#why are they wearing suits in an ihop at 2 in the morning

[aestheticsyoutubers]

hannah alonzo, hannahalonzo ↳ mlm top fails #58 | young living not paying out commissions but still reporting income on tax forms?

[psychedellic-phase]

Fifteen (pt 5)

A/N: I had a little mental block when trying write this one! I think it worked out in the end but better is coming ! I promise. Enjoyy :)

masterlist

(Part 1) (Part 2) (Part 3) (Part 4)

Word count: 3.4k

tw: none, fluff :)

Spencer didn’t dream about you. When he woke up, he was sweaty and disoriented and had no recollection of the dreams he had. He fell asleep next to the box fully clothed, his arm thrown across where you should have been. In those first few moments of morning when you aren’t quite sure where you are or who you are, he reached around for you and found nothing but emptiness. 

‘Emptiness? No that can’t be right. She was right here.’ 

Just as he thought it, the truth occurred to him. 

‘She was never here. Just the box. Wait, the box. Where is the box?’

He shot up quickly, getting a little dizzy, and frantically looked around the room. He saw that he had knocked the box over while he slept and the contents were scattered all over the floor. He groaned and went to pick everything up. His hands found all the items and he put them away carefully, not peeking. He didn’t want to ruin the surprise. When everything was put back where it belonged, he sighed and sat on his bed, staring longingly out the window. 

It was barely 6 am and the sun had risen, but he couldn’t see it behind the thick gray clouds that lined the sky. It was snowing. Not a rare thing to see in Virginia, but it was very appropriate for this day. You loved snow, wintertime, the holidays, all of it. You even tried to get him to go skiing with you a few times, which he refused to do. He is extremely clumsy in nature and would definitely hurt himself or someone else if he tried. It’s a miracle they even let him carry a gun. Besides, he’s more suited to drinking hot cocoa in the lodge by a fire. The cold is much less forgiving to him. Growing up in Vegas made him partial to the heat. Even though he had lived on the East coast for many years, he’d still complain anytime the temperature dropped below 40 and bundle up in a wool coat and scarf.  Your New England roots on the other hand, taught you to handle the cold much better. When he’d complain about being freezing, you would tell him that he had no idea what real cold was like, and when you would complain about the heat he’d return the sentiment. 

He left the box on the bed and took a shower. He needed to wash everything from the last day off.  It was therapeutic to just stand in the hot water and let it burn slightly, reminding him he could still feel. This had been so emotionally draining; he could barely remember the last time he cried so much. Today he just felt numb, barely bothering to put on more than sweatpants, but somehow mustering up enough energy to make a pot of coffee. He had a feeling he’d need the whole thing to get through the next twelve letters. Each one felt heavier in his hands than the previous did, and each cut a little deeper too. With a cup of coffee in hand, he fished around for envelope #4. 

“Spence, this next one is special. You’ll know why the second you pick it up. #4: The Book of Margery Kempe.”

He smiled and ran his hands over the book, his mother’s favorite. The spine was bent like it’d been cracked open many times, and the pages were worn and well read. He could tell it was your personal copy because of the dog-eared pages. You always did that, making him grimace every time you creased the corner of a page. 

“You could just use a bookmark, Y/N,” He’d say, earning an eye roll from you. 

“A book should look like it’s been read, that’s why I buy paperbacks and write in them! I want anyone who picks up something I’ve read to feel how much I loved it, that way they love it too.” 

That comment always made him smile, “Fine, just don’t do it to any of my books.”

“Don’t worry Dr. Reid, I only do it to my personal collection.”

The memory felt warm and inviting, but ended quickly. Instead, he grabbed the book, the letter, and his coffee and sat at the chess table he had pushed against a window. He wanted to see the snow while he read, just to feel closer to you.  

“I bought for our flight to Vegas, the trip where I met your mother for the first time. You mentioned Kempe was her favorite, and I so badly wanted to impress her. I know she’s...well she’s her. But you’re her pride and joy, Spence, I didn’t want to disappoint her. Or disappoint you for that matter. Remember when you asked? 

“I’d like you to come with me next week,” You said over an IHOP pancake breakfast. 

“To Vegas?”

You nodded, “Yeah I’d love if you came with me. You could see my hometown.”

“I’ve been to Vegas, Love.”

I know it seemed like I didn’t want to go, that isn’t the case. I did want to go. I wanted to go so bad, but I was hesitant. I was so terrified that I would mess up. I didn’t want to ruin us, we’d been doing so well. I felt like this would be a defining moment in our relationship (spoiler alert: it was) and I didn’t want to risk it going poorly. 

“Yeah on cases! And that is not the impression of Vegas I want you to have. C’mon please? It would mean the world to my mom.”

I think I choked on my pancake, “Your mom? She knows about me?”

“Of course she does, I write her letters all the time.”

“Your mom knows about us, and you want me to meet her?” 

You smiled and nodded, “Yeah Y/N, how many times do I have to say it? I want you to meet my mom.”

That’s probably when I tackled you in a hug in the middle of an IHOP. That solidified the fact that you trusted me. I knew you trusted me at work, but the fact that you were willing to show me that side of you, the side you don’t really show anyone? I can’t thank you enough for it. 

We’d been together just over six months, which to most people that seems like a long time to wait to meet the parents, especially when we were already so serious, but your situation is different. I wanted you to do it in your own time. 

My family on the other hand, you met them pretty early into us dating. My niece turned one a few months into us being together and I dragged you to Connecticut for the party. Everyone loved you, of course they did. There isn’t one thing to not love about you. Nate and my dad were definitely not thrilled that I was bringing you. Nate tries to be all Big Brother-y but it’s all an act, he’s a softie. And dad would rather I marry a rich man and be a stay at home mom. I can hear him now saying, “Y/N if your mother were here to see you thirty and unwed she would be so disappointed !” Dads. They’re the worst, but I don’t have to tell you that.”

For some reason that made him chuckle, having rough/nonexistent relationships with your fathers was just another item on the long list of things you had in common. On paper, you were a perfect match. But that was the only place. 

“But somehow, you didn’t have to wear them down, they just loved you instantly. Even Mia loved you, and she was one! You handed her toys and helped her put on her shoes. You talked to my dad about whatever he had on the History channel. It was perfect. You fit right in with us; it was like you completed us, you were the missing piece that we didn’t even know we needed. I know Mia will miss you; you were always so good with her. I think we’ll all miss you. And my dad is going to hate that I will not be married off any time soon, but he can deal with that. 

But back to your mom. To say I was nervous to meet her is probably the biggest understatement of all time. The way you love and care about her is one of the many reasons I fell in love with you. The way a guy treats his mom says a lot about how he’ll treat you, and with you it said ‘oh my god he’s perfect’. You do everything you can for her, even though it’s the hardest thing you’ve ever had to do. I admire that; I can only wish to be that kind and giving. 

We both took a few days off to go see her, and when we were in the airport I pulled out this book and tried to read it. 

“That’s mom’s favorite,” You said, smiling at me shyly. 

“I know.” 

The plane was delayed due to a storm. We sat waiting and waiting for a few hours, your hand on my thigh and my head on your shoulder as I desperately tried to read this book. I really did. I stumbled through about 50 pages but had retained literally nothing. I found myself rereading sentences like ten times over and trying to decode them. I felt embarrassed about it. You could read the whole thing with your morning coffee and immediately recite it forwards and backwards, and translate it into Korean and Russian flawlessly and there I was, sounding out every word. It’s not like I can’t read. I can read, I just can’t read and comprehend 1500s English very well. Science was always my strong suit.

I didn’t get much farther on the plane ride either. You, on the other hand, brought a whole library in your carry on and on that 5 hour plane ride you read two thick books, took an hour long nap, played solitaire (twice), won war against me (twice), and ate all the snacks I brought for you. And in that same time frame, I had gotten through maybe half of the book, taking very long breaks to stare out the window, talk to you, and try to sleep. 

“What part are you at?” You asked me at one point and I just kind of stared at you. 

“Uh, the uh, part where she’s going to Jerusalem?”

You chuckled, “That’s not very far.”

I shoved you playfully, “Hey! It’s confusing and hard to understand!”

You reached for the book, trying to take it from me, “Let me see.”

I moved it out of reach, “No! I need to figure it out on my own.” You smiled and let me keep trudging along. 

When you woke up from your nap your head was on my shoulder and I was running my fingers through your hair like I usually do did when you slept. 

“You don’t have to read it, Y/N,” you mumbled, your voice groggy with sleep. It’s always raspy when you first wake up. 

“I know, I just thought maybe I would impress her.”

You smiled and leaned over and kissed my cheek, “I love that, but don’t worry. I promise she’ll love you.”

Then you nuzzled into the crook of my neck and fell back asleep. I put my head on top of yours, closed the book, and allowed myself to do the same. 

When we landed, it was hot. Like, ungodly hot. No wonder you can't stand the cold. 

We first went to the hotel and I changed into more appropriate clothes for the weather. You somehow still had on slacks and a shirt, I don’t know how you didn’t sweat to death. I drove us to the sanitarium, and you were nervous, you barely even spoke. You were twiddling with your fingers and bouncing your leg, I didn’t have to use my profiling skills to figure it out. The radio was off and you stared out the window. 

“How long has it been?” I finally said. 

“Three hundred and six days.”

I just nodded, your nerves added onto mine tenfold and I thought I may faint. I got us there safely though. 

“You stay here, I’m going to see if it’s a good day. If not we’ll come tomorrow,” You said. 

I just nodded and leaned over to kiss you. It took way longer than I thought it would for you to come out and when you did you were smiling. Huge. 

“Good day?” I asked, hopping out of the car. You just nodded, still grinning ear-to-ear. You grabbed my hand and every nerve I had melted away. You always had that effect on me, even when we were just friends. No one will ever get me in the same way again. Even if they tried, I wouldn’t let them. You were it for me”

Spencer reached for the mug to take another sip and found it was already empty. He stared into the bottom of the mug where some sugar hadn’t dissolved and mulled over that last sentence.

You were it for me.

He put the mug down forcefully, knocking a few chess pieces over.

So then why wouldn’t you LET him be it for you?

“You led me to her, pulling me behind you, whispering reassurances to me the entire time. 

“Mom, this is Y/N, Y/N this is my mother.”

I came out from behind you, probably looking like a meek little mouse, “Hello.” I waved. 

“Now Spencer, you didn’t tell me she was pretty.”

You blushed and stammered, she chuckled, “It’s nice to finally meet you Y/N. I’ve heard a lot about you.” 

“Likewise,” I said, and shook her hand. It was warm and soft like yours. In fact, so much of her is in you. You don’t look the same, but your mannerisms are pretty close to identical. Her hair is lighter than yours but equally as wild. I love her, because she’s you. So many parts of you, the best parts of you. She made you, and I love you, so I love her too. 

You let us talk alone for a while and she told me about your childhood. How she called you ‘crash’ because you were always running into something. How you were always the smartest kid around and how she was so proud to be your mom. She told me about the letters you send her, much like the one I’m writing right now. You told her about all our adventures, nights crying over Emily, the film festival, Jacksonville (PG version of course); you told her all of it. Your mom had your version of our love story hidden in letters somewhere in her room. That inspired me to write my version, the version you’re reading right now. 

She told me she knew we were together before you even told her because all your letters became about me. All the case stories had me and you as the stars, everyone else falling into the background. Hearing how you talked to her about me made my insides feel all fuzzy. You told her I was intelligent, courageous, empathetic, funny, and pretty much every other positive adjective you could find. 

“I’ve never heard him talk about anyone the way he talks about you,” she told me, “He definitely cares about you.”

I smiled, “I’ve never cared about anyone as much as I care about him.”

“So you love him?” 

I was taken aback at first, and paused for a moment to think, “Yeah, I do.”

It’s a weird thing to say to your boyfriend’s mom the first time you meet her, but she’s just so easy to talk to. It’s double weird because I hadn’t even told you that I loved you yet. I was being honest, I never loved anyone the way I loved you. 

“I couldn’t ask for anything more for him.”

Then I hugged her awkwardly and you came back in. I was trying and failing to suppress the smile on my face the whole time. The three of us talked until visiting hours were over. We left her with the promise that we’d be back again tomorrow.

“I was right Y/N, she loves you!” You said as we climbed back into the rental.

“She’s pretty great,” I said and held your face in my hand, “So are you.”

Tomorrow never came. 

The next day was a bad one for her, so you took me to the neighborhood you grew up in, pointing out the sites you wanted me to see and telling me the memories you had there. You took me to get chicken fried lobster at Binion’s. You held my hand as we walked down the Las Vegas strip, pointing out the ones you’re banned from. On the last day, we ordered room service and spent all day in bed, not bothering to get dressed. I loved learning about your past. At the time I anticipated being part of your whole future; I would be in every story for the rest of your life. I hate that now I’m just another chapter of it.

On the flight home I cracked open the book again and this time I read it with newfound vigor. I had a new appreciation for it after talking to your mom. You watched me flip through it, highlighting and annotating like I was in English class. You peered over my shoulder the whole time, and don’t think I didn’t see the smirk on your face. 

“When her crying passed, she came before the Archbishop and fell down on her knees, the Archbishop saying very roughly to her, “Why do you weep so, woman?” I read aloud, looking up into your warm eyes as we descended. 

“She answering said, ‘Sir, you shall wish some day that you had wept as sorely as I,’” you finished, not even having to look at the page. 

You have wept as sorely as I, Spencer, and I do not wish this feeling on anyone. 

I closed the book and held it to my chest, staring at you and mustering up the nerve to say it.

“I love you,” I whispered, just loud enough for you to hear. 

You tried to contain your grin and scrunched up your eyebrows. You cupped your ear and pretended you couldn’t hear me, “What was that?”

I rolled my eyes, “I love you.” I said it louder, more forcefully this time. 

“I love you too,” you said, no hesitation. 

I turned my head up to catch your lips and seal the whole weekend with a kiss. 

It’s kind of funny how I confessed my love for you up in the sky, among the clouds, somewhere over Virginia. It’s funny because I was on cloud nine, almost literally. It felt so good to finally say it. We were in love, arguably the most magical thing in the world. There is no one I would rather have experienced that with than you, Spence. And no one I will ever experience it with again. 

Your mother and I write to each other sometimes. Like remember when she went to the Grand Canyon? She may have sent you the Grand Canyon, but she sent me a turquoise necklace, which I will be keeping. She wrote to me once in the last few weeks since we broke up. I can’t answer. I can’t send her any more letters, it doesn’t feel right; it’s no longer my place. 

So next time you visit her, show her this. I hope she doesn’t mind that I wrote in parts of it, maybe someday I’ll be able to find it in myself to write to her again and she can tell me what I missed or got wrong. Give her a hug for me Spence, and tell her I’m sorry, I wish I could come in person to tell her, but I can’t. Tell her I already miss her. I know how happy she was for us, how excited she was about... well everything. How excited we all were. Tell her I’m sorry that I couldn’t do it. Thank her for making you who you are, the most amazing man alive. Tell her it’s been a privilege, because it has been. I mean that.”

Spencer cracked open the book and admired your dog-eared pages and highlighted bits, reading your annotations and rough translations of old English to modern English. He sighed and slid his fingers down the pages. His chest tightened as if he should cry, but no tears could fall anymore. Instead, he stood up and put the book on a shelf, where one day he’d read it again to remember that weekend. To remember you. He walked slowly back to the kitchen, filled his mug again and went to find the box.

(part 6)

tags! (if you would like to be added just let me know!): @l0ve-0f-my-life @aperrywilliams @helloniallslovelies @random-ravings @ajwantsapancake @boiled-onionrings @andiebeaword @frnks-stuff  

[sweetbirdlittlebird]

The Everclear Machete Story

Boy howdy do I have a yarn to spin for you motherfuckers. 

So I have this friend, Sally. She’s my best friend and she’s super little and I love her. She’s from a tiny redneck village in the Midwest that for the purposes of this story we’re gonna call Fuckville Nowhere. Fuckville Nowhere is like two+ hours away from the college we’re dicking around in. One night, she asks me if she’ll drive her home for her friend’s graduation party. I didn’t know her super well, but she was nice and literally everybody else bailed on her, so sure, fine, why not, let’s go to a party.

I, by the way, had only been to one actual party. It was in an on-campus apartment and consisted of booze, Super Smash Bros. Melee, and exactly one knife. I have not, by any stretch of the imagining, ever been a partier. I had like one one-thousandth of a solo cup of sangria and I thought that was lit. 

So we drive out there, we go to IHOP with her friends who just graduated high school, everybody’s psyched, we ate crepes, it was super. And eventually they say the magic words (manic whisper: “alcohol”) and we go back to this one dude’s house to get cRuNk. I had to park my tiny city person car in a church lot and get Captain Mochismo to take us up the awful gravel roads in his Truckstosterone vehicle to Casa de Crunk. The roads go up and down a bunch, it’s total dark, and after like ten entire minutes of driving through the most cursed looking forest I’ve ever fucking seen, we pull up to this decent little house on patio stilts. It’s surrounded by trees and there’s no other houses in sight, so this is definitely where I’m getting murdered. 

So we go in, Sal starts up with the boys in the kitchen pretending they know how to make screwdrivers (there was like a millimeter of vodka for every entire glass of orange juice) and I sit with the girlfriends on the couch and start nursing a lemonade bitch beer. A few of the guys go out on the back porch to get high, because this is Grady’s house and he doesn’t want the whole place to smell like weed when his parents come home, and everybody’s settling into their Party Places. I know exactly one of these people, but they seem nice. We’re chilling. We’re having a grand ‘ole time. 

And one of the guys is like “DUDE LOOK” and takes out this upsettingly large bottle of Everclear. 

Everclear is 100% alcohol. This isn’t just the good shit, this is the Platinum God of All Booze. This is how Russians commit seppuku. 

So Dude #1, let’s call him Simon, who is this spindly little Barbie Doll of a dude, fills a shot glass with this liquid insurgence, knocks it back, and crumples to the floor like he’s been shot. 

And I’m like, I’m sure he’s fine. 

Dude #2, Grady, who is only slightly larger, takes a shot of Everclear. Then he takes another one. Two full shots of arsenic’s bastard child, and he looks like he just mainlined lemon juice. 

Something like five seconds goes by and he’s almost gonna take another because he “isn’t feeling it yet”, and there’s this shift, and suddenly he’s this huge drunk caricature of a human person. He’s smiling and his eyes are mostly closed and he’s taking off his suit jacket. He starts reciting passages from the Bible in fluent and dramatic German, because this dude is deeply Lutheran, and it’s all slurred and abandoned-snow-cone slushy. He stops, he looks around, says, “I wanna be a pastor”, wobbles, and hits the floor like a sheet of metal. 

The level of chaos in this house exists in direct proportion to how much clothing Grady is still wearing. 

The Parent of the Party, Parent Dude, gets him off the floor and into a chair. Next to this chair, there is an ashtray. In this ashtray is a cigar that had been confiscated from Grady sometime during his ramblings. This cigar is out. Grady sees this cigar and thinks, yes, mine, and he picks it up and sticks it in his mouth. A solid ten minutes pass before he realizes it’s not burning. 

So somebody else, the Parent Dude, looks at the Everclear and is like, this is the stuff that ends the world, we’re putting this away now, and Grady pounces on him like a pissed-off cat. Parent Dude is holding the bottle in one hand and trying to push Grady off of him with the other, and Grady screams, “Is it with a kiss, Judas, that you betray the Son of Man?” while trying to kiss him. He takes off his dress vest. 

Meanwhile, Simon is on the couch in the corner, watching TV, and let me tell you, you have not seen somebody properly dissociate until you’ve seen someone drunk on Everclear watch 2001 Space Odyssey on mute in the dark. 

But eventually they get the booze away from him and they start piling all the bottles over by me and the Parent Dude, because this is Grady’s house so there’s no cabinet we can hide it in that he can’t reach. And it’s suddenly my job to watch the alcohol so Parent Dude can make sure Grady doesn’t set the house on fire. 

Time passes, Grady stands up, says some more stuff in German, and he opens his shirt. It’s not off yet, but the buttons are undone. He does a couple of passes by the alcohol stash and scoops up some booze, and Parent Dude has to keep chasing him down to get it back. Eventually, Grady gives up and wanders off and by now Simon has moved over to my couch and he’s playing with my hair telling me how soft it is, so I don’t notice that Grady’s gone. I’m babysitting the Bunny Drunk, the Disaster Drunk isn’t my problem yet. 

Yet. 

So he’s gone for a while and Parent Dude eventually is like, where the fuck did the apocalypse engine go, so he goes looking. And before anybody can find him, this bitch-ass German comes prancing out of the laundry room with a goddamn bag of Tide Pods like, “I found a snack!” and goes to put one in his mouth.

We get the bag away from him and he’s like, awwwww, and we decide to put him the fuck to bed because this is getting out of hand. 

So we grab his girlfriend and she helps us get him into his bed and we leave them in there to pass out. 

Except he doesn’t pass out. 

This is Grady’s house. Grady’s parents have lots and lots of really cool toys in this house. We are in the middle of Fuckville Nowhere in Redneck Ravine, in the middle of the night, in the middle of the woods. 

Two minutes later, drunk Grady comes tumbling out of his room, shirtless, with an entire fucking shotgun. 

And everybody still in the house is like, fuck, fuck, fuck, and Sal and two of the dudes rush him and grab it and Grady falls back giggling like the Joker on laughing gas. I’m still on the couch watching this all happen, and it’s fucking surreal, my dudes. At some point, the girlfriends yeeted out, so I am now the only sane person on this property with maybe the exception of Sal. 

They get him back in bed and hide the shotgun in one of their cars or something,. We think we’re clear. Then Grady’s girlfriend comes running out, giggling, to get Parent Dude because Grady’s trying to eat something. They go back, and Grady has locked the door from the inside. They lure him out with the promise of his naked girlfriend and Parent Dude rushes in to stop him from literally biting a bullet.

They take all the ammo out of the room and lay him down with a glass of water. They watch him drink it, they make him promise to fuck his girlfriend and go to sleep (her idea) and he’s like, sure my dude, no problemo. 

Time-lapse, twenty minutes. I’m sitting with Simon and talking to Sal about her certifiably insane friend group. It’s like five, closing on six in the morning. Simon is playing with my hair and he’s about to fall asleep on me, which is fine, he weighs like half an ounce plus the shot of Everclear. I’m chatting with Parent Dude about the woes of babysitting drunk rednecks. It’s all fine. We’re fine. He gets up to go check on Grady, make sure’s he’s either fucking or sleeping, leaves me to guard the booze, etc. 

And he comes back all pale like, “Guys where’s Grady?”

So they start looking, Parent Dude and Sal, and they go out to the back porch to ask the crossfaders if they’ve seen him. Crossfaders say nay, they come back, sit down, reason he’ll come back when he comes back. 

And within minutes of them sitting down again, the front door bursts open and Grady, with his tie wrapped around his head like he’s a goddamn pirate, runs in waving the biggest fucking machete I’ve ever seen. He’s singing something in German that might be a pirate shanty and might be something from Lamentations. I don’t know. The important part is: knife. Drunk man have big knife.  

Sam and Parent Dude charge him, Sal gets the machete out of his hands, and Grady is slurring like his life depends on it. “Chill, dudes, I just wanted to scare you guys,” and we’re like “congratu-fucking-lations, you did it, now for the love of everyone who’s ever been drunk, go to sleep.” 

So we get Grady to actually go to sleep, and then we passed out, and me and Sal get up four hours later to drive two hours back to the college because she had a rehearsal to get to at like noon. 

And that my friends is the Everclear Machete Story. 

(reblog with the dumbest thing your drunk friends (or your drunksona) have ever done)