#you think he took time away from work to drive to a polling place? when he doesn’t even bother to do anything for his own birthday?

[uhyeahnoabsolutelynot]

some tlou fic writers are like “joel voted for bush” based on, i assume, that stuff he said to ellie about american politics and the sticker on tommy’s truck and the texas of it all and i’m like. oh you think joel voted?

[lives-in-midgard]

Finally, Back

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x reader

Summary: When you hear a loud noise in the middle of the night, you think someone is breaking into your apartment, turns out it's just Bucky who is back from his mission.

Word Count: 820

A/N: Hey everyone! Thank you for helping me decide what to post, with voting on this poll. I hope you like it!

Divider made by @firefly-graphics

Masterlist

Being in a relationship with a superhero wasn’t always easy. Especially if you are a civilian and living a normal life. Well, actually it’s not that normal anymore since you started dating Bucky Barnes. Now you always have to worry when he is on a mission, but when he gets home, Bucky immediately drives to your apartment. Bucky loves you so much and so do you. You had been dating for a few months when you decided to move in together.

You love living with Bucky. From waking up cuddled up with him to going for a walk, cooking together and watching your favorite shows or movies together. Another thing you like to do is reading next to each other and then discuss what happened in the book.

You were currently cooking dinner, normally you would cook with Bucky, but this time you were cooking alone because Bucky was on a mission, which he had already been for three weeks. You weren’t sure where he was or when he would be back. You just knew that it was a dangerous mission and to protect you, Bucky didn’t want to tell you anything about it.

Before Bucky left, he promised you that he would come back home to you and you’re believing and hoping that it’s true and he will come back home soon.

You missed Bucky so much and felt so lonely without him. You started to miss him a lot and everything felt different when he wasn’t here. Especially coming home after work to an empty apartment and no one is waiting for you. Bucky also missed you so much and couldn’t wait to see again. He did his best on this mission, so that he could be home as quickly as possible.

It was in the middle of the night and you couldn’t sleep again. You missed Bucky’s arms around you and how he always gave you a kiss on the forehead before saying goodnight. After lying there for a while, you started to overthink and couldn’t get the idea out of your head that something might have happened to Bucky. You heard the wind outside and some strange noises. Suddenly you heard a loud bang, and someone mumbled something you couldn’t understand. You sat up in your bed and listened carefully. Suddenly you heard someone opening your apartment door.

Shit, someone broke into your apartment. You thought and reached for the gun, you put in the bedside table in case something happens. Bucky taught you how to use it, even though he hoped you would never need it. You stood up and took a deep breath. You had to be brave for Bucky.

You quietly opened the door to your bedroom a bit, held the gun in front of your body and then said loudly.

“Wherever you are, I have a gun and I’m not afraid to use it!” You opened the door more and took a step out of your bedroom. Suddenly the light went on and you saw Bucky standing a few steps away from you.

“Doll.” He said softly.

“Bucky you’re home.” Tears began to form in your eyes as you watched Bucky walking closer to you. He gave you a soft smile and said.

“Yeah, I’m finally back home with my girl.” He looked at the gun and then back at you.

“I’m sorry for scaring you, doll.” Bucky said and then you realized that you still had the gun in your hands and got nervous.

“Let me take the gun, doll.” Bucky said and you nodded. Then he gently took the gun from your hand and put it in his back pocket. After that, Bucky opened his arms and pulled you into a hug.

“I missed you so much.”

“I missed you more, sweetheart.” You don’t know how long you stood there, hugging each other and telling the other one how much you love and missed each other. After a while you turned away and Bucky placed his hand on your cheek and his metal hand on your back and pulled you into a passionate kiss. When the kiss ended, you smiled at each other and Bucky took your hand.

“Let’s go cuddle.” Bucky said and you giggled, which made Bucky smile. He kissed your forehead and then you went to your bedroom. Bucky changed into different clothes and laid down next to you. Then you laid your head on his chest and Bucky wrapped his arms around you.

You laid there for a while when Bucky suddenly broke the silence.

“Let’s go somewhere, just you and me.” You looked up at him with a smile and Bucky gently rubbed your back.

“Yeah, let’s do this.”

Bucky and you then started talking about some places that you both have wanted to visit for a while and you can’t wait to see these beautiful places with Bucky. After a while, you nodded off in your boyfriend's loving embrace.

Taglist:

@marvelogic | @eviebuggg | @buckys-wintersoldier | @nicoline1998enilocin | @kandis-mom | @sergeantbarnessdoll | @noellez-best-life23 | @beaubbdoll | @sgtgarricks | @ratchildspartan | @scott-loki-barnes |  @mrs-bucky-barnes-73 | @mrsbuckybarnes1917 | @brnesblogposts

[bones4thecats]

hii,

can u please write a scenario where reader bombs ruggie with kisses and compliments when they saw him in his spell drive clothes for the first time? Also loudly cheering him up during the game (#1 fan) <3

a small bonus pls: (after the game) reader pullling him away somewhere where no one can see them both and starts making out with him a lil bit ( juuuust a little bit spicy)

i hope this isnt to much but can u make reader flirty and shameless please.

(does this make sense?)

Type of Writing: Request Characters: Ruggie Bucchi Name: Ruggie with an S/O that loudly cheers at his first Spelldrive game Requester: Anonymous

A/N: If my memory serves me right, this would be my first Ruggie piece, so he may end up being slightly out of character! And, just as a note to those who have not yet read my announcement, I am going to be working on my Tokyo Revengers poll pieces until this Saturday. So, the requests will be opened sometime afterwards.

✧⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋄✧⋄⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋆⋄✧⋄⋅⋆⋄✧⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋆⋄✧⋄⋅⋆⋄✧⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅

✧⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋄✧⋄⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋆⋄✧⋄⋅⋆⋄✧⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋆⋄✧⋄⋅⋆⋄✧⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅

���� When Ruggie and you first started your relationship, you would randomly run up to him and gift him with kisses and hugs, making him flush and chuckle at your reactions

🍩 And this year, they were getting new Spelldrive uniforms, since some of the older ones has become far to rough for the players to work in

🍩 Once the uniforms were delivered and washed, Ruggie and the team dressed in them for their first game of the year, unaware of the urges you would be consumed by

🍩 He smirked as he looked in the mirror of his locker, and he looked behind him as he heard the familiar sound of Leona's scoff

" Why are 'ya staring at yourself so much? Worried Y/N's gonna be embarrassed or somethin'? " " Oh far from that, I just wanna look my best. Who knows what they'll be thinking? Shishishi~ "

🍩 Leona rolled his eyes as the hyena-beastman walked out of the locker room and towards the entrance for the team, and once he caught sight of you in the stands, his tail began swaying

🍩 You were running your eyes everywhere, and once the announcer began their small rant about the sport and the previous season, you grit your teeth lightly as Royal Sword Academy's team was announced onto the field

🍩 But, once the familiar sound of Night Raven College's name rang out, you jumped up and began to cheer with your fellow students, Yuu and Grim were cheering with you, and also trying to calm you down

🍩 Ruggie smirked as he and his fellow teammates rolled onto the field to make their plan for defense and offense, his eyes wandering over the stands as their rivals took their places

🍩 When the whistle rang, he jumped right into action, and your eyes couldn't stay off of the man you were greatfull to call yours

🍩 Yuu smiled as you would cheer loudly for Ruggie's points, making Leona glare at you as the hyena would lose concentration from their gatherings to think of their next moves for the following quarter

🍩 Grim was getting more aggressive with his words as the game commenced, and because of this, you and Yuu had to hold the small beast away from releasing a blast of blue flames onto the field at the head of RSA's team

🍩 Once the game finished with NRC's victory and RSA's defeat, you ran down the stands with your two friends trying to catch up with you during your burst of energy

🍩 One thing was on your mind; Ruggie

🍩 You needed to congratulate him, and comment about how beautiful he looked in his uniform

" Ruggie! " " Dandelion! "

🍩 Grabbing his hand, you pulled him away from the exit and into the nearby hallway, one that was normally never occupied after a game, since the players just wanted to clean up and go back to their dorms for the night

🍩 Ruggie smirked as you backed up against a wall while holding his arms, gliding your hands up and down his thin, yet-muscular arms, a light amount of sweat layering the soft skin delicately

" You were amazing out there, my dear. "

🍩 The beastman smirked as your hands ran up his arms and behind his neck to grip his hair, his ears now falling back in pleasure, the feeling of your hands gripping his hair made shivers down his spine, all the straining muscles on the way loosening as you whispered in his ears

" The way you pulled that disc away with your magic was very enticing, I must say. And how your eyes narrowed with concentration was so... nice. "

🍩 He smirked, his small fangs shimmering with his cloudy blue eyes, great seven, when your voice was lowered like this it drove him crazy! He felt like he was losing control of his own body as his eyes drifted towards your lips

🍩 You chuckled lowly as you locked your lips onto his, and as each slow second passed, your minds began to darken with thoughts, but, before you could act upon said thoughts, a cough made you guys turn around

" Really? Ruggie get clean, great sevens this is nastier than Cheka's constant clinging... "

🍩 As Leona walked away with his ears down underneath his jacket's hood, you and Ruggie looked at one another and laughed, what a funny way to end a night, huh?

[familyvideostevie]

I saw your requests are open and I simply had to send a request for Steve and Bee Girl! I’d love to see them at the Fun Fair or something equally summery. But anything you want to write is awesome! Thank you for NGAW, it’s such a fantastic series ❤️🐝

wow, how did you know i was writing exactly that already for this poll!! so, here you go my dear. steve and bee girl from no good at waiting go to the county fair | fluff, post-au summer fun, a little suggestive! 1.4k

Steve's been nagging you to go on a date like this ever since you took the kids to the amusement park.

"Come on," he'd say. "I want to let loose at a fair or something without worrying that one of those shitheads is gonna hurl all over a family."

"In the summer, Steve," you'd tell him. "We'll go in the summer."

Well, summer has come. Your life in Hawkins continues to be lovely. The farmer's market has started again and the kids run wild, seemingly growing before your eyes.

But today is about you and Steve. Well, and candles.

"So, you're telling me that this date is actually just a recon mission?" Steve says once you're on the highway. It's a hot day and all of the windows are down, the most recent tape you've made him playing low enough that you can still hear him.

"It's multitasking," you insist. "Bob says that rival farm will be at this county's fair and he wants me to see what their scents are like. And lucky for you, I decided to ask my boyfriend to come along." You lean over to tap his nose with your finger, which he swats at, eyes still on the road.

"Lucky for you, your boyfriend wanted to drive across state lines for some wax," he drones. You blow a raspberry at him and Steve grins, resting his palm on your bare knee. It's honestly too hot to be touching that much but with Steve you never really mind.

You'd left mid-afternoon so you could get to the fair for the cooler evening, and then plan to stay in a motel before heading out tomorrow morning. Your bags are in the backseat of the BMW and it's kind of thrilling to get out of Hawkins, to get away from everyone and everything you see everyday and to just be with Steve.

The drive is calm. You and Steve spend a lot of time together, sure, but there's always someone who needs one or both of you for something. This feels like the first time you can really relax in a while. You chat about nothing important, time flying by as it tends to do in the company of one of the people you love most in the world. Pretty soon he's pulling up to the fair, the sky now a soft pink, the lights bouncing off of the rows of cars in the makeshift grass parking lot.

"Have you ever actually been to one of these before?" he asks you, locking the car and linking your arms. The heat of the day is already fading and he eyes your bare arms but knows better than to suggest a coat. He'll just give you his jacket eventually.

"I think so," you say. "When I was young."

"These things are nuts," he says. "I gotta take you to the Indiana state fair someday. You'll freak." You imagine a younger Steve at one of these, cotton candy all over his face and the lights of the rides he'd be too short to ride reflecting in his eyes. You kiss his cheek, just because.

He doesn't question it. Something you've worked on is vocalizing your feelings but also showing him as much affection as you can stand -- it always makes his cheeks darken and his eyes sparkle.

"I can't believe you haven't taken me already, Harrington," you tease. "Feels like a right of passage."

Steve buys you a handful of tickets at the entrance booth and rolls his eyes. "Honey," he says. "This is our first summer. And I'm not the one working extra shifts."

He doesn't really mean it. You both know you're working extra shifts -- he is too, just starting in the fall -- so you can save up for a place of your own someday. For both of you.

"Anyway," Steve says. "We should make a summer bucket list."

"What, like we're in a teen movie, or something?"

He pulls his arm from yours and slings it around your shoulders, grinning at you. His hair is lighter this time of year, you've noticed, and he's got a nice tan. You met Steve at the beginning of fall and fell in love with him as the days got colder, but you see now that he's made for summer. The season highlights everything about him and he has come alive.

"Exactly like we're in a teen movie."

You laugh as you walk slowly through the fairgrounds, hardly paying attention to anything but the beautiful boy at your side. "Alright. What should we do?"

Steve puts on his thinking face. Bottom lip jutted out, eyebrows raised, head tilting side to side. He counts off on his fingers.

"Skinny dip in the lake, for sure," he says.

"If you're lucky." He winks.

"Do karaoke at that college bar with Robin."

"Oh god," you say, laughing. "I don't think they'll let us back after we tried last time."

"I don't think they'll let you back after last time," he corrects. You wrinkle your nose at him.

"Alright, hotshot, what else?"

"That's all I've got," he sighs. "But I'll workshop it. Right now, I'm going to win you a fish."

"A wha-- Steve, wait!" Your boyfriend charges ahead of you to some kind of water gun game where he can, sure enough, win a fish.

Steve does not win you a fish.

"Can we go find that candle stand now?" he says to you instead of apologizing for the lack of fish in your hands. You don't tease him, though you desperately want to.

Then you see something even better. "No," you tell him. "Because I'm going to win you a stuffed bear."

It's Steve's turn to look incredulous as you stride towards the ring toss.

You do win him a bear.

"Holy shit," he says when you hand it to him. It's purple and has a yellow bow around its neck. "That was kind of hot."

The laughter sputters out of you before you can control it and it makes Steve laugh too. He buys you some fried Oreos as thanks and makes sure to get powdered sugar all over you and then brush it off a little too thoroughly for such a public setting.

You do make it to the candle stand, finally, and the girl working it is so nice that you buy one. "Don't tell Bob," you warn Steve.

The evening is winding down when Steve convinces you to get in line for the Ferris wheel.

"Remember when we frenched in the one in the amusement park in the fall?" he whispers in your ear.

"Oh, do you mean when I sat in your lap and you almost busted your pants--"

He claps a hand over your mouth. "Yeah, guess you do remember." You lick his palm and he grimaces and lets you go. "Gross."

"You love it," he says. Well, what can you say to that?

You climb into the car -- this one isn't enclosed like the last one, more of a bench that sways a little too much for your liking, so there will be no funny business. It goes slow and as you rise you realize how pretty the fair looks against the darkness of the woods around it.

"It's so pretty," you say.

"Sure is," Steve replies. You don't look at him, but you put your hand on top of his where it rests on top of your knee.

"You better not be looking at me as you say that because that's so cheesy."

"Me? Cheesy?" You do look at him and yeah, he's looking at you. He's smiling at you. It's your favorite Steve smile -- it's soft, sincere. Almost disbelieving, like he thinks he's in a dream and he's going to wake up any second. You know how he feels.

The wheel stops and you have a perfect view from the top. "I never thought life could be this perfect," you say softly. "We've come so far."

Steve somehow squeezes closer to you. "We have," he replies. "And we deserve it." He kisses your temple.

"It's just so nice to be happy. To belong." Your throat feels tight and you're not totally sure where this is coming from. It's just another night, right?

"I love belonging with you," he says. It takes your breath away.

"That's so cheesy, Steve," you say thickly.

"I know," he says. He traces the faint scar on your palm. "Still true, bee girl."

You kiss him under a sky full of stars.

thank you for reading <3 reblog, send feedback, masterlist here!

[lucifers-horror-harem]

Cheering You Up Headcanons

Hey all! I decided to write some soft headcanons this time around! Plus, I added a new boy, Travis Hackett from The Quarry! I know hes not exactly the same as my usual roster of horror slashers and villains, but I love him and this is my blog soooooooo I don’t care lol Also thank you to the people who voted for the 3rd character, Otis! I really like using the poll option to see what people are interested in seeing, I might have to use it some more when I’m stuck between choices :)

Freddy Krueger:

As much of an asshole Freddy can be, he’s fully capable of toning himself down if you’re looking upset. But if he’s in a particularly antagonistic mood, the signs you’re upset will fly past him entirely until you go off on him, whether it’s crying or yelling at him for being such a dick. 

Freddy isn’t the kind to comfort you with his words, his love language tends to trend towards acts of service rather than sappy throw-away lines. He’ll never admit it, but ultimately he feels a smidge guilty for causing you more upset. So he’ll begin his scheming on a way to make it up to you.

Luckily for you, Freddy has his dream world, and he can make anything possible in your dreams. Freddy will hit you with just about everything he’s learned about you since knowing you. Do you like fancy romantic dinners? You’ve got the best seat in the house. Want to travel to places you wish you could afford? He’s got a first-class ticket to get you there. Just want a simple night in? He’s got you covered.

In all honesty, it would be a shock to see him put this much work in. Especially when half of the time you weren’t even sure he listened to what you were saying. Freddy not only listens to you, but he remembers everything. He just doesn’t like you knowing how much he truly cares. He thinks it makes him look too soft.

He’d get truly cocky as he soaks up the praise and affection you give him for such a sweet surprise. Freddy acts like it’s not a huge deal at all, and it wasn’t like he had to put much thought into it. You’re just so easy to please, he insists. But deep down even his cold black heart can feel a little something just from seeing your smile. As he lets you have your fun, he can’t help but smile to himself while watching you.

Travis Hackett:

While Travis might be awkward about expressing his emotions too freely, he’s more observant than he lets on. He’ll listen to everything you have to say, and figure out what you need based on that. He’ll let you rant and rave if you're venting until you finally let it out of your system, or he’ll hold you tightly if you’re an emotional wreck in need of comfort. And if it’s something he can take care of, well, he’s not above solving the issue himself.

Above all else, Travis makes sure you’re safe and comfortable. You mean more to him than he could ever put into words, and he’d do anything to see your smile. Even if he has a hard time expressing it, you can tell just how much he cares by the way he looks at you with adoration and softness you rarely see from him. He’s a brick wall to damn near everyone, but once you crack inside you’ll find he’s a bit of a sap. 

The next day, he’d tell you to cancel any plans you have for that night. If you ask, he’ll simply grunt and ask you if you trust him. Obviously, you do, so you let him continue his planning.

That evening, he’ll drive you to a secluded area of the Hackett property where no one will bother the two of you. When you get there, you’ll find he’s already set up camp, and you can’t help but feel a smile pull on your face. Don’t make too big a production out of it, or Travis might get too flustered. As it is he’ll keep fidgeting and rubbing the back of his neck as he insists it’s no big deal, that he uses this campsite so often that he just keeps these things here. Suuuuuure. 

He finds the outdoors peaceful and relaxing, much of his best memories took place in the vast expanse of wilderness that fell in the Hackett property, and he hopes that perhaps you’ll feel just as calm surrounded by nature. Maybe create some new memories too.

You’ll have a front-row seat to the sunset falling below the trees, reflecting over everything in sight and giving the forest a soft orange hue. And as night begins to fall, you sit by the campfire that Travis had kept up past dinner time, looking up at the stars as they shone more brightly here than anywhere else you had seen before. 

When the fire finally dies down, Travis will have you pulled to him on a blanket as you look up at the stars together and speak softly to each other as you begin to feel sleep pulling at you. Before you both fall asleep and get bit by all the mosquitos, Travis will make sure he carries you to the tent before finally settling down for the night, his arms wrapped protectively around you.

Otis Driftwood:

Otis isn't exactly the best choice if you're wanting a traditional cheering-up session. In fact, he might even complain if you pester him too much. "Can'tcha go bitch to Baby or something, I'm doing some important fucking shit here!" He'd probably shoo you along without so much as another glance your way.

After a while though, Otis will come around to the fact you need him. It's way easier for him to provide sexual affection, but genuine kindness is a bit out of his repertoire. But, after mulling it over for a while (as well as getting ripped a new one from Baby), Otis will try his best to be whatever you need.

He likes it best when all you need is for him to just exist in the same space, not needing him to provide a solution or answers. It's easy for him to just be a shoulder to cry on, that way he can't say all the wrong things like he tends to do. 

Otis also loves it when you need to have a good vent session. He'll hype you up, telling you that yeah, that guy was a motherfucker and maybe someone should do something about it. Maybe it's good if you don't let that get too far because Otis gets an itching for revenge at the drop of a hat just to make you happy. 

He also likes taking you on drives to calm you down. While he doesn't like to drive if he's too worked up because he's prone to road rage, he finds drives to be something that eases his mind when his thoughts are too scattered. And he's happy to share them with you, just so long as you don't become a backseat driver. Hell, if you ask nicely, he'll stop at whatever roadside spots you see. He’d even stop for ice cream if you’re being good.

[sunny6677]

Spooky Month: The Dating Sim

Part 23

(I'm mainly just doing this because it's fun to watch, but this is basically a spooky month interactive thing/poll which is kinda like a dating sim. Of course, only the adult characters can be your love interests. So do take that in mind.)

————

You decided to answer Lila first.

Clicking on the notification of her message, it went to the screen that was usually shown whenever you texted someone. Seeing her message pop up, you began to type away at your virtual keyboard. You answered that you had just woken up.

You began to slowly sit up in your bed, unplugging your phone from its charger. You were about to slowly slip yourself off of your bed so you could get ready to go and see her so you could babysit her son, but in the corner of your eye, you saw another message from her presumably pop up on screen. You turned your gaze back to the screen.

Her message had read, "Oh—alright! Don't worry. I think I'll just be giving my prints to the boss today, so it shouldn't take too long. I'll wait for you as long as I can, alright?"

You smiled, and typed back a thanks in response. You promised that you'd be there soon.

With a sigh, you clicked on Kevin's notification before you got ready. You then typed an apology for not having responded last night, and that you fell asleep around the time he texted you. You typed that you had a kid to babysit today, but that you'd try and talk to him when you could.

Setting down your phone, you then finally slipped out of your bed, and walked toward your closet. It was time to get ready.

————

You were on the road by now, driving in the front seat of your car. You hadn't dressed up too much, merely picking something casual. You took your phone with you just incase anyone you had the number of wouldn't be stuck waiting for you to answer. You couldn't exactly text right now though, considering you were on the road after all. Birds chirped from outside of your car, and occasionally, vehicles would drive by you.

Lila's address wasn't far. So you were at least thankful for that. Even if it had been far though, you still would have tried the best you could to get to her place. She seemed to be under a lot of stress right now.

You drove by the movie theater, and a part of you wondered if you could see Radford again. He seemed like a nice guy after all. In the distance, you could see the candy store, and Kevin came to mind. The lights seemed to be on, so he was probably working by now. You drove by the sidewalk. You saw a group of three mischevious looking teenagers.. well, at least the one in the middle looked mischevious.

As you kept driving along the road with only the sounds of the ambience of the street accompanying your hearing, you finally saw Lila's house in the distance. You at least recognized it as her house because you could see the address. With an eager but soft smile, you began to turn once you managed to get close enough, and slowly inched your way into the sidewalk. You drove slowly, trying to be careful so you wouldn't hit her vehicle which was clearly there.

Finally, you stopped. You then let out a slight sigh, before opening the door, and tucking your phone into your pocket. You wouldn't be using your phone much since most of your attention would be presumably focused on her son for the entirety of the time you were watching over him, but you also thought to bring it just incase of any sort of emergency.

You slammed the car door shut, and locked it with your car key. You then began to walk toward the door. Her house looked.. nice. It was like any other ordinary modern looking house, but it looked nice even so. Inviting, even. Or maybe that was just because you knew it was her house.

You finally stopped once you got closer to the door, and you rang the doorbell. There was a few moments of anticipation, the ambience being that of birds chirping all around you, and the sounds of vehicles driving from behind you. Finally, the door slowly opened.

You smiled once you saw the familiar look of Lila's face peeking through the crack of the door. She opened it more, and her whole body finally became more visible. She looked to be wearing a dark purple coat, even despite the temperatures. Perhaps it was just to look more formal for whoever her boss might have been?

She then grinned, and spoke, her voice raising an octave. "Oh! You're here!"

You greeted her, and then apologized for not having answered her a little earlier since you were asleep and all. In response, sne only shook her head. "No, that's okay. Just come in. I'll show you around so you'll know what to do, okay? I'll let my son know you're here too."

You nodded meekly in reply. She stepped out of your way, and you entered the home. The cold air caused by the air conditioning then hit your skin, and caused a breath of relief to seep out of your mouth like pouring automatic lava. You had to admit, living in a suburban town in Arizona might not have been the best life. But maybe that was different if the people here were friendly enough.

You took a look around. You could hear the muffled giggling of what must have been her son in the other room. Most likely the living room from what it seemed, since the kitchen was nearby and you could very clearly see it.

You thought of what to do. You weren't necessarily shy about this, but you didn't want to make the whole situation awkward b doing nothing, and you didn't want to make a fool of yourself either. Even if you had only met Lila a few days ago.

[nodynasty4us]

This is my first post to escape containment without the help of Blaze or a Tumblr celebrity.

Below the cut are some good responses from the tags and reblogs:

i legit lied to vote in the 2016 primaries#i told my parents i was going to the library and took the car and drove over an hour to my polling place#it was the furthest i had ever driven and probably like the 10th time i'd driven alone#i had a panic attack on the way there#but i still fucking did it!!#also i did really go to the library to get a dvd to prove i'd been there

I forget the quote, but: Answer the question they're asking. They aren't asking what your vote was; they're asking if they can punish you. Answer whatever means no to being punished.

i just watched that ad#and i am already writing fanfic about those two women ditching their horrible husbands#and going off together to start a llama farm or something#where they will live happily ever after

A reminder also that the men quoted above are effectively saying that they'd do harm - whether physical, financial, emotional, or social - to their wives if they found out that they'd voted for Harris. It is always acceptable to lie in order to escape abusive violence.

What IS nauseating is the fact that women, and people in the situation of dependency, can be and are pressured into voting for the candidate NOT of their choice. “The same as having an affair” ? Fuck you Jesse Watters.

I can see the Fox News reactions inspiring women to vote for Harris more than the ad itself does.

reminder that jesse watters let the air out of his current wife's tires#so he could drive her home#while he was still married to his previous wife#his current wife didn't know this until he mentioned it on air#girl g e t o u t

Someone on Tiktok commented that these men are so offended by this partially because they feel that since they "own" a woman it means they get two votes, and like, I think I knew that but somehow, it's different seeing someone say it just like that.

I feel like every single person mad about this is telling on themselves so hard.

Can I say something? As an American, do you know how sick it makes me to see other Americans want to control how those close to them vote? This is America. The freedom to choose who you vote for is supposed to be in our blood. We should not be discriminating against people because of how they voted. No one should have to hide or lie about who they voted. What the fuck is going on in my country where we have to tell voters that they might have to lie about who they voted for for their own safety. And then other people immediately PROVE that they ABSOLUTELY have to lie for their own safety.

i lied my first vote#at work I'm lying still#i know people who have said biden n all his supporters should be hung so yeah no i ain't telling people who i vote for

if you're nauseated by women having minds of their own#that sounds like a you problem#you should stay away from women until you get over it

vote democrat and lie you voted 3rd party to your activist friends who want to burn it all down or think it will help when it sure won't

If you voted or not is public record. Who you voted for is not. So lie about who you voted for if you have to, not if you voted or not. If you're in a relationship where you don't feel safe to tell the truth you need to leave if at all possible of course.

your vote is yours#your vote matters#your vote is your voice#even if someone is trying to silence you#vote blue#They're saying the quiet part out loud these days#If she doesn't do as he tells her then 'it's the same as having an affair'?#These are people who want slaves - not spouses#Now imagine how little they think of you if this is how they talk about their life partner. Who they ostensibly love.#Don't let anyone steal your choice

My great-grand[father] used to accompany my great-grandmother into the booth to make sure she voted how he wanted. When they finally made that illegal (and enforced it) she was so relieved she could finally vote with her beliefs. Don’t let anybody send you back to 1940s Alabama. Your vote is your own. Not your spouse’s, your father’s, your boss’s, your pastor’s.

Your party affiliation and whether or not you voted are public record, but who you vote for is private. I wouldn’t recommend saying you didn’t vote when you did because you can easily get caught in that lie, but I am absolutely in favor of lying about who you voted for. If you’re stuck in a situation where you don’t know somebody’s political views and they ask who you voted for, you can always say “Oh, I’d rather not talk politics!” or “These conversations can be so loaded! Let’s discuss something more fun.” and change the topic. You don’t owe anyone your political views, and you certainly don’t need to tell them who you really voted for.

From the October 31, 2024 article:

“In the one place in America where women still have a right to choose, you can vote any way you want. And no one will ever know,” Roberts says in the ad as a woman on screen meets up with her husband after casting her ballot for Harris.

The voter winks at a fellow female voter as her husband asks if she made the “right choice.”

Republicans have responded to the video with outrage, with some claiming that a wife lying about her vote is as bad as an affair.

“If I found out Emma was going to the voting booth and pulling the lever for Harris, that’s the same thing as having an affair,” Fox News host Jesse Watters said on air Wednesday in a clip highlighted by Mediaite.

Other GOP members including Charlie Kirk said the thought was “nauseating.”

[simplee-dreaming]

The Party

A/N: I spent far too much time deciding how all of their outfits were gonna look so I hope it paid off. Also, I know some things I mention have different names in different countries but I've gone for what I only know as the British version. Hope you like it! (Totally didn't get inspiration for this idea from driving past a joke shop myself...)

Word count: 2951

Summary: The reader attends her first themed party hosted by RDJ, but her outfit lands her in trouble.

------------------------------------

Tonight was the night. The night you had been waiting for for weeks. A party at Robert Downey Jr’s house. But not just any old party, oh no, a party for the Avengers cast. Not even just a party - a themed party.

See, Robert is well known for his themed parties. Of course he’s done the classics such as the black and white theme, the 80s theme, even the “dress as your favourite superhero” theme - what could be more suited? But he’s also well known for his unique themes. For example: dress as what you wanted to be when you were a kid; dress as your favourite fruit or veg; dress as another member of the cast; dress as your favourite gay icon. The list goes on.

This was your very first party with the cast though. Being the newest member, you were super excited to have a great night with them all outside of work - plus little Tom couldn’t stop guessing what this theme could be. It was, of course:

“Dress as your favourite board game.”

Yep. Board games.

You spent ages trying to figure out what board game you were going to dress up as. The main rule of the themed parties was that you couldn’t tell other people what you were going as unless you deliberately needed someone else to complete your outfit.

You were desperate for ideas now that the party was only a week away. It wasn’t until you were walking down the highstreet, and something in the shop window caught your eye, that you finally had an idea. You were standing outside of a joke shop, and in the window stood a dress...designed like a Twister mat.

Perfect.

The day had finally arrived. No one was filming today so you had all day to get yourself ready. Hair and makeup done, Twister dress on, ready to rumble.

You made your way to RDJ’s house at half 8 - late enough to not be the first one there but early enough to enjoy everyone’s company for longer. You smiled with glee as you stepped into the house. You were tingling with excitement as you walked towards the room where the music played. The minute you walked into the room, everyone approached you. And one by one you scanned them all to see what they were dressed as.

The first person you saw was Anthony, he was dressed up as Cards Against Humanity. Not quite a board game but funny nonetheless. The front of his outfit was completely black and the back was completely white. The writing on his front read “I drink to forget _____”, and the writing on his back read “Tom Holland”. You giggled.

Next was Scarlett. She decided to come dressed as Pictionary. Part of her outfit was made with polyester and nylon, and she carried around a whiteboard marker so that anyone could draw a picture on her outfit and others had to guess what it was. This could also be wiped off easily, ready for the next person to draw.

Sebastian was next, you snorted when you saw him. He was dressed as Frustration. His outfit was divided into the four colours: his top right being yellow, top left being green, bottom right being blue and bottom left being red. He had placed a semisphere plastic hat over his head and inside lay a foam dice which jumped about whenever he shook his head.

After Seb came Liz. She was dressed up as Uno. Her front and back were two different colours of the uno reverse card - the front being red and the back being green. The point of this is that whenever someone asked her to do something she didn’t wanna do, she’d just point to her outfit and get out of doing it.

Next was Paul B. He came as Trivial Pursuit. Random questions and answers were plastered all over his suit, such as: “how many feet are there in a fathom? 6”; “What three-word slogan was named the most popular advertisement ever in a 2000 poll? Beanz Meanz Heinz”; and his own personal saying, “Where do snitches end up? In ditches”.

Following Paul was the unsurprising double act. Big Tom and Hemsy. They had come dressed as Snakes and Ladders. Tom had glued a giant toy python to his all-black outfit, and Chris had stuck a cardboard ladder to the front and back of his all-white outfit. Simple, yet effective.

Then came Evans who was dressed as Noughts and Crosses, despite numerous comments from RDJ about it not being a board game. His back was full of paper noughts and crosses stuck to his top but his front had a similar material to Scarlett’s where the cast could play their own game on his front and then wipe it off for the next players.

You scanned little Tom next. He had gone all out with his outfit, dressing up as Operation. He was wearing a light pink coloured top and matching trousers and had stapled all the pieces of operation to their correct areas, such as the butterfly, the spare rib and the wish bone. He’d also used face paint to paint his nose a dark shade of red. Adorably creepy in a way.

Last, but certainly not least, was the man himself. Robert Downey Jr. He came as the popular game Cluedo. And boy did he look fancy. He wore a top hat that had a giant question mark stuck to it, and a tuxedo with a long sweeping tail attached to the jacket. Neatly placed all over his black suit were the names of the suspects, the names of the rooms and the names of the weapons - all written in white. He looked splendid.

“Twister. How unusual. I love it,” Robert said, the others nodded in agreement.

“Thanks, you all look incredible,” you said.

Little Tom held out his arm and led you to the dance floor where you spent the next hour dancing the night away. Big Tom and Hemsy were owning the dance floor with their moves. Many party classics blared through the speakers, including 5,6,7,8...which you knew the dance off by heart but RDJ had to be taught the moves by you and little Tom.

Another hour passed and you were sat with Scarlett, Liz and Paul in the other room where the music wasn’t so loud. Seb was with you but he had asked Liz to get him a drink and she played the uno reversal so now he was on drinks duty.

“Paul, can I borrow your suit just so I can literally look smarter?” You asked, he chuckled.

“Maybe I can just follow you around and relay the facts for you,”

“You could be the Yoda to my Luke. Though I think you’re too big to sit on my back,” you said.

“Here’s your punch,” said Seb, returning with two cups for him and Liz.

“Finally, what took you so long?” she asked.

“I stopped in the party room, Anthony and little Tom are having a competition to see who can do the macarena better,” he said.

“But...the macarena is the macarena…” you said, confused.

“Try telling them that. Tom insisted that the Brits do it better apparently.”

“Well, we do have some absolute bangers,” you chuckled. Paul agreed.

“So where did you get that dress?” Scarlett asked you.

“The joke shop down the highstreet. I was walking past it last week and found it in the window. Thought it would be perfect,” you shrugged.

“Until Mackie gets over excited and plays Twister on you,” Seb said.

“I’d like to see him try,” you replied.

“Ah, here’s the gang. What are you all doing in here?” Robert said, entering the room with big Tom and Evans.

“We’re just sat chatting….wait, have you left Holland and Mackie alone?” Seb asked.

“They’re fine, Chris is with them,” Tom replied. You tilted your head at him and raised an eyebrow.

“Maybe I should check on them…” Tom said, you nodded and he left the room.

“Soooo, how’s it going?” Evans asked everyone.

“We’re all fine but Y/N is a bit twisted,” Seb said. Everyone laughed but you bonked him on the head, making the dice jolt.

“Oi!”

You giggled and slapped the plastic hat again, the dice landed on a 6.

“Eyy I get another go!” You cheered before bonking him on the head again. He sighed but chuckled.

“Well it’s nice to see her dressed as an actual board game,” Robert said, turning to Evans.

“Hey, that’s not fair! Noughts and crosses is a board game!” Evans protested.

“I wanna play,” you said. Evans smiled at you.

You got Liz to play with you and you went first. You decided to play as noughts and took the bottom left corner. After a few rounds, you got a straight diagonal line. You cheered as Liz huffed, but she congratulated you nonetheless.

“I wanna play pictionary now,” you said, turning to Scarlett. She smiled and handed you a whiteboard pen. You thought for a moment then began drawing.

You pressed down on Scarlett’s outfit to make sure you could draw properly. You ran the pen down her stomach and she giggled.

“Hey, careful, that tickles,” she said. You blushed and apologised but continued. Everytime the pen went over a certain spot Scarlett would giggle but she never flinched.

“Okay, I’m done,” you announced. Everyone leaned forward and groaned once they saw it.

“Really? You know none of us can say that,” Seb said.

“First one to say it correctly wins,” you shrugged. You had drawn Mjolnir, something that everyone struggled to say.

“Midge-oh-lair,” said Liz.

“Mjohn-ler,” said Seb.

“Me-joln-ier,” said Evans.

“Hey! It’s Mjolnir!” came a voice from the door. Hemsy had just walked in with Mackie, little Tom and big Tom.

“We have a winner,” you grinned and everyone groaned again.

“Okay now I wanna play snakes and ladders,” you said. You scrambled to your feet and launched yourself at Hemsy, climbing up his tall body and clinging to him like a koala. He laughed.

“Okay, and what do we do now?” He chuckled. You shrugged and hugged him tighter, he returned the favour.

“As nice as this is, princess, I can’t carry you around the rest of the evening,” Hemsy said.

“Alright, hang on. Gotta complete the game,” you said. You motioned big Tom to come nearer and leaned over to hug him. Your legs followed and wrapped around his waist before you slid down his body and landed on the floor. Tom laughed.

“Impressive,” he said. You lay flat at the floor and looked at him, giggling.

“You’re very playful today,” big Tom said.

“I’m just happy to be here,” you giggled, he smiled at you.

“Alright my turn, I wanna play twister,” Mackie said, launching himself at you.

“WAIT!” You cried, panicked by his sudden movement. Mackie didn’t listen.

“I’m not doing anything! I need someone to give me an instruction,” he said.

“Right foot red,” Seb said. Mackie lifted his foot and put it on the first red spot he could see, directly on your tummy. You giggled as he adjusted his foot, rubbing it against your tummy.

“Noho Anthony!”

He looked and realised what he was doing, then smirked and vibrated his foot on your tummy again. You giggled louder.

“The twister mat is making noises, how do I turn it off?” He asked.

“Um, try putting your left hand on yellow,” little Tom piped up. Mackie grinned as he spotted a yellow spot on your ribs. He put his hand down and gave them an “accidental” squeeze.

“Hehey!” You shrieked.

“Didn’t work Holland, anyone else?” Mackie said.

“Try right hand green,” Scar said, smirking. Mackie placed his right hand on the green spot on your side and squeezed again.

“Stohop!” You cried.

“Right well that didn’t work, and I can’t put my left foot on it otherwise I would break it. Any other ideas?” he said.

“You may have to push a few buttons, try turning it off and on again,” Paul said. Mackie squeezed your ribs and sides again and shook his foot on your tummy. You screeched loudly.

“Nope, still making noises,”

“Let me have a look,” Liz said. Mackie had you pinned below his hands and foot. You started to giggle as you felt a single finger run up your neck.

“Nonono Lizzie!” You squeaked as she dragged a nail up the other side.

“There must be an off button around here,” she teased. She gently scribbled all her nails into your neck. You scrunched up your shoulders and shrieked.

“NOHOHOHO!”

“Definitely not here, you sure it’s not there Mackie?” Lizzie asked. Mackie squeezed your ribs and sides again and your giggles turned to laughter.

“Nope, no no, that’s made it worse,” he said. “Someone try a blue spot!”

Evans jumped up and ran over to help. He found a blue spot right on your hip, he placed his hand over it and started squeezing.

“NAHAHAHAHAHA!” You screamed. Trying to buck your body was impossible with Mackie still pinning you.

“Dammit Evans you turned the volume up!” Mackie yelled.

“Maybe the problem lies outside of the mat itself,” big Tom piped up.

“What you saying Hiddleston? That we’re the problem?” Mackie asked.

“Not at all, just that there appears to be parts connected to the mat, but not part of the mat itself,” Tom said, putting his hand on his chin. He slowly approached you and swiped a single finger under your knee. You kicked it away.

“Now it’s malfunctioning,” Mackie informed him. Tom hummed and swiped a finger under your other knee. You kicked again. He then spider tickled under both your knees and you shrieked loudly.

“PLEHEHEASE I’M NOHOT BROKEN!” You screamed.

“God DAMN you made it talk!” Mackie yelled.

“I know what the issue is,” Robert said, stepping forward.

“Do go on?” big Tom said.

“You need to hit all the pressure points at once. It’s like a giant reset button, wear it down till it reboots itself,” he said. Everyone looked at each other.

“Position yourselves,” Robert instructed.

Mackie stepped off of your stomach and knelt by your left side, Seb knelt by your right. Lizzie was still up by your neck and big Tom by your knees. Scarlett was by your right shoulder, Paul by your left. Evans positioned himself by your hips, little Tom the other side by your thighs. Hemsworth and Robert sat next to your feet.

“Nonononono please!” You cried.

“Rebooting systems in 3…” Robert began.

“No please!”

“2…”

“Wait!”

“1…”

“No wait I’m not brOHOHOHOKEN!” You cried as everyone attacked you at once. No one was pinning you down but you could hardly twist and turn with 10 people tickling all your spots at once. They were all ruthless and yet...you sort of loved it.

“PLEHEHEHASE NOHOHOHO!” You cried, flailing your arms around. Mackie and Seb were squeezing up and down your sides and across your tummy, Lizzie was tickling deep into your neck, Scar and Paul had just caught an arm each and pinned it upwards so they could tickle your underarms, big Tom was scratching under your knees and squeezing the tops, Evans was squeezing and scribbling into your hips, little Tom was scratching up and down your thighs and Hemsy and Robert had grabbed a foot each to tickle. It was pure torture.

“KEEP GOING, IT’LL WEAR DOWN EVENTUALLY!” Robert yelled over your screams of laughter. Everyone picked up the speed and you screamed louder than ever before.

You now had your arms and legs pinned by Scar, Paul, Robert and Hemsworth so you tried to buck your hips as much as possible and scrunch up your shoulders to protect your neck but it was no use.

“NOHOHOHO MOHOHORE!” You cried. You let out another loud scream and fell into a silent laughter. Tears filled your eyes to the point where you couldn’t even see Lizzie kneeling over you.

“Reboot complete,” Robert instructed. He stopped tickling your foot and one by one the rest of the cast followed and ceased their attack. You lay there, taking in deep breaths of air.

“You alright twisty?” Mackie asked, sliding up to your head. You nodded, letting out residue giggles. Evans gave you a hand up and propped you up against the sofa.

“You...are...all...evil…” you breathed out. Everyone chuckled.

“You were in a playful mood, we wanted to join,” Evans said, winking at you.

“I never knew you were so ticklish,” Hemsworth said.

“So would you be if 10 people ganged up on you,” you replied. He laughed and nodded in agreement. Little Tom sat down next to you.

“You okay?” He asked, pulling you in for a hug. You nodded.

“Yeah...that was fun,” you clamped your mouth shut after realising what you just said.

“Fun eh?” little Tom teased, quickly spidering your side to make you giggle again.

“We had fun too if that’s any consolation? Could go for round two if you want,” big Tom said. You looked at him and smiled.

“Not today I don’t think, you guys well and truly broke me,” you said, everyone laughed.

“I think I’ve already decided on the theme for next year,” Robert said. Everyone turned to him.

“Tickle Me Y/N,” he said, “where everyone has to bring a random object to tickle Y/N with. First to make her say stop wins.” He winked at you and you blushed and hid your head in little Tom’s shoulder. He chuckled and stroked your head.

“Now that will be a fun theme,” Mackie replied.

[luna-the-moth]

Crimson Rivulets (SFW) Pt.1

Alright, since Lucifer won first place in the poll, I’ll start off with the Avatar of Pride himself! This was supposed to be a hc/scenario, but I suppose this jumped out at me! GN! reader, and SFW. This’ll be a series, so I’ll link each part as they come out! 

Word count: 2.1k words

This is a Vampire!Lucifer AU and (SFW) Modern! CEO Lucifer AU

REQUESTS ARE CLOSED

Reblogs, likes, and comments are greatly appreciated!

Vampire!Lucifer AU (SFW)

A pureblood vampire, scorned by his father, and cast out with his siblings. From a young age, Lucifer had learned to take care of himself, along with his brothers. As the eldest, he felt a strong urgency and need to shield and protect his siblings, at any cost. Even at the expense of his pride.

Before stepping out of his father’s light, Lucifer had been one of the most prestigious vampires; the most sought-after. Fellow purebloods, half-bloods, and turned vampires alike had flung themselves at him, left and right.

In truth, Lucifer had no interest in any of them. Why would he distract himself, when he was supposed to inherit the family business and fortune? As the eldest son of the household, he was expected to be the pinnacle of class, intelligence; the embodiment for everything a pureblood represents.

He was known by many titles and honorifics, having obtained various positions of high status throughout his eternal lifetime. Governor, count, high priest, etc. But the name you know him as now, is Lucifer, CEO of Morningstar Corp.

The same Morningstar Corp., where you were going to apply for. Specifically, the open occupation of a personal assistant. You had been searching for a job close to the city, with decent benefits and stability. Which is quite odd, as Lucifer was known for his short temper, and had a reputation of going through assistants at least once a month.

Along with the fact that he was one of the most influential businessmen, it added an extra reason to be cautious. After all, he could make or break you, and if he didn’t like you? Say goodbye to all future job potential. His influence spread across the country, connections with almost every important figure of power.

The position offered a higher-than-average salary, and benefits of high worth. It was a gamble, but if fate smiled down on you, it may as well be one of the best opportunities of your life. Well, it was, but not in the way you expected.

Adjusting your tie slightly, you entered the doors of the building, a pleasant demeanor sweeping over your features. You had to be poised and professional, after all, this was a multi-billion company, if you weren’t your best, failure was guaranteed.

You had worn a simple outfit, contrasting to the corporation’s high-class, expensive atmosphere. But you were just applying to be an personal assistant after all, behind the scenes; so you wore a professional outfit, that wouldn’t stand out.

Arriving just on time for your interview, you took the elevator to the 27th floor, as the receptionist had instructed. With smooth, light jazz playing in the small space, your mind wandered to the possibility of what would happen if the job was granted to you.

Would Lucifer be a haughty, conceited, arrogant boss to work for?

Snorting, you thought, “Of course he is, he’s Lucifer Morningstar, CEO of one of the most prestigious companies in the country, why wouldn’t he be?”

Ping!

Interrupted by the signal of arrival from the elevator, you took in a deep breath, and stepped out of the elevator, hope in your heart.

The interview had gone fairly smoothly, as you answered the questions in a concise, polite manner. It was surprisingly less nerve wracking, besides the fact that your interviewer looked like he wanted to bite you-

At least, he had seemed like it. With mesmerizing, and hungry forest green eyes, you felt yourself gravitating towards him. Although, you quickly reminded yourself that this was a professional setting, and you were applying for an interview.

Seemingly pleased with your responses, the interviewer bade you goodbye as you left the office, a mysterious smirk gracing his features. Leaving the room, the image of him stayed in your mind for days, the intensity and calculation in his gaze haunting you, luring you in.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For a few days, you had idly scrolled through other job listings, as you didn’t want to rely on the Morningstar Corp. application. After all, you were just one of many applicants, it’d be foolish to place all your hope into that one position.

After another day or two, you got a callback. They had accepted your application, and Mr. Satan, your interviewer, had wanted you to come back and sign the official papers, along with a tour of the building.

With hope in your heart, and a lightness in your step, you entered the skyscraper of a building once again, an air of confidence about you. Well, a sense of security and assurance would be a more accurate description.

Walking down the clean, polished hallway of the 34th floor, your thoughts wandered. However, they were abruptly stopped when you heard a stern voice ring out, prideful and condescending.

“Yes, and? It’s almost pitiful, how lousy you are with your job. I hired you as an interviewer, yet all of your choices have been fired or left on their own accord.

Honestly, since you are one of the most educated and competent halfbloods, I thought you would at least have some potential. If you can’t even find a decent personal assistant for me, I see no potential for you here at Morningstar Corp.”

In an open conference room, you saw a young man, with blond hair, and seemed to be his mid twenties. With a scowl on his face, narrowed eyes were directed towards the man in front of you.

Ah, it was your interviewer, you had realized. Who else had such enchanting, deep green eyes? Focus, you chastised yourself.

“Oh please, you drive off even the most patient of assistants! Speaking of personal assistants, you can’t just call them ‘degenerate, insolent worms not worth the dirt on your shoes, much less your investment,’ because they brewed your coffee a little too long, sir.

If you weren’t such an entitled, demanding pureblood, I’d-”

Wait- pureblood?

As he was about to fire off an insult, his gaze darted towards you, eyes seemingly gazing into your soul. Your breath hitched, words barely being able to force themselves out of your throat.

“Ah, my apologies, I didn’t mean to interrupt, I’ll be back later-”

Hastily turning on your heel, you attempted to leave, but were stopped by a commanding voice behind you. Immediately, you had recognized him. The same voice you had heard over and over, in press conferences, and various ceremonies.

“Just where do you think you’re going?”

You turned around, suddenly anxious and on edge. Something about that voice made you shiver in fear, and...delight?

Lucifer was dressed in a dark navy blue suit, with corresponding dress pants, along with a crisp, white dress shirt, hidden under a dark blue not unlike that of the suit. To add on, a black tie was adorned around his neck, with black dress shoes.

Wow Y/n, the first thing you think about when confronted by one of the most powerful businessmen in the country, is about how hot you think his voice is, and that collar- Get yourself together!

Blinking once, your gaze meets that of a blood-red one, almost hypnotic. A deep, bloody red that was similar to that of roses, or perhaps rivulets of blood. Almost like the blood red eyes of a vampire, found in fantasy novels and mythological stories.

Although, maybe he was one, since Satan had mentioned him being a ‘pureblood,’ if I recall correctly. That could mean anything, though.

Nonetheless, you quickly snapped your focus back to the present, as you had realized you had been staring into his eyes for maybe a bit too long. With burning red staining the tips of your ears, you replied with a slight waver in your voice,

“I was just about to leave and reschedule my appointment with Mr. Satan, as it seemed the two of you were busy, Mr. Morningstar.”

Staring at each other’s eyes for what seemed like forever, Lucifer smirked, breaking the hold on your gaze to glance back at Satan. With a dignified air around him, his moniker of “The Peacock” seemed quite fitting.

“Is this the new assistant you were speaking of, Satan?”

Scowling, he nodded curtly.

“Yes, this is Y/n L/n, your newest personal assistant. Out of all of your previous assistants, they’re the most qualified, and seem to align with your standards the most. I have faith in them.”

Taken aback by the blatant praise, you dipped your head in a gesture of thanks and gratitude.

Lucifer observed with a slightly curious gaze, masked behind a cover of apathetic, uninterested layers of emotions. It was rare for Satan to praise anyone, much less a new assistant.

He couldn’t deny that his curiosity was piqued; after all, he held Satan’s opinion in high regard, arguments aside. If he believed in your capabilities, you had to have at least some merit.

As much as Lucifer would like to deny it, he was a demanding boss, especially since his levels of stress were through the roof. Hell, if he was human, he’d be dead from overworking and lack of rest. Fortunately for the undead immortal, he wasn’t.

“I see, well Y/n, why don’t you finish up the required paperwork with Satan, and he’ll give you a tour afterwards. Your first day of work starts this coming Monday, be here at 7AM, sharp.”

Turning away, you stole a glimpse his face once more before Lucifer left, leaving you and Satan.

Letting out a breath you hadn’t known you were holding in, you turned to Satan, mind clouded with thoughts flurried, flying through your head.

With  charming smile and a certain glint in his eye, Satan gestured to the conference room, with papers and files ready on the table.

“Shall we?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Monday, 6:50 AM

Arriving at the building, you were huffing, as you had rushed over. Your morning had been fairly quiet, but the real issue was with traffic.

There was a car crash on your route to work, and it nearly made you late, added with the fact that parking spots were far and few to find, it was a miracle you had made it on time.

However, the sight that greeted you when you stepped into the polished office was...something, to say the least.

The first thing you noticed was a wave of iron and rust permeating your senses, filling your nostrils and causing light-headedness.

On Lucifer’s desk, sat vials of blood, and the man in question, had his fangs inserted through a vial. seeming to drink the blood through his fangs.

With closed eyes and a contented look on his face, Lucifer seemed to drink the blood like a mere cup of tea, nonchalant.

Letting out a noise of surprise, you clapped a hand over your mouth in shock; your boss was a vampire, just like from the manga you had read....

Lashes fluttering open, Lucifer looks at you with . Removing his fangs from the vial,  he swiped his tongue along his fangs, not letting a drop of blood go to waste.

Setting it down, he placed his head on his propped hand in a bored manner, a contempt expression worn smugly across his face.

“Right on time, L/n. Since today’s your first day on the job, I’ll give you a simple task. Prepare a coffee with 18 shots of espresso, a dash of milk, and a caffeine booster.

Afterwards, you will stop by the clinic on the 13th floor, and collect a vial of Aspherion from the medicinal vault. The identification program should have your information set, and should be able to identify you by the card Satan gave you previously.”

Standing in shock, your eyes were wide with surprise, firstly, because your new boss was a vampire; also, that is an inhuman amount of caffeine, how the fuck has he not died yet- plus, having a vampiric boss wasn’t included in the contract.

No wonder the benefits were so great, he was gonna drink your blood like a fucking juice box.

“What in the world? First of all, my name’s Y/n, and I would appreciate if you would call me as such. Secondly, a vampire? Do you really think I’m just going to accept that, no question?”

Incredulous, you had gestured your hands in a dramatic fashion, genuinely offended that your new boss had thought you were going to take in this new information within seconds, and be completely fine with it.

Sighing with a look of irritation flashing across his features, he gestured for you to sit in an empty seat, proceeding to prop his chin on his hands. In his eyes, shone curiosity, and a challenge.

“Fine. What would you like to know?”

[writingsfromhome]

Bad Timing I(.5)

A/N: This is the sort of backstory to Harry and you, I think it can be read on its own if you want, or before you read the first part too. It’s angsty af, but it has some death and sensitive topics jsyk. I tried to keep it concise but it got a little wordy as angst does. xx

Part 1

-------------------------------------------------

About 12 Years Ago:

“So are you coming to that party or not?” My roommate asks. She was one of the first people I’d met last year when we started uni and even though we came from different backgrounds we remained friends over the last year, even choosing to room together again. She got me to open up and find the extroverted part of me that was able to enjoy uni outside of academics.

“Ugh, I’m volunteering for the voting booths for the rest of the week. Maybe if I can make it?”

“You’re actually doing that?” She scrunches her nose. “I don’t get it. You’re just way too nerdy to be my friend.”

“And yet you loove me,” I squeeze her against me and she laughs. “It’s my mom, she said I had to do at least one extracurricular so I could meet friends this year.”

“You already have friends,” she points to herself, and with her came her group of friends that’d quickly taken me in last year.

And my mom doesn’t like that I hang out with you, I think. She thought we partied too much even though my grades stayed decent. “She wants me to have nerdy friends too, I dunno. They’re helping me pay my tuition until I get a job so I kinda have to play nice.”

“Parents suck,” my roommate flicks through her closet. I agreed, this was just something I would get through to get through. Then they would leave me alone for the rest of the year.

Little did I know the person they’d partner me with at my polling station was someone who would be in my life for the next decade.

“I’m Harry by the way,” he’d said after we received our orientation and assigned the building we were going to babysit the votes in. “Second year.”

“Me too! I’m Y/N. What’s your major? I’ve never seen you around.”

“Law--well I haven’t decided if it’s law but that’s what I’m in right now.”

“Really? Law?” I was openly judging, he just didn’t seem the law type.

“Well what are you in?” He demands.

“Business,” I cringe.

“Really? Business?” He has a cheeky smile on, one that would become familiar to me.

“Well, you just don’t seem like the law type. They’re usually more uptight, dress way too smart for me.”

“I know, it’s like, we’re not even in the courtroom yet,” he joins in and it makes me laugh--how he could poke fun at his own people. That’s when I knew we would get along fine, and I actually looked forward to the next few days getting to know him better.

“I’m definitely telling my mum about you, she’s been begging me to make friends outside of my circle. I’ll tell her I’m friends with a law student.”

“So we’re friends already?” We’d reached our booth and began setting up the partitions. He takes over when I set it up wrong.

“Obviously,” I say. “I actually like you which means you’ll have a hard time getting rid of me.”

“I’m alright with that,” he grins and I notice the laugh lines that are brought to life as he does. It somehow made him seem more genuinely.

We spend the rest of the time swapping stories, classes, rants. We check student IDs and hand out voting cards in between but it doesn’t feel like a drag anymore. At the end of the day, I invite him to the party my roommate was going to with our friends. If he was going, maybe I would too. He seemed like he might be fun at a party.

“Er,” he suddenly seems nervous. “I’ll have to ask my girlfriend, she wanted to hang out tonight.”

“Well bring her too!” I say excitedly. “Is she law as well?”

“No, she’s in the arts.”

“I like her already,” I push. “Bring her, my friends are fun you’ll learn how to have a good time.”

“I know how to have a good time,” there was the flash of his dimples again. “Text me the address.”

And thus began a friendship for the next four years, partying together, studying together (trying to), and hanging out in each other’s rooms. We would set each other up with other friends, double dated, went out for sunrise-hikes, and took long drives at night when we had to blow some steam off from being over-stressed, over-studied uni students. Our friend circles overlapped, the fabric of our lives eventually bleeding together. We were made of the same fibers, sticking together even after uni, when our friends got more serious about their careers. When they moved out of the country or to another city, we made sure to rent places close enough that we could still see each other often. And somehow, in the new chapter of our lives, without the partying and our other friends to buffer, we became closer than before.

We cared for each other--we didn’t deny that ever. And somehow that platonic love turned romantic as we depended on each other while we navigated adulthood. I can’t exactly pinpoint where things changed, but one evening our relationship was changed forever.

7 years ago:

“She literally wants me to stay until 7, and she was offended when I said no! I’m not even getting paid for that!” I was bitching to Harry about my shitty job.

“That’s bollocks” Harry shrugs. “Just say you’ve got family obligations or something.”

“I said that the one time she wanted us to come in on a weekend and she gave me shite work the following week! I just...I can’t afford to lose this job Harry.”

“That’s shitty, I’m sorry.” He takes the last swig of his beer. “Want another one?”

“I haven’t even finished this one,” I moan at my now warm beer that I’d been nursing for the last hour, too busy ranting to drink it. “It’s getting late though I should head home before it’s dark. Don’t want that nutter that hangs around my building to harass me again.”

“I’ll walk you home,” Harry suggests. He lived a 15 minute walk from me.

“No no,” I get up and take our dirty dishes to the sink. “I didn’t even ask about you, how was your day?”

“Same old,” he sighs against the counter. “I feel like I don’t fit in, everyone my age is finishing their law degree but I don’t think I want to.”

“I knew from the day I met you, you weren’t destined for the courtroom.” I pull him into a comforting hug. “Do what makes you happy, or what doesn’t make you want to say fuck it and quit your job to hibernate.”

“You really know the perfect thing to say,” Harry chuckles but he pulls me tighter against him. I stroke his back, reassuring him he’d be alright in the end.

“Y/N-” he pulls away to say something but freezes mid sentence. I raise an eyebrow but he’s still, staring at my face.

“Harry?” I ask, but he continues staring. “Hello? You alright?”

“Yeah,” he breaks into a sudden smile. That was weird--I make sure he’s okay before letting go.

Before I leave, I kiss Harry’s cheek goodbye--I was never shy in the affection I gave my friends and Harry’s bummed mood needed extra affection tonight. But what I don’t expect is for him to catch me before I pull away, staring intently into my eyes. The lighthearted energy between us disappears instantly as it dawns on me, how close we were, the unspoken feelings in his eyes, the hesitation before he presses his lips to mine.

I kissed him back then, barely understanding what was happening, before pulling away. I give him a smile but that’s just what he sees at the tip of the iceberg, underneath my mixed feelings churn away. My best friend just kissed me, and I wasn’t totally mad about it.

“It’s getting dark I-” I say as Harry says, “Sorry was that okay?”

We laugh awkwardly, neither of us sure what to do at this point. We decide to ignore it instead.

“I’ll talk to you later,” Harry lets me go and opens the door for me. “Watch out for the neighbourhood nutter yea?”

I stand in place, feeling the fibers of our friendship unraveling but feeling hopeless in mending the tear. “Take care Harry.”

I high tail it out, my thoughts going at an impossible rate as I sort out what happened. And we try to ignore it the next couple weeks,

We hadn’t made it official then, too nervous to face what this meant about our friendships. It was only at my sister’s wedding, that I realised what was wrong between us. I’d been mourning our old friendship, and avoiding him in the weeks since the kiss. But what I didn’t realise was that our friendship had been changing over the last year anyway, and getting drunk on champagne and dancing with Harry, while my sister celebrated the happiest day of her life, made me realise there was a cause for celebration here: a new chapter in our lives.

A couple days later, after a stressful day at work, I’d taken the tube to his flat and waited for him outside. He was surprised to see me there, not saying much except to open the door and let me in. As soon as he’d closed it, my lips were attached to his and we’d let our bags drop, coats, and any piece of clothing between us. After that night, we didn’t even try to deny how we felt about each other.

“I didn’t think I could ever be this happy,” he’s whispered to me after. I thought he’d fallen asleep but his whisper in the dark made me grin to myself. “Are you awake.”

“I am. Awake and happy.” I turn to face him, giggling. “Who knew this could feel so right.”

“Our first kiss was quite wrong though wasn’t it?” Harry says and it makes me laugh.

“That’s why I needed to do a redo,” I tease. “Can’t leave you to plan anything.”

“It wasn’t planned I swear, I was trying to be spontaneous.”

“Let’s not try ‘spontaneous’ again then,” I kiss him in the dark. He pulls me snug against him, I never knew how safe it felt. The safest I would ever feel, wrapped in the warmth with my best friend and now something else.

It was a good few months, testing the waters as our relationship underwent a transformation. All of our friends were supportive, but we never missed the glances between them. Apparently, they were waiting for this to happen. But as sweet as those first few months had been, finding out my mum was sick with a timeline was devastating. I came apart at the seams but Harry stayed through it all, holding me together. He’d proposed then, wanting my mum to be part of the ceremony. We had a small wedding, intimate but still magical. It was bittersweet, the amount of love and happiness I felt towards Harry and our loved ones around us as he said I do and as he took my arm and swept me across the dancefloor. But the amount of sadness crushing my chest kept me from being the weightless bride I always thought I would be.

Through it all, Harry stayed by my side. While we were hopeful, the day our hopes were dashed, the days and weeks I mourned. When my sister and her husband came to stay with their crazy toddlers and Harry kept them entertained giving my sister and I time together. I thought he was perfect, that I’d lucked out.

That lasted a few years, 3 and a half to be exact. There were months leading up to our split and we could point to a bunch of things that could’ve led to it. a) him wanting kids, and me wanting to wait or b) long hours we worked as we changed careers and tried to make our way up or c) how hard getting pregnant actually was. Maybe I pushed him away, or he didn’t love me enough to try and make it work.

I think I lied to myself, avoiding the tension creeping into the relationship. The tired excuses and time spent apart, the lack of usual affection, or casual conversations. I was an idiot, I realise every time I think about the end in retrospect. Maybe if I caught on earlier I could have fixed us before we fell apart. Maybe I could have saved us.

“There’s someone coming in Tuesday morning to fix the broken washer, will you be home?” I ask, still in bed and scrolling through my phone. I hadn’t meant to be up this early but Harry woke me as he got up and I couldn’t fall back asleep.

“No,” Harry responds, his back to me as he ruffles through the dresser. “I’ve got a thing that morning.”

“Well I’ve got to go in early Tuesday-I thought you might be home.” I say. I hear an edge to Harry’s voice but I try not to focus on it. He’d been a little cold all weekend and I was scared to think what it meant.

“You couldn’t be bothered to check in when you confirmed the date?” Harry asks harshly.

“I...guess not.” I put my phone down and wait for Harry to turn, maybe I could read his expression. Maybe he was stressed. “Harry?”

“What?” He turns, but he looks at me with no emotion. No stress, no frustration, not even anger. It’s the lack of emotion in his face that cause my eyes to prick with tears. Harry raises his eyebrows and I shake my head, untangling myself from the sheets so he doesn’t see any tears. I rush to the bathroom but forget to close the door out of habit.

“Y/N,” a kinder Harry appears by the doorway. His face has smoothed out the harsh lines, his eyes hesitant and cautious.

“What’s happened with us?” I blurt out. “Why are you so cold all the time? Am I doing something wrong?”

Harry’s face falls and he walks towards me but doesn’t touch me. “It’s nothing like that. It’s...I don’t know. We should talk.”

He reaches his hand out but I flinch away. “Did you meet somebody new or something? What are we talking about?”

“Let’s not do this here. Right now.”

“Why not!” I finally had enough. “I’ve been walking on eggshells for months Harry! I don’t know what’s wrong and I keep waiting for you to bloody tell me!”

“This isn’t working!” Harry raises his voice to compensate for mine. I’m immediately silenced by the volume, and then the words sink in.

“Is there someone else?” I ask.

He doesn’t answer, his gaze on the hanging vines by the window. My heart drops into my stomach like a boulder, and I find it hard to breathe. I clutch the porcelain sink and ask in a surprisingly even tone, “Harry. Answer me.”

“What we have, Y/N...it’s dysfunctional.” He says quietly, meeting my eyes. “It doesn’t matter if there’s someone else, we’ve been fighting for months. Things aren’t the same between us-”

“Who is she?” I ask. I needed to know.

“That’s not relevant,” he shuts my question down quickly. “I’m sorry Y/N, I...I don’t want to hurt you. I care about you, I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Then don’t,” I’d pleaded. “We can go to counseling, talk it through-”

“I can’t Y/N.”

“Because of her.”

“No, because this isn’t good for either of us.” He’d walked up to me, cradled my face. “We’re not good for each other, not like this.”

“Who is she?” I yank his hands away.

“She’s...it doesn’t matter, I swear nothing happened between us Y/N. Knowing who she is isn’t going to help this situation--”

“It is! If it weren’t for her, you’d be willing to work on us--to see a future. You...Harry how could you do this to me? To us?” The tears come with no control. “You’re moving on before we’re even over. How are you giving up on us like that?”

“I’m not!” his voice booms in the tiled bathroom. “I’m not bloody giving up on us! I tried Y/N, so many times. I tried! You just keep pushing at me to be someone I’m not and-”

“I can say the same thing about you!” I throw the brush in my hands into the sink. “We were good! And you got it in your head you wanted a baby even though we’re young, oh my god Harry you kept pestering me to change my mind even though I told you I needed time!”

“It’s not like we could have a fucking baby anyway,” Harry says bitterly before realising what he’d said. “Shit-”

“There you go,” I mock. “I knew it. I knew you were holding that against me. And that,” I jab my finger into his chest. “Is what’s made you so moody, so mean and why we’re always fighting. You held it against me.”.

There was absolute truth to what I said. Last year, Harry had brought the baby topic up. I’d told him we were only in our mid-20s, we had a lot of time, and we still had a career to establish. But he would bring up the topic often enough that I’d given in.To make him happy. And months went by, trying for a baby. Went we finally went to our doctor, she’d told us why it was so hard, it could take us years she’d said.

Harry came home that day dejected, and left me feeling like a failure. I think it tore us up.

“You wanted a baby so fucking bad and when I couldn’t, it made me feel like a complete failure. And I told you that! And you did absolutely nothing to make me feel better. You held it against me, Harry! You didn’t even try to tell me it was okay.”

“It’s not so fucking simple,” he says, his cheeks flushed pink. Maybe it was anger, or maybe it was embarrassment from being confronted with an ugly truth.

“It is. And now you’ve upgraded to a newer model, maybe her version comes with a fertile womb.” I take the cheap shot.

He doesn’t say anything though. And I don’t know why that hurts more than knowing he’d fallen for another woman while he was still married to me. My best friend in the whole world had just broken my heart into a million irrevocable pieces.

“It’s a bunch of things Y/N,” he finally says. “That’s just part of it. We’re not...we’re just not working!”

“Did you even try to make it work?” I ask, swiping my sleeve across my face. “Did you ever think how I felt? How you made me feel Harry? You’ve been slipping away from me without talking to me-” I break off. I couldn’t speak through the heartbreak, the thunderstorm of grief threatens to consume me and my sobs are the only thing that manages to come out.

“I never wanted to hurt you,” Harry tries to place a hand on my shoulder but I jerk away, moving to sit on the edge of the bathtub. “Y/N...”

“Just go,” I say through the tears.

“We can talk more about this later-”

"Just go,” I say louder.

Harry’s phone rings again from the bedroom and he sighs. But he leaves me, crying on the bathroom floor. The sadness that was always in my peripheral consumes me. I’d carried this sadness for a long time--ever since I found out my mum was sick, the sadness plagued me. I’d neatly packed it up once I decided to move forward with my life like my mum would want me to, but now it comes back tenfold, marrying the grief of losing Harry like this. And I stay on the floor crying my grief away for hours, eventually crawling into bed and sleeping the daylight away.

When I wake, it’s 6 and Harry isn’t home. I take that as a sign and get up to pack up a few things. I call my sister who still lived in London then, and crash on her couch, staying there for a few weeks and ignoring any call or text from Harry. When I need to go back, for my things, I find him sleeping on the couch with the TV on, something I always found endearing. But I can’t afford to dwell on how much it hurt seeing him like that.

He must have woken from the noise because when he finds me, he tries to stop me and tell me that we still needed to talk.

“About what?” I ask, just tired now. Too many tears shed and too many hours laying awake thinking about the exact moment we went wrong.

“Us,” Harry looked tired too. He was probably throwing himself into his work with nothing like me to hold him back, I think bitterly. His girlfriend had probably already been to our house--his house.

“What about us?” I barely look at him as I begin folding away all my clothes.

“I don’t know,” Harry sits on the bed. “Don’t you want to talk?”

“I’ve got nothing to say, do you?”

Harry sighs, “I don’t know.”

“Nice talk then,” I say, shoving the rest of my things in just so I could get out.

“I just want you to know I care about you Y/N, I don’t want to hurt you.” He says as I pack.

“It doesn’t matter anymore. If you cared about me, and you didn’t want to hurt me you wouldn’t have done this to us.”

“I wasn’t trying to--I didn’t mean to go and fall for someone else-”

“Just stop,” I cut him off. I couldn’t hear it, how the man I loved fell for someone else. I couldn’t break down here. Again.

He said he cared but it didn’t feel that way. It hurt more than I wished to admit. He knew what I’d been through and he still betrayed me, tossed my heart like it was replaceable. The cut he left in me ran deep.

As I leave he tries to talk to me, but I barrel past him. He still reaches for me and pulls me into a hug, I struggle against him but he’s too strong. He wraps me in his arms until I go still but it’s too much. A sob escapes me, and this time he lets me push him off and leave, my bag banging into my hips every time I take a step. As soon as I got into my Uber, I can’t stop crying. There was an infinite pool of tears where Harry was involved.

3 years ago:

My trust and my heart had been been lost in the war between Harry and I. It only took him a month to mail my divorce papers which sat collecting dust on my dining table until he showed up at work one day and demanded I sign them by the end of that week. I’d taken the day off the day I mailed those in, mourning the end of something that was once so safe and beautiful.

When a close friend calls me on a warm July afternoon, I don’t consider her warning that I shouldn’t check Instagram. That I still had Harry’s friends on my list. I open Instagram before she can tell me why, and see it. Harry was getting married, again. To the woman he gave up on us for. I try to zoom in on a picture without liking it, she was pretty...and blonde. She looked familiar--probably from his office. It didn’t take him long.

It was like someone had taken a retractor to the wound I thought had finally scabbed over. The physical proof that Harry had moved on is just the salt on the wound.

I cry myself to sleep that night.

2 Years ago;

The guy in front of me drones on about his job, mansplaining to me how a mortgage worked as if I wasn’t in finance myself. I excuse myself to use the restroom, checking my phone to see a text from my sister. She’d moved to Scotland this year, to where her husband was from, and I’d missed her terribly in the last year.

A little birdie told me your demon-ex just got divorced 🥂

I stare at the screen, chest feeling tight. I felt vindicated somehow, but I also felt a small bit of sadness. What a fuck-up.

Good for him I had texted back. A part of me wanted him to hurt the way he hurt me.

I went back to my date with a renewed enthusiasm. I’d ordered more wine and got so drunk he was actually interesting enough to take home.

About 1 year ago

“Y/N,” a voice from my past says, one that haunted me some nights. I turn as I exit the shop I was just in. I blink at the sight before me, Harry in a vest and hat. He realises what I’m staring at and laughs awkwardly. “I’m in uniform.”

“You’re...police?” I look up to his face finally. He hadn’t aged a day, although the hat he wears makes him look a little silly.

“Yeah I joined the force uhm...almost 4 years ago now...law didn’t really suit me.”

I know what he was doing, trying to find a baseline to have a conversation. But he was dead to me, and I didn’t want to invite him back in when I was finally forgetting about him.

"Seems like you dropped a lot of dead-weight four years ago.”

I watch his face fall as he realises I wasn’t going to pretend to be friendly.

“Seems that way to you,” he says cautiously. “But that’s not how it happened.”

I shrug. “So. I heard about the divorce. Must’ve been hard being put through that.”

I knew I was being petty, obviously I never got the closure I want (according to my therapist) and I wasn’t over him hurting me the way he did (also according to my therapist). This was how I got my peace, and it wasn’t the best version of me but it was the only one I knew how to be right now.

“Yep,” he crosses his arms over his chest. “So, are you seeing anyone?”

He knew I wasn’t, I don’t know how but the way he stoops to my level I know he knows I hadn’t had a long term relationship since him.

“Not at the moment,” I say awkwardly. “Just focusing on my job...trying to get this promotion.”

“Sorry,” he seems to shake off whatever had come over him. “That was...nosy, I shouldn’t have asked.”

Having him be the bigger person sets something off in me, like there was an anger-bomb inside my mind where he lived and knowing that he was doing okay enough to be able to be the bigger person disrupts this calm I was trying to keep.

“Maybe you shoudn’t have stopped me to ask anything at all. We don’t have anything to talk about anyway.”

I turn around and start to walk away but he catches up, “I wasn’t trying to upset you-”

“Well you have a way of doing that. Please just leave me alone Harry.”

He huffs beside me, “After all this time, can’t we just bloody talk like two adults?”

I freeze and turn to him slowly. He seems to sense this was the wrong thing to say because he takes a step back. “After all this time? Are you serious? I was the one you left behind Harry when you went off to lives your best lift Harry. We’re not living the same life, and we’re not coming from the same bloody place. Don’t fucking patronize me and ask me to talk to you like an adult when you bring out the worst part of me. I meant what I said: I want you to leave me alone. And you know what, if we ever run into each other again, just don’t even talk to me. Pretend you don’t know me. I want nothing to do with you.”

He opens his mouth but his partner calls him from the shop’s entrance. He stays silent, letting me go. As soon as I turn the street corner I rush the rest of the way to the tube, collapsing into a seat and trying to sort out my breathing. It was a shitty feeling, knowing someone was going to be in your life forever because you shared so much history that even when that part of your life ended they were still there. There was so much apart of me, around me, that reminded me of him. And it felt so lonely carrying that around. I wanted to be done with him, I wanted my heart to purge him out. But it couldn’t stop carrying him around everywhere I go.

[motherofoliver]

Bloom Me A Flower, Maybe Two

(AO3)

Summary: Silly fluff, Kaneki meeting his daughter for the first time and giving her a name.

Word Count: 1,582

Notes: This was the first work I ever shared online and I deleted it along with my account during a particularity difficult time. Although reading it now, I see a lot of things I would like to fix, I am still proud of being able to share it.

*****

“Touka is in labor. Come quick.”

The call was short, like all of Ayato’s calls, but it was enough to send a jolt of panic through Kaneki’s body. He was on the outskirts of the city with some members from the United Front and was preparing to start running in whatever direction led to the hospital until Hide placed a calming hand on his shoulder, implicitly understanding the terrified look on Kaneki’s face, and telling him they could take Marude’s car.

So that was how he found himself squished in the backseat between Takeomi (Yoriko was already with Touka) and Itou (just excited about seeing a baby) while Hide (for the father’s emotional support) took the front seat and Marude (who wouldn’t allow anyone else to drive his new car) drove, grumbling about having to leave the mission early.

Itou was excitedly asking Kaneki a lot of questions like is it a boy or a girl? (he didn’t know, they wanted to keep it as a surprise, but he could’ve sworn Kimi slipped and said a she during their last appointment). Natural or cesarean? (natural if they could help it, despite his own objections to Touka having to put herself through so much pain after seeing that educational video). Would the child eat normal food? (Most likely if Kimi’s predictions were right, and they usually are). Did they have the nursery ready? (It’s been ready for a month with Urie personally doing the drawings on the wall). Will they have anyone to help the first few weeks the baby is born? (They had so many people volunteering to help that they couldn’t schedule all of them, and he and Touka wanted to spend the first night alone with the baby to bond anyway). What were they planning to name the baby? (They actually had no idea, but it wasn’t due to lack of trying).

Question after question, Kaneki appreciated Itou trying to take his mind off worrying about Touka but he really couldn’t focus with him at all. He had read too many books and too many disaster birth stories on mom forums to be able to just relax, and he hated that he wasn’t there to support Touka through what was probably the most painful experience of her life. He kept asking Marude if he could speed up and the man kept telling him, through gritted teeth, that it was the fastest he could go in a residential area.

After what seemed like an eternity, they finally reached the hospital and Kaneki all but jumped through the window and into the hospital, running up the stairs to the birth ward. He was met with Yoriko who was crying outside room 125 (the room they booked in advance, Touka thought it was a lucky number), and she came running towards him as soon as she lifted her head. “She is so beautiful, Kaneki, so beautiful. They both are.” she said through sobs while hugging him tightly.

Kaneki mentally beat himself up for missing the birth (and considered beating up Marude before the more sensible version of himself took over) but he returned Yoriko's hug and thanked her. “Go in, she’s waiting for you” Yoriko gently pushed him to the door "I'll join everyone in the cafeteria so you can find me there if you need anything".

Kaneki stood for what seemed like another eternity at the door. He was overwhelmed by so many emotions that he felt a little tingling at the tips of his fingers. On the other side of that door was Touka, and their child, the child she fought so hard to keep, the child they both tried building a better world for, the culmination of all their hopes and dreams. He was so happy and scared that he felt his heart could stop any moment now.

He braced himself and opened the door to be met with an immense amount of sunlight (unusual for this time of year). Once his eyes adjusted, he was witnessing the most beautiful sight in his life. His wife, Touka Kaneki (whom he expected to be exhausted after such an ordeal), was absolutely glowing, looking at the bundle in her arms with the biggest smile he had ever seen. The scene was so perfect that it looked like a painting and Kaneki took a few moments staring to preserve the memory in his mind.

“Touka, I am so sorry I missed the birth” he apologized quietly, but Touka looked up at him, still beaming, and gestured him to come closer.

“It doesn’t matter, you’re here now, come look at our daughter” she turned the bundle towards Kaneki so he can see.

“She has sesame pudding hair!”

Those were not the first words Kaneki wanted to say upon first meeting his daughter but he couldn’t help himself. Touka laughed and nodded “I was surprised too but it’s cute, I like it”.

Mesmerized, Kaneki couldn’t help but agree as he gently stroked the hair of his sleeping daughter with his finger. “Poor thing was exhausted after the birth and Kimi doing her exam so she is just taking a well earned rest”, Touka brushed her cheek with her finger and the little girl scrunched her nose, much to her parent’s delight.

Kaneki was still in awe, he had read and heard stories, but nothing could compare to the feeling of warmth spreading through his body now. He moved his finger to his daughter’s hand, and she quickly gripped it. He read about this instinct in babies but in that moment, it felt like she was welcoming him.

“We need to give her a name; I can’t keep calling her Usagi forever. Unless…” Touka looked up at Kaneki with a mischievous glint in her eyes.

“We are not naming her Usagi! We discussed this already!” 

Touka pouted playfully and turned to look at her child’s face again. “What will we name her then?”

They went through Kaneki’s list of names with meaningful kanji again, Touka rejecting each one again saying they were too old, too pretentious, or just didn’t feel right, then they moved to the names suggested to them by friends and family (Ayato being a huge supporter of any variation of Usagi), but none of them felt right either. They finally got to the list of ridiculous names Hide sent them after creating an online poll with Saiko. Surprisingly enough, Usagi was the most normal name on that list. Kaneki put the list away after reading the first few names, not wanting to name his daughter Toyotama-hime or after a manga character.

With Touka resting her head on his shoulder, Kaneki tried to brainstorm a good name but he was drawing blanks. His eyes drifted back to his sleeping daughter, noticing for the first time the blanket wrapped around her “the hospital has some really nice blankets, don’t they?”

“Oh this isn’t from the hospital, Yomo gave me this. He embroidered that flower on top himself, with Uta’s help of course”. As he felt the intricate design on the blanket, Kaneki couldn’t help but feel his heart swell a little at the thought of all those people in his life that loved him and his family, those people who willingly intertwined their lives with his and allowed him to be part of theirs. It’s been months but he still wasn’t sure if he would ever get used to the feeling.

“It made me really happy” Touka suddenly spoke up after a long period of silence, her voice a little somber “back when we first moved underground, I was really afraid we would spend the rest of our lives there, if we managed to live long enough. I never liked that place when I was little and I really dreaded the idea of us dying in a place with no sunlight.”

She had never spoken so candidly about that before, and Kaneki’s heart ached a little at the memory of all they went through during that period.

“But I prayed back then that we would get a sign, even if it’s one flower blooming through a crack” she looked up at him again, eyes filled with tears and a small smile on her face “I didn’t think my prayers would be heard but they were, I got my flower when I found out I was carrying our daughter, and I just knew things would turn around, I would make them turn around myself if I had to” they both chuckled through tears as Kaneki brought her head to his lip and kissed it over and over again.

Kaneki felt his mind clear for a moment and as if it was lurking there all along, he finally thought of the right name.

“How about Ichika?”

“Huh?”

“For a name, how about Ichika?”

One flower.

“Ichika” Touka whispered the name then repeated it, a little louder each time, her face brightening up as if she had finally found what she was looking for, “Ichika, do you like that name?” The little girl in her arms suddenly sneezed and woke herself up. She looked up at her parents with big curious eyes and a little smiled formed on her lips.

“I think she likes it.”

“Kaneki Ichika, has a nice ring to it” Kaneki felt a strange sense of pride at his name being carried by the symbol of hope to Touka and himself.

“And it’s really useful for keeping track of the kids in the future” Touka joked, gently elbowing Kaneki in the ribs.

“You want another baby already! Aren’t you tired?!”

“Not right now! Maybe in a few years. I want us to take our time getting to know little Ichika first”

Ichika made an incomprehensible baby sound that her parents interpreted as agreement.

Overjoyed with the prospect of raising a small child in a world that will be much kinder to her than it was to them when they were little. Kaneki and Touka couldn’t wait to build their life with the new addition to their family.

Their story had just begun.

[ye4gerismarchives]

the bachelorette chp 5, part 2: connie’s proposal

an: hey yall 😛 i'll be posting another q&a before the final elimination chapter comes out. the day after that, i will close the poll, so make good choices! if you wanna change your mind, do it NOW! if you haven't voted, NOW is your chance😁 also, once again, i had to add an extended part to the connie family chapter because the full thing did not upload :( if the extended part helps you change your mind on connie, let me know! also, i really like this chapter because i could properly write a beach story! i went to a beach last week for the very first time and now i won't sound stupid when writing (and i'll never beat around the bush again!) link at the bottom!

tags: fem, black reader

tag list: @taybird

Unlike Jean, Connie did give you an idea of where you were going. He told you to bring some sandals and a light outfit and "not to worry about swimming because I know you don't want to mess up your hair- or makeup". There was a high chance you would be going to the beach where you had your first solo date. It was also the first time you talked about Connie being your husband. He said something about being "wise" about your decision. Now that you think about it, there was a pattern of Connie trying to avoid the fact that you two would have to be in love. You wondered if he'd bring that up again while proposing to you. You wouldn't want to say no to Connie if he did that but the whole friend zone thing is a BIG turnoff (y'all's words, not mine 😉)

But there was a positive side to this maybe? You already knew Connie and he had a higher advantage than Jean. You wouldn't even have to think about building a connection with him because you already had one. But the problem was love. You knew would enter a relationship with Jean, y'all would be lovey-dovey BUT you would need to build a friendship too.

Damn, this was hard. But this would all be over soon. You'd get a big wedding and if you didn't like Connie or Jean, you could move on. It's not like you're signing papers at the televised ceremony.

But anyways 😭 let's starts Connie's date. No time for analysis!

Connie had texted you that he was outside. You grabbed your purse and left the mansion. When you got outside, Connie was leaning on his car, being handsome and all.

"Hey," you greet him. You hold your arms out, hoping for a hug or even a kiss. Connie steps forward leans towards you but his head goes to the side and he's hugging you. Would this guy wait till the possible engagement before getting romantic with you or would the rest of your marriage be like this?

Connie pulls away. "I'm really excited," he says. You want to yell at him right now but the day just started. Maybe he was doing all this to lead you on and make sure you want to fight for him. To be real, this was getting tiring. Connie better be doing something big!

"I'm really excited to see what you have in store for me as well," you reply. Other than seeing Connie's next moves or his proposal, you were excited about the food. You knew Connie could cook, it was in his genes and he did cook for you multiple times throughout the show. As Connie opens the passenger seat for you, you begin to ask him what was on the menu today.

"Well, I've noticed how nauseous you get when under the pressure, so I made egg sandwiches and I packed juices and water. I hope that's alright. When we get engaged, I'll make you a big meal. I promise," Connie says before closing your door.

You thought it was sweet that Connie took note of that. When he got into the driver's seat, you gave him a small smile before opening your mouth. "Thank you, Connie. I really appreciate the fact that you thought about that."

Connie starts the car and begins the drive to the venue. There wasn't much talking done, probably because you would bring up the whole friendship thing. You wanted to get that settled but you also wanted to see what Connie has planned. These two dates weren't just about you saying yes or no but it was a way to see how much Jean and Connie wanted you. If there were problems in the past, they would try and fix them now.

Minutes later you were at the beach (you were right😁). Connie found parking and got out of the car to get the food. You got out on your own. It was weird not having someone rush to your side to open your door. Connie met you on your side of the car and offered you his hand. You can't remember him doing that before (if he has, forgive me yall🧍🏾‍♀️). But his hands felt nice, so you couldn't complain.

The same table from your solo date remained there. "Hey, Connie, just for you, I'll get in the water," you suddenly say. "Huh?! Really?!" he explains. 'Gosh, what a kid,' you think. "You just made this better, y/n! Thank you!" Connie continues. "Just my feet though. I didn't come here to get baptized or anything."

Connie places the picnic basket with all the little things he packed for you. He then proceeds to pull a chair out for you. When you sit, he pulls out one egg sandwich for you. "Juice or water?" Connie asks. "Um, (juice/water)," you reply. He places the drink of your choice in front of you and finally sits down. Connie sets up his food and is ready to dig in until he notices that you haven't touched any of your food.

"Hey...is everything alright? You feel sick?"

You shake your head. "Connie, we need to talk."

Connie sits up slowly. "What's up?"

You liked that Connie was able to see that something was up. This would be useful if you got married.

"How long are you going to friendzone me?"

Connie chokes in his spit. "What?"

"I mean sure we've been lovey-dovey but I still don't feel that romantic connection. If I do say yes to you, I expect us to start acting like a couple. I want you to be my husband, not my friend."

Connie is silent for a minute and then he opens his mouth. "But people who are friends-"

"Oh, shut up. You can be my friend but I want a husband! Please, stop bringing up those statistics and love me!"

You never thought you would be throwing a mini tantrum over a man. Is this who we are? Is this what we represent?

"Come with me," Connie says. You're hesitant to get up until he offers his hand to you. You take it and he pulls you up from the chair.

Connie slowly leads you down the water and you start to freak out mentally. Was he going to drown for telling him off? Connie wasn't that crazy right?

As you walked, you felt yourself slipping out of your shoes. The sand didn't hesitate to fill in the gaps of your toes and tickle your feet. The further you went, the deeper you were. Connie was just walking like it was nothing. You reached the water and Connie came to a stop. For a moment, he stared out into the ocean. You just stared at your feet. The waves pushed the water on your feet causing you to sink more into the sand. This was the world. You were on the edge. You weren't going to live for long, so you had to make the best of it.

"y/n, I hear your cries for love and I'm willing to give it to you. Marry me. I'll work on myself and you'll work on yourself. I promise you, I'll do anything to grow old with you."

Connie’s ring didn’t come in a box. He just pulled it out from his pocket. It was a diamond covered band with a halo shaped sapphire right in the middle.

damn, wonder who y’all gonna choose🤒 LINK

if you’re curious about how these rings look like, here:

connie (left) jean (right , however, his doesn’t match the description i wrote😒)

also, sorry for the white hand. i took a buzzfeed quiz

[btssavedmylifeblr]

I forgot to send on my voting story. Ok so my brother and I both got mail in ballots, and let me tell you how we both forgot to mail it in so we just thought to bring them to our voting location. The lady there kinda yelled at us? She was confused and didn't know how to go about it. And honestly I just took it because we were the idiots who didn't mail in our ballots. We had to rip them up and they just us new ones to fill out in person and submit. Not exciting, but a story for void snippet. 👀

Anonymous said: Hi!! I'm so excited for void! I voted today around 30 minutes before the polls closed in my neighborhood because I had to wait for my dad and brother to get home from work since they wanted to go all together hehe. It was a pretty fast process! We just pressed buttons on screens (compared to last election where we had to bubble in everything by hand) plus, I got to keep the stylus that they gave us and it works on phones too! 🥰🥰 Thank you! I love your writing so much 💜💜💜

Anonymous said: I did mine through mail me and my husband did and we went to the post office a little while back and then he took us on a nice little date afterward and we got ice cream! Also I love void💖 keep up the good work

Anonymous said: VOTES FOR VOID??? I love democracy and I love VOID! So since May I've (temporarily) moved back home from New York to Indiana RE: covid; I've voted absentee for the both the primaries and presidential election (I'm still in IN rn...blah). I voted early and mailed in my ballot for the presidential election (about 3 weeks ago). Made sure my family was voting (brother mailed it in, mom dropped off a ballot, and dad did early voting) and encourage them to put up a Biden sign in our yard <3

Anonymous said: HI BEE! I ALSO VOTED TODAY! IM 21 SO THIS IS MY FIRST TIME VOTING FOR THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION (my 18th bday didnt make the cutoff since im a december bday) im so happy to have done my part! I made sure to study up on the judges and policies and everything! Luckily the polling place didn't have a line so i was able to get in, get my ballot, and fill it in right away! I even dragged my mom and cousin to come with me. I made a joke on snapchat to encourage my friends to vote too. It was a pic of my "i voted" sticker with a caption saying "omg youre so sexy when you vote aHaha" -🦙

Anonymous said: this is my first time doing this so, so i hope i’m sending this correctly! i voted early in late september by mail! i live in a swing state, so it’s really important for me to vote and not waste time!! bc of my age, this is my first time voting so i’m really nervous 😅

Anonymous said: I voted by email! I'm overseas so I wasn't sure if my ballot would actually make it through in time, so I decided to go electronically. Had to sign a waiver saying I understand that my vote won't be anonymous but I haven't been given a reason to suspect voter suppression/fraud in my state, so I'm happy I think...!

Anonymous said: hi, i voted early on oct 24th. my absentee ballot didn't come in, so i had to travel back home to vote (~3 hour drive). when we got there, there was a ton of people outside the polling place, but no lines, so i was in and out pretty quick. it was my first time voting, so i had all the candidates i was voting for written down on a tiny receipt so i wouldn't forget 😅. my mom was with me, so she voted too. took a pic with my sticker (mask on for extra covid-ness) and went home. drove back the next afternoon!

whippedforkook said: Hi Bee. 💕 I voted in early October - nearly a month ago! 😱 It’s been really weird with all the lead up to the election because it felt like it should have been done once I cast my ballot! A lot of my friends have volunteered to get out the vote: writing postcards to voters, texting, phone banking, working the polls, curing ballots. I didn’t volunteer at all this year, but I hope that all of my friends’ hard work and everyone else’s is enough. I’m also hoping and praying that I will be in a better place mentally for 2022 so that I too can volunteer. Our work starts with 2020 not ends. 💕 Wishing you well. 💕

begineuphoria said: I went and voted last Friday as it was our last early voting day. No way was I going to wait until today with the crowds of people in my area that still act as if masks are somehow infringing on their rights. 🙄 It was a rather normal experience for the most part. Other than having to use a coffee stir stick to press the buttons on the machine to vote. In and out within five minutes.

Anonymous said: I voted down the street at this pretty park this morning. I got up at 5:30 and it was freezing. Luckily I wore like 30 layers and stood outside for 2 hours. Some nasty orange man supporters were rude but everyone else was pretty nice. A really cute older couple was playing soccer with pine cones and kicked it towards me to play too. Not the worst time tbh.

Anonymous said: Did mail-in voting in California! Extremely exhausting and took forever to research all the propositions - they are notoriously tricky in hiding their flaws and one side tends to outrageously outspend the other. But in the end I felt really good about my research and decisions! No need for you to post a snippet for this story - would like to save that to read sometime in the future ;) Thank you so much for doing this!

joonsgotthejuice said: Votes for void??? I am here! I went last Thursday and it was chaotic bc I kept going past the poll place but the line was soooo long so my mom called me and woke me up like "its pouring rain and the line is super short get up I'm gonna pick you up" so thats the story of how I got dressed in 5 minutes and dragged my ass to vote in the rain <3

Anonymous said: i voted early on thursday it was cold and rainy but i went in the late afternoon and thankfully the only waiting i did was a few minutes for an elevator i got very lucky and while waiting for the results is awful the relief that came from voting in general was just great

Anonymous said: Wheeew the polls just closed and I finally got to cast my ballot yayyy ( I was the one working the polls from earlier) it’s been a really really long day and we actually had surprisingly good turnout. I saw a woman try to vote for someone else who claimed to be “helping” and I saw a woman who I’m pretty sure was on some typa something 👀 Overall though I really I’m really thankful for people like you who encouraged people to get out and vote. I hope the odds are in our favor❤️🤞🏼

chelsea-chee said: Hello Bee! Today surprisingly my elderly father wanted to vote so I brought him out with me. He only cared about voting for Biden, which meant I got to help decide who he should vote for with the rest of the candidates and amendments! Say hello to baby bee for me as well! 💖

Anonymous said: Okay I gonna got a chance to vote today and the process wasn’t that bad actually. I went in just now and it wasn’t that busy( thankfully) so no lines. I’m from Texas and it’s gonna be almost impossible to turn this state blue, but every vote counts! I love that you are getting people to vote and also sharing your experiences as well!

owl-orgy said: Dropped off my mail in ballot at a polling location! I originally wanted to vote early in person because I was worried my signature wouldn’t match closely enough but ended up just turning it in and double checked today to make it said “ballot accepted and counted”!

Anonymous said: I voted in person this afternoon, better late than never I guess. I was gonna go last week but then I got cramps from hell. There was no one in line in front of me, I think my county early voted because it was packed everyday the last few weeks

Anonymous said: I voted early a couple weeks ago. Exciting thing though that did happen was I got both my parents to vote for their first time ever.

Anonymous said: I had a mail in vote. So, I filled it out and dropped it in at the ballot box at my library. (I also checked out books for the first time in years, so I had fun!)

bubblyjiminnie said: I literally just finished voting. Lucky for me, the line and wait wasn’t very long, and it was a nice enough day that the short amount of time I had to spend in line outside of the building wasn’t too bad. My social anxiety when it comes to stuff like this tends to be high but that’s what I get for waiting until Election Day instead of going the mail in route. This was only my second time voting, but I’m glad that I did 😊

Anonymous said: I turned my ballot in last week :) I’m not a big fan of crowds and I hate make spur of the moment choices but despite that the first time I was able to vote back in 08 my Mom pressured me into voting in person because “you’d have to experience it at least once in our life”. And ever since then I comfortably vote by mail. I take my time, do all of my research, listen to music, and best of all don’t have to deal with people.

Anonymous said: here in Washington state it’s super easy to vote. I dropped my ballot off in mid-October and it’s already been accounted for! Mail in voting and drop box voting is fantastic and provides equal opportunity and access. Sad to see some people in red states misinforming Americans about it! We also have a referendum for implementing mandatory sex ed, including teaching respect, empathy and consent as part of the curriculum so I was happy to vote yes on that too!

unionrox006 said: I voted about 2 weeks ago by doing a mail in ballot. The other eligible to vote members of my household did the same. We chose to vote by absentee ballot because both my mom and I have an autoimmune disorder, so we have to be careful going out in the pandemic. Tbh, the ballot layout was a bit confusing at first as was all the paperwork and required IDs and documents. But my dad explained it to me and we got them filled out and mailed off. Kinda mad I didn't get a sticker for it though

bluetostone said: Love this and so excited for the next chp of void! I early voted a few weeks ago and because I live in a pretty rural county I was in and out of my polling place in a few minutes. No sticker though 😢. I live in a swing state so it could go either way in terms of delegates. Just praying everyone is safe tonight as the results roll in...though, won't we not know for sure for a couple of days or weeks?

Anonymous said: My mom, sister, and I received our early voting ballots a while ago and I took the longest to fill mine out because it was making me anxious :,( but I did return it before it was due. I checked our ballot statuses and mine and my moms were accepted but my sister’s said they hadn’t received hers back. Then she got another ballot so she filled that one out too and I took it yesterday 👍👍 I think she got two because she changed her address late so they sent two?

vixsynsblog said: Non-interesting voter story: I'm paranoid and live in a highly divided area, so I filed mail-in ASAP, mailed it a few days after cause neighbors are nosy and don't understand boundaries. Was able to track my ballot through my credit company, which was nice. Only thing I was missing was my sticker. Never got one✊😔. So I had to improvise and write it in pen on my disposable mask. I'm working all this week so if riots break out from either side, I'll be at work. Prayers for the safety of others🙏

______

Waaah!!! Thank you all for voting!! You are all my heroes. I am so grateful and proud of you. I’m sorry I ran out of time to respond to you individually. I’m going to drop two big scenes from Chapter 7 in gratitude (one of which will be familiar to my patrons and one won’t). I’m hopeful I will have the whole next chapter out very soon. Love you all!

Void spoilers below the cut.

When you wake up in the morning, there are still no signed HR forms in your messages. Had you been a fool to think they were interested? How much time does it take to decide such a thing? Perhaps just by putting the idea out there explicitly, it had lost all of its taboo appeal. 

There is a calendar reminder waiting for you: Today is chili pepper pollinating day. At least this gives you an excuse to talk to Hoseok. 

You find the science officer in the lab as always, sitting with his knee up against his chest. Hoseok doesn’t look well. He’s got dark circles under his eyes.

“Hey, um…” You shuffle your feet. Want to fuck me? No wait…“You don’t look good. Were you here all night?” you ask.

He blinks at you, bleary-eyed. “Um, was I? Yeah.. I suppose. Lost track of time.” He rubs his eyes, before looking you up and down, then casting his gaze back to the floor. 

All you want to do is ask about the forms. Or the meeting. Or what he thinks of you now. But you don’t. “I need to pollinate the chili peppers today.” Usually Hoseok is the person who assists with that. “But I can get one of the other guys to do it if you need the sleep.”

“No!” Hoseok lurches forward, standing up a bit to rapidly and needing to put his hand back on the bench to steady himself. “I mean, I’m fine.” 

You should disgaree with him. He is exhausted. But you’d like more time to talk to him. 

Pollinating the chili peppers is both time-sensitive and time-consuming, hence why it took two of you to get the job done. There were no insects on your ship to do the job for you and if they didn’t get pollinated, they wouldn’t bear any fruit. Your chili peppers were your favorite crop. Not only a vital source of Vitamin C, but all your food benefitted from having a bit of spice added to it. 

You and Hoseok head for the greenhouse together. The intital set-up gives you something to talk about in the beginning. Hoseok gathers the pollen from one flower onto a paintbrush, then hands it over to you to paint onto the stigmas of each little flower on the next plant in the line.

Slowly the conversation dries up as you fall into a silent rhythm. Other than just enjoying the chili peppers, you must admit that this was one of your favorite tasks on the ship because of the high likelihood that the two of you would brush hands peridically. Always gave you butterflies. But today he seems extra intent on keeping his distance from you. Was he disgusted by you now? His hands are trembling.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” 

His hand twitches so hard that a little rain of yellow pollen cascades onto the floor. He curses in frustration before turning to face you. “Are you sure you’re okay?” 

“Um, yes, I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“This, um, plan of yours…” he gestures to the vague tension in the air. “It doesn’t feel like you.”

“I’m trying to save the mission. That has always been my top priority.”

“Yeah, I’m still not clear on how this benefits the mission.”

“Yoongi said…” you start to say, but are cut off my Hoseok’s derisive snort. 

“Look, if you’re in love with Yoongi, just go date him, okay? Don’t feel obligated to include the rest of us out of pity.” 

You frown. “I’m not… I’m not in love with him. It’s just sex. Just biology.” 

“This isn’t you!” Hoseok argues back. “You hated the idea of anyone of us ever treating you that way. And now you just want all of us to… to… use you like that?”  He splutters out the end of the sentence.

“No one is using me! This is my plan! I’m in charge!”

He sighs. “Well, I can’t be a part of it. Excuse me.”

______

Taehyung finds you in the gym. It’s good to see him up and about, even if his arm is still in a sling. 

“Hey, so I need to talk to you about this, um, ape sex thing.” He fishes awkwardly into his pockets and pulls out his tablet.  Maybe Jimin was right. Is Taehyung going to be the first to take you up on your offer?

You pause your jog on the elliptical machine. You wish you weren’t so sweaty and gross for this conversation. Taehyung is such an intimidatingly attractive man with those strong eyebrows and that perfect skin. 

Taehyung opens up the tablet and flips to the form. It’s happening. He’s going to sign the form. Shit. Then what will you do? It’s one thing to say you want to have sex with your whole crew, but what if he’s hoping to go right now? You need a shower. 

Taehyung has really nice hands. Long strong fingers delicately navigating the touch screen. It seems totally improbable that a man this attractive would be into you, even if you were the only woman in the universe. It just adds to your suspicions that hormones are driving everyone crazy. Perhaps if you slept with him once, he’d lose all interest. 

He finds the form and then turns his gaze up to you, staring you down with those eyes. It’s a good thing that Taehyung rarely turns his full gaze on you, because it is almost too much to bear. Shit, is he just going to sign it? Is he waiting for you to give him some sort of signal?

“You can’t do this to Jimin,” he says.

“What?” Not what you were expecting. “Do what to Jimin?”

“This.” He gestures over the HR form. “Signing these forms with everyone. Having sex with everyone. You’re going to destroy Jimin.”

“Jimin’s the one who suggested this whole thing in the first place.” It’s a lie. You know its a lie. Or at least a gross exaggeration. But Jimin was the one who first brought up the idea of sharing. All for the benefit of the man in front of you now. 

“No way.” Taehyung scoffs, crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow. “No way was it Jimin’s idea that you sleep with the whole crew.” 

“Well…” You can’t bear his gaze anymore and look down at the floor. “He wanted me to sleep with you.”

That surprises Taehyung. He puts down the tablet. “What? Why would he want that?”

This is awkward. “He, um, thinks you’re in love with me.”

“What?” There is only surprise on Taehyung’s face. It’s actually a relief to see that Taehyung is just as shocked by that idea as you were. “Why does he think that?”

“I don’t know…” You feel kind of dumb now. Of course, Taehyung doesn’t feel that way about you. Look at him. “Cause you told him you were jealous. Cause you can’t stand to be in the same room as us…”

Taehyung bites his lip. “Oh, um, shit, sorry, that’s not what I meant.”

If Taehyung isn’t jealous of Jimin... 

“Taehyung…” He looks up, biting his lip. “What did you mean? Who are you jealous of?” 

Taehyung’s eyes widen, but he doesn’t say anything. Instead he reaches for his microphone and mutes it. Out of respect, you mute yours as well. He glances toward the camera in the corner of the room, then stands up and begins unzipping his jumpsuit. 

“Um…” You are distracted by the golden arms that peak from either side of the tank top as the zipper reaches his groin. “What are you doing?”

“Need something to block the camera.”

“We have towels,” you mutter.  But he’s already stripping out of his shirt. The musculature of his back ripples. He hangs the shirt off of the camera to block the rest of the room from view. 

“Yeah, but this way anyone watching will think we’re having sex.” His chest is just as attractive as his back and you flush at the sight of it. Mercifully, he zips back into his jumpsuit as he returns to his position in front of the exercise machine. 

“You want them to think we’re having sex?”

“Don’t you? It plays right into your whole save the mission with bonobo sex plan.”

“I suppose.” Though the plan was also supposed to be that there would be no more secrets between the crew. “What plan of yours does it play into?”

“The one where Jimin doesn’t realize I’m in love with him.”

“You’ve never tried to tell him?”

Taehyung laughs wryly and shakes his head. “How would that conversation go? Hey man, I know we’ve known each other for years and I’ve already seen you naked and that you just think of me as a friend, but I’m in love with you. I know that’s awkward but now you have to spend the next twelve years with me, knowing that I’m attracted to you when you don’t feel the same way.” Taehyung sighs. “Doesn’t sound like a good plan to me. If he doesn’t feel the same way, I’ve just ruined the friendship for nothing and then I don’t even have that.”

“Yeah… I get that.”  There’s something touching about realizing that Taehyung has been fighting the same battle as you for the last two years. 

“I couldn’t tell anyone before launch because what if they wouldn’t let me go then? You know?”

“Yeah, the director wasn’t big on sending anyone who might ‘complicate’ the mission.” The two of you share a sad knowing smile. 

“Yeah… And I thought it would be fine, you know? I like women too. I’d just date women until launch and no one would know. I wasn’t planning on falling in love with my roommate.”

“I don’t think any of us really knew what this would be like.”

“I knew it was going to be a problem. I should have pulled out…” 

Your mind flashes back to that moment of doubt when Hoseok talked you into still coming on the mission.

“But I couldn’t just let him go off into space without me. Even if he’d never feel the same way, at least he’d still be in my life.”

The emotion in Taehyung’s words makes your eyes begin to mist. “You really do love him.”

“Yeah,” Taehyung sighs again. “But he’s in love with you.”

“Well, he thinks he is.”

“What does that mean?”

“He only feels like that about me cause he thinks I’m the only option.”  You wonder if maybe he would feel differently if he knew about Taehyung’s feelings. 

Taehyung frowns and shakes his head. “You don’t give him enough credit.”

“Oh come on, you know him. How many women did he date while we were in training?”

“A few…” 

“And how many of them was he in love with before he found the next one?”  

Taehyung bites his lip. He can’t really argue with that. “So why are you with him then, if you don’t think it’s real?”

You shrug, rubbing your arm. “He wants me. It’s nice to feel wanted, I guess.”

“You know you could have that with any man on this ship right?”

You scoff. “They’re all suffering the same delusion. It’s only-available-vagina syndrome. I just want us all to fuck and get it out in the open. Maybe if we could get it out of our system, they would see I’m nothing special. And then we can get back to the mission.”

Taehyung eyes you up and down. “You don’t give yourself enough credit either.”

You shrug. “You wait and see. Jimin will get bored of me. They all will.”

The two of you both slump backwards in your seats, mulling over your shared woes.  Taehyung bends down and picks up the tablet again. “So what should I do with this?”

“Obivously, you don’t have to sign it. I should have realized that not everyone would be interested.”

“Jimin thinks I’m in love with you?”

“Yeah…”

“Is it okay if we let him think that for now? At least until I figure out how to tell him the truth?”

“Okay.”

Taehyung smiles and signs the bottom of the form, then sends it to you. Your phone lights up with a message. “Thank you,” he murmurs before he leaves. 

[biwenqing]

So this is for the day three prompt: Social Media AU for Spring Sleuthing over at @tsomdevents! I wrote this fic a while ago, and it fits perfectly for this. But I realized it was going to be more than one chapter. I will continue it once the prompt week is over!

teen | pre-relationship | WIP | ao3 link | formatted as tweets | wc:1767

WZ @theroommatedilema

i made this secret account to live tweet my two oblivious roommates having a quarantine romance. or not. they are idiots. follow to find out will they/won’t they.

he/him | Joined March 2020

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 27 we are starting week 2 of quarantine and i realized i needed to document this. my two roommates who have been dancing around each other since before shit hit the fan are driving me crazy and if i have to watch this the world has to as well.

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 27 we need to give them code names because, while i don't think either of them will find this account, best not to tempt fate. so we have 'hot chef' and 'smart aleck'.

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 27 all that out of the way, we can now get to the live tweet. hot chef was doing his laundry so he was walking around the apartment shirtless. smart aleck walked into a wall, not once, not twice, but three times. hot chef didn't help this when he put on an apron

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 28 smart aleck started the day by almost burning down our kitchen trying to make breakfast to impress hot chef. luckily i was awake and stopped things before there was a grease fire, before making breakfast myself. they both seemed to like it.

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 29 hot chef thinks we should try and exercise, but i think it is cold and slippery out, so if he expects me to join him on his morning runs, he is wrong. smart aleck did make an attempt and i got to watch him wipe out from the window. lucky for him hot chef caught him. yea i know

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 29 follow up to wipe out: hot chef helped smart aleck back into the house and then took care of him, before then still going on his run. smart aleck pouted next to me on the couch, watching out the window for when he came back like a puppy.

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 30 smart aleck has decided he needs to clean and organize the whole apartment. i think he just doesn't want to do his real job. this has led to an argument with hot chef because smart aleck has taken everything out of the kitchen cabinets and messed with his books.

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 30 as a household, we have a pretty solid 'don't touch my stuff' understanding, but that apparently goes all out the window during a pandemic. hot chef keeps all his cooking tools and supplies in a special order that makes sense only to him and i leave it be

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 30 but smart aleck wants to "help" and didnt ask if anyone wanted help so here we are. don't worry, this account isn't in vain, i can confirm that their argument is more bickering and that bickering is the stereotype of an "old married couple"

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 30 SA: but you do so much, i wanted to help! HC: if i need help, i'd ask for it SA: *arms crossed* would you? give an example of when you have asked for help. HC: ....i haven't needed help SA: bullshit! remember when you got the flu last year and didn't tell us?

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 30 SA: you practically passed out before you let WZ and i take you to see a doctor! and then you still argued about us making sure you got the food and fluids and everything you needed so you didn't die! HC: ...i didn't want either of you to get sick

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 30 SA: oh yes so ignoring the issue really helped? it’s better that you almost died? in case you didn’t already notice, smart aleck is always dramatic.

WZ @theroommatedilema . March 30 for those wondering, smart aleck is not wrong here. this is exactly how events occurred. it was only a few months after I moved in with them. for the fight i think smart aleck somehow won this round. tune in tomorrow for what happens next!

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 4 no updates because they have been pretending to ignore each other and focused on work. hot chef in particular. smart aleck claims it is because hot chef isn’t used to being cared about. he told me this in a deliberate stage whisper.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 4 i think it is important to note that hot chef did still make dinner each night to share... he just went back to his room after.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 5 i got a question asking what we all do for work. that’s classified. and mostly unrelated. though it is how we met in a very odd course of events.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 5 that was not an invitation to send me more questions. i know you are all nosy, or else why would you be following this account. but we have established this account must go unnoticed.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 5 fine. general ages = smart aleck is in his 20s. hot chef is in his 30s. and because you for some reason all want to know: i am also in my 20s.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 5 pets = yes one. smart aleck has a pet cat named goat he inherited from a past roommate. goat the cat tries to eat anything and everything, thus the name. she particularly likes to eat house plants. she likes smart aleck the least, hot chef the most. i hold a pretty solid 2nd place.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 6 update: they made up. a package arrived today and it was apparently a pan to replace one smart aleck had destroyed. hot chef made smart aleck’s favorite dinner. SA talked the whole way through to meal, and HC looked smitten. so we’re back to normal.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 10 where do we rank the level of domestic where one person brushes their teeth/gets ready for the day while the other is in the shower? bonus points for some mild discussion and/or bickering.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 11 smart aleck has a new scheme. he is trying to persuade hot chef to teach him to cook. so far HC has held firm. we mark day one of this new standoff.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 12 i’ve been asked a few times why i don’t just use initials of smart aleck and hot chef’s names. it’s all part of keeping this hidden. i have also chosen nicknames that i don’t think they would think i’d use for them.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 12 smart aleck is the type to figure this out if i’m not careful. he’s both too clever and too dumb for his own good. which is part of the reason i must document all of this, so i can shove it in his face later.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 12 we are also on day two of cooking teaching standoff. i think some of you rightly assume SA is imagining hot chef standing behind him and idk helping him cut vegetables

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 13 standoff continues. i made dinner to see if that would throw the balance off. no change yet

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 14 resolution! hot chef did give in, on the condition that he teaches both of us. i didn’t manage to escape because smart aleck seemed to decide this was the only way. don’t know how this fits into whatever romantic daydreams he had.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 14 i see those comments that this might give me a chance to put them together. but i think it is more fun to not help them at all. they need to do this on their own

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 15 to do such teaching, a grocery shopping mission is needed. because the world is... well. i suggested just they go together so fine. maybe i will try and assist.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 15 level of domestic of sneaking things you know your “just friends roommate” loves but won’t buy for themselves in the cart without them knowing?

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 15 you ask how i know that and it is of course because smart aleck, so proud of himself, announced it as soon as he reentered the apartment. goat the cat tried to get into the bags to eat raw fish while this occurred.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 16 first cooking lesson, some simple stir fry. i already can cook this so i get to just perch at the counter and watch. vote on the poll below how you think this will turn out

[hands brushing softly] [sparks, and not the sexy kind] [food hopefully?]

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 16 everyone who voted for fire won. the neighbors are quite upset. and not even goat the cat will eat the final product. i ordered take out and a fresh fire extinguisher while they dealt with the mild fire and smoke detector.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 17 smart aleck is pouting so there will be no cooking lessons today. the good news (for his employer) is he seems to actually be focusing on doing his job.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 20 hot chef actually asked smart aleck if he wanted to try cooking again. very interesting. this has mostly been coming from SA’s side, so i would call this positive movement.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 20 SA has completely perked up and agreed.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 20 oh apparently the plan is SA will watch and i get the place as the student in the kitchen. this is probably safer for everyone

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 21 for those asking what happen: dinner was made with no issue. I was in charge of the main dish and that left HC to work on side dishes. SA even helped wash and chop some vegetables. goat took some chicken right off SA’s plate and ran away with it growling.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 21 i take that to mean the cat approves of my cooking. but she also tried to steal things from the trash, so that isn’t much of an endorsement.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 22 SA is avoiding work and trying to clean again. he actually asked if he could move stuff around. growth.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 25 hot chef spotted leaving smart aleck’s room this morning?

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 25 false alarm, he was just looking for the cat.

WZ @theroommatedilema . April 30 final report for this month: progress made in communication. new together activity established. the apartment has not burned down. a baby step closer, yet still so far away from them figuring this out...

[layniapetrovnaaa]

Golden Dandelions: Preview

Listen to Golden Dandelions by Barns Courtney on spotify or youtube, while you read!

He wasn't planning on watching any of the girls on stage. In fact, the only reason he was there was because it was the closest place to him with alcohol. The younger version of himself wouldn't hesitate to watch the show, maybe pay for a private one and end up taking that woman to bed with him, but that version of himself had passed away with the rest of the x-men on that god-forsaken day. This version of the wolverine was sick and dying. He was cold and tired, and surviving only on alcohol, coffee, and cigars.

He didn't even want to temp himself by looking over at the almost naked women, figuring that he would become distracted far too easily because of his past year of abstinence. When he was unable to prevent his eyes from wandering, they landed on the dazzler in the middle row of polls. Her hands sliding up and down her body as she danced provocatively around the pole. 

His lips wrapped around the cigar as he took a long inhale, the nearly empty glass of whiskey fascinating him more than the colorful lights and sexual music. As he exhaled, the smoke clouded his vision, and he downed the rest of the venom in the glass. 

Despite their location being right by the Mexican border, the Texas weather was still fairly cold on march nights, but as the old man recalled, they were not nearly as cold as march in NY, or Canada for that matter. He stumbled out of the flashy building, taking a minute before going to his car to finish his cigar. Despite his gruff and slightly western look, he did not like the south-west. He hated the dry air and hot climate, and he hated how dusty it was. He preferred the cold– or at least cooler temperatures. 

Once he is finished, he taps and rubs the fiery end on the side of the building, dropping it on the ground once it was put out. The old him would have been appalled at his execution, but now he was too tired to care.  

He would have ignored it, he should have ignored it, but the version of him that he thought had died along with the rest of his friends never truly did. It, being the sounds of a tussle between a man and woman in the alley next to him. He grumbled knowing he was still there where it counted. He still had that thirst for justice and need to help. 

Even though all his aching limbs voted against it,he started towards the slender man in the alleyway, the one who had a tight grip on the petite and scantily dressed woman. Logan figured that she worked at the building that he had just exited, given her intoxicating aroma, oiled up body, and...other factors. 

She ripped her wrist from out of the weasely man’s grasp. Logan stopped, seeing her reel the same hand back into the air, ready to attack. It was as if time moved in slow-motion as he watched her shiny fingertips melt down to glove the rest of her hand in cool metal. He would have taken more time to admire the femme fatale’s mutation, as it gleamed in the blue moonlight and pink neon sign that hung above their heads, had it not been for the situation at hand. 

He wasn't as alone as he thought.

He came back to reality just in time to see the clammy looking guy fall back into the brick wall behind him, quickly scurrying away, but not before spitting “Freak bitch!” at the damsel. 

Her hand shifts back into flesh as she dusts them off, letting out a deep breath. 

Logan continued to stand in the small and dirty alleyway. He observed the young female mutant as she bent down to pick up her coat and bag from off of the cracked pavement. The knee length black coat she wore disguised her appearance, but the makeup she still had on was quick to make you suspicious. As she slings the bag over her shoulder, her eyes flick up to meet Logan’s, and in that moment he was able to get a good look at her.

His eyes raked down her body. Had her figure been less than greek, the coat would have completely muted her. But with the way that it cinched at the waist, exposed some of her shiny and supple cleavage, and showed off her killer legs, you had no choice but to succumb to her obvious goddess-like aura. Her hair cocooned her in sensuality and etherealness. Logan felt stuck where he stood as he watched her brush past him and out onto the busy street.  His feet were quick to follow her, feeling completely encapsulated by her beauty. 

“Hey! Um-’ she turns and glares at him slightly, thinking she was going to have another run in with a sleazy man. 

“Do y’need a ride?” 

*** 

The wolverine observed her in his peripheral vision every few minutes, and he noted that her gaze never moved from the window in the five minutes that they had been driving for. He had barely even talked with her, only a “yes” and a “thank you” had passed through her sensual lips, but the nearly 200 year old man was already hooked. He never took himself as the type. Maybe he was just desperate, after all it had been a year since he had any physical or romantic contact with anyone. And the insatiable animal that still resided inside of his adamantium bones was begging for her.

She looked young, too young. But then again, he thought to himself, everyone was to young for him. But this girl looked hardly legal, despite her job and tired eyes. 

“So,” he clears his throat, looking over at the nymph-like woman

“You're a mutant.”

She couldn't tell if it was supposed to be a statement or a question. She knew that he had been in the alley with them, but she didn’t know when he had appeared and tried intervene, maybe she could play it off. She knew how mutants were treated around here.

“I don’t know what you're talking about.” she mutters, her body tensing, but her stare was unwavering from the lit streets. 

“In the alley, your hand turned into metal.”

He watched her body shift to face forward, still not looking at the chauffeur. She reached into her bag and pulled out a cigarette, only looking up at him to ask if he minded.

“No, but you gotta put the window down.” 

She obliges and lights up the cancer stick.

Logan was never one for cigarettes, but the way she looked with it hanging out of her mouth, the way her fingers and lips wrapped around it, or how the smoke twisted around her, made him rethink his convictions. 

“I don’t know what you think you saw, but I’m no mutant.”

“I can tell when people are lying to me, sweetheart.” 

She stays silent and takes another drag. 

“Why do you care, anyways?” she finally speaks up.

“Because, there aren’t many of us left.” 

She nods, and Logan can feel her stare rake over him, but only when he was focused on the road ahead. 

“What’s your name, kid?”

“[Y/N]. What’s yours?” she says, taking in a breath of smoke. Her tone sounds impassive, yet there is a slightly cocky and curious ring to it, and the male mutant wasn't sure as to why. Maybe she knew that the lone wolf was already wrapped around her finger. 

“It’s Logan.”

“Well, Logan, this is my stop right up here.” she says in a sultry tone, and at this point he realizes that there must be no on or off switch for her titillating presence.  

He pulls up next to a quaint diner, decorated in blue and white paint that was starting to chip off the side. He decides not to ask about why she would be going to a random diner at 1 o’clock in the morning, as his eyes scan her once more.

“Well it was nice meeting you [Y/N], nice to know I’m not as alone as I thought.”

She nods.

“I know what it's like to be alone.” she looks at her feet then back up, the cigarette still clasped between her fingers. 

Her eyes squint slightly as she looks at the old man, a small prurient smirk playing on her plump lips, and he gulps. 

“Would you like to come in for a cup of coffee, Logan?” 

His eyes flicked to the center of the dashboard where the digital clock shined. The left side of his brain telling him not to go, and that he should get a few hours of sleep; the right, saying: Fuck it. When are you ever gunna get a chance to be with a girl like this again?

Let me know what you think! I’m planning on writing a series and this is part of the first chapter. 

[exophile3d]

Old Rip

The poll I did last week came up with ‘gargoyle’ for my next Monster BF ficlet, so here’s Part 1. It was only going to be a shortie, but I got carried away!

Male Gargoyle, Female Reader.

Part 1 (SFW)

“Morning, Rip!” You wave cheerily at the snarling, stone-faced monstrosity that guards the entrance to the grand drive. It doesn’t respond. It’s never been much of a talker. It’s a good listener though and it must surely know more about you than anyone in the world. It’s almost a shame it’s a series of inanimate lumps of stone.

Your feet crunch pleasingly on the wet gravel as you make your way up to the house to start your day’s work. Ravenscourt has been your home since you were five years old: your grandparents took you in after the loss of your immediate family, and now only you granddad, ‘Grumpa’ remains. The main house dates back to the seventeenth century, although there has been a building on the site since Roman times, if Grumpa’s fireside stories are to be believed. History is rooted here, and nowhere more so than the archway next to the gatehouse where your family has lived as stewards to the Bryant estate for over two hundred years. It is an imposing entryway, perhaps built with the intent of making anyone who enters think twice about crossing the Bryants, and above it, for added intimidation waits a demonic stone figure that Grumpa refers to as ‘Old Rip’. Its head, hands and wings alone are visible, placed by some unknown architect so that it looks for all the world like it is emerging from the ancient stone to punish trespassers. As a child, it frightened you. As you grew, you came to see it for the impressive architectural feat it is, and now, you harbour a certain fondness for it, and see it as a co-worker that assists you in caring for the estate.

“Getting the gutters cleaned today, so don’t frighten the workmen when they get here,” you tease.

It’s part of your morning routine. You always greet Old Rip as you go about your chores, telling it what you plan to do, what’s needed around the estate and wishing it a pleasant day. It never answers, of course, but you’d feel rude ignoring it. It’s part of the family. You often climb the service stairs at the back of the archway, an old, worn stone spiral that leads to a treacherous, narrow ledge along the back of the entryway. There’s a spot just to the left of Old Rip’s face with a flat surface that’s perfect for sitting, dangling your legs, and looking out over the tree-lined drive. With no companions your own age nearby, you’ve been chattering away to Old Rip for years from your precarious perch atop the archway. You can tell him anything, and in all the times you’ve shared your secrets with him, he’s never once been judgmental.

“And the new owner’s coming later, so play nice! I’ll be back at lunchtime to share my sarnies with you,” you call over your shoulder as you trudge along the driveway. “Ham and mustard - your favourite.”

Neither you, your stalwart Grumpa nor the demonic stone guard could have prevented the passing of old man Bryant. The last of his line, he left no will, and with no family to argue over the house and land, Ravenscourt has been put up for sale. You’ve agreed with the lawyers that you and your grandfather can stay on site until the new owners take over, and they will decide whether they want you to stay on: it will be up to you to argue your case. Over the weeks, prospective buyers have come and gone. Some plan to restore the house, some to turn it into an artists’ retreat or a wellness centre, and yet others to repurpose it into luxury apartments. You like none of the potential newcomers as much as you did old man Bryant, but you accept that times must change, and you’ve managed to keep a civil tongue around them all, not knowing which you might need to talk into letting you and Grumpa stay.

In the end, it was a city banker who forked out the cool nine mill, and today will mark his first visit to Ravenscourt since he bought it. He turns up in a DB9 and a sharp suit and immediately starts making plans to build this, tear down that, split this room into three, put in hot tubs and jacuzzis, oh, and last but not least, pull down the ugly old gateway and put in mock-Grecian columns that would suit the seventeenth-century charm of Ravenscourt about as well as a disco-ball.

“Pretty sure that gateway is protected,” you argue as he takes off his shades and saunters over to you. “Grade II listed.”

“You’re the stewards, aren’t you? I heard you came with the gatehouse,” he drawls. There’s something both possessive and condescending about the way he phrases that comment and you shudder, but he does at least seem to have forgotten about the archway. Good. “Any decent restaurants around here?”

You pause before replying. There are some fantastic family-run eateries in the village a mile down the road, but not only do you not want to inflict this city boy on them, but you suspect he’s looking for something rather less ‘rustic home-cooked goodness’ and rather more ‘pretentious haute-cuisine with Michelin stars’. “There are some nice restaurants in Oxford city centre,” you inform him.

“Great. I’ll send a car for you around six thirty,” he says, sliding his sunglasses back up the bridge of his nose.

“You’ll- what?” you ask.

“We need to talk about your options,” he says, with a tilt of his head towards the little stone cottage you’ve come to think of as home. “I thought we could do that over dinner tonight. My days are spoken for.”

You shrivel inside. The thought of spending a couple of hours in his company turns your stomach, but if you want to ensure security for you and your grandfather, you’re going to have to grin and bear it. “Six thirty,” you confirm as he gets into his Aston and revs the engine unnecessarily.

He stops the car under the archway and leans his arm on the open window. “And wear something pretty,” he says, looking at you over the top of his expensive-looking shades and winking. You feel physically sick. You can see where this is going, but if this banker decides he doesn’t need you living in the gatehouse and looking after the property any more, then you and Grumpa are out on the street with nowhere to go. You manage a smile and he leans a little further out, his smile widening as he opens his mouth to make a further suggestion, when a chunk of masonry the size of a breezeblock detaches from the archway and lands neatly in the centre of his pristine Arizona bronze DB9 bonnet.

You manage to keep a straight face until he has stopped swearing, removed the block, ascertained there is no damage to the engine, and driven off in a huff. You walk to the end of the drive to see him off, then turn back and head for the house to get dinner ready for Grumpa. You pause under the archway, noting that the masonry detached from just under Old Rip’s hand and you shake your head and tut at the lifeless stone effigy.

“That wasn’t very friendly, Rip!” The wind blows your hair across your face and a family of ravens wheels overhead, cawing loudly. Just for a moment, with strands of hair undulating in your field of vision, it almost looks as though Old Rip is laughing. You scowl as you pull the hair from your eyes. “You better be nice to him, or he’ll tear you down and replace you with a pair of concrete columns!”

Part 2