#yeah maybe I also got gifted kid syndrome

[bookwyrminspiration]

hm. just having Thoughts about achilles come down as a moonlark song. “you crave the applause, yet hate the attention, then miss it - your act is a ruse” t h o u g h t s ,,,,,,,,

Well the thing about this is that you're absolutely 100% correct, so jot that down

I saw someone (so sorry I can't remember who) say something rather incisive about Sophie's relationship with attention, but I can't remember all of it so I'm just gonna use that as a starting place and if I misremember things I'm sorry. But it was about how there's a part of Sophie that does want attention, that wants to be noticed; not in a "all eyes on me in the spotlight" kind of situation but in the "I want to be praised and recognized and acknowledged and loved" kind of way. If you've been the shy gifted kid then you might recognize that, and I think we can see that in Sophie and in those first two lines.

She "craves the applause" as in she craves praise. She wants compliments and for people to like her, she wants to be told she's doing well and that people are proud of her achievements. But she "hates the attention" because she doesn't want to be focused on; she doesn't want to be observed and scrutinized and put in this spotlight where any mistake she makes will be public and ridiculed and impossible to hide. It's this seemingly contradicting balance that's got some nuance to it.

There's also the "then miss it" part, where as soon as the focus is away you want it back--not because you want the attention, but because the applause comes with it. There's seldom one without the other so even when you hate the attention, it holds the praise you're silently wanting so badly so you conflate the two.

Focusing on the "your act is a ruse" as well there are a few ways to look at it. One is externally, people seeing who she is from the outside and thinking that something has to be fake, there's something about her she's creating that doesn't add up. She's not really that smart or talented or powerful, she's just pretending to be. Or there's an internal view of her doubting herself, thinking she's not good enough and that she doesn't deserve to be where she is or that everyone is seeing her as better than she is, and she's just trying to fake it to go along with it because she doesn't know how to be anyone else.

Anyway the conclusion of this post is that Sophie Elizabeth Foster has gifted kid syndrome. Both incredibly capable and constantly doubting her skill and how far she can go, constantly on edge of how others perceive her at all times. Excellent song comparison!

[jelsah27]

imposter syndrome talked ab just some forewarning

In History Class

MC: *walks into class with a small smile on their face*

Deuce: Good morning, MC. You seem happy today.

Ace: Yeah what's got you all smiley?

MC: Well, Kalim and Jamil were at my dorm the other day. Kalim really wanted to know about foods from my world and Jamil tagged along for obvious reasons. At on point Kalim wanted to look at my room and he found my snap-out-of-it post-it notes on the wall.

Deuce: Snap-out-of-it post-it notes?

MC: Oh, yeah they help remind me that a lot of the problems I think I have aren't really as problematic as I think. Like "Every personality is a creation of experiences that make you you." or "My friends like me because I am me". You see a while ago I figured out that I have a bit of Imposter Syndrome.

Ace: A bit of what?

MC: Well, it's pretty much I feel like I'm not the person everyone thinks I am. I'm not the gifted child everyone remembers or the smart person everyone seems to think I am. That if I can't hurry up and live up to everyone's expectations that they'll figure out I'm not as great a person they think I am and be disappointed and angry that all I am is an empty shell of who they believed I was and leave. Some times it will also come in the form of believing that my friends only want to be around me out of pity or that if I don't like what they like or want to do the same things as them then they will leave, even if they've reassured me they love me. I think the worst thoughts I ever got from it was when I started to believe that my personality was fake and that I didn't know why I was so different than the kid everyone liked. I started to believe that I had faked my personality from different shows, books, or even people to even have one.

MC: Honestly I didn't even realize it was imposter syndrome till someone else pointed it out to me after telling them this. I genuinely had no clue I was so disgusted with myself till I was talking with them about it and they pointed out that none of what I was saying was true, that everybody knew who I was and loved me as I am. I think I cried when they told me that.

Deuce: Prefect... I had no idea...

MC: It's alright, I've been learning to get better at combating it. Anyway, Kalim asked me about it and I basically told him and Jamil what I just told you. He then asked me what I'm doing to overcome it. So I told him about the main things that have helped. Reminding myself constantly that I am not fake or hiding who I am from people I love and who love me. Whenever I feel negative thoughts try to take over, think about one positive thing that I have done or something someone had said they love about me for every dark thought. If it gets to bad though, go to someone I trust and ask them flat out about those thoughts, it helps a lot. And twice a week I make a post-it or journal about one or two small things. Maybe a compliment someone gave me, or a task I completed. So every day or so since they've-

Jamil: *walks into the room* Prefect, here. I must get to class before Kalim catches something on fire I mean gets into trouble. Have a good day.*hands MC a small note and leaves the classroom*

MC: *smiling contently* It say 'Thank you for helping Kalim study yesterday great sevens know he needed it and your smile is unique'

Deuce: *getting out paper* If it helps you, I'll gladly join in.

Little bit of a rant u can skip I hope you enjoyed the post <3 Y'all I'm sorry I didn't mean to trauma dump but I really like the idea. But the story is true and I did cry (and it was in a restaurant) when my sis told me I was wrong and she knew who I really and she loves me. That our friends won't leave because all humans have opinions and we are allowed to clash. And that my personality isn't fake, that everyone's personality is what they've created themselves and that people add and take away from themselves all the time and work on parts of themselves they don't like to become better. That my brain was just being dark when there was many lights around me, waiting to be recognized. If any of y'all read this its just one side of imposter syndrome, there are a few versions and many levels of severity. I genuinely think you are awesome and perfectly imperfect the way you are!

Anywho thanks for reading!

[weebsinstash]

I'd be judging the hell out of Mom!Reader for naming her twins GABRIEL and GABRIELLA!!!! (Not judging her that much for instigating Miguel to get me or something, I mean. Stockholm syndrome is a bitch. and also. I get it, the power of big d and all that stuff) GIRL. That's the SAME NAME!!!!!

Smh there's so many beautiful names in spanish but MomReader and Miguel 2 are lacking in the creativity department.

Miguel over here watching Mom!You being so radiant and joyful while showing off her chunky babies and he's sending sly glances to you, lowkey being a snob as he thinks "OUR babies would have much better names" and before he knows it he's building up this little fantasy in his head by accident. He keeps hearing these little stories or details from the other you and the other him and in his head he keeps thinking of what he would've done, how he thinks it would've gone for you and him, and you two are not even in a relationship. In fact depending on how drawn out this gets, you haven't even been in the Spider Society for several weeks and are at home with no intention of ever coming back, heartbroken, alone

I even thought of "what if an afab Reader got so desperate to escape canon and have freedom again that she gets pregnant by a stranger and literally carries a full pregnancy so she can abandon the baby, because the kid will eventually become a Spider and maybe they'll take over the canon and then you'll be able to do whatever you want" because you're just. You're so upset that canon is controlling your life and basically like ENSLAVING you that you're desperate

Lmao Peter B sneaks back to see you even though he isn't supposed to and finds you, he's ecstatic, "oh my god you're SUPER pregnant!" and he knows he isn't supposed to see you but he zips it and goes back home and, months later he visits you again with gifts, "so where's the baby?" "I dunno, where IS the baby? :)"

Would the baby technically be an anomaly since you weren't supposed to have it, not like this? What if they had to get rid of it to re-stabilize the timeline or whatever? Now you're being EXTRA shunned because, "wow you went through all that just for yourself huh 🙄 you'd rather abandon a baby than get married..." like people just beyond appalled with you, meanwhile you feel extra victimized because, wow that was all for nothing, you're trying to rethink strategies since "the contigency" didn't work out.

Or less dark but imagine dumping that kid and then some time later you're invited back to the Spider Society and it's like "oh hey Miguel what's the deal with this random baby you're taking care of" and you don't even recognize it, don't even know, you didn't even look at it hard enough to ever really know what it looked like, and, well, WE know whose baby it is lmao. You thinking you escaped from it and it's off living its own life and is going to someday free you and they, maybe not even realizing your intentions and just thinking you were scared, are raising it to give it back to you. I'd go absolutely wild lmao. Their shock when you break it to them "I literally nicknamed it Connie as in contingency, I never even knew what sex it was, I never even fed it, oh my god get it out of here, you're ruining everything"

Miguel MAKING YOU raise it even if its like tbh a fucked up little accident, or, if it's the whole "anomaly baby's gotta go" situation, after the, uh, disposal, he realizes he's pushed you way too far and you're too stressed and scared to think and behave rationally anymore and THIS is where he basically assigns himself as your caretaker and eventually takes you for himself which is kiiiiiiiiinda for the best because you're losing it a little. Like idk I imagine with LYLA maybe he has her programmed to tell him his own canon or he can look at it himself but like, what if he avoided spoilers because he wanted his behavior with you to be authentic or whatever. Like Miguel 2 might let him know "yeah dude turns out we hook up with them in a lot of different universes, it's almost like a separate canon like Peter Parker having Mary Jane" and Miguel takes some sneak peeks at other realities and then he shuts himself off from it so he can move forward of his own accord, but he now knows a sort of guideline and maybe some things to avoid doing (he can see the reality where the YouTwo disaster is going down and he's like "I would NEVER make MY You feel replaced *acts like having Mom!You and Miguel2 around doesn't count, the denial is stored in his ass, that's why it's so big*")

He's got a little notebook or data log where he takes down notes and details on things you like, things he notices about you, things you do often, habits, favorite foods, favorite color, how often are you doing your laundry (he knows you keep re-wearing that bra, girl), are you making your bed, how well are you functioning. Jesus, he literally has technology that can recreate extremely hyperdetailed recreation simulations; if he isn't outright putting camera bots in your room, he can "recreate" however you've been spending your day. He can learn all your routines and rituals and habits, decide what things may be problems, what things you might need more of in your life, he's, studying you really, with a romantic and almost scientific obsession

Not to be all 50 shades of gray in here but would Miguel eventually come onto you, all pent up and control finally bursting, "if we were made for each other, you must like taking it as hard as I like to give it" and whether you want it or not he takes you, and your bodies feel like they fit together perfectly, he stretches you out and fills you up JUST right, you can't help but have your eyes roll into the back of your head with how good it is, and of course he used any good reactions out of you as an excuse/"sign" he's doing the right thing and to keep going, that you're consenting, that he's finally winning you over

Who know; the two of you might start having those babies faster than you both initially thought 😳

[liffy-feelin-jiffy]

Coroika Gorai headcanons

Rider had typically been more closed off about his sexuality, for reasons he decided to keep to himself as they mostly originate from insecurities, but also because he actually hadn’t known he genuinely likes guys the way he thought he liked girls for the longest time in his life. It wasn’t until he was 15 in a half, and having gotten to know Goggles a lot more at the time did he realize that he likes guys in more ways he initially thought he did. It didn’t help when the devastating realization came to him that he had a crush on a specific blue idiot boy… a hard crush as a matter of fact. Like, I’m talking head over heels kind of stuff, Spiderverse Gwen syndrome. Mans is tripping on his own feet because he can’t stop thinking about that scatterbrain for the life of him. Goggles is in every corner of his mind, he’s in the reflections in the windows of the subway, his bubbly laughs can be heard through the soft breeze like bird song. Rider always looks at the Pilot Goggled buffoon’s empty hands, willing everything in himself not to take it and intertwine their fingers together like thread sewing fabric, and he clenches his own hands into tight fists whenever he’s away from him and the thought of hand holding comes to mind. He’s so in love, he wants to kiss that stupid little weirdo’s face it’s making him look like the biggest dumbass that’s ever been born-

Sorry I got a little too into it there I guess. Whether you wanna take all that seriously or not is your choice of poison.

Anyways, yeah, once Rider finds out he’s literally in love with the squid who deadass flashed him to the public during their first match back in the Plaza, it’s not going so well for him. Why in the world would he start getting all blushy and feely for that absolute moron? What possessed him into developing feelings for that over-ecstatic boy with tentacles as blue as the shining sea? With a goofy smile so bright that it rivals the very sun? With such inspiring optimism that Rider can only dream of possessing-

😑

Oh, who was he kidding.

What makes it worse is that his crush on Goggles actually started back when he was teaching blue team how to train to fight against Skull, hence adding onto his seemingly territorial behavior on Gogs when Skull eagerly said he wanted to fight team blue again. Jealous much? Lmao. It gets even funnier when he and Goggles both end up crushing on Skull too BAHAHA (I believe in fixing love triangles/squares with the power of POLYAMOROUS RELATIONSHIPS. SKULLAMIGORAI FOR LIFE✊🏻✊🏻✊🏻✊🏻)

For the longest time he tried to repel what he considered were “intrusive thoughts” of Goggles. He’d try gaslighting himself that he’s someone Goggles would never find that kind of interest in; maybe he already has someone else, like a guy or girl, he’s bi after all, isn’t he? He and Goggles would never work anyways, Rider’s personality was too serious to match with Goggle’s boisterous and colorful character even though he’d be willing to undergo any more bullsquit imaginable if it meant he’d get to spend the rest of his days with the blue buffoon. He doesn’t see him that way, they wouldn’t mesh well together, Goggles deserved to have someone nicer than he was, etc.

This kept going on for a little while, until eventually Aloha finds out—it’s a long story—and accidentally rats Rider out to his sister and momma—that’s an even longer story, and they both enthusiastically try to coerce him into confessing from there.

Aloha: “You should write him a song and play it for him-!”

Rider: “Bitch heeeeell no”

Rider’s mom: “why not make him something? Like bake a cake or a pie for him as a gift”

Rider: “did you forget what happened last time? what happened to having me banned from using the oven???”

This was all meanwhile Goggles was actually having a secondary crisis of his own. Not the extent Rider had, but all through the Turf War and Ranked Battle Tournaments to his journey with Sheldon to find the treasure, he’d been quite distracted needless to say.

Compared to Rider, Goggles was plenty more laid back and wasn’t shy about his sexuality, though he didn’t ever tell anyone his sexual/romantic orientation that much, so it lead to everyone believing that he was a gay squiddo—though he was really bi and had an equal preference for both boys and girls. There’s still not a lot of people who know he’s bi because he never tells anybody, and if he ever does it would be like discovering rare dialogue in a video game. Even though he has little interest in pursuing a love life, he still kinda had some hope in finding that special someone that he would get to spend the rest of his life with. He tried one time with a girl back in Inkopolis plaza (before the events of the manga) but it ended kinda rocky and he kinda tried to distance himself from relationships for a while until he moved on and kinda just went like “if it happens, it happens.”

Again, his crush was more mellow compared to Rider’s, or at least it started out mellow before eventually growing into a deep sweet longing for his companionship. Goggle’s crush started off typical, thinking that Rider was all handsome, strong, total dreamboat kinda guy. After they’d gotten to know each other some more, and upon moving to the Square did Goggles really have a thing for him. Even the rest of the blue team began to notice. His interest in him peaked when Rider stopped him before his battle against Team Emperor and told him “watch the next semi finals match closely. Because you’re gonna be facing against me in the finals.”

Can you tell that these are my favorite panels because ho mine gosh

Goggles wasn’t as insecure as Rider was in terms of self esteem, but he also came up with the thoughts that Rider wouldn’t see him like that, too. He even worried that Rider would’ve been disgusted if he told him 😭. He wanted to at least keep their friendship together so he was just like “I like you a lot and I admire you to no end but I understand that it may never really come to that so I’ll just support you and admire you for all your grace from afar. 😁”

Hope you enjoyed this cuz now I’m eepy and I’m gonna take a nap. I’ve got college now and I didn’t get enough sleep last night because my adhd will never love me.

(Edited a few things in here. Hope you like the changes better!)

[bi-lavelent]

Lone Wolf (Quinn Fabray x Fem-reader part 2)

Warning: Cussing, Bullying, Angst, Fluff

Maybe I realized I needed friends. But I definitely wasn’t gonna join the four weirdos. I wanted to find a club where I wouldn’t be rejected. I went home for the first time in a week. I kept my head down and waited to go to school the next day. As I entered the school. I headed towards the bulletin board to see if there was any clubs that it would be easy to join. But the only two that I saw was the Celibacy club and the Glee club. My Stupid sister was in the Celibacy Club. According to her most of the Cheerios were in it. It would be nice to have a sister hood but maybe a CO-ED team like glee would be great. Also one where I could still hookup with people as it helped me feel wanted.

I skipped a lot of classes like usual. It was Wednesday and I was sat under the bleachers watching the Cheerios practice. Those skirts were extremely sexy. Why couldn’t any of them like a little girl on girl sex here and there.

There was a stupid assembly today. I never bothered to show up to the assembly’s I thought that they were just a waste of time. I sat outside the gymnasium waiting to see if anything important happened. Like it ever would this school was boring as heck. I entered the gymnasium when I heard music I watched as the Glee club embarrassed themselves. Did this school need to talk about sex yes. But also we didn’t need a public display to push it. Those kids needed a role model one that was older than them not that I am much of a role model but I don’t think that those kids care.

I walked up to Mr.Schue after spanish class to talk to him about glee club.

“Hello sir, I was wondering if I could talk to you about auditioning for glee club.” I asked him

“Yeah totally Mrs.Y/L/N. Come to the glee club after school.” Mr.Schue said

I came in after school and sat in the choir room. Mr.Schue was late he was talking to Principal figgins about the assembly incident.

I walked over grabbed a gutair to play well I sang Something About A Woman by Jake Owen

She pulled her hair back to sun her shoulders Took the oil and rubbed it all over her soft skin Oh I'm a lucky man She wasn't wantin' any suntan lines so she Reached back and she untied that little string And then she smiled at me

And blew a kiss right off her fingertips I don't know what it is

But there's something about a woman Yeah some kind sweet little something That I may never understand Yeah some kind of gift they're given That makes this life worth livin' And it makes a man a man Oh there's nothing like that Somethin' about a woman

I sat there for a while and wondered And she took a nap there under that summer sky And then I realized

There are things in life that are meant to be Maybe left a mystery

Yeah like that something about a woman Yeah some kind sweet little something That I may never understand Yeah some kind of gift they're given That makes this life worth livin' And it makes a man a man Oh there's nothing like that Somethin' about a woman

Yeah some kind of gift they're given That makes this life worth livin' And it makes a man a man Oh I'm nothing without that Somethin' about a woman Oh about a woman

The next day I walked into the auditorium and Rachel was trying to seduce Finn and it worked it was funny watching him walk out with his boner showing straight through his pants. It was nice to finally have some dirt on two members of this new club I was in. That way if they did anything wrong to me. I could tell everybody there secret. Although Rachel’s attraction to Finn was obvious everybody in the school knew that she liked him.

I never talked to the school counselor. The last one when I came my freshman year the counselor did not understand what I was going through. Freshman year I got diagnosed with autism. Coach Sylvester found me in the hallway breaking down when i found out. It turns out her sister had Down syndrome. She took me in like I was one of her kids as much as she wanted me to join the Cheerios. She never forced me she just let me be myself and come talk to her when I needed her. But like everything with Sue it was a two way street she wouldn’t do anything if she didn’t get anything in return. Rather my sister knew it or not that’s why she was on the Cheerios.

So When I got called into her office I was expecting it to just be us like usual. Us talking to each other about life and her usual check-in that we had once a month over school. Although when I came in I saw my sister, Brittnay, Quinn and Santana. Apparently they had all signed up for glee to keep Finn away from Rachel. Little did they know that he had already made himself known to Rachel’s tongue. I wasn’t gonna tell them anything. Until Sue told us that we were to destroy glee club. I told Sue that I was gonna help so that I didn’t get in trouble with her; but sue can’t end everything that she doesn’t like I never was gonna help her do anything.

The girls seemed happy to destroy glee club. They seemed like Sue had brainwashed all of them. I bet that they were always this way. Even if my sister hadn’t changed. I guess they were all always bitches. Hot bitches but still. Sue let everyone go.

Sue had me stay behind to make sure I was okay. With the start of senior year. She had started to help me find scholarships last year. Although it was hard when I had no motivation to do anything. It seemed like a normal thing to do at McKinley to not know what college you were going to until four months before graduation. Sue and me had been trying to find a good job for me to do. We had looked into Nursing but all the programs seemed like they were rare to get into. Criminal justice sounded good til I realized that I would have to go into dangerous situations. I might seem tough but I’m actually really soft. We looked into me becoming a pilot something I really liked until we found out that no one with Autism could fly a plane. It’s stupid you would think that they would focus more on other mental illnesses but they didn’t. We came to forensic science last year Sue got in contact with someone she knew to let me shadow one last year. I ended up having nightmares for weeks after. I had no clue what I was gonna do with my life. Sue really encouraged me to graduate but that really depends on how this year goes. I am currently 17 and in June I could make my own decision which could mean not finishing high school. That’s what I was planning to do everyone in the school knew one thing about me and it was that I was a repeating senior next year.

“How you holding up?” She asked

“Good we’ve only been at school for a couple weeks.” I told her

“I’ve looked and you have been missing classes.” She said

“Do you get on your Cheerios like this?” I asked

“Look I’m looking out at what’s best for you” she said

“ I got it figured out.” I told her

“Is that why you’re gonna have to do an extra amount of school.” She told me

“I will start showing up to more classes.” I told her

“Okay, Just know that I’m looking out for you.” She told me

Sue had tried to help me stay out of bullying way the entire time I was at school. We both knew that if I got bullied and people started looking into me they could easily figure out my mental illness. I wouldn’t be able to even show my face at the school. They bully people who don’t even have mental problems. They call them names. If anything could happen if they found out that I had autism.

[fluffypotatey]

Yeah, the Knights of the Round Table are cool, but what about the Squires of the Round Table? I want to know about the pack of hapless adolescents that are supposed to be learning the finer points of knighthood from THEE most chaotic bastards to ever share a braincell.

(Merlin unknowingly becomes, like, the patron saint of squires bc if he can handle Arthur, they can handle their respective masters as well)

no ok i'm in love with this. the squires of the round table is the spin off i didn't know we needed, but by GOD am i glad you told me, anon.

(you are a GEM, anon, i'm in love with you)

the squires for knights are the round table's adopted children. oh, sorry, was that kid the son of such and such??? he's leon's boy now. they all have youngest sibling syndrome so sorry i don't make the rules and yes they do treat merlin like he's a mob wife.

anyway,

these squires would get up to so much shit omfg. if you're the squire to gwaine, have fun upsetting your noble father (because most squires come from the nobility and since arthur took down that rule when he became, then there became this influx of squires who were from the common people) and learning that doing illegal shit is the best thing and you've only tasted a sliver of what gwaine has been doing since he was 13 but you LOVE IT---

squires of sir leon are trained into how to become the mom friend. it's not much, but it's hard work. sometimes the little squires pity their knight because he is not paid enough for for the antics his other knights and king get into ("poetry??? seriously, is that what they told him???" "idk that's roland said" "maybe we should gift him some more moisturizer?"). yes they do treat sir leon with the respect they would give an older cousin.

sir elyan is very new to all this...squire business but he's not one to let his little men (little brothers tbh) be caught slacking. he has them run drills everyday and they complain about it all the time ,but then you'll find them in an empty room perfecting their forms, and making sure it's perfect because sir elyan deserves the best. and he called nathan's form "superb" but nathan's a bitch and you just think that if you get this form right---

elyan teaches his squires moves that were taught to him by tristan and isolde because they totally worked together while elyan was away and he respects them so much and misses them and wonders if they ever got the chance to settle down and breath like they had dreamed

sir percival is second on the list of knights who teaches his squires the more traditional way (first is leon obvi) but that does not mean he let's them fall behind with dirty tricks. listen, this man was friends with lancelot (honorable, noble, dreamed of being a knight since he was prob 15) so he knows the intricacies of knighthood; however, he is also besties with gwaine and elyan both of whom are a chaotic combination if put in the same room. the squires are granted the perfect balance of swishy swordplay and body slamming a bitch. sleeves??? don't know her. the squires beg percival for them to cover their arms and he is offended.

sir lancelot, the epitome of honor and loyalty, is a force to work with. the squires think that he'll be the one whose teaching will lead them far off adventures and gain cool ass scares. lancelot is actually the old coot who grants wisdom like an old man who's lived two lifetimes. his training is unusual but somehow it works. the chores he assigns aren't demeaning, nor are they used as punishment. you are lancelot's squire for a week and you immediately understand that this man is a man who has his heart on his sleeve and you watch as he gazes at the king, the queen, and the manservant. his eyes always fond and full of...something. you are too young to pick up on a deep and unconditional emotion like that. not yet.

[quietbluejay]

Lion Son of the Forest

Iiii've been putting off talking about this one because I didn't like it. I think there's a lot that's good about it, but, the reason I brought up some of my issues with Master of the Maelstrom when they didn't bug me that much then, was that they were a lot more present here and did bother me in Son of the Forest.

I think Brooks is a superb short story writer, but that he's got issues with adapting the short story approach in terms of plot structure to novels, so the novels really read as long short stories.

Anyways. As always, it's just my take.

apparently sometimes you can Just Say No To Chaos For Ten Thousand Years and not be especially strong willed gw have consistency or draw 20 this guy doesn't seem to be getting tempted at all meanwhile his boyfriend is a chaos sorcerer

like the other guy, zabriel, it makes sense, he hasn't been doing anything w.r.t. the warp he's just been running around as a fugitive for 400 years so it makes sense also on a side note REALLY not a fan of how it switches tense and person between POV scenes

me: there should be more renegades who don't turn to chaos this book: has that me: no not like this i…i don't know why i'm not liking it am i just salty because it's not one of my favourite factions? maybe i'm just in a bad mood ….i think i've put my finger on what bothers me about Brooks' writing when he's not a bad writer! i think he's more technically proficient than mcneill or abnett tbh, in a lot of ways but it's…he's writing tie in books for the game that's what these are primarily that's the perspective they're written from which is why they don't have thematic consistency with the other writers maybe not quite the right term but it's like, and i kind of hate using this as an example, but it's like trying to mesh together Sins of the Wreckers and Barber's writing (Transformers, I will elaborate on this for anyone who is curious)

…okay enough meta, I am now understanding why people say Lion is autistic-coded i will also say this, Lion is definitely more of, hm, how to put it more morally upright than Guilliman

like this should be everything i want, it's got forgiveness, renegades, protecting the little people as a first priority…why is it leaving me cold?

i think also because it's standing in stark contrast to the themes of the Ahriman trilogy, or Black Legion it just feels unfair? the whole thing is predicated on there being no good choices but then here it's like "yeah actually these guys went and somehow became unambiguous good guys offscreen problem with chaos what problem with chaos their main issue is being hunted by their loyalist brothers" despite them also starting out from the base state as the "final solution" legion

i will say i do very much vibe with this in theory

okay so like, i will be fair part of the reason most of these guys managed to avoid chaos was because they time travelled to the future and skipped most of the intervening years

im finally getting some resonance here

okay that's a hook

like the whole situation with the Fallen is "stuck as traitors due to tragic misunderstanding" which i mean, that's astraeos but these guy get lucky enough to land in places offscreen where they can become people's protectors? also again, i don't think it really follows from what i saw of the dark angels in 30k but im not a dark angels expert lol and I've only seen a bit of them it just doesn't feel earned

also lion's character arc happened offscreen

i think i'm probably going to have to reread this book in a different mood and see how i feel then

lion has gifted kid syndrome as i suspect all the primarchs do note from future bluejay, as I read this like a month before AE: lol, though I meant it a different way for Perturabo none of them ever had to practice anything so finding something he can't do immediately is very troublesome to deal with lol -_- ahriman: my existence feels pointless and the only thing that keeps me going is the hope that i will be able to make things right zabriel: have you tried meditating it worked for me

this is who Lion is! and now he's changed to this offscreen:

one heck of a nap

also we have our second forehead kiss the subtextual relationship here is probably the most blatant space marine romance i've seen so far like even more so than loken/mersadie oh hey actual acknowledgement that how the imperium treats mutants make them super easily turn to chaos apparently lion can also no-sell magic attacks somehow lol

like the whole tragedy of Guilliman in Dark Imperium is that he is unable to recognize that he's repeating the past and hasn't learned but this kind of seems to be going in the direction of "it's fine as long as he's pointed in the right direction"?

lion is having a two paragraph struggle about "is the emperor actually a god" guilliman divinity wrestling speedrun

like that sounds contrary to what chaos energies actually do but okay mmm, still not a fan of mercy kills especially in this context which is redemption equals death

wait wait lion is being worshipped as a god even if he's not a fan lion: better me than the alternative maybe that's what turned him into a good guy okay this is kind of cool lion is fighting all his brothers i think structurally this should have been at the beginning, though but the book isn't quite over so maybe im wrong expansion: fighting all his brothers and they're poking into his weak spots

>kurze appears out of the shadows >says something cutting >refuses to elaborate >leaves

okay this is fun

like okay i do get that it's not exactly super realistic to expect lion to go "the emperor's entire methodology was completely flawed" but also given the tone of this whole thing i kind of expected it if we were to have any kind of good resolution here

lion: have any of you tried not being doomed by the narrative?

Not a bad way to end it though!

I'll come back to this after I've read Unremembered Empire, maybe, and re-evaluate.

[disorganizedkitten]

This Is The Road To Ruin Chapter One

Harry Potter | 2022 | 6,362 | Ao3 | Masterlist | Next

And We're Starting At The End Magic is real. That's probably supposed to be the most important bit, here, but to Eden's kids that doesn't mean much. There are a lot of magical children without families, just as there are even more nonmagical children without them. Eden's takes them both and tells them to get along, it's probably just genetics. The actual important bit is this: Harry Doe gets his Hogwarts letter on July 24th, 1991. For someone who's birthday is November 11th, 1980, that's a touch odd, but whatever. For someone whose magic doesn't work quite right, that's more odd, but he knows better than to look a gift horse in the mouth. Adapting to a largely new culture, making friends, and spontaneously bleeding whenever he's around a specific professor? Yeah, so there's a Reason Florine didn't think he'd make it to Hogwarts. Still, he's gonna make the best of it; even if that means ignoring That Weird Potter Kid, befriending the Obviously Raised By A Serial Killer Dormmate, and joining a conspiracy labelled 'blue and yellow make green for a reason, children'.

24/7/91

 Harry got his Hogwarts letter today! He was so happy about it. I am too. We haven’t been able to tell Clemencia yet, but everyone else knows. Aletris is already teasing him about his future house, although Hana’s reactions make me think he’s not remembering them right. Or maybe she’s just teasing; I don’t remember them either. They’re not important, so long as he makes friends and feels comfortable.

 Ravenclaw is the perfect place for the girls, so I can only hope Harry goes to one perfect for him.

 ... don’t tell Harry, but I was a little worried he wouldn’t get one. And it’s a year early, that worries me. We’re not going to edit the birth certificate, but if magic reads his birthday as before September first, that opens a whole new set of opportunities for his birth family. I don’t want them to find him, but we’ve had this conversation before.

 I was worried that his shapeshifting was going to be like Tansy’s smoke, a sign that something was supremely wrong and the wizarding world didn’t want him either.

I might be jealous, but only a little bit. I don’t want to know what would’ve happened if they were successful.

 Anyway, we’re picking up Clem first thing tomorrow morning, and heading off to Diagon Alley! Hana says that she has most of the third year booklist too, so we can get their supplies all at once, and send someone for the final things in August. Aletris-

***

 Minerva McGonagall, Transfiguration Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, hummed as she looked at the unfortunately familiar building. Eden’s was painted on the little picket sign in the front yard, with a tree curving up over the word and an apple leaf instead of an apostrophe. Despite the sadness implicit in this place, she forced her thoughts to warm, considering the letter in her pocket.

 It was a familiar name, which made the trek to this place simultaneously more and less depressing.

 She entered the gate, looking warmly over the well-used yard. There were kids playing in a sprinkler on one side, and she waved when one of them caught her eye. That set off a chain reaction of kids waving, which made Minerva smile. How cute.

 She rapped sharply on the door, as was her custom, and was let in by the Matron of this not-orphanage. Minerva had called it an orphanage once and was promptly treated to a lecture about how orphanages were dead.

 “Hey,” she said with an easy smile. Mrs. Konstantina Calmiris was also a widow, and Minerva was relatively sure they had almost been in the same year, or would have been had Konstantina had magic. She was stout and kind, with graying blonde hair and blue/hazel heterochromia. As Minerva had heard it, Mrs. Calmiris had started the group home out of a severe case of empty-nester’s syndrome after her child had run off to the circus with her full approval.

 She also, oddly enough, had quite the knowledge of magic. Minerva had considered sending an Obliviator after her, but decided that it was justified as Mrs. Calmiris was essentially the single parent of fifteen kids. And with the number of muggleborns Minerva had delivered letters to either in this building or who had come back to this building at some point in summer, obliviating her would have been more work than it was worth anyway.

 “Good Morning, Mrs. Calmiris,” Minerva returned, just as warmly.

 “Is that Professor McGonagall?”

 Mrs. Calmiris grinned impishly and shouted down the hallway. “Yes, actually!”

 There was an excited yell, and one of her sixth-year lions came scrambling out of the drawing room. Jeanette Scott. “Awesome! Professor, I had a question about the Fawcett principle; it said in chapter seven that all transfigurations are finite and will fade, depending on the amount of magic put into it, right? But then what about magically transfigured houses? By all accounts they should fall, making it a completely illegal and unsafe building practice!”

 “The key to that, Miss Scott, is the materials. If you transfigured the shape of wood, but not the amount, the transfiguration doesn’t fade because there’s no extra energy there. The same cannot be said of turning your teacup into a kitten; not only do you change the mass, you change the properties.”

 “Huh,” Scott said. “Thanks, Professor. Are you here for Harry?”

 “Likely,” Minerva hummed. “Harry Doe?”

 “That’s the one. I’ll go get him.” Jeanette ducked outside.

 Mrs. Calmiris led her to the same office she had used every other time – Konstantina didn’t allow strangers, especially adults, into her children’s rooms, ever. It had been a fight the first time Minerva came to Eden’s, nine years ago.

 Minerva took her seat with grace. They existed in silence, Konstantina digging through her papers from behind her desk. “July thirty-first,” she murmured, nose in her pocket calendar.

 Minerva hummed inquiringly.

 Konstantina glanced up and shot her a tight smile, before putting a note in one of her many, many files. “You deliver letters exactly a week before birthdays, correct?”

 “Yes,” Minerva agreed.

 There was a knock on the door, and then a child popped their head in. “Jeanie said I was needed, Tanti?”

 “Yeah, come on in, Hawthorne.”

 Hadn’t they said Harry?

 He came in all the way and closed the door; after a quick glance at the other chair in the office, he hopped onto a clear corner of the desk instead. Minerva tried in vain to smother her smile as he looked at her, feet kicking. He was surprisingly pale for a child so late in summer, with just the touches of a sunburn across his nose and arms, wet, dark hair plastered to his forehead, and slightly disturbing eyes. They were bright green, as though someone had caught the killing curse in marbles and stuck them in. There was a pang of sadness as she pushed away a niggling sense of recognition; there had been too many orphans made of the last war, orphans whose parents she’d taught or fought with personally.

 “Are you Mr. H. Doe, of the Mint Room?”

 “Yep. Hawthorne Doe, nice to meet you.”

 “You as well,” she said warmly. As likely as it was that he already knew of magic, she still looked forward to explaining. “I’m Professor McGonagall, of Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry.”

 As she spoke, a look of excited awe dawned over Doe’s face. “Is this- do you- I thought not until next year?”

 And oh, Minerva realized with a pang. The poor child didn’t even know his own birthday. “No, Mr. Doe. We’d love to see you on September first.” She offered the letter, green ink glimmering in the office’s light.

 He took it reverently, smoothing out the folds gently. “You’re sure I’m supposed to go?"

 “The magic is never wrong, Mr. Doe. You’re part of the 1991 intake.”

 She watched happily as a smile slid over his face, and he turned to look at Mrs. Calmiris. “Can I go tell the others?”

 “Pack your bag for the weekend, and I’ll take you over.”

 His smile managed to get brighter. “Thank you! And you, Professor!” he added, turning to her. “Do I need to pen a formal acceptance?”

 “Merely say you’ll be there on September first, Mr. Doe, and it’ll be official.”

 He nodded. “I’m absolutely going to be at Hogwarts September first.”

 “Good, now, before I let you go-“ she made sure to stress the statute of secrecy, knowing it would likely be ignored anyway and not caring as much as she likely should, and also handed him a card for the Hogwarts Stipend. “Present this to the Goblins at Gringotts, and it should cover most if not all of your supplies.”

 Mrs. Calmiris didn’t even try to argue this time; the first few, she had, because apparently the muggle government gave her a stipend per child that she would gladly use to cover the expenses, but Minerva had talked her into it the second summer, after Konstantina had met her fuming about the home that one of her kids had been in for the first half of the summer. Minerva convinced her that even if she covered their expenses while she watched them, the money could be put into savings accounts and be there for an emergency, or, if all went well, be used to buy friends Christmas presents. 

***

 Tanti, as Mrs. Calmiris preferred her kids to call her (because it sounded like tante and Mrs. Calmiris was nothing if not in love with languages) was the best, for a multitude of reasons, but the most common one was that she got it. She’d had many kids throughout her years, and she understood and noticed that some of them got more attached than others did. She put in the work to make sure that they stayed in contact, if not outright together, which had been Harry’s saving grace when he was seven. Jacinta had moved out as soon as she was eighteen, moving in with Aletris and Florine instead. As she’d raised him up until that point, it was a big change. He shuddered to think of how bad his abandonment issues would be if he hadn’t been allowed to visit.

 Tanti made him promise to have one of them call her if he wasn’t coming home tomorrow night (he kindly didn’t tell her that this apartment was more home than Eden’s nowadays) before leaving him at the bottom of their building, secure in the knowledge that he’d be okay.

 With his siblings, what else could he be? He made his way upstairs to their apartment, and opened the door with a grin, catching sight of his favorite sister right away.

“Jacinta! Guys, guess what?”

 “Celosia’s food arrived?” Jacinta asked, only half serious. Or so Harry hoped. She was reading A Dramatic Retelling Of The Midnight Ride , the cover done mostly in bright blues and yellows reminiscent of a Van Gogh painting.

 "Not yet," Harry said, kicking the door closed and dropping his suitcase in the tiny entryway. "Are you running low?"

 He hoped not, but he couldn't remember the last time they had gotten food. He could talk them into swinging by the pet store when they go to Diagon Alley, though.

 "No," Jacinta said. "He's just whiny."

 Harry ducked his head, hiding a fond smile she wouldn’t see anyway, and darted into the little living room.

 The Garden Apartment was small, with only two bedrooms, one bath, and a kitchen-dining-living room that bled together. It could, generously, be called an open floor plan, with the kitchen and dining room each taking up a quarter of the floor, separated by a counter, while the other half had stained beige carpet and was their living room, denoted by the blue tie-dye sofa and large, glass windows. And the snake cage, with a heavy heat lamp and brightly colored serpent inside. "Celosia!"

 "Two-leaf!" The snake said, rearing up happily. "Smoke-nestmate is a wonderful hunter, you should let her teach you!"

  "She is," Harry agreed, a little uncomfortable. Florine's 'hunting' was… not something they talked about. "How are you?" He reached down, and Celosia wrapped around his wrist.

  Celosia began to regale him with tales of sneaking around the kitchen to try and eat a raw egg without Aletris catching him.

 Celosia was a blue coral snake, scales done primarily in dark blue, but with a pillar box red head and tail, and two light blue stripes connecting them.

 Harry carried Celosia over and leaned on Jacinta's back. "You didn't guess my news."

 Jacinta went stiff for half a second. Harry pressed harder into her side. Jacinta took a deep breath, and when she spoke next it was a little warmer, a little more excited. "Are you going to Hogwarts?"

 "I'm going to Hogwarts!" Harry agreed, vibrating.

 She leaned back into him, catching his head in a one-armed hug. "I'm proud of you."

 "Thank you," Harry said softly. "Do you know where the others are?"

 She nodded, twisting off her chair. "Aletris and Tansy are shopping, Clem's at work, and Hana's been practicing for her marathon. Clemsr's still with the Gibsons, so she won't be here for dinner but I'll get Hana."

 Jacinta Pérez was an odd woman, but Harry wouldn't trade her for the world. Aside from her latent ability to locate her family, she was also an absolute flower nerd - specifically, their meanings. Thus, everyone but Harry had a matching nickname, and his wasn't flower related only because Jacinta had been able to give him a flower as his legal name.

 Hawthorns were a flower of love and protection. Tansys were violent, a declaration of war . Edelweiss was for courage, devotion and loyalty. Salvia for connections, thinking of you. Heliotrope for ambition, Cornflower a good luck charm.

 (Harry meant ruler. Florine meant flower. Aletris meant corn grinder. Jacinta for beautiful, drawn from the Greek Hyacinth. Hana meant happiness, drawn from another flower. Clemencia meant merciful.)  

 "Well," Jacinta said, letting him bring her to the living room. "Tell me all about it!"

 He grinned, sat down beside her, and started talking.

 ***

 "Florine!"

 "Why is there screaming?" His eldest sister asked, half-materializing in the kitchen. The smoke of her form moved back and forth over brown skin, solidifying into groceries every time more wrapped around her hand. Florine Dupont and Jacinta Peréz could easily be mistaken for biological siblings, something they’d taken advantage of many times; both had brown skin and dark hair; black in Florine’s case, and brown in Jacinta’s. Florine’s eyes were hazel, when they weren’t a surprisingly demonic white.

 "Harry reached a milestone ," Jacinta sung proudly, leisurely following his mad dash to the kitchen.

 Harry slammed into her middle, not minding the freezing mist that danced around them both. "I'm going to Hogwarts!"

 "You're- Harry that's great!" There was a clatter as she dropped the rest of the groceries and scooped him up. There was the vicious feeling of too-hot too-cold not-there and then they were in the living room and she was cupping his face, brown eyes jubilant. Harry grinned back at her.

 "I know!"

 There were things they didn't talk about with the other witches in the family, like the fact that neither of their magic worked quite right. Harry hadn't expected a letter, even though Jacinta told him to keep his hopes up. (He told himself he would be okay if it never came, but he'd been dreading next summer - dreading the confirmation he was a freak, even among magicals.)

 Hot-cold fingers brushed away the tears he hadn't noticed were welling up. "You're going to be amazing," she murmured softly.

 "They're going to think I'm weird," he whispered back.

 "Pity them," Florine said seriously. "If they're so closed minded to care, they're not worth it anyway."

 He nodded, and dangit, he wasn't supposed to cry, this is a good thing, it's just-

 It's just-

 (Jacinta never said she was magical, but Harry will eat his own hand if Seeing isn't a magical gift. Florine has always been magical but people are scared of her, call her a monster, a killer, and they're not wrong. Harry was magical from the moment they met him, a screaming child who couldn't stop changing his face, his limbs, who made Jacinta taste blood the first time she held him.)

 (Hana and Clemencia never talk about that, never get odd, awed or disgusted looks just from using their magic.)

 It's just a lot.

 Florine kept brushing away his tears as they came faster, to the background noise of Jacinta putting away groceries.

 He's going to Hogwarts.

 He's going to Hogwarts!

 It feels surreal. 

***

 Aletris didn't trip on the bags at the door only due to his wonderful ability to walk blind. He stepped over and took in the scene in moments. Jacinta was putting away groceries, singing louder than usual. Florine was in the living room, for a given value of in, considering the amount of smoke bleeding off her into the air, wrapped around with Hawthorne.

 He left them to it, instead helping Jacinta. She didn't look at him for long, but she greeted him by bumping into him. He bumped back, and when her singing stuttered a few minutes later, started a new beat.

 She sang along.

***

 Clemencia grabbed for the nearest hand, looking in horror at the crowded interior of the Leaky Cauldron. How the heck did it manage to get more crowded than when booklists came?

 "Looks like we're aiming to be done before lunch," Aletris said, on the other side of Harry. Florine was after him, fingers curled into his sleeve, with Jacinta looped tightly at the elbow and keeping up a running commentary in Sign Language. Hana brought up the rear, wand in her teeth. She wasn't hanging on yet.

 Clemencia groaned.

 Hana shook her head. "Just- let's do this fast."

 Clemencia took off through the crowd to the back alley. The tavern was hidden with repelling charms, strong enough that Aletris always closed his eyes and let them guide him in to avoid a debilitating headache. Once inside, the entrance to the actual shopping district was down a dingy hallway, back outside to a group of rubbish bins and a blank brick wall. She wasn't sure why there were so many layers of concealment on the shopping district, but it did give her a chance to stop and look back at her littlest brother. "Ready for this, Haz?"

 Harry nodded at her.

 She slipped her wand out of the pocket she'd sewn into her sleeve, and reached up to tap the proper brick. Edge of the gray rubbish bin, five up, seven left, and a double tap.

***

 Harry gasped. It wasn't… it wasn't a new sight, not really, but somehow it felt like one.

 Maybe because this was the first time he was going as a student.

 Usually by now one of them had pushed forward, but it seemed everyone was waiting for Harry to lead the way. He didn’t move. The alley was bright and casually magical, with storefronts whose letters moved and displays that flickered with enchantments to mimic screens; the people were a hodgepodge of not-quite-Victorian dress and robes, with various headwear that Harry found himself cooing over and side-eyeing in turns.

 And yet, despite the familiar sight, despite the support at his back, he wasn’t moving. Someone slipped their hand back into his, squeezing. Harry closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He squeezed Florine’s hand in return, and then glanced up at her. “Can we skip the threshold?”

 “Sure.”

 There was the uncomfortable feeling of his skin ripping apart, the rush of tripping into snow or a cold river, of standing too close to a fire, frostbite and freezer burn, and then he inhaled sharply as his lungs reformed. Florine had reformed them in the same positions, so Harry tugged her arm up so he could spin in and curl up; Aletris' swing dancing lessons had been passed on and reappropriated. She moved with him, pressing him to her side.

 "Come on," Jacinta said from behind, skittering her fingers up his shoulder blade. "Your friends are waiting."

 And, like he always had and always would, Harry believed her.

 He shifted so he wasn't leaning quite so much weight onto Florine's side, and as a unit, they stepped forward.

***

 "It wasn't this crowded last time," Harry said, looking at the lines inside the bank apprehensively. Jacinta had linked elbows with him as they climbed the stairs, and was now building a twelve string leaf pattern bookmark.

 "No, it wasn't," Clemencia agreed, eyeing the crowds both inside and out with distaste. “We usually come early so we avoid the letters crowd, I wonder what’s going on?”

 “I haven’t seen signs for any sales or book signings,” Hana said. “Maybe it’s a holiday?”

 “I don’t remember any holidays in July, but I guess it’s possible.”

 “Wasn’t there something about celebrating some famous kid’s birthday last year?” Aletris asked.

 Hana hummed. “That’s possible, if ridiculous.” She leaned forward and hugged Aletris, before opening one of the large doors for her family. Florine didn’t try to enter this time, just squeezed Harry’s hand before stepping back, fully solid. Aletris stayed out with her. Harry watched as the Goblin Guard’s dark eyes followed Florine until she was off their property, which began at the large marble steps.

 Jacinta led them to a line, still focusing on her bookmark.

 Harry leaned into her side and looked around. This wasn’t the first time he’d visited Gringotts Wizarding Bank (and every time he wondered at the name; the bank was run by Goblins, so why was it called the wizarding bank? Is there another branch for Centaurs and Werewolves? He’d been trying to find Gringotts Muggling Bank for three years and thus far had failed miserably) but Harry still found the architecture awe-inspiring. It felt like stepping into an ancient cathedral, the ones that featured in books on Renaissance art and stained glass history, if cathedrals were done out of brilliant white stone instead of deep wood.

 There were golden arches and inlays, patterned in such a way that Harry was sure they were some sort of hieroglyph, a tall domed ceiling, and no visible light fixtures. The desks lined the walls closest to the door, leaving the open floor for wizards to stand in twisty lines and walk around each other.

 Sadly, there weren’t any stained glass inlays. Harry didn’t know much about wizarding history, but he’s sure that anything important enough to become a stained glass window would be fascinating.

 Hana and Clem had moved on in conversation, talking about book lists and wondering if this year would be the year they’d get a decent Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. Harry enjoyed people watching instead.

 Some of the wixen were polite to the Goblins, some were sneering, some looked annoyed, and then there were the ones that looked scared. Harry couldn’t blame them that much; Goblins had little, dark eyes like guinea pigs, shark sharp teeth, and leathery, komodo dragon skin; if komodo dragons came in brown and gold. All in all, they were intimidating when you first met them, but it hadn’t taken Harry long to realize they were pretty chill. Loved money, loved weapons, loved to see who could make more interesting threats (Harry had gotten a lot of points for ‘by the time I’m done you won’t have enough soul to reincarnate into a flobberworm’, which he was quite proud of. Even if he hadn’t known until then that souls were real, and could be affected by magic), didn’t like people, and didn’t like threats to their safety.

 Hence why Florine had a permanent ban, despite never even misting inside the building. Apparently they could recognize what she was, and didn’t want to risk that in their tunnels.

 And even then, they hadn’t been horrible, once they got past the whole ‘ax at her throat bit’. (The ax did not survive the encounter. Florine did.)

 Aletris called it Orange-Blue Morality. Florine said Black-White Morality was boring anyway.

 “But are you sure he’ll still be using Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them?” Hana said. “The upper years keep expecting him to die over the summer, we might not even get Kettleburn.”

 Textbook lists often didn't go out until August, or at the very least later in July, which led to a mob nearly as bad as Boxing Day sales caused. The Ravenclaws had teamed up to ensure they could go shopping whenever (not very many of them liked crowds, which Hawthorne could understand) by talking to upper years and the teachers. Except for Defense Against the Dark Arts, they had a margin of 89% success for getting the right books by passing down old booklists, and that was just because no DADA teacher seemed capable of staying more than a year.

 “That one’s on my list,” Harry said.

 His sisters turned to look at him, then shot each other questioning looks. “Really?” Clem said. “I wonder who’d be using it.”

 “Isn’t DADA supposed to cover creatures at some point?” Hana asked.

 “Oh thank goodness, we will have a good teacher this year.”

 Harry stifled his giggles, glancing at them in open adoration.

 Clemencia Doe was a thirteen year old witch, with white skin and Robin's-egg-blue tips dyed through her short black hair. Her eyes were also blue, although they were river-dark and could easily be mistaken for hazel. She was older of the 'twins', and had a tendency to force situations to work out in her favor, no matter how unusual or unlikely.

 Hana Griffiths was younger by four months and not afraid to start a fight. Her best friend outside of the Garden was a Hufflepuff, which explained a lot. She too was white, with dark brown hair she kept longer than her sister's, at mid-bicep. Currently it was loose, brushing her shoulder blades. Hana's eyes were also blue, but a much brighter, clearer shade.

 Jacinta, turning twenty-one in two months, was eight years older, with fathomless black eyes that would glow blue when Something Was Happening, brown skin, and darker brown hair, cut to her elbows. Playing with it was another of her coping methods, as was letting her siblings do the same.

 Then of course, there was Harry himself. He could whine about how there were no mirrors in Gringotts, but he didn’t need a mirror to know exactly what he looked like at any given point. Harry’s… abnormality was that he could shapeshift. He had a form for each of his siblings, whenever he wanted to feel biologically theirs, and he had his own face. Black hair that curled, pale skin, and bright green eyes. Long fingers, a flat nose, none of Aletris’ freckles or Jacinta’s moles. Although he’d dimmed his eyes today, from smooth greensnake to a muted swamp that made him look more like Clemencia.

 Clemencia and he still looked like biological siblings when he was himself, and sometimes he imagined they’d have been cousins had their parents not died.

 They were still debating whether or not it was worth it to go off last year’s third-year booklist when they reached a teller. Like most tellers at Gringotts, he was a Goblin. It was a Goblin run bank, so it made sense that Human employees were few and far between.

 "We have three for the Hogwarts vault," Hana said, looking up. Despite Goblins being short, they set up their desks tall enough they could look down on most, if not all wizards. The teller sneered down at her.

 "Keys?"

 They handed their key cards over together, and after a moment of silent inspection, were told everything was 'in order'. The teller called over another Goblin, ("Griphook!") and Jacinta unhooked her elbows and waved them off with a kiss each.

 "And you?" The Goblin asked.

 Harry didn’t hear Jacinta’s response, but having stayed with her the last two years he knew she had just silently offered up her own key.

 “Boneclaw! Take Ms. Rosier to her vault.”

 He pretended the tick in his jaw was because he was going into the tunnel system for the first time. Which, to be fair, he was a little nervous. Aletris had gladly stayed out with Florine after saying the carts put him off rollercoasters forever.

 On the other hand, Clemencia said it was the most fun of any Diagon trip.

 They ended up piling into a minecart, of all things, and setting off down a set of dark railroad tracks.

 It was terrifying, and fun. Harry was absolutely joining Clemencia's camp.

 Unlike the glowing marble in the main room, the tunnels were lit with lanterns that became orange blurs as the cart picked up speed, pointing downhill. Harry forced himself to look as well as he could, keeping track of their turns just because he could. Many of the turns were jerky, or fake-outs, which were terrifying, and he wasn’t sure if Hana would be able to hear when they finished.

 The tunnels, too, were rough-hewn and in some places it looked more like they were going through wide, dark caverns, full of stalagmites and stalactites and some things that looked like actual jewels. Did the goblins use these tunnels as a proper mine? Did they have canaries?

…was there a spell to use so they wouldn’t need a canary to ensure the mine was safe?

 Harry was still wondering about that when they reached the Hogwarts Vault. Harry had to lean on his sister because his legs were shaky, which was ridiculous because he hadn’t even used them!

 Bodies are weird.

 “How do you remember which is a stalactite versus a stalagmite?” He asked, watching Griphook stroke a finger down the side of the vault door frame.

 It was Hana who answered. “There’s a rhyme. I think it’s… the ones on the ceiling have to hold tight so they don’t touch the floor, and the ones on the ground might reach the ceiling?"

 “That sounds right,” Clemencia agreed. “I learned it as stalactites have a C for ceiling, and Stalagmites have a G for ground.”

 The door shuddered, and then melted away. That looked so cool. Harry wondered if they taught that to the other bankers, because he definitely wanted to learn.

 “Come on,” Clem said, leading the way. “I want to stay for dinner.”

 Harry frowned, but stood up and followed. Clemencia’s current foster family had a curfew, which was fine, and logical, except it was eight in the evening and meant Clemencia barely got to spend time with them.

 The vault was tidy, a room carved from stone with layers and layers of little bags hanging from hooks along the walls. They looked like red velvet, with little golden drawstrings. Hana grabbed one for both of them before dropping cross-legged on the floor to ‘key’ it.

 Harry fiddled with his, watching as she used her wand to make her finger bleed, before smearing it down the drawstring. The rope didn’t glow, as he half-expected it to; instead, Hana’s blood flashed spring green before vanishing.

 “Do you want help with yours?” Hana asked. Harry caught a flash of blue out of the corner of his eye and knew Clemencia had done the same thing.

 “What does it do?” He asked, even as he held out his hand for her to poke.

 “It’s a blood based enchantment, makes it so no one else can open it.”

 Harry paused. “Maybe I shouldn’t.”

 Hana opened her mouth, but something in his face made her think twice. She murmured a quick spell to heal both their fingers, and handed him hers. “Here, shift and see if you can get in.”

 Two years ago, Jacinta had taken a pre-med class and part of it was learning how to test blood types. Harry’s had changed based on how deeply he shifted into someone else - and, once he’d learned how to do it to just his blood, as he chose.

 He didn’t normally think too deeply about it, just accepted that it took more work to shift into a deep copy of Aletris than it did any of his sisters. He wasn’t sure why, considering it took more shifting of organs to truly copy any of them, but more often coloring was enough so it wasn’t like it bothered him.

 Harry closed his eyes, felt the change wash over him like a wave of warmth, settling into the feel of Hana Griffiths. Hana felt like sunburns, like standing in a windy meadow and knowing it won’t last. She smelled like vanilla flowers and heliotrope, the same thing Jacinta Saw but could never explain. He felt his hair lengthen and smooth, the weight falling differently. He felt his organs rearrange, his limbs grow. When he pulled, the bag opened halfway before stopping.

 He handed it back to her. Clem stopped beside them, looking down in concern. “Everything okay?”

 “I’m scared it’ll lock on me,” Harry admitted, falling into his ‘default’ skin in a rush of relaxing muscles and cracking bones. He didn’t like growing his limbs, it always left him awkward and uncoordinated,

 The vaguely painful heat on his skin faded, the damp smell of the cavern replacing immaterial winds and flowers.

 “Just do it as yourself,” Clem said warmly. “You’re you, Harry, no matter what your face looks like or your blood reads. And if it does mess with it, just use your own face.” Clemencia wasn’t a seer, but sometimes it seemed like the universe answered to her, instead of the other way around. Thus, he believed her.

 He grinned up at Clemencia, and closed his eyes, making sure he was himself, completely comfortable in his skin. It felt like flopping into bed, comfortable and safe, warm and unequivocally his.

 Hawthorne Doe was a ten year old with glowing eyes and skin that didn’t break, he could talk to snakes and steal faces like a fae left behind. He was young and hopeful and loved with his whole soul, he had nightmares that felt more like memories and he was raised by traumatized pre-teens. He was an orphan and despite that fact had a family he would fight for. His magic smelled like lightning and cold metal, felt like granite and silk.

 When he opened his eyes, they were glowing bright enough he could see light reflected on the backs of his hands.

 He reached out, let Hana cut his finger and keyed himself into the bag before shifting his skin back over the cut, healing it prematurely. Clemencia helped them both up, before leading them out and to the minecart.

 The ride back up was just as fast, even without gravity adding momentum. Harry hid his face in Hana’s back because the air was cold, and he wanted to.

 They quite literally stumbled back into the light, not taking nearly enough time to readjust their eyes, and ducked outside to wait on the steps for Jacinta. The sunlight on the marble hurt, especially since they’d just been underground instead of in the equally-bright lobby.

 Jacinta was already outside, sitting a few stairs below the Goblin guards and drawing, singing under her breath. Harry flopped down beside her, leaned into her side as he absently shifted. His second favorite form was the one that looked like her biological brother, with brown skin and shorter, fluffier hair, although he never tried to match her eyes. His own were plenty unusual, thank you.

 “Just a second,” she hummed, leaning back into him. “Where to first?”

 Clemencia grimaced, looking out at the crowds that had not lightened in the slightest. Harry had never seen the alley this crowded. “It looks like there’s less people around the offshoots, maybe it’d be best to duck to Knockturn first.”

 “You just want your books,” Hana accused lightheartedly.

 Her sister stuck her tongue out, leaning heavily on her. “Or maybe I want to convert Harry to the side of antique books.”

 “I’d read them if I weren’t afraid of them falling apart in my hands!”

  “Sure.”

 “What’s on your list, Hawthorne?” Jacinta asked softly. Harry pulled it out of his bag, and spread it on his knee.

 The supply list was separated into three easy sections; Uniform, Books, and Other Supplies.

 “Three ‘plain work robes’ in black, a black hat, probably the cliche one some of them-” he gestured to the throng below, “-are wearing. Protective gloves?”

 “For herbology,” Clemencia said. “Lots of magical plants are worse than poison ivy and stinging nettles. And that’s without touching anything with thorns or teeth.”

 Harry stared. “The plants have teeth?”  

 “Sometimes.”

 How had he not heard of this yet? Were they going to get a biting plant for the apartment? …actually, that didn’t sound like such a terrible idea.

 “Anything else?” Jacinta asked distractedly. She was hunched over her drawing, adding more details to someone’s hair.

 “A winter cloak. And nametags, but I’m not sure if those’ll be here.”

 She hummed.

 “Then there’s books, a wand, a pewter cauldron, glass phials, an 'astronomy starter's set', brass scales, and a pet. Cat, toad, or owl.”

 “You can probably sneak Celosia in,” Clemencia said. “One of my yearmates said he was gonna get a tarantula this year, and I know an upper year with a pet rat, plus the four prefects with ferrets. I’m sure nobody will care so long as he behaves himself.”

 “Celosia always behaves himself,” Harry said, mock-indignantly. “Do we need our own Potions ingredients?”

 “If you want to practice outside of class, yes, but wait till we get there. If you decide extra practice is good we’ll hook you up with the smugglers,” Hana said.

 “They’re almost here,” Jacinta said.

 “It might be worth getting your wand first,” Clemencia offered, leaning bracingly on his shoulder. “That’s- that’s a pretty great feeling.”

 Harry’s answer was cut off by a familiar voice shouting. “Harry! Heliotrope! Salvia! Cornflower!”

 “Over here!” Clem called back, jumping up to wave like a maniac.

 Harry didn’t look up, but he wondered if Florine had dissolved. She could carry most of them when she discorporated to travel, but Aletris always had bad reactions. She’d have to either leave him behind or run loops, if she did.

 Jacinta was drawing what looked like a framed photograph, one of the ones with an ornate, oddly shaped frame. It almost looked like a Victorian standing mirror, with the sheen over some of the faces and the curls and spires at the top.

 He finally looked up when Hana yelled too.

 “Tansy!”

 Florine did flicker then, just dust for the last few steps. “Ready to go?”

 Harry smiled widely up at her, ignoring that they hadn’t actually picked a destination. “Absolutely! Where are we going?”

 She and Aletris shared a look that screamed conspirator, and she offered him her hand, palm up. Celosia, curled around her wrist, looked up and scented him. “Want to go and see the magic snakes?”

 The answer was, obviously, absolutely.

[lynne-monstr]

hi blog, it's friday! having a bit of an admin day at work, which is both a little relaxing (can't get pulled in to too many meetings because i am shifting everything to a new computer) but also annoying (I have to set up everything again ughhh)

last night i started watching doctor slump, which is really cute and i loved the first 2 episodes so far. thought tbh i could do without the flashbacks as i don't really think they are necessary to the story.

but oof i got punched in the face by that show. because of the bit about, yeah you can grow up as an exceptional student and you think you're going to become an exceptional adult. but the real world doesn't work by giving tests and grades.

i remember the first time i realized in school that at the end of the semester, some people went to the professor to negotiate their final grade. and i remember kind of looking down on that because I always did well on my exams and assignments. but the joke's on me because that's how the world works. people don't just give you things when you do a good job, you have to demand it and fight for it or you're stuck getting 0.5% raises for the rest of your life.

anyway, that got away from me. don't get me started on my half-assed theory that a lot of "gifted kid syndrome" is really the culture shock of discovering that the things that made you successful in school, the things you were valued and praised for, only partially apply in real life.

on the fandom front, I'm still picking away at this fic i'm revamping from a tumblr ramble! if i don't get caught in an editing spiral, maybe i'll post it this weekend!

I hope everyone has a good day!

[thecoolerliauditore]

I know I don't deserve another response from you, so just ignore this if you want. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have sent that message. I appreciate the kindness you gave me that I don't really deserve.

Honestly... I just can't believe that artists don't have a knack to start with. Because I've always had a knack for anything I'm good at, like math. I never really had to put effort into learning math. And even the things that I'm good at that did take effort I still had a knack at the beginning. I'm not trying to downplay artists' effort, I know it does take effort, but I don't think you can just start from 0. Or at least, I can't. So I'm not making that conclusion just on other people's art but also in other things I'm good at.

By the way, I'm not the person who sent the "life is unfair" ask, but I was already feeling negative and saw Struda's response and I reacted even worse.

My life's going pretty well all things considered, and I'm going to a good college to study some STEM related stuff. In the background I've struggled with this desire to be creative, though, and I'm trying to stifle that desire but it's not working, and no one really seems to have tutorials on how to get rid of that desire. I have a therapist and parents I could talk to, but doing so didn't help, either, because they don't understand what I'm trying to say.

I'm sorry also that it came off as guilt trippy. I'm really bad with managing my tone, especially when I'm feeling like this. I don't mean that as an excuse but as an explanation.

nah this is way more like it, i think we all need a bit of practice online with talking to each other like actual human beings and not text boxes to write ur entire internal monologue into 👍

happy to hear your life is going okay! If anything I'm just glad you're an adult who can reflect on yourself enough to recognize what you were doing was not great. I was trying to keep things vague as possible because, again, idk you and you could've been a 13 year old with no allowance for all i know lol.

i've noticed alot of beginner artists tend to have this.. all or nothing mindset? i don't really understand the desire to stifle your need to create. like. are you not allowed to have a hobby lol. amateur means to love yada yada. especially if you're not trying to make a living out of it where's the rush 😭😭

Going to link this marco bucci video again because even tho it's long it's probably one of the most eye-opening things I've ever watched in terms of his view on talent, gifted kid syndrome, etc.

I used to say I had a 'knack' for art tbh. then i realised i.. really didn't? i just drew more than the other kids in my class because i didn't like sports or maths and got the reputation for being "the art kid". funnily enough i was also into creative writing and history but no one looks at reciting historical facts like they do with drawing 🤷‍♂️

it wasn't til i was in a course with other artists everywhere when I realised just how not-talented i really was. and thats fine cus none of us really were. some of us were just better at learning than others (which is a trained skill in of itself) and that's about it. 👍

if it helps at all, I have gotten into sports recently despite being useless at it all my life and have realised that it was more that I just needed an environment to flourish in instead of any problem with my athleticism itself (which is STILL BAD don't get me wrong but im not hopeless like my gym teachers thought i was 😭😭). so maybe what u need is just the right people? try finding an online artist community that you fit in, make some friends, and just chill with them while making art together?

again i dunno you so idk what would work lmao

so uh yeah 👍

[dulcewrites]

Aemond and Aegon’s talk and him threatening Aemond 😭. Love you bby girl but you ain’t winning that fight. It’s the the thought that counts tho 😔. Also him entering aemond room despite his protest 💀.

Aegon gifting her a necklace (I think) and him getting all shy about it 😭. What’s sad is Aemond probably never gifted her something during their entire marriage, he probably thinks the kids are a good enough gift 💀. Don’t get me wrong I love the kids, but it’d be nice to receive something like some flowers or jewelry, maybe even your favorite book. The reader better then me I would have taken Aegon’s gift 😭.

Her and Helana talk about being queen and ruling the kingdom. Also I noticed that line about the reader mentioning how Rhaenrya was know for her beauty and never her politics and smarts 😭. She’s not wrong tho. Nrya was never taught how to rule properly 💀.

Aemond talking about how pretty the reader looks and noticing how tried she looks(like I wonder who’s the cause of that 🙄). Like I know he doesn’t love her but they way he talks about her and how he finds her beautiful and smart would have me fooled 💀. Wonder if he got little heart palpitations when he first saw her. I wonder if he did like her at the start of the marriage and then Dameon and Rhaenrya’s ruined a potential happy and loving marriage 🙃.

Daella shrugging her shoulders when Aemond asked if she’ll miss him is so funny. Also babushka Vhagar, wondering where her best friend went also that she loves her too is so sweet.

I can’t wait for the reader to rise hell at dragonstone 🤭. I know she’s gonna have them all gagged Daemon included.

My emotions during this:

Me @ the reader, Daella,Alaric,Ser Quinton, Helaena, Alicent and Aegon

The reader @ Nyra and Alicent

Also you ate you this chapter(I mean you’ve ate and left no crumbs with this whole series)

Aegon knows there is strength in numbers and if reader gets harmed, Aemond will be jumped! LMAO

Reader is a material girl so she definitely enjoys a gift 😭. The sunfyre necklace (that’s what I’m calling it bc it’s gold and pink) is very her. I think any other time she would taken it happily, even when her and Aegon weren’t as close. She’s super weary of everything now which sucks (for Aegon lol)

It’s really unfortunate how Rhaenyra (nor any of viserys’ kids) were given the tools necessary to lead. The coddling that viserys did only did her a disservice. while, yeah it fucked them up badly, but Alicent’s kids had to sort of fight for every inch.

I think Aemond sees reader as a smart and pretty woman… he’s just a self sabotager. Imo Aemond has like ugly duckling syndrome, but not for looks. his childhood (the bullying, the neglect from his dad) did a number on him. In a different life, a well adjusted Aemond would’ve been sooo head over heels for reader. But he’s grown up, hasn’t dealt with his trauma, and has this “symbol” on his arm… it freaks him out a lot I think. He should be better and he isn’t. Hence the pitching (I have the headcanon of both Alicent and Aemond have self harm/anxiety tendencies) and wishing to go back in time). Alys being an “out” on top of his trauma was the perfect storm of mess

I’m soooo excited for the dynamic I have in my head for daemon and reader.

[kn96artworks]

self? talk

so i was recently introduced to Dr G on yt by my older sister and i’m currently stuck binging his videos xDDDD

they’re just really good stuffs

tho i figured some things might fly over your head if you’re not that familiar with hospital working environment

certain things do differ here d/t the system but overall yeah it’s roughly the same

the burned out interns (be strong bill my man), condescending superiors, bone bros being bone bros 

yes i can attest to the fact that bone bros does not bother themselves with medical stuffs. ‘that’s what internal medicine is for’ - one of the ortho surgeons. 

housemanship (HO) is the equivalent of residency here where i am. and yeah it’s hell. bill really speaks to me on a visceral level i actually teared up a bit after the ‘bill goes to therapy’ skit. 

i was first referred to psychiatry in my 2nd? month of HO-ship i think. by then my gastritis got so bad i can only tolerate like 1/4 of a piece of bread(yes) and a dose of MMT every morning. i got sick every several days to the point that even feeding myself felt like a massive thing to do. then one day i just literally broke down and yeah, the rest is history (which some of you may remember). got diagnosed with adjustment syndrome with anxiety symptoms, started on meds, and somehow managed to pull through. then moved on to ortho, which btw was the least stressing period ever honestly. and then to internal medicine.

i know it’s literall hell even before i started going into medical. both of my older sisters are doctors. i read through their textbooks when i was like 5 years old. i know the names of bones and major organs before i know how to make friends.

(which honestly tells certain important things about me that i just finally started to find out after 2 decades)

so, yeah. bill is me. i was bill. probably still is somewhere in there. 

i don’t think i can stop being bill the doctor even when i’m no longer one now. it’s after my binge watch spree i realised.

i didn’t want to stop. i didn’t want to quit. but i had to, because otherwise it’ll be to painful to keep on living like that. i wished i had found Dr G’s videos before i quit, then maybe i could’ve pulled through somehow. yes, i know it’s the regret talking.

the environment was hell but i genuinely did enjoyed working. enjoyed the feeling of being able to do something for others no matter how small it is.

i suffered from a year-long burnout that manifested as anxiety symptoms and panic attacks (or longer. much, much longer). and it took me that long too to finally realised that i have impostor syndrome and have been unconsciously masking myself for so long it felt like i finally broke out of the water when it dawned upon me. i’m still in it. not quite entirely out of that headspace yet.

(during the follow up immediately prior to my prolonged sick leave i even confessed that i sometimes did thought of jumping from the wards balcony on the 8th floor. and yes i did consciously avoids the balcony out of fear. i also admit to almost punching one of my attending for being an insensitive jerk. i figured my psychiatrist must’ve saw the murder in my eyes back then.)

(also hence why my stuffs from that period are decidedly fked up.)

i’m still messed up. still trying to mend the broken pieces and frayed ends. still lost with no dreams or goal. still feels like i’m a burden to my parents. still working on how to be myself again after so long. i still have my work messaging groups saved to my phone though left on mute since then. i still kept contact with my work friends though minimal because i don’t know what to say and honestly, i couldn’t bring myself to disturb them. i did think of going back from time to time, but then i’d have to start over again and i got reminded of the horrible things and i just felt so discouraged.

i am one of those ‘gifted kids’ that went down the ‘severely burned out doctor/adult’ pipeline. i am 26 years old (as of this year) when i finally found out that, yes, i am neurodivergent. i have yet to be properly assessed but i’m pretty convinced that i am ADHD/autistic. 

i first found out i was ADHD a few years ago. in which my older sister who is a psychiatrist agrees on and went on to mention that she herself is also ADHD. then we both agreed that we got it from our mom, who is also evidently ADHD, though she didn’t know that. though i wondered why i present differently compared to them (they’re both very similar. high energy, short attention span, poor working memories, the tendency to pick up a new thing and then dropping them after in quick succession, strong personalities etc)

me? i’m different. i have those but i’m not physically hyperactive. i’m mentally hyperactive. i also have oddly keen sensories. i also suffers from abyssimal self esteem. i picks up stuffs just as quick (if not faster) but i generally don’t drop them. i keep them into an imaginary drawer in my brain and grab them whenever needed. i have social anxiety but because i have impaired emotional expression no one knows that (my friends told me i don’t look nervous at all regardless of situation). i had always been different but i didn’t know why. i hyperfixates all the way to 6th dimension.

one thing i could really say now is that my impostor syndrome got worse over the 1 year period of working. i remembered telling my psychiatrist that i really just ‘wanted to work well but can’t even do that anymore’.

i miss my friends. i miss work. i miss all the nurses and everyone that helped me, that was nice to me, that was actually concerned about me. that openly asked me what’s wrong  when they saw my reddened eyes. i wonder how are they doing. i wonder if they wondered about me. i hope they’re doing well wherever they are. they deserve all the good in this world.

i’m still lost. but everyone got lost in life at least once. it’s a journey with winding roads, you’re bound to get lost. maybe it’s a needed rest. maybe it’s a subtle message for me to stop for a while, take a deep breath, and just look at the flowers growing by the roadside and the clouds floating in the sky. and i’ll find my way in time.

[anthropwashere]

thank u for the tags yelling at us youths to sit up straight. im only 23 but disabled and my back is about the only part of me that ISNT fucked up yet, so i will attempt to not destroy my spinal cord in your honor (•̀ᴗ•́)و

Gonna take this as an opportunity to go off on a tangent and emphasize how out of nowhere your health can 180 in ways that will have a lasting impact for the rest of your life, and that this can happen at any moment no matter how careful or healthy you try to be

-I grew up poor enough to not have regular access to medical/dental/etc. for years at a time, avoided serious issues by sheer fucking luck and an extended family that did not sign up to raise another kid but thank christ they stepped up for me.

-managed to stay healthy enough to join the Air Force at 18. this was good news because the alternative was being homeless (again), which gosh got old fast. free medical? fuck yeah, uncle sam! my teeth are a mess and it sure would be nice to have glasses again!

-knees started acting up in BMT. slowly got worse as the years passed. haven't needed surgery yet but they make some wild gristly sounds when I go up stairs these days and anything more than a casual running regimen is immediately vetoed

-deployed when I was 22. wearing body armor was Not Great for my upper back. lost ability to pop anything in my spine from the shoulder blades up, gained some truly unsexy shooting pains in exchange

-several years of severe headaches i ignored because lmao childhood trauma and also not wanting to be seen as weak due to being just about the only enlisted woman in almost every unit/office i worked in.

-marriage imploded at 26 which gosh, did NOT do good things for the mild anxiety/depression i'd been staunchly ignoring for like a decade at that point. i used to think commercials for anti-depressants were like, rude satire. nope. that really is just how shitty a brain can get!

-apropos of FUCKALL I woke up one morning just before I turned 27 with a headache that has varied in intensity and location but has never gone away. latest diagnosis is a type of headache that's so persistent and resistant to treatment that there are known cases of people having this type for 30+ years. i could be one of those unlucky fucks! or it could go away tomorrow! we just don't know!

-spent 2018-2021 making EXTENSIVE USE of that free medical trying to figure out what the hell was going on or to at least find literally anything that will help reduce/control it. I have at this moment within arm's reach something like $2k worth of medical devices I got for free to help with the migraines.

-they don't.

-one time i tried to do a tally of how much I would have had to be pay out of pocket for all the primary care visits, the specialty care visits, the physical therapy, the stupid fucking useless acupuncture, the Botox, the ~16 different medications, the ER visits from bad reactions to medications, etc. etc. etc. if i hadn't been in the AF and I decided to go lay down in a dark room with an ice pack and not think about it instead.

-i did spend thousands out of pocket on a chiropractor, massages, and gas to keep driving to all those fucking appointments.

-during all this the constant migraines wreaked havoc on my neck, jaw, and shoulders, which in turn contributed to a vicious cycle of pain where doing anything beyond boiling myself in a dark shower 1-2 times a day did not only seem more trouble than it was worth, but WAS more trouble than it was worth.

-i was also diagnosed with fibromyalgia at 28. the rheumatology clinic gave me a pamphlet that was less informative than a google search and a politely phrased 'you're young and you still have all your limbs, why are you complaining? go away.'

-fibromyalgia diagnosis was given despite more evidence pointing to Sjogren's syndrome, which is an actual autoimmune disorder that sure, won't kill me, but it WOULD explain why my teeth have only gotten worse despite extremely thorough annual workups. it can cause all sorts of fun organ dysfunctions too. i could also go blind! either way neither is curable and whatever i've got showed up a decade earlier than is typically expected for my demographic!

-it wasn't any of the squillion medical experts i saw but literally just some other woman in my squadron who suggested i put my name on the Airborne Hazards and Open Burn Pit Registry, because she developed all sorts of autoimmune fuckery after her deployment. all of That is still being researched and debated and such, and has been for decades. maybe breathing too much sand and burning garbage gave me brain damage! maybe not!

-also during all this i lost half my hair due to damage caused by using Devacurl products. if you use that brand there are currently multiple lawsuits going on! you or your loved ones may be entitled to compensation, etc.

-anyway i turned 30 this year and a month later the Air Force kicked me out with 90% disability pay, a couple anti-depressant/anxiety prescriptions, and 0 fanfare.

-things could have gone so much worse for me and STILL COULD AT ANY MOMENT. I never considered myself invincible when I was younger but my good fucking gracious chronic pain isn't something i'd wish on anybody. i am terrified of the state my body might be in when i'm 40, never mind when i'm actually old. i am terrified of tomorrow. this is probably the severe anxiety talking.

-at least i've managed to avoid the heart disease rampant in my family? so far????

IN CONCLUSION, TO THE YOUTHS:

sit up straight, do some stretches, go for walkies, eat a vegetable, turn the music down a little, clean linens are the best gift you can give yourself, however much water you typically drink in a day it isn't enough, therapy does actually help, it's okay to be mad sometimes but i'm begging you to find at least one thing to laugh about every day, please take care of yourselves, and most importantly ENJOY your bodies while the going's good. this meat is expiring fast and there are no refunds.

[lexidei]

Dear young lady,

I am writing to you this now to let you know how things have changed over the past 5 years. You’re not gonna believe it.

Should we start with the good news?

Remember the first boyfriend you were talking about? You’ve just dated him for 6 months. Well, guess what? You’re still with him today, and his love for you has never changed. The consistency, assurance, love and care he has shown you since the day he confessed his feelings for you--it’s all still the same going 5 years today. Thankfully, he remains to be the greatest gift you’ve ever received since you were born. You always said the past few years that your life may be super shitty and uncertain but you’ve got one person you are super thankful for who makes your life so beautiful.

Wanna hear another good news? You’re able to afford a monthly consultation with a doctor now. You found a doctor who understands you. And oh, by the way, you witnessed firsthand a pandemic, which became the reason why you don’t have to struggle with long queues in the hospital now because medical consultations could now be made online. 

Your medicines have certainly upgraded too. They cost you about Php 12,000 monthly. You’re taking anti-anxiety and anti-depressants drugs now. The first few months were the worst because you couldn’t figure out how to go about your day without feeling dizzy or nauseous after taking your medicine but you eventually found sleeping time as the best time to take them so you would be asleep when the side effects start showing.

From two medicines, after 5 months maybe, the doctor reduced your medicine to only anti-anxiety drugs. You felt good because there were times you would vomit with blood twice within a week everytime you drink your medicine.

Oh, aside from that, you discovered in 2018 that you have Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. Just right after a guy found you beautiful, you physically looked less. You gained weight and had terrible acne problems. You were advised to restrict your diet. Upon finding out that you are prone to diabetes and hypertension, you laid in bed for 3 straight days because you couldn’t accept your condition. You’ve just graduated college and was expecting to have fun in life to make up for the lost time in your younger years spent in the four corners of your room studying. You couldn’t accept how why of all the people, you got PCOS and depression. Things even got worse when you continuously gained weight. People body-shamed you; and instead of trying to have a healthy lifestyle, you hated yourself for it so you resorted to stress-eating. I am so sorry for not pushing you to recover. I pushed you to just wanna die instead. 

Let’s skip to 2019. You finally went to Disneyland with your family. However, you were not in good terms with your mom. Remember how you always wanted to go to Disneyland when you were a kid? Your mom told you she’d bring you there if you graduate Valedictorian in grade school. However, you still had to graduate Valedictorian again in high school then Cum Laude in college before you were ever even able to go to Disneyland. So yeah, you were in Disneyland, but it didn’t feel like the happiest place on earth at that time. I hope you could go back there again at a time you’re happy.

Before you went to Disneyland, you also came to Palawan with your family. Guess what? Your family hated you for destroying the trip because you accused your dad for cheating on your mom. Everyone told you you were overreacting and paranoid. You felt strong about your instinct but they didn’t believe you.. only to find out 3 years later that your dad was indeed cheating on your mom that time.

Here comes the heartbreaking part now. Remember when you thought that your high school senior crush graduating was gonna be your greatest heartbreak so you chugged a whole 1.5L of Coca-cola on his graduation day? That’s not gonna be your greatest heartbreak. Your greatest heartbreak would be your dad cheating on your mom. 

You decided to go to law school in 2021 because you thought you could do it. Come the prelims exam of your first semester in first year law school (days after your 24th birthday and your dad’s 56th birthday), you found out about your greatest heartbreak. You were doing great in your studies prior to that but your subject Persons, Family, and Relations just reminded you of your dad’s immorality. Those days, you couldn’t even sit continuously to study because everything that ran on your mind was your dad’s cheating and your mom’s pain. You’ve always been disappointed in your dad, but you just lost all your respect for him now; and until today, 9 months later, you’re traumatized by the new facts you learn each day. 

At first, you wanted to avenge your mom by facing the mistresses. You were full of pain and anger. But today, you learned which battles to choose. You held to the belief that the universe had its karma-- whatever goes around comes around. 

I’m so sorry you have to replay in your head everyday the infidelity of your dad. No matter how I’d like it to stop, it just couldn’t. 

[come-along-pond]

I'm always down for OC discussion and I see you're looking for asks, so maybe a bit about Rebecca Williams? She seems interesting 😄

Rebecca mi amore

I love her

She’s an icon

Okay, so i haven’t got her whole plot figured out like other OC’s

Shes the granddaughter of some wealthy bloke idk yet

He’s into dodgy stuff

She’s half english lol

I have a problem with making most my OC’s english

Americans are so hard to write okay??

Her mother is next to take the business and Rebecca ‘Becca’ is basically being trained to take over after her mother

She speaks four languages, english, french, spanish and german

She’s very much got gifted kid burnout syndrome

She takes to drinking in her late teen years

Then she’s kidnapped by the people from season one of arrow (god i cannot remember the plot, this will change i’m sure)

She’s on the island for a short bit, then she escapes when oliver and slade blow the base up (do they do that???)

So she’s there for season 2 basically

Idk about when or how she leaves or anything yet

I haven’t watched arrow in a while

But this is an Oliver Queen x OC

Although Sara and Becca have a few hook ups lol

They like eachother as friends and care about eachother a lot

Anyway, Becca picks up a bit of archery and fighting

She dyes her hair a lot

Its pastel pink on the island

Then as she grows older she goes sort of rose gold blonde and darker colours

Time skip

She rocks up after Sara does

Because of fuxking course the green arrow is oliver

Turns out she’s been training off the island

She becomes a vigilante as well under the allies ‘Silver Bow’

And yeah, her and Oliver get together after a LOT of pinning

Tiny bit of enemies to lovers

Might make a whole plot about her grandfather’s business and her buying him out and making it good again idk.

She’s a ✨business✨ woman

All I know is Becca is amazing and i adore her

I don’t have a face claim, but here’s some picrews

I’ll find the links in a minute

Here’s her pinterest board though

(also, hi!! I’m sure I have more OC’s you’ll like, so feel free to ask!)

possible taglist: @witchofinterest @bathed-in-lilac

send an ask if you want to be permanently added!

(the last is her as a teen)

[bopbopstyles]

7. Home for the Holidays

SERIES RATING: M (sex)

CHAPTER WORD COUNT: 10.1k

MASTERLIST | INSPO TAG | ASK TO JOIN THE TAGLIST

Y/N promised herself she would never date a musician. It was her one rule–her only rule, actually–when it came to dating. But then, Harry Styles rolled into her life and asked her to break it, just this once. And this is what happened.

a/n: thank you for all the love lately!!! <3 u guys

pls reblog to spread the word about only exception! 🥰

Harry and Y/N had discussed the idea of having some elaborate reveal that they were having a baby, but they decided to just do it in the fashion of buying onesies for their parents for Christmas gifts and letting their parents open them and discover the truth. Harry and Y/N spent hours one evening picking out onesies on Etsy that said things like “I love Grandpa!” and giggling over the prospect of telling their parents, excitement seeping out of them.

But first, Y/N knew she had to tell Hanna and Jamie. She suspected that they already thought something was wrong, after she had cancelled on all of their recent requests to go out for drinks. So when she asked them over to her apartment for dinner, she didn’t know what the mood would be. They arrived in normal fashion, though, Jamie bringing ice cream for dessert and Hanna bringing a bottle of wine for them to share.

When she plucked glasses from the cabinet—three, one for each of them—that’s when Y/N knew her time had come. “Not one for me,” she said calmly, turning away from the salad she was making.

Hanna looked at her, confusion across her face, and then at the wine. “But…it’s wine.”

Y/N nodded. “I can’t have any.”

Hanna gasped, the glasses dropping to the counter and barely avoiding cracking, and rushed to her friend. Jamie stood there, shocked, eyes flickering between Y/N’s stomach and her face. “You’re pregnant?” He asked finally, eyes wide.

She nodded, and Hanna dropped to her knees. “Can I touch?” Hanna asked softly, eyes on Y/N’s belly. She was the first person to ask, the first person who would feel the place where Y/N’s child was growing, but she didn’t mind. It was her best friend, after all. So she nodded.

“What’s it like?” Jamie asked, coming over to stand next to her, head cocked to the side.

“What, pregnancy?” He nodded. “Well, so far, it just means I can’t have wine and I vomit a lot. I’m also so fucking tired all the time.”

“When you were sick,” Jamie said, putting the pieces together in his head. “Shit.”

Hanna slapped him. “Stop it, you.”

“No, what is it?” Y/N asked, pushing Hanna away from her so she could turn to Jamie.

“I just…” Jamie ran his hand over his face, eyes flickering to her. “Harry knows?” She nodded. “And?”

“He’s over the moon,” she informed him, voice stern. She got it. He didn’t think Harry would want the kid, that she was going to be raising it alone. And maybe, if Harry wasn’t so goddamn stubborn, she would be. “I tried to tell him he didn’t need to be around, but he literally started crying at the prospect. He’s the one who convinced me to let him stay, to do it together.”

“Wow,” Hanna said, leaning against the counter. “I always knew he was wonderful, but that—that’s something else.”

Jamie reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder, his expression softening. “I’m sorry—I was worried about you. I’m happy for you, and Harry, as long as you are.”

She took his hand and pressed a chaste kiss to the top of it, something they always did to make up. “Honestly, I am. It’s not what I was expecting, but doing it with Harry, it’s not as bad as I was expecting. It’s actually kind of incredible.”

“Is the sex, like, insane?”

Her head swiveled to Hanna and Jamie gasped, swatting at Hanna’s shoulder. “Han!”

“What? Your hormones are like raging right? It’s got to be incredible.”

Y/N coyly smiled and this time both Hanna and Jamie gasped, their questions toppling over one another. She had never shared too much of her and Harry’s sex life with her friends, valuing his privacy, and that wasn’t going to change. But she did tell them, “It’s on a whole other level,” which earned clapped hands and shrieks. And she wasn’t lying. The added hormones raging through her bloodstream had her wanting him at every time of day, and Harry seemed even more infatuated with her than normal, touching and kissing her every chance he had. She couldn’t even count the times they had had sex in his kitchen, not being able to wait until they went upstairs, or the times he had dropped to his knees in the shower, desperate to taste her. Sex with Harry was always mind-blowing, good in a way she had never experienced before, but sex with Harry while pregnant neared an out of body experience sometimes. He could oscillate so well between kind, soft, cuddly, and this man who was simply dying to be inside of her, murmuring words in her ears that had her blood rushing straight down.

When her friends left, she called Harry and told him exactly what she had been thinking about, and he promptly drove to her apartment, not wanting to leave her desiring him and unable to quench her thirst. He took her on her bed, their teeth gnashing and hands scrambling over skin, Harry sucking harshly on her neck until she reminded him they were seeing her dad tomorrow, at which point he opted for a spot on her breast. Their increased size and sensitivity was driving Harry—and Y/N—mad, so he had his lips on them whenever he had the chance.

“How,” he exhaled as he drove deeply into her, the only sound audible in her room the sound of their panting and skin slapping, “do you feel better every time I’m inside of you?”

She knew what he meant. She could never tire of him, the way he fit inside of her, the way he touched her body, the way he made her feel. Fingers threaded in his hair and she yanked him down to her, begging for his lips to reach hers again. And when they did, she murmured, “You’re the best I’ve ever had,” against them. Harry groaned, deep and throaty, and pressed a deep spot that had her seeing stars.  

Afterwards, Harry asked her to lay down and he slipped down her body, pressing his lips to the spot right below her belly button where their child rested. “Hi Peanut,” he whispered against her skin, Y/N smiling down at the sight of him talking to their child. “It’s Papa. Sorry if that disturbed you, just needed to show Mama how much I love her. I hope you can understand and forgive me.”

“Shut up,” she told him. “That’s much too crass for them still!”

“Shh,” he told her, finger to his lips. “I’m not done.” He bent back down and rested his hands on her hips. “Can’t wait to meet you. I’ve been dreaming about you, you know.” Y/N didn’t know that and she looked down at Harry in wonder, curious how she had gotten so lucky. “Dreamed you were a girl. Not that that means anything—you are whoever you want to be, Peanut. I’ll love you no matter who you are, always, unwaveringly.”

“You didn’t tell me that,” she whispered, hand curving over his jaw and tugging his head up so their eyes met.

He pressed a lingering kiss to her belly before crawling up to her face, fingers brushing across her flushed cheeks. “I wanted to tell Peanut first.”

“A girl, huh?” He nodded, and she smiled. “I’d like that, I think.”

“I think you’ll like whoever they are,” he told her. “Because they’ll be utterly perfect, just like you.”

She smiled into the kiss she gave him, hoping he knew that it wasn’t her they’d resemble in perfection, it would be him.

Harry was bouncing on his toes in both excitement and fear at the prospect of telling her father. He genuinely liked Peter, looked up to him even. Even as he grew older, he had managed to maintain his career, finding new and creative ways to make a living, which was not easy. Despite his success, he was still incredibly down to Earth and didn’t make you feel judged when you wrote with him—which was something Harry, as a relatively new songwriter, deeply appreciated. His imposter syndrome in the songwriting room was something he constantly battled, especially when he wrote with new people. But Peter put Harry at ease immediately, making suggestions in a way so Harry didn’t feel like an idiot, and praising him when he had genuinely good ideas.

So that was all to say, the last thing he wanted was for Peter to hate him for getting his daughter pregnant at 23.

Peter opened the door to his house beaming, the Motown Christmas Album playing in the background as Y/N and Harry stepped in, a flutter of hellos and hugs. “It’s been too long!” Peter said, giving Harry a clap on the back. “How was tour?”

“Good,” Harry said as Peter shut the front door. “Long.”

“Heard from Jeff you’re doing March to July this year,” Peter said, leading them into the living room where the tree was set up, the jolly holiday spirit wrapping around Harry like a hug. He and Y/N had decorate his place a bit, putting up a tree she went and got from the store and decorating it with ornaments, but he never went all out with decorating. Decorating any house that wasn’t his mom’s just felt wrong somehow.

Harry nodded, taking a seat next to Y/N on the couch, loving the way she leaned subconsciously into him when he wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “Yeah, should be a long one.”

“Didn’t know you and Jeff were friends,” Y/N asked her father, taking a sip from the hot coco her father had placed in front of them.

“Decided I should get to know him a bit better ever since you and this one started spending all your time together,” Peter said with a chuckle. “Especially since you don’t call enough and give me the information yourself.”

“That’s a lie,” Y/N said, glancing up at Harry as if to reassure him that she was, in fact, a good daughter. “I call him all the time.”

“Don’t doubt it,” he replied, pressing a kiss to her hair. He was an affectionate person, and he had always appreciated the fact that Y/N never pushed him away, always seemed to lean in for more. Made him feel even more loved by her.

Peter set down his own cup of hot chocolate and made his way over to the tree. “Now, I know you have to head up to your mom’s, so should we get started on the presents?”

Harry and Y/N had decided to go to her dad’s on the way up to her mom’s house, driving up a rental car and fly out of San Francisco to London to cut down on the amount of time they had to drive. It was busy on the highways and honestly, Harry hated driving for long distances in the states, but for Y/N he’d do it. Driving on the wrong side of the road was something he never could fully adjust to and doing it for hours at a time took the utmost concentration.

“Yes!” Y/N replied, grabbing their gift for him from her purse and setting it under the tree. “But I want mine first.”

Peter chuckled and dug around for Y/N’s, the red and green wrapping paper making Harry smile. He liked that Peter wasn’t perfect at wrapping but he still made an effort, the crinkles in the paper and jagged edge of the paper authentic and loving. “Hope you like it, doll.”

Y/N ripped open the paper, a green slim box revealing itself in the paper. She shook it like a little girl, which made Harry laugh softly next to her, before opening up the box. Inside lay three concert tickets to the upcoming Taylor Swift tour, which had Y/N squealing, launching herself into her father’s arms. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” She said, giving her dad a tight hug, Peter’s full body laugh filling the room.

“You’re welcome,” he said. “You never took me up on last year’s gift, so I decided to just make an executive decision. Harry, I know you’ll be gone, but I thought you could take Hanna and Jamie with you.”

Y/N nodded, a quick look to Harry that made his heart clench. “Yes, of course. They’ll scream when I tell them how good the seats are.”

Her dad chuckled. “I have no doubt.” Y/N gave her dad one last squeeze before settling back into her spot next to Harry, the way she interlaced her fingers with him sending him the message that She wished it could be him going with her, but she wasn’t mad. “Now, Harry.” Peter reached around the tree and grabbed a gift for Harry, wrapped up and looking like a book of some kind.

“Oh,” Harry said, reaching up to grab it, “thank you so much. You didn’t have to get me anything, though.”

“Nonsense,” Peter replied, waving the idea away. “You’re with Y/N, so you’re part of the family.”

Y/N shot him a knowing smile, the thought passing through both their heads at how right her dad actually was. Harry ripped at the paper, his fingers curving around a leather journal that quite resembled the one he lugged around with him everywhere he went. “Oh,” he said, looking up at Peter. “Wow. Thank you so much.”

“Of course,” Peter replied. “When we were writing I noticed you were about halfway through your old one, so I thought you were probably due to have a new one.”

He was right, in fact. Harry had planned to buy one back in London at his favorite shop, but it seemed that Peter had beat him to it, the mark on the back from the same place as his current notebook. “This is incredible,” he said, wiping at the tears threatening to spill from his eyes at the thoughtfulness. “So thoughtful. Thank you.”

Y/N threaded her hand through his, giving it a squeeze to remind him she was there and he glanced down at her face to help stitch his emotions back into place. “Now, Dad, we’ve got ours for you.” She scrambled up, grabbing the bag from under the tree that held their carefully selected onesie for him.

Peter ripped out the tissue paper, digging his hand in and reaching around for the gift. Y/N bit her lip and looked up at Harry who gave her a reassuring smile, reminding her with his eyes that Peter was going to be happy for them, just as they had discussed. “Oh!” Peter said when he pulled out the onesie that said “#1 Grandkid” on it and an ultrasound photo they had had printed for him. Tears welled in his eyes, looking up at Y/N and Harry in disbelief. “Really?” He asked, words breathless.

Y/N nodded and Peter yelped in excitement, rushing to grab them both into hugs, a flurry of love and warmth they desperately needed. “Due in June,” Y/N told him.

“Summer baby,” he said, to himself looking back down at the ultrasound photo in his hand. “Good. Could use one of those in this family.”

Harry laughed and Peter reached out, a soft hand on Harry’s cheek. “Welcome to the family, son.”

The word made Harry’s heart clench, the thought of being a permanent part of Y/N’s family a prospect too good to be true. “Thank you,” he replied.

Peter proceeded to pepper them with questions, cracking a joke about how he almost got Y/N a crate of wine as a joke from last Christmas but was glad he didn’t, and they chatted about what he was going to be called. They decided on “Pop”, something short and sweet, and a shortened of what Y/N had called her grandfather before he passed. Over brunch they talked about their upcoming trip to England and their plan to tell Y/N’s mother that evening. Peter nodded at the sound of his ex-wife’s name, and Harry thought for not the first time about the fact that both he and Y/N had parents who were divorced. He hoped it wasn’t a sign for him at Y/N—he wanted to stay with her forever. They hadn’t talked about the idea of marriage, but it was something playing at the back of his mind ever since they’d learned they were going to have a baby.

He didn’t want to get married just because of their child, but at the same time, he loved Y/N and couldn’t imagine wanting anyone else. She challenged him, loved him, made him a better person. Made him laugh like crazy, bought him all the weird foods he liked, gave the best massages. Reminded him that he had a life outside of work—a life he loved. The prospect of marrying her wasn’t scary to him. In fact, it sounded like heaven.

Y/N couldn’t help but watch Harry as he drove, one hand on the steering wheel, one on her knee. At first, he did it because she was bouncing her knee up and down, but then kept it there, and Y/N suspected it was because of the same reason that her fingers crawled up his forearm: to feel his skin under her fingers. The drive was long, probably eight or nine hours, but she didn’t mind it—nine hours to spend with Harry’s undivided attention, the coast whipping by them.

They got on the road by noon, hugs and teary eyes as they said goodbye, and she texted her mom they’d be there at nine and would grab dinner on the way, so no need to wait up for them for dinner. Harry told her to DJ and she put on their playlist first, belting out lyrics to all of their favorite songs, Harry even using her water bottle that sat in the center console as a microphone. His seat dancing had her laughing hysterically and his smile never seemed to fade from his face as they drove. After the playlist ended, she put on the NPR podcast she had been listening to lately, and Harry asked her political questions, still trying to wrap his head around American politics.

They stopped for dinner at In-n-Out and Y/N took the wheel for the remaining two hours of the drive, since she knew it by heart and Harry was getting a bit stressed. They switched shakes back and forth as she drove, chattering about their favorite holiday memories as kids and laughing at their embarrassing moments. She loved glancing over and seeing Harry’s eyes already on her, a twinkle in his eye she knew well—it was the one where he was overwhelmed by his feelings for her. He had told her one time when they were wrapped up on his couch and she asked him why he was staring at her like that, and it had made her pull him into a deep kiss, much like the one she wanted now. But she was driving, so she settled with kissing the back of Harry’s hand, the smile he gave her settling deep in her heart.

The porch light was on at her mom’s house, the simply blue post-war bungalow the perfect place for her mom to have moved into. It was the right size for a single woman and her dog, June, who they’d gotten shortly after her and Y/N’s day got divorced. Y/N usually stayed in the guest room, which she didn’t mind too much—she was proud of her mom for making a new life for herself in San Francisco. It just meant her bedroom at her dad’s house was even more special to her, the one remaining shred of her childhood.

“Nervous?” She asked Harry. He’d met her mom once, back in the summer before he left for Dunkirk press. They’d gotten on famously, but they definitely weren’t as close as Harry and her dad. One time she’d walked into his house to find him on the phone with her dad, jabbering about songwriting and the brilliance of Stevie Nicks.

He shut the car door behind him and walked to the trunk, popping it open. “A bit, yeah.” He pulled out their suitcases and shut the door, looking up to where she leaned against the car. “I just don’t want her to think I’m horrible for getting her daughter pregnant, ya know?”

Y/N scoffed, and walked over to him, hands on his cheeks. “H, it’s not like you were the only one having sex. It’s a two-way street—I’ve got just as much responsibility in this as you.”

He nodded, leaning into the press of her fingers on his skin. Together they walked up to the front door, Y/N knocking softly. The door swung open not even a minute later, her mom standing there beaming at them. “Mama!” Y/N wrapped her mom up in a hug, her mom’s blunt bob swinging as they rocked back and forth. Her mom was a hugger, always had been.

“Hi you two,” her mom said, embracing Harry next. “Come in, you must be exhausted from the drive.”

They made their way inside, the screen door slamming shut behind them. Inside it felt like her mom—a winter candle burning on the counter, the news softly running on the TV, a blanket thrown over the couch. A glass of wine sat on the coffee table half-empty and Y/N looked at it longingly. How was she going to make it until June without a nice relaxing glass of wine at night?

Harry was talking to her mom, telling her about the drive and how they’d stopped for burgers, her mom telling him about her preferred In-n-Out order. “Let me take you back to the room,” she said, and Y/N and Harry trailed behind her to the guest bedroom where a fresh set of sheets adorned the bed, a soft glow from the bedside table lamp. “Here you are,” she said, leaning against the wall as Harry set up the suitcases in the corner. “I’ll let you guys settle in for a minute. I’ll be in the kitchen, okay?”

Y/N nodded and her mom left the room, shutting the door behind her. She looked to Harry, who was sitting on the bed, a lingering gaze on her face. “What are you thinking about?”

“Didn’t realize you didn’t have a bedroom here.”

Y/N glanced around the room, the nondescript art making it obvious that it wasn’t Y/N’s room. There were no traces of her in it except for the framed photos on the dresser of her and her mom from her childhood, the ones her dad’s best friend had taken when she was seven. “When she moved up here it just didn’t make sense,” she explained. “Only two bedrooms, after all.”

“Mhm,” Harry said, grabbing her waist so she could nestle between his knees. “Kinda liked the idea of sleeping in your childhood bed.”

“Dirty, dirty boy,” she murmured against his lips, bending down to kiss him. “Well, don’t worry, we’ll be sleeping in yours to make up for it.”

He nudged at her neck, pressing a kiss to the skin there, a soft gasp leaving Y/N’s mouth. “Can you believe I’ll have my girl and my baby in bed with me?” He kissed the juncture of her jaw and neck and she carded her fingers through his hair, loving the way his eyes fluttered shut from the touch.

“Lucky man,” she said.

He kissed her one more time before saying, “Got that right.”

Hearing her mom in the kitchen, she pulled away from his grasp. “We should go out to my mom.”

“Gonna tell her now?” He asked, standing up from the bed.

Y/N considered it. It was late, but she couldn’t very well stand in her mother’s house and pretend. “Yeah. I don’t want to pretend.” She bent down, unzipping her suitcase so she could pull out her mom’s gift from where it was tucked in between her clothes. With a kiss between her shoulder blades, Harry followed her out of the room, their gift held tightly in her fingers.

She was nervous, she had to admit, as she walked into the room. Her mother had always wanted her to wait until she was older to have kids, to have a full career and life before she started a family. But she didn’t think that her mom would be unhappy with her once she told her—her mom had always been there for her, through thick and thin, every step of the way. This was changing Y/N’s life forever, so of course her mom would be supportive, she told herself.

“Mama?”

Her mom’s head popped up from where she stood at the sink, washing dishes from her dinner. “Room okay?” She asked, drying her hands on a dish towel.

“Great,” Harry answered, hand squeezing Y/N’s. “We wanted to give you your Christmas gift, actually.”

“Oh!” Her mom’s eyes widened, eyes darting to her small tree nestled in the corner of the living room. “Thought we could wait for the morning, but that’s fine. Can I get you anything? Wine, water?”

“Water is perfect,” Harry replied. He had promised to abstain from the same things she had to, a promise Y/N wasn’t sure he would be able to keep but loved the idea of. He had been so sweet when he’d made it, pushing the bottles of wine to the back of his pantry and swearing he wouldn’t touch a sip of alcohol until the baby was born.

Her mom filled two glasses with water and together they all migrated to the living room. Y/N could feel her heart hammering in her chest. This was more anxiety-inducing than telling her dad, who she knew wouldn’t say a word to her about it, be nothing but supportive. But her mom had a tendency to be a bit judgmental, a side Y/N had experience a few times in her life and one she hated. She swallowed her fear, though, and handed her mom the paper bag, the tissue paper crinkling in the room.

She leaned into Harry’s side as her mom opened the bag, thankful for the comfort of his arm wrapping around her waist softly, the reminder of him being there to support her.

Then her mom pulled out the onesie, “I <3 Grandma!” embroidered on the front, flowers all over the material, and her mom yelped in surprise. She looked up at the two of them, eyes wide, disbelief all over her features. “You’re pregnant?”

“Yes,” Y/N said, unsure how to read her mom’s reaction.

“This isn’t a prank? I’ve seen them on the internet before.”

Of course she had. “No, Mom. It’s real.”

Her mom didn’t said anything for a bear, her eyes flickering between the onesie and Y/N, and then to Harry and back down. “Congratulations, honey,” she finally said. “Harry, can I talk to Y/N alone for a bit?”

Harry stirred against her. “Uh, of course. I’ll be in the room, okay, love?” He pulled away, a lingering kiss to her head, and left the room, leaving Y/N and her mom alone.

When the door clicked shut, her mom finally spoke. “Are you sure this is what you want to do?”

“Yes,” Y/N replied without even thinking. “I thought a lot about it before I even told Harry, and we talked about it once I told him. He wants this baby, and so do I.”

“But your career,” her mom said, voice hardening and the sound making Y/N stomach curl. “It’s just starting out. Won’t this affect it at all?”

“I can still be a mom and work,” she said, pointedly. “You did it, after all.”

“I was 33 when I had you,” her mom reminded her. “You’re only two years out of school.”

Y/N sighed. This was the exact reaction she didn’t want from her mom, but at the same time it didn’t surprise her. “This wasn’t in the plan and I know the timing isn’t great, but I want to have this baby. I love Harry and he’s going to be an amazing father.” Her hand slipped down to cup her belly, where a bump wasn’t quite apparent but would be soon enough.

“When he’s here,” her mother said and Y/N glanced up from her belly to her mother, whose expression was blank.

“What does that mean?”

Her mother gave her a pointed look. “You know exactly what that means, Y/N. You’re going to be essentially a single mom. It’s not even like it was with your dad—Harry’s one of the most popular celebrities in the world. How is he going to be able to be here for you? For your child? And what about privacy—have you even thought about what it’s going to be like to raise a child in the public eye? How are you going to have playdates and send your child to school and let them live a normal life? It was so hard for me—you saw that. It was hard on you to have your dad gone all the time, and you always told me how you didn’t want that. And now here you are, doing it all over again.”

Y/N could feel her heart beating faster, the anger rising in her body. She hated it when her mom spoke like this about her father, as if all that happened in her life was all because of her dad, but she knew it wasn’t true. She loved her father, always had, despite her mother’s attempts to sow seeds of discontent in her. “Harry isn’t my dad,” she said, trying to keep her voice measured, but failing miserably. “He wants this child, Mom! I tried to shut him out, tried to force him to leave, and he wouldn’t let me! He wants to raise this child and he wants to raise it with me. We talk about things, you know—it’s not like you and Dad, living in a house where you don’t even talk to one another.” Suddenly it was spilling from her, all the things unsaid over the years, her anger at her mother’s attack on not only herself, but on Harry who had been nothing but good. “You don’t know Harry, so how dare you paint him to be someone he isn’t.”

“He may want this baby now,” her mother said, a lace of venom dripping from her words that Y/N hadn’t heard in years. “But what about whenever you’re telling him he can’t tour because you need help? And what about whenever you’re left at home, taking care of a child while the father of your child is off gallivanting across the world? Will you still want him around then?”

She pushed herself off the couch, the desire to argue with her mother not something she wanted to play into. She just wanted to get out of there, to grab Harry and go. The way her mother spoke to her about Harry made her see red, and she didn’t want to hear it anymore.

“Don’t you walk away from me, Y/N.”

At the sound of her mother’s words, Y/N whirled around, staring her mother straight in the eyes. “I’m not a child, Mom. I know what I’m getting myself into. I’ve thought long and hard about this decision, about how my life is going to change, and this is the decision I made. This is the decision I made with Harry. We’re talking about his tour, how he’s going to do it. We’re talking about the life we’re going to have together. But I also know who he is—he loves what he does, and I love that it makes him happy. I can’t ask him to give it up, even if it would be easier, because it’s part of who he is. If he didn’t have that, he wouldn’t be the man I fell in love with.

“I don’t care what you think about this,” she said and she realized the words were true. Her mother’s opinion of her didn’t matter nearly as much as it used to and she didn’t know when that had changed. “I’m doing this and I would love your support, but if it’s not there, I’ll be okay. But I’m not going to sleep under your roof while you speak about the man I love like that.” And with that, she spun on her heel and walked down the hall, heading straight for the guest bedroom where Harry was waiting for her.

When she pushed open the door, Harry was already on his feet, walking towards her. “We’re leaving,” she told him, ignoring the arms he held out for her. “Now. We’ll find a hotel—I just cannot be here with her right now.”

Harry nodded, not fighting her on it. He had probably heard the entire fight—the walls in her mother’s house weren’t thick. He helped her zip up her suitcase and find her phone that she had plugged in, tucking everything into her purse without a word. They left the room they had barely even settled into, suitcases behind them as they walked down the hall.

Her mom stood in the same exact spot, staring as they walked towards her. “Please, Y/N—“

“No,” she said, cutting her mom off. “I came here hoping you would be happy for us, but if you aren’t that’s okay. Just don’t call me until you are ready to welcome Harry, and our baby, with open arms.” She unlocked the door and pushed the screen door open, holding it as Harry exited behind her.

“Wait,” Harry said as she went to close the door. He pushed it open and stepped into the house, Y/N watching as he looked her mom straight in the eye. “I love your daughter, Trisha,” he said, “and I’m not going anywhere. I cannot wait to have a family with her, to love her for the rest of my life. And I hope you can come to accept that.” He pulled the door shut behind him, Y/N watching him with wide eyes and love in her heart. “Come on,” he said, tucking his hand in hers. “Let’s go.”

He pulled out of the driveway wordlessly, holding Y/N’s hand tight over the console. “I love you,” she said, her words making Harry glance at her. “Endlessly.”

With a soft kiss to her hand, she knew that she had made the right decision. “I love you more,” he said.

They found a hotel downtown, Harry running the room on his credit card despite her protests, and took the elevator upstairs to their room. Y/N was exhausted from fighting with her mom, even if it wasn’t long. She hated arguing with people, but especially her mom. And now she was sitting on a hotel bed as Harry set up their room, running through the argument in her head over and over again, playing over each of her words, analyzing each with precision.

“Baby,” Harry said, crawling across the bed behind her so his body surrounded hers. “Come shower with me.”

She leaned back into his body, letting him absorb her weight. “I can’t believe she said those things.”

“Me either,” he agreed, “but can we shower and then talk about it? Know you’ll feel better after.”

“I guess,” she said, letting him pull her off the bed and guide her into the bathroom, the look on her mother’s face when the door slammed shut behind her in her brain on repeat.

With delicate hands, Harry untied the laces of her Converse, peeling her socks off and not reacting when she tried to get him to stop, worried her feet smelled. Instead, he looked up at her and said, “Bit past that, love.” He pulled her sweater off, then her loose-fitting jeans, then made her turn around so he could unclip her bra and shimmied her underwear down her body, leaving her naked in the hotel bathroom. He shed his clothes in rapid time and turned on the shower, warm water cascading down from the shower head. “C’mon,” he said, stepping in and beckoning to her, his curls flattening under the water. “Let me wash your hair.”

The prospect sounded divine, so she followed him in, letting him position her so she was directly under the stream. He hummed a tune she hadn’t heard before as he squirted the hotel shampoo in her hair, running it through her locks tenderly.

“What’s that?” She asked, bobbing her head back so he could get better access to her locks.

“Hm?”

“The song that you’re humming.”

“Oh,” he said, pushing her head forward to let the water rinse out the shampoo. “Wrote it a few days ago.”

Conditioner was next, a blob in his hands before he started massaging it into her hair. “What’s it about?”

He was quiet for a minute, untangling each of the knots in her hair like he knew she did. “Our baby,” he said, words so quiet they were almost lost under the stream of water.

She turned around in his hold, eyes fastening on his. The water was warm on her skin as she looked up at him, wonder in her brain at the sweetness in his eyes as he ran his fingers up and down her arms. “Really?”

He nodded, a flush to her cheeks that she adored. “Woke up in the middle of the night and the tune just…came to me. Don’t quite have all the lyrics yet, though.”

Without a pause, she pulled his body into hers, struggling to find the way to show him how that made her feel. “Will you play it for me when it’s done?”

“It was goin’ to be your birthday present,” he mumbled.

“I guess I’ll wait,” she told him and turned back around to let him continue washing her hair. “I meant what I told my mom.”

“Hoped so.” He brushed his hand through her hair to let the conditioner run out of it. “Nearly made me cry.”

“Why?”

He paused. “So different from when you first told me,” he said, words rough in his throat. “To hear how you feel now, how you defended me to your mum, it meant a lot to me.”

“H,” you said, “I love you. No matter what.”

He didn’t reply, but she knew it wasn’t because he didn’t feel the same way, but because if he told her he would cry. She could hear it in his words, feel it in the air between them. Instead, he showed her how much he loved her by lovingly pulling out the knots in her hair, by washing every inch of her body, by even helping her shave her armpits, by wrapping her up in a hotel robe after and rubbing lotion into her skin. He passed her a toothbrush with toothpaste on it and side-by-side they brushed they teeth, soft gazes in the mirror. And then he turned off the light and pulled her into bed next to him, arms surrounding her body and holding her as she cried, her mother’s words swirling through her thoughts. He pressed kisses to her hair and murmured how much he loved her, how proud he was, what a great mother she was going to be. With each touch he helped heal her heart, push the words away, focus on the truth: that she was  happy with him, no matter what anyone tried to convince her of. She just hoped he would stay around even when she doubted it.

The drive to Holmes Chapel brought Y/N peace, the English countryside a warm embrace, the settled and peaceful look on Harry’s face making her smile as he drove. She had been ignoring text messages from her mother since she had woken up, and being away from Wi-Fi meant her phone wasn’t buzzing with text messages and phone calls every few minutes. Suddenly, Y/N was thankfully for the fact that she didn’t have cell service in England, because it made her push away her worries and focus fully on Harry.

He was describing his mother’s home to her. The furniture collected from charity shops over the years, Anne having a knack for finding the thrown away and giving it a new home, despite his many offers to buy her new furniture. She liked filling her house with stories of the past, of considering the life a side table or a throw pillow had before it found her. Y/N thought it was quite sweet, and from what she knew about Anne it didn’t surprise her in the slightest. Gemma and her boyfriend Michal were going to be there when they arrived, both of the Styles children bringing home their significant others, something which apparently Harry hadn’t done in a while. When he revealed this, she smiled and told him that she was honored to be there.

It was a three hour drive that passed quickly, since Y/N fell asleep about halfway in, her head lolling on her shoulder as the countryside passed by. She woke to Harry’s voice, murmuring, “We’re here, love,” in her ear and unbuckling her seatbelt. “Time to go give my mum the surprise of her life, yeah?”

That idea woke Y/N up right away. She was admittedly nervous to tell Harry’s mother, especially after how telling her own had gone. Although from what she knew of Anne and Harry’s own accounts, Anne seemed to be much more willing to go with the flow, surprises rolling off of her quickly after years with Harry Styles as her son. So she tried not to dwell on it as Anne and Gemma rushed out of the house, enveloping Harry into their arms and then Y/N, a flurry of hugs and kisses to the cheeks that had her feeling like she was being welcomed home.

The house was smaller than Y/N expected, but somehow perfect. A wide white door and a lovely patio outside, white framed windows that reminded her of her own childhood home. There was red brick she loved and a large tree outside. “You look beautiful, dear,” Anne said, an arm around Y/N’s shoulders as she guided her inside. “Glowing, you are. You must tell me your secret!”

Pregnancy, she thought to herself, but instead just said, “Lots of moisturizer,” which had Anne chuckling to herself.

The house was just as Harry had described. Laden with rugs and family photos, a few of Harry’s awards on the walls, displayed with pride. A giant Christmas tree sat in the corner, hung heavily with ornaments and tinsel, Y/N smiling at the sight of an ornament with a young Harry’s face on it, her having a nearly identical one at home on her mother’s tree. Although she didn’t have time to notice it. “So this is it.” She turned and found Harry standing behind her, watching her study his childhood home. “What do you think?”

“It’s exactly as you said,” she replied. “I love it.”

He pressed a kiss to her temple. “Want to see my room?”

“Desperately,” she replied, which had Harry chuckling.

“Mum,” he called into the house, “I’m going to show Y/N my room. Be back in a jiffy.”

“Don’t make too much racket!” She heard Gemma holler through the hall, “These walls are thin, in case you’ve forgotten!”

“Shut it!” Harry replied, Y/N laughing at their exchange, it making her wish for not the first time that she had a sibling. “Come on, love.”

They climbed the stairs, Y/N commenting on his yearly school portraits that decorated the staircase, which he tried to cover her eyes for so she couldn’t see them, but she managed to wrangle free. She had to admit that Harry was a downright adorable child, although when she looked at his face—dimple and crinkled eyes from laughter, she wasn’t surprised. The thought had her considering what their child would look like, which she couldn’t help but smile at the thought of.

“Whatcha smilin’ about?”

“Thought about what our child would look like,” she said softly, Harry’s eyes lighting up at the thought.

His hands found her waist, tucking her close to him, her back pressed against the wallpapered walls of the second floor. “And what are you thinking?”

“With your face,” she said, a finger running down his cheek, “and my brain, they’re going to be unstoppable.”

He frowned. “But your face is nicer.”

“They have to have your eyes,” she said with a pointed look. “I’m not willing to compromise on that. And your dimples.”

He smiled at her, the dimple in question popping out. “My dimples, eh?”

“Mhm,” she murmured. “Quite like them.” She stuck her index finger into the depth of it, the chuckle escaping his lips warming her body that was still cold from the December chill.

“I’ll allow it as long as they have your ears and your lips,” he said, a lingering kiss pressed to the latter. “Now let me kiss you in my childhood bed, for Pete’s sake.”

“Dirty, dirty boy,” she said, and let him lead her into his room. It was an alcove room, one he could barely stand up fully straight in, and somehow it suited him. The walls were a simple cream, but covered in posters of bands from eight years ago, when life was simple and he was still sixteen. An overstuffed bookcase sat against one wall and an oak dresser, most likely empty, sat next to it with photos of him and his family scattered across it. The main attraction though, was the bed, an oak headboard attached to it with plenty of pillows and a checkered duvet cover that reminded her of the ones she had seen in the dorm rooms of boys at college.

“Well?” Harry asked from where he leaned against the closed door. “Is it how you imagined?”

She turned and she couldn’t help herself—the appearance of Harry in a beanie and an oversized sweatshirt in his childhood bedroom with a shit-eating grin on his face made her want to have him in every way possible. “Better,” she replied before backing up until the back of her thighs hit the edge of his bed. “But better if you eat me out on your childhood bed.”

“Fuck me,” he breathed, feet moving quickly to reach her, hands on her cheeks before she could process it. His lips were sweet, wet from when he’d licked them before pulling her in, and his palms were calloused against her skin. But he felt like Harry—her Harry—and that’s all that mattered to her. With a nip at her neck, he fell to his knees in front of her, eyes darting up at hers as he shimming off her leggings and the blue cotton underwear underneath them. “Like these,” he mumbled against the skin of her inner thighs. “Might have to keep them.”

She gasped when his tongue licked up the length of her slit, the sensitivity from not having him on her skin in the past few nights combined with the raging hormones in her bloodstream had her keening for him. “They’re just cotton,” she said through gritted teeth when he sucked on her clit, toying with her. “Harry, Jesus.” “Not my name,” he smiled against her and Y/N couldn’t help but tug on his hair as if to tell him Shut it you narcissist, which just made Harry chuckle. The vibrations sent shockwaves through her body, her head falling back as a moan of his name left her mouth. “Gotta be quiet,” he reminded her, shoving two fingers in her mouth that she quickly accepted, lolling her tongue around them like it was a lollipop. The sight had Harry bucking into the end of the bed, which Y/N just grinned at, not missing it for a second. When Harry had his mouth on her, she couldn’t look anywhere else.

Then he darted his tongue inside of her and Y/N’s hand went to her breasts, which had grown from her pregnancy and Harry didn’t seem to mind, adoring how sensitive they were. “More,” she begged, voice rough in the room. “Please, please, H.”

“Comin’ love,” he said, sucking on two of his fingers before pressing one to her slit, the cold feeling of his rings on her hot flesh making her gasp. “Like that, baby? Like it when I fuck you with my fingers, my rings still on? The fingers you just had in your mouth?”

“Harry,” she groaned, trying to contain the sounds threatening to escape her. Not being able to hold up her body anymore she rested on her hands, propping up her body on his mattress. She knew that it made her breasts stick out, which Harry loved—he was a man, after all—and the sound of him grunting at the sight made her smile at him coyly. “Like the view?”

He sucked on her clit in response before twirling his tongue in a cruel circle around her labia. “Love the view,” he muttered against her, spit falling from his mouth. “Love you, baby. Fuck, look at you as I fuck you—like you’re made for me.”

“Close,” she said, the sound muffled against her hand she had thrown over her mouth to keep the sounds in. She was leaning on just one hand, unsteady and about to let go if he let her. She loved to let him control her orgasms, the sound of him telling her to come always sending waves of pleasure through her body.

“Yeah?” He said, inserting another finger and curling them so she was bucking against his hand, his name an echo on her tongue. “Come for me,” he murmured, fingers digging into her thighs to hold her steady, his rings imprints on her skin. “But you gotta stay quiet love—I’ll have you screaming for me when we’re home, okay?”

She turned her head into the duvet in an attempt to silence the scream rising in her chest, but when she came, it just simply wasn’t enough. Anne and Gemma would’ve probably heard her if they were outside the door, a muffled scream of his name flowing from her mouth. She bucked against his hand, chasing her high and Harry licked her through it, the cold saliva from his tongue and his rings inside of her making her body shake.

“Fuck,” Harry said when she finally came down, body pliant in his hands. “That was bloody incredible.”

He pulled his fingers from her, a hiss leaving her teeth at the emptiness inside of her. “That’s how you got me pregnant,” she told him with a laugh.

“But that involves my dick,” he informed her, crawling up her body so he could smother her face in kisses, the slick of her still on his chin.

“Yes,” she said, pushing him away. “But it was that and then your dick that got me pregnant. You’re good, you know.” She rolled over, a hand on his chest. “Not that you need to hear it. Your ego is already too big for this relationship.”

“Ha!” He grabbed at her sides, pulling her closer into him. “You love my big ego. And my dick.”

Her head dropped to his chest with a groan of defeat. “God, you’re such a boy sometimes, I swear.”

With a kiss to her temple, he sat up and tugged her along with him. “C’mon, we can’t stay too much longer or Gemma will never let me forget it.” She licked at his chin, letting the rest of her juices land on her tongue before following him downstairs, trying not the laugh at the way he walked, obviously trying not to let the material brush against his dick too much. She truly loved a menace, she thought to herself. But he was her menace.

In the kitchen, Gemma, Anne, and Michal were sat with cups of tea, two set out for Y/N and Harry that had now gone cold. “Took you long enough,” Gemma said. “Tea’s gone cold while you two got reacquainted upstairs.”

“Gem,” Anne scolded. “Don’t embarrass your brother.” Gemma rolled her eyes, but stood up to reheat their tea.

Harry wrapped his arms around Y/N and she leaned into him, loving how his hands subconsciously rested on her lower belly, right over where their child rested. “Mum, Gem” he said as Gemma returned with their now warm tea. “We have somethin’ for you.”

“Oh!” Anne set down her tea and surveyed the two of them. “But we don’t do gifts until the morning of.” That was still two days away, but obviously Harry was eager. Y/N had told him that he could choose when he wanted to tell Anne, and it seemed like now was the time he had chosen. He was like Y/N, she thought to herself, unable to keep a secret from her parents for long.

“I know,” Harry replied. “But want to give it to you both now.”

Gemma shrugged. “I don’t mind an early gift,” she said.

“Perfect. One second,” Harry told them, disconnecting his arms from Y/N’s waist. “It’s in our luggage. Meet me in the living room?”

They all nodded and Harry disappeared, the sound of a zipper in the other room. “Well, he’s certainly excited,” Anne told Y/N, coming over and giving her a smile. “It’s good to see him so happy.”

Y/N couldn’t help but wonder how often Anne had seen her son unhappy over the years, how many women had broken his heart, how many times the world had broken him down. Harry had shared some of it—the disappointment over Zayn leaving, the women who had ripped him to shreds since Harry gave his heart so willingly—but not all of it. She supposed with time, she would learn it all, but she was no longer eager to uncover every stone of him that she was when they were starting out. Now, she knew she would have quite a long time to know every part of Harry, and the idea quite appealed to her.

Anne and Gemma sat on the couch, Michal in one of the armchairs, and Y/N took the other one, the one closest to the fire burning in the hearth that stockings hung from. After growing up with solely warm winters, it was nice to be someplace cold for a change.

Harry wandered in with the last two bags, one for Anne and one for Gemma. Gemma’s was Y/N’s favorite, the one that said, “I love Auntie” in multi-colored letters and confetti all over it. She fully planned on finagling it back from Gemma so she could actually dress their child in it one day. “Here you are,” Harry said, handing both the bags over before going to sit on the arm of Y/N’s chair, her hand in his.

Gemma looked at her mother. “On the count of three?” Anne nodded, a playful smile, and they counted down, Harry squeezing Y/N’s hand in anticipation.

“Oh,” Anne said when she pulled out the onesie, the one nearly identical to Y/N’s mom’s. She looked up at Y/N and Harry and there were tears in her eyes that made Y/N want to cry. “Really?”

“You’re pregnant!” Gemma shrieked, dropping the onesie before bounding over to Y/N. “Oh my god, I’m going to be an Aunt! A little niece or nephew!” She grabbed her into a hug, laughing with joy in Y/N’s ears. “Best Christmas gift. Oh my god, Haz!” Gemma pulled her brother into a tight hug, and Y/N’s eyes rested on Anne who was full on crying at the onesie in her hands.

Harry saw it and went over to his mom, his arm around her shoulders. “You’re going to be a grandma,” he told her, which only made her cry harder. “Mum?”

“Happy,” she reassured him, before taking his face in her hands. “So happy I could explode!” This was the reaction Y/N wanted, she thought to herself, surveying the scene of pure joy. “Y/N,”  Anne said, arms outstretched. “Come here, love!”

Y/N practically floated to Anne, the prospect of a mother’s arms around her exactly what she needed. Anne bundled her up in them, tears still streaming down her face as she gave her a tight hug. “We’re due in mid-June,” she said when Anne pulled back, it being the only thing she could think to say.

Anne beamed at her, eyes darting between her and Harry. “My word,” she told them. “This it the best surprise. A little baby! My baby boy,” she said, taking Harry’s face in her hands and kissing his cheeks, “is going to be a Dad.”

Harry’s eyes caught Y/N over his mother’s shoulders, a reassuring gaze that told her he knew what she was thinking. That he wanted to remind her it would all turn out okay. And when she looked around her to the happy scene, the fire in the hearth and the joy on the faces in the room, she knew he was right.

Harry purposefully woke up earlier than Y/N on Christmas morning. He had been trying to figure out when to give the key to his house (not that she didn’t already have one, but it was the idea that counted) and finally he had settled on Christmas Day. So when he awoke, snow falling softly outside his window, he scrambled out of bed to grab the key he had wrapped up in a box the night before with his mother’s help.

“Harry?” Y/N’s sleepy voice came from the bed, her hand sticking out to the place where he’d just been lying.

He loved that she always craved his presence in her sleep. He had noticed it early on, the way she held him in her sleep, always burrowed deeper into his body, was hesitant to let go of him in the morning. With the box in his hand, he crawled back onto the bed, occupying his old space. “Morning, sleepyhead,” he said, placing the box on her pillow, right next to her head.

Her eyes fluttered open, eyelashes brushing against the pillowcase. Then her gaze met the blue box tied with a white ribbon sitting on the pillow, and her eyes widened. “What’s this?”

“One of your Christmas gifts,” he said. “Didn’t want it to be in front of the whole family.”

She sat up, pushing back the duvet cover revealing his old school shirt that she had worn to bed. When he had told her to pick anything she wanted, she had gone through every shirt in his drawer before settling on this one, loving how soft the material was from years of use. Harry loved how she looked in his clothes, but seeing her in the mornings with messy hair and adorned in his Holmes Chapel Comprehensive School shirt made his heart clench.

He didn’t know how she would respond to the gesture, the request for her to move in with him. To his brain, it made sense—they were having a kid together, after all—but he also knew how Y/N was about these things. It meant commitment and she was always hesitant to take that next step. “Open it,” he told her, sitting up too so their bodies faced one another.

Her fingers grasped the edge of the box, eyes flickering to his face before pulling it open. Inside lay the key to his house, golden and ridged, the one that fit perfectly into the lock on his front door. “Harry…”

“Will you move in with me?”

For a few beats, she just stared at the key, but when her eyes raised to his, he knew what she was going to say. “Yes.”

He leaned over and kissed her, one filled with love and passion and everything he was trying to say. She dropped the box to the bed and let him press her back into the mattress. “Can’t wait to make you come in our bed,” he mumbled against her cheek, drawing a chuckle from her, but she didn’t stop him she he drew her underwear to the side and dropped to his knees, wanting his girl to start her Christmas off right.

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NEXT CHAPTER COMING JULY 25TH @ NOON CST