#why did you waste it on the used tyres. why did you give us hope.

[flatspot]

@ lewis for once in your life could you save the insane lap for WHEN IT'S ACTUALLY NEEDED

[salemshotspot]

Hey there! I love how you write some niche pairings like Shawn Michaels/Stone Cold, so I wanted to know if, once you're done with your WIPs could I pleaseee request Shawn Michaels/Triple H. Angst with happy ending or jealous/possessive!Triple H but still with a happy ending! Thanks!! 💕

NO FEELING QUITE LIKE IT

Shawn Michaels x Triple H

WORD COUNT: 1.6k

DESC: After seeing the way Shawn treats his friends Hunter fears Shawn doesn't love him in the way he once thought

WARNINGS: Not Proof Read//Characters Acting Out Of Character//Angst With A Happy Ending//Arguments//Relationship Insecurity//Jealously//Small Hint At A Past Bad Relationship//Generic Pet Names//Smoking//Possessive Behaviour//Crying//Reassurance//Hints At Fears Around Not Being Good Enough

A/N >> I AM ABSOLUTELY OBSESSED WITH THIS ASK ANON I HOPE I’VE DONE YOUR REQUEST JUSTICE!

TAGS: anon @prettyboymichaels-ao3 @outsiderswolfpac

Enjoy!

——————————————————————————

Shawn Michaels didn't earn the title 'the heartbreak kid' for nothing; he was overly flirtatious by nature and everyone knew it. This was why when Shawn and Hunter made their relationship official everyone was surprised; they didn't think Shawn had it in him to settle down with anybody, especially somebody as reserved as Hunter. Despite the boisterous manner in which Hunter acted in the ring, behind the scenes he was one of the most private, self-contained individuals anybody could have the pleasure of meeting; Shawn on the other hand was a different story. Shawn was every bit as provocative and as playful backstage as he was in the ring and Hunter couldn't help but resent Shawn for it, he’s his boyfriend, why is he flirting with everyone he comes into contact with when his boyfriend is stood right next to him?

Hunter wasn’t even supposed to be working today, he finally had his first day off in a long time, he finally had a day where he didn’t have to spend countless hours cutting promos and taking blows in the ring. However, Hunter couldn’t spend a day away from work if his life depended on it, it just so happened that the one day he had off work was the day would be the day his boyfriend Shawn would flutter his pretty little eyelashes at Hunter and ask him to drive him to and from work as his car needed a new tyre that wouldn’t be ready in time for him to drive himself to work; and of course Hunter couldn’t say no to Shawn no matter how hard he tried. Since it was a waste of both gas and time Hunter decided he’d just spend his day backstage while he waited to drive Shawn home since he really had nothing better to do; yet here Shawn was, throwing Hunter’s kindness back in his face as he fawned over Chyna and anybody else that would give him as much as a sideways glance.

Hunter had had it, he promised himself that after his last relationship he wouldn't dedicate his soul to somebody who made him feel like he was only kept around because he had a surface level use; he couldn't put himself through feeling unlovable, not again. Hunter's spiralling was quickly interrupted as Shawn, having just finished filming a promo, dramatically burst into the room Hunter was waiting for him in; flashing a toothy grin at the entirety of the roster who happened to be backstage. As Shawn's eyes scanned the room and landed on Chyna, Hunter's heart began to hurt as Shawn opened his mouth to speak; 'Chyna! Looking good' he excitedly announces, opening his arms for a hug 'come here sugar' he gently spoke, the words practically falling from his lips. Chyna dramatically rolled her eyes and gave Shawn a quick hug; Hunter couldn't focus on the conversation which Shawn had started with Chyna as his mind began to race; Shawn never hugged him like that, hell he was lucky if Shawn would acknowledge him half as much as he did anyone else the two worked with.

'Don't you think Hunter?' The drawl of Shawn's voice pulled Hunter from his thoughts once again and without thinking he harshly snapped back at the man with an abrupt 'what?' The manner in which Hunter replied caused Shawn to jump a little before repeating in a careful manner, 'I was just saying how good Chyna looks today, don't you agree?' Standing up to leave, Hunter sarcastically muttered in a defeated tone 'oh yeah Shawn she looks good enough to just take right here and now'; before either Shawn or Chyna could respond Hunter had left the room.

Fighting the tears threatening to form in his eyes Hunter forced his way out of the building, he had never felt so stupid, he's never felt so guilty but how did Shawn think he would react to him drooling over Chyna without even so much as an acknowledgment that his boyfriend, his boyfriend who at the drop of a hat agreed to spend the whole day waiting around his place of work just so he would have a ride home. Hunter let out a long, self-hating sigh as he shoved his hand into his pocket and pulled out a slightly crumpled cigarette; he promised himself he would stop smoking but he couldn't bring himself to not carry one cigarette 'just in case of an emergency' he always told himself. Lighting the cigarette with ease, Hunter brought it to his lips, taking a long drawn out drag, sliding down the wall he was leaning against as he exhaled, eventually leading to him sat on the floor. Hunter frowned and slowly shut his eyes, as good as it felt finally having a cigarette after so long, as much as he loved the feeling of his chest tightening, forcing him to let out a cough as his body was shocked by the reintroduction of nicotine into its system, Hunter couldn't help but feel his body loved nicotine more than Shawn had ever loved him and it broke his heart.

Before he had even gotten half way through his cigarette Hunter felt a figure cautiously set down next to him, reluctant to open his eyes Hunter simply sat and listened, it wasn't long before the figure revealed himself; 'I thought you quit' Shawn's voice announced. Taking another drag of his cigarette Hunter coldly responded with 'you? Having a thought about me? Well aren't I the lucky one?' Shawn went uncharacteristically quiet before questioning, 'what are you talking about?' 'What I am talking about?' Hunter shouted, his eyes snapping open to look at the man sat with him; 'you know exactly what I'm talking about Shawn.'

Hunter felt a pang of guilt strike his heart, he hated shouting, especially at Shawn, he could see his pupils decrease in size in fear as Hunter shouted. Swiftly readjusting his volume Hunter spoke again; 'don't play dumb with me Shawn please, I can't-' his voice trailing off as tears filled his eyes. Not wanting to be this vulnerable in front of Shawn, Hunter went to stand up and leave but before he could get up he felt Shawn's hand wrap around his wrist, gripping tightly in an attempt to stop him from leaving, 'Hunter please talk to me' Shawn begged, worry enveloping his voice. Sighing, Hunter sat back down and, in a distant, detached tone began; 'you want me to talk to you Shawn?' He sarcastically asked, 'how about we talk about the fact you're more than clearly waiting to leave me, is that something you want to talk about Shawn?' Hunter practically spat out.

Shawn was taken aback, he dramatically blinked as if it would help him hear Hunter better as there is no one in Shawn's mind that Hunter thinks he wants to leave him, he must've misheard him, he had to have misheard him. Almost certain this was a poor joke, Shawn nervously laughed, 'oh come on now Hunter you're being ridiculous', but the growing pain in Hunter's eyes told Shawn Hunter was anything but joking; in a whisper Shawn readjusted his tone, 'come on Hunter, you're killing me here, there's no way you seriously think I want to spend the rest of my life with anyone but you.' Hunter scoffed; 'oh yeah the way you fawn over, actually no, the way you drool over anybody with a pulse besides me, your supposed boyfriend? All the compliments that you throw at people while I have to practically beg you to acknowledge me?' Before Shawn could even comprehend the words which had fell from Hunter's lips, Hunter sarcastically added on, 'oh how lucky I am.'

A wave of guilt washed over Shawn, he knew he was an openly flirtatious guy with anyone who so much as looked at him but he didn't once realise he was neglecting his boyfriend at all, especially not to the point where the idea that Shawn no longer loved him had the chance to float into Hunter's mind. 'Hunter-' Shawn began, almost unsure what to say to make what must have been weeks of insecurity melt away, 'you're the first person I have ever truly loved and for that I'm sorry, I'm just so used to casually flirting with people I care about I never learnt how to show real love, intimate love, Hunter please', Shawn's voice suddenly grew desperate, his eyes suddenly glazed over with tears, 'please give me the chance to learn, let me make it up to you.'

Hunter couldn't stand seeing Shawn so panicked, so broken, without thinking he took Shawn's hand in his own, almost instantly grounding Shawn, bringing him back from his spiralling thoughts; 'Shawn please breathe' Hunter requested in a soft tone, 'I promise you I'm not leaving you, I love you, I love you so much but I'm just scared Shawn, seeing you act like this with other people just feels like a constant kick in the teeth that just shows me how much better you could do than me.'

With his fears slowly depleting, Shawn took Hunter's face in his hands, speaking with the upmost conviction in his voice; 'I will never for as long as I live even entertain the idea of devoting any part of me to anyone other than you Hunter, you're so much more than my entire world and if you ever feel as if I am anything other than in awe of the very ground you walk then I have failed my role as your boyfriend.'

Tearing up, laughing in relief, Hunter pulled Shawn into his chest, resting his chin on Shawn's head, the two men whispering affectionate words to each other. It was safe to say that for the rest of the day Shawn wouldn't let Hunter exist anywhere beside hanging off his arm, sure to tell anyone he came across how much he loved 'his drop dead gorgeous boyfriend', Shawn loved Hunter more than life itself and he was going to do everything in his power to never let Hunter forget that.

——————————————————————————

A/N >> I'm sorry this took a while to get to, I'm not really sure if I like this, I'm doing my best to make it through all my requests so hopefully this was worth the wait :) Drop writing requests in my inbox and let me know if you want to be tagged/untagged in future fics

[inkmemes]

mcfly  lyric  sentence  starters ↪  taken  from  their  first  four  albums.  alter  as  you  see  fit  ♡

“but is this what we want?”

“i guess i should have seen the warning signs.”

“she's got a boyfriend.”

“i wanna stay here forever.”

“i never know what you’re gonna say.”

“i can't seem to get you off my mind.”

“my tired radio keeps playing tired songs.”

“back then, she wrote me letters just to say she loved me.”

“if we were together, nothing could tear us apart.”

“i should have known much better.”

“find some way to make him change his mind.”

“i'll stand right beside you.”

“there must be another way.”

“there are no secrets to be told.”

“don't get all emotional, baby.”

“i can't stop loving you.”

“i've wasted half my life.”

“i want the the world to know how beautiful you are.”

“we want the neighbours to complain.”

“everyone will tease me now when rumours start to spread around the school!”

“i know i never will be good enough for her.”

“i can't remember falling in love with you.”

“put your clothes back on and tell me your name.”

“i wish i could bubble wrap my heart.”

“i'd never wish for anyone to feel the way i do.”

“everything was going just the way i planned.”

“loving you feels like a kick in the balls.”

‘sorry's not good enough.”

“she said i was to blame.”

“i never meant the things i said.”

“i don't know how the hell i fell in love with you.”

“i think i’m gonna lose it.”

“i feel like i've been here once before.”

“my life has lost all its meaning.”

“i'm starting to remember things that you said.”

“if you need me, i'll be there.”

“don't tell me what's gonna happen next.”

“all the alcohol in the world could never help me to forget.”

“pinch me, i must be dreaming.”

“my body aches from giving them hell.”

“come and sing with us.”

“how does she cope with her new found fame?”

“i’m not tired enough to sleep.”

“you don’t think that you’re my type, but you are.”

“i love it when our hands touch.”

“i just wish you had tried.”

“everything is beautiful.”

“i just wanna date a surfer babe.”

“it's been so long now.”

“you got nothing to prove.”

“she's just a loner with a sexy attitude.”

“and the rest is history.”

“am i too much for you?”

“i wanna hold you.”

“we hope you drop dead.”

“dude you're being silly 'cause you're never gonna get that girl.”

“every day just seems to be the same.”

“i must’ve left it on the floor.”

“the light is dancing in your eyes.”

“there's not a chance in hell.”

“we all look the same in the dark.”

“it's always better late then never.”

“i'm waiting for my chance to bail.”

“i'll come and pick you up.”

“we'll find some rope and make a swinging tyre.”

“you may not remember me.”

“that’s enough to get you through the night.”

“i'm glad i shared this with you.”

‘don’t let them in.”

“every time i fall asleep my dreams are haunted.”

“your coat's still on the couch.”

“how did you happen to me?”

“she keeps draggin' me in.”

“i'm feelin' much better.”

“my voice is gone from screaming.”

“you wrote the book on how to be a liar and lose all your friends.”

“i can't take another night on my own.”

“'cause obviously, she's out of my league.”

“now that she's getting married, i'm in misery.”

“i don't want my friends to see.”

“you’re a dreamer.”

“is this a sign from heaven?”

“i'm not sure what's happening to me.”

“everyday feels like a monday.”

“pour yourself a coffee.”

“i wish i'd fallen in love.”

“i will destroy the world for you.”

“was i just another ghost that's been in your bed?”

“i want nothing to do with the things you're going through.”

“i guess my friends were right.”

“i know you believe me.”

“this is the last time.”

“i never wanted everything to end this way.”

“we got no worries in the world.”

“i guess i could fill a book with things that i don't know about you.”

“we’re gonna have a party tonight.”

“she keeps inviting people home all the time.”

“life isn't fair.”

“you're a hurricane full of lies.”

“i'm wastin' my time.”

“i look pretty cute.”

“everybody knows.”

“i wonder if someday i'll be good with goodbyes.”

“i tried to compromise.”

“your words are like bullets, and i'm the way your weapons aim.”

“since then loneliness has been a friend of mine.”

“i'm not god.”

“these things never seem to last long.”

“i'm better off without you.”

“don't pretend that you don't know me.”

“he doesn’t look at me the same way that you do.”

“you need someone to take the blame.”

“i know that love is blind and i'm not seeing right.”

“everybody makes mistakes.”

“wanna run my hands through your hair.”

“today we're changing history.”

“we're not in this for the cash but it helps.”

“i’ve been waiting for a girl like you.”

“you'll be okay; you don't need me.”

“life's a bitch and so are you.”

“i think we're alone now.”

“if we're gonna die tomorrow, at least we can say life has been alright.”

“why are we breaking up?”

“you’re too much for me.”

“i'll be okay if you come along with me.”

“was i too close for comfort?”

“just want to make it through the night.”

“so much has changed.”

“i didn't know what i did wrong.”

“we’re hanging out at the pizza place.”

“i'll be grounded for a while.”

“i still got so many unsaid things that i wanna say.”

“i hope i’m not a little too late.”

“i wonder what it's like up there.”

“he’d kill me.”

“the heart never lies.”

“i never doubted you at all.”

“i think she was impressed and was having a good time.”

“i could've fallen in love.”

“do i have to stay?”

“i will change the world for you.”

“it's not always easy, but i'm here forever.”

“i never meant to do you wrong.”

“i'm a little dazed and confused.”

“i never know where i stand.”

“home is where the heart is.”

“do you remember how it started?”

“she went insane.”

“we had something good together.”

“you never asked me to stay.”

“there's great expectations that weigh on our heads.”

“it’s times like these we'll never forget.”

“we're gonna die in this town.”

“it's getting dark.”

“i threw a house party and she came.”

“i wanna put my hands on your skin.”

“i'm asking myself is it worth this at all.”

“i just can't wait another day.”

“did you miss the stop sign?”

“the devil has got his eyes on you.”

“that's why i'm a kiss-a-phobic.”

“no one's getting out alive.”

“i told him that i liked him, but i lied.”

“hold me 'til the sun burns out.”

“we got no fears of growing old.”

“nothing you don’t already know.”

“i can't change the stars.”

“you keep telling me all these lies.”

“my reflection’s cracked, and looking back, it’s unrecognisable.”

“things are just a little strange.”

“i'm hurt, but i'll be fine.”

“how did we get this way?”

“i won't run.”

“captivated by the way you look tonight.”

“i guess that’s what they call ‘growing up’.”

“what was i thinking of?”

“and every time i close my eyes i'm not alone.”

[nellemakes]

APART TOGETHER.  —  142 sentences from tim minchin’s 2020 album.  change pronouns etc as needed.  trigger warnings for alcohol and drug use, mentions of / allusions to plane crashes, infidelity, and death.

SUMMER ROMANCE.       “Wind blows, but I refuse to close the windows.”       “I’m holding on.”       “I know it’s hopeless.”       “I am holding on for one more day of sun.”       “It’ll all be over soon.”       “These moments never last.”       “We both know that it’s true.”       “I love you, you’re beautiful.”       “It was just a summer romance.”       “Our time is through.”

APART TOGETHER.       “I guess the upside of freezing to death is that you tend to stay that way.”       “God sure works in mysterious ways.”       “I think this could last forever.”       “Let’s fall apart together.”       “I can handle the entropy, if you promise to stay with me.”       “I can handle the entropy.”       “Promise to stay with me.”       “I give you my heart, knowing things fall apart.”       “I give you my heart.”       “Things fall apart.”       “In the morning a new life will dawn.”       “Maybe don’t set the alarm.”

AIRPORT PIANO.         “I wrote this song on an airport piano.”         “I wrote this song.”         “I was the guy disturbing your journey.”         “Maybe you noticed me.”         “Women in SUV Porsches always look miserable.”         “I don’t know why they’re so sad.”         “I always hated those airport pianos.”         “I’m out of time.”         “They’re calling my name.”         “I know why they’re so sad.”         “They’re looking for more.”         “The time just keeps slipping away.”

THE ABSENCE OF YOU.         “I feel only the absence of you.”         “I turn round to find there’s a girl in my room.”         “I don’t know what all of this means.”         “I don’t know what all of this means if you are not here with me.”         “I am lost.”         “I am lost when we are apart.”         “There’s a hole in my heart.”         “I don’t know what all this is for.”         “I don’t know what all this is for if you are not near to me.”         “I can’t sleep.”         “Sleep is no fun.”         “All of this beauty runs over and through me.”

I CAN’T SAVE YOU.         “I’ll walk to the freeway to help change your tyre.”         “I’ll give you money, if money will help.”         ”I’ll give you money.”         “Money will help.”         “I can’t save you from yourself.”         “I can’t save you.”         “If you fall ill, I will nurse you back to health.”         “I will nurse you back to health.”         “But darling, I can’t save you from yourself.”         “If you need me to.”         “You know it’s true.”         “No lover will hurt you, no ally will flee, without some day having to answer to me.”         “I’ll give you my heart.”         “I’ll give you my heart, if you think a heart will help.”

TALKED TOO MUCH, STAYED TOO LONG.         "Don’t wanna be in your club if you’d take me as a member.”         “Don’t wanna be in your club.”         “I’m not even slightly interested in whether I’m remembered.”         “I’m not even slightly interested.”         “Here lies a clown.”         “Here lies a clown who wrote some songs.”         “He talked too much, and stayed too long.”         “He talked too much.”         “Three drinks make you straighten up, and four get you swingin’.”         “Three drinks make you straighten up.”         “We’d talk too much and stay too long.”         “We’d talk too much.”

LEAVING LA.         “Check the locks and leave the keys.”         “Check the locks.”         “Leave the keys.”         “Some poor fuck will deal with it later.”         “I’ve talked until there’s no more to say.”         “There’s no more to say.”         “I’m going away.”         “Please give me the directions to the Hollywood sign.”         “Please give me the directions.”         “I always dreamt of coming here to see the Hollywood sign.”         “I always dreamt of coming here.”         “Did you have a good time?”         “It’s just some fuckin’ letters on a hill.”         “There’s too much light for stars anyway.”         “There’s too much light.”         “I’m getting out of this place.”         “Blaming others for their failures, taking credit for their wins.”         “You oughtn’t take it personally.”         “I’ve been going slowly insane.”         “I’ve seen your sport, and I don’t wanna play.”

I’LL TAKE LONELY TONIGHT.         “I’ll take lonely tonight.”         “Pretty hard to resist.”         “Christ, what a night.”         “I think you’re pretty high - I know I’m pretty pissed.”         “I think you’re pretty high.”         “I know I’m pretty pissed.”         “I’m not denying I hate being alone.”         “I hate being alone.”         “I know regret in the making.”         “You’re one of those ‘others’ I swore I’d forsake.”         “I’m sorry, I’m not gonna bite.”         “I’m not gonna bite.”         “I know I might well have future regrets.”         “What is life for?”         “What is life for, but to shag, drink, and dance?”         “My girl has my heart.”         “I’d rather murder than hurt her.”         “The Devil should have offered him you.”

BEAUTIFUL HEAD.         “What’s going on?”         “What’s going on inside that beautiful head of yours?”         “I know everything about her.”         “But I don’t know what’s going on inside that beautiful head.”         “I don’t know what’s going on.”         “I don’t know.”         “I just wanna know what’s going on.”         “I know she loves me.”         “I know she loves me by the look in her eyes.”         “I know her better than anybody.”

IF THIS PLANE GOES DOWN.         “Could I be more of a cliché?”         “The plane is almost empty.”         “A fact we’re only coping with by drinking.”         “I hope that I’m one of the cool ones.”         “Remember me as someone who tried to find a balance between self-loathing and pride.”         “It ends in fire and glass.”         “I’ve no regrets as such.”         “It’s just a shame, I’ve got so much still to do.”         “I’ve got so much still to do.”         “If my youth was wasted on me, I don’t mind.”         “My youth was wasted on me.”         “I don’t mind, ‘cause I wasted it with you.”         “I don’t mind, ‘cause I wasted it with you, my love.”         “I really think that I’d be fine.”

CARRY YOU.         “If they would let me trade, I’d give a year for half a day just curled up on the sofa with you.”         “Let me trade.”         “I’d hold my breath for ‘I forgive you’.”         “Sometimes I feel you with me in the dark.”         “Your face is in the faces of the strangers walking by me in the park.”         “So though we cannot be together, I know that I will carry you wherever I go.”         “I will carry you wherever I go.”         “I will carry you.”

[brilliantt]

Gangster in Distress

Summary: Tommy was only interested in Y/N to seal a deal with her father. He thought she was a spoilt, rich girl... until a mishap with some thieves makes Tommy reconsider.  

A/N: I just rewatched the movie Ever After with Drew Barrymore and let’s just say it heavily inspired this fic....

It was often that Tommy would sacrifice his own family to ensure a deal or stop a war. A key example being when he convinced John to marry Esme, preventing a battle with the Lee family. Tommy was rather good at pushing his family to the forefront of his problems. Now though? Now it was Tommy’s turn. 

Tommy desired to extend his gin business through London and beyond. The only issue being a Mr Walter Brown. Mr Brown ran an immensely successful distillery in the heart of London and Tommy knew striking a deal with him was his only route to a new found fortune. He had met with the man once at his home, the house exceeding even Tommy’s manor. They had spent a long time coming to a suitable deal. The man had no need for money nor protection, although Tommy tried to persuade him. It was a lost cause; the man’s fine suit and multiple men lingering by the door could have told him that. There was nothing the Peaky Blinders could offer him that he didn't already have, Tommy still persisted.

The meeting had lasted three hours before Tommy watched the man stand up and glance out the window behind him, the view obscured from Tommy. Mr Brown rubbed his white moustache and sighed, resting his gaze back on Tommy. He explained to him that he had a daughter who he wished to see married, and to a financially secure man. Of course Arthur and John were out of the question and Finn was too young for the woman. This left Tommy to take the bullet. It certainly felt like a bullet when the daughter had slammed the door, storming out of her father’s study just after she was told the news. Perhaps it would be for the best, he would have some company and Charlie a mother figure. Not forgetting their union would make Tommy very rich. 

The deal was settled and they would be married the next month, giving Y/N and Tommy some time to get to know each other. He made frequent trips to London to become acquainted with his bride-to-be, the two of them left alone in one of the parlour rooms. The first few times she had sat like a petulant child, ignoring his attempt at conversation, and not being afraid to tell him what she thought of the arrangement. Her expensive gowns and shiny jewellery reminding him of the two different worlds they came from. It was on the fourth visit when he became impatient and decided to move their relationship forward and to try and seduce her. His hands on her waist and wandering lips warranted a red cheek and a view of Y/N’s back as she huffed out of the room. 

The next time he came, he made sure to bring Charlie. She would have to meet him eventually and he could only hope she wouldn’t bring up his actions with a child in the same room. It was fair to say she much preferred the boy’s company, immediately grinning Charlie and bringing out a story book to share with him. It was this moment where Tommy couldn’t completely resent the arrangement. Charlie liking her was more important than him liking her. And after Y/N had taken him to the stables to meet her horses, Charlie would barely release the woman. It was there where Tommy had attempted to apologise for his behaviour the previous visit (not really because he was sorry, but more to remain on good terms with her father). It was also here that when Y/N had distracted Charlie with her most beautiful mare, told Tommy if he tried anything again she wasn’t afraid to use the hunting gun and shoot it at his unmentionables. 

---

The wedding hadn’t been anything special to Tommy. He had already had his dream wedding with Grace and Y/N had refused to have a big attendance, although this didn't stop her from wearing a very extravagant dress. The ceremony was limited to only Y/N’s father, Charlie and Aunt Polly.  Polly had returned to Birmingham the same afternoon, after their lunch, with Charlie. Mr Brown had retired to his room which left the newly weds alone. Except their anticipated wedding night consisted of Y/N leading Tommy to a guest room and shutting herself into her bedroom. 

Tommy spent the next few days, finalising some business and plans with his new father-in-law, while Y/N was busy packing her bags to move into Tommy’s manor with him and Charlie.

The rain was heavy on the day they were to drive back. Despite still being angry at her father, she gave him a tight hug before rushing into the vehicle, out of the rain. It was a long car journey back to Birmingham and Y/N had taken to sulking with her arms crossed, staring out of the window for the first hour. 

Tommy sighed and pursed his lips, “We should at least try to be civil, you know.” By the look on Y/N’s face, he knew his words would cause them to argue. He didn't care though, arguing would be better than sitting in silence for the rest of the trip. He also couldn’t take another minute of watching the woman fidget in her seat, he knew she was itching to speak.

Y/N kept her gaze out of the window, “You and my father dealt me off like i’m a fucking horse. I don’t have to be nice to you.” 

Tommy clenched his jaw, feeling desperate for a cigarette. ”Your father wanted what was best for you.” He heard Y/N let out an amused huff.

“Oh and you’re my knight in shining armour? Lucky me.” Tommy turned to look at her before focusing back on the road. He chose not to say anything, “I don't even see why I had to marry in the first place. I was fine staying with my father.’”

This time Tommy felt amused, “Hmm and doing what exactly? Perching on your little pedestal and looking pretty?" He hid his smirk when Y/N turned to look at him with an annoyed expression. He quite liked riling her up. 

“I’m not just some spoiled little girl, so stop treating me like one.” She crossed her arms again and huffed.

“If you didn’t act like one, perhaps I wouldn’t treat you like one.” Tommy retorted.

"Your perception of women is abhorrent. Just because I'm pretty and like to dress nicely, does not mean you can belittle me. And if you continue to do so, we are going to have problems." Tommy raised his eyebrows. "Besides, you ought to tread carefully, you are looking at the future owner of the Brown distillery. My father may have made a deal with you that doesn't mean i can't change it when i'm in charge."

Tommy felt a smile growing on his face, "You would deny your own husband?" It widened when all Y/N did was smirk at him. The silence grew again before Tommy asked, "You think you can handle running the business?"

Y/N smoothed down her hair that had gone fluffy from the rain, "You may think i just sit around, but I am very much involved in the distillery. I'm more than capable of running the business."

Tommy quickly glanced at her again, finding a sense of respect he didn't expect to feel. 

When Tommy didn’t reply, Y/N scrunched her nose up, "I do hope you're not a husband who will deny me of such a job.” Tommy rolled his eyes and shook his head. “Good, because I wouldn't have listened anyway."

"And what shouldn't a husband deny you of?" Tommy questioned in a teasing tone.

"Hmm,” Y/N grinned. “A good husband should let me do exactly as I please. He will let me work, go to the market, run through the garden without shoes, gallop through the field on a horse, or do absolutely nothing all day."

"And, what about a good wife?"

Y/N stroked her chin in thought and looked at Tommy "Well, I guess that's for you to decide."

Tommy didn’t answer her. "You like horses?" He said a few moments later. 

"Love.” Y/N smiled and looked out the window dreamily, the rain still hitting the window. “I grew up with my grandparents in the countryside, they were from my mum's side, who, well, were not rich like my dad’s. We spent all our time on the farm and from the moment I first laid my eyes on the beautiful horses, that was it."

Tommy smirked, "So the city girl is actually a farm girl?" Y/N’s response was a roll of the eyes.  "The horses you showed Charlie were incredible." His words seemed to divert Y/N back into her bratty state, she crossed her arms again and glared at the man, raising an eyebrow at him. "And I had to leave them behind."

Before Tommy could respond, the car jolted. He lost control for a moment before managing to stop the car. Trees surrounded the pair and Tommy recognised the road built through the forest. He wasted no time to jump out and check each wheel, finding the problem on Y/N’s side, a small hole visible. Y/N rolled down the window, "What happened?”

"The tyres burst, I must have hit a stone or something." He stood back up wiping down his suit. "Come on." He opened the door to her side and gestured for her to get out. 

"What?"

"The house isn't far from here, we can go by foot." Y/N looked at him in shock.

"It's raining and muddy!" She made a motion to her dress, to which Tommy rolled his eyes. He grabbed her arm and pulled her out, dragging her to the boot of the car. He pulled out one of the smaller luggage bags and pushed it in her arms before looking at her pointedly, "You said you grew up on a farm." 

"Past tense, Thomas!" She huffed and re-positioned the bag, watching Tommy grab the two larger ones. He led them around the car and they walked barely a metre before a man with shoulder length grey hair came out of the trees pointing a gun at the two. "Don't be leaving so quick now." He let out a whistle and more men came from the trees, all with guns. Y/N gulped and raised her hands in the air, subsequently dropping her bag, the contents spilling over the floor. She heard Tommy curse and watched him put the luggage down more carefully than her. 

"Y/N go back in the car." Not having to be told twice she rushed back to the passenger side. Feeling nervous when the men advanced on Tommy, a fist fight, four on one beginning. 

Before she could open the door, one of the men had grabbed her, making her yelp and shove him to the ground. She tried to hit the next man who made a grab for her but he caught her arm and held it behind her back. It took three men to stop her struggling, pulling her to where their leader stood. They held her there, Tommy a few metres opposite her being held in a similar position, a cut on his forehead and a bruised eye. The two watched as the thieves began rifling through Tommy’s car and her luggage on the floor.

One of them held up a rather beautiful, expensive looking dress adorned in jewels. “Excuse me!” Y/N spat, missing Tommy closing his eyes in annoyance. ”That was my mother’s dress, you give that back!” She felt the men tighten their hold on her. The leader smirked and stalked over to her. He lifted one of his ring covered hands and caressed her cheek. "Feisty little thing.” He whispered. 

Tommy began struggling, "Let her go.” He demanded, voice strong but eyes tired. “Your fight is against me not her." Y/N could only then see that the two men knew each other. The man removed his hand and walked closer to Tommy. He relented and told the men to release her.

Y/N pushed her way out of their arms, shivering from the rain and annoyed at the mud tracing up her skirts. She raised her chin to the leader, "I demand that you give me back all of my things. And since you shot through one of the tyres and have my driver captured, a horse for the journey back." All of the men’s eyes widened at her order. The leader titled his head, and grinned sarcastically.

“Princess,” He spread his arms out in front of him, ”You may have anything you can carry." His men chuckled around them. Y/N raised her eyebrows, a devious look in her eyes as she glanced at Tommy, who was staring at her in disbelief. 

“Do I have your word on that, Sir? She asked.

The man bowed his head, “On my honour as a Gypsy.”

Y/N nodded once. She walked past the Gypsy, staring at him as she passed. Walking straight over her clothes on the floor, Y/N  made her way to Tommy, the men who were holding him backing away. She lifted his arm up and bent down, huffing as she lifted her husband across her back. The Gypsy man opened his mouth in shock, watching as Y/N gave him a sarcastic smile and a slight curtsy before making her way down the road, holding Tommy on her back.

A ruckus of laughter erupted from the group of men at the sight. Even the leader couldn't help but laugh loudly at the daring girl. "Come back!” He paused, chuckling, “You may have a horse."

Y/N sat in front of Tommy on the horse as they rode to the manor. He knew that this reckless but incredibly clever woman would cause him a great deal of trouble, he just couldn’t bring himself to resent it anymore.

I can just imagine Y/N telling John this story and Tommy having to kick him out because of all the teasing... 

[allthefilmsiveseenforfree]

Godzilla vs. Kong

From the first rumble in the seats in the Dolby theater, I was so glad I chose to see this movie on the big screen. At times it felt like I was on one of those “4-D” roller coasters where the seats rumble and they spray water on your or pipe smells into the audience. That’s how close I was to the action! As at least a casual fan of the previous entries in the Monsterverse, I was looking forward to Godzilla vs Kong and my goodness, those medium expectations sure were met. How medium was it? Well...

I would like the science in this movie to win Best Comedy or Musical in next year’s Golden Globes. This is probably the hardest I’ve laughed in a theater in over a year (obviously there are other reasons for that, but the sentiment still stands). This movie was nonsensical, loud, shiny, dumb fun and I had a great fucking time watching it. Oh, you probably want a plot summary - I’m just gonna refer you to the title of the film. That about covers all you need to know.

Some thoughts:

“Somewhere on Skull Island” - whaaaaat is with this title card? It’s a tiny island. How many possible locations could there possibly be for a giant fuck-off ape to be taking his nap?

I know we’re not here for any semblance of plot but boy, they really sprained something trying to lift these clunky paragraphs of exposition into anything resembling what actual humans would say.

These opening credits are one of the funniest sequences I’ve seen in ages.

My main man Brian Tyree Henry! I had no idea he was in this (frankly I knew virtually nothing about this movie because what do you even need to know about a movie with the title Godzilla vs. Kong). He’s playing a completely different vibe than I’ve ever seen him play - the comedic relief and a mile-a-minute vaguely conspiracy theorist podcast host who is obsessed with Sir Zilla and the other Titans. I really enjoyed seeing this other side of him!

Absolutely terrible waste of Kyle Chandler, who was probably paid more than my yearly salary for 60 seconds of Protective and Frazzled Dad perfection.

One of the highlights of the film is the performance of young actress Kaylee Hottle as Jia. Jia is Deaf, and so is Kaylee in real life, and I’m always here for more Deaf representation onscreen! And her friendship with Kong is one of the few things in the movie that elicits any genuine emotion of any kind. When he booped her I literally said “Aw!” out loud.

The visuals of the hollow Earth are very cool and remind me of those space age desktop backgrounds that most of the guys I know who built their own PCs and spent a lot of time on Tor.com would have had.

Even the most ridiculous films like this one will sometimes include little bits of worldbuilding that are thoughtful and have fascinating implications. For example, the “Titan Shelters” in Hong Kong - who pays for those? The government? Do rich people have reinforced private Titan Shelters while poor folks have to rely on the public ones, which are likely overcrowded and possibly don’t have enough resources? (I think we all know the answer to that).

I am very much enjoying all the neon in the Hong Kong fight, and how much more visually interesting it makes two giant blobs slamming their blob bodies against each other while causing a staggering amount of property damage.

Finally a realistic “I can crack the password!” scene!

Did I Cry? Ok, a teeny tiny bit, about Kong and Jia’s friendship.

Times I laughed LOUDLY in the theater: when Mr. Zilla, who can literally shoot lightning out of his damn mouth just straight up punches Kong in the face. When Kong gets attacked by all those lizard things in the hollow Earth and just uses one motherfucker to slap another motherfucker. When they use an anti-gravity machine (whatever that actually means) as a defibrillator for an ape that is sometimes as big as a skyscraper and other times as big as a mountain.

And now a series of questions:

Why is this high school class just watching the news in the middle of the day? The G-Z has attacked cities at least 3 other times in this universe that we know of. Like, this isn’t their 9/11, this is a thing that just regularly happens.

You decided it was a good idea to transport Kong over the ocean...where Big Daddy G hangs out all the time? Like...that’s where he lives, you guys. You’re basically trying to sneak Kong over the roof of Godzilla’s house and hoping he doesn’t notice.

OH and you had a Kong-sized net and a team of Kong transport helicopters ready the WHOLE TIME? But you still chose “sneaking over Godzilla’s house” as your first plan of action????

How long can Kong hold his breath? He goes underwater for some long ass periods.

In fact, what are the details of Kong’s physiology in general? How tall is he? Because at one point in his fight with The GZA, he’s standing on the floor of the Tasman Sea, no big deal - except the Tasman Sea has a depth of roughly 18,000 feet. And Kong’s just chilling out in the water at waist level? But he’s also shorter than the skyscrapers in Hong Kong? I choose to believe he can grow and shrink at will because that makes more sense than the sloppy joe approach to his biology the screenwriters are using.

I like Millie Bobby Brown as much as the next guy, but does it bother anyone else that she always sounds congested? Is that a consequence of her doing her American accent? It’s incredibly distracting.

Oh, this entire scene is set in Antarctica but no one is wearing hats or gloves? Sure sure sure.

And no one is having any problems breathing the air in the middle of the fucking earth? No one thought to check that the atmosphere was breathable before everyone takes off their helmets? No noxious fumes to worry about in the center of a planet that produces magma and shit?

You’re taking your child to the literal center of the earth? Is this not the ONE TIME you think you might need a babysitter?

The ship that can *checks notes* withstand the forces present during an entire reversal of gravity is crushed by Kong’s fist like it’s a tube of toothpaste?

Even though the Earth is hollow, I’m assuming the distance to reach the core is still about the same, so Godzilla’s lighting can 1) act as a drill to - I cannot reiterate this strongly enough - the CENTER OF THE FUCKING EARTH and 2) Godzilla and Kong can yell at each other for 3,958 miles (give or take) and still hear each other? Do they have superhearing? Is this something we’re studying or are we content to just have them Hulk smash all of that incredibly important evolutionary biology to bits while everyone stands around?

Because this is a “vs” movie, of course there is no clear-cut “winner” at the end. Instead the two parties leave each other with a grudging respect formed, an uneasy truce in place. But I’m obsessed with the way this final scene plays out, as though Godzilla is a bitter ex walking away from Kong after their doomed relationship has run its course. The lighting, the soft music, the absolute melodrama of this giant lizard slinking slowly back into the sea. Godzilla is giving the gays everything they want in 2k21 and I am here for it. Here’s hoping the next entry in the franchise has Kong hooking up with Rodan to make G jealous and they all have a messy public fight over brunch, Real Housewives style.

If you liked this review, please consider reblogging or subscribing to my Patreon! For as low as $1, you can access bonus content and movie reviews, or even request that I review any movie of your choice.

[ineloqueent]

the whole of the moon

Platonic!Queen x Reader

cannot remember where this gif is from. if it’s yours, drop me a line!

synopsis: a late-night shopping trip goes awry...

warnings: swearing, mentions of drinking

word count: 1.8k

a/n: happy birthday, dearest vi ( @doing-albri​ )!! i hope you have a wonderful day, because you deserve it. i’m sorry this is so short; i’ve been terribly busy, for whole months, it seems. but i’ve done my best, and i hope you’ll enjoy it. inspired by this song <3

⭒

1975

“Just like old times,” said Roger happily, cranking up the music and beginning to tap his fingers on the steering wheel.

Brian immediately grimaced, and reached over to turn the volume down again.

“Hey!” Roger smacked Brian’s hand away from the knob, and you laughed, from your place between John and Freddie in the backseat.

Brian turned his head to wink at you.

“Some of us need our hearing to be able to play, Rog,” he said.

John wrinkled his nose, flexing his fingers as he shifted a ring from his pointer to his pinky, and back again. “You’ve still got yours left?”

Brian looked confused. “Yeah..?”

“Oh,” said John, with an air of sarcasm, “that’s right. You’re the one who talked our ears off yesterday.”

Now Brian looked miffed. “Just because you don’t understand zodiacal light, doesn’t mean it’s uninteresting.”

Deacy rolled his eyes.

“No offense, darling,” Freddie sighed, “but if you say one more word about science before we’ve finished this champagne-run, I’m going to climb over the console and strangle you.”

Roger guffawed, and John grinned so broadly one would’ve thought him a small child on  Christmas morning.

“Fine,” said Brian, miffed. “I won’t talk at all.”

“Good riddance,” Roger muttered, and Brian crossed his arms.

“Why did I agree to going with you all, again?”

You leaned forward to tug on one of his curls, and Brian whirled, startled, pushing his fingers into his hair. He relaxed when he saw it was only you. “To be the voice of reason, of course,” you told him.

He smiled. “You’re not wrong.”

Roger grumbled, “Don’t boost his ego, sweetheart.”

“Too late,” said Freddie. “He’s going to start talking about time dilation any moment now.”

“Time dilation?” Brian asked. “Hadn’t even thought of that. But if you really want to know—”

A collective groan rose from the other three, and you laughed again.

You loved this.

You loved them.

You loved travelling the world with your four best friends, watching them live their dreams, and getting to be a part of that reality, the reality no one could ever have thought would take on such a life of its own.

Tour life could be hectic at times, but you wouldn’t have given it up for the world.

Not when you arrived in a ramshackle town where the nicest place in sight was the funeral home, not when your legs felt tired enough to give out from beneath you, as you stood watching the show from the wings, for the umpteenth night in a row.

Because when John decided to put on a record, he always asked for your opinion, and picking Roger’s outfit was as much your job as it was his, and when Brian and Freddie played to the crowd as though they were old friends, it was like you held the world in the palm of your hand.

Even if the four of them argued constantly.

As the van suddenly swerved, and the three of you in the back clung to each other in terror, Brian said crossly, “Jesus, Roger, watch the road!”

“I am!” protested the drummer, and Brian grumbled a response in the negative.

“You absolutely are not,” said Freddie, hanging onto the headrest of Brian’s seat. “And I refuse to die in the middle of nowhere, thank you very much, so you can keep your eyes forward if you want to still be in the band by tomorrow night.”

Roger rolled his eyes, and made a blah blah blah gesture with his hand. But he was clearly not as adept at multitasking as he thought, because a moment later, Deacy cried,

“Watch out for that deer!”

“Yes, Roger, slow down,” said Brian warningly. “I swear I will murder you in cold blood if you kill that deer.”

“What deer?” Roger squinted. “I don’t see a— DEER!”

He swerved so violently this time that your seatbelt dug into your skin, and you pushed against the seatbacks to keep from falling forward.

The van hurtled off the side of the road, but Roger had somehow managed to slow the vehicle significantly before the swerve, and so the off-road trip would have been only a momentary pause in your journey into town.

Had it not been for the barbed wire lying in the grass.

The tyres of the van had surely seen better days, after so many miles on the road, and you felt the moment all four of them punctured.

Roger gripped the steering wheel for dear life, and Brian, struggling to combat inertia, had both hands on the dashboard, one knee against the console and other against the door, whilst Freddie still clung to the headrest, and John pushed at the back of Roger’s seat. You, stranded in the middle, failed to maintain any sort of position.

The van ploughed forward like a tidal wave, into the field by the road, then sank abruptly to a stop with a whumph, when the last of its momentum had been wasted.

There was a silence as you looked around the car, at Roger’s tousled hair and Brian’s wide eyes, Freddie’s gritted teeth and John’s crooked collar.

Then the shouting started.

“Roger you moron!”

“How the hell did you not see that coming?!”

“I’ve told you, I need to get my eyes checked!”

“Well, kindly do it before you kill us all!”

“I’ve seen 90-year-old women drive better than you do!”

“Fuck off, Brian! If you hadn’t—”

“We’re never going to get that champagne!”

You all turned to Freddie.

“Really,” you said, “you’re thinking about Moët et Chandon right now?”

Freddie shrugged. “Seems we’d all be in better humour if we’d had the option to have a glass before we left.”

“Or maybe,” Brian drawled, “we’d all be dead, because Roger can barely drive when he’s sober.”

Roger was fuming, bright red in the face with a will to speak but no adequate words to suit, and he looked as though if he stayed silent for a moment longer, he would try to throw a punch at Brian.

Brian, to his credit, folded his arms and raised an eyebrow, and stared Roger down.

Laughter broke the silence, and you all turned to find John completely beside himself with amusement.

He did not stop laughing until he was wiping tears from his eyes, and by then, you had begun smiling too.

“What,” barked Roger.

Deacy shook his head, his soft hair flying about his face. “Don’t any of you see how funny this is?”

“Funny..?” asked Brian cautiously.

“Well,” said Deacy, “are any of you hurt?”

You looked around, tallied the appearances of everyone in your head.

“No,” you replied.

“Okay, then listen: we ran out of champagne, so, despite the fact that it was half-past eleven at night, we all piled into a sort of run-down van, without security, without crew, and set off to buy a bottle of champagne. We’d been driving for all of five minutes before we started arguing the first time, and half an hour into the trip, Roger drives us off the side of a road after Brian finishes rambling about science—”

“Astrophysics, actually—”

“—and all four tyres puncture,” John went on. “And now, we’re in the middle of nowhere.”

There was a pause.

But despite everything, John was right. This really was funny.

You started to laugh as well, and Deacy grinned at you until both Freddie and Brian were smiling, and the corner of Roger’s mouth tugged upward as his colour faded.

Brian sighed, running a hand through his unruly curls. “So, now what?”

“Spare tyres?” you suggested.

“About that…” Roger mumbled.

“Oh, dear god,” Freddie said, dropping his head to his hands.

John laughed again, and Brian made a noncommittal noise.

“So we walk,” you said.

Freddie shook his head. “I am not walking on the side of a road in the middle of the night.”

Roger wrinkled his nose too. “Bloody insects,” he muttered, “get in your hair.”

“And Brian’s stretched his hamstring again,” said Deacy. You glanced over at Brian, who winced apologetically. He wasn’t one to complain, though; you’d all but forgotten his incapacity.

“Which just leaves just you and me,” Deacy nodded to you.

“I dunno, Deacs,” you made a face. “Freddie’s onto something, about not walking on the side of a deserted road in the pitch black. And,” you continued, before John could object, “you’re not going on your own. We’ll simply have to wait until morning.”

Everyone seemed lost in thought.

“Right,” Brian said, “that’s it.” He pulled on the handle of the passenger door, and it clicked open. “We’re sleeping under the stars.”

“Not this again!” Roger cried, but Brian reprimanded him.

“I think you’ve said enough for the time being, Rog.”

The heavy door slammed behind Brian, and you could hear the boot being opened.

“He’s right, you know,” John remarked, in a rare display of solidarity with the guitarist.

Roger only sniffed.

A few seconds later, Brian knocked on Freddie’s window.

“Come on, then!” he said, smilingly. “I’m only sorry none of us brought our instruments.”

Deacy widened his eyes at you. “Thank god for that.”

You laughed and pushed him lightly, toward his door, and when he’d hopped out, you followed.

You rounded the car with John, to find Brian already staring up at the sky, as Freddie and Roger joined you as well.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Brian murmured.

You turned your face to the sky, and saw what he meant.

There was no light pollution here, no skyscrapers or tall houses to obstruct the view, and the world above stretched on endlessly, a plethora of life above your heads. It was so very bright, and yet so very far away. It was indeed beautiful.

You breathed the night air, and nodded.

“I found a picnic blanket,” Brian added, holding it up, “and apparently, Crystal keeps a chocolate stash, so we’ve got that too.” He then sank into the grass, stretching out his long legs, entirely without regard for the light blue suit he wore, and Freddie looked on in distaste.

“That’s no way to treat perfectly good fashion, darling. Now, if it’d been that horrible knitted sweater of yours, and those old, tatty velvet trousers, I’d have said otherwise, but that there is a perfectly good—”

“Sit down, Freddie,” you said, and Freddie closed his mouth and sat. You made your way over to Brian, who had now reclined completely, his fingers winding absently in the pale grass.

Soon, you were all sprawled in the field, which, funnily enough, was peppered with moonflowers, and you sighed, utterly at ease with the peacefulness of the scene around you: your family, the sky, the stars, and the whole of the moon. It shone radiantly this night, full and subtly tinged with orange, warmth softening the usual coldness of its light.

“Spare some of that chocolate?” John whispered from beside you.

You nudged Brian, who passed over the wrapped sweets, which you then handed to John.

Roger was placated by the sharing of the chocolate, and Freddie seemed perfectly content to laze about in a manner similar to that of one of his many cats. The latter fell asleep within minutes, having stolen Roger’s jacket.

It wasn’t long before only you and Brian remained awake, gazing up at the stardust which spilled from the heavens, and the world was quiet.

Brian shifted slightly, and you turned your head to find him looking at you.

A soft smile touched his lips, and his cheeks were rosy in the blue-dark.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he said.

You could not help but smile back, because your heart was as full as it had ever been.

“I’m glad I’m here too,” you whispered.

[pachitoherrera]

Poison x Reader ii // coffee

a/n: i’m ready to hide forever in a closet!! anon i really hope this piece is what you expected, or at least that it’s alright :) i felt like a student writing a thesis, doing all this reaserch on how to write smut, so yeah,i hope you can enjoy it xx (18+)

Manizales was a beautiful city, old and new buildings aligned on steep streets creating a unique atmosphere in the city centre as you were leaning out of the window, trying to spot the famous Nevado del Ruiz volcano. It was also the main centre for the production of coffee, and either it was your mind projecting your knowledge and expectations to your senses, or there really was the sweet but bitter smell of coffee permeating the air, blending perfectly with the scent of a late summer afternoon. 

“I would kill for a coffee”, you sighed, closing your eyes and taking a deep breath in. The corners of your mouth twitched when you thought about the choice of your words. Kill for a coffee. Poison would probably take that literally. It was so easy to forget that the man next to you was the cartel’s most trusted sicario, and the second you remembered it, a sense of unease began to lift in the back of your mind. However, that feeling was quickly shushed as you reminded yourself that even though he was a ruthless killer, he was just following orders. And unless your death was ordered by Pablo – which you doubted – chances were good that you could push boundaries without receiving a bullet to your head. All these thoughts were so quickly occupying your mind that you almost jumped in your seat as Poison spoke. 

“You can’t sleep if you drink caffeine now”, he said without taking his eyes off the road. 

A chuckle escaped your lips. “Who says I’m planning on sleeping tonight?” Poison turned to look at you. Internally you were rewarding yourself for such a clever answer but you let a few seconds pass before you met his gaze with a doe-eyed expression, shrugging your shoulders. There was no change upon his face, and admittedly, it did frustrate you, but then again you could expect from the head of the sicarios to be able to hide his thoughts quite easily. 

“We are here to do a job, not to play tourists.”

“Ya sé, ya sé, it’s the highest priority. But drinking is a basic human need, isn’t it? And how can we visit Manizales without having tasted the coffee here.” 

--

With two cups of coffee in your lap – you couldn’t just buy a coffee for yourself without thinking about your companion who so reluctantly agreed to your pleading – the car came to a halt in front of a small house off the city centre. Poison was just about to get out of the car and open the garage when you held him back. “I’ll do that.” 

The cups now balancing in one hand (a skill you had acquired from your part-time jobs as waitress), you walked in front of the car to the garage gate. You knew he was looking at you, and so you made sure to bend forward slower than necessary, letting your short dress do the rest as you pulled up the gate, careful to not spill the coffees. You turned around just quickly enough to see a faint smile on Poison’s face, which was gone as soon as he pulled past you. Now it was your turn to serve the self-confident smile as you waited for him to get the bags out of the trunk. 

The rooms inside the house were more spacious than what the outside gave away, and you figured it was one of the many houses owned by Pablo that would eventually serve as a hiding spot one day. “Is it just the two of us? No additional guards?”, you asked with a raised voice as you wandered around to give yourself a small tour, noticing the lack of people with guns which were such a common sight back in Medellín. 

“Am I not enough for you o qué?” Poison was standing by the window in the living room, a soft breeze moving the curtains and the ends of his hair. He looks like a model, you thought. Walking over to the window, you handed him one of the coffees that you were still holding on to and took a sip of the other. To your surprise, the liquid was still warm. The aroma of freshly ground coffee beans spread on your tongue, so delicious that you could not suppress a slight moan.

“Depends on what for”, you finally answered. Your gaze was resting on his face, waiting for something that might give away what he thought. But just as earlier, you couldn’t read him a single bit. The silence between you was disturbed by the shrill ringing of the phone that belonged to the house, and you figured it would be someone from the cartel calling. Maybe even the boss himself, since Poison wasn’t subordinated to anyone but him. Your assumption was proven correct when he mumbled a “si, patrón”. You were watching him while you drank your coffee, not trying to hide your curiosity about the topic of their call. This nosiness was even fueled when Poison looked into your direction and nodded, even though Pablo couldn’t see his movement. “The boss wants to know whether you’re still ready for tomorrow.” “I am”, you said soberly. When it came to Pablo, you had quickly learned two rules for talking to him; be honest and don’t say more than needed. 

Eventually, you decided to leave him to it and take a quick shower. The car ride had been long and the sweat on your skin was mixed with the road dust from when you were waiting for Poison to change the tyre. An event that seemed like from a different timeline, you thought to yourself. You emptied your cup of coffee and went to the bathroom, turning on the shower. Immediately, Poison’s voice became only a subdued sound. As the water was running down your body, washing away the dirt from the day, you wondered what was taking them so long. They must have been aware that the Americans could listen to their phone calls, so why take the chances? But it wasn’t your problem, you weren’t a killer, nor a drug trafficker. Sooner or later the cartel would go down, and you were just a simple girl who had fallen for the wrong men.

You wrapped yourself in a towel after you left the shower, looking forward to putting on the fresh clothes that were waiting for you in the bedroom, neatly stuffed in your bag. There was no noise coming from the living room, so they must have finished their phone call while you were lost in thoughts. The cool air from outside the bathroom caused goosebumps on your skin as you walked through the corridor, stopping by the living room to check on Poison. Your heart made a small, joyful jump when you saw him sitting on the couch, drinking the coffee you had bought for him (which by now must have been cold). He raised his head to look at you, and this time you could have sworn to see a hint of amusement in his expression.

“Enjoying the view?” you asked as an allusion to your small road trip when these words were said by him. You could go further, just one small movement. But it would push all boundaries, was it really a good decision?

Fuck it, you thought, the inner argumentation that you had earlier in the car as to why you could do it playing in your head again. You already went through this. He wouldn’t kill you. In addition to that, your shower thoughts were still circulating in your mind. If he, or you, would get caught by the law one day, you would deeply regret not having tried. And so, eyes still locked with his, you dropped your towel on the floor, not giving him time to look at your exposed body before turning around to walk to the bedroom. 

You bit your lip, halfway through starting to regret it, when you were suddenly thrown aside, your back hitting the wall in a rather violent manner. Poison was pressing you against the wall, one hand on your throat to keep you locked in place. 

“Venga, cariño, that’s enough. I have been giving you a pass on your little theatre the whole day, do you think this is some fucking game?” You didn’t answer, you couldn’t answer with his face only inches away from yours. You felt your heart pounding into your chest, breath coming in short waves. It was not fear that caused it, neither the hand on your throat. You were exited. So instead, you just looked at him with pleading eyes. The air between you was filled with anticipation, and you leaned your body into his, bringing your face closer, his hand on your throat allowing the movement. And then his lips were pressed on yours, eager and passionate. The kind of kiss that left you breathless when he pulled away, as his lips wandered down your jaw to the crook of your neck. You closed your eyes, your skin burning under his kisses, every fibre of your body enjoying the moment. You felt his arms grasping the back of your thighs and lifting you up. A surprised cry left your lips and you quickly wrapped your legs around his waist, your tongue now caressing his neck, one hand grabbing his beautiful hair that felt so soft under your fingers. 

Poison carried you effortlessly to the bedroom where he carefully set you on the bed, with a gentleness that surprised you given the way his hand so quickly squeezed your throat just moments ago. You suddenly felt small, your naked body exposed under his eyes that were filled with desire as he watched you while unbuttoning his shirt. You crawled forward to unzip his pants, eager to show him that he made the right decision. The growing bulge was showing you that he wanted you just as you wanted him. With his help, you quickly got rid of the clothes that were in the way, shirt and pants tossed away without care, so that only out of the corner of your eyes you noticed the pack of cigarettes falling on the floor.

Suddenly, you were thrown back, his body now hovering over you. He lowered down to kiss you again, his tongue not wasting any second to enter your mouth. His hands found your breasts, his thumbs against your hard nipples making your back ache and sending a burning sensation down to your core. Poison smiled against your lips and his mouth wandered down your jaw again, to your throat, and then to where his right hand was seconds before. Being lost in the feeling of his tongue against your nipple, your hand wandered down to your burning core but was grabbed by him before it reached its destination. He pinned your arm over your head, and the second his lips parted from your body, you started to miss them. “You think I’m letting you off so easy?” You opened your mouth to say something, but your breath hitched as Poison parted your legs with his hands. “Don’t move”, he ordered with a stern voice and you felt compelled to obey.  His lips started making a path down your body, the softness of the touch leaving you shuddering. Stopping at your inner thighs, he gently placed kisses on your skin, and your body was yearning for what was to come. 

“Ah princesa, you are so excited to see me,” he said at the sight of your wetness. “Pend–” The word got stuck in your throat when his tongue flicked over your sweet point, sending sparks through your whole body. Eyes closed, you felt his hot breath against your sensitive entrance as he worked on your swollen clit, sucking and swirling his tongue. Instinctively, you tucked your pelvis up, only for his hand to press it back, his lips now moving away from your core. You opened your eyes, pleading with your gaze for him to continue. “I said don’t move.” “I won’t”, you whimpered, the rational thinking part of you angry that he got you so easily wrapped around his little finger.

His tongue was back at your soft spot, this time accompanied by his thumb, and it didn’t take long until you tensed, your legs starting to shake because of the orgasm that was building up. That is when he suddenly stopped. You looked down on him, ready to protest, but the sudden feeling of his cock sliding deep into the wet of your body made you lose all thoughts. He lowered down as he took up the pace, mouth all over your body. One of his hands found your throat again as he thrust into you, over and over. You wanted so badly to release, but the small power games between the two of you reminded you to do otherwise. “Let me ride you”, you whispered and didn’t let him answer as you moved your body up to turn him around. The surprise was written on his face as you sank down, whimpering from his full length inside you. With a smile, you slowly started rocking your hips, hands on his chest to hold him down. You couldn’t help but notice the admiration in his eyes, and you didn’t remember the last time someone looked at you like that. 

He sat up and grabbed your chin to make you look at him. “A disobedient princesa.” His wet kiss washed away the smile on your lips before he started thrusting his hips, moving rhythmically against you while his tongue was leaving hickeys on your neck. His hands moved to your waist, pressing you against him as his pounds got faster and more erratic. You tried to hold off your orgasm, lowering your head to the crook of his neck and grabbing his back with your nails. As his breathing became rapid, you threw your head back and his lips immediately found yours. Your walls clenched around his shaft and a cry left your mouth as pleasure shot through your whole body, you both coming undone with Poison shuddering and uttering your name. 

You were breathing heavily when Poison sank back into the bed and you rolled down from him with a swift movement. You wanted to stay with to him, kiss him again, rest your head on his shoulder. But in this final part of the game you couldn’t give in, not with the success you had until now. So instead, you got up, taking his shirt to cover your body. His eyes were following you as you bent down to pick up the cigarettes from the floor, thoughts wandering to the garage door earlier that day. A cigarette in your mouth, you fumbled with the lighter to light it while throwing the cigarette pack on the bed for him. Without a single word or glance, you left the room, welcoming the tobacco smoke that filled your lungs.

[pensofgrace]

Feminism Gone Wrong!

cene one Rose parked her black ride in front of her favourite restaurant, picked her bag, got out of her car. She adjusted her black body hug that speaks classy, executive, sexy, well marched with a luxury bag and watch, she matched in as beautiful as she can. Upon entering the restaurant, moving to their regular sit, she realised brandy was not present yet, shakes her head and sit. Rose: "this girl cannot fail to disappoint", she says while looking at few posts on Instagram. "let me see what her excuse will be today, maybe its flat tyre or traffic". She called on the waiter to give her regular drink. While rose was sipping her smoothie, a woman with nice curves walked in with all her glory, a well porshe girl with a simple dress of about $300. " before you run curses on me, babe the traffic was terrible, I couldn’t drive rough like those rough beard guys do", brandy says while sitting down, dropping her purse and phone on the table, she looks at rose smiling. " I was waiting for your majestic excuse already ma", she says not looking up, " so, you had a terrible traffic from vgc to chevron, hmmmm, impressing", she stops talking, looking up at brandy with a smirk on her face. Brandy looks away scratching her ears, " baby love, am sorry, I was watching spider man when you called that you were 5 minutes away, I totally forgot about our date”, giving her apology smile. " keep that love for them that sort for it, I knew you lied when you said you were out of your gate, I just knew it. You know what, lets just forget it, its your usual behaviour, am hooked forever. Brandy erupts into loud, mocking laughter, " am happy you know dear, we are stacked forever. So, you said you had something important to tell me, which could not be said over the phone or through mail". She says closing the joke atmosphere automatically, pulled up her serious wall up face. Now, it was brandy’s turn to look guilty, up in her mind she stated to think of how to present the matter, "o my God, how is brandy going to take this, am I being stupid and selfish right now, what if she breaks it with me, I don’t want to lose my best friend, really been together for five years. She shouldn’t be that angry right, what!!!, the oath, am in serious trouble right now, what if sheeeee…. "rose Philips", brandy voice erupted close to her nose, rose jerked back, " why did you scream my full name like that, common some respect", rose said trying to hide her anxiety. Brandy looked at her " look here I don’t have timed for your games, you went off for about five minutes, I ordered a drink just thinking about what could have been so big that you went so locked down", brandy sighed, smile and said " sweetie I love you, we are best friends, nothing can be so difficult you cant tell me, we are in this together, remember?, remember our promise to one another, no issue and problem coming between us, unless you’ve broken our oath, I mean you remember right", brandy took a sip of her drink, sit back and said, " well, I trust you that you wont break that, we decided on it together, no man making decisions for us. We are the independent woman baby! " brandy says laughing and jumping on her seat. Rose sits up straight, took a sip of her smoothie, she looked at brandy and continued the conversation. “, that’s why am here, you see... "what do you mean, our promise, babe you are scaring me", brandy jumped in. Rose breath in calmly them looked up to brandy. "brandy, please can you calm down, promise me you will let me explain, let me finish before you jump in’, brandy smiled and shake her head up and down while crossing her leg. " am all ears rose, feel free, tell me anything, we will solve this together". " okay, here it goes. You remember how much we suffered in the hand of men, how they treated and molested us, making us feel like we worth nothing, brandy, remember how drake used my skills and potentials to build himself to the top he his right now. Can you remember how we decided to never fall for any human being with a short hair, no breast to feed a baby and a

material to produce a baby, our decision to never be vulnerable or subject to a man, how we made that oath to be independent, an ability to depend on ourselves only, equality with men, {at this point rose was up in tears, not bothering to swipe it off, rose did not make any movement m, looking still, it feels as though she knows what this is about already, not ready to acknowledge and accept though}. "am sorry brandy but I can’t do this anymore, I can’t push this wanting, this desire for a help mate away anymore, brandy I can’t keep ignoring his care, his love, his realness, he loves me, and am not sorry to say I love him too". Rose stopped talking waiting for brandy’s comment after no response, she looked up to see rose giving her the betrayal eyes. She quickly spoke up. " brandy please, I didn’t mean too……. "rose from this day onward we are officially off, no need of arguing and trying to convince you, goodbye rose Philips". Brandy stood up dropped some thousands on the table, left without looking back. Rose dropped her head on the table and sobbed. SCENE TWO " hi baby, you miss me, matt kisses rose on the cheek, rose left her sitting position to assist matt with his attire. Rose: "how was your meeting, contract coming in", she looks at him with hope Matt: " well, am sorry to say babe, am not the most successful CEO in the world yet, but you are looking at the youngest successful CEO in Arica". Rose jumped on the bed, screaming yes! Yes! Yes! "you deserve it baby am so proud of you", she looks at him with a serious face, ‘ you complete me , you are my perfection’. Matt: " it’s the other way around love’. Rose:" let me drop to the kitchen, something special for a special man with a special achievement" Matt: " no baby, no stress for you, love, we are going out, a friend told me about a nice place, its new, very exclusive, executive and exotic" Rose: "funny, three e’s for a place" Matt: "actually the place is called three e’s" Rose: "okay, let me freshen up, give me 10" Matt: "no, make it 15, I won’t be done in 10, not as fast as you fox" Rose laughs, shaking her head " just like brandy". SCENE THREE Brandy stood near her office table, checking for a Particular important document her personal assistance should have documented properly, " stupid man, they never do any thing right, such a disappointment, what a waste of resources, I presume too". Her office door opened with no noise, " madam new couples are here, we got their details to be their first, should we give the the ultimate on the house service". Brandy: " next time you come into my office without permission, I will make sure you never get a job in Nigeria again, is that clear Patrick, idiot, now do that which is right, I will come down and greet them myself, get their table number for me. Make them comfortable". Brandy found the document, kept it ion her bag, checked herself in the mirror reapplied her lip stick. " Patrick, what table", she said with no smile " ma, its table 7, they are having a drink right nooo…… "shut up, I didn’t ask that, hmmmm 7, rose favourite number". Brandy walked down to table 7, upon getting their she discovered it was rose, she looked at her, full of annoyance and betrayal, left the table without a word, rose stood up immediately ran after her lost best fiend screaming her name, not minding the scene they were both creating. Rose: " brandy, please wait, please, its ben so long, hear me out. Brandy turned back sharply " I want no conversation with a person like you, enough!" Rose; " stop, just stop, okay can we talk, maybe not n ow, someday during the week, please, just please, I will drop my card with the receptionist. Will be waiting to meet up. I still love you". Rose turned making her way to her husband, she turned " by the way, nice restaurant, it has always been your dream, good work, brandy". Scene

four Brandy sit quietly at the corner of the restaurant, everywhere seems cool and fun. She sips her drink smirking at herself, at a little side up she could see matt chatting and laughing about something rose says. "stupid fool, let’s see if you will see something to laugh at by the end of the day" Brandy calls upon a waited for a refill, seeing matt standing up moving towards the rest room, she sends the waiter off standing up and walking towards matt’s direction. She waited for matt to come out of the gent, Brandy: hello to you too Mr matt, having a fun day" Matt: ohh, brandy you scared me, what’s up, you look good, didn’t know you were around" Brandy: you weren’t supposed to know, you brought this upon yourself though, what aaaaaa……. Matt: see brandy, I know you vexed with your bae, its wasn’t her fault, seriously, she told me about the oath and promise, I thought they were unreasonable first but after she told me about you and your past, I came to understand, but you see, you are a very beautiful girl…. Brandy; ohh, Mr matt, rose told you about my past right, lovely, I believe she told you about the gang rape too, how interesting my life story with Fred, I guess I have a better reason to do this. Brandy comes upon matt suddenly, knowing his head against the wall, after so many punches, she believed him to be dead. Brandy: no man, we promised no name, rose and our oath is mine. I hope the angels are willing to take you to hell for breaking two friends up with fake love, and I hope rose realise I just did her a good favour". Brandy adjust her cloth cleans her hand, heads back to her seat, calls for the waiter for a drink while she watches matt body being rushed out, with a devastated rose. SCENE FIVE rose knocks on brandy’s office door, enters and takes her seat, looking at brandy. Brandy: to what annoying honour do I hold this unexpected, unwelcome visit Mrs rose Chantel" After few second of no response from rose Brandy: am giving you 10 seconds to leave my office, or I will calllll…… Rose: why, why, why brandy. You hate me that much Brandy: well, I would have an answer to any why if I do know where the why is directed to Rose: you hate me so much, you angry about the oath but do you have to do what you did, almost killing my husband Brandy: almost, he’s not dead, what! That bastard isn’t dead, how come, how Rose: so, you won’t deny it, really brandy I never knew you were such a snake, well to disappoint your miserable life, he’s not, because he never deserved it. How could you, for what reason, because he loves me. Aint you suppose to be happy for me, happy for your best friend, what has gotten into you. Brandy; best fiend my foot, you lost that title months ago, you lied to me, betrayed me. Rose; then have you forgotten our promise to each other, forgiveness all the way, I could hand you over now to the police, but I won’t, I still love you brandy, you’ve always being sister, please stop all this. Just stop it. Brandy: just get out, I hate you liar, get out…… Brandy screams at rose, after rose left the office, brandy break down weeping SCENE SIX Brandy sit at the sitting room, watching the tv, news going on around the world obviously her mind seems outside the house, all in another world. After about a minute of leaking tears, she picks up her phone. Went to a number, typed a capital "AM SORRY". Switch off her phone and lays down. SCENE SEVEN Rose; " thanks for coming, although it took you extra two hours after you said you were close, guess you haven’t changed", smiling to brandy " I don’t have time for your nonsense chit-chat, why am in here, I got business to run’. Rose: " I love you, please never doubt that, what happened wasn’t planned, I didn’t even know I had gotten so far in, until he proposed, and I said yes. The feeling wont just go away, bran…… Brandy; " since when,

since when have you two been together, till the time you told me, since when rose, one month, two months, answer me!!!", she spoke up so angry Rose: "six-month brandy, babe, I was only joking around, I only planned to play him and make feel miserable, please, I love him". Brandy; "six, six, woah, six months, my best friend kept a secret from me, how many more do I need to know, you married, you got two kids in the cupboard’, Rose; ‘after you left, I lost it, couldn’t contact you, he stood with me, he was my comfort, he gave me happiness, we got married. I love him brandy and am not ready to leave him for anything". Brandy:" so why am I here, what do you want", Rose:" I want my best friend back, I want you to enjoy the happiness I do now, I need you to change your mentality about this feminism of a thing, please". Brandy: " so you want you change, why should I do that, give me reasons rose. Your love for a man made you leave me, common convince me your betrayal". Rose:" I accept, I betrayed you, but it was for a good thing, you are not happy brandy. I know that, I can see it in your face, just one chance, just a chance with a good man" "baby", she says holding a broken brandy’s hand, " please, a good man is what it takes, a good man won’t make you feel like a slave, like a servant, no he won’t want, he would want you as a helpmate, someone to complete him. Thank about it, no need to rush, just calm your heart, baby I need you to break that wall when that man comes, that responsible man with a good knowledge of how to treat a woman, okay, love”. Brandy kept to silence holding rose’s hand like her life depend on it. A lot was going through her mind, he wanted to talk but knew deep down the truth was been laid down flat. SCENE EIGHT ‘happy birthday brandy" "thanks so much for coming it’s a small party I guess, like I want, hmmm, rose is poking my eyes with invisible spears, wanting a speech, isoritte, here we go, thanks to God first, He made me special, am grateful to my parent for the prayers and support am 25 meh, so to rose, I love you more than life itself, you aint just a friend, you are my sister, days of fight and love, of arguing and convincing. Thanks for changing my mentality on some ideas I keep to heart, thanks for making me make the best decision, my life could ever need. Thanks love am happy for you, I appreciate you. To the man that wet through hell to get my heart, bros kudos to you mehn, guy you deserve some awards, thanks for not giving up on me, thanks for always running off to rose for ways to cool mu hot brain. I love you. Just mind you, no baby yet, let me enjoy my marriage first. And to all that…………….

cene one Rose parked her black ride in front of her favourite restaurant, picked her bag, got out of her car. She adjusted her black body hug that speaks classy, executive, sexy, well marched with a luxury bag and watch, she matched in as beautiful as she can. Upon entering the restaurant, moving to their regular sit, she realised brandy was not present yet, shakes her head and sit. Rose: "this girl cannot fail to disappoint", she says while looking at few posts on Instagram. "let me see what her excuse will be today, maybe its flat tyre or traffic". She called on the waiter to give her regular drink. While rose was sipping her smoothie, a woman with nice curves walked in with all her glory, a well porshe girl with a simple dress of about $300. " before you run curses on me, babe the traffic was terrible, I couldn’t drive rough like those rough beard guys do", brandy says while sitting down, dropping her purse and phone on the table, she looks at rose smiling. " I was waiting for your majestic excuse already ma", she says not looking up, " so, you had a terrible traffic from vgc to chevron, hmmmm, impressing", she stops talking, looking up at brandy with a smirk on her face. Brandy looks away scratching her ears, " baby love, am sorry, I was watching spider man when you called that you were 5 minutes away, I totally forgot about our date”, giving her apology smile. " keep that love for them that sort for it, I knew you lied when you said you were out of your gate, I just knew it. You know what, lets just forget it, its your usual behaviour, am hooked forever. Brandy erupts into loud, mocking laughter, " am happy you know dear, we are stacked forever. So, you said you had something important to tell me, which could not be said over the phone or through mail". She says closing the joke atmosphere automatically, pulled up her serious wall up face. Now, it was brandy’s turn to look guilty, up in her mind she stated to think of how to present the matter, "o my God, how is brandy going to take this, am I being stupid and selfish right now, what if she breaks it with me, I don’t want to lose my best friend, really been together for five years. She shouldn’t be that angry right, what!!!, the oath, am in serious trouble right now, what if sheeeee…. "rose Philips", brandy voice erupted close to her nose, rose jerked back, " why did you scream my full name like that, common some respect", rose said trying to hide her anxiety. Brandy looked at her " look here I don’t have timed for your games, you went off for about five minutes, I ordered a drink just thinking about what could have been so big that you went so locked down", brandy sighed, smile and said " sweetie I love you, we are best friends, nothing can be so difficult you cant tell me, we are in this together, remember?, remember our promise to one another, no issue and problem coming between us, unless you’ve broken our oath, I mean you remember right", brandy took a sip of her drink, sit back and said, " well, I trust you that you wont break that, we decided on it together, no man making decisions for us. We are the independent woman baby! " brandy says laughing and jumping on her seat. Rose sits up straight, took a sip of her smoothie, she looked at brandy and continued the conversation. “, that’s why am here, you see... "what do you mean, our promise, babe you are scaring me", brandy jumped in. Rose breath in calmly them looked up to brandy. "brandy, please can you calm down, promise me you will let me explain, let me finish before you jump in’, brandy smiled and shake her head up and down while crossing her leg. " am all ears rose, feel free, tell me anything, we will solve this together". " okay, here it goes. You remember how much we suffered in the hand of men, how they treated and molested us, making us feel like we worth nothing, brandy, remember how drake used my skills and potentials to build himself to the top he his right now. Can you remember how we decided to never fall for any human being with a short hair, no breast to feed a baby and a

material to produce a baby, our decision to never be vulnerable or subject to a man, how we made that oath to be independent, an ability to depend on ourselves only, equality with men, {at this point rose was up in tears, not bothering to swipe it off, rose did not make any movement m, looking still, it feels as though she knows what this is about already, not ready to acknowledge and accept though}. "am sorry brandy but I can’t do this anymore, I can’t push this wanting, this desire for a help mate away anymore, brandy I can’t keep ignoring his care, his love, his realness, he loves me, and am not sorry to say I love him too". Rose stopped talking waiting for brandy’s comment after no response, she looked up to see rose giving her the betrayal eyes. She quickly spoke up. " brandy please, I didn’t mean too……. "rose from this day onward we are officially off, no need of arguing and trying to convince you, goodbye rose Philips". Brandy stood up dropped some thousands on the table, left without looking back. Rose dropped her head on the table and sobbed. SCENE TWO " hi baby, you miss me, matt kisses rose on the cheek, rose left her sitting position to assist matt with his attire. Rose: "how was your meeting, contract coming in", she looks at him with hope Matt: " well, am sorry to say babe, am not the most successful CEO in the world yet, but you are looking at the youngest successful CEO in Arica". Rose jumped on the bed, screaming yes! Yes! Yes! "you deserve it baby am so proud of you", she looks at him with a serious face, ‘ you complete me , you are my perfection’. Matt: " it’s the other way around love’. Rose:" let me drop to the kitchen, something special for a special man with a special achievement" Matt: " no baby, no stress for you, love, we are going out, a friend told me about a nice place, its new, very exclusive, executive and exotic" Rose: "funny, three e’s for a place" Matt: "actually the place is called three e’s" Rose: "okay, let me freshen up, give me 10" Matt: "no, make it 15, I won’t be done in 10, not as fast as you fox" Rose laughs, shaking her head " just like brandy". SCENE THREE Brandy stood near her office table, checking for a Particular important document her personal assistance should have documented properly, " stupid man, they never do any thing right, such a disappointment, what a waste of resources, I presume too". Her office door opened with no noise, " madam new couples are here, we got their details to be their first, should we give the the ultimate on the house service". Brandy: " next time you come into my office without permission, I will make sure you never get a job in Nigeria again, is that clear Patrick, idiot, now do that which is right, I will come down and greet them myself, get their table number for me. Make them comfortable". Brandy found the document, kept it ion her bag, checked herself in the mirror reapplied her lip stick. " Patrick, what table", she said with no smile " ma, its table 7, they are having a drink right nooo…… "shut up, I didn’t ask that, hmmmm 7, rose favourite number". Brandy walked down to table 7, upon getting their she discovered it was rose, she looked at her, full of annoyance and betrayal, left the table without a word, rose stood up immediately ran after her lost best fiend screaming her name, not minding the scene they were both creating. Rose: " brandy, please wait, please, its ben so long, hear me out. Brandy turned back sharply " I want no conversation with a person like you, enough!" Rose; " stop, just stop, okay can we talk, maybe not n ow, someday during the week, please, just please, I will drop my card with the receptionist. Will be waiting to meet up. I still love you". Rose turned making her way to her husband, she turned " by the way, nice restaurant, it has always been your dream, good work, brandy". Scene

four Brandy sit quietly at the corner of the restaurant, everywhere seems cool and fun. She sips her drink smirking at herself, at a little side up she could see matt chatting and laughing about something rose says. "stupid fool, let’s see if you will see something to laugh at by the end of the day" Brandy calls upon a waited for a refill, seeing matt standing up moving towards the rest room, she sends the waiter off standing up and walking towards matt’s direction. She waited for matt to come out of the gent, Brandy: hello to you too Mr matt, having a fun day" Matt: ohh, brandy you scared me, what’s up, you look good, didn’t know you were around" Brandy: you weren’t supposed to know, you brought this upon yourself though, what aaaaaa……. Matt: see brandy, I know you vexed with your bae, its wasn’t her fault, seriously, she told me about the oath and promise, I thought they were unreasonable first but after she told me about you and your past, I came to understand, but you see, you are a very beautiful girl…. Brandy; ohh, Mr matt, rose told you about my past right, lovely, I believe she told you about the gang rape too, how interesting my life story with Fred, I guess I have a better reason to do this. Brandy comes upon matt suddenly, knowing his head against the wall, after so many punches, she believed him to be dead. Brandy: no man, we promised no name, rose and our oath is mine. I hope the angels are willing to take you to hell for breaking two friends up with fake love, and I hope rose realise I just did her a good favour". Brandy adjust her cloth cleans her hand, heads back to her seat, calls for the waiter for a drink while she watches matt body being rushed out, with a devastated rose. SCENE FIVE rose knocks on brandy’s office door, enters and takes her seat, looking at brandy. Brandy: to what annoying honour do I hold this unexpected, unwelcome visit Mrs rose Chantel" After few second of no response from rose Brandy: am giving you 10 seconds to leave my office, or I will calllll…… Rose: why, why, why brandy. You hate me that much Brandy: well, I would have an answer to any why if I do know where the why is directed to Rose: you hate me so much, you angry about the oath but do you have to do what you did, almost killing my husband Brandy: almost, he’s not dead, what! That bastard isn’t dead, how come, how Rose: so, you won’t deny it, really brandy I never knew you were such a snake, well to disappoint your miserable life, he’s not, because he never deserved it. How could you, for what reason, because he loves me. Aint you suppose to be happy for me, happy for your best friend, what has gotten into you. Brandy; best fiend my foot, you lost that title months ago, you lied to me, betrayed me. Rose; then have you forgotten our promise to each other, forgiveness all the way, I could hand you over now to the police, but I won’t, I still love you brandy, you’ve always being sister, please stop all this. Just stop it. Brandy: just get out, I hate you liar, get out…… Brandy screams at rose, after rose left the office, brandy break down weeping SCENE SIX Brandy sit at the sitting room, watching the tv, news going on around the world obviously her mind seems outside the house, all in another world. After about a minute of leaking tears, she picks up her phone. Went to a number, typed a capital "AM SORRY". Switch off her phone and lays down. SCENE SEVEN Rose; " thanks for coming, although it took you extra two hours after you said you were close, guess you haven’t changed", smiling to brandy " I don’t have time for your nonsense chit-chat, why am in here, I got business to run’. Rose: " I love you, please never doubt that, what happened wasn’t planned, I didn’t even know I had gotten so far in, until he proposed, and I said yes. The feeling wont just go away, bran…… Brandy; " since when,

since when have you two been together, till the time you told me, since when rose, one month, two months, answer me!!!", she spoke up so angry Rose: "six-month brandy, babe, I was only joking around, I only planned to play him and make feel miserable, please, I love him". Brandy; "six, six, woah, six months, my best friend kept a secret from me, how many more do I need to know, you married, you got two kids in the cupboard’, Rose; ‘after you left, I lost it, couldn’t contact you, he stood with me, he was my comfort, he gave me happiness, we got married. I love him brandy and am not ready to leave him for anything". Brandy:" so why am I here, what do you want", Rose:" I want my best friend back, I want you to enjoy the happiness I do now, I need you to change your mentality about this feminism of a thing, please". Brandy: " so you want you change, why should I do that, give me reasons rose. Your love for a man made you leave me, common convince me your betrayal". Rose:" I accept, I betrayed you, but it was for a good thing, you are not happy brandy. I know that, I can see it in your face, just one chance, just a chance with a good man" "baby", she says holding a broken brandy’s hand, " please, a good man is what it takes, a good man won’t make you feel like a slave, like a servant, no he won’t want, he would want you as a helpmate, someone to complete him. Thank about it, no need to rush, just calm your heart, baby I need you to break that wall when that man comes, that responsible man with a good knowledge of how to treat a woman, okay, love”. Brandy kept to silence holding rose’s hand like her life depend on it. A lot was going through her mind, he wanted to talk but knew deep down the truth was been laid down flat. SCENE EIGHT ‘happy birthday brandy" "thanks so much for coming it’s a small party I guess, like I want, hmmm, rose is poking my eyes with invisible spears, wanting a speech, isoritte, here we go, thanks to God first, He made me special, am grateful to my parent for the prayers and support am 25 meh, so to rose, I love you more than life itself, you aint just a friend, you are my sister, days of fight and love, of arguing and convincing. Thanks for changing my mentality on some ideas I keep to heart, thanks for making me make the best decision, my life could ever need. Thanks love am happy for you, I appreciate you. To the man that wet through hell to get my heart, bros kudos to you mehn, guy you deserve some awards, thanks for not giving up on me, thanks for always running off to rose for ways to cool mu hot brain. I love you. Just mind you, no baby yet, let me enjoy my marriage first. And to all that……………. One Rose parked her black ride in front of her favourite restaurant, picked her bag, got out of her car. She adjusted her black body hug that speaks classy, executive, sexy, well marched with a luxury bag and watch, she matched in as beautiful as she can.

‘happy birthday brandy"

"thanks so much for coming it’s a small party I guess, like I want, hmmm, rose is poking my eyes with invisible spears, wanting a speech, isoritte, here we go, thanks to God first, He made me special, am grateful to my parent for the prayers and support am 32 meh, so to rose, I love you more than life itself, you aint just a friend, you are my sister, days of fight and love, of arguing and convincing.

Thanks for changing my mentality on some ideas I keep to heart, thanks for making me make the best decision, my life could ever need. Thanks love am happy for you, I appreciate you.

oy my marriage first. And to all that…………….

[cherryrogers]

Falling For You.

— Chapter 10

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Fem!Reader

(Modern High School AU)

Warnings: Alcohol, swearing, fluff!!

Synopsis: Unlike most teenagers, you had your life completely mapped out. You’d graduate high school, go off to the university of your dreams, and live the life that your parents always wanted you to. That was always the plan.

Falling for Bucky Barnes, however, was never part of that plan.

Being ‘just friends’ isn’t enough. Becoming anything more is too much. But suppressed feelings can’t stay ignored forever, and you were about to learn that a lot sooner than you thought

Inspired by the song, ‘Fallingforyou’ - The 1975

Series Masterlist

_______________________________________________

Wiping an aching hand across his forehead, Bucky stood from where he’d been crouching next to the tyre of the large truck and set down the tool in his other hand. He eyed the exterior of the vehicle, taking a mental note of the work on it that he still had to finish with a tired exhale.

It was only him in the garage, the rest of the guys were holed up in the break room eating lunch, one of which being his father. His dad suggested that he took a lunch break too, but Bucky hadn’t felt like eating - he hadn’t felt like doing a lot since the beginning Winter break, since the last time he saw you.

Bucky had spent most of the cold days working in the auto-shop, hands slick with grease and a tool of some sort in his hand. He’d barely touched his phone, leaving countless unopened messages and unreturned missed calls from his concerned friends clogging up his notifications. None of them were from you, though, which he wasn’t really surprised about.

You hadn’t left things on bad terms with Bucky back at Carter’s, but you’d made it clear that you needed your own space for a while, and the boy wanted to respect that, even if it was a lot more difficult than he’d anticipated. He hadn’t realised how much time he actually spent with you until it’d been a week without doing so. It only made his more anxious, knowing that the feeling of missing you might become a regular thing if you decided that you didn’t want him. He tried not to think about it too much, delving into whatever work had to be done at the shop to take his mind off you.

Christmas had came and gone quickly; a casual day spent with his parents at home, the thought of you passing his mind one too many times. He wondered what you you were doing that day. Your parents had came home for the holidays last Christmas, but considering your mother had practically disowned you that last time the two of you spoke, he wasn’t so sure that they’d make an appearance this time. Bucky would’ve been more than happy to let you spend the day with him and his family, but the last thing you needed for the time being was to be around him, so he only hoped that you’d enjoyed the day in your own way.

His friends had tried to get in touch with him a lot after that day, wanting to get the group together again before Val’s party on New Year’s Eve. None of them knew what happened at the Winter Formal - apart from Natasha, but he didn’t know that - and none of them knew about the conversation you’d had the day after. Bucky just couldn’t bring himself to tell them about it. He didn’t want to talk; he only wanted to hear from you. To know what was going to become of you and him, but he had to be patient. And until then, he felt like the only person he wanted to be around was himself.

However, his friends weren’t going to let him isolate himself for the rest of the break, that was for sure.

“I thought I’d find you here.”

Bucky’s head snapped up to the doorway of the garage, seeing no other than Natasha Romanoff leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed over her chest. He didn’t respond, not knowing what to say as he grabbed the towel from the stool next to him and began to wipe himself down.

It reminded him of when you’d shown up at the shop to get an explanation as to why he was still friends with his ex. That was a simpler time, a much simpler time.

The click of the girl’s boots echoed through the garage as she neared where Bucky was stood. “You’d always come here after we had an argument. I remember, it became such a routine for me to come here to try and work things out...” Nat chuckled softly, recounting the memories of a time long ago. “...that your dad would see me step one foot through the door and direct me to whichever part of the shop you were holed up in.”

Bucky didn’t think about his relationship with Natasha a lot, not as much as he used to, anyway. Sure, they could look back at it now and laugh because they were friends, but the two knew that their relationship was never healthy. It was argument after argument with a few nice moments in between, and the people around him weren’t oblivious to that.

The boy glanced up at his friend, manoeuvring himself around the truck to examine the rest of the damage. “I know, ‘cause after you’d leave, he’d try to question me about what our third fight of the week was about.”

A sympathetic smile set on the redhead’s lips. “I think he always knew that I was bad for you.”

“He knew that we were bad for each other.” Bucky caught her gaze, standing still for a moment before shaking his head and focusing back on the truck. “What’re you doin’ here, Nat?”

Natasha’s gentle expression turned serious at his question. “I told you I was coming to see you; you’d know that if you checked your phone.”

Sparing a glance at his phone on the counter across the room, Bucky let out a sigh. “I haven’t been on my phone much lately.”

That wasn’t necessarily a lie, but he’d seen all texts and Snapchats and whatever else his friends had tried to contact him on. He just wasn’t sure that he could deal with talking to them yet.

“Something’s up with you, Buck.” Nat pressed, deciding to just get straight to give point. The girl was never one for beating around the bush; it was only a waste of time. “Have you talked to (Y/N)?”

Hearing your name caused Bucky’s stomach to turn. “What?”

“(Y/N), have you talked to her since the dance?” The girl repeated. Truthfully, she’d been surprised that she’d remembered the conversation you’d shared while she’d been drinking, but she was glad that she did. If Bucky wasn’t going to talk to her about it himself, then she was going to confront him about it.

The boy’s brows furrowed confusedly. “How do you... how you even know what happened?”

“She told me.” The redhead shrugged. “Well, I kinda coaxed it out of her when I was tipsy, but... it definitely sounded like something you needed to talk about with her.”

Bucky bit down on the inside of his cheek, hesitant to talk about the situation that he’d been trying to take his mind off for the past week. There was a short silence before he nodded slowly. “Yeah, I talked to her.”

Natasha raised her brow. “And...?”

“And... she needs time to think things through.” Bucky dragged the nearest stool in the garage over next to the truck, sitting himself down with his elbows digging into his thighs. “She wanted to kiss me, and I think a part of her wants more than just a friendship. But... she’s still scared, Nat. She’s convinced that the both of us are just gonna end up getting hurt, and I don’t know how to show her that she doesn’t have to be afraid.”

The girl pursed her lips, eyes glued to the ground as she considered Bucky’s words. She was careful with her response, cautiously looking back up at Bucky and letting out a quiet sigh. “She’s afraid because you’re opening her up, Buck. Being open with you makes her problems yours, and that means if things get complicated in her life, they’re gonna affect you just as much. She doesn’t want that for you, just... just like I didn’t.”

Blue eyes darted over the redhead’s softened features. The only time they ever referred back to their relationship was in a joking manor, but Natasha didn’t have a hint of humour in her expression. The girl could tell that Bucky was unsure of how to respond, so she carried on speaking.

“I have a lot of regrets, Bucky. One of them is how I acted when we were together. I shut you out without an explanation and got mad when you only wanted to help. There was stuff going on in my life that I didn’t want anyone but me to have to deal with, so if it meant that my issues didn’t become yours as well, then I wasn’t ever going to open up to you.”

For a short while, Bucky was speechless. He’d had no idea that Natasha was dealing with her own problems during their relationship; if she was hurting, she’d never let it show in the slightest.

“Fuck, Nat.” The boy ran a hand over his face, standing from his stool. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know-”

“That was the point, Buck. I didn’t want you to know.” The corner of Nat’s lips upturned. “I wasn’t ready for a relationship, but I think (Y/N) is. I didn’t want to open up to you, but she does. I could see it when I talked to her at the dance; she really wants things to work out between the two of you.”

Bucky smiled at that. The redhead was smart, and she didn’t say things if they weren’t true. It sparked hope in his heart, hearing that she was sure you wanted him. “So, what do I do?”

Placing her hands on her hips, Natasha smiled softly up at him. “You show her that letting you in is okay. That you wanting to help her isn’t going to end up hurting you, and she doesn’t have to deal with whatever she’s afraid of alone.”

A laugh escaped Bucky’s lips, not because he thought what Nat said was funny, but because he was amazed at her words. While the two didn’t get on and boyfriend and girlfriend, Bucky truly couldn’t ask for a better friend than Natasha. The boys were great too, of course, but they definitely couldn’t have came out with anything that the girl just did.

“You’re pretty smart, you know that?” Bucky grinned for what felt like the first time since the dance.

“I know.” Natasha sent him a wink, beginning to take a few steps backwards from the boy. “The guys and I are grabbing dinner later, you should join us.”

Bucky didn’t waste any time thinking about his answer. “I’ll be there.”

“Awesome.” She nodded, heading for the exit of the garage.

“Nat?” The boy called out, prompting the girl to turn around with a quirked brow. “Thank you, for everything.”

“Don’t sweat it, Barnes. I just want you to be happy.”

There was a certain warmth in his chest as Bucky watched Natasha leave the shop. It was similar to what he felt when he first saw you across the room at the Winter Formal, when he was ready finally make a move on you. While that plan didn’t necessarily pan out correctly, he had a feeling that the next time he saw you would be different. Good different.

As long as you still wanted him, Bucky was going to show you that you didn’t have to be afraid anymore.

* * *

After walking for fifteen minutes in what you’d hoped was the right direction, you finally began to tell that you were nearing Val’s place, the sound of blaring music getting louder with each street corner you turned.

Somehow, you couldn’t really believe that it was New Year’s Eve. The majority of what had occurred in the past year had happened within the final month. Falling out with your parents, falling even more for Bucky... the year hadn’t quite ended how you’d thought it would.

And now you were off to a New Year’s party that you didn’t really want to go to, to apologise to a friend for not reciprocating the feelings he had towards you, while hoping to avoid the friend that you actually did reciprocate feelings with. What a year it’d been.

Wanda had told you to just meet her at the party, since Pietro had offered to take her and Vis, and you couldn’t even imagine the sheer awkwardness that car ride would ensure if you tagged along. At least the long walk allowed you to rehearse your actions going into the party.

Find Pietro, apologise, leave.

It was a very simple plan, but if you lingered at the party long enough for Val to find you, the girl wouldn’t let you leave before midnight, and your limited social battery definitely wouldn’t last for that long.

Soon enough, you’d arrived at Val’s house, hesitantly making your way up the stone steps to the open front door. You immediately recognised a bunch of familiar faces, and assumed that Val had literally invited the whole of senior year, which wasn’t so helpful when you were specifically there for one person.

Everyone was pretty dressed up for the night, as opposed to you who had pulled on a pair of jeans and swiped a layer of mascara over your lashes to not look utterly out of place. You weren’t staying for long, and when you got home, you were hitting the hay as soon as possible.

As if luck was on your side, you saw a flash of messy silver hair a few feet away from where you were stood at the front of the house, seemingly heading into the backyard along with Clint. Bingo.

However, as you did your best to swerve in and out between the number of bodies blocking the way to the sliding door leading outside, you suddenly stopped in your tracks, hearing a familiar loud laugh from the room on your right.

Your eyes widened as you whipped your head to the side, eyes landing on the one and only Bucky Barnes with a bright smile on his face, amused at something that Sam looked to have said. Even though you knew that Bucky wasn’t one to miss a party, it still didn’t make seeing him at Val’s any easier. It’d been a week since you’d talked to him, and even just hearing his laugh pained you a little.

You knew what you wanted; you wanted him. Absence truly does make the heart grow fonder, you’d had the displeasure of learning that in your time away from Bucky. It made you wonder if being more than friends with the boy perhaps wouldn’t be such a bad thing. If it meant you could spend your free time with him, be close to him, just let yourself care for him openly without having to push your romantic feelings away... didn’t that sound perfect to you? Almost like it was too good to be true.

Except it wasn’t too good to be true. Bucky wanted you too, he’d made that clear. If being with him was really what you wanted, it was your call to make if it was going to happen.

The silver hair came back into view momentarily, snapping you from your thoughts and encouraging you to make your way outisde. It was pretty dark apart from the array of LED lights decorating the rim of the roof, but you still managed to locate Pietro on the far side of the yard, thankfully stood alone with a beer bottle in his hand as Clint left his side to talk to some other people.

The rate of your heart was speeding up as you paced over to the boy, and as you approached him, you fiddled with your hands nervously.

“Pietro?”

His eyes flicked up to meet yours, a lopsided smile on his lips. “(Y/N), hey.”

The words left his lips in a slurred manner, and by the way his body was swaying as he stood in one place, it was safe to assume that Pietro was drunk. Great.

You sighed, unsure of how what to do next. This conversation couldn’t be had while he was drunk, right? “Uh, I came here to apologise to you, Pietro. We need to talk, but I don’t think you’re in the best state of mind to-”

“No, no; we can talk.” The boy interrupted you. “Let me s-save us some time. Y-you wanted Bucky to be your date to t-the dance, but you said yes to m-me because you felt bad for me...”

“That’s not-” You tried to intervene, but having a productive conversation with a drunk person just wasn’t possible.

“And then, you ran away from me at the dance to go and m-make out with him! You could’ve just told me you liked him and not me, (Y/N). Man, I’m such a moron for even thinking you’d choose me over h-him.”

You shook your head at the boy, guilt building in your stomach. Even if you didn’t have feelings for him, you still cared about Pietro, and you didn’t think you could stand having him not wanting to be your friend again. “I went as your date to the dance because you’re my friend, Pietro. I did want to go with you, but... I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to go with Bucky too. Look, I don’t think we should talk about this-”

“I n-never had a chance, did I?” He let out a strained laugh, hand gripping his empty beer bottle tightly. “It’s always been him, hasn’t it?”

Your eyes moved to ground, Pietro’s words cutting deep. For being drunk, he couldn’t have said anything that was more right.

It had always been Bucky.

There was no point in trying to deny it, to Pietro or to yourself.

You thought you’d move on eventually, that your stupid crush on your best friend would fizzle away as the end of senior year got closer. But it wasn’t just a stupid crush, it was much more than that and it definitely wasn’t something you could just move on from. No one would ever be Bucky; no matter how kind, or funny, or loyal, nobody would ever make you feel the way that Bucky did. You didn’t have to be a fortune teller to know that, you could feel it.

Biting down on your bottom lip, you gave the boy a weak nod, finding the courage to look him in the eye. Hurt was evident in the gaze he had on you; that was all he needed to hear.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Pietro murmured, shaking his head as he walked away, leaving you with a heavy feeling in your chest.

While the boy wasn’t sober, you could tell that his pain was genuine. You didn’t want to hurt him, you hadn’t wanted to hurt Bucky either, yet you ended up doing both of those things, all while hurting yourself in the process.

“God fucking dammit.” You mumbled under your breath, regretting ever stepping foot out of your house.

After being left alone for a couple of moments, you almost flinched when you felt a gentle hand on your forearm.

“(Y/N)?”

Concerned eyes pierced into yours when you looked up, and you couldn’t help but feel a sense of relief being in Bucky’s presence.

“I didn’t think you’d come tonight.” He stated softly, mutually relieved to see you too.

You offered him a sad smile. “Honestly, I kind of wish I hadn’t.

By the way he nodded understandingly, you assumed that Bucky had heard the conversation with Pietro, which also meant he heard you admit to only having feelings for him. Well, that was just amazing. You needed to get home; you needed to get home and forget that you even thought about going to the party.

“I should go.” You said hurriedly, stealing your eyes away from his before his baby blues alone could change your mind. The only reason you’d came was to make amends with Pietro, and you’d only made things worse.

“Don’t go.” Bucky suddenly spoke, pressing his lips into a thin line. “Please, just stay for a little while.”

“Bucky...”

“We can go upstairs, outta the way of everyone. Just you and me.”

The way he was looking at you, his ocean eyes pleading you to stay, there was no way you could say no to him. It’d been too long since you’d seen each other, and you missed him. You missed him a lot.

You glanced to his hand that was still resting on your arm, your lips curling into a faint smile at his touch. “You’re insufferable.”

A grin crept onto his lips as his hand slowly trailed down your arm to your hand, enveloping it in his own, and your mind for once wasn’t screaming at you to pull away. “Can’t be that bad if you’re agreein’ to come with me.”

You could only roll your eyes before Bucky began tugging you through the cramped hallway, up the stairs and into what looked to be Val’s bedroom; it was obvious by the bottles of alcohol lined neatly on her dresser as if they were ornaments. Did that girl ever stop drinking?

Bucky gently closed the door behind him, the loud music and chattering voices muffled through the wall separating you and Bucky from everyone else. The quieter setting allowed the conversation with Pietro to replay in your mind again, and the boy in front of you noticed the way your eyebrows dipped and a frown formed on your lips.

“Can I ask what happened?” He asked quietly, pressing his back against the door.

He’d heard the majority of the conversation, so you weren’t exactly sure why he was asking. Though, you did need to get the matter off your chest. “I wanted to apologise to Pietro about what happened at the dance, but then I realised he was drunk when I started talking to him. He has feelings for me, well, he did. I’m not so sure now since he... thinks that I’ve chosen you over him.”

A sigh fell from your mouth as you took a seat on the edge of the bed, actively avoiding Bucky’s stare on you. There was a battle going on in your head; to tell Bucky that you had feelings for him, or to just let go. It wasn’t fair to let him wait any longer for an answer that would change everything no matter what it was. You needed to tell him soon, now.

“He’ll come around, (Y/N).” Bucky reassured, walking over to the bed and taking a seat next to you, your hands merely inches apart. “It’ll take some time, but he will.”

“Were you...” You started, a little hesitant about asking the question. “Annoyed when I didn’t like you back?”

The boy shook his head, smiling shyly. “No, not annoyed. Kinda bummed, I guess, but I couldn’t get mad at you for somethin’ you couldn’t control.”

With every word that left his lips, Bucky was making you fall more and more for him. You knew a fair share of guys would likely throw a hissy fit if they got rejected by the a girl they’d pursued for months, but Bucky wasn’t like that. He cared about you, truly. He’d remained only your friend for over a year in spite of his feelings for you just because he still wanted to be in your life, romantically or platonically. The universe was definitely on your side when it decided to bring Bucky Barnes into your life, and the fact that he was still your best friend proved that it still was.

“I don’t deserve you, Bucky.” You exhaled after a moment, playing with your hands in your lap. “I lied; I did have feelings for you then, and I have ever since. You didn’t know that, yet you never tried to push me into liking you, or tried to make any sort of move on me no matter how much you wanted to be more than friends. And even now that you know that I like you, I just... I don’t think I can be the person that you want me to be, the person that you want to be with.”

Peeling your eyes up from the floor, you looked at Bucky directly, who had his brows crinkled while he bit the inside of his cheek in thought. His hand moved slowly to cover yours, a feeling of comfort running through you when you felt it thumb stroking your hand. “I just want you to be you, sweets. I want you to be whoever you want to be.”

“But what if I don’t know who that is anymore?” After your solid plan for the future had crumbled due to the argument with your mother and how you’d fallen hard for your best friend, you didn’t have a clue what the future now held for you.

Refusing to let yourself get upset, you swallowed the lump in your throat. You’d never felt so vulnerable before, your heart so out in the open for Bucky to see. It was odd, scary even. But it felt okay. Everything felt okay with Bucky.

“Then I’ll help you figure it all out.” He spoke quietly. You weren’t sure when his face got so close to yours, but it was a lot closer than it was, your noses barely brushing together. “It’s always gonna be you and me.”

Inhaling sharply, your eyes flickered between his bright eyes and pink lips, your heart pounding against your rib cage. “You know, if we, um... if we kiss right now, we can’t ever go back to just being friends.”

Bucky chuckled deeply, a sweet grin pulling at his lips. “That’s okay, sweets, cause I don’t wanna be your friend. Now, will you let me kiss you?”

You had barely started to nod when the boy’s hand came to your cheek, cupping it gently as he pulled your lips to meet his.

Fireworks. There were fireworks erupting in your stomach, flaming sparks coursing through your veins as you leaned into him, feeling more at home with his lips pressed against yours than you ever had in the house you’d lived in for eighteen years. All that time you spent pushing him away, telling yourself that Bucky Barnes was your friend and nothing more - if it all added up to this exact moment, then every second of it was worth it.

It was a long kiss, one that was around a year overdue, and neither one of you wanted to be the first to pull away. It was Bucky who did it, though, worry momentarily flashing in his eyes in case you were immediately regretting kissing him back. It was soon replaced by relief, however, when he saw how you were gazing at him. It was like you’d just awoken from a beautiful dream, a soft smile sitting on your lips.

“I don’t wanna be your friend either, Buck.” You whispered against his lips, causing the corners of his mouth to upturn.

The boy picked up your hand that was still enclasped in his, pressing a kiss to it before standing up, a sudden new glow to his presence. “C’mon, sweets. Let’s get outta here.”

“And go where, exactly?”

“Shakes at Carter’s?”

You quirked a brow, gradually rising to your feet. “Bucky, it’s like, eight o’clock.”

“Closes at nine.” He winked boyishly, wasting no time in interlacing your fingers together and tugging you out of the bedroom.

Like magic, anything that had stopped you from kissing Bucky the first time had disappeared from your mind. Once you entered back into the swarm of drunken teenagers, you didn’t focus on the strong scent of alcohol lingering in the air or the bodies that were accidentally bumping into you in the crowded space; you could only focus on him. Bucky, and the kiss, and the way you felt in that moment with him.

It was always going to be Bucky, you could feel it in your soul. Your were sure you’d always known it, but it’d taken you a hell of a long time to finally admit it to yourself. The problems in your life certainly hadn’t gone away just yet, but you weren’t going to handle them by yourself anymore. It wasn’t going to be easy, letting someone in after so long of building walls around yourself, but you were willing to try for Bucky.

As far as New Year’s go, this one was definitely one to remember, and it’d be the first one where you were able to have a stupid New Year’s kiss that you’d always secretly wanted.

And that kiss was just as mesmerising as the first; the sweet taste of strawberry milkshake still on your lips, his fingers gripping gently at your waist. Bucky had insisted on kissing you at midnight, so he walked you home from the diner and you let him hang around until the clock struck twelve, talking about anything and everything and laughing like children to pass the time. Even after staying for so long, once you’d had your second kiss of the night, the boy eventually returned home, not wanting his mother to lose sleep over him not being home on New Year’s Eve.

That night, you had maybe the first good night of sleep you’d had in a long time, the warmth from your night with Bucky never fading even as your eyes fluttered shut.

Things were still going to be hard, you knew that, and you and Bucky weren’t necessarily ‘girlfriend and boyfriend’ yet. You’d agreed to take things slow, and that meant not rushing into a full-blown relationship that you weren’t yet ready for. But it was different now; you trusted Bucky wholeheartedly, and you were okay with being vulnerable in front of him.

If your past self could see you now, falling for a boy so easily and pushing aside your college plans - well, for now - you probably wouldn’t have been able to believe it.

Yet, it was real, all of it, and you couldn’t be more simultaneously scared and excited for what was to come next.

* * *

Taglist:

@americas-ass-assins @stevieboyharrington @itz-kira @broco8 @bxrnsfeyson @lovvliies

[wolfpawn]

I Hate You, I Love You, Chapter 107

Chapter Summary -  Danielle returns from LA and decides to go to Suffolk, only to be informed by Tom that she is supposedly in LA snuggling up to a man that is not him.

Previous Chapter

Rating - Mature (some chapters contain smut)

Triggers - references to Tom Hiddleston’s work with the #MeToo Movement. That chapter will be tagged accordingly.

authors Note - I have been working on this for the last 3 years, it is currently 180+ chapters long.  This will be updated daily, so long as I can get time to do so, obviously.

All image rights belong to their owners

tags: @sweetkingdomstarlight-blog @jessibelle-nerdy-mum @nonsensicalobsessions @damalseer @hiddlesbitch1 @winterisakiller @fairlightswiftly @salempoe @wolfsmom1

If you wish to be tagged, please let me know.

Danielle walked through the street feeling confident and good in herself. Her return from the US had been quick and almost as enjoyable as her journey over, though if she was honest, she preferred First Class flying to a Private Jet, which she was sure to tell Tom, to which the reply was “duly noted :)” Mac trotted along happily beside her as she went about her day. They had gone for a run and had dealt with arranging the delivery and installation of the kitchen, now they were simply going for a walk because they were both bored in the house. With earphones on, Danielle only paid heed to road crossings, instead focusing very much on her own little world.

At one stage, she realised Mac had gone in front of her defensively and looked to see what he was looking at, on seeing the same photographer that seemed to effectively camp outside of Belsize in hopes of seeing anyone from there.

‘Where’s Tom?’ The man demanded as she walked by, acting as though he was not there. ‘You’d think since Irish people are supposed to be welcoming, you’d have the decency to answer someone.’ Danielle scoffed under her breath at that, but kept walking, Mac turning and giving a low growl and bark at the man before turning back to the direction of travel again.

Danielle scratched his ear when they came to the next traffic lights. ‘You love minding me, don’t you?’ his tongue lolled out of his mouth at that. ‘When the kitchen is done, we are going to Suffolk.’ Mac sneezed, ‘Glad you agree.’

*

The workmen were far messier than Danielle would have liked, but finally, the kitchen was done, she sent a picture of it to Tom as well of one when the men were getting more equipment, Mac sniffing the tools they had, one paw on them, she captioned that “I am not sure if this is against union regulation, but he seems trustworthy” Tom apparently laughed loud enough to pause production for people to come see. He sent her back a picture that someone had printed of Mac and the tools and put on set.

With the house cleaned and tidied, Danielle readied herself and went to Suffolk with Mac, who seemed elated to be back there for a while, nearly bowling over Diana when she came out to say hello.

With no annoyance, she was able to focus on her work and train for triathlons happily.

After a hard training session, she came home exhausted to check her phone, frowning at four missed calls from Tom and one from Luke. Worried, she rang Tom first. He answered after the second ring. ‘Tom?’

‘Elle.’

‘What is it?’

‘Where have you been?’

‘Out, I was cycling, what is it?’

‘There’s pictures.’

‘Of what?’

‘You and some guy in LA.’

‘Tom, I’m in Suffolk.’

‘I know that, but according to this, you and some guy are cuddling up in LA right now.’

‘I am not sure what you want me to say or do about that Tom.’ Danielle felt uneasy with the whole thing. ‘What guy?’

‘I don’t know, it’s you and some guy, is Lucas Aboriginal?’

‘No, he’s exactly what people turn on Home and Away and see, a white, surfer type guy.’

‘This guy looks native.’

‘Tom, I have no idea who the hell you are talking about, Khan is darker, but I mean, his dad is Middle Eastern, so he would be, but I only spoke with him in the offices. I have no idea who...okay, don’t talk for a second, I have to see this.’ she pulled the phone from her ear and got up Google and typed Tom’s name in. Sure enough, there was a piece by a Hollywood gossip column, claiming she and Tom were done and that she was in LA with her new beau. She rolled her eyes before focusing in on the picture. ‘Tom?’

‘Elle?’

‘That’s not me.’

‘What?’

‘She looks like me, but she has highlights in her hair and she has to be at least five-six or five-seven, and when did I start wearing shoes like those.’

‘I…’

‘And when did I get Chanel sunglasses?’ she giggled. There was silence on the other end of the line. ‘Tom?’

‘Those bastards.’

‘Tom? Wait, did you believe that?’ she felt genuinely hurt at that.

‘No, of course not. I know you’re at home and those movie posters in the background only were put up today, I heard Evans mention seeing them being put up here on the way to set.’

‘Then, why?’

‘They want to hurt us, they want to affect us.’

‘We don’t care though.’ Danielle commented. ‘We know the truth, you are there, making the biggest blockbuster of next year and I am here, working on everything I need to for my big “Oh my God, why the fuck did I agree to this” movie, as well as other things.’

Tom gave a small laugh. ‘I love you.’

‘What a coincidence Mr. Movie Star, I love me too. And you, sometimes, when you’re nice to me, and sometimes on Sundays.’ Tom chuckled more. ‘I miss you.’

‘I miss you too.’

‘Only two weeks left, then I get to kiss you again.’ She chirped.

‘Elle.’ He groaned, causing her to bite her lip.

‘No, not over the phone.’

‘You are an incredible tease.’

‘I am, and you are blocking me from answering Luke, so I am going to ring you again later.’

‘Do, the poor man is probably going grey.’

‘I blame you, goodbye Tom.’ she hung up and pressed the answer button for Luke. ‘Hello, Luke?’

‘I assume you got through to Tom.’

‘It’s not me.’

‘I had gathered that since you have been spotted here in London last week, though those photos were not very interesting and did not make it online, also the fact that this call is going through so easily.’

‘I am in Suffolk.’

‘The picture, what makes you sure it’s not just one from when you were there?’

‘It’s not me, her hair is different, she’s taller and I don’t dress in those clothes.’

‘That sounds fairly reasonable.’ Luke chuckled. ‘Alright, just get on with your day, I think you were spotted stopping to change a tyre earlier on your bike.’

‘No, just pumping it up for the way back, who the hell noticed that?’

‘Well, since last summer and the world declaration as to where Diana’s is,’ there was no hiding the disapproval in Luke’s voice. ‘There have been people waiting to catch Tom there.’

‘That’s disturbing.’

‘Why do you think he was adamant on you getting a gate on your driveway?’ Danielle frowned. ‘They have figured out you have the house next door.’

‘Well, I feel exposed.’

‘I can imagine.’ Luke acknowledged.

‘So we just ignore?’

‘Just ignore.’ Luke stated.

‘Diana and I were going to go to Aldeburgh later, there’s a Summer festival on.’

Luke chuckled. ‘That will confuse people.’

‘Yes, unless they say I went with him to get to his mum next.’

Luke laughed again. ‘I am sure there is someone somewhere that would accuse such a thing. Though thank you for the heads up.’

‘Sorry for the bother to you, Luke.’

‘Do not apologise, after all, it is not even you, is it?’ Luke dismissed. ‘As I said to Tom before, you are the perfect partner for a client, you do nothing to make my job difficult.’

‘Thank goodness I am boring.’

‘I would not call it boring, it is hardly sitting in watching trash television.’

‘That’s not boring, that is just wasting life.’ Danielle commented.

‘Indeed. If there is any issue today, please do not hesitate to inform me.’ Luke offered.

‘Thank you, Luke, have a lovely afternoon and evening, and sorry again for the trouble.’ she stated before hanging up. As she ended the call, she looked at the woman again and laughed. ‘In all fairness, if my arse looked like that, I’d wear those pants too,’ she commented to herself as she threw the phone on the bed and went for a shower.

*

Diana laughed as they watched two men walk by in seemingly medieval attire. ‘That is the wrong era.’ SHe informed Danielle.

‘I will have to take your word for it.’ Danielle smiled back as Diana linked her arm with hers. ‘Dare I ask?’

‘We’ve been spotted.’

‘Ah, well this will confuse them, they think I am in LA with some guy that is Tom’s replacement.’

Diana’s head fell back as she laughed. ‘Lord, do they ever stop?’

‘Why would they, as long as they have people willing to click on it and buy the trash papers, they will sell it.’ Danielle sighed. ‘I can accept it, or lose Tom.’

‘You can’t do that.’

‘Why, are you still looking at venues?’

‘No.’ Danielle looked at her. ‘I found the perfect one.’ That caused Danielle to roll her eyes. ‘But Tom would be lost without you now.’ She gave a small somewhat unbelieving smile. ‘You know it’s true.’ Diana pointed out. ‘Dismiss me if you want, but you and Tom are so good for one another. You are both so happy together. You add to one another’s lives yet do not need to be with each other at all times. Look at you now, smiling and happy, he, according to the texts you say you have received, is also happy. When you are together, you’d swear you were teenagers and not two people in very successful careers, looking to the future. You have never looked at life outside work before this.’ Diana pointed out, ‘In the six years I know you, you have not been so willing to step back and enjoy everything life has to offer.’

Danielle had to acknowledge the truth in her words. Though her career was only on the rise, the fact that now she had more work than ever, she was indeed making more of her life, and if she was honest, Tom was the greatest part to play in that, she wanted to make time to be with him when he was home and to be happy by herself when he was not.

[dippedanddripped]

Upcycling boundary-pusher and ex-Reebok graphic designer Nicole McLaughlin has turned making something out of nothing into an art form. For her, sustainability starts with the urgent need to repurpose waste. The footwear industry alone pumps out 24 billion pairs of shoes a year, and much ends up in landfill. But it doesn’t stop there. Designers must think differently, says McLaughlin, and make sneakers circular. One thing we can do to fast-track it? Collaborate

Allbirds: How do you approach sustainability?

Nicole McLaughlin: “You can’t just kind of be in it; you have to fully be in it. I wouldn’t want it any other way, now that I’ve dipped my toe into to the world of sustainability, mostly through upcycling and having conversations with people who are much more expert than me. I’m learning as I go.”

Allbirds: What do you see as the most pressing sustainability issues in fashion, and how are you trying to overcome them?

McLaughlin: “Overproduction and waste. I used to work within corporate fashion and footwear. Coming into the industry as a lover of clothing and shoes, then being faced with the reality of working in the field, seeing the scale and travelling to factories - all that made quite an impression on me.

“I look at sustainability from a social perspective too: how you are paying your workers and how they are treated. The human side is very important. But I felt, honestly, that Adidas and Reebok had pretty good factories, so the thing that really got me motivated was how much product the industry produces. It’s crazy to see that in its full form. It changes you. Also, just being around piles of clothes and shoes in the office, you start thinking about using what’s already available.

“It’s definitely wild to see the scale of waste, and I don’t think most consumers really know about it. I’m trying to raise awareness without putting companies on blast. Rather, to help them, to be like: What are the things we can do creatively to address the problem? Because this is not about one brand or another brand; this is about the culture as a whole.

“Sustainability within sneakers is just starting to become a more discussed thing, but from an upcycling perspective, it’s not brand new. At one point Reebok used recycled tyre rubber to create soles. There’s so much that can be done if we’re more resourceful. Actually, Allbirds was my first real introduction to a sustainable brand that puts materials first, and I’m not just saying that!”

Allbirds: You did a collaboration with us, together with Chinatown Market, in August, donating the proceeds to charity. How did our materials inspire you?

McLaughlin: “I wanted to highlight Allbirds’ amazing materials and still have the fun, playful aspect. It was during peak quarantine, and you shipped me three or four huge boxes of sample materials, including these square swatches that were perfect for patchwork.

“It was my first time working with wool [and] it was cool to understand how it folds and moves. A lot of my process is sculptural because I am physically putting it on my body, seeing if it’s a malleable material, what I can do with it. I designed some bags, I did a vest made from shoe uppers, a shoe ,which was really cool, and a really fun basketball hoop bra.”

Allbirds: You use humour to cut through. Let’s unpack this statement from your website: “This unexpected translation of materials allows her to uniquely highlight the message of sustainability.” How do you talk to your community about your ideas and values? What kinds of reactions do you get?

McLaughlin: “Humour can break the ice. I’m trying to say there’s a lot of stuff already made, in a funny, practical way to get people thinking. I get messages pretty much every day from students, or people into sustainability that get it. Then I have other people who’ve followed me for a long time and it suddenly clicks for them; they’re like, ‘Oh, I see, all of this stuff is secondhand…’ That’s something I really love.

“My approach to upcycling and sustainability is a little bit different than the traditional way of creating a sustainable collection. For me, design - and the way that you perceive it - comes first. You think about the sustainability after you have been interested in the invention or the idea ... I don’t want to say it’s sneaky, because that’s not the right way of doing it, but you know what I mean. There are people who don’t want to be lectured to.”

Allbirds: You’ve made working with other brands’ deadstock into an art form, but what do collabs mean to you beyond their physical possibilities?

McLaughlin: “It’s funny to see the evolution because now brands are reaching out to me. When I started, I was using [items from] brands I liked, that I felt passionate about, just on my own. Now it’s great to have the opportunity to work together on finding solutions. There are more younger designers getting these collaborations, which is awesome. It goes both ways: we’re teaching these brands methods of dealing with waste, and they’re giving us a larger platform.”

Allbirds: What would real change look like for you?

McLaughlin: “I think a lot about circularity. It’s a daunting task for larger brands that have been in business for longer than I’ve been alive; they’ve put out years and years of product, and to change the whole way they work, and take back all that product, is asking for something major. But I see the value in brands that do take their product back, or have repair programs. Or if something’s too damaged to fix, they will take it back and re-use the materials. If you want to get really deep into it, there are so many layers driving the problems - consumerism, fast fashion, social media - but ultimately the solution that I find has the best design integrity is circularity.”

Allbirds: It’s interesting that you began by talking about takeback schemes and looking at responsibility for a product’s end-of-life…

McLaughlin: “I just don’t believe that brands should be like, ‘We made all this stuff, you buy it and then it’s your problem.’ I don’t think that’s the way we’ll do it in future. I mean, that’s what we have been doing, as an industry, and look where we are. More accountability would change things. Thrifting and donating is awesome but people don’t realise how much stuff is sitting in warehouses and on palettes, or getting burned. I think new technologies and new materials are part of [the solution], but what are we going to do with all the stuff we already have? We need to change the way we think about trash.”

Allbirds: Where do think the big opportunities lie for shaping a different kind of fashion industry? What gives you hope and why?

McLaughlin: “I am super hopeful when I do my workshops. Honestly, the most inspiring thing is to see people come up with solutions and make them happen. You could sit in a board room and chat all day about 2025 and 2030, all the targets you want to reach, but to make something together, a physical, tangible thing, is to be like: this is possible!

“It’s been amazing to have some of these brand partnerships on the workshops too. So you’ve donated Allbirds stuff you don’t need as the base for a workshop. Or Adidas helped me host one in China, where we also had people bring in their own things, which was really good because thrifting culture in Asia is very different. There’s the language barrier, but design is a way to communicate without words.

“I’ve held workshops all over, some in the UK, and around the States. All kinds of people come from different backgrounds and skills levels, not just design students - teachers, hospital workers, it’s crazy! People can come with no experience and leave with something amazing. They’ll bring their own items from home that they don’t know what do with anymore, and we find ways to rework them. It’s a very intimate process, of going around learning about each person and what they’ve brought, and creating a project around that. The most inspiring is when they start to work together and give each other advice. I miss the pre-COVID physical events.”

Allbirds: What have 2020’s disruptions highlighted for you as a business?

McLaughlin: “I’m going to go back to that word: resourceful. I really had to use what I had. Some of my old projects I took apart and remade. I literally used kitchen items from my house. It was like going back to my early days of designing. You run out of white thread, you have to get around it.

“I also think this year has pushed me more on connection and communication, to bring people along. Even just taking the workshops digital. You don’t have to be a designer or be able to sew to make better decisions about what do with the trash that you have.”

Through Waves of Change, Nicole McLaughlin is supporting Sunrise Movement to fight the climate crisis, and The Okra Project, a collective that brings culturally specific meals and resources to Black Trans People.

[expatimes]

Lebanon’s year of fire

Beirut, Lebanon – From his home nestled in the lush mountains above Beirut, Salim Abou Moujahed watched flames eat up foliage on an opposing hillside.

The 32-year-old had been intrigued by fire since his childhood days spent outdoors in the rugged wilderness of Aley. Tonight, however, the fire was infernal, quick-moving, unpredictable. Soon enough, bone-dry shrubbery a few dozen metres from where he sat began to crackle.

He quickly got up and rushed towards the blaze, armed with basic fire-fighting equipment on hand in his village, Btater.

Once Abou Moujahed was there, the scale of the fire became clear. He sent four frantic voice messages to friends on a local WhatsApp group.

“Whoever has a cistern come now!”

“The neighborhood is on fire!”

It was October 14, 2019, and Aley, just like the neighbouring Chouf mountains and much of Lebanon, was engulfed in what would become the country’s worst wildfires in decades.

Across the mountains that rise steeply out of the Mediterranean, hundreds fled their homes under a night sky that burned an atomic orange. Embers carried by powerful dry winds sprouted fires across vast distances. Flame fronts tens of metres high thundered over hills and leaped across valleys.

“The scenes here bring tears to my eyes,” a news reporter cried, as red-hot coals whizzed through the air around her.

“I really can’t control myself, people are screaming from their homes … There is no one to help them.”

Those on Abou Moujahed’s WhatsApp group were busy responding to fires of their own. They knew no one else would: the Lebanese state had in the past shown it had neither the strategy nor the equipment to help them.

Salim, 32, was left on his own.

He returned home later that night covered in soot and visibly exhausted. Then, the father of two collapsed. His family rushed him to a hospital.

Just before 2am, he was pronounced dead of a heart attack, apparently caused by overexertion and smoke inhalation.

“Regrettably, this state doesn’t have the capacity to help us, it only has the capacity to steal and plunder and take from us,” said Salim’s brother, Wissam.

Soldiers attempt to clear a road during nationwide protests in Lebanon [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

Lebanon’s rickety state, hollowed out by sectarian politicians who never relinquished the militia mindset that first brought them to power during a 15-year civil war, had once again failed the people.

Three fire-fighting helicopters donated to the state had been left to fall into disrepair by successive governments that failed to fund maintenance.

The fires were left to gobble up green plains and mountains, the pride of Lebanon immortalised in the country’s national anthem as “the birthplace of men”.

Officials could offer little more than the promise of an investigation into the helicopter matter, ordered by President Michel Aoun.

Then, they pleaded for help from the international community – the habit of a group of men whose grip on power has been sustained by decades of foreign intervention.

People were left to fend for themselves. They banded together as the world burned around them, organising temporary shelter, food, water and medication for those affected by the fires.

When a government minister came to visit the biggest volunteer centre in Chouf, he was unceremoniously kicked out. 

“He came to a place where we were working to do what his state had failed to do, so we let him know he’s not welcome,” said Nada Nassif, a 32-year-old Chouf resident who helped organise the distribution of aid at the centre. “We were furious.”

The fires in three days scorched more than what usually perishes in an entire year in Lebanon. A molten mix of anger and grief swept across the country.

It was only the beginning. Over the coming year, it seemed that everything would catch fire, collapse or run amok as if decades of corruption, neglect, stopgap measures and unenlightened leadership finally caused the country to cave into its rotten core.

The currency imploded. Beirut’s port erupted like a dormant volcano. Whole city blocks were cracked open and regularly burst into flames as gas canisters exploded along with diesel storage tanks and electricity generators.

Lives were cut short and others were forever disfigured; friends were lost to death or departure and every day a novel trauma inflamed wounds that had just been sustained, never giving them time to heal.

But first – there was hope.

Barrier of fear is torn down

The country was still smouldering when the cabinet met the morning of October 16 to endorse a set of budget cuts and taxes, part of what Prime Minister Saad Hariri described as “unprecedented” austerity that his coalition government was imposing to prevent total collapse.

The next day, it surfaced that the cabinet endorsed a tax of up to $6 per month on WhatsApp, widely used as an alternative to Lebanon’s state-run mobile duopoly that has fees that run among the highest in the world.

It was an insult to people who had just seen their country burn. “I mean, how shameless can you be?” Nassif said.

In response to the fires, Li Haqqi (For My Rights), an independent political group that Nassif volunteers with, had planned a protest the coming Monday. But news of the taxes drove them to call it immediately, at 6pm on the 17th.

Three days volunteering in the Chouf left Nassif tired. The fatigue of five years of activism, since 2015 demonstrations sparked by a waste management crisis, left her weary of protest.

“We would pretty much just go to the streets to see friends, and then go back home,” she said. But she decided to head down anyway.

A woman joins protesters in occupying a highway north of Beirut [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

As the sun set, a few dozen people gathered in Beirut’s central Riad al-Solh Square, near parliament and the Grand Serail, the seat of government.

They marched in a loop to the Ring Bridge, a flyover that connects eastern and western Beirut, and on to Hamra Street, a formerly bustling commercial district.

The numbers slowly grew. They passed through the glitzy downtown Beirut district and spotted a convoy of cars with tinted windows: the unmistakable sign of an official (Education Minister Akram Chehayeb).

Dozens prevented the car from moving. Suddenly, the front door burst open and shots rang out. A squat man with an assault rifle fired into the air and pushed protesters aside, ordering them to make way.

An incredulous shout: “What are you shooting at?”

A protester beat his chest and screamed. “Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!”

Chehayeb exited the car and pushed the bodyguard back. Another climbed onto its roof and brandished his weapon.

More joined in: “Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!”

Shots rang out.

A protester climbed onto the car and tore off his shirt, daring the armed man in front of him: “Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!

In the background, an armed bodyguard stumbled between protesters, then was kicked squarely in the groin by a woman, Malak Alawiye. The image instantly became a symbol of defiance – of a barrier of fear torn down.

The earth quaked. Reality jumped tracks. People stormed into the streets. From Tripoli in the north to Tyre in the south, Baalbeck in the east and all across the Bekaa and Beirut and its suburbs: “The people demand the downfall of the regime!”

It was the greatest show of unity Lebanon had ever seen. “Everything is ours,” read graffiti spray-painted onto a wall in Beirut.

A roadblock by protesters in downtown Beirut [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

At Martyrs’ Square, a towering bonfire roared at a main intersection in front of the iconic blue Mohammad al-Amin Mosque and St George Maronite Christian cathedral, in an angry rebuke of the picture-perfect image of coexistence that the country’s sectarian leaders proclaimed themselves the keepers of.

The air filled with profanity-laced slogans that tore apart the gilded images of politicians accustomed to royal treatment.

Protesters rose up in peripheral areas regularly described as “strongholds” of sectarian parties; they smashed the offices of Hezbollah MPs in southern Nabatieh, and attacked the homes of politicians belonging to major parties in Tripoli.

“Look at how the country has spit you out, there is no place for you anymore,” Lebanese rapper El Rass said to politicians in his song Shouf or “Look.”

“My people have destroyed their idols, now nothing is impossible.”

An ‘open-mic revolution’

Around 11pm, Telecommunications Minister Mohammad Choucair announced he would cancel the WhatsApp tax.

A reporter asked a young protester what he thought.

“F*** him.”

“Why?” the reporter asked.

“Because he f***** us over,” the man spat.

“Is this the kind of language that you think will get your message across?” she asked.

“I’m not trying to send him a message – F*** his sister.”

In a brazen manner, protesters took over the soundscape. One chant – which rhymes “Helo Ho” and a crude reference to the foreign minister’s mother’s genitals – was everywhere by the second night, sung by thousands in Beirut.

It spread across the country like wildfire. People went to bed hearing it in their heads. Memes featured it, T-shirts were imprinted with it, no TV interview on the street could take place without it being heard in the background.

It was, as Lebanese investigative journalist Habib Battah put it, an “open-mic revolution” where all officials were wiped off the screens and replaced by the round-the-clock live feed of people speaking from the streets – angry, fed up, cursing.

They voiced grievances about perennial power cuts and poverty, about corruption and being forced to emigrate and the sectarian political system that enabled all of the dysfunction.

A man leads a chant under Beirut’s Ring Bridge [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

Over the next few days, well over one million Lebanese – some 20 percent of the population – filled the streets.

So did thousands in the diaspora from Los Angeles to Sydney, London to Madrid, Mexico City and Paris, suddenly drawn back towards a country that had pushed them away.

Protest encampments sprung up. Everything was cared for by an army of volunteers and piles of incoming donations, from food and water to shelter and speakers.

Kitchens were set up, as were medical tents and play areas for children.

Groups of musicians and actors toured streets putting on shows – “We want to dance, we want to sing, we want to bring down the regime,” they chanted. Football and frisbee were played in Riad al-Solh and on the Ring Road; debates and discussions reverberated through reclaimed buildings along with lectures and movie screenings, group therapy sessions, performances and several raves.

Far from just demanding a country that closer fit their aspirations, protesters were creating it on the ground, and soon began to build alternative institutions, such as independent unions.

Tarek Chehab, the 34-year-old owner of a 3D decorations company, decided he too had to contribute.

“‘I said, ‘let’s do something big.’ It was as spontaneous as that,” he says.

At his factory, he asked an employee to look for revolutionary images, and picked a raised, clenched fist: a universal symbol of defiance and solidarity.

The nine-metre icon was cut out, imprinted with the word “Revolution” and raised in Martyrs’ Square. Many other areas then followed suit.

As the protests grew, attacks began – verbal at first – by establishment parties who accused them of being funded by foreign embassies.

Protesters warm themselves by a fire on the main Beirut Ring Bridge [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

People took it in stride, were brilliant in their rebuttals: “Who is funding the revolution?” someone would shout out. “Me!” everyone replied gleefully.

Waving a small bottle of tequila at a protest encampment on the Ring Bridge, one man teased: “Look what the Mexican embassy got for me.”

Protesting became second nature. People fell in love with the simple power of the streets, and many who passed through that time talk of an unspeakable attraction to those around them as social bounds let loose.

Born into a country of pockmarked buildings, members of a generation finally got to know each other without the weight of history on their shoulders.

“Don’t you dare try to convince us that you are protecting our religions,” a young female student who skipped school to protest said, in a widely shared TV clip.

“You could convince our grandparents of that, you could use that to convince our parents, but us? No. I don’t want Christian rights, nor Muslim rights, as long as I don’t have the right to food and water and electricity,” she said, her voice hoarse from chanting.

So momentous was the occasion that many felt the gains made could not be lost.

From Shouf, the song by El Rass: “Look how far we’ve come, Look how far we’ve come, look at what we built and look at what we’ve destroyed. They united us in our suffering, so we became a people and won.”

Weakest link breaks

Those first days and weeks existed in a space seemingly outside of time – as if the country had ground to a halt.

“Road closed for maintenance of the nation,” one sign on a Beirut thoroughfare read.

But in the space of a few days, reality came crashing back in.

It began with October 29: a day of two pivotal events. Around noon, hundreds of supporters of Hezbollah – an armed militia and leading political force – and its main ally Amal amassed on the Ring Bridge.

They had come to open the road. The men charged peaceful protesters, sparing no one in a rampage that swept first across the bridge, and then into the protest encampment nestled in Martyrs’ Square.

Some moved as if in formation, shouting slogans that praised their leaders, along with the sectarian chant, “Shia, Shia Shia.”

The words poisoned the soundscape of the reclaimed downtown area; a vulgar expression of primitive identity that protesters believed they had rendered irrelevant.

The men shredded tents, smashed large pots and pans and cracked open Tupperware containers filled with food – multicolored pasta salad. They emptied water bottles and bashed speakers and stage equipment.

Then, they set fire to what remained.

“This is the real revolution,” said one of the men to another as they stood on the sidelines, smirking.

The sun rises on the protest camp [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

As the world spun around him, one member of the riot police splashed the contents of a mostly empty bottle of water onto a flaming tent, in a futile attempt to put it out.

Security forces on site, initially outnumbered, pushed the men back from downtown, across the Ring Bridge and into the poverty-stricken Khandak al-Ghamik neighbourhood, where Amal has control.

A line had been drawn; protesters now knew where their revolution ceased and the old guard began, and the area would become the front line of many clashes over the next year.

Just a few hours later, the prime minister announced his resignation.

“I won’t hide from you that I have reached a dead end, and it’s time to create a big shock to fight this crisis. I am going to Baabda Palace to hand in the government’s resignation to President Michel Aoun and to the Lebanese people in all areas, in response to the will of many Lebanese who went down to the squares to ask for change,” Saad Hariri said in televised remarks.

Celebrations took place across the country’s poles of protest, though they were muted by the day’s events in Beirut.

The departure of Hariri’s government meant the weakest link had broken. Now, those on the streets had the daunting task of facing off against an entire political system, guarded by former militia leaders. And they would have to do so as the financial system came crashing down.

A Ponzi scheme

Banks reopened on November 1, following two weeks of closure during the protests.

Informal capital controls had been installed. In Lebanon’s highly dollarised economy, people were first allowed to withdraw several thousand United States dollars per month, but that limit quickly dropped to just a few hundred.

Their money was trapped in an insolvent banking system.

Lebanon’s financial crisis had its roots in years of mismanagement and top-level corruption by the ruling elite.

The country produced little, consumed a lot, and was sustained by an outsized banking sector that sucked funds in from abroad with the enticement of sky-high interest rates.

“The only way you can pay, say, 15 percent interest is if your economy is growing at an even higher rate than that,” said Dan Azzi, an expert on the Lebanese financial system and former CEO of Standard Chartered Bank Lebanon.

“But growth here was negative or flat. That’s a clear example of a Ponzi scheme.”

Protester Miriam Fares shows an image of her with her late husband at protests in 2015 [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

The crash had already begun in the summer as the Lebanese pound slid against the dollar, to which it had been pegged at 1,500 to $1 since 1997.

Amid growing signs the system would collapse, the well-connected transferred billions out, further destabilising the fragile economy.

The Banque du Liban, the central bank, later said it was investigating the transfers.

The currency dropped. First, by 25 to 50 Lebanese lira per day, hitting 2,000 lira to $1 in late November.

People who had formerly used local currency and dollars interchangeably were forced to wait in long lines at banks to withdraw dwindling rations of their own money, then exchange it via illegal black market trades resembling a drug deal.

Protesters targeted banks with increasing frequency – first with civil disobedience and graffiti, then with stones and petrol bombs.

The largely peaceful, hopeful and constructive character of the uprising had its last hurrah on Independence Day, November 22, when dozens of pro-protest civilian battalions took the place of the drab, invite-only military parade.

It was electric. Wave after wave of people marching amid their compatriots in a massive showing of support from all across society: doctors, pilots, teachers, students, fathers, mothers, lawyers, pharmacists, farmers, musicians, the unemployed and even a diaspora brigade, rolling their suitcases, singing “Toot toot too, we’re coming back to Beirut.”

It was also a day of defiance: The “Revolution Fist” icon that had been set up in Martyrs’ Square was set alight by unidentified men on mopeds in the morning. Videos quickly spread online.

Chehab was awoken to the news that his creation had been torched.

“We decided to start cutting a bigger one – the first one was nine metres, the second was was 11.5,” he said.

Later that day, the icon was hoisted back up to ecstatic cheers from a sea of people.

“We made history that day,” Chehab said. “It was so emotional for people here and even more for the expats: This is the dream you’re trying to burn and we were able to bring that dream back again on the same day.”

‘I’m not a blasphemer’

Lebanon entered its wettest winter in 16 years. Protesters donned ponchos and jackets, erected tarpaulins and fortified their encampments.

But the downpours made staying out and demonstrating difficult. In tandem, arrests, lawsuits and the state’s crackdown increased, as did attacks by party loyalists across the country.

The political establishment wasn’t budging. It backed little-known academic Hassan Diab as prime minister, and protesters who previously blockaded two parliament sessions were unable to prevent Diab’s confirmation in February.

Lebanon recorded its first coronavirus case later that month, the country was locked down by mid-March, and security forces swiftly tore down the main remaining protest encampments in Beirut and Tripoli.

It was a winter of stagnation and repression.

A woman teases a member of the security forces [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

Ironically, the population’s lack of faith in politicians may have helped avoid an initial breakout of COVID-19, according to Firas Abiad, the head of the country’s lead COVID-19 treatment facility, Rafik Hariri University Hospital.

“People got scared and part of that fear was that politicians wouldn’t handle it well,” he said.

“At the same time, I’m sure that in those conditions the state was not very unhappy to initiative a lockdown. It was a good pretext to entirely remove people from the streets, and we saw that they did.”

In a dramatic shift, those who had taken their lives into their own hands and practically lived on the streets were now relegated to their homes and bound by government directives.

But the state provided little aid, even to those most in need. While many had tired of the streets, scattered protests quickly returned – this time demanding the simple right to exist.

“We want to eat, we want to live,” protesters in Aley chanted as they marched through deserted streets in April.

The uprising went through a marked shift from aspirational to being focused on basic needs.

No longer were protests coloured by banners, quippy slogans and creative chants. Instead of signboards and Lebanese flags, people held rocks and Molotov cocktails.

Lines of peacemakers had initially kept apart angry protesters and security forces, shouting these were “our brothers”. There were few such peacemakers by spring.

Tired and desperate people pushed against exhausted security forces, and hundreds of injuries were regularly recorded in a single protest by April.

Diab talked the talk – often in stinging speeches where he railed against an unnamed “they”. (The rhetoric seemed almost eerily in tune with what people were saying online).

But he couldn’t walk the walk. Diab was “basically politically inept, and though he was a good guy he was in way above his head”, a government source later said.

The political establishment that named most of the ministers in Diab’s government sabotaged what attempts were made to rescue and reform, such as official controls on money transfers, freeing the judiciary of political intervention and even providing aid to the population. Life got worse.

A protester parades a trophy that he removed from a bank in downtown Beirut [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

The currency hit 3,000 lira to $1 by the end of April, shot down to 4,000 by the end of May, and crashed to 8,000 by the end of June. Two days later it hit 9,000.

The minimum wage of 675 thousand pounds, formerly equal to $450, was now worth $80.

Some of those providing aid started to fear becoming impoverished themselves.

Mahmoud Kataya, a 40-year-old anti-corruption activist and financial manager, had helped organise support for dozens of families with food aid at the beginning of the year, along with protest activists.

“We can’t really help anymore today, after what happened with the currency and with our money stuck in the banks,” he said.

“We were a large group and everyone would do a bit – but we’re basically cannibalising ourselves. Soon, I’ll need help.”

With less to go around, crime began to spike. According to numbers from the Internal Security Forces, robberies jumped nearly 50 percent between January and August when compared with the same period the year before, from 1,080 to 1,602.

Double as many cars were stolen: 593 versus 266.

Murders also doubled, from 63 to 129.

On the morning of July 3, Ali al-Haq walked to the Dunkin’ Donuts on Beirut’s Hamra street and placed a copy of his criminal record – clean – on a potted plant.

The 61-year-old had written “I am not a blasphemer” in jagged, red Arabic letters underneath the document, and covered it with a Lebanese flag.

Then, he shot himself in the head.

His words were an apparent reference to a song by famed Lebanese musician and composer Ziad Rahbani, whose lyrics about the harshness of life in civil-war-era Lebanon have never lost their relevance.

“I’m not a blasphemer; hunger is,” the lyrics go. “I’m not a blasphemer; this country is.”

More suicides tied to the crisis would follow. The country’s fall was now unabated and people were losing their grip. Diab was rudderless. Basic symbols of normality like traffic lights stopped working.

Then the earth quaked for the second time that year.

Volunteers clear rubble after the Beirut blast [Timour Azhari/Al Jazeera]

A tidal wave explosion

First came the sound, then the ground rumbled. Instinctively, people across the city lifted their heads to the sky – it must be an Israeli air raid, they thought.

Some spotted a large plume of smoke near the sea. Customers at a shop pressed up against a window to get a better look.

A car on a main highway in front of Beirut’s port slowed so the driver could stare at the towering inferno that fizzed and popped like a fission reaction.

Suddenly, an incandescent, airborne tsunami was unleashed and all the glass in the city was airborne.

The tidal wave burst through brick and mortar buildings and twisted metal fixtures into steel wool and flung people through their homes, out of vehicles, out of this world.

Beirut’s mangled skyscrapers were blanketed in a lifeless yellow-gray mist that gave the city the appearance of a single, contiguous mound of dust and rubble. It looked like the dystopian world of 2008 cartoon Wall-E – all signs of life extinguished, leaving only towering piles of garbage.

At the port, containers were crushed like Pringles cans, cars strewn like toys and the large grain silos eviscerated so that their contents spilled into the sea like a massive sandbox.

One of the country’s greatest symbols of corruption – known locally as “The Cave of Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves” for the decades of state-sponsored theft that took place there – had exploded.

It was caused by almost 3,000 tonnes of highly explosive material. It was left there for nearly seven years. It was neglected and officials and judges and security forces knew and nobody did anything.

“My government did this.”

The haunting words were spray-painted on the side of a highway in front of the port.

In the background, the gutted silos loomed like a great tombstone for all those who perished. Nearly 200 would be dead in the end.

In the moments after, there was little news from the area struck. The hyperconnectivity of modern life paused. People could only tend to themselves and the wounded, numbering more than 6,000.

The worst of the state and the best of the people was immediately on display again.

Medical workers and students and an army of volunteers and civil defense did all they could to rescue the wounded, then to begin clearing the rubble and rebuilding.

Security forces patrolled the area but did little to help. No top official visited the victims, but instantly dubbed them “martyrs”.

No one knew for what cause they had died.

In the days that followed, a new macabre symbol gained prominence among the population: The noose.

It was hung from bridges across the country, graffitied on buildings and carried by volunteers.

At a large protest four days after the blast, cardboard effigies of the country’s leaders were hung in Martyrs’ Square. People wanted accountability, but mostly revenge.

Security forces rained down a hail of rubber bullets, tear gas, metal pellets, sticks and fists on an already-wounded people, injuring hundreds.

“We’ve lost everything,” a man repeatedly screamed at soldiers in a hoarse voice that night, in disbelief over the crackdown.

“It’s a miracle that no one was killed,” said George Ghanem, the head of cardiology at the Lebanese American University Medical Center, which received a flood of injured protesters even as medical personnel there continued to treat blast victims.

Facing ministerial resignations, Diab announced his departure. “I said previously that the regime of corruption is deeply rooted in all parts of the state, but I discovered that the regime of corruption is bigger than that state, and that the state is ensnared by this regime and cannot confront it or rid itself of it,” he said.

An investigation into the blast, first spearheaded by military authorities under the administration of a political committee, was transferred to an opaque judicial council.

No top official has been arrested. Few believe the probe will lead to justice for the victims.

A long process

Indeed, one year after the October protests began, there is little to suggest the country’s leaders are more accountable.

A presidential source said the investigation ordered by the president into broken fire-fighting helicopters had found unpaid maintenance contracts to be the issue – something that was already common knowledge.

No one was held responsible. Instead of fixing the helicopters, the source said the government had decided to sell them off.

The billions of dollars transferred abroad by the well-connected have not been returned, nor have the names of those involved been made public despite promises of a thorough investigation.

And despite repeated promises by officials to fight corruption, not a single case against a high-level official made significant progress in the country’s courts.

Meanwhile, since the day the protests began, some 1,400 protesters, activists and journalists have been arrested, interrogated or called in for interrogation by security forces, according to the ad-hoc Lawyers’ Committee to Defend Protesters.

Over the course of the accountability-driven protests, the Red Cross treated 5,339 people, of whom 1,394 were taken to hospital, it said. The total number of protesters injured is likely much higher.

Life in Lebanon has now merged into a seemingly endless series of intertwined sorrows.

During a burial for one of the blast victims, some men fired weapons in the air.

On the other side of town, a bullet hit prominent Lebanese football player Mohammed Atwi in the head. He died a month later.

Three men were shot dead in a northern town.

Streets south of Beirut turned into a war zone amid a firefight sparked by the placement of a religious banner; a 14-year-old died, as did another man.

There was more gunfire at the funeral.

The port ignited again, sending people sprinting away and cowering under furniture and fleeing the city.

An iconic building caught fire. A bakery exploded. A restaurant exploded. Black smoke seemed to rise incessantly from the city.

At Chehab’s 3D design factory, two employees – Ibrahim El-Qaffas and Roshdi al-Gamal – were killed in the blast. Another has left the country.

Two more who were with El-Qaffas and al-Gamal at the time of the explosion are so traumatised that they are unable to work, Chehab said.

“Ibrahim died in the hands of one of them.”

The remaining employees are now making the equivalent of just a few hundred dollars per month, and his company is struggling.

“We work with malls, window displays, exhibitions, weddings and events. There is nothing left of that,” he says.

They now primarily make wooden frames and structures destined for the broken homes and businesses of blast victims.

Despite the country’s spiralling demise, Nassif, and many others, try to maintain their push for change.

In the ruined centre of the city three weeks after the explosion, she was on stage to launch an opposition front of dozens of independent political groups looking to confront the establishment.

She says the blast has catalysed their work, and sees hope in continuing to fill the voids of the state, building alternative institutions and cleaning up the mess of others.

From the fires to protests and through the blast, people like her made oft-unspoken, collective decisions to work hard in the public interest, and for transient moments conjured the outlines of the community they want to live in.

“It’s not going to happen in one year. Change builds over time, its a long process and needs patience,” she says, as if repeating a mantra that she wished she didn’t know was true.

“Hopefully we can stay in this country and take it from them.”

#world Read full article: https://expatimes.com/?p=12060&feed_id=10346

[jiminwreckedme]

That One Night.

Chapter 1/5

Genre - Thriller, Angst. 

Warnings - The series has some slightly dark ideas. I cannot say more than that. 

Members - All members.  

Word count - 5549-ish

Summary - Sixth sense. We all have a sixth sense that warns us before something bad happens. Like a raspy voice in our head that tells us, ‘You. You are in danger’. Your sixth sense has been trying to tell you something strangely similar since the evening. Something that sounded like tonight is very dangerous for you, dangerous enough to get you killed. But you didn’t listen to it. And now…. 

Now there are people in your house. You don’t know who is good and who is bad, but you know one thing for sure - One of them is here to kill you. 

[A/N] - I wanted to something for the Halloween month haha but I’m someone who cannot handle horror so I thought of working on a thriller instead. It’s a super small series though, and I’ll be posting one chapter a week to finish it by end of October :) Do let me know your theories, ideas, etc!

It wasn’t the sound of rain that woke you up. Neither was it the thunders. Nor was it the screech of tyres somewhere far down the road. It was only when the wind slammed the windows shut that you woke up with a start. You sit up in the blink of an eye, chest heaving with suddenness of the act, a small scream drowning in the back of your throat. Taking a breath you run your hands through your hair to calm yourself down as the wall clock lets out a long ding and your eyes fall on the time. 

7.

“Oh fuck.” A short whisper leaves you like a whimper as you finally notice the darkness outside. It’s too dark. Way too dark. You weren’t supposed to be asleep now. “Why the fuck didn’t my alarm ring?” 

You quickly look around for your phone finding it on the bedside table and fumble with it. It shows an alarm at 5. But its switched off.

“What?” You frown at the screen confused. “But I remember putting an alarm and I made sure -”

CRACK! The thunder slaps its way into your words, making you shiver, fear coursing its way through your body. 

“What’s going on? Why was I so careless?” You push the sheets off and swing your legs off the bed, sitting down. Before you is the mirror, you reflection staring back at you with a strange uneasy intensity. Tonight doesn’t feel good. Something about tonight doesn’t feel good. You try to push your thoughts back as you messily pull your hair into a bun, the strands falling apart, and walk out of your bedroom and down the stairs. 

In the kitchen is the familiar yet not so familiar sight of a tall, lean, brown haired man, his back to you, whipping up something on the counter. Considering how long he has been living with you, you should have been used to his presence by now, but somehow it always seems to take you aback. But then again, you get frightened by everything. You hurriedly walk down the stairs, making your way to the kitchen, raising your voice a little. 

“Taehyung? Taehyung! You knew I had appointment at 7:30 with Dr. Kim right? Why didn’t you wake me up?”

He turns, very slightly, allowing you only to see the profile of his face. “Didn’t you tell me Y/n that you were putting alarm and going to sleep. Then why would I wake you up?”

“Oh great!” You throw your hands in the air exasperated, walking to him. “You knew I was supposed to be leaving by now Taehyung.” You hold out your phone to show him the time. “You could have woken me up when you realized I overslept, it was supposed to be an afternoon power nap.”

He looks at your phone, then at you, then rolls his eyes and gets back to chopping whatever he was making with that big butcher knife of his. Normally you would have called him off for being so inconsiderate. But now you had other things to worry about. Much more important things. “My medicines are over, I lost the prescription, my head feels like its splitting into two, what am I supposed to do? I cannot - ”

“Listen.” He wipes his hands on the kitchen towel, scooping something into a bowl. “I’m making chicken Phad thai today okay, It’ll be ready in about half an hour? You should freshen up and come for dinner.”

You look at all he has laid out on the counter - the veggies, the meat, the sauces and then look back at him bewildered. 

“Are you nuts Taehyung?” He gives a strange smile. “I’m talking about something important here and you’re just blabbering away? First of all you don’t wake me up and now -”

He slams his hand on the counter, stunning you. “But that’s the thing about waking up Y/n. Another cannot awaken you sweetheart,” He leans in, close to you. “you need to awaken yourself.”

You blink at him rapidly a few times and then slap your forehead. “I really don’t know why I waste my time talking to you.” 

Taehyung laughs as you walk ahead pouring water into a glass and slowly gulp it down, discretely watching your house mate. Sometimes you wonder what in the world went through your head when you agreed to let him live with you. Rather, when you asked him to. Maybe it was pity. Maybe it was guilt. But whatever it was, you were really starting to question it now. 

Taehyung was a….was an eccentric man. He had strange habits. Sometimes he would joke and laugh normally with you, sometimes he would zone out and utter completely weird things. Most days he was always around, doing something or the other right under your nose - watching tv, making dinner, cleaning your unnecessarily large 2 storey house. But sometimes he would leave the house for days together, he wouldn’t pick your calls, he wouldn’t tell you where he went or what he did. He would simply smile and shrug - ‘just had some work.’ And you didn’t know how to press things further and get information out of him. You were too gentle that way. And its so unlike you considering what your career choice was a couple of months ago. 

Anyways, Taehyung’s presence in the house didn’t bother you much most of the time. The relationship between you two was symbiotic. You gave him shelter, he gave you the human company you were devoid of. Sometimes it felt as though without his presence, you would have actually gone insane. 

You drain the last of your water, rinse the glass and place it on the counter. The ticking of the clock is the only sound that is echoing in the silence. 

“Well it’s only 7:15. There’s still time left. Even if I get late, maybe if I request him he’ll see me?” You wonder aloud, calculating the possibility in your head. 

You quickly make up your mind and grab an umbrella from the stand near by and proceed to the coat stand to slip on your coat. You are so lost in your own head that you do not hear Taehyung walk up and stand behind you till he speaks.

“You are not going anywhere.”

You turn around slightly jumping at then let out a short scream. There’s a knife hardly 5 inches away from your throat and its in Taehyung’s hands. 

“Wh…What’s wrong with you Taehyung?” You are breathing heavily. His eyes look blank, emotionless, cold and distant. But then his demeanor changes in the blink of an eye and he puts down the knife looking genuinely concerned. 

“There’s such a heavy rain outside Y/n. Everyone is trying to come back home as soon as possible and there’s you, trying to leave the place?”

You let out a sigh as you notice the cloth in his other hand which he is using to wipe the knife. Why do you keep overthinking everything? “The rain isn’t even so heavy Taehyung. I’m sure me going a mile away from home is not a big deal.”

“Really?” He scoffs, crossing his arms. “That’s what you think? Come see the news.”

You look at him uncertainly till he takes your hand and walks you towards the tv, urging you to switch it on. Hesitatingly you turn on the news channel, the weather forecast coincidentally being the first thing shown. 

“The information from the weather bureau has arrived just a while ago, and we request all residents to take note. The rainfall so far has already been 15 mm and there are possibilities of heavier rains. There is also a report that mentions that the situation today seems to be the same as the flood incidents that happened 6 months ago.” 

You swallow on nothing at a memory, heart pounding away in your chest. You are so engrossed you don’t see Taehyung looking at you keenly rather than listening to the news. 

“Police advises all residents to stay indoors. All flights to and from the city have been cancelled-” 

You resignedly switch off the tv, pinching the bridge of your nose. “Oh god there’s been so much going on in the city and I didn’t even know about it?”

“That’s exactly your problem Y/n.” Taehyung walks to you standing impossibly close. You want to listen to what his saying but your mind has still not gone beyond the fact that there’s a knife in his hand. “You don’t let anything beyond these 4 walls reach you and when they don’t, you ask why they haven’t reached me?”

You step back worried and walk towards the window, looking out. “I just hope this rain finds its end soon. How am I supposed to stay without my medicines?”

“In pain.” 

“What?” You turn around to see Taehyung walking away towards the kitchen. You follow him, getting madder by the minute. “Are you insane? What do you mean in pain?”

“Not every pain has a medicine Y/n.” Taehyung slides the knife slowly against the chicken breast he’s laid out on the cutting board. He looks up to meet your eye. “Some pains just have to be beared.” 

You shiver at his words, not able to find the sense behind them, as you take steps back towards the stairs. “I don’t know what the hell you blabber all the time Taehyung. I’m going up to my room, call me when dinner is ready.”

And you turn and run up, away from him, away from the rain, away from the small smirk that’s dancing on his face.

You stand in a barely lit room, right across the painting and the hundreds of colors splattered before you. Taking the sponge you dip it into the blood red color, watching it slowly soak up the color till it cannot anymore and it begins to stain your hands, making you look like a perfect criminal. 

Perfect criminal. The thought itself makes you laugh out loud. You and a criminal? You could hardly hurt a fly. 

Pablo Picasso once said that art is that lie which makes us see the truth. And the truth is that there was once a time when crime and murders and deaths was the world you lived in. The world you ruled. Putting these violators behind the bars was your job as one of the biggest prosecutor in the city. And then something happened. Something which forced you to throw everything away and change what you thought was reality. What happened really is a story for another day. Today’s story is that you are painter in your mid thirties who has not sold even a single piece till now. Your art is a lie and it is your truth as well.

You wipe your hands with the wet cloth and turn around in the silence when the door flies open and all you can see is a silhouette. A silhouette which is walking closer and closer to you, threateningly slow, making your hair stand as you walk back, swallowing. It’s only when he enters deeper into the room and stands before the light that you see Taehyung’s face.

“Dinner is ready Y/n, come let’s eat.”

You let out a very audible breath, muscles finally relaxing and point towards the shower. “I’ll just quickly shower and come.” 

Taehyung pouts adorably, “You know I don’t like eating when food gets cold Y/n, how about you shower later?” 

You hesitate but give in looking at his sweet face. “Fine fine, I’ll wash my hands and come.”

Taehyung smiles cutely and walks away. You proceed to wash your hands in the basin but the whole time you do not look at the color of the water. At the color of blood. 

5 minutes later both you and Taehyung are sitting on the dinning table across each other. You eating your mango salad going through your phone, Taehyung reading a newspaper starting off with his main course. 

“Eat the noodles Y/n, tastes super good today.” He doesn’t even look up as he speaks to you.

“I like having my salad first.” You answer annoyed. Somehow you find yourself listening to Taehyung all the time. You seem to do everything he says. He said don’t go out, you didn’t. He said don’t shower, come eat, and here you are. Again, being too gentle. That was the problem. You need to learn how to say no. 

“The city witnesses another heart breaking incident.” You look up as Taehyung reads off the paper. “A young boy found half dead, badly beaten till he succumbed from the injuries in the city hospital 4 hours later.” You can feel the panic rising in you, a fear, a very dark fear from memories you didn’t want. Taehyung looks at you. He sees you are uncomfortable and breathing hard and the sweat making its way down your forehead. But he does not stop. “The fatal injuries seem to have-”

“Enough Taehyung!” You slam the table, anger taking over you. “Is it necessary to talk about all this at the dining table.”

Taehyung looks perplexed. “What? It’s good to stay aware of these kind of things you know. And just because you don’t want to listen things won’t disappear.” 

“Yes but it doesn’t have to be done over dinner.”

“I don’t understand Y/n, why do you always look forward to running away from every problem? Death, murder, crime, these are realities of our harsh world. Running away from them is impossible Y/n. Closing your eyes and ears won’t change anything.”

“Yes. yes they won’t disappear. But I don’t find the need to think about it day and night like you. They say right, one person’s tragedy is another’s entertainment. This kind of news doesn’t entertain me Taehyung.”

Taehyung looks like you slapped him across the face. “Look at me Y/n. You know me. You know who I am. You know what I’ve been through. Do you think a person’s tragedy could ever possibly entertain me?”

You are instantly washed over by guilt for accusing him of something like that. “Taehyung, I’m so sorry….I didn’t-”

“Nevermind, it’s okay.” He turns back to his food putting his paper down. “If you really are apologetic then eat dinner, I took extra effort in making it today.” 

You smile back at him and take a bite. And another one. And another. Till suddenly it feels as though your throat has swollen up and is closing up on you. And then your lungs stop taking breaths and you aren’t able to see anything properly and everything is spinning. But somehow your vision tunnels onto the food piled on your plate, specifically onto the crushed peanuts.

“Y/n, what’s wrong? Y/n!” Taehyung’s voice is echoing in the background but your voice isn’t leaving you. Not even air is leaving you. You point at the peanuts in your plate and Taehyung’s lips part apologetically as his eyes widen. 

“Oh my god, your allergy! Y/n I’m so sorry I completely forgot!”  

You stand up, losing your balance, making your way to the room to get your injection. Epinephrine or something the doctor called it. As you stumble towards the room, Taehyung doesn’t even lend you a helping hand up the stairs. Instead he watches, again, with a small smile dancing on his face, as you fight for your life rushing up the stairs. 

On reaching your room, you slam the door open and empty the contents of your bedside drawer hurriedly. Your body is threatening to pass out any minute. You have no idea how you have been keeping it all together or how you are alive for so long. You aren’t someone who is that strong. On finding it you pull out your injection and slowly pierce your skin with it and letting the liquid flow into your blood, coursing through your body. It takes a whole 15 minutes for your breathing to come back to normal. And your heart is beating regularly again and there’s no more sweat making its way down your neck. You walk to washroom and splash water on your face, the chilling waters making you shiver even more. You sit on the edge of the bath tub slowly, calming yourself. Though your body seems to have come back to normal, your mind is still not at rest. What was Taehyung thinking when he….Where was he anyway?

You get up to go find him but then you hear something that makes you tracks freeze. Muffling sounds. Muffling sounds of a man. It’s definitely a man. And its the sounds of someone’s breath stopping. Or being forcefully stopped. 

And the fear that was beginning to ebb hits like a tide again. Legs shaking, eyes flickering between things, your breath has lost its rhythm again. You need to find Taehyung. At this point you cannot bear to be alone. You rush out of the room and your eyes fall on him as he stands by the window at the edge of the stairs, looking out at something you cannot see, talking on the phone. You want to approach him, but his words make you stop and listen.

“Yes I tried…..And it did have a little effect but….please, have patience, I shall do it.”

The thunder crackles again as he cuts the call and you swallow not knowing what else to do or what else to make out of the situation. Was everything done purposely? Taehyung spots you as he looks up and his face grows concerned again. 

“Y/n, you feeling better? You poor thing sweetheart, you didn’t eat anything. shall I make something else for you?”

You ignore his words and walk down the stairs till you are standing right before him.

“Who were you talking to?”

“Oh my aunt.” He doesn’t even hesitate before answering. “She’s a dietitian so she’s been trying to get me to drink this green juice everyday which apparently clears your skin. Now the effects of that are hardly going to show over night right? It’s a slow, delibrate process.” He smiles sweetly. But it isn’t going to stop you from askng more questions.

“You’ve never told me about your aunt before.”

“So? You haven’t told me about your family either Y/n. Why are you being so paranoid?”

“I’m not being paranoid!” The frustration leaves you like a loud voice before turning into a whisper. “Listen Taehyung, earlier, just a few minutes ago, did you hear those noises?”

“What noises?”

“Like some weird muffle sound? Like someone was struggling or being forced on? A really soft sound?”

“Oh come Y/n it must be the rats or something. Look at the rain outside, they might have entered the house. And before you even go there, please, there are no ghosts-”

“Of course there are no ghosts Tae, I’m not mad. But its definately not rats.” You take a deep breath before spilling your suspicion. “I think…I think there’s someone in the house.”

“You think too much Y/n.”

“And you don’t think at all Tae. It’s just the two of us in the house, so many miles away from the city and if someone tries to do something to us, no one can even come save us in this rain.”

“The doors are locked Y/n. No one can come here. And if there’s anything we need to save ourselves from, it’s your imagination.” His hands grip your shoulder softly. “Just relax Y/n.”

You push his hands away and try to justify yourself but then the sound doesn’t allow you to. The sound of the shattering of glass. You stumbling run towards the noise and look around till you see the broken window pane, the crack staining it like a spider web. You take worried steps back until you walk into Taehyung and jump at the contact of your skin against his cold skin.

“Tae look. Someone threw a stone at our window. There’s someone outside.”

“Y/n we are in the middle of a rain storm. and there are so many trees around. It could have been a big branch.”

You want to argue with what he’s saying but you cannot find a better explanation. It’s because Taehyung doesn’t understand your fear. He doesn’t know your secret. He never should and he never will. 

It takes nearly 20 minutes for the two of you to tape up the window using news papers. You step back and look at your work but before you even have the chance to see it properly, your ears catch the sound of something being scarped against the floor from above.

“Tae!” It’s a loud whisper. “Did you hear that?”

“What?”

“Don’t tell me you didn’t hear anything”

“No I didn’t Y/n, what are you on about?”

“Tae, you have to listen to me. There’s someone in the house.”

And then a shadow runs past the window, in the dark bushes. 

“Did you see that?! That…that….there was definately someone outside Tae, I’m telling you-”

“Not again Y/n-”

“Why don’t you understand Tae, someone is here.”

“No one is here. You probably just saw the trees swinging-”

ringggg

The doorbell. Someone is at the door. 

“At this hour?” You take a couple of steps back. “In such a heavy rain? Who could it be?”

“If we don’t open the door how will we find out Y/n?”

“No! No one is opening the door! What if someone comes and tries to do something-”

“Something like what Y/n?” Taehyung throws his hands in the air frustrated. he’s not getting your point. And he never will maybe. “Y/n, someone would have come this far in the rain only if they were in danger. I’m going and opening the door.”

He takes a few steps forwards but you are faster than him. You stand before the door, blocking his way. 

“No! Please Tae don’t open the door. I’m getting this really strange feeling that something very bad is going to happen tonight.”

“Are you mad Y/n?” Tae shakes you holding your arms by the side. “How will we know what is happening tonight unless we open the door.”

“You don’t understand Tae!” you take ragged breaths. “Do you know back in the days when I was practicing law I used to get this intution sort of thing when something is about to go wrong. I feel the same way now Tae I -”

“You are no practicing law now Y/n and this is not a courtroom.” He grips you firmly. “Are you going to open the door or should I do it?”

Whoever is here is here for you. You know it. You can feel it. You couldn’t let anything happen to Taehyung because of your troubles. 

“I’ll go. Just stand here.”

Taehyung rolls his eyes at your fear as he lets you go and points at the door when the ringing becomes more persistent.  

You walk up slowly and push down the handle. Taking a breath you slowly pull the door  back, peeking through the small gap. And then your eyes fall on your visitor.

“Hi Y/n….May I…May I come in?”

You quickly slam it shut and press your back against the closed door. 

“Who is it?” Tahehyung frowns at you. 

“Ji…Jimin.” You whisper, barely believing that he’s there and that you just saw him. After so many months, after so long. So long after he left you. After he didn’t stop that day when you called out to him, running behind. When he just sat in the cab and left and never saw you or even talked to you again. 

The expression on Taehyung’s face hardens. “Jimin?”

“Yes, but what is he doing here? In such a heavy rain?”

“How would I know?” Taehyung’s voice leaves him like a snarl. “If it were up to me, I wouldn’t want to see him for the next 7 lifetimes. But you….you don’t think like that, things are different for you.” Then suddenly he straightens out, eyes narrowing at you. “You didn’t call him here did you?”

“What rubbish of course not! Why would I call him? I haven’t spoke to him in months.”

“So are you going to let him in?”

“Should I?”

“It’s your wish Y/n. This is your house. But don’t tell me later that I didn’t warn you. There can be no one more dangerous than Park Jimin. And you know that right?”

It doesn’t take you even a second to become defensive. “Jimin is not dangerous. I know he’s careless and he lies but…but he’s no dangerous.” 

“Fine, your wish. But I’m definitely not going to stay here to welcome him.” And with that Taehyung leaves. Leaves you to face your past alone.

You open the door as Taheyung disappears from sight. Jimin is standing there drenched. The water droplets are hanging at the ends of his black hair, dropping on to his shirt which is sticking too too close to his body. He lets go the suitcase next to him as he smiles.

“Y/n.”

“Jimin.”

“Seeing me after so many months I would understand if you were shocked but slamming the door on face…that was unexpected.”

You play with your fingers uncomfortably. “I’m sorry…come in.”

“Are you sure?” He’s giving you time to think, but the hopeless you has already made up your mind. 

“Yeah.”

You shut the door behind him, and then walk him into your living room.

“I’m so sorry Jimin. Seeing you suddenly after so many months….that too in such a storm…I sort of wasn’t thinking straight.” You stop your tracks and face him. “But what are you doing here?”

“I’m sorry Y/n I had no other option.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning I was stuck Y/n and there was no better place than here nearby to hide.”

“Who….Who are trying to hide from? What have you done Jimin?” You take an uncertain step back, questioning yourself if letting him in was the right choice.

“What did I do?” He laughs, the beautiful laughter you missed. “I didn’t do anything Y/n. The rains did. It’s a fucking deluge out there. My flight to New york got cancelled and I got stuck on the way. My house is too far away from here, I cannot go to the airport, so this was the only option I had.”

You nod understanding, calming your racing thoughts which have gone way ahead of what the situation actually is. Jimin smiles trying to catch your eye.

“I see the lawyer instincts haven’t left you. You still haven’t stop suspecting everything.” 

You open your mouth to justify yourself but Jimin doesn’t want any explanation.

“That’s okay Y/n, I’m just kidding….but if you don’t mind can I get a towel to dry myself? I’m sort of freezing right now.”

“Yeah sure, come this way.” He follows you behind as you walk deeper in the house.

“By the way what are you going to New York for? I mean, as far as I know you aren’t the type to take holidays….unless of course in these few months you have changed.”

Jimin lets out a short laugh. “I haven’t changed. I’m going there for work. To fight the case of an absconded criminal. My first case overseas.”

“That’s amazing Jimin. I’m so proud of where your career is going.” And you are genuinely happy for him. You know how much the two of you struggled back in the days when you just started. if not yours atleast his efforts paid off well. 

“Thank you Y/n, but I haven’t done much yet. I still have so much left to do.” He smiles but you don’t understand if there’s something hidden behind those words.

You point out to the room you are taking him to as you walk ahead. “This is my guest room. I would have given you my spare bedroom but Taehyung stays there.”

Jimin stops walking. “Taehyung? The Taehyung of that case?”

You nod slowly, as Jimin turns worried. “What is he doing here Y/n?”

“Well he lives with me. I didn’t see him for a long time after that case. Then I met him by chance at the hospital one day when I fell sick and stopped practicing law. He was lonely and I was alone. So I asked him if needed a place to stay and he said he did so I brought him over….Misery befriends misery I guess.”

Jimin looks at you as you go on, lost in thought. “Sometimes I think it must be my guilt, or maybe its just humanity, I don’t know.”

“I just hope I wouldn’t have to encounter him alone.” Jimin looks genuinely worried at the thought. You shake your head and reassure him. “Don’t worry he doesn’t want to see you either.” 

You are about to go on walking when you hear those same sounds again. The sounds of struggle, and somehow now they are much louder.

“Jimin, did you hear that?”

“Hear what? No, I didn’t hear anything.”

You don’t know if the answer is making you more relaxed or more tensed. You simply reply with what you think you should say. 

“It must be rats, Tae and I were thinking about it earlier.”

Jimin laughs. “Rats and in your house? You are such a scaredy-cat that if rats were in the house, you would have run miles away.

You smile at that. At how different things are now. At how he was never there to see any of it. “Perhaps I’ve changed.” 

Walking ahead you open the door as Jimin walks behind you thoughtfully. As you flip the switches, the light falls  in the old barely furnished room.

“Come in.” 

Jimin walks in looking around. 

“Sorry I don’t get a lot of guests here, in fact you are the first so this place is quite unused.” You take a look at the bed and then turn to Jimin who is stripping out of his leather jacket. “Um..I’ll get you new sheets and the you change it. You must be tired so you should sleep.”

“Sleep?” Jimin hangs his jacket on the clothes hanger nearby. “I’m not here to sleep Y/n. In fact,” He takes a step forward, closer to you. “I have been way too fast asleep for the past many months.” 

“What do you mean?”

“Do you remember we always used to think about going out for drinks during the evening but never managed to because our work schedule was too tight? So” He pulls his wet shirt over his head, shaking the water from his hair. “maybe we should have a drink tonight. What do you think?”

You swallow nervously as your eyes fall on his body. It seems so much more chiseled than when you last saw it. If it hadn’t been so many months since he last saw you, you doubt the sight before you would have let you stay this far from him. But things between you have changed. You have changed. So you take a step back looking away. 

“I think…I think you should get changed, I’ll…I’ll um wait outside.” 

And with that you are about to leave but his words stop you. “You were right Y/n. You really did change. Yet,” He runs his fingers through his hair pushing it back. “Yet you seem the same.”

You want to argue with that but the muffled sounds make a return and its getting way too loud now. It cannot be this loud. It shouldn’t be. 

“Jimin just…just change, I’ll be back.” 

You walk out of the room and are about to rush up the stairs but Taehyung is standing at the foot of them.

“You made a mistake letting him in Y/n.” he crosses his arms, looking serious. “I could see all the way from here that something is wrong with him. Can’t you see it Y/n?”

“There’s nothing wrong with him Tae. It’s natural for you to not like him, I understand. But it’s okay.”

Taehyung simply shakes his head, disappointed for not being able to change your mind. The sounds from above though are getting more and more persistent, more and more troublesome. You grab the keys to the attic from the counter and rush up the stairs only to come to a complete halt right before the locked door of the attic. Taking a deep breath you slowly open the lock into  darkness, the only light coming from the exhaust fan whose shadow is decorating the wall ahead. 

Swallowing hard, taking timid steps you flip the lights on and it falls on the blonde haired man who sits on a chair, gagged and bound to it by ropes. He flinches at the light and looks up at you, immediately struggling furiously to break free. You can feel the shivers running down your body as you walk closer to him, taking a small timid step at a time till you are standing right before him. You lean closer to him hands on both arms of the chair and then a short laugh leaves you before your lips twist into a menacing smile.

Sorry Jimin. Sorry I lied to you that you are the first guest in my house. Truth is, someone had come to the house before you. And that someone has still not left. 

And I don’t think, he will be able to leave so easily. 

[kingfisher95]

A Little Apology And Then Some

So last year I dropped off of the face of tumblr, basically because uni was absolutely kicking my ass. But sadly that meant I left many things unfinished. One of these was a fic exchange which I got far far too dedicated to and kept saying to myself I would finish. I never did. @avatarquake I am so so so sorry. My prompt was - Daisy/Coulson, their vehicles and car races [fanfic, graphic, fanart]. Here below, for you and every Skoulson and Formula 1 fan, the first 2000 words of my fic which I do hope to keep working on. It’s very close to my heart, but I haven’t even got to the shipping aspect.

I also do not think I will return to tumblr for several more months, probably not until well into 2018.

“Give me an update, where is Loki?” Phil thinks he manages to sound nonchalant even in the heat of battle, bracing his body and throwing the wheel left praying the tyres will grip. Of course they do, 7 laps old and there’s no give at all but it’s always a gamble. They bite and bite and bite and the apex roars around and now he can hit the gas again, franticly climbing gears as he’s pressed back in his seat by the acceleration.

“All good Phil. You’re 6 seconds up, he’s got the edge in sector 3 but you’ve gone purple in sector 1 the past 2 laps. Fuel is on target,” May crackles in his ear, breezily calm, he can almost picture her leaning in to the telemetry screens with that tiny crease of concentration between her brows, working the best way to keep their agile little car ahead of the overpowered Asgardian brutes.

The next corner races at him and he lifts off and he fights the instinct to brake, carrying all the speed he can, deeper, deeper.

NOW. His foot stamps on the brakes and he wrenches right. This time the tyres slip just a millimetre before they catch and he’s flooring it again, racing toward the start-finish line to start lap 45/51 and sector 1, a fast and tight set of corners which test the aero package to the limit and makes his heart race like a derby stallion.

“Purple again, how are the tyres?” May asks as he punches in to sector two.

“Tyres are good,” he manages to grind out as he maxes out and the force of the acceleration pushes him backwards into his seat and the heat of the roaring V12. The back straight wings past the corners of his sight in a blur of colour, eyes fixed on the approaching corner, a vicious left hander where drivers can experience in excess of 4 G.

“Loki closing we need to hit 1:39,” crackles the radio as the force of his braking causes the webbed harness to bite into his shoulders and Coulson hits the confirm button as he flicks the car into the corner just a fraction too late, running wide and setting him up wrong for the sweeping right hander. The tires squeal in protest, smoking and drowned out by the engine’s roar and he runs far too wide onto the curb. Coulson swears violently, wrestling the car back onto the tarmac and hitting the accelerator down the third straight.

“Sorry Phil. Damage report on the lockup?”

“Intact. Tyres will make it to the end of the race if I’m careful.” Honestly he’s not sure if they will and Copse is closing on him, a corner taken almost flat. The sweat is running in his eyes now and he can see a flash of the golden Asgard livery in his right mirror.

Copse is over in a flash and the frantic weave of the next few corners feels all the worse as Coulson starts to feel the back end slide by increments. Around Stowe the back end steps out like an American drifter, smoking violently.

“Box. Box.” May still sounds calm but Coulson can’t believe she’s calling him in, 6 laps to the end. 6 laps, he’ll make it last. “Box Phil, and confirm.”

Coulson wings past the pit lane entry and on to the start finish straight, glancing at the timing board that still shows him in 1st place. He’s in the 1.41’s and suddenly Loki’s car is looming large in his mirrors. The SHIELD engine is vastly underpowered compared to the Asgard team and a tight feeling develops in his chest as he throws the car in to the first set of corners of lap 46. He’s got to rely on his aero package and pray the tires make it.

“Coulson when I give an order, I expect it obeyed. Box this lap unless you want your ass handed to you extra crispy,” the radio booms with Fury’s voice. “Confirm.”

Coulson doesn’t have time to confirm. Loki’s gotten better drive out of Aintree and the superior horsepower is telling. He’s forced to go deep in to go defensive in to Stowe, compromising the right hander for the second time running. It’s a horse race down towards Copse and Coulson doesn’t bother touching the brakes as he flings the car into the pass. Its rear end steps out like a ballet dancer as Loki dives towards the inside line, trying the undercut, the smell of burning rubber is everywhere and all Phil can see is smoke and yellow livery and then black.

A fierce joy rises inside Daisy as she flies through the final corner of the penultimate lap. Spa-francorchamps, the fastest race on the calendar. The black tarmac glistens festively, varnished with rain, and the chunky inters throw plumes of water to her left and right.

“1:55.2,” the radio intones. Daisy flicks the confirm and surges across the line. She needs to shave a quarter of a second off this lap and she knows exactly where to do it. The track is rising beneath her and she punches the gas, following the fading racing line to the crest of the hill in Eau Rouge, a terrifying blind corner and she turns in with a thrill in her heart the same as every time she takes this corner which betters even the bravest of drivers.

All she can see is trees and sky and then the track falls away beneath her as she turns in on faith. With a snap the track comes back in to view but she’s carrying too much speed to make the left hander. She punches the brakes and the tyres lock in protest, skating over the soaking track and the gravel trap spits as she slides to a halt and the screen flickers black.

Daisy slams her hands against the wheel in frustration and rips off the VR headset, revealing the dark room and the cheap plastic of the simulator’s walls. May perches to her left, tablet in hand and a steely look in her eyes.

“You just wasted an hour and half driving time to crash out on the final lap. You knew you were taking eau rouge too fast, that was stupid and reckless.” She clips out in her emotionless voice, reaching for Daisy’s wristband and flicking to her heart rate monitor. It’s hovering around 85, and the older woman makes a noise of approval. “Good recovery. But you can do better.”

May drops Daisy’s wrist and stands up, tapping on her tablet with a small crease between her brows. Daisy unclips the steering wheel and places it in front of her on the nose of the sim. Unbuckling the racing harness, she stands, rolling her shoulders to relieve the tension of being cradled in a carbon fibre cocoon for nearly 4 hours. She hops neatly out, and turns to start unscrewing her seat, a custom made mould of her body, from the skeletal sim car.

“No need for that,” May interrupts, looking up and snatching the steering wheel. “You’re back down here this afternoon.”

That was unusual, usually SHIELD only gave their young drivers half days on the simulator, here and there, crumbs off the tables of the big boys. Now it was Winter break Daisy had expected to have even less time with Barton and Romanoff back and needing to run the predicted spec for next year and learn the new track in Azerbaijan.

“Why’s that?” she asks, tugging off the worn racing gloves and instead tossing them in to the chair. She’s instantly suspicious. “You finally convinced them I’m a rockstar worthy of recognition?”

May doesn’t even look up.

“After that display?” she says coolly. “Not likely. Get some lunch Johnson, I expect you back here at 1.30.”

“Yes ma’am!” Daisy darts up the stairs into the sun-filled atrium, breathing in deep, clean lungfuls of air, wonderfully fresh after the stuffy sim room. The glass the room, like a giant fishbowl, is bedecked in twinkling lights and icicles. A colossal Christmas tree takes pride of place, it’s boughs heavy with silver SHIELD-sponsored baubles and a selection of perfectly wrapped cuboidal presents crowd at its feet in silver and black paper. Daisy pauses to examine the thing with distaste, a heavy-handed tribute to consumerism, and glances round at the clipped sound of heels approaching.

“Hiya Daisy!” Bobbi chirrups, and Daisy spins and hugs a statuesque blonde woman in greeting.

“Bobbi! Long time no see! I didn’t expect to see you here, they running you though the mill too?”

“Yeah, Fury’s giving us some big inspirational speech and then I’ve got sim drills, according to my timetable.”

“Yeah, I spent all morning down there with the cavalry, apparently I’ve got to go back there this afternoon. Don’t fancy a swap do you? Who’ve you got?”

Bobbi chuckles as they cross in to the swinging doors of the canteen.

“No chance girl. I’ve got a hot date with Hunter. Besides, you know May’s the best at what she does.”

Daisy groans and rolls her eyes melodramatically, snatching up a bottle of water with one hand and an apple with another.

“Sure, but would it kill her to crack a smile every so often?”

The plastic canteen chairs scrape on the faux wood lino as they sit by one of the curved bay windows and Daisy bites in to her apple with a crisp crunch. The room is rapidly filling with a buzz of noise as more and more people file in and she glances around curiously. Fury is lurking ominously in a corner, dressed in a black leather biker jacket.

“You gotta remember what she’s been through Daisy.” Bobbi reproves as she pokes her salad with a plastic fork.

“Yeah and what was that exactly,” mutters the smaller woman. “Nobody seems to be able to tell me. And why does that mean she gets to put me through the ringer. She made me drive Spa twice this morning. In the wet.”

Bobbi casts her a sympathetic look and opens her mouth to reply.

“Ok PEOPLE,” comes the bellow. Fury is standing at the front of the room, flanked by Fitz-Simmons, head engineer and biomechanics respectively. He builds the cars and finds the limits of their capabilities, she does the same to the drivers. Daisy hates them both. Neither of them deign to work with anything or anyone below top level, Daisy who gets a morning in the sim a score of times a year is quite beneath their notice.

“I have been informed that we are performing… suboptimally,” he glances fiercely at the gawky Scot on his left who blinks robotically at the attentive crowd. “Our competitors are churning out better, faster and stronger drivers. SHIELD has not had a package to rival for the championship since Rogers. We are going to be making big changes around these parts, starting this afternoon. We are working towards a more integrated, innovative system. The board wants results. You all gotta pull your weight, or you might find you have no weight to pull. Engineers of all descriptions, report to Fitz for debriefing in the garage. Drivers, PR, trainers, personal engineers, report to Simmons right here. “

[mimichootings]

The Mackerel Fiesta

Thank you, Gethin. Ladies and gentlemen, it is, I must say, a great honour to be here today, and to preside over this wonderful fiesta, now in its thirteenth year. I have heard one or two complaints that, as festivals go, ours is less than venerable, and, indeed, is a rather artificial affair, a flimsy excuse for public inebriation, not based at all on a genuine tradition, but shamelessly copied from similar festivals to be found in Spain or Portugal, one or the other, or perhaps both, or neither. Malta maybe? But never mind about that. Some cynical souls have even suggested that the whole event has been manufactured with the sole aim of drawing in crowds of gullible tourists and pocketing their foolishly spent money. Yes, boo hiss indeed, ladies and gentlemen. Boo hiss indeed. Well might you boo, and well might you hiss. But not with your mouth full, Mr. Jenkins, that would be my advice. But, looking around me, I see so many local faces, that, while I won’t say that this is a local fiesta for local people, ha ha, it does illustrate the value we in this lovely little town attach to a sense of community, for what can bring a community together more effectively, more cohesively, than burning a giant fish on a beach?

 Those of you who have attended the fiesta before will know the routine: from here we march in procession to the sweet sounds of our talented band, through the centre of town, over the bridge, down to the yacht club, where there will be some entertainment and a few words from me (as if that weren’t entertainment enough), and then it’s just a short walk to the beach, where, after we have given thanks to Almighty God, our fishy friend here will make the supreme sacrifice, and be set alight. And then, at the end, we’ll have the raffle, with the first prize being this impressive magnum bottle of champagne. For the procession we have, as you see, six bearers to carry the effigy―a round of applause, ladies and gentlemen―including Mr. Andrews, who, of course, being a genuine local undertaker, is used to this sort of thing. Following them will be our weeping, wailing widows, and a fine sight they are, I’m sure you’ll agree, ladies and gentlemen, so another round of applause, if you please. Don’t milk it, Mrs. Pryce-Evans, there’s really no need for a twirl.

 Right then, if everything is ready, let the procession begin! Don’t push, Gethin, I’m ahead of you, it’s only proper. I wish this music were a bit more mournful; rather too jaunty for the occasion, don’t you think? Widows, your keening is commendable, but might I suggest a few more ululations, and less of the giggling, if you please. This is a serious matter, after all. Thank you, Mrs. Pryce-Evans; that was an excellent flutter of the handkerchief, but try not to overdo it. Let dignity be your goal. And bearers, if you could just attempt to assume a more solemn air, that would be appreciated. For God’s sake! Who is that wearing trainers? Mr. Andrews, I am disappointed! You, of all people, should know better. Some of you, I regret to say, are not taking this quite as seriously as you should, but there we are, it can’t be helped, I suppose. What is it, Gethin? No, I don’t want a shot, get back to your place, mun.

 Now then, ladies and gentlemen, here we are, and, as promised, we will have some entertainment for you very shortly. But first, as your minister, it behoves me to say a few words on this momentous and splendid occasion. Those of you who know me will know that community is one of my chief concerns, and in our community, we value very much those members of it who go out to sea and bring us back its bounty, braving the winds and the waves and the terrors of the deep. Thank you, God, for keeping them safe. But God, if you must know, I have bone to pick with you, because, to tell the truth, the catch has been a bit disappointing this year, hasn’t it? Not much of a bounty at all, really. And what’s worse, it’s a continuation of a recent trend. People talk about overfishing and marine pollution and what-have-you, but other towns and villages, some of them not so very far from here, have done much better than us, and that’s a fact. Why is that, Lord? What have we done? Where have we sinned? I know you move in mysterious ways; that, I can’t deny. But if, in your infinite and impenetrable wisdom, you could see to it that next year we have a better catch, I for one would be most grateful. To that end, we offer you this piscine effigy, and hope you like it. In fact, I’d say it looks so fetching, that you’d be a bit of an odd fish not to. Odd fish, ha ha.

 Now, I am well-known in these parts for the keen interest I take in fishing matters, which some have said rivals the interest I take in religious matters. More than rivals, thank you! Mr. Jenkins, there, always ready with his little quips, some of them, as you can see, being less successful than others. I have been on several fact-finding missions across the globe in order to develop and enhance my understanding of the issues, and to attempt to find a solution to the relative dearth in maritime produce that has brought about so much local consternation. For instance, at the Trøllbøgrøll Institute in Bergen, in Norway, where I have been―TWICE!―I was reliably informed that the annual percentage, not excluding… Ah, I see that Gethin is gesturing to me in that characteristically frantic way of his, and I can only interpret his gestures as a polite reminder that time is of the essence, and on that, he has my full agreement, for if we take a moment to consider time, yes alright Gethin, keep your bloody hair on, boy.

 Right, time now, ladies and gentlemen, for that entertainment I mentioned earlier, for which I am sure you have been waiting with baited breath. And so, without further ado, let me introduce you to someone who needs no introduction, the one and only, our very own, Mrs. Llinos Wendy Davies! A warm welcome, ladies and gentlemen, please. That’s better. It’s a thrilling performance we have in store for us now, ladies and gentlemen, because Mrs. Davies, who no doubt has already captured your attention with her remarkable attire, is about to combine the noble arts of belly dancing and fire juggling. Take it away, Mrs. Davies!

 After that eye-opening spectacle, no-one can say that the years have not been kind to Mrs. Davies. Indeed, one might say that age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite b―yes, you’re right, Gethin, that would probably be a bit off-colour. Well caught. Careful, there, Mrs. Davies, one of the torches is not quite―Good God, she’s on fire! Someone put her out, for the love of Christ, I can’t bear all that screaming. What are you doing? You can’t chuck her in the harbour, the bloody tide’s out, mun. What? The prize champagne? But what about the raffle? Oh, sweet Jesus, what a waste! Still, at least she’s out. Thank you, Mrs. Davies, that was unforgettable. Don’t worry, the ambulance is on its way. I’m sure, ladies and gentlemen, that you will all join me in wishing Mrs. Davies a speedy recovery. Now then, Gethin, what can we get to replace the champagne? We need something for the main prize. A big bottle of Strongbow? Very well, it will have to do. Wait, it looks as if it’s been opened. Well, if it’s only one swig, I suppose no-one will mind.

 Ladies and gentlemen, after that excitement, it is time now to move on to the ceremony itself. Bearers, widows: to your positions please, so that we can go down to the beach. Musicians, there’s no need, we have had the benefit of your talents for long enough now. This year, ladies and gentlemen, in a bit of an innovation, we have built really quite a large pyre on which the mackerel will be placed. A bit more oomph, you see, like a Viking funeral. Doesn’t it do the town proud? Here we are. Before we consign this extraordinary effigy to the flames, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to say a few brief words and to lead us all in prayer. Yes, Gethin, I did say brief. Lord, we are gathered here today in thy presence to give thanks for thy munificence, which, though in the opinion of some may have fallen a bit short in recent years, nonetheless blesses us and is still a cause for gratitude, and after all, Lord, who are we to complain? We are but maggots, crawling and slithering repulsively in the noxious depths of sin and iniquity, blind to thy holy purposes, Lord, and undeserving, mostly, of the paltry crumbs of sustenance you deign to drop, from time to time, when the mood suits you, and evidently it hasn’t suited you much this past year or in previous years, but that’s quite alright, mustn’t grumble, you are the Lord of Light and Life, after all, and we thy humble―alright Gethin, no need for that. Burn the damn thing, amen.

 Well, ladies and gentlemen, it’s a promising start to the conflagration. The mighty, marvellous, majestic, magnificent mackerel really giving out some heat, there, ha ha, although I do detect a faint aroma of… I’m not quite sure what, exactly, but I can’t honestly say it’s pleasant. Gethin, what did you use to make the fish? Plastic! Good God, mun! Whose bright idea was that? No, it was not my idea, you lying git. What kind of plastic? What do you mean you don’t know? No, it’s not a bloody technical question, it… wait, are those tyres? You put car tyres in the pyre! You fucking idiot! You useless bucket of shit! Jesus fucking Christ, the smoke coming off that thing! Oh God, the smell! No, no, ladies and gentlemen, stay put, I think the wind is about to change. Yes, yes, there we are, see, blowing it all back into town, out of the way. Great black billows of Satanically noxious smoke, pretty poisonous, I should think. I hope people in town are inside with their windows closed, although on a lovely sunny day like this, it’s quite possible that they’re not. Still, rather them than us, ladies and gentlemen, eh? Ha ha. No. No, Mr. Jenkins, you’re right, that was inappropriate. Gethin, you’re sure this isn’t dangerous, aren’t you? I mean, I hope we’re not going to get sued.

 Oh Christ, I think the wind has changed again. No, don’t panic, ladies and gentlemen, there’s no cause for alarm, it’s simply a minor… My eyes! My God, my eyes! And my throat, too! Thank you, Lord, thanks a fucking bunch. Run! Run, ladies and gentlemen, run for your lives! Christ on a bike, I’m blind! Oh fuck fuck fuck. Gethin! Gethin! Gethin, where are you, boy? Don’t leave me! Oh, the pain! I can’t breathe. Not like this, Lord! Not like this!