#wristful

[vitalphenomena]

@wristful // x

ALEX HATES THE SMELL OF CIGARETTE SMOKE. They prefer vapes—even the clunky ones, even the obnoxiously fruity ones, the ones that make your vision all cloudy for a few seconds too long.

But living their life, accompanying people on smoke breaks is sort of just a thing that gets put up with. Being so close with Stevie Danvers—despite the consequences—these are the sort of things that you pardon.

They wipe under their nose with a tissue, catching snot and blood and bloody snot. They shrug loosely, try to mirror Stevie's crooked smile. Maybe they are just looking for lessons.

"Tell me how to not feel so guilty," they mutter, getting straight to the point, and quick. "You must not feel guilty. Right?"

[newsworth]

     @wristful​ said,  “i play it cool with the best of them.”  from sloan.

     the correspondents dinner is the first time they’d seen each other since he left new york.   they’d said they would keep in touch ,   but.   well ,   everyone always says that.

     “ this is supposed to be you playing it cool? “   you know ,   he says it like that ,  but he’d always considered sloan’s aloofness to be a part of her charm.   

[exspiritment]

@wristful // stevie said: a kiss on the corner of the mouth 

Nobody’s using you, baby she had said. And maybe she thought she could mean it at the time — but Stevie is a drug user, and Spirit is a people user, and these are things that will always get in the way of just about anything else. 

Andrew wouldn’t let her do this. Droopy and drunk and rambling — he would tell her to say what’s really on her mind or just go to sleep, start fresh tomorrow. He wouldn’t let her sit in his lap, play with his hair. She rests her head on the curve of his shoulder, lets herself feel the warmth. Lets herself pretend. 

Even when she looks up at him, she is disoriented enough to keep pretending. 

And so she kisses him — perhaps missing his mouth on purpose to gauge his reaction, perhaps having awful aim. She kisses the left side of his lips once. Twice. 

She pulls away to see what he says, if anything — disturbingly lucid, disturbingly vulnerable.

[feralego]

@wristful | logan

          It’s been a long time since she’d last heard from Logan, but that doesn’t mean he’d completely fallen off her radar. Few of the people from Westchester had; she’s still just as nosy as she’d been before, and is arguably better, now, at finding information.

         So she knows he’d moved to Los Angeles some time ago. She knows he’s been married and divorced. Knows he works in the journalism sphere, though some might think the term too generous for what he specializes in. Knows he’d had a child, and recently lost him.

         And... she knows that he’d stopped writing her back sometime around when she and Theo had been up near the Great Lakes. For whatever reason. She doesn’t know if their friendship had just petered out naturally, given the time and distance separating them, or if she’d said or done something to offend him. Which is a distinct possibility.

         But it doesn’t really matter much in the grand scheme of things, because she’s found herself in Los Angeles, and she’d looked up his address, and she just thinks that maybe he could stand to see her for a little while if she comes bearing condolences.

         So she shows up one day, using skills she certainly hadn’t learned under Xavier’s tutelage, to let herself into his home well before Logan wakes to lay out an assortment of baked goods, and to start a pot of coffee for her old friend. All without so much as an inkling of permission from her unwitting host. 

         She hadn’t wanted to wake him. And breaking and entering is about as ingrained into her as her tendency to snoop.

         “Mornin’, Logan,” she tells him when he finally makes his way out of his bedroom, leaning a hip up against his stove as she sips from a chipped coffee mug. She smiles, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Hope you’re hungry.”

[halechief]

u already know what time it is five times KISSED

@tahitiwoke

ONE. JAN, 2018.

is there anything you can’t do. he doesn’t frame it like a question, more like a statement of fact – he has already answered it for himself. you started a war. 

does it escape his notice, somehow? talk of carol danvers has fallen out of fashion, crushed under the weight of a ten second soundbite, under headlines she could never have competed against. AMERICAN JOURNALIST EXECUTED. claire buries the guilt down deep, pretends it didn’t hurt to do it. the hurt wouldn’t matter, not if she accomplishes what she needs to. RECORDED ICO COMMUNICATIONS RELEASED BY WHITE HOUSE. 

❝  you don’t approve. ❞  she thinks she’s said this to him before, long ago. he’s taller than her, and it is made more noticeable in the absence of her heels, some missing aspect of her armor that when they’d first met, she’d never have dreamt of greeting him without. there’s more missing, she knows, but doesn’t dwell on these things, content to lay her hand on his chest, a rare softness scraped from the base of her, glinting in her eyes in the moonlight streaming in through the window. ❝  no. ❞  she leans toward him and up onto her toes, her lips meeting his cheek with a soft, conciliatory brush, her hand slipping from him as she paces away and toward her bedroom, answering him though she knew she didn’t need to. ❝ there’s nothing i can’t do. ❞

TWO. MAR, 2018.

❝  i want it done before the month is out.  ❞  jane nods, pretending not to see the shadow of him haunting the window behind the resolute, holding her gaze as if there’s something more she wants to say, but she never gets the chance. claire’s attention has already dropped from her back to the plan laid out in excruciating detail, red stamped to indicate its importance. jane retreats and leaves only the soft clicking of the door in her wake, her absence keenly felt as phil asserts himself behind claire, his arm laid across the back of her chair when he leans in to read from over her shoulder.  her gaze wanders from the document to where his other hand is braced against the desk, his palm indented by the edge of it, his fingers pale and splayed against the wood. i’m sure she’s thrilled to be your hero on this. his tone is dark, and claire lowers the packet to the desk with a soft scoff, her neck twisting as she turns and looks up at him, the distance between them so small that his breath tickles over her lips when he offers a short huff of laughter in response, staring down his nose at her.  ❝  are petty remarks really the best use of your time? ❞  

there’s tension in the gaze, like he wants to reverse the judgment onto her, make her own the fault as she deserves to, but he doesn’t. maybe he knows that she is already ashamed, deep in the core of her. instead he bridges the gap between them, and his hand on the desk lifts to circle her throat. 

THREE. NOV, 2019.

her fingers pull at the strap of the sling, discomfort and annoyance evident in her every movement, resentment rolling off of her palpable waves. it isn’t long before her touch is replaced by a more patient one, readjusting where it is needed, his hand falling then to embrace the meeting of her neck and shoulder. the side of his index finger meets the edge of the freshened dressing on her neck, the sensation ticklish as he idly toys with the edge of it. she wonders if he is curious to see what it looks like. his thumb runs upward along the back of her neck, and she realizes faintly that her hair has grown longer than she prefers it. it tickles behind her ear as he displaces it, and she tells herself that she’ll have it cut tomorrow, the color cooled, her image reasserted as something unbreakable. they tried to kill her, and failed. she won't let them forget.

her back meets his chest as she softens her posture, and it occurs to her that she is tired, despite being confined to a hospital bed for the better part of a month. relax. she bristles somewhat at his suggestion, but it fades quickly as she feels his nose press into her hair, his lips soon to follow as he rests his hand across her abdomen and draws her nearer.  ❝  don’t tell me what to do. ❞  it lacks the bite it ought to have had, his hand drifts lower and she leans her head back against his shoulder, ignoring the inflamed ache in her own. 

FOUR. JAN, 2021.

happy inauguration, madame president. 

she smiles, and doesn’t bother to hide the deeper layer of satisfaction at his address. from time to time, she can be won by the little things – it certainly helps that she is already in a winning mood.  ❝  thank you, phillip. ❞ the champagne flute in her hand lifts a little, the mouth tilting toward him in salute before she angles it back to her own, keeping his gaze above the rim as she thoughtfully sips from its edge. when she’s had her fill for the moment it lowers, and she curls it in against her chest, her weight still resting against the edge of the desk. a smile of his own takes up residence on his lips, and he paces toward her with his hands in his pockets, coming right up to where his feet can frame hers where they extend and lay crossed at the ankle. it forces her to look up at him, but she doesn’t mind the position.  ❝  now the hard work can start. ❞ 

her hand stretches out at her side, leaving the glass on the desk as she pulls her feet in to stand, rising up and letting her hands cradle his face as she pulls him down to her. there’s something deceptively soft to this kiss, a tenderness she’d never cop to if he brought it to her attention, but victory makes her . . .  sentimental, at times. she parts from him with a whisper of a smile on her lips, and smoothly slides from his grasp, lifting her drink from the desk as she goes. ❝  enjoy the party, phil. i’ll see you in the morning. ❞

FIVE. DEC, 2022.

what’s this? one of his arms is propped beneath his head, his elbow sticking out from him like a wing. it’s amusing, almost endearing in a way, and so she is smiling as her hand reaches out to pluck the card from his fingers.  ❝  i don’t recall telling you to root around in my things. ❞  he doesn’t appear cowed in the slightest, and part of her wonders why she isn’t more irritated by the fact. she knows what it is of course, without needing to open it. still, she does, and for a moment, the familiar script gives her pause. my dear, nothing is forever. except us. she stares at it for a long moment, and then bends at the waist to tuck it back into the side table.  ❝  an old note. from francis.  ❞ 

he waits, then, and she assumes it is to see whether it will somehow fracture the moment, and reassert the walls she is so fond of leaving up in his presence even now, years into the endeavor. it doesn’t. as she settles at the edge of the bed her gaze drifts from him to the nightstand, drawn to the digital face of the alarm clock.  ❝  it’s midnight. ❞  her observation is blandly offered, blue gaze shifting back to him as the smile returns, more muted this time as it spreads.  ❝  hope i didn’t keep you from your new year’s kiss. ❞  there’s a beat of silence between them, before he pushes himself up from the mattress, the sheet falling away as his hand finds the back of her neck and brings her toward him, stopping short of her lips with a smirk. happy new year. claire. 

she closes the gap herself, and follows him down when he goes. 

[reignthem]

@wristful​  gets a short little thing.  

“  i mean, she does kind of give off a sapphic vibe.  ” 

[fakedsciences-a]

@wristful​ // will

“I do not mean to offend you. But your phone — it’s been ringing ever since you sat down.” 

Cain stumbles and blunders his way into casual conversation — violating boundaries and perceiving things that aren’t his business — at the bars he frequents when he doesn’t want to go home, with Kieran — or when he doesn’t want to go to his home in the city, without Kieran. 

“You might miss a family emergency.” 

[danviers]

“ The DEO has a responsibility to this planet to keep every piece of kryptonite on earth in secure confinement.  For Supergirl’s sake, and Superman’s. ”  

Alex’s rebuttal rolled off her tongue barbed, sharp — defensive, almost.  If Lena had meant for her choice of verbal ammunition to wound, she’d more than hit her mark.  She’d never forget the devastating force it’d taken to run Astra through in one clean stroke.  She’d never not feel the blood shed that night on her hands — or how shellshocked Kara had been, to watch the life fade from the eyes of yet another displaced member of her obliterated bloodline.  How crushed she’d been.

Perhaps Lena’s motivations had been born of pure intent, but her methods, backed by billions of dollars and an unequivocally brilliant mind still left much to be desired.

“ You planned to devise alien detection technology that would have forcibly revealed the identities of millions, ”  Alex returned.  “ You held Sam in a secret sub - basement lab, and didn’t tell anyone that she was Reign until it was too late. ”  

Squaring her shoulders did nothing to alleviate the weight that still seemed to bear down on her.  There was no sidestepping that Lena, too, had the consequences of her own albatrosses to reconcile with.  “ We have all done things that we’re not proud of, Lena.  And I know that you just want to help.  But that doesn’t make this any better. ”

@wristful​.  /   cont.

[rekant-2]

@wristful

"hey," she nudges him with her foot, none too kindly. hopefully, hard enough to stir him from slumber. "last call. they want you gone, anyway. you got keys i gotta take?"

[vitalphenomena]

@wristful // stevie (x)

They don't know how to calm him down — wish they did, wish they could. They want to be competent and collected and serene. They want to make everything better for Stevie, but the only people who can help them now are themselves, not each other.

"You shouldn't have done that to their car," Alex says primly, like they have any room to fucking talk, like they haven't driven drunk and reckless and high on painkillers. Like it isn't a literal miracle they're here to talk to Stevie. "Besides, what if they aren't even nice to me? What if they don't like me?"

[newsworth]

will mcavoy:  fuck you,  claire.  chris: 

[exspiritment]

@wristful​

a headache is splitting behind his eyes; really pounding, the kind that makes you dizzy and sick and makes it hard to look at headlights in the dark. fuck he needs -- well. she knows what he needs.

"isn't that supposed to be my line?"    

he jitters on his feet, rocks back and forth, settles when a car drives past a little slower than he'd like; it's harlem, people don't look too hard, but it's not hunts point and he knows the bronx like the back of his hand. stevie itches. his fingernails are so bitten down that it doesn't make a damned bit of difference when he tries scratch over his neck and ears and head.

"i got what you asked me for -- you got what i asked for?"

“This is bad. All I’m getting at is that this is bad.” 

She feels that, knows that to be true. But she also knows herself, and she knows that who she is — it’s the type of person who doesn’t really, truly, give a shit. About the badness of it all, that is. 

Cars go by. People a block over, they talk about fuck knows what. Spirit steps close to Stevie like a lover, slips something into his front pocket. He’s tall, with the sort of build you’d expect. She looks small and harmless while she might be slowly killing him. 

“But I’ve got you. I’ve got you, always.” 

[rassvetiye]

you let love cloud your judgement. / Xoxo vasily

𝐀𝐒𝐊 𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐄: I CAN'T FIND IT / @predateliya

they had begun to speak of vitaly, the man that anatoliy had made into a brother over their traded turns of bleeding so that the other would not have to. anatoliy is never very far from grief over his loss, especially in talks like this when he has no pictures of him and can only use memory to fill the gaps in vasily's understanding of what had made anatoliy's life, before there was ever a son that slept in this house. nothing that anatoliy can create with his hands would ever equate to the weapon that is memory.

it is not possible to have this discussion without also speaking of mariya. they do not speak of her very often, but this is not the first time. anatoliy looks away towards the candle that sits lit on the other side of the room and carries its scent off the needles of balsam firs. the wick burns much deeper into the center wax than it had when they first came to this table. this is the longest they have ever spoken of her. he looks at vasily again.

“ vitaly was my brother. and mariya was... she was my heart. together, they were all i had left to call family. if i have not done well in my effort to show you what that means then i hope you may find someone out there who can. “ it wasn't his intention to hurt vasily with with the way this thought saddens him, so he wears the feeling soberly on his face. “ but love was all there ever was, vasya. “

[feralego]

@wristful | steven

          It’s so easy. It’s so easy that it nearly takes the enjoyment out of it.

          What kind of New Yorker is this oblivious to his surroundings? He’d not been expecting Spirit’s trip buddy to be as alert and attentive as the pseudo-celebrity, Andrew Bragin, had been, but come on.

          It’s a miracle, Daniel thinks, that he doesn’t witness the man getting mugged. But wouldn’t that be a treat?

          Still, he bides his time, keeping his distance for a good long while, measuring Steven’s gait and waiting for the perfect moment. And that moment comes just as he steps off an uneven curb: as the sole of his shoe touches the pavement, Daniel surreptitiously delivers a zing of sharp pain to the nerves in his target’s ankle, mimicking a badly twisted ankle.

          A few steps behind the man still, he wonders if it will make him fall. And he rather hopes that it does; that the sudden explosion of sensation will fold him over in the gutter as he checks for an injury that isn’t there.

          “You okay, mate?” He asks when he gets closer, pausing with an air of concern about him instead of continuing on his way.

[lgbtcorp]

@wristful / lex: just let it go, bro!

oh this has got to be a fucking joke — a cruel twist of fate that leaves her exactly where she tried to escape the last time. the methohexital fogs her brain and feels as though a fucking sledgehammer is pounding behind her eyes, but lex offers a peace-offering OJ and twists his smarmy little fingers around the signet ring that never quite seems to leave his person. he's gotten good at that — snatching her away from the direction her life should be leading, and drawing her back into his clever, megalomaniacal little fingers without so much of a pushback from her. note to self: jess will now get her coffee, no excuses.

"you try and kill me on numerous occasions and you tell me to let it go, bro?" she's sitting up now, nursing the glass between her hands before quickly discarding it to the coffee table. this isn't the first time he's done this but at least he's not now breathing down her neck as she twists her wrists through duct-tape bindings and a particularly uncomfortable chair.

"you don't look surprised to see me — i would've thought you'd be throwing a tantrum at your numerous failings. i'm not really in the forgiving mood, brother."

[halechief]

‘  i’ve gone from being his bitch to being yours.  ’

𝐀 𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐄 𝐈 𝐇𝐀𝐕𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐒𝐓. @wristful :

❝  please, phillip. don't be vulgar. ❞ her head is angled backward slightly, a necessity to keep his gaze as he towers so near to where she is seated. fingers tap in a slow cadence against the arm of her chair, and she is careful to keep her simmering amusement from her features as the glance she gives him steadily becomes a stare, as she watches his shoulders rise with the depth of his wavering inhale. another beat passes between them before she carefully rises, her movements slow and deliberate, and she does not know whether to liken herself to predator or prey : is she moving slowly out of range of claws, or stalking silently through the underbrush ? she knows very well that either of them could be ruined by the other ; her with the truth, and him with any number of credible lies, any collection of uncovered wrongdoing. he should be grateful that in that fact, they were equals. he should be grateful for much more than that. (had it been francis that wanted him dead, or was it her?) ❝  maybe you aren't ready to hear this yet, but you're going to, all the same. ❞

she steps out from behind the desk and brings herself to stand in front of him with little in the way of hesitation ; he could test the length of his leash if he wanted, but he would not find it lacking tension. ❝  i think we've taken good care of each other, all things considered. i have protected you when it has been in my power, and you, ❞ she pauses, allows herself a cursory glance from his hairline down to the tips of his shoes, noting the intensity that pulls him up to his fullest height apart from the downward angle of his head. if she had touched him, it might have burned. ❝  you have helped me to keep that power.   ❞ claire's gaze finds his again, her features smooth of any indication as to what conclusion she'd drawn from her observation of him. ❝  i don't want to hear about any pretended flare of conscience, or your petty . . . indignation over the freedom you think you do or don't have. whatever we've done, i don't doubt for a second that you did worse for shield. you wouldn't have even had the opportunity to be resentful of francis, and i'll let you divine for yourself what that means. ❞ the derision she'd suppressed until then spills over in the final sentence, and for a moment her poise is punctured, a breath loosed as her attention drags away from him, her head shaking as her tongue presses between her lips to wet them.

❝  be honest with yourself, phillip.  ❞ another shake of her head fills the pause thereafter, and she gathers her composure once more, turning back to fix her gaze on him, this time with a knowing smile tilting the corners of her lips upward. ❝  you don't mind your position at all, not really. you're just ashamed to enjoy it as much as you do.  ❞