prestoncarver-blog

[prestoncarver-blog]

[prestoncarver-blog]

not gonna lie i’m pretty uncomfortable like all the time

[prestoncarver-blog]

campbellnina:

“I guess that’s true, not sure if that works for businesses like this though, but I don’t have one so I’m not sure. If you ask me, I’d say the only way that works is with people, but what do I know,” Nina shrugged, “but a second location might be a good choice! That would be really fun, actually. Are you sure you don’t secretly run this place? Because if you ask me, I think you should. Find the owner and give them your insight, get some share of their income. You’ll be able to buy more dragons and stuff. Other tiny things for the game, whatever they are.”

Did those even have a name? “Well if you’re the owner, I don’t think you’d have to be here every weekend, right? You can just… tell people what to do and then leave someone else responsible to keep things in check, probably. I guess this place looks a bit more personal than a regular big business chain or anything, but it’s probably still manageable.” She shrugged and took another sip of her drink, “are these great or what? They don’t even taste like alcohol!”

     “How do you know I’m not the owner?” they joked, mock-serious, but they couldn’t keep it up for long, laughing at the idea -- there were a lot of things they toyed with the idea of doing if he got rich some day, but owning a club was least among them. Maybe a laser tag arena or an escape room place, maybe with a similar vibe to the weird unreality of this place, but never ever a club. They didn’t even like being here. “If I find the owner, I’ll pass along my sage knowledge, but something tells me that’s unlikely.”

They considered the drink in their hand, taking another sip like they couldn’t decide. “They definitely don’t taste like alcohol, but I’m not sure I like it. There must be, like, twelve kinds of sugar in this.”

[prestoncarver-blog]

📲 mona >> preston

MONA💋: most of them are like, old dudes

MONA💋: they look @ me as if i was a weirdo

MONA💋: oooooh did u?

MONA💋: wait why did u hate it? did u have a bad time? :(

PRESTON: it was CIRCUS THEMED mona

PRESTON: i don't like clubs to begin with but i felt like i was in a britney spears music video

PRESTON: and i was gonna hang out with lem but he spent the whole night hooking up with valentine so i did that thing where i.... stand there not talking to anyone because i don't want to approach people awkwardly and it just makes me more awkward

PRESTON: sorry long text haha

[prestoncarver-blog]

location: cerberus      ( open )

He was trying not to feel weird about the fact that Mona hadn’t texted him yet.

He knew, objectively, that she’d only been gone for a day, that she was probably still traveling or getting settled in or just too busy to pick up the phone and write out a message. He knew, intellectually, that it didn’t mean anything that his phone hadn’t buzzed all day. But there was a small part of him that couldn’t help but worry that she already regretted their kiss and that she was just going to ghost him again.

It was fine. He’d get over it. That’s why he’d decided to go out, anyway – with Denna out of town and Tara busy and Brenton probably off with Samira somewhere, the only way he was going to do anything but mope and sulk was to go somewhere and try to find people, to force himself to be social, looking for a familiar face. 

And he’d been looking for an excuse to go back to Cerberus since he’d been here with Lem, just to take another look at the eddies and currents of unreality that flowed through entirety of the place. 

     “Can I just get, like… a water?” he half-shouted, leaning across the bar for the bartender to hear him, and then looked around, hoping to see someone he knew. 

[prestoncarver-blog]

campbellnina:

“Well that wouldn’t be a problem if the owner’s some multi billionaire or something, right? Or, hey, what if they’re a great lawyer? They wouldn’t need to pay for one if that were the case, even if they were getting sued. They can represent themselves, like the guy in Suits!” Nina grinned and nodded, grabbing her drink and sniffling first before taking a sip. Okay, not as weird as it looked. “What’s even the point of that, though? If all these people that normally can’t get in try to come any other weekend, you’d get lines long enough that they’ll go all the way outside, and the neighbors might start complaining, and on top of that people would get angry because they can’t get in. That doesn’t sound like good publicity at all, babe. Come on.”

     “You know what they say about the best publicity, though,” they countered, and then finally followed suit and took a sip of their own drink, the sickly sweet taste masking any trace of alcohol, which should have been good except that he felt like they were suddenly developing a cavity. “Exclusivity makes the heart grow fonder. I’m sure whoever they are, they’ve got a plan to do something... open up a second location, offer up some elaborate Willy Wonka-esque competition to gain entry to the club for life or something like that.”

Actually, as soon as they said it out loud, it sounded pretty badass. Find the golden ticket in the club on Circus Night and you’re on the List for good. They weren’t a businessman, didn’t know exactly what benefits that’d have, but it sounded awesome. 

     “I mean, not that I’d want to be here every weekend for the rest of my life, but I can’t resist a good game; I’d be sold, just for the fun of playing along.”

[prestoncarver-blog]

gamers deserve death

[prestoncarver-blog]

📲 mona >> preston

MONA💋: good morning baby!

MONA💋: im sorry i didn't text before

MONA💋: dad's been driving me nuts.

MONA💋: i'm getting to meet all his doctor friends it's been fun

MONA💋: i miss u tho. how are u?

PRESTON: oooh fancy doctor friends, sounds like a blast 😂

PRESTON: I miss you too. bored out of my mind without someone to play video games with so I went to cerberus last night

PRESTON: I... honestly dk why because I hated it but it's FINE l o l

[prestoncarver-blog]

location: cerberus      ( open )

He was trying not to feel weird about the fact that Mona hadn’t texted him yet.

He knew, objectively, that she’d only been gone for a day, that she was probably still traveling or getting settled in or just too busy to pick up the phone and write out a message. He knew, intellectually, that it didn’t mean anything that his phone hadn’t buzzed all day. But there was a small part of him that couldn’t help but worry that she already regretted their kiss and that she was just going to ghost him again.

It was fine. He’d get over it. That’s why he’d decided to go out, anyway -- with Denna out of town and Tara busy and Brenton probably off with Samira somewhere, the only way he was going to do anything but mope and sulk was to go somewhere and try to find people, to force himself to be social, looking for a familiar face. 

And he’d been looking for an excuse to go back to Cerberus since he’d been here with Lem, just to take another look at the eddies and currents of unreality that flowed through entirety of the place. 

     “Can I just get, like... a water?” he half-shouted, leaning across the bar for the bartender to hear him, and then looked around, hoping to see someone he knew. 

[prestoncarver-blog]

willemdriscoll:

Lem’s anticipating anger so he’s more or less blindsided when his friend’s voice is careful and calm in return, even more so when their touch is so gentle. It makes his heart race a little bit, in a different way than it already is, to think that Preston cares about him enough to want to help with this mess. He doesn’t really feel like he deserves it, especially with the way his confrontation with Denna had gone down. 

Still, he can’t help how his body responds to the physical contact, which had always been the quickest way to calm Lem down, to force him to a stop when his mind is wildly running. He takes in a deep, shuddering breath and closes his eyes, his hands unconsciously gripping Preston’s in return, holding a little tighter than he means to. His chest hurts and his eyes sting like tears could start falling at any moment, and he can’t help but feel like he’s grasping at a lifeline so he doesn’t drown in them.

“Yeah I uh… I threatened to expose something about her to Heath…” he admitted, still struggling to breathe properly around his words although they seem to be coming out a bit easier now. “It’s not even that big of a deal I just… I couldn’t stand the thought of her keeping something from them, I guess… And I- I mean… She was really upset… I should’nt have-”

Lem stops again when he feels a hand on his face, thinks he feels his heart stop, for just a second, and then it’s hammering against his rib cage again so hard it hurts. All he’s wanted for months is for Preston to touch him like this, and for a moment he imagines the moment as more than it is again, thinks out of nowhere that they might kiss him again, although that makes no sense in context… 

His eyes open when Preston asks, and he looks at them, and for a long blissful moment his mind empties. Lem concentrates on them, on their features, on the way they’re looking back at him. He doesn’t think about it too hard but he puts his hand over Preston’s and holds it there. And of course he still doesn’t know how to read what he finds there- he’s never been good at it and he’s certainly not going to be any better when he’s freaking out… But he feels at peace, for a moment, calm in a way that actually makes the hurt go away. It’s a pity it can’t last…

He’s quiet and still for a fleeting moment and then it all comes crashing down again, and his eyes slip shut once more against the rush of unpleasant thoughts.

“But so like, what if I’ve just ruined everything? I mean, what if they choose her and they never want to speak to me again?? I mean we’ve been friends for years, like, best friends, but now I feel like it’s all slipping away and none of it matters anymore. It’s all happening so fast I just don’t want to lose them over this, I don’t want them to hate me for not liking her. I don’t want them to choose her over me but that’s… That’s fucking crazy isn’t it because they’re allowed to- I mean, who am I to say who they date? And like, why does this matter so much to me? Why don’t I like her? I just don’t understand what’s happening, I feel like I’m going crazy or like I’ve been missing something for years-”

The tirade doesn’t show signs of stopping soon, and Lem’s hands begin to tremble in Preston’s again.

I threatened to expose something about her to Heath, Lem said, and all Preston  could think was: what did Denna have that was worth exposing? Denna, has Denna, who played video games and d&d and occasionally went out drinking at parties with Nina Campbell, who told him everything and called everyone darling. Denna wasn’t the type for secrets; she never had been. What would she have been keeping from Heath-- and what would Lem would have known that he didn’t?

He pushed it out of his mind, though, in favor of the man in front of him, who seemed to be getting worse the more he talked it out. Wasn’t that supposed to have the opposite effect? Wasn’t talking it out, like, the thing you were supposed to tell people to do when they were upset, because putting those big huge feelings into words made them feel more approachable, or smaller? 

He’d have to try something else. He’d worry about Denna being upset later.

     “Lem,” he said, setting aside all of the stuff he was pretty sure he was supposed to do when a friend was upset and just letting himself talk. “If they’re gonna stop being friends with you because they’re dating a girl, I think that means they’re not a very good friend. Which....” he sighed, not wanting to bad-mouth Heath in front of someone who clearly cared a lot about them. “Doesn’t seem like something Heath would do. I mean, I don’t like Heath, I don’t want Denna dating them, either, and it fucking sucks, right? But that doesn’t mean I’m crazy. I’m just gonna... do my best to be nice to Heath until Denna realizes it’s a terrible idea and breaks up with them.”

[prestoncarver-blog]

willemdriscoll:

“Broken Mirror? Alright I got you, hold on…” Lem slid back out of the booth again and stood, for a moment casting a silhouette against the rippling light and sound of the club, throwing a shadow over where his friend was still seated.

“The deal…? Can’t you tell, Perseus?” he teased, leaning over the table back into the dim cove of the banquette. The atmosphere that hung around them in that moment seemed still and dark compared to the pulsating energy of the rest of the room behind him, and he let it add to the mystique of what he was saying, let the question hang in the air for a moment for dramatic effect. 

“We’re in the Underworld, babe.” Lem laughed a little on it as he leaned back into the spray of neon lights and the thumping ambient music. “Crazy’s pretty much the currency here…which explains why yours truly can get whatever he wants.” He threw a little wink at them as he slipped away to the bar. 

Lem wasn’t gone long, appearing back at their secluded booth in a matter of a few minutes with two new drinks and a sly smile on his face. He shifted back into place next to Preston like a mirage with lights dancing off of him, only solidifying to his material form again as his leg pressed against theirs beneath the table. His expression was happy and excited, and he immediately traced his gaze over Preston’s face again as he settled in, trying to see if they were enjoying things so far.

“Nice to see you haven’t faded away to rejoin the universe,” he commented, signifying with a glance the crazy light show of stars and galactic clouds playing out along the wall opposite, hurling shooting stars up to the vaulted ceiling. He stared, for a moment, let himself get lost in it a bit because this was his favorite room for a reason, after all. It was an easy room to lose yourself in, especially with a little stimulant help, or a good dance partner. He glanced back at Preston curiously, suddenly wondering if they had any interest- Lem wasn’t the greatest dancer himself, but he was willing to look a little ridiculous if it meant watching someone else move, especially someone he liked as much as Preston…

“It’s cool, right? Nice place to let loose, for sure… You can just kinda melt into the wall here, y’know?” He took a swallow of his new cocktail, which seemed stronger than the first somehow… he knew that bartender had thrown an interested glance their way when he’d ordered… “…So, what’ve you been up to? It’s been a while since I crashed one of your streams or anything… What’s new in game world?”

The moment of quiet as Lem disappeared was disquieting, his words ringing in Preston’s ears over the sound of the weird ambient music around him. The Underworld, and shit, the more he thought about it, the more it felt like a level in one of his games -- not even the ones he played, but the ones he made, adventure games with deceptively simple graphics and intuitive mechanics that still left you lost in a labyrinth of levels and stories by the time you reached what should have been its center. 

Something like this, the disorienting, dissociative confusion of Cerberus, was exactly what he needed for  In the Heart of the Medusa, exactly the thing he’d been missing, the thing he had been putting off working on the game for months because of. When they player character in Medusa descended to the underworld, it didn’t need to feel like the hell of his Catholic upbringing: it needed to feel like this. 

He was zoning out, thinking about it, when Lem returned, drink in hand, and Lem’s voice startled him out of it; he looked around for a second, like he was trying to remember where he was, but smiled gratefully at the return of Lem’s voice all the same. 

     “Like, not much, you know? I’ve been playing a lot of PUBG, mostly, because it takes fucking..... hours to get the hang of before you’re any good at it. But it’s a good game, really clean interface, the mechanics are honestly perfect...”

He was rambling, he knew, and he also knew that a review of PLAYERUNKNOWN’S BATTLEGROUNDS probably wasn’t what Lem had been looking for when he asked. But he wasn’t sure what else to day: that d&d had been weird because Mona wasn’t talking to him? That he’d been too distracted the past few weeks to do anything that required him to actually think and not just follow his reflexes? That he wished he had a computer with him right now so he could try to capture anything about this place to use as inspiration for later?

     “Hey, the person who owns this place is like... super secretive, right?”

[prestoncarver-blog]

     “I don’t know, Nina,” they said, leaning against the bar and looking skeptically at the cocktail in their hand, an actual cloud of cotton candy rising from the top of the glass -- they hadn’t dared to try it yet, but somehow it smelled exactly like circus peanuts and that was terrifying. “I’m all for a good crazy conspiracy theory, but I feel like someone being sued wouldn’t spend this much money on anything but a really good lawyer. Blackmail, maybe, but... I dunno, it feels more like a publicity stunt to me. Show it off to people so they want to come back, even when they know they can’t.”

location: cerberus night club date: january 28th time: night / 1AM

“What do you think happened?” Nina asked, resting her elbows over the bar and looking back at the women hanging from the ceiling, dancing and twirling around. Whatever they were doing, it looked really complicated. And probably more expensive than regular club dancers, as everything in this club did, so whatever happened, the club owner did definitely not go broke. “I mean, Cerberus doesn’t just open with no password. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of this happening before— do you think the owner sold the place? Or maybe they died and there’s a new one! Oh man there’s going to be crazy conspiracy theories on social media next week, that’s going to be fun,” she chuckled. “What if they got sued? Or blackmailed into doing this?”

[prestoncarver-blog]

breakerofchainx:

Mona couldn’t quite believe what was happening. It was pretty much surreal, if she had to be honest. There had been so many more appropriate opportunities for them to kiss, for her to finally tell Preston how she had been feeling since he had entered her life. She had always been watching him, one way or another, from a distance. 

First he was just Zac and Lem’s friend, the gamer, the YouTuber or whatever. She couldn’t care less, because even though he was very cute and seemed really nice, he wasn’t really hanging out with the same people she was. And then they had gotten closer, and became friends, and Mona had slowly realised how much time she spent thinking about him, staring at him whenever he streamed and grinning like a dork at every little thing he said. 

And then she had tried for him to notice her, she had really tried to learn about the things that he liked and worm herself into his world. It had worked, apparently, because now he was kissing her and she felt like she could have stayed like this all night if he let her. 

But she had to breathe at some point, and eventually she pulled back, in need for air. However, she didn’t move away, her thumb softy brushing his bottom lip for a second. “That was- wow. I didn’t know heroes kissed like that.”

[prestoncarver-blog]

@zac-bailey

Preston didn’t even drink beer. Contrary to the way the past couple of weeks had been going, he barely drank at all these days. But Zac had seemed out of sorts at their game night, that week, and Preston had felt like a distraction would be good for him, and he knew there were few things that did Zac better than beer and video games without having to worry about anything else -- it’s was Preston’s cure-all.

So he’d grabbed a six pack from the store, knowing he would probably cringe his way through one while Zac drank the other five, and headed over to Zac’s, only bothering to shoot him a text to let him know when he was already on his way.

     coming over, beer & games, you free?

[prestoncarver-blog]

breakerofchainx:

The kiss couldn’t have come soon enough; but she didn’t want to make the first move. Not because she wasn’t used to it, quite the contrary, but because this time it was different. She didn’t want Preston to feel pressured, to believe that he needed to do this to keep her friendship or something like that. Mona wanted him to be sure, and she was willing to wait; she had been waiting this long anyway. 

Finally his lips collided with hers and she could have sworn she felt butterflies fluttering inside her stomach. He was hesitant, like asking her for permission, and oh she was going to give it. 

There were many things that she didn’t know, especially when it came to Preston. She still wasn’t exactly sure about how to use her human druid, Kendall Jenner. She messed up the spells sometimes, or cast them at the wrong time. Often, she would mix up Link with Zelda, and the only true RPG she knew how to play was The Sims 4. But kissing, kissing she knew. That was her field; and she was ready to make him enjoy every second of it, just like he did when they were playing video games. 

One of her hands slowly moved to his jaw, and the other further down to her collarbone. She deepened the kiss, parting her lips and welcoming him. It’s okay, you don’t need to hold back, she was trying to say, but she chose to show him instead. 

It was exactly the invitation he needed, as she parted her lips, allowing him to taste her, to feel how soft her lips were, her fingertips running down his skin as she pulled him closer. His body seemed to know what it was doing, which was good, because his mind was severely preoccupied, racing almost faster than he could keep up with as he tried to process what was happening.

It wasn’t even the kiss itself that sent his mind spinning; it was the whole situation, so unbelievable that he could barely focus on the moment they were in for thinking about it. She liked him. She wanted to kiss him. She had called him her hero and now she was kissing him, her knight in shining armor.

His hands found there way to face, first, cupping her jaw before sliding back into her hair to pull her closer, as if they could get any closer than they already were. His leg was falling asleep under him on the couch, but he barely noticed, didn’t care, not if ignoring it meant he could keep kissing her, could never have to open his eyes and come back down to Earth. 

[prestoncarver-blog]

breakerofchainx:

She felt so stupid for a second. Preston started rambling and that could only mean one thing, right? That meant that he was trying to come up with an explanation and tell her that they worked better as friends, that she wasn’t her type - and who could blame him for that? 

She wasn’t centred, she didn’t have all her life figured out like Denna and Tara and all the people he hung out with. She was always looking for love, but never finding it; she was looking for prince charming - but who would really want to be that to a faulty princess? A princess who passed out not because she was bewitched, but because she had drunk one too many shots of tequila. Rejecting her would be a wise decision on his part. 

Pulling back a little, she was ready to apologise and leave, but his next words caused her to look up at him, as her smile grew stronger and wider. And just like that, she started laughing. A true fit of laughter; because she couldn’t believe she had almost done the wrong thing again. She had almost run away without really listening to him. 

Now she looked like a crazy person, though. 

Still chuckling, her hands moved to both sides of his face and stayed there. “If you always want to kiss me, then do.”

He was afraid, for a little longer than was comfortable, that she was laughing at him. It wouldn’t have been the first time a girl laughed in his face when he admitted to liking her; the majority of his barely-existent romantic history involved people laughing at him, and it wouldn’t have been a stretch to add one more to the list.

But then her hands were on his face, and she was telling him to kiss her, and part of him thought this must have been some kind of dream, an elaborate day dream maybe, but even if it was it didn’t really matter.

There were a lot of things that probably mattered; it probably mattered that she’d ignored him for two weeks and it had eaten away at his self-confidence so badly that he’d barely left the house; it probably mattered that he’d spent so long fantasizing about the idea of kissing her that sometimes he forgot he never had. It probably mattered that he still didn’t understand why she even gave him the time of day. 

He didn’t care.

He leaned forward, pressing his lips to hers, unsure at first, like he was waiting for her to respond, to know that it was okay. 

[prestoncarver-blog]

breakerofchainx:

She didn’t really know what had prompted her to say that. It was confusing, obviously, and it had the potential to mess everything up again. She just wanted him to know, though, she wanted him to be sure that he could never be anyone’s mistake. That anyone would be lucky to kiss him any time, drunk or not. Maybe things were going to be awkward now, maybe the best option for her now was to just get up and leave - but there was going to be time to fix things if that happened, or at least she thought so.

And maybe he did feel the same way about her. Maybe he was just shy, and that was the reason he hadn’t made a move despite how obvious she was when he was around. Perhaps he was just on the fence because of the way she was, because she liked to party and drink and she slept with a bunch of people - what if he didn’t trust her? The thought made her chest ache. She wanted to be someone he could rely on, she just didn’t know how to do it. 

Being honest was always a good start though. 

Mona moved a bit closer to him, her hand reaching up to brush his hair away from his forehead, then his cheek, and finally settling on his chest. “No Preston, I wouldn’t have.” Her lips curved into a weak smile. “Would you?” 

Okay, he wasn’t misreading signals. 

If he was misreading signals, something had gone terribly wrong and it was not his fault, because there was no way touch his face and his chest and looking at him like that and basically saying she wanted to kiss him was not Mona telling him she wanted to kiss him. It was impossible. He was certain of it.

     “Would I have regretted you kissing me while drunk?” he said, and then internally cursed his tendency to babble when he was nervous. Just kiss her, something in the back of his mind said, but something else kept talking. “I mean, I would have regretted the fact that you felt the need to be drunk to kiss me, but...”

He shook his head a little, swallowed. He sounded stupid, rambling on and on. She was so close, she was right there, and all he had to do was lean in and kiss her.

Was this why she’d ignored him? Because she wanted something to have happened? 

      “I mean, I kind of always want to kiss you, Mona.”