#ALSO. ABUSIVE MAY PARKER???? FUCKING REALLY???????? WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU

[rhodeys]

always been indifferent towards irondad because of the blatant may parker erasure but the fact that there are literal tags on ao3 called 'dark may parker' & 'abusive may parker' used for the sole purpose of glorifying tony&peter is.... disgusting

[goosegoblin]

I'm genuinely really confused. What is an anti and an anti-anti??????

can, open, worms, everywhere-

I will try my best but I’m struggling to not strawman, so I do recommend doing your own research etc to make sure I’m not misrepresenting. Tucked under a read more because it’s long and may cause brain rot. if any of y’all fuckin @ me with your personal opinions on why this post means i’m going directly to super predator hell or something, you just get winnie the pooh with teeth. don’t say i didn’t warn you

(click here to view full post if you’re on my theme and the post seems to end here)

Anti, short for ‘anti-shipper’, refers to people who believe that what a person ships, writes, creates art of or consumes content about directly relates to their moral opinions and attitude, and should be judged accordingly. The main three topics I see them bring up and challenge are incest, paedophillia and abuse. They believe that fiction featuring these is problematic as it can lead to the normalisation of damaging and abusive behaviour. They are often concerned about the potential for minors to access this content.

I went digging to try and find some examples to avoid putting words in people’s mouths etc. Here’s a couple:

If you’re writing abuse/rape/racism/pedophilia AND ROMANTICIZING it INSTEAD OF CONDEMNING it, then maybe try to re-evaluate why you feel like other people’s source of pain and trauma excites and titillates you enough to be enthusiastically dismissive about the issues people are raising, and why other people’s bad experience should simply be relegated to wank material status for you.

another:

I think aging up to suit underage ships isn't okay (for example, MCU Peter Parker/Tony Stark), because that's you seeing chemistry between an adult and a child and thinking they'd be Hot Couple even though their dynamic is strongly suggestive of a familial bond.

(the next is on the topic of Call Me By Your Name)

As to the grown ass adults getting off to a 24 year old man going after a 17 year old boy AKA a teen that's high school aged, if you REALLY don't see anything wrong with enjoying a 24 year old preying on a 17 year old- fictional or real- then that just shows how desensitized you've become to it, and as much as you might want to claim it's a normal fandom thing, it's simply not psychologically healthy or normal to get off to a boy being sexualized by an adult.

So that’s their side of things!

Pro-shippers- or anti antis- by comparison, believe that if something is correctly tagged, warned and labelled, it has a right to exist, and a person should not be harassed for creating it/ engaging with it etc. There are lots of other points made here- about censorship, coping mechanisms for trauma, personal responsibility and autonomy, the nature of fiction as a safe place to explore etc- but honestly, it does kind of boil down to.... ‘none of this is real, and you are fully able to choose not to look at it’.

One main issue that comes up is that that, quite often, ‘antis’ feel rather intensely about their stance. I’ve seen a huge amount of hate mail, death threats, hate messages etc aimed at people creating ‘problematic’ material. Additionally, there’s like... a definition creep? Over time? So ‘paedophillic content’ can easily refer to like... high school AUs that include sex, or relationships where an age gap is present. And there’s a lot of guilt by association, so if you follow someone who follows someone who reblogs Thorki, You Are Also Problematic.

There’s also a tendency to focus on individuals rather than bigger or more mainstream stuff. Game of Thrones is infamously full of rape, incest, paedophillia, torture etc, but it doesn’t get anywhere near the level of attention and grief that Reylo shippers seem to. I can’t believe I just wrote a sentence about Reylo shippers in the year 2021. Good fucking God.

Anecdote: I actually left the Pathologic fandom on Twitter after seeing somebody attacked and isolated for saying “I don’t like or write incest or age gap stuff, but if people want to write it I won’t attack them for it”. This got quickly translated into ‘[username] is a paedophile’, and then it was all ‘if you follow [username] block me now, you pedo apologist’. Like... see how earlier today I got called a paedophile for reblogging this post? That was some SPEED OF LIGHT stuff, folks. That’s seemingly a person who has followed me for years and instantly decided I’m One Of The Bad People now. 

so like, I guess I fall into the category of ‘anti anti’, because my take remains ‘you have the right to enjoy whatever content you want, and I have the right to judge you for it’ lmao

but if I ever wade deep enough into the mess of teenagers vs thirty-something year old ‘fandom moms’ that these debates tend to become to self-identify, I will launch myself immediately into the sun, so-

[captainscanadian]

Better | Bucky Barnes x Reader (Part 7)

My Masterlist

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6

Summary: You finally decide to open up to your friends, realizing that opening up your heart would definitely make everything better. You knew exactly what you needed to be better.

Word Count: 7170

Pairing: Doctor!Bucky x Doctor!Reader, Doctor!Natasha x Platonic!Reader, Lawyer!Peggy x Platonic!Reader, Doctor!Tony

Warnings: Swearing, Mentions of Abuse & Alcoholism, Surgery, Organ Donation, IV & Needles, Emotional Distress, Physical Pain, Drugs, Hospital Stay, Homelessness, Anxiety, Betrayal

A/N: After the last few updates, some of you have been very upset with me and I know that. I hope this make all of you happy. <3 Gif is not mine, credits to the respective owner!

Primum non nocere // “First, do no harm”

Though some may say that Latin was a dead language, it was that single Latin phrase which you had always lived by. No one really knew the origins of that phrase. Whether this exact phrase was even mentioned in the original Hippocratic Oath was debatable, but it is commonly believed that the promise “to abstain from doing harm” in the modern version oath itself came from this particular Latin phrase.

As a doctor, you had sworn to uphold the Hippocratic Oath in order to be able to practice medicine. But upholding the oath did not just apply to you practicing medicine alone. It was certainly binding; it was a sacred piece of text to all doctors, nurses and other medical professionals in the world for generations. It applied to the way you lived your life, just as much as it applied to the way you practiced medicine. Perhaps the Hippocratic Oath had been the reason why you were currently in this situation. After all, being a better person had been just as important to you as being a better doctor.

“I will apply, for the benefit of the sick, all measures that are required, avoiding those twin traps of overtreatment and therapeutic nihilism.”

You had firmly believed that it was your duty to apply all measures that are required for the benefit of the sick. That was why you had even volunteered to donate your liver in the first place. Even if he was your abusive father, he was still a patient. This was a measure that only you could have taken, for you were your father’s only offspring. Anyone else may have had a choice in whether they must come forward to donate a piece of their liver to save another life, but as a doctor who had sworn to the Hippocratic Oath, you had been left with no choice. You had to do what you had to do. There was no other option for you than cutting out a piece of your own flesh.

“If it is given me to save a life, all thanks. But it may also be within my power to take a life; this awesome responsibility must be faced with great humbleness and awareness of my own frailty. Above all, I must not play at God.”

It was true. You as a doctor, with your knowledge and the skills that you had acquired from the professors and surgeons before you, did have the power to take a life as much as you had the power to save a life. All it took was one wrong cut, one wrong dosage and one wrong judgement to take a life on your table. But as a physician, you could certainly not do that. You had to uphold the Hippocratic Oath. Did this certain promise to not use your power to take a life or play at God not apply to every other decision you made in your life? You did have the power to take your father’s life had you chosen not to move forward with the transplant. With his position on the list and the wait time for a liver transplant, he certainly would not have made it. But you knew that it was not the right thing to do. You could not violate your oath nor play at God like that. You had to do what was within your power to save his life, not take it.

“I will remember that I remain a member of society, with special obligations to all my fellow human beings, those sound of mind and body as well as the infirm.”

This was your obligation as member of society to your fellow human beings. Your father, regardless of who he was and whatever the issues you had with him, was a fellow human being who deserved to be treated as such.

You had thought that you did the right thing by donating your liver. You had saved his life and it had brought you a sense of relief. You had not brought him harm. You had often wondered if you leaving behind your parents had brought them more harm than good. Had you intentionally did them harm? While you wished that the answer was no, you knew that was certainly not the truth. After all, you had done them harm... though not physically, you had put them in harm’s way by worsening their financial situation. It was only a matter of time before they end up on the streets of Buck’s County, and as someone who’s had to live through that, even if it was for one night, you would not even wish that upon your worst enemy let alone your own parents.

You could not deny that a part of you wanted to fix this for them. You wanted nothing more than to make their lives easy. After all, you had made their lives harder as they had made your life harder as well. Sure, they had abused you. But you could not blame them for their behavior. Losing their business had put a strain on their whole being. While being a child who needed to be provided with food, clothing and shelter was certainly not your fault, you blamed the added stress of providing for a child along with the emotional distress that came with being bankrupt for being their reasons to take it all out on you. Had they been right about doing what they did? No, certainly not. But should you wish that they must continue to be punished for their wrong-doings? Had they not had enough, being hated by an entire town while their own child had fled them? Had they not had enough, with your father drinking away his health and your mother being burdened to be the sole breadwinner of the family? They had had enough. You could not let things get worse for them.

You certainly did have the money. But you also knew that paying off their medical bills would mean that you could no longer afford to keep your make shift clinic running at the local homeless shelter. You had been put in a position where you had to choose between the countless of homeless people who depended on that shelter and your clinic and your own biological family. And what kind of a daughter, let alone human being could you be, if you chose to help those unknown people while your own family might even end up in the streets at this point. This choice was certainly not as easy as the first one.

It had taken a few days for the hospital’s in-house attorney to draft a proper contract upon the request of Dr. James Barnes. But she had done it to the best of her ability, ensuring that by accepting his payment, your parents did agree to never contact you ever again. She had triple-checked that this contract had no loopholes and that you were protected from them, as you should have always been.

She had even informed Dr. Romanoff, Dr. Wilson and Dr. Parker of the situation, for they had been the doctors on your case and needed to know of the current circumstances between you and the recipient of your liver. However, she had only shared the financial aspects and not the emotional ones. After all, she still respected your privacy and decision not to over-share the issues your personal life with anyone else, even if they were your friends.

For the sake of protecting you and this hospital, though she knew that your parents were certainly not smart enough to come after the hospital anyways, she had also informed Dr. Stark of what Dr. Barnes was about to do. There was no reason for the hospital to be involved in this transaction, unless there was an eventual lawsuit, which there would not be. As long as the hospitals bills were paid off, Tony did not object to it. In a way, even he had cared about ensuring that your abusive parents were out of your life. He had even mentioned to Peggy about him paying off the bills out of his own pocket; all it took was a little nudge from the attorney for the Chief of Surgery to understand that this was Bucky’s burden to bear.

“No, he pays them off. She finds out, even though he doesn’t want her to. Then she’ll finally realize that he’s been in love with her all along. She’ll ask him about it. He’ll have no choice but to fess up and they’ll both live happily ever after. Is that not what you want, Tony?” Peggy Carter had asked him, a hint of frustration evident in her voice. As a mother herself, she was disappointed extremely disappointed at what your own parents had done. If she could have done more than just draft a contract in this situation, she would have done it all. Hell, she would have taken their asses to court and ripped them to shreds if you did have a strong case. But you did not and this was the next best thing she could do for you. “Because that’s literally what every single person in this entire fucking hospital wants at this point.”

“Do you really think he’ll fess up though? I made a bet with Pep. She says he will but...  I wouldn’t put all of my faith in him.” Tony had remarked with a chuckle.

“This thing’s been going on and on forever. It’s about time it all came to an end.”

“But he doesn’t even want her to know that he’s paying them off. How is she going to find out about it?” He had asked the lawyer, his eyebrow raised at her.

“Do you think I’m an idiot, Tony?” She asked the man as she crossed her arms against her chest. “He can be this selfless, righteous... ‘I just want to protect her even though she doesn’t love me back and I don’t want to put my money down because of my own personal gains’ ... all he wants, but I’m not going to let him do whatever he pleases by now. The bloke’s the godfather of my child and she’s the closest thing Steve’s had to a sister. Those two are going to get together by the end of this thing and I’ll make sure of it.”

“Sounds like you’re meddling, Peggy. Are you a meddler though?” He asked as he feigned a dramatic gasp. “Is this what my father taught you? Meddling? Really? Is that what Howard taught you to do in court? How often do you do this in court anyways? How much have you meddled in the past?”

“Oh get over yourself...” She rolled her eyes at him. “As a matter of fact, your father did... teach me what it means to meddle in certain cases, not that I agreed with him or anything like that. There is a reason why I left his firm all those years ago but that’s not the point. This isn’t a court case, its Bucky and Y/N’s life and I’m going to meddle... the living shit out of it if it means that we’ll get a happy ending. Steve agrees that someone’s got to do something and he knows he’s not the right one to do it either. So, I’m going to meddle and get those two together, even if it’s the last thing I do.”

“I guess I better get ready to lose my bet with Pepper then.”

While Peggy did not completely agree with Bucky’s decision to pay off your parents himself, she knew that this was the only plausible solution to your dilemma. Though there were certain legal actions that could have been taken against your parents, she knew that you would not want to go forward with that. And even if you did make that call and had approached her for legal advice yourself, she would have told you not to do it. After all, the court would have suggested settlement anyways. A case of emotional extortion would not stand in court and knowing of your past, the last thing Peggy would have wanted was for you to relive that trauma in a court room. The court room was a brutal place just as it was and you had suffered enough.

“Are you alright, love?” She asked you as she sat down at the edge of your bed, her hand reaching over to grab yours. “I know you’ve had a rough couple of days but is there anything... anything we could do for you?”

Your eyes glazed over as you shook your head. “No... no, I... I’ll be fine, Peg.” You croaked out. You were still in and out of consciousness, thanks to the pain medications that continued to be pumped into your system. The dosage was controlled, but it made no difference. Even when you were completely knocked out, a part of you still felt the pain. But you could not tell for sure if the pain you had been feeling was physical or emotional. It was blurry...

“Sweetheart, you know you can talk to us about anything... right?” Natasha asked you as she stood by your bedside. To say that a part of her felt slightly frustrated that you had not opened up to her over the years would be an understatement. But she understood that you must have had a valid reason for trusting only a few people. Though she could not deny that she had grown to despise your parents a lot more now that she had found out about their attempt at extorting money from you, she had tried her hardest not to show it when she had to face them. After all, she was still in a conflicted position being your father’s doctor and your friend. She wanted nothing more than for all of this to be done for good. After hearing from Peggy about Bucky’s decision, all she could do was hope that the man would finally come forward and confess his feelings to you. She knew that he did not want to do that but she also knew him. She had known him for years, ever since they were residents. If anything, Dr. James Barnes was good and fixing broken hearts and your broken heart was indeed his to fix. “We’re your friends, Y/N. We’re here for you because we care about you. You know that, right?”

You sniffled as you turned over to look at your general surgeon, though you tried to ignore her words. A part of you wondered if your request might offend her, but it was for the best. You did not want to hurt her as much as you did not want to get yourself hurt again as well. You had a reason to want what you had wanted, so you might as well just ask her already. “Actually... Nat, there is something you could do for me.” You told her with a nervous smile, a sigh escaping your chapped lips as you looked over at her..

The red-headed surgeon perked up at your response. “Sure, what is it? What can I do for you?” Ever since you had first started working it this hospital, Natasha Romanoff had been the one who had constantly approached you in hopes of befriending you. Though her attempts had often failed, she took no offense to that. She had heard from Steve that you were not the kind of person who liked to hang out in a large group of people so she had let it slide until you were ready to accept her friendship.

You could not deny that this woman was extremely forward and perky, much to your dismay at first. It may have taken you a few weeks to warm up to her, thanks to a heart-liver transplant that the two of you had first worked together on. But eventually, you had managed to hang out with her outside of work. You were not one to go out a lot, but when you did, it had always been because you had accepted Natasha’s invite.

Even when it came to her being your father’s doctor, you had requested for her to be yours too. In most transplant cases, the donor and the recipient had different doctors and a whole separate team dedicated to them, working on them separately. But Natasha had been the one you had trusted with your own life. You had asked her to be the one to cut you open and remove your liver and she had made the arrangements to do so. You had trusted her to be your doctor and she was your doctor, a good one at that.

“Can you... can you refer me to... psych?” You asked her as you looked down at your lap. “Preferably with Dr. Rhodes, he already has a file on me and he’s familiar with me... I think I have a lot to talk to him about.”

Dr. Romanoff frowned at your request as she walked up to you, sitting down across from Peggy and taking your other hand in hers. “Y/N, honey...” She let out a sigh and you could have sworn that you saw her eyes glaze over with tears. “I’m not going to pressure you to open up to us. None of what’s been happening to you lately is any of our business. But it breaks my heart that you... that you’d rather share what’s going on with you to a psychiatrist than your own friends. I don’t know what it would take for you to trust us... but we’re all here for you and we’re all worried about you. I just want you to know that we’re not going to leave you hanging. And as your doctor, I’m telling you... you don’t need a psychiatrist. You need a friend. You need a family and you have a god damn family. You have all of us.”

You wanted to believe it. You really did. But you did not know if you should. Someone else had said these exact words to you all those years ago and you had believed her, only to realize how wrong you had been about putting all of your trust in her. She had also said the opposite of these exact words to you to and you had still believed her. For all these years, you had held back from making close friends because you had been terrified to get hurt again, the same way she had hurt you.

Peggy reached over to place her free hand on Nat’s shoulder and turned over to look at you with a frown that matched hers. “Sweetheart, come on... we’re not going to let you go through this alone. Steve’s not going to let you go through this alone. Tony’s not going to let you go through this alone. Barnes... is not going to let you go through this alone.”

You could not deny that your heart skipped a beat when the woman had mentioned his name. Dr. James Barnes had always had a special place in your heart. You knew that you shared a very special bond with him, a bond that was just not the same as what you had or did not have with anyone else at this Brooklyn Hospital. You had met him that night when you had been at one of your lowest points in life; you had been ready to give up on your entire career that night, which had been the one thing that had kept you going up until that point. You would have given up on your whole life had you not met him, for he had told you to aim to be a better surgeon and you had strived to be just that over the years. In a way, he was the reason why you were still alive today.

You remembered the first time you had become acquainted with his name though. It was not when you had first arrived at Brooklyn Hospital. No, it was years before that. You had been a fourth year medical student at NYU Med at that time, meeting with one of your former undergraduate professors for coffee. Though the woman had only taught you in your freshman year, you had kept in touch with her throughout the years of your undergrad and medical school. She had always appreciated having her former students come back to visit her, though you knew that you weren’t the only one who had kept in touch with her over the years.

When you had mentioned that you were planning on becoming a cardiothoracic surgeon following your graduation from NYU Med, she had recalled to you that two of her former students had went on to become successful cardiothoracic surgeons in Brooklyn. All it took was a Google search for you to find out who they were, Dr. Steven Rogers and Dr James Barnes. In a matter of hours, you knew exactly why the two of them were the best heart surgeons in all of New York. You had read every article they had published on the medical journal and watched every video of their surgeries that had been recorded and published for teaching purposes. They really were the best at what they did and you knew that training under one of them was the only way to succeed in your own career.

You had become determined to land a fellowship at Brooklyn Hospital and had worked your butt off during residency to get there. You had made it where you wanted to be. But even then, things did not seem like they were going to get better for you, at least not until you had met Dr. Barnes. He made you want to be better. He made you better.

Over the years, you had gotten to know Bucky as much as you had gotten to know Steve. Aside from having to work closely together, he had been one of the few people whom you had gotten to know outside of work as well. Although that had not been your intention, you could not deny that he had gotten to know you a little more than you would have allowed him to.

Perhaps the turn of recent events had been you realize just how oblivious you had been to your own emotions. But you felt something for that man. You knew you did, even though a part of you knew that he may just be way out of your league and he may not feel the same way about you. You did not have the courage to act on these feelings but you knew that you felt something for him, you had been feeling something for him the moment he had walked into your make shift clinic at the homeless shelter that night.

It may have been his dark jeans and leather jacket that he had been wearing that night. They did make him look extremely attractive. It may have been the way he had come all the way to the shelter after not finding you at home and apologized for the way he had treated you in the OR. He sure had been persistent that night. He had respected you enough to give you a personal apology and no one had ever treated you with such courtesy. It may have been the way he had walked you back home or told you that you were capable of doing better than what life had to offer you. He was a true gentleman though. There was no denying that. But that snowy night in New York, when you had ditched the formalities and gathered the courage to address him by his first name, you had fallen for him. And unbeknownst to you, that same night when you had called him by his first name, your James had fallen for you too.

“Peggy, where’s Barnes?” You asked her as you turned over to look at her, biting down on your chapped bottom lip as you let the tears stream down your face. “He hasn’t come by to see me in the last couple of days. I haven’t seen him since... before my mother... came to see me.” The James Barnes you knew had not dared to leave your bedside since the moment you had first woken up from your surgery. But when you needed him the most, he was nowhere to be found. “I know he was mad at me for... not listening to him and going forward with this transplant. But is... is he...” You could not find the words to say that all you wanted at that moment was his presence, the glint of his bright blue eyes and his genuine smile that always calmed you down. You wanted his hands on top of yours or your head to rest on his shoulders like that day in the supply room almost two weeks ago. All you wanted was James, even if he did not want you. You wanted that clarity that he always brought to you.

“Well... I’m glad you asked about him because I didn’t know how to start that conversation.” The British woman let out a sigh of relief as she gave your hand a squeeze. “He’s... not mad at you, darling. I can tell you that for sure. He’ll never be mad at you. He respects you and your bodily autonomy above anything else. He’s... just been a bit busy with patients, you know... you know how it is. He’s also been... um...” If the woman could just spit out Bucky’s plan and did her meddling as she should, she knew that all would be well. But she was hesitant about sharing this with you, for a part of her was worried about your reaction while another part of her was not willing to break Bucky’s trust. She felt conflicted, even though she knew exactly what she had to do.

“I miss him...” You admitted, a small smile creeping upon your lips. “I miss... him sitting on that chair with a book in his hand and pretending to read it even though he knows I’m awake and watching him. He’ll keep reading until he gets to the end of the page before he turns over to look at me... I miss his smile, the way he always calls me ‘doll’ and... I miss him... scolding me for not wanting anymore pain meds... and grabbing my PCA remote and pushing the button himself because he can’t stand to see me in pain. I miss him watching me doze off. I miss him... placing a kiss on my forehead... when I fall asleep. I was pretty sure I was hallucinating when I first felt him do that but... he did it more that once so I know that actually happened... more than once. I miss... waking up to him... and... he was always there and I felt safe, like I could get through this with him at my bedside. But ever since he left me... things haven’t been getting better and... I don’t know. I miss him.”

Natasha and Peggy looked at each other with wide eyes before quickly looking back to you. “What?” They both said, in unison. They both knew what this meant. You must not have been as oblivious to Bucky’s feelings as they had thought you were. Not to mention that it seemed as though you had felt the same way about them. If they only knew for sure, they would know just how to meddle with things.

You leaned back your head against your pillow as you close your eyes, thinking about everything that had happened to you that had led up to this moment. “Margaret...” You whispered, as though her name had imprinted itself as a curse word in your mind. Saying the name of the woman who had somehow instilled some sort of fear in your heart had been terrifying itself to say the least. But you knew that you had to let her go. It was the only way you could finally allow yourself to open up to anyone. To Natasha and to James.

“What?” Peggy perked up at the sound of her name. You did know that it was her name. Perhaps, she may have been the reason why you believed that not all Margaret’s could be so cruel.

You opened your eyes to look at the woman and shook your head, letting out a sigh. “Margaret. She was my... roommate... at NYU. The first real friend I had... or so I thought. It was strange to me, you know... to find a friend in someone that the housing department had assigned to live with me. But I... I was young, just turned eighteen, finally out of the system, on my own and starting college... I was so excited to have a friend after being alone for... my whole life. I had a whole life ahead of me and... Here was... someone who... who actually gave a shit about me and I was grateful that... I had someone to call my friend, maybe even my found-family.” You could not help the tears that continued to stream down your face, the ping at your heart as you had just opened up the baggage you had been unnecessarily holding onto for years. “You know that feeling that you get when you... think that this person would be there for you throughout your whole life when no one else would? That was her. I thought she would be my best friend for life but... I was wrong about that.”

Natasha was still holding onto your hand as you continued to speak. The thought of you having had a best friend in the past did not surprise her to the slightest. After all, she firmly believed that anyone who met you would genuinely want to be your friend, as she had done so when she had first met you. But she could not help but wonder how this friendship had ended for you, since it had certainly left such a lasting impact on your social life, even after all of these years. Whatever happened between you and this Margaret, it must have caused you a lot of pain. Because if there was one thing that she had just realized, it was that this person was the reason why you had been so closed off; the reason why you had been hesitant to accept her friendship at first. There was one thing that she knew for sure though. Whatever may have happened with you and your former friend, it must not have been your fault. She knew you well enough to know that you would never intentionally even hurt a fly, let alone another human being.

“I mean, we were best friends. We... spent a lot of time together, did things that friends in college... did. She was the one who took me to my first college party, bought me my first drink when I turned twenty-one... she really got me to come out of my shell. And I was willing to do that for her. I was willing to put myself out there for her; I never did that for anyone. I went above and beyond for her... you know... I valued her friendship so much that I was willing to sacrifice... anything for her. No one wanted to be my friend through high school because everyone hated my parents. No one knew my parents in New York, no one cared who they were or what they did... or who I was, really. So, her wanting to be a close friend of mine... I was grateful. I gave up a campus job once in first year because she needed a job; I had two other jobs already so it was fine. I... uh... always did things when she asked me to... like... things that she did around campus. She... had joined a sorority and when she... did these events for them, I would buy myself a ticket and show up because I wanted to support her. Charity fundraisers... I was the first one to donate. I... couldn’t afford it but... being a good friend was more important to me and I would have expected her to do the same for me. I guess... we were close friends, but maybe it was just... me... maybe I was the only one who thought that when she didn’t...? I don’t know how things... even happened. I mean, after a while... she started hanging out with all of her sorority sisters a lot more... ditched me but... I didn’t think much of it at first. You know, I... I’m not an idiot. I did notice that she was spending a lot less time at home, but I really didn’t think much of it. I thought I was overreacting... and I let it slide.” You paused to take a breath. “I didn’t think she was... deliberately trying to distance herself from me. I mean... it was my fault.”

Peggy was listening intently as you spoke, for you had not even told her or Steve about this certain Margaret. But there must have been a reason why you had kept this from them. If you had kept it from them for as long as you had done, it made her wonder why you had chosen to share this with her and Natasha rather than her and Steve. Why now? The problem was your parents, right? So, why were you bringing up your former friend? She wanted to put the puzzle pieces together but she was unable to figure it out on her own.

“I... I always told her everything... everything about me and... What I’d been through, what was going on with me. I mean, she had to live with me... right, so... I know I had a lot of emotional baggage then, still do now but... back then, I was younger and a lot more... vulnerable. The wounds were still fresh. I just needed someone to lean on and she was always there... she didn’t mind it. She always told me that she didn’t... until one night. I remember being in my room, studying for a Biology exam. It was... December... and it was snowing really badly. I could see the snow falling from my bedroom window and... The next thing I knew, I felt like... I don’t know, I had an anxiety attack. I felt like the room was closing in on me and it just... I couldn’t breathe. I was shaking, I was cold... I remember putting a sweater on and just... hiding under my blanket. The heater was on. I tried to warm myself up but... I felt cold, my feet were numb. I panicked and I didn’t know what to do. My first instinct was to grab my phone and call her. She didn’t pick up and... I was... my hands were shaking so much when I texted her. I asked her where she was, she said that she was just leaving class and that she wasn’t coming home that night. I told her that I was... having a panic attack and that I needed help... that it felt like the night... that night in the snow storm... she knew what it meant. I had told her about what happened that night with my mother... so she knew why I was feeling... the way I did. But... just when I needed her the most... just when I thought that... she would... at least try to get me some help...” You felt a sob before wincing in pain and you could have sworn that you had felt a tug at your heartstrings. Margaret was not an easy subject to talk about but she was necessarily. She was the reason why you had given up on finding any sort of companionship in anyone, whether it was a genuine friendship or a romantic relationship.

Dr. Romanoff immediately sprung to her feet, moving over to gently pull you into a side-hug, careful not to mess with the wires and tubes that were still attached to you. Honestly, at this point she could care less about them though. If she did mess them up, she could just put them back in you herself. She knew that you needed a hug and she was going to give you a damn hug.

“The next thing she said to me... the last thing she ever said to me before she moved into her sorority house... she said and I quote, ‘Fuck off, I’m not a qualified therapist,’ and... I kid you not... it hurt like a bitch when she said that. I was shocked... I was... I didn’t know what to do, I... I knew that I’d just lost the one friend I had, I wasn’t sure if... she was the one real friend anymore but... I thought it was my fault. I blamed myself. I had ruined something for myself, I felt like I could never do anything right. Things were finally starting to get better and I had... just fucked it up with her. I just cried myself to sleep that night.” You admitted as you let out another sob, leaning your head gently against the red-headed surgeon’s shoulder as you sobbed.

“Holy shit, what a bitch!” Peggy exclaimed as she stood up to hug you from the other sweetheart. “Sweetheart, I’m so sorry... you had to deal with her. You know, none of that is true. You’re...” Even she was at a loss for words as she turned over to look at Natasha and gave her a nod. If was not the right time for you to know just how unconditionally loved really were, she did not know when it would be. You needed to know what Bucky was about to do and she was going to tell you either way.

“I thought she was my friend but...  she had hurt me. I never saw her again but... after what happened with her, I just... couldn’t get myself to become friends with anyone. I couldn’t let myself trust someone and... Give my all in a friendship and get nothing in return. To have my feelings be hurt like that... Nat, I didn’t mean to push you away for all these years. I was just terrified... terrified to get close to anyone because... you become close to someone, you tell them everything, do everything for them... one day, they’ll be your best friend and the next day, they’ll tell you to get a therapist.”

“Oh Y/N...” Natasha Romanoff did not utter a she word as she held onto you, her arms wrapped tightly over your shoulder as she gently held you against her body. Her hand stroked through your hair as you continued to sob, and you had felt the weight that you had been holding onto for years start to fade away. “I’m so sorry you had such a terrible friend. I can understand why you would have had such a hard time trusting anyone after what she did, after what your own mother did. People suck, Y/N... I know that for sure. But not all of us can be so terrible. We’re not like that; we won’t ever... judge you or throw you away like that. We are actually in it for life.”

“I’ve been... I’ve been holding myself back from trusting people, from having relationships. I kept believing that I wasn’t worthy of being loved because... I thought no one could love me.”

“Oh honey, you know that’s not true...”

Peggy looked over at Natasha and bit her lip. “No, it’s not... Y/N, I can’t speak for all Margaret’s but I’m sure that not all of us are such devils. I mean, at least I’m not like that and you know that. I would be honored to be your replacement Margaret if you would let me. I... I hope you would let me.”

You gave her a weak smile through the tears. “Yeah, well... you’re a much better Margaret than her, Peggy. But... um... I’m still scared... I.. I want to tell him everything, everything since the very beginning... the night I left Buck’s County, the day I got to New York, Margaret... my parents... the loss of a sense of belonging... a sense of being loved... that I lost years ago... the sense of belonging that I lost when I left home... that I didn’t get back until that night... when I was crying in an on call room and he made me realize... that I did belong in this hospital. He made me better... he makes me better, and I need him right now. I want to be better. I want him. Buck’s County is not my home... it never was, that’s where I left. But Bucky Barnes... James... he wouldn’t tell me to fuck off and get a therapist if I opened up to him and... told him how I really feel about... everything, would he?”

Natasha was in tears when she realized what all of this meant. Things were finally starting to be better for both of her friends and all she could do was hope that they ended well. She pulled back from the hug before wiping away her tears, her hands on his hips as she looked down at you and shook her head. “Fuck, no... of course, not!” She told you as she let out a chuckled. “If he dares to do such a thing, I’ll pull him by his hair and drag his ass through hell myself.”

Peggy Carter let out a sigh of relief as she wiped away her tears, hugging you for a moment longer before she pulled back. “As a matter of fact, he... he’s been thinking about making things better for you long before any one of us did. He... uh... he’s decided to take care of your dad’s medical bills himself. Of course, he didn’t want you to find out what he was going to do because you would have said no. But um... he said he’ll take care of it. He’ll make sure that your parents are well taken care of... financially speaking.”

You reached your hand up to wipe away your tears, a small chuckle escaping your lips. “James was always quite philanthropic. But it makes sense because... he... my clinic received a cheque from an anonymous donor a few years ago. I knew it was him because he... he has a big heart, even though he says he doesn’t. He’s always had a big heart.”

“You knew...? You knew it was him?”

You nodded. “I’ve known all along, Nat. I’ve known everything. I was just dumb enough to believe that I didn’t deserve any of it. But I’ll be doing much better once I see him. I need to see him.”

[fortunatelylori]

This is a long one: having read all of the sympathetic and convincing Sidney Parker posts here, I am wonder if you’re letting Sidney off a little too easily? It seems to me that no matter how much he may want to find love (as has been so eloquently argued here), he has not yet learned true selfless love imo. His half proposal is a point in case. Consider the comparison with Babbers.

Sidney: “What a brute I was… I hope that I am a different man now… If I have changed at all it is in no small part to you. I have never wanted to put myself in someone else’s power before. I have never wanted to care for anyone but myself.”Lord B: “My dear girl don’t you know that I am in love with you… It’s enough that you like me and that you trust me…I have no wish to own you…i want to make you happy. I could never try to lead or constrain you, Esther. All I ask is to walk through life by you

I know he was just getting warmed up, but Sidney’s expression of love is still very firmly about his own development and his own realisation, while Babs’s expression of love is very much about what he hopes to give, and what it means to love. Sidney’s growth arc is incomplete and he still hasn’t fully earned Charlotte, whom Rose Williams has made so generous, brave and loveable. You have already pointed out that this is the midway point in the story, and I completely agree.

But I would love to hear your thoughts on how this circle can be squared: Are we supposed to think that Sidney has done something noble by pimping himself out to Eliza Campion for the sake of his feckless brother and disappointing and destroying his own happiness and, more importantly by JA rules, that of a young inexperienced woman whom he has publicly shouted at, exposed himself to, felt up, kissed, and half proposed to?

Andrew Davies has put Sidney in a hell of a bind: If he breaks it off with Eliza now, he’s a dishonourable cad. If Eliza breaks it off with him, Charlotte looks like second prize to his first great love in the world’s eyes. If he marries Eliza and she dies and he runs back to Charlotte, how can we expect Char to enter that “river” again?

The only comparable situation in JA is Elinor Dashwood and Edward Ferrars, and Edward’s honour was completely intact throughout: his secret engagement occurred when he was young and naïve; he retreated from Elinor once he realised he loved her before more damage was done; he stuck by the loathsome Miss Steele once their engagement was public despite wanting Elinor; Miss Steele throws him over for his brother making clear that she was only ever interested in money and feelings were not at stake.

By contrast, Sidney has broken the heart of an intelligent and worthy young woman for a venal and loveless marriage, though the cynical “bargain” seems to be that he try to love Eliza. Ugh. Badly done, Sidney! How can we redeem Sidney to the point of making him worthy of St. Charlotte? How can he be extricated from this mess without losing his honour and without making Charlotte suffer any further?I would love to see Charlotte released from the passivity she has been forced into here.

She has been robbed of any agency after being established as an active character – a toiler and a spinner. Perhaps she will concoct a way to save Sidney’s soul behind the scenes, showing him in the process what true selfless love looks and feels like. I have a weird feeling that in one episode someone said something like “Men need to be helped without ever knowing they’re being helped…” or something similar. That’s coming back to me now – maybe that’s the only direction this can take:

Charlotte orchestrates Sidney’s rescue with the help of Lady S and the Prince Regent and then retreats back to Heraclitus and rabbit hunting in Willingden, where Sidney comes to find her. After a spot of grovelling and sexy scything in the fields to show that he is not just a dandy city boy but a man of substance, he will win back our Charlotte. Whew! sorry forth long one, had to get it off my chest. Now, about that GOT ending…

Hey there!

Whew … that was INTENSE! Lol … I hope you really meant it when you said you wanted my thoughts on this take because you’re going to get them and …. I don’t think you’re going to like them.

So here goes nothing … I’m going to break this down into topics because your messages covers a lot of ground.

Firstly, the issue of selfless love:

When I was much, much, MUCH younger that I am now, I watched a little movie called Love Story (1970). This film was essentially The Notebook of my mother’s generation. And the most famous line in that film is:

Jenny: Love means never having to say you're sorry

The main female character is standing in the freezing cold with no way to enter her apartment because her husband got pissed off at her and bolted. And that’s what comes out of her mouth … Because love is selfless, right? You don’t need to apologize for anything EVER because love means never having to say you’re sorry.

Let me tell you something: THAT IS COMPLETE AND UTTER BULLSHIT! Anyone who believes romantic love should be selfless needs to reevaluate. The belief in selfless romantic love will not help anyone find that kind of love (because it doesn’t exist). What it will do is that it will allow that person to be prayed on by fuck bois/fuck girls everywhere because you are going to continually excuse their behavior … because you have to love them unconditionally, right? WRONG!

Selfless love is acceptable only in a parent-child dynamic. That’s it! As Cersei would put it:

Cersei: On that front, a mother has no choice

Romantic love is very much conditional on treatment, involvement and attraction. When it isn’t, that’s fertile ground for abuse.

You think this is romantic?

Babington: My dear girl, don’t you know that I am in love with you?

Esther: And what is that to me since I do not love you?

Babington: I don’t care. It’s enough that you like me and that you trust me.

What happens six months down the line when Babs catches Esther having sex with Edward in their marital bed? Do you think he’s still not going to care she doesn’t love him back? What Babington is doing in his proposal is lying to himself. No person who has ever been in love ever genuinely does not care if the object of his affection loves him back. We all want to be loved back. We pretend we don’t because we’re so desperate to have that person that we think we’re able to live without it or, most likely, because we think we can talk them round into loving us.

To be clear, I don’t think Esther will cheat on Babington with Edward. But you can bet your bottom dollar Edward will be coming back into her life in season 2 and that she won’t be over him. Guess who will get his heart put through the ringer?

Sidney’s proposal, on the other hand, is very much how an adult should suggest a lifelong commitment to another adult.

Sidney: If I have changed at all, it’s in no small part down to you. I have never wanted to put myself in someone else’s power before. I’ve never wanted to care for anyone but myself.

In his speech what Sidney is laying out is the following: I am well aware I have issues and that we’ve clashed around those issues time and time again. I am committing myself to fixing them because you make me want to do better. I have trust issues but you make me want to hand you my heart because I know you won’t hurt me. I want to share my life with you and make your needs a priority in my life because you make me less selfish.

I’m sorry … but I’ll take Sidney’s proposal over Babington’s any day of the week because Sidney has a plan for our future (lol) while Babington knows I don’t love him but he is so blinded by infatuation that he can’t see he’s promising something he can’t deliver on … and most crucially no one should deliver on.  

Sidney’s growth arc is incomplete and he still hasn’t fully earned Charlotte, whom Rose Williams has made so generous, brave and loveable.

I agree that Sidney’s arc is incomplete but so is Charlotte’s. She’s not fully come into her own either and this isn’t a matter of one character being flawless while the other has to work his way to her perfection.

Sidney doesn’t need to earn Charlotte because Charlotte is not a possession, she’s a person and Sidney is not some lecherous monster that needs to go through the 7 circles of hell in order to “earn” anything. Sidney and Charlotte are two people that have had some conflicts but nothing truly disastrous (until Sidney proposes to Eliza, that is) and in which they both have had their share of blame. It’s not like Sidney has been the sole aggressor in all of this. Charlotte has insulted him and mocked him in an assortment of ways.

In the end they have chosen to put those differences aside and have come together with a new understanding of who the other person is. They’ve chosen to love each other and accept each other’s flaws. There is no discrepancy in worth between the two of them that needs to be addressed by Sidney.

What should happen in a potential season 2 is that he will need to rebuild Charlotte’s trust after breaking it with his engagement to Eliza. But that discussion is separate since his initial proposal comes before the Tom Parker realizes he doesn’t have insurance debacle.

Are we supposed to think that Sidney has done something noble by pimping himself out to Eliza Campion for the sake of his feckless brother and disappointing and destroying his own happiness and, more importantly by JA rules, that of a young inexperienced woman whom he has publicly shouted at, exposed himself to, felt up, kissed, and half proposed to?

I think what we’re supposed to take from Sidney’s decision to sacrifice his happiness to help his brother is that his “outlier” facade was just that … a façade. Beneath all that is a man who is willing to go to extremes for the people he cares about. I also think that it shows Sidney, despite his outward confidence, doesn’t really love himself that much.

You’re making the mistake of assuming Sidney’s decision to marry Eliza is a rejection of Charlotte. I wouldn’t blame Charlotte for thinking it but we have a 360 view of the story that she doesn’t have the luxury of having.

We know Sidney loves her. We know he is heartbroken at having to let her go. But he doesn’t want his brother to go to jail and he has only 1 week to figure out a way out of the hole Tom has dug himself into. I’m pretty sure Eliza was the last option on the list of things Sidney tried to do in order to help his brother.

As for your implication that Sidney somehow dishonored Charlotte, it’s pretty obvious from the tone of the show that the whole “there always has to be a chaperone” and “no kissing before marriage” etc. are not rules they are choosing to include in their version of the regency. Charlotte leaves Sanditon with her reputation intact. It is her heart that is broken and I’d be willing to bet that in Sidney’s mind, he has already convinced himself that she will recover very quickly while he will be in pain for the rest of his life. Because … as I’ve said … he doesn’t love himself enough to realize just how much Charlotte loves him.

If he breaks it off with Eliza now, he’s a dishonourable cad. If Eliza breaks it off with him, Charlotte looks like second prize to his first great love in the world’s eyes. If he marries Eliza and she dies and he runs back to Charlotte, how can we expect Char to enter that “river” again? The only comparable situation in JA is Elinor Dashwood and Edward Ferrars, and Edward’s honour was completely intact throughout

I’m not sure what your point is here? For starters, who cares what “the world” thinks? Charlotte will know that Sidney loves her and only her and that his engagement with Eliza was an act of desperation on his part. And so will we, the viewers, because and I quote:

Sidney: I don’t love her, you know.

Charlotte and Sidney’s situation is exactly the same as Eleanor and Edward’s, with the exception that Sidney didn’t flirt with Charlotte and almost proposed to her while being engaged to someone else the way Edward does.

And if we are going to take “the world’s” opinion into account, I’m pretty sure people very much speculated that Edward was nursing a broken heart over the woman for whom he risked everything, was disinherited and that abandoned him to marry his brother. After all why else would he retreat to the countryside and marry the almost old maid with no fortune, Eleanor Dashwood? See how you can spin anything into something negative if you want to?

How can we redeem Sidney to the point of making him worthy of St. Charlotte?

Sigh … Sidney has always been worthy of Charlotte. He is a good man ... with great AAAABBBSSSS. And while Charlotte getting her heart broken is deeply sad, I think it’s safe to say it’s Sidney that has gotten the truly shitty end of the stick. He has tied himself to a woman whom he does not love and who treats him like he’s her dog.

I don’t think people realize just how hopeless his situation is. It’s not like if he marries Eliza, he can get a divorce a few years down the line. He is stuck with the woman who betrayed him 10 years ago for the rest of his life. And he’s in this situation not even because of his own venal desires or greed. He’s in it to save his brother … a brother that will probably ruin himself regardless. That kind of thing eats at a person.

Charlotte’s state, on the other hand, is not permanent. I’m not trying to minimize her pain. Heartbreak is horrible and deeply traumatizing. But as everyone who has gone through it can tell you, it eventually goes away. You recover, you move on.

I don’t think she will need to go through the entire letting go process because she and Sidney will be reunited and everything will work out for the best but if she had to, she would go through it and come out the other side even stronger than she is now.

I would love to see Charlotte released from the passivity she has been forced into here. She has been robbed of any agency after being established as an active character – a toiler and a spinner. Perhaps she will concoct a way to save Sidney’s soul behind the scenes, showing him in the process what true selfless love looks and feels like.

See … this is confusing to me. On the one hand you think Sidney isn’t worthy of Charlotte, on the other you want her to save him. I would suggest it’s not Charlotte’s job to extract Sidney from the shitty situation he’s in. He has to do that for himself.

As for Charlotte being robbed of agency … what’s that even based on? What was she supposed to do in that situation? It’s not like there’s 80.000 pounds hidden under the Heywood family tree that Lassie can dig up …

After a spot of grovelling and sexy scything in the fields to show that he is not just a dandy city boy but a man of substance, he will win back our Charlotte

And this is the part where you truly lost me … As a born and bred city girl, with a generational line of city dwellers dating back centuries, I will have you know I have SUBSTANCE, ok?!?! I have many, many substances … I’m oh so substantiated and stuff.

All joking aside, why does Sidney need to prove that he is a man of substance? What the hell has he done to make anyone assume he isn’t?

I guess in the end our conflicting views come from our perceptions of Sidney as a person. I don’t think Sidney is a bad boy that needs to be redeemed through his love for Charlotte. I think he has always been a good man who is trying to do his best for those around him, who has had to deal with some pretty shitty situations in his life and who is involved in at least one toxic relationship (with his brother). In addition to that, he has a self-destructive streak (people who get dumped don’t necessarily react to it by setting fire to their whole lives and almost dying in the process) which makes it easy for him to prioritize Tom’s well-fare over his own life.

The reason why he falls so deeply in love with Charlotte is because she offers him a real chance of breaking out of those patterns and being able to be seen and loved for who he is. The problem is that toxic past relationships are still very much encroaching on his ability to move on with his life in a healthy way.

In order to break free, what Sidney needs isn’t to be saved. What he needs is to put a stop to the negative patterns that exist at the core of his relationship with Tom (and Mary by extension) and to put the whole Eliza relationship to rest.  

[lapixie]

Version 629

It was so stupid how it happened. It wasn’t even during a fight. He was just walking down the hall, minding his own business, when he got attacked. Okay, so maybe attacked was the wrong word, maybe it was more like some hapless intern was walking a sample from one lab to another, tripped over their own shoelaces, and dumped the sample directly on him. But still. Attacked. In his own hallway.

Before he could even begin to process what had happened, the intern was turning pale, hyperventilating, repeating, “I’m going to lose my job,” over and over. Which. Fair. He had just dumped an unknown substance all over his boss. But. Tony wasn’t going to fire him. Yet. He may have to enroll him in remedial shoe tying classes though. And why was he personally transporting a substance in the halls? Tony had protocols in place for that. But most pressing…

“What was I just doused in? Am I going to turn green? Shrink? Expand?” He asked wryly. He knew he wasn’t going to die, those experiments weren’t done on this floor.

“Well, um, Mr. Stark, uh, it’s a truth serum we’ve been working on for SHIELD?” He peeked up between his fingers, looking for signs Tony was going to blow.

Well fuck. “Well fuck. Wait. I did not mean to say that out loud. Which version was this?” He was starting to get a bit more panicky. Tell him it wasn’t version 629. Please tell him it wasn’t version 629.

“Version 629.” The intern said as he started slowly backing away.

Fuck. “Fuck. Why was it in the hall? I had that locked away!” He was starting to get angry. This was the version which not only made it so you couldn’t lie, it also made you say 85% of your thoughts out loud. No one knew why it was 85%. It was supposed to be locked away for SHIELD to pick up, so that Fitzsimmons could do more research.

By this time, the intern was almost back to the lab they had come from, and he yelled over his shoulder as he ran in, closing the door behind him, “Captain America wanted it for an interrogation!”

Leaving the intern to quake in fear alone, Tony stomped over to the elevator, determined to give Steve a piece of his mind. “Friday, send me to Steve.”

Getting off at the floor the elevator stopped on, Tony followed Friday’s instructions until he was standing outside a door. Taking a deep breath, trying to calm down, he opened the door and immediately became enraged all over again. There was Steve, leaning against a wall, and sitting at the table in handcuffs was Bucky.

“Are you telling me I now have to say whatever is on my mind, without lying, for the next 24 hours, because you wanted to play 50 Shades with Reindeer Games here?!” he shouted out.

Steve widened his eyes and walked over to Bucky, letting him out of the cuffs, before looking back at Tony. “Uh, I don’t know what you’re talking about?” he tried to say.

“You may want to make it less of a question next time, Capsicle! The little intern you had running your errands spilled it all over me! Thanks for that! I didn’t want to know how kinky you and your boyfriend got! Now I’m going to be thinking about that next time I try to talk Peter into something!”

“Peter? Parker? You and Peter?! Since when?!” Bucky sputtered out.

“Since the night of his 18th birthday. Little spider rode me till the sun came up. Shit. I did not mean to say that. Maybe it wasn’t a good idea to confront you while I was still under the influence.”

Bucky and Steve looked at each other and just smiled. Bucky motioned for Steve to go first. “So Tony, you’re gonna think about Bucky and me later, while you’re with Peter?”

“Hell yeah I will! I’ll tell him about the handcuffs and he’ll beg me to use them on him. I’ll call him Bucky and he’ll call me Steve. Then for round two, we’ll switch, and I’ll be Bucky and he’ll be Steve. And fuck, I really shouldn’t have said any of this.”

Bucky’s eyes drilled into him, holding a heat he had only ever seen directed at Steve before. “No, Tony, please. Continue. Is this something you guys do a lot, pretend to be other people?”

“No,” he noticed Bucky’s eyes dropped at that, before he continued, “Not other people. Just you two. Sometimes we both play one of you, sometimes only one of us does. Pete loves when I pretend to be you, and finger him open with my gauntlet, pretending it’s your metal hand.”

Bucky perked back up at that, as Tony couldn’t stop the word vomit leaving his mouth. “Then, he’ll hold me down with his super strength and pretend to be Cap, telling me how dirty and naughty I am, as he drills into me.”

Steve and Bucky slowly stalked closer as Tony was speaking, until they were on either side of him. Silently, Steve took Tony by the neck, bringing his face closer, before claiming his mouth. Tony automatically opened for him, as he felt Bucky behind him, arm reaching forward and around, slipping down his pants, brushing his cock. He moaned into Steve’s mouth, clutching his shirt, twisting it in his fingers. Bucky took his cock firmly in hand, and started stroking at a leisurely pace. With his last bit of sanity, he wrenched his mouth from Steve and ground out, “Friday, get Pete. Tell him to get here as quickly as possible.” He then slammed back into Steve’s mouth, sucking his tongue, grinding back against Bucky’s hardening length. He slid his hands down to cup Steve’s ass, and yes, it was America’s ass, pulling him to grind against his cock, still in Bucky’s hand.

Less than a minute later, the door opened and Tony heard Peter take in a sharp breath. He raised one of his hands waved him over. He stepped closer and immediately fell to his knees, reaching up and pulling Tony’s pants down around his ankles.

“Oh, fuck, yes!” Peter whimpered out, seeing Bucky’s hand working Tony. Seeing Peter on his knees, Bucky moved his hand back around to Tony’s ass, letting a finger enter the crack, rubbing against Tony’s furled entrance. Tony moaned into Steve’s mouth, spreading his legs further apart, giving Bucky easier access. Peter took Tony’s cock in hand, rising up on his knees until his face was level with it. Sucking the tip into his mouth, he used his other hand to start undoing Steve’s pants. When he didn’t meet any resistance, he quickly shoved them down as far as they would go, seeing Steve’s cock for the first time. He moaned out loud as he took it in hand, maneuvering until he could get both into his mouth, causing both Steve and Tony to moan into each other’s mouths. 

Bucky had reached into his pocket and pulled out the little bottle of lube that he carried around at all times (with a boyfriend like Steve, he kind of had to), and proceeded to sink a finger knuckle deep into Tony. He felt around until he found his prostate, and proceeded to pet it. He added another finger, scissoring them, opening Tony up for him. Adding a third finger, he then slicked his cock up, before passing the bottle down to Peter, nodding over at Steve.  Peter’s eyes widened, before he gave a devilish smirk, and proceeded to get his finger nice and lubed up, before sinking it knuckle deep in one go. Quickly adding a second, he watched as Bucky removed his fingers from Tony, replacing them with his cock, sliding in completely without stopping. Not giving Tony a moment to adjust, Bucky immediately pulled out until just his head was still in, before slamming back in, as hard as Tony could take it. Peter added a third finger to Steve, stretching as quickly as he could, before removing them all, rising to his feet, dropping his pants, and shoving his cock into Steve.  Steve reached down, taking himself and Tony in his hand, stroking them as Peter and Bucky fucked into them.

Tony was in Heaven, getting fucked by Bucky, stroked by Steve, and watching his baby boy fuck Steve as hard as he could, knowing the super soldier could take his spider strength. Then he felt another finger at his entrance. He whimpered, opening his legs even further, feeling Bucky rumble a laugh against his back.

“Look at our little cockslut. Already getting fucked by me, but so ready for more. Do you want more, baby?” Bucky purred in his ear.

“Fuck yeah, I do. I want everything you can give me. Fuck, I want it so bad!” He panted out, feeling a second finger join the first in his already stuffed hole.

“I’ll give it to you. And you’ll take it like a good little boy. I’m gonna blow your mind, doll.” Bucky hummed as he thrust even more forcefully against Tony’s prostate, making him cry out. He added a third finger, stretching even further, before lifting him up, and depositing him on Steve’s cock, stuffing him full. Steve continued pumping Tony’s cock as him and Bucky found a rhythm, sliding their own cocks in and out in tandem, making Tony feel like he was going to burst. He couldn’t even talk at this point, just letting out little moans and groans as his body was used, held between the two super soldiers, watching Peter fuck Steve’s ass ruthlessly. When Bucky pushed his metal fingers into Tony’s mouth, telling him to suck, it was the last straw, and he whited out as he came all over his and Steve’s chests, his clenching causing a chain reaction, with Steve and Bucky filling him up deep inside with their cum, and Peter’s hips stuttering until with a final shove and groan, he came inside Captain America. They all took a minute to just catch their breaths, the soldiers easily able to hold Tony’s weight. Finally, with a pop and a wince, Steve pulled out, pulling up off of Peter at the same time. Letting Tony’s legs down, Bucky removed his cock from the used and abused hole.

“Well. That was something different.” Peter said, always the master of understatement. Then he grinned, looking at Tony, and continued, “When can we do it again?”

Huffing out a laugh, Tony replied, “Spoiled brat. I love you, baby. But who says we’re going to do it again? Although, I do want to. Very much so. Almost more than I want anything else. Only thing that I want more, is you, baby, happy and satisfied and mine.”

Peter just looked at him, shocked, because Tony had never told him he loved him before. Up until now, they had played it very loose. “Really? Oh, Tony, I love you too! So, so much!” Peter threw himself at Tony, both of them still pantless. Then he looked up at Tony, saying, “And why are you being so open? Don’t get me wrong, I like it, but it’s really not you…”

Rolling his eyes, Tony replied only with, “Version 629.” and Peter’s eyes opened wide, before he started laughing. Looking over at Steve and Bucky, who had finished getting their clothes straight, he asked, “So, are you guys up for doing this again? It was quite fun!” Then he wiggled his eyebrows exaggeratedly. 

Chuckling, both Steve and Bucky were already nodding before Peter had finished speaking. “Yeah, this is a definite yes. Maybe next time, you’ll be in the middle.”

Sagging against Tony, Peter let out a little whimper, already looking forward to next time. Kissing his temple, Tony pulled away, pulling his pants on, helping Peter with his. “Let’s go back to my rooms. I have quite a few more hours that I don’t want to be caught around other people. Especially Nat. But I do have to say, this was the best accident I’ve ever had.”

And if a certain intern got a bonus in his next check, instead of being fired like he thought? Well, that was just Tony being Tony.

[irondad-defensesquad]

Familiar

Fandom: MCU

Rating: T

Relationships: Tony & Peter, Tony & Jarvis

Characters: Tony Stark, Peter Parker, Edwin Jarvis (flashbacks), Pepper Potts (minor role); other characters are only mentioned

Summary: When Tony comforts Peter, his brain suddenly clicks, as if it’s remembering something that’s been lost inside him for years. Or, Tony realizes how much his relationship with Peter reminds him of Jarvis.

(AU where Thanos is defeated only a few months after Infinity War and nobody dies - except for the purple prick, of course. Tony and Pepper get married and expect Morgan. May didn’t dust and neither has everyone in Peter’s class, only a few people.)

Word count: around 6,529

Also on AO3! (separated in two chapters)

–

A/N: Heya! This MCU sideblog is kinda new, so I posted the full work here, too. I hope you guys enjoy it!

WARNINGS - mentioned child abuse, alcoholism and character death.

Tony knows something is up with the kid.

Having known Peter for a couple of years now, the teenager is prone to bottling things up. It started off with wounds, which were easily detected by his suit. Following that, Tony would find out he had the same coping mechanism when it came to things that deeply, mentally affected him; and that is harder when you’re unable to get reports on someone’s emotional well-being.

Peter hasn’t been out as Spider-Man as often. Tony has somewhat expected it after bringing the kid and everyone back, but it doesn’t help that the kid rarely answers his calls now. When he does, Peter comes with excuses not to come visit him, arguing he has his own life to get through, which Tony understands at first, but then Peter straight up ignores him, and the man becomes skeptical and worried. He even goes to the point of calling May, who only tells him that her nephew has grown a bit distant overall.

It takes two or three months for Peter to come visit at all, and it’s pretty much thanks to his aunt, who finally convinced him to sleep over there since she would have to work on helping the people affected by the Snap. Happy picks him up, almost bringing Tony to the good old days when Peter used to come by the compound… he can’t help the reminiscent feeling.

Pepper snaps him out of it with her sweet, concerned voice. Her hand is carefully placed on his knee, caressing it with the most gentleness.

“He’s coming now, Tony,” She reassures him, as if reading him like he’s an open book. “You don’t have to be worried.”

Tony sighs. “I couldn’t even get him to come here by himself, Pep… what can I do?”

“You have to be patient with him, honey. Peter has been through a lot… he’ll tell you once you make it clear that it’s okay.”

He doesn’t reply then, as she gives him a supportive smile. Tony tries to believe that’s how it’s going to work out, so he returns the gesture and holds her hand. His eyes gaze at Pepper with adoration and sheer joy of expecting their child.

(He won’t admit out loud that there’s fear somewhere inside him, too, despite having literally dreamed about it and becoming so enthusiastic after. Not only was his father the worst role model, there was… also the guilt of Peter dying in his arms, as Tony couldn’t do anything. Nightmares would still haunt him to no end.)

It takes Tony another moment to return to reality when Happy arrives with Peter. The head of security has a rather uneasy and concerned expression on his face, silently telling Tony that the kid is acting off. The older man doesn’t have to take another minute to confirm it as Peter barely looks at him and Pepper in the eye when they greet the teenager.

Being the great people he could’ve asked for, Pepper and Happy make up the excuse they needed to get something heavy inside the house. They disappear quickly before Peter can protest. It’s probably the first time they’re alone in such a long time.

“So, uh, wanna get inside?” Tony proposes. “Or do you want to sit out here for a bit?” He presents the chairs standing in the porch.

Peter simply shrugs and sits in one of them, refusing to look at the man as the stubborn boy that he is.

“How have you been, kiddo? Has school been tough?” He asks nonchalantly, only to get no response.

Tony really wants to be patient with him like Pepper suggested, but he’s had it. The kid hasn’t talked to him properly in freaking months, has only ignored him. It’s obvious that something is wrong, and all Tony did was give it time. He’s given enough time, more than enough.

“Kid,” The man stands on his knees in front of him. “Pete?”

Peter turns his head away, only the dead silence replies.

“Peter, you’ve been away for months now and you’re not going to tell me anything?” Tony insists.

“No.” The kid’s voice is the quietest he’s heard, beating it to when Peter said I’m sorry before he faded away with the wind.

“And why is that?”

Nothing. Tony sighs, almost groans.

“I know there’s something wrong, Peter. You don’t have to hide it from me. You’ve been ignoring my calls and texts all over. Your aunt noticed you’ve been quiet, too,” Tony explains. Having no reply, his voice lowers, “Jesus, kid, I’m- I’m really worried about you. Why won’t you talk to me?”

The question makes Peter shift to anxious and guilty, yet it doesn’t convince him to talk. No, it makes the kid more stressed, as his hands are visibly shaking.

“You know you can trust me, right? I… Kid, I care about you, so much. You’re so important to me.” Tony almost feels hurt that Peter seems to not believe it. Has he not made it clear before?

The man reaches the boy’s hand, grabs it gently. “Pete. Please look at me.” At Tony’s pleading tone, Peter hesitantly raises his head, revealing unshed, repressed tears. “You can tell me anything – anything that’s hurting you. I won’t think any less of you.”

Tony doesn’t take the eyes off the kid, who’s unable to contain the following sniffs that escape. The older absolutely hates seeing Peter in this state, but it’s worse when he thinks just for how long he’s been bottling it up.

“I-I don’t- I c-can’t fit in, Mister Stark,” Peter whispers.

“What do you mean?”

“I can’t fit in! I-It’s only been months and- and everything feels so different, Mister Stark! I don’t- I don’t know how to explain and it’s frustrating, like—” Peter sobs. “E-Everyone is just acting like n-nothing happened. And I’m here, still remembering every single detail. Still feeling myself disappear. I can feel everything, and I c-can’t forget.”

Tony’s heart breaks. “Peter…” He holds his hand tighter.

“May’s found someone, my classmates aren’t always there… Ned and MJ were dusted, too, but they have their own lives, too. A-And you, you got married… you’re gonna have a kid…” Peter’s eyes are fully red, tears falling nonstop. “Everyone is moving on but I’m still here… fearing I’m gonna disappear again.”

He takes a while to reply. Tony blinks his own tears again, as his hand reaches Peter’s cheek.

“Oh, Pete…”

“I just- I get it, y’know. I’ve never been a normal kid. Now it’s pretty much worse and I’m trying to accept that, too. That I’ll never fit in. I want everyone to be happy. I w-want…” Peter sniffs. “I want you to be happy, too. You have your own family. Y-You don’t have to babysit me anymore.”

“No, Peter—”

“It’s okay, Mister Stark. I-I’ve always been different- I’ve always been a freak—”

“For fuck’s sake, kid, that’s not true,” Tony snaps for once, immediately toning down as he feels Peter flinching. His own dark eyes are burning now. “You’re not a freak, you’re- you’re my family, too.”

He places both hands on Peter’s shoulders firmly and doesn’t look away, ever.

“Peter, you’ll always fit in my life. And in May’s life, and your friends’. I want you to be here. You’re my kid, you’ve- you’ve always been my kid, and nothing will ever change that, okay? Nothing.”

“But—”

“I mean it, Pete. Do you have any idea how much I missed you? Do you know how fucking horrifying it was to watch you die in my arms? It was hell without you, all those months…” Tony’s own tears start falling. “It was killing me, Peter. May couldn’t handle it, either.”

The teen grows quiet again. Tony starts drying some of his tears with one of his hands.

“You don’t… you don’t get it, everyone’s just acting like things are fine and I just c-can’t forget what happened.”

“It’s okay if you don’t feel okay. You’ve been through so much, Pete… everyone copes differently, you’re not forced to act like everyone else does. You shouldn’t bottle it up.”

There’s silence between them for a couple of minutes before Peter hesitantly speaks up again.

“B-But what if… what if everyone gives up on me?” He wonders, absolutely frightened, despite his whispering tone. Just those words manage to destroy Tony inside more.

“That’s never going to happen, not in a million years. We love you, kid. I love you so much you have no idea.”

Peter only cries more, and Tony finally hugs him. The teen sobs in his shoulder, breaks down hard as the man holds him, putting one of his hands in the kid’s brown curls while the other soothes his back. Tony can’t help letting out shaky breaths in the meantime, but he’s still firm in his grip, grounding the kid, reminding him of the unconditional love he has for him.

Knowing Peter, the teenager will need the reassurances over and over again, and Tony is going to do that every single day if necessary.

When the boy’s sobs start quieting down, the man plants a kiss against his cheek and squeezes him, unable to contain his tears. Tony pulls him away only slightly, still holding him by his arms and keeping him close.

“We’ll get through this, okay? I’m never giving up on you, kid,” He reassures, sighing deeply while Peter is able to breathe slowly. “I will always stand by your side.”

Peter, teary-eyed, looks at him with certain doubt. “Always?”

“Always.”

The teen jumps in his arms again, only for… for something to catch Tony off guard. There’s something like… like a click. In Tony’s mind, that is.

He freezes for a moment, but he cannot refuse to comfort Peter again. The mechanic mumbles soothing nonsense, only for him to become silent as his attention shifts… to somewhere else.

This moment, he realizes… it feels like a deja vú. Except it’s not actually a deja vú. If that makes sense.

It doesn’t help that Peter notices when they finally face one another – or at least when the kid looks at him, since Tony is facing the nature around them, not quite focusing on the trees themselves.

“Are you okay?” Peter asks, taking him out of the trance.

“Wh- of course, kiddo. You shouldn’t worry about me.”

He doesn’t look convinced. Tony almost feels hypocritical now, not wanting to worry the kid with some weird impression he has. But how can he explain when it doesn’t even make sense to himself?

Before Peter can question him again, Pepper and Happy are back there. The latter tells them he should get back to the city and the former offers them to come inside and get themselves something to eat. Peter finally looks a little excited, maybe because he might be hungry, so he no longer focuses on Tony, or so he hopes. The kid isn’t stupid.

Pepper and Peter get to the kitchen first, especially as the teen offers to help her. Tony doesn’t follow them immediately, facing the wooden walls of the house. Words fly around and replay in his brain, somehow in different voices other than Peter’s and Tony’s.

It’s almost like Tony has actually heard them. Somewhere, a long time ago…

It might be a lost memory. It sounds so familiar. Why is it?

He doesn’t think about it now as Pepper calls for him. Tony shakes his head and is able to put on a mask for the meantime.

(Yet not for a moment does he try to stop struggling to remember.)

 It comes to him at night. If anything, it’s nothing more than a mere glimpse.

Everything is mostly blurry. He can recognize old colors, that remind him of a distant past. Of a familiar face. One so important and meaningful that has craved a place in his heart. He can’t put his finger on it, however.

He hears silent crying. Feels warmth wrapping around his body. Arms that feel like… like home.

I will always stand by your side. The voice says, in a memorable accent.

A-Always? It’s a tiny, young one that asks.

Always, Tony.

Tony wakes up with actual tears in his eyes. He’s not scared, but… it’s something strong regardless.

It was an actual memory. If it weren’t, he wouldn’t have gotten so shaken.

He… He wants to understand. He wants to remember.

As a result, he doesn’t fall asleep again. No, he ends up going downstairs. Tony doesn’t think too straight, so next thing he knows, he’s somehow inside the garage. To find answers.

B.A.R.F was created to recount traumatic experiences, change them, give him some comfort. It was his own therapy method for quite some time after he’d developed it. Tony hasn’t used it in a long time, though, but he still remembered to implement it in his E.D.I.T.H glasses (… which might have its name changed now that the big battle is over).

Today, he doesn’t mean to use it to change something in his past. This time, he wants… he wants to activate his brain, somehow. He’s still trying to make sense of the flashback he had. More and more words fly here and there, and he knows there’s something meaningful about them, about the memory he’s striving so hard to clear it up. It’s too bad that he can’t rationalize.

He keeps feeling the same pain and warmth from that moment. He remembers his frustration. He knows it’s from his distant past, long before Tony was known as the genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist persona. It’s a part of his life that the Stark has forced himself to repress, to the point where it’s still affecting him now.

Now that he has the glasses, parts of the memory are coming to life, right there in his garage. There are the same colors he’s seen. Dark red that reminds him of blood, of violent words and remarks. The sunset outside, a rather beautiful and tear-jerking sight. Frustrated yelling, except Tony can’t understand any of it. In contrast, there’s another calm voice that tries to reason with it.

Tony knows he’s going to feel even more fucked up. Almost nothing about his past leaves him at peace. It always comes back to haunt him with the same questionings about himself. He partly blames the media for getting literally anything from his life and making a huge deal about it, despite having become familiar with being such a recognizable figure.

He doesn’t want it to matter now. He wants to understand what happened. There are memories that may never come to the surface, thanks to the long-term trauma. A mechanism his body has developed all those years, long before the occupational hazard that is to be a hero.

Tony is sure he’s on the verge of breaking down as he tries to force it to come out. No, it’s not working. He shouldn’t do it this way. Shouldn’t yell at his oppressed, younger self that’s never been truly gone. That’s been quiet, in an inner coma, suffering all at same.

He should be… patient. Suddenly, Pepper’s words come to him again.

You have to be patient with him, honey. Peter has been through a lot… he’ll tell you once you make it clear that it’s okay.

He takes comfort in them. He should… give himself time.

It’s okay, he tells himself. It’s okay. You don’t have to come out now, but you don’t have to be afraid. You’re… You’re safe.

In response, Tony is able to breathe again. He tries not to focus on what B.A.R.F is up to.

You’re safe, he repeats again, and again. He closes his eyes and relaxes, at last.

He… lets it flow.

(Distantly, it kind of reminds him of that movie with the cartoon panda achieving inner peace. He must have seen it with Peter one time. It feels like decades ago.)

In. Out.

In. Out.

In. Out…

When he opens his eyes, he’s no longer in the garage.

Rather than the cozy wood, it’s a wide room with dark red walls. Tony recognizes it to be the living room of the Stark mansion. He’s been so used to the lake house that he forgot just how big (and empty) everything was. Sunshine rays enter the residence, it’s a rather beautiful day.

In contrast, there’s the yelling again. Fighting. The bright blue pixel figures slowly come to surface. One he acknowledges to be himself. Young Tony seems to be at least 15, as he’s already wearing one of his old MIT hoodies. The other person turns out to be Jarvis, who still has his fancy, black suit.

The two are arguing. A very rare occasion to happen. They never got into a bad argument, not like Tony and Howard constantly did. Though, if anything, Tony is the one yelling. Jarvis calmly tries to get to him, which makes the teenager behave worse.

“You don’t GET IT, Jarvis!” The boy screams. “I don’t fit in anywhere! Not in MIT and certainly not in my own home! My parents send me away whenever they have the fucking chance!”

“Master, they only… they only mean to do the best—”

“DON’T YOU DARE DEFEND THEM! You hear them say that yourself! They don’t want me around, n-nobody wants me around.” Tony’s voice is angry, furious, yet it’s dangerously close to break in tears that threaten to fall. When he was young and more emotionally unstable, he’s not yet learned to keep on a mask. That would happen after MIT. “Nobody gets it, Jarvis. I’m… I’m never going to be normal. I’m a Stark. I’m supposed to be great, but I’m… not.”

Present Tony feels the words stinging in his heart. The look on Jarvis’ face only makes it harder to watch, to listen. He doesn’t repress it again, though. It’s too late to go back.

“Mom and Dad gave up on me when I was fucking six, Jarvis,” Young Tony hisses, words poisoned with disgust. “They barely let me get home now. And when I am here, they never want to see me. They’re ashamed of me.”

The boy’s eyes only grow deeper as he continues, “I w-want to believe you, Jarvis… I want to believe Mom, that she and Dad… that they love me, but it’s- I’m not that fucking stupid, okay? No matter how hard I try to be better, I’ll never be good enough. No matter how many stupid robots and engines I build, that’s never going to change.”

(Present Tony feels it. The shame. The disappointment in himself. It was never truly gone, was it?)

“I don’t… I don’t blame people for feeling ashamed of me. For thinking so little of me.” The teenager’s voice breaks in sobs. “I-I know I’m a fucking freak. Okay? I get it. I’ll never be normal. And… you know what? You don’t- you don’t have to keep babysitting me anymore, Jarvis, you can- you can just leave me, too. Y-You have your family to get back, you should be with them. I’m not worth it.”

Jarvis is silent. He’s completely torn, heartbroken.

(Tony almost wishes he could never remember the look on the man’s face.)

“Maybe Howard was right,” Young Tony says bitterly. “I’ll never be someone anyone can be proud of.”

The teenager weeps and falls to his knees. Present Tony only stands there, unable to see the look on Jarvis’ face as he stares at his younger self. Tears creep in his own eyes, the speech getting through his heart, ripping it to a million pieces again.

(He hates that he still feels like Young Tony to this day. Feeling useless at the battle against Thanos. Helpless as he watched Peter die. Failing to save half of the universe. Watching the world still falling apart, despite everyone getting back. Expecting his child, Morgan, to arrive and fearing he’ll fuck her up, too.)

Present Tony doesn’t say a thing. The silence that follows in the scene almost drowns, suffocates him.

It’s a long time before he hears slow footsteps coming to him. His teenage self, that is. It’s then that Jarvis wraps his arms around the young boy. The Present Stark can feel its affection from there.

(He faintly feels what teenage Tony must be feeling right now. Having always wondering how a hug from Jarvis felt like. It’s something he never admitted to himself until maybe that moment and right now, years later. Tony can even smell the butler’s cologne and it’s so much like home.)

Young Tony freezes; stiffens his body while Jarvis welcomes him in his embrace. The butler places a hand behind his head, touches his dark hair so caringly that Tony finally gives in – he downright melts.

“I’m… I’m very sorry. For making you believe all of this.” Jarvis sighs. “I will not defend them – and not him ever again, because he is wrong. For a so-called genius, he knows nothing about you. I have not known a boy as intelligent and as good-hearted as yourself.”

The younger makes no noises nor moves while the older continues, “You have already changed the world… and you will make it much better, because you are going to be greater than he could ever be.”

“Jarvis…” He whispers. “I…”

Present Tony can tell he wants to say I love you. But he doesn’t. He’s too shocked, too broken to say it; but Jarvis seems to hear it anyway. The butler soothes him as he leans his chin against the top of Tony’s head.

“I am very proud of you.” The man speaks, with the most sincerity he’s heard. It might be the most genuine and positive thing anyone told the fifteen-year-old in more than a decade.

Jarvis gently pulls him away, faces still close and he gazes at him with unconditional love.

“I will always stand by your side.”

“A-Always?”

He doesn’t hesitate. God, Jarvis smiles fondly at the hurt boy. “Always, Tony.”

It’s the first time Jarvis calls him that. He’s not Master Tony. From the sound of it, he has never been just Master Tony to the man. He’s always… been family. Just like that, the teenager sobs even harder, only to be protected by Jarvis’ arms again. The crying echoes in the living room, and so the sun illuminates them both.

“M-Mister Stark?”

Tony doesn’t startle up, even though he was entirely integrated. He partly turns around, finding Peter, his curly hair the biggest mess he’s seen. Were it not for the situation the teen finds him, Tony would have squished the kid for how freaking adorable he is.

“I-I’m sorry, I uh- I heard you wake up and you- you just rushed out here and I got w-worried, so I followed you and… I kinda saw some of that. Sorry,” Peter rambles. “Are you okay, though?”

Despite the tear that rolls down Tony’s face, the man nods. “I’m fine, Pete. Sorry for scaring ya… there was something that wouldn’t leave me be. Not the first time that happens,” He shrugs, which doesn’t really soothe Peter. Tony then admits, “But it was… different this time.”

The boy’s puppy eyes shyly glance at the projection of B.A.R.F, which hasn’t faded away. It’s paused like a Youtube video, so it has stopped by Tony having a full crying attack while Jarvis holds him.

“Who’s… W-Who’s Jarvis?” Peter asks.

Tony is almost shocked to realize that he’s… he’s never talked about the butler before. Well, he never opened up much about his past, but the kid is already aware that Howard wasn’t the best father in the world. The billionaire would have, maybe, if he had the A.I., but much like its inspirational muse, it was… gone, for good. Remembering what happened to Vision makes Tony’s heart drop more.

“He was… like a father to me. When my old man couldn’t be.” He swallows a lump in his throat. Tony ends up gazing at the projection of his own father figure. His real one. “You know I wasn’t in a good place before… but Jarvis was always there to take care of me. He never stopped, not for once, until he passed away.”

From the corner of his eye, Peter nods in silence. Tony doesn’t mind that he hasn’t stopped crying quietly himself. He just lets it all go. As he gazes at the image in front of them, guilt fills Tony’s heart. Certain… fear of letting people down. It’s a feeling he honestly only felt when he was a kid. Maybe, it’s there whenever he remembers Yinsen, whose advice Tony never once forgot. But now that he truly remembers this argument with Jarvis, it makes him feel worse. Makes him feel like he’s been… ungrateful to his father figure – forgetting him.

Part of Tony remarks that he couldn’t remember this, it is his coping mechanism, whether he likes it or not. Still… he can’t help feeling terrible about it. He hates that he ever developed that method.

“What’s wrong?” Peter isn’t dumb to ignore the look on his face. This kid… he’s too good.

Tony sighs in fondness, looking at Peter briefly with a sad smile before resuming to Jarvis. How sweet of a man the butler was… to the freaking mess that younger Tony was.

“Just feeling nostalgic is all.”

It’s true; B.A.R.F reacts to what his brain is currently thinking. The scenario changes to what was Tony’s bedroom, as huge as the rest of the mansion was. An even younger Tony Stark, probably seven or eight, fixing a little electronic car toy that he built. Jarvis is standing next to him, watching with clear interest.

“Look, Jarvis! I think I got it!” Little Tony claims, very proud of himself.

“I knew you could repair it, Master Tony.” Jarvis smiles. “Let’s put it in action, shall we?”

Following that, they test the car, that runs at full speed while the child controls it. Tony is having the time of his life and the other is satisfied.

“Look at it go,” Jarvis says in his same tone, not taking the smile off his face.

Another memory replaces it. Little Tony hesitantly enters a room, crying and hugging himself. There are plenty of bruises in his arms, from what they can gather from the rare lighting from the night outside.

“J-Jarvis?” He calls, vulnerable.

The butler wastes no time to get there.

“H-H-He got m-mad that I w-was- was p-playing with the…” Tony tries to explain it but is interrupted.

“Shhh… you don’t need to explain it.” The man carefully holds his hands. “I will take care of this, alright?”

Tony nods. “I-I don’t like it when he drinks… h-he gets really worse.”

Jarvis sighs. “Neither do I. But you are safe now. Once I get you cleaned up, I could tell you a story. What do you think?”

“I like stories. C-Could I… have some some chocolate milk, too?”

“Of course.”

There are others to come. Jarvis greeting a younger Tony whenever he gets home. Jarvis comforting him after a nightmare. Tony shyly giving him a hand-made Happy Butler’s Day card one time when he found out that day existed, since he… he never had the courage to do the same when it was Father’s Day. Not even when it was just Jarvis and Tony after Howard and Maria died.

The unpleasant memories of that time are projected by B.A.R.F, too. A nineteen or twenty-year-old Tony Stark coming home drunk with some random lady. Jarvis isn’t looking pleased, but he could never be angry. He’s just worried.

“Ah, beat it, Jarvis,” Tony groans. “Don’t need to baby me anymore. See?” He smirks at the lady that playfully threatens to bite him.

“Sir, this is getting too far.”

“Sheesh, can’t I have some fun? C’mon. You would like that too, old man. Next time, I’m gonna bring you a lil’ friend.”

Jarvis can only sigh. Tony scoffs, “Alright, whatever, we’re going to bed. See ya.”

“Let me assist you—”

“Hey- Hey! Leave it, okay?” He almost slaps the other’s hands away. “Ugh, Jarvis. I can handle stuff on my own. Don’t need any diapers. See?” Tony kisses the girl passionately. When he finishes, he says, breathlessly, “I’m a big man now.”

The butler doesn’t protest, if not for a pained look. “Of course.”

The drunk young man stumbles to his room with the girl, leaving Jarvis on his own. The man was old, nearing the end of his life and yet he still insisted to take care of Tony, even if he was nothing more than some stupid piece of shit that always disappeared in parties, coming back with random girls every night he came back.

Current Tony is silent when the last memory comes. He’s at some other event, some party at Stark Industries. Obadiah brought him to meet some of his co-workers and stuff. Tony is having the time of his life when someone rushes to him; one… one of the housekeepers that sometimes helped Jarvis at home.

“Mister Stark,” She tries to get to him.

“Marisa! What’re you doing here? You’ve come to join us?” Tony laughs with the others, but she looks serious.

“Tony, this is no time for partying.” When she calls him Tony, that’s when something is wrong. His face almost falls.

“Shit, you’re scaring me; what happened?”

“It’s… It’s Jarvis, he’s…”

What she says next isn’t heard, as Tony doesn’t remember. The look on the twenty-one-year-old says otherwise. Next, he’s at the hospital. Awaiting with Obadiah by his side, he’s insisted to come.

When the nurse comes out, she has a heartbroken look on her face.

“How is he? Is he okay?” Tony already throws a bunch of questions, even though her expression… it tells him everything. He can’t accept it.

“No. No, c-c’mon. Jarvis is the strongest person I know, he can’t… he can’t just…!”

He doesn’t finish the sentence. The nurse lowers her head. “I’m very sorry. We tried everything we could. I’m sure he tried, too.”

Tony doesn’t cry; he straight up faints. The alcohol must have worsened it. When he awakes, they’re alone at the corridor and he begs Obadiah to assure him that Jarvis is fine. He hopes his butler rushes to see him, so they could go home, watch the genius build something, play a game, do anything.

He couldn’t be more wrong. The now older Stark almost feels disgusted as his younger self craves Obadiah’s comfort, but well. He couldn’t have known.

“He can’t die, Obie,” Projection Tony whispers, only to raise his voice. “H-He can’t die. He can’t leave me, too!”

Finally, the man removes the E.D.I.T.H glasses. The whole hospital ambience disappears and they’re both back at the same old garage. Everything feels so small now. So crushing, all this knowledge.

He almost forgets Peter is there at all. The teen saw everything… all the details. Tony didn’t want to hide anything from him, not anymore. On the other hand, he also regrets it when he sees Peter’s sorrowful gaze. Shit, it’s too much for him.

Tony looks away in shame and regret. “Yeah. Now you get why I don’t talk about that past stuff with anyone,” He jokes darkly. He sighs and tries again. “I’m sorry you had to see all that.”

Peter looks a minute away from crying with him, but he takes a deep breath and replies, quietly, “It’s okay.”

The mechanic holds the glasses like they’re going to break at one touch. He puts them away where they were, by the desk with everything else he kept there. Tony resumes to the same spot he was, no longer seeing the projections, just his adapted workshop. Everything is very quiet now, not even the crickets outside can be heard.

(It felt like his house after Jarvis was gone. Tony would barely be there, drowning himself in every drink he found at bars.)

“He died before I could say I was sorry.” Tony whispers. “I… I forgot what he told me. That he believed in me. And after my parents died… I just stopped caring, for good. But he didn’t stop caring about me and…” His lips are quivering. “He was gone before I could realize it. Before I could b-be better.”

Peter takes one step. “Tony…”

Tony now stares at his own feet, the tears making it to the wooden floor. He realizes he doesn’t have any socks warming the former. “He… never gave up on me. But he knew I was ruining my life. I… I let him down. Really bad.”

He can hear Peter stopping. He knows the kid is closer, but he doesn’t have the courage to approach. Maybe it’s the right thing to do. Tony feels like the worst person in the world now. God, he’s fucked up so many damn times.

The broken man is silent for dreadful and long minutes, Peter not getting any closer, nor saying a thing, either. Tony’s hands are shaking.

“I just… I wonder if…” His breath trembles. “I-If he could come back and see me one last time… wh- what would he think of me now?”

He doesn’t expect an answer. Or, he might know it. It might not be too pretty.

Tony embraces the dead silence. At least, before he’s embraced by two arms from behind.

“I-I… I think you’re pretty great, Tony,” Peter gulps, clearly crying. “You grew so much, you became a hero. You saved the universe, you… you saved me.”

Tony’s mouth opens but nothing comes out. Especially not when the boy hugging him, desperate to reassure him, continues with a whisper full of intensity, “You changed the world, just like he said. He would be so proud of you, Tony. We all are.”

That’s enough to break the elder. Tony sobs, his own hands reaching Peter’s arms and squeezing them. For once, he turns around and hugs his kid tightly again. They stand there for an eternity, ugly crying, repeating reassuring words.

“I love you. I love you.” Peter repeats, each time with more sincerity than the last.

“God, I love you too, kiddo.”

(He hopes he can feel Jarvis’ presence there, too. Even if that’s technically impossible. Jarvis never left his heart, after all. Tony promises he will stop hiding it. He’ll make sure to tell Morgan about the man, too. He was his hero. He just wishes he could have actually realized it sooner.)

Finally, Tony leaves one last breath before pulling away from the crushing hug. He still holds Peter’s arms affectionately.

“Thanks, Pete. I needed that in this moment of catharsis,” He tries to joke, getting a little smile out of the kid.

“Are you okay now?”

“Never been better.”

Peter nods. Tony wonders what they can do, seeing as it it’s so late in the night. They both have terrible sleeping habits, he’s afraid.

“Let’s get outta here, yeah?” The older suggests. “How about we see a movie? I miss late movie night.” He puts an arm around Peter’s shoulder, guiding them both out of the garage and closing the door behind them with his spare hand. “Remember we used to put on Star Wars for the hundredth time when you couldn’t sleep?”

Peter snorts. “Y-Yeah, that would be cool. Any suggestions? Would be nice to pick something different.”

Tony hums and thinks for a while… then he has it. “I remembered this one… you know that, uh, that panda that learned to gain some inner peace or something? And he did those moves with the water?”

“You mean Kung Fu Panda?”

“Yeah, that’s the one! I suddenly remembered it today. Thought of refreshing my memory.”

“Oh, cool. That’s the second Kung Fu Panda movie, by the way. The best one in the series, to be fair.”

“Of course.” Tony smiles as they reach the house and get to the living room. The lights are dimly on, thanks to his instructions to F.R.I.D.A.Y.

They both stay awake until the movie ends. Doesn’t take long for the two to fall asleep right there and warm themselves up with the blanket Tony grabbed. They snuggle against one another, safe with each other’s company.

He missed this.

When he falls asleep, though, he remembers Jarvis tucking him in to bed one night. Like every other night, Maria is at a business trip and Howard just isolated himself somewhere in the mansion.

“Tell me that story, Jarvis! You promised!!” The enthusiastic, small Tony demands.

“Very well. Once upon a time, a very stubborn little man went to bed… the end.”

Tony groans. “That’s a horrible story!”

Jarvis openly laughs that time. He is usually contained, being affectionate in his own way, and much better than his father, that’s for sure. Still… it’s nice to hear it.

“Do not worry, Master, I have many other ones like that. You will learn to appreciate true art.”

“Noooo, I know you have better ones, Jarvis!”

“Oh no, you have discovered my secret.”

“Tell meeee,” Tony whines.

“Very well. Can’t say no to that face.” Jarvis dramatically sounds defeated, making Tony giggle. He then sounds serious again. “Once upon a time, there was a very smart boy who created amazing inventions. He had a room full of them, but he had to hide; for his intelligence was misjudged by the mean people of the village. His father would not give much support, either; but the boy was fearless.” Tony’s eyes brightened up as the man continued, “He went outside and helped everyone with their problems. Built stronger homes, vehicles, all constructions you could imagine… and one day…”

Jarvis grabs the little metal man Tony built when he was six, which sitting on his bedside table.

“… He discovered how to fly. He created magnificent wings and flew by his village. The people saw him as their hero… and they had hopes. For the little boy, now a grown man, changed their world and would continue to change every other place he went, making the whole world a better place. The end.”

Tony blinks in awe. “Woah…”

“Did you like it? I personally prefer the one of the boy going to bed, though,” Jarvis teases, the boy rolling his eyes as a response.

“I loved it,” Tony answers, clearly flustered.

Jarvis smiled at him for a couple of minutes. Then, he would stand up and say, “Very well. It is time to sleep, Master Tony.”

“Okay.” The boy yawned, feeling the exhaustion coming to him. A gentle hand is placed by his leg. “Good night, Jarvis.”

“Good night. You can call me if you need anything.”

Once Jarvis turned off the lamp, Tony closed his eyes, faintly hearing the butler close the door in the distance.

When Tony opens his eyes again, he’s flying in the blue sky. Flying to the horizon ahead of him. Knowing the people down there are counting on him. They are proud of him. They’re their hero.

Somewhere down there, he knows his family is there rooting for him. Peter, Pepper, his little Morgan, Rhodey… and Jarvis is there, too, smiling with pride.

[joyful-soul-collector]

Here to Help: Chapter 1

I’m sorry I didn’t notice

Word Count: 4719

TRIGGER WARNINGS: Mentions of past emotional/physical abuse from a parent, a small panic attack, PTSD symptoms, and while Peter doesn't have an eating disorder, his behavior/the descriptions may be triggering to some

Synopsis: Tony Stark finds his intern Peter Parker living in the alleyway by Stark Tower.

You can also read this story on AO3 if that’s easier for you!

I slammed my fist against the table in frustration as the program failed again. I’d been trying to code DUM-E to fix one of my suits for the past few hours, but none of the codes I put in seemed to be doing what I wanted them to.

“Friday can you run a scan on this?”

“Sir, I’ve scanned this three times already.”

“Yeah yeah, I know, I just can’t figure out what’s up with it. I’ve had DUM-E fix my suits before, but it just doesn’t want to work today. Just try scanning it again.”

“Alright. Scanning now,” Friday said. I walked to the window while Friday did another scan, and stared down at the city below. I wasn’t too far from the ground, my lab on the higher floor was being renovated, so I had to move down. It wasn’t bad down here, I can see things better from this height. Cars didn’t look like little lego pieces, they looked more like Hot Wheels.

I also liked watching the people, I hadn’t realized how mesmerizing it was to just watch people walking and going about their day. I watched someone with a blue jacket walking down the sidewalk, and suddenly realized it was my intern, Peter Parker. I smiled, remembering how good he was with tech. Maybe he can figure out what’s up with DUM-E, I thought.

But Peter didn’t go into Stark Tower like I expected him to. He went down an alleyway on the side of Stark Tower, one that I knew for a fact lead to a dead end. What the hell is he doing?

I watched him until he was out of sight. Something wasn’t right. That alleyway doesn’t go anywhere. And he can’t be changing into his suit for patrol, he had an internship meeting with me in about five minutes, I was going to help him update his suit. So what the hell was he walking into a dead-end alleyway for?

But now that I thought about it, I hadn’t heard from Pete in about a week. He usually left me messages and called me all the time, updating me on everything from patrol to how pretty he thought MJ was. But he hadn’t spoken with me once this week. I was so busy with meetings that I didn’t notice.

A sick feeling formed in my stomach, guilt creeping into my chest. Clearly something was wrong. I had to find out what it was.

It didn’t take me long to get down to the ground floor, and I rushed out the doors of the tower, becoming more and more worried with every second. I practically sprinted through the alleyway.

“No, no no no! They’re gone! Oh god they’re all gone, fuck, no, no no no…”

I froze, hearing Peter start to sob. My heart clenched at the sound of his voice cracking with misery. I rounded the corner.

There was Peter, hands running through his hair as tears fell down his face. He was staring at a shopping cart, which was empty except for a half-full water bottle and an open trash bag. Peter looked thin and tired, and he had small patches of dirt all over his face and clothes. His tears actually made visible tracks through the grime on his cheeks.

“Peter?” I said.

Peter snapped up, his eyes wide with fear. I wasn’t used to people being afraid when they saw me, most of the time they looked happy to see someone coming along to help them.

“Peter, what’s wrong? What’re you doing here, why--” and then I saw the tent set up in the corner.

Peter looked like he was going to run for a moment, but as he realized I’d already figured it out, he started to cry even harder. He put his hands over his mouth, squeezing his eyes shut and looking very much as though he’d rather disappear.

“Oh my god, Pete, hey, shhh, it’s okay,” I said, rushing to him and pushing his curls out of his face, trying to see his eyes. “Hey, hey it’s okay, kid. Can you tell me what’s wrong? I’m here to help kid, just tell me whats’ wrong, I can fix it.”

“Aunt--Aunt May--” Peter said through broken sobs, “She, she kicked me out. She kicked me out last week. I couldn’t-- I didn’t know where else to go!”

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” I said, pulling his hands away from his mouth so I could see his face.

“S-so I came here, and I thought I’d stay here in case you needed me for a mission, but--but I had to get a job and--and now all my clothes got stolen--” Peter broke off with a sob.

So that’s what he meant by “they’re all gone”. Someone had taken all his clothes. His clothes were some of his only possessions , I realized, looking around the alleyway. And someone just took some of the last things Peter owned.

“Do you want a hug kid?” I asked.

“We’re there?” he said, looking hopeful for the first time.

“Jesus, of course we’re there kid, come here,” I gathered him in my arms, holding him tightly to my chest.

I had far too many questions. Why did his Aunt kick him out? How did I miss this? He had to get a job? Why didn’t he tell someone? Why didn’t he tell me?

He’s so thin. I swear I’ve seen him in this sweater before, and it didn’t hang off his body like it does now. I’m not used to feeling the knobs of his spine, and his shoulders are bony and poke painfully into my skin.

“You’re way too thin kid, have you been eating?”

“Not-Not really,” he answered quietly. “I think the last time was a day or so ago.”

“Shit kid. I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry I didn’t notice.”

“It’s okay, it’s okay Mr. Stark, it’s not like I made it very obvious in the first place. I didn’t want anyone to notice.”

I pulled away from him, holding his shoulders and leaning down to look in his eyes.

“Don’t tell me it’s okay. Don’t ever think it’s okay to go unnoticed. Don’t ever think it’s okay to stay quiet and suffer in silence. You need help, you get it, okay? You need help, you make sure people know and you make sure that you get the help you deserve, okay?”

Peter looked at me with mixed confusion and relief.

“No one has ever told me that before,” he said. “I-I thought I wasn’t supposed to have help, I thought I was supposed to do everything by myself. I thought…”

Peter heaved a shaky sigh, and I realized just how heavily he was leaning on my hands. I held him steady while he finished his sentence.

“Well I’m the hero right? I’m the one who’s supposed to help people, I shouldn’t need help, I’m supposed to be okay. Right? I shouldn’t have help, I’m not the person who needs--”

“Pete you help people every day, and you didn’t think once that you deserved the same kind of help you give to others?” I interrupted. I pushed his curls out of his face again, gazing into his dark, red-rimmed eyes. “You are important. You can’t help others if you yourself are hurting.”

“Yeah, I definitely feel that, I haven’t been able to go on patrol since I started my job at the Daily Bugle.”

“You work at that place?” I said. “But they hate Spider-Man!”

“It was the only place that was hiring and paid well enough for me to maybe get my own place someday. They like my pictures.”

“Is that why you didn’t call me? Because you didn’t go on patrol?”

“Well yeah, I mean what was there to report?”

“Oh I dunno, maybe that your Aunt fucking kicked you out and you’re living in an alleyway? Maybe that you don’t have a place to go and you’re starving? Maybe that you needed some help?”

“Oh. Heh, I guess I thought about it, but I didn’t want to bother you, you’ve got all this stuff going on with running your own company and everything with the Avengers breaking up, and I didn’t want to give you another thing to stress about.”

He was worried about me. He didn’t want me to stress, so he tried to shoulder all this by himself.

“Pete, you are far more important than the freaking company. You are worth the stress, you are worth the worry, and I would do anything to see you happy and healthy. But, obviously, you are neither of those things right now,” I said.

Peter gave a weak laugh, wiping the tears from his cheeks and consequently smearing the dirt more.

“No, heh, not really. Feel kinda shit to be honest.”

“So, would you like some help?” I asked. Peter paused for a moment, looking at the ground, then met my eyes and nodded.

“Yeah, yeah I think… I need some help,” Peter said.

Peter suddenly never looked more powerless. He’d been trying to hold some sort of courage, any scrap of strength he could find in himself this whole time, and it seems that he’d finally admitted defeat. He somehow looked smaller, more neglected and scared than when I had first found him back here.

“Alright then. Let’s go up to my space. We’ll get you cleaned up, I’ll make you something to eat, make you feel better. You look like you need some good food and rest. Do you need anything from your tent? They didn’t take your suit too did they?”

“No, I kept that in my backpack,” he said, gesturing to his backpack lying in the corner of the alley. “I didn’t want to leave it here even though I knew I couldn’t use it because of my job. I can’t imagine leaving home without my suit. There’s not much in my tent, just a sleeping bag and some school books I need for next year. Anything that’s really of value, besides my clothes, I keep in my backpack. So my camera, my computer, my suit, all of that stays with me all the time.”

“Alright, well I’ll get your school books and backpack, just wait here a moment.” I let go of his arms. I had barely walked a step before I heard Peter whimper.

“Mr. Stark?” I whipped around to see Peter swaying dangerously. “I think I’m gonna fall?”

“Shit.” I caught him just as he started to keel over, and Peter struggled to stand upright again. “Nope, no, stay down kid, just sit down, lean on that wall, there you go, just rest there for a moment.”

“I’m sorry, I just--I can’t--”

“It’s okay, you’re fine kid. You’re not in trouble, nothing to apologize for.” I looked down and spoke to Friday. “Hey Fri you know those special protein bars Bruce made for after he Hulks out? Could you send a suit down here with one of those?”

I heard Peter’s stomach rumble at the mention of protein bars, but oddly enough Peter didn’t look very excited.

“Doesn’t Dr. Banner need those?”

“Kid, we don’t even know where Bruce is right now. He won’t miss them. Unfortunately you probably can’t eat more than one, they have this special sedative in it that makes sure Bruce stays Bruce after his transformation. There have been a few times where he’ll have a relapse of the Hulk after a battle from a panic attack, so we put basically a very powerful anti-anxiety pill in the bar. But your enhanced metabolism won’t burn through it as quickly as with other foods, so eating more than one of that serum could cause you to fall asleep, which of course would be bad because then we wouldn’t be able to  get you cleaned up or give you any real food.”

“That makes sense,” Peter said a little dazedly. I’m not sure he’d really been listening.

I opened the flap in Peter’s tent, and I had to bite back a gasp at what I saw.

Peter had been sleeping in a ripped, old sleeping bag on the gravely alleyway floor, and upon seeing the inside I realized how little room there was in here. Peter’s books were stacked on the side, and there was an empty plastic water bottle by where his head would lay. I realized that Peter must have been filling up on water when he couldn’t afford to eat.

I found myself trying to think of all the places Peter could get basic needs, trying to figure out what Peter had to do to get by this week. Where was the cheapest place to buy food? Were there water fountains nearby? Where could he shower and clean himself? How did he get to and from work?

I left the tent with Peter’s books in hand, and found him and my suit waiting for me. My suit was kneeling down and holding the protein bar wrapper, while Peter ravenously dug into the bar.

I wished I could get this kid some food sooner, but I can’t just feed him fast food, he needs real, good food that will give him nutrients and energy. Maybe some pasta, with vegetables? Roasted broccoli doesn’t take too long to make, and I know Peter likes Fettuccine Alfredo. I’ll make that for him then, I thought.

Peter finished the bar, and got up a little shakily. But he wasn’t falling over, so that was good.

I stepped into the suit and flew up to my lab with Peter clutched in my arms bridal style. He clung tightly around my neck, though the only thing I noticed was how light he was.

When we made it up there I let his legs drop and steadied him before stepping out of the suit.

“Alright kiddo, why don’t we get you in the shower, I’ll make you something to eat while you’re in there okay?” I said, as my suit flew out the open window again and I set his things on the kitchen counter.

Peter only nodded, looking a little relieved at the thought of getting clean. I led him to the shower and showed him how to turn it on and off and control the temperature.

“You good to shower? I wouldn’t want you to fall in here,” I said. Peter nodded again.

“The bar made me feel a little better, I don’t think I’ll fall.”

“Alright then, I’ll leave you to it,” I said, setting some spare clothes on the counter as Peter started to take off his sweater and lift his shirt. But I wasn’t more than five steps away from him when I heard a strangled gasp.

I turned around to see Peter standing shirtless in front of the mirror, a hand clasped over his mouth and tears spilling from his eyes. Peter’s bones were jutting sharply out of his skin, his stomach sunken and hollow, concave between his hip bones and rib cage. Peter stared in horror at himself, as though he didn’t recognize the person there. His thin shoulders shook as sobs wracked through him, and he squeezed his eyes shut, looking rather frozen in place.

I slowly walked towards him again, and leaned against the doorway. He opened his eyes, and seemed to calm down a little at the sight of me.

“Does it scare you?” I asked softly. He looked from me to himself in the mirror, then down at the tiled floor.

He nodded.

“You know,--” I said gently, “--you can wait. We can wait till later to get you cleaned up. You don’t have to do it now. Do you want to wait until after dinner to shower?”

He blinked and thought for a moment, dropping his hand. “I… I want to get cleaned up, it’s just…” He trailed off and made a vague gesture at his reflection in the mirror.

“You could just wash off your face. Washing your face will help. That’s often what I do when I don’t have enough energy to shower after a fight. Feels better than doing nothing.”

Peter gave a little sigh, looking relieved at the compromise. He nodded and put his shirt back on.

“Meet me back out there when you’ve finished,” I said patting his shoulder as he splashed water onto his face.

I went to the kitchen and began cooking, boiling the water, putting the broccoli in the oven to roast, and melting butter in a saucepan. I started cutting the garlic as Peter came around the corner.

“Hey! You feel better now that you got all the grime off your face?”

“A bit,” he replied, walking over to the sink and filling up a large glass of water. I noticed how he had to hold the cup with both hands, trying to keep it steady as he sat down behind the counter.

“Well you look a lot better,” I said, pouring the chopped garlic into the pot of simmering butter. The delicious smell of buttery garlic filled the room and Peter sniffed the air.

He swallowed thickly as his stomach gave a hollow rumble, advertising loudly how hungry he was.

“Sorry,” he said sheepishly. Peter picked up his glass of water and started taking large gulps, trying to silence his belly by filling it with liquid.

The timer for the broccoli went off and I set the pan in front of him, gesturing for him to take some.

“You don’t have to fill up on water anymore. Eat,” I said. Peter reached out for the broccoli a little hesitantly, but popped a floret in his mouth with a moan all the same.

“Broccoli never tasted so good,” he said with his mouth full.

“Makes sense, you haven’t eaten in a while, and it’s even worse with your enhanced metabolism. What did you eat this week?”

“Well I had a sandwich from Mr. Delmar’s on Monday when I was kicked out, and then I had another one on Wednesday. I think he knew something was wrong ‘cuz he put extra stuff on it. That was nice.”

“That was nice,” I agreed. I made a mental note to do something for Mr. Delmar as a thank you for taking care of Peter. “So all you’ve had this week is a couple sandwiches?”

“Well, I had coffee every day at the Daily Bugle, and someone left a cereal bar on the breakroom table after work on Tuesday so I ate that,” he said, putting another piece of broccoli in his mouth. I could tell he wanted to be eating much faster, but the food was too hot.

“So not really food huh?” I said, stirring the pasta as it boiled. Peter sighed and shook his head.

“No, not really food no. I was so hungry I wanted to cry last night.”

Something inside me snapped at that moment, and I slammed the spoon on the stove with a rather loud bang.

“I’m sorry!” Peter shrieked, suddenly getting up from the chair and backing away. It took me a moment to realize what he was reacting to. “I’m sorry Mr. Stark, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to, I’m so sorry--”

“Sorry? Pete what’re you-- Oh no, it’s okay! I’m not angry at you, it’s okay,” I said. What on earth did this kid’s Aunt do to him?

Peter put down his arms but he was still breathing like he’d run a mile, and his hands shook so hard it looked like they were vibrating.

“Woah, woah hey kid? Kid look at me, deep breaths okay? Can you hear me?”

Peter nodded, but his breathing wasn’t getting better.

“Peter, I need you to try and breathe deep, okay? Breathe all the way down to your belly, okay? Can I touch your arms?”

Peter nodded again, and his breathing slowed a bit as I rubbed his arms and shoulders. I’m not sure why I was doing it, I just knew it was nice when Pep did it when I was having a panic attack. Suddenly Peter was leaning forward and hugging me around the middle, speaking into my shirt.

“I-I thought you were gonna--Gonna hurt me, I don’t--I don’t know why I thought that--I know you wouldn’t do that, I just got scared--”

“It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s not your fault. We can work on that okay? It’ll get better, I promise kid. I’m sorry I scared you, I wasn’t angry at you, I was angry at myself. I can’t believe I didn’t notice.”

“It’s okay Mr. Stark. Like I said, I didn’t want anyone to notice. I was fine being alone.”

“You don’t have to be alone. I’m here for you. I’m here to help.”

“Yeah. I know that now.”

I held him tightly for a few moments before Peter’s stomach grumbled, reminding me of the pasta.

“Heh, your stomach’s rumbling. I think it knows the pasta is almost ready,” I said, gently pulling away to drain the pasta. Peter went silent for a few moments.

“Aunt May always told me to quit eating so much,” he said quietly.

I paused, realizing Peter was actually opening up to me now. I didn’t want to bring it up, but I’d been wanting to know why she kicked him out. What had she done to him?

“She did?” I said. Peter nodded.

“‘Quit being so needy,’ she would say. She said she’d kick me out if I kept making her spend money on me like this.”

I froze.

“She… said that to you?”

Peter nodded, looking down at the counter.

“Told me I wasn’t hungry unless she said I was. I wasn’t tired unless she said I was. I wasn’t sad or happy or angry or scared unless she said I was. I wasn’t allowed to sleep until she said I could, if she was in a bad mood, I had to stay quiet, if she was in a good mood I had to be in a good mood too. I wasn’t allowed to ask for anything, or take anything, I was only allowed what was specifically given to me.  I was only supposed to eat what she gave me, and not to take anything else from the house. I tried to follow the rules, I really really tried but some days I was just I couldn’t do it. I’d cry or I’d ask to go to bed, or I’d get home from patrol and my sandwich from Mr. Delmar’s wouldn’t be enough and I would try and find something to eat that she wouldn’t miss, something she wouldn’t notice was gone. And it worked most of the time, but I guess she caught me breaking the rules one too many times on Monday, because she told me to pack up my stuff and get out. If I wasn’t gone by the time she came home from work then she said she was gonna get me transferred out of school so I couldn’t see Ned or MJ again.”

“What were you doing?” I asked.

“I was eating a bowl of cereal in my room. She came home and I didn’t hear her come in because I was stupid and had my headphones on. She came into my room, took it, threw it out the window, bowl and everything, then told me to get out.”

I set a plate piled high with pasta in front of him, and his eyes went so wide I thought they might just pop out of his skull. Peter practically fell on the food, wolfing it down desperately, as though the protein bar and the broccoli had never even happened.

His Aunt starved him, I thought. And kicked him out when she found him eating. He was just eating, he was just trying to get by, and she wouldn’t let him. What kind of person does that to a kid? A child?

Peter was still eating rapidly, and I realized he should probably slow down. If he eats too much at once he would throw up, and he needs to keep his food, he needs the nutrition. I reach up and touched his shoulder.

“Hey, Pete--”

Peter flinched violently at my touch, and the fork he was holding bent in half beneath his fist. He calmed down not a second later though, but stared at the fork in his hands.

He didn’t seem to understand what happened for a moment. He swallowed the bite of pasta in his mouth, and set the fork down with agonizing care, as though he were holding something extremely delicate. And after that, he did nothing. Just sat there, staring at the ruined fork.

“I can get you a new fork,” I said. “I just needed you to eat a little slower, I’m sorry I scared you.”

“It’s okay, I was just startled, I spaced out,” he said flatly, still staring at the fork.

“I don’t know how this is going to get better Mr. Stark,” he continued, his voice barely above a whisper. “I know I’m safe here, I know you would never hurt me like Aunt May did. But I’m still scared. I don’t know why, but I’m so, so scared, and it feels like I’ll never feel okay again.

“And part of me… Part of me worries that maybe I deserved it. Maybe I’m broken and Aunt May was giving me exactly what I deserved, and she wasn’t in the wrong at all to kick me out. I broke the rules, so of course I got punished for it.”

I gave a deep sigh as he finished. I reached up slowly, picking up the ruined fork and turning it over in my hand.

I handed it to him, and he looked at me like I was crazy.

“What… What do you want me to do?”

“Bend it back. As best you can.”

Peter stared at me for a moment, then looked down and started bending the fork back into shape. It took a few tries for him to get it right, at some points he bent it wrong in another place, or the tongs of the fork got mashed together, and he had to separate them again. But eventually the fork looked like a fork, though definitely not the same as before it was bent.

“You’re gonna be alright Pete,” I said, looking at the fork as well. “There are going to be some setbacks of course, recovery isn’t linear. And you’ll still have the memories of what she’s done to you. But you’ll be okay. You’ll be happy, and safe, and you are loved so much. Look at me,” I said. Peter looked up, rubbing at a slight divot in the fork’s handle.

“You are not worthy of the abuse your Aunt gave you. You are not worthy of any of the horrid things she’s done to you. None of this is your fault. You are not broken.” I got up and walked to the silverware drawer. “And know that when you’re ready to start working on yourself--” I plucked his fork out of his hand. “--Me, Pepper, your friends, and all the people who love you will be here to help you become everything you could ever want to be.” I replaced it with a new, untarnished fork.

Peter stared at the new fork, and gave a small smile. He stood up and hugged me tightly.

Peter finished his plate, then went to the bathroom to shower. When he came back out again, wearing my hoodie, he stared at the pasta for a few minutes before remembering he was allowed to eat if he was hungry now. We watched tv (mainly cartoons, the nerd) while he ate the rest of the pasta and broccoli. When his head started to droop, I lead him to a spare bedroom next to Pepper and I’s. He pressed a hand to one of the pillows, muttering something about how fluffy they were, before flopping down and snuggling himself under the thick blankets.

I walked back into the dining room and picked up Peter’s still slightly mangled fork, then went back to his room to find him snoring softly, his face half-buried in the pillows.

I left the fork on his bedside table.

[the--ghost--king]

Spider-Man:Far From Home

Hey so I just saw Spider-Man: Far From Home. And I got like mildly spoiled beforehand about the end credit scene but that didn't take away from the story at all so time to dive the fuck into my ramble anger.

The movie is phenomenal. I was shacking and anticipating and on the edge of my seat the whole time but that doesn't mean that I don't have things that bothered me about it.

First, let's talk about Tony Stark and how his death has impacted Peter. Peter is unsure and doesn't really know what to do with himself at the start of the film which is completely understandable. He's still mourning, Peter doesn't feel ready (the scene with the reporters shows this expertly when you contrast Peter handling the Press and Tony handling the Press) which is completely understandable. He's 16, he's just come back to life and everything is strange and confusing. He's vulnerable as Hell this whole movie and a fuckton of people abused this vulnerability.

First of all, I'm just gonna start about Nick Fury and the second after credit scene. Talos was Fury all along which makes sense with how to an extent Fury didn't act like himself and missed certain things etc but that doesn't excuse the manipulative behaviour he exhibited towards Peter. Maybe it's just me but I was quite angry with how Fury kept pushing Peter towards taking the mantel of 'New Iron Man'. I get that He (Talos) was probably working with some loose orders and figured this was the best course of action because Tony left Peter the glasses but the way he went about it is all wrong. We don't expect Nick Fury to be a nurturing presence or anything but making Peter feel like he's failing the world and more importantly letting Tony down by not taking on the 'Iron Man' Mantle is fundamentally wrong in my opinion.

You can't tell an emotionally vulnerable teenager that his mentor figure, who has just died, would be inexplicably disappointed in him if he didn't do something he (the teen) is afraid of/ doesn't feel ready for/ doesn't want to do yet. It's upsetting that Tony's legacy and his death was used as a manipulation tactic like this. That it's Talos and not actual Nick Fury excuses some of his actions, Talos is maybe less aware of earth costums or is maybe playing up the 'Hard-Ass Nick Fury' idea but that's also kind of unbelievable because we know that Talos is rather empathetic by nature because of his family. He has it in him to be cruel but wouldn't do so unnecessarily and lovely reminder: Peter is a child. He might be a superhero but he is still a child and they should have taken a different approach towards getting Peter to rethink being involved in all this. Because the way Talos(Fury) just made Peter be involved by changing all these aspects of his trip that he can't control must feel very violating to Peter as well. He seemingly has no control over his life at all and it's fucking awful.

Now that we've got that out of the way it's time to fucking talk about our favourite motherfucker Aldrich Killain Quentin Beck. (I'll talk about Iron Man 3 and General Iron Man parallels in a bit) either way Quentin Beck aka Tony Stark inconvenienced me that one time and now I'm willing to Kill Children -Man number 700. Is this just going to be a thing in Spider-Man movies, all villains are going to say it's Tony Stark's fault they're doing what they're doing whilst they're fully functioning adults with autonomy(??????) (Is it obvious that I am Mad). Either way.

Quentin Beck is mad because Tony used his holographics technology and called it BARF. Sounds like a fair thing to be mad about when Tony seemingly didn't give him any credit for it. I use seemingly here because we don't have the full story. We just know what Quentin told us which is that Tony did something that upset him and Quentin figured the best course of action was to become the next Big Superhero and kill a bunch of people in the name of his goals. ( *cough* Killian *cough*). Also William from Iron Man 1 working with him is a fun little Easter egg but it also makes no sense that he'd somehow hate Tony because Obadiah yelled at him. Like what's the thought process there? Do we actually justify this? Doesn't Marvel know how to give people proper motivations for their actions? Maybe I'm just salty (and like I'm biased because I love Tony Stark) but still. Beck called him a drunken manchild (which a lot of Tony antis do) and then disregards all the good Tony has ever done for the world and how he's been growing and changing and trying to do better since IM1 and how that culminated in his death in Endgame to instead focus on the things he did before he decided to turn himself around (like a lot of Tony antis do).

Mysterio's entire motivation is based on him misinterpreting Tony's character. Tony did one thing that was detrimental to Mysterio and then Mysterio made a huge leap and just said, 'Y'know how I can best get my revenge over this tiny little thing that most people would either go to court over or go to the press with to gain public trust/opinion to ruin their opponents reputation? Making myself an elaborate superhero and not caring about casualties because they're for the greater good.'

Basically I'm done with people making Tony responsible for their actions when they made these radical choices completely on their own without him ever doing anything but upsetting them in one way or another.

I'm not saying that Tony didn't do anything wrong in this scenario (if we were told the whole truth and Tony stole someone else's idea for no good reason, which, knowing him, sounds fake) but I am definitely saying that Beck could have done literally anything else to get back at Tony especially if he had like 5+ years to think of his evil revenge plan.

So next up is first me being slightly mad about the Spidey-sense being called the 'Peter-tingle' and how it's really not explained how it works in the movie (maybe it was but I just missed it) either way, it was very funny but also mildly upsetting.

And then the last thing I'll complain about is the mid-credit scene. I'll talk about the whole Peter/MJ romance subplot later but I want to specifically concentrate on the identity reveal. I'd been spoiled for this but only a little. I knew they would paint Peter as the bad guy and they set the whole identity reveal with The Daily Bugle (well done on that) up by showing us William grabbing the USB-stick and this being done makes a lot of sense with Mysterio's character bc he was a conniving bastard who'd obviously have contingancy plans. I'm not mad about how the reveal was done or that it happened necessarily. Overall the scene was handled very well and was very impactful. I'm just kinda upset because Peter just gets thrown into this new thing and never gets a break and I'm upset about what they want to do with this information now.

Side note: they also foreshadowed the identity reveal when Peter was talking to May and Happy by making it look like he was maybe talking to a camera or something (clever shot Marvel).

But now my issue with the world knowing Peter's identity: It's going to Fuck his life over immensely, especially because the world thinks he's evil. The Next Spider-Man film (and I'm pretty sure the last one) is going to come out in 2022 and I'm pretty sure they're not going to mention how the Spider Man conflict is handled in other movies. Which means they'll have to fix that up in the next Spider-Man movie somehow.

In the comics some peope of the New York public disliked the Neighbourhood menace Spider-Man because of J.J Jameson and The Daily Bugle and how they talked about him being distrustful but the world didn't know who Spider-Man was, so Peter could live his life normally without Spider-Man debilitating him. In this timeline (fucking earth 616 Marvel who are you kidding, also does this mean that that was actually a lie because motherfucking Mysterio made his story up???) The world Knows that Peter is Spider-Man and he has no one to protect him, he's on his own, completely and he's not ready.

That's a huge thing in the film. Peter isn't ready but everything around him seems to push him to be without regarding what he wants at all and then the reveal happens. Idk if this made complete sense but the lack of agency Peter gets over his life especially with Beck pulling this shit is astounding and Marvel will have to somehow fix this by the next Spider-Man film and sell that convincingly and I don't like their prospects at all.

So now we're going to talk about things I liked about this movie:

The MJ/Peter romance. It was great and made a lot of sense. The way that MJ had issues with being vulnerable. Peter "Hopeless Romantic" Parker. How Peter just really wanted to get the girl and have something nice for himself after all the bad shit that happened. Their romance made sense and although I don't like love triangles the whole Brad thing was pretty funny and did have us on the edge of our seat sometimes. The romance was a subplot but it was a part of the story in a way that seemed very organic and it added to Peter's story and character without taking away from the bigger story.

Next thing up: a loose list of Iron Man 3/ Tony Stark parallels. (Which made me a very happy lad)

Tony lost his suit in IM3 and has to work around this, Peter loses his suit and then also has to work around this (although he gets help ig). (Very thin I know)

The villain being a deception somehow. Aldrich Killian being the manderin and Mysterio being the bad guy.

The way Peter just started rambling about the multiverse and science the moment he heard about it.

Peter ghosting Nick Fury

How Peter made his suit on the plane and configured a bunch of things and used the holograms so organically. (did you see how Happy looked at him it was so obvious that he was fondly thinking 'wow he's just like Tony')

Other things:

Peter swinging a vaguely hammer-like object whilst also holding a vaguely shield-like object

Peter holding a vaguely shield like object in another battle scene

The entire May/ Happy romance

NED AND BETTY

Brad (Also the Peter is half naked with this random lady scene had Issues but I've been mad about this movie over enough shit already and someone else has already talked about it for sure)

Their teachers

Flash loving Spider-Man and still bullying Peter.

Flash being a vlogger

The fact that they called it 'The Blip' sounds a little dumb but it grew on me.

Also the acting in this movie was phenomenal. Mad respect to Jacob, Zendaya, Jake, Samuel and Tom they captured the characters really well and every scene was good.

I loved all of the super unsettling and upsetting illusions Beck showed Peter (fucking Tony's grave and that goddamn skeleton of decay Iron Man crawling out of it was Art)

Also the second end credit scene with Nick Fury in space was funny. Nick deserves a break.

It might have seemed like I was shitting on the movie a lot but I honest to God loved it. It's just that me, this boy, is a whiny little bitch and nitpicking is one of my favourite hobbies.

[blapisblogs]

Corey Taylor (yes, he’s still here) has so little to do in this “review”- er, is so bored of this “review”- uh, I mean, is so bored with watching The Wall that he starts drifting off. Doug somehow knows this, stares at him through the TV, and says “Is there anybody who cares”, leading into the next song parody. Part-way into the song Tamara Chambers comes back in as the maid, Malcolm Ray as a body guard (still dressed as one of the “kids” only now he’s wearing glasses), and... Brad Jones (aka The Cinema Snob) as the manager (I guess), all of whom try to wake up Corey Taylor by overacting like hell.

For those who don’t know, most people ended up leaving Channel Awesome with three exceptions: Doug Walker (of course), Larry Bundy Junior (who only stayed for laughs), and Brad Jones, so I’m not that surprised the latter has turned up here. I’m ashamed to say that I used to watch some of Brad’s content, but since the whole Not So Awesome document incident happened, he’s said some pretty terrible things about the whole situation (he’s the one who infamously said “Logan Paul filmed a dead body and he still has a career” during an interview talking about the Change the Channel movement), so I’ve since stopped watching him as well. That said, at least he’s slightly better than Doug is at imitating the film counterpart he’s standing in for (in this case Pink’s manager, played by the late Bob Hoskins), but that’s hardly saying much when Doug’s not even trying.

While the first line spoofs “Is There Anybody Out There?”, the actual song that gets parodied next is “Comfortably Numb”, a song where Pink is being medicated by a doctor in order to perform for his next show. I don’t have much else to say about what happens during this parody, it’s really uninteresting, which is exactly what Doug is saying about these parts of the film. The thing is, those “slow, mopey” songs serve a purpose to the plot: they’re about how Pink feels as he’s gradually isolating himself from everyone else. This parody? It’s a whole song calling the other ones slow and boring, and takes yet another jab at Roger Waters. This is, what, the third or fourth parody song in a row where he’s insulted him now? We got it the first time, Doug. There are so many other things in this album and film that could be discussed here: how the gradual abuse affects Pink’s psyche and causes him to further spiral into depression, the dangers of what Pink is doing to himself (and unintentionally others), the directions they took for this film that differ from the album, anything. Yes, Waters’s ego might be hard to ignore while knowing the backstory, but you could at least try to talk about literally anything else regarding the film. Or, if you wanna talk about Roger Waters’s ego behind this project so badly, Doug, then actually talk about it. Talk about the spitting incident that led to this, talk about how Waters had the most creative control on this project while the other three members had almost no say in it, talk about the disagreements he had with director Alan Parker while making this film, talk about how this led to Waters leaving the band and later tried to sue them for still calling themselves Pink Floyd afterwards (which he of course lost). Doug does literally none of this, which makes it feel like he either assumes everyone knows this already or he himself doesn’t know all of it due to not doing any research into it (and let’s just say that I wouldn’t be surprised if the latter turned out to be true). I’m sorry I keep bringing up this one thing, but that’s because that’s what Doug keeps doing in this “review”; he’s a broken record.

The song eventually ends when Brad Jones tells Corey Taylor to “sober up or have an existential conflict”. I didn’t even know he was supposed to be drunk in this “review”, but I guess that would explain a lot. Also, I guess this means that Doug Walker doesn’t find Pink’s internal conflict (which is, you know, the whole point of the album and film) to be interesting, which at this point is unsurprising but still frustratingly disappointing. It’s also sad considering that Doug is a critic who can’t be bothered to consider internal conflict as valid as existential conflict or think that Pink’s internal conflict is causing some of his existential conflict. For someone who goes on about character depth and development in other things, Doug sure avoids talking about any of that for this in favor of continually shitting on it for the sake of poorly-thought-out jokes.

Anyway, it then goes to the in-video commercial break. I’m not even half-way through yet.

Fuck.

[Lyrics (and snark) below the cut]

Is there anybody who cares?

Wake up (wake up, wake up) Are you still awake in that chair? Just keep listening to me I know you’re kinda bored

[Five lines and every single one leaves good openings for jokes at its expense. At least the parodies before this weren’t this easy to make jokes about, this is just... It’s too much to not use it as an excuse to make fun of it, yet also too easy. Fuck you?]

Yeah sure (yeah sure, yeah sure) It’s a lot of slow songs now It’s hard to keep on track With mellow songs back-to-back

[Again, this means that you somehow consider “What Shall We Do Now” (warning: this one has NSFW and unsettling imagery depicting sex, violence, blood, drugs, Nazis, death, and other things, and also gets really loud), “Young Lust”, “One of my Turns”, and “Another Brick in the Wall (Part 3)” to be “mellow”, which they aren’t really, at least not compared to the others. I can’t even think of how you could say that about “Young Lust”, unless... Doug, please don’t tell me that you think “Empty Spaces” and “Young Lust” are the same song, because I cannot comprehend how you could know that “The Happiest Days of Our Lives” and “Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)” are separate songs but not know that those two are not one and the same.]

(Sorry, I can’t tell what these next couple of lines are saying because this is the part where Brad, Tamara and Malcolm come in and the former starts talking over the song. Given how crappy these lyrics are, maybe that’s for the best.)

You need to watch this movie first Just a half-hour more Come on, you’ve gotten through worse

[I’ve been telling myself that since roughly the ten minute mark of this video, and yet every time I come back here to type more about it I keep feeling the urge to close the tab for it.]

You can’t be bored while we are singing

[Wait, “we”? Are you making fun of all of the members of Pink Floyd now instead of just Roger Waters? What did David Gilmour, Nick Mason and Richard Wright do to you, asshole? I thought you were taking these potshots at Waters because of the effect this album ended up having on the other band members even after he left, now it sounds like you’ve got some personal beef with Pink Floyd in general, which gets really screwy given something you end up saying later.]

Unless you don’t wanna be seen as deep

[Doug, you can’t be bothered to even analyze or even properly talk about the surface-level symbolism that’s right there in front of you in this film; you don’t get to lecture me on what’s deep or not.]

Your attention constantly may fade Your eyes move, but do you care what we’re saying?

[You might as well have called this “Tempting Fate: The Song” with all these lyrics ripe to make fun of.]

When I was a child I remember being invested Like hearing “The Dark Side of the Moon”

[You can barely comprehend the things that are going on in “The Wall”, don’t drag “Dark Side of the Moon” into this.]

Now I’ve grown, this section starts to drag Like a long neck, I just don’t understand Is this now how I am? I have become comfortably dumb

[As many others have already pointed out, that is literally the easiest joke you could’ve gone with for that line. It’s like turning “Kingdom Hearts” into “Kingdom Farts”; a literal child could’ve come up with that joke.]

Okay (okay, okay) Just get through the damn flick You want to seem cool But this ain’t getting your kicks Can you listen? (Listen, listen) Later there will be a quiz

[You are the last person who should be giving quizzes about this film or album, Doug.]

Somebody has to feel the same When I become so lame

[“Lame”? I could be wrong, but last I checked Waters is doing just fine. Or are you talking about the other members of Pink Floyd? Because from what I’ve heard Gilmour isn’t currently doing so well mentally, and if you’re making fun of that, then... wow, fuck you.]

There is only so long I can go With hearing a millionaire say that things blow It’s like I’ve been asleep for days The film plays, but I can’t take the complaining

[You know, you keep saying that, but at least people can relate to some of the things that were brought up in the songs here. Losing a loved one in a tragic and violent way at a young age? Having an overbearing, emotionally abusive parent? An oppressive and unfair school system? An unfaithful partner? As unfortunate as it is, those are all things some people out there can relate to. At least they’re all not petty, shallow insults about things Waters doesn’t personally like, Doug.]

Like telling a child “It’s just how everything is” Just fighting to open my eyes The epic feels I had are gone I don’t know what is going on

[Neither do the people who watched this and know nothing about the film or album, from what I could tell: you’ve done nothing to help them understand what’s actually happening given how much context you’ve left out. All you’ve done is go “Roger Waters has a big ego, Roger Waters has a big ego, people who complain about school are special snowflakes, something something World War 2, animation, slow mopey songs, did I mention Roger Waters has a big ego?”]

Now the child is gone And I’ve moved on I wish those days weren’t just a phase

[Since you said there was a quiz later, Doug, I’m gonna have to retaliate and ask you to submit an essay to me explaining why you thought it was necessary to put this song into your already lengthy “review”. No, you are not allowed to use the phrase “Fuck Roger Waters and his ego” or words to that effect; that alone is not a decent argument.]

[letstalksymphogear]

Symphogear, EP. 5

LAST TIME ON SINGY WINGY

ANGRY GREMLIN BEAT UP GOOD BY SUICIDE MOVE SURVIVE BLUE BIRD YES. BLUE BIRD GO TO HOSPITAL FOR WATER METAPHOR WITH AFTERLIFE GIRLFRIEND. TINY BIRD SAD, BUT THEN NOT GET SAD! JACKIE CHAN TIME AFTER MUCH THINKING. WIFE WORRIED ABOUT THINGS. SOMETHING SOMETHING PUNCH GOOD NOW.

Let us continue.

Miku wakes up to see her wife has run off yet again. This is the part of the Sam Reimi’s Spiderman franchise phase where the Mary Jane (not weed) begins having a rockier relationship with Peter Parker (not slang for penis) due to lack of availability.

It’s contrived.

It’s almost impressive that she left a note and had time to draw a tiny Hibiki saying something in a bubble. Glad to see you have your priorities straight, Hibiki.

“you know she might have had a better time in the local art school that doodle aint half bad”

Hibiki is motherfucking Rocky all up in this.

She’s going to kick some ass and nobody’s getting in the way.

“YOU’RE GONNA EAT LIGHTING AND YOU’RE GONNA CRRRRRAP THUNDER TACHIBANAAAAA”

“THAT’S A DIET I CAN GET BEHIND”

I wasn’t joking when I said she’s not fucking around anymore. Did you think I was joking? I can see how you can get the impression given the first few episodes, but I really can’t emphasize the thoroughness of the ass kicking she is going to be capable of.

“MY FATHERLY ENERGIES ARE WORKING! ADOPTERS ANONYMOUS WAS WRONG AFTER ALL!”

That’s totally not ominous in the slightest.

Meanwhile, in the middle of an unnamed McMansion in the middle of who knows where...

Gratuitously spoken English is heard. To be fair, it’s actually really impressive pronunciation coming from people whose native language are systemically different to ours. Most shows would just settle for “this dude is actually speaking english but everything is said in japanese for better interpretation” but not Symphogear! No siree!

Relic business is afoot.

We have a random blonde lady shooting random Noise from the thing The Gremlin had in her hands.

She’s really trying her best with her accent. She’s also casually shooting Noise because let’s face it, would we not do the same if it were in our hands?

“i do whatever i want with my big stiff rod pal”

Also, she’s a nudist. To also be fair, if you lived in a fuckoff rich McMansion with weapons beyond your comprehension, you likely couldn’t help but walk around naked doing whatever the fuck you want.

The people she’s talking to are the Americans, which we explained before are portrayed strictly in an antagonistic light. They want some relics, and this lady clearly deals them like like some sort of glorified drug dealer.

Suffice it to say, she’s not a very nice person.

Also, the subs don’t match what they’re saying in English in the slightest.

The name of this woman... is Fine (pronounced fi-neh). And she is the main antagonist of this series.

Fucking identical.

And here is the most unpleasant scene in the entire season.

The person we’ve repeatedly alluded to as The Gremlin is called Yukine Chris. She serves Fine in whatever the hell they’re up to right now. In this case, it’s using the Nehushtan armor to run around with Solomon’s Cane to throw Noise around the city.

“shits gonna get real abusive, pal”

Fine is a narcissistic sociopath. She’s manipulated Chris into servitude by believing she is the only one that can pave humanity into salvation.

“i dont like that smile”

Chris thinks Fine can secure her deepest wish. Ironically? It’s world peace.

“yeah! yeah yeah, world peace, yeah, totally. just treat me like jesus and we’re gucci”

Anyway, she proceeds to thoroughly shock Chris.

The lore behind this is that this is helping her resistance with dealing with the physical demands of the Nehushtan armor, as well as deal with the pieces of Nehushtan that may be still inside. Let’s be real, though. Fine’s a sadist, and just likes hurting people willy nilly.

“fuck... that hurt like shit... hey wait... wouldnt some of the electrical arcs hit you and shock you too, given you’re so naked and close to all this...?”

“ya nevermind that food looks real nice and i want a piece of that fuckin turkey”

It’s a real creepy scene, and it cements Fine’s horribleness really well. One of the most pivotal things to take note is that Fine says that people can only communicate with each other universally through pain. Strong, terrible BDSM overtones notwithstanding, this will be a common (though varying in quality) motif of the entire series.

“BITCH YOU THOUGHT WE WAS GUNNA EAT AFTER THAT FUCKIN’ WISECRACK ABOUT GETTING SHOCKED LIKE YOU’RE EVEN FUCKIN’ NIKOLAI TESLA ALL UP IN HERE WE’RE GONNA ELECTRIC SLIDE YOUR ASS TO NEXT WEEK”

“FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK”

“WHERE THE FUUUUUUUCK IS HIBIKI?!”

“i was gonna invite her to the circus with the rest of the class ‘cause i felt bad about how i treated her but i guess she’s not here”

“the only clown im interested in is hibiki, in the carnival tent of my own bedroom”

“isn’t being a part of /fit/ great, hibiki? can you just feel the gains?”

“yeah who needs doting wife based significant others when you have your gym bros, right newly acquired father figure?”

Hibiki, having acquired a new brain cell during her training, asks the million dollar question:

“Why the fuck are we relying on schoolgirls to deal with all this stuff?”

“anime just be that way, hibiki. i’m just the wrong protagonist in the wrong show.”

Japan is super big on keeping the Symphogear a secret because they are strong and the world really, really wants a slice of the Symphogear pie. These people are basically walking super-weapons. Tsubasa literally dropped a sword the size of a skyscraper. It’s like the premise of the series of Iron Man films.

“do i get like a superhero name too or”

Something to wrap your head around. This was released around 2012, and while the setting seems to be slightly more futuristic, the world it was made in at the time had not been through the era of social media/smartphones we have right now. It was on the cusp of doing so, which means the idea of decent (yet vertical) amateur footage of things happening wasn’t something in the mainstream yet. Why do I say this?

Because in Symphogear, the fact that Symphogear exist is the biggest open secret in this unidentified city ever. NDAs are passed like hotcakes to keep people’s mouths shut on seeing monster-fighting singing superheroes. And they sing, too! Symphogears as an entity are the most high-profile fighting agents out there. Bright colors, no masks, constant singing, fighting in broad daylight in populated areas. Everybody knows, but no one says a word.

Which means every politician on the face of Japan hates these idiots, but they’re stuck with them out of sheer necessity.

“i swear to god if you bring up sam reimi’s spiderman one more goddamned time”

“look it’s the truth, all anime comes back to sam reimi’s spiderman. fate zero did it. uhhh, fucking...baccano, probably? now us. face it. its pretty much the bible.”

It’s also pointed out that the very concept of a Symphogear is born from a science that didn’t exist, and it probably contributes to political frustration as well.

“im going to microwave all your sam reimi spiderman dvds. im gonna do it. you try me, motherfucker. i didnt go into acting and get into this position to hear lectures about a decades old film franchise nobody cares about anymore.”

“can we stop fighting about the validity of sam reimi’s spiderman for five seconds and get back to helping me thing of a dope as hell superhero name? now, lemme lay one on you: Mister Fister”

Hibiki asks where Code Ryoko is.

“any answer besides Not Here works”

“oh, she left to talk to the americans, why?”

“huh, shes sorta late, actually”

“WHY A BAD BITCH LIKE ME GOTTA GET STUCK IN TRAFFIC LIKE THIS”

In the mother of all Mom Vans, no less.

MEANWHILE... IN METAPHOR LIMBO...

Tsubasa has reached the sea floor of the water metaphor dimension surrounded by water, which is her feelings, which are very gay. Imagine the Mariana Trench but like, deeper. Way deeper. That’s where Tsubasa is.

Leave it to Kazanari “I am literally a sword” Tsubasa to successfully spin the very act of surviving a suicidal move during combat as a failure. That’s a special kind of self loathing right there.

“the sheer force of my love for big ladies is keeping me alive”

Tsubasa asks about the point of Kanade’s sacrifice. Why’d she do it? Why was she so hungry at the end?

She personally shows up to answer that question, because that’s Kanade for you.

“being badass is cool, but you know whats cooler? caring.”

“sharing the sauce... you... you shared the sauce...”

“thats right, tsubasa. i wanted to protect the sauce, but... ultimately... sharing it was better. it wasn’t my sauce, tsubasa. it was everyone’s...”

“im gonna suck on a ketchup packet in your memory, tsubasa”

Kanade’s spirit pulls her out of the dimension of water metaphors as she is slowly undrowning from her emotions.

Tsubasa, like Kanade, was lost in the sauce. But now, after Kanade’s touching peptalk, Tsubasa is lost no longer.

“will i ever see you again in my dreams, kanade...?”

“where there’s a sauce. i’ll be there.”

“ill eat taco bell every day just to see you again kanade”

“and i dont even like taco bell... im more of a chipotle girl...”

After accepting Taco Bell as her lord and savior, she is immediately pulled out of the metaphor zone.

And wakes the fuck up.

“b..... b..... b............”

“Baja Blast....”

[pass-the-bechdel]

Marvel Cinematic Universe: Captain America: Civil War (2016)

Does it pass the Bechdel Test?

No.

How many female characters (with names and lines) are there?

Seven (30.43% of cast).

How many male characters (with names and lines) are there?

Sixteen.

Positive Content Rating:

Three.

General Episode Quality:

Exciting and full of strong fodder for discussion and debate; by the same token, potentially frustrating.

MORE INFO (and potential spoilers) UNDER THE CUT:

Passing the Bechdel:

Natasha directs comments to Wanda in Nigeria, but Wanda addresses her response to the team as a whole.

Female characters:

Wanda Maximoff.

Natasha Romanov.

Maria Stark.

Mrs Spencer.

Sharon Carter.

Mrs Zemo.

Aunt May.

Male characters:

James Buchanan Barnes.

Steve Rogers.

Sam Wilson.

Brock Rumlow.

Howard Stark.

Tony Stark.

T’Chaka.

Vision.

Thaddeus Ross.

James Rhodes.

Helmut Zemo.

T’Challa.

Everett Ross.

Peter Parker.

Clint Barton.

Scott Lang.

OTHER NOTES:

My immediate thought on the concept of the Avengers being directed by a United Nations panel is the Rwandan genocide; follow from that, any number of other major atrocities that have taken place while the rest of the world sat back umm-ing and aah-ing over whether or not they should intervene. Anyone who knows a speck of history should be very reticent about the idea of being shackled by such political whims.

Ross refers to the unknown locations of Thor and Bruce Banner as being like ‘misplacing a couple of megaton nukes’, as if they’re objects and not autonomous sentient beings who can go where they please without having to declare their intentions, and that should really be the first major red flag to everyone that this guy ain’t on the level.

Vision’s equation about causality is a false equivalence, and an irrelevant one anyway, since oversight doesn’t do anything to hamper his theory about strength inviting challenge. You’re not actually reducing your strength, you’re just making yourself less able to meet those challenges as they come. I feel like Vision should be a Hell of a lot smarter than this absence of logic (also, looking at the threats themselves in previous films, the only ones which can be considered ‘strength inviting challenge’ issues in which the actions of any Avenger characters have ‘bred catastrophe’ are the Iron Man films, and Age of Ultron, all of which are examples of Tony’s hubris coming back to bite him, specifically. The conflict of every other film stems from either 1) trouble predating Iron Man (most of it SHIELD/Hydra related), or 2) other-worldly overspill where Earth becomes the battleground for something uninvited (Asgardian and/or infinity stone bullshit). And even when Tony is the one creating his own demons, he usually doesn’t do so actively through his Iron Man tech or persona (Obadiah Stane’s villainy is what led to Iron Man’s creation, not the other way around; yes, Tony’s grandstanding did directly invite competition in Iron Man 2, but he didn’t make an adversary out of Ivan Vanko, that was his father’s legacy; and Tony’s particular cruelty may have incited Aldritch Killian, but that event predated the creation of Iron Man by nine years, so it’s not a response to that strength. Only Ultron was genuinely a catastrophic consequence of Tony’s (and Bruce’s) abuse of power, but hobbling the Avengers’ ability to operate does nothing to prevent that sort of thing from happening again, it just stymies their ability to halt the onslaught after it begins. You solve that one with legislation limiting what anyone can recklessly create and unleash (which includes Vision himself, incidentally)).

And see, Steve is right; the Sokovia Accords just shift the blame when things go wrong, functionally it makes the Avengers less accountable for their actions by allowing them to play the ‘just following orders’ game. And the point he makes about the panel still being run by people with agendas is exactly what I’m talking about in that first dot point; when decisions are being made on a political basis instead of according to need, you get atrocities, and any person working for the United Nations is a political agent by default. Sokovia is actually a great example of the kind of place that falls through the cracks on the political stage, as it was noted to be ‘nowhere special’, i.e. not politically valuable, and therefore unlikely to receive a swift response from powerful nations who have no vested interests in the good of the country.

Tony’s argument here is extremely personal and emotion-driven; it’s all his own guilt about Ultron and Sokovia and his decision to stop manufacturing weapons, etc, and none of that is relevant to the rest of the team’s situation or their choices. He’s also utterly oblivious to his own privilege here, in that it’s super easy for him to handwave the particulars of the Accords, because he’s a filthy-rich white American whose main ‘thing’ is new technologies, which are not being restricted at all by these Accords; he has the luxury of just signing on and hoping to negotiate amendments later (and also, of having the resources to be able to thwart anything he disagrees with and just do what he wants regardless if he decides he’s right). He’s not taking a moment to consider what the Accords really mean for those members of the team with powers they can’t just ‘put down’, who don’t have the kinds of options and opportunities he has, up to and including the bargaining power to have the Accords ‘fixed up’ later. I really do my best to see both sides of this situation because there IS merit in the idea of the Accords, but no one in favour of it makes a good argument for it and it’s really frustrating.

Who tells someone that a close beloved friend is dead in a fucking text message??? The real villain of this film.

It goes without saying but I’m gonna say it anyway: it’s very hypocritical of T’Challa to support the Accords while also donning his super-suit and taking matters in foreign countries into his own hands. All of the destruction that occurs in Romania after Bucky escapes from his apartment building is because of T’Challa’s involvement (because he was trying to commit a literal murder!), and that kinda gets glossed straight over here. 

Tony falls for Ross’ trick by referring to Wanda as a ‘weapon of mass destruction’ in the process of his efforts to justify her internment. It’s all really solid writing, really, vernacular choices that highlight the dehumanisation at the rotten core of the Accords and how good people can be suckered into it without realising until it’s too late (even when things like, say, denial of legal representation should definitely be red-flagging up the wazoo right now). But honestly, it’s such a wild leap from ‘Wanda can’t go on missions anymore’ to ‘we’re going to forcibly deny her the ability to go out in public’. Keep trying to tell yourself that’s not a fucked up situation, Tony. 

Steve Rogers holding down a fucking helicopter is just...peak Captain America and I’m so glad.

The part where Tony recruits an actual child who is not involved in this situation at all, spiriting him away to another continent to fight supersoldiers, that’s just...beyond, honestly. I hate this as an introduction for Spiderman because it’s so wildly irresponsible of Tony, it’s an unforgivable thing to do. He’s a kid. This has nothing to do with him. This is where Tony officially loses me in this movie. You can take your self-righteous attempts at justifying your actions and shove ‘em, buddy. You’re actively endangering a child.

We really don’t need Steve to kiss someone every Cap movie. We didn’t need him weirdly mackin’ on his recently-deceased ex-love’s niece. Seriously.

Spiderman’s particular brand of quipping while fighting really irritates me, also. It’s altogether a big no from me on the Spiderman front. 

Still love Ant-Man, though. He’s delightful. I also enjoy Hawkeye so much more here than I have in the Avengers films. 

C’mon, T’Challa. You can’t attack and attempt to kill a guy outright and then play the ‘you must be guilty because you ran away’ schtick. Do a brain about it.

See, everyone else knows why they’re there and what they’re fighting for, they know the stakes. Scott is the only one on Cap’s side who isn’t already part of the situation anyway, but he’s read in on why he’s being asked to get involved and he’s a grown adult person making an informed decision. Peter doesn’t have that, he’s there fighting because Tony said so, and that’s just fucked up. 

Heavy sigh. And here we go with the emotional Tony thing. Yeah, he just saw how his parents were killed by the Winter Soldier. That’s rough. It’s really rough. But he doesn’t just have an immediate emotional outburst, he has a sustained homicidal rage, which includes not only trying to kill Bucky, but also beating the Hell outta Steve, who, y’know, did not kill Tony’s parents. The fight scene lasts way too long and involves too much opportunity for cooler thought to prevail (both in problem-solving and in conversational moments), and someone whose emotions can send them reeling so completely out of control - even when they actively know they’ve been manipulated into it! Zemo literally just told you to your face that this was his plan! - someone with so little impulse control should never be given the power to make decisions for others or wield anything over them. This is all just a really, really great case for why Tony is ill-equipped to be an Avenger at all.

Watching Bucky digging the repulsor out of Iron Man’s chest with his metal hand is...so exciting. Rest in peace, awesome metal arm.

Zemo’s just a regular human, but he gets locked up under utterly inhumane circumstances. Again, the Accords involved a deal with a pretty insidious devil, and they didn’t actually have to prove that Steve’s position was the correct one to such a strong degree (we could have had a more nuanced conversation about the subject of accountability if the two sides were more evenly presented), but damn, the red flags, guys. It shouldn’t have taken Tony until he was horrified seeing his friends in the raft prison to finally clue in. 

Ok, so, I know I already played the ‘I’m pregnant’ card to explain away my meandering commentary for Ant-Man, but it’s still true and only getting more significant as time goes on, so I regret to announce that - despite having looked forward to disassembling this movie since I started on this Marvel adventure - we’re now only a day out from publication and I haven’t written anything yet. I know, the deadline isn’t exactly set in stone and I could just hold off publishing until I’m ready, but that’s a slippery slope and if I start telling myself to just ‘get to it when you get to it’, who the fuck knows when it’ll happen. This isn’t supposed to be stressful, so I’m just gonna ramble a bit and see what comes out. There’s a thing wriggling in my guts and I have a house to paint. I’m doing my best.

First things first: my stance re: Accords is that the best method of oversight is the one which emphasises accountability, rather than permission (with acknowledgment that this is a fictional universe with threats and powers which do not reflect the real world). The kinds of issues our Avenger characters get involved with are typically of the sort which has to be nipped in the bud right-quick before it becomes untenable, and also not infrequently, the types of problems which do not offer them bountiful evidence to present to a board for evaluation before they get the ok to counter it. Faffing about with diplomacy and bureaucratic carrying-on is a great way to, say, allow Hydra to launch the Insight helicarriers and wipe out all dissenters to their rule before you have the chance to stop them, or (if Zemo’s apparent plan with the Winter Soldiers had been his real plan after all), to be stuck mopping up the global damage as an elite death squad roams around destabilising governments. I’m not a supporter of the adage ‘it’s better to ask forgiveness than permission’ in the real world, but in a comic book universe, with the supervillains and the world domination and the plots which consistently include chronic time-sensitive action and little if any concrete evidence? The Sokovia Accords are woefully inadequate. By all means, the Avengers should be answerable to someone, and being required to submit reports justifying their actions (and face disciplinary measures or even criminal charges if they cannot explain themselves to a satisfactory degree) is a completely reasonable thing to convene a United Nations panel to oversee. Maybe Tony can hop down off his high horse and face actual consequences for the Ultron fiasco. That’s fine with me, and it’s a logical thing for the world to clamour for. Shifting responsibility to a panel of UN politicians who will then no doubt be reticent to send the Avengers into anything pre-emptively (or within any kind of useful time frame) for fear of backlash is a terrible solution, and even more so when you’re being pushed into it without any time to evaluate and amend the original document before it becomes law. 

(It’s worth noting that the person most likely to appreciate how easily the UN panel could be hijacked by political machinations not in the interest of the public good is Steve, owing to his personal role in uncovering and thwarting Hydra’s plans; Sam was roped into the Avenging world through that event, and thus it’s unsurprising that he would have the same concern chief in mind when refusing to sign. While Natasha does sign on to the Accords, she explicitly does not do so because she thinks the Accords are a good idea; she’s playing the political game and ‘reading the terrain’, as she says, and that’s consistent with her character. Tony being impulsive and dangerously emotion-driven is also unfortunately consistent, as is his self-righteousness about imposing his will on others to assuage his own guilt. Vision really has no excuse for being so bad at logicking his way to signing the Accords, but it’s no surprise to me that the most clear-headed staunch Accords supporter would be Rhodey, since following orders from others and unquestioning trust in your governing body is dead-on character for him as a career military man. I think he’s categorically wrong, yes, but I’m not mad at Rhodey for being a True Believer any more than I am at Natasha for being mercurial; both are in-character choices and ones which involve evaluative thought processes, and while ‘in-character’ may still be in play for Tony, evaluative thought processes are not, and that does make me mad. As I’ve noted before, he tends to work as a likable character despite his MANY flaws when he’s in his own movies, because acknowledging those foibles and working to fix them is a core part of his personal arcs in each Iron Man film; it was an essential quality missing in Age of Ultron, and one which made a monster of the character which I AM glad this movie is addressing with fallout; still, there’s a lack of tangible self-reflection and making amends from Tony in this movie, alongside some of his worst personal decisions, and I sincerely do not love him by the end of it.)

The good thing is, despite a few lazy elements - Vision! You tool! - and despite some very frustrating decisions, the central dilemma of the film is a strong and nuanced conversation-starter (and perhaps, argument-inducer). Even though the specific scenario and the people involved (Ross (both of them) and the floating Guantanamo, et al.) skews the narrative definitively against the Accords by the end, there is still fodder there for an intelligent debate about the merits of the concept if not the execution. And, most importantly, Steve’s position on the matter is the MCU’s Captain America to a T - a political story about the appreciable and essential difference between doing one’s duty to a concept, vs adherence to a moral code. Disobedience is a core part of Steve Rogers’ dilemmas - not that disobedience IS the dilemma for him, but that it is at odds with the patriotic good-ol’-boy image he is expected to inhabit from outside. Every Captain America film carries with it the idea that to do the highest good can mean rejecting everything that the people and institutions around you try to insist is right; refusing to play a role that has been prescribed to you; always making the choice for yourself, by your ethos, no matter how hard it is. Refusing to compromise when you see the compromise as an evil; planting yourself like a tree, and saying ‘No. You move’ (a great way of keeping Peggy’s influence alive and moving in the plot, by the way, and a key demonstration of how she and Steve met on the same wavelength. Lots of strong details in this movie, tbh). 

My primary complaint, however, is that this is also too much like an Avengers film; nearly all of the other major characters are there, and Tony especially gets a LOT of screen time, and since Cap and his films are my uncontested faves I am pretty salty about having to share the stage for his last outing. The tone and the subject matter are still totally on-brand, but the focus is split, and that’s particularly annoying for what it leaves behind. While Bucky is made central to the drive of the plot, Steve finally being reunited with him, bringing him in, getting the cathartic other side to what was so exquisitely set up in The Winter Soldier, it falls by the wayside a bit and comes off underdone. Sam is certainly there, being wonderful as always, but he doesn’t get a lot to actively influence, he’s mostly just That Other Guy, and it’s a real shame since he was a highlight among super-stiff competition in his introductory film. The touch of Peggy that shines through the film is poignant, but Sharon Carter gets the bad end of the stick with under-developed characterisation and a very ill-advised zero-chemistry attempt to stir a speck of romance in a story with no room for it, and altogether, the kinds of quiet character moments which added so much depth to The Winter Soldier are very much lacking here. We’ve got so many other characters on deck already, plus the introduction of two new major players (T’Challa has a solid, sombre presence which suits the film, and even his hypocrisy fits snugly into the plot so as not to be a barb against him, but as I’ve mentioned already, I am squarely against Peter Parker’s squeaky excessive comic-relief inclusion and the dire implications it has for Tony Stark’s moral compass), and we’re already spending so much time on beefing up Tony’s side of the Civil War. I don’t personally think the movie is bloated, overlong, or incoherent, but it definitely wanders close to all three and I wouldn’t be inclined to argue very strenuously with anyone who wanted to denounce it on any of those fronts. It has a lot going on, not quite too much for an ensemble movie, but more than it should as a story with a single character’s name in the title. I’m still mostly-satisfied by it, and consider it one of the stronger MCU films to date, but as a third Captain America, specifically? A bit of a let-down. 

[sweethails]

Prompt List #2 (D-H)

Send a request with the number(s) and which prompt list it’s from if you don’t give me the prompt list I will just assume its from #1. and also Give me the character you want!  

[Example request]: Can I please have number 2 from prompt list #7 and  number 72 from prompt list #10 for peter parker where the reader finds out Pete’s spiderman

You can send in your own prompt(s) or just send in a request without one. these are here to use at your leisure (Most of these are not mine. Credit goes to those who made them.) I am add to this list occasionally so check back later for new ones. This is prompt #2 (D-H)

I do not take straight up smut requests even if some prompts sound slightly dirty. (I might change my mind who knows send me your smut request and i might decide to do it) There may be some repeat prompts but bare with me I’m trying to clean them up. Thanks enjoy!!!!!!

There are 289 prompts in this list

D-did I ever tell you how beautiful your eyes are?“

Daddy, how did you and mommy fall in love?”

Damn, when did y/n get hot?“

Damn, you’re strong for a little thing.”

Damned if I do, damned if I don’t.“

Dance with me!”

Dance with me.“

Dance with me? But there’s no music!”

Dear Diary, …"

Define normal.“

Despite what you think, I am completely capable of taking care of myself”

Detention? again?“

Diamonds.”

Did I ever tell you how beautiful your eyes are?“

Did it ever occur to you that you’re hurting me too?”

Did someone eat half of the cookies?!?“

Did someone spike the eggnog?”

Did you actually get a Santa suit?“

Did you actually just climb in through my window? You couldn’t have been normal and used the door?”

Did you buy me… lingerie?“

Did you do something different with your hair?”

Did you do this to yourself?“

Did you get my text?”

Did you have to sneeze in my face?“

Did you hear that?”

Did you just call that alligator by name?“

Did you just casually throw an ax?”

Did you just fall? No, I attacked the floor. I’m freaking talented!“

Did you just flick me?”

Did you just go throw up?“

Did you just hiss at me?”

Did you just see that?“

Did you know they used to be called ‘Jumpolines’ until your mum jumped on one?”

Did you need something?“

Did you read it?”

Did you see my phone?“

Did I actually sleep through New Years?”

Didn’t you read the sign?“

Disgusting.”

Do I get bonus points if I act like I care?“

Do I have to ask you again?”

Do I look like I’ve moved on?“

Do I regret it? Yes. Would I do it again? Probably.”

Do it. I dare you.“

Do it. Take a chance, I’m begging you. You don’t want to spend the rest of your life wondering what could have been.”

Do not tempt me.“

Do that again.”

Do us a favor… I know it’s difficult for you… but please, stay here, and try not to do anything… stupid.“

Do we have to kiss at midnight?”

Do we have to?“

Do we like…hold hands now?”

Do you believe in aliens?“

Do you believe in ghosts?”

Do you believe in love?“

Do you ever chill?”

Do you hate me?“

Do you have a problem with me?”

Do you have a ride home?“

Do you know what’s funny?”

Do you like it?“

Do you need that much candy?”

Do you promise?“

Do you really need all that candy?”

Do you really need those?“

Do you think I’m scared of a woman?”

Do you think other species have their own kind of drugs? Like something that gets them high?“

Do you think you can teach me that?”

Do you treat all your hookups like this?“

Do you trust me?”

Do you two still talk?“

Do you wanna Build a-”-Absolutely not.“

Do you want me to accept you as you are, or do you want me to lie to myself and try to like you?”

Do you want this?“

Do you want to kiss as bad as I do right now”

Do you want to kiss as bad as I do right now?“

Do you want to kiss me as badly as I want to kiss you right now?”

Do your parents even realize they’re living proof that two wrongs don’t make a right?“

Do yourself a favor and ignore anyone who tells you to be yourself. Bad idea in your case.”

Does it Hurt?“

Does this make me some kind of hero?”

Dogs don’t wear clothes!“

Don’t call this number again.”

Don’t argue. Just do it.“

Don’t be a smart ass.”

Don’t be afraid.“

Don’t be embarrassed, it’s normal.”

Don’t be scared, I’m right here.“

Don’t come back.”

Don’t cry.“

Don’t deny it”

Don’t die on me– Please.“

Don’t drink that! I saw that guy slip something in there!”

Don’t fuck this up.“

Don’t give me that puppy dog face.  How am I supposed to say no to that?”

Don’t leave me. Don’t you dare leave me.“

Don’t leave me…”

Don’t let the negativity get to ya! Here, have a flower!“

Don’t let your mind wander, it’s far too small to be let out on its own.”

Don’t lie to me.“

Don’t look at me like that.”

Don’t look for any redeeming qualities. I don’t have any.“

Don’t look in her eyes, she might steal your soul.”

Don’t make me come over there myself!“

Don’t make me pop your ten grand sandbags, honey.”

Don’t make me regret this.“

Don’t make me tape your mouth shut.”

Don’t mind if I do.“

Don’t open those till later!”

Don’t play me for a fool, I know exactly where you were.“

Don’t pretend I didn’t just see what you were doing.”

Don’t promise me you won’t leave. Just don’t leave. I don’t think I can handle another promise right now.“

Don’t say another word.”

Don’t say that.“

Don’t sell yourself short.”

Don’t start with that again.“

Don’t talk. Please.”

Don’t tell me to shut up.“

Don’t tell me we’re in matching costumes AGAIN.”

Don’t test me.“

Don’t thank me for insulting you. It was my pleasure.”

Don’t touch me.“

Don’t try to fix me. I’m not broken.”

Don’t worry about it.“

Don’t worry, you’ve got me to take care of you.”

Don’t you dare say/do that to me.“

Don’t you dare touch _______!”

Don’t you dare!“

Don’t you ever change.”

Don’t you get it? I’m in love with you and it scares the hell out of me.“

Don’t you give up on me.”

Don’t you just hate those things you say that make you feel really blonde?“

Don’t you just love it!”

Don’t you know how to knock?“

Don’t you love me?”

Don’t you realize that there are already enough people to hate in the world without you putting in so much effort to give us another?“

Don’t you think this is too much Fall decorations?”

Don’t you think you’re a little too old to be using cheesy pickup lines?“

Don’t you think you’ve done enough?”

Don’t you trust me?“

Drop the attitude.”

Easier said than done.“

Eggnog rules, bite me.”

Eggnog sucks, fight me.“

Enough with the sass!”

Even when we were kids, I always kicked your ass!“

Every day I get with you is a good day.”

Everyone gets so annoyed by how much I talk about you sometimes.“

Everyone’s entitled to act stupid one in a while, but you really abuse the privilege.”

Everything is fine.“

Ew, that is so sappy, I might vomit.”

Excuse me. I have to go make a scene.“

Excuse me?”

F-Fuck.“

Fair enough.”

Feed me that chocolate I’m busy"

Finally! Snow!“

Fine, don’t say anything and make me worry.”

Fine.“

First one to make a noise loses.”

First rule, no being a heathen.“

First second I saw you and I couldn’t get over how beautiful you were.”

Flea markets don’t carry fleas, you know?“

For starters, that’s impossible.”

For the last time, I AM NOT JEALOUS!“

Forget it.”

Forget the douche. He’s a dick. He’s a dickdouche.“

Forgive me. Not for my sake, for yours. Forgive me.”

Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.“

Fuck you”

Fuck- please just pretend to be my date until we can leave this joint?“

Fuzzy socks.”

Generally speaking, you aren’t learning much when your lips are moving.“

Get away from me.”

Get it away from me- that’s disgusting!“

Get out of here! This is my hiding spot!”

Get out of my way!“

Get out!”

Get over it, pussy.“

Get that thing away from me!”

Get your hands off of me!“

Ghost hunters.”

Ghosts are real, I’d know because I am one.“

Gingerbread people are very serious!”

Girls night in?“

Give it back!”

Give me a chance.“

Give me a reason not to turn around and walk away now.”

Give me anime or give me death.“

Give me back my phone!”

Give me that back!“

Go ahead and hit me.”

Go back to bed.“

Go back to sleep.”

Go fuck yourself.“

Go home.”

Go on, knock his teeth down his throat.“

Go on… Touch it.”

God, you always make me blush so damn much.“

Going somewhere?”

Good story, but in what chapter do you shut the fuck up?“

Good thing I didn’t ask for your opinion.”

Good, bad, I’m the one with the gun.“

H-how long?”

Haha, made you look.“

Haha. Nice try. Magic isn’t REAL.”

Half the time I get too embarrassed to say anything.“

Halloween decorating.

Halloween is better.”

Happy Birthday.“

Happy Festivus!”

Happy New Year’s Eve eve eve eve eve eve eve!“

Have fun being deal.I will.”

Have I mentioned, I fucking hate Halloween.“

Have you ever had those days when you are holding a stick and everybody looks like a pinata.”

Have you ever heard of personal space?“

Have you ever heard of what happened in this building?”

Have you ever tried to run in heels?“

Have you got your speaker on you?”

Have you lost your mind?“

Have you seen my glasses?”

Have you seen my… oh"

Having you as a best friend is simultaneously the best and worst thing that has happened to me.“

He already boarded the plane. We’re too late.”

He already knows.“

He did what- and you just let him off?!”

He yelled yeehaw and I’m not quite sure why.“

He/She did it.No he/she did.”

He/She kissed me" Who?“ ”___“

Heaven won’t take me and hell’s afraid I’ll take over.”

Help me hide!“

Help me I’m stuck.”

Help me pack or get out. You’re in the way.“

Here take my sweater.”

Here, let me help you.“

Here, take my blanket.”

Here’s my number, call me some time.“

Hey! Don’t do that! You can’t do that to me!”

Hey, at least you tried.“

Hey, hey, calm down. They can’t hurt you anymore.”

Hey, I know you’re hurting.. but, you’re not alone, okay?“

Hey, um, can you not pretend to play the drums on pots and pans at 3am?”

Hey, what would my name be if I was a Pokémon?“

He’s a fuckboy and he’s never going to treat you better than this.”

He’s dead because of you.“

He’s dead.”

His finger was right on the trigger but he wasn’t fast enough.“

Hold me and never let me go.”

Hold me. Just for a bit, okay? I just… I need someone to hold me.“

Hold my hand until it’s over?”

Hold still.“

Hot, gorgeous, beautiful…whatever you want to call it.”

How about you make me?“

How am I meant to hate you when you look like that?”

How are you feeling today?“

How can you say that to me? After everything you did, how can you possibly say that to me?”

How can you still look so attractive while crying.“

How come you’re here? I thought the zoo is closed at night…”

How could I ever forget about you?“

How could I forget?”

How could someone make food this badly?“

How could this happen? They’re so…so pure. Ugh.”

How could you ask me that?“

How could you do this to me?”

How could you do this?“

How could you forget your son’s birthday?”

How dare you? Yes, I am.“

How did I lose it?”

How did it take me so long to realize?“

How did we get here?”

How did you fail a survey?“

How did you get here? Did someone leave your cage open.”

How did you get in here?“

How did you imagine our future together?”

How did you know where to find me?“

How did you know? I never told you, so how’d you find out?”

How do I know that I can trust you?“

How do I look?”

How do we get in?“

How do you always manage to look so captivating?”

How do you do that? Are you a witch? What type of witchcraft is this?“

How do you get your skin to be so soft?”

How drunk was I?“

How is my wife more badass than me?”

How much did you drink?“

How much money would you give me to flip this table, right here, right now, in the middle of class?”

How ‘bout you stick it up your ass instead?“

“How’s life treating you?” “Like I ran over its dog.”

Hug me so I can Get warm.“

Hurry up, before we regret it.”

  Other Prompts Here Masterlist Here Request Here

[captainscanadian]

Better | Bucky Barnes x Reader (Part 3)

My Masterlist

Part 1 | Part 2

Summary: As Wanda convinced Bucky to leave your bedside for the night, Becca Barnes arrives in Brooklyn to let him know of the findings of her investigation. While Bucky thinks that no harm would come your way during his absence, he would not know how wrong he had been about that. But one thing is clear, Bucky fell in love with you one wintry night in Brooklyn after he learned that you were indeed a much better doctor and a much better human being than he could ever be.

Word Count: 6083

Pairing: Doctor!Bucky x Doctor!Reader, Doctor!Bucky x Platonic!Nurse!Wanda, Nurse!MJ

Warnings: Swearing, Mentions of Abuse & Alcoholism, Surgery, Organ Donation, IV & Needles, Emotional Distress, Physical Pain, Drugs, Hospital Stay, Homelessness, Mentions of Death & Cancer

A/N: It may have taken my about two months to write this part but I do apologize for my lack of inspiration that was caused a major life change (of me moving to the UK). I am so excited to continue this fic because I just love Doctor!Bucky with my whole heart. I would like to thank @dramadreamer14 and @thedarklightwithinus for providing me with some genuine feedback for this fic. They really kept me going! On that note, here’s an extra long chapter to make up for the wait time. I hope you enjoy reading this and feedback is always welcome! :)

Perhaps it was impossible to get Dr. James Barnes to leave the hospital for the night. Hell, he was not even planning on leaving your bedside for more than a few minutes if he had to. But as the sun had finally set and visiting hours were over, Wanda Maximoff had woken up from her post-night shift nap to dial the nurses’ desk at the post-op ward. She had a gut feeling that Bucky would still be there, for she knew that man well enough to know how much he loved you.

Michelle Jones, the trainee nurse who had replaced her at the desk since that morning, answered the phone in an instant. “Good evening, you’ve reached Brooklyn Hospital Post-Op. How may I help you?” She recited in her best customer service voice that seemed way too polite for her own liking.

“Hey MJ, it’s Wanda.” She responded as she rubbed at her eyes, ridding of the last bit of slumber that remained within her eyes before she let out a yawn. “Is he still there?”

“Does it snow in New York in December?” The younger nurse retorted with a chuckle, pulling up the moleskin journal that she had been keeping. After Wanda had instructed her to keep an eye on your hospital room, Michelle had managed to write down every single instance that Bucky had left your bedside. “He took a bathroom break every one or two hours and when Peter- I mean, when Dr. Parker went to check her vitals around 2 pm, Dr. Barnes promised to let him scrub in with him on his next surgery if he brings him lunch. Dr. Parker brought him a sandwich from the cafeteria, and then a vanilla bean latte from the coffee cart across the street at around 4 pm. He had his last bathroom break a few minutes ago but he’s still there.”

“And Y/N?” Wanda asked as she bit her lip, completely unsurprised by the fact that the lover boy was still at your bedside. She made a mental note to give him a stern talking to and make sure that he left the hospital for the night. As much as she adored that he was putting himself out there to care for you; she believed that you needed someone like him in your life too, but she could not help but worry about him just as much.

MJ set aside her moleskin before pulling up your file on the computer. “Well, her PCA log shows that she’s been pumping pain meds every few hours, as she should be doing for the amount of pain that she must be going through on her first day in post-op. Nothing unusual there. She was knocked out when I went to change her IV and drainage tubes and I don’t think she would be waking up for another few hours or so. I had to kick him out of the room for a few minutes but he didn’t mind. He had no problem letting me do my job but he’s still sitting there.” MJ replied with a shrug, turning her head towards the hallway once she heard footsteps approaching her. Noticing that Bucky had stepped out of the room and was walking swiftly towards the desk, she quickly turned away to avoid his eye contact. “Wanda, he’s coming towards the desk right now.”

“MJ, please give him the phone.” The older nurse demanded. “I’m going to talk some sense into his head so if he tries to get out of my lecture by giving you back the phone, don’t you dare let him do that. Visiting hours were over hours ago so if he doesn’t leave after I hang up on him, just let him say goodbye to her and make sure he actually leaves the hospital and doesn’t crash in an on call room. He might even try to go down to the pit and get himself a patient, just so that he doesn’t have to leave the hospital. Don’t you dare let him do any of that! Call security to drag him out if you have to, because I wouldn’t trust him if I were you.”

“Michelle, can I ask you-”

She held her finger up for at him for a moment, listening intently to what Wanda had just told her. “Yes, ma’am...” She turned over to Bucky with a toothy grin. “Phone call for you, Dr. Barnes!”

Bucky gave her a confused look for a moment as she handed him the phone. “Hello?” He said, casually, as he brought his phone up to his ear.

“Bucky, you’ve been sitting there for more than twelve hours!” Wanda yelled at him through the phone, startling him slightly. “Get the fuck out of there! Go home, visiting hours were over ages ago.”

The dark haired doctor gave the other nurse a look of disbelief, shaking his head at her as she pulled out her cell phone to make another call. “Wanda, visiting hours don’t apply to me. I work here.”

“You went over your weekly limit yesterday, you dipshit. You shouldn’t even be back at the hospital until the day after tomorrow.” She reminded him. “What are you even doing there? She’s knocked out on pain meds. Just stop sitting in her room like a fucking creep and get your ass back to your apartment, Barnes. You haven’t been there in days.”

“Don’t talk to me like that.”

“Why? What are you going to do about it? Fire me? If I tell Chief Stark that you’ve been a fucking nuisance around the hospital, I’ll make sure he’s the one firing your dumbass!”

“Wanda...” Bucky let out a groan at her threats, not even sure if she actually meant them. As much as he loved her like a fourth younger sister, he knew that Wanda could be a bitch when she wanted to be. A part of him was hesitant about pissing her off even more. He could not risk it. “I can’t just leave Y/N here like this. She’s all alone. She has no family to watch her and... I’m not doing anyone any harm by being here.”

“Every single doctor, nurse, lab tech and orderly working in that hospital is her damn family, Bucky!” She reminded him with a sigh. “We’re all her family and we’re all keeping an eye on her. You’re being hard on yourself, Bucky. I know you care about her and you want to be there for her right now. But you should also take care of yourself too. You haven’t been home in days. Just go home for the night, sleep in your own bed for once. Take tomorrow off for yourself. She’ll be right where you left her when you come back.”

He let out a sigh as she contemplated her words. “But Wanda, what if something happens to her while I’m gone?”

“Bucky, are you out of your mind? You’re a fucking surgeon, come on, get it together. You know how liver transplants work. She didn’t suffer any complications during surgery. Nothing’s going to happen to her. She’s just going to be in pain for a few days so she’ll be knocked out on drugs until then. She’ll be back to her cheery self by the time you get back to work and Romanoff will discharge her by the end of next week.” She explained, wondering if you had made any arrangements for how you were going to spend the next eight weeks in bed rest. After all, Wanda knew that you lived alone. There was no way you could get through the days of recovery on your own. She made a mental note to ask you about it when she returns to work in the morning. Though knowing you, she was also contemplating on calling a family meeting with everyone else to come up with a solution for that. Asking you about it or offering to help take care of you would not cut it. She knew that you would refuse the help either way. If she had just went ahead and made the arrangements herself though and let Steve deliver the message to you, she knew you wouldn’t say no to the offer. You would never say no to Steve.  

Wanda was right and Bucky knew that. But his heart refused to accept it. He did not want to leave you when you were all alone and in pain. Nevertheless, he gave in, only because he trusted the rest of the hospital staff to keep an eye on you during his absence. “Fine, I’ll go home. I’m sure everyone here would make sure she’s still in one piece by the time I get back.” Boy, if he only knew how wrong he was about that.

“Good. Now, you better not be at the hospital when I get to work in the morning and you better not show up until my eighteen hour shift is over. Are we clear about that, Dr. Barnes?” Wanda asked him with a chuckle.

Bucky laughed softly. “Noted, Maximoff. And before I forget, Y/N told me that she asked you to check on the status of her father. Can you let her know what’s up with him when you see her tomorrow?”

“Okay, I will.” She told him as she bit her lip at the thought of your father. Though she did not know the man personally and was certainly in a place where she should not be judging him, she could not help it. Boy, did she loathe that man for drinking away his health, driving away his own daughter and showing up at this hospital to make you pay for his mistakes. Having lost her own parents when she was eleven years of age and having lost her twin brother at sixteen, she felt empathetic towards the way your parents had been treating you despite your sacrifice. She could not believe how much you cared to ask about the man who could not care any less about you. But she knew that it meant you were a much better person than the people who had raised you. “Now I told MJ to call security. So once you hang up the phone, if you can go and kiss your Sleeping Beauty goodnight and then go straight to your car that would be highly appreciated.”

He turned around to give MJ another look of disbelief before seeing Thor, one of the security guards at the hospital, standing next to her and giving him the same toothy grin as the nurse. “Damn you, Wanda!” Bucky let out another chuckle as he hung up the phone and turned back to MJ. “Take care of her, yeah?”

Michelle gave him a nod. “Don’t worry, Dr. Barnes. She’s one of us. We’re definitely not going to let her pull one on us.” She gave him a reassuring smile.

Bucky gave her a nod before he turned over to look at Thor. “God, I can’t believe you’re-”

“Move it, Dr. Barnes.” The security guard cut him off, motioning him to walk back to your room as he gave him a playful glare. “Wanda’s orders.”

The love struck surgeon laughed softly as he shook his head, turning around and walking back to your hospital room with the beefy blonde male following right behind him. Bucky entered the room while Thor stood by the door, knowing that he should give the doctor some privacy. After all, not even the security guards and the rest of the hospital staff were immune to the gossips around the hospital.

Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that they were all quite fond of you. Despite the fact that you were a surgeon, which had naturally given you a higher rank within the social hierarchy of the hospital, you were known to be extremely polite towards the nurses, orderlies, lab technicians, the catering staff and the cleaning staff alike. Most of the surgeons, your own friends included, possessed a certain arrogance that came with being a surgeon. But you had managed to overcome that arrogance rather quickly, thanks to your very humble beginnings. Even the staff had been concerned about your health following your surgery. But the moment news broke out that ‘Dr. Long Hair, Don’t Care’ had found himself sitting by your bedside for the whole day, it seemed that they were also eager to know if he would finally confess his feelings to you by the time you recovered and returned to work. Their bets had been placed but all they could do was wait and watch.

It seemed as though you were the only one who had been unaware of Bucky’s feelings for you, but you had a reason for that. Your years of longing to be loved by someone had only resulted in multiple rejections, causing you to eventually give up on pursuing any kind of relationship at all. For some reason, you had become accustomed to turning a blind eye to anyone’s romantic advances towards you. Perhaps that was why even Bucky had been hesitant to ask you out over the years. You had told him early on in your friendship of how the only reason you had moved to Brooklyn was because you wanted to train under Steve and build yourself a career. You weren’t looking for love, you had told him, even though that had been a lie. You had just believed that you did not deserve to be loved; you still believed it too, as a matter of fact. And Bucky, even he had started to fear your rejection after that.

But he could not deny that he loved you either way. He loved everything about you, from your determination to be a better surgeon to your generosity when it came to the way you treated your patients. You weren’t a surgical robot; unlike him, you actually had a heart. You had a heart that had been so deprived of love yet had so much love to give to everyone else around you. He had been the first one to notice that about you. And it was at that moment that he had fallen in love with you.

The two of you had only ever gotten a chance to work closely together when Steve had made the decision to go on a six month paternity leave after his daughter’s birth, leaving Bucky in charge of the department in his absence. Perhaps that was the time he had really gotten to know you as a surgeon and a human being, even though the two of you hadn’t gotten along all that well back then.

You had disagreed with him regarding a patient at that time, to which he had responded by taking you off the case. Your inability to see him in a place of authority and your slight confidence that Steve would have understood why you did certain things the way you did, had caused you to lash out at him. Bucky, being irritated by how you had challenged him in that situation and in desperate need of proving his authority, had suspended you from his service for an entire week.  

He had realized a few days later that he had been wrong to punish you; he had Wanda to thank for knocking some sense into his head regarding the way he had exercised his newfound power. But when he had approached you to convince you to return to work, he was slightly surprised to find that your time away from the hospital had been spent providing free medical care at a local homeless shelter in Brooklyn.

“I wasn’t expecting any visitors at this time...” You had told the familiar dark haired man who had entered the make-shift clinic you had set up at the shelter. Despite the issues that you may have had with him, you still had a lot of respect for him. He was a renowned surgeon in his own right, certainly more experienced than you were. A part of you felt guilty for the way you had disrespected him at the hospital, but you had only stood up for yourself and the call that you had made for your patient. You had every right to do that. “And I certainly wasn’t expecting a visit from you.”

“So, this is where you spend all of your free time after... turning down Nat’s invites to go to the bar after a hard day’s work.” Bucky noted as he looked around the dimly lit room that was barely the size of his laundry room. The clinic did not look typical at all, an old single bed pushed against the back wall, a small school desk and folding chair placed in the center of the room and a shelf against the other wall holding various medical supplies that you might need to use. The pasty white paint was starting flake out of the walls despite your attempts to cover them up with multiple anatomy posters. It could not compare to Brooklyn’s most reputable teaching hospital where the two of you worked, but he knew that you were certainly making a difference in the lives of the homeless people you were helping.

“Well, I do think that there’s a lot more value to my time if it’s spent tending to these people rather than screwing up my liver.” You told him with a hint of sarcasm evident in your voice, removing a pair of latex gloves that you had been wearing and tossing them into the trash can. “No offense to Nat though. I’m sure she understands that I had a valid reason to skip out on her usual hangouts.”

He stuffed his hands into his pockets as he stepped over to the shelf of supplies, eying the items that you had purchased and donated to the shelter before turning back around to face you. “Are you paying for all of these?”

You gave him a nod as you lathered some hand sanitizer on your hands, getting up from your chair as it was about time to close up for the night. “Well, these are just the bandages, gauze pads and cotton swabs... I only keep these in here. The ibuprofen and other pain killers, all of the other over the counter drugs, needles and syringes are locked in a storage room near the kitchen. I’m the only one who can go in and grab them. I can’t have anyone coming in here for free drugs, you know?”

Bucky nodded, understandingly, and his lips curled into a small smile at the thought of your generosity and the skill you had in operating such a clinic, the thought and planning that had gone into doing something like this. He was well aware that you had only moved to New York two years ago to begin your fellowship with Steve. But the woman who was running the shelter had informed him just now that you had offered to start up this make-shift clinic within a few months of living in Brooklyn. “And you’re prescribing as well?” He asked, noticing your prescription pad on the desk.

“Mostly antibiotics, to treat minor infections.” You replied with a shrug, reaching under the desk to grab your bag. “I made a deal with the drug store down the street. They’re open twenty-four hours a day. I would write down the prescriptions and one of the volunteers, MJ, she’s a nursing student from Queens who helps me out... she would run down the street and fill them up. The drugstore sends me a receipt and I pay them off, out of pocket.”

His eyes grew wide as he realized what you had been doing. “Out of pocket? How are you able to afford all of this?” He asked, curiously. Surely, as a heart surgeon himself, he knew just about how much money you would be making since you were recently board certified. While you could certainly afford to pay for the entire make-shift clinic at the shelter, he had assumed that you must still have some student loans to pay off. Taking that debt into consideration, he was surprised that you were able to give back so much.

You nodded as you tossed your prescription pad and pen in your bag, pulling off your stethoscope that loosely hung over your shoulders. “Yeah... I mean, it’s not that much. I think I’ve mastered the art of saving up and living on a budget over the years, Dr. Barnes. Most of my tuition during pre-med and med at NYU was paid off by scholarships. I had pretty good grades and the financial need so I pretty much got... a free ride. My rent and food were covered by the money I made working two part-time jobs and a weekend job and there wasn’t any student loan debt to be paid off. I made a pretty decent income working as a resident but after paying my rent, groceries and other necessities, I pretty much saved up. I didn’t even have a car so I didn’t need to pay for insurance or gas. I didn’t even waste my money taking the subway. I rode a bike to and from work... for five years. Everyone I knew judged me for it but I didn’t give a shit. Saving up a lot of money during residency was the only reason I was able to afford living in New York in the first place and... Now, I think I’m in a really good place.” You could not help but smile at that, feeling a sense of pride at how much you had accomplished over the years. “I worked so hard to get where I am, Dr. Barnes. And I did all of this because I wanted to make a difference. So, if I can’t make a difference by cutting into people’s hearts then I might as well make a difference by... doing this, I guess?” You told him with a shrug, sighing as you packed up your bag and grabbed your jacket.

It was at that moment that Bucky had truly regretted how harsh he had treated you, but he did not show it. He remembered that night two years ago, when he had walked in on you crying your eyes out in an on call room. He had remembered how he had told you to aim to be a better doctor than him and Steve could ever be, yet he had now seen in person that you already were a much better doctor and human being than he could ever be.

James Buchannan Barnes had always been a privileged man. His parents were both doctors who ran their own respective practices. He and his three sisters had been raised by a nanny in their mansion in Clinton Hill. By the time he had started first grade, his parents had already deposited a large amount into his college fund. At sixteen years old, he had been given his own Mercedes and at eighteen, he had moved into his own penthouse apartment overlooking the bridge. He had never had to work a part-time job or live on a budget to make ends meet. But he felt extremely guilty for being someone who had had it all and had given back nothing. Yet there you stood before him, someone who seemed to have very less than what he had but still gave more than he could ever.

“I... hate to do this right now, Dr. Y/L/N. I think it’s a very noble thing that you’re doing here and I hate to be the one to drag you away from it.” He admitted as he bit down on his bottom lip, his hands still stuffed in his pockets as he finally gained the courage to look you in the eye. “But the reason why I came down here was... because I wanted to apologize to you for the way I treated you and ask you to come back to work, even though what you’re doing here seems... better. You’re a really good doctor and a really good human being. I could really use someone like you on my service, someone who actually has a heart.”

You let out a chuckle as you shrugged on your jacket and walked up to him. “Well, as much as I love being here... and mind you, I’ve been here every single day since you kicked me out of the OR, I’ve come to realize that the only way I can keep running this clinic is if I can actually fund it.” You admitted, laughing softly. “And I may or may not need to have a day job for that.”

Bucky chuckled softly as he nodded in agreement. “No, really... I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have humiliated you in the OR like that and I shouldn’t have undermined your judgement. Your patient, your call... although the procedure was rather unconventional, I could have cut you some slack. After all, you did train under Steve and I shouldn’t have been so surprised to know that you might have picked up some things from him.”

You laughed at the way he poked fun at his best friend. “Well, Dr. Barnes... I did cross the line and as my newly appointed boss, you had every right to interfere and take disciplinary action.” You admitted as you sighed. “I’m sorry too, I shouldn’t have been so disrespectful towards you, especially in the OR. That was extremely rude of me and I’m really sorry.”

He nodded. “Apology accepted.”

You smiled politely at him as you motioned him to follow you outside of the room, turning off the lights on your way out. “Hey, I never bothered to ask. How did you even find me here?” You asked as you locked up the clinic, turning over to give him a confused look. No one at the hospital was aware of what you did on your spare time, except Dr. Rogers. Yet you could not help but wonder how he had found you.

Bucky looked down at his feet as he walked down the dimly lit hallway of that led to the front desk of the shelter. “Well, my temporary yet newfound power does allow me took look into your employee records.” He admitted as he laughed softly. “I found your home address from your profile and went down to the Indian restaurant that’s located on said address. A waiter told me that you lived on the loft apartment upstairs and that you weren’t home right now. So, I asked him where I could find you.”

You let at a sigh at his explanation. “Did you really go out of your way to... do what? Ask me to come back to work?” You were slightly surprised by the fact that anyone would even care that you were not home. Hell, you were even surprised that Dr. Barnes had even showed up to your little clinic to apologize to you after what had happened. You had taken him for a rather arrogant man, compared to Steve. This was partially true though, even he wouldn’t deny that. Yet his attempts to give you a personal apology did seem endearing to you. He intrigued you.

He nodded as he looked over at you. “Yeah...” He looked over at the woman who was sitting at the front desk and waved her goodbye.

“Goodnight, Dolores.” You told her as you walked out the front door, Bucky following right behind you. “You’re not going to ask me why I live above a restaurant, are you, Dr. Barnes?” You asked him, curiously, wondering if he was judging your choice in a home. While you could certainly afford a nicer apartment with your new salary, you had chosen to live there for the sake of convenience. The old Indian couple who owned the restaurant were kind enough to allow you to eat in the restaurant whenever you wanted, knowing very well that your unpredictable work hours did not allow you to even cook a meal for yourself. When you weren’t working at the hospital or running the clinic at the shelter and you happened to miss the good old days of waitressing, you would lend them a hand at times.

“It’s none of my business.” He admitted, shaking his head as the two of you stepped had stepped out into the cold winter night. “But I think I learned a lot about you this evening and that’s saying something, considering how distant you have been with all of us.”

Your warm breath had condensed every time you exhaled, the air a little misty as it was that night. “I admit that I might come off as- more like, I really am... a bit closed off. But I have a valid reason for that.” You admitted as you walked along the sidewalk, the snow crunching under your boots with every step you took. “I’ve been used to doing my own thing, Dr. Barnes. It’s really hard to get out of that.”

“That’s understandable.”

The two of you walked in silence for the next few minutes, neither of you uttering a word as the snow continued to fall from the sky. It was not an awkward silence but one that was calming, to him more than yourself though. You kept your eyes at your feet, not knowing what exactly you needed to say in order to keep a conversation going. Not that you had nothing to say. You wanted to keep talking but you were hesitant about doing so. What could you possibly say to that man that could be of interest to him? What if you said something wrong and he took it the wrong way? That had happen once already and it had almost cost you your job. You could not make that same mistake.

“What made you want to start up this clinic, Y/L/N?” Bucky asked, curiously, finally breaking the silence. “Why did you go out of your way to do this?”

“Because...” You paused to bite down on your bottom lip, not knowing if you should give him an honest answer to his question. Would that be over-sharing? After all, you had spilled quite so much of your past to him. Did you need to say more? “Because I know how it feels, Dr. Barnes. I know how it feels to be out here in the cold... no food, no warm clothes, nowhere to go. The uncertainty of whether you would get through the night and into the next morning, it’s... the worst feeling in the world and... I just wouldn’t wish that upon anyone.”

“You know, Steve grew up... just a few blocks away from here.” He recalled, his hands still cold despite the fact that they had never left his pockets.

You nodded. “He did mention it when I told him about me volunteering for the shelter. As a matter of fact, he funded the clinic for the first couple of months until I was able to handle it on my own.”

“His mother was my nanny. She started working for our family after her husband passed.” He did not know why he was telling you this but his guilt for not being the better human being may have had a part in that. “Steve and I knew each other since we were very little. He’s like the brother I never had. His mother raised me and my sisters as if we were her own. She passed away when he was just about eighteen. Bronchioloalveolar carcinoma, the tumor was malignant by the time they caught it and she had already been misdiagnosed with pneumonia. There was nothing anyone could have done to save her. Steve couldn’t... he couldn’t afford to live after that. My folks offered to pay off the medical bills but he wouldn’t accept it. He had just gotten into NYU but he didn’t even know if he would end up going. A few days after his mother’s funeral, I found him right outside of that same shelter. I asked him to come and live with me and he told me that he could get by on his own. But I told him he didn’t have to... and I dragged him right back to my place and let him live in my guest bedroom for as long as he needed to. I owed that much to his mother. Best heart surgeon in New York and the best father in the entire world now that he traded his scalpel for changing diapers, he was capable of being so much better... than what life had to offer him, Y/N. You are also capable of being so much better than whatever life had to offer you and I hope you know that.” And that was the moment Bucky had realized that even he was capable of being better than what life had offered him. Perhaps he would start by writing you a cheque so that you could continue you doing what you were doing for the shelter. That was the least he could do.

Just then the two of you reached the Indian restaurant above which you lived. “Well... this is me.” You told him as you motioned towards to loft above the restaurant.

He nodded, pointing to his Mercedes that he had parked just across the street from the restaurant. “And that’s me.”

“Goodnight, Dr. Barnes.” You gave him a wave as you began to walk into the diner, stopping in front of the door before turning around to look at him. “Hey... James?”

He had turned around to cross the street once he waved you goodbye when you had called out to him. At first he was a little startled that you had referred to him by his first name, as you had never done that before. Besides, no one else other than his parents had called James. “Yes?”

“Thank you.” You told him as you gave him a genuine smile.

He nodded, smiling brightly as he ran his hand through his hair. And it was at that moment on that cold winter night did Y/N Y/L/N manage to thaw out the cold dead heart of James Buchannan Barnes.

“Goodnight, Y/N.” Bucky leaned over to press his lips against your forehead once more, his cold hands gently running through your hair as he sighed. He knew that you would have no recollection of this, since you were still knocked out from pain meds. But he could not help but speak to your unconscious self before he left, for the sake of his own sanity. “Wanda’s making me go home for the night so I might not see you again until... the day after tomorrow, I guess. Hang in there, doll. I hope you feel better... and I’ll see you when I get back.” I love you, he wanted to say, but he held himself back because he would rather say it in person and when the time was right. Grabbing his belongings, he walked out of your hospital room as he gave Thor a thumbs up, jogging down the hallway, down the stairs, past the ER and out the door towards the parking lot where he had parked his Mercedes.

It was only when he had started his car did he remember that he had forgotten to turn his phone back on. Before he pulled out of the parking lot, he turned on his phone to see that had several missed calls and text messages from his sister.

His eyebrows furrowed as he read her texts, a lump forming in his throat as he began to worry about the context of the messages. Bucky had asked his private investigator sister to do him a favor last week. And from what her messages now said, she must have found something that was relevant. He could not help but expect the worst after that.

Becca Barnes: Hey Buck, your phone’s off so you’re probably at work. Just wanted to let you know that I’m just heading back from Philly.

Becca Barnes: I found some things that you might find concerning. Let me know if I can come over tomorrow. I can’t tell you any of this through the phone.

Bucky bit down on his lip as he typed up a reply, but he could not help but worry about what his sister had found out for him.

How about first thing in the morning? I’m not working tomorrow.

[takealottodragmeawayfromreddie]

Whatever floats your boat - Chapter 2

Summary: When they were fourteen years old, Richie climbed through Eddie’s window with the excuse of having another secret sleepover and they had the longest conversation in their friendship history instead. He got tangled in what he was trying to say a million times, went forwards and backwards in his explanations too much and even cried a bit. But at the end, it was clear, and Eddie understood

At the age of fourteen, Richie Tozier was impossibly aware of the fact he was gay. Then, why did he start dating a girl when he turned seventeen? And why was Eddie so mad about it?

Prologue, Chapter 1

Warnings: Internalized homophobia, referenced sexual abuse, referenced underage oral sex.

AO3 LINK

Proofread by the amazing @aizeninlefox

Chapter 2

Derry, Maine; 1994.

In their last year of high school, Richie started dating someone. It surprised a lot of people, but not Eddie. He knew it wasn’t the first time something like this had happened.

A year ago, Richie went to a summer camp that would help him to improve his grades and capacity of learning. His parents decided to send him when they found out he wasn’t doing well in school anymore, and not even remedial classes would fix the situation.

Richie, of course, hated that solution. He spent his last days of freedom complaining about it, responding to everything with insults and rejecting any kind of condolence for his lost vacations.

But the funny thing was that when he came back he didn’t seem angry at all. In fact, he looked satisfied with the turn things had taken. The Losers interrogated him about it, and he just shrugged and said there were some hot girls and all of the campers went to swim together in a lake when it was free time. The only one who knew the true explanation for his joy was Eddie.

For the first time in years, Richie snuck into his room at night to have a private chat. Eddie immediately got stiff, fearing the worst. Richie’s gladness should have been a good indication, but it was two in the morning and he was too sleepy and nervous to understand.

“Okay, Eds, I know this is all so disgusting and traumatic for you, but I got to tell someone,” Richie’s voice sounded fast and excited as he walked around the room, incapable of sitting down.

“Can’t it wait?” Eddie drowsily asked, rubbing his eye.

“Hell, no. I went to Bev first and she told me to go to sleep.”

“Bev is a wise woman, you should listen to her,” He muttered, getting into bed again and pulling the blanket over his body, including his head.

“Come on, Eds, don’t you wanna hear about my summer romance?”

Eddie exhaled a bitter laugh.

“You? Romance? One of those girls who swam in the lake, I guess.”

“Nah, a super-hot guy.”

That was all it took for Eddie to get out of his cave of sheets. At the mere sound of the words, he quickly sat up and looked at him with a death stare.

“What the fuck?”

Richie’s chest inflated with pride.

“Yep,” He confirmed, casually exanimating his nails, “A super-hot guy who was basically begging for my—”

“And you were planning to tell Bev?!” Eddie snapped, doing nothing to hide his angriness, “What the hell is wrong with you?”

All the arrogance in Richie vanished. Now he looked confused and vaguely embarrassed.

“She’s…” He started, his voice fighting for leaving his throat, “She’s my friend, Eddie.”

“And what about me? I’m not your friend? I don’t have any say about… this?”

He left bed again and walked towards Richie, whose eyes were opened wide in complete confusion. It almost hurt seeing him taking a step back when they were face to face, as he was scared of Eddie injuring him.

“This is not some silly game, Richie. This is not something you wear in your forehead like it’s something you’re… proud about. It’s your future, your health, your whole life.”

“I can trust Bev.”

“You can’t trust her about everything. In fact, you shouldn’t trust anyone about this. Not even me.”

Richie looked in the verge of tears for a few seconds. A brief tremble of his lower lip wouldn’t let him pretend he didn’t care, like he always did. But nothing happened. He just stared into Eddie’s eyes like he did the Monday after the college party, thickened his skin and acted.

“You’re right,” Now his voice was more like the straight line in a monitor that announces the death of a patient, “I shouldn’t have trusted you.”

Then, he started walking to the open window, so decisive Eddie thought nothing could stop him. However, he did stop at the last minute.

“And for your information,” He said, turning back in Eddie’s direction, “I wasn’t going to tell Bev it was a guy. Don’t worry, no one knows your best friend is a faggot.”

After that, he initiated his already dominated descent through Eddie’s house façade.

“Wait!” Eddie called out, trying to not being too loud, sticking his head through the window, “I didn’t mean it like that.”

Richie ignored him.

“Come on, you know I didn’t mean it like that!”

“No, Eds,” Richie finally answered, looking up at him, “I don’t know. Fuck you.”

Eddie felt panic getting its way into his chest.

“I’m sorry, Richie! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be an asshole. Please, come back. Please tell me about that… super-hot guy.”

“You don’t wanna hear it, trust me,” He said, getting his feet on the ground and walking towards his bike, “We spent the whole summer sucking each other’s dick.”

Eddie choked, trying to resist the urgency of puking. Richie left.

Even if their first try to openly talk about Richie’s romantic life failed, Eddie got the chance to properly apologize and Richie, in a less emotional mental state, paid the incident no mind and agreed to talk about it when they got to meet without the rest of the Losers.

It turned out it wasn’t as simple as a ‘whole summer sucking each other’s dick’. The super-hot guy had a name and Richie found himself repeating it a lot more than necessary. He couldn’t disguise that little glitter in his eyes every time he mentioned it.

“So, his name was Jake and he wasn’t just hot.”

“He wasn’t?”

“No, I mean, yeah, he was hot. But he was also super funny. Like, the funniest dude I ever met? I know it’s hard to imagine a guy who’s funnier than me, but…”

“I can imagine it.”

“Mean.”

“Go on.”

“Right. And he was tall. He said he was in the basketball team of his school and his mother sent him to the camp ‘cause his grades sucked and the coach was going to kick him out if they didn’t get better.”

Richie went on and on about Jake and how much they kissed every time they could be all alone. And what an amazing kisser he was. And he gave the best blowjobs in the world. And you don’t know how Heaven looks like until Jake Parker gets his hand inside your pants.

“Will you ever see him again?” Eddie asked when he was done. It wasn’t the kind of question a good friend dreamily brings up when you meet someone new, but a nasty challenge to look at him in the eye and say his little summer fling meant something for the other guy, too.

“He told me he’d call me when he got home,” Richie said, not very convinced, “He’s from Portland, so…”

Eddie felt guilty for seeding that doubt on his mind.

“It’s been two weeks, Rich,” He gently commented, putting a hand on his shoulder.

Richie nodded.

“I know.”

Of course he knew. He wasn’t stupid. And Eddie wasn’t stupid, either. All he could do was keep rubbing comforting circles into his friend’s shoulder and respecting his silence.

Jake never called back.

Although it didn’t end well, none of them could deny it was serious. Before that, Eddie couldn’t imagine Richie actually liking someone. He wasn’t exactly the kind of person who would give up his eternal childhood to satisfy all the expectative of a formal relationship. Sure, he was capable of wanting —his whole summer was about oral sex, anyway—, but the deep desire of being with someone didn’t seem like something he could feel.

Jake proved Eddie wrong. Richie had feelings just like anyone. The kind of feelings you would expect from any teenager. Eddie realized he never stopped seeing Richie as the sarcastic, dirty kid he grew up with. He also found out that hearing him talking about how he wanted to get into somebody’s pants, didn’t feel as shocking and wrong as picturing him wanting to wrap his arms around a waist from behind and resting his chin on a shoulder.

What was Richie’s type, anyway? Did he really had a type? What made Jake different from all the boys he had met in his life? How could Richie like someone who was funnier than him? Wouldn’t he feel humiliated? Or was it all because Jake was tall? Did Richie like basketball players? If Richie met another guy who was funny and tall and a good kisser, would he fall again?

Eddie didn’t mean to ask himself all of these questions, but he couldn’t help but think about them every time he tried to close his eyes and sleep. The only conclusion he got from all this wondering was that Richie’s type was a guy. Simple as that. That was the secret.

So Richie dating someone a year after wouldn’t be that alarming. Except for the fact that that someone was a girl.

Nobody knew when it started. Richie was very private about it and not even Beverly was aware of his relationship. But most of them noticed weird things before it was made public.

The first signal was when they were standing in the line of the cafeteria and a group of girls stopped behind them. At the start, they didn’t paid them no mind, but after a short time, they heard them giggling.

Although it was obvious they were trying to hide their amusement, they weren’t doing a good job and soon their voices turned into a choir of hysterical and poorly controlled laughs.

“There,” One of them whispered, “The one in glasses.”

“Oh, my God,” Another one giggled.

“Shut up, you idiots,” Said a third girl, even if she was taking part of the fun.

Eddie felt his blood burning. It wasn’t unusual for them being the brunt of constant jokes, but there wasn’t anything subtle about the way those girls were acting. For all he knew, they may very well be sharing those stupid rumors about Richie and Bev, and they didn’t care about respect enough for trying to be more discrete.

All of the Losers noticed too. Mike turned around and gave them a serious, but yet sympathetic look.

“You need something?” He asked.

The girls stared between the others and giggled again. The taller one dared to answer.

“No, we’re fine, thank you.”

Mike solemnly nodded and took his tray, ready to go and find a table. Now Richie was closer to the group, too focused on choosing his dessert for notice the way he seemed to be the topic of their conversation.

Eddie quietly observed how one of the girls pointed at Richie, while her gaze travelled to the opposite side of the room. To a particular table. She smiled and winked, as her friends kept laughing.

He tried to see who was the receiving of the comment, but his short stature and how the cafeteria was full of people and the line was moving didn’t allow him to find out.

“Eds,” Richie, who had already made his decision, was standing a few feet away with his tray and an impatient look, “Are you gonna stand there the whole lunch or what?”

Eddie looked at the girls again. Now they looked serious and quiet, like they didn’t even know each other. He turned back to Richie.

“Shut the fuck up,” He said, taking his own tray and hurrying to follow him.

It happened again a few times. Those girls couldn’t be around them without whispering that secret joke that had something to do with Richie. And it soon extended to a couple of people who haven’t even noticed his existence before.

A certain day, it reached an unexpected height when the Losers were standing next to Ben’s locker, waiting for him to get all of his books, and one of these out-of-nowhere laughers and her friends walked besides them and stared directly at Richie.

“Hi, Romeo,” She casually said, gaining more giggles and even some ‘oh, my God, you really said that’ from the rest of the group.

“What was that?” Stan frowned in confusion once they had left.

Everybody turned at Richie, silently interrogating him. He limited to shrug.

“How am I supposed to know?” He replied, glowering, “Maybe they just find me that hot.”

He shrugged again. They were planning to keep digging for an actual answer, but Ben got the rest of his books just in time and they didn’t have any option but to head to their classrooms.

Eddie told himself to forget about the whole thing. Even though he knew it was stupid, he couldn’t stop turning it over in his head. Definitely, those girls didn’t want Richie. There wasn’t any flirting intention to the way they talked to him. It was more like a mockery. But why would they do that? Richie wasn’t attractive at all and that never been a secret. Why would they wait so long for start making fun of him for not having dates?

The answer came sooner than later. As he walked to his classroom, he realized Richie and Bev were going in the same direction, just a few steps behind. And they were talking.

“Are you sure that’s it?” She said, a knowing smile audible in her tone.

“Yeah, why not? It’s a very natural reaction,” He responded.

Beverly stayed quiet for a few seconds.

“Fuck, what is this? The Holy Inquisition? I don’t know!” Richie kept defending himself.

“Oh, well, I thought you may have an idea…”

“What are you implying?”

“You see, I saw the most interesting thing today…” Her voice revealed pure evilness.

“And what was that?” Richie sounded plainly exasperated at this point.

Beverly took her time to let air fill her lungs before exhaling the magic spell.

“Fran Cobb.”

Eddie got tense at the mention of the name, and he could feel Richie also got tense behind him. He didn’t recognize who Fran Cobb was, but such a powerful energy emerged from the only implication of her existence that he felt immediately overwhelmed by it.

He suddenly understood how private this conversation was, how full of meaning it was getting, and he realized he shouldn’t be listening. But he couldn’t un-hear it. He just couldn’t. He had to know what was so interesting, so important about that mysterious presence in Richie’s life. So he slowed his steps down just enough to get closer to his friends without them noticing it.

“What about her?” Richie questioned.

Yeah, Eddie thought. What about her?

“Nothing special,” Bev continued, “I just sat behind her at Biology today and, I could almost swear, she was wearing an… oversized Hawaiian shirt?”

Eddie heard Richie gulping.

“A woman with good taste,” He casually replied.

“That’s what I thought,” Beverly chuckled, “By the way, where’s your shirt?”

“I didn’t wear a shirt today.”

“Richard…”

“What?”

“Nothing,” She sighed, carefree, “Romeo.”

Then, she speed her walking up and passed by Eddie’s side, giving him a side smile. He hurried to pretend he was tying his shoes and barely reached to see Richie half-running and half-waddling to follow his best friend, ignoring him and mumbling excuses for the fact that Fran Cobb, whoever she was, was indeed wearing his shirt.

Richie didn’t say a word until two weeks later. Two weeks full of cancelled plans of hanging out or doing something together, coming up with lots of explanations that seemed to get more and more ridiculous as they days passed by. Two weeks of the question of ‘what were you doing the other day?’ going vaguely answered or practically ignored. Two weeks of getting extra suspicious every time Bill talked about Audra, the girl he was dating.

But it all had to come to an end and, when it happened, it wasn’t Eddie or Beverly who were informed first. For some reason, Richie decided to trust Ben about what was going on. Or, in better words, he had no other option.

Noticing how weird Richie was acting recently, Ben managed to meet him alone and have a heart-to-heart talk. He wasn’t pressuring him or forcing him to open up, he just wanted to make sure his friend was doing well, and it surprised him to find out Richie needed to be honest about the matter more than anything.

Nobody knew what was said in that conversation, but it proved to be very effective because, two days later, Richie sat at their habitual table at the cafeteria and formally announced it.

“So,” He started, pretending to be focused on his piece of chicken, “You know Fran Cobb?”

All of the Losers considered the name for a little while, except Eddie, who didn’t feel comfortable with thinking about it, and Bev, who looked ready to burst out laughing.

“I-isn’t she in th-the D-Drama Club?” Bill ventured to guess, “A-Audra had mentio-mentioned her a f-few times.”

“Yeah,” Richie confirmed, so quickly it was clear he was nervous, “Yeah, she is.”

“Cool, so, what about her?” Stan asked.

Richie left out a sigh, as he was preparing to speak in public for the first time in front a crowd of a thousand people.

“Well,” He started, “I mean, don’t get super… It’s no big deal, just…”

“They’re dating,” Bev interrupted, rolling her eyes.

Their friends stayed in silence, looking between the others in search of a hint this was a bizarre dream, as Richie’s face turned red. He almost dropped his fork and hurried to recover his hold of it before it fell.

“No,” He instantaneously said, “Not exactly. I mean, I don’t know, it’s not…” The confusion in everyone’s faces told him he needed to explain himself better, “Nobody said the word ‘dating’, we’re just… We haven’t fucked yet, but we do kiss and go out and…”

“ Date ,” Beverly whispered, like it was some kind of big epiphany.

“Is she deaf?” Stan joked.

“Fuck you, Stanley,” Richie bitterly answered.

“Well, as long as you’re happy, I’m happy for you,” Mike smiled.

“W-when will you intro-introduce us?” Bill enquired with kind curiosity.

“Shit, I don’t know, Big Bill,” His friend teased, “Like, she thinks I’m so cool and amazing and hot. What would she think if she knew I hang out with a bunch of losers?”

All of them laughed, even if Eddie didn’t find the joke that funny.

“Our little boy is growing up,” Bev said in a high-pitched voice, putting her arms around Richie and shaking him a bit.

“Sorry, Marsh,” He smirked, “I know you’re disappointed, but you’ll find a man for you someday,” He brought the fork to his lips and didn’t bother to swallow the food before adding, “Hanscom, for example, is still single.”

Now it was Ben’s time to blush, but the topic didn’t stay around enough for it to become a problem. Eddie imagined Richie and Ben talking about their crushes, about how stunning the girls they liked were, as they were best friends, as Ben had the right to know before anyone what was going on. As Richie was straight.

At the end, no one talked about meeting his girlfriend for a while. They just started excusing him when he couldn’t be with them and moved on. Eddie felt stupid for not being able to ignore it, like everybody else did.

His mother always said love could save almost anyone. She always talked about how beneficial finding a good wife could be for men who dealt with ‘deviations’. When he was a kid, every time he complained about people making fun of him for being too small or too weak, she would say the he’d grow up and find someone who allowed him to be normal, to be healthy . Of course she realized her mistake a few years later and changed to the ‘I’m the only person who loves you’ tactic, but Eddie knew what the truth was.

However, he felt inexplicably betrayed by Richie’s change of heart about his sexuality and how he was managing it. It wasn’t like he would have enjoyed listening, but at least an effort for talking to him about it first would have been appreciated. It felt almost like an insult that Richie wouldn’t mind to tell him about his blowjob summer with all the dirty details, and still he didn’t trust him enough to let him know he had a girlfriend.

After all the trouble they went through, after the 3:00 AM talks, even after the college party —as rude and hurtful it was to think about that right now—, finding out Richie was forgetting all of that just for a girl seemed unfair. Eddie couldn’t un-hear his sobs, Eddie couldn’t retire that hug when they were fourteen, Eddie couldn’t forget the gentle pressure of that college guy’s lips against his own, and he couldn’t forgive himself for not even remembering his name when he saved him from hell itself.

Richie was getting over everything. No matter how hard life hit him, he would always fall in his two feet, like a fucking, lucky cat . He didn’t have to face consequences, he didn’t have to take responsibilities for the choices he made. He could always take it all back and move on, and no one would ever say anything. Nobody cared. Eddie was the only one who did. Even Beverly was worried for just a few days after the party incident, when that was still everything Eddie could think about three years later.

He shouldn’t care about Richie. Richie didn’t need anyone to protect him. Everything was a reversible joke for him, an endless comedy show that went from one act to another burning the ones that stayed behind. The rest of the Losers knew, and Eddie had to learn it, too.

But he couldn’t. Not caring wasn’t in his nature. And, most of all, he felt curious. If it was true that the perfect girl could save the sickest man alive, he needed to know who could be the perfect girl for Richie. So he grabbed his yearbook, flipped through the pages until he was at the Drama Club part and started searching in the photographs.

The only faces he could recognize were Audra’s and the insufferable group of people who would giggle whenever they saw Richie. It was obvious they were Fran’s friends and they knew she was seeing him. Eddie frowned at the thought of Richie’s girlfriend divulging their relationship while he was clearly not ready to make it public.

The central picture showed the whole club sitting at the stands of the football camp, around the old, bohemian woman who was their teacher. Eddie quickly examined the list of names and it didn’t take him too long to find the name that still managed to make his stomach turn. Francine Cobb . She was sitting at the first row, only two seats away from the teacher.

He was nearly disappointed. She wasn’t ugly, not at all, but she also didn’t look like the kind of girl who would have Richie going crazy for her. Even though the blonde, wavy hair falling over the shoulders was considered attractive most of the time, hers looked grungy in a very Courtney Love-style that he didn’t find nice. Her pale face seemed too round and childish, even when her features weren’t unappealing, and her full lips felt like almost too much, just like Richie’s did.

In addition, her figure couldn’t decide between growing up into a woman’s body or stick to childhood. Respectable breasts raised under the dimer overall —‘typical cool kid clothes’, Eddie cynically thought—, but she didn’t have an actual, defined shape aside them. Her legs and arms seemed too long for the rest of her constitution and the way she sat, slightly arching her back, gave her a funny appearance.

If Eddie was confused before, he was definitely astonished now. The other pictures showed Fran as a very joyful person, always smiling in that open way that built winkles around her eyes, always throwing her head back when she laughed, always sitting in the floor with her legs crossed or taking the stage to make everyone cackle.

What did Richie see in her? He was so disgusted by girls like this when he was younger. Girls who worked so hard for being funny, and to fit in. Actually, he was disgusted by any kind of girl who wasn’t opening her legs in the centerfold of a dirty magazine. And those girl didn’t exist in the real world.

But there was Fran. The girl from the Drama Club. The girl who had hobbies and went to school with them. The girl who laughed out loud and showed emotions aside of pretending to be turned on by a camera. She had a name, a house in their town, and a personality. She was a complete human being. And she was Richie’s girlfriend.

Eddie felt sad for her and didn’t know why. He hoped Richie would never introduce them, because he knew that as soon as he was were face to face with her, he couldn’t hide it anymore. And he didn’t know what he was hiding, either. All he could tell was that he felt sad, disappointed.

He felt betrayed.

Taglist: @beepbeepbeleven @irl-tozier (please let me know if I forgot about someone or if someone else wants to be added)

[theitsybitsyspideyboy-blog]

Prompt List #2 (D-H)

Send a request with the number(s) and which prompt list it's from if you don't give me the prompt list I will just assume its from #1. and also Give me the character you want!  

[Example request]: Can I please have a number 2 & 72 from prompt list #7 for peter parker where the reader finds out Pete’s spiderman

You can send in your own prompt(s) or just send in a request without one. these are here to use at your leisure (Most of these are not mine. Credit goes to those who made them.) I Do Mostly Peter Parker for now but I will accept requests for other Avengers.   I am constantly adding to this list so check back later for new ones. This is prompt #2 (D-H)

I do not take smut requests even if some prompts sound slightly dirty. I do not do personal requests meaning I use (y/n) instead of an actual name. There may be some repeat prompts but bare with me I’m trying to clean them up. Thanks enjoy!!!!!!

There are 289 prompts in this list

D-did I ever tell you how beautiful your eyes are?"

Daddy, how did you and mommy fall in love?"

Damn, when did y/n get hot?"

Damn, you’re strong for a little thing."

Damned if I do, damned if I don’t."

Dance with me!"

Dance with me."

Dance with me? But there’s no music!"

Dear Diary, …"

Define normal."

Despite what you think, I am completely capable of taking care of myself"

Detention? again?"

Diamonds."

Did I ever tell you how beautiful your eyes are?"

Did it ever occur to you that you’re hurting me too?"

Did someone eat half of the cookies?!?"

Did someone spike the eggnog?"

Did you actually get a Santa suit?"

Did you actually just climb in through my window? You couldn’t have been normal and used the door?"

Did you buy me… lingerie?"

Did you do something different with your hair?"

Did you do this to yourself?"

Did you get my text?"

Did you have to sneeze in my face?"

Did you hear that?"

Did you just call that alligator by name?"

Did you just casually throw an ax?"

Did you just fall? No, I attacked the floor. I’m freaking talented!"

Did you just flick me?"

Did you just go throw up?"

Did you just hiss at me?"

Did you just see that?"

Did you know they used to be called ‘Jumpolines’ until your mum jumped on one?"

Did you need something?"

Did you read it?"

Did you see my phone?"

Did I actually sleep through New Years?"

Didn’t you read the sign?"

Disgusting."

Do I get bonus points if I act like I care?"

Do I have to ask you again?"

Do I look like I’ve moved on?"

Do I regret it? Yes. Would I do it again? Probably."

Do it. I dare you."

Do it. Take a chance, I’m begging you. You don’t want to spend the rest of your life wondering what could have been."

Do not tempt me."

Do that again."

Do us a favor… I know it’s difficult for you… but please, stay here, and try not to do anything… stupid."

Do we have to kiss at midnight?"

Do we have to?"

Do we like…hold hands now?"

Do you believe in aliens?"

Do you believe in ghosts?"

Do you believe in love?"

Do you ever chill?"

Do you hate me?"

Do you have a problem with me?"

Do you have a ride home?"

Do you know what's funny?"

Do you like it?"

Do you need that much candy?"

Do you promise?"

Do you really need all that candy?"

Do you really need those?"

Do you think I’m scared of a woman?"

Do you think other species have their own kind of drugs? Like something that gets them high?"

Do you think you can teach me that?"

Do you treat all your hookups like this?"

Do you trust me?"

Do you two still talk?"

Do you wanna Build a-"-Absolutely not."

Do you want me to accept you as you are, or do you want me to lie to myself and try to like you?"

Do you want this?"

Do you want to kiss as bad as I do right now"

Do you want to kiss as bad as I do right now?"

Do you want to kiss me as badly as I want to kiss you right now?"

Do your parents even realize they’re living proof that two wrongs don’t make a right?"

Do yourself a favor and ignore anyone who tells you to be yourself. Bad idea in your case."

Does it Hurt?"

Does this make me some kind of hero?"

Dogs don’t wear clothes!"

Don't call this number again."

Don’t argue. Just do it."

Don’t be a smart ass."

Don’t be afraid."

Don’t be embarrassed, it’s normal."

Don’t be scared, I’m right here."

Don’t come back."

Don’t cry."

Don’t deny it"

Don’t die on me– Please."

Don’t drink that! I saw that guy slip something in there!"

Don’t fuck this up."

Don’t give me that puppy dog face.  How am I supposed to say no to that?"

Don’t leave me. Don’t you dare leave me."

Don’t leave me…"

Don’t let the negativity get to ya! Here, have a flower!"

Don’t let your mind wander, it’s far too small to be let out on its own."

Don’t lie to me."

Don’t look at me like that."

Don’t look for any redeeming qualities. I don’t have any."

Don’t look in her eyes, she might steal your soul."

Don’t make me come over there myself!"

Don’t make me pop your ten grand sandbags, honey."

Don’t make me regret this."

Don’t make me tape your mouth shut."

Don’t mind if I do."

Don’t open those till later!"

Don’t play me for a fool, I know exactly where you were."

Don’t pretend I didn’t just see what you were doing."

Don’t promise me you won’t leave. Just don’t leave. I don’t think I can handle another promise right now."

Don’t say another word."

Don’t say that."

Don’t sell yourself short."

Don’t start with that again."

Don’t talk. Please."

Don’t tell me to shut up."

Don’t tell me we’re in matching costumes AGAIN."

Don’t test me."

Don’t thank me for insulting you. It was my pleasure."

Don’t touch me."

Don’t try to fix me. I’m not broken."

Don’t worry about it."

Don’t worry, you’ve got me to take care of you."

Don’t you dare say/do that to me."

Don’t you dare touch _______!"

Don’t you dare!"

Don’t you ever change."

Don’t you get it? I’m in love with you and it scares the hell out of me."

Don’t you give up on me."

Don’t you just hate those things you say that make you feel really blonde?"

Don’t you just love it!"

Don’t you know how to knock?"

Don’t you love me?"

Don’t you realize that there are already enough people to hate in the world without you putting in so much effort to give us another?"

Don’t you think this is too much Fall decorations?"

Don’t you think you’re a little too old to be using cheesy pickup lines?"

Don’t you think you’ve done enough?"

Don’t you trust me?"

Drop the attitude."

Easier said than done."

Eggnog rules, bite me."

Eggnog sucks, fight me."

Enough with the sass!"

Even when we were kids, I always kicked your ass!"

Every day I get with you is a good day."

Everyone gets so annoyed by how much I talk about you sometimes."

Everyone’s entitled to act stupid one in a while, but you really abuse the privilege."

Everything is fine."

Ew, that is so sappy, I might vomit."

Excuse me. I have to go make a scene."

Excuse me?"

F-Fuck."

Fair enough."

Feed me that chocolate I’m busy"

Finally! Snow!"

Fine, don’t say anything and make me worry."

Fine."

First one to make a noise loses."

First rule, no being a heathen."

First second I saw you and I couldn’t get over how beautiful you were."

Flea markets don’t carry fleas, you know?"

For starters, that’s impossible."

For the last time, I AM NOT JEALOUS!"

Forget it."

Forget the douche. He’s a dick. He’s a dickdouche."

Forgive me. Not for my sake, for yours. Forgive me."

Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn."

Fuck you"

Fuck- please just pretend to be my date until we can leave this joint?"

Fuzzy socks."

Generally speaking, you aren’t learning much when your lips are moving."

Get away from me."

Get it away from me- that’s disgusting!"

Get out of here! This is my hiding spot!"

Get out of my way!"

Get out!"

Get over it, pussy."

Get that thing away from me!"

Get your hands off of me!"

Ghost hunters."

Ghosts are real, I’d know because I am one."

Gingerbread people are very serious!"

Girls night in?"

Give it back!"

Give me a chance."

Give me a reason not to turn around and walk away now."

Give me anime or give me death."

Give me back my phone!"

Give me that back!"

Go ahead and hit me."

Go back to bed."

Go back to sleep."

Go fuck yourself."

Go home."

Go on, knock his teeth down his throat."

Go on… Touch it."

God, you always make me blush so damn much."

Going somewhere?"

Good story, but in what chapter do you shut the fuck up?"

Good thing I didn’t ask for your opinion."

Good, bad, I’m the one with the gun."

H-how long?"

Haha, made you look."

Haha. Nice try. Magic isn’t REAL."

Half the time I get too embarrassed to say anything."

Halloween decorating.

Halloween is better."

Happy Birthday."

Happy Festivus!"

Happy New Year’s Eve eve eve eve eve eve eve!"

Have fun being deal.I will."

Have I mentioned, I fucking hate Halloween."

Have you ever had those days when you are holding a stick and everybody looks like a pinata."

Have you ever heard of personal space?"

Have you ever heard of what happened in this building?"

Have you ever tried to run in heels?"

Have you got your speaker on you?"

Have you lost your mind?"

Have you seen my glasses?"

Have you seen my… oh"

Having you as a best friend is simultaneously the best and worst thing that has happened to me."

He already boarded the plane. We’re too late."

He already knows."

He did what- and you just let him off?!"

He yelled yeehaw and I’m not quite sure why."

He/She did it.No he/she did."

He/She kissed me" Who?" "___"

Heaven won’t take me and hell’s afraid I’ll take over."

Help me hide!"

Help me I’m stuck."

Help me pack or get out. You’re in the way."

Here take my sweater."

Here, let me help you."

Here, take my blanket."

Here’s my number, call me some time."

Hey! Don’t do that! You can’t do that to me!"

Hey, at least you tried."

Hey, hey, calm down. They can’t hurt you anymore."

Hey, I know you’re hurting.. but, you’re not alone, okay?"

Hey, um, can you not pretend to play the drums on pots and pans at 3am?"

Hey, what would my name be if I was a Pokémon?"

He’s a fuckboy and he’s never going to treat you better than this."

He’s dead because of you."

He’s dead."

His finger was right on the trigger but he wasn’t fast enough."

Hold me and never let me go."

Hold me. Just for a bit, okay? I just… I need someone to hold me."

Hold my hand until it’s over?"

Hold still."

Hot, gorgeous, beautiful…whatever you want to call it."

How about you make me?"

How am I meant to hate you when you look like that?"

How are you feeling today?"

How can you say that to me? After everything you did, how can you possibly say that to me?"

How can you still look so attractive while crying."

How come you’re here? I thought the zoo is closed at night…"

How could I ever forget about you?"

How could I forget?"

How could someone make food this badly?"

How could this happen? They’re so…so pure. Ugh."

How could you ask me that?"

How could you do this to me?"

How could you do this?"

How could you forget your son’s birthday?"

How dare you? Yes, I am."

How did I lose it?"

How did it take me so long to realize?"

How did we get here?"

How did you fail a survey?"

How did you get here? Did someone leave your cage open."

How did you get in here?"

How did you imagine our future together?"

How did you know where to find me?"

How did you know? I never told you, so how’d you find out?"

How do I know that I can trust you?"

How do I look?"

How do we get in?"

How do you always manage to look so captivating?"

How do you do that? Are you a witch? What type of witchcraft is this?"

How do you get your skin to be so soft?"

How drunk was I?"

How is my wife more badass than me?"

How much did you drink?"

How much money would you give me to flip this table, right here, right now, in the middle of class?"

How ‘bout you stick it up your ass instead?"

“How’s life treating you?” “Like I ran over its dog."

Hug me so I can Get warm."

Hurry up, before we regret it."

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