tarnishedhalo

[tarnishedhalo]

Genuinely curious here...my own version of a proctology check {meaning....is my head up my own ass?} An rp blog is recommended to you. You scroll through to see what the writing is like, the ooc/ic ratio, muses, etc. You see they have written an open starter that says "males preferred but females accepted" and I mean, on one hand...yeah I get it but it still turns me off because it feels exclusionary to women. I know a lot of female muns and muses {cis/trans/enby-with-leanings} that work so hard to be taken seriously, to put out good work. Only to find themselves constantly defeated, discouraged, ignored.

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Get to know me meme tagged by: stolen from Beth's dash. tagging: hoist the colours, raise the black!

do you make your bed? the spouse does.

favourite number? 3, 19, 13, 14, 23

job? Superhero. …I mean librarian.

if you could go back to school, would you? In a heartbeat. If I were born a billionaire in real life, I would have/would still spend my time being a perpetual scholar, taking any and every class that ever interested me.

can you parallel park? Nope. I actually don't even know how to drive.

do you think aliens are real? Look, man. I'm not saying I've seen some things, but I've definitely seen some things™. I also believe in supernatural entities, fyi.

can you drive a manual car? re: parallel parking. After getting into a car accident literally every time I've ever tried to learn how to drive, I figure the Powers that Be are trying to send me a message. The last time banged up my knee and contributed to it trying to currently enact the Great Escape from my body almost on the daily.

what's your guilty pleasure? Pasta and home made bread {despite medical reasons to just...not.} I love specialty coffee drinks, socks, and stuffed animals. Also...doomscrolling tic.tok and you.tube when I should be writing or dishes or...really most other things.

tattoos?  None, though I have ear and nose piercings.

favourite colour? Green, Silver, Black.

do you like puzzles? Jigsaw puzzles, word searches, crosswords, interactive puzzle games etc? Absolutely. Sudoku can fuck right off. I have a Math learning disability. But I think my favourite thing is trivia.

any phobias? trypanophobia, arachnophobia, although that one isn't as bad as it used to be due to some very cute spider propaganda. I also have a fear of public speaking and presenting.

favourite childhood sport? I fell in love with American football when I was a pre-teen, and I have been a stan ever since. Unfortunately, I live exactly in a state where the 'local' games are all the teams I personally loathe. I also love caber and sheaf tossing, fencing {withe swords/foils/epees}, roping, bull/bronc riding, and barrel racing.

do you talk to yourself? Oh absolutely. A lot of times it's muses, it's snippets of RP that play out in my head like a radio drama, it's me having arguments with myself as myself and others. Fun fact, I always put on a show or an audiobook/ambient music at bed time because that's the only real way to make my head quiet enough *to* sleep. I also have binged entire series in 10-15 minute intervals. I feel I deserve a patience award or something.

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Chris sits in what was Andy's room, looking down at an old photo. Jess, Chris, Beth and finally Andy at the local arcade, all wearing fake moustaches. The Fantastic Four of they dubbed themselves once they all began hanging out (though Jess wished for a cooler name). Damn near inseprable, even when the elder siblings moved onto the next step of their education and career. But when they got the news of Andy's passing, it was nothing short of devastating. Those soft brown eyes stare at the whisky in his hands, "Happy Birthday, Andy. We miss you everyday, hope you and my folks are getting along up there."

One thing Riley knows, without having to explain how or why, is that Chris has to be held tightly in the palm of God's hand. He knows his sister is particular and in a lot of ways peculiar. Photographic memory tells him nothing has been moved since the last time he'd been here...and that was almost a decade ago. And yet the boy ~scratch that~ the man sitting there still has his flesh on his bones. No open wounds seeping blood onto the bed. The echo of her screaming for Chris to get out of Riley's room haunts the air nor shatters glass. Suddenly, he feels...old. He unhitches his bag from his shoulder then rolls his neck from side to side. It cracks quietly before he leans in the door frame, folding his arms across his chest. His chest aches for the loss. For the missing years. For seeing Chris without his emotional armor on, and can only imagine what Jess might say. He can almost feel the sting of her palm and the air being cut off from a hug. But he is here. Maybe not in one piece but...it's better than where he's been. The things he's been doing. "I dunno, kid. Your moms honestly scares the crap out of me. Whenever I looked at her, I felt a chancla in my future."

[tarnishedhalo]

Drabble Challenge:

Rules: Followers send a number to your Inbox (Ask), and you write a drabble using that dialogue in your piece. Try to keep up! Expect a TON of requests!

Don’t you dare say another word.

We’re going to freeze to death

I don’t mind if I do

I’ve never seen you dance before

What do you mean you’re leaving?

You drank a gallon of milk over night

Please, I’m begging you.

You don’t know how to tie your shoes?

Is a chicken really a bird if they can’t fly?

You it be a grown up, but you’re still my baby

I got fired.

We’re out of money?!?

Have you seen my stamp collection?

Fire! Fire! Fire!

You watched 4 seasons today?

Stop questioning my life choices.

You didn’t have to marry me, you know

It’s my turn to pick

It’s a hundred degrees out

When’s the last time you smiled?

Stop being such a brat

If I wanted one, I would have gotten it myself

Wanna see something cool?

I think it’s broken

This is a once in a lifetime thing and you want me to blow it off

Friends don’t last, they never last

Sometimes I just don’t want to exist

I should’ve written it down

Go eat an exotic food or something

Way to not like my Instagram post

Remember Walkmans?

He would have really loved that…

It’s a shame when things, when people, go so soon

They used to tell me I’d never amount to anything

I almost didn’t graduate

I should’ve stayed in bed

I woke up knowing this would happen

I had a dream last night about _____

She sat next to me on the bus

Just promise to never lie to me, okay?

I thought you said you were a doctor

This cost a thousand dollars?!

Foreigners…pffft

He used to be my best friend.

Look at them, their perfect tans and cold margaritas…assholes

I’m not the jealous type, I swear

I didn’t cheat!

Let me smell your breath

Did you let the dog out?

We’re taking you downtown

If you don’t like it, leave.

She’s got a way with words

I didn’t know it when I met her

It sure as hell does change things!

I remember when you were a baby!

Give me my beer, or else

You asked me if unicorns were real

If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen

Why so glum?

Cotton candy is for adults too, leave me alone.

Yeah, okay, when pigs fly.

I haven’t seen you in ages!

Picnics are for losers

If I could go back, I wouldn’t change anything

Somethings are just better as memories

She was hot, admit it

When the hell did you break the vacuum?

We’re rich.

Bed. Now.

Call me that one more time, see what happens

Don’t ever call here again

Your brother told me all about it

I’m pregnant.

Happy birthday!

Apples, oranges, same thing

Don’t let it go to your head

Is it gone?

Where’s the first aid kit?

What do you mean you’re in jail?

Fight me.

Will you marry me?

stop worrying so much

Come on! Hurry!

Put your hands where I can see them

Strike 3

You’re cute with glasses

Are you five?

You have enough

Are you drunk?

Road trip!

You’ve been listening to the same song on repeat all week….

She’s your sister. You have to help her.

I owe you what?

Let’s bet.

What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

I could’ve gone pro

All I need is you, and Cheerios

You don’t need another dog

Do you kiss your mother with that mouth

Nobody needs fake friends

I just want somebody who’ll text first

Buy me chocolates and tell me everything’s going to be okay

Are you asking me out?

Remember that really embarrassing memory you told me to never speak of again?

I’m soaked.

He’s been like that all day

This house isn’t even haunted

Isn’t that bad luck?

Shut up and dance

*Make your own*

Happy Writing! Visit @prompt-bank for more prompts!

[tarnishedhalo]

[tarnishedhalo]

Send this to all your favourite moots and pass the pumpkin round! KEEP THE PUMPKIN TRAIN GOING 🎃🖤🎃🖤🎃

[tarnishedhalo]

Day 12

@tarnishedhalo

[x] Every Sunday, the good Pastor Francis led his congregation in solemn prayer. They bowed their heads, dropped copper in the collection plate, and beseeched the Lord to bless their lands with rain. April had near fully passed without a single droplet. Cattle grew lean, barrelled girths narrowing into accordion ribs. Where lush seedings should be advancing towards cloud-dappled skies, cotton instead stayed burrowed beneath arid soil, leaving fields stark and bare.

The Riley ranch was one of the few to prosper through the dry stretch. Corn continued to mature and bean plants wove tight around their wooden trestles, guided when needed by Beth Riley’s gentle hand. Only on the outskirts of their boundaries did grass show hues of parched amber, the blades turning closer to dust each time the elder sibling rode his daily circuit, checking posts for rot and the trees for trouble. An occasional jealous neighbour made whisper of how their good fortune was not wholesomely obtained. Claimed they saw the woman sacrifice all kinds of creatures. The rumours on occasion found receptive ears. For the rest, there were enough rustlers and thieves and other wild men to be concerned over, without adding imaginary mischief to the list of woes that life in the frontier brought. [x]

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Day 20

@therealgamble @tarnishedhalo

Riley leaned against the hood of his Mustang, the classic car gleaming in the dim light from the streetlamp above. The waited in a town that had seen better days. On the residential street they had parked, Halloween decorations hung limply from weather-beaten porches and brittle leaves gathered in clumps over various lawns, more muddy brown than the golden hues that fall promised further upstate.

"Looks like it’s going to be a slow evening," Brian muttered, flipping a silver knife between his fingers as he glanced around. "Nothing but pumpkins and not a naughty nurse costume in sight.”

Riley snorted, his eyes still scanning the barren street. "Want me to go slip on something pretty for you?”

Brian flipped a specific gesture at his hunting partner in reply. "Put a paper bag over your head when you do." He slipped the knife back into his jacket, standing straighter as if it would unpack his restless energy. "So, what’s it gonna be? Wendigo, ghoul, or just another crackhead in a mask?"

"Could be any of them," Riley replied. Of the two of them, he was better versed in the lore, spending nights in motels reading age-worn books while Brian reshaped bullets to be filled with holy water, silver, and everything in between. "But I’m betting on wendigo. Missing hikers, bodies half-chewed up… it fits the pattern."

They shared a brief moment of silence as the wind picked up again, sending dead leaves dancing down the road and making the street seem even more of a wasteland. This was what happened when monsters lurked around a town; doors got locked, curtains drawn tight and folks stopped living. After losing any semblance of normally in their own existence, this was what Gamble and Riley fought to protect.

The scanner in the Mustang crackled to life. Another body had been found, same area as the previous ones… just deeper into the woods this time.

Brian sighed, shaking his head as he opened the car door. "Don’t get all smug about being right." He shot a glance at Riley, his usual cocky grin in place. "You ready to go?"

Riley slipped into the driver’s seat, turning the key in the ignition and bringing both the engine and the radio to life, classic rock filling the silence. "Depends." His own grin birthed into place. “You gonna admit that I was right?”

The car rolled along the empty street as the two men prepared to face what lurked out in the darkness. The hunt was calling, and Halloween wasn't over yet.

[tarnishedhalo]

Quixotic

adj.      foolishly impractical especially in the pursuit of ideals;       especially :  marked by rash lofty romantic ideas or       extravagantly chivalrous action. capricious, decidedly       unpredictable.

                                    Dossier |  Mail Call  |  Files

[tarnishedhalo]

Fuck, marry, kill (clint, Bucky, Matt)

This Ain't Game of Thrones || Accepting

He may be entirely too sober for this line of questioning, but at least that clarity gives him some control over the shit that comes out of his mouth. For now, any way.

"I mean anything I could say will get me cancelled but...but if I'm playing by the game? I'm gonna have to probably kill Barnes. I can take Steve Rogers in a fair fight, but Sam's my brother from another mother, and with Barnes out of the picture, then we're back to the natural order, and I get the wings." He's still bitter about the whole Falcon program but at least it got made as close to right as could be with the Stark Industries leg. "Fuck Barton because he wouldn't really hear me bitchin' the whole time. Plus I heard he grew up in the circus. Might could use that to my advantage." Is that wrong? Absolutely. And intentionally so. He has nothing against the archer, except maybe the way his sister smiles and finds excuses to hang out with him whenever she can. It doesn't sit well with Riley. "And clearly I gotta marry Murdock. Only Catholic in the whole group. Which means he knows what my values are, won't mind going to Mass early on Sundays...and that poor bastard's law firm could use a little help. It does mostly good work but man it doesn't pay for shit, you know?"

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“Sorry I missed your birthday.” Fi says with an apologetic tone as she passes a bottle of top shelf whiskey over to him.

"Hey, not your fault. Don't really advertise it and stuff. Plus...you're here now." He takes the bottle and works the cork out after breaking the wax seal. He grabs two glasses and pours them three fingers each. Hers is carefully handed over and his? He takes a moment to get a nose full of the sweet and fiery aroma. A lot of people say Riley appreciates whiskey almost as much as he does women, and he can't really fault them for it. "Just passin' through or you stayin' the night?"

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What do you get for the guy that can just go out and get anything he wants? Brian had no idea. But he also knew that his partner didn’t really give a shit if he was given anything at all. He wasn’t the type that was counting up favors and trying to even scales. He couldn’t be bothered to worry about who paid for something last or who got him a present or not. And somehow Brian knew he’d still be that way even if he was dirt poor.

So he didn’t worry about it. He didn’t bother trying to make excuses or promises. He just walked in like he owned the place, the way he always did, clapped his friend on the back and wished him a happy birthday.

Riley’s just adding the pasta into the boiling water when he hears the door open. He knows it’s not his sister, she’s not coming home until tomorrow evening, taking on extra shifts at the hospital which is overly strapped for capable bodies. He and Gamble know all too well what that’s like. And so the only other person who would make himself at home is in fact his brother.

He turns away from the stove and there’s a wide smile on his face. “McG! You managed to make it! Good thing too or I’d be over run with penne alla vodka.” He steps into the slap between his shoulders and slings an arm around Gamble’s neck for a minute or so before stepping back. “You know where everything is so if you could grab me a couple bottles ~Grey Goose or Tito’s~ and crack one open, I’ll owe you one. Hundred percent squid ink free.”

He laughs and shakes his head. “Assuming that you didn’t make any plans other than hanging out with me, tonight.”

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As the storm rolled in, bringing torrents of water and urban chaos, it became quickly apparent that most birthday plans would need rescheduling. Raincheck, literally the joke in most of the messages. Everyone understood. They would see how it was looking by the weekend. Turning forty was enough of an event that a few days askew on the calendar couldn’t be too big of a deal.

There was still cake. A joint effort by Beth and Tabby, one clutching the bakery box to her chest and the other on umbrella duty. Their feet were soaked but not a crumb was out of place. Dinner came from the small Italian place down the street, roast garlic and basil heavy in the air when Riley arrived home from his last-minute shift. Whether he took it to be out of the girl’s hair, or to delay the celebrations as long as possible, was a secret he was allowed to keep to himself.

Tabby’s first gift sat among the pile with Beth’s. Delivered across the ocean from a small designer in County Cork, to her eye, it was the right mix of reimagined tradition in a decidedly masculine design. The final gift emerged in a small interlude of just the two of them on the couch, Beth temporarily absent as she warmed her bones in a deep bath. “I know it’s a lot of pages.” Tabby’s chin propped on Andy’s shoulder, the five year diary on his lap. “But think of it more like a planner. Because time keeps slipping by and I don’t want to leave this too late. So, like, have a look and pick the day you want to be a dad by.”

The aroma in the house, the warmth from the fire-place and his girls, everything embraced him once he shut the door behind him. His raincoat is left on the hook, a little plastic tray catching the drip of the rain that didn’t dry up on the four flights of stairs up from the lobby to the fifth floor. Elevator still isn’t fixed and by now he’s given up on it ever working. He kicks off his work boots. Thankfully there’s enough wax and they’re pretty well sealed so his socks are dry. Not unlike Beth at the end of a shift there’s a process. Wearing patrol gear instead of one of his suits, he’s got to shed the gun belt with all of its attached gear which he then takes and hangs up in his closet. The Sig Sauer gets locked in its case and once all that’s done, Riley grabs the quickest shower he’s had since he’d left the Air Force, and redresses in a tee-shirt, in jeans. He could have stayed home; enjoyed the day to celebrate another decade being started, but he assumes that Tabby understands the driving need that he and Beth have to do what they can, when they can once shit hits the fan. When the precinct put out that they needed extra hands on the streets, he couldn’t refuse. He enjoys dinner and the cake, coffee over beer. He opens each gift with care. The Claddagh is gorgeous, and he asks her to slip it on to his left hand crown pointed toward his finger tips; meant to signify he’s engaged. The kiss he offers Tabby is slow and tender. After Beth excuses herself, everything about Tabby’s demeanour changes and he cards his fingers through her hair before she settles her chin on his shoulder. He slips an arm around her.

He cracks a smile when she mentions the page count but he’s curious enough not to interrupt her. Then his face freezes.

Not many people can say they’ve ever left Riley speechless but Tabby’s done just that.  Some of her lamented time passed before he moves and takes her face in both hands. He scours her face with a whisper.  “Are you....Are you sure, Tabs?”