things around and added two new main characters, and both involve jay finding a new love intrest and intorduce a lot of the cast. I found him to be right, so where we are and after the cut i’ll dive into the good and bad of both episodes and see what changed inbetween seasons. 

That gag will make sense.. later. Right now it’s time for our very first episode, the show’s very first episode as you could probably tell by the title. 

Pilot:  The pilot starts with Jay getting touched up by his Makeup Person Doris. Jay is played by legendary comedian John Lovitz, who this show gave me a deep and lasting appreciation for. Lovitz was at the time best known for his 5 year long stint on SNL, and film wise is best known for Three Amigos, the Brave Little Toaster, The Wedding Singer and Rat Race. Sadly while I do geninely love the guy.. he has been in enough crap to destroy the New York Sewer system, as everyone needs money and sadly not everyone appricates the talents of John Lovitz like I do. 

So naturally he’s also been in The Stepford Wives remake, Grown Ups 2, The Ridiculous 6, Eight Crazy Nights, North, Benchwarmers and Benchwarmers 2: Breaking Balls. Yes that’s an actual movie, though it’s already better than the first one for virtue of not having Rob Schnider and David Spade starring in it despite.. that title. The irony is not lost on me that Lovitz has essentially made his money starring in the kinds of films Jay was forced to see for his job.  Still a VERY talented, very lovely man.

Before we get to our next voice actor up, no profile of Jon would be complete without mentioning that time he slammed Andy Dick’s face into a bar. To make a very long story short, Lovitz was friends with the late great Phil Hartman, who even did some voice work for this very show, whose wife who had severe drug and mental ilness killed them both. Phil had told Lovitz he saw Dick give his wife cocaine, so after Phil’s tragic murder when Lovitz and Dick ended up on the same show, Lovitz ended up exploding at the guy out of grief and blamed him for her death, but later apologized like a gentleman.  Living up to his name though Dick later went up to Lovitz at a restraunt Lovitz owned and said “I’m giving you the Phil Hartman curse, you die next”. Granted he was drunk but still...

Naturally Lovitz banned the guy and Lovitz later demanded an apology when the two ran into each other when they ran into each other at Lovitz regular gig at the comed store. Dick not only refused to apologize even when Lovitz put him against a wall, but said it was because “you blamed me for her death”... which was a decade ago with change by this point, the actions of a man GREIVING for his best friend whose wife’s relapse you caused which inadveradntly lead to her and her husband’s death, and something HE APOLOGIZED FOR. Naturally Lovitz took this how you would and did what we’d all like to do in general and broke the shit out of his face and only didn’t do more because they were seperated. IN short this man is a hero and I wil lbring up this story at every opportunity.  Doris was played by the late voice actress Doris Grau, a script supervisor who worked on a LOT of films as one , the most notable I could find on wikipedia being Clue. This is a fact I just learned today but boy if it isn’t neat. Grau mostly did aditional voices for shows, most notably Ducktales and the Simpsons, where she played Lunchlady Doris, and of course this show. Still she seemed like a very funny and talented woman and it’s sad she’s gone.  The two start the series mostly sniping at each other and while that never ENTIRELY goes away, Doris gets more supportive after a spotlight episode where she and Jay bond and Jay thinks she might be his mom. And while she’s not this surprisingly sticks and for the rest of the series while still not above making potshots at him on occasion, she’s far more supportive. She also informs him she’s out of spray on hair “I’m bald and ugly, get more!”. This show is naturally comedy gold and a lot of it relies on Lovitz sense of timing, though the rest of the cast aren’t slouches but we’ll get to them as we go.  She ends up putting a hat over him and we get our first film parody, Rabbi PI starring Anuld, which is alright. Not one of the series best but passable and gets the gimmick of having film parodies on jay’s show across, which was a nice way to set it apart from the Simpsons. Jay reviews it on the Shermometor, a gimmick jay hates and that disappeared by season 2, giving it a bellow zero to the ire of his boss Duke Phillips.  Duke is one of the best parts of the show, an unhinged southren billlonare who was a modeled after Ted Turner, down to the mustache, who built up his fried chicken franchise into a multimedia congrlomorate and is also mildly nuts, though that part would be more of a thing in season 2. In season 1, he’s mostly there to make Jay’s life hell, with about half of the seasons episodes having him either fire jay or put his job in jeapordy versus 2 the next season. He’s still not unfunny, but most of his best stuff is in season 2 when Charles Napier’s allowed to cut loose a little more and the character wasn’t shoehorned into just being a clueless executive.  Charles Napier is a longtime character actor who showed up in TONS of films and tv shows too many to list.. and trust me with some of the lists of credits before and after this that’s saying something, his biggest voice rolls being in this series and Men and Black the Series as Zed. But needless to say he was ALWAYS this awesome and sadly passed in 2011.  Jay’s guest for the day is Valerie Fox, an up and coming actress whose first film kiss of death is coming out soon.. and whose age is an engima and it’s only a problem because if she’s 20, like the episode mildly suggests giving her starting career and her voice actress being that age, then this gets really gross as jay is 17 years older than her then. But given she looks older than that and sounds certainly older than that, i’m going more with 30, since she looks more like it, and sharon stone, who she’s mildly based on given she stars in a basic instinct knockoff and does the leg thing, was 32 at the time of basic instinct.  Valerie is voiced by Jennifer Lien, aka Kes from star trek voyager who I only know about because of reviews done by SF Debris and Allison Pregler. She was the childlike love intrest of Nelix, the ship’s resident pain in the audience asses who made them BEG for early seasons wesley crusher and who once, and I saw footage this wasn’t SF Debris exagreated, lunged at a crewmate in a jealous rage, unfounded by the way since Tom was AVOIDING kes depsite being attracted to her as he just wnated her to be happy and to not mess up her relationshpi, and screamed “i’ll kill you!”. Point is she hasn’t had a huge career, but was still worth noting and does a fantastic job here. Again I did not realize she was that young at the time by her voice, and that means she did a great job. 

So Jay’s smitten with her, finds her super attractive and she asks him out.. but to the show’s credit, and Jay’s he does try to rebuff her because he knows ther’es a conflict of intrest there.. but ends up giving in. However at least the show not only is upfront that there’s an issue here but that ends up being the thrust of the last act. Granted there’s still some.. questionable stuff like when she does the basic instinct leg cross and he says “can we get a shot of that”, which no.. Jay.. no you can’t. Ewwww. Seen far worse, like It’s Pat, which was a VERY real SNL sketch about people trying to guess the titular pat’s gender because that’s not creepy or invasive even for the time. And they made a movie out of it because Wayne’s World was popular forgetting that Wayne’s World, one of my faviorite movies by the way and one I need to cover here sometime this year now the thought’s occured to me, was a labor of love, with a talented director and actual ideas from it’s two leads who actually fleshed out the character versus a concept that was NEVER funny to begin with and has gotten down right horrifying with age. And wasn’t I talking about the Critic? Not the abusive jackass mind you, Jay Sherman. 

Ah yes so Jay takes Valerie to a date at Lane Riche, the rich jackass where we meet Vlada, a vaugely european man whose your typical hollywood suckup. As Jay puts it in a later episode  Vlada: I love you too Jay: You only love my money Vlada: That’s true but it is a love that will never die.  He also naturally scoots Jay to a less nice table in the Critic’s section once Conan O’Brian shows up... which WAS supposed to be a different kind of joke, as at the time Conan was just a writer on the simpsons and SNL, but now given he has a decades long career in late night and famously said fuck you to NBC during that whole Tonight Show debacle, which netted him his own show on TBS, it comes off more as the kind of self deprciating gag Conan makes about himself. So in other words it’s actually funnier now? 

As for the critic’s section that’s a part of the series I’ve neglected to talk about so let’s do that: The kind of critic Jay is, one who plays clips of the movie and reviews them.. on television. And were usually academics who looked down on popular film, the kind Siskel and Ebert popularized, and both suprisingly had a huge guest apperance in season 2 and even reviewed the show on their show. This kind of film criticism just dosen’t exist on tv that i’m aware of anymore, and mostly lives on with internet reviewers , many of whom were inspiried by critics like this, and who range from acadmeics to average joes to some mixture of both. It never went away just simply went to a younger generation. Some of which squandred it and somehow still have a career like certain abusuive jackasses i’ve mentioned enough with that one gag a few paragraphs ago. Point is it’s a much more varied and different game now so the critic ended up as one of those shows or movies where the main characters very job feels like an artifact of it’s time, like our heroes in Wayne’s World hosting a public acess show, when nowadays they’d just put it up on youtube or the entire idea of a UHF station in well.. UHF. It’s not a BAD thing, just something to note. 

But the date goes well as Valerie shows she’s really into jay and even takes him oggling her in stride, though we do get an utter classic of a gag when Jay says something about women being drawn to him.. and cue an old woman asking to rub his nonexistant hump for luck “You hunchbacks are all alike”. She does so anyway to his understandable annoyance. 

But the two go back to Jay’s place, talk about his acomplishments including a pulitzer and then well.. the obvious happens they go to bed together and the next day after Valerie is horrified at his just woke up fac,e he gives her an easy out but she’s fine with it. It honestly shows just how low the poor guy’s self esteem is that he just.. assumes a woman will regret having slept with hima nd walk out and while played for laughs it really gives a clear look into Jay’s mental state: He’s so full of self loathing, not helped by the world being out to get him, that it’s really oddly endearing. And VERY releatable.  The two are interupted by Jay’s son Marty. Marty is played by the very recognizable and very wonderful Christine Cavanagh, who sadly passed away in 2014. She voiced Chuckie Finster, Gosalyn Mallard, Oblina, Dexter from Dexter’s Lab and the titular pig from Babe. She decided to retire in 2001, so while her career was only about a decade she made quite the impact and is sorely missed. Unsuprisingly her usual voice is perfect for the very awkward Marty, who Jay asks to tell eveyrone about the beautiful woman in his bed especially his unfaithful and utterly loathsome ex wife ardith. 

This scene demonstrates two problems. The first is just the pilot as Jay’s kind of sleazy. While Jay being thirsty wouldn’t go away, especially in the episode Lady Hawke, it’d be made more awkwardly endearing. Here there are moments of him just plain being creepy like the aformentioned oggling, which while not bad in itself, if a bit awkawrd, also has him creepily muttering to himself while doing so which removes any charm or relatability and just sends it straight into needing 10 showers just to wash this scene off. The rest of the series would just turn him into a bit desperate at worst.  It also explains why the only other romantic story the guy has in the season is a pastiche of misery. Thanfully this would be GREATLY adjusted next season but we’ll get to that. 

The other problem is just the tone... we get a good half a minute of Marty talking about how he calls Ardith’s boyfriend “Uncle Al” because he likes him a lot.. to his dad’s face. And granted his dad is being creeptastic this episode but the early episodes just pile on the Jay hatred by the world a bit thick, to the point one episode puts him as “worse than hitler”. Granted the audience is full of idiot teens who have no idea who hitler is, and the gag is kinda funny, but it makes my point: Jay is just utterly shat on by the world, and while he does get a few wins, most are undercut by something awful and it gets taxing sometimes. The guy is just too loveably pathetic to hate, too relatable even as a teen and not snobish enough to be really loathsome or WANT to see him knocked down by the world. It’s not overwhelming enough to ruin the first season, it still has good episodes but this episode does highlight a LOT of these problems.  He does get to spend the day with val though, dancing outside the trump buliding, seriously even back then he was a joke and his lack of money half the time was well known.. how did the last four years happen, and they tell each other they love each other. I’d aww if I didn’t know how this ended.  So jay relates the good news of how he feels to his best friend, Jeremy Hawke, played by Maurice LaMarche. LaMarche is one of the most talented voice actors alive, a master of impersonations paticuarlly orson welles, who was naturally brought on board because they knew they were going to need a lot of celebrity voices for the film parodies and needed one or two guys to do them to keep it cheap. The guy is like most of this cast a legend in the industry, having voiced the Brain, Squit, Dizzy Devil, the Human Ton, Big Bob Pataki, Egon Spengler, Sleet,  Kiff Kroker, Headless Body of Agnew, Morbo, Various other Futurama characters because that list is long, Mortimer Mouse, Blue Falcone, Father, Yosemite Sam, Vincent Van Ghoul, Doctor Doom, Abradolf Lincler, and Odval. Point is the guy has been engranged in my childhood and adulthood and will probably even after he’s gone come back from the grave to do some voices. He even got the part of Jeremy Hawke here because he happened to do a REALLY good australian accent depsite not being australian. Jeremey was a combination of paul hogan, the star of the Crocodile Dundee movies and at the time sex symbol and at this time known anti semite Mel Gibson. Obviously neither of those refrences has aged paticuarlly well, but since hollywood ALWAYS has room for a super hunk from australia, just ask Chris Hemsworth or before him Hugh Jackman, the character still works and his breakout role, Crocodile Ghandi is so ludcrious it works. I.e. a white australian man playing the mahtma and saying before he brings peace “First a tasteful shot of my bum for the ladies. Jeremy, while sometimes increidbly oblvious, is still a fairly nice easygoing guy and an extremley loveable character. And whie Jay worries about Valrie meeting him because he’s sex on a cracker she ignores him and jay gloats for a bit, paticuarlly with the great bit “take your genatalia right back to australia”. And while Jeremy’s happy for him he tries to reign Jay in when Jay talks asking her to marry him.  As Jeremy later relates on Jay’s fire escape “Bubala, i’ve learned there’s two things you should never do: Marry an actress and wear blackface to the naacp image awards. Two things I found out the hard way. “

So Jay takes her to meet his parents and finds out he’s adopted.. and their also rich. Jay’s waspy parents are his cold and overly honest mother Elanor, played by  Judith Ivey, his kooky dad and THE best part of the series Franklin played by Gerrit Grahm and his loving and free spirited teenager sister Margo played by Nancy Cartwright.  Okay (cracks knuckles) here. we. go. Judith Ivey is a tony wining stage actress and has also directed numerous plays and is mostly known for her stage work but I know her from Designing Women where she played BJ in the last season. Garret Grahm apparently shows up in a lot of brian depalma movies, including Beef in phantom of the paradise, a lot of tv work and to my shock the asshole dad from Child’s Play 2. Another thing I genuinely love I wasn’t aware an actor or actress from this series had a part in.  Finally there’s Nancy Cartwright, who you DEFINTELY know from the Simpsons, where she plays Bart, along with Nelson, Ralph, Kearny, Database, and Maggie, and Kearny. Other credits include Pistol Pete, Mindy from Animaniacs, Chuckie Finster picking up for Christine Cavanagh ironically enough, Lu and Rufus from Kim Possible. She’s a talented lady and i’m glad sh’es still around. Whew. 

Okay so yeah I do love the shermans and fraknlin is again easily the best part of an already excellent series and unlike Duke that’s in full display here, with him saying, when his wife mentions they were going to give jay back at one time, “Son if I’ve said it once I said it a thousand times.. who are all you people. “ and he’d only get better. Sadly he’s NOT in sherman woman and child. Our loss really. But he’s in pretty much every other episode of season 2 thankfully and most of this season so eh, fair trade off. Also we get the classic line, after Jay says he’ll love valrie even when he’s decaying in the ground, his mom quips “Cna’t we go one meal without talking about your rotting corpse?” Though Eleanor understandably thinks Valarie is using jay for a good review. Margo suspects her of the same and takes her on a horse ride, though all she can gleam is that Val genuielly loves jay and welcomes her to the family.  Jay however does decide to duck out of the inteview by faking sick, which leads to a really sweet moment where Valerie visits him and they dance, in a hilaroius but oddly sweet parody of Beauty and the Beast, Beauty and King Dork. Despite the title and the song insluting him a LOT it’s still just endearing. This is a problem but we’ll get to in just a moment WHY all these touching moments are a problem.  So naturally things don’t go that well for Jay as Duke has a tape of the film sent to him “My shrink was right: GOd does hate me!”

Naturally kiss of death is bad and valrie is bad in it and Jay is left uncertain what to do, but eventually decides he has to do what he feels is right,.. though he does take a picture of her while she’s sleeping. “In case you do leave”

So in a tender and heartbreaking moment Jay is honest, the movie does suck and she’s not good but he does compliment her, for her personality not her body despite his skeevy behavior and say she could get better. Instead when he arrives home.. she dumps him to his face and leaves never to be seeen again while he assumes she’ll come back. And that’s the issue it’s GENUINELY hard to tell if we’re supposed to side with Jay. On one hand he genuinely loves her and does the right thing and on the oth er he’s kinda creepy. It’s a mixed tone that just sorta hurts thing and something the series DID fix after this, as it found a better ballance of the guy being pitable while also still being an ass and ONLY usually being punished when he does something actually wrong, the only exception being Dial M for MOther which is easily the weakest episode of the series. The episode does close on a really funny moment as Jay’s dispondent because “I’m sitting on top of a volcano of rage and I don’t knwo where to direct it”. Marty mentions a new Sylvester Stallone movie where “He plays a concert pianst who” And jay dosen’t even need the rest of that to shout “To the multiplex!” The man is back

Final Thoughts for Pilot: This episode is not bad. It has it’s flaws as I said, mostly in tone, but the series would iron that out and it’s still a great pilot that organically introduces the entire main cast in one episode and really gives us the full idea of who Jay Sherman is. It’s also REALLY funny, as the series should be and it would get better, but i’d still put it over some more awkward first episode like Letterkenny’s “No Reaosn to Get Excited”, even with it’s brilliant ending or Bojack Horseman’s first episode  whose title is way too long to put here in an article that’s already long as hell about about to get longer. But like those series this pilot worked pass the awkwardness and the result is a damn good series. but if you want a better idea of what it became.. wellllllll

Sherman, Woman and Child: So yeah as you can tell JSUT by contrasting images a few things were changed up between seasons, part of it at network instance. The designs were softened , the color palette was brightened with jay being the most noticably alterted between seasons. 

The execs wanted jay a bit warmer, so his face was given wider more expressive eyes and was also scrucnehd down a bit. He was also made slightly less of a jackass, with his elitisim toned down a bit and his creepeir moments gone. For instance he no longer had a split personality/imaginary secretary named ethel. That was actually a thing. It didn’t even really change Jay as a person, this very episode mentions him not liking the Lion King, and he’s still snooty, he’s jusst not as punchable about it and that was for the best.  But the cringe comedy in general was taken down a peg and replaced with more fun weirdness, which wihle present in season 1 really pops more here, especially with Jay’s dad who sadly dosen’t show up in this episode, but at various points dresses up like El Kabong, puts on the mask from the mask (”He did the same thing at Nixon’s funeral”), and blows up famous works of art while babysitting. But yeah things get a bit more surreal like the simpsons from season 4 onward, ironically enough given these guys left to make their own show, and it’s to the show’s benefit. 

But besides a lighter tone, they also wanted two things to hook viewers in: A permenant love intrest for Jay, and an adorable kid character. The former.. was acutlaly quite resonable, as i’td both give jay a “win” as it were, allow the cast to have another femlae character and give him someone else to confide in besides Doris or Jeremy, to give those characters a break. The other was less so and we’ll get into why when we meet her. 

This episode really is a second pilot, reintroducing about half of the main cast. Marty, Elanor, Margo and as I said Franklin are all absent. But their reintroduced soon enough with the fourth episode in both broadcast and dvd order, and my personal faviorite “A Song for Margo, is entirely focused on Jay’s parents and sister, while Lady Hawke has marty breifly at the start for broadcast order and he’s in the frmaing device for Sherman of Arabia in dvd order. So the characters all get a proper reintroduction to new audiences, but it was the right call to NOT shove them into this one, still introducing new people to the new cast, but letting the two new additions to it breathe and get properly intergrated into this universe.. well more Alice than Penny but we’ll get to that. It’s part of why, besides the genuine extra coat of polish aand seasonal changes I feel this is the better episode. 

So we open with Jay on his show and two parodies in a row. The first is a few good men but with Jack Nichelson making fun of Christan Slater for sounding like him even though. they honestly aren’t too similar other than both doing that pause thing a bit. So yeah not their best but the second segment makes up for it “The Nightmare Before Channukah” a parody of the nightmare before christmas that was so beautifully animated and funny, that they actually bumped it up to the season premiere.  But while the parodies are good Jay’s show is once again, this happened a LOT in season one, in jeapordy, being beaten by the Benedictine monk variety hour. Which while the Bendictine Monks are VERY much an artifact of the 90′s a choir of monks that somehow went mainstream, the whole segment is so absurd and wonderful it stands on it’s own and is still funny to me in 2021. Duke comes in anda fter trying to softball things shows the change I mentioned: He’s actually sorry the show is in danger and is genuinely sincere that he’s sad he’ll probably have to cancel it versus season 1 where he was ready to cancel it what felt like every other episode. And I prefer this, where he can still mess with jay or flex his power over him, but is more cordial with the guy and it allows more jokes between the two. 

So Jay’s not doing so good.. and during his crappy day he spots a 30 something woman and her young daughter struggling in the rain and stops his cab to help. And gets maced for it “MMM, Jalapeno”. Though Alice does apologize and Jay does understand as it is New York and she graciously takes the offer. It’s in the cab their properly introduced. Aliice thompkins and her daughter penny who in a great bit punches jay in the nose for not liking the lion king (”rex reed did the same thing”) and then kissing him on the nose in apology (”Rex did that too” And he acompanies them in.. and also gets conked on the head by a potted plant and put in a materinity dress. 

So we get to know Alice and what her deal is: Alice was once married to and supported the career of country star Cyrus Thompkins who was.. less than subtle in his music about how faithful he was

Easily one of my favorite gags of the series if in part for Pat Overall’s delivery. So she moved from Knoxville to New York to prove to her daughter a woman can make it on her own, and proves she’s smart, talented and driven she just needs a break. She seemingly gets one in a man in a bright white outfit who says “this is your ticket out of this rundown flophouse” only for him to cheerfully exclaim “Your being evicted!”... PFFFTT. Cue where the commerical would be

So during this lull in the action let’s talk about Alice and Penny’s voice actresses: Alice is voiced by Park Overall, though for some weird reason I thought she was voiced by Hollly Hunter. Dunno why. Park is an outspoken liberal, supporting my boy bernie sanders in 2016 and in general seems like a fascenating lady. Naturally like with Jay’s parents I know her from something more oddly specific, the sitcom Reba, as I did not realize she voiced alice depsite using a similar voice for her character there, Reba’s best friend Lori Ann.. And while Park TRIED her best.. the character didn’t work out: a combination of it being simply funnier that barbra jean tried to wedge herself into the roll and the fact Reba really didn’t need a horny abrasive sidekick meant the charcter had a very short shelf life and the audience had very low patience for her.  I did like her constnatly insulting Brock as he was not a good person andi t was nice SOMEONE besides Reba actually got to roast him on a regular basis. 

Penny was voiced by the one and only Russi Taylor, who sadly passed in 2019. She voiced Huey Dewey and Louie, Webby Vanderquack, Minnie Mouse, Fantasma, the imcomprable martin prince...

Among tons of smaller rolls. She’s sadly missed. We’ll get more into what they add or subtract from the show in a minute, as the next day at work Jay wonders how to help, though Duke’s interjection gives us two great gags: his “30 second workout” which involvees throwing jay around like a medicine ball and.. well this. 

The man is a legend for a reason. He earned that golden statue. So Jay TRIES slipping alice the money only to give it “To my good friend crazy postman”, and Alice refuses the money due to pride.. even if you know, she has a small child and new york is expensive but Jay finds a better solution, hire her.. even if it’d make it impossible for them to date. For all of one episode. What keeps the power dynamics from feeling EUGUUUUGGHH here is that Jay treats alice like an equal partner at work and dosen’t let their relationship really impact things outside of one episode, and dosen’t use his position to get into a relationship with her nor does she use being responsible for a turn in his fortune for hers. 

And yes turn in fortune, as a makeover and a change of attidue under Alice’s direction, which is utterly amazing to watch and wow’s duke and hte audience, wins back his fans and his job is secure. Duke meets alice and we get more great duke stuff. including something truly iconic...

I want bears who sing for me, doo dah, doo dah. But yeah things are well though Jay ends up admitting to Jeremy he can’t stop thinking about her “Her merest smile is like pedals of the empreror’s bathwater, BATHWATER I TELL YOU BATHWATER. “ So Jeremey encourages him carpe canum “Seize the dog”. He does so.. and the day but instead finds Alice with her ex Cyrus whose trying to win her back. Wuh oh.  Once the asshole leaves, and agrees to give her the night to think, Alice admits the only reason she’s considering it is she has a weakness: his singing melts her like butter on a bagle (”God i’ve been in new york too long”. )  Jay tries to talk her out of it at the critics meeting for “Dennis the Meance II Society” which involves Dennis pulling a drivebye on mr wilson.. why wasn’t this the second live action dennis the meance movie? WHY I ASK YOU. But Jay gets a good idea, as Alice TRIES to tell the asshole to get to stepping (And to see penny often, she’s not a monster), he works his evil song magic.. only for Jay to undercut it with his own amazing song on acordian. “Cyrus is just a virus, he wants to tie you down while your still young. Your potetial, is what’s essential, you could someday be another connie chung!” And that ultiamtely shows WHY jay is the better man. He just wants what’s best for her and dosen’t care if it’s him, he just wants it not to be THIS asshole. He’s not even trying to win her over, which a lot of these gestures creepily lead to. He just wants to help her be who she’s MEANT to be. And that’s why this works better: Instead of a fake relationship built on lust and someone conning the other person, it’s a real one built on genuine chemistry. Also Alice you know dosen’t just.. vanish after an episode but is a permenant part of the cast. I mean she does for the webisodes but we don’t talk about those. 

So our hero undercuts Cyrus one more time  Cyrus: “Loverrrr, without you there’s no other” Jay: Give him a chance he’ll do your mother....

I mean he’s not worng, So Cyus is sent packing and we get a nice romantic moment between the two. 

Final Thoguhts: Sherman, Woman and Child This one is truly excellent. It relaunchs the show on all cyllanders. And frankly Alice was a fine addition to the cast: her own fully fleshed out woman with her own personality outside of jay, who was tough, smart and a good counterpoint and confidant to Jay and it felt like she’d always fit. Penny on the other hand, apologizes to the late Russi Taylor who tries her best, just dosen’t work and feels ultra cloying and out of place in the series and unspurisingly is barely used after this. But overall a better pilot than the actual pilot was already pretty good and a fine pair of episodes. Check em out whenever the series eithe rgets on a streaming platform or pops back up on youtube as Sony’s struck it down... despite not putting it up anywhere i’m aware of. Seriously sell it to HBO Max or Disney I want a reboot. But for now this series is awesome check it out and until the next rainbow, it’s been a pleasure. 

[jace-todd]

Hahaha I wrote a todoshin story. @bakushinsquad newest post. Yeah here's my crappy story.

Really, he knew that something like this was bound to happen. He had heard all about Endeavor’s shitty behavior towards his family from late nights with Shouto, the other curled up around him, tears still spilling down his face from a nightmare. He’s heard of all the times that Endeavor was too hard on Shouto or his brother, Touya, who had been considered dead for a while now. He had heard all about the quirk marriage, about what his mother had done to him, about where his mother was currently. He had heard about how Shouto’s sister, Fuyumi, was the only one who had a semi-decent relationship with their father. He had heard about Shouto’s brother, Natsuo, was the most aggressive towards their father, having outright arguments and being downright petty.

Shinsou knew it all, having gained Shouto’s trust after the many nights he comforted the dual-quirked boy after nightmares. Shouto had seemed to let it all out after hearing about one of Shinsou’s bad exploits with a father figure in his life. And for that, Shinsou would always have a sense of protectiveness over the kid.

Growing up, Shinsou was almost always the one protecting others. From bullies, teachers, foster parents, and even himself. It was second nature to him, something he didn’t even think twice about despite his usual think before you act attitude. When it came to saving others, he wouldn’t think twice about his own health, which had gotten him plenty of injuries and a decent number of scars.

Maybe it stemmed from trying to make up for all of the wrongs he had never done but everyone thought he’s done. Maybe it stemmed from his heroic desire, the longing in him to help people because no one deserves to go through what he’s going through, or has gone through. Or maybe it stemmed from something else, from his own stupid belief that maybe he deserved it. Deserved the pain that came from jumping in front of his little siblings when their foster father or mother raised their hands or moving them out of the way before a quirk hit.

He knew that ever since Shouto had confided in him that if Endeavor ever showed his face and intended to hurt Shouto, he would get in the way. Shouto didn’t deserve the pain from his father, no one did. And there was no way in hell, Shinsou was going to let Endeavor hurt him anymore.

And as expected, when it finally happened, he did jump in front of Shouto.

They had been working on hand-to-hand combat, Shouto paired against Uraraka, while Shinsou had been paired against Kaminari. It wasn’t a fair fight, but then again no one would’ve had a fair fight against him, other than maybe Ojiro, but they weren’t paired together after an incident. Shinsou had been taught to fight hand-to-hand since he was a kid, his criminal parents wanting him to know how to stand his ground, while the fights in the streets had wanted to underdog to win the fighting rings when he was 11. Shinsou had just wiped the floor with Kaminari again when the figure descended onto campus.

 

Shouto had gone stiff, arms falling to his side, and eyes watching his father land and start his walk towards Shouto. Aizawa hadn’t been paying attention, his back to the commotion, trying to deal with Bakugou and Midoriya who were arguing again. The rest of the class either continued fighting, glancing occasionally over, or stopped altogether.

Shinsou had helped Kaminari back up before starting his way over. He couldn’t tell what was being said between the duo, but he could tell that whatever Shouto was saying wasn’t pleasing his father. Endeavor was progressively getting angrier, his voice rising some, enough so that Shinsou could start to hear him, but blocked out the voice when he saw Endeavor start to raise his hand.

Logically, he knew that Endeavor wouldn’t hit Shouto in a public setting, especially not in front of heroes to come who had a decent amount of sway already, and another hero who was also respected. But that protective feeling consumed him and Shinsou using the capture device around his neck to swing closer, using a tree to swing around the rest of the way and land perfectly in front of Shouto.

Both Todoroki’s seemed surprised to see the hero student drop down between them, the conversation stopping. Shouto lifted a hand to rest on Shinsou’s shoulder, pushing some, “Hi-Shinsou, what are you doing?” He could hear Shouto’s own protective-instinct kicking in but ignored it as he stared directly into Endeavor’s eyes.

“Todoroki go get Aizawa. I’m going to have a talk with your father.” Shinsou held his ground, still holding the capture device at the ready.

Shinsou could hear Shouto begin to argue, but when he glanced behind him, his eyes soften and he gave a small smile, “Please.”

Reluctantly, Shouto let go of Shinsou’s shoulder, backing up before racing towards where Aizawa was holding Bakugou with the capture device, the blond acting feral again. Shinsou followed him with his eyes before turning back to the adult in front of him, finding a comfort in the fact that he was only a few inches shorter than the hero since his latest growth spurt.

Endeavor looked piss, and Shinsou wondered if there was steam coming out of his ears. Shinsou held his own ground as Endeavor lowered his arms to cross them over his chest. Just as Endeavor was about to speak, a word already leaving him, Shinsou cut him off.

“Don’t say anything. You’re going to listen to him, Mr. Number-One-Hero. You’re a shit person, father, and husband, forcing a woman to marry you to have kids that would be strong, then taking the childhood away from those kids. You isolated them from one another, trained them to exhaustion, traumatizing all of them. When your wife had a meltdown, you set her into a mental institution, because you know you couldn’t control her anymore and she hurt your masterpiece. But your masterpiece is a kid, was a kid when she hurt him. You never treated him like a kid. You only care about being famous, about being adored, about the money and title. He’s an emotionally screwed kid, estranged from reality and his siblings, because of you.

“You can’t afford a scandal, so you made sure that Shouto wouldn’t speak up about it. You got the cops to admit that Touya was assumed dead after just a day. You keep Natsuo silent, pulling the card of your connections of knowing the boss of his school. You are kind to Fuyumi, maybe because if Shouto does turn into your definition of a failure, you’re hoping you can turn her into a hero. Yeah, I know what her quirk is. You still try to control your kids, control Shouto and what he wants to do now.”

Shinsou channeled all he could remember from how his father acted when dealing with subordinates, the strength and firmness in his voice, the pure anger in his eyes. He was tired of Endeavor’s shit, and he knew that someone else needed to put Endeavor in his place alongside the siblings, someone who may not have hero connections, but had villain connections. He hated having the connections that he did have, but at times like this… he wouldn’t be afraid of pulling some of those strings and get Endeavor into more trouble.

“Here’s what’s going to happen, Endeavor. You’re going to keep your distance from your kids, you’re going to leave Fuyumi to her job, you’re going to stop holding Natsuo’s education as a hostage, and you’re going to let Shouto be who he wants to be. Or so help me, I’ll expose everything about you, Endeavor. I may just be a second-year hero in training, but I’m not afraid to lose everything I’ve worked for to get your ass thrown in jail. Leave, Endeavor. You’re unwelcome here.”

Endeavor looked beyond angry now, lifting a flaming hand out to Shinsou, as if to get him to shut up or get rid of his anger. “Who the hell do you think you are, speaking to me like that?”

Shinsou smirked, “I’m Shinsou Hitoshi, nice to meet you.”

Behind him, he could hear some laughter, meaning that they had a crowd watching him. He could sense Aizawa’s presence behind him, along with Shouto’s. Aizawa looked between the two, before facing Endeavor.

“He’s right, Endeavor. You’re not welcome here without valid reason to be. Take your leave. Now.” Aizawa’s voice was firm, quirk activated and the fire around Endeavor faded.

As expected, Endeavor opened his mouth to argue back but realizing that all the kids seemed to be against him, that Aizawa was prepared to fight him, that he had lost this battle. He stepped back, anger still clear in his eyes. He searched the ground for his son, finding him already standing next to the purple kid who had gone after him.

“This isn’t over, Shouto. You’ll realize you need me, that my quirk is the better.”

Shouto shook his head, “No, father. It’s over. I’m done with you.”

With that, Endeavor took his leave, scorch marks filling the ground as he flew off. Shinsou was still tense as the rest of the kids stood around. They were all making sure Shouto was okay, praising the other for telling him no, etc. Shinsou was still standing tall, staring at Endeavor’s retreating figure. Aizawa’s hand found its way to his shoulder, startling from his trance.

Aizawa gave him a soft smile, “I’m proud of you, Shinsou, for sticking it to Endeavor and for protecting your friend.”

Shinsou gave him a smile, turning back to where Shouto was being embraced by the Dekusquad. Shouto peered over Iida’s shoulder, their eyes connecting for a moment, but that was all it took for Shouto to mouth ‘thank you’ at him before Shinsou looked away.

The rest of class got canceled, with Aizawa sending the students back to the dorm so he could deal with Endeavor’s appearance. Shinsou had hung back to catch his breath, everything that had just happened setting in like it always did.

He had thought he was alone when he slumped against the tree, pulling his legs to his chest, and laying his head against them, eyes sliding close. But when a hand fell to his hair, he was proven wrong. The familiar warm hand kept him from tensing though, only leaning more into the hold as he lifted his head to look at his boyfriend.

Shouto was kneeling in front of Shinsou’s spot, a smile on his face. The younger boy looked more at ease than he ever had after a visit from his father, which made Shinsou immensely happy. Shinsou lowered his legs, sitting cross-legged as he waited for Shouto to do something. And something he did, as the minute Shouto removed his hand from Shinsou’s hair, he launched onto the taller, hugging him tightly.

Shinsou’s arms came around Shouto’s waist, hugging him back. They sat like that for a while, Shouto in his lap, arms around one another, enjoying the other’s presence, before Shouto pulled away.

Shinsou flinched when Shouto flicked his forehead, “That was really stupid, Hitoshi. Something could’ve happened. He could’ve hurt you. My father has a short temper sometimes, especially when people challenge him like that. Never do that again.” Then he surged forward and kissed Hitoshi softly, causing the other to chuckle. “Also thank you, that was very sweet of you to protect me like that even though you know damn well I can hold my own.”

Shinsou placed his forehead against Shouto’s, staring into the mix-matching eyes. “I’d take a hit for you, any day, Shouto. Plus, someone had to stand up to him. I was tired of him being a little prick. Someone needed to put him into his place.” There was a pause before Shinsou looked away. “I didn’t want you to get hurt by him again.”

Shouto pressed another kiss to his lips, earning a content hum from the other, before pulling away. “I would take a hit for you, as well, Hitoshi. You’re lucky I love you so much.”

Shinsou beamed at the declaration, holding him closer. “I love you, too, Shouto. And I meant when I said, if he bothers you or your family like that again, let me know. I’ll make his life a living hell.”

Laughter from the other filled the area as Shouto rearranged so the two could lean fully against the tree. Things weren’t okay, but they were getting better. It was more bearable with the other by their side. With interlaced hands, Shinsou knew that Shouto would be okay from now on, that the other was reassured that he wasn’t alone anymore in this fight against his father. Now he had some friends and a boyfriend to fight with him. 

[monkey-network]

My Issues with Butch Hartman

Call this the sequel to my post on Mr. Enter. But honestly compared to Enter, Butch Hartman has made himself look far worse in so little time. Not only with how he uses his influence, but he basically showed his true colors not long after he left Nickelodeon. With Enter, the worst you can say about him is his opinions on media and his politics. With Hartman, there is a surprisingly lot more under his belt that made the hate towards him .

To preface this, while I’m gonna shit on this dude, I’m not shaming anyone who still likes his past content. With that said, bibbity Boppity boopity. Let’s look at the fucking scoopity.

The Telltale Oaxis

This really takes the cake as the scummiest thing Butch has done. Words and opinions can be one thing, but using your platform to basically trick some people out of their money for a project you abandoned for the most part grinds me gears a lot more. As bad as his marketing strategy was, at least Enter provided effort in his indiegogo project beforehand for god’s sake. Oaxis is one of the most pitiable crowdfunded projects I’ve seen.

It’s nearly two years since Butch got Oaxis funded and what have gotten beyond pure dead silence. Nearly two years and little to no significant updates for Oaxis’s Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, his Youtube, or the site’s official account. No wait, that last part’s kind of a lie. They had monthly updates on the official site up until September 2019. Could’ve posted this on their social medias but you take what you can get. 

The major takeaway from the updates, in all fairness, was that the kickstarter wasn’t enough and they still need to raise more funds for the service. The “capital-building” stage he calls it where he’s looking for more investors in addition to getting actual programs onto the service. That and Oaxis is a big vision for Butch and his wife in spite of not only giving up the monthly updates and basically secluding any mention of Oaxis from any place else. That’s basically it and I legit feel sorry for everyone that couldn’t get their refund back.

This isn’t HBO Max or Disney+ where you just expect them to have something together after their initial announcement because they’re already media conglomerates, this is an independent project. One that people, your fans included Butch, put over 200K thinking you would at least give people something. But beyond a “sizzle reel” that said nothing aside from Oaxis going to be a thing, you have presented jack after two years. I don’t expect the ins and outs of every business meeting with executives, but staying silent about everything except for monthly newsletters that offer very little encouraging progress and hasn’t updated since September of last year is not a good sign. And I’m especially hard on this topic, Butch, because this is the biggest point where it is seriously hard to trust you. It’s not criticizing your ego when after having too many cracks in your story, you really haven’t put your money where your mouth is.

I don’t wanna presume the guy’s given up on it, hoping everybody would forget it after a while, but he’s really put the effort in to make Oaxis feel like a afterthought. I’m not an expert in business, but even I can believe that after his non-apology for not being upfront with his initial intentions, that he’d try to provide updates on the project to not come off as the scam artist people have accused him as. Even with his Youtube channel that I’ll get to later, I don’t think it’s hard consistently posting about your so called vision if you have that much faith in its success. You’ve already gotten thousands of bucks initially with the crowdfund, people deserve more than your pitiful wishful platitudes and I unfortunately can’t believe you’ll have anything after a few years. It’s not that everyone forgot about it, but you mostly took the money and ran. If Butch pops up with something if he sees this somehow, I’ll eat that crow, but I sincerely doubt it after this long. Like at least post something on the Twitter, I get depressed just looking at it; that account is the textbook definition of famine.

The Childhood Reposter

I’ve brought up Butch’s youtube channel a couple times, and it’s when every time I look at it, it’s a little sad. When it comes to major creators, I typically think that after finishing their projects they’d move to newer things. People like Lauren Faust, Mike Judge, CH Greenblatt are all continuing to make new works under differing studios while new creators are getting the spotlight. Butch though? I mean, he has a new cartoon that I swear you’ve never heard about but other than that, the dude looks like he has little to say for himself nowadays beyond the 2 shows he’s famous for, Fairly Odd Parents and Danny Phantom. I would’ve added TUFF Puppy and Bunsen is a Beast but I can see that those two aren’t his major players seeing as how they’re rarely ever mentioned on the channel.

If it’s not some watchmojo level meme video, almost every other video is about either two of those shows in some varied fashion. I get that he “created your childhood” and made credulous bank from Nickelodeon, but it’s like Danny Phantom is all that stands between him and having an audience. That and drawing anime characters in his style which is... y’know, I’ll leave that to you. It’s like he retired and yet goes on about the good old days like a fluctuating ego. He’s still making a cartoon but to him that’s hardly a factor compared to his known successes.

Personally, I wouldn’t want to just be known as the guy who made two of your countless beloved cartoons. Not that that’s all he talks about, but it’s the insistence of his legacy that unfortunately gives me Bojack Horseman vibes. He no doubt has a good thing going but I believe that this isn’t gonna last. Just saying, dude has 850K subscribers and unless it’s a real hook like with the recent Danny Phantom/Jake Long death battle, he’s hardly getting a good fraction of views anymore. There’s only so many times you can milk Danny Phantom as your masterpiece before everyone moves on.

The Holy Boast

I wanna make this short because I’m not a huge talker of religion, but I stand to say that you should NOT, under any circumstance, believe BPD, PTSD, autism, fucking heart & kidney failure can be “cured” or “healed” through sermons of prayer. This here? This is genuinely something else.

https://www.healingjourneys.today/

For clarity, this was a gospel conference hosted by Butch and his wife and yes, they openly proclaim that BPD, austism, and heart disease can be cured through prayer of holy worship.

Now, I’m gonna give a full disclosure right here because this most certainly biases my point here, like I’m gonna own this. But my grandpa was a religious man that suffer from health problems. He notably prayed to carry on, yes, but at the same time he sought medical help. Even he told me that prayers wasn’t gonna keep the pacemaker going, he went to the doctors and actually did more than read the bible to improve himself. He unfortunately passed, but he was in his 70s and I honestly couldn’t believe, as hard as I try, that he was gonna live forever. My grandpa would’ve no doubt died far earlier if he followed this conference’s logic.

My point is that this is personally unsettling. I seriously cannot believe this is how autism and religion works and it blows my mind that him and his wife thought this conference was a suitable idea. I’m not bashing them as christians, but thinking mental disorders and bodily diseases can be done away with motivational seminars because that’s basically what they are is a legit slap to the face. And the seedling idea that they’ve done this before blows my mind.

The Financial Flaker

This is very recent and everything is generally explained in the 12 minute video but long story short: Butch hired an artist and never paid them for their work. The artist in question, Kuro, describes what happened between him and Butch in this video and provides receipts. Can’t really add anything to this myself beyond this just builds to the idea that Butch cannot be trusted as a professional business maker. I believe he still has people working for him but from this video, it tells me that Hartman will gladly use those lower than him in favorable pursuits and will gladly throw ignorance when he wants to because his cartoon veteran status presents that shield from thinking he can do no wrong, which can mean throttling his hires.  Let’s end this.

The Conclusion

When I get down to it, Butch is almost a Machiavellian character in a way. It’s amazing how much the trust people have had with Hartman have evaporated in less than a couple years. It’s amazing how much his ego has truly shown after he stopped being a namestay in Nickelodeon. Haven’t even mentioned the times he arrogantly deflected criticism because he was a namestay at Nick and how a couple who’ve worked with are well aware of his ego. I can’t help but believe that even after everything, he claims ignorance to his fall from grace and keeps going. Even when more and more are knowing his true self, he’s mostly just doing what he’s been doing for the past few years.

It’s respectable in a way, but shows that the world will move on without him. Again, if you like Danny Phantom and Fairly OddParents, I won’t judge you for it nor say you should be ashamed. This isn’t about cancelling Butch, or get him to stop spreading whatever wacky things he believes in. It’s my personal take of how this man whom I once respected because of what he made before has lost every bit of that from me. It really feels like he grew up with that “I Created Your Childhood” mentality being a 4 time showrunner for almost a couple decades. And when he finally left Nickelodeon, I guess the chance to be that stand out self-made success got to his head and he finally showed his true colors. I now find it hard to believe Butch cares about the little guy that were his fans as much as he rides off his success and others who tolerate him. As such, like JK Rowling, more are seeing this side of him and leaving him behind. Meanwhile Butch is gonna chug on until he just loses steam. It’s kinda like Icarus where the guy will make every effort to fly to the sun. But sooner or later, he’s gonna fall, and in the end I doubt anyone’s gonna care to see it. I know he won’t.

[miss-tc-nova]

The Cat’s Meow - Jumin Han x Fem!Reader Pt 13

Drama drama drama. I love it. Maybe too much...Oh well. 

Part 13: Do You?

                Today’s the day. For months I’d been avoiding and ignoring the man I loved; not that any of it did any good—I still love him. At least he’d finally gotten the point, but I still dreaded today—today is the day of Jumin’s wedding.

                Since I’d gotten the invitation, I’d had considerably more drinks, but not as many as that first night; I still had my clinic and wallet to think about. I tried every trick in the book to shove intrusive thoughts of Jumin out but they come back in every spare moment I have.

                As for the friends between us, they’ve been going above and beyond to distract me. Luciel offers to hang out more, Yoosung tries to get me to talk about work much more while making it look like he’s getting extra serious about our jobs, and Zen becomes a regular hang out buddy. It’s Jaehee that I’m sometimes still on the fence about. I’m not as close with her as I’ve gotten to Zen and Luciel, but I want to. She’s so loyal and sweet and down-right incredible, but I can’t help always thinking that Jumin sent her when we get together. Still, I elect to ignore who her employer is and get my dose of girl talk in when we do see each other. But it’s going to take a lot more than their antics to distract me from today.

                Against my better judgment, I prepare myself for probably the worst decision of my life thus far. Even though there’s a rift between us, I find myself wanting to support him; I want to show that I think he’s made the right choice and congratulate him. So a little red dress with three-quarter lace sleeves becomes the outfit I’ll face him in. Mako gets an early dinner and I pull on a pair of black heals when my ride arrives.

                Zen’s waiting at the door. “Hey. Are you ready?”

                “As I’ll ever be,” I sigh, picking up my purse and the gift bag from my sofa.

                Those silver brows furrow. “Are you sure you want to go?”

                “Yeah. He’s made the right choice and I want to support that,” I say.

                “If you say so.”

                We head for the red sports car waiting in front of my home. Yoosung pops up from the other side. “Hey, _____. Do you want the front seat?”

                I laugh a bit. “No. I don’t mind sitting in the back. Nice car, Luciel.”

                “Isn’t she just a babe,” he coos, stepping out to let Zen and I into the back.

                “Is this the new one?”

                “Nah. The new one I got is silver. But I figured this one fit the colors.”

                I giggle. “Fair enough.”Having three goofy guys escort me to the wedding is a bit odd, but it’s nice to have a support group.

                The event is huge, but what else could be expected of the heir to a major corporation. However, I do think it’s a bit much for even Jumin. The guys had gossiped a bit about this Sarah Choi that Jumin is supposed to be marrying. They don’t seem all that fond of her and some have even said they think she’s in it for the money. My stomach churns if that’s true. Unfortunately, even Jaehee has expressed that Sarah has very easily adjusted to having access to Jumin’s money.

                We show our invitations at the door since they’re keeping out the paparazzi. The smell of roses is almost overwhelming as they’re peppered everywhere as the red decorations. They’re twisted around banisters, placed on the table, petals across the aisle, rose everything everywhere. There are a few other red items to tie in the color, but mostly, just flowers. It’s like trying to force the image of love with the only image of love you can think of. I guess they could’ve used hearts, but then it might look like a Valentine’s party in here.

                We veer off to the side when Jaehee finds us, followed by a vaguely familiar man with mint-colored hair.

                “You all made it. We have seats reserved for you at-” She hesitates when she spots me. In response, I give a sheepish grin.

                That’s when the gentleman addresses me. “Hello. You seem well acquainted with my RFA but I don’t think we’ve ever met.” He offers his hand. “They call me V.”

                “V? How mysterious,” I say with a bit of a laugh. He now wears the sheepish grin. “My name’s _____.”

                That smile disappears to a blank void. “_____? You’re _____?”

                Against that expression, I’m very quickly second guessing my presence here. “Yeah…”

                V seems at a loss, simply staring at me. There’s no anger, no pity, nothing. He just stares. I feel the blood rushing up my back, into my ears, and across my face. Nervously, I glance to Zen.

                “I-Is there something on my face? Should I-”

                “Oh! No! Sorry!” V interrupts. “I didn’t mean to stare; it’s just…I’ve heard a lot about you.” He pauses, still with that blank stare. “I’m the best man.”

                I know who this is now, somewhat. I’ve heard plenty stories of him. The word comes from my mouth barely above a whisper. “Oh…”

                “If it’s not too much to ask…why are you here?” Reaching into my purse, I pull the invitation and pass it to him. It’s got my name scrawled on the front along with my address. “And you came?”

                I can feel all their gazes on me, which doesn’t help my anxiety. “I want Jumin to move on. He deserves someone better than me and I’m glad he found her. I support his decision.”

                V looks the envelope over very carefully. “Jumin had all the invitations written by other people. Even mine was written by, I assume, Jaehee. But this…” He passes the envelope back to me. “Is Jumin’s hand writing.”

                He personally invited me? Does his fiancée even know about me? Maybe I should go…

                Before I can make a decision, Jaehee seems caught up in another conversation and grabs V’s attention. “It’s starting.”

                “Oh. Right.” V gives me one last look of unreadable interest before following the woman to his place.

                The boys and I get ushered to our seats and I sit between Luciel and Zen. Music begins to play and a door off to the side opens. My breath hitches like I’m falling back into my old, stupid ways. I feel a hand slip into mine and give Zen a grateful glance.

                In all honesty, Jumin doesn’t seem any different than normal, suit and all. Sure, he’s wearing a red tie to match the colors and there’s a rose sticking out of his chest pocket, but he seems normal otherwise. Actually, looking a bit closer, he seems rather bored of the whole ordeal. As a man about to get married, I would’ve expected him to be a bit brighter. Then again, I heard that it was Jumin’s father who set the two up and insisted he get married after only a few months. Maybe I shouldn’t be supporting this. I wanted Jumin to find someone better for him, but if he’s not even excited to get married to this woman, he’s still making the wrong choice.

                Shut up! He’s probably nervous. He never was great at showing emotions in front of people.

                The groom and best man stand at the alter and the doors behind us open. People awe and coo over the train of bridesmaids and groomsmen, and even more at the ring bearer and flower girl. And then the wedding march plays and the bride reveals herself.

                Sarah Choi is beautiful; I can see that, I can say that. But everything about her also looks so fake. I’m pretty sure there’s more hair on her head than her skull can grow and she’s put on more make up than she needs. I’m no expert, but she looks like she’s had a few surgeries done before. Even something about her dress screams ‘barbie doll’ and less ‘human being,’ and it has the longest train I’ve ever seen.

                To each his own…I guess.

                Sarah, head held high and bursting with pride, makes her way to the end to meet Jumin. His best man is smiling, but Jumin certainly is not. Even when he faces her, it’s like he’s not really looking at her.

                And we settle in for the ceremony. The officiant talks about love and the new chapter of life and blah blah blah. I zone out his words, looking over the bride and groom. They appear so opposite that I wonder how his father could even recommend these two. Over and over again, I tell myself that I know nothing of their relationship and they could already be best friends. They might be madly in love with each other.

                Okay, new thought!

                And then my brain does the terrible thing of inserting me into this wedding in place of Sarah.

                NO! No nono! Stop it! Get a hold of yourself!

                “Jumin, do you take Sarah to be your wedded wife?”

                Of course, of all the times for me to zone back into the ceremony, it had to be during Jumin’s vows. A cold pit grows in my stomach as I look at the couple holding hands, currently vowing their lives to each other.

                “To live together in marriage? Do you promise to love her, comfort her, honor and keep her for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and health, and forsaking all others, be faithful only to her, for as long as you both shall live?”

                I almost want to jam my fingers into my ears. My grip tightens around Zen’s fingers and he rests his second hand over mine. Then I realize that it’s completely silent; the entire room hanging, waiting for him to say those famous words. Refocusing on the front, I see Jumin staring down at their joined hands, silver eyes full of something that wipes the smile from Sarah’s face. We can all hear her hiss his name from the microphone.

                Suddenly, Jumin drops Serah’s hands and the entire room gasps. Even I cover my mouth in shock. “I don’t.”

                “What?!” Serah screeches.

                “Jumin Han!”

                His father is on his feet, but Jumin takes the microphone. “I apologize for wasting everyone’s time today, but I have come to the realization that marrying this woman would truly be a mistake. I don’t see a reason in making a pledge that I know will end in failure.” The entire room is murmuring and gossiping. “Thank you for your attendance. Please feel free to reclaim any gifts you have brought and enjoy the refreshments.”

                Those eyes lock on me and I know the reason he’s cancelled this wedding. Terrified and shocked into stupidity, I leap to my feet, scramble over Luciel, and bolt from the room, losing shoes in the process. Outside, I’m instantly met with flashing lights and people shouting, but I race down the pathway towards the street. Thankfully, a cab pulls over as soon as I hail and I request a ride home. The phone in my purse rings and meows repeatedly and I power the device down to get it to stop. When we arrive, I hurl some bills at the man and jump out of the car.

                “_____!”

                My blood turns to ice. Stopped behind the cab is a familiar black car and Jumin is stepping out. I didn’t expect him to chase me all the way home, especially right after the chaos he’d just caused. My feet pound against the sidewalk as I race for my front door. If I can get inside, I can lock the door and hide away from him.

                My fingers fumble with the keys but I manage to get the door open. Jumping inside, I push the door as hard as I can to slam it shut. A second later, it lurches but does not give as Jumin pounds on the other side.

                “_____, open up. We need to talk.”

                My throat is threatening to close up. “I don’t want to talk to you!”

                “_____!” I flinch away from the door. “Let me in!”

                “Go away!”

                “Haven’t I proved my feelings for you yet?!” he shouts. “I don’t understand! If kissing doesn’t work, and cancelling my own wedding doesn’t work, then what do I have to do to prove I love you?!”

                My brain is running on fear and defiance. “I know you love me!” I hit the door back. “I know you do and I hate it! I hate it so much it’s suffocating me!” I should reign myself in but I can’t. “It’s not supposed to be us! We were never meant to be together! And when I know you love me, it hurts so much because you’re not supposed to! YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO LOVE ME BACK!”

                “_____?”

                I pound away on my own door. “And I knew better! I knew I shouldn’t have let you in! I was your vet and that’s all I should’ve been! Not your friend! Not your scheming cohort! Least of all your lover! But I couldn’t help myself!” My knees hit the floor.

                I can hear the commotion of other cars arriving. Flickers of flashing lights get through my curtains. People are shouting, but Jumin continues pounding on my door and calling my name.

                “JUST GO AWAY!” I scream.

                “Mr. Han, we need to go,” I hear Jaehee.

                “Jumin, come on.” That’s V.

                “Let go of me!” he snaps. “_____!”

                “You’re not doing anyone any favors! Let’s go!”

                His shouting dies down and I hear Jaehee directing various people. Before long, there’s a significantly lighter knock on my door. “_____?” Yoosung calls.

                “Go away!” I wail.

                “Hold on.” I hear the key slipping into the lock and the doorknob turns. The door pushes up against me but I don’t really fight against it and Zen squeezes through. I now regret giving him that key he insisted on after my second breakdown. “Come on,” he grunts, scooping me off the floor.

                The man sits on the sofa and cradles me against his chest. Yoosung, Luciel, and Jaehee enter and try to console me but I lose myself to my own little world of wallowing. 

[myhockeyworld87]

Nervous Regrets - Tyler Seguin - Part 22.5

Word Count: 3422

POV: Tyler

Warnings: Language

Notes: So I decided to do the proposal from Tyler’s point of view, since he went through a lot to ask (Y/N) to be his wife. I tried not to make it too repetitive. Hope you guys like it. Peace, Love and Hugs all!!!

Present day….

 As you held (Y/N) in your arms on the dance floor, part of you still couldn’t believe that she’d agreed to be your wife. The last time you were this nervous, was when you’d been in this exact same place only months ago, trying to win her back. Now here she was, your fiancé. Your heart was so full at this moment, it felt like it was going to burst.  Looking down at (Y/N), you could see her eyes sparkling with happiness.

You expected her to ask you all kinds of questions about tonight, that’s just who she was; though you didn’t expect them now. “Ty, I can’t believe you did all this for me? Jenna said there are even cameras somewhere around here. How in the world did you do this?”

 “Well it wasn’t easy, but it was worth it; you’re worth it.” And though you were teasing her about it not being easy, there were times you’d thought about calling the whole thing off; and just making the proposal simple. “You know, I almost cancelled this whole thing.”

 “What? Really?”

 “Yep. There were so many times I thought I was just hurting you and I didn’t want to do that.”

 “You mean yesterday?”

 “Well yeah, but it actually started….”

 Sometime in November….

 She was crying and it was all your fault, that’s the only thing you could think of, when you found (Y/N) in the baby’s room sobbing after the phone call to her mom. She had no clue that none of her family or yours were going to be coming for Thanksgiving because they would be here about a week later. The only thing you could think of to do, was to gather your hockey buddies who would be home and make new traditions. She seemed totally excited about the idea, and you knew Candace and Cassidy coming would distract her for a little bit.

 What she didn’t know, was the reason behind their little jaunt down to Dallas. They were bringing her ring which was finally finished and you couldn’t wait to see it. Luckily you were able to pull Candace aside after the tour of the house. “Do you have it?”

 “Of course I have it!” You pulled her further into the bedroom she would be using, and put your finger to your lips to shush her. “Sorry. Yes, I have it and it’s absolutely gorgeous.” She started digging through her purse looking for the box. “Like seriously Ty, I hope some guy gives me something even remotely close to this someday.” She held the box out and your hands shook as you took it from her. When you opened the velvet clad box and saw what the jewelry designer had done, you were speechless. It was everything and more than you ever imagined. “I know takes your breath away doesn’t it? You did good big brother.”

 “Thanks. It’s amazing.” The emerald cut five carat diamond, lay nestled in a trapezoid diamond ring mounting.  There was a smaller diamond on each side of the emerald cut one, to accentuate the large stone.  The band was also encircled in diamonds, while the entire ring was done in a platinum setting. “I hope she likes it.”

 “She’d be crazy not to.” It was the answer you were hoping she would give you, even if it insinuated (Y/N) was a bit off her rocker. “So where are you hiding this until the big day?” You thought about this for awhile now, and knew it would be hard to keep it hidden in this house from (Y/N); but you’d finally decided on the perfect place.

 The back of the walk-in closet in Candace’s bedroom held some of your spare shoes and their boxes in it, so you decided it was the perfect place to hide the ring. You placed it in the third row, in the third box down, which made it easy for you to remember; but also some place (Y/N) wouldn’t look right away. If she would by chance come in here, she would probably just grab one of the top pairs. “There, perfect. This will be one of the last places she’ll ever look. Now we better get downstairs before she notices we’re missing.”

 “Wait.” Stopping in your tracks, you turned around to see what else your sister had to say. “So, like on the way home Cass totally lied to (Y/N).” You gave her a quizzical look. “Well, she was wondering why we weren’t coming for Thanksgiving and well at first she blurted out that we were Canadian.”

 “Oh my god, you’re kidding me? Why would she say something so stupid?”

 “Well she did cover that up, by saying I’m dating some guy; that you basically wouldn’t approve of. So if she says something to you; it’s not true.”

 “You sure about that?” You couldn’t miss an opportunity to tease your sister about a boyfriend.

 “Yes I’m sure, you ass!” She swatted at your shoulder.

 “Ouch!” You rubbed your shoulder even though it didn’t hurt. “Alright, I’ll play along. Now let’s get going.”

 By the time you got downstairs, (Y/N) and Cass were in deep conversation about the Bachelor or some such nonsense. Eventually you were able to butt in and tell her about your fake gala. When she asked you to skip it, you thought you were going to die. Luckily you had back-up in the form of your sisters; who offered to take her shopping, on your dollar of course. Though if it got (Y/N) to go, you had no problem footing the bill.

 The rest of the time with your sisters flew by and soon you were headed off on another road trip. Thankfully Candace and Cassidy stayed a few extra days with (Y/N). You were extremely grateful that they did, knowing that (Y/N) was having a hard time with Thanksgiving coming up. The holiday itself ended up being a huge success, as about twenty or so of your teammates gathered at your house for the feast. (Y/N) was in her glory, cooking and hosting everyone; and you could really tell how much she enjoyed being surrounded by your hockey family.

 However, the joy was short-lived as you had to head out of town again for several days. Luckily, when you got back (Y/N) still hadn’t found the ring and was still blessedly unaware of any of the plans you had for her. Enlisting the help of two of your teammates significant others, you planned for (Y/N) to spend most of the day at the spa getting ready, though there were things that you needed to have done before the actual day of the proposal. The idea was to meet (Y/N)’s best friend Jenna and a few others, as well as the event planner, to make sure everything was perfect in the ballroom. You wanted to run through everything one time before the big day; after all, just like hockey, practice makes perfect. Which is how (Y/N) found you in the guest closet. You’d just put the ring in your pocket and were placing the shoe boxes back when she came in.

 Thankfully she thought you were trying to peek at her dress, which she’d kept hidden from you. When she suggested that she run errands with you, you’d just about died. There was no way you could take her with you and get everything that you needed done. Why you’d insist that she stay with the dogs, was beyond you; you’d chalk it up to your brain being fried from planning this proposal and keeping everything from (Y/N). It would’ve been easier to say that you had practice or needed to watch films, she would’ve easily accepted any of those excuses. Instead she stormed out of the room, obviously upset, and you had no idea what to do. So you left.

 By the time you arrived in the ballroom, you were already fifteen minutes late and Jenna was on the phone. “Sorry I’m late.” She shushed you quickly, so you assumed (Y/N) was on the other end. Ugh! It must be bad if she was calling Jenna about you. You couldn’t have her hating you, the day before you were going to propose. Hopefully Jenna would be able to help you make things right with her.

 “Jesus Seguin, have you been hit one too many times in the head or what?”

 “Is it that bad?”

 “Fuck yeah it’s that bad. She thinks you’re cheating again.” Your heart literally sank into your stomach and you felt like you were going to throw up its contents.

 “You can’t be fucking serious.” All you could think of was that all these plans were going down the drain, because if she truly believed you were cheating on her, she’d never say yes to marrying you.

 “She said you’ve been acting weird lately and that’s all that she can come up with.” Before you could say anything, Jenna continued. “Remember, she’s pregnant and hormonal, so of course she’s going to jump to conclusions; but I covered for your ass.”

 “Really?” So there was some hope in salvaging all this.

 “Of course, I couldn’t let her think that you’re cheating on her when you’re doing all of this.” The ballroom you were standing in was coming to life. Flowers everywhere, shimmering lights, glowing off of beautifully decorated centerpiece. The room all done in white and silver, as the only details of the dress your sisters gave you was the color. You turned your attention back to Jenna. “I convinced her, that you were just doing something special for tomorrow night, like getting a limo or something to that effect.”

 “A limo?”

 “Hey! You’re lucky I came up with anything at all.” This was true. “She actually didn’t think you’d be renting a limousine either. So I told her it was probably something more extravagant.” She just shrugged at you, as if to say what else could I do.

 “Ok, so what do you suggest?”

 “I can’t do everything Seggy.”

 Which was also true. You should be able to come up with something on short notice. “What about jewelry? Earrings or a bracelet.” There was a jeweler close by that you’d used in the past. They usually had beautiful pieces on hand that wouldn’t have to be specially made.

 “Jewelry’s good. Nothing says ‘I’m sorry, I’m a fucking ass’ like diamonds.”

 “The fucking ass part was a bit much.” Again she shrugged and cocked her head at you. “Alright maybe not, but I am making up for it all with this.” You gestured to the room with your hand.

 “Fair enough, but don’t mess up again; or I may have to punch you into next week.” You both laughed, however you knew in the back of your mind, that Jenna would follow through with her threats.

 “I promise, you’re never going to have to do that. Now let’s get to work on this place, because apparently I have to make a stop at a jewelry store.”

 You had wanted all of your friends and family to hear the words you spoke to (Y/N) when you asked her to marry you. So you and the event planner had worked a way to stream a live feed to the room adjacent where everyone would be hidden. She even had multiple cameras hidden all over the room, and a videographer who would be switching between so everyone would be able to see her reaction. A hidden microphone was placed high above in a chandelier directly in the center of the dance floor, which would pick up every word the both of you said. With one last run through of the whole thing, you said goodbye to (Y/N)’s friends and headed out to the jewelers.

 On the way there you decided to call Candace for advice, as to what would look good with her dress. “I’m not going to give you all the details…”

 “Really? I’m struggling here can you not help your big brother out?”

“If you’d let me finish.” You kept your mouth shut. “but…it has a low plunging neckline, so I’d go with some sort of necklace.”

 “Perfect. Necklace it is.” Pulling into the parking lot of the jewelry store, you added. “Thanks Candace. I’ll see you tomorrow night.”

 “Good luck brother.”

 The jeweler greeted you as soon as you walked in the door, and you explained what you wanted in short order. He took you over to a case which contained several pieces, but only one stood out to you. The necklace contained three stones, two smaller ones and one larger pear-shaped diamond at the bottom. It was the combination of the three stones that drew you. Of course, most people looked at them as, the past, the present and the future; which could totally be true in this case. But when you looked at it, you only saw that each smaller stone represented you and (Y/N); only leading to a larger one that represented not only the love that you shared, but the culmination of that love which was your child.

“I’ll take it.” It didn’t matter what the cost was, you knew then and there that your future wife needed to have this when you proposed to her. You could already picture (Y/N) wearing it on your wedding day, and then a thought struck you. It was picture almost clear as day, your daughter wearing it on hers, it would become a family tradition. Of course you still didn’t know if you were having a boy or a girl, but you were sure at some point you’d have a daughter and she too would wear this. They wrapped it in a black velvet box, then placed it in a gift bag for you. Now all that was left to do was give it to (Y/N).

 It was later than you anticipated when you walked through the door of your house, but what surprised you more, was that you couldn’t find (Y/N). She wasn’t in the office or the kitchen, which is where you’d assumed, you’d find her. Instead, she lay sleeping on your bed, surrounded by her ever-faithful protectors, your dogs. She lay there so peacefully, yet you could see the tears that stained her face. It tore at your heart, and though part of you hated to wake her, there wasn’t much time for an apology, given you’d be leaving for the game soon.

 Fortunately for you, (Y/N) forgave you and totally thought that you bought the necklace for her to go to the gala. Though you didn’t get to tell her it’s significance until later that night, as you were too busy worshiping her body with only the necklace on her. It wasn’t until later that night as you were lying in bed, after making her put the necklace back on; that you were able to tell her why the necklace was so special to you.

 Pointing to the first stone, closest to the chain, you started to tell her. “This one right here, that’s me.”

 She smirked at you before saying, “I thought you’d be the largest one.”

 “Haha…you’re so funny.” You poked at her ribs, causing her to giggle. When her laughter finally subsided, you continued. “The one in the middle, that’s you; and the last and biggest stone is our love, this one right here.” You placed your hand on the baby, softly caressing her skin, then moved your lips close so you were talking to your child. “See little one, you get the largest stone, because mommy and daddy’s love is so great, it made you.” Gently, you placed a soft kiss on (Y/N)’s stomach, then looked up at your soon to be fiancé. There were tears in her eyes, but you knew they were happy ones.

 “I’m the worst girlfriend ever.”

 “No you’re not baby.” You moved so you could gather her in your arms.

 “But I totally ruined your surprise. I swear I’ll never doubt you again, Ty.”

 “Babe, you didn’t ruin anything.” Which was completely true. Buying this necklace had been an added bonus, that you didn’t know you both needed. “Though I won’t lie, I love knowing that I’m earning your trust again.” “Oh Ty, I do trust you. I think this pregnancy is making me a little crazy, but I love you so much; and I know you wouldn’t cheat on me. I’m so sorry for thinking that. Can you ever forgive me?”

 “Sweetheart, there’s nothing to forgive.” To empathize the point, you kissed her with all the love you had in your heart. Which soon lead to other things.

 When the alarm went off in the morning, your heart was racing for what was to come today. (Y/N) had plans with a couple of the wags today, which left you free to put all the last-minute finishing touches on everything. There wasn’t a lot to do, but it gave you time to meet up with some of your family and friends before everything. As the day continued on, you felt your nerves picking up. It wasn’t that you were nervous about proposing, in fact, it was the exact opposite; you were excited for it. The only thing that bothered you, was the slight chance that (Y/N) could say no. Of course, you knew she loved you; it was just every time you’d brought up the topic of marriage, she’d always claimed it was too soon.

 “Stop worrying. She’ll say yes.” It was your mom’s voice that broke through your thoughts. She knew you all to well.

 “I sure hope so mom, cause I don’t know what I’ll do if she doesn’t.”

 “Tyler honey, she loves you so much. Anyone can see that. She’s just been scared, and rightly so.” She patted you on the shoulder. “But lately, you can see…she wants this as much as you do. She wants you guys to be a family.”

 “I hope you’re right mom.”

 She wrapped you in a tight embrace. “She’ll say yes honey; trust your mom on this.” A sigh of relief escaped you, as her words sunk in. Squeezing your mom one last time, you headed back home with one thought on your mind; the next time you saw your family and friends you’d hopefully be an engaged man. That thought made you smile the whole way home.

 When you saw (Y/N) walking down the stairs of your home, she literally left you speechless. You knew she’d be gorgeous no matter what she wore; you just hadn’t expected her to look so…well, stunning, but then that wasn’t the right word either. The sparkle of the gown cast a magical glow about her, while her smile captivated you with it’s radiance. She looked truly enchanting, and not that you hadn’t known this before; but you realized in that moment how lucky you were to have her in your life. Hopefully that luck would carry you through tonight, and you would be calling her yours forever.

 You knew the moment she went to call Andrea and Alandra, the fake gala plan had worked. She was still clueless about your proposing. Holding her in your arms as you moved about the dance floor was almost surreal; yet it calmed nerves. This would be the last dance you would have as just two people, the next time you held her like this you would be on a path to becoming one.

 You weren’t sure if you’d said everything you wanted to say to her, or if you fumbled getting all the words out, but what you were one hundred percent sure of, was that (Y/N) said yes. And now she was here in your arms dancing again, just like you were moments before only this time she was your fiancé; and now she knew everything that had gone on up until this moment.

 “So now you know, how we pulled it all off.” There were tears in her eyes, and you reached out and brushed them away. “There’s one more thing you need to know though.” “Oh Ty, I can’t think of anything else you could tell me. You went above and beyond anything I could’ve ever dreamed of.”

 “What if I told you, I’d do it all over again, even the part where you thought I’d cheated on you.” She smiled through her tears at you, and you wiped them away again. “And you know why I would? Because the love we share is worth everything.”

[five-wow]

on to 10.16! the valentine’s episode!

fjdkfdjkfd a very worried-looking woman accepts a valentine’s bouquet and i was like, did she kill her husband and he’s lying on the floor somewhere and that’s why she looks so awkward about it? and then there’s a BLOODIED HAMMER and A BODY and i was probably right, omg, i love it.

oh! looks like she maybe called hpd herself? that’s an interesting twist.

oh my gosh, noelani is getting surfing lessons, and that alone is cute enough but then suddenly there’s a whoop and it’s tani on the beach giving vocal emotional support and I LOVE THAT. after a very, very long draught, this season is so good for us when it comes to female friendships.

lou is mad that adam put his niece’s life at risk, and that’s fair, but maybe... also be mad at adam for doing crimes? like, that’s bad? maybe?

fjdkfd we ended the last episode with danny and steve in the kitchen and that’s also their first appearance in this one. this is beautiful.

steve: “i do have a date, indeed.” danny: “with who?” steve: “a lady.” LISTEN, i am taking this as the “a lady” part being not just an evasive maneuver, but intended to be an actual answer, because it could also not have been a lady. bi steve. it’s canon now.

steve LOST COUNT of how many dates he’s been on with brooke (the lady he’s ironing his shirt for on valentine’s day) and he’s kind of smiling while he says it and that’s cute!! i like that for him!! but also. when the fuck did he go on all of these dates with brooke when he was also dating the vet in between, out of the running entirely for at least a month or two, and he’s been continually living with danny since he got back to hawaii and danny apparently knows nothing about these dates. what kind of stealth techniques has steve been employing? has he had brooke sneak in through his bedroom window at night so danny wouldn’t find out? how many times did he have to cancel a date because danny refused to sleep on the couch and there was no space left for brooke in steve’s bed? (i kid, but seriously, what is this timeline?)

danny: “i’m glad somebody has a life.” steve, pointing at danny: “oohhh, tani and quinn are going to the movies tonight...” fdjkfd, first bi steve, and now tani and quinn have a movie date. good stuff. i’m enjoying this.

fjdkfjdkf, steve, whAT. “tell you what, buddy, if i finish up early with brooke, i’ll give you a call, we can hang out.” i mean! that’s really sweet! but also very wtf, because he’s essentially going “hey, maybe this thing i have to do (date my girlfriend, ugh) won’t take very long and we’ll have time to hang! :D” and i just. god. i’m laughing, but i am so glad brooke is not a real woman because i feel very sorry for her.

danny a) recognizes signs of domestic abuse and b) has done his research and c) is appropriately gentle with this woman, even though they have her in custody and she’s already admitted to killing her husband and she potentially started an international conflict by doing so, and just. yes. good. this is a danny i love.

side note: adam is just randomly present at hq with the rest of the team when steve and danny are on the phone with them. and, oh my god. did he not just kidnap a suspect to make a secret deal with a yakuza boss? is that not the sign steve had been looking for, the reason why steve’s spidey sense had been tingling around adam? they still trust him currently and he’s just back on the job without so much as a warning? i mean, to be fair, steve is the type of guy to be all for crazy shit if it gets results, so maybe he’s glad adam did what he did, idk, but i am genuinely so confused at this point about what the writers are telling us about where adam stands, both with the team and in his own life, and with the yakuza, for that matter. is he now an active gang member while also trying to earnestly protect the law in five-0?

i love how this episode is escalating, omg. first we’re told the wife killed her husband, then he’s a thai diplomat, then the wife’s boyfriend killed the husband, then he didn’t, then thailand wants the wife while five-0 knows she didn’t do it and so they STEAL HER. taking a page out of adam’s book, i guess, though at least this time the entire team knows what’s going on.

except for tani and noelani, who are being held hostage by two amateur criminals in a convenience store, which is also a subplot i really like! honestly, not a bad moment in this episode so far.

okay, one very minor note though: please, for the love of all that is holy, do not let this woman they’re saving become a love interest for danny. they have a lovely talk in the back of a truck during the grand escape and that’s wonderful and good and i like it, but i can’t help but be really scared that the show is aiming to somehow make that romantic at some point because oh, dear lord, danny has dated enough abused women under questionable circumstances. doooon’t add a third one to the list, i beg of you.

the amateur criminals are trying to get cash that they need for MEDICAL CARE. god, i hate a world in which your options are a) commit crime or b) die. it’s a good plot, though!

kamekona is providing a safehouse for danny and the woman and he’s being very kamekona about it - warm and welcoming, but warning danny off of texting too much with kamekona’s phone because it’s ten cents per message - and it’s glorious.

oh dear lord. the couple robbing the store can’t afford the surgery the husband needs, so tani presents mandatory medical attention for prisoners as a solution, and that’s a good way to talk the wife down and probably also the best the couple can hope for in their current predicament, but it’s also very fucked up. you shouldn’t have to wave a gun around to get help for your brain tumor.

danny and the woman are found and get arrested, and the VERY NEXT SHOT is danny turning to steve in the car and asking how he got him out so fast. that WAS very fast, danny, you’re right. zero seconds has to be a new record, dang.

steve: “i may have promised yang that if she didn’t release you immediately i was gonna make a whooole lot of noise.” i do understand what this means, but i also enjoy the thought of steve literally making noise. any noise. if you don’t release danny, steve will appear at your door and start quacking like a duck very loudly. you’ve been warned, state department!

ahhh! they solve the case, find the actual killer of the abusive diplomat husband, make sure the wife gets to stay where she is and reunite her with the concerned doctor boyfriend who didn’t kill anybody!! this makes me very happy, all the more so because they won’t have her date danny if she’s already dating someone else, which puts my fears to rest. this season continues to be better about things than this show has been in the past and i appreciate the heck out of it.

adam gets an ominous warning to watch his back from a criminal he’s delivering information about hpd to. are we supposed to be on adam’s side? i’m still very confused.

fjdkfd, danny walks into the house to find the entire team getting ready for a night of hanging out and wonders if he invited everyone and forgot about it, and steve walks in, already chewing on something, and says “it’s possible, because you’re old now”. what a brilliant burn, steve. very impressive.

i won’t recount everything that happens because i know i’d end up writing a stupidly long paragraph but i do adore everything that happens and want that noted. the whole team just chilling and arguing about whether love actually is a romcom or a christmas movie? yes, please! a hundred of those.

danny takes steve aside to tell him he doesn’t have to worry about danny and steve gives an unconvincing reason for why he totally didn’t arrange this because he was worried about danny, which essentially makes it canon that he did plan all of this for that exact reason, which is SO EXTRA. they live together, they’ve spent the entire day together, and then steve cancels a valentine’s dinner with his girlfriend (who he told earlier that he didn’t want to involve danny in their relationship, because he’s too nosy) and invites like six other people just so he can hang out with danny again.

annnd they end up snuggled together on the couch. on valentine’s day. you know, like homies do.

THIS. WAS A VERY GOOD EPISODE. thoroughly enjoyed practically every second of it, 10/10, would like more like this.

[imagine-loki]

Pride and Prejudice

TITLE: Pride and Prejudice CHAPTER NO./ONE SHOT: Chapter 27 AUTHOR: wolfpawn

ORIGINAL IMAGINE: Imagine Loki was raised on Jotunheim as Laufey’s son after the war, but an agreement was then made that he would wed Odin’s daughter so Odin could secure the alliance of Jotunheim through the marriage. Loki, in turn, was raised to be king of Jotunheim, but how he views Asgard is far different from how Odin’s daughter is raised leading to a clash of cultures as well as uncertainty between the pair of betrothed youths.     RATING: Mature   NOTES/WARNINGS: Forced Marriage, not all fun and games. My first real step back into the Loki scene in over a year.

Tags - @skulliebythesea @asimovethroughthisworld @blackcherry26-blog @we-shadowhunter2901

Loki rushed through the halls of the palace, not paying heed to any around him, he didn’t care. He simply did not care. 

On his travels, he did not notice Ella, who had gone to get something to drink for herself. Ella, however, noticed him and more so, she noticed his distressed state. 

Worried, she went to go after him but was stopped by a long blue arm. When she noticed to whom the arm was attached, she paused. “I fear Loki needs some time to himself right now, Princess.” 

“What has occurred?”

Laufey sighed. “I should not say, as it is not my place.” “If I were to wait for Loki to say anything, I would be waiting until the end of time.” She pointed out. 

Laufey chuckled and nodded, noting the truth of her words before becoming solemn. “I fear my eldest son has broken an unwritten rule of our realm.” “Which rule is that?” “To never take the mate of a family member.” 

Ella frowned before her eyes widened with realisation. “The one Loki loved before everything.” 

“Yes. On Jotunheim, if a pairing cannot occur, for whatever reason that is, it is generally respected that none within the family will take that being as their mate as to be a mate is a complex bond and it is frowned upon to trespass on the bond shared by such an individual and one’s own kin.” “And Loki just found this out?” She looked to where Loki had rushed of sadly. “I cannot imagine how greatly that hurts for him.” 

“You show more sympathy than most.” 

“He loved her, I cannot say if he does not love her still, to have her torn from him for me and then for his own brother to do something like that, that is horrid for him. I cannot imagine how this hurts him.” She explained. 

Laufey looked at Ella in startled amazement at her empathy for Loki considering the subject matter. “It is best to leave him for now, Princess.” With that, Laufey turned and walked away. 

Ella, however, did not heed his advice. Slowly, she made her way through the palace, using the startled Jotnar that seemed confused by something they had just witnessed as her manner of finding where Loki had been. She finally came to a large open area that seemed to have no real defined purpose. The snow was deep and undamaged by footfall, bar one single set of prints. She walked through those prints, though her own strides were less in length until finally, she came to Loki, sitting on an ice bench. “I’m so sorry.” “Did you know?” His voice heavy, telling her he had been in tears. 

“No, no. I only found out a moment ago.” Her reply was quiet and sincere. 

“So why are you apologising?” “Because you are hurting, because it is not fair, because those who should, have not.” She walked closer to him. 

“I chose to end it.” “But you never wanted to. And though I suspect that with time, you would have accepted her finding another, you had not thought it so soon and with your brother.” “He is not my brother,” Loki growled coldly. 

“He has wronged you. He has broken your trust, but he will never stop being your brother. Trust me, if there is any that would wish to break such a title, it is me and damn but I tried. We’re stuck with them regardless.” Loki could not help but huff a small laugh. “Did Thor steal your beloved?” “Yeah, that’s why Liuilf stands behind him every day, to stare at his ass.” Loki looked at her in shock of her saying something so crude. “No, he did not.” She put her hand on his arm gently. “I know this is a peculiar situation, I know it is a betrayal yet not one at the same time.” Loki looked at her hand on him before looking at her, not trying to hide the tears he had shed. “You are the only one who is always truly honest with me.”

“Yet it was my ultimatum that forced your hand. That forced you to leave her go. In all honesty, I thought you would despise me for it.” 

“I made that choice, and I stood by it. I knew it would hurt when the time came, as you said, but my brother....” He looked down again, the last word barely a whisper. “My kin.” “It makes you question if she ever loved you at all, or if it was all for position.” “She could not have loved me, not by doing that. I loved her. I was trying to let my feelings fade naturally. I did not even try to uphold my father’s demand for children, not while I still cared, and she…”

Ella gently squeezed his hand again. “You don’t deserve this.” 

“I wish I could just break something.” Ella thought for a moment before using her seidr to create a pillar of ice not too far away. “Break that.” “What?” “Make an ice knife, and shatter that. I love shattering glass when I am angry, shatter that.” Loki eyed her for a moment. “Do you know how to be angry?” “Thor is my brother, I know how to be incandescent with rage.” 

Loki’s eyes widened. “You’re not a Berserker too, are you?”

“Norns no, if I go into a fit of anger and kill you, it will be with a clear mind and planning that I do so. Where my brother would have no idea he pummeled you to death with his beloved mallet, I will have poisoned you and watch you choke while I plan where to dump your miserable corpse.” 

Loki stared in terror for a moment. “I think I rather the idea of a Berserker.” 

“Yes, I figured. Though in your favour, were I to go on a killing spree, chances are that you are safe.” “Or the first port of call.” Loki pointed out. 

“Give me ice-figures to shatter and distract me.” She indicated to the one she had made. “Try it.” 

Somewhat sceptical, Loki looked at the large piece of ice for a moment before summoning an ice dagger and aiming it at it. To his shock, Ella had made the lump of ice hollow so it would break and hearing the sound of the ice shatter gave him some sense of pleasure. “Another.” 

Smiling, Ella did not just that, but four others and one after another, Loki broke them all. “More?” “How many can you muster?” “Oh, you are setting me a challenge.” She gave a smug smile before making a small army of them. 

Loki created dagger after dagger and no sooner had he one broken, Ella had it replaced. He threw and threw until he felt himself sweat, then he pushed himself more. “Can you make them look like someone?” “Yes?” Ella felt she knew where this would lead. 

“Make them look like them.” “No.” He looked at her offended. “No, I cannot. He is still your brother, I will not feed a hate of him. The best I can do is this.” She turned and created a figure. 

As soon as Loki realised who it was, he had two fresh daggers ready. “It will have to do.” He lunged the daggers forward and into the effigy of Prince Nigel. “You cannot just give me one.” “Say when you have enough.” She replied, creating more. 

Loki continued to pierce each ice sculpture until he was breathless. The snow that had been so fresh and smooth before was nothing more than a graveyard of ice shards now. One lone ice sculpture remained as Loki fell back to sit on the bench again. “Thank you.” “I am not who you want, Loki and I am so sorry I can never be but know that I am here for you, no matter what. And not because I am duty-bound as your wife.” Ella looked at him as she spoke to show her sincerity. “I will cancel the dinner for tonight and give you time to collect yourself.” She gently squeezed his shoulder once before going to leave. 

“The last piece of ice, we can’t have anyone see, in case it makes its way back to him.” Loki looked at the ice sculpture. 

Ella created two blades from thin air and threw them as she spun around at the sculpture, both piercing the statue through to the other side, before having them break it apart. With that done, she walked off. 

Loki spent a moment staring blankly ahead at the broken statue, shocked not at her getting them to hit, but the fact that for the moment after impact and her getting them to shatter it, he noted they had pierced it through the location of the heart and directly between the eyes. 

His thoughts went to her sympathy, which did not even feel forced or pathetic like others would be, it felt genuine. He thought again of what he had said to her earlier in the conversation, only she was ever genuinely honest with him. 

[wolfpawn]

Pride and Prejudice, Chapter 27

Story Summary - Based on an idea I had that I submitted to Imagine Loki. Imagine Loki was raised on Jotunheim as Laufey’s son after the war, but an agreement was then made that he would wed Odin’s daughter so Odin could secure the alliance of Jotunheim through the marriage. Loki, in turn, was raised to be king of Jotunheim, but how he views Asgard is far different from how Odin’s daughter is raised leading to a clash of cultures as well as uncertainty between the pair of betrothed youths.

Chapter Summary -  Loki's reaction to the new revelation, and that of Ella on her learning of the situation.

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Loki rushed through the halls of the palace, not paying heed to any around him, he didn’t care. He simply did not care. 

On his travels, he did not notice Ella, who had gone to get something to drink for herself. Ella, however, noticed him and more so, she noticed his distressed state. 

Worried, she went to go after him but was stopped by a long blue arm. When she noticed to whom the arm was attached, she paused. “I fear Loki needs some time to himself right now, Princess.” 

“What has occurred?”

Laufey sighed. “I should not say, as it is not my place.” “If I were to wait for Loki to say anything, I would be waiting until the end of time.” She pointed out. 

Laufey chuckled and nodded, noting the truth of her words before becoming solemn. “I fear my eldest son has broken an unwritten rule of our realm.” “Which rule is that?” “To never take the mate of a family member.” 

Ella frowned before her eyes widened with realisation. “The one Loki loved before everything.” 

“Yes. On Jotunheim, if a pairing cannot occur, for whatever reason that is, it is generally respected that none within the family will take that being as their mate as to be a mate is a complex bond and it is frowned upon to trespass on the bond shared by such an individual and one’s own kin.” “And Loki just found this out?” She looked to where Loki had rushed of sadly. “I cannot imagine how greatly that hurts for him.” 

“You show more sympathy than most.” 

“He loved her, I cannot say if he does not love her still, to have her torn from him for me and then for his own brother to do something like that, that is horrid for him. I cannot imagine how this hurts him.” She explained. 

Laufey looked at Ella in startled amazement at her empathy for Loki considering the subject matter. “It is best to leave him for now, Princess.” With that, Laufey turned and walked away. 

Ella, however, did not heed his advice. Slowly, she made her way through the palace, using the startled Jotnar that seemed confused by something they had just witnessed as her manner of finding where Loki had been. She finally came to a large open area that seemed to have no real defined purpose. The snow was deep and undamaged by footfall, bar one single set of prints. She walked through those prints, though her own strides were less in length until finally, she came to Loki, sitting on an ice bench. “I’m so sorry.” “Did you know?” His voice heavy, telling her he had been in tears. 

“No, no. I only found out a moment ago.” Her reply was quiet and sincere. 

“So why are you apologising?” “Because you are hurting, because it is not fair, because those who should, have not.” She walked closer to him. 

“I chose to end it.” “But you never wanted to. And though I suspect that with time, you would have accepted her finding another, you had not thought it so soon and with your brother.” “He is not my brother,” Loki growled coldly. 

“He has wronged you. He has broken your trust, but he will never stop being your brother. Trust me, if there is any that would wish to break such a title, it is me and damn but I tried. We’re stuck with them regardless.” Loki could not help but huff a small laugh. “Did Thor steal your beloved?” “Yeah, that’s why Liuilf stands behind him every day, to stare at his ass.” Loki looked at her in shock of her saying something so crude. “No, he did not.” She put her hand on his arm gently. “I know this is a peculiar situation, I know it is a betrayal yet not one at the same time.” Loki looked at her hand on him before looking at her, not trying to hide the tears he had shed. “You are the only one who is always truly honest with me.”

“Yet it was my ultimatum that forced your hand. That forced you to leave her go. In all honesty, I thought you would despise me for it.” 

“I made that choice, and I stood by it. I knew it would hurt when the time came, as you said, but my brother....” He looked down again, the last word barely a whisper. “My kin.” “It makes you question if she ever loved you at all, or if it was all for position.” “She could not have loved me, not by doing that. I loved her. I was trying to let my feelings fade naturally. I did not even try to uphold my father’s demand for children, not while I still cared, and she…”

Ella gently squeezed his hand again. “You don’t deserve this.” 

“I wish I could just break something.” Ella thought for a moment before using her seidr to create a pillar of ice not too far away. “Break that.” “What?” “Make an ice knife, and shatter that. I love shattering glass when I am angry, shatter that.” Loki eyed her for a moment. “Do you know how to be angry?” “Thor is my brother, I know how to be incandescent with rage.” 

Loki’s eyes widened. “You’re not a Berserker too, are you?”

“Norns no, if I go into a fit of anger and kill you, it will be with a clear mind and planning that I do so. Where my brother would have no idea he pummeled you to death with his beloved mallet, I will have poisoned you and watch you choke while I plan where to dump your miserable corpse.” 

Loki stared in terror for a moment. “I think I rather the idea of a Berserker.” 

“Yes, I figured. Though in your favour, were I to go on a killing spree, chances are that you are safe.” “Or the first port of call.” Loki pointed out. 

“Give me ice-figures to shatter and distract me.” She indicated to the one she had made. “Try it.” 

Somewhat sceptical, Loki looked at the large piece of ice for a moment before summoning an ice dagger and aiming it at it. To his shock, Ella had made the lump of ice hollow so it would break and hearing the sound of the ice shatter gave him some sense of pleasure. “Another.” 

Smiling, Ella did not just that, but four others and one after another, Loki broke them all. “More?” “How many can you muster?” “Oh, you are setting me a challenge.” She gave a smug smile before making a small army of them. 

Loki created dagger after dagger and no sooner had he one broken, Ella had it replaced. He threw and threw until he felt himself sweat, then he pushed himself more. “Can you make them look like someone?” “Yes?” Ella felt she knew where this would lead. 

“Make them look like them.” “No.” He looked at her offended. “No, I cannot. He is still your brother, I will not feed a hate of him. The best I can do is this.” She turned and created a figure. 

As soon as Loki realised who it was, he had two fresh daggers ready. “It will have to do.” He lunged the daggers forward and into the effigy of Prince Nigel. “You cannot just give me one.” “Say when you have enough.” She replied, creating more. 

Loki continued to pierce each ice sculpture until he was breathless. The snow that had been so fresh and smooth before was nothing more than a graveyard of ice shards now. One lone ice sculpture remained as Loki fell back to sit on the bench again. “Thank you.” “I am not who you want, Loki and I am so sorry I can never be but know that I am here for you, no matter what. And not because I am duty-bound as your wife.” Ella looked at him as she spoke to show her sincerity. “I will cancel the dinner for tonight and give you time to collect yourself.” She gently squeezed his shoulder once before going to leave. 

“The last piece of ice, we can’t have anyone see, in case it makes its way back to him.” Loki looked at the ice sculpture. 

Ella created two blades from thin air and threw them as she spun around at the sculpture, both piercing the statue through to the other side, before having them break it apart. With that done, she walked off. 

Loki spent a moment staring blankly ahead at the broken statue, shocked not at her getting them to hit, but the fact that for the moment after impact and her getting them to shatter it, he noted they had pierced it through the location of the heart and directly between the eyes. 

His thoughts went to her sympathy, which did not even feel forced or pathetic like others would be, it felt genuine. He thought again of what he had said to her earlier in the conversation, only she was ever genuinely honest with him. 

[theemptyquarto]

Abandoned WIP

Warstan (but John got killed off before the story starts) and purely platonic Sherlock & Mary.  Quite AU... John and Mary get together before Sherlock jumped off of Bart’s.  Maybe a little bit of hinted unrequited Johnlock, I honestly can’t remember if I was going there with this fic.  A “Mary is the new Watson” retelling of “The Adventure of the Empty House,” rated T.  This was written before S3 happened and I fell in love with BBC Mary and she actually made me view BBC John as an interesting character in his own right and I rejiggered my alignments.

I’m going to rant here, just briefly, about how ACD’s Mary Morstan is probably one of the most wronged-by-their-author characters that I can think of, which is why I started writing this fic where she takes the lead.

She appears for the first time in the second-ever (authorially, not chronologically) Sherlock Holmes story, “The Sign of the Four,” and is delightful.  Watson falls hard in love right away and acts like a huge dweeb about her, she’s courageous, clever, and kind.  Maybe without all the panache of the later Irene Adler, but a more traditionally Victorian heroine for our more traditionally Victorian junior protagonist.  Her next appearance, “The Adventure of the Crooked Man,” is significantly more tangential, but she sets the action of the story in play and is shown to be a helpful, kind figure.

And then all of a sudden Conan Doyle ships her off to visit her mother (she was established as an orphan), stops using her at all, and finally kills her off.

Not even on the page.  Between books.  And it’s mentioned so tangentially in two lines of “The Adventure of the Empty House” that you can easily miss it if you aren’t looking for it.

(Incidentally this sort of shit is why ACD fandom can’t agree on how many wives Watson had or who the subject  of his “sad bereavement” is.  The number ranges from 1-13.)

Why, Artie?  Why did you do that?  I mean I get if you want to park Watson back at Baker Street you probably do have to off her but you were a fairly good hack and doing it this way made you give up the opportunity to have some sort of emotional payoff in your stories.  Especially since you later introduce another wife character who is in no way distinct from Mary (a niche component of ACD fandom thinks that Mary didn’t die at all and Watson “abandoning (Holmes) for a wife,” was him and Mary reconciling after an estrangement.)

Anyway.  Don’t create cool characters and then kill them for no good reason.  That’s my point.

_____________

The Empty Flat (Mary)

I had been widowed for three months and was rather surprised at how badly I was doing with it. The snug three-bedroom garden flat in Maida Vale had been the perfect size for a not-quite-young couple planning on children.  Now it seemed vast and empty and utterly, utterly silent.  When I slept, which wasn’t all that much, I did it on the sofa.  Our bed still smelled faintly of his aftershave, and I couldn’t stand either to sleep there or to wash the sheets.  Arthur, the blue point Siamese cat who I had bought into the marriage, would curl up on my feet and awaken me with his yowls in the morning.

To some extent I had been able to occupy my mind with work, and the requirements of my job had kept me more or less a functional adult.  But the summer holidays had begun a week previous, and I was thus thrown entirely on my own resources, which were scant. What family I had left were all back in America, and the friends I had made in England seemed to have melted away since John’s death.  Some days, I thought that this was due to the universal impulse to avoid reminders of mortality.  Other days I decided it was more likely due to the fact that I deleted their emails and declined to answer their phone calls.

The truth, as always, was probably somewhere in the middle.  

Whatever the cause, my life was empty.  I ate when I remembered that I was meant to.  I wore pajamas all day.  I left the flat when I ran out of cat food, and at night I would turn on the tv and stare at it without paying attention until I finally sank into oblivion.

Presumably it was on one of those descents into the maelstrom of crap British late-night TV that I first took note of the murder of Ronald Adair.  The dead man was vaguely familiar to me, though I had never watched any of his shows personally.  He was a scion of one of those impoverished but very old-and-noble families that the English keep on out of sentiment. Showing unusual initiative for one of his class, he’d made a success of himself by appearing on a famous reality show, then on the “celebrity” version of that show, and parlaying that into one of those mysterious but apparently quite lucrative careers that consist mostly of having your picture taken.  

And now, he was dead, shot in the back of the head in his own bedroom on Park Lane.

The story struck me, for some reason.  John, when he’d been alive, used to take four daily papers and half a dozen weeklies, and I had not cancelled them yet.  I plucked a week’s worth out of the recycling where I had tossed them, unread, and scanned through them for articles about the murder.

Ronald Adair had been alone in his bedroom, drinking neat whiskey and updating twitter, when he died.  His last tweet (@JustLukeyA, “LOL C U @ Ibiza”) had been sent at 10:11 in the evening. His personal assistant had heard the sound of breaking glass, broken down the locked door that led into the bedroom, seen his body, and dialed 999 by 10:17.  The bullet had been a large caliber hollow point round that had done severe damage to the back of his skull, and he had most likely died almost instantly.

The entire affair was mysterious.  While the police hadn’t released any real statements, the personal assistant had been the only other person in the house at the time of the shooting, and had been released after questioning.  This would suggest the shot had been fired from outside, but the window in Adair’s bedroom, while open, was on the fourth floor.  There was no evidence to suggest anyone had climbed to the window, meaning that the shot had come from somewhere outside.  

This made no sense at all to the gossip rags.  The window faced directly over Hyde Park, and any level shot would have had to come from over a mile away.  And shooting from ground level would have been impossible: the Park was open, reasonably crowded given the warmth of the summer evening, and no one had heard a thing.  The American embassy was less than two hundred yards away, and even its overblown security hadn’t noted any unusual activity.  Essentially, it was impossible that he could have been shot, and yet there he was.

As I read through the papers, I thought how John would have gone through them at the breakfast table to try and figure out what had happened.  Although his professional interest in solving mysteries had died with Sherlock, he never lost his fascination with the more arcane sorts of crime.  He would have loved this one, and I could imagine the crinkles that would form around his eyes as he would describe the possible motives, mechanisms, and solutions.  It was a Sunday, and I suspected that he would have wheedled me into taking our normal long walk in the direction of the crime scene.  I’d have teased him, said he was morbid, but I’d have gone, and he’d have hypothesized happily for a while.

I could so clearly imagine it, and it made me smile, despite myself.  It had been difficult to like Sherlock Holmes, and very difficult to deal with the fact that their association put John into danger on a regular basis.  Yet, now that they were both gone, I found myself forgiving every thoughtless insult and sleepless lonely night the detective ever gave me, since he had made John so happy.  

Wishing to hang on to my happy memory, I decided, abruptly, to take the walk over to Park Lane myself, just as John and I would have done.  It was past time I actually started doing things again.  I would go and see where Ronald Adair had died, and I would try and solve the mystery, and I would remember John.  Quickly, before I could change my mind, I showered, dressed, and left the flat.

July, in London, is one of the few times of the year when it approaches being warm enough, and it was a beautiful day.  I took the long route around Kensington Park, since a straight shot would have taken me directly past St. Mary’s Hospital, where John had worked - and where his body had been taken. The trees were brilliant green, and it seemed everyone in London was sunbathing or playing football or falling in love around me.

Ronald Adair’s flat was adjacent to the Mariott, in one of the converted brick Georgian edifices that infest all of Park Lane.  I had forgotten to take note of the number, but it was easily identifiable by the flowers and stuffed animals heaped up on the low fence that surrounded it. There were a fair number of gawkers, and by asking, I found which window Adair had been shot through.  I was stumped, for the moment, but thinking logically, decided the best route was to see from where I could have made the shot.  The busy street and the shrubbery borders of the park being ruled out, necessarily, I confined my attention to the sidewalks.  I took pictures on my phone, and paced around, and tried to work out the trigonometry involved.  

Then I stopped.  There were half a dozen locations from which the shot could have come.  It would be the hell of a task: the window was small and high, but if it were dark out and the shooter were aiming into a lit room, it would be possible. I had hunted a lot as a kid, and might have been able to make it with a rifle.  John, who had been an excellent marksman, might have been able to do it with a handgun.  But to do it quickly enough to avoid notice in a busy neighborhood, to do it silently?  That was impossible.

All facts that were undoubtedly obvious to the police.  If John had been with me, it would have been a fun little mathematical exercise.  We’d have followed it with a walk home, dinner at the pub on the end of our street, and making tipsy love in the light of a summer sunset in our flat.  But he wasn’t with me, and he never would be again, and the day would end as all days did, alone with the cat and the television and the dark.  The whole thing was a pointless, futile exercise - a little girl’s attempt to play make-believe.

I knew, suddenly, that I was going to cry.  It happened a lot, and it wasn’t an experience I wanted to share with all London, so I spun around to depart and slammed full-force into a souvenir hawker who had been just behind me.  Grace has always eluded me.  The pole she carried, hung with ballcaps and other tat, fell to the ground, and she gave an indignant Cockney squawk of “Oi! Watch it!”  I bent to retrieve her pole and handed it back to her, mumbling, “Sorry, sorry,” and fled outright into the park, keeping my eyes firmly on the ground.  

Leaving the path, I hurried through the park, not really aware of where I was going as long as it was quieter and emptier.  I reached a dim copse free of children, tourists, and lovers, where I sat down, and let the tears flow.

It’s easy to see why the ancient Egyptians thought that the heart, and not the brain, was the source of love.  True sadness isn’t felt in the head, it’s felt in the chest, and I could feel every choked beat of my heart as I sobbed and gasped and tried to catch my breath for what seemed like ages.  But from a pragmatic point of view, I’m sure I didn’t go for long.  Crying is too tiring to keep up for much time.  Of course, I had come out without any tissues, so I wiped my aching eyes and puffy face on the corner of my cardigan.  

At that moment, the hawker walked into the copse.  

“There you are!” she called out, “Wondered where you’d got to!”

I sighed.  “Look,” I said, “I’m sorry about knocking into you.  It was an accident.  If I’ve damaged anything I will be happy to pay-“

“Na, na, love.  Just a load of rubbish.  Can’t hurt it if it isn’t worth anything to start with.  But I saw your face and thought you might be in some trouble.”  The woman was elderly, with a mop of dyed auburn hair and a thick Docklands accent which I would love to render in text, if it didn’t look so silly.  But her blue eyes were kind, and she handed me a miniature water bottle marked with “Souvenir of Hyde Park.”

“I’m – fine.  I just got a little upset.  Thank you.”  The water was lukewarm and tasted faintly of plasticizers, but it soothed my irritated throat.

The woman seemed to take this remark as an invitation, and placing her wares on the grass, sat next to me.  I have lived in London since I was twenty-five years old and I could tell what was coming.  There are two main personality types among the English: the type that is intensely uncomfortable with any sort of emotion, and the type that delights in every possible expression of sentiment and wishes to hear all about it.  They’re like New Yorkers in that respect.

Apparently I had found one of the latter variant.

“You get to see a bit of everything, my line of work,” she said, digging a battered packet of Silk Cut out of her pocket, “Care for one?”

I had officially quit smoking years ago, when I finished my doctorate, and stopped even having the occasional one when I started dating John, since he loathed the things.  Just at that moment, though, it sounded like heaven.  “Yes, thank you.”

She shook two out of the packet, and passed one to me before getting out a transparent plastic lighter.  She lit hers, and then handed over the lighter.  A brief breeze kicked up, and I bowed my head over the tiny flame, trying to make the cigarette catch, as she said, quietly, “Now, Mary, you need to remain calm.”

The cigarette caught, and I took that first delicious, poisonous drag, before the fact that this stranger knew my name really filtered into my mind.  

I looked over, and where the woman had been, sat Sherlock Holmes.

  The Sign of Four (Sherlock)

The art of disguise, as I have often remarked, is in context far more than it is in costume.   Truly approximating the appearance of someone else is only possible from a distance: in ordinary situations major alterations to the face appear theatrical and attract more attention than not.  If, instead, you select a character who would be entirely appropriate in the context in which he appears, you need make only minor changes to your own appearance.  The observer’s mind will then do ninety per cent of your work and you will be de facto invisible.  I intend to write a monograph on the topic when I have the time.

Mary Morstan may have had some subconscious understanding of this.  On the occasion of our first meeting, I observed that she was wearing a carefully calibrated disguise, although I doubt she would have referred to it as such.  Very high heels, but an intentionally prim and boxy suit, severe makeup and hairstyle, heavy-framed glasses.  She introduced herself with a flat, middle-American accent, only slightly sharpened by years of living in London.

Just after she arrived, John walked into the flat, his arms filled with carrier bags of groceries, which he set down with great rapidity in order to shake her hand.  

“Mary Morstan, my associate, John Watson.  Miss Morstan,” I said, “Teaches maths at Westminster School.”

She stared at me when I said that.  John, I noted, didn’t let go of her hand when her attention was distracted.

“How do you know that?” she asked.

I sighed, though in truth I always enjoy it when they ask for the reasoning.  

“You’ve obviously come straight from work, meaning that you work Saturday mornings.  Chalk dust on the right cuff, which is worn in a way that you only ever see with people who spend a great deal of time writing on blackboards.  There are traces of red ink on the heel of your hand and a splotch near the tip of your index finger.  Thus, teacher.”  

As I’d expected, she dropped John’s hand to examine her own.

“You took the tube to get here, and in those shoes you probably didn’t walk far before you boarded at Westminster station: there’s construction digging up the street there and the fresh splashes of yellowish mud on your left stocking are quite distinctive.  Half a dozen schools in that area, but your ensemble suggests older students and moneyed parents. Hence, Westminster School.”

The last was a gloss, as her ensemble suggested nothing of the sort.  It said quite plainly “I teach older boys.”  Her skirt was unfashionably long, her blouse was buttoned up to the neck, and her jacket was boxy in order to conceal her rather large breasts.  Having attended an all-boys senior school, I recognized the style, and the motivation behind it.  But since I was undoubtedly going to receive the ”abrasive” and “show-off” lectures after her departure, I saw no reason to add the “inappropriate” one, and simplified the matter.

“And… maths?”

I sighed again, this time sincerely.  The easy ones are never any fun.

“There’s a graphics calculator in the right pocket of your overcoat.”

At that, she laughed.  Giggled, really.  But almost instantly, she caught herself, cleared her throat, and dropped back into the lower vocal register that she had previously affected.  Everything I could ever have wished to know about Mary Morstan’s character was thus revealed in the first five minutes of our interview.  Nature had given her a respectable brain and deposited it in a body that was small, blonde, and rather fluffy.  Her disguise did a reasonable job of concealing this, but she would spend the rest of her life trying to make people take her seriously.

“That’s amazing,” she said, “I read in your blog, Doctor Watson-“

“John, please,” he interrupted.  Oh dear.

“John.  I read about this kind of analysis but it’s remarkable to see it in real life.”

“Can be a bit creepy if you’re not used to it, though,” John replied, which I thought extremely unfair, given that I had been very polite and not mentioned that her teeth demonstrated her adolescent bulimia or that her fingers and eyebrows strongly implied a mild obsessive-compulsive condition.  I maintained my dignity, and said only,

“Thank you, John.  State your case, Miss Morstan.”

“Right.  Well.   I suppose I have to go back to the beginning.  My father, Thomas Morstan, was English.  I was actually born in Sussex, but when I was two my parents divorced and my mother and I moved back to America. I never got to see him much, growing up, but he always kept in touch, by phone and letters, and then by email when that came around.  Sent birthday gifts and that sort of thing.  Ten years ago I finished grad school, and he offered to buy me a ticket to come and meet him in London.  I hadn’t seen him for several years at that point and I didn’t have a job so, obviously, I said yes.”

“Mmm.  Continue.”

“He’d booked us rooms at the Langham, which I thought was much too expensive for him, but he said it was a treat for my graduation.”

“What was his profession, then?”

“He started off in the Army, but he resigned his commission after the first Gulf War and joined the diplomatic service.”

“As?”

“An attaché.  Just an office job, basically.  Visas and helping distressed tourists and so on.”

“And his rank in the army?”

“Ah, he ended as a Lieutenant Colonel, I believe.

“Go on.”

“I flew to London, expecting him to pick me up at Heathrow, but he wasn’t there.  No answer when I tried to call him.  I took a cab to the Langham and asked if he’d checked in, and he had, but there was no answer when they called up to his room.  Eventually they agreed to open the door – he’d had a heart attack a few years before, and I was getting very upset - and all of his things were in there, but no sign of him.  I never saw him again.”

“Interesting.  Did the police investigate?”  John was patting her shoulder, sympathetically, which seemed excessive given that the death (and yes, it was death, almost certainly) was ten years in the past.  She should have been well beyond it by this point.  But upon closer observation, I could see that he was right: a slight swimminess around the eyes and the set of the jawbone indicating gritted teeth.  Oedipal complex.  She replied, calmly enough.

“Yes.  They didn’t find anything.”

“Of course they didn’t.  They never do.  Did your father have any acquaintances in London?”

“Only one that they could find: a Major Sholto.  He had no idea Dad was even in town.”

“Mmm.  I doubt a disappearance ten years ago would incline you to seek the services of a consulting detective today.  What has changed?”

Morstan cleared her throat and opened the battered leather attache case that had been sitting at her feet.  From a manila folder, she removed a broadsheet page of yellowing newsprint, with a quarter-page sized advertisement in the upper right hand corner circled in red ink.  The paper was the Omaha World-Herald, the date was May 4, 2004, and the advertisement simply stated:

“If Mary Morstan, daughter of Captain Thomas Morstan, will contact the address below, it will be to her advantage” followed by an email address.

“Half a dozen of my friends from high school saw this and forwarded it on to me.”

“And what did you do?”

“I sent them an email.  I said I was Thomas Morstan’s daughter, that I’d relocated to London, and asked what they wanted.”

“Any reply?”

“No.  And when I sent on a follow-up a few days later, it bounced.   It was just Hotmail… could have been anyone.  But then a few days after that, I received this in the mail.”

Reaching back into the attaché case, she pulled out a small pouch made of black jeweler’s felt. Loosening the drawstring, she tipped something small and square into her palm, and passed it over to me.

I could hear John inhale sharply through is teeth as I reached for my lens.  Mary said, wryly, “Yes, that’s pretty much how I felt.  It’s a three carat, blue-white, flawless diamond.  Probably dug up in India, if that’s any help.  It’s worth around $150,000, retail.”

“Unusual cut,” I murmured, looking at the magnified lump of crystallized charcoal, “It’s called the-“

“The old mine cut,” interrupted Mary, “Meaning it was most likely faceted sometime between 1700 and 1900.  I know.  After the police gave it back to me, I had it appraised at Sotheby’s.”

“You went to the police again?”

“I did.”

“Any good?”

“Not really.  They hung onto it a while, but nobody reported any similar gems lost or stolen, and then they gave it back.  Apparently it’s “not illegal to be given things.”  So after that I was on my own.  But I still didn’t feel right about it, so I had the appraisal to see if a real professional could find anything more useful.”

“Well done,” said John, heartily.  He was in a fair way to make an idiot of himself over this woman, although she seemed flattered by the compliment.

“Thank you,” Mary replied, “And then, the thing is, Mr. Holmes, that it didn’t stop with this.  Every year since then, on May 14, I get another one of these in my mail.  I’ve changed addresses and it didn’t make a difference.  Perfectly matched, very expensive diamonds.  I left the rest of them in my safe deposit box: even carrying one of them around makes me edgy.  And then, yesterday, there was this.”

She passed over a letter.  Fine, high linen content paper, no watermark, 10-point… Trebuchet font, printed on an HP laserjet printer. It read, “Be at the third pillar from the left outside the Lyceum Theatre on Saturday, July 9 at seven o'clock. If you are distrustful, bring two friends. You are a wronged woman, and shall have justice. Do not bring police. If you do, all will be in vain. Your unknown friend.”

There was no signature or address.

“Did you keep the envelope?”

“Yes, here.  And here,” she said, passing over a small heap of padded mailers sealed into plastic zip-topped bags, “Are the envelopes the diamonds came in.”

“Well, you do have the right instincts.  Not much to see here, though… the letter and the last three packages had their labels off the same printer.  The first four were from another.  It stretches credulity to think that there are separate groups doing this so we’ll assume for the moment it was simply a matter of replacing an outdated device.  The mailers can be bought anywhere.  Various London postmarks… thumbprint on this one, Miss Morstan, may I see your right hand please?  Thank you.  Your thumbprint. I’ll put them under the microscope later but I doubt there’ll be that much to learn.”

“And you’ve no idea at all who may have sent these?  No… admirers, things like that?” John asked.

She laughed at that.  “Generally, when men are interested in me they go more for things like asking me to dinner rather than anonymously sending me a million dollars in gems over the course of seven years.  I’m not that unapproachable.”  I rolled my eyes at their stale flirtation, although I don’t believe either of them noticed it.

“But…” she continued, more hesitantly, “Mr. Holmes, do you think that there’s any possibility that these are from my father?”

John was glaring at me, and so instead of saying “Of course not.  He’s been dead for ten years,” replied “I’m afraid it’s very unlikely.”

“I see,” Mary replied, quietly.  She drew a deep breath and continued, “Well, regardless, I had planned to go… unless you can give me a real reason not to.  If whoever it is wants to hurt me it seems like they’ve chosen a really baroque way of going about it.  I mean, they already know where I live so it’s not like there’s much point in avoiding them. And I’m getting sick of this mystery.”

“There are, however, a few points of interest in it.  As you are allowed to bring two friends and John is already planning on accompanying you, I believe I shall join him.”

She darted her gaze back and forth between us, smiling, “Really?  You will?  Both of you?  Oh, thank you, thank you so much! This whole saga has just been so shady and I didn’t know anyone who’d be any help with this kind of thing.  It’s such a weight off my mind. Thank you.”

She was gushing, and her voice had inevitably pitched up again.  I responded calmly with, “Yes, well.  Can you be here by five thirty on Saturday?  And leave us your contact information.”

“Of course!”

And, writing an email address and a phone number on a sheet of scrap paper, she disappeared in a whirl of gratitude.

John rose to escort her to the door.  I remained seated, and began texting.

“That, he said, picking up his carrier bags and taking them into the kitchen, “Was a very attractive woman.”

“Hadn’t noticed.”

“Really.  I knew you were a human adding machine but I never thought you were actually dead.  Sherlock, it’s an objective fact!  She’s got a beautiful smile.”

“Very short.”

“Oh, come on.  She’s an inch or two shorter than I am.”

While this statement would not actually exclude “short” from consideration, I simply raised my eyebrows and replied, “Women have developed this remarkable technology called shoes which they use when they wish to increase their height, John.  She’s no more than five feet tall.”

“Yes, well, shortness is not a handicap, Sherlock.  And she’s clever.”

“She’s adequate.”

“And brave.  She was going to walk by herself into a threatening situation just because she wanted to find out the truth.”

“So are you.  So am I, for that matter.  I fail to see why it’s so much more meritorious when it’s her doing it.”

“I’m a combat-trained military reservist, and you are England’s only consulting detective.  It’s our job.  She’s a very small maths teacher.”

I set down the mobile and glared at him, “Mary Morstan, John, is in no need of your protection.  This affair of the diamonds is a mere personal intrigue.  She’ll meet with the woman and resolve it without the benefit of your attention.”

He paused from putting the potatoes in the bin and inquired, “It’s a woman sending the diamonds?  You’re sure?”

In general, I don’t admit which of my deductions I’m certain of and which are (very good) guesses.  Maintaining a reputation as infallible isn’t a trivial exercise.  But John had repeatedly earned the truth from me, and so I said, “No, I’m not.  I’m reasonably confident, given the font choice, the computer used, and the wording, that it’s a woman, and a rather melodramatic one.  But there’s more – uncertainty in these things than I would like.”

John chuckled.  “I should take a picture of you right now and call it ‘Sherlock Holmes admitting he might be wrong’.  They’d love to have it down at the Yard.  So why take the case if you don’t think there’s any mystery?”

“Oh, there is one, just not the “why is someone sending me expensive gemstones” one she came in with.  Can you log on to the GRO database and look something up for me?  My email address and password will get you in.”

“Sure,” he said, walking back into the sitting room and picking up his laptop, “What?”

“Deaths.  Start by looking for “Sholto” in late April, early May of 2005.  If that doesn’t bring up anything, look for ex-military, older, in London, same time frame.”

“Right.  What are you going to do?”

I held up my mobile.  “I’ve done it.  I’ve sent a text to brother Mycroft.”

“Why?”

“Watson, when a man leaves a high rank role in the army to become a low-end functionary in the diplomatic service, what does that suggest?”

“Er, PTSD?”

“No. It suggests spy.  I want to find out exactly what Thomas Morstan did for a living.”  

A week after that, Mary Morstan arrived punctually back at Baker Street. She’d replaced the dowdy suit with trousers and a blue blouse cut low in the front, left off her glasses, and undone her severe bun to let her hair hang over her shoulders.  She had chosen flat shoes this time, which was a relief, as it showed the target of all this display was John rather than me.

Six hours after that, I saw that the display had been successful.  I had to physically restrain John from going to her as she was handcuffed and loaded into a black maria for the murder of Barbara Sholto.  As typical of Americans, she was explaining loudly and slowly to the arresting officer that there had been a terrible misunderstanding, clearly expecting this to rectify the situation.  

“John, look,” I said, sotto voce, as I pinned him to the wall of the alley, “If you go over there you’ll only be arrested too.  Athelney Jones has already picked up the entire domestic staff and Theresa Sholto and would be only too happy to increase his bag.  The man’s an idiot, even by the standards of the metropolitan police.  We’ll text Lestrade to let him know, and the worst she’ll have is a few uncomfortable hours, but we need to be on our way if we’re going to actually catch the killer which is the only thing that will do her any good.”

Even that early, I suspected that Mary would not be as swiftly forgotten as the rest of the girlfriends.

Three days later, Mary was a free woman again.   The lost crown jewels of the Russian Tsars, of which she had been offered a one-third share, were scattered along six miles of the bottom of the Thames.  She had accepted this development with equanimity.  As she said to John, “Even if they hadn’t been lost, it’s not like I was expecting to keep them.  I’m sure there’s still some Romanovs somewhere who’d like to have them back.  The whole time Teresa was telling me the story of how she got them I kept thinking “Yeah, this kind of stuff doesn’t happen in real life.””

I heard, while they were falling in love, enough of “The Things Mary Says” to gag a cat.  I heard about Mary’s feelings on politics, the arts, and current events.  I heard about Mary’s emotional turmoil on the discovery that her father was an intelligence agent who had taken the pay of so many competing nations and organizations that even now nobody could say who he had really worked for.  And that was apart from his being a jewel thief.  I heard enough recitations of her personal charm, intelligence, and integrity to gag a dog.

  Not being enamored of her, I was able to observe her far more clearly.  I saw that she omitted to mention during the investigation that she was already in receipt of seven perfectly-matched flawless three carat blue-white diamonds, pulled from a coronet made for some forgotten Tsarina.  I saw no reason to bring it up to anyone, if she had overcome her scruples about receiving stolen property.  I would rather the money have gone to John than to anyone else, and it was clear by that point that it would.

Over the next months, Mary incorporated herself into John’s life, and thus, into mine.  I grew accustomed to the scent of her cosmetics in the flat’s shared w.c. (she was a disgustingly early riser and had usually gone before I woke up), and the sounds of their post-sex conversation from the upstairs bedroom (they kept the actual lovemaking quiet, out of politeness, but the after-chat was quite distinct).  I drew the line, however, at allowing her to tidy the place.  She didn’t understand the system and would have made a hash of it.

Ultimately, just over six months after the day she rang the bell at Baker Street, I found myself ordering a round of tequila shots at the bar of the White Lion and slipping chloral hydrate into three of them.  Earlier, Mary had balanced on tiptoe to kiss my cheek and whisper in my ear “Can you please try not to let them get him too drunk?”  I carried the round back to the table where a flushed and grinning but not yet weaving Watson listened as a dozen of his Army and medical school friends speculated on whether Mary would qualify him as “Four-Continents Watson” or if the actual location of the coitus mattered more than the origin of the lady in question.  I passed the shot glasses around, judging that the administration of three Mickey Finns to three particular members of the party would bring the night to a graceful but early end in about an hour.

I judged, as usual, correctly.  After decanting the three dazed ringleaders into a cab, the party broke up, and John and I made it back to Baker Street with only slightly more difficulty than usual. The stairs did give him some trouble, but ultimately I was able to successfully deposit him on the couch.  I shook two aspirin from the bottle and handed them to him along with a glass of water.  He took both uncomplainingly.

“Sherlock?”

“Yes?”

“Thanks.  For whatever you did back there.  I’d hate to be a mess tomorrow.”

“I looked up the duties of the best man and apparently making sure the groom is present and presentable are tops on the list.”

“And you even agreed to wear a tie!”  This non sequitur amused him, and he chuckled at his own joke for a moment, before sobering (comparatively), and staring around the flat.  “I’m going to miss all this.”

“No, you won’t,” I predicted, climbing the stairs to fetch the blankets off his bed.  

“I will!” he insisted, “I’m happy, really happy, about Mary.  She’s wonnerful.  But I’ll miss this life.  And you.”

“It’s not as though I’ll be dead.  You’ll be ten minutes away.  I’ll be sure to call you whenever I need my cases blogged.”

“I love you, mate, you know that?  Even though you are- just such a prick.”

I smiled and pitched the blankets at his head.  “I do.  Tosser.  Now go to sleep.  You have a busy day ahead of you.”

He was out and snoring, wearing everything but his shoes, five minutes later.  I refilled his water glass and left it on the end table.

At noon the next day I (wearing not only a tie but my entire morning suit) stood at John’s left shoulder and watched Mary Morstan walk down the aisle.  I doubt she saw me: her eyes were fixed on John, who was sober, alert, and in full dress uniform, as requested.  The expression of love and joy on her face obliged me to concede that, at the moment, she was in fact a very attractive woman.  

I don’t think I could have given him up to anyone who loved him even a bit less.

At the reception I gave a speech which everyone said was very interesting, and drank one and a half glasses of inferior Prosecco.  I watched them cut the cake, noting that the new Mrs. Watson was far more comfortable with John’s ceremonial saber than he was.  She’d lost the callosities of the dedicated fencer, but the skill remained.  Then, as Molly Hooper was prowling around with an eye towards dancing and my actual duties were complete, I slipped out of the hall and walked back to Baker Street.

I stopped in at the chemists and bought a packet of cigarettes, then let myself into the flat.  There was a peculiar sensory illusion that it was larger and emptier than normal: nonsense, of course.  John was routinely absent when I was there.  The fact that the absence would now be permanent didn’t alter the actual physical size of the place.

There was always work, and heedless of my dress clothes, I went to it.  Three months later, I “died.”  And three years after that, I returned to a London which seemed larger and emptier than I recalled.  Sensory illusion again.  The softer emotions have a very negative impact upon accurate observation, and the world in general doesn’t change at all when a single person drops out of it. On an individual level, though, a single death can rip the bottom out of everything.  Such was the case with Mary Watson, who I encountered on a bright August day in Park Lane.  She’d lost a stone in weight, which was significant at her height, and was wearing an oversized camel-colored cardigan which I recognized with a pang as being one of Watson’s.  She had, in general, the appearance of a child’s toy where the stuffing had been pulled out.  I approached her, unseen, as her attention was on Ronald Adair’s flat.   When she lost her composure and fled, I hesitated.  Then I followed.  There were two reasons for this.  The first, as always, was John.  I couldn’t envision a situation where he would not have come to the aid of a crying woman.  In the particular case of Mary, he’d have sprinted to it.

As for the second, well…  On the occasion of the case of Neville St. Claire, John had said to me that, “People in trouble come to my wife like birds to a light-house.”

And I truly had nowhere else to go.   Chapter 3: The Death of Ronald Adair (Mary)

In general, I am not a fainter, and I didn’t faint then.  But a grey mist swirled in front of my eyes, and when it subsided I noticed I had dropped the cigarette onto the well-clipped Hyde Park grass.  I picked it up with numb, nerveless fingers.  With my other hand I reached out to Sherlock and pushed on the flesh of his bicep.  He was reassuringly solid.

“So I haven’t gone mad.”

“No.”

“Not dead, then?”

“Yes.”

I took a drag from the Silk Cut and asked, “Does anyone else know besides me?”

“Mycroft.”

“Of course.”

“And Molly Hooper.”

“That bitch!” I exclaimed, before I could stop myself.  I wouldn’t quite have called Molly a friend.  We didn’t see much of one another, but her quiet competence had gotten me through the hellscape of the funeral.  I found it startlingly painful to believe that she had been concealing a secret like this- especially from John.

Sherlock quirked an eyebrow at me and said, “You’re harsher on her than on Mycroft?”

“There is nothing that I would put past one of the Holmes boys.”

He sighed, and drew on his own cigarette.  The sun dipped below the treetops and set us into shadows.

“Sherlock,” I asked, eventually, “What do you want?”

“I need a gun.”

“Oh, Jesus Christ.  Of course you do.”

“Mary, please-“ and he hesitated.  He and I had never been more than “friendly”, and he certainly had never been inclined to ask any favors of me.  

“You’re still in trouble, aren’t you?” I accused.

He hesitated again.

“Yes.”

“Right,” I said, brushing off my pants and rising, “We’ll talk.  Baker Street, or our place?  My place.”

“Baker Street is being watched.”

“Can we take a cab?”

“Probably.”

It was actually very impressive, how he collapsed his face into that of the Cockney souvenir hawker.  He even seemed to lose several inches in height.  The stage lost an excellent actor when he decided to go into detective work.

We walked in silence back to Park Lane, and took a cab (after he’d dismissed the first one that tried to stop).  He sat next to me in silence, until a horrible thought overtook me, and I said, “Oh, God, has anyone told you?  About-“

“Your… bereavement?  Yes.  I was… very sorry to hear of it.”

It was a relief.  It had already happened several times: some colleague or acquaintance who I hadn’t seen in a while would, in the course of ordinary chit-chat, drop, “Oh, and how’s John doing?” into the conversation.  And then I would have to watch their faces change from polite disinterest to horror and pity as I gave them the news.  I would say it was the worst thing I had to do, but I had developed an entire new suite of worst things in recent months and was somewhat spoiled for choice.

We didn’t speak any further until I let us into the flat.

“Have a seat.  I’ll just go get it.”

John, given that he was occasionally prone to physically violent nightmares, had always kept the Sig Sauer semi-automatic securely locked away in a box in the master bedroom closet.  I retrieved it, and returned to the living room.  Sherlock had installed himself in his old favorite spot on the sofa, and Arthur had climbed onto the arm next to him.  They were watching each other with matching expressions of flat-eyed distaste.

“I don’t know where the key is,” I said, passing the box over.

“It’s fine,” he replied.  And indeed, he materialized a lockpick from somewhere and opened it within ten seconds.

He’d removed his auburn wig, although he still had on an excellent shade of lipstick for his complexion: a glossy transparent berry-stain.  It was almost the only color on his face.  Whatever he’d been up to, it was doing no favors for his health.  I wouldn’t have thought he could have gotten thinner or paler, barring his contracting tuberculosis or vampirism.  And yet, he had managed.  At some point, he’d cut his hair off close to the scalp, and it was faintly peppered with grey.  Sherlock was a year or two younger than I, but at the moment I could see what he would be like as an old man.

“You know that thing’s illegal, right?” I said.

“It’s not something that’s a real concern just at the moment,” he returned, calmly.

“It should probably be cleaned.  It’s not been touched since… well, I’m not sure of the last time John cleaned it.”

“It will be fine.  They’re very simple instruments and Watson was always over-cautious.  I didn’t clean my old one for years and it never had any problems.”

“That’s because John would secretly do it for you every few months.”

One of the small pleasures in life that everyone should get to experience at least once is to watch Sherlock Holmes’ face when he is informed that one of the normals has gotten something past him.  I had to suppress a flicker of a smile at how thunderous he looked.

“Look,” I said, “Give it here and I’ll do it.  The cleaning kit’s on the top shelf above the stove in the kitchen, if you’ll reach it down for me.”

I could hear him rummaging around in the cabinet as I released the clip, disconnected the slide, and popped out the spring.  I laid everything down on the coffee table and accepted the kit when he returned and gave it to me.  When I sighted down the barrel, I could see ample dust, and a fair bit of corrosion from the soggy English atmosphere.  It only made sense, really.  When Sherlock had died, John had lost any professional reason to carry a gun, and gained a strong personal reason to lock it away and leave it to rust.  Dipping the cleaning swab into the wide-mouthed jar of solvent, I began passing it through the barrel.

“’In a self-defense situation, there will be many things you can’t control. The condition of your weapon is not one of them,’” I quoted.

“Did Watson say that?”

“No, though he’d have agreed with the sentiment.  That was my stepfather.  He was the one who taught me about shooting.”

Sherlock blinked at me.  “I didn’t know you had a stepfather.”

“Like everyone else, I do actually have an objective existence apart from the parts you find interesting, Sherlock.”

I sounded bitter, but I didn’t care.  I had been the one to put John back together after Sherlock’s quote-unquote death, and having him sitting calmly on my sofa irked.

“I only meant,” he replied, “That he wasn’t at your wedding.”

“He has congestive heart failure and travel is very difficult for him!” I snapped,

“Sherlock, why the hell did you do this?”

“Well, I had in fact been exposed as a fraud and-“

“Bullshit.  You have been more or less cleared for two years and I’m sure your brother told you that.  D.I. Lestrade had to demonstrate that you weren’t, in general, a criminal, because he wanted to keep his job. Fifty people, including me, by the by, came forward to tell stories of how you had solved cases that you couldn’t possibly have faked.  The only real mystery remaining is this whole affair with Richard Brook, and frankly the best person to justify that would have been you.”

He scrubbed his hands through the bristles of his hair.  “There was more.”

“So tell me.”

Sherlock sighed, and stared off into the space over my left shoulder.  “When the head of an organization is removed, the organization generally remains.  John Kennedy is shot, the United States persists.  The death of Jim Moriarty left a thriving multinational criminal organization with a vacancy at the top for which there were numerous keen candidates.  I have spent the last three years attempting to take advantage of this situation and dismantle its operations entirely.”

Something about the cold way he said “dismantle” made me think I really didn’t want to hear much about this process.  I asked, “And you couldn’t have done that in your own persona?”

“No.  Because- Moriarty was in many ways a remarkable man.”

The tone of this statement was pure admiration, and I rubbed my forehead where I could feel the old familiar “Sherlock” headache coming on. “How’s that?” I asked.

“I don’t want to say he founded a cult of personality, but in his immediate circle were several men who genuinely did admire him and support him in his goals, as opposed to the ordinary hangers-on who simply were in it for the profit.”

“So, his friends.”

“What?”

I sighed.  “Never mind.  Continue.”