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joannaliangart · 3 months ago

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Here; (is the only place) (2025) 2 x 10.5” (closed), 16.5 x 10.5” (fully open), 1.375 x 16.5” (pop-out accordion segment) 16 page accordion-fold book (+23 page pop-out accordion). Risograph-printed, ink and coloured pencil illustrations and poetry.

Here; (is the only place) features riso-printed ink illustrations and poems. The book connects childhood grief with climate grief through their shared experience of losing home and being swept into a future that threatens unbelonging. Depending on how the book is held, the openings cut into the pages become doorways to frame the past (pages) or only empty space— regardless, something has disappeared.

---

My last crit at ECU was for this piece!! im graduating this May my god it still hasn't really sunken in yet

I got a lot of positive feedback for this work and my live reading of it and the colours turned out even better than I could’ve hoped :']

I’ve applied to a few zine fairs including VABF, so hopefully I’ll be able to sell these there! Otherwise I’ll look into maybe an online store or smth like that (spooky but exciting)

Oughh I don't know about new favourite (There Are Good Things Yet To Bury still pops off to me lol) BUT I think it's definitely been one of my favs to work on!! in terms of process n all that C: BECAUSE!! I got to try out my new dip pens and finally use those acrylic inks (that i got in 1st year cause they were on the class materials list and then we never fuckin used em. rip but hey now here we are full circle) and do some traditional illustration!!! New territory for me and it was really fun!!

I usually stick with digital illustration for all my finished illustration work (vs my traditional sketchbook is only rlly for studies or sketches/thumbnails) but oughhh my god this might change me. this might do it LOL

Maquettes / Ideation phase

I knew I wanted to do more cool stuff with windows after TAGTYTB + at the time I recently had a dream about my childhood home again. It's something I noticed a long time ago, and all poetic metaphor aside I do literally just. only really dream about my childhood house lol, or rather do sometimes dream of other imaginary places but I NEVER dream of the current house I live in (maybe like 1-2 times that I can remember in the 8+ years I've been living here). I also wanted to do a long skinny accordion fold guy. No particular reason than it was an idea that kept sticking to me lol; + I hadn't done anything with accordion fold+windows and AH there's so much potential there because of how every single page overlaps each other with that folding method!!!

So! That was the basis for my concept, and I started to fold n scribble on scrap paper to make these maquettes. I also started numbering them which was SO helpful thank god because I think I ended up with TWENTY OR MORE maquettes by the end wagh!! But oh my god these were so helpful to make so many of I really hit on something with this one below, 1 big rectangle and 2 circle windows... It wasn't even intentional, I just cut them into the paper and then started drawing/writing, and once I reached the flipside realized that you could see the words "this is my home" on one page, above the drawing of the house which was on ANOTHER page. WHAT!! literally so cool I'm so happy that happened it literally dazzled me:

Midterm / printed maquettes aka poem writing in affinity publisher

In my final crit, one of my profs asked if 'this is what I saw in my head the whole time' in a 'wow I can't believe it looks this good congrats' kind of way LOL which is like so oof but so fair because this is what my midterm presentation looked like LMAO:

I have a LOT of analysis-type notes I wrote down in my google doc so I can remember in the future all my intentions with the poems and its a pretty LONG list. One of the main ones is how the semicolon ; operates as the symbol of being inbetween a continuation, barrier, threshold, stop, doorway... ALSO it kinda looks like a lock+door handle (!!)

Also this might've been before my midterm, but I went back to my childhood home area and ough. I'm glad I did cause I got inspiration for the illustration imagery when I saw how big the trees had gotten. I literally said out loud "oh!" aough my god. I don't know I just hadn't expected it... I think I had even noticed it a few years ago when I visited but forgot and I just. augh. Included the experience in one of the poems in this book "I looked for my grief / I looked / for disappointment [...] and still i was / startled / by the / bigness of the / trees [...] it's just such a relief / to know that something grew / up with me"

ILLUSTRATION TIME BABEY

this whole process was FULL of stress but like GOOD stress. I was on my fuckin grind dude All my text/poems/windows layout was all formatted in affinity publisher, and then I printed that out (at staples, I was gonna use the library but they couldn't print tabloid size paper rip) and just pencil sketched right on those. I COULD NOT HAVE DONE THIS DIGITALLY I DON'T THINK. Because it involved cutting out the windows so I could PHYSICALLY take the paper and see where the images would line up on other side. which was fun as hell

Then I took to staples again and made photocopies (so I didn't fuck up the original pencil sketch), and then traced the tabloid size + windows onto my nice paper. Also look at my setup !! We have this glass table in my house, and I had the kickass idea to put a bright light underneath as a DIY lightbox yippee!! It is however a very low table and while I had a lil stool it prob wasn't great for my back or legs lol (sidenote why are lightboxes so expensive its just a box with a light in it man)

inking time! dip pens ouh my goodness... Still trying to get used to them but they give such nice results.. I'm surprised at how much I like how the illustrations turned out tbh but I am really enjoying this kind of weaving, vignette/snapshot/overlapping almost collagey kind of vibe it has, especially with the text. Similar to the poems I also have a list of all my illustration symbolism/analysis kind of thoughts. it's a shorter list, but one of the main things on there is how I kinda in the moment ended up creating these visual rhymes: The door hinge = rollerskate wheels = moth (plucked wing) = pine cone scale; representing how things follow you from past to present in different forms, things changing but into what? I did separate layers for lines and colour, main book and pop-out accordion. The colours were fun because the acrylic inks came with a dropper and I'd drip bits of ink from real high up to get a lovely splatter !! and also used a straw to blow wet ink around all around a good time I used a sheet of plastic to protect the paper with the lineart on it from the wet ink/water going onto the colours layer. The lightbox was good but defo less effective with the colours layer because the water would warp the paper and lift it away from the table surface (so I couldn't see the lines below rip) Oh my gosh and I used pencil crayons for more texture!! forgot about that lol but it really really helped, and I did some frottage of my childhood house's key+traced its outline; I really wanted the key to be as "real"/"connected to reality" as possible (+yes once again that is a truth in the poems, I do still have it because before it was sold someone broke in and completely destroyed the door handle/lock. we assume with a crowbar.)

also my cat would sit behind me on the couch while I worked sweet creature... (ouh and I know there's Himi Gouache in that one image but I didn't use gouache lol I was considering it but didn't) I worked on the illustration every day of reading week from morning to night to get it done in time for risograph printing hoowheeee

Scanning and Prepping for Risograph Printing

I scanned my lineart and colours with my school's fancy scanner (which I'm gonna miss once i graduate augh it scans soo nicely staples scanners dont do shit for detailed scans)

I knew how to do it in photoshop already, but Managed to figure out how to split my colours so I had files for just blue, just yellow, etc. Ended up with SO MANY FILES!! i love you risograph printer even if I had to prep and print 16 files and redo 2 masters lol

I checked how all the colours looked digitally but you really can't exactly predict how risograph will look until you print it, and I was trying to extrapolate and imagine how the prints would look based on these digital mockups lol.

Lucky for me, they actually turned out BETTER and brighter than I was imagining!! Except for pop-out accordion side A, which looked wayy too busy and forest-green for my liking lol. So I had to redo the master and ended up doing NO blue colours, only blue lines which I think turned out ooo yummy tasty speaking of redoing masters, I also had to re-do the teal in the main book too because it was WAY darker than I was expecting and making the text too hard to read waaagh but I'm so very glad I fixed it because it made a world of difference in legibility. In total ended having to buy 4 new masters to redo orz

Trimming folding binding

This was kinda irritating lol .. I didn't realize I guess the stack cutter in the comd studio cuts at a bit of an angle or smth cause the size was slightly smaller than I wanted. which is a problem because I need my windows and folds to line up as precisely as possible and the slight size difference kinda fucked that up :(( but ah well. it doesn't get super in the way of experiencing the work but I'm a little miffed lol I also had to score and trim all the pop-out accordions one by one waghhhh Look at this pile orz

I'm SO glad I scored all the fold lines for these though that was so smart of me thank god because I could not have folded them without those guides holy shit it would've gotten so misaligned. AND it made it soooo satisfying to fold along a score line, like with the gentlest pressure it folds perfectly right where you need ouh chefs kiss cutting the windows is tedious sigh but!! I'm very happy with the circle cutter I bought just for this project (and for future window cutting in future projects ofc). I actually bought 2 circle cutters but the first kinda fuckin sucked when I tested it out rip. You can't see where you're cutting and it's fine for Cutting A Circle but not for when you need to cut a circle in a SPECIFIC spot like I do lol. Olfa Compass Circle Cutter for the win babey (not sponsored. is that even a thing on tumblr posts. lol) also when you grab a handful of the folded pop-out accordions it makes me feel like I'm grabbin a bunch o fun caterpillars C:

Final crit!

I was really strugling with figuring out where or how to install this thing, but thankfully my profs had booked a space that once I took a look (I'd never been in that room before lol there's still so many rooms I probably don't even know exist at ECU) ended up working really well ! I borrowed a blanket/tablecloth from my supervisor at my workplace when I was talking about my project and wanting to find a fitting tablecloth, and the pic they showed me of it was p much perfect very colourful !! yaaay thank goodness I was able to haul a plinth over to the room and set it up by the window C: natural light and near the rooftop garden, very good! And set up a bunch o chairs so people could sit while I did my reading.

The reading went very well!! I actually lol its soo funny I had practiced a bit at home and had always held the book out to my right, but on the day of I held the book to my left n as I started reading realized "oh no. unexpected flip I can't see some of the words as good" LOL but once I got to the pop-out accordion I kinda had an excuse to switch to holding it out to my right haha and it went smooth The class really liked my performance and the work overall which I'm awaughhh :'] like TAGTYTB people were really into the "choreography/architecture" of the windows, as one person described which is SUCH a good word for it o my goodness

And 5 people bought a copy!!!!!! oh my god!! tbh I thought maybe 1 or 2 ppl might but 5!! I'm not particularly close with any of them either, I'd consider like 2-3 I'm more familiar with but even then oh my gosh. awaa ;;w;; was so so lovely and gave me a lot of confidence in the piece I printed 100 copies! don't know if i should print more or not seeing as it was so successful... my energy is pretty spent now and I wanna take a while to recover lol now that the semester is winding down. But I'm gonna lose studio access to the comd risograph printer soon so i dunno... ah sigh

Now the grad show is my next big thing. my application is submitted and the due dates gone n passed, but this crit gave me the confidence n idea to do a reading of the book(s) I'm showing...... I sent an email if there's any way I could add some kind of scheduled event to my application but idk it's been a week since the due date so it might be too late to make changes rip

other fun stuff

It's now in the ECU artist book collection!!! I was so spooked by it but my profs recommended I look into it and the process was way easier and the person I emailed had the vibe like they did this all the time lol???

🎶 Music I was listening to while writing the poems to try and catch the vibes I needed:

Virgina - Boys Go To Jupiter

Claw Machine - Sloppy Jane ft. Phoebe Bridgers

Death Throes Of A Struggling Romance - (formerly Maryknoll)

Copacabana - Harvard Dn & Tonics acapella with Soloists Elio Kennedy-Yoon and Andrew Courtney

No More Birthdays - Sophie May

Anthems For A Seventeen Year-Old Girl - yeule

wish u were here - Boys Go To Jupiter

Lovers Always Lose - Boys Go To Jupiter

Ankles - Lucy Dacus

+like the whole Meet Me After Practice album - Boys Go To Jupiter LOL i love it soooooo fuckin much

#Here; (is the only place)#2025 #traditional #process #wip #illustration #ink #acrylic ink #apple #featured

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ya-boi-joule · 2 years ago

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Ay man, I absolutely love your works!

Do you have any tips about how to make gouache work? I'm trying my best, but it just isn't arting the way i want it

But yeah I LOVE YOUR WORKS

aaAAA THANK YOU!! Thank you so much it means a lot :'>

I honestly don't know what I'm doing, figuring out gouache has been a lot of "fucking around and finding out". So I absolutely cannot speak about how one should use gouache, but what I can tell you is how I personally do things.

THE STUFF I USE

-I use the kind of gouache that you get from a tube. Apparently there are gouache that are sold in pans, but I don't know anything about those.

-Good watercolour paper is something I recommend getting, it makes painting a less of a pain.

-Because I work on a relatively small scale, I use these tiny brushes. I also have larger ones, but I like using these when painting details in faces or lineart for example.

-Paper towels for cleaning brushes but also for absorbing water/paint in case you fuck up.

SO, GOUACHE

Gouache is opaque, and the opacity depends on how much water you add. Using more water makes gouache act like watercolours, and using less water they're closer to acrylics (not sure if that if the best thing to compare it to - the point is that it is opaque, covers stuff up very well and dries fast).

With gouache you can work from dark to light, so you can add a shadow to a generally shady area and the lighten areas within it later.

HOW I PAINT STUFF SOMETIMES (this is not a tutorial lmao)

I don't always make a sketch, but when I do, I paint over it with a wash of a base colour(s), using more water. The layer(s) are trasparent enough for one to still see the pencil lines coming through. (Käärijä on the left is a better example of this). This usually helps me with mixing colours and sticking to the colour palette. Also the lines are great so I can tell what's going on.

I then add stuff until it looks about right: colours, highlights, shadows, lines, stuff, eventually the pencil lines get covered up. I use less water during these stages, and may even use colours straight from the tube. GENERALLY SPEAKING, I use slightly more water for larger areas, and less water while painting details, but that isn't really a rule or anything.

THERE WILL VERY LIKELY BE AN UGLY PHASE - that is totally normal, push through it, have a bit of faith, you'll get there.

I don't always paint like this. Sometimes I don't make a sketch, and I just layer colours until it looks right. This way has a higher risk rate for me (=nothing looks good no matter what I do and I give up), but it is fun sometimes and has yielded nice results.

SOME THOUGHTS

-Try a bunch of different stuff! See how the amound of water affects the opacity, look up tutorials from various different artists (Scott Christian Sava is a sweet man who makes short form videos on IG and YT), try painting without a sketch, etc., find out what works for you.

-A darker looking paint may dry to look light, and the other way around. So. Beware of that.

-You might dissolve layers underneath with

-Sometimes while mixing colours I add white to make it more opaque, if that makes sense? If I want to make sure that an area I'm trying to cover up doesn't peek through, I might add just a bit of white paint to the new colour.

TL;DR I GUESS

-Generally speaking I use more water in the beginning and less water later on

-There will be an ugly phase, that is normal, push through it

-Use good paper (or don't, I'm not your mom)

-Practise and experiment and try different stuff!

I hope this has been at least somewhat helpful? Again, I don't really know what I'm doing. I wish you strength, have fun with gouache and with making art in general, "hakkaa päälle" as we like to say in Finland :D

And also thank you once again for thy kind words <3

#aski tai semmonen #other

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helloalycia · 4 years ago

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The Wrong Lifetime – Three // Wanda Maximoff

chapter two | story masterlist | main masterlist | wattpad | chapter four

author’s note: i have nothing to say except enjoy!

Chewing on my bottom lip, I looked over the shelves at the different kinds of stationary the shop had to offer. I needed a new notebook and some ink since I'd ran low at home, so I decided to come into town to have a look.

A brown leather-bound notebook caught my eye and I picked it up, flicking through the pages. Sadly, they were too thin for my liking, so I replaced it and kept looking.

Moments like this were one of the few luxuries I had to myself, where my mother wasn't nattering in my ear about finding a husband and learning to do something useful other than writing, or where my brother wasn't overshadowing me in everything he did, making me feel even worse about myself. No, moments like this, I could just be.

"Y/N? Is that you?"

And there goes my moment.

Plastering a smile on my lips, I spun around and was surprised to see Wanda approaching me with an equally surprised expression on her face. She really was everywhere, wasn't she?

"Wanda, hello," I greeted as she stopped by my side. "It's good to see you."

She looked good, considering I hadn't seen her for a few days. Maybe once when she'd popped in to say hello to everybody before her date with my brother, but that was hardly a meeting. Now, she looked cheery, eyes sparkling with their usual excitement.

"You, too," she said softly, a smile creeping on her lips. Her eyes fell to my hands, where I was holding some ink. "Don't you have servants to do that for you?"

"Don't you have servants to do that for you?" I countered lightheartedly, eyes flickering to the vast amount of paintbrushes and paint in her arms.

She narrowed her eyes in a playful manner. "Touché."

Rolling my eyes in good nature, I asked, "So, what made you decide to go shopping?"

"I needed some new supplies," she quipped with an adorable smile, lifting her arms which were filled with said supplies.

"And you didn't think a basket would help?" I joked, before turning to grab a stray basket beside the shelves and helping her to put everything in it.

She chuckled, accepting my help, and answered, "Truthfully, I only came for the paint, but then I saw some new brushes I wanted to try, and then there were some new colours in stock and, well, before I knew it–"

"This happened," I finished for her with amusement, handing her the filled basket.

She took the basket from my hands and nodded. "Exactly. I would have sent my servant to get the paint, but last time I did, she came back with the wrong one."

"Oh, the scandal," I teased.

Her cheeks flushed with embarrassment and it was refreshing to see the shoe on the other foot. I guess I could see the fun in it now – no wonder she teased me often. Plus, she looked cute when she was caught off guard.

"What about you?" she countered, attempting to take the attention off her.

Content smile on my lips, I watched her. "What about me?"

She gave me an isn't it obvious? look. "I told you why I was here. What about you?"

I shrugged, looking back to the shelves. "I just needed some things... and I may or may not get excited when buying stationary."

Her melodious laughter filled the air. "Of course."

"I just don't know which to get," I told her, motioning to the notebooks. "There's so many options!"

She hummed with amusement, stepping by my side closely and reaching out to get a better look. I was acutely aware of her shoulder pressed to mine and tried to stop thinking about it, but obviously, once I told myself to stop thinking about it, it was all I could think about.

"How about this one?" she suggested, picking up a notebook wrapped in a burgundy-coloured sleeve. She was probably biased since it was her favourite colour.

I took it from her grasp as she held it towards me, feeling tingles at the tips of my fingers when they grazed her hand. God, I needed to get a grip.

Before I could look at the notebook properly, I noticed a smudge on her hand, subconsciously grabbing it before she pulled away. Flipping it over so I could see her palm, I saw several smudges of colour and stared with confusion.

"Paint," she explained, mildly embarrassed as she pulled away. "The stuff goes everywhere."

I hid a smile, finding it cute, before looking to the notebook again.

"I like it, but now to see the pages," I said, flipping through them to see if they were thick enough. I hated getting a notebook with flimsy pages that ink seeped through.

"Are they to your liking, your majesty?" she teased, and I looked up to see her tilting her head and watching me through her eyelashes.

"Yes, they are actually," I retorted with a childish glare, before closing it. "Thanks."

She half-suppressed a laugh. "Good. Let's hope it gives you some... vdokhnoveniye."

She paused, scrunching her nose in thought, probably searching for the right word in English. I was too distracted by how enchanting she looked when she did that to care about her struggle to find the word.

"Vdokhnoveniye is like inspiration," she explained, eyes looking back to me after staring up in thought, "but it's something better. It's from the word vdykhat', meaning to breathe."

"So, you want me to get a good breath from this?" I asked, quirking a brow with bemusement.

"No! No." She laughed, running a hand through her curls. "It's like... when you get inspired by something so quickly, as quickly as it takes to take in a breath. Never mind, it's stupid."

"It's not," I reassured her with an appreciative look. "I get it. Thanks. I like that. Russian is definitely a fascinating language."

She seemed glad that I made sense of her ramblings and I smiled, realising there was much more to Wanda than her ability to make me a stumbling mess.

"Have you got everything?" I asked her, glancing to her basket, before quickly adding, "What am I saying? Of course you've got everything. Practically half the store is in there."

She shoved me gently. "Not nice. But yes, I have everything."

I refrained from chuckling at her dismay before leading the way to the till so we could pay. As we took turns, the cashier made conversation with both of us. I knew of him because I'd been here enough times to make a friend, but I was surprised to see Wanda was the same. I was certain I'd never seen her here before. And I'd been here a lot.

When we finished paying, we began to head outside and I decided to speak my thoughts.

"You know, it's strange to think that we've both been coming here for a while and yet we've never crossed paths," I noted. "I mean, unless we have and just didn't know who each other were then."

She shook her head casually. "Oh, no, we haven't crossed paths. I'd definitely remember a pretty face like yours."

I paused, bewildered at her words as they took time to sink in. She seemed to notice as she laughed, holding the door to the shop open for me. I walked outside and she followed after me, eyes glancing at me satisfactorily.

"So, er, what are you doing now?" I changed the subject, recovering from my momentary shock.

She settled with a smile as she answered, "I'm in the middle of adding some finishing touches to a painting I'm working on. I'll probably head back to finish it."

"Ah, the paintings that you talk about but I've never seen," I joked, relaxing under her stare. "I'm starting to believe you're lying to me, love."

She rolled her eyes, though her smile widened, revealing a dimple by the corner of her mouth. "I'm not... You can come with me if you'd like. I don't mind showing you." When her eyes met mine, she quickly added, "If you're not busy, that is."

Humour disappearing, I nodded with surprise. "Sure. I'd love to."

And that wasn't a lie. I was curious to see the Sokovian's work since she seemed to enjoy talking about art so much. Plus, I could appreciate some good art when I needed to and I wondered if hers would fit the bill.

Or at least that's what I told myself when she flashed her dazzling smile my way, making my heart explode with adoration.

—

Just like me, Wanda didn't have a dedicated place to work from because her parents didn't deem her passion an appropriate hobby for a young woman in today's day and age. So, just like I did, she worked in her room and made the most of the space she had.

As soon as we took a step inside, I was amazed by how much stuff there was. Of course there was the expected – a bed, an ottoman, a wardrobe and a desk – but it was as if that was all secondary furniture to the main focus.

Closest to the giant window on the opposite end of the room were several canvases being supported by easels, some painted and some blank. Papers with sketches of literally anything you can think of were taped to the walls, some scattered along the floor and some scrunched up entirely, missing the bin.

Her desk was filled with jars of paintbrushes, oils, pencils, chalk and any other art supply I'd probably never heard nor seen of before. The place was messy, but not dirty. Her bed was made, the sheets as crisp as could be, her books were lined up neatly, her paintbrushes all had a perfect spot. It was clean, but it was a giant mess, and it was the most beautiful mess I'd ever seen. I refused to believe art was merely a hobby for her when it seemed like her room was dedicated to it.

"This is your room?" I asked with disbelief, eyebrows raised.

Clearly mistaking my amazement for critique, she dumped her newly purchased art supplies on her bed before rushing to pick up some loose papers and canvases from the floor.

"Yes," she squeaked, attempting to kick some papers under her bed as she straightened up sheepishly. "Sorry for the mess. Believe it or not, it does follow a system."

I laughed wholeheartedly, heading further into the space to where her makeshift studio was. "Wanda, you don't need to apologise. This place is amazing."

She snickered, glancing around at everything. "You think? I'd love something more – a real studio – but of course, women aren't supposed to have hobbies apart from pleasing their husband and hosting dinners every other week."

The last part she said with a hint of bitterness, clearly repeating what she'd been told before, no doubt by her parents. I was surprised by her vulgarity, but I wasn't in disagreement. She was absolutely right and it was such a shame because women were so much more than their husband. Too bad society would never see that.

"My father only allows me this... sanctuary," she finished with a sigh, before her hand rested on her desk. "It's not much, but at least it's mine."

"Well, I love it," I told her honestly, making her smile as she looked my way. "Can I look around?"

She waved her hand. "Of course. Nothing's off limits, but do be generous. My ego is easily bruised."

I chuckled at her joke and she flashed me another smile before grabbing her neglected art supplies. As I helped myself to looking around at her work, I heard her rustling around behind me and glanced her way, seeing her making herself comfortable on a stool before a particular canvas. I presumed it was the piece she was working on that she mentioned earlier and got back to my browsing.

She was extremely talented, not that I had any doubts to be honest. There were her bigger pieces, the extremely detailed ones, that she'd painted of grassy landscapes. Some were green full trees with falling leaves, some were cherry blossom trees with pink blossoms floating in the air, some were buildings overgrown with mother nature. I recognised none of them, but they transported me elsewhere like a nostalgic reminder of being a kid and playing in the garden with my mum. Even now, I helped her do the gardenening, but I'd never really appreciated my surroundings until I saw Wanda's work.

And those were just the huge pieces. She'd done sketches that were taped to the wall, to her desk, floating out of sketchbooks. Some were plans for bigger pieces, others were daily observations, all of her surroundings. She didn't draw people, I noticed, it was mainly scenery. But it was all stunning and it brought a smile to my lips as I imagined her producing all of this in her own little sanctuary, as she called it.

"You've been quiet for too long," she called out jokingly, after a while of me perusing her sketchbooks.

I looked up from my seat at her desk, seeing her focused on her painting, but an amused smile ghosted her lips. The sunlight from the window was hitting her perfectly at the moment, and even from where I was sat, I could see the flecks of gold shimmering in her eyes, matching the auburn streaks in her hair. The breath got knocked out of me momentarily, and I almost forgot that she'd said something.

Clearing my throat, I returned her smile. "I'm admiring your work, Wanda. You're bloody talented."

She lowered her paintbrush and gave me an incredulous look. "Tell me what you really think, Y/N."

I grinned, laughing slightly. "I am! I genuinely think this is amazing."

She pressed her lips together, still reluctant to believe me, but she nodded gratefully and returned her attention to her painting. I didn't fail to notice the pink spreading across her cheeks at the compliment, and my heart fluttered at the sight.

"Would you ever sell any of these?" I asked her, standing up and approaching her side to see what she was working on.

I noticed the addition of stray paint that had made its way to her hands and forearms and it made me smile. I don't even think she realised it was there.

She scrunched her nose up at the idea. "I've given some away to family friends because my parents made me. But no, I don't think I'd sell them." Something seemed to make her snort with amusement, then she said, "Nobody would buy them anyway."

I frowned as she sighed, her shoulders sagging at the thought. It was horrible to admit, but she was right. Female authors – questionable, but sure, they existed. Female painters? Let's just say that it was easier to be successful if you worked under a pseudonym and pretended to be a man. Which she clearly wouldn't do, or at least her parents wouldn't allow her to do. Sadly, Wanda Maximoff was in the wrong lifetime.

Hoping to cheer her up, I stood by her side and admired the strokes she made with her paintbrush. "If it's any consolation, if we were in another lifetime where I actually made money, I'd buy them."

She glanced at me, partially disbelieving my words, partially intrigued. "Seriously?"

I nodded with certainty, eyes flickering between hers and her painting. "Seriously. All of them. I'd buy every single one."

She looked away, swallowing hard, then a soft, barely noticeable smile appeared on her lips, and I was glad I'd said the right thing.

Focusing my attention on the painting again, I saw it was a stunning view of a stream, and the way she'd painted it made it seem like it was flowing off the canvas. Her last minute touches, adding white flecks of oil paint on the water, managed to bring the piece to life without any effort. I was amazed at how someone could make nothing turn into something so easily.

"Where is this?" I asked curiously, not recognising the scene, and also wondering where she'd gone for the inspiration since we lived in a busy town that didn't have water sources nearby.

She pointed to her head with the end of her paintbrush. "Up here."

"You made this up?" I asked, surprised for the millionth time since arriving.

"Uh-huh." She tilted her head to study the piece, whilst saying, "I usually paint what's in the garden. Sometimes what I see in town is good, too. But I really wanted to paint water, and apart from the constant rain we get, there is none. So, I made it up."

I was impressed at her ability to make up something like this, but also slightly confused. "Why don't you just visit Blackpool? There's a beach – water, sand, pier, everything. And it's not too far from here. You could make it a day trip."

She shrugged, distracting herself with dipping her brush on her palette. "I don't want to go by myself."

I probably should have recommended she visit with my brother. You know, the man she was engaged to? But my eagerness got the better of me, and I ended up saying, "Maybe we could go together. If you want."

She looked up, a slow smile forming on her lips. "I'd like that."

I mirrored her expression, nodding slightly. "Great. I'm sure we can arrange something. Promise."

She held my gaze for a second longer, saying, "I'll hold you to that, milaya," before looking back to her painting.

"What does that mean?" I asked suddenly, my mind clearly not controlling my words today. "You keep calling me it."

She chuckled, leaning forward to get a closer look at her work with her paintbrush. "Darling."

"Pardon?"

She shook her head, glancing at me with amusement. "No, Y/N. It means darling."

I swallowed awkwardly, certain my cheeks were as red as they felt warm. I wasn't sure what was more embarrassing – that I'd responded to her calling me darling when she hadn't, or that she'd been calling it me this whole time without me knowing. "Oh."

"Pull up a stool," she changed the subject, though my mind was still racing at her revelation. Had she called Y/B/N that? I couldn't recall. "I'll show you how to paint a little if you want."

Dazed, I did as she said whilst chewing on my lip with thought. She watched me, grinning from ear to ear, but said nothing. Was it normal for my heart to flip-flop in my chest like it was? I couldn't tell anymore. And when she grabbed my hand without saying anything, my hand felt like it was on fire with her touch.

The tip of her paintbrush swiped against my inner palm, her soft fingertips holding it up. Every area that her finger touched was burning, sending tingles up my arm and leaving me paralysed. Good thing I was sat down.

"There," she said like it was obvious. "Now you're an artist."

Blue eyes met mine excitedly and I gave her a small smile in return, hoping that these strange thoughts and reactions would disappear soon enough. Because this was definitely not appropriate.

—

My dreams were never anything worthwhile.

For someone who had a creative mind and could string sentences together to create a story I was proud of, my subconscious was the opposite. It was dry and boring and I rarely remembered my dreams unless they were scary enough to wake me up. But this time, this was a dream I was certain I'd never forget...

As with all dreams, I was unable to control what was happening. I was myself, observing from a first person point of view like it was real, but I had no control over my words or actions. Everything was predetermined, like a script I was forced to follow.

So, in this particular dream, I was sat in the back of a carriage, wearing a dress that was fancier than my usual taste. One hand was clutching my purse and the other was in someone else's hand, the person playing with my fingers soothingly.

"We're stopping now. Are you ready?"

It was Wanda. I had no idea why she was in my dream, or why she was leaning into my side comfortably, or why she was playing with my fingers like she did it all the time. I just knew that it shouldn't have been happening.

"Yeah, c'mon," I said with a smile, following my dream's script.

I intertwined our fingers and raised them to my lips, pressing a kiss to her palm. She smiled with adoration and allowed me to lead her out the carriage quickly. We were at the theatre and the first thing I thought was that my mind was creating a date similar to the one she shared with my brother. Oh, God, this wasn't good.

"Promise you've got the tickets?" she asked as we walked inside, hand in hand.

In my dream, nobody around us seemed to care that we were together, that we were two women showing affection and simply existing in a way more than friends. As wrong as I knew it was to dream of my soon-to-be sister-in-law like this, my mind was at peace, knowing I could be myself in my dream state. I didn't have to hide my identity and it was liberating.

"No, I decided to leave them at home," I answered her sarcastically, smiling.

She squeezed my hand and tugged me close, stopping me from walking any further. Her face scrunched together with a feigned annoyance.

"You don't need to be mean," she mumbled, eyes peering into mine, and my heart raced at the contact of her body pressed to mine.

Grinning, I pressed a kiss to her nose. "I've got them right here, love. Now let's go before we're late."

The dream didn't have a clear transformation. I just knew that one second I was staring at Wanda and the next I was sat beside her in the theatre, waiting for the lights to go down.

"Here," I said, passing her the programme for the show that was in my hand.

When I looked down at it, I was surprised to see a wedding ring on my left hand. Huh.

The lights dimmed when Wanda looked my way, green eyes bright in the dark. She shrugged, grabbing the programme and tossing it over her shoulder to the (thankfully) empty seat next to her.

"Looks like I missed my chance," she said, referring to the lack of light.

I opened my mouth to counter her words, but she didn't give me chance to as she pressed her lips to mine, hand raising to hold the back of my neck and pull me closer. Real me was freaking out, wondering why the hell I was allowing myself to have such thoughts about the girl who was going to marry my brother. And dream me was melting into her touch, shivering at her warmth and the way she began to suck my bottom lip.

"Wanda," I breathed out, pulling away breathlessly, but she continued to hold me close with a stifled grin.

"Isn't that why we got these tickets?" she said jokingly, eyes meeting mine.

My heart raced as she did, the simplest of glances making me weak in the knees. I was beginning to learn that her eyes were irresistibly beautiful.

"Right," I found my words, smiling in agreement as my eyes flickered to her lips.

They were painted red tonight, slightly smudged from the abrupt kiss she gave me, and I could only imagine the state of my own lips.

"We can watch the play now," she whispered, and I just about managed to tear my gaze from her lips to see the entertained look in her eyes.

I hummed in response, not trusting myself to say something comprehensible. Her lips curved into a smile and she linked our arms before settling into her seat, head leaning on my shoulder. I leaned mine on top, kissing the top of her head gently before also getting comfortable.

When I woke up, I didn't remember the rest of the dream, or know if there was a rest of the dream. I opened my eyes and found myself laying in my bed alone, tired and in the dark. It was still nighttime and my mind was foggy with fatigue. It took a moment for me to remember what I'd just dreamed. And then it hit me.

I liked my brother's fiancé.

#wanda maximoff au #wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maximoff x you #wanda maximoff imagine #scarlet witch imagine #scarlet witch #elizabeth olsen x reader #elizabeth olsen imagine #elizabeth olsen #marvel #marvel imagine #mcu

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bozo-boy · 2 years ago

Text

a retrospective of my art of 2022

i love that you can tell what i’m hyperfixating on judging by the art. more detailed explanations below the cut!

january

i started off 2022 with a redraw of a piece from april of 2021. for christmas of last year, i got an ipad and apple pencil, so this was largely me exploring procreate and the feel of a new way of drawing. there’s a lot about this one that i still like, particular chat noirs cute lil face, but there’s so much i would do differently now that i’m more comfortable with the medium.

february

i was still finding my footing with this one. i was really into fnaf, and naturally, monty. the shine on the ass was using one of the in-app stamp brushes, which was quite fun to play with. honestly, going back, i would just add more depth and complexity to this one. i stand by the bones of this one.

march

this one was done so i could have a fancy new pfp. to be completely honest, i’m not a fan of this one. it’s a redraw of a screenshot from the show itself, and even at the time i was unsatisfied with how this turned out. in retrospect, i would’ve started the sketch small and then scaled it up so it would look a bit more,, normal. i find my art comes out much better when i start small.

april

this drawing is for a worldbuilding project i like to work on when i’m not obsessed with anything else at the time. in this world, there’s a city with a whole festival for phoenixes, and a legend involving a raven falling in love with the sun, but i won’t get into that right now. if i’m remembering correctly, one of my references for this one was a swallow. i still like the way the sun shines through the feathers and the more painterly style. i still stand by this one 100%.

may

oh boy may. this was when my apple pencil broke, and lined up with me getting into sonic, after watching the movie. one of my friends sent me a picrew, birthing this little nameless character. i’m still quite happy with this one, i think i got the style really good while still making it a little bit my own. my short lived sonic hyperfixation is still visible in the way i draw eyes while sketching, which i think it pretty neat. i wonder if, had my apple pencil not broken, i would’ve gotten more into the franchise.

june

AHHHHHH. sorry, this is from when i got back into a set of my ocs, affectionately dubbed “the sin boyz”. they’re all based on the seven deadly sins, and this is asmodeus, embodiment of lust. he’s definitely the most fun to draw because of him being quite high energy, and i’d love to come back to these characters once again. i don’t have much to say about the drawing itself, other than still liking how cartoony it is.

july

i’m not entirely sure what sparked this, but i got really back into the arcana, a game which i’ve been into for years now. this little fella is my character for the game, named zephyr! this piece is actually based on a sketch from i think a few months earlier. i still like this one, with his cute little face. i adore how his eyes turned out, and i’d love to try returning to that style, even just to experiment.

august

this is actually a reference photo for zephyr, but i wanted to fully render it to try to demonstrate some of the fabric textures. i still adore just about everything about this, aside from how his face turned out. i’ve always struggled a little with placing eyebrows too close to the hairline, dating back to my art from when i was like,, 12, where the eyebrows would actually float above the head. aside from that, i still love this.

september

when i made this, i was actually rereading lucio’s route (i’m obsessed with it in a train-wreck way) and found the imagery of the player investigating his abandoned room super compelling. the background from this is actually from the game itself, which is something i had never done before. i even slightly edited the background the reflect some of his magical light! this one is much less colourful and saturated than my other stuff, and i have mixed feelings about it. still though, i’m proud of it, and i think this style of lighting is reflected in what i make today, even if the colours are out of my comfort zone.

october

this is probably one of my favourite pieces of ghost fanart i’ve made. the lighting is a little unpolished in relation to the smoke, but i couldn’t care less cause i just think it looks so freaking cool. i was directly inspired by mummy dust, both in the vision in my head when he growls “duuuuustl, but also in the green stage lighting when it’s performed on stage. i love how swirly the smoke looks, and even now, i’m obsessed with drawing characters lit from below. it’s one of my favourite things i’ve ever made.

november

so uh,, i was a very passionate voter in the american music awards, and the news of ghosts win was so wonderful. i, like many others, was and still am obsessed with the outfit tobias forge wore, and found it super inspiring. i was really worried about this one, cause i basically never draw real people and really wanted it to actually look like him while still being my art style, and i think i did pretty good. this was also new for me because it has two light sources! this presented a really fun challenge and i’m still so proud of this, aside from the lighting on the glass part of the award itself. also, three.

december

i got a new apple pencil for christmas! i immediately had to make something with it and the wonderful pressure sensitivity. i was mostly just playing around with this one, and doing back i’d change a few things, even if it’s only from a few days ago. nonetheless, i had a lot of fun here and really like the colours.

summary

oh boy i sure did draw this year! i think i’ve improved a lot, specifically in shading and rendering. i went outside of my comfort zone a lot with lighting, like things with multiple light sources and coloured light. next year, i wanna go outside of my comfort zone in different ways, particularly with things like backgrounds and character interactions. if you’ve read this far, i hope you enjoyed my self-analysis, and i hope 2023 brings you joy!

#bozo dtawings #bozo babbles #my art #digital art #for future reference #cw assless chaps

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librarianandguardian · 4 years ago

Text

Just a feeling- Saul Silva x Female!Reader

Pairing : Saul Silva x Female!Reader

Word Count : ~2300

Warnings : Fluff, brief mention of drug use and burns

Music : Un homme - Jérémy Frerot

Author’s note : Getting pretty stressed because of a huge project at school, so I wrote this to blow off some steam ! I also wanted to say that I do not agree with the way some characters are written and treated in this show. I hope I did not perpetuate these errors, and that I got Silva’s personality a bit right at least. Feedback is appreciated, may it be on the story telling or even the grammar. English isn’t my first language. Flahs-backs in italics. Enjoy ! :D

GIF ‘s not mine, and I can’t find the creator.

French First World songs resonate in the Great Hall, she is dancing. Wild and free. Her loosened hairs fly through the wind. She has traded her Specialist armour for a long flowing dress. Her feet are hammering the ground in rhythm. The crowd carries her all over the dancefloor; she twirls and claps her hands following the music.

From an ignored fairy bloodline, her parents considered her a Specialist Legacy. When her mind fairies powers woke up, everything went wrong ; she was always an overwhelmed child. No one could help her everytime she lost control. Nothing but medication: earrings to contain, and pills to attenuate. It wasn't bad. She lived like that her entire life.

Silva is sitting on a plastic chair, leaning on the table by his side, his gaze lingering. She is an exceptional fighter; dance must be a piece of cake and fun judging from her large smile. To be fair, he barely remembered her from their time at Alfea. Farah told him she was three years younger than him and seemed to have a few memories.

« (Y/N) travelled a lot to the First World prior to college. Her parents were emissaries and brought back souvenirs. Rumours said that her room resembled a cave of wonders.

-Ever went there ?»

His friend chuckled.

« Once. It was full of trinkets, books, movies, postal cards too. Ben caught interest in it, especially the giant botanic encyclopaedia throning on her bookshelf. We both agreed after a while that she might be the ray of sunshine of her Specialist promotion. But I guess she was discreet, if you've never heard of her.»

It took some memory searching, but he indeed remembered one thing. A conversation between a bunch of 1st years talking about a secret party displaying famous First World movies. A few hours later, on the training field, (Y/N) battled fiercely. It caught the attention of many students, who gathered around the platform. Curiosity taking the best of him, he had followed the crowd.

« What's that First World song that I love to describe you with ?

-By the light Clairo, is it really necessary ? »

Her opponent mocked her. She rolled her eyes, wielding her sword before choosing her fight stance.

« You son of... Maneater from Nelly Furtado. Now let's fight please.

-Alright doll, eat me up. »

(Y/N) huffed in annoyance. Clairo was a good fighter, but a little bit too flirty. He launched himself at her. The young woman stayed incredibly calm. Dodging to the right, she left him to stumble before hitting his back with the wooden weapon. He fell to the ground with a grunt. A shy smile spread on her features.

Now that he thinks about it, her earring had intrigued him : an ear chain hanging from the top of the cartilage of her ear to her lobe. Each end was composed of a lavendish round lilac crystal. When she lost control recently, those crystals lit up with a blinding light and burned her skin.

« I change the earring every five year. Every year If any several big crises occurred.

-What about your burns ? How did they clean them up ? »

Her left hand ghosted over her intact lobe, while Harvey healed the bruised flesh. Her eyes stared at the floor of the greenhouse. Saul was holding her other hand.

« They... I stuffed myself with pills. Sometimes enough to sleep through an entire day. Within the Solarian force, it was the only way for them to treat me. None of their mind fairies could calm me down. I don't think you realize how much this, she lifted her intertwined hand, helps.»

The soldier chuckles at the memory. His eyes examined his fingers, remembering how she locked hers, as she found an anchor in his mind.

« My best guess ? Your training forged your head to have a certain mindset in crisis.

-Loads of Solarian troupers could have given you that.

-Yeah. I can't really explain it, she laughed shyly, maybe because you're a teacher, that two of your long time friends are fairies or just because you're good with people.»

Their gazes crossed. The air thickened. Truth to be told, (Y/N) was so lost upon why he managed to calm her down. Farah tried to guide her, but even then, nothing positive came out. Her youth as a student at Alfea only consisted in shared side glances with him in hallways. She sure as hell found the man attractive, but she had other stuff to think about.

A loud giggle snaps him back to reality. (Y/N) falls on his laps while trying to take off her high heels. Her eyes are opened wide and a little glassy. She's definitely drunk.

« Oh by the light, I'm sorry Silva. Aimed at the table ! »

The atmosphere becomes lighter. He catches her when she nearly trips off by trying to get up, one of his arms snaking around to help. Steadying herself on his laps, she catches her breath slowly, though some giggles erupt as she looks around.

« How can you still dance, uh ?»

With a guilty smile, she leans slightly against the table.

« Alcohol ! It's the only thing keeping me up, baby !»

Instant regret shoots through her veins. Some red creeps up on her cheeks, as her hands cover her mouth. The soldier chuckles, enamoured by her adorableness. One thing that strucked him when they met was her lightness. Out of all the solarian troupers out there, or even all the specialists he ever crossed paths with, she was one of the few who stayed so bright and playful. Subconsciously, his fingers dig slightly in her hips.

« It's alright, (Y/L/N).»

She giggles a bit, but thanks him. Farah watches from a far, joined by Ben. (Y/N)(Y/L/N) has been teaching at Alfea for a year now. The entire school seemed to have transformed into a much more joyous place : students got along better, the shyest opened a tad and the roughest softened. Ben's daughter Terra found a supporter of her personal projects and a confidant. Ben himself benefited from her return. Mostly in books and knowledge but that meant already so much to him. Farah gained a daughter ; (Y/N)'s powers were a mess for her advanced age, helping felt natural. But what she loved the most was how confused Saul got with the new Specialist. Their bond strengthened with time, however the first few days rocked the Headmaster all over the place.

«(Y/L/N), what did you do to our office ? Did you... Are these books classified by alphabetic order and colour ?! »

His colleague shrugged, trying to see if he was mad or just surprised. It happened a few days after her arrival. Their shared office went under few renovations.

« (Y/L/N), why dancing classes ? »

She shot up, put her hands on his desk and took twenty minutes to explain how it would make their movements more flexible, strengthen teamwork and be a tool for future mission on the job. Astonished could not describe Silva's feeling.

An admirable change that proved beneficial to the students. These two grew very fond of each other. A lot more than they thought. Words in the hallways started to spread about their growing fondness.

« Okay, I got a question for you, soldier boy.»

Saul tilted his head to the side.

« Are you having fun ?

-Of course I am.»

(Y/N) looks disappointed. Turning around, she pours some water in her cup and chugs it down.

« Really ? 'Cause the only thing I've seen you do is sit in a corner all night. »

He lowers his head, searching for the right words. How does he say that he just loves watching her run around the dancefloor ? How she bounds with students but also keeps their respect ? The fact that she's so organised that she could plan a First World themed party and keep her teacher skills to their best ? The shortest way for that would be admitting his feelings. He zones out long enough for her to talk again.

« It's okay. »

His eyes lock with hers. How did she sober up so quickly ?

« I know you have a reputation as a serious and frowny teacher to keep. And this is a graduation party, so. »

Never mind, she did not. The woman gets up, only to kneel under the tablecloth. He panics briefly.

« (Y/N), what on Earth are you doing ?»

She mumbles before appearing back outside. Her hands are holding a package. Another bright smile shines on her face. Silva knows what's coming, and he has mixed feelings about it; between fear, excitement and confusion.

« Happy Birthday Saul. »

His heart nearly stops. Few people know about his birthday, she is now a part of them. He frankly does not mind, even wished for it for a while now. His hands gently take the package to open it. Before his eyes lies a hard covered sketchbook and a wooden box full of high-quality pencils. The cover has a crow flying in a pearly sky with a red sun. The box is made of ebony and his name carved in silver. She knows an another of his secret. He tears up. The woman worries when he starts to sniffle. Much to her surprise, the soldier puts the gifts on the table before hugging her with all his might. Thank God the students are dancing or already out of the hall to smoke. (Y/N) answers his embrace, reassured.

« Thank you so much dear. »

It's her turn to have glossy eyes. She buries her face in his shoulder. This man is constantly under pressure and she has always wondered what he does during his free time : Does he train more ? He probably reads, right ? The answer came on a regular afternoon.

Silva knocked on her quarters' door. He heard shuffling before (Y/N) opened. She was wearing a bathrobe and a towel around her hair.

« Hi Saul ! Sorry hum. I woke up late and did not expect you so soon so, hum. »

The woman looked around, making her towel fall. Picking it up, she invited him in. He indulged, though a bit surprised.

« I'll be back in a jiffy, you know, putting some clothes on and all. Okay.»

She disappeared in her bathroom, leaving him to explore her room. Many watercolour paintings covered the walls, some abstract and others from the Realms of the Otherworld. However, a few landscapes felt unknown to him. On her desk lied sketches with a horde of different pencils. He discovered portraits of Farah, Ben, Terra, Sky, Riven and finally him. The lines were thin, some shadows sharp for the warriors and smoother for the fairies. A hint of jealousy took over him, quickly brushed away by shyness. The fact that she took the time to draw him was flattering. His fingers grazed over the pencils, wondering if he had time to prepare a little surprise. He puts down the file he came to discuss. A few minutes later, (Y/N) came out, dressed but her hair still wet on the edges. Silva was leaning against her desk, file in hand, a small smile on his features. She mirrored it before asking about the important matter at hand. Twenty minutes later, he left. Her eye caught a change in her drawing material : the portrait of Farah and Ben switched positions. She shuffled them, making sure everything was here, only to find an unknown piece. A cute fox was smiling, a little bubble under him stating :

« Nice Work (Y/L/N). Nice pencils too. Wish I had your talent.»

That last sentence made her wonder if he indeed had an artistic side. Needless to say that his quarters gave her answer. Same reason as his when he came, she knocked on his door one night. Though he did not fully invite her in, her eyes caught glimpses of nice sketches lying on a table, some rudimental equipment next to it.

They stay like this for a few seconds. The headmistress and Professor Harvey look at each other. No words, no need. Terra is chatting with a second year in a corner, bur her eyes catch them. She smiles, looking away shyly, but happy Sky sees the scene too, thanks to Riven who taps on his shoulder. They can't help the smile growing on their faces. Sky's father figure finding support is definitely going to be one of the highlights of their first year. (Y/N) and Saul part. One of her hands pats his arm.

« Wanna dance ? »

He closes his eyes, sighing. There is no lack of desire but the fear of what the students will say.

« I wish but... I don't know.

-I get it. But one day, you will ! That's a promise. »

With one last smile, she strolls back to the dancefloor, leaving him sheepish. He takes the sketchbook and a pencil. He might not dance tonight, but he'll make up to it.

#fate the winx saga #saul silva #saul silva x reader #sky of eraklyon #fate riven #farah dowling #ben harvey #saul silva imagine

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leossmoonn · 4 years ago

Text

chemistry part fourteen

part thirteen | part fifteen | masterlist

zuko x fem!reader

avatar: the last airbender

includes - you, zuko, suki, katara, toph, sokka, and aang

special appearances by - iroh, azula, appa, and mai

warnings - language, angsty, mentions of sex

“what if they don’t like me?” you asked nervously.

“they, will. azula’s opinion doesn’t matter, and my uncle loves you,” zuko said.

“alright,” you smiled. “i’m ready.”

zuko leaned over and kissed your cheek. “you’ll be great.”

you smiled and stepped out of his car, wrapping your coat around you. zuko and you walked up to his house, holding hands. you had the cupcakes you made in the other hand, and zuko had the gifts you two bought in his other hand. the door opened quickly, revealing iroh.

“hello! come in, come in,” iroh smiled.

“hi, iroh,” you smiled.

“hello, y/n. it is so nice to see you again. i was wondering when my nephew would finally ask you out,” iroh said.

zuko rolled his eyes. “well, i did it.”

“yes, and we’re all happy. hm, you brought cupcakes! you can put those on the kitchen table,” iroh said.

you nodded and left zuko’s side for a moment, going into the kitchen and seeing a few more of zuko’s family members.

“you must be y/n. i’m azula, zuko’s sister.” a pretty, young woman came up to you. she looked so much like zuko; basically a female version.

“hi, it’s nice to meet you,” you smiled and held your hand out. azula shook it, giving you a welcoming smile.

you felt a hand snake around your waist and looked to see zuko standing behind you. you smiled at him, metling into his embrace.

“zuko, you didn’t tell me your girlfriend was so pretty,” azula complimented.

“thank you,” you smiled.

“he could do better,” a mono-toned voice said. it belonged to a girl- zuko’s age. she had black hair, a red dress on, and a cold glare that she directed towards you.

“mai, don’t be so rude,” azula frowned.

“and don’t be so nice, zul,” mai said.

“oh, you’re mai?” you said, your mood dimming a little. “it’s, um, nice to meet you.”

“likewise,” mai gave you a strained smile. she then looked to zuko.

you stiffened as you saw the look she gave him. zuko noticed your reaction and pulled you closer, interlocking hands.

“want to get a drink with me, zuzu?” mai asked.

“nope, i’m good. i’d rather get a drink with y/n,” zuko said.

“ugh, fine. you’ll regret saying no,” mai grimaced, walking away.

“sorry about her, she’s still in love with zuko. if you ask me, you two are cuter together,” azula said.

“thank you,” you smiled gratefully at her.

“yeah, thanks, azula. y/n, wanna go get those drinks?” zuko asked.

“yeah, sure,” you nodded.

you two moved passed azula, exchanging goodbyes.

“so, when did you and mai date?” you asked, grabbing yourself a diet coke.

“in high school. i dated her from sophomore year to half my junior year. so it was about a year and a half relationship,” he explained honestly.

“wow. that’s a long time,” you chuckled.

zuko sensed your anxiety and put his hand on your’s to reassure you. “yeah, but it’s all in the past now. i’m very over it. and plus, i’m with you now.” you smiled at him. “yeah, i know. thank you. have you had other relationships in the past before?”

“yeah, a few. another long-term, a couple short-term. i haven’t been on a date since sophomore year of college, to be honest with you,” zuko said bashfully.

“well, i’ve never had a boyfriend before. well, not an offical one anyways, so i wouldn’t worry,” you smiled

“you not having a boyfriend? i can’t imagine that,” zuko teased.

you blushed and shrugged, “no guys interested me. especially not in high school. all of them are so immature and gross.”

“understandable. i came from a strict family, so i wasn’t too bad,” zuko said.

“that’s not what sokka said,” you grinned.

zuko rolled his eyes. “alright, well, sokka is different. he's all goofy and may have coerced me into pranks, but i was a good kid and student.”

“true. i mean, you are my tutor after all,” you laughed.

“right. right. speaking of tutoring, do you still want to continue?” zuko asked.

“yes! but instead of calling it ‘tutoring’ we can just hang out and you can help me with homework,” you suggested.

“sounds good,” zuko nodded, taking a sip of his beer.

“hey, did you want to play with the vr?” he asked.

“yes!” you exclaimed.

zuko smiled at your enthusiasm. “alright, wanna go in the basement or my room to play?”

“oh, um, wherever,” you shrugged. the thought of you in your boyfriend’s room made you nervous, but filled your stomach with butterflies.

“we can go in the basement,” zuko said.

you nodded. “wait, i want to see your room though.” you knew you didn’t have to go in there and be alone for a long period of time yet, but you at least wanted to see what it looked like.

zuko nodded and took your hand, leading you through the small crowd of people. you went up to stairs and walked to the bedroom that was down the hall.

“i’m going to the bathroom real quick, feel free to look around and stuff,” zuko smiled.

you nodded, watching his retreating figure. you opened his door hesitantly, your nostrils immediately filling with the sweet smell of cinnamon. your eyes immediately went to the bed that sat across from the door and in the middle of the room. his sheets were black with red lines down the middle. his pillows were both black and red, alternating in a pattern. he also had a few stuffed animals laid out on his bed. one of a red dragon, turtle-duck, and a polar bear-dog. he had two, dark-brown coloured nightstands on each side of his bed. on the left one, which was closest to you, was a lamp, a few gum packets, and a few books for school. the right one had a picture frame of him and his mother, him and his sister, one of him and just his mom, and another of him and iroh. across from the right nightstand on the wall, was a black bookshelf. it had 5 shelves with three and a half filled with all sorts of books.

avid reader, i see, you thought.

all around his room he had posters and pictures. the posters were of his favorite bands: AC/DC, greenday, rolling stones, queen, and nirvana. he had some jazz singers, too. like louis armstrong, billie holiday, frank sinatra, and nat king cole.

good music taste, too.

across from the foot of the bed was his desk that had a bunch of papers on there, a clock, and a pencil holder. he had standing lamp next to his desk, too.

“his bed is so comfortable.”

your body stiffened once you heard mai’s dark, monotoned voice. you didn’t look at her, you just kept your eyes trained on his stuffed animals.

“oh, really? how would you know?” you challenged.

“because we’ve had sex there. he’s really good at it, too,” mai said. you could hear the smirk in her voice.

of course that’s the reason why.

“and the jazz music he would play while we cuddled after a few rounds. ugh, so magical. you won't believe the things he can do with that body of his,” mai said.

“oh,” you said, your voice breaking.

mai put her hand on your shoulder, leaning to whisper in your ear. “he's mine, y/n. always have and always will be. he’ll be done with you soon and come running back to me. he always does.”

tears sprung in your eyes and a few ran down your cheeks. you didn’t say anything else, knowing that if you opened your mouth, the only sound that would come out was a sob.

“have fun. ta-ta!” mai said and took her hand off of you. you heard her footsteps walk away, going down the stairs.

you let out a shaky breath, taking out your phone to text katara to take you home. she responded quickly, thankfully, and told you she’d be there in 10.

zuko existed the bathroom, smiling once he saw you in the doorway of his room.

“hey, how do you like the room?” zuko asked.

you took in a deep breath, wiping away your tears harshly. “it’s cool. i really like the posters and the stuffed animals.”

zuko noticed your discomfort. “what’s wrong?” he went in front of you, his heart breaking once he saw that you were crying. “hey, hey, why’re you crying?”

you averted his gaze, shrugging. “nothing, i’m just tired. you mind if i have katara pick me up?”

zuko narrowed his eyes at you. “al-alright. but… why?”

“i just… i got a text from my mom. it's an emergency. i have to go,” you lied.

zuko looked at your face, knowing you were lying. he knew he wouldn't get the truth out of you now, though. so he decided to let you go, let you calm down, then ask you about it in the next few hours.

“yeah, sure. i’m sorry you have to leave,” zuko said, reaching out for your hand gently.

you let him, his touch calming you. “yeah, me, too. walk me out?”

zuko smiled softly, “yeah, sure,”

you two walked down the stairs in silence. you put on your coat, reaching for the doorknob.

“i had fun, thank iroh for inviting me,” you said.

“of course. text me when you get home, okay?” zuko asked.

“will do,” you nodded and exited the house. zuko watched you walk away, sighing.

he looked to his left, catching the eye of mai. she had a malicious smirk on her face, not trying to even hide it. zuko glared at her, putting the pieces together of why you left.

fuck you, mai, he thought.

you got into the car, seeing katara with worried eyes.

“hey, what’s wrong?” she asked.

as soon as you sat down was when the tears starting coming out in hot streaks.

“m-mai,” you sobbed.

katara narrowed her eyes, “that bitch. what did she say?”

“she was talking about how good zuko was at sex. how wonderful their sex was. it was horrible. she also mentioned that he goes back to her all the time. is that true?” you asked.

katara’s eyes widened. “i… why don’t we go back home and get you calmed down first, alright? we have cookies and whiskey.”

you nodded, wiping your eyes. katara drove you home, keeping her hand on your’s for comfort.

note - hope you guys read and enjoy this as new parts are added! if you wanna be on the taglist, message me and/or reply to this post :))

taglist - @sorrythatspussynal @theblueslytherin @charlenasaxen@akiris @the-paintedlady @thatarthistorynerd @freckled-and-daydreaming @fi-chanwrites

#atla #avatar: the last airbender #zuko #zuko smau #zuko imagine #fire lord zuko x reader #atla zuko x reader #prince zuko x reader #atla zuko

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ohtobeaspettyasleah · 4 years ago

Note

Okay so with Piper and Ethan? How do they meet exactly? How does the stroy actually begin.

“Fight, fight, fight, fight, fight—“ Ethan placed his car keys into his front pocket as he walked through the doors. Pushing on the glass, a smear of strawberry jam left behind from his thumb— crumbs on his dress shirt as he swallowed the last bit of his soggy cold breakfast, half a piece of toast Lexi didn’t finish.

Monday mornings were always the toughest, always the earliest. Always, in Ethan’s case, the worst day of the week. Back to back classes and a steady stream of pre and post pubescent teenagers disregarding the information he tried desperately to teach them had Ethan, by the end of his mondays, screaming to the heavens above to just give him one kid that listens to him.

Ethan sighed as he watched the crowd in the main hallway get bigger and bigger. A fight— a growing amount of teenagers egging the two boys at the centre of it all on. Screaming “fight, fight, fight, fight.” As they did so. Ethan manoeuvred himself through the teens, pushing past to break up the fight. His laptop case hanging off his side.

“Hey! Hey! Enough—Anderson, hey Oliver, that’s enough— that’s enough—“ the second Oliver Anderson turned around and collided his scrunched up fist into Ethan’s nose had the entire crowd dispersing with accidentally perfect videos on their Snapchat and Instagram stories. Ethan groaned, covering his nose as he looked up. Hunched over slightly as Oliver stood before him. Shocked that he’d just punched, on accident, his Media and tech skills teacher. Mr Dolan.

“Mr Dolan—“ his knuckles stung. The other guy, John Harrison, saw his opportunity and ditched out. Not ready to be dragged down to the principals office by his ear. This time anyway.

“Principles office, now Oliver.”

“I’m so sorry I—“

“Don’t make me say it again, get to the principles office now.” Ethan shoved at his shoulder slightly. Kicking the kid into gear.

“Don’t call my mum.”

“You punched me in the face kid you’ll find yourself lucky if calling your mums the only thing we do— it’s a Monday morning! Why’d you have to punch me in the face on a Monday morning.” Ethan held his head up. Walking Oliver to the principals office. Ethan liked to give kids the benefit of the doubt, it’s something his dad always did. But today was not that day.

“Are you saying if I’d done it on a Wednesday—“

“Shut up Anderson.”

Principal Yang was calm on the phone, informing Pipper Reid, a 32 year old single mum of one out of control teenage boy. A kindergarten teacher, listening to how her son had started a fight on school grounds, she wished there was a way to keep them so small. So innocent and fragile.

“I can’t leave till lunch Mr Yang—“ she sighed as she watched her little ones play in free time from the door of her classroom. “Can you uh, keep him in some sort of detention till I can get there?”

“Mrs Anderson—“

“It’s Miss Reid actually, Julian c’mon, you know this, it’s Miss Reid, has been for a long time now.” Pipper sighed. “Just let him sit and stew for a while till I can get there, he shouldn’t be acting this way. I—I don’t know what’s gotten into him, his a good kid.”

“The absence of a fatherly figure during these times can sometimes—“

“Don’t tell me I’m not doing my best! Because you know I am, Oliver’s a good kid.” Piper didn’t mean to raise her voice. “I’ll be there a soon as I can.” It was Lexi who calmed Miss Reid down when she hung up.

“Miss Reid? I know you’re busy but I wanted to colour and I didn’t want to take the good pencils off your desk without asking, so may I please borrow the good colouring pencils?” It made Piper smile bright as she leaned down to pinch Lexis nose softly— not know her dad who had the same one was nursing a swollen one her son a decked him with earlier that morning.

“Course sweetheart.”

“Yeah she won’t be in till her lunch break.”’Yang sighed as he rung up the phone. Ethan groaned as Oliver smirked. Slumping back in his chair across the desk from where principal Yang sat. Ethan leaning on the bench behind him.

“I told you that—“

“Listen kid, this is serious, the police could get involved if Mr Dolan here wants to press charges of assult.”

“I’m a minor though!” Oliver growled.

“Juvenal detention exists for a reason champ—“ Ethan huffed through his swollen nose. “Can’t have a kid with a mean hook like yourself roaming the halls doing damage to anyone who tries to get within a foot of you.” Ethan was being sarcastic, but it struck a nerve in Oliver.

“You suck you know that, all my friends always talk about how cool your are, how you’re one of the better teachers, but in reality your just a fucking looser who can’t take a hit.” Ethan lunged forward while Yang held him back— it wasn’t one of Ethan’s finest moments. The kid was 15.

“I can’t wait till your mother shows up—“

“She probably won’t! She’s got priorities! She works.”

“why’d you punch me?” Ethan pressed.

“It was an accident!”

“You turned around and got me right in the nose—“

“YOU GRABBED MY SHOULDER!”

“To stop you from laying into another student!” Ethan hissed. Principal Yang sighed as he watched the two go back and forth in his office.

“Alright that’s enough you two, Oliver, go down to detention and just sit there—face the wall, do some homework, play in your phone I don’t care just don’t bother anyone till your mother arrives and we can reconvene and discuss appropriate punishment, Dolan?” Ethan raised his eyebrow in response as he crossed his arms over his chest. “Go do what you do best, teach.” Ethan flared down at Oliver who barley hard the heart to look at Ethan.

“I’m not doing because you told me to I’m going because I like my next class Julian—“

“Dolan just go—“ Me Yang chuckled as Ethan bellowed down the hall over his shoulder.

“I’m coming for your job Mr Julian Yang and you know I’d do it better!!”

Ethan Dolan was a good teacher, he enjoyed what he did. He liked being able to mold the minds of a younger generation— even if most of them didn’t want a bar of what he was trying to teach. There were some though, and they always made it easier.

“Alright, now when we’re filming, lighting is important—without good lighting, you don’t have a good short. If the light is coming from behind you it’s gonna cast a shadow over you, so it’s best if—“ a knock at the door interrupted Ethan’s class. Oliver shoot small and hunched over in defeat. Ethan knew it was time, he was ready to give this kids parents or parents if you will a piece of his mind. “Excuse me everyone, continue working on your settings, lighting, exposure and all that fun stuff— I’ll be back soon and don’t even think about messing around mrs Johnson is next door and the walls are incredibly thin.”

He was ready, he’d been waiting for this, Ethan nose was throbbing and he was ready to give Oliver’s mum a piece of his mind. Until he saw her. Sitting in the same chair Oliver was sitting on earlier. A lot younger than he thought she’d be, around if not the same age at Ethan.

“Oliver!! What did you do what has gotten into you!” Pipper hissed as he slumped in the chair beside her. “Mr Dolan—I’m do sorry, he’s normally a very good kid” Ethan was speechless from the get go. Rage no longer there.

“It’s uh—it’s Ethan actually.” Oliver scoffed.

“I just don’t know what’s gotten into him.”

“Kids, what are you gonna do am I right?” Pipper settled into her chair a little deeper, not so on edge after Ethan didn’t lose his cool. Me Yang sat stern, locking eyes with Piper.

“I’d encourage Oliver to seek out anger management, but physically assult on one of my teachers is unacceptable. The police—“

“Look we don’t need to get the police in here do we Julian?” Ethan interrupted. “I’m fine, everyone’s fine.”

“We can’t let this incident go without punishment, mr Dolan.” Yang sighed as he looked at Oliver who couldn’t handle his mother’s eyes staring him down in disappointment.

“I’ll take him under my wing— a mentor type situation, keeps him on the straight and narrow and everyone goes about their lives without records.”

“I don’t wanna spend him with you!” Oliver hissed as Ethan sighed.

“You and I both don’t have an option kid— you punched me? This isn’t a joke—why were you even fighting that guy anyway?” Ethan asked as Piper looked at her son. Asking again:

“Why’d you do it O?” Oliver broke— he cried in front of his mother, principal Yang and Ethan, it broke his heart.

“John said dad left because you stopped putting out, I didn’t mean to punch you Mr Dolan— I just I was blind, he sucks and no one says shit about my mum. Ever.” Oliver sucked up his tears. Me touch guy once again. Ethan sighed as he tapped Oliver’s shoulder:

“I would’ve done the same kid, looks like your stuck with me.”

#ethan dolan #dolan twins #teacher!e

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happybeeps-nat · 5 years ago

Note

Prompt idea: Post-war, Finn and Poe attend some sort of art therapy session together.

A/N: oooh thank you so much for this random, weirdly specific prompt, I was so delighted when I got it and writing something for it was fun! BUT I have not a single idea as to how art therapy works? And so I focused more on the art than on the therapy, I hope this is to your liking! Thank you so much for the prompt! 💕

Light angst, obviously, but the hopeful kind

Words: 1478

------

Scars On Our Future Hearts

“Where exactly are we going again?” Poe asked as he was being dragged along by Finn who seemed to know where he was going at least.

“Art therapy,” Finn replied, way too chipper considering the circumstances. Therapy. Art therapy! Poe had as much to do with art as he had with wielding a lightsaber or lifting rocks. But sure. Let’s go do some art therapy, what a wonderful idea, Finn. He sighed and said nothing. That was how it went most days. He talked a lot but didn’t feel like he said anything.

Okay, so maybe this art therapy was actually a good idea…

“Doctor Kalonia recommended it,” Finn explained. “It’s unconventional but says it’s actually a good approach after a war. And it can’t really hurt.”

“Yeah, except in all the ways therapy usually hurts,” Poe muttered.

“Exactly!” Finn smiled, coming to a stop in front of a nondescript building. It looked like all the others, but Finn with his photographic memory would know exactly how to differentiate it from their surroundings even though he’s never been here. Finn was awesome like that.

“I promised her we’d try and if it’s not for us, we can just, you know. Not come back again.”

The casual we that Finn threw around casually still made Poe feel warm all over.

“Okay, okay, let’s try this thing. It it in there?” Poe inclined his head toward the building.

Beside him, Finn nodded and squeezed the hand he was still holding. “You ready?”

“Nope,” Poe sighed and let the p pop, but shrugged. “Let’s do this. Can’t be worse than crashing a TIE-fighter, right?”

Well, turned out it was actually pretty much like crashing a TIE-fighter. Or, like the moment right after the crash. The second of numbness where you didn’t know anything, not even if you were still alive. You didn’t know if anything hurt but you also didn’t know if everything was okay. You had a minute where your judgment was clouded and the only thought was “I need to get up and leave” until you realise that’s not possible because slowly, everything comes back to you. Why you’re there, what happened to get you there in the first place.

And now Poe was staring at a blank canvas and he had no idea what to do, what to feel, what to think, what to say. He had no idea what to draw.

Future, they had said. Future was the prompt for this session, and it was a stupid shitty prompt, like, who even asked veterans about their life plans? They had none! For years, Poe’s future had consistent of the present need to not fucking die, and now here he was, in a non-threatening room full of blank canvases and he was asked about his life and he had nothing to fucking draw. He had nothing to think, he had nothing to say. He barely even had a life.

So the canvas stayed blank while Poe stared at it, feeling as just as empty. Directionless. Not a single splash of colour on his mind, not a single line to give him the vaguest idea od a direction. He was just Poe Dameron, former pilot to the New Republic Navy, former commander of the Resistance who got promoted to the rank of General because he had just enough hope and idiocy left in him to actually go through with winning. That hope was now gone, because why hope to win when you’ve already won? Why create colours when that would just be a waste of resources an actual artist could need?

He had nothing but Finn. Finn who was painting his canvas in the brightest of colours, splashes and lines and everything all over the place, and the board looked ecstatic. It was colourful, it looked random but Poe could see an order there. A system. And of course it was there, Finn would never get rid of that part of him that needed order in everything. But now he had the chance to create the order by himself.

Poe smiled a little as he watched Finn paint, and picked up his pencil again. Yellow, blue, green, red, in all their shades. And in the middle, right in the centre, there was a splash of orange, looking out of place but also just right. It completed the painting, gave it a meaning, an order, a direction. A centre. And it was the same shade of orange as Poe’s old flight suits from the Resistance.

It warmed him to see that, to see the colours, to see that maybe this meant Finn saw a bright future, a colourful life, and Poe right there with him. Poe in his centre. Poe in his heart.

What a wonderful thought. He smiled to himself and stared at his own blank canvas. Then back at Finn’s concentrated form, and without really thinking about it, he mixed a few colours himself. It was the same deep, dark shade of brown as Finn’s skin, yet bright in a way it looked when the sun was dancing on it. Brown with a touch of gold.

Poe grabbed the biggest brush he could find and spread that colour on the whole canvas until there was no untouched space left. The whole thing was covered in golden brown, some places darker than others, and all of them reminding him of Finn.

On a whim, he used more of that golden colour and painted a few traditional Yavinic ornaments. Small, fragile little things, drawn with more care than he’d thought he could use, but the result was absolutely worth it.

It wasn’t perfect and real artists would probably roll their eyes at him for feeling pride as he looked at it, but to him it was perfect. It was his future. It was Finn. Because maybe it was okay that he had no direction, that he felt lost without a cause, even if that cause he used to have was tainted with death and killing and losing and pain. It had been a cause. And now he had none. But he had Finn, so maybe that could be his future.

Everything else, he thought, was a bonus. Direction, meaning, structure, he could find all of that, build all of that with Finn by his side. But without Finn, there was no future. Not for him.

He sighed. This absolute dependence was dangerous and he knew that, he’d have to do something about it, there was nothing romantic about it and it spoke more of his trauma than his lack of words ever could say, but he also knew that wasn’t the whole story. He was in love with Finn, absolutely enamored every day anew. Finn completed him in every aspect, he loved him back with his whole heart, Finn had a huge orange splash in his painting that maybe stood for Poe’s love in the centre of his world. This wasn’t just co-dependence. This was love, a love as deep and as old as time, and one he couldn’t deny.

Finn was his future. And not just because of his past. He would be in every kind of universe. No matter the story.

They got to keep the paintings, brought them home, talked about them. Not with the therapists but with each other. Finn explained every line, every splash, every dot and every brush, the order in it that still felt like chaos. Told him how he was feeling. About himself, about them, about the present and about the future.

And so did Poe. “I, uh, I think I did it wrong? But it doesn’t feel wrong, so… Yeah, anyway, I don’t know what to do. What the future holds or even what I will do tomorrow. I may not even know who I am when I’m not a hotshot pilot or Resistance General. I never had to be just Poe Dameron, and I don’t really know who that is. But I would like to find out? With you by my side? And build a life and all that stuff, but not without you. And I have no plans. I only have you, and that’s pathetic, I guess, but-”

Finn silenced him with a kiss. Then apologised, because Poe was finally talking and he had to ruin that, but Poe just laughed, relieved. He’d finally said it. He was Poe Dameron and he didn’t know what that meant but with Finn by his side, he was ready to find out.

Later, Finn grabbed his hand and took him to bed, giving him a detailed insight to who he thought Poe Dameron was. There were still traces of paint on their skin, but for some reason that made everything feel more real. Like they were okay, and like they had a future. Together.

#finnpoe #stormpilot #star wars fanfic #poe dameron #finn #prompt fill #light angst #canon verse #post-ROS #i loved writing this but idk if thats what you wanted #i hope you like it thank you so much for the prompt I love you! 💕#nat writes #also had two separate language breakdowns while writing so i hope its not too bad

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franboos · 5 years ago

Text

I don’t want to be your friend i want to kiss you neck

a vds college roommate fic

written by @gucciboner and me <3

word count: 2045

chapter one, part 2/3

chapter one, part 1

Lucas’s alarm goes off at 7 am. He groans and stretches his arm out to stop it from ringing. He isn’t the best at getting up early, but today is his first day of school and he is quite excited.

He never expected to be excited to go to school, but he was finally going to do something he genuinely enjoyed doing. So he got out of bed and changed into a pair of denim jeans, a burgundy coloured shirt and his hightop converse.

When he walks into the living room it looks like he is the first one awake, since there is nobody else to be found. He quickly gets some breakfast, although he doesn’t have a lot of choices, they really need to get some groceries. So he just eats some bread with cheese.

After he finishes his breakfast, he goes to the bathroom, brushes his teeth and at least tries to make his hair look presentable. His curls are all over the place. It takes him about 10 minutes until he is kind of satisfied with how his hair looks. He gives himself a thumbs up and a sarcastic smile in the mirror and heads out.

The school is just a short bus ride away. While he’s on the bus he texts Isa to wish her luck on her first day. She starts later than him so he didn't want to wake her up.

Before he knows it, he is standing in front of the schools entrance. It is going to be okay Lucas, you were excited remember? keep that spirit, come on. You maybe don’t know any people yet, but that comes with new experiences. He takes a deep breath and walks into the school.

When he gets inside, a girl sitting behind a desk asks what his name is so she can look him up on a list where she can find the number of the classroom he needs to be. Since he has never been here before the girl explains where he can find the classroom for his introduction. While he walks through the building, he admires some of the classrooms he can look into through the open doors or windows. The ceilings of the school are very high which makes it look very specious. The school looks very pretty and he can’t wait to spend a lot of time here.

After almost entering the wrong classroom, he finally finds the correct one.

“Hello! What's your name?” a man around the 40s asks him.

“I’m Lucas, van der Heijden,” he answers. The man sticks his hand out and says, “I’m Lambert Mertens. One of the teacher here and the student coordinator for the first years. You can take a seat at one of the tables, and I hope you enjoy your first day!”

Lucas gives him a smile. “Thank you,” he says before turning to the tables.

They are in a quite big art room. there are six big wooden tables, totally covered with paint and pencil marks. The room has large windows, which makes the room very light. On the walls hang some artworks, probably from other students, Lucas thinks.

He walks to the table in the front and gives the people who are already sitting there a nod when he sits down. He takes off his denim jacket and lays it down on the table.

After about 5 minutes, the last person enters the classroom and the door closes. They are with a small group right now, about 12 students, so they are only using the first two tables. Lambert walks to the front of the class and starts talking.

“Welcome everybody! This is going to be your first day at this school, so of course, it is kind of scary, but we want you to feel comfortable and at home. This school is a safe space with a lot of talented and nice people. Since we want you to help you enjoy your first week in the best way possible, we all have a personal student coach for you. Your coach is going to show you the whole school and give you all the information you need. You can keep in contact with them over the first few weeks. So, when I say your name you can come to the front and I’ll introduce you to your student coach.”

“Rick Willems, your coach is Elvin Petersen.”

Lucas waits a few minutes until his name gets called.

“Lucas van der Heijden, you coach is Sander Driesen.”

Lucas stands up, grabs his jacket and walks to the front. A boy with bleached blond hair comes walking up to him. His outfit is almost all black, except for the white design on his shirt. This guy is fucking cool, Lucas thinks to himself

“Hey, I’m Sander. A third-year art student, nice to meet you,” he says with a warm smile while shaking Lucas’s hand.

“I’m Lucas, nice to meet you too,” he says while smiling back.

“So, I’m going to show you some of the basic rooms but also a few of my favourites spots in the school. I’ve always liked this school, mainly because it is almost always open. You can get a room to paint or to draw any time you want.”

“That’s awesome.”

“Well I don’t know what we're still doing here, kom.” he grabs Lucas’s arm and leads them out of the room.

The whole day is filled with Sander showing him places and Lucas admiring everything he sees. They went to the different type of classrooms, he showed him where he can find new paints, brushes, canvases etcetera, they visit the cafeteria and even the schoolyard.

After walking around in the schoolyard, they both take place on a bench.

“So what do you think?” Sander asks while looking at him.

“pretty awesome, can’t wait to start classes and really work here on stuff.”

“I’m glad you’re excited, this is really going to be like your second home,” Sander says. “Do you live around here?”

“Just moved in yesterday, with one of my friends from the Netherlands, in a student residence. There is a lot happening in just a few days, new city, new school, new people, even a new country for god's sake,” he says laughing.

Sander laughs back. “I get it is a lot, but I love Antwerp, so I hope you’re gonna enjoy your time here.”

“Yeah, I’m gonna make the best of it. Do you also live in Antwerp?”

“Yes, in a small apartment, together with my boyfriend.” His face immediately lights up when he mentions his boyfriend.

“Really? That’s awesome. How long have you been together?” Lucas asks curious.

“About a year and 10 months,” he responds immediately with his smile widening. “His name is Robbe, he is so amazing. Truly the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Lucas watches him stare off into the distance with that dopey smile on his face. He can tell that this guy is in love, deeply in love. He is kinda jealous of him. He looks so happy and peaceful, like he totally knows what he wants to do with his life. Just because of one guy.

One guy. Is Lucas ever going to find one guy? The one, for him? His mind suddenly wanders to some raven coloured hair, a pair of pretty brown eyes glistening in the light. The guy is tall and-

“Sorry,” Sander giggles while interrupting Lucas’s train of thoughts. “I always get carried away when I’m talking about Robbe.”

Lucas refocuses his thoughts back to Sander. “It’s fine, I get it. It must be amazing to already have found the one for you,” he says with a little sad smile.

“Yeah, it really is. I would never even dare to dream that this could happen to me, but here I am,”

“Aren’t you dating anyone?” Sander asks.

“No, I haven’t for a while. The situation was all a bit stressed back home and I just wasn’t looking for anything.”

“But you live here now, so do you want to start dating again? It can be fun you know. It is also nice to have someone who really listens to you and who gets you. ”

“I have people where I can tell everything to, don’t need a relationship for that.”

“But that’s different, there are some things that are easier to explain to someone you really love and who loves you back.”

“Are you love adviser in your free time or something?”

Sander laughs. “You know what I mean.”

“Hhm, yeah I do. I would like to start dating again but I’m not the best at stepping up to some random guy,” he says while not making direct eye contact with Sander. He may have fully accepted himself and his sexuality, but sometimes he’s still scared of how others will react. Which is a bit silly now, since Sander has a boyfriend himself.

And just as he expected, Sander doesn’t think anything of it. “What are you talking about, you don’t need the be afraid, look at you! You have the whole package,” Sander says with a smile while lightly elbowing him in his side.

Lucas laughs. “Thought you had a boyfriend?”

“Yes, but that doesn’t mean I’m blind. I can still tell if someone is attractive.”

Lucas rolls his eyes. “Okay mister smarty pants, don’t you have anything else to show me?” he says while waving his hands to the school.

Sander laughs and stands up to lead Lucas into a new part of the school.

After a whole day of walking around the school and getting to know each other it’s time to head home.

“So, we’re kind of skipping my favorite spot in the school, but I’m not sure if I’m ready to show you that yet.” Sander says a bit insecure.

“That’s fine, is it like a spot you like to work in?”

“Yeah, it is almost my own room, since I’m the only one using it and they gave me the key.”

“That’s cool, to have your private working spot here at school. Then you can always find some peace when you need it. So I get you don’t feel like sharing your own space immediately, and that you don’t want some random dude like me waltzing in.”

Sander didn’t expect Lucas to get him so well, that it for him indeed is like a safe space at school.

“That’s true, but also the fact that half of the room is covered in paintings and drawings of my boyfriends face, kinda creepy.”

Lucas laughs. “Well, when you’re ready, i’d like the see it someday.”

“I will, you seem like a genuine guy.”

“Thanks, and also thank you for today, you’re a really good tour guide.”

“How many stars on booking.com?” Sander asks with a grin, trying out his inside joke with robbe on somebody else.

Lucas looks confused for a second, but then he answers. “You use booking.com? Nah man, I’d rather use Tripadvisor. They have way better deals.”

Sander is again taken aback by Lucas answer but he laughs.

“Ouch, that hurts. I’m really fond of booking.com you know? Don’t disrespect it like that, and I still want my rating.”

“Okay then, from 1 out of 5? I’ll give it a 4, because you are a nice guy willing to spend his day walking around with a random dutch dude.”

“You’re kidding me, why not 5? I’m the best tour guide you could get around here,” he says with fake offendence.

“I’m sorry dude, but you still need some improvement in explaining things in less than a half hour.”

“Everything i tell you is interesting! I’m just really passionate about some things, isn’t that good?”

“Yeah, but sometimes a bit boring you know,” Lucas teases.

“And here I was, thinking we could be friends…”

“I’m kidding, I loved everything you told me.”

“Well good, because I was going to ask you for your number. Not only for school related stuff, we could hang out one day if you like.”

“Yeah, of course,” Lucas smiles, happy that he already made a friend on his first day.

They exchange numbers and say their goodbyes. It really was a good first day.

#hope you enjoy #van der stoffels #wtfock #skam nl #vds week #i don't want to be your friend i want to kiss your neck #Lucas van der heijden #fic

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mikauzoran · 5 years ago

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Adrienette: Serendipity: Fifty Marichat and Adrienette Kisses: Kiss Eighteen

Read it on AO3: Serendipity: Fifty Marichat and Adrienette Kisses: ...as encouragement.

“What did I miss?” Adrien called as he trotted up to his friends waiting at the bottom of the school’s front steps.

“Marinette’s going to win this contest Hermès is holding,” Alya announced with a smirk. “You know. No big.”

“Alya,” Marinette sighed in exasperation. “I haven’t entered yet. I haven’t even come up with a design.”

Adrien gave Nino a fist bump in greeting before turning to beam at Marinette. “Yeah, but you’re going to win once you do.”

“I don’t know about that,” Marinette mumbled, looking back down at her sketchbook.

“I do,” Alya snickered. “Listen to the boy. He knows what he’s talking about. He’s a fashion thoroughbred.”

Adrien blushed, finger going to tug at his collar. “Uh, technically, I think I’m more of a nouveau riche upstart, but I definitely know a thing or two about fashion, and you’ve got talent, Marinette. What kind of contest is it?”

“Ties,” she sighed, trying to hide how red her cheeks had become at his praise. “The artistic director for the men’s line, Véronique Nichanian, is going to be judging the finals herself, so I really want something that’s going to stand out.”

Nino gave Adrien a nudge. “Didn’t you do some modeling for Hermès a year or so ago when your father was pimping you out to other fashion houses to quote-unquote ‘expand your resume and build up the foundations of your career’?”

Adrien sighed, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Yeah. That happened.”

“Well, hook a girl up,” Alya chuckled, giving Adrien a teasing shove. “Not that I don’t think Marinette can win on her own merits, but having an edge never hurt anyone. What kind of insider knowledge do you have?”

“Nothing really,” Adrien admitted shamefacedly. “I wish I could be more helpful, but the only piece of advice I can think of is to do a fun, quirky pattern, but camouflage it so that it doesn’t look tacky. Like, Hermès does have some silly patterns. For example, there’s this one with horses and jockeys up in the clouds, and then on the reverse side it has the horses and jockeys with parachutes.”

Nino cracked up. “Seriously? And let me guess…they want, like, two hundred euros for it, yeah?”

Adrien shrugged helplessly. “It’s hand-sewn silk?”

Nino shook his head sadly. “Mec…no. Two hundred euros for a silly tie? That’s criminal.”

“Okay,” Adrien admitted. “That one’s a little…less sleek, in my opinion, but then they have this one tie I actually really like.”

“Also probably for two hundred euros,” Nino chuckled, elbowing his best friend playfully.

“It’s got a bunch of little blue fish on it,” Adrien explained, giving Nino a light shove. “From afar, it just looks like a normal tie with a small geometric pattern repeating, but when you get up close, you can tell that they’re fish, and it’s kind of funny. It looks professional at a distance, but up close it’s a quirky tie. I think that’s the kind of design the judges will be looking for.”

Marinette, who had been hanging on Adrien’s every word, nodded, making mental notes.

As if coming to an important realization, Adrien gave a start and hurriedly added, “Only if that’s what you’re inspired to do. I don’t want you thinking you have to limit yourself based on what I said. I don’t really know what I’m talking about, and you have such a sharp instinct for this kind of thing, so…just do whatever you think is best.”

“No, I really appreciate your input,” Marinette assured, stepping in across the little circle their group had formed to rest a hand on his forearm. “In the end, I’ll go with my gut, but what you said gave me some ideas, so I think I’m off in the right direction. Do you think there’s anything I should avoid doing? Any colours or patterns or subjects?”

Adrien bit his lip as he considered briefly. “A lot of their products have the H logo all over them. I think they’ve done the H in all the ways it’s possible to turn an H into a design element. I know you’re super innovative, but I think that, since it’s their signature thing, they’ve probably seen pretty much everything and have higher standards for what they want in that kind of design, so it might be really hit or miss. I’m not saying to play it safe, but maybe save tackling a new take on one of the signature elements of their branding for later.”

“Noted,” Marinette affirmed.

“Also, maybe avoid horses,” Adrien added with a grimace. “It’s another one of their things. I’m sure plenty of other people do horses, so if you do horses, you might not stand out unless your design is over and above amazing—which I’m sure it will be anyway, but—and, besides, they already have a lot of merchandise with horses on it, so I don’t know that that’s what they’d be looking for.”

“Why horses?” Nino couldn’t help but wonder aloud…though, he wasn’t sure he actually wanted to know.

“If I remember correctly, the company founder originally made luxury leather goods like saddles and stuff for English nobles for horseback riding. So, yeah. Lots of horses,” Adrien explained with a smile and a shrug.

Nino frowned. “I mean…I guess that’s legit.”

“So, do you have any ideas now?” Alya excitedly inquired of Marinette…who didn’t respond because she was already absorbed in her sketchpad, quickly drafting the beginnings of a handful of possible designs.

The squad watched in awed silence as Marinette’s pencil moved frenetically across the page.

Less than five minutes later, she had three rough sketches and half a dozen other fledgling ideas in the works.

“What do you think?” She flipped the sketchbook so that the others could see the page with her quick sketches and notes on colour.

Adrien’s eyes went wide as he observed that the designs were all Chat Noir-inspired.

The first featured green paw prints on a black ground, spaced close together and turned around anticlockwise on their axis so as to give the impression of cohesive dynamism.

The second was black cat heads on a rose-pink background that had the same effect as Adrien’s fish tie. From a distance, it would look like a respectable, grownup tie, but up close you could see the fun in the design.

The third had miniature Chat Noir batons arranged in staggered, downward diagonal lines that, again, looked like a normal tie design from farther away.

“That’s amazing,” Adrien breathed, looking up at Marinette as she stowed the sketchbook back in her satchel. “Did you seriously just come up with all these right now, in, like, five minutes?”

Marinette smiled shyly, tucking a bang behind her ear as she shrugged. “What can I say? You really inspired me.”

A surge of joy and pride and love welled up in his chest.

His girlfriend was the most talented, incredible woman, and he wanted to put her up on a pedestal so that everyone could see how awesome she was. And yet, she was so humble about her gift and her achievements, going so far as to pretend that he had anything to do with her genius.

He took her by the hands and watched as her eyes went wide, locking with his.

“You are so amazing, Princess,” he cooed, overwhelmed by her greatness and the miracle that a girl so out of his league could be interested in him. “You’re going to win this contest. I know you are. Do you even know how epic you are?”

She opened her mouth to reply but was cut off as Adrien leaned in, catching her lips in a short, sweet, bolstering kiss.

Marinette froze as her brain tried to reboot.

Alya gasped even as she mentally lamented the fact that she hadn’t been recording this momentous occasion.

Nino cursed under his breath, preparing to build his bro back up after Adrien inevitably got shot down.

“I am so proud of you,” Adrien continued obliviously as he pulled out of the kiss. “You’re going to have your own label before you graduate.”

“Adrien!” Marinette hissed as her system came back online, pulling back and turning away.

Adrien blinked, shrinking slightly at her sharp tone. “What? I think it’s true.”

“Adrien, you can’t kiss me like that,” she groaned.

“…Oh, crap,” he breathed, covering his face with his hands. “I did it again. I am so sorry, Marinette. I don’t—”

“—Back up,” Alya interrupted. “‘Again’? As in, this has happened before?”

“Al,” Nino growled warningly.

Alya didn’t seem to hear him. “How many times have you guys kissed behind my back?”

“Three now?” Adrien mumbled miserably.

“Alya, this is serious,” Marinette chided. “I have a boyfriend—a serious boyfriend.”

Alya rolled her eyes. “Who I’ve never met and don’t even know the name of. Girl, you may have given up on Adrienette, but I haven’t. If my ship is sailing, I deserve to know.”

“Alya,” Nino snapped even as he put one arm around Adrien’s shoulders and rested the other hand on Adrien’s forearm. “Situational awareness much?”

To Adrien, he directed a soft, comforting, “Hey, it’s okay, Mec. It’s going to be okay.”

“This is kind of a big deal,” Alya huffed. “My bestie could easily have the man of her dreams, but, instead, she’s insisting on pretending to have some fake boyfriend she made up because she’s afraid to accept happiness and the good things the universe has sent to her. Clearly, an intervention is necessary for the good of both of our best friends.”

“He’s not fake!” Marinette retorted vehemently. “I told you, I met him online. We game together, and I only know his username, but he’s a real guy, and we’re really dating, so I can’t be making out with other blondes behind his back.”

“The good of our best friends?” Nino snorted crossly. “Right now, I think the best thing for our best friends is to keep them from getting akumatized.”

“I am so sorry,” Adrien repeated powerlessly, unsure of what else he even could say.

Nino gave him a squeeze. “It’s okay, Mec. Why don’t we head down by the river and try to calm down, yeah?”

“Sounds like a plan,” Marinette huffed, making a break for it and striding off towards the bakery. “I’m going home.”

“Marinette!” Alya called and started to chase after her.

Nino sighed, briefly watching them go before getting back on task.

“Come on, Adrien,” he gently coaxed, leading Adrien down onto the walkway along the river.

They found an empty bench and sank onto it, Adrien snuggling up against Nino’s side and dropping his head onto Nino’s shoulder while Nino wrapped an arm around his friend and gave another supportive squeeze.

“It’s okay,” he repeated like a mantra, keeping an eye out for purple butterflies. “It’s okay.”

“I think I just ruined things with the person I’m desperately in love with,” Adrien responded blandly. “I don’t think it’s okay.”

Nino was silent, contemplating for a moment before he amended, “It’s going to be okay. I’m going to make this okay for you, all right? Marinette’s still going to be friends with you, and everything’s going to be fine, yeah?”

Adrien didn’t have the energy to engage in optimism. “I royally screwed up, Nino.”

“Yeah, but what you did wasn’t unforgivable,” Nino tried to comfort. “Things can be patched up. You’ll see. Just hang in there for me right now, okay? Try to think happy thoughts.”

Adrien managed an affirmative grunt.

And then his phone chimed with an incoming text.

There on the screen was a short message that restored his strength.

Marinette had written: “I’m not mad at you. <3 Everything’s fine between us.”

Adrien tipped the screen so that Nino could see and then smiled up giddily at his friend.

“There you go,” Nino chuckled. “Everything’s fine.”

Adrien sighed, sinking back into Nino. “No, it’s not. Wanna hear a secret?”

Nino shrugged. “Sure.”

“I’m Marinette’s boyfriend.”

It felt really good to finally get it out into the air.

Nino took a deep breath, schooling his expression into a cautious neutral before responding. “…The one she plays online games with?”

“Yep. She doesn’t know it’s me, and you can’t tell her. She has her reasons, but she won’t let me reveal my identity to her, so…I keep accidentally kissing her because she’s my girlfriend, but she doesn’t know she’s my girlfriend, so…we end up having scenes like the one you just witnessed,” Adrien wearily informed.

“…Dude,” Nino replied poignantly.

“Yeah,” Adrien sighed.

“You have to tell her,” Nino insisted. “No joke.”

“Yeah,” Adrien repeated. “It’s complicated. I don’t want to talk about it.”

Nino pursed his lips, trying to process. He wanted to tell Adrien that nothing too bad had happened when Nino and Alya found out about Rena Rouge and Carapace’s secret identities. (In fact, Alya had seen through Carapace right away, so…) And nothing bad had come of Nino being ninety-nine-point-nine-repeating percent sure that Adrien was Chat Noir, so…

Nino took a deep breath and let it out, giving Adrien’s hair a distracted tussle. “Well…if…when you do want to talk about it, I’ll be here. You know you can talk to me about anything, right? Anything.”

“Yeah,” Adrien breathed, snuggling in closer, resting his head under Nino’s chin. “Yeah, I know. I want to, and I know I can trust you with anything, but…I can’t talk about it right now.”

“Okay,” Nino agreed, letting his chin rest on top of Adrien’s head. “Okay.”

“Thank you,” Adrien hummed, closing his eyes and letting himself relax.

#Adrinette #Adrienette #Marichat #Miraculous Ladybug #Miraculous Ladybug Fanfiction #Adrien Agreste #Marinette Dupain-Cheng #Chat Noir #Nino Lahiffe #Alya Césaire #Kissing #Writing Prompt #Mikau's Writings #Serendipity: Fifty Marichat and Adrienette Kisses

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starkerforlife6969 · 6 years ago

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Starker Highschool AU - Natasha is Tony’s sister

“Keep it down tomorrow tonight, short stack. My boyfriend’s coming over after school and I’m not sure he wants to hear you mangling the violin.”

Natasha looks up from her homework and stares at her brother in the doorway; lips parted in surprise. Tony’s going for nonchalant, which of course, she can see through in an instant. He may be two years older than her, but Natasha is a particularly observant fifteen year old. “Your boyfriend?” She says, a grin spreading across her face when Tony shifts a little uncomfortably.

“Yes.” He bristles, not quite making eye-contact. “My boyfriend.”

“Since when do you-“

“Since none of your business. Gonna be chill about this or not?”

She lifts her eyebrows and mimes zipping her lips. Tony half-smiles at her: soft and gentle, the sort of smile that says she’s the only one he’s told about his boyfriend, the sort of smile that lets her know that even though he’s a complete dick, he’s a good guy at heart, and a good brother too. She loves him, really. So she says: “My silence will only cost you thirty dollars.”

He smirks at her, and tosses some cash onto her bed. “Jokes on you, short stuff, I was prepared to go to fifty.” And then he wraps his knuckles against her doorframe, and disappears down the hall.

She huffs, rolling her eyes, and turning back to her notebook.

But she doesn’t stop thinking about it. Tony, her brother, Tony has a boyfriend.

Tony doesn’t do boyfriends. He does hook-ups at parties that become the talk of the school and Nat tries not to listen to the gossip or the rumour mill as it goes around and around. A few times, older kids have come up to her, tried to ascertain the truth over a certain one-night stand and she’ll glare at them until they turn away.

But a boyfriend. He must be special. She taps her pencil against her desk and thinks. Is it someone from school? Maybe. She wonders who.

She wonders what they might be like and shudders a little.

Tony dresses like a complete douchebag. He rides his stupid motorbike to school (and okay, yes he does give her a ride from time to time which is pretty cool, but also, no, he’s her big brother, so he’s not cool at all), and he wears black leather jackets and sunglasses inside. He thinks he’s better than everyone else and brags about all his science fair trophies with no degree of humility.

He’s cocky, arrogant and constantly sarcastic.

She can only imagine what horror his boyfriend will be.

Still, she rolls her neck and turns back to her work, it’s only a high school romance, and she knows from experience that those don’t last.

*** “Your hair looks-“ Bruce trips over his shoelaces and hastily rightens himself “-really nice. R-really good.”

She smiles, flicking the vibrant red for effect. “Scarlet suits me, right?”

Bruce nods eagerly, and nearly careens right into an open locker. She catches him by his backpack last minute, and he smiles gratefully.

“So, your brother’s in my brother’s grade, right?” She asks.

Bruce nods as he starts slotting in his textbooks. “Sure, why?”

“Apparently,” she drops her voice into a whisper, not trusting the roaming ears of the hallway, “Tony has a boyfriend?”

Bruce blinks in surprise, before shaking his head and grinning. “Your brother is so cool, honestly, I want to be just like him when I-“

Natasha resists the urge to throttle him, and decides that since Bruce is in science-infatuation mode over her brother’s lame AI tech, that maybe the best person to ask is Clint. She shoots him a text and he replies by saying he’s got a free period later.

The bell rings and Bruce locks up. “Good luck on your recital this Friday! I wish I could make it!”

Nat shrugs, slinging her backpack on. “It’s just another violin thing. You’ll catch the next one.” And then she reaches forward and ruffles his hair.

Bruce bats at her, and scurries away.

* Clint, as it turns out, has information.

It’s not a boy from this school, but-

“Murberry Academy across town,” he says, mouth full of chips. The teacher on duty keeps glaring at him, but he hasn’t noticed. “That’s what I heard.”

Natasha leans back in her chair, thinking. She doesn’t know anyone from Murberry Academy. But she does know about it. “Super preppy school- the one with the blue blazers?”

Clint nods, licking cheesy dust off his fingers. She tries not to make a face. Boys are gross. “Yeah. So, your brother probably met his bae at a party or something.”

She does make a face at that. “Not bae. Never say that again. You’re banned.”

“Hey, Nat?” Comes a whispered voice, and Natasha turns only to feel her whole face bloom bright red as Pepper leans over with her stupid gorgeous face- “Do you have a pen I can borrow? Mine ran out?”

Natasha hands one over with sweaty fingers and what she hopes is a smile, but might be a grimace-

“Well that,” Clint mutters, laughing and choking on his snack, “was smooth.”

Natasha hits him, and it’s worth the apology the teacher makes her give.

There’s a big part of her that wants to play really loud music that night. Howard and Maria are out, like normal, and she knows Tony is getting ready. She wants to blast Taylor Swift or one of her podcasts, or maybe practise for her recital- but there’s thirty dollars in her purse, and she doesn’t want Tony to chicken out.

She’s curious.

So, when she hears Tony leave his room, she bolts out of hers, and follows him to the kitchen.

He’s wearing a tight black tee and dark jeans, and his hair is messy in that bedhead kind of way that meant he spent ages on it-

“Oh god,” he groans when he sees her, shooing her away. “Go. You’re banished.”

She laughs, sitting up at the breakfast bar in her pyjamas and shakes her head. “No way. I wanna meet him. What’s his name?”

Tony rolls his eyes, and he starts pulling stuff out of the cupboards. Flour, sugar, eggs- Nat frowns and wonders just how nervous he is. “Oh, right, his name, how could I forget? It’s- none of your business.” And then he pats her head with the newspaper.

She reaches forward and grabs the pot of frosting he’s taken out, popping the lid and digging out some with her finger. She’s watching her brother through her lashes, trying to be discreet, because he’s agitated, pacing, he’s a little sweaty, which is- weird. He must- the thought seems odd, he must really care about this guy.

So, she swallows her frosting, and goes for casual: “You know, Spongebob-Uglypants, I’ll probably like him, right? I like Clint, and Clint is a piece of garbage sometimes.”

Tony relaxes, just a little. “He’s uh- special.” He admits, rubbing the back of his neck.

Natasha wants to say: high school relationships don’t last and how long have you even known him?

But she doesn’t. She just offers the chocolate icing to Tony who takes some gratefully.

And then the doorbell rings.

Nat beams and Tony groans, and goes to answer it.

There’s silence for a moment and then-

“Oh my god, you taste like chocolate!” Comes a bubbly voice, and Natasha frowns, because that doesn’t sound like a motorbike riding, black leather wearing piece of boyfriend material-

And then they walk in.

She can’t help but sputter.

The guy next to Tony is- he’s- what the fuck.

He’s all small and dainty, with pastel highlights in his curly, light brown hair. He’s wearing a pink sweater and beige corduroys and he looks like- he’s- sweet- and friendly looking and- he smiles brightly once he sees her, and Natasha cannot compute because her brother is all in black, stone-faced and sarcastic, but this boy is-

“You must be Natasha!” He squeals delightedly, bounding forward with an outstretched hand. She shakes it in disbelief, eyes flitting to Tony for confirmation that this is a joke. It must be. “Tony’s told me so much about you! Oh my gosh, you guys look so alike!”

At that, both Tony and Natasha recoil.

Tony grabs Peter’s wrist, tugs him into his side and settles a hand instinctively onto his waist and Peter cuddles him automatically.

Oh god. This isn’t a joke.

This is- this is Tony’s boyfriend, this is-

“Peter,” Tony introduces, “this is my sister. She’s promised not to be annoying today.”

“Don’t think I promised that,” Natasha quips, finally dragged out of her stunned silence. She looks over Peter again, at the bright colours and big honey eyes. “Peter, how did you and my brother meet?”

Tony looks pained. “We don’t have to-“

“Oh, it’s so sweet!” Peter gushes, “I go to Murberry and we were having a decathlon contest against your school and I got lost on my way back from the bathroom and I ran into Tony! He was so sweet and funny! And we just hit it off, right, my gorgeous scientist?” Peter nuzzles Tony’s neck and presses a sweet kiss to his cheek and Natasha bites back her laugh because this is brilliant.

She needs to start recording this.

Tony looks like he’d kill her if she tried.

“That’s right, babe,” Tony sighs, sounding resigned to his fate.

Peter pouts up at him. “No, call me by the nickname you call me all the time-“

Natasha can’t help the giggle that slips out, and Tony glares at her without any heat before whispering: ‘bambi’ right into Peter’s ear.

Oh god. This is everything. Her brother is a softie. Oh god. His weakness is pretty boys who are on decathlon teams-

“We’re about to make cookies for the charity fun run winners, Nat!” Peter exclaims, as he and Tony walk around the counter. “Do you want to join us? Oh Tony! You got the white flour just like my Uncle- you didn’t have to! You are so sweet!” And he’s tiptoeing and kissing Tony again and-

This is brilliant. Her brother is a sweet, thoughtful softie. He’s not a cool guy at all. And all the ingredients on the counter now make sense.

Tony gives her a look that says: stay and die.

So, she decides to do him a favour. “I would, Peter,” she smiles warmly, because Peter is sweet and she likes him enormously. “But I have a lot of homework to do. Say bye before you go though, okay?”

“Okay! Good luck on your homework!”

“Yeah, yeah,” Tony mutters, practically shoving her out.

For the rest of the evening, she hears Peter’s giggles and her brothers own, softer laughs. Laughter she’s never heard from him. She hears the low murmur of their conversation, and then silences where she tries not to think too hard about what’s happening.

When it hits midnight, and she needs to go to bed, she leaves her bedroom to tell Peter goodnight, and she finds her brother and his boyfriend on the couch, snuggled into each other, watching an old Friends episode.

“Natasha,” Peter blinks drowsily, sitting up. He’s so cute, he’s like a deer- oh. Bambi. “Hey,” he smiles, “wha’ time is it?”

She smiles back, “it’s almost midnight.”

“I need to be heading home,” Peter sighs, and Tony grumbles, half-asleep.

“Stay the night, bambi, please.”

Peter blushes a little, and kisses Tony’s nose. “I wish I could, handsome.”

Tony yawns, forcing himself up. “I’ll pick you up after practise tomorrow,” he promises, kissing Peter on the mouth, and Nat looks away politely.

“Only if you bring a spare helmet,” Peter chirps, and Tony swats at him but misses. His fingers are curled into Peter’s sweater, like he doesn’t want him to go, and Natasha can’t-

It was funny, before, with the flour in their hair and the pet names, but now- it’s just sweet and soft and warm and-

She thinks of Pepper and feels a little lonely.

After bidding Peter goodnight, Tony stares at her, as if waiting for the jokes to come, but she doesn’t have any. Okay, she does, but not for tonight.

“He’s nice,” she says, as lightly as she can, “I like him a lot. Plus, the house smells like cookies. It’s a yes from me.”

Tony scratches his chin where his awful, patchy, teenage stubble is starting to make an appearance. “It’s a yes from me too, squirt,” he says fondly, and they both go to bed.

* Natasha’s a protective little sister, just like Tony can be a protective older brother, so she stalks Peter’s facebook a little.

It’s all just gut-wrenchingly charming.

He posts an inordinate amount of cat memes but also lots of photos of him and Tony, and in all of them, Tony is a stoic-faced figure, effortless suave and leaning back with perfect hair in dark clothes, with Peter as his rainbow-splashed companion, with his huge smile and sun-dappled freckles.

Peter tags Tony in pretty much every post she sees and Tony replies to them all without fail.

Her brother is a sap, and honestly, Natasha’s kind of here for it.

Peter adds her on facebook and she hits accept- and then suddenly she’s getting tagged in stuff.

Stuff like tag the prettiest girl you know and who rocks red hair the best and- damn it, she’s getting more and more fond.

She hopes they don’t break up. She hopes high school relationships last.

Peter even comes to her recital. Rushes up to her back stage afterwards, flushed with glee, and gushes over how “amazing you are- oh god, you’re just- you’re amazing! Please tell me you want to be a violinist when you grow up.”

She laughs, glowing with pride and the rush of the performance, and shakes her head. “I don’t think so, it’s just a hobby. I’m glad you liked it though, Peter.”

“I just- Tony said how good you were, but you blew me away and-“

“Wait.” She cuts him off; surprised, “Tony said I was good?” Her arrogant, know it all brother said-

Peter rolls his eyes like she’s being silly. “He’s always talking about you! I feel like I already know you! He brags about you all the time. How you’re a black belt already, and how you stood up for that girl by punching that waiter in the face! And that he loves listening to you play- he’s come to all your recitals!”

She shakes her head, heart pounding with emotion. “That’s not- he hasn’t-“

Peter laughs, eyes crinkling, “he has! He takes a photo of you each time, he has an album on his phone- oh wait.” Peter suddenly looks worried, “that might be a present for you- oh no! Act surprised? Please?”

She can’t find the words.

She pulls Peter into a hug and shakes her head. “Tell my idiot brother I love him okay? And tell him to never let you go.” She says into his ear.

Peter beams, and kisses her cheek. “Okay! And there’s someone waiting to talk to you outside! They asked me to tell you!” And then he’s gone, no doubt to his very-in-love boyfriend aka her brother. Will wonders never cease?

Natasha puts on her coat, and goes out into the cool, crisp air of the parking lot.

Pepper’s standing there, holding a rose.

#starker #tony x peter #high school au #young tony #young peter #fluff #tooth rotting fluff #happy ending #dating #tony and natasha are siblings #natasha x pepper #tony is a softie #tony stark has a heart #slightly fem peter #precious peter parker #petnames #cute shit honestly #well i think so #popular tony

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chloeillustrator · 4 years ago

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Post 1: CV & Online Portfolio

The first thing I did after been given this course module was deeply considered what future career I possibly wanted to get into after I finish university for I could use this module to build my client connections and/or my portfolio around this future career and help myself for when I finish university. Thinking hard and looking into the different career paths illustration could take me and remembering past university modules. I realised how much I really enjoyed book illustrating so I looked into that career path, looking online at existing book illustrators such as Dan Santat, and discovered that becoming a children’s illustrator appealed the most to me since I feel like my art style and passions work best for children media. So, going forward into this client studies module, I had the idea of a children’s illustrator in mind.

After talking to the work placement partner Laura, I realised I would need to do some preparations before applying to placements, such as creating a new CV and online portfolio. I have had a CV before but it was very basic and designed more for retail jobs, not illustration work, so I looked on Behance and Guru for existing examples to get some ideas on how to create an illustrator CV.

I discovered I gravitated towards the more graphic CV’s with illustrations instead of photographs, I liked how more unique and personal they felt and how they showed off their art styles and brand. With this in mind, I started to consider what my style and brand was, looking at my artwork I could see a running theme of bright colours, simple lineless art and a child-like charm which suited the children’s illustrator career path I had in mind thankfully; so, I decided to design towards this mindset.

I was unsure how to start but decided that the information was the most important since that is the purpose of the CV so I started to add that onto the page. I quickly realised that this was my first opportunity to make it more personal, so I when onto Calligraphr, downloaded the template and digitally designed my own font using my handwriting. This was fun and was a great skill to learn for the future especially if I want to do children’s book in the future since I won’t have to worry about the copyright of the font and can make it personal and stylised to fit alongside the illustrations.

After putting all the information I wanted to include such as my previous work experience, what software I use and some brief information about myself I realised there wasn’t as much room as I wanted for illustrations. I discovered that layout is not my strongest skill, I couldn’t work out how to layout the text with enough space for illustrations while not making the text hard to read, I tried to use the CV examples I found but I didn’t want to straight-up replicate them since I want my CV to represent my style and stay true to my strengths and weaknesses. I manage to somewhat fix this by cutting down some of the information and just briefly mentioning stuff by name and date only but there still wasn’t much room left. So, I prioritied the illustration I knew I wanted to include, an illustration of myself that show off my art style and the logos of the software I use, after doing this the CV still looked a little plain but I wasn’t sure what other illustrations I could do, so I thought maybe showing off another aspect of my style which was my use of bright colours so getting the colour I like the most that work best together I colour the text in my name and added spots of colour around the text to help separate it and make it more visually interesting; it also helps add to the child-like style I am trying to convey.

Looking back, I think after my experience during this client studies module and having gained more practice with text layout from personal projects, I think I would be able to improve this slightly; change the spots to more solid shapes to frame the text and add more illustrations such as a props/objects like pencils and maybe fun characters that would show off my character design skills. However, I do think this CV does best represent the style I wanted to present and helped me figure out a colour scheme I could use as an artist brand, it gave me more practice with text layout and taught me a new skill (creating a font) that will benefit me greatly in the future. I am also able to use the illustration of myself in the future to represent/market myself and I am happy enough with the final product to send this to future work placements and clients.

Next preparation I needed to do was create an online portfolio before I had just used my Instagram but it never allowed me easily show all my illustrations related to past projects, so using Wix I created an online portfolio in the same style (font & colour scheme) and my CV. I created the main page that shows an illustration from each of my projects, original work and fanart with a title when hovered over it which will lead you to another page when clicked.

Link to my online portfolio: https://chloeillustrations.wixsite.com/myportfolio

The other page show all the original illustrations and a brief description of the project. I also included an about me page, using the same illustration of myself from my CV and wrote a more detailed bio about myself to give new viewers and clients a better idea of how I am as an artist and person. I kept my portfolio simple and easy to see and navigate for all ages and to keep to my child-like brand. However, I may update it in the future to make the main page a bit more visually interesting and easier to see what each project is without the need to hover over the images but for now, the website works for what I need for this module. I may also fix the placement of the images since some on some of the pages, the images are too large, making it feel cluttered and could detract people away due to how much scrolling is needed to see my illustrations.

Overall, this taught me a lot, I hadn’t created a portfolio like this before so it was fun to experiment with website layout which slightly improved my basic layout skills, made me look into my past projects and see how much my style has evolved and made me consider who I am as a person and an artist as I wrote the bio; the bio will be helpful in the future when I may need to describe myself again in the future. Creating both the CV and the online portfolio helped me design a style from my brand as an artist and was a nice welcome back to the university course and this client studies module, warming me up for what is to come. Next, it was time to look into work placements now that most of my preparation was finished.

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anxiouslymalicious · 6 years ago

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Finding Home

A Peter Parker x (female) Reader series. This follows the events of Spider-Man: Far From Home, except with a new character; Y/N Wood, an enhanced human.

Warnings: mentions of a death and other than that, just talks of the blip and stuff like that. Oh and SPIDER-MAN FAR FROM HOME SPOILER WARNING!

This is unedited and this might be kind of bad as this is my first time writing in third person and my first time writing for Marvel. If you guys like it, I’ll continue writing this series, if not, I might delete this first part and pretend that none of this ever happened.

Anyway, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy!

Peter Parker was a nervous boy. Always fidgeting, always trying to explain himself if someone couldn’t really follow his train of thought, always scared of embarrassing himself. After all, he wasn’t too popular in school, but embarrassing himself in front of the people he saw every day wasn’t really something he wanted to, so he kept to his little friend group. Well, MJ and Ned, but they were all he needed.

After the blip and the whole battle with Thanos, Peter was almost excited to live a more normal life than he had over the past time. It was still strange to him that he had been gone for five years and some people around him had aged while others still looked the same, but the fact that everyone almost tried to push away the thoughts of what exactly had happened, gave him some kind of normalcy.

It was nice. Nice, being a silly schoolboy with a super-secret hobby and what he felt like was the biggest crush on a girl he spent a lot of time with.

Pain was a steady companion. An unwanted companion, yes, but it was always there. Not even physically, really, Peter was aware that it was something from mental origin, but it felt so bad that sometimes he wasn’t sure if it really wasn’t physical.

Especially as he put on his suit and mask and turned into the friendly neighbourhood-Spiderman, he couldn’t help but feel the pain of losing the only father figure he had ever known. He had lost a man who had given him so much, who cared for him so much, who he had grown so close to despite Stark’s efforts to keep him somewhat on distance. He felt the pain of having let down Mr. Stark, having let down his family and friends. He felt the physical pain from the battle he had fought.

And the pressure, how could Peter forget about the constant pressure from the media. The people who were now, understandably, scared of potential new threats and with three of the strongest Avengers gone, with the whole Avengers group going MIA except for Spidey, everyone kept bribing him with questions and the responsibility to keep everyone safe should another alien attack.

So, when the trip to Europe was announced, Peter couldn’t have been happier. Being in a place where Spider-Man was not present, a place where he didn’t have to care about being a hero, and instead could focus on a certain girl sounded heavenly and like the thing that he needed the most in that moment.

Especially once he had declined a call from Nick Fury himself, going to another continent was probably the only right thing to do if he wanted to stay alive. Not to mention whatever seemed to be going on between Aunt May and Happy. Peter felt uncomfortable just thinking about how close they might be.

“I have a plan.” Peter said excitedly to his best friend, Ned, as he sat down at the table next to him. Ned looked at him, wordlessly telling his friend to keep going. “Okay, first, I sit next to MJ on the flight.” Peter continued to which Ned hummed in reply. Peter’s voice caught the attention of another person in the room. Y/N, who was one of the people who hadn’t been blipped away and, thus, now shared classes with Peter and Ned, watched as the boys in front of her brabbled on.

Well, Peter was passionately and not exactly quietly talking about his plan to ask MJ out, Ned was only giving him unimpressed one-word replies. To Y/N, he really didn’t sound happy about the plan Peter had probably spend hours developing. The young girl imagined how Peter had been lying in his bed for hours and hours on end every night, trying to think of a way to ask out this one special girl, but overthrowing his plans over and over again because they were not good enough and she probably wouldn’t like them.

Y/N felt her cheeks up in embarrassment and hoped that no one was an enhanced human, like her. Her mother was, according to her father, enhanced, but she had never gotten to meet her as she died during childbirth. The young girl knew how to control her powers, but she barely used them. Not unless her father told her that she could. She didn’t trust herself enough to decide when the situation became too serious not to use them and when she should avoid using them, so she relied on the people who trained her.

“Oh, don’t forget step seven!” Ned replied with enough enthusiasm to pull Y/N out of her Peter-related daydreams.

“Step seven…?” Peter was confused at Ned’s sudden outburst and made a little note, eager for help to improve his plan.

“Don’t do any of that.” Ned told Peter dryly which surprised Y/N. She couldn’t hold back the little snort and giggle and she was sure that, even though she had slapped her hands in front of her mouth, desperate to muffle the noise, Peter and Ned had heard her. She could feel even more blood rushing to her face and tried to shuffle in her seat, hoping the ground would swallow her. Technically, it could, but she knew that she couldn’t use her powers in broad daylight in the middle of her school. So, she didn’t and just kept hoping.

Once Ned had explained to Peter why they should both be bachelors in Europe and how his plan was stupid, MJ came by. Y/N hadn’t seen her coming, but she had heard how Peter’s voice got higher, whether it was fear or excitement, though, she couldn’t determine. Peter sat with his back to her, but even if he hadn’t, the young girl still felt too mortified to raise her head from where it was resting on her desk.

But once Peter and Ned started talking to MJ, Y/N felt less mortified. Because Peter and Ned just made complete fools out of themselves as they were talking to MJ. Or more stuttering and trying to come up with excuses. Once MJ had told the boys about the VPN, she left them and walked over to Y/N.

MJ at least assumed that it was her, she recognised her hair colour and her silly behaviour when she felt embarrassed.

“What’s up dork?” she asked as she plopped down in a chair next to her. Y/N grunted in reply. MJ took out some paper and a pencil. “Stay like that, it’s the perfect misery to capture. Maybe once I’m done, you’ll be done doing… that.” She told the teenager before she started scribbling.

A smile tugged on the corners of the embarrassed girl’s lips, and before she could fight it, she was giggling, to which MJ told her: “Stop. I’m not done capturing your misery! You can’t smile now!”. She was having a hard time fighting her own smile, though, and so they soon found themselves laughing, the thought of potential embarrassment was the last thing on their minds.

Once the girls had calmed down enough to realise that they were in public and no one had seen either of them so carefree, they stopped laughing, only giving each other knowing smirks.

The sudden laughter made Peter and Ned turn in their seats only to find the edgy duo laughing loudly. Y/N and MJ had been close friends ever since MJ had been blipped away and Y/N had grown up to be the same age as MJ.

Now fortunately for her, Y/N belonged to the half of the universe that wasn’t blipped away, the harsh and barely populated world around her giving her the will and opportunity to train her powers in a way that she couldn’t before. But it had also caused the enhanced human a lot of pain, being without most of her friends and the people she considered family, she felt alone. Abandoned, even in the first few weeks of the blip. It had also filled her with rage and a wish to fight those so-called-superheroes that have ruined so many people’s lives.

She stopped feeling comfortable in things that were too colourful and her hair often looked messy from her hands running through it ever so often. Those looks attracted MJ a lot once she had been blipped back and so, she took the girl under her wings. And throughout the past eight months, the two of them had grown rather close.

Y/N’s pocket began to vibrate, her phone demanding attention. She averted her focus and noticed that her father was texting her. Something about a new mission that he would tell her about once she had gotten home. It was his way of indirectly telling her to come home immediately after school. Being the nice kid she is, Y/N made her way home immediately after school ended, only yelling a short “see you tomorrow” towards MJ when she passed her friend in the hallway.

It didn’t take her long to get home, and once she arrived at the apartment building in which she lived with her father, the girl felt tingles in her fingers and a warm feeling in her belly. The last mission, as they called it, had been fun. It had felt amazing to let out all the pent-up energy that she never got to let out in her day-to-day-life and support her father.

“Dad, I’m home!” Y/N yelled once she arrived and went straight to the kitchen to grab a snack.

“Hey, sweetheart. How was school?” the brunette man asked as he found his daughter in the kitchen, as he always did when she came home from school.

“Good.” She replied and looked at her dad with a huge grin adorning her face. He knew that she was too excited for the next mission to tell him more about school and other casualties. But he wanted to hear it from her, so he played her little game.

“Have you gotten any homework? Maybe you can do that later here in the kitchen when I’m cooking so I can help you. If I’m right, you had physics today and I know that’s not your thing- “

“DAD! Stop, please.” His daughter interrupted the word-vomit which he was purposefully using to avoid the one thing she was eager to hear about. He chuckled at her antics as she jumped up to sit on the kitchen counter, taking berries out of the container she had found earlier in the fridge.

“Well, I told you that we would have to expand the targets soon. And, as you are going on that science trip with your school, I thought about where to take the next mission. And I talked to the team.” The man started, scratching his beard as he acted as though the whole thinking process had been tough for him. And only after his daughter urged him to go on, he actually did.

“And?”

“And we came to the conclusion that Italy would be a great next target. Venice, to be exact.” He continued, making his daughter gasp in excitement. The girl promptly jumped off the counter again to hug her father, knowing that the next mission wasn’t too much of a wait and that she would be able to do her job and let some steam off while she was in Europe. It was unsuspicious enough, easy to do and, as she assumed, finally something new.

After the earth elemental and air elemental, she would finally be able to make a splash with the water elemental, something she had been looking forward ever since she started training her powers.

“Beck, we need you in the dungeon for the simulations.” Said one of the team members, his voice muffled through the door as he knocked.

“Guess we’ll have to order takeout. The mission is more important than cooking.” The girl said with a grin as she sprinted to her room to change into something more comfortable for training.

“I raised her right.” Quentin Beck said to himself with a smirk on his lips as he watched her go. “Thank god she doesn’t know the truth. Silly little girl.”

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strawbrymilkshake · 6 years ago

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the true gift...is my presence

Dad!Reigen Week 2019 Day 4: Gifts || Baking

AO3 Description: Tome enlists Mob to help show her appreciation for Reigen. (4.2k words)

Tome let out a heavy sigh, her breath bunching up, dancing around and eventually fading in the early morning air. “Boy, is it hot out here or is it just me?”

Mob cast her a glance. She was currently bundled up in a puffy, oversized down jacket, with a scarf wrapped around her neck and a garishly coloured beanie pulled down to cover her ears. He was in a similar state, hands buried deep in his pockets and shivering to try to keep warm. He had heard a newscaster somewhere say that this was one of the most severe winters Seasoning City had ever faced.

“Are you too hot in your jacket, Tome?”

She turned to him, and it was kind of awkward, her movements restricted. She chuckled dryly. “Ah, no. Nevermind.”

They went back to waiting in silence. Currently, they were in line outside of their local department store, bunched closely together between strangers, waiting for the doors to open at seven A.M. It was the second last weekend before Christmas, and Tome had insisted to Mob that they weren’t in any sort of hurry; they were waiting in line to mooch off the warmth of others more than anything else.

“This is the last gift I have to buy,” she told Mob. She kept glancing in the direction of the doors, then checking her phone for the time. 6:59. They would open any second now.

Pocketing the phone away, still awkward in figuring out the manoeuvre while wrapped in her many layers, she turned fully to Mob. Before he could figure out if she wanted him to contribute in any meaningful way to her offhand comment, she continued.

“I’ve already bought Serizawa’s gift,” she said. Her eyes were bright and her words were fast. “I got him a new pencil case and some stationery for the new school term. I think he’ll like it.” Mob smiled, amused at how Tome was now bouncing a little in her spot. “I got him this special pen that doubles as a highlighter. It’s really cool; I almost got one for myself. It’s in his favourite colour, too.”

Behind her, there was some commotion at the front doors. Mob looked over her shoulder to see that the line was now steadily streaming into the building, and that they would be swept up by the momentum any time soon.

“Ah, Tome—” he gestured behind her.

Tome looked back, and when she turned to Mob again, she had a wide, determined grin plastered across her face. “Alright, Mob! It’s time to do this!”

He nodded back, just as determined as she was, and together they marched squarely towards the doors.

The line wasn’t too long, and it wasn’t moving too quickly, either — Mob suspected that it would gradually grow bigger and more frantic as the days neared the twenty fifth, but for now it was mostly comprised of those just a bit too eager to wait until later in the day. He wouldn’t be surprised if many of the people there shared a similar personality to Tome’s. They were closer to the back of the line than the front, but in a few short moments they found themselves in the toasty, heated entrance of the store.

“It’s so nice in here,” he remarked to Tome. They had to hold their coats to adjust to the inside warmth, but it was worth it.

She nodded to him, her cheeks flush from the change in temperature. “Okay, first order of business.” At once she started down the pathway of the store, leading them further in between the items and aisles. Everything was decked out in golds, greens and reds, with tinsel glittering everywhere they looked. Mob followed close behind Tome. “If you were getting Reigen a gift, what would you buy him?”

Mob almost paused in his step, thrown off from the attention directed at him. He opened his mouth to give Tome a response, but quickly shut it when he realised that he had no real answer.

Following after her as they ambled through the store, he stopped paying attention to the countless goods, little trinkets and potential gifts lining the shelves either side of them. What would he get for Reigen? Surely, he’s gotten something for him in the past — he’s known him long enough. Although, Mob had never seen himself as one that was particularly good with gifts, so he feared that Tome may have made a mistake in bringing him along today for some help. Despite how well he knew Reigen, that didn’t make him any less unsure of what he would like to get during this season, if anything, he was more used to Reigen taking him on an ‘office holiday trip’ as an excuse to go out and eat dinner somewhere, rather than any sort of gift exchange. And besides, in the end did it really matter what Mob would hypothetically buy him? This gift was from Tome, wasn’t it? And wasn’t that the most important thing about gifts — who they came from and their own thoughts behind it?

Tome was getting impatient. “Well?”

Mob furrowed his brow. “Hm… I’m not sure.”

“What? How are you not sure? He was your master for so long!”

“Yeah, but we didn’t really do stuff like gifts. I guess he never expected me to give him one. I don’t think I ever have.”

“Not even for his birthday?”

The answer was no, but Mob hesitated to tell her that. Was it a bad thing that he never bought gifts for his master? “Uh…”

Tome huffed, but not out of annoyance. “Well, that’s fine, I guess.” Mob let out a small sigh. “You can still tell me what he likes, though, right?”

He nodded.

Mob thought it was a little fascinating that Tome could be working for Reigen for some eight months now and would still need to get his help on deciding what to buy for him. Reigen had been such an integral part of his life for so long now that he almost didn’t know how to flip that perspective, to see him through the eyes of someone new. Mob worked for him for years of his life, but he rarely saw him as often anymore; Tome hadn’t known him for as long, but she saw him just as regularly as Mob once used to. She saw what Reigen was like now, gaining access to any current changes and evolutions that Mob would no longer see as closely — he wondered, would either of them know Reigen better than the other? Was that a sort of thing you could properly judge?

He thought back to how well he knew Reigen when he was only eight months in. It seemed like ages ago; he was just a kid. Mob was so different to how he was now, too — back then, he never would have imagined that he’d have friends close enough to call him up like this out of the blue. He smiled to himself.

Over the next several minutes, the pair took to browsing throughout the store according to Mob’s suggestions and Tome’s insight on what would or wouldn’t make a good gift for Reigen. Mob didn’t know what he was expecting of the day when Tome called him up, but he found it was more of a relaxed, fun errand, or a conveniently situated catch up, rather than anything else. Tome was determined on making sure the gift for Reigen was just right, and Mob was more than happy to go along with the flow.

Eventually, conversation drifted outside of their primary mission.

“I’m not sure what to get Dimple,” Tome said once they made their way to the men’s clothes section. She was standing in front of a rack of ties, and picked up a brightly coloured, loud, green and red polka dot tie. She held it up to her neck as if to wear it. Mob snickered. “I don’t even think I’m supposed to get him something.” She walked up to a mirror, Mob by her side.

“It brings out your eyes,” he said.

Tome laughed, putting the tie away. “Should I get him something? Am I supposed to?”

Mob brought a hand to his chin, considering it. “Well…I think that if you really want to,” he started eventually, “you could get him some spirits to eat. Bring him to a place that’s really haunted.”

Tome’s eyes lit up. They started on their way from the clothes section, already having dismissed it without saying so out loud. They turned a corner. “Ohh, you’re right, Mob! That’s a really good idea!”

“What’s a good idea?” came a voice from in front of them.

Tome jumped, not just caught off guard, but completely startled. She didn’t quite scream from the surprise, but definitely yelped, before she took a second to calm down and realise who was standing in their way.

“Geez, Reigen,” she exhaled. “Don’t ever do that again.”

“Oh, sorry,” he said, but he was definitely smiling through it, “I didn’t know I’d scare you that much. Mob saw me, right?”

He hadn’t, but his reaction was much less dramatic than Tome’s had been. He blinked when he saw his old master, suddenly appearing right in the aisle where he and Tome had been searching for gifts for him, and panic rose slightly in him. Where did he come from? Were they caught? Was he going to find out what they were doing? Of course, Mob was happy to see Reigen again — it had been a while, after all — but showing up this unexpected, at this place, where Mob was certain he’d never seen Reigen before, was either some extremely apt or some extremely inappropriate timing.

“Hi, Master.”

“You can’t go around scaring people like that!” Tome chastised Reigen before Mob could speak any further.

“It’s nice to see you, too, Tome,” Reigen said, though he was putting his hands up in a show of mercy. Once he could tell that Tome was done with yelling at him, he slid his hands back in his pockets, taking in the two in front of him. “So, what’s up? What are you two doing here?”

Tome was suddenly ramrod straight in her posture. She turned to Mob silently. Mob looked at her. At that moment, all of her work into investigating telepathy started to gather in her head as she desperately tried to connect with Mob, trying to make sure he knew that Reigen was not to be privy of anything that occurred that day.

Mob stayed silent. Good.

“Are you guys on a date or something?”

Tome, her eyes still locked with Mob’s, winced a little bit.

“Uh…” Mob side-eyed Reigen.

“…Sure,” Tome finished. Hopefully, he wouldn’t question any further.

He didn’t, thankfully, nodding as if the information was just idle small talk. And it sort of was, anyway. “Have you guys been enjoying the season so far? Mob, I haven’t seen you in a while, how are you?”

“I’m doing well, Master.” And he really was. He had been wanting to catch up with Reigen, considering his school term was coming to a break soon and he’d have more time to relax before his final days at middle school kicked in — with all the stress of everything coming to an end, and the new start of high school looming in his sights, it was a sort of comfort to fall back on and talk things out with his master. Except, maybe not now, when he was technically supposed to be conspiring with Tome behind his back. “What brings you here?”

It was Reigen’s turn to be silent. He looked at them for maybe a second too long, as if his brain was dealing with low buffering speeds, before something seemed to click in his head.

“Oh! Ah, well. You know.”

Apparently that something wasn’t very eloquent or well thought out. Reigen was now surreptitiously trying to avoid eye contact, and sweat was beading across what looked like each and every single one of his pores.

“I’m, uh— It’s, nice, in here and the sales, you know, they’re starting, so…” Tome and Mob stared at him blankly. “It’s helpful for my… Groceries…”

“You’re grocery shopping here?” Tome raised an eyebrow. “This is a department store.”

Reigen didn’t have an answer for a moment or two, but he looked calm enough about it. “Yeah. You’ll, uh…you’ll understand when you’re older.”

No one said anything for a few long seconds.

“Well!” Reigen started, suddenly clapping his hands together. “It was nice seeing you two. Mob, you should come over sometime so we can catch up. Tome, I know you’re never gonna leave me alone, so I guess I’m seeing you next week?”

Tome nodded. “Sure thing, Boss!”

“Alright then. I’ll catch you guys later.” Reigen nodded to them as one final goodbye, and started heading off in the direction he’d originally been going. Tome and Mob watched him leave, until he was out of sight, off somewhere deeper in the store they couldn’t see.

They turned to each other.

“Oh, my god!” Tome bent over, resting her hands on her knees. “What’s he doing here?”

“Probably shopping.”

Tome didn’t have a response, just groaned at the general direction of the ground. “We have to make sure we don’t run into him again.”

“Are you sure?”

Tome took a deep breath as she stood up straight, placing her hands on Mob’s shoulders. “Yes. We can’t ruin the surprise. So.” She pulled him just a little bit closer. “Can you keep an eye on him for me?”

“I thought I was supposed to tell you what gift he would like?”

“The plan’s changed. You’re the lookout now. I’ll be there to help, of course; you can keep an eye on Reigen from afar, and while you’re doing that, I’ll be stealthily looking for the perfect gift. We just have to wait until he leaves before we go to buy it, or we could run into him again. Got it?”

Mob nodded.

“Okay, good. Let’s do this.”

They carried out the plan near perfectly; Mob quickly scouted out where Reigen was, and Tome made sure that he kept him in his sights at all times as they browsed the store from a distance. Any time it seemed that Reigen would spot them, they’d quickly turn and act like they couldn’t see him (“He’ll think it’s just coincidence that he can see us again. He won’t come over to talk to us. Let’s just…act natural… Oh, what a nice…fridge magnet… Is he still looking?”), but after five or six times of trying to look coincidentally busy, Mob wasn’t so sure on the plan anymore.

“Isn’t he going to get suspicious that he keeps seeing us? We’re always the same distance away, too.”

“It’s a small store, Mob. It’s not like we were never going to see each other again. We just have to wait him out.”

So, they did. Or, at least they tried to, since Reigen continued about the store for minutes upon minutes upon minutes more on end. Tome was browsing in the meantime, making use of Mob’s watching eye, but only really half-looking at the stock on the shelf. Nothing there seemed to be the right thing for Reigen. She’d have to come across something good eventually, right?

As the minutes dragged on, Mob’s certainty of the plan drew thinner. He gained Tome’s attention from where she was directing it at a pair of blue headphones decorated with stylised cat ears on top.

“Tome, it’s been almost twenty minutes. I don’t know if he’s leaving any time soon. And I’ve been watching him, he hasn’t picked up anything.”

“What?” Tome marched right up to Mob’s side, following his gaze to where Reigen was across the store. He was right; Reigen was empty handed. “Why didn’t you tell me that before?”

“Was I supposed to?”

Tome furrowed her brow and brought a hand to her chin. “No…but…”

Together they looked on at Reigen as he continued to idly browse. He wasn’t even really looking at anything; just strolling through the aisles and occasionally picking up something from a shelf before putting it back down. He did this for some time, wandering aimlessly through the store.

“Why’s he so weird?” Tome asked.

Mob didn’t have an answer.

“What is he doing?” Neither of them could make any sense of what Reigen’s main objective was, or if there even was one. “Okay, new plan,” Tome said. “Let’s just watch him for a bit and try to figure out what his deal is.”

Mob didn’t see how that was all too different from what they had just been doing, considering Tome hadn’t picked out anything they could even count as a gift. But he agreed anyway, and soon enough, the Let’s-Go-And-Find-Something-To-Buy-For-Reigen Plan turned into the Let’s-Spy-On-Reigen Plan.

A couple of minutes went by.

“He’s really not leaving, huh?” Tome deadpanned.

A couple more minutes went by, with Reigen getting no closer to the exit, and definitely getting no closer to making a purchase. Tome rubbed her temples.

“He’s not doing anything. He’s just…circling around the store,” she groaned.

“Isn’t that just what we’re doing?”

Tome’s shoulders dropped with a heavy sigh, and she stared off at some non-specific point on the ground, contemplating life. “Alright.” She snapped back upright. “I’ve had enough of this. We have to ask him what he’s doing.”

She was already marching off in his direction before Mob could agree.

They intercepted Reigen just as he was leaving the pet care section — who was he trying to fool with that? He didn’t even own a dog — and blocked him from going any further.

“Oh, hey again,” he started. “Fancy seeing you guys here.”

“Reigen,” Tome said, her tone more serious than it might have needed to be, “what are you doing?”

“Uh— What? What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean.”

“I don’t.”

“Yes, you do.”

“I assure you, I don’t.”

“I think you do know; perfectly well.”

“…Tome—”

“Master, why haven’t you bought anything yet?”

Reigen turned to Mob, dumb. He looked back to Tome, only to find her slowly narrowing her eyes, before turning back to Mob, who was waiting patiently for an answer. “Why do you want to know?”

“Hm,” Tome scoffed. “Suspicious answer.”

“Suspicious question!” Reigen rebutted. “Listen, what do you guys want? Do you want me to buy you something?”

“Oh, the opposite, actually—” Mob started, before being elbowed in the side.

“We want to know why you’re loitering in here!” Tome pointed an accusing finger at Reigen. “It’s been half an hour and all you’ve done is wander around the store.”

Reigen was quiet for some time, looking down on the two teenagers. For a second it seemed like he was going to play it off with some other quick remark, just to get these kids off his back from whatever weird scheme they’d been up to. But he was waiting too long, like he was going back over what the two had said, processing their words, their actions, their demeanours.

“Well,” he started, eyes dark — Mob recognised this expression from when they used to make house calls for exorcisms, when Reigen would give one last parting speech to whichever spirit in question. “If you really want to know why I haven’t bought anything, then why don’t you show me your purchases, huh? You’ve been here for the same amount of time I have, haven’t you? If not — longer.” He was now stepping closer to them, leaning down slightly to get in their faces — mostly Tome’s. “Because, I’m pretty sure the last I heard, browsing wasn’t a crime!”

“It is if you’re being super shady!”

“You don’t know how crime works!”

“Well, I do know how— that you have been acting weird since we ran into each other!”

“What, have you been watching me? And I’m the one who’s being super shady?”

“Um, guys?” Mob interjected.

“What?” Tome and Reigen snapped simultaneously, both turning their heads to face Mob at once.

He felt a bead of sweat forming on his forehead. “Just remember, we are in public…” He didn’t want them to disturb the other customers on their weekend morning shopping, some of whom were starting to cast glances over at the commotion.

Reigen stood up straight with a clearing of his throat. He looked down at Tome, who now had her arms crossed, looking off to the side. He wouldn’t be surprised if she was grumbling under her breath.

He clicked his tongue, then sighed, keeping himself restrained from rolling his eyes. “Tome, if it really means that much to you,” and he wasn’t sure why it did, anyway, “well… Here’s the thing.”

She was turned back towards him now, her interest piqued.

With one last sigh, he pinched the bridge of his nose. “It was supposed to be a surprise, but…”

“A surprise?” Well, at least it got Tome in a better mood.

“Yeah.” He paused again, considering his words. “So, Serizawa had the idea of throwing an office party for the holiday, and you could invite your friends, and everyone would come over and hang out…” He sucked in a breath between his teeth. “I was supposed to get the decorations, but I might have left it a little last minute? But not entirely last minute, because—! Wait, when does your break start?”

“Next week,” Tome said.

“Okay, so, it turns out I left it last minute, and I really only had time to get it done today, so… I was just kinda…hoping you guys would leave so I could buy this stuff without you noticing.”

“Oh! We were doing that, too,” Mob told Reigen.

Slowly, like she had rust in her joints, Tome pivoted in her spot to stare, eyes wide and mouth in a thin line, right into Mob’s soul. Panic dawned in his eyes. He began to mouth an apology, before Reigen spoke up.

“Is that why you guys have been acting so weird?”

Tome was still in ‘death glare’ mode as she looked at Reigen. “We haven’t been acting weird at all, Reigen. What’s happened here is that I also wanted to leave something a surprise,” she gave a look back at Mob who only grimaced, “but it seems I’ll have to play the hand I’ve been dealt.” She took a deep breath, as if steeling herself. “Mob and I came here today because I wanted to buy something — also last minute — to gift to you this season. I’ve already bought gifts for my friends at school, and for Serizawa, and I wanted to bring Mob along to help me buy something for you, too. To be honest, I had no idea what to get you. And, yeah, we were kinda spying on you… We wanted you to leave so you wouldn’t see the gift and ruin the surprise.”

“Ah,” Reigen said. His voice was a little soft. “I see.” He sniffled.

Tome was incredulous as she looked up at him. “Are…you okay?”

“Yep,” his voice cracked. He coughed. “Uh, Tome… You didn’t have to do that.”

“I wanted to, though.”

“That’s very sweet of you. Thank you, too, Mob.”

Mob was mostly watching this from the sidelines, wondering if Tome was still mad at him. He gave a small nod to Reigen.

“Honestly…the fact that you tried so hard to figure out what gift I would like is a gift enough, you know. I’m more than happy for that to be my present.”

“But—!” Tome protested. “I already bought gifts for everyone else! I can’t just exclude you from that!”

Reigen furrowed his brow, deep in thought. “Okay…how much money do you have? Oh, wait, I’m not supposed to ask that, am I? Okay, then…how long did you tell your parents that you were gonna be out?”

Tome and Mob looked at each other. “Uh…”

“At least before dark, I’m assuming?”

Tome shrugged yes.

Reigen brought his hands together. “Okay. So. Here’s what we’re gonna do. You two are gonna help me with these decorations, and make it look like I put more than just a week’s thought into them, and then after that…” He brought a hand to his chin, finalising his plan. “We can spend as long as you want in the mall, and do anything as long as it’s within my price range. How’s that for my gift?” He smirked, putting his hands in his pockets definitively.

“So,” Tome spoke with consideration, sounding everything out slowly, “your gift would just be us…saving your ass?” She turned to Mob. “Haven’t you got a little tired of that by now?”

Mob looked between Tome and Reigen, and smiled. “What’s wrong with one last time?”

Eventually, the three of them left the department store together, some many, many minutes after they had entered, arms all the more heavier from the bags swinging in their hands.

#mp100 #mob psycho 100 #dadreigenweek2019 #tome kurata #reigen arataka #smth a bit more lighthearted than yesterday's post uwu #my writing #and...with that.....ive officially written and completed three fics in a row for one fandom #oohhhhh man i usually never even finish fics for any fandom im in let alone MORE THAN ONE #LET ALONE IN A ROW #holy heck mob psycho has given me the gift of endless motivation

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