#((feel free to take over ford in the next one))

[fluffykiddosstuff]

stanford and stanley pines fighting for you (headcanons)

i just played swooning over stans and...help i'm so obsessed with these two now..here is littles headcanons for them when they are both in love with you :-)

warnings : swearing (thank you stanley), gn!reader, using they/them pronouns, mention of child abuse

context : the kids are gone, the grunkles are on adventures, so to their surprise when they came back for a month, they saw you in the living room (stanley almost hit you with a stick if ford and soos didn't got him), soos explain to them that you got banished from your home and came to the shack late at night under the rain. Pitty hitting them since they know damn well what a lonely life is, they let you stay and life goes on..well not as they expected...

stanley pines :

at first he tries to deny what he feels, you are friends, right ?

if you laugh at his jokes, swear with him against things he dislikes (tv-shows, young people ect..), and that you help him annoy poeple by stealing and other things ? My man is head over heals

you can see he start to grow fond of you when he wants to protect you even more than before, especially since he knows what is gravity falls made of

when you where gone for shopping with soos, he decided it was time to annonce it to his dear twin brother

he would talk about it while watching a romance movie with ford (even tho he said he didn't wanted to watch)

"you know, i start to kinda like them..but like like them you see.."

the pills doesn't pass well when ford says he likes you too

stan is definitely the most childish one

"let's make a bet sixer ! the first to got a date with them wins !"

he likes to come in while ford tries to show you something or even tries to speak to you

he even broke down ford's clock so he would be late to your weekly monster's chase

he still as limits of course, ford is his twin brother after all, and it's only little jokes that doesn't harm anyone right ?

will definitly show off with his boxing skills or by putting a nice suit (for exemple the one in the gif) while you all go out together for a party or something, will try to do sport everyday but heh, he is a little bit too old to do those things daily..

gives you his jacket when you are outside with him, even if you aren't cold, when he sees ford's face when he smells his cologne on you while you both work on something, i'ts worth it

gives you flowers and little gifts, puts them on your bed for you to find when you come back

verbally says what he thinks about you, while ford can't even say two lines in a phrase when all he wanted to say is that your outfit was pretty

stanford pines :

he mainly start to realise he likes you when you helped him with his reasearches for a creature, he is amazed by how much you are interested in his work and doesn't hesitate to take you as an assistant and answer all of your questions

man did he regret telling stan's about his feelins for you, now his life is a living hell (sometimes he thinks about going back in the other dimension by how stan can be extremely annoying, really)

you only get free time with him when you are both in the forest to hunt monsters, you talk for hours about many toppics

smarter than stan, he tries to make you more open around him, asking you about personnal stuff and trying to comfort you when things gets too hard for you to tell, he even experienced to make hugs (bc my dude is awkard) and he purposelly hugs you in front of stan while you are crying about something related from your abusive parents, bonus point if you say : "oh ford..what would i do without you..", he would look at his twin, sticking out his tongue in a proud grin, revenge is a plate you eat cold they said

when you are all watching a show on the t-v and that it's his turn to choose the movie, even if he is dying to watch a documentary, he puts an horror movie and sits next to you, watching you take his hand as a loud noises his heard or hugs you if you are too scared

when you both work and you pass out on a table, he first puts his long jacket on you, and if it gets too late, he takes you in his arms to put you in your bed, all while him and stan are having a "who is gonna look the more angry at eachother" contest

when stan swears , he likes to take him back, especially if you don't like that either (or if it's not the right moment or the right place to do those) of course it doesn't stop him for saying : "for fuck's sake" or "fucking little nerd" while you laugh with ford

[ckret2]

Chapter 33 of human Bill is still the Mystery Shack's prisoner:

Stan takes Bill to get fillings from a creepy dentist in the back of a white van. And also they're handcuffed together the whole time.

Hijinks ensue.

Stan was startled from reading the paper by a shrill up-and-down whistle. Bill trotted into the kitchen, his voice a singsong lilt: "Incoming!"

Stan lowered the paper to glare at Bill. "Still doing that, are you?"

"Of course! I'd hate to scare you." Bill took the chair across the kitchen table from Stan. "Gooood morni—"

"Go away." Stan determinedly returned his attention to an article about the deathball arena construction.

Bill laughed. "You're funny. Anyway!" He noted Stan's plate of eggs and salsa was hidden behind his newspaper, and quietly slid the plate across the table as he spoke. "I need you to do me the teensy, tiniest little favor—"

"Nope."

"Take me to your dentist."

"No." Stan didn't even lower his newspaper. "The last time I took you anywhere, you almost made my niece cry, my brother left a Shopliftaholics Anonymous flier on my bed, and all I got out of it was a crummy ring. You wanna go somewhere, talk to Soos."

But, Bill noted, Stan was wearing said crummy ring. "Spend a day with that loser?" He rolled his eyes. "Please. I'd rather pry out my fingernails."

"You'd probably enjoy that, you freak."

"Not the point." Bill stuffed half an egg in his mouth. "Anyway, it has to be you. I need fillings, and Dr. Illing does them for free."

Stan squinted over the top of his newspaper. "How do you know about Dr. Illing?"

"What part of 'all-seeing eye' don't you get?"

Dr. Illing was a wandering dentist who spent the warm summer months in Gravity Falls. He squeezed his van and trailer into alleys between businesses in town, where he both lived and provided dental services until the police caught wind and chased him and his van out into the woods for a few days. On days with good weather, he'd pop open the back hatch of his nondescript trailer and set up a sign that read "COME INSIDE! FREE CANDY (for new patients)". He didn't attract many customers.

What really made him stand out was his unusual pay structure. He charged typical rates for regular teeth cleaning and dental maintenance; but if a patient had a cavity, he gave them a gold filling for free, and he paid them if he needed to pull their teeth.

Stan thought he was terrific. He hadn't had to pay for dental care in thirty years! Granted, he also wore dentures now; but hey, Dr. Illing had helped pay off Ford's mortgage, and at least the dentures were on the house.

Bill said, "You're the only one in the shack who knows all the places Illing might set up shop. Besides, he might be less jumpy in front of a stranger if an existing patient can vouch for it."

"I can see where you're coming from," Stan said. "But my answer is no, because I don't wanna."

Bill scowled in irritation. He sat back and ate another of Stan's eggs as he reconsidered his approach.

"Stanley—I'm a simple shape," he said. "A simple shape who's used to being coated peak to base in pure, lustrous, 24-karat gold. Having skin makes my skin crawl. I don't need any dental work done, these teeth are fine—but I'd really, really like just a bit of gold, somewhere on my body, so I feel a little more like myself in my final days."

Stan muttered, "You're trying to appeal to sympathy I don't have, Cipher."

"And then, once I'm dead," Bill went on, "I suppose I'll be leaving behind a corpse with a mouthful of free gold that whoever's disposing of my remains can do whatever they want with, do you catch my meaning Stanley?"

Stan lowered his newspaper just enough to grimace at Bill. "That's absolutely disgusting," he said. "But okay, I'm bribed!" He tried to fold the newspaper. "If you want your mouth to fund me and Ford's next year of globe-trotting, fine by me. Least you can do for messing up our summer."

"Mhm." Bill shoveled the last egg into his mouth while Stan was distracted by the paper and slid the plate over to Stan's side.

Stan slapped the paper down. "But we're not telling Ford about this. Agreed?" He offered a hand to shake.

"Agreed." Bill took Stan's hand, with the wrong hand—but before Stan could figure out what to do with that, Bill jerked his hand back like he'd been burned. "We'll take this to our graves."

"Or to your grave, anyway!" Stan laughed loudly, slapping the table.

Bill watched him with a forced smile. "Great. Deal made. Let's go get the magic friendship bracelets and—"

"Ohhh no," Stan said. "I'm not trusting a little bit of colored lace and some mystical hocus-pocus to keep you contained. If we're going anywhere, I'm making sure you can't escape."

"Okay," Bill said, a touch warily. "Fine. How?"

####

Soos took the handcuffs out of his toolbox, removed the key and stuck it in his pocket, and asked, "What side do you want it on?"

"Left," Stan said. "Gotta keep my punching arm free." Bill rolled his eyes. 

Soos closed the cuffs on Stan's left wrist and Bill's right, then tightened Bill's half until it actually held his tiny wrist. "There."

"Ha!" Stan grinned at Bill. "Try escaping that!"

"I wasn't planning to escape."

"Sure, pull the other one." Stan pointed toward the door. "Now... to the car!"

####

They stared in dismay at Stan's car.

The El Diablo was a classic of the 1960s American automotive industry—and it was in terrific condition. (Notwithstanding the recent dents, scrapes, and keyed scratches in the paint reading "TRICK-OR-CHEATER!!") It came with the features standard to American cars of the time, like a steering wheel on the left, and a wide front bench that provided space for multiple passengers to sit to the driver's right side.

Bill was handcuffed to Stan's left side.

"Wow. You're stupid," Bill said.

"I'll break your smart mouth."

"What do I care, we're headed to the dentist anyway." He sighed. "Okay! Let's go inside and tell Questiony how stupid you are."

Stan did not want to tell Soos how stupid he was. "No! How do you know I didn't do this on purpose? Maybe having my right arm free is more important than—er... driving."

Bill considered that with pursed lips. After a pause, he ventured, "Do you want me to drive—?"

"No, no, nope, I am not letting you drive my car, under any circumstances, ever! Not a chance!"

"Then how are we doing this?"

####

Stan gripped the steering wheel with both hands, knuckles white and jaw clenched.

Bill was uneasily cuddled up against Stan's right side. The handcuff forced him to stretch his right arm across Stan's chest. 

They were both wearing tank tops. Their bare upper arms were plastered together with sweat.

They were getting cricks in their necks from how far they were tilting their heads away from each other.

On the radio, a hit 50's soul song crooned romantically, "Oh, my sweet love... you're my lovely sweetie... and I never love you more, than when you're pressed to my side... as we go for a sweet loving car ride..." Neither of them could reach the radio dial without touching each other even more. They'd silently decided to pretend as hard as possible that they couldn't hear the radio.

"Welp," Stan said. "Out of all the times I've been handcuffed in a car, this is one of the worst."

####

They spotted Dr. Illing's "FREE CANDY" sign posted surreptitiously near the barrel and crate factory, and circled the block to park the car in front of a business that looked responsible enough to file a missing persons report if the car was still abandoned there by nightfall.

They tumbled out of the driver's side door with a maneuver that looked like a cross between a waltz and a mugging. Stan kicked the door shut. As they untangled themselves, in a surprisingly decent impression of Stan's voice, Bill said, "Gotta keep my punching arm free. How's that working out for you?"

"Bold words from a guy in punching range, you little—" As Stan finally separated himself from Bill and straightened out, he caught sight of Sheriff Blubs and Deputy Durland halfway up the block. "Oh, great. Cops. Exactly what you want around when you're doing something weird." Stan shook his head. "Well, as long as we go the other way and don't make eye contact—"

"Hi Darryl! Hi Edwin!" Bill stood on his toes and waved wildly. "Hey! Working hard or hardly working? Haha!"

"Oh, hey Goldie!" Durland waved back, and he and Blubs headed their direction. "How've you been, did you have a nice Summerween?"

"Ahh, I was stuck in the house—"

"Bill," Stan hissed. "Whaddaya think you're doing? Do you want them asking questions?"

"Hey," Durland said, "Why're you handcuffed to Stan?"

Bill turned toward Stan. He smiled at him. It was a smile that said I did not think this through.

"You need some help there?" Blubs asked. "I bet we've got a key that matches that handcuff model."

Stan bet Bill would love to accept that offer and go traipsing off with the cops. "Nope! That's fine! Thank you officers, but we're keeping the handcuffs on," Stan said. "Because." He paused. "They're necessary. For... uh... for me."

The cops and Bill watched him expectantly. Bill had that awful gleam in his eyes that he got when he saw an opportunity to make up a story.

"Because I'm old," Stan said. "It's to keep me from wandering into traffic."

Bill laughed, "Yep, that's true!" He jabbed Stan's shoulder with a finger (harder than necessary, he thought). "This guy's cataracts are so bad, sometimes he asks us if he's dying because all he a see is a white light in a dark tunnel! And the way his mind's going, woof—"

Stan growled, "All right you don't have to lay it on so thick—"

"—he's so addled it's like he's completely forgotten the last century of technology, he'll just walk right off the curb and expect the horse-drawn carriages to stop for him—"

"Hahaaa, but we won't bore you with my medical history!" Stan jerked on the handcuffs. "C'mon, Goldie, you're gonna make me late to my heart doctor appointment. You don't want my life on your hands, do you?"

Bill murmured, "Don't threaten me with a good time."

"Hold on," Blubs said. "You can't see? Didn't we just see you get out of the driver's seat of your car?"

Stan and Bill exchanged a look. Stan said, "Goldie's giving me directions."

"Oh! That makes sense," Durland said.

"All right," Blubs said, "We'll let you get to your doctor's appointment. You folks have a nice day."

As the cops left, Bill called after them, "You too! Hey, I'll see you guys at Rainbow Club!"

"See you there!" Durland turned to Blubs. "Y'know, I think Goldie's a step up from that seeing-eye bear."

Bill and Stan eyed each other. "All right, you're not bad at improv," Bill said. "I can respect a decent actor."

"You too," Stan said grudgingly. Bill looked at Stan like he expected a little more than that; but Stan kept his mouth shut. Bill didn't need the encouragement.

####

Dr. Illing's "FREE CANDY" sign leaned hopefully near a gap in the fence around an overgrown lot by the barrel factory. The gap was large enough that a reasonably limber human could duck through with little difficulty; however, Stan was old and Bill was still controlling his alien body like a rookie puppeteer learning the marionette, so they circled halfway around the lot until they found a gate in the fence to push open. They trod across scraggly grass, a row of dying mushrooms, and years-old litter to reach an unmarked white van hooked up to a camper trailer.

The back hatch of the trailer was flipped up to serve as a makeshift metal awning, and inside, a tall, spindly man was snoring atop a military cot in his underwear, using a white lab coat like a blanket. Stan cleared his throat loudly, and when that didn't disrupt the snoring, knocked on the side of the trailer. "Hey! Doc!"

Dr. Illing jolted upright with a yelp, seized an enormous wireless power drill off the floor to point at them like a gun, lowered it slightly as he registered he wasn't under attack, then realized he was nearly naked and yelped again. He tumbled off the cot, flailed his way to his feet, and turned his back to them as he jerked on his coat and buttoned it. "Just—just a second!" He got on one sock, couldn't find the other, and gave up, pulling on his sneakers with one bare foot. "Sorry, so sorry, I must've—just—nodded off for a second, there—"

"Maybe we should have made an appointment," Bill said wryly. "He looks busy." Stan snorted.

Dr. Illing turned around, smoothing out his rumpled lab coat. He was a jumpy, twitchy man with heavy circles under his eyes, short badly-cut hair, and a 5 o'clock shadow that had evolved into a 25 o'clock shadow. His gaze darted nervously between their faces. "Sorry. Hi, hello, can I help you? Are you maybe here for a tooth extraction, or—or perhaps wisdom teeth removal...?" His gaze caught on Stan's face, and he started. "Stan Pines! I haven't seen you since I pulled your last tooth ten years ago! What are you doing here?" His brows creased in worry. "You're—you're not mad about that, are you—?"

"What? No! The dentures are—fine. They're actually lower maintenance than teeth. Sort of. In a way," Stan said. "No, I'm here to refer a new customer." He pointed at Bill.

Bill made a gesture like he was tipping an invisible hat. "Hi there!"

"A customer?" Dr. Illing said blankly. "Oh—yes! Of course, hold on—" He pulled a hospital curtain over the front half of the trailer to hide a dinette covered in laundry and old magazines, lifted one end of the military cot and slid a step stool under the legs to keep it raised, and tugged the arm of a dental light down from the ceiling to aim it at the chair.

Stan said, "So, do I get some kind of referral bonus, or..."

"Oh—sure, sure. Have a, uhh..." Dr. Illing opened a heavy yellow and black tool bag, pulled out a battered cookie tin, withdrew a gold coin, and offered it to Stan. "One of these or something, here."

"Huh." Stan inspected it. No idea what currency it was, but a gold coin was arguably cooler than actual cash.

The dentist batted aside the hospital curtain to grab a tiny stool from the dinette, shook a damp towel off the seat, placed the stool beside the cot, and sat. "Okay!" He clapped his hands. "New customer! What can I do you for?"

Bill had been gazing in naked longing at the bag hiding the gold coins; but at the question, he looked up with a grin. "I'm here for fillings!"

"Ah! Wonderful. No charge for fillings, of course." He started rummaging through his tool bag for supplies. "Do you know which teeth need them?"

"Whichever you think would look best with some," Bill said. "Driller's choice!"

Dr. Illing stopped rummaging to give Bill a perplexed look. "I—sorry, come again?"

"I said I'm leaving it in your hands." Bill climbed into the trailer and put his free hand on Dr. Illing' s shoulder. "I'll be straight with you, Frankie: all that matters is that my teeth do not currently have any gold in them, and I want that to change by the time I leave. I'm not too picky about the details beyond that."

The dentist stared at Bill, then glanced at Stan for confirmation. Stan shrugged and nodded. "Oh-kay!" Dr. Illing wasn't quite smiling, but there was a strange, eager gleam in his eye. "Super! This'll be fun!" He gestured for Bill to sit on the cot. "Let's see what I have to work with."

He ushered Stan in, and pulled the trailer's hatch shut.

####

"Your teeth are amazing," Dr. Illing said, voice hushed with awe. "Perfectly white. Who's your usual dental hygienist? Did you just get these cleaned?"

"Nope," Bill said, forgetting for the third time that humans keep their teeth and their voice in the same hole and he shouldn't talk with the dentist's fingers in his mouth. Dr. Illing quickly pulled his hand back. "Just basic toothpaste, floss, and dish soap."

Dr. Illing shook his head in disbelief. "Well, they look amazing. And no wear at all, remarkable... Have you ever considered having any of these pulled? Do you mind if I take a few pictures?"

Stan shuddered as the dentist pulled out an old film camera and started snapping photos. "Yeesh. I forgot how creepy you are. Kinda glad I ran out of teeth."

Dr. Illing straightened up, snapped off the dental light, and sighed. "Well, I'm sorry to say that all your teeth are pristine. Not a hint of cavities—not even plaque. It'd be a shame to drill such pretty specimens. You're sure you don't want one pulled...?"

Stan grimaced, but Bill pursed his lips thoughtfully, as if he were considering a perfectly normal question. "As fun as that sounds, I said I want to leave with gold today, and the whole extraction-and-implantation process for gold teeth takes ages. Unless you happen to have a little secret magic trick to speed up the process?" Bill laughed, fixing Dr. Illing with a piercing stare.

Dr. Illing looked nervous. "Er—no."

"Then just the fillings. But who knows, maybe I'll feel naughty and be back in a couple of weeks." Bill laughed again. "Just pick a couple of your least favorite teeth to drill into!"

"Okay, suit yourself." Dr. Illing shrugged and fished around in an overstuffed cardboard box under the dinette table. "Let's gas you up and get drilling."

"You can skip the sedative," Bill said. "I don't mind a little pain. I prefer it, actually! It adds some zest to the experience..." He trailed off as he caught sight of the label on the gas canister Dr. Illing had pulled out. He pointed at a word, "I thought that additive was illegal."

Dr. Illing flinched guiltily. "Not in the state where I got it."

"Oh, buddy. I didn't realize I'd climbed into the party van!" Bill settled back on the cot, laced his hands behind his head, and got comfortable. "You know this stuff has something like sixty percent odds of causing hallucinations? Most people get either haloes around lights, or spiders. Go ahead, gas me—I wanna find out which I am."

####

In five minutes, Bill was overjoyed to report that the dental light had a spider halo. He did not explain what this meant.

Since Stan had typically been under anesthesia himself whenever Dr. Illing operated on him, this was the first time he'd had an opportunity to watch the dentist at work. Stan discovered that when Dr. Illing drilled into a tooth, he didn't suck the resultant dust up with one of those little dental vacuums with a plastic tube Stan was more familiar with. Instead, when a bit of dust had accumulated, he reached in with what looked like a cotton swab, wiped up the tooth dust, and scraped it off into a Petri dish; and only then did he use the vacuum to suck out any saliva and continue. Was he saving the leftover tooth dust? He was an even bigger creep than Stan had thought.

By all appearances, Bill didn't handle the gas well. It wasn't that it made him sick, or that he wasn't having the time of his life. It just made him completely forget how to operate a human body. When Dr. Illing told him to hold his mouth open, he also held his eyes open until they watered; and whenever he lost the battle to keep them open, he automatically shut his mouth too, often to his own peril as Dr. Illing shouted about the drill jostling. Within ten minutes, Dr. Illing had given up on convincing Bill to keep his mouth open and instead started giving him blink breaks when he could shut his mouth.

It helped some, but they couldn't do anything about the fact that Bill had fully forgotten he couldn't talk while getting dental work done, and kept up a regular chatter—during which he cheerfully mentioned he'd died recently, attempted to explain that the entire universe was actually an elaborate hologram projecting from the "true" third dimension, and asked Dr. Illing all about the cruise to Panama he'd recently stowed away on (which the dentist hadn't mentioned). During one blink break, as Bill closed each eye separately, Dr. Illing leaned toward Stan and muttered, "So... what's her story?"

Stan tilted his head toward the Petri dish. "What's with the tooth shavings?"

Dr. Illing considered that, slowly nodded, and got back to work.

####

After several hours, Dr. Illing wiped his brow and sighed in relief. "All right, that should do it. You've got fillings on five teeth now." Under his breath, he muttered, "It would have been two, if you hadn't kept talking while I was drilling."

Stan shook his head in amazement. "Doesn't that hurt?" 

"Yes," Bill said. "I've never felt pain like that before. What a rush."

"If you do come back for a tooth extraction, I'm getting a dental gag to keep your jaws open." Dr. Illing finished pulling out the array of clamps and barriers around the filling sites and wearily dropped down onto his stool. "There. The rest of the sedative should wear off gradually over the next few hours. Usually I tell patients to wait three or four hours before eating to let the swelling go down, but..." He waved wearily. "You can do whatever you want."

"Admit it, you like having an enthusiastic patient!" Bill heaved himself off the military cot, forgot he couldn't float, and immediately collapsed to the floor.

"Whoa there—" Stan helped Bill back to his feet. The handcuffs prevented him from getting an arm around Bill's back, so instead he helped keep him upright by firmly squeezing his upper arm. "I don't know about you, but I'm eating as soon as we get home. You made me miss lunch—and for some reason, I feel like I barely had any breakfast." Bill inexplicably found this declaration hilarious. Probably the sedative, Stan reasoned.

Bill waved at the dentist as Stan tugged him out the trailer's hatch, chattering the whole way: "Thanks for the gold, the sock you were looking for is a bookmark in the March issue of Floss Girls, Atlantis is rising as we speak, you have less than seven years to prepare for the plague, tell the little lady I said hi! Byyye!"

Stan squeezed Bill's arm tighter and muttered, "Would you cut that out?

Bill stumbled across the uneven lot. "I made up the part about Atlantis."

"Okay just shut up and stop saying weird things."

Bill attempted to walk sideways all the way back to the car.

####

Stan gripped the steering wheel so tightly, his arms were trembling.

Bill was sprawled all over the front bench, the dashboard, the seatback, and Stan's shoulders.

On the radio, a hit 80's R&B song with a sexy saxophone was playing, "Babe, the sad things you've been through... I swear I'll make it up to you... If it takes a thousand years..."

Bill was singing at the top of his lungs directly in Stan's ear, "I'LL WIPE AWAY ALL YOUR TEARS, WOO!—sax solo!—BA DA-DA DA, BA DA-DAAA—"

Stan turned off his right hearing aid.

Every once in a while Bill attempted to grab the steering wheel and turn it in time to the song, like a kid playing in a toy car; Stan had given up telling him to stop and instead started just smacking his hand away every time he tried. After another smack, Bill draped his arm awkwardly over Stan again, and announced, "I can't feel my tongue at all! I bet I can chew it off!"

"Don't do that."

"The last time my mouth was this numb, my girlfriend had just gotten done with me, haha." Bill stuck his finger in his mouth to experimentally poke at his tongue. "I couldn' thee for the nex' hour from all the thporeth—"

"I swear if you don't shut up—"

Bill flopped his arm across Stan again. "I just realized I haven't gotten any action since I died. Wow. What's normal for humans, couple times a week until you start the slow lingering decline toward death?" He looked straight at Stan. Stan could feel that side of his face start to sweat. "This isn't a weird time to bring that up, is it?"

"Bill, if you say one more weird thing, you're riding home on the roof of the car."

Bill was quiet for three seconds. And then he started poking Stan's bicep. "Your arm's a lot meatier than Sixer's! What's your favorite flavor of cancer?"

####

Mabel asked, "Why are you on top of the car?"

Bill—eyes wide, hair disheveled, one arm hanging through the driver's door, sprawled out clinging to the roof like his life depended on it—replied, "I don't know, it's all a blur."

Stan opened the car door and jerked on the handcuffs. "All right, get off my car."

Bill shakily climbed off, lay in the dirt, and tried to catch his breath. "That was fun. We should do that more often."

"Not on your life."

Eyeing the handcuffs, Dipper said, "What were you doing, anyway?"

"Nothing!" Stan snapped. "Why? Who's asking? I wasn't sneaking the demon out to get a shady back-alley dental procedure!"

Mabel and Dipper stared up at him.

Stan pointed at them. "What are you doing?"

"Going camping," Dipper said, turning so Stan could see his stuffed backpack.

"Something's been stealing Pacifica's alpacas at night, so we're going on a stake-out," Mabel said. "They took Giorgio. It's personal now."

"We think aliens might be abducting them," Dipper said.

From the ground, Bill said, "It's not aliens."

"Ah, taking the law into your own hands. It builds character," Stan said approvingly. "You need firearms?"

They exchanged a glance. "We're good," Mabel said. "Grunkle Ford loaned us his freeze ray. It seems less lethal."

As the kids headed toward the road, Bill finally heaved himself up. "Well, that was fun!"

"No it wasn't," Stan said.

"Your opinion doesn't matter. Anyway—" He shook his cuffed wrist. "We're home, get me out of this thing. It makes you look like my ugly accessory and I want my hoodie."

"I elevate your whole look!" Stan protested. "And I don't have the key, it's with Soos."

Mabel turned back to shout at them, "Soos is out! He's got a dinner date with Melody!"

Stan grimaced. "Uh-oh."

Bill shrugged and said, with a confidence Stan didn't share, "He left the key behind."

####

"Oh man, sorry dudes," Soos said over the phone. "I totally forgot I still had it. Yeah, it's on my key ring. Is that, like, gonna be a problem, or...?"

"It's fine," Bill said, sitting atop Soos's office desk and leaning all the way across it to reach the phone. "Just pass it through the phone, we'll catch it."

"What?"

"Ignore him." Stan shoved Bill's face away. Bill gave him a dirty look as he straightened out his eyepatch, which he'd finally gotten to put on once they were home. Stan spun the desk chair away from Bill so he couldn't try to join the conversation again. "He's hopped up on psychedelic laughing gas. When are you gonna be back?"

"Uh..." Soos thought for several seconds. "Nooot for a while. Abuelita and I were talking about maybe kind of staying the night?"

"Well—pfff—can't you duck out and bring the key?"

"Uhhh. I would but, this is the first time Abuelita and I are having dinner with Melody's parents, and I'm really worried about impressing them parents, and the casserole's about to come out, and I think they might judge me if I leave, it would probably ruin dinner..."

"Okay, fine. What if we drive over to get the key?"

Far louder than necessary, Bill asked, "Stanley can I drive this time—!"

"Absolutely not!"

"Oh sure, that'd be fine," Soos said. "I'll give you directions, Melody's parents' place is in Portland. You got a pen?"

Stan frowned. "Portland."

"Yep."

"As in, outside the magic bubble trapping Bill in town."

Soos paused. "Oh, right."

Well, Stan wasn't about to make Soos look bad in front of his future in-laws. He'd never had in-laws, but he'd seen enough sitcoms to know how messy that could get. "Never mind. We'll figure something out. You kids enjoy dinner." Stan hung up the phone, sighed, and turned to face Bill. (Bill had plucked a figurine of a bulky robot in a cute girly pose off of Soos's desk, and was staring at it in wonder, like he'd never seen overpriced anime convention merch before.) "You got any other bright ideas?"

"We could still call Darryl and Edwin..."

"No way," Stan snapped. "I am not calling the cops for help! Never gonna happen. I'd rather wait for Soos to get back in the morning if I have to!"

"Oh would you." Bill laughed scornfully. "And what do you plan to do until then?"

####

They got TV dinners and grumpily watched Cash Wheel together.

####

(This entire chapter was just an extended excuse to annoy Stan and Bill as much as possible. But mostly Stan. Thanks for reading, and if you enjoyed I'd appreciate a comment or reblog!!)

[myosotisa]

Like Real People Do - e.m.

Part 1/2 - Why were you digging?

ǁ  summary: 30 days into your stay at the Betty Ford Center for Rehabilitation, Eddie Munson gets brought in against his will. While in the middle of trying to figure out your own issues, you find yourself being followed around by a detoxing rockstar who won't take a hint and get lost.

ǁ  tags: angst, hurt/comfort, heavy themes. depictions of inpatient rehab in the 90s. implied fem!Reader, no pronouns used, no y/n. strangers to reluctant acquaintances to lovers.

ǁ  content warning: both parts will contain mentions of drug use, struggling with addiction, self worth, society's view on drug users, grief, and death by drug overdose. brief mention of domestic violence and drug assisted disordered eating. please consume thoughtfully and if you have any questions before reading, feel free to message me.

ǁ  word count: 7k

ǁ  Part 2 ǁ  Read on AO3 ǁ

The lock on your door clunks open at exactly 8am every morning. A glaring alarm that your new day is about to start whether you want it to or not.

At 8:15, one of the workers on staff is barely knocking before pushing in to make sure you and your roommate will be ready for breakfast at 8:30 sharp.

At 8:30, you’re standing in line with everyone else to get your morning meds. Amoxaphine for depression. Atenolol for high blood pressure. Methadone for opioid withdrawal. Acamprosate for alcohol withdrawal.

A little paper cup of water to wash them all down, your mouth presented to prove you did actually swallow them, and then a verbal pat on the back before sending you over to the breakfast line.

A styrofoam plate of scrambled eggs and toast with jam on a plastic tray, balanced carefully with a cup of whatever juice they decided to buy this week. Carefully set down on one of the small tables by the window where you’ll sit and eat alone – appreciating the quiet and serenity for the few moments a day you get it before you’re shoved off to the next task.

The same thing for the past 28 days since you were deposited in the Betty Ford Center. You’d gone from euphoric, cold, and totally out of it to anxious, shaky, unable to sleep, and just fucking miserable. And while some days were getting easier and others seemed more difficult than ever, at least you had gotten into the routine of inpatient rehab. At least you knew to expect the same thing everyday. At least you were prepared to deal with what the external world threw at you.

Until you weren’t.

The moment the doors to the main hall are thrown open – impacting the opposing walls with a slam –  you get an overwhelming feeling that something is about to change. Something big.

“Hey fucker! Hey! Get your meat hands off me, lughead.”

Most of the heads in the room turn toward the source of the yelling, a parade of 5 coming through the double doors. Two you know, the medical director Mr. Ford and one of the doctors Dr. Lincoln. They both look annoyed and uncomfortable as they walk ahead of a set of 3 men. 

Flanked on either side by a buff orderly, getting borderline dragged across the floor, is a man you’ve never seen. His long, messy waves whip wildly around his head as he lets out expletives and pulls against the sharp hold on his biceps. His voice is ragged and slurred as he makes nonsensical arguments towards the two men leading him away. He’s in regular clothes – outside clothes – with torn jeans and metal chains hanging off his hips, ripped sleeves showing off his tattooed arms, and large rings on every finger.

Someone new?

Having gotten their eyeful, half the room goes back to pushing around their breakfasts with plastic cutlery while the other half continues to watch with amusement. A new person only comes through every 15 days or so, and this was only the second since you’d arrived. The first one, a meek boy named Thomas, had been admitted so quietly that he all of the sudden appeared one day in group, already through the worst of the detox, before you had ever even heard of him.

It makes you wonder if more inpatient admissions are like that or like this.

You wish you could remember yours.

In a whirl of movement, the man rips his arms free and flies backwards with a stumble. Had he been more coordinated, and probably more sober, than he is, he might have made a decent break for it. As he is, he’s barely able to turn toward the doors they came through before the men are grabbing him again from behind, hooking their arms around his to now actually drag him down the hallway toward the hospital wing.

The heels of his black boots drag against the beige tile floor as he slumps in their grip, eyelids fluttering slightly before he manages to bring back enough energy to yell another, “Fuck you!” at his captors.

Just before they disappear behind another set of locked down double doors, the two of you make eye contact. From this distance, you can still see how bloodshot his eyes are – deep brown ringed by red toned white. They are steadily falling closed with each blink as he most likely loses the fight against some kind of sedative. But somehow, with what must be the last moments of consciousness he has left, he sees you watching him. The corner of his mouth tilts up in a lazy smirk. And he winks.

The motherfucker winks at you right as his head lulls to the side before falling forward and the group of 5 disappears.

Something new indeed.

You don’t see the stranger again until 6 days later.

New admissions normally spend anywhere from 3 days to a week and a half in the hospital wing after arriving. IV fluids, heavy meds, and a more prepared medical staff to deal with the worst of the detox period. Depending on what you were on, how recently you took it compared to when you arrived, and the length of your addiction makes a huge difference in how much time you spend there before being sent back to the rest of the floor.

4 days is average, which is the amount of time you spent in the hospital wing before being put into room 102 with Melissa Redding. Teen beauty queen of the Betty Ford Center who got hooked on meth after a consultant for the pageant used it to help her lose weight.

The center had a neat little tradition of having your roommate show you around on the first day. For you, that had meant busy bee Melissa whispering in your ear in and outs of who was who and all of the drama entailed even though you didn’t care in the slightest. That continued through the rest of the day as she showed you around the main hall, gave you a tour of the garden during your mandated 1 hour of outside time, and into the Therapy House.

While she had initially been excited to have a roommate, she very quickly learned you would not be the entertainment she wanted. So she went back to gossiping with Kathy the housewife, who was in for a bad habit of using too much Adderall to get through the day with her kids. Leaving you to your own devices.

It was better that way.

You’re already in your seat by the window with breakfast by the time the stranger stumbles in after Howard, the gruff old man whose family sent him here for drinking too much (drinks the same amount as any other man his age, but who are you to judge?). He gets right into the med line, now half diminished due to their late arrival, and doesn’t seem to pay any attention to the stranger as he wanders away.

Guess he decided that wasn’t his job.

Tall, dark, and lanky looks like he’s been through the ringer. Skin pallor and clammy, hair pulled into a bird’s nest of a bun on the back of his head with the top and bangs matted flat with what you assume is sweat, hands fussing in front of him like if he doesn’t move as many muscles as possible at once he’ll explode. There are deep purple bags under his wide eyes as he approaches one of the other windows in the space, 30 feet away from where you’re sitting. 

He looks over the frame like he’s trying to find a way out, coming back with nothing before heading to the next window, closer to you. His appearance and behavior make you think of a wet rat trying to claw its way up the side of a bathtub – unable to grip onto anything and getting sent back down into the water again every time he tries to climb.

Hoping not to catch his attention, you direct your gaze down, focusing back on your under salted eggs and grape jam. Between the lack of seasoning and the juice of the week being some kind of weird pineapple mix, you’re left wanting even more so than usual over your bare bones breakfast.

Despite your half assed attempt to be invisible, the single chair across from you at your table is pulled out, flipped around, and then settled into by the stranger. In your shock, you look up at him before you can second guess the reaction.

“I saw you, I remember,” his voice is deeper than you thought, raspy at the edges with exhaustion and hardship. His gaze flicks rapidly from the table, your food, your face, the rest of the room, his hands. Everywhere at once it seems. “The day they brought me in.”

“Yup,” you confirm with an awkward nod of acknowledgement before looking back at your food.

Please leave, please leave, please leave.

“I’m Eddie. Eddie Munson.”

Looking back up at him, he has a bit more life in his face. Something that looks a little bit like hope.

“Okay.”

His face falls.

“You… Doesn’t ring any bells? Eddie Munson, guitarist, Corroded Coffin, biggest rock-metal band of the 90s?” The longer he goes, his wet eyes widen, making him look like a pleading animal looking for food scraps. When you show absolutely no recognition for anything he’s saying, he brings his hands together, fingers moving to twist at rings that no longer sit there. When he doesn’t find them, his leg starts to bounce under the table and his palms start tapping on the top of the chair at his chest.

“If you’re looking for celebrity worship, I’m sure Melissa or Kathy would be happy to provide.” You inform him, hoping he will lose interest and go searching for them to give him the attention he seems to be looking for. You go back to spreading jam on your slightly burnt toast.

He doesn’t take the bait. “How, uh, how long have you been here?”

Taking a long inhale through your nose and out through your mouth, you set your plastic knife back down. “A month.”

His hisses out air through his teeth, eyes searching over the rest of the room, like he’s waiting for something bad to happen. “How long do people normally stay locked up in here?”

Ah. 

“I dunno. A couple months? I’m not exactly some kind of authority here. You should go ask–”

“Has anyone ever broken out?”

Though you’re not sure why you’re surprised, you still struggle with the question. He makes eye contact with you again and the look in his eye is different now. Smaller.

He’s scared.

“I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

He scoffs, using his hand at his chin to crack his neck in either direction, looking unsatisfied with your answer. “Come on, like nobody has ever tried to get out? You’ve never tried?”

A weight presses down on your chest. “No, I haven’t.”

“Yeah right, I’m sure that there’s some–”

“Mr. Munson!”

An orderly stalks toward the table, looking crabby and annoyed this early in the day. Eddie looks about ready to bolt after their bark but somehow remains seated until they arrive. “I’m sure Howard didn’t inform you, but first thing in the morning you’re supposed to come up to the nurse window to receive your medication.” They present their arm back to where the now empty med line stands, everyone else settled into seats with their breakfasts. “After you’ve taken your medication, you can grab some breakfast and…” They make eye contact with you that you’re quick to avoid. “Converse with whoever you want.”

“See, your mistake was that I don’t need any medication, so I don’t need to wait in line.” His voice is slowly raising in volume, drawing more and more attention as he goes. “In fact, I’m not even supposed to be here!”

“Mr. Munson, please lower your voice, you’ll disturb the other residents.”

“Fuck the other residents,” he slams his palms down on your table, almost knocking off your plastic cup of juice when it rocks and you jolt back from the show of aggression. All eyes in the room are on him now, and by extension, you. Other residents, other orderlies, nurses, the kitchen staff.

Too many eyes.

While the attention makes you want to crawl into a hole and die, it seems to please Eddie. He pushes up off of his chair and makes a show of arguing with the annoyed orderly all the way over to the nurse’s station. All eyes in the room follow him and his suddenly animated features, looking like he has gained 10x more energy than when he walked in. You use the distraction to your advantage.

By the time Eddie has had medication forced down his throat, a plate of shitty eggs deposited in his hands, and he turns around to look at your table again, you’re nowhere to be found.

He finds you again in the garden before group therapy.

You’re tucked away in a painted white, wrought iron chair that’s bolted to the ground next to a tall shrub. It’s still in the gated off outdoor area, but mostly hidden from view. The orderlies know to find you there if they need you because that’s where you always are – sitting on that single chair in the sunshine with a paperback book on your lap. Today it’s Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch.

When a body blocks the sun over your book, your first assumption is that it’s an orderly coming to tell you it’s time to head to Therapy House. But it seems too early for that, and you’re normally a pretty good judge of time (at least, in here), so when an unfamiliar voice clears its throat in front of you, you huff a breath before you raise your head to acknowledge him.

“Is that seat taken?” He asks with a grin, motioning to the empty table bolted to the ground beside your chair. It’s obviously a rhetorical question – maybe to get you to smile or laugh. You do neither and give him a flat look.

“Actually, I’m saving it for someone.”

This seems to delight him even more, eyebrows raising and eyes getting some more life in them as he takes a seat on the table anyway. “Well I’ll keep it nice and warm for them until they show up.” He pulls his facility-issued navy sweatpants covered legs up to cross under him, effectively draping his knee over your arm.

Accepting your fate to not get rid of him, you open your book again to where you left off. 

“Best not to speculate, really,” said Aziraphale. “You can’t second-guess ineffability, I always say. There’s Right, and there’s Wrong. If you do Wrong when you’re told to do Right, you deserve to be punished.”

“I checked the perimeter of the garden,” his voice is lowered, as if someone would overhear him, “looking for weak spots.”

You hum an acknowledgement, keeping your eyes on your book as you reply in a sarcastic monotone, “Because that’s definitely not suspicious.”

He waves you off out of the corner of your eye, beginning a light tap of his hands against his knees. Even with the medication. He either needs a higher dose or he’s hyperactive at baseline. “They probably just thought I was giving myself a little tour or something, I don’t know. I don’t really care if it’s suspicious, actually. All I know is there’s like… Nothing. At all.”

“Shocker.”

Continuing to ignore your lackluster responses, a bopping of his head joins the beat of his palms. You attempt to reread the same paragraph over and over to try and comprehend it through his talking and fidgeting, failing time after time. “Not even like a locked gate or anything. And the fence itself is too high to get over with no footholds, unless you got something to stand on to grab the top and pull yourself over. Yeah…” 

“Oh!” The sudden volume of his voice makes you jerk away from him again, not expecting the sharp change. “What about your chair, is it loose?” One long fingered hand grips the backrest between your shoulder blades and the other the chair arm closest to him, attempting to give it a shake. “Maybe we could get the bolts out and use it to climb the fence.” He only succeeds in making an annoying rattling sound and jostling you back and forth.

“Fuck, Eddie, will you –” Using the paper cover of your book, you smack at his forearm a few times, causing him to quickly withdraw and hold his hands up in front of his chest like he’s worried your attack will continue. “Fucking, stop it.”

“Geez, sorry,” he mutters, looking slightly sheepish but still not exactly apologetic. “What’s your name, by the way? I forgot to ask.”

“Seems a little too late to ask now, don’t you think?” You turn the page of your book to make it look like you’re making progress despite the fact that you haven’t been able to finish a sentence since Eddie sat down beside you. Anything to help you look less interested in his attempted escape and, therefore, him.

An amused snort leaves his nose, tapping hands turning to a hold on his knees to let him lean back without falling off the table. “Well you are just a ray of sunshine,” he snarks back, looking more amused than annoyed. “Anyone ever told you that before?”

Finally lifting your head to give him a placating and overly artificial smile, you meet his eyes to make sure he can see your insincerity when you say, “Only every day.”

And while he opens his mouth to probably throw back another sarcastic retort, he’s interrupted by the “relaxing” (read: fucking annoying) gong by the Therapy House going off, signaling it’s time to head inside. You snap your book shut and push off your chair without a word to join the rest of the group outside in the unenthusiastic shuffle toward the birch wood doors. Another set of slip-on shoes, a matching pair to yours, sidles up beside where your own drag through the dirt path.

“So what happens now?” He asks, leaning a little bit closer to you as he speaks again, like the two of you are conspiring together on something. Based on your interactions so far, maybe he thinks you are.

“Therapy,” is your sharp reply. And, as if finally understanding he probably isn’t going to get much more information, he shuts up and just walks beside you toward the two story building off of the main facility.

All 12 of you wander through the doors in your similar outfits – sweatpants, t-shirts, and hoodies in shades of blue, grey, and black. Crossing from dirt and stone pathways onto the pristine wood floors of the Therapy House that’s awash with sunlight. As many windows as possible in all directions and a huge circular skylight above leaves the whole room bright and airy.

There are 13 metal folding chairs set up in a circle beneath the skylight, 1 more than yesterday, and the one directly across from the door is already occupied.

Mrs. Penelope Windsor is the head of therapy at the Betty Ford Center for Rehabilitation and wears that title with the utmost pride. She’s put together, ambitious, intelligent, and damn good at her job. Not to mention attractive, with her long legs crossed under her black pencil skirt, her crimson red button up blouse showing just enough collarbone to still be ‘professional’, and the long brunette braid draped over her shoulder. Her black heels are patent leather and perfectly shiny along with the matching briefcase sitting beside her chair. She stands out sharply from the white walls and birch wood floors of the Therapy House – but she commands your attention that way. A focal point in a room of white and tan and beige nothingness.

And the moment you walk through the doors with Eddie beside you, you feel her hazel eyes on you like a fucking hawk.

You avoid making eye contact, as per usual, and settle into the seat you’ve been using since the first day you came here. To your displeasure, Eddie immediately grabs the seat to your right, flipping it around to sit backwards in it, folding his arms over the back with a certain lazy confidence.

Tony, who normally sits there, hovers uncomfortably for a moment behind before scuttling over to the only remaining chair between Mrs. Windsor and Melissa.

As soon as he’s seated, heavy and tense silence settles over the room while the rest of you wait for Penelope to greet the group. You could hear a pin drop in the room in these moments, everyone shifting uncomfortably in the quiet as she takes a few moments to look over the group before her.

Almost like she enjoys making us all squirm under her authority.

Her sharp eyes settle on Eddie, her face as passive as always. He does very little to react to her stare but takes it as a sort of challenge – staring right back where most would shy away. The corner of her mouth lifts almost imperceptibly, like she appreciates the challenge.

The silent standoff is broken as Thomas’ wooden cane clatters to the floor beside his chair from where it had been leaning. He immediately turns bright red from the collar of his black t-shirt all the way to the tips of his ears. “Shit – Wait, oh, shoot, sorry!” Scooping it up in shaky hands, he is quick to tuck it between his knees, white knuckle fisting the handle in his embarrassment.

“That’s quite alright, Thomas,” is Penelope’s serene reply, a gentle smile directed his way before she addresses the group. “Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome back to our group session for today.”

No one says a word as she takes another uncomfortable moment to scan the group before doubling back to land on Eddie. “I see we have a new member of our group today. My name is Mrs. Windsor and I’m the head therapist here at the Betty Ford Center, but you’re more than welcome to call me Penelope. Could you introduce yourself for us, please?”

“Eddie Munson, guitarist, Corroded Coffin.” He answers cooly, and you watch his eyes do a quick scan to see if anyone shows any recognition. When there are a few reactions, his smile grows into one of satisfaction before he returns his gaze to Penelope. “Am I supposed to say what they locked me up for now or somethin’?” It comes out in a teasing lit, like he is trying to make a joke of it all.

No one laughs.

She takes it in stride. “You’re more than welcome to share what you’re struggling with, if you’d like.”

His shoulders rise slightly, like a cat going on the defensive. “Okay, first of all, I’m not struggling with anything. I’m not even supposed to be here. I keep telling them if they just let me call my manager we could get this whole thing cleared up so I can get the fuck out of here and back to my life.”

“Your manager…” She leans over, plucking a file from her briefcase and unfolding it on her lap. “Mr. Scott?” She looks up through her eyelashes for confirmation.

He settles again, looking slightly relieved. “Yeah, Jonathan Scott, Razor & Tie.”

“Mhmm…” She looks back at the file, flipping a page up in what looks to be a show. Like she already knows what she’s supposedly ‘looking’ for. “It says here Mr. Scott is the person who applied for your stay in our center and is the sign off as your legal guardian while you’re completing your treatment.” She lightly closes the file, sitting up straight again to look at him. “Did you know that Eddie?”

“No,” he answers, voice suddenly unsure, eyebrows drawing together on his forehead and shoulders falling. “No, I didn’t.”

“Well then,” her smile is nothing but satisfied when she slips the papers back into her briefcase. “It seems there’s nothing to be cleared up here after all. And I’m sure we’re all very excited to get to know you over the next few weeks, Eddie.”

Challenge won.

When he doesn’t respond, she moves on. “Now, Kathy, it looks like your nails are doing better…”

You tune out the rest of her interaction, focusing on the man beside you. He has his head slightly hung down, eyes on his hands as he holds one wide and uses the opposite thumb to rub along his palm. There’s an air about him – closer to one you saw this morning. Confused. Lost. Scared.

You almost feel sorry for the guy.

Two hours later, you’re in one of the ‘office lofts’ of Therapy House, a 5x5 closed room with a loveseat for you and an armchair for your therapist. After group is over, there are rotations of 1 on 1 therapy with one of the various counselors on staff, herding each of you into tiny rooms for an hour at a time. At the beginning of your stay, you had somehow lucked out to being assigned to Queen Penelope herself.

She sits across from you with her holier-than-thou attitude and a spiral notebook clutched in her well-manicured hands – filled with notes about you that you’re not supposed to see. In the sunken down cushions of the loveseat, you end up sitting below her eyeline even if you tried to sit up straight. So you don’t try – tucking your legs under you and crossing your arms under your chest.

As per usual, she starts the session with a few moments of horrifying silence. Almost as a dare to get you to talk first just to break it.

You never have.

“So, how are you feeling today?”

“Fine. Same as always.”

She clicks her pen, like she’s already prepared to start taking notes off that one sentence. “Indeed. Everyday is always ‘fine’, isn’t it?”

Eddie must have made you more snippy than usual, because you’re already ready to turn on her. “What point are you trying to make, exactly?”

“Everyday, every time anyone asks, the answer is always ‘fine.’ Fine is a noncommittal answer that means nothing.” She leans back in her chair, cool and collected as always. “Fine is the answer you give when you’re avoiding the answer.”

It takes everything in you not to roll your eyes at her. “Okay, what is my answer supposed to be then?”

“The truth, preferably.”

Wow, thanks, that’s helpful.

When you don’t respond with a new answer, she moves on. “Are you still having nightmares? Flashbacks?”

A shiver crawls up your spine, creeping toward the cold sweat that starts to build at the nape of your neck on instinct. “Sometimes.”

Liar.

“How often, would you say? For the nightmares?”

Clammy hands press into the fabric of your grey sweatpants. “Maybe once a week.”

Liar.

She scribbles something down in her notepad. “And the flashbacks?”

A vision of cold, blue tipped fingers reaching out toward you from the dark comes to the forefront of your mind before you blink it away. “Less than that, I think.”

Liar!

“And are they all still about her?”

The cold from those blue tipped fingers permeates through your body, settling into your bones in a chill that never seems to leave you anymore. “Not all of them.”

LIAR. LIAR. LIAR. LI–

“Actually, can we talk about something else?” Your request comes out quicker than you’d like, giving a show of desperation as you adjust in your seat. “Please,” you add as an afterthought.

Her gaze is sharp as ever and calculated in her perusal of you for another few moments, but she concedes. “Alright. What would you like to talk about then?”

When you flounder for an answer, mouth opening and shutting uselessly, she offers an alternative of her own. “I saw you walk in with the new guy today. Eddie, right? Did you talk to him at all?”

You let out a huff, eyes directing down to where your wandering fingers have landed on a piece of loose thread on your pants. “More like sat there while he talked at me.”

“He didn’t give you a chance to talk or you never took it?”

“I don’t exactly have anything I want to talk to him about,” is your cold response, once again looking up to make eye contact with her.

“You know, it wouldn’t actually hurt to try to connect with someone again. Maybe open up to a new friend?”

This time you’re not able to withhold your eye roll. “Junkie rockstar is not exactly the kind of friend I’m looking to make.”

“That’s a bit of a hurtful representation, don’t you think?” She is writing another note as she speaks, eyes looking between you and her page. “How would you feel if someone didn’t want to interact with you because you’re a ‘junkie’?”

Your gaze flicks back down to the thread between your fingers as you mumble, “They wouldn’t exactly be wrong.”

“Do you think you’re a bad person because of your drug use?”

I think I’m a bad person for a lot of reasons.

“It doesn’t exactly give you a glowing perception in the eyes of the public,” you answer defensively.

“That may be true. So you did something that was frowned upon by the general public, making it ‘bad’ or ‘wrong’.” She adds in the air quotes, even though her tone was enough to warrant the assumption that she was being facetious. “What about all of the good things you’ve done? Is there some kind of threshold for the amount of ‘bad’ things a person needs to have done in comparison to the good ones to brand them as a ‘bad’ person?”

“I don’t know, maybe.”

Her eyes flit over to the book beside you, resting on the cushion with the cover Good Omens facing up, before returning to you. “I think, personally, that it’s possible to have done bad things without it making you a bad person. It doesn’t make you a good person either, mind you. Because there’s also no such thing as a person who is wholly good either.” She folds her hands over her lap like she always does when she thinks she’s about to say something really profound.

“Good and bad are just malleable descriptions we give to things. People are not simply good or simply bad. People are just… People. Where good, bad, and everything in between coexist.”

Then why do I feel like this?

Eddie plops down in front of you at breakfast looking slightly less like a wet rat than he has so far.

"Good morning, sunshine." And he grins, way too fucking chipper for being 2 weeks into detoxing.

"Don't call me that."

"Whatever you say, sunshine," he repeats with the same grin, like he's glad you don't like it. "I have a plan for us to get out of here."

Get out? A plan? Us? You don't even know where to start with that. "Ah. No wonder you look like it's Christmas morning."

"I'm going to take that as a compliment." With a noncommittal 'mmfh', you go back to pushing around your over salted scrambled eggs. "Aren't you going to ask what my plan is?"

"No."

"Well, since you asked," he ignores you and leans over the table, once again lowering his voice to a soft murmur. "One of the night nurses is a fan of my band."

He pauses there, like he's looking for some kind of response. You offer up a completely lackluster, "Congrats."

"Sooo, maybe I can butter her up. Promise her VIP tickets or backstage passes or something. Bribe her to get us out."

Stabbing into a chunk of egg hard enough to almost pierce through the styrofoam beneath, you mumble, "Good luck with that."

He points his fork at you, eyes narrowing in a glare. "You don't think it will work."

"I don't care if it works," you sigh as you bring a hand up to rub at the sudden tension in your temple. "What do you think is gonna happen when you get out, huh? They're just gonna say 'Well, he got out of rehab, guess that's it then!' Your manager is just gonna have you delivered right back here."

"Then I get a new manager." Another flat look is leveled in his direction. "Seriously, I can figure it out once I get out of here. And if you're gonna be this negative about it, then maybe I won't take you with me," he says it like a threat, looking smug as he sips at his not-quite-pineapple juice.

"Good."

His plastic cup hits the table fast enough that a bit sloshes out and onto the vinyl cover. "What do you mean 'good'? You're telling me you don't want to get out of here?"

It's like he's finally hearing you for the first time. "Yes, that is what I'm telling you."

"As if." He scoffs, shoving a chunk of scramble egg in his mouth before continuing to talk through chewing it. "Nobody wants to be in here getting pumped full of happy meds and talking about our feelings with the Ice Queen."

A part of you actually wants to be amused at the term Ice Queen, but you're quick to beat it down. "Yeah, well, maybe I do."

He takes a big bite out of his stiff toast next, crumbs flying with the force of it. "I think," he pauses to swallow the bite before pointing the toast at you this time. "That you have Stockholm Syndrome. And have accepted defeat in your captivity."

"Whatever you say, Munson."

You should've known better than to assume it would end there.

After breakfast, all of you scatter throughout the main hall to do various things to fill your time. As usual, you sit down on a chair by the window so you can continue your book. You're quickly approaching the climax of the narrative, when the four horsemen begin their ride toward the end of the world.

Eddie has set up shop at a table nearby, bent over the top that's scattered with papers that are all covered in drawings of various mythical creatures. He's currently scratching away at a sketch of a three headed Hydra, mouths roaring fire toward the sky.

You'd never tell him this of course, but you have to admit that they are pretty good.

It's 30 minutes of blissful silence with plenty of progress made in your book until he starts talking again.

"Do you actually not want to get out of here?"

You exhale through your nose sharply, annoyed that you're being forced to continue this conversation. Closing your book with your thumb tucked in to save your page, you turn your upper body toward him. "Is that really so hard to believe?"

"Yeah, actually, it is. What are you even in here for anyway? Like what 'problem' do they think you have?"

"None of your fucking business," is your extremely grumpy reply, settling back into your chair and opening your book again in hopes he'll drop it.

"Well, whatever it is, it's not worth sitting in this glorified prison for months on end, I can tell you that much."

Something about the way he's talking really starts to grate on your nerves, making you want to fight more than you want to ignore him. "I'm sorry, would you rather be in actual prison?"

This makes his face drop, a muscle in his jaw rolling with tension. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

"It means that coke and meth are illegal, in case you forgot. And can actually get you arrested." Your tone is condescending, tinged with venom. "So maybe you should be grateful to be in this 'glorified prison' instead of a real one."

"Grateful?" He lets out a fake laugh, looking at you in disbelief. "Yeah, let me just try to be grateful to have my every move watched and my entire day planned for me like I'm in a fucking daycare."

An orderly walks in through the double doors to the garden, propping them open in an invitation to move outside for the hour. You're quick to rise, tucking your bookmark into your spot and muttering a dismissive, "Whatever," as you pass.

You're barely off the stone path and into the grass towards your seat when he comes barrelling out after you.

"Hey, I'm not done."

"Listen," you continue forward, talking over your shoulder at him as he marches after you, "I get you're still in denial and everything. But it's not my job to make you accept that you're here for a reason. So why don't you just leave me alone."

A hand grips your shoulder, forcing you to turn toward him. The sun is behind his head from this angle, leaving him silhouetted in light and you standing in his shadow in the grass.

"And what exactly do you think the reason I'm here is?"

"I don't know," you push his hand off your shoulder, tucking your book in against your stomach. "Why don't you ask yourself that question?"

"I'm here against my will because a fucking corporate prick thinks I need 'fixing'," his voice comes out as a hiss through his clenched teeth. His hands tighten into fists at his sides. "Everybody thinks we need to be 'fixed'."

"Maybe we fucking do, Eddie! Did you ever consider that?"

Out of the corner of your eye, you see your argument getting some attention from other patients and an orderly standing watch, but you're too caught up in your anger to care.

You jolt in surprise when Eddie's hands grip your shoulders, forcing your attention on him. "Are you even fucking listening to yourself?!"

"Eddie, let go of me."

His hands only tighten, his wide eyes going wild. "They fucking infected you with their bullshit doctrine of what society thinks is right and wrong, but it's not true."

You try to pull away from him but his grip just turns bruising in response, fingertips digging into your skin painfully. Fear takes hold, tears starting to push at the back of your eyes as you plead, "Please, Eddie, you're hurting me–"

"They're hurting you!" He's borderline yelling in your face now, emphasizing his next point by shaking you where you stand. "Don't you fucking get it? They're the ones hurting you by making you think there's something wrong with you!"

An orderly appears beside him and grips his shoulder, ordering a tense, "Let her go."

This seems to shock him as his hands release you mid-shake, sending you backwards onto your ass. You make impact with a yelp, the tailbone pain enough to force the tears that were threats before to start to spill down your cheeks. You're sure that if your hands weren't pressed to the ground behind you, they'd be trembling.

Heels click along stones on the approach, heated and quick. "What the hell is going on here?" Penelope Windsor asks sharply, barely faltering as her heels meet grass and dirt.

You look up at Eddie with tears in your eyes, shocked and terrified.

He looks down, as pale as a ghost, the orderly's hand still on his shoulder as he stares at his own like they don't belong to him.

"Are you alright?" Penelope asks when she kneels to the ground beside you, fancy slacks of her pantsuit in the dirt. A gentle hand hovers over your shoulders, concern evident in the way she looks you over.

Swallowing hard around the lump in your throat, you break away from your stare at Eddie to glance at her and then the ground. "I'm fine."

"I…" Eddie's voice sounds small, scared. "I'm so sorry, I don't know what happened. I didn't mean to–"

"Come on." Penelope is calm as she interrupts him, more caring and gentle than you've ever heard her. "Let's go get you cleaned up."

You manage a nod before you allow her to help you to your feet and put a protective arm around your back as she leads you over toward the Therapy House.

Eddie stands there with the orderly, hands shaking and tears forming in the corners of his eyes as he watches you go. Hoping you'll look back. That you'll tell him it's okay, that you'll forgive him. Tell him that you will be okay.

You don't look back.

Once you've disappeared behind those birch doors, the orderly finally lets him go. Walks back over to the main hall without another word – leaving Eddie alone to his panic and shame while he stares at your copy of Good Omens from where it sits half open and abandoned in the grass.

Your chair is empty in group that day.

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thanks for reading!! please reblog if you liked it and let me know what you think, feedback means everything!! read part 2 here

[spinningwebsandtales]

Imagine Looking At Maverick’s Photo Collection With Rooster

Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw X FemReader

Warnings: Suggestive themes, mentions of death, angst but mostly fluff

Rating: T

Words: 1,688

Requested by @carpediem1219​

(A/N): I honestly didn’t think I was going to be able to get this done so fast but I got started writing and couldn’t stop until I finished. I absolutely loved writing this and I hope it’s everything you hoped and wished for. Thank you again for the request it brings me such joy to be able to write things that my readers want to see! Enjoy the fluff and until next time happy reading! ~Countess

This day was one you were always going to remember, as you watched the scenery pass by while sitting in the passenger side of Rooster’s Ford Bronco. The sun seemed to shimmer on the dust kicked up behind the Bronco’s tires while the rays made your skin glow. Rooster relaxed in the driver’s seat, one hand lazily on the steering wheel with his aviators perched on his nose. You couldn’t help but notice his wind tousled hair and how the breeze pulled at his tank top giving you glimpses of his broad chest. He was wearing one of his father’s old shirts you noticed as well.

 Married life with Rooster was absolute bliss and you couldn’t help the feeling of joy when taking glances at the golden ring you had slipped onto his ring finger that unforgettable day. You remembered the fear at the news that he and Maverick had been shot down during their mission but you were relieved when the news broke that they were okay came around. You were angry but also thankful that they both made it through. 

Rooster had always looked at Maverick as a father figure until their relationship was strained. You couldn’t talk Rooster out of hating the man who tried so hard but when you both had a talk the night he returned from his mission he talked about how he forgave Maverick and you were so proud. Now with their father and adopted son relationship patched you were going to see Maverick’s hanger for the first time. You were kinda hoping for a plane ride as well as a tour. Rooster glimpsed over at you smiling to yourself.

“What’s got you all smiles over there,” he grinned looking back at the gravel road.

“I wanna go on a plane ride,” you giggled like a five year old. “I can’t believe I haven’t gotten to come here before!”

“Weelll I didn’t help matters,” Rooster said sheepishly.

“No you didn’t but that’s all in the past. I’m glad that everything is better between you two. I know Mav has your best interests at heart.” You took Rooster’s free hands his fingers automatically tangling with yours. “I have the same want in my life that you are happy and that you are healthy.”

Rooster kissed the back of your hand since he couldn’t look away from the road but for just a few seconds, “As long as I have you, I have everything I could ever want and need.”

“Oh stop or we’re not going to make it to Maverick’s without a pit stop,” you snickered.

“I’ll pull over right now!”

“No,” you laughed slapping his shoulder. “Maverick is waiting for us. But you can take me to bed after we visit with Mav.”

“I’ll remember that,” he wiggled his eyebrows behind his aviators.

“Oh I know you will. I’ll help you!”

Maverick stood outside the hanger entrance waiting on the arrival of two of his most favorite people and when he saw the Bronco trailing dust a large smile graced his face. Before Rooster could shut off the vehicle you were out of the passenger side racing towards Maverick with open arms.

“Mav,” you yelled your hair billowing behind you.

“Hey! Glad you both got here safely,” Maverick answered embracing you before picking you up and swinging you around. “Welcome to my place.”

“Navy man through and through are we,” you teased seeing the faded words above your head.

“It’s in the blood.” Maverick turned to Rooster who was now standing close his hands in his pocket. Maverick gave his arm a tender slap before pulling the young man into a hug. Rooster returned it, happy to have all animosity gone. You both followed Maverick inside to where he showed you his very own P-51 Mustang and all the work he had been doing to the aircraft. Rooster was really intrigued but they lost you right at the beginning. So you just found yourself looking around at the surrounding area of the hanger. There was awards hanging everywhere, motorcycles lined up in a row, a smaller closet, and other things that piqued your curiosity. Stepping away you looked back at both of the men, Maverick could tell that you didn’t want to just stand around to hear them talk planes so he gave you a nod.

  Off you went to explore more on your own. While he still payed attention to Maverick and he was interested on being hands-on with a different plane Rooster couldn’t help but watch as you explored around on your own.

“Don’t be,” Rooster chuckled picking up the photo you were reaching for. It was him as a kid being held by Maverick as Goose and Carole stood by his side. “Dad died a little after this photo was taken.”

Your hands crossed behind your back you rocked back and forth on your heels while reading the multiple plaques up on the wall. Maverick was absolutely amazing and one heck of a pilot. And while all his awards were intriguing there was one spot you were making your way to that had your interest more than anything else. One spot held pictures of all kinds and you could tell most of the people on them. Even far away you could recognize Rooster’s dad that he couldn’t help but talk about all the time. You were reaching for a photo when a presence made itself known at your side causing you to jump.

“Sorry,” you cringed. You felt like a kid caught with their hand stuck in the cookie jar.

“I know you told me that he died when you were a kid but I didn’t quite imagine that you were that young Roos.” Tears pricked at the corner of your eyes.

“Yeah,” he chuckled bitterly. “Mom did everything she could and Maverick was my father figure as I grew up. But I was kind of a brat growing up without a dad. Fellow kids didn’t help, I was bullied some. That’s why I never told anybody in Top Gun about Goose being my dad or how he was Maverick’s wingman. I didn’t want the sympathy and I didn’t want anybody to know why I hated Maverick so bad.”

“Rooster,” you whimpered.

“Hey don’t cry it’s okay,” he wrapped an arm around your shoulders and giving you a squeeze. “Here look at nerdy looking me in my ball uniform.” You laughed at his curly hair sticking out from under the green cap. You sniffled but took the photo.

“I think you look really cute.”

“So did mom,” he rolled his eyes. “Good thing I’m a better pilot than I am baseball player. I didn’t suck, but I wasn’t the best either.”

“Who’s tempting,” you cooed.

“Top Gun pilots are cooler than baseball players,” you teased elbowing him. “But this one,” you picked up another photo, “is my absolute favorite.” You touched the photo tenderly of Rooster in his official Navy uniform. A sharp looking photo of him well groomed and his uniform pressed.

“Picture day was awful,” he moaned.

“But you look so hot,” you purred.

“Careful Maverick is still around,” he warned. “Don’t tempt me.”

Maverick felt like he had given you both enough time and he was wanting to visit with you as well. When Rooster had talked to him about finally asking you to marry him, despite the rift between them, he was beyond ecstatic. You were good for Rooster and kept him grounded. Now he looked to you as a daughter so he didn’t feel too guilty when he cut in.

“Walking down memory lane,” he spoke patting you on the shoulder.

“Yeah. Or you could also say that I’m laughing at all these photos of baby Rooster.”

“Ain’t he a cutie,” Maverick cooed reaching to pinch Rooster’s cheek. The younger man slapped the offending hand away giving Maverick a nasty glare.

“I think it’s time to add to the pile besides just these ones,” Rooster replied looking down at you still in awe of all the pictures of the people Maverick considered family.

Maverick nodded also looking down at you still oblivious, “(Y/N) I think it’s time to start adding you to the family wall album.”

“Me?!”

“Pfft yeah,” Rooster snorted. “You married me! Welcome to our weird and kinda tragic family.”

Maverick nodded in agreement, “Welcome new pilot let’s go get your picture taken with Rooster of course.” Before you could protest or say anything else you were swept off your feet by Rooster who started towards the plane parked in the middle of the hanger. Maverick grabbed a camera he kept around (he would lie saying that he hadn’t bought it two days ago with this in mind) before following behind Rooster. Rooster stopped in front of the plane refusing to let you go despite your protests.

“Perfect,” Maverick answered. “It’s finally official (Y/N) Bradshaw is now one of us.”

“Say cheese,” Maverick yelled positioning himself and the camera for the best angle. You had no choice but to give in so you threw up a peace sign while giving Rooster a big smooch on the cheek.

“Cheese,” you mumbled, lips pressed against Rooster’s scarred cheek.

Rooster laughed still holding you while Mav took the photo.

“Glad to be here,” you nodded. The rest of the day was spent laughing and telling stories and you couldn’t remember having so much fun.

Taglist: @mads-weasley​

As the years passed by, the collection of photos began to grow. Photos of Rooster helping Maverick with his plane, you cooking dinner for them, Penny joining the growing family with her daughter, and then came the photos of you with Rooster, your stomach rounded with the next generation of Bradshaws. Those were Maverick’s favorites. The first pregnancy photo was followed by another and then one more. Then photos became the sound of tiny feet padding against the hanger floor. The calls of children with the perfect mix of Rooster and you following their father around asking questions. It was the kind of perfect that Maverick thought would never come and yet here it was and he wouldn’t change anything.

[seenoversundown]

Sparrow Of the Dawn : Chapter 1

Sam x Willa (Fem OC) Warnings: Alcohol / Mentions of drinking, brotherly banter, dark humor/mentions of death (if you squint), otherwise silly boys being boys.

Word Count: 3.9K

Summary : Sam unfortunately finds himself in not so meet cute with Willa. Hopeful that he doesn't cross her path again; the world works in mysterious ways and not always in your favor.

Authors Note: AHHHHH I can’t wait for everybody to read and I hope you all love it as much as I do!! I’m so excited and nervous, feels like I’m waiting for the midnight premiere of Deathly Hallows (part 2) all over again 🥹😭💜

Flower Power - Greta Van Fleet “She’s a sparrow of the dawn, our love is born”

“Oh, HEY,” Jake says sarcastically the second he opens the front door, “Nice of you to show up, Jackass,” huffing out a laugh as he shuts the door behind me. The scuffed-up cherry wood floor creaks under the weight of our feet as I follow him over to where he had been organizing new stock behind the bar. 

“Right.. aaand where’s my paycheck again?” I retort, sliding onto my regular spot and dropping my camera bag next to me. The spot in the dead center of the bar has been claimed as mine since before Jake even opened, the stool now complete with my etched initials SFK under the cushion. 

“Time is money, brother, and I lend you mine for free, so you get me when I’m free. Which apparently to you means 9 a.m.?” I say, clasping my hands on the bartop, “So please, tell me what is so important that I needed to be here so early.” He sourly smirks back at me.

“Yeah, yeah. I have a few new ones in for you to shoot, and I’d like to get it done before we get busy today.” He picks up his clipboard, eyeing his stock list.

 “We finally got the pomegranate Downeast released last month that was on backorder, as well as the pear and the guava passion fruit. Then we have ‘Reciprocal’ from Bissell Bros here in Portland, and ‘Interchangeable #7’ from Blaze Brewing in Biddo. I’d really like to get the blaze shot for our ads because it has the most interesting can art. But, ya know, I trust you.” He reads off.

A year ago, Jake, my older brother, bought this bar located right here in the heart of the Old Port. Back in his senior year of high school he got really into “Black Sails”, this pirate TV show; he practically made it his personality. Naturally, he decided he wanted to run a bar for the rest of his life, so when old man Chuck decided to retire, Jake jumped at the opportunity to purchase it. “Caravel Tavern” has only been open for 6 months and It's been his baby ever since. 

“Wow, Jake Kiszka putting trust in ME? Are you feeling okay?” I feign shock grabbing at my heart.

“Just get it done, you idiot,” he says with a roll of his eyes.

“Alright, alright,” I say, glancing over the options. “Give me like an hour. I have an idea that might work. I need to head to the farmer’s market in town, but I can have the best shots edited and emailed to you tomorrow, and then we can pick the best ones for print.” I grab my bag, digging around for my car keys. “Hey, when is Josh in today? I’d like to get some shots of you guys pouring drinks for the website and Instagram for Josh’s intro post.”

“He should be here by the time you’re done with everything. That is if he’s on time. But let's be realistic, when is a Kiszka ever on time?” He replies as he breaks down boxes with a box cutter. 

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I take a right onto the gravel that’s set behind the farmers market, my rusty 92’ Ford F-150 rattling as I park. I hope to god it’s just a heat shield making that noise. I cannot afford another repair on Edith. She may be an old crotchety bitch, but she has my whole heart. Well, right behind Penelope, my Bernese mountain dog, Penny girl will always be my number one.

Ding 

I put her in park and shove my hand into my backpack blindly searching for the source of the text tone. Finally finding my phone Tweedle Dum🦞 appears on the screen.. I let out a giggle. 

We’re running a special on whiskey sours tonight pick up some eggs, princess.

I switch Jake and Josh’s contact name back and forth between tweedle dee and tweedle dum mainly to keep them on their toes, but I’d be lying if I said tweedle dum isn’t just whoever has pissed me off or been dubbed the biggest dumbass that week. The emojis always stay the same so I can keep them actually straight though. 

You got it, boss, I send back to Jake, winning the title this week for making me wake up at the ass crack of 9am. Which absolutely is early for me. 

Gathering my things, I step out of my truck, immediately being hit with a cold gust of wind, the air causing my eyes to water slightly. I brush away a tear forming in my eye before it threatens to fall down my cheek. For it being the end of March the air is crispier than normal. I pause a moment too long, and a shiver runs through my body. I zip my jacket up a little higher, trying to preserve my body heat. Making sure I have my mesh bag with me, I shut my door and head over to the booths. 

I make a beeline for Linda, a sweet older woman who is here every week selling chicken eggs, various fruits from her garden, and some knick-knack crafts she makes. I have about seven bowl koozies, though I’m not sure I even own as many bowls considering it’s just me, but they are really good for ramen and ice cream. Which I do not eat together. Jake and Josh live in the apartment above the bar, so when I moved back after college, I got an apartment a couple roads away to stay close. 

Our parents moved out of our small hometown, which sits just on the other side of Portland. Padded off to Apple Valley, Georgia trying to settle into a warmer climate or something. They bought a house big enough for just the two of them and a guest room on an acre of land, “just in case any of you boys come to visit” Mom said. In all honesty, Apple Valley is just the same town, different state. They always said they didn’t like the city because it was too big, which is funny to me after spending the last four years in Boston. Everything here seems much smaller now.

“Morning Linda!” I smile and wave at her.

“Oh, Samuel. You’re up early this week. How are you doing, Sweetheart? How’s my Daniel?” She flashes me a warm smile. She’s also Daniel’s biggest fan. Pretty sure she only comes into the bar to see him, even though I met her first. But what can I say? I’m apparently an excellent matchmaker; we just won't mention the fact that she's 72.

I chuckle, “I’m just out running some errands for Jake. I’m on call today, apparently. Daniel’s good though! He misses you, ya know.” I finish flashing her a wink.

She lets out a high-pitched laugh, “I’ll be down to visit with Miss Eleanor. You tell him not to worry.” She raises an eyebrow and smirks at me, “Anyway, what can I get ya my dear?”

“Think two dozen will do it for today.” I hand her a crumpled ten-dollar bill in exchange, “Keep the change, Lin. I’ll see you at the bar or next Saturday, whichever comes first.” I set the eggs carefully in my tote and head toward my next stop, the flower truck.

The beer I’m photographing for the bar has a brightly colored logo in a style reminiscent of comic book art. A bold red can with yellow, blue, and purple adorning the signature name. My idea is to use a bouquet of different flowers to accent the colors and make the can pop. 

I scan through the metal buckets, trying to mentally piece together an arrangement without disturbing the flowers too much. They are far too delicate to be pulling and yanking on them just to try them out for size. Some of the people here, like Linda, make their living posting up every Saturday. 

I reach for a bundle of forget-me-nots, settling on those along with the last of the remaining Irises, a few red Dahlias, Daffodils, and Butterfly Milkweed. Taking a step back slightly away from the displays, I start to rearrange the bouquet to my liking. Extending my arms out in front of me, and changing my angle to make sure I like how the flowers look together. Just as I decide that, yes, these will do for what their intended purpose is, I feel someone aggressively poking my bicep. 

I turn toward the person attached to the finger. Not going to lie; I’m a bit impressed by the force of it, considering I’m wearing a sweater under my quilted jacket, and the woman who’s doing the poking is standing at about 5 foot nothing and looks like a swift breeze might carry her away. I blink slowly at her a few times and raise my eyebrows waiting expectedly.

“Did someone die, or did you just fuck up like, wicked bad?” the snark heavily laden on her tone. 

I close my eyes and let out a long breath, “Uhm, it’s uhh –” I stutter a bit, really trying to play it up, “My grandma died last week, actually. Did you know her? Her name was Althea.” I gaze down at my shoes and drop my head a bit, taking a moment before I attempt to look for her reaction through my eyelashes. If I held my breath long enough, I might just be able to work up a tear. Would that be too dramatic? .. maybe.

“Oh.. uh. No, I didn’t. I’m sor–” Regret immediately paints her face.

“I’m fucking with you.” I let out a small laugh

“What?” her eyes narrow at me, trying to figure out if I’m lying or telling the truth.

“I’m joking, my grandma is fine. Are you okay? Or is it a normal occurrence for you to ask a complete stranger if they’re mourning a dead relative?" Amusement settles on my face.

She lets out an audible groan. Why is she so angry? She tugs down at the sides of her short floral dress and waves a hand out toward my arrangement. 

“Why on earth do you need every single purple flower!?” She exclaims, “And who jokes about their grandma dying?” stamping her beaten-up Doc Marten into the patchy grass. She actually stomped her foot at me. What are we twelve?

I roll my eyes and attempt to alleviate the situation, “Bachelor Buttons.” 

I have work to do and absolutely do not need an attitude from a complete stranger, even if she is cute. I have brothers for that purpose, and they do their jobs well enough.

 “They’re mostly purple but with a bit of blue. They symbolize love if you’re trying to give them to someone important.” I scratch the back of my head and briefly hope she says she’s not. I immediately throw the thought away with a shake of my head. Nope, not opening that door.

“I don’t need Bachelor Buttons.” 

“.. ookaay. You could always d –” 

“I need Irises.” She says, cutting me off, “Specifically. Okay? And I’m fine, but if I can't find irises today because of you count *poke* your *poke* days!” she ends her sentiment with a final sharp poke to my chest and storms away. God damn, her finger is like a tiny dagger.

Listen, growing up without any sisters means I don’t know much about women, but what I do know .. is definitely never believe one when they say they’re fine. 

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As I walk through the door of Caravel Tavern for the second time today, I call out, “Okay, Jake, I’m back with your eggs, Asshole. Where are you?”

I set my camera bag and the eggs down and lean over the counter, checking to see if he’s kneeling behind the bar top.

 “.. Jake?” I look side to side. Where the hell is he? It’s the middle of the day, not nearly early enough for lunch.. Not like the guy takes a break anyway. 

“JAKE WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?!” I yell through my cupped hands. The sound echoes through the empty space.

He comes running from the back room, a panic written on his face. “Jesus Christ, Sam, what?”

“Got your eggs.” grinning wildly at him. I swear I'm actually his favorite brother. 

“Well, thanks, Samuel, for being useful for one thing today.” He says, before changing his tone, “You okay? You look a bit tense?”

“Yeah,” absentmindedly, my hand drifts to my shoulder, rubbing at the area where angry-flower-girl poked me earlier. “Actually, you’ll never believe what happened to me at the farmers market.”

He’s not looking at me when he hums his response, just putting the eggs in the mini fridge next to the ice well. I slide the second carton over to him.

“I ran into this girl, actually, she ran into me rather. I was picking out the bouquet arrangement for the photos I want to take and she sorta.. Came at me poking?”

He slowly stands and looks at me, his brow furrowed a bit. “She.. came at you?” He pauses. “Poking?”

“Poking,” I point to my shoulder in disbelief.

“Okay, and what did this poking girl want?”

“To yell at me for taking all the irises. I tried to do the gentlemanly thing and suggest an alternative, but she poked me some more and stomped off. She was hot as hell even if she was a bit psychotic.” 

“Well, why did you take all the irises? You also could have taken the other- wait, “ Jake pauses, turning to face me head-on. He sets the empty carton on the counter, “No, whatever you’re thinking about, cut it out,” He points at me, “Did you forget about the last ‘cute but insane’ girl?” 

“Hey, she wasn’t that bad! AND she was really hot?!” both hands raised.

“Sam, she cracked your windshield” he pinches the bridge of his nose.

Just as I’m about to further protest, “Cracked windshield? We’re not talking about ‘the Bride of Chucky’ are we?” Josh says

“Oh, come on guys, you can say her name. And again.. She wasn't that bad.”

“No, every time you say her name she comes back like Voldemort, and none of us need that shit.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. Get your ass clocked in so I get your headshots done, and you can get to work lest Jake have a stroke.” I lean toward Josh and whisper, “You’re already late.”

“When isn’t he late?” Jake sighs and rolls his eyes.

“Well,” Josh claps his hands together, “it is clearly time for my close-up. Sammy, let’s get this shit fest over with.”  

Oh, Josh, ever the dramatic brother.

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I don’t spend a ton of time taking Josh’s photos, grateful that he isn’t afraid of the camera. I barely have to direct him, which makes my life that much easier. If he could work on just not being a pain in the ass the rest of the time, that’d be great. 

A few goodbyes later, and I’m finally off to edit. Putting all my things into the passenger seat and giving my truck some words of encouragement, the engine turns over. Thank fucking god. I live fairly close to the bar, so I decide to not bother with the radio and just listen to whatever comes my way. 

Still thinking about the poking girl, mostly because my chest was sore. I didn’t expect to be stabbed today. I do hope she found her Irises…  

‘Now I don’t hardly know her, but I think I could love her,’

I turn the volume up on the radio, hoping it’ll help me focus on driving and not thinking about her.  

I make it back home, throwing the truck in park and hustling up to my apartment. I’m quickly greeted by my bundle of joy. I set all my things out to edit on the counter and take care of Miss P before I start working.

Taking a walk is probably what I needed to do anyway. 

I got Penelope right after I graduated and moved back up here. Being used to a house full of people to just living alone was.. well, lonely. I think I lasted only a few months living alone before I gave in and went to find a pet. The twins suggested a cat because they’re fairly low maintenance, and their plan was to get a couple cats once their lives settled a bit. Settled ended up being right around when Jake bought the bar, I would hardly call that settled, but it worked out for them. Me on the other hand, I’m more of a dog person. As soon as I saw Penny, I knew she’d be my adventure buddy, coming with me on my walks and hikes and photography trips. It’s definitely easier with a dog, despite what Josh says about how easy it is to train a cat with a harness to adventure with you.

Once she is settled in after our walk, I sit down to edit for a while. Pulling up the photos of Josh, something seems off. Why are half of these out of focus? I think to myself, scrolling through the options. If he could have just stopped talking for two seconds, this one would have looked good.  The longer I scroll through the options, the more annoyed I get. Why did she poke me so fucking hard? Finding myself rubbing the spot on my chest, I force myself to get up for a minute. Maybe I just need to walk around. Wandering into my bathroom, I pull the collar of my shirt down to see the spot, if it doesn’t actually bruise, I’ll be SHOCKED.  

Sitting back down, I take one look at the photo I've been trying to salvage, letting out a sigh. This is awful. 

Me: hey I’m not super happy with how Josh’s pics came out.. Do you care if I just borrow him in the morning to get some new ones? 

Me: Not at 6am tho-  it’ll be Sunday, The Lord’s day, and he would want me to get my beauty rest. 

Tweedle Dum🦞: lol that’s fine bud 

Me: I may come back for a drink tho. Shit has me STRESSED.

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“God, Sam, don’t you ever leave?” Josh calls from behind the bar. 

“You’d think I was tired of looking at your ugly mug all day, but guess not.” My lips wind into a tight smile. “Can I actually get a drink? I’m annoyed as fuck that I hate all the pictures I took today, and a drink sounds like the perfect remedy.” 

“Turning to alcohol to solve your problems, hmm?”

“Shhhhh,” I wave my hands in front of me. “Can I get a Clover Club, maybe? In a whiskey glass.. No garnish. I don’t wanna look like a little bitch.” I groan 

“Let your freak flag fly, brother,” spinning away to go make my drink and tend to the other patrons seated down the bar top. 

This drink really better do the trick so I can relax for five minutes. Honestly, the pressure I put on myself to make sure I do well for Jake’s pride and joy, along with trying to find my own way with a full-time job is a little exhausting. It’s hard knowing that Caravel is his baby; he really doesn’t have much else going on. I swear if he got laid, he’d be a hell of a lot less uptight about it, but I digress. I don’t totally feel like I’m the most reliable person, but I try to make sure he can count on me and I don’t contribute to his stress. Ya know, he’s my brother, and I want him to be as proud of me as I am of him for doing what he loves so much. I don’t think I tell him enough how proud I really am of him. He’s someone I look to for inspiration for trying to pave my own way. I’d never tell him that though, because he’d probably think I was yanking his chain or something. I have a job trial-type thing down in Boston later this week, and I’m really hoping it turns out to be something good. I could use something good right now.

Josh interrupts my thoughts, setting my drink down, “Just how you asked for it in a cocktail glass with extra garnish.”

I sigh audibly, “Ya know, I don’t even care. Gimme it.” I gulp it down in nearly one go. Josh looks surprised at me. Whether it’s because of my eagerness or because he knows I’m terrible at holding my alcohol, I’m not sure. I don’t care. 

“One more.” I close my eyes, waiting for the gin to work its magic on me. Feeling my muscles relax bit by bit, my brow finally straightens out, and I sink down against the wall closest to my seat. I sigh audibly again, though this time it’s one of relief.

The longer I sit here, the more people are trickling in. Sipping on my drink this time, I notice people in all sorts of outfits looking vaguely like anime characters. Gathering in little cliques of friend groups, a few interesting folk bouncing from table to table. I can't tell if time is moving incredibly fast or if the alcohol has made me move slower, but suddenly, I have the realization that it’s packed in here. Since opening, they’ve been able to handle everything behind the bar, just the two of them, with Daniel manning the door, but I don’t think they’re equipped to handle whatever event these people are overflowing from. 

I swig back the last sip of my drink, grab my glass, and make my way to the back room. I toss the raspberry garnish before setting the glass in the sink to be washed. Grabbing the ice bucket, I start to fill it to make sure the front is stocked for them; ice is usually always the first thing to go. I lug the full bucket back behind the bar, and refill the ice well. 

“Thanks, Sammy. Hey,  would you mind bussing some of the tables and asking the people with tabs if they need any refills, please? I’ll make sure I put you on the payroll for the night,” Jake asks, eyes pleading and desperate for help. And really, who am I to say no to him?

“Of course I can. I’ve got nothing else better to do anyway.” I start to reach for a tray. 

“Thanks. I mean it.” he says, squeezing my shoulder, “I forgot PortCon was happening, and we’re close to one of the hotels.” He explains before returning to the drink he's making. 

That explains the costumes. I do my rounds checking to make sure everyone seated in the booths are okay, grabbing the empty drinks out of their way, making light conversation when I can. I bring a tray of glasses, napkins, and various random trash items back behind the bar and set them in the bin next to Jake. Just as I go to take another trip, my eyes catch the door. Of course. Of course, this would happen to me. I can’t have a single day go smoothly if my life depended on it. Good God, someone is out to get me, I swear. 

“Fuck me,” I say out loud. 

“Who is that?” Jake says to me as he’s working on his current drink order. 

“The angry-flower-girl with the dagger fingers,” I pause, looking at the dude standing next to her, “annnd her date.”

“Oh shit.”

Crimson and Clover - Tommy James and the Shondells

“Now I don't hardly know her But I think I could love her Crimson and clover”

<- Prologue Chapter Two ->

Masterpost | Taglist | Jukebox Playlist

Taglist:

@gvfsstardust, @myleftsock, @mindastreamofcolours, @dont-go-home-without-me, @literal-dead-leaf, @lizzys-sunflower, @threadofstars, @mackalah, @klarxtr, @edgingthedarkness, @writingcold, @i-love-gvf, @takenbythemadness, @ladywhimsymoon, @earthgrlsreasy, @ourlovesdesire, @peaceloveunitygvf, @anythingforjtk

[bradshawssugarbaby]

She's in Love with the Boy - Jake Seresin x OC

A/N: This is part two in my series She Had Me at Heads Carolina, I don't know why I see country music + hangman as a thing (ok so maybe I do know why) but here we are. I wrote this half awake this morning and it's probably a lot less cute than I think it is.

tagging: @mamachasesmayhem for the update lol

pairing: Lt. Jake Seresin x fem! OC

warnings/content: literally just Jake drunkenly singing 90s country music badly again

word count: 2.4k

 It had been two days since your beach trip, and you were thinking over the past 48 hours as you sat at your vanity, brushing your hair out before getting ready to go out that night.

Courtney had been far more bold than you were at the beach that day, having gone home with Bradley as soon as it was offered. You knew she was crazy for him already just by the way she looked at him. She’d always been one of those love at first sight types, the kind who believes in soulmates and finding that perfect person who makes you swoon with one look. It didn’t typically work out for her, wearing her heart on her sleeve and being so head over heels in love every time, but, this one occasion, you really hoped it did. She hadn’t talked about anything but him for the last day and a half it’d been since she got home - he’d been the perfect gentleman, driving her home the next morning in his 1972 Ford Bronco, dropping her off and seeing that she got inside ok, even though it was broad daylight and you and Stephanie were both still home. 

Stephanie had been texting with Bob ever since, giggling and blushing at the small screen every so often. Where Courtney over shared about her time with Rooster, Stephanie undershared about her relationship with Bob. She kept her lips sealed about just about everything, including their date yesterday morning. Bob had shown up in uniform to pick her up on his way into the base, wanting to take her for breakfast before they both had to go into work for the day. 

As far as you and Jake went, you’d been exchanging text messages back and forth with one another. It started with Jake sending you a “Hey there Heads Carolina,” to you responding with “Does that make you Tails California?” From there, it evolved into a near constant back and forth between the two of you, swapping country playlists and favourite songs, facts about your lives back home, yourselves, your likes, your dislikes. You weren’t normally one to fall in love instantly, but after two days of exchanging texts, you found yourself dying to see him again. He’d apologized for not taking you out yet, he’d been called in for an early briefing the first day, and yesterday he’d been stuck late working on something, none of which you could know any details about.  Courtney and Stephanie had tried reassuring you that he was interested in you, but part of you wondered if maybe it was just Jake being too polite to tell you he didn’t want to see you again.

Your phone had buzzed violently against the wooden top of your vanity a couple of hours ago, vibrating and moving across the slick, matte white finish of the furniture. You looked down and saw it was Jake, or as you’d saved him in your phone, Tails, California.

“Hey sweets, I was wondering if you’re free tonight. Karaoke at The Hard Deck. I need a duet partner. I’d sing with Rooster, but he’s a spotlight hog.”

“I can come, but that singing on the beach was a one time thing. I felt bad you were getting roasted alive.”

“I’m not that bad.”

“Really?”

“Are you not going to feel bad if I get booed off stage tonight? I might end up getting drunk and singing Amazed or something.”

“Oh God, can’t have you butchering poor Lonestar. The whole state of Texas might shun you. I’ll be there.”

“Thanks sweets, karaoke starts at 7. I’ll be there a little earlier.”

You breathed a sigh of relief as you realized that Jake hadn’t been avoiding you on purpose. You were never the type to get in too deep after one meeting, but something about Jake had you completely taken by him. You couldn’t put your finger on it, but you could feel the infatuation with him brewing whenever you thought about him. You scrolled through your phone and settled on a country playlist you’d built years ago during college, back when you still lived in Tennessee. You hadn’t even been remotely interested in it in years before the beach, but since Jake got you singing along with him, you found yourself wanting to revisit it for the nostalgia. Plus, you wanted to make sure you didn’t humiliate yourself on karaoke night by not knowing the words to 90s country songs, which were all probably fair game if Jake was choosing.

As the opening notes of She’s In Love With The Boy began filling your room, you hummed the familiar tune. You picked a sweet, pale blue daisy print sundress from your closet, pulling its thin fabric over your head as you got dressed. You began rummaging through your closet, praying you hadn’t left any boxes of shoes at your parents house back in Tennessee as you looked for the perfect compliment to your outfit. Pulling out a pair of classic cognac brown cowboy boots, you gave yourself an eyeroll as you put them on, unable to deny you were doing it purely to impress him. You turned to yourself in the mirror and examined your outfit. Your hair was curled and neatly pushed back off your face with a baby blue headband,  one that perfectly matched hue of your dress. Your makeup was simple and natural, a nice compliment to the vibe of the dress you’d chosen. As you nodded your head once, you grabbed your phone, turning your music off. 

A short drive later, you were at The Hard Deck with Courtney and Stephanie in tow, looking for Jake and his friends. Bob waved you all over with a friendly smile, and Stephanie practically ran to him. He put his arm around her affectionately and kissed her cheek. He handed her a drink and smiled. 

“Hey, I know Rooster’s up at the bar, Courtney,” Bob said with a nod towards where Bradley was standing. Bradley waved excitedly, his aviator sunglasses clipped to his white tank top under his open Hawaiian print dress shirt. Bob was sporting a simple jeans and oxford-blue dress shirt combo, with the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to his elbows, showing off his somewhat surprisingly muscular arms. He smiled as he pointed to the dart board where Jake was standing on the other side of the bar, sporting a Texas Longhorns baseball jersey, light washed denim jeans and cowboy boots. 

“Hangman’s currently mopping the floor with Coyote in darts right now. I don’t know how that guy does it, but he hits bullseye every time. It’s literally my job to hit targets and I can’t even do it as accurately as he does every time in darts,” Bob shakes his head in disbelief as he laughs. “He should be almost done, I think. I don’t really know how long a game of darts goes on for?”

You politely excused yourself from your friends for a moment, heading over to where Jake was standing. He leaned in to his step, tossing another perfectly thrown dart at the board again. 

“Nice shot,” you said cooly as you looked at him.

“Hey! I figured I’d play some darts until you got here,” Jake laughed softly as he nodded his head before setting the darts down and leaning on the high top table that his drink sat on. 

“Courtney and Stephanie were invited too, so we just carpooled down, took us a bit longer than I’d hoped because Courtney couldn’t decide what outfit Rooster would like better on her,” You shook your head as you thought about how silly it sounded when you said it out loud, “She really likes him, wants to make a good impression.”

“Oh trust me, he hasn’t shut the fuck up about how great she is over the last two days. It’s kind of cute in a way though. Also kind of annoying in a way but I’m letting it slide because he’s in love,” Jake smirked as he put the amber coloured glass bottle to his lips, taking a sip, “You can tell her though, he doesn’t care what she’s wearing. He’s going to respond the same way if she shows up in a trash bag.” 

“Noted. Stephanie is getting all giggly over Bob, but I she’s always giggly and blushing so it’s hard to tell with her. She’s not as…open as Courtney is. Although, I think she’s pretty smitten since he took her for breakfast yesterday and picked her up in his uniform. That alone probably sold her.”

“Oh she liked that? That was my idea. Bob’s a little shy and a little…inexperienced when it comes to dating. Figured I’d help the poor bastard out a little bit on that one. He really likes her.” 

“Your idea?”

“Yeah, he had to meet me yesterday for a training exercise, but I told him I could stall for an hour if he wanted to take her out or something. I suggested he just wear his uniform, because girls apparently love men in uniform. And I clearly wasn’t wrong,” Jake’s smile was smug, yet genuine as he shrugged his shoulders.

“What are you, some kind of professional matchmaker?” You retorted dryly as you raised an eyebrow at him, trying to hide the fact that you were about to break out into a grin.

“Nah, I just know the poor guy needs the extra push, ya know?” Jake set his beer down as his eyes scanned over your body, taking in your outfit choice for the evening, “You look fantastic, sugar. You even brought out your cowboy boots?” 

“I thought I left them back home, but I found them in the back of the closet, I haven’t worn them since I finished college. Even then, it was just for bars and homecoming. I’m amazed they fit.”

“Hey, I appreciate a good boot,” He nodded, gesturing to his own matching pair of cowboy boots. “Especially if we’re gonna be belting out another classic tonight. I have to see what our options are up there. Any preferences? I think we’re up after Payback and Fanboy. Not really a tough act to follow. The only one of us who can actually carry a fuckin’ tune is Rooster. Not fair he gets to look good with a mustache and sing,” Jake says as he mockingly pouts and rolls his eyes before grinning again. 

“Aw, jealous are we?” You teased, folding your arms across your chest as you raised your eyebrow at Jake.

“Only because when I grow a mustache like that, I look like an 80s porn star,” He shakes his head and laughs, “C’mon, let’s go get a drink and get closer to the stage so we can see what we’re up against.”

He took your hand in his, and you couldn’t help but notice how perfectly your hand fit in his. He smiled at the bartender, a pretty brunette woman, older than you both but by how much, you couldn’t be sure.

“Penny, m’dear, can I get another beer and whatever Lauren here wants to drink?” He smiled at you before turning back to face Penny, nodding his head as he handed her his credit card. “Here, I’ll save myself the trouble and just leave this with you,” He laughed and put his wallet back in his pocket. 

Jake handed you your drink and smiled as he tilted his head back towards the makeshift stage, where two men were currently butchering the entire melody of ‘Yeah!’ by Usher. 

“Tweedledee and tweedledum over here are almost finished up, it’s us next. You ready? Pick a song yet?” His green eyes looked at you full of intrigue as he awaited your reply.

“The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia?” 

Jake flipped through the options and shook his head, “Nope.”

“Chattahoochee?”

“You want me to get up on stage and sing that opening verse about the river being hotter than a hoochie coochie?”

“Good point,” You laughed and shook your head, feeling the humiliation at the mere suggestion of it now that he’s brought it up. 

“She’s In Love With The Boy is on here. That’s a good one.”

“You wanna sing Trisha Yearwood? Can your voice go that high?”

“Absolutely not but it’s that or I down another beer and start belting out Neon Moon by Brooks and Dunn with or without you.”

“Fair enough, Trisha Yearwood it is.”

“Her daddy says, “he ain’t worth a lick, when it comes to brains he’s got the short end of the stick,” you belted out with as much passion as you and your cocktail could muster.

“But Katie’s young and man she just don’t care, she’d follow Tommy anywhere” Jake harmonized with his adorably out of key baritone, trying to carry the note as best as he could.

“My daddy said, you wasn’t worth a lick, when it came to brains you got the short end of the stick–”

“but he was wrong and honey you are too, Katie looks at Tommy, like I still look at you.”

“She’s in love with the boy, she’s in love with the boy.”

As you and Jake continued to finish the last verse of the beloved country song, you couldn’t help but think about the words. You looked over to Jake who shot you a grin while he gripped his microphone, giving the final line as much as he could as he sang it out. 

“What’s meant to be will always find a way, she’s gonna marry that boy someday.”

You took note of the way the makeshift spotlight highlighted his dark blonde hair and sunkissed skin, his green eyes shining brightly, and the unmistakeable grin of someone having the absolute time of their life on his face. He looked even better in this light than he did on the beach the other day, cowboy boots, off-key singing and all. The more you thought about it, the more you thought that maybe, just maybe, the song might have been more than just a song you chose for karaoke. Whether you wanted to admit it or not, maybe you were in fact in love with the boy this time.

[harley-sunday]

Feels Like Home [Epilogue]

Summary: When an unexpected three-week break between Monza and Singapore finds Daniel back on his farm in Perth he’s desperate to use this time to clear his mind, figure out his future in Formula One, and find his way back. He didn’t expect a new neighbour, a sassy two-year old, and three alpacas would make him realise that sometimes, what you’re looking for is right in front of you.

Pairing: Daniel Ricciardo x reader (unnamed OFC)

Warnings: None. Weird.

Word count: 3k

AN: Sorry for the long wait, bb’s. Life got in the way and- Ugh. Anyway. Here we are, the last part of this story. I hope you liked reading it all as much as I enjoyed writing it. Please leave a comment if you did :) ♥

Masterlist

"Danny, banana. Danny, bana-"

"Mate-" Daniel locks eyes with his best friend through the rear view mirror and shakes his head.

From the driver's seat Blake shrugs and grins, "What? Shi-" He catches himself just in time, no doubt also because of a whispered, "Blake!" coming from next to Daniel, and corrects himself quick enough for it not to reach a certain three-year-old's ears. "It's a catchy song, mate." Blake looks over his shoulder then, wiggling his eyebrows, "Right, El?"

Ellie nods in response, dancing in her car seat as she continues where Blake left off, "-na. Danny, banana. Danny, banana."

There's a stifled laugh coming from his left, followed by a hand on his knee, "Regretting bringing us along for the weekend yet?"

He takes her hand in his, intertwining their fingers effortlessly, before he brings them up to his mouth and places a kiss to the back of her hand, "Never."

They're on their way to the track, Blake driving the Ford pickup Red Bull arranged for them this weekend, Mia, one of the Red Bull PR girls, in the front seat and Daniel, her, and Ellie crammed in the backseat together. It's Friday, free practice day, and so there's no rush, not much on his schedule except a sit-down interview with Sky Sports later today, once the two practice sessions are over. 

Next to him Ellie keeps singing her song and when he looks at her she smiles up at him with her toothy grin, holding out her hand to him. He takes it and presses a kiss to the back of her hand the same way he did to her mum's a few moments ago, "You excited, bub?"

"Yep," Ellie says confidently even though Daniel's sure she has no idea what's about to happen. She leans forward and looks around him, at her mum, "Happy days."

On his other side she laughs and shakes her head, muttering a quiet, "Tell me your kid is hanging out with your boyfriend too much without telling me your kid is hanging out with your boyfriend too much."

Daniel doesn't say anything but an exciting mix of happiness and pride and love spreading inside his chest, pushing out the nerves that have been there all morning. Because it's one thing to be going to his home Grand Prix, but it's another thing to do so with her and Ellie by his side. 

It feels like only yesterday when he was in Abu Dhabi, confirming after weeks of speculation that yes, he would be returning to his former team, but at the same time so much has happened in the time he’s been home that it’s hard to believe it’s only been four months.

The farm- their farm now, ever since he asked her and Ellie to move in with him at the end of January- has seemed to come alive and feels more like a home than it ever did before. They moved the girls from Oscar’s farm to theirs early March because it would be a lot easier for them to look after six alpacas than it would be for her Granddad, who now only has Homer to worry about and can finally enjoy his retirement. 

Last week they spent some time with Blake, trying to figure out whether or not they should launch their relationship ahead of the Grand Prix but in the end she made the decision for them when, after another hour or so of discussing the pros and cons, she looked at him and Blake and simply said, "Why don't we just see what happens? It can't be that bad, right?”

Blake, bless him, wasted no time and started rattling of a list of reasons why it would be bad, why they needed a plan, why-

"I get that part," she said, reaching over the kitchen table and putting her hand on Blake's arm, "and I think it's good that we have something to fall back on once the news breaks, but- I just don't like the idea of an official statement, or orchestrating a 'candid'-" she air-quoted the word, "-moment with the press. I much rather just have it happen naturally, if that makes sense."

Daniel remembers nodding in agreement, "She has a point, mate.”

Blake had leaned back in his chair, pushing up his glasses to pinch the bridge of his nose but then he dropped his shoulders and let out a resigned sigh and Daniel knew they had won Blake over, "Fine. I'll call Christian and Vicky and hear what they think.

Daniel told Christian about her, last November, in the few quiet hours before they announced his return to Red Bull. Christian hadn't said anything at first, just looked at Daniel the way he so often looked at Max, a softness there that Daniel hadn't quite known how to take until Christian clasped his shoulder and told him, his voice thick and laced with pride, "I'm really happy for you, Daniel. You- You more than anyone deserve this." 

And so he wasn’t surprised when Christian gave them the go-ahead.

They’re almost at the track now and when Daniel clears his throat, the nerves from earlier back in full force, he feels her squeeze his hand, like she knows exactly what he's feeling right now. He guesses that in a way she is. 

***

From the moment you arrive at the track it's hectic, Daniel and Blake leaving the car first in an attempt to give you and Ellie some respite from hundreds of the waiting fans. Mia stays with you, so she can escort you, in what everyone hopes will be relative peace, to the paddock once Max arrives in about five minutes. 

It's a carefully planned setup by Vicky who, more than anything else, was concerned about you and Ellie and promised she would try to make it as enjoyable as possible. Even if that meant you had to wait in the car for a few minutes so Max could act as a decoy.

Looking out of the window and seeing just how crazy people get when they see Daniel, you're glad you agreed. 

You're not sure if Vicky had anything to do with it but both Max and Sergio arrive at the track at the same time and with the fans' attention turned solely to the two Red Bull drivers, you make it to the team's garage without too much trouble. Mia not wearing any team gear but instead being undercover in her plain clothes definitely helped, you tell her with a wink once you're safely inside.

"I felt like I was on a secret mission," the young girl beams back at you. She nods then, "You guys have fun today."

"Thank you, Mia," you tell her with a warm smile that grows even wider when you see Daniel coming towards you.

"Hey you," he says, standing in front of you with his back towards the pitlane, effectively blocking you and Ellie from prying eyes. "All good?"

"All good," you confirm easily enough. 

He holds something out to Ellie then, looking extremely pleased with himself, "Here you go, bub. You have to put these on when the cars start to make loud noises, ok?"

Ellie takes the headphones from him, looking at Daniel with wide eyes.

"Oh wow, Ellie," you say as you pinch her cheek with your free hand. "Danny got you pink headphones, huh? How cool!"

"Thank you, Danny," Ellie says, leaning forward in your arms so she can press a kiss to Daniel's cheek.

Daniel smiles widely at Ellie before he grabs something off the counter next to you, "I got you a pair as well."

"Momma, look!" Ellie holds up hers, "The same!"

You smile, "Yeah, we're matching, bub. How very awesome."

"So free practice starts in an hour or so, do you want to grab something to eat first?" Daniel's rocking back and forth on his feet and you can tell he's getting a little nervous again. It’s the only downside of not having an official moment scheduled, you’ve come to realise, because it’s completely out of your hands and it’s just one big waiting game until someone spots you together and runs with it. 

You try to give Daniel your best reassuring smile, "Sounds great." Taking Ellie's headphones from her, you put them, and yours, in the large tote bag that's hanging from your shoulder before you move Ellie to your other hip, "Lead the way, Ricciardo."

Daniel nods towards the back of the garage and when you turn around he puts his hand on the small of your back, guiding you through a maze of corridors that lead back to the paddock and the Red Bull hospitality. 

Before you've crossed over though, Ellie starts wriggling in your arms and it isn't until you see a familiar face coming your way that you understand why. Ellie tries to push herself free and so, once he's close enough, you set her down and watch as she wobbles over to, "Uncle Mikey!"

Michael's entire face lights up and he squats down just in time to catch her, picking her up and laughing when she presses a wet kiss to his cheek, "Hello Miss Ellie. How you going?"

"Uncle Mikey," Ellie repeats, a little quieter this time, letting her head rest against his shoulder with a content sigh.

Michael nods to the driver who's standing next to him, "Go on, mate. I'll catch up with you in a bit, yeah?"

Yuki nods and gives Ellie a quick wave, "Bye."

A few heads have turned your way but then you greet Michael with a warm hug, Daniel keeping his distance, and it seems people lose interest rather quickly, probably thinking you're here for the Alpha Tauri trainer instead of Red Bull's reserve driver. Ellie, bless her, helps by babbling incessantly about whatever she deems interesting enough, as if she hasn't just seen him last Sunday when he was over for dinner with Nathalie and Blake. 

Michael listens intently but nods towards Red Bull's hospitality and so you follow him to where he stops in front of the sliding doors, thankful for the escort. When there's a lull in Ellie's stories, Michael takes it as his cue to hand her back to you, but not before promising he'll catch up with you later this weekend. 

Daniel reappears then, and together you head inside. The room is full of Red Bull employees enjoying their lunch but none of them seem to pay you any mind and it's then you remember a brief was sent out by the team earlier this week, where it was mentioned you and Ellie would be joining Daniel this weekend, effectively introducing you to the crew. 

There is someone waving at you from the other side of the room and so Daniel gently pushes you forward to where Blake is sitting. Without hesitating Blake pushes his chair back so he can take Ellie from you, bouncing her on his knee as you hang your bag on the back of a chair and sit down. Ellie's giggles quickly fill the room and you can't help but smile by how at ease she is.

"Well, hello,"

You look up and see Christian joining your table, giving Daniel a hug before he turns to you. Standing up you're ready to shake his hand but find yourself being pulled into a hug instead.

"It's so nice to finally meet you," Christian says when he lets go of you, one hand still on your arm. He nods to Daniel then, a mischievous grin on his lips, "This one wouldn't shut up about you."

You let out a laugh at the way Daniel's cheeks redden and smile at Christian, "Surprisingly enough we talked a lot about you on our first date, so I guess that makes two of us."

Christian chuckles and nods at Daniel, "I can see why you like her so much." He turns to Blake and Ellie then, "And who is this lovely lady?"

"Bit weird of you to call Blake that," Daniel pipes up with a grin, "but I'm sure he doesn't mind the compliment."

You shake your head at Daniel, trying to not laugh at the way Blake gives him one of his better scowls, and pick up Ellie, "This is my daughter Ellie."

"Hello Ellie," Christian says, giving her knee a gentle squeeze. "Don't you look just like your mum."

Ellie studies Christian for a second, her little eyebrows knitted together as she tries to decide whether she likes him or not, but then she grins widely, "Danny go racing."

"Not this weekend, bub," Daniel explains from next to Christian. "Some other time maybe."

Christian leans closer to Ellie then and whispers, loud enough for you and Daniel to hear, "Definitely some other time, sweetheart."

***

She and Ellie watch both the first practice session from inside Max’s side of the garage, while Daniel is on the pit wall, trying to concentrate but catching himself looking over his shoulder every couple of minutes to see if they’re still ok. He spots Brad, Max’s trainer, chatting to Ellie animatedly towards the end of the session and feels a little more at ease, once again reminded how fiercely loyal and protective everyone in the Red Bull family is. 

Once free practice is over he starts to head back inside where he finds Ellie admiring the lion on top of the helmet Max is showing her.

“It is of course not like a real lion, Ellie,” Max tells her as he traces the lines with his finger, “but it looks like one don’t you think?” 

“Danny, look!” Ellie says when she spots him and points to Max’s helmet, “It’s a lion.”

“It’s sure is, bub,” Daniel agrees with a smile, picking up Ellie then when she holds out her arms to him. When she rests her head against his shoulder he hugs her closer, still amazed by how much it means that she trusts him so much.

Max looks at him a little strange and Daniel half expects him to crack a joke but instead he claps Daniel’s back and gives him a kind smile, “I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah?” 

“Yep.”

Daniel watches as she says her goodbyes to Max, not surprised when his teammate returns the hugs she gives him without hesitating. When she turns back to Daniel she smiles, “I like him.” 

“Good.” Daniel chuckles, “I like him too most of the time.” Ellie lets out a yawn then and Daniel presses a kiss to the top of her head, “You tired, bub?”

Ellie shakes her head but another yawn betrays her.

She runs her hand through her daughter’s hair and smiles, “It’s a long day, huh bub?”

Daniel smiles apologetically, “I can have someone take you back to the hotel if you want?”

“Oh, no, that’s ok,” she says. She nods towards Ellie then, “She’d never forgive me if we left early but-” she looks around, “-if we could find somewhere quiet, maybe?”

“Say no more,” Daniel says and uses his free hand to guide her to the back of the garage and into the maze of corridors that ultimately leads them to a conference room that he hopes still has a comfortable couch in it like it used to do when he first was with the team. It does.

“Perfect,” she tells him with a smile as she sits down at an angle, one leg folded in front of her. She leans in and takes Ellie’s shoes off, the little girl already fast asleep in Daniel’s lap. She looks up at him then, “You sure you don’t have anywhere else to be?”

“Nah.” Daniel shakes his head and leans in to give her a kiss, “There’s nowhere I’d rather be right now.” 

***

“Daniel, after four years you’re back to where it all started for you, back at Red Bull,” Nathalie looks up at him and smiles. “Are you happy to be back?”

“I am,” Daniel agrees easily enough, leaning back in his chair. You can tell he’s at ease, no nervous tapping of his foot or biting the skin around his nails, and you know it’s because he and Nathalie are good friends and he knows he won’t push anything. You watch as he nods to where the Red Bull garage is, “It feels good, you know? They’re family.” 

Nathalie nods, “Christian told us you’ll probably be at eight races this year, Melbourne being the first, are you ok with being around the paddock but not being able to drive? Do you miss it?”

“Of course I miss it but-” Daniel sits up a little, as if he wants to get his point across, “-I know I still need some time. These past few months- Without the pressure of having to prepare for a season, you know, it’s- It’s been good. I’m in a much better headspace now and I think if we can keep this up for the next couple of months-” He shrugs, “Who knows what might happen.”

“Would you say you’re happier now than you were at Renault and McLaren? Even though you’re not driving-”

“Oh definitely,” Daniel answers without hesitating. “It feels like this is exactly where I’m meant to be.”

Nathalie smiles, “You seem more relaxed than when we last spoke in Abu Dhabi last year- Would you say the longer winter break helped with that?” 

“Amongst other things,” Daniel says with a grin, making Nathalie shake her head. 

“I heard something about you being an alpaca farmer now,” Nathalie teases, as if she didn’t come by after Jeddah for a two-day visit where she spent most of her time cuddling the girls. And Ellie. 

“You heard correct,” Daniel shoots back, smiling widely.

“You are a man of many talents, Daniel,” Nathalie says as she throws him a wink. “Amazing.” She clears her throat then, “So is it safe to say you’re in a good place right now? That you’re happy?”

Daniel nods, “Yep.” 

“Why?”

Daniel looks past Nathalie at you and Ellie, locking eyes with you as he smiles and says, “I’ve got everything I need right here.” 

“Yes?”

“Yeah.” Daniel looks back at Nathalie, “I’m home.” 

[side-shuffling-hyperfixations]

Let Me Count The Ways

Summary: Stan wonders why his family thinks he's worth a celebration. Ford takes their birthday as an opportunity to remind him of so many reasons.

“You’re strong.”

“Well, that goes without saying. Look at these arms!”

“You’re resilient and brave, even if it is to the point of recklessness—”

“Yeah, and how many times has it saved your skin?”

“And on that note, while I may not always appreciate it in the moment, I can’t deny the potency and effectiveness of your protective streak.”

“Isn’t that kinda just like saying the same thing twice? Come on, Poindexter, you’ve got a big brain and an even bigger mouth for all this waxing poetic but I doubt even you can come up with sixty-something reasons I’m apparently so great or worth celebrating.”

“Is that a challenge, Stanley?”

“Uh, no? But you’re probably going to take it as one anyway, aren’t you? If you’re really that invested in swelling my head up as big as these balloons, feel free to keep trying, I guess—”

“Very well then, I will, considering the fact that I still have a plethora of wonderful things to say about you! You’re shrewd and savvy, and not just as a businessman crunching the numbers. No matter the situation, you continue to think outside the box and look at things from distinctive, fresh angles. Your unique perspective and insights always find a way to surprise me.”

“Heh. That’s me, Mr. Full of Surprises!”

“You’re creative and offbeat. Your humor may not be very opportune or to my particular taste but I have to admit—”

“Aha, so you do think I’m funny! Yes, yes, I knew it! Trust me, I’m gonna remember you said that!”

“I didn’t even get to finish what I—”

“Don’t have to! A ‘have to admit’ is good enough for me to hold it over your head next time you try to say my puns are terrible.”

“The puns are terrible.”

“You’re smiling!”

“Never mind that I’m smiling, let me make my point! What I was going to say is that I can’t fault your enthusiasm. When you’re at your best, your happiest, your spirit is infectious. You’re…uncontainable. You inspire me.”

“Ahh, geez, anything but inspiring! Lord knows you don’t need me feeding any more of your crazy ideas!”

“Haha, perhaps not—but if or when those ideas take any unfortunate turns, I can trust that you’ll be right there to face them with me. I’ve never known anyone else to have such unshakeable loyalty…even for those who may not deserve it.”

“Wha—Hey, don’t say that. You do, you deserve it.”

“Just as you deserve to be acknowledged for it. You deserve to be appreciated; you deserve to be thanked.”

“You’ve already thanked me.”

“I can never thank you enough, Stanley—for all of it, everything you’ve done for me. Everything you are to me.”

“You…Ford, come on…You don’t have to get all serious about it.”

“I am serious. It may not look or feel like much to you but don’t forget, I wouldn’t be here—I probably wouldn’t have survived to see this birthday if it weren’t for your hard work, your care, your determination, forgiveness and faith, your heart.”

“…Ugh, you really do go for a plethora, don’t you? You don’t have to make such a big deal out of…I mean, what else was I supposed to do, just let you go? There really wasn’t much reason to celebrate our birthday without you.”

“I suppose you’re right. I wouldn’t be here to celebrate you properly.”

“T-That’s not what I meant, stop turning it around on me!”

“Why? This is what we agreed, isn’t it? We agreed to be more open with what we’re feeling and this is it. I know perfectly well how much love you have to give, how much you always give for this family. Now I need you to know how grateful I am to be included in it, to be one of the people you love—to be one of the people who get to love you too. If it takes sixty-something reasons to convince you, that’s what I’m here to do.”

“…”

“And this time, when I thank you, I mean every word. I’m—truly, I’m so grateful, and so glad, and so honored to be your brother.”

“…”

“Stanley? Are you—?”

“…Jerk.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Jerk. You and all your words. Y-You know there’s no way I can top a speech like that.”

“Heheh, yes, well, I wouldn’t ask you to try. There is something else you have that I don’t; it will be a much more beneficial gift to me than words.”

“Oh, yeah? What’s that?”

“Your healthy appetite. I need you to polish off what’s left of this cake before Mabel tries to push one more slice down my throat. It’s even more saccharine than my speech.”

[5eraphim]

eras of tumblr i could give hour-long Ted Talks about

(only including eras i participated in, not what i’ve lived through second-handedly. these are what i personally remember seeing on my dash, i’m sure there’s plenty i missed. This is an ongoing list/not fixed/subject to future edits.)

2015 gravity falls 

the rise of sexyman bill cipher 

depravity falls and putting 12 yr old characters in violent guro situations 

alex hirsch worship

billdip discourse

the diehard thirst for Gruncle Ford 

“i want to fuck that dorito”

2015/16 Black Butler

SebaCiel discourse

Grelle discourse (like, i don’t even know how to elaborate, but if you were there you would remember how people were fighting over her characterization in all different directions. Which is funny because, love her or hate her, she is barely even in the show lol)

The needlessly intense sjw vs anti-sjw/ fiction doesn’t effect reality/ shipping fighting

can’t quantify this, but i swear 80% of the fans were ex-hetalia fans 

Black butler 2 being either loved or hated, while book of circus was almost unanimously loved

the Scott Freeman incident...

no one giving a fuck about the female characters

Yana/Jay Michael Tatum worship

2016 Undertale

Sans undertale sexyman rise

the most raw video game soundtrack of all time

papyton

no one agrees how to draw undyne, but we all agree that she’s gay as fuck

(This is a personal anecdote, but i actually made a friend in highschool bc i drew undertale fanart on the board at latin class nd she added to it the next day, i added to it the next day and eventually we met up and it was so adorable)

“get dunked on”

2016-17 hamilton, heathers, great comet, dear evan hansen, be more chill musical theater insanity

rip tumblr user galactibun

The Hamilton craze breathing new life into the 1776 musical fandom

Most bizarre fanfic aus seen on tumblr thus far (hamilton)

The great comet Tony snubs

BMC and DEH blowing up, despite most fans only caring about the characters, totally ignoring the plot.

“Miku binder Thomas Jefferson”

No one giving a fuck about “The Hamilton Mixtape”

Gatekeeping fans who didn’t read war and peace or the ron chernow biography (i don’t think anyone ever gave a shit about the BMC orginal book which is SO FUNNY)

lin manuel miranda worship

real people fanfictions of actors/shipping them (especially hamilton!)

Key Figures include: Lin Manuel Miranda, Ron Chernow, Philipa Soo, Daveed Diggs, Ben Platt, George Salazar, Barette Wilbert Weed, and Mike Faist

2016-2017 the yuri on ice, killing stalking, kaikyu yaoi trifecta 

Yaoi take over

The anime fans collective salt over YOI winning anime of the year 2016

Not in this time period, but the Killing Stalking fans despising the ending en mass several years later.

Free! was also huge as the second season concluded not long before, but wasn’t receiving new updated in Realtime like the other three.

honestly? i mostly just remember people drawing some of the most beautiful fan art of the characters and not bothering to follow the plots

2015-2016 steven universe discourse peak craziness 

There are no words, looking back this all feels like a fever dream

Insane fan-theories (as in- even for Tumblr, these theories were very out there)

Pink diamond character derailment

“watching steven universe is the opposite of eating pussy” 

Gemosonas

fusion = sex???

“it’s over isn’t it” single-handedly inspiring some of the most beautiful fan art to come out of the show; "Stronger than you” def inspired much more fan-creations, but they were nowhere near as good imo

That terrible lily peet video that sent a tidal wave of fandom-fighting 

Concrete

Nicki Minaj guest appearance 

the porn avalanche predating the 2018 nsfw ban

My OG account got banned >:( (i never posted porn, tried to email support to no avail, I DID NOT DEVERVE THIS YOU NARCS)

50-50 mix of people posting lewd art and people posting links to find them as they migrated to twitter

“Female presenting nipples”

The return of the citrus scale (orange: PG/G, Lime: PG-13, Lemon: R, Grapefruit: X)

“Too Spicy for Tumblr”

Didn’t even stop the porn bots, mostly just screwed over artists and writers

IMO the peak of user v staff animosity

2020 hannibal

The small but loyal anthony hopkins defenders

Some of the most beautiful creative gore art

The moodboard to web-weaving pipeline

People being surprisingly respectful of fans who only watched the show, or who didn’t read Red Dragon/Silence of the Lambs, or where otherwise not invested in the greater overall Hannibal canon.

Manipulate, mansplain, malewife

Key Figures Include: Madds Mikkelson, Hugh Dancy, Anthony Hopkins

november 5, 2020

You just had to be there man, i don’t know what to tell you.

Key Figures include: Donald Trump, Castiel, Dean Winchester, Joe Biden, Vladimir Putin, Nevada, Georgia, Wisconsin and debatably Sherlock season 5

the 2021 coquette girl blogger era

Lana del rey worship

The ungodly amount of softcore porn

Gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss

Glorification of eating disorders, benzos, trailer parks, predatory men, age gap relationships, and so much more!

Teenagers blogging about Russian lit you know they never read

Waifblr

Still not sure to this day how much of this was ironic and how much wasn’t?? Or if any of this was self-aware???

Yes babe you’re so bambi, kate moss, diet coke, wellbutrin, dasha nekrosova, ballet, klonopin, trad cath, fawn, dior, sofia coppela, can you please shut the fuck up now?

key figures include: Lana del Rey, Daisy Randone, Dasha Nekrosova, Nina Sayers, Fiona Apple, Anya Taylor Joy, Sylvia Plath, Kate Moss, Kirsten Dunst (probably so many more, but this is just off the top of my head)

(bonus)

2015/16- My personal earliest memories of really getting into tumblr, and witnessing the tail-end of the Hetalia reign

2016- the end of Homestuck

2016- the epidemic of overwatch porn

2016- Does Jumin Han is gay?

2017- RWBY’s nosedive in quality from season 3 to 4, losing the majority of the fanbase

2018 Boyfriend to Death civil war (Gatobob v ElectricPuke)

2018- Detroit become Human drops and the robot-fucking gatekeeping 

2018- the Game of thrones/Endgame joint disaster ending melt down

2019- Sub-par Omens

2020- the Dead by Daylight community rioting when Pyramid Head’s ass got nerfed

2020- Cyberpunk 2077 is released and is torn apart almost instantly. Looking back by my approximations post were made up of- 10% people who were actually playing the games and enjoying themselves, 20% people who were playing the game and WEREN’T having fun, 55% People who never bought/played the game who were making up crazy glitches for clout, 15% hardcore pornography of characters you’d never seen before. (I’m quite salty about this bc I worked at GameStop at this time and had people constantly talking about glitches in casual conversation and I just know most of these bitches were LYING.)

20??- don’t remember the exact dates, but phase 3 marvel was un-escapable at this time

2020/21- Succession blows up

2022 Ghost bc blows up on tiktok, the fandom already sizable on tumblr only goes up from here

[always-music0]

Run Rabbit Run.

Hannah would considers herself the unluckiest girl in the world,having being born into a tangled web of murderers and monsters that live in your closet and under your bed. Until one day an unforeseen issue makes its way into her already fucked life and now if she thought her life sucked it’s about to get a whole lot worse.

Pt.1

A Creepypasta/Twilight crossover 18+

There went many things that made me scared-

— I mean when you grow up with the people I grew up with you get used to the ice cold feeling in your veins when you cut it a little too close to the edge and death himself is only a few inches away waiting to free your soul from this purgatory plane we call earth. But when your friends are friends with the spirit of the dead the sweet relief of becoming stardust fades into the background, and when god turns his back on your soul just because of the people you associate with you kinda don’t even consider heaven an option anymore.

Now you may be asking yourself ‘how in the hell could someone be so unlucky?’ And I should be honest and admit that it’s sorta my fault and I happen to find myself in the wrong place in the wrong time frequently.

Take last week for example jumping from state to state and school to school with the three looneys I call my ‘caretakers’ even though for the most part I take care of them and I just happened to run into a certain organ eating demon on my way home from grocery shopping it took quite a lot of convincing to keep him from taking me with him and making the looneys fucking loose their shit, even though that would be pretty funny for the first ten minutes, but would ultimately get my ass beat but I also had to cough up the fresh liver I had gotten for the dog.

He was not impressed when I came home without a treat for him to sink his teeth in. Anyways my current situation was even worse cause the three fucking losers I lived with didn’t even believe me when I said the school I would be attending for then next ten months was crawling with vampires.

“Look Tim! You have to believe me!” I wined as I followed him outside the dog at me heels.

The house we were living in was pretty secluded besides a few houses a few acres away Tim scoffed and threw his bag into the back of his old ford f-150.

The old thing was partially rusted out and everything had been replaced maybe more that it should have but like Tim it never seemed to die even with the absurd amount of times they both have been thrown off cliffs .

“Listen here, I don’t give a fuck if they were goddamn transformers. We have a fuck ton of work to do around here and not a lot of time to do it. So your gonna take your perky little ass to that school everyday and stay out of our way and stay safe” he snapped

I flinched a little, I could tell he was getting a little annoyed or stressed one of the two

“ ok so you do believe there’s vampires?” I asked and when his eye twitched I smirked

“NO! There’s no creature like the vampires I know around here and if there were the boss would have already let us know!” He yelled walking over to Brian’s 1976 Bronco and thew the back door open. I trotted after him the dog followed me silently

“Well what if they aren’t like the vampires we know?!” I asked and he groaned took a deep breath and pulled out his cigarettes Putting one in his mouth he turned his head towards me.

I immediately fumbled for my lighter almost dropping it twice, if there was one thing Tim and his counter part loved was a well trained bitc- ahem. Lighting his cigarette he inhaled.

“Look” he started blowing out the smoke he just inhaled.

“If there is for some reason vampires at your school they must be harmless otherwise big man wouldn’t have you here” he tilted his head at me as though to say ‘ya even think about that’ I blinked. of course I thought about that, I would have been shipped off to stay with someone else entirely if that were the case.

“Yeah I guess…” I said slowly looking at the dog, his eyes met mine and his tongue rolled out as he started to pant, this Washington mugginess was getting to him.

“Look at me sweetheart.” Tim said and my eyes lifted from the dog to his.

“ we wouldn’t let anyone or anything hurt you, not only is that our job it would kill us if you were hurt by something we didn’t know about” he said stepping towards me and eventually standing right in front of me. I could smell the cologne I had got him for Christmas and the cigarette smoke the reason I got him cologne. I met his eyes and they flashed darker as he switched and I tried not to wince as his hand shot up and griped my chin and squeezed my cheeks not tight enough to be painful but just to keep eye contact.

“Got it princess?” Masky said I nodded the best I could he grinned as Tim took back control patting my cheek

“Good girl” he said and turned back to the bronco reaching for another bag.

“Now be a good little thing and go bother someone else I have to fix the breaks on the ford and I definitely don’t want your annoying ass around when I do it” he commanded and I sighed flipping him off

“Go fuck yourself Tim” and walked away as he laughed at me The dog at me heels.

I suppose it could be worse, I mean the three fucking weirdos did a good job of keeping me safe although I wouldn’t admit that to their faces. What’s the worst that could happen?

A/N: Thanks for reading if you did! I know it’s littered with grammatical errors and run on sentences and it’s definitely not formatting correctly but I think meh who’s gonna see it anyways so why the hell not. But if you do read all of this thank you! Your wonderful and I will continue to post more parts as I write them<3

[seven-stars-in-his-palm]

hiiiiii, coming in here asking if you got any tips for possibly writing ford getting drunk and just generally how to write such a thing? I really want to have him do that in my next Forduary fic that I'm writing but I don't know where to start since I've never had a lick of alcohol and idk what my headcanons for him about this will lie, ie. whether he'd be a lightweight, whether he'd have drunk alcohol before this fic or how he acts under the influence (he'd be buzzed to tipsy most of the fic besides the end end, if that helps). for context, I was thinking he was going mad trying not to think of Stan on his 30th birthday and eventually caves in to drink some cheap whiskey from the convenience store while doing errands to forget. if you have tips or fics where that happens I can reference or even just headcanons about Ford and alcohol, I'd gladly take it, but it's alright if you don't. feel free to take this to discord but also answer this ask privately if you would.

man im gonna be honest with u i havent drunk a lick of alcohol either 😔 i just bullshit it most of the time and have gotten oddly good at it lately. i can, however, give you tips n tricks to make it seem like you do. and headcanons too--those go first ;)

(also please take this with a grain of salt as i too haven't drunk alcohol regularlu to know my shit. this all just research and thoughts on this specific situation. thoughts below the cut ! please dont come at me)

first off u gotta figure out the basics: adding the character + alcohol together; what would it do? i see ford as a "drinks to forget the outside world" type of drunkard. he's blissfully ignorant but still has the wired anguish within him, resulting into... a lot of feelings. he tasted it young, but didnt get Into It until the paranoia stint when taste didnt matter anymore and al he wanted was a decent depressant. however he can hold liquor very well, which is a problem considering the purpose, and has to drink a lotttt to achieve what he wants to the point he could get addicted. those are things you can make up yourself and therefore pretty easy: but actual facts? those are harder. here's some i've learned:

- there's a hugeeee difference between hard alcohol and a drink that happens to be laced in alcohol. for one, hard alcohol is served in small glasses/shot glasses while other drinks can be served on pretty much anything (but still small). an easier to understand real world example would be this: someone could, say, have seven shirley temples (an alcoholic beverage) without being incapacitated, but seven shots of vodka will at minimum knock you unconsious. five glasses of wine could do shit to you but five shots of whiskey will GET you. you gotta know what your character's drinking. pick a type you know and research if you must.

- hard alcohol has no taste. again, big diffence between these types. if anything it burns because, well, have you felt alcohol placed on ur skin while getting a shot or placed in a wound? that shit burns and it wont be any different down ur throat. if there js a taste you're barely gonna notice. alcoholics dont drink for taste--they've got more sinister shit goin' on.

- you gotta know what your character has. is it a regular small glass you'd see in a movie or a shot glass he takes from over and over? is he drinking from the bottle directly? how often is he taking a drink? is it bourbon? whiskey? vodka? rum? they alllll do different shit. you gotta KNOW (sorry if im repeating, but this is crucial)

- there are different types of addicts. there are binge drinkers, alcohol abusers, alcohol dependant (theres a difference), and u gotta.research which one u wanna portray. i say ford's an abuser: he has a somewhat consious level of what he drinks, but still doesnt stop because--well, its either being drunk off your rocker or having to succumb to Reality, which in this case, is genuinely dangerous (Bill.)

- there are also a lot of different symptoms, depending on the dosage. here's some ive screenshotted from a post a while ago:

so that's something. also, here's some sites thatcould help:

how to write drunk speech

a page in the CDC about alcohol and beer

a page on the national institution of health about alcohol (really nice, gives you a lotof the basics)

and the australian alcohol and drug association

also i will say that if it werent for bill, ford's relationship with alcohol would likely be very different and probably healthier tbh--again, it differs on why your character drinks, related to trauma or not. sometimes, they just do, and there's nothing you can do about it--but there's usually a reason when it comes 2 fiction. the point: know ur shit even if ur gonna be vague, and if u can help it, name names when it matters. dont say "he drank a shot of alcohol" say he "took a shot of whiskey" and such-like. look up what kind of hard alcohols there are and understand what would be on hand if ford were to get his hands on some of this stuff. i hope this helped, and good luck on forduary! <3

[jackheathwriter]

There's a scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade where Indi (Harrison Ford) and his father (Sean Connery) are tied to chairs, having been captured by Nazis after Indi's girlfriend betrayed them.

Indi quietly asks his father, "How did you know she was a Nazi?"

His father replies, "She talks in her sleep."

Indi does a double-take.

When I first saw that movie I was about 8, sitting cross-legged on the carpet in my parents' house, way too close to their CRT television. I thought, "Nazis talk in their sleep? What an interesting piece of trivia."

I watched that movie a lot of times over the next few years. When I was about 12, and old enough to realise the idea that Nazis talk in their sleep was absurd, I interpreted the double-take differently. I thought, "Ohhh. Indi has suddenly realised his father has lost his marbles."

It's been more than 20 years since I've seen that movie, but having watched it over and over back when my brain was still spongy and malleable, I don't need to see it again. I can watch a highlight reel in my head whenever I feel like it (although while fact-checking this piece I noticed that Ford and Connery weren't tied to chairs, as I remembered). This scene popped into my head recently, and I finally, finally, understood why Indi was so startled.

It made me laugh.

I'm sharing this story because I've been thinking about how many metrics are involved in the consumption of art these days. When Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade came out, there weren't many ways of measuring its success - just the number of dollars it earned at the box office, the quality of the reviews in the newspapers, and the number of Oscars it was eventually nominated for (3, winning 1). If it were made now, the distributor could track not only how many people watched it, but at exactly what point viewers were most likely to stop watching, which scenes got paused and replayed, and how likely viewers were to tell their friends about it on social media. All this extra data seems like it should help filmmakers tell better stories.

But how do you track which jokes will make people laugh, when they're thinking about it 20 years later?

You don't, I guess. Algorithms can track your behaviour, but they can't actually spy on your thoughts (yet). So, creators optimise for the data they do have. This creates an incentive to tell stories which keep people watching, listening and sharing, but which are quickly forgotten. Engaging, but evaporative. I'm sure there are many reasons for the effervescence of contemporary film and television (the sheer amount of content, pressure to compete with social media, the fact that 45% of us are watching our phones and our TVs at the same time) but this is definitely one piece of the puzzle.

I don't have Spielberg's genius, but I am lucky enough to be working in a medium that isn't quite so quantifiable (although that is changing). This means I'm free to tell the stories I think readers will remember for years to come, even if I have no way of telling whether my instincts are right.

 Speaking of which...

In 2014 I wrote a book called Scream: The Human Flytrap.

It was translated into French, adapted for audio, and spawned three sequels. And now, ten years on, it's about to be re-published.

Warning: the book was intended for kids and teens, but when I asked my publisher how scary I could make it, her response boiled down to "as scary as you want, so long as there's no sex or drugs in it." I took her at her word, and wrote a book which gave nightmares to a generation of kids, who are now deeply traumatised adults.

Preorder it from your local bookshop or below - if you dare.

[mylifeincinema]

My 25 Most Anticipated Films of 2023!!

No intro this year. Just, y’know, here they are...

PHOTO ONE:

1. Infinity Pool (Brandon Cronenberg) – 1.27.23

Haaaave you seen Possessor?!? Plus, that trailer!!

2. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (Peyton Reed) – 2.17.23

Bring on Kang...

3. John Wick: Chapter 4 (Chad Stahelski) – 3.24.23

I’ll never not be excited to see Keanu kill the shit out of people.

4. Renfield (Chris McKay) – 4.14.23 

Nic Cage as Dracula... I repeat, Nic Cage as Dracula!!

5. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (James Gunn) – 5.5.23 

The trailer alone has me more emotionally invested than anything I saw in 2022, period.

PHOTO TWO:

6. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (Dos Santos, Powers & Thompson) – 6.2.23

Haaaaaave you seen the first one?!?

7. Asteroid City (Wes Anderson) – 6.23.23

Wes is one of my very favorite directors. Enough Said.

8. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (James Mangold) – 6.30.23

If you’re actually questioning why this is here, you clearly did not know how obsessed I was with Temple of Doom and Last Crusade as a little kid.

9. Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning – Part One (Christopher McQuarrie) – 7.14.23

Cruise can do no wrong... until he does... but even then the footage of his death will be a fucking blockbuster, and all his fans will give him the exact sendoff he’s apparently begging for. Can’t wait to see how he almost dies, this time.

10. Oppenheimer (Christopher Nolan) – 7.21.23 

So very excited to see Nolan take on something more dramatic... plus, look at that cast!!!

PHOTO THREE:

11. Barbie (Greta Gerwig) – 7.21.23

Margot and Greta... enough said. Oh, but I’ll say more... we live in a world that will soon be home to a Barbie movie co-written by Noah Baumbach!! That’s beautiful.

12. Dune: Part Two (Denis Villeneuve) – 11.3.23

The first felt too unfinished to not be excited to see where Villeneuve brings it next.

13. Wonka (Paul King) – 12.15.23

Really couldn’t care less about Chalamet, and this project is totally unnecessary. But... I’m a die-hard Roald Dahl fan, and this is directed by the man who gave us Paddington 2, so... yeah.

14. Killers of the Flower Moon (Martin Scorsese) – TBD 

C’mon... It’s Scorsese!

15. The Killer (David Fincher) – TBD  

C’mon... It’s Fincher!

PHOTO FOUR:

16. Napoleon (Ridley Scott) – TBD 

I love Ridley Scott... and Joaquin Phoenix looks like he’s going to murder this role.

17. Maestro (Bradley Cooper) – TBD 

The theatre geek living deep down within me is enough reason. But then I also want to see if A Star Is Born was a fluke.

18. Ferrari (Michael Mann) – TBD 

Michael Mann directing a movie about Enzo Ferrari starring Adam Driver... why aren’t you excited about it?!?

19. Beau Is Afraid (Ari Aster) – TBD

No clue what we’re in for... but I’m certain it’s going to fuck me up for a week or two.

20. Peter Pan & Wendy (David Lowery) – TBD  

David Lowery... enough said. I mean, seriously, have you seen A Ghost Story or Pete’s Dragon?!?

PHOTO FIVE:

21. Lee (Ellen Kuras) – TBD  

If Kate Winslet wasn’t enough... well, it is... it really is.

22. Blitz (Steve McQueen) – TBD 

It’s McQueen doing a WWII drama starring Saoirse Ronan...

23. Megalopolis (Francis Ford Coppola) – TBD  

I’m hoping it’s as wild as those set photos have been...

24. The Way of the Wind (Terrence Malick) – TBD

Malick does Jesus...

25. The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (Wes Anderson) – TBD

 I doubt this is actually going to release in 2023, but it is already in post, so in case does, I really need you all to know just how excited I will always be for new Wes Anderson.

There they are!

As for My Best of 2022, once again all of the major lists will not be getting posted until mid/late January, but I’m going to try to get some of the early lists – such as Posters, TV & Non-2022 Films – sorted and posted over the next week or two. Please Feel Free to Follow Along So You Don’t Miss Anything!

Stay Tuned!

-Timothy Patrick Boyer.

[theycallme-thejackal]

One MidgeLenny x TSwift Fic Per Day

46. You Belong With Me

It’s a typical Saturday night.

Her children are with Joel this weekend and she has a gig. Midtown. A dark club with good drinks and a solid paycheck.

What’s not so normal about it is that tonight Lenny’s here.

She spots him halfway through her set, and the feeling in her gut is twisty and a little warm, but she manages to get through the rest of her act as planned, receiving plenty of laughs and a good round of applause at the end. When she finishes, she stops backstage and breathes deeply, calming herself.

A couple minutes later, she finds him at the bar where she’d spotted him during her set, and he looks good. Really good. Handsome in his usual black suit, but also healthy. The suit doesn’t hang off of him like it did the last time she saw him.

He spots her then, and the way he smiles at her makes her knees weak. She manages to stop herself from wobbling and approaches him with a smile of her own. “Welcome back,” she says as she takes the stool next to where he stands, leaning on the bar.

“It’s good to be back,” he says, sliding over a martini he’d ordered for her.

She grins widely. “You remembered.”

Lenny shrugs and takes a sip from his own glass. “Sorry I couldn’t make it to your show last week,” he says. “Had some things to deal with in California.”

She nods slowly. “You’re busy,” she says. She knows about the girlfriend. She’s young. Pretty. Uncomplicated in a way Midge herself can never be. She doesn’t come with two kids and an ex-husband that just can’t seem to let go. And if Lenny is happy - healthy - that’s what matters.

But there will always be a part of her that knows who he should really be with.

“I wish I could have come. Upstairs at the Downstairs is a big gig,” he explains. “It go well?”

She nods again. “Yeah. A booker from Gordon Ford’s show was there, actually. They want to try me out to be the in-house comic.”

Lenny raises his brows, looking impressed. “Way to bury the lede, Mrs. Maisel,” he teases. “That’s great.”

She smiles broadly. “Yeah. If it works out, it’s a steady paycheck and a bigger audience.”

“More people to fall in love with you,” he comments, his voice tinged with affection making her blush softly as she sips her martini.

“When do you have to go back?” She asks as she sets her drink down again in favor of smoothing her dress.

��I don’t,” he answers. 

Midge’s eyebrows lift in surprise. “You don’t?”

He shakes his head. “I’m back for good.”

“What about - ” She stops herself from asking about the girlfriend, instead finishing, “Kitty?”

“Kitty’s got a few weeks of school left, so she’s still with my mother. Ma’s gonna bring her out here in June. I got a pretty nice place in Hell’s Kitchen.”

“Hell’s Kitchen?” She asks. “That’s almost Upper West Side-adjacent,” she teases.

He chuckles. “Gotta start being a more responsible guy now. Full-time parent, you know?”

“I am very familiar with the concept,” she replies.

“And...” Lenny rubs his jaw for a moment before reaching out, taking her hand. “As an added benefit, it’s a much shorter drive to Riverside.”

She looks at their joined hands before meeting his gaze again. “But what about - ”

“I told you it wasn’t that serious, Midge,” he says earnestly.

He did. The one and only time they talked about her, he said it was casual. She didn’t believe him. “But all those pictures...you looked happy with her,” she breathes.

“She’s funny. She’s a comic, too, so yeah, sometimes she made me laugh,” he explains, his thumb rubbing gently over her skin. “But...she wasn’t you.”

Midge exhales slowly. “Lenny...”

He stops her with a gentle kiss. “I love you, Midge,” he whispers. “I never stopped loving you.”

She chokes out a happy giggle. “I love you too,” she breathes. She cups his neck in her free hand and kisses him again.

[wonderlandleighleigh]

Please Leigh some more Rainy Gaslight Coffee

The Gaslight is blissfully warm, and Midge gets them each a cup of coffee, bringing them to the table he's staked out way in the back corner where no one will recognize him.

Once he sheds his trench coat, he starts to dry off more than he thought he would.

He's contemplating responding "no" to anyone who comes up and says "aren't you Lenny Bruce?" Because he certainly doesn't feel like Lenny Bruce tonight.

Leonard Schneider, most certainly, but not famous bad boy comedian Lenny Bruce.

Midge sits with him though she doesn't say much, sipping her coffee and watching the guitar player on stage. Some kid singing something sad.

"I bombed tonight," he says quietly. "Badly."

She glances at him and rests her hand on top of his on the tabletop in commiseration, and it feels good. She's taken the gloves off and her can see now that her nails are painted a pretty pink shade that goes well with her lipstick.

"And then I got punched," he goes on, lifting his free hand to point to his heeling split lip. "Because I made a terrible joke about Jesus."

"Such a sensitive boy, that Jesus," Midge jokes gently. "Jews usually have thicker skin."

"The Nazis seemed to find that useful," Lenny comments wryly, making her choke on a laugh, and suddenly they're both giggling softly over his horrendous, tasteless joke.

"That's the shit that gets you punched," Midge tells him after a moment.

He sighs softly and nods, letting his thumb brush over her knuckles. "Generally."

"So what happened after you got punched?" she asks.

Lenny sighs heavily, looking away from her. "I had a drink. I tracked down my dealer and bought some...wares."

"Oh," Midge says softly.

He grips her hand tightly. "I threw them away, despite dropping some serious bread on them. And then I dug them out of the garbage and then I threw them away again because a month is the longest I've gone without in a long time, and I like having being on a roll."

She nods, going quiet again.

"And then I sat down in the freezing rain to feel sorry for myself," Lenny finishes. "And contemplate life, the universe and everything, like some dumb fucking shmo."

"You're not a shmo," she assures him. "Well, you kind of are, but you're not dumb. You're good at fucking though, if that's any consolation."

He chuckles softly. "I'll take what I can get." He looks at her and takes a breath. "And then I was rescued by a woman in a red and black coat with a matching umbrella."

Midge smiles at him. "Drink your coffee, you'll fee better."

He nods, doing as he's told, taking a sip. "What about your night? Infinitely better than mine, I assume."

She takes a breath and looks him dead in the eyes. "I had a great set on Gordon Ford tonight. And then backstage, Gordon Ford offered to finger bang me, and he was very surprised when I turned him down."

Lenny nearly spits out his next sip of coffee. "Jesus, and hear I thought he was a bland motherfucker."

"Nope. Loves to fuck, it turns out. Pouts when you tell him no thank you."

"He pulling your spot from the show because of it?" he asks.

"Not yet," Midge shrugs. "We'll see. Normally I'd be freaking out about that sort of thing, but I've been working the clubs so regularly that losing the Ford spot would sting, but it wouldn't end me."

Lenny nods. "Good." He keeps holding her hand. "That's good."

[cyberphuck]

You meet him at a tiny locally owned gas station twelve miles off the highway, where he’s fueling up his ancient red Ford ranger (at least you assume it’s red, it’s so covered in caked mud and road dust that it’s obviously hard to tell). He’s dusty as well, from the battered blue cap with the frayed brim to the white t-shirt stained a permanent sienna around the collar from years of scrubbing sweat and grit off of his face with it. You can see the outline that his wallet has made in the back pocket of his jeans. In the other pocket, an oblong shape that is definitely a utility knife. He stands at the counter to hand over crumpled bills to the cashier, who nods at him. “Hey there Tom, your usual?” “Thirty on two.” His voice sounds creaky, like he doesn’t use it much. “Please.” As the cashier is punching numbers into the register, Tom sighs and plucks a Slim Jim from the bouquet. “And this.” The cashier smiles. “Tell your pup I said hi.” A courteous nod and a less courteous grunt. Tom slips right past you without looking at you, but you still feel... examined, somehow. You take your turn at the register, and the cashier notices when you keep glancing out the advertisement-strewn windows to where Tom is standing by his truck, scratching a large gray dog behind the ears. “That’s just one of the locals. Comes out here once, twice a month for a tank of gas and sometimes a six pack. He lives down off Bramble Creek road. Doesn’t say much, but he’s never given me any trouble.” You hand over your debit card. There are only two pumps, so you find yourself filling your shitty Craigslist beater right next to Tom, who is feeding his dog bits of Slim Jim. You can take or leave mysterious hillbillies, but you do like dogs. You’re trying to figure out whether Tom’s dog is a Malamute or some kind of dirty Husky when a roar shatters the peace of the little oasis. A lifted Ford F-150 screeches into the station, sending gravel flying from its dual back tires. You take several steps back, sure for one second that the truck is going to run both you and your tiny coupe over. It stops six inches from your bumper. At this distance, you can’t even see into the cab, but the driver leaps down from his perch, turning to hock a wad of brown spit onto the pavement. You edge around your car, squeezing yourself between it and the gas pump, and will the tank to fill faster. The man makes a show of taking in your car-- the dented back hatch, the coastal license plate, the Pride sticker-- and leers, “You from outta town?” He’s wearing dog tags, you notice, with an American flag painted on one side, over a black shirt that challenges “COME AND TAKE IT” in large white letters. He’s got a red hat on. You don’t have to read it. “I can give you directions back to the highway,” the man says. He keeps stepping closer, despite your suddenly deciding that you need to squeegee your windshield. “Which way you headed? Shelbyville?” He pronounces it ‘shullb-vull.’ You stammer something about visiting family, and the man scoffs. “You must have come the wrong way,�� he says, grinning. “There ain’t nothin’ out here for you.” It’s then that you notice the holster on his hip. You recognize the strange, floating feeling of real fear, like the time you saw the sheen of black ice on the road the instant before you hit it. “Darryl.” You don’t know when it happened, but when your brain finally lurches back into gear, Tom is standing between you and the gun. They’re not chest to chest, but Tom has stepped close enough for it to be a challenge. In the bed of Tom’s truck, his dog growls lowly. “Oh. Tom. Hey. Hey Tom.” Darryl hooks his thumbs into his belt loops, then frees them and lets his hands hang to his sides, then puts them behind his back. “Didn’t see you come in, I guess it’s that time of the month, right? I mean-- you know. I usually see you here, around. How, uh, how’s your, uh, how’s Hap?” He leans around Tom and peers into the cab of the truck, searching for a friendlier face. “I think you have business to do inside,” Tom says, lowly and clearly. Darryl nodded, then nodded again. “Yeah! Yeah, I just came to-- and then I saw them, and since they were from-- you know, I thought--” He gestures to your car. “Easy to get lost out here, if you get turned around on those back roads, and there’re all sorts of psychos-- not you, but you know, you know what I’m talking about, Tom.” The dog’s growl increases by a few decibels. “Anyway. Anyway. I’d better go and get-- see you later, Tom, tell Hap I said hi.” Darryl turns and walks into the store, walking like a wind-up toy about to topple over. Tom watches him go a moment, then turns to you. “Do you need directions?” He asks. You shake your head, pointing to the TomTom suction-cupped to your windshield. He nods, but, “Sometimes the maps in those are old.” He points along the road. “Down that way, turn left at the ‘HELL IS REAL’ sign. It’ll take you back to the highway.” You express your thanks, get back into your car, and start the engine. Tom pats his dog on the head and climbs into his own truck. While you’re resetting your GPS, he pulls out ahead of you and pauses at the curb. There’s a John Deere sticker on the tailgate, slapped crookedly there and wiped clean of dust with the swipe of someone’s hand. The buck’s antlers are lowered as if to charge.