#Fabric Roll Measuring Machine

[airybcby]

જ⁀♡⊹｡° thinking, counting all the hours you wait

( alexis ness x fem! reader )

♡ a/n — part six in my seven petals, all poison series!! ( masterlist )

♡ word count — 1k

♡ content — alexis ness x fem! reader, obsessed! ness, designer! reader, jealousy (ness), obsession (ness), unrequited feelings, not love- infatuation?, reader wants to be friends, ness wants more, not proofread!

♡ synopsis — You’re a designer hired to develop new merch for Bastard München, working closely with the players to reflect their personalities in your designs. Alexis Ness finds himself drawn to your presence—your insight, your laughter, your time—and begins to crave more. Too much more.

── .✦ you know it's good to be tough like me, but i will wait forever

The first time Alexis Ness sees you, you’re holding a sketchbook and standing in front of Michael Kaiser, speaking confidently and jotting things down while Kaiser gives vague, smug input. 

Ness doesn’t usually pay attention to outside contractors, but something about the way you move, the way your eyes light up when you talk about fabric cuts and “brand identity,” makes him pause.

You’re not just another staff member. You’re real. Creative. Alive in a way that draws him like sugar.

You’re there to design the new line of Bastard München merch, and Noa had told everyone to cooperate—meetings, interviews, and even the possibility of signed collaborations.

Ness had rolled his eyes at first. But now?

Now he’s wondering what you’ll say when you ask him what Bastard München means.

You’re not supposed to have favorites, but Alexis is surprising.

He’s polite, measured, and unexpectedly thoughtful.

When you ask about the team’s colors, he talks about contrast.

When you ask what he’d wear, he leans in close and asks, “What would you want to see me in?”

It’s teasing, but not quite flirtatious. More curious. Like he genuinely wants your opinion.

Wants to understand the you behind the clipboard and the sharp tailoring.

Your meetings become regular—longer than they need to be. At first, he offers tea from the vending machine.

Then it becomes specialty drinks he brings from local cafés. You always say you’re fine with water, but Ness insists.

“Let me spoil you a little,” he says once, almost too quiet for you to hear.

You laugh it off, brushing your hand against his wrist as you take the drink. Neither of you mentions the way your fingers linger.

The turning point is subtle.

A loose thread on your sleeve. You tug it, frustrated, and Alexis reaches across the table, brushing your hand away gently.

“You’ll ruin the seam,” he murmurs, carefully twisting the thread back in place before pressing his thumb to it.

That night, he texts you for the first time without any professional reason.

Alexis: Let me know when you get home safe.

You do. And after that, it becomes routine.

You don’t notice the shift at first. How he always seems to be the one scheduling meetings now. How he volunteers to stay behind after practice just in case you need someone to test fits or model new cuts.

But Alexis notices.

He notices everything.

You make him feel full. Of something he didn’t know he’d been starving for.

He watches the way you speak to others—Isagi, Kunigami, even Kaiser—and feels his jaw tighten. They don’t deserve your attention like he does. They don’t see you the way he does.

Ness starts arriving early to meetings. Staying late. He sends you music recs. Brings you things—little gifts. A charm he saw in a boutique that “reminded him of you.” A book you mentioned in passing. Snacks you’ve never asked for.

Your boundaries blur before you even realize they’re softening.

“You’re always taking care of me,” you say one day, smiling at him. “You really don’t have to.”

But Alexis only tilts his head.

“I want to.”

He overdoes it. Slowly. Steadily.

He starts hovering during practice. Peeking into rooms where he knows you’re working. Dropping by your desk under the guise of “checking samples.” The others tease him, but he doesn’t care. He just laughs, all sugary smiles.

Then one afternoon, he walks in and sees you laughing at something Kaiser says.

That smile. That look in your eyes. Ness freezes.

It’s his.

It should be his.

He ghosts you for a few days.

No messages. No visits.

When he finally does text, it’s clipped.

Alexis: Sorry. Was busy.

You give him space, but it gnaws at you. When he finally shows up again, you find him in the locker room, sitting alone, eyes tired.

“You okay?” you ask, crouching beside him.

He looks at you—truly looks—and then his hand reaches for yours. Fingers curling too tight.

“I don’t want to share you.”

You blink, startled. “Alexis…”

“I know I shouldn’t say that.” His voice trembles, and it hits you then���he’s not just obsessed. He’s drowning in it. “But I hate when you’re not with me.”

“Alexis, I was never—”

“You are, though.” His voice hardens. “You act like this is just a job, but it’s not. Not for me. You made me believe—”

“I didn’t make you believe anything.”

The silence after is sharp. Wounding.

His eyes narrow just slightly, the sweetness peeling back like a mask slipping.

“No,” he whispers. “You just let me.”

Alexis Ness doesn’t understand temporary.

“You don’t get it,” he continues, voice shaking now, standing in the doorway of your shared design room. “You made me want more.”

“Alexis—”

“You gave me a taste and then decided I don’t get to have the whole thing?” he asks, stepping closer. “That’s not how it works. You started this.”

You realize then that it’s not love. Not even infatuation.

It’s hunger.

He wants all of you—the time, the praise, the attention. Not because he cherishes it, but because he can’t bear the idea of not having it. Of not owning it. Of not consuming it completely.

You take distance. You stop replying late at night. You ask Ego to assign another player to help finish the final part of the line. Alexis doesn't fight it, not out loud.

But the next time you see him at a team event, his eyes follow you the whole time.

You’re in a corner, quietly talking to someone from PR. And he watches you. Drinks you in.

Not like a man looking at someone he loves.

Like a man starving all over again.

He texts you again, long after the project ends.

Alexis: You ruined me, you know.

Alexis: But I’d still wear anything you designed.

Alexis: Just say the word.

You never respond.

But the next Bastard München campaign? The one featuring Alexis Ness?

He wears a bracelet you left on the meeting table. Barely noticeable.

Except to him.

It’s the only thing he keeps from you. And he never takes it off.

i know it's short but it is so hard to write someone as the embodiment of gluttony but not LITERAL gluttony yk?

likes, comments, and reblogs are appreciated!

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⋆.˚✮ 2025 ©airybcby ✮˚.⋆

[miss-multi45]

Death Warden

Eyeless Jack x Fem!Reader

cw: horror obvi, mentions of dead bodies, my attempt at suspense, masturbation in a way, reader has a cool dad (based off mine), gore mentions, graveyard, yurr. based off the mortuary assitant, the house is basically a yassified version of the one in the eyeless jack game on roblox. i will be contaminating this with british energy, but it's based in Canada. this is my take on ej with my headcanons.

When you woke up, Dad was already gone. He had left you a cup of tea and a note.

'At work, be back late, love you. Dad xx.'

Good thing you had a busy day, otherwise you'd just be sat around doing nothing. Starting with a shower while you sipped your tea, making sure not to get any soapy water in the tea.

Afterwards, you tucked a corner of the towel under the fabric on your chest, emptying a load of washing in the machine. You leaned over the washer, enjoying the scent of the amber and spiced pear laundry detergent you had bought after telling your Dad you wouldn't.

It was only close to the end of the cycle you noticed how conveniently your crotch was placed, right against the corner of the machine. It couldn't hurt, especially since it was practically calling you.

You almost flinched at the feeling of the rough vibrations against your clit, slowly grinding your hips on the edge of it. Even through a towel, the jumps and trembles of the washing machine was making your breath hitch. Soon, your orgasm had come. A small wet patch on the towel that could easily be fixed.

You got dressed, throwing on a cardigan for good measure since the temperature was unpredictable this time of year. Hopefully it would be warmer, considering cleaning headstones in the rain wasn't going to help with the lichen scraping.

A few commissions had popped into your email overnight, people sending you requests to fix up their deceased relatives' graves'. A bit of backstory and a name, so you knew the story of the person who's headstone you would be restoring, and an address of the cemetery.

After texting Dad and letting him know your schedule, you were on your way with the necessary cleaning supplies and the name of the cemetery in mind. It was a nice area of land, despite being riddled with graves and stone statues of weeping angels with quotes of love and sorrow engraved on the plaques below.

You set up at the grave, carefully placing the solutions, brushes, and hard plastic scrapers beside the headstone instead of on the land in front of it.

Ida Ernston

Beloved Mother and Wife

1895 - 1956

Or atleast from what you could read. From your point of view, it looked like it said she was born in 1395 rather than 1895. There was lichen over the latter half of the name on the headstone, so it read 'Ida Er on'.

You got started, scraping off the muck and clumps of moss from the stone, then using your hard bristled brush you got the tougher excess dirt off and rinsed the plaque with a special chemical solvent that wouldn't damage the stone.

After picking out the mud from the numbers and letters carved into the headstone, you gave it one final rinse before standing back to look at your handiwork. Now the grave was clean, the once brown and mossy stone was now back to grey.

There weren't many other plots to restore, and you ended your day early with a heft paycheck since your last cleaning site was a grave with an angel on the stone, the plot belonged to a dead police officer. Apparently known for his grit and perseverance, which meant you got more money than usual.

-

It was still light when you got home, and the weather had been on your side. The sun was out, so a book in the back garden was your reward for spending your day in cemeteries.

Halfway through your chapter, you felt your phone buzz. But the sound of the ping was drowned out by incoming rumbling of Dad's motorbike. He rolled into the car port, kicking the little metal rod that balanced his bike down, flicking the kill switch and coming over to give you a peck on the cheek.

"Good day?" You asked, watching him hang his jacket up and store his helmet on the kitchen table.

"Good as it gets, Julie's nephew just turned four." He replied, sticking the kettle on and grabbing a mug and a decaf tea bag. There wasn't much to his job, as a grave cleaner you felt the two of you had similar occupations.

"Matthew?" You remembered, as Julie's brother was one of your past graves to fix. Matthew was a sweet little thing, at least from the videos you'd seen.

"That's the one." Dad called from inside the kitchen, "Wanted to see a picture of the bike."

Dad was probably the coolest morgue worker ever, riding around on a motorbike with his tacky solar system braces keeping his oddly casual denim trousers in place.

"How were the graves? Any ghosts come to thank you?" The sound of the kettle hissing as the hot water touched the equally hot metal made you give up reading, bookmarking where you'd gotten to and putting the book down.

You laughed, "Not today, but I got a little extra money for cleaning a headstone." His 'ooh' was code for 'do tell'.

"Micheal DeVito. A police officer with a weeping angel on his grave. I had to clean that up, too." Dad sat down on the chair across from you, watching the magpies mingle as he drunk his tea.

"Oh, yeah. I worked on his body when he died." He replied, his tone conveying that there was something memorable about it other than his name. The reality of being a grave cleaner and having a coroner Dad was that you would eventually clean headstones of the people he'd worked on.

"Sad, he was killed not too long after being appointed to a cult case." The way you and Dad talked about these things was the way anyone else would talk about dinner plans. "Poor guy," You muttered, "How'd he die?"

Dad squinted, racking his brains to recall the COD. "Blunt force trauma to the head, the murderer was never determined but it's possible he was a cult killing."

You pressed your lips together, shaking your head. "Damn. Is the cult still around?" Even though it was highly unlikely that you would be encountering them, it would help to know if they were still in action.

"Oh, god no. Some of the members are serving life in prison." He could tell you were a little paranoid, and was relived when the expression on your face loosened up. "The rest were killed."

-

The next morning, you got up just before Dad left for work. You made him a cup of tea in a flask, before sending him off with a hug. Since you had taken a shower yesterday, you decided to put a plait in to keep it neat and tidy.

Checking your new emails, there were three new commissions. An Albert Johnson, a June Adams, and a Jack Nyras. June and Albert were buried in the same cemetery, and Jack was in a countryside looking graveyard.

It was sunny as well today, with a lovely fresh breeze weaving through the trees in the cemetery. Albert's grave was first, and the most difficult to clean. A lot of lichen, and the muck in the birth and death date carvings almost snapped your bamboo sticks with how stubborn it was.

However, Jane's was just muddy. Only needing a bit of scrubbing and water to get it back to its original state. She seemed have been well-liked, as her headstone had a quote engraved into it. Not everyone got that privilege.

Finally, Jack Nyras. His was the cleanest, he even had a small bunch of daisies and forget-me-nots on his plot. It didn't really look like it needed cleaning, but his death was the most recent, so it was probably a way to honour him and keep his memory alive. He died young, only 23, barely making it past college.

Jack Nyras

Beloved Son and Boyfriend

1994 - 2017

It was his mother who had requested for his grave to be cleaned, and even though it was an email, she sounded melancholic. He was an only child, so she likely felt robbed after his death.

You always sent a reply to the people who commissioned you, letting them know it had been cleaned and thanking them for their email. But this time, you added a little extra to the reply, giving her your condolences and telling her that you liked the flowers she chose.

-

When Dad got home, you were refilling the small tanks of solvent and water the you used to rinse the headstones.

"Good day, pet?" He asked, giving you a squeeze and a peck on the cheek.

"Yeah, not many graves but the first one was a piece of work." You hummed, putting the portable hoses of water and solution back in the back of your 1965 Mustang.

"Hm, would I know who it is?" He plopped the bags of shopping on the kitchen counter, putting everything in its place.

"Unless you were born in the eighteenth century, I highly doubt it." You grabbed a tray of grapes, washing and drying them before sitting outside with them. "There is one you might know, Jack Nyras?"

Dad perked up, nodding solemnly as if it was too upsetting to even mention. "Worked on him, poor kid." That caught your attention.

"What?" You said, turning to look at him. "Why? What happened?" Dad finished unloading the shopping, sitting outside and sharing the grapes with you.

He paused before speaking, his tone low as if someone was listening. "He was the main victim of the cult." You brought your hand up to your mouth, a sudden understanding of why the email from his mother sounded so pitiful.

"Oh, god." You mumbled, thankful that you added a gentle compliment and condolences in the reply you send back to her. "His grave was the cleanest, and his mother put flowers next to it."

Dad smiled, happy to hear his memory was still alive. "He was a sweet kid, from what I heard. Like you, kept to himself. A medical student, wanted to be a surgeon."

You nodded, remembering that from the brief backstory his mother gave you. "Apparently he had a girlfriend, Jenny." Dad winced at the mention of her, which was a mistake since it made you nosy.

"Poor girl went missing a little after he died. Well, I say a little after. It was the same day, but the investigators were so focused on Jack, they forgot about the rest of the people involved." This kid had a hard life, her boyfriend was murdered and right after, she went missing? God, the poor thing.

"Her blood was found at the crime scene, but not enough to be considered horrific and it didn't trail off anywhere." Dad went on, but something about his statement caught your ear.

"Wait, why was everyone so focused on Jack? How bad of a murder was it to be the center of attention?" The look on Dad's face told you it wasn't pleasant, but he told you anyway.

"There was tar found in his eyes and mouth, probably to blind and stop him from screaming." You felt sick, what kind of cruel monster would do that to someone so young?

He quickly moved on, seeing how visceral your reaction was. "The cult was a bunch of college kids, the cops went through one of their notebooks and found out they were trying to sacrifice him to a thing called 'Chernobog'."

You thought back to last night, when he mentioned the cult with members of it murdered. "Were the cultists found dead?"

"Some of them, they had been ripped apart. They still don't know what happened, but the ones that weren't were in shock and covered in blood, admitted to prison psychiatric hospitals." You were thankful you weren't a coroner, at least cleaning graves didn't give you the gory details.

"That's good." Popping a grape in your mouth, Dad changed subjects and eventually it was time for bed.

-

While checking your new requests, you noticed one of the plots was in the same graveyard as Jack's grave. It was the furthest cemetery from home, so you went to that one last.

While you were restoring the last grave, you noticed a person standing in front of Jack's headstone, just stood staring down at it. It was a man, quite tall and broad, dressed in jeans and a black hoodie. It could be his father, visiting his son and thinking about him in silence.

You turned back to the grave you were cleaning, noticing that the man had seen the headstone looked freshly cleaned. He probably heard the scrubbing of your brush against the stone, because you could see out of the corner of your eye the man watching you, but getting up and leaving before it got creepy.

You discreetly watched him leave, noting how strangely large he was. Definitely over the 6-foot mark, and quite muscular. He could be a college friend of Jack's, as even though you didn't see his face he looked too young to be a father.

Over the next few days, you decided to do some research about it. Even though Dad had given you a lot of info already, you wanted to know the rest. Unfortunately, the websites didn't have much new knowledge. And it wasn't like you could just ask one of the people involved, right?

....

...Right?

[cassolotl]

Making a bag from a broken umbrella

A few years ago I saw a broken but cool umbrella on the side of the road. (The Welsh climate kills tens of thousands of umbrellas every month, it's very sad.) Someone had hand-stamped yellow bees onto a black umbrella and it looked badass. I rescued it with the intent to turn it into something cool, and recently I got around to it and succeeded:

It's a super-lightweight, fast-drying, very strong shopping bag. Umbrella fabric is perfect for this. The only part that didn't get used is the very tip of the umbrella, and there was enough fabric for TWO bags.

It was pretty easy and fun, so here I am to show you how I did it.

You will need:

Sewing machine (though you could do it by hand)

Broken umbrella with intact fabric

Stitch ripper, or tiny scissors, or big scissors and good fine motor control

Reel thread and bobbin thread that you think looks nice with the umbrella fabric

Pins

Set square

Tailor's chalk

Wide drawstring band type stuff for handles - about a metre? (Or you can make something from random fabric in your stash.)

Scissors

The chalk and ruler and stuff are pretty optional if you are happy to just eyeball it and hope for the best.

How to do it:

The bag bit

Remove the fabric from the umbrella frame. Take your stitch ripper or scissors and very carefully snip the stitches at the point of each umbrella spoke. You will then find that there is probably another set of stitches around halfway up each spoke, so cut those too. Then cut the fabric around the tip of the umbrella, because it's probably attached very securely.

Then fling the umbrella frame into a bin and never think about it again, or turn it into a cool spider sculpture.

Carefully remove the velcro fastening strap. We will need it later, so keep it all in one piece - use the stitch ripper or tiny scissors.

Cut the umbrella fabric in half. The umbrella will have an even number of segments, probably eight. It's tempting to cut it along a seam, but if it has eight segments it'll work better if you cut it along the middle of the opposite panels, like so:

Fold your semi-circle in half with the seams on the outside (right sides together), like this:

Roll-and-pin and sew the open side - this one:

Edit: I had someone ask me what roll-and-pin means, so I asked my sewing friend if it was obvious what I meant by it, and they said they were not sure! So, this is what I mean:

You fold in the edge, and then fold it in again, to make a little roll.

Then when you sew along the middle of the roll it catches and traps the raw edges. That way it can't fray or unravel.

Pinning this way (perpendicular to the edge instead of parallel to the edge) makes it easier to sew with a sewing machine because you're a bit less likely to bang your sewing machine needle into a pin. However, do take them out just before the needle gets there, or at least go slowly over the pins, if you can.

Trim the bottom off. How much you trim off will depend on how big your starting umbrella is and what shape you want your bag to be, but maybe 10cm or so?

Make a mark about 10cm from the bottom along one of the pre-existing seams.

Use a ruler (or a piece of string or whatever) to measure the distance along the pre-existing seam from the top corner to the mark.

Measure the same distance along the other seam from the other top corner, make another chalk mark.

Draw a line across the whole width of the quarter with the ruler, joining the marks. This should make the chalk line parallel with the top flat edge.

Make another line about 2cm below it, and then cut along the bottom line.

Then roll-and-pin and sew along the remaining chalk line.

Sew the side seams. Mark them on using the set square and the chalk, and then pin them and sew. Make the sides square with the top edge.

These triangles on the sides are going to become inside pockets, so also sew a square line along the bottom. That'll stop tiny things from getting stuck in the point of the triangle.

Sew the top edge of one pocket to the side of the bag. The bag is inside out at this point, so when you sew the pocket to the "outside" (wrong side) it'll end up inside the bag when you turn it right-side-out at the end.

I recommend pins for positioning the pocket. The stitches will show on the outside of the bag, so bear this in mind when choosing your thread. Try and keep everything nice and flat so there's no bunching; the triangle should fold over exactly on the vertical stitches along the side and then the pocket should lay flat against the side of the bag. Be careful to only sew through one side of the bag, and only through the adjacent side of the pocket.

Flip the bag over, and do the same on the other side.

The top left and right corners can be pretty weak because the ends of several seams meet there, so...

Roll the top over outwards and hem. That's wrong-sides-together.

That's the bag part finished!

Handles

Grab your wide drawstring fabric tape stuff. (Or, cut a really long rectangle 6-8cm wide, sew along the long open edge so it makes a tube that is open at both ends, and then turn the whole tube inside out so that the seam is on the inside.)

Choose how long your handles will be. This is a very personal choice. Do you want to carry it on your shoulder, or in your hand?

Or... both, like this Ikea bag??

It can help to pin them onto the bag to get a feel for what it'd be like to hold. Here's what we're approximately going for, with your bag inside out:

Add 3cm to the length of one handle, cut it, and then cut the second to match the length before you sew anything on.

The extra 3cm is because you're going to fold over 1.5cm at each end when you attach it, to stop it unravelling.

Pin one end of one handle. The bag should still be inside out, i.e. the "wrong side" is still facing outwards. First fold 1.5cm at the end of your handle, and then attach it about a third of the way along one side of the bag, on the wrong side. The 1.5cm flap should be tucked underneath itself, between the handle and the bag.

I often have to use two pins to keep the handle really square with the top edge.

Measure how far it is from the side seam, and pin the other end of the handle the same distance from the other side seam, being careful not to twist the tape.

Sew the handle to the bag. Start with a square, remove the pins without lifting the sewing machine foot or breaking the thread, and then sew a cross through the middle of the square. Sew over some stitches you've already done and then reverse over them, to make it really secure.

See how sewing the handle down secures and tightens the loose woven ends of the handle stuff:

Do the same on the other side of the bag with the other handle tape.

Fastening

Turn your bag right-side-out. Lay it flat and then fold it up the way you kind of instinctively want to when you're trying to pack it away really small.

Grab your little velcro fastening strap from earlier and play around to find a good place to put it. The back of the soft side of the velcro will get sewn onto the bag.

Grab your tailor's chalk and draw an arrow where the stitched-down end of the velcro is going to go, with the arrow pointing in the direction that the tape will be lying when you unfold it.

Flatten out your bag again, and pin the back of the soft end of the fastening strap down onto your arrow, with the flappy end lying in the direction of the arrow. Again, you may need to use two pins to keep it square. Make sure you only put the pins through one layer of bag fabric.

Use the same technique as you used with the handles to sew the fastening strap down.

YOU ARE NOW DONE.

Lay it down and roll it up and fasten it a few times and bask in smugness. You earned that dopamine, and you should enjoy it. Fill it with tins to test the strength and marvel at your handiwork.

You can also make a second bag with the other half of umbrella, if you're into that. It will be exactly the same, but without the little velcro fastening strap.

Optional:

Reblog with a photo of your new umbrella bag. :D

[misssparklingpaws]

Shadow in the Flame

Chapter 29: Echoes of sentry

The gym buzzed with movement and effort, each strike, shout, and thud echoing against steel and glass. Morning light filtered in through the high windows, catching on sweat-slick skin and the sharp edge of discipline.

Aria Stark stood on the raised walkway above the training floor, arms folded over her chest, her dark hoodie zipped to just below her ribs. At nineteen weeks, her bump was undeniable beneath the fabric, but her posture remained stiff, unyielding commander.

Her sharp gaze swept across the team.

“Yelena, tighter footwork. You’re telegraphing your attacks like a teenager with a crush.”

“Not true,” Yelena grunted, dodging Ava’s sweep.

“Then why is Ava smiling?” Aria shot back.

Ava smirked. “Because I like being right.”

Below, John Walker blocked Alexei’s punch with a grunt and countered. Aria called down, “Walker, your stance is sloppy. Shift your weight or go home.”

John rolled his eyes. “You don’t miss anything, do you?”

“Not unless I’m choosing to,” she said, and tapped something on the datapad in her hand. “And I’m not.”

Bob stood off to the side, arms crossed, quietly observing with barely restrained energy. He watched Aria as much as the training how her brows furrowed every time someone lost rhythm, how her hand instinctively braced against the railing whenever a sharp noise startled her. She hid it well, but he knew the signs. Something was off.

After the circuit wrapped, Aria’s voice rang through the space: “Hydrate. Ten-minute break. Then drills.”

The team dispersed in a mix of groans and grudging respect. Aria turned to step off the walkway, but her balance shifted.

The metal beneath her feet seemed to ripple. Her vision flickered. Her breath caught short.

Bob was there before she could steady herself.

“Hey,” he said, low and urgent, taking her elbow. “What is it?”

Aria blinked hard, then clutched the rail with her free hand. “I don’t… feel right.”

Bob’s eyes darkened with concern. “What kind of not right?”

“Dizzy. Sharp pain low in my abdomen. It came on fast.”

Without another word, he moved. One arm around her, steady, protective. “We’re going to Bruce. Now.”

---

The medical wing was prepped by the time they arrived. Bruce Banner stood waiting, eyes immediately flicking to Aria’s pale face and the way Bob practically carried her.

“What happened?” Bruce asked as Aria sat gingerly on the examination table.

“Pain. Pressure. Dizziness,” Aria replied, every word clipped but controlled. Her hoodie was unzipped now, exposing the black tank top stretched over her bump.

Bruce nodded, already rolling over the ultrasound machine. “Let’s have a look.”

Bob hovered beside her, fingers woven through hers, silent but visibly wound tight. Bruce applied the gel and began the scan, eyes narrowing as he adjusted the resolution and contrast.

On screen, the baby appeared, small, curled, heartbeat fluttering like a distant drum.

“Vitals are present. Growth is on track…” Bruce said slowly. Then his expression changed. “But… there’s something else.”

“What?” Aria asked, too fast.

Bruce enhanced the image, toggled to a secondary filter. Faint but unmistakable—the flicker of energy patterns around the fetus.

“There’s early manifestation of abnormal bio-signatures in the neural tissue. They’re faint, but measurable. It’s not ordinary cellular development.”

Bob’s breath hitched. “It’s the serum.”

Bruce hesitated, then nodded. “Yes. It’s mimicking patterns we’ve seen in you, Bob. Not fully formed, not stable, but it’s there. Meaning… some element of the Sentry serum has been passed to the fetus.”

Aria went still.

She hadn’t moved since the word neural was spoken.

“So what does that mean?” she asked, steel just under the calm.

“It means we need further analysis, cord blood sampling, cellular mapping. Right now, we’re not seeing distress. But the child’s DNA is… reacting. Mutating in a way we don’t fully understand.”

Bob stepped back like he’d been struck. “It’s my fault.”

“No,” Aria snapped, her voice suddenly sharp. “Don’t do that.”

Bob stared at her, pain in his eyes. “It’s the serum. My DNA. My mistake.”

“You’re not a mistake,” she said, softening, just slightly. “And neither is this child.”

Bruce quietly set down the probe. “We’ll monitor closely. No missions, no stress, no exertion. We’ll get answers within 48 hours.”

Aria nodded once. “Do what you have to.”

Bob sat on the edge of the exam table, elbows on his knees, hands clutched together like he could hold the world still with sheer force.

Aria stood a few feet away, arms crossed. She hadn’t said anything in several minutes. Just… watched him. Felt him crumble in silence.

He didn’t look at her. Couldn’t.

“I’m not even human,” he finally muttered. “Not really.”

Aria’s brows lowered slightly. “Bob”

“I mean it.” His voice cracked, brittle as glass. “I’m a science experiment with a ticking bomb inside. I never should’ve let myself want this, want you. I thought maybe if I held on tight enough, if I stayed good enough, it wouldn’t touch you. But it’s in her/him now. Our baby. The serum, the instability. The Void. I gave her that. I gave you that.”

He finally looked up at her, eyes shining and wrecked.

“I did this to you.”

Aria’s eyes didn’t soften. Not immediately. They stayed hard steel forged in grief and fire.

Then, slowly, she walked toward him.

“Get up,” she said.

Bob blinked. “What?”

“Stand up.”

He obeyed out of instinct. She stepped into his space, close enough that her belly brushed his shirt, and reached for his hands. Her fingers laced through his, grounding him.

“You didn’t do this to me,” she said quietly. “You did this with me.”

“But.”

“You think I didn’t know what came with you? You think I didn’t look at the serum reports, your psychological files, and every record SHIELD had buried in their archives before I let myself love you?”

Bob stared at her. “You looked me up?”

She arched an eyebrow. “I’m a Stark. Of course I did.”

He huffed a tiny, broken laugh. But the guilt still swam in his eyes.

Aria reached up and cupped his face in both hands. “You didn’t trick me, Bob. You didn’t curse me. You gave me something real. Something no one ever offered me without conditions.”

Her voice dropped, raw and honest. “You love me. All of me. Not Stark’s last name. Not the armor. Me. And now… we have this little chaos forming inside me. Maybe she’ll glow gold. Maybe she’ll shatter planets. Or maybe she’ll just cry too loud and hate vegetables. I don’t know yet.”

“She,” he whispered.

Aria hesitated, then gave him the faintest of smirks. “I like the odds.”

Bob’s chest stuttered, like the breath had just been punched out of him.

She pressed her forehead to his. “We are going to get through this. Together. On my terms. Got it?”

He nodded, swallowing hard. “I just… I don’t want to lose you.”

“You won’t,” she said, fierce and certain.

“Even if it gets worse?”

“Then we fight harder.”

Bob choked on a laugh that was almost a sob. “You’re so much stronger than me.”

Aria smiled really smiled, just a flicker. “I know.”

He leaned into her hands like they were the only safe place in the universe.

And for the moment, maybe they were.

---

Night fell quietly over the Tower, the skyline humming with distant lights and muffled traffic below. Inside their quarters, the soft glow of the bedside lamp flickered against shadows dancing on the walls. Aria was curled on her side, face buried in a pillow, her bare midriff rising and falling with every even breath.

Bob lay beside her, unmoving, eyes wide open.

Sleep had come quickly. Peacefully.

Then… the Void.

The nightmare was as vivid as a memory.

He stood in a hospital room painted in blues and whites. Aria screamed, silent, her mouth open but no sound came. Her hands clawed at the sides of the bed, and blood pooled beneath her. A nurse turned away, her eyes swallowed by black, inky darkness spilling down her face like tears.

Then the baby was in his arms.

Too still. Too quiet.

But alive until black eyes flicked open, glowing, pulsing, unnatural. The baby stared at him with pure void.

And then the shadows screamed.

Aria reached for him, her voice finally breaking through like glass shattering. “Bob, don’t let it take me”

And then they were both gone.

The room turned to dust in his hands.

He gasped awake with a choked sob, heart pounding like a war drum. Sweat clung to his chest and neck. The air felt thick.

Next to him, Aria slept undisturbed, moonlight caressing her skin. One arm flung lazily over her head, her dark tank top had ridden up slightly, revealing the gentle swell of her stomach, peaceful, alive, untouched by shadows.

He sat up, hand hovering just above her belly.

“I'm sorry,” he whispered to the sleeping form, voice cracking. “I shouldn’t have given this to you.”

Bob slipped from the bed silently, grabbing a hoodie as he padded barefoot through the hallway and out onto the terrace. The wind was cool against his skin, grounding.

He didn’t expect to find anyone else there.

But Bucky Barnes leaned against the railing, coffee in hand like he hadn’t slept at all. His sharp eyes flicked over as Bob approached.

“You look like hell,” Bucky said without judgment.

Bob let out a shaky breath. “Thanks. You always this nice at 3 a.m.?”

“Depends. You always show up looking like you wrestled death in your dreams?”

Bob didn’t answer right away. He rubbed the back of his neck, eyes on the skyline. “It was Aria. And the baby. The Void took them from me.”

Bucky was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “That’s your guilt talking. Not prophecy.”

“You didn’t see it,” Bob muttered. “It was real. Her screaming. The blood. And the baby, God, the baby wasn’t even human anymore. It was like something wearing a child’s skin.”

Bucky nodded, slowly. “I’ve seen war do worse to good men than any nightmare.”

Bob’s voice cracked. “What if I gave this to her? What if she dies because I loved her?”

Bucky turned, finally facing him fully. His voice was steady, colder than Bob’s panic but far more grounded. “You didn’t give her a curse, Reynolds. You gave her a future. A messy one, maybe. But she chose it.”

“I should’ve known, my DNA, my serum, the Void, it was never safe.”

“And she still chose you,” Bucky repeated, firm. “You think Aria Stark makes blind choices?”

Bob barked a bitter laugh. “You really think she’s okay with any of this?”

“She’s scared,” Bucky admitted. “I see it in her posture, the way she holds her stomach like a shield. But you know what else I see? She lets you stay.”

Bob was quiet.

“That means something,” Bucky continued. “When Aria lets you close while she’s vulnerable, it’s not by accident. She trusts you. Now trust yourself.”

Bob dropped onto the bench beside the planter box, burying his face in his hands. “What if I can’t protect them?”

Bucky sipped his coffee, watching the horizon. “Then you learn. You fight smarter. You ask for help. But you don’t run. Not unless she tells you to.”

Bob looked up, eyes glassy. “I can’t lose them.”

Bucky’s voice was low but strong. “Then you don’t.”

Back in the room, Bob returned like a ghost reentering his body. He sat on the bed quietly, careful not to wake Aria.

Still, as if sensing him, she stirred. One eye cracked open, voice thick with sleep. “Bad dream?”

He nodded.

She reached out, blindly, until her hand found his and tugged it to her belly.

“Still here,” she murmured.

And he melted, forehead pressed to her stomach, whispering to the life they made together like it was the only prayer he’d ever known.

---

The compound kitchen buzzed with low chatter and the clink of cutlery against ceramic. Morning sunlight spilled across the counters, too warm for how cold everything suddenly felt.

Yelena was flipping eggs with theatrical flair while Alexei and John argued softly about something in Russian and protein-related. Ava sat curled at the edge of the table, sipping her tea with sharp eyes scanning the door.

The second Aria and Bob walked in, the room fell quiet.

They looked wrong.

Bob’s usual glow was dimmed, golden presence dulled like sunlight through storm glass. Aria trailed beside him, hoodie zipped, face unreadable but not unreadable in her usual way. This was cracked porcelain.

Yelena straightened. “Okay. What happened.”

Aria sat down stiffly at the table, folding her hands with precision that tried to mask the tremor in them. Bob didn’t sit. He stood behind her, a protective shadow with sad eyes.

“We went to see Bruce yesterday,” Aria said, voice flat at first. Her stare was fixed somewhere past the table. “To check on the baby.”

Ava put down her mug slowly. Yelena’s brow furrowed.

Bob looked like he wanted to speak but didn’t.

Aria’s jaw tightened, and then,like something inside her cracked, she exhaled shakily. “Something’s wrong,” she said. “The baby is showing signs of absorbing the Sentry serum… it’s unstable. Bruce doesn’t know how it will affect development. Or… if the baby will even make it.”

The room felt like it stopped breathing.

“I” she tried again, then broke. Her voice cracked, a rare fracture in all her iron. “I don’t know how to fix this. I don’t know how to protect them.”

Bob finally sat beside her and gently took her hand, his thumb rubbing slow circles over her palm.

“I’ve lost people,” Aria whispered. “Too many. But this… this is mine. Ours. And I don’t know if I’m strong enough to lose something like this.”

Yelena moved without hesitation, settling a hand over Aria’s forearm. “You don’t have to be strong every second, Stark. That’s why we’re here.”

Alexei nodded solemnly, uncharacteristically quiet. “You’re not alone in this.”

Ava leaned forward, eyes steady. “Whatever happens… we handle it. Together.”

Bob’s voice was low, cracked with guilt. “If anything happens, it’s because of me. My DNA. My.”

“Don’t,” Aria cut in, squeezing his hand. “Don’t carry that. We go forward. We don’t drown in blame.”

She looked around the table, tears unshed but visible in her gaze. “You needed to know. I’m not stepping down. I’m not retreating. But I’m not pretending either.”

There was no cheering, no easy comfort. Just the silence of a team absorbing pain… and silently promising to hold it with her.

Yelena passed her a napkin with a soft snort. “If this kid is anything like you, they’re not going down without a fight.”

A ghost of a smile touched Aria’s lips. It was enough to breathe again.

[feedybot]

Chapter One: The First Taste

Amira had always been a machine.

Her routine was religious — early morning cardio, mid-morning lifting, protein shakes between meetings, perfectly portioned meals prepped every Sunday night. Her body showed it, too. Lean muscle carved every inch of her frame, from her strong shoulders to the flat plane of her stomach and the sharp taper of her waist. She moved with quiet power, the kind that came from years of training, discipline, and dedication. She was stunning. Intimidating, even.

And Haze adored her.

He watched her with quiet fascination — the way she flexed in the mirror when she thought no one was looking, the way she measured her rice and chicken with militant precision, how she drank water like it was sacred. She had spent years building herself into this. Strong. Focused. Controlled.

But Haze had always wondered.

What would happen if that control… slipped?

Not all at once. Not enough to scare her. Just a gentle shift. A subtle redirection. What if all that fire, all that hunger for strength and discipline, could be channeled into something softer? Slower? Hungrier?

What if Amira let go?

He never asked. Of course not. She would have laughed. Or maybe worse — she would have pulled away. Amira lived in motion, and Haze knew better than to interrupt it directly. So instead, he adjusted the current. Barely noticeable, just beneath the surface.

It started with the meals.

She’d always trusted him in the kitchen. He cooked most nights, and she rarely paid attention to the details. She liked to eat — she just preferred not to think about it. So Haze began to shift the balance.

A little more oil.

An extra drizzle of sauce.

Cream where there used to be almond milk. Butter melted invisibly into rice and vegetables. More generous helpings, second servings already plated before she could wave them off.

And Amira? She didn’t notice.

Not at first.

She kept training like always, hammering her body through sweat and strain, pushing her limits at every turn. The extra calories had nowhere to land — not with the way she moved. They burned away like smoke, leaving her as lean and chiseled as ever.

But Haze was patient.

He played a long game.

He knew she liked how he doted on her. That she felt loved when he cooked for her, when he filled her plate and watched her eat. So he leaned into it — always ready with something warm, something rich, something satisfying. She started asking about dinner earlier, lingering in the kitchen while he worked, stealing tastes with that hungry smile he loved.

“You always make too much,” she teased one night, licking sauce from her fingertip. “Trying to fatten me up?”

She said it as a joke.

Haze only smiled.

“Maybe I just like seeing you full.”

She rolled her eyes, but took the plate he offered — bigger than usual, loaded with pasta and creamy sauce. She cleaned it without thinking, sitting back with a soft sigh, belly faintly swollen beneath her tank top.

She still got up the next morning to run five miles.

Still trained like an animal.

But slowly — so slowly — the balance started to tip.

Haze saw it first. A faint softness creeping in at her midsection. The flat, taut lines of her abs beginning to blur, replaced by a gentle curve that lingered a little longer after dinner. Her workout clothes began to fit differently — nothing dramatic, just the faint stretch of fabric around her thighs, the way her sports bra dug a little deeper into her sides.

She hadn’t noticed yet. Not really.

But she was eating more.

Always hungry. Always asking what he was making. Always finishing what he gave her.

And Haze kept feeding her.

Every bite was a quiet seduction. Every extra helping, every dessert, every rich sauce poured just a little too generously — they were all part of the same patient plan. He wasn’t just feeding her food. He was feeding a craving she hadn’t yet named. A shift. A surrender. A softness waiting to bloom.

She was still his Amira.

Still strong. Still fierce.

But she didn’t know she was changing.

Not yet.

Chapter Two: A Shift in the Mirror

It started with the leggings.

Amira stood in front of the mirror, tugging at the waistband. The same black pair she always wore for her Monday morning workouts. The ones that used to slide on effortlessly, hugging her hips without resistance. But this morning, they clung differently — tighter around her thighs, the band digging just a little deeper into her stomach. She exhaled slowly, adjusting the fit, frowning just enough to register the change.

Weird.

She turned to the side and scanned her reflection. Her arms were still solid, shoulders broad and toned. Her calves were still thick with muscle. But her middle… there was something else now. A hint of softness. Not a bulge. Not quite. But a rounding where there used to be nothing.

“Must be water weight,” she muttered.

She skipped the scale. She always said she didn’t believe in them anyway. Weight didn’t matter — strength did. She told herself that again as she tied her shoes and headed to the gym.

Haze noticed, of course. He watched her leave, eyes tracking the snug way her top pressed into her sides, the way the softest hint of belly rose against the waistband of those stretched-out leggings. She still moved like a goddess — strong, fast, determined — but he could see it now, blooming beneath the surface.

And when she came home, flushed and tired, he already had a smoothie waiting.

Extra peanut butter.

Whole milk.

A little protein powder, of course — just enough to keep the illusion.

“You’re spoiling me lately,” she said, raising an eyebrow at the massive glass he handed her.

“You’re working hard,” he replied easily. “You need fuel.”

She drank it down in five minutes. Haze watched her throat work with every swallow, watched her belly rise and settle as she sat on the couch with a heavy sigh.

That evening, she took a second helping of lasagna without even thinking.

⸻

The softness came slowly, but it came with certainty.

A week later, her sports bra fit tighter across her back. Her arms looked… fuller. Not bigger in a strong way — just padded. It bothered her, just a little. Enough to hesitate before lifting her shirt to check her stomach in the mirror again. There it was — that same gentle curve. A little more defined now. She pinched it, frowning, then quickly pulled her shirt back down.

“Am I bloated?” she asked over dinner, stabbing a fork into creamy potatoes.

Haze looked up from his plate, eyes soft.

“Maybe a little. But you look amazing.”

“You sure?” She smiled, but only halfway. “I feel like I’ve been eating a lot more lately.”

He shrugged, casual. “You’ve been hungry.”

“True.”

She popped another bite into her mouth and didn’t mention it again.

Not that night.

Not the next.

But she started checking the mirror more often.

Haze kept feeding her.

He never pushed. He never said a word. Just made sure there was always more. Full plates. Seconds before she could say no. Richer food. Creamier sauces. Dessert offered gently, like a gift. And Amira — disciplined, obsessive, goal-driven Amira — started to surrender in tiny ways.

She lounged longer after dinner.

She moaned softly when she ate something particularly good.

She let him bring her snacks on the couch, thighs parted, stomach rising gently under the hem of her hoodie. The workouts stayed the same — for now. But her body was changing. Her cravings were growing. And the mirror was getting harder to ignore.

Haze saw it all.

The way her belly creased slightly when she sat. The way her thighs brushed now when she walked. The little breath she took before a heavy meal, knowing how full she’d be — and accepting it anyway.

He didn’t rush.

He just smiled, kissed her temple, and asked if she wanted a little more.

And Amira?

She always said yes.

Chapter Three: A Number She Didn’t Expect

It was supposed to be an easy outfit.

Just a casual Saturday — coffee, errands, maybe a walk later. Nothing serious. Amira had barely thought about it when she reached for the jeans at the back of her drawer. The faded pair she always wore on weekends, broken in just right, hugging her hips without squeezing.

Or at least, they used to.

She stood in front of the mirror, one leg in, then the other. Pulled them up like she always did. But halfway through zipping, she froze.

The fabric clung to her thighs — tighter than she remembered. She had to shimmy the denim up over her hips, tug hard to get the waistband close enough to meet. Then came the button.

It didn’t close.

She held her breath and tried again, sucking in her stomach, angling her body awkwardly in the mirror. The waistband still gapped an inch from closing. The buttonhole mocked her.

“What the hell,” she muttered under her breath.

Her brows drew together. She stepped back, looked at her reflection, and saw it: the soft roundness of her belly pressing gently over the waistband, the faint curve that hadn’t been there before. She hadn’t imagined it. She really had filled out.

But this… this was different.

Jeans didn’t lie.

She yanked them off with a frustrated grunt and reached for a looser pair of joggers, something that didn’t press against her skin like an accusation. Then, something she hadn’t done in months — she crossed the room to the scale tucked under the sink.

She paused.

Amira never used to care about numbers. She measured strength in reps and time and weight lifted. Not the scale. The scale was for people obsessed with aesthetics, and that had never been her focus.

Until now.

Until her favorite jeans refused to button.

She stepped on.

The number blinked once, then held steady.

And Amira stared.

It was twenty pounds heavier than she expected.

Twenty. Not five. Not a bloated weekend. Not a cheat day or a missed workout. Twenty.

Her stomach churned — not with hunger, for once, but confusion. She stepped off, then back on. Same result. She looked down at herself again, suddenly more aware of the soft curve under her hoodie, the swell above her waistband, the way her arms felt just a little heavier when they hung at her sides.

When had it happened?

Her workouts hadn’t changed.

She still trained hard, still ran, still lifted. And she hadn’t felt bigger. Just… hungrier. She’d been eating more lately, yeah, but that was supposed to be fueling her. Not changing her.

She sat down on the edge of the bed, the scale still glowing faintly behind her.

That’s where Haze found her.

“Hey,” he said gently. “You okay?”

She looked up, startled. “I… yeah. I just weighed myself.”

He raised his eyebrows, casual. “Haven’t done that in a while.”

“Apparently not.”

Haze sat beside her. Close. Warm. He reached out, resting a hand on her thigh — thicker now, softer, the muscle padded by new flesh she hadn’t noticed until this morning.

“What did it say?”

“Twenty pounds.” She blinked at the floor. “Twenty. That’s a lot. I didn’t think I looked— I mean, I knew I’d maybe softened a bit, but…”

“You look amazing,” Haze said simply.

She turned to him, lips parted. “I don’t know if it’s muscle or—”

“It doesn’t matter,” he said, voice quiet. “You’re strong. You’re beautiful. If your body’s changing, that’s okay.”

“But I haven’t changed anything—” she paused. “I don’t think I have.”

“You’ve just been enjoying life a little more,” he said, smiling. “Eating well. Letting yourself breathe.”

She didn’t answer right away.

The number still echoed in her head. But so did something else — the way Haze looked at her when she ate, how he always had seconds ready, how he always encouraged her to “have a little more.” She thought it was love. Maybe it still was.

But something was happening.

She exhaled slowly and leaned into his touch.

“I guess it’s not the worst thing,” she murmured.

“It’s not,” he said. His fingers traced slow circles into her thigh, soothing, grounding. “You deserve to enjoy yourself. You don’t have to be so strict all the time.”

Amira nodded, distant.

And Haze? He smiled quietly behind her.

The weight was real now.

The shift had begun.

And there was so much more to come.

Chapter Four: Slipping Further

Amira gave herself one week.

One week to “tighten things up” — her words, said with that familiar fire in her eyes, the one Haze hadn’t seen in a while. She was back to measuring her meals again, logging her macros, squeezing an extra twenty minutes of cardio into every workout.

She was trying to reclaim control.

Haze let her.

He didn’t protest when she skipped dessert or when she turned down the wine he offered with dinner. He just nodded, supportive, smiling with quiet understanding. But he watched. He always watched.

Because something had shifted.

Amira could train just as hard. She could track every calorie. But now… her body didn’t bounce back like it used to. Her metabolism, once a roaring fire, seemed to smolder now — slower, quieter. Every indulgence lingered. Her softness didn’t just vanish under discipline. It had settled into her.

And more than that, something inside her had changed too.

She was hungry.

Constantly.

By day three of her “reset,” she was snacking between meals. By day five, she was visibly annoyed during workouts — frustrated with herself, short of breath more often, her clothes clinging in places they hadn’t before. The extra weight she’d gained wasn’t just aesthetic anymore. It was physical. Heavy. Real.

On the sixth day, she cut her run short.

She didn’t say why.

She just came home, sweaty and red-cheeked, dropping onto the couch with a tired huff. Her sports bra dug into her ribs. Her leggings rolled beneath the soft bulge of her belly. She looked down at herself, silent, then pulled off her shoes without a word.

Haze brought her a glass of water. Kissed her temple.

That night, she didn’t log her dinner.

And on the seventh day — her “final” day of being strict — Amira stood in front of her closet for ten full minutes, staring at her options. She bypassed the jeans immediately. Too tight. She slipped into loose black pants topped with a flowy blouse instead. One that didn’t hug her stomach, forgiving and soft.

“You look beautiful,” Haze said, watching her from the doorway.

She looked at him, unsure.

“Are you sure we should be going out to eat tonight? I was trying to…”

“You’ve been working hard,” he said, cutting in gently. “One meal isn’t going to change anything. Let yourself enjoy it.”

Amira hesitated. But only for a moment.

She exhaled slowly. Smoothed the blouse down over her belly. Grabbed her purse.

“Okay,” she said. “Yeah. One meal.”

She followed him out into the cool evening air, her stomach brushing softly against the fabric with each step. Her arms were bare — fuller now, gently dimpled when they bent. Her gait had changed too, subtly slower, more measured. She felt the difference, but she didn’t speak it.

And Haze?

He reached for her hand.

Led her across the sidewalk.

And together, they stepped through the doors of the restaurant — dim lights, low music, the scent of cream and butter and grilled meat already in the air.

The host greeted them warmly.

“This way,” they said. “Table for two?”

Amira glanced at Haze as they followed, the faintest hunger already stirring in her belly — physical and emotional, blended into one. A craving she didn’t quite understand.

And Haze?

He smiled.

Because the real feast was about to begin.

Chapter Five: The Button

The restaurant was warm and dimly lit, all deep woods and flickering candles. Low music played in the background, soft and jazzy, the kind that made everything feel a little slower, a little richer. Amira sat across from Haze, shoulders back, arms resting lightly on the linen-covered table, her expression calm — but inside, she was tense.

She’d told herself she’d take it easy.

Just a light meal. A salad, maybe grilled chicken. Something clean. Something smart.

But then the bread came.

Warm, crusty, still steaming from the oven, served with a dish of soft whipped butter and fragrant garlic oil. Haze reached for one and glanced at her with a quiet smile. She hesitated… then followed. Just one piece. Then another. Her fingers left faint smears of butter on the napkin.

“I forgot how good this place smells,” she murmured.

Haze just nodded, eyes steady on her.

The waitress returned with menus, reciting the specials with practiced cheer. Amira didn’t hear most of it. Her stomach was already responding — humming faintly, warm and alive. She hadn’t felt full in days. She hadn’t let herself.

Tonight, something was shifting.

When the waitress left, Amira glanced across the table.

“What are you getting?”

Haze shrugged. “Thinking about the short rib pasta.”

She smiled faintly. “Dangerous.”

“You?”

“I was going to be good,” she said. Then sighed. “But honestly? I’m starving.”

She ended up ordering the same.

The plate arrived heavy and beautiful, piled with wide ribbons of handmade pasta drenched in rich sauce, the meat so tender it fell apart at the edge of her fork. She took the first bite and closed her eyes.

“Oh my God.”

Haze chuckled softly. “That good?”

“Better.”

She didn’t talk much after that. Just ate — slowly at first, savoring it, then faster, like her body had stopped asking and started demanding. Halfway through the dish, she leaned back for a moment, hand resting low on her stomach. There was a quiet swell there now, pressing faintly against her waistband.

She took a breath, adjusted in her seat.

Then she kept eating.

By the time her plate was clean, a soft flush had crept into her cheeks. Her posture had changed, slouched now, hands resting protectively over her full, rounded belly. The blouse had once flowed over it — now it clung. Not tightly, but enough to trace the outline of where fullness had taken hold.

“You okay?” Haze asked gently.

Amira let out a small laugh, breathy and low. “I think I ate too much.”

“You haven’t eaten like that in weeks,” he said.

“I know.” She glanced down at her lap, voice lower. “I can feel it.”

She shifted again, subtly trying to ease the pressure in her midsection. The pants she was wearing… even they were beginning to strain. She tried to sit up straighter, suck in a little, but—

Pop.

A sharp, quiet sound under the table.

Amira froze.

Haze heard it too.

She looked down quickly, eyes wide, and there it was — her blouse stretched gently across her lap, but the pants beneath it now sat slightly open, the button having given way, the zipper just beginning to peel.

Her cheeks burned.

“Oh my God,” she whispered. “Did that just—?”

Haze’s voice was calm. “Yeah.”

“I can’t believe it— I wore these a few days ago. They were—” She looked down again, pressing her hand over the open waistband. “They were fine.”

She wasn’t fine now.

Her belly, full and round with pasta and bread and wine, swelled gently into the open space her pants had surrendered. Her breath was shallow. She felt heavy. Exposed. Soft.

“You’re okay,” Haze said quietly.

“I just…” She looked up at him, eyes uncertain. “I didn’t realize I’d… changed this much.”

“You’ve been enjoying yourself,” he said. “That’s not a bad thing.”

“I look—” She stopped herself. “I feel huge.”

He reached across the table and took her hand.

“You look beautiful.”

She wanted to believe it.

She wasn’t sure if she did.

But her hand stayed in his. Her body didn’t move. And she didn’t ask for the check.

Because deep beneath the confusion… something else stirred.

Satisfaction. Warm and lingering. Like her body had been waiting for this. Like she was meant to be full.

The button was gone.

And part of her didn’t mind.

Chapter Six: Becoming

They didn’t speak much on the ride home.

Amira sat in the passenger seat, arms folded across her belly — or trying to. It was still swollen, heavy with the feast she’d just devoured. Even with her pants unbuttoned, there was pressure. Her middle rose up between her arms, a soft mound that hadn’t been there just weeks ago. Each bump in the road made her shift, squirm, feel the fullness inside her.

When they got home, she kicked off her shoes slowly. Her blouse clung faintly to the places it had once skimmed over. Her thighs were thick now, fuller at the tops, brushing slightly with every step. And her ass — she could feel how much it filled her underwear now, the way it pushed against the fabric, stretched wider and heavier than it used to be.

Haze followed her inside.

Quiet.

Watching.

She turned in the hallway and looked at him, hands resting low over her middle. Her expression was open — almost vulnerable.

“I think I’ve really let myself go,” she said softly.

Haze stepped closer, slowly.

His eyes roamed down her — from her slightly flushed cheeks, down the gentle swell of her chest, the subtle roundness at the top of her arms, past her bloated belly and to her hips, now thick and curvy and solid.

“I know,” he said, voice low. “And I love it.”

She blinked.

“You— what?”

He took another step, close enough now to touch.

“You think I haven’t noticed?” His hands rose, slow and deliberate, resting on her sides. His thumbs pressed gently into her waist — or what remained of it. “You’ve been changing for weeks, Amira.”

Her breath caught in her throat.

Haze slid his hands forward, fingertips grazing her belly through the soft cotton of her blouse. He pressed, just slightly — enough to make her gasp.

“So full,” he murmured. “So heavy. You’ve been eating so well, haven’t you?”

Her knees almost buckled.

She nodded.

“I didn’t mean to… I just…”

“You didn’t fight it,” he said. “You let it happen.”

His hands moved lower, over the curve of her stomach, then down — tracing the soft swell of her hips, the thickness of her thighs. He gave them a squeeze, firm, claiming. She bit her lip.

“I used to be tight everywhere,” she whispered.

“You’re soft now,” Haze said. “And it suits you.”

He pulled her in, kissing her deeply — and she melted into it, hands gripping his shirt, body pressing into his. She could feel the weight of herself now, the way her belly pushed into him, how much she took up in his arms. And he held her like he’d been waiting for this.

Like it was exactly what he wanted.

When he pulled away, he guided her to the couch, sitting her down with care — then kneeling in front of her. He lifted the hem of her blouse slowly, revealing her bare thighs, wide and plush, faintly creased where they met her hips. Her belly spilled gently into her lap now, soft and obvious, even without the pressure of food.

He pressed both hands to her middle.

Let them roam.

“You’ve grown so much,” he said. “And not just tonight.”

Amira looked away, breath trembling.

“I thought I was slipping.”

“You were,” he said. “And I watched it happen. Every second. Every bite.”

His hands rose higher, feeling the roundness, the subtle creases at her sides. His fingers dug in, gently exploring the softness that had taken over.

“I wanted this,” he whispered. “I wanted you like this.”

“Why?” she breathed.

“Because you’ve never looked more real. More satisfied. More yours.” He leaned in close, lips brushing her ear. “And now, you’re mine.”

She didn’t argue.

Because she was too full to fight it.

Because part of her had wanted to be taken this way all along.

And as he kissed down the curve of her belly, hands squeezing her sides, the soft roundness of her body giving under his grip — Amira finally let go of the woman she used to be.

She wasn’t tight, lean, controlled anymore.

She was full.

Heavy.

Transformed.

And utterly adored.

[leo-fie]

Progress Pride Flag Quilt Block Pattern & Tutorial

Don't you just love the flag of our people? Do you have an inner grandma that years to make stuff? Do you want to combine these two things and make a queer quilt?

Well, I've got you.

Behold the pattern! And my lack of graphic skills, so I drew it on paper!

Basically it's a bunch of rectangles, one half square triangle and a fuzzy cut circle. I don't know shit about quilting and I was able to come up with it. Why centimeter, you ask? Because I'm German and that's what I'm familiar with. Why weird measurements and not jelly rolls and layer cakes and stuff? Because I'm German and quilting is not really a thing here.

Onto the tutorial!

You'll need:

A scrap of fabric of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, black, brown, light blue, pink, white each

additional fabric for the border

Cutting mat, quilting ruler, roll cutter

sewing machine

thread

pins

double sided interfacing

iron and ironing board

fabric sheers

compasses

Step 1: Cut everything. Duh. We'll take care of the circle later, don't worry about that now. The half square triangle is exactly what it sounds like. A square and then you cut it diagonally. That's why I didn't give the length of the hypotenuse.

(Note: I'm making two blocks at the same time, that's why there's so much fabric. Also this is a middle of the night project, hence the lighting.)

I'm using all kinds of different fabrics, different weights and drapes, some stretchy, some transparent, so I needed to interface some of them.

Step 2: Sew the rainbow together. 0,5cm seam allowance on everything, that's exactly the edge of the foot on your machine. Double and triple check that everything is facing the right direction before sewing. The seam of yellow and green does not get sewn fully, only 21,5 cm! That's important later! Also backtack there. Don't forget to iron.

Step 3: Sew the strips to the half square triangle. For this you have to switch between the sewing machine and the ironing board constantly. Attach the shorter strip diretly to one side of the HST, iron it open. The second strip of the same colour gets attatched to the other side of the HST and the first strip. Look at the pictures closely if you're unsure how that works. Also the strips are longer than the triangle. We'll square that up later.

All strips attatched will look like this. See how the two strips meet at the tip!

Step 4: Cut the rainbow part to size. The length between yellow and green is 22cm long. The shorter seam from before plus some seam allowance. The outsides of red and purple are 44,5cm long. These two points are the beginning and end of your cutting line. You will cut a little triangle from every single colour. Do this slowly and carefully. Maybe your fabrics have stretched a bit (mine did). Don't worry, it will be ok.

Step 5: The Y seam, part one. Y seams are tricky, but there's only one for this block. So put your strips part on your rainbow part and line them up so that the tip of the strip part overhangs the seam between yellow and green by about half a centimeter. Remember that it's not about the edges of the fabric, but where the seam will be. But don't sew all the way! Leave 0,5cm at the tip!

You can also mark on your strip piece two lines 0,5cm from the edges of the black. They should form a little square at the tip. There they meet is where the actual tip on the finished block will be. So place this spot directly on the seem between yellow and green and only sew right up to it. Not beyond.

Step 6: The Y seam, part two. Now, fold both the rainbow part and the strips part in half and if you've done the last step correctly, the remaining two edges will allign. Pin and sew.

I can't explain it better than I've done here, I'm sure there are tutorias out there. Good luck!

Step 7: Square up. Iron your block to that everything is nice and straight and flat. Then use the fabric edges of the red and purple to cut the remaining ends of the strips. Use the HST to cut the white. Be careful, the long side of the triangle is on the bias and likely stretched a bit.

I already added borders here. I'm making a pillow case.

Step 8: Fuzzy cut and raw edge applique. Double sided iron on interfacing is essentially double sided tape. It has two types of glue, one gets activated by 2 seconds of heat, the other by 5 or so (depends on the product). The second side is also covered with a paper that needs to be removed before the second gluing. Read the instructions of the product you are using!

Use your compasses to draw a circle on the protective paper side of the interfacing. It's actually two circles from the same middle point, see pattern. Cut it out roughly. Then place it with the rougher side on the backside of your purple fabric and iron for 2 seconds on middle heat. If you've just ironed your fabric before and the ironing board is still hot, wait for it to cool down. Also let the fabric cool down after applying. Then cut out your circle. The interfacing will have stiffened the fabric, so that shouldn't be a problem. Then remove the protective paper, place the circle on the yellow triangle where you want it and iron for 5 seconds. Let cool.

And you're done! The applique at this point is only secured with the interfacing, but it should hold fairly well. The quilting will secure it further.

And that's it. BTW, did you know that this design was made by Valentino Vecchietti for Intersex Equality Rights UK in 2021? Now you do. Happy quilting!

[theshiniestgemstone]

Hi, I love your Gideon fics.

Could you write a fic where reader is comforting Gideon after the shooting?

hey babes, thank you for the request!! no joke, i had to ask myself which one before I assumed s4

warnings: s4 spoilers!!! brief descriptions of blood and grief, in universe level violence

He hadn’t stopped shaking since you first saw him.

You stood beside Gideon, running a hand soothingly over his back, your palm tracing slow, steady circles between his shoulder blades. His skin was clammy beneath the thin cotton of his shirt, muscles twitching under your touch like he was trying to hold himself together. He sat stiffly on the edge of a plastic hospital chair, elbows braced on his knees, fingers knotted so tightly in his hair they’d gone pale.

The waiting room reeked of antiseptic and burnt coffee. Abraham was sprawled across two chairs to your left, his knees tucked in and a jacket draped over his face, though it barely muffled the fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. You weren’t sure if he was asleep or just trying to disappear for a little while.

Across from you, Pontius sat on a larger bench with Amber cradled in his arms. Her head rested against his chest, face blotchy and exhausted, while Pontius rocked her gently, his long arms wrapped protectively around her like she was the one needing reassurance now. Her makeup was rubbed off, streaked over her hands and the small mountain of tissues in her lap. One of his hands trembled against her back, fingers curling into the fabric of her sweater as if he was afraid to let go.

You’d picked up the boys a few hours ago, stepping carefully around the chaos at the lake house. You walked over shattered glass, overturned furniture, streaks of blood drying like rust along the floor. Police lights bathed the scene in red and blue, officers weaving in and out with quiet urgency. Gideon had been sitting on the porch steps, dried blood flaking at his temple, his hands trembling in his lap. He didn’t speak when he saw you, just wrapped his arms around you. His tears soaked the shoulder of your t-shirt. You gave Abraham and Pontius each a hug, tightly holding them before they climbed into the back of your car.

You looked over at him now, chest tight with the helpless ache of watching someone you love suffer in silence. His jaw clenched, and you caught the way his leg bounced.

“I’m here,” you whispered, leaning down so he could hear you over the hum of the ice machine and the distant call of a nurse’s name. “I’m not going anywhere.”

And even though he didn’t respond, didn’t lift his head or say a word, he shifted slightly, leaning just a little closer to your side, enough to let you know he’d heard you.

It was the quietest you’d ever witnessed the family, and rightfully so. Judy, Jesse, and Kelvin are nothing if not resilient. At least that’s what you told yourself and whispered into Gideon’s ear as he sat slumped in a hospital hallway. Because no matter how loud or flashy or godly they made themselves out to be, none of them were immune to the devastation of a friend with a gun.

Eli sat in a corner of the room, humming prayers and pleas to himself. Every once in a while, he’d disappear to the chapel, returning with red rimmed eyed and swollen cheeks. BJ’s hands were clenched. Occasionally he’d let out an angry grunt or whimper, tears rolling down his cheek as he stared at his phone, at a photo of Judy he’d taken one morning. Keefe hadn’t stopped crying, wringing his hands around the strap of a Fanny pack.

When the doctor finally stepped into the waiting room, clipboard in hand, the world seemed to still. Every breath caught. Every head turned.

“They’re stable,” he said, voice level and measured, like he’d done this a thousand times.

That was all it took. “Judy’s awake. The other two are resting, but you can all see them if you’d like.”

A rush of breath passed through the room like wind through a forest. Eli’s head dropped into his hands. Amber sobbed, loud and broken, while Pontius squeezed her shoulder with a shaky hand.

You stayed back as the family moved to follow the doctor, shuffling out of the waiting room like people emerging from a long, dark tunnel. They didn’t say much. They didn’t have to. You patted Gideon’s hand, trying to anchor him just long enough for him to steady himself.

“You comin’?” he asked, his voice rough and low. He squeezed your hand like a lifeline, like he needed you beside him just to take another step forward. His eyes finally met yours, silent pleas swimming in his pupils.

You gave a gentle shake of your head and glanced over at Abraham’s sleeping figure stretched out on the chairs. “I’m going to keep an eye on him,” you said, even though part of you wanted to go with them, wanted to see for yourself that the siblings were really okay. That this wasn’t all a cruel waiting-room dream. But someone had to stay behind. Someone had to hold the stillness.

Gideon hesitated, jaw tightening. Then he gave you the faintest nod and followed the rest of the family out of the room, disappearing through the double doors with his shoulders hunched like the weight of the night had finally settled in his bones.

For a while, you sat in the silence, unsure how long they were gone. Time folded in on itself. Minutes dragged, stretching thin and frayed at the edges. The lights never dimmed, the air never warmed. The vending machine clunked to life at one point, startling you with its mechanical hum. Abraham stirred, blinking at the empty room.

“Your dad’s in 482. Second door,” you said, nodding towards where the others disappeared to. “Judy’s awake. Kelvin’s still asleep.”

Abraham pulled the door open, leaving you alone in the family room. You were alone now.

A few of your own tears slipped out in the quiet. You wiped them away quickly, rough and unsentimental, like if you didn’t acknowledge them, they didn’t count. There’d be time to cry later. For now, there were things to do. You rose from your seat, brushing off your legs, and moved around the room, gathering what had been left behind in the scramble. Amber’s purse was tucked beside her chair, forgotten in the blur of bad news and better news. A stray jacket, Keefe’s, probably, lay bunched over the back of another seat. You folded it as neatly as your shaking hands would allow.

When the family returned, the energy in the room was different. Tired, but less tense. Amber walked in first, her arms folded tightly across her chest. Her eyes found yours immediately. She crossed the space between you without a word and wrapped her arms around you in a firm, silent hug. It was the kind of embrace that didn’t require explanation, just understanding. You returned it without hesitation, your hand rubbing lightly over her back.

“Thank you,” she murmured into your shoulder. “For coming. For… everything.”

You nodded. Words felt clumsy, too heavy for the moment. “I’ll bring you some clothes in the morning,” you said gently. “Something comfortable.”

She gave you a soft, grateful look before moving to join BJ and Keefe. One by one, the others followed, murmuring tired goodbyes or small thank-yous. You didn’t linger. It was late, technically early. The sky outside had begun to pale with the slow onset of dawn, the first hints of sunlight brushing against the horizon.

You found the boys huddled by the hospital entrance, quiet and dazed. You opened the car without a word, letting them pile in like sleepwalking soldiers after a long battle.

The drive back to the compound was still and soft, the kind of silence that didn’t beg to be filled. Trees blurred by, the road lit by the gold of an emerging morning. Pontius stared out the window, his cheek resting against the glass, Abraham dozing lightly in the back. Gideon sat beside you in the passenger seat, arms folded, jaw set, but calmer than before.

When you pulled into the long driveway, the compound stood ahead silent and looming, bathed in the pink-gold light of a brand new day. The boys got out slowly, dragging their feet across the gravel, and you followed them up the steps and into the warmth of home.

Inside, Gideon collapsed onto the couch, curling onto his side with one arm tucked under his head. You stood there for a moment, keys still in hand, watching his chest rise and fall, watching the dawn finally catch up with the nightmare.

“Goodnight, guys,” you said, waving to Abraham and Pontius as they made their way to the stairs.

“‘Night.” “G’night.”

You gently sat down beside Gideon, running a hand over his hair. He began to cry again.

“I should have stayed.”

You shook your head. “Don’t do that, Gideon. You had no reason to think you couldn’t go on the boat.”

He sniffed. “I could have stopped it.” His breaths stuttered. “If I would have just said I didn’t want to, or if-“

“Or you could be in a hospital bed too,” you said, cutting him off, not unkindly. “Or worse. You don’t get to carry the blame for something you couldn’t have known.”

He turned his face toward you then, eyes rimmed red, jaw clenched like he was trying not to sob again. “I can’t stop seeing it. I keep picturing them all there like…”

It was horrible, how he’d been the first one to find them slumped in the den. That’s the kind of image you can’t shake after a few tears of a couple of hours. “I’m so sorry, Gideon.” You moved closer, pressing your forehead to his, grounding him. “They’re okay. They’re alive. That has to be enough for tonight.”

Gideon nodded against you, barely perceptible. His shoulders hitched as he drew in a shaky breath, his body slowly relaxing under your touch. You pulled the blanket down over his legs, tucking it around him like you would a child, and stayed right there beside him, your fingers moving slowly through his hair.

You didn’t need to tell him it was going to be okay. At least not yet. That kind of hope would take time. But he wasn’t alone. And for now, that would have to be enough.

[stquilts]

2nd Quilt top finished!!

I’m calling it a Split Rail Window Pane Pattern.

I’m pretty proud of myself! I think it came out great. The sashing around the blocks was the right choice. I have a light lilac backing fabric and will be piecing the binding with some of the leftover strips from the jelly roll. Finished size should be around 58-59”. Hope my mom likes it!

Part of this journey is sharing the ups & downs (strikes & gutters) of learning how to quilt. Here’s what I have for you today…

My background is sewing clothes. Sewing clothes is a little more forgiving than piecing quilt blocks. Quilt Sewing requires:

VERY straight cutting - Fabric moves and rulers slip. The world is an imperfect place. Make sure your shit is square. “Close enough” will most likely give you a headache later on.

VERY precise measuring - See above.

Ironing, ironing and more ironing- I hope you like your iron. You’ll be using it A LOT. Steal the water bottle your spouse uses to squirt the cat when he’s being an asshole because you’ll need it. Easier to spray than refilling the iron all the time. I’m considering spray starch to keep pressed seams in place. I read somewhere that you could use a water/vodka mix as a DIY hack but I buy GOOD vodka and I’m not wasting the good stuff on a DIY spray starch.

MAJOR attention to seam allowance - When they say 1/4” they mean ONE QUARTER INCH. Use a 1/4” foot, one with a guide, painters tape to mark the base of your machine, anything to help you keep that seam straight and 1/4”.

My sewing machine is still relatively new and I’m still figuring it out. I got a Pfaff Passport 3.0. One thing I learned is that I never knew how much I needed an auto thread cutter until I had it. That is AWESOME and I’m never going back. I’m still dealing with some “nesting thread” when I reverse to lock the beginning of a seam. I’ve tried rethreading and redoing the bobbin (the sewing equivalent to the IT “have you tried turning it off and back on again?”) but still does it. If anyone has an idea what it could be, I’m all ears.

I’m a little nervous to start quilting because the Passport is a little on the smaller side. I got it because I already had some compatible Pfaff accessories from my previous machine and I really liked my old Pfaff. I didn’t really have this idea of trying to quilt until recently. I think I’d like to get into teaching sewing or maybe designing quilts. Perhaps it’ll fund my early retirement!

Stay tuned for the trials and tribulations of creating a “quilt sandwich” and topstitch quilting on a smaller machine.

[cyberm0sh]

Hi!

I want to get into modifying clothes/sewing/etc but I have no idea where to start and I've never really sewn before, aside from minimal repairs. I also don't have access to a sewing machine. I was wondering if you have any advice, both in general and for what type of project is reasonable to take on.

Thank you!

yo!!

so fun fact i do not own a sewing machine and have never operated one in my life. LOL. (it's a project for whenever im in an apartment that would actually give me the space to have one, one day!)

my biggest advice is to look at what you have, look at what you like but don't love, and think about what u could do to make it better! you can also start with the stuff you dont like and either repurpose it for materials or donate it, and work your way up, or just like. brainstorm for projects idk. i work on one piece at a time usually!

so here's some project ideas of stuff i do pretty regularly in my own wardrobe!

Cropped tshirts! i HATE how long band tees are now. it sucks. bitch thats a DRESS. i had a bunch of shirts from bands i loved that i just never wore because id either have to tuck it in my pants and even then theres just be so much fabric and itd look weird and lumpy, so i just cropped them all! my preferred length is what i like to call "80's slutty men's crop top", so just long enough to be like a normal tshirt but raises a bit and shows a lil midriff when my arms are lifted. good shit. don't even need to hem them tbh (though do keep in mind when measuring that about an inch of fabric will roll up on itself if it's not hemmed)

blank shirts or tanks are great canvases (ive printed some lino patch stamps directly on tank tops, and ive seen people printing on black with gel bleach mixed with cornstarch?? dying to try it once im less busy)

patches is an obvious one, you dont need a machine! this post has more advice if ur into that

diy distressing! recently distressed a sweater for a goth night and its honestly entered my everyday wardrobe its such a good layering piece (only took like. a day of very rushed ripping w a seam ripper because i started the day before the event. lmao.) and underneath was this cheap back-of-spencers bodyrage lingerie top i got at the thrift that had this godawful red plaid pattern printed on shitty polyester, and i just painted over it with black fabric paint so it kept its flexibility (even w a relatively thick coat of paint to get it opaque, it isnt crunchy at all, and feels more like a pleather material) (fabric paint can be made w equal parts cheap acrylic and fabric softener, if the paint is too thick to work with, add fabric softener, also its better to have too much fabric softener than too much acrylic for that texture aspect i just mentioned)

on a similar topic, rit dye is ur BEST FRIEND!!! i have a vendetta with synthetic dyes so im just talking about the REGULAR ALL PURPOSE rit dye. anyways yeah just takes a sink or a bucket and warm water and an hour. i also follow the instructions and add a cup of salt and a tsp of dish soap idk if makes a difference, but ive had great results. this shirt used to be light brown and now look at her. my baby. color distribution is so smooth. ptit belliveau acadian king (listen to ptit belliveau the album. theres both a hyperpop and a metal song on the album i love him)

im also big on visible mending personally!! i have a flannel that is so old and so fragile and i call it my flannel of theseus, these are its elbows

thats all i can think of for now?? but a lot of these are super super easy (minus maybe the stamps?? and making the patches themselves depending on complexity. im a big fan of complex patches i think they make crust pants look so much better in the long run but thats my taste talking)

hope this helps and inspires :D!!

[jisokai]

You always thought the circus was where you yearned to be. At least, until it finally let you in—and introduced you to Hanta Sero.

[circus AU where seamstress!reader and acrobat!sero realize that their lives have been running parallel for a long time, and it’s up to you to weave them together]

part 2: veiled by the daytime sky.

sero hanta x reader ch 2/6 | 11.4k words | masterlist | ao3

cw: slight spoilers for the war arc/fights if you squint notes: ch songs are birds of a feather by billie eilish, saltwater room by owl city

you watch the circus performance of a lifetime.

✰.

"It's all so familiar yet I know I've never been here before. I feel so at home."

-Sophie, from Howl's Moving Castle

You wake up in your own home.

Despite the excitement and thrill of the night, the buzzing through your body came to a halt when your dance with the stranger ended. You tried, gave a valiant effort to continue, but your heart felt heavy. You were missing something—a partner. In an attempt to sooth your melodrama, you purchased another round of taiyaki, hoping to suffocate your delusions with the fluff of pastry and dense red bean paste. When that failed, all you felt was the pull to be home, comfortable in your bed. You heeded Chiara’s offer and took the metro home, ignoring that you’d have to get your garment bag and box in the future regardless. Then you took the train back, showered your fastest shower, and laid in bed curled around your precious book, fingers threading through the pages. It felt more real, somehow, after running into that man.

You turn over in your bed, squinting at the morning light crawling through the room. You blink a couple times, trying to smear your vision to clarity as you notice the grey of the sky. When your focus sharpens, you catch light tufts of snow gently falling.

It’s enough to have you leaping out of bed, hopping and stumbling as you untangle the giant comforter from your legs. When you free yourself you run across the room, planting your hands on the windowsill and pressing your face against the glass. Joy blooms in your chest, watching puffy whiteness cling to the pavement and grass.

You think today will be incredible.

It’s also a working day, you decide, to spend your morning on the start of your next order: another opera gown. You make your breakfast unhurried before slipping on a coat and into the garage. The door to the driveway opens with its usual squeaky greeting, and you step outside with a smile. Your hands raise, outstretched to the sky to catch the softly falling snow. You tilt your head upwards, scrunching your nose when a bundle of flakes lands on the tip.

It takes a while for you to start working, first pulling out sketches from the meeting with your client. You spread them across your work table, shoving unnecessary ones aside, some of them falling to the ground. Next you scan them for the measurements you jotted down, outlined with a bright yellow square. Notes for colors and textures are scribbled underneath, with a crude sketch of lace swirls. You rummage through your rolls and scraps and samples, looking for fabrics that match best. You take a picture of three similar options, asking your client for her preference. You set an alarm before switching off your phone and pulling out the dress pattern, to start on the bust.

You work steadily, taking your time to cut and pin swathes of sapphire blue. Next you sew, listening to the comforting hum of the bouncing needle, your hands gliding smoothly beside it. These movements are technical, practiced, running on muscle memory. You are another type of sewing machine, one that measures and cuts and hems, one that will later embroider and meticulously weave details into the fabric—but you are still another machine, in the end.

It’s easier to work on autopilot somedays, like today, when you’re still trying to grasp that your last project came to an end. You have different fabric in your hands—no longer fiery red and blood-maroon. You’re cradling a different story, a new client, a new destination. But you work as per usual, going through the same motions, the same patterns, the same focused, uninterrupted state of concentration.

The air is chilly, biting against your hands and seeping through your jacket. But you leave the garage door open, soaking in the light diffused through clouds, the crispness of winter flavoring your work. Stray flurries breeze into the room, greeting you for a moment before they unravel into small puddles on the concrete.

A soft smile sits on your face as your mind wanders. You love winter, the coldness initially foreign and villainous when you arrived in Italy. You’re used to the tropics of Costa Rica—hot, humid air and black sand beaches, crystal blue water with the warmth of a hug. You hated these wet winters and the dry heat of Milan summers, how they deepen your ache to go home. But you’ve come to love the new layers of your seasons, the arrival of one always blooming excitement for the next. 

But your hands go numb, and you have to close the door.

The alarm sounds, pulling you from the depths of your focus. The last piece of fabric slides through the needle before you lift your foot from the pedal, to halt the machine. You swipe your thumb to end the alarm before briefly scrolling through your notifications. Your client responded with her preference: a thin and lacy fabric, the one you’re almost out of. You make a note to pick up another bolt today.

You don’t bother with cleanup, leaving scraps of fabric and papers and spools of thread across the surface of your table. Instead you stand and stretch out your arms, rolling your shoulders beneath the heaviness of your coat. There’s an ache in your neck from hunching, worsened by the stiffness from the cold.

Dressing today is a rare challenge. Normally it’s a sequence of intuitive decisions, hardly a thought entering your mind when you toss on garments. But today is special; today is the first showing of Gōyoku—the first production by Hoshi no Sākasu that you get to see, and with your first costume in a circus production ever. You didn’t expect to feel this indecisive, with uncertain hands carding through your closet and drawers, nothing catching your eye. You pout at your lack of inspiration.

A flicker of feathers catches your eye, glimmering like a wave from the back of the closet. You pull the hangers aside to reach for it, frowning in confusion. When you manage to pull it from the rack and hold it in the light, you laugh. It’s a long piece, the fluff and volume of a black feathered boa. The thought that crosses your mind feels impulsive, sabotaging even, but you’re already giggling at the thought of wrapping yourself in it. Your mind races with possibility: a flapper dress, blazers with giant shoulders, giant sunglasses. They’re re-entering the fashion scene, appearing on the streets with skin-tight dresses, but you want something more casual.

You settle on creamy linens, white with the faintest touch of warmth. They sit heavy on your skin, thick enough that you consider going coatless. Knowing you’ll be cold, you snatch a matching coat to settle on top. After looping your star garment around your neck, black feathers stark against smooth fabric, you turn to the mirror and laugh. Chiara would groan if she saw you, but you work in costume before fashion. Looking ridiculous is part of your job.

You take your time entering the city, leaving early to stop by a bakery and fulfill your craving for panzerotti—the call of fried pockets of mozzarella and tomato—buying some extras and a few different tramezzini to share. Kendou sends you a pin when you let her know that you’re close, leading you to one of the trailers behind the auditorium tent. You walk giddily, smiling at the sparse snowflakes still feathering down.

The piazza is quiet when you walk through through the main entrance, the sides now blocked from the night festivities. There are few people: stray observers and occasional staff members. The guard by the security clearance lets you through with ease. Another guard notices you straying towards a secondary fence, tracking the pin with a frown, and helps you navigate to the trailer once you offer your ID card.

You are led to a white rectangular trailer, one of three in a line. You check the pin once again before walking to the one in the center. Unsure if you should step in without warning, you knock hesitantly on the door.

Only a few seconds pass before the door swings open. You blink in surprise when you’re greeted by the man you met last night, now dressed down from his festival costume. His hair is ruffled, bangs scattered sloppily across his forehead, and his stubble is gone. You swallow as you take him in, the softness on his face, along the edge of his jaw, as wears a matching surprise. He’s flustered, but there’s a shine in his eyes as he watches you. What is he thinking, to look at you like this—like you mean something? He has an air of mystery that tugs at your heart, a yearning to ask endless questions about him, to know who he is. It’s paired with an ease that convinces you he would answer; he would tell you all you wanted to know.

You fight through your smile to speak. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon.”

He opens his mouth to respond, and you’re eager to hear it, but Kendo’s face appears behind the man’s shoulder. “Hey! You found us! Come in, come in.”

Mystery man steps aside to let you pass, just close enough that you brush his shoulder. Your mind flashes to the night before, his hand on your waist and then entangled in your own, spinning you while your wings flapped over your shoulders. You try to blink away the thought, but it persists. 

You catch Momo sitting by the vanity, waving with a cheeky smile. You frown at her expression.

Kendou speaks again, gesturing to the man. “This is Sero, by the way. One of the performers.”

You nod, then smile towards him as you introduce yourself. He grins brightly, not a trace of uncertainty in his eyes. It’s a stark contrast from moments ago. Another mystery. 

“Nice to meet you properly,” he says.

“Sero was just about to get ready,” Momo says. Her eyebrows are raised into her bangs, glancing towards Kendou with a look you can’t read. 

You hear Sero’s voice hitch, like he’s about to say something, before he sighs. “Yeah, I was on my way out.” He looks at you regretfully. “It was nice to catch you.”

You nod, offering one of the small sandwiches from the bakery before he leaves the trailer. He takes one without looking—prosciutto, with tomato and olives and Swiss cheese—before gently closing the door. When you turn to Momo in anticipation, ready to help her into her dress for the show, you’re met with a mischievous grin. You frown again.

“What?”

Her lips twitch. “Nothing.”

You look at her expectantly, unamused, but she doesn’t budge. Kendou smiles, making you equally skeptical of her, before speaking. “We have a bird to dress! Aoyama will be here any minute with the skirt, and then we’ll get to work with your supervision.”

You nod, understanding that you’re meant to be the supporting role for the other costume artists, for them to figure out the kinks of the dress by the time they’re on the road. It’s bittersweet, to spend a few more days with your creation before it sets off without you.

A man appears shortly, noisily strutting through the door of the trailer. His outfit is entirely reflective, the iridescent shine of a CD, and you assume he must be Aoyama. You grin at the sight. Kendou is quick with the introductions. “This is Aoyama, the other costume manager. Aoyama, this is the costume artist—”

You shake hands as you finish her introduction. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

He winks while responding. “As it should be! I love your boa.”

You suppress a laugh. “And I love your outfit.”

“Heat transfer vinyl,” he sings, pressing a hand to his chest. “Do feel free to ask where you can purchase it for yourself.”

You laugh, telling him to give you the details later. 

The air of the room shifts, everyone settling into business as Aoyama sets down the hoopskirt and Kendou pulls the dress from the closet. The trailer is surprisingly large despite being a room on wheels, offering a wide breadth for Momo to step into the frame and have the other two fuss over her. They check with you on its placement before gathering the dress. Your fingers itch to join theirs, to fix the stray bends of fabric or straighten how it lays against Momo’s skin, but the hands of the costume crew trace over those spots eventually. 

When the headpiece is set in place and you get to see Momo in full costume—her hair falling in loose, long curls, eyelids powdered the same blush as her lips, an elegant jewel strung around her neck—you swallow. Seeing your finished pieces, dressed on the figures they were made for, will always clench at your stomach. It brings a rush of euphoria over you, followed by a sweeping emptiness.

You do a onceover to look for anything out of place or concerning, but they’ve laid it perfectly. Your chest both lightens and pangs. The dress will be in good hands.

“If we’re settled I think it’s time we take our star to the main room, yes?” Aoyama asks.

You nod slowly, pressing down the ache. 

Kendou smiles softly. “It’ll be okay.”

“I know, I know. I have attachment issues.”

She laughs and slaps at your shoulder. “I would too. Now go busy yourself until the show starts.”

You help them pin the fabric at the back of Momo’s dress before exiting together. You stop at the back entrance of the tent to say a temporary goodbye, handing over the remaining triangle sandwiches. The crew members slip carefully through the canvas, holding the thick material back to avoid brushing against Momo. You avert your eyes, only catching a glimpse of feathered costumes drifting in the background.

The next half hour is a struggle, time passing slowly in your giddiness. You stand in the cold for the first few minutes, remembering how snow fell softly from the sky just hours prior. The sticky remainders flatten under your shoes with a soft crunch. Your mind drifts to the grueling months leading up to now, iterating the dress and the push and pull between what you, Momo, and Kendou all envisioned. The sky is still hazy, a bright white mist covering the blue buried above. You imagine a plane beyond the fog, Momo and Kendou sitting together by the window, waiting in anticipation to see your mockup in action. 

You smile wistfully. It already feels so long ago, that flood of excitement and the fear of not finishing in time—hours stretching on with you hunched over the gown. It was a painful sort of urgency: the need to be finished, all the while your hands only ever moved at the same steady pace. And now you suddenly have the next step to focus on—the show for tonight, or the next gown you need to sew. Where does the time go? Is it buried in the folds of your projects, sewn into the fabric like a quilt? Are you giving your own life away when you pass on the garments—holding all those moments in their fluid spaces?

Sometimes you wonder how you got here, always moving and moving, never taking the time to look back, to reflect and connect all the pieces of your journey to who you are today. Sometimes you feel like you never made a decision, that these events unfolded on their own, little seeds that blew in the forceful wind of life, hiding in the crevices until you finally turned to look at them: sprouted and standing firm in the ground.

Too firm, too rooted, to move.

Tired of your sentiments and the creeping chill, you decide to enter the shelter of the stage tent. The main entrance is littered with people checking in, clumps that thin into long lines. A metal guardrail separates you from the ticketing to enter the tent, so you approach one of the security members to ask for help. When you show him your ticket and ID card, he leads you to another entrance, skipping the line entirely. 

You reach the edge of the interior where the concessions are prepared, sandwiching the stairs to the seating. The crowd thickens as showtime approaches, the lines for food and drink quickly elongating. You’re prepared to skirt around and go directly to your seat, not tempted by the wafting scent of buttery popcorn and the sweetness of pretzels, but your eyes land on that fluffy fish-shaped bread from the night prior, and your feet take you to the line before you mentally make a decision. Luckily it moves quickly and you soon purchase two taiyaki, placed gently in a crinkly paper bag. You hold it gently, the heat spreading through your hands. 

The seat number on your ticket indicates that you’re in the section closest to the front, but in one of the furthest rows. It’s the seat you requested, centered to get the ideal view and close to the stage, but slightly elevated for the best angle to view the performers. You walk unhurriedly to your spot, taking a booklet offered by the attendant in the aisle. Once seated, you run a finger over the glossy paper—the striking art of a fiery phoenix—then press your thumb against the edge of the cover to open the first page. You scan your eyes over the introduction, three separate paragraphs for the original Japanese, followed by an English and Italian translation.

Gōyoku—meaning ‘Fierce Wings’—is the action-packed story of the impossible creatures of the sky. For just one moment, in the wake of their greatest desperation, these winged beasts are able to be glorious, fiery gods. Follow the journey of a guardian hawk as it battles fearsome foes, inspires his apprentices, and eventually burns out in his diligence to protect the new generation.

You smile with anticipation. The next page contains a list of names and roles: the director, producers, and stage crew displayed in neat rows, with details written in a small font beneath the individual names. You catch Aizawa’s, the romaji bringing a grimace to your face when you once again remember your first encounter. You flip the page, eyes recognizing a list of acts, and then immediately skip to the one after. The back has a list of acknowledgements and gratitudes, to donors and inspirations for the show. You blink when you see your own name on the bottom, with a small paragraph describing your work and why you were chosen for the production. It pulls a tight smile across your face.

You close the booklet and eat one of the taiyaki.

At four on the dot, the lights dim. Most people are in their seats, some stragglers still filtering in. Your eyes trace the room, packed full with spectators. Nearly every seat is filled, a mix of ages, singles and couples and families. Your eyes widen when you catch sight of the little girl from last night, the same pinched face of her Hyottoko mask. You’re tempted to wave, to see if you can catch her attention, but she’s up in a row towards the side of the stage. There’s no reason for her eyes to swoop in your direction. 

But they do, to your surprise. First in glee, excitement, and then in surprise. You look at her confusedly, slightly tilting your head. Her parents are watching you too, with the same expressions. Other people in their seats look your way. Your heart starts races, wondering what about you has grabbed their attention—

A pair of hands cover your eyes from behind, jolting you in your seat. They’re paired with a deep giggle, almost dark and maniacal. You grin in embarrassment.

Crowd work. You’ve seen the cartoonish forms of circus clowns engage with the audience before, oftentimes its own act in the show, but you’ve never been subjected to it yourself. Your heart races from the attention, anxious at being part of the spectacle. Part of you  Suddenly the hands trail downwards, to your large boa, and pull it away, bringing a waft of cool air to your neck and shoulders. You blink in surprise, head turning to follow it.

You see a blond man nearly skipping down the aisle, your boa swinging in his hand. He’s dressed in a tight black suit, tipped at the wrists with tufts of feathers. The fabric of his clothes are sewn with analog watch faces, set at a variety of times. His face is obscured by a bird mask, only revealing a wide, cheeky grin. He makes a show out of floating your boa around him, posing as if he’s unsure what it is, before wrapping it around his own neck, letting out a fit of ridiculous laughter and then skipping through the seating. 

You wonder if he was informed that you were in the audience, if this was planned. 

Your grin spreads easily across your face, watching as he turns back with a wink before bothering other audience members. He stops by the girl, where she sits in the front row of the next section, and makes a show of looking curiously at her mask. He reaches for it and she giggles, holding it against herself in defense. The suited bird cocks his head, then pouts before sighing and strutting away dramatically in defeat.

Commotion from the other end of the room turns your head, to another figure working the crowd. This one is a bubbly woman, with a costume of bursting pink feathers and purple, shimmery patterned cloth. She wears a giant smile as she hops along the seat, looking curiously at the audience members. When her mask turns so you can see the face, you are struck by the illusion of darkness beneath her eyes, completely blacked out. A pair of sharp but narrow horns sprout from the edges, giving her an alien quality. Like her show partner, she giggles happily as she skips along.

The pair charades their way to the front, keeping the eyes of the audience focused. When they meet each other on the stage, they communicate with overexaggerated gestures and gibberish noises. The blond one does a twirl, raising his hands to bring attention to your boa with a wide smirk. The pink one gasps and reaches for it, only for the blond to huff and jump away. You watch with amusement—and apprehension, hoping your scarf will survive the show.

The sound effects of the characters start to blur into a song as they move around the stage. A light melody settles in, synchronized with their steps skirting back and forth. Just as they dart into the center, a loud bang resounds from the speakers. The characters pause, dramatically turning around the stage in defensive stances. The girl looks up and points, hopping in excitement. Her partner tilts his head, offering a polite clap with a shrug.

You follow her finger, watching as a hoop slowly lowers from the ceiling. It spins slowly, cradling a man. He’s almost lounging, lazily lying with his back on the bottom, neck cradled to the side. One leg dangles while the other is bent into the frame, foot toeing against the edge. You are close enough to see his face, the confident smile that pulls at his lips. His eyes are closed, outlined with red markings. His clothing matches his hair, golden and ruffled, white feathers accenting his wrists and ankles. He wears a transparent golden mask, open to let his expression shine through. 

The music continues gently as the hoop lowers. The bird characters on the stage cheerfully try copying his pose from their standing positions, the blond shaking his head at the woman as he lifts one of her arms higher. Your eyes travel back to the lyra, to the man’s face, his eyes peeling open. He slowly sits up, trailing his arms around the perimeter of the hoop. His face morphs into curiosity as he takes in the crowd, then the birds beneath him. A sharp grin spreads across his face while he leans forward to watch them closely.

In a flash the hoop falls—you think more than his body length—and it pulls a sharp inhale into your chest from surprise and fear. The performer leans back with the movement, as if he’s going to plummet to the ground, but he catches himself with the underside of his knees. The two below shriek in fright, before scattering across the stage in opposite directions, disappearing into the back. As this new character—you assume the hawk in the booklet summary—comes to the end of his fall, he stretches his arms, reaching to catch the scattered jesters. Bright red wings sprout from his back, feathers swaying with the jolt of the fall. They’re giant, especially to have been so well concealed.

The hawk draws out the lowering of the hoop, removing one leg to fall into a split, holding his ankle by his head for the sake of showing off. Then he releases it to snake back up the hoop. His arms follow, pulling him back into the frame. He tangles himself through the edge, making a show of his flexibility, before sitting in the center. He grabs the frame below him before rolling forwards, swinging as he dangles in the air from his hands. The wings burst open once again, fiery red flaming behind his figure. The lyra is lowered enough that his feet barely skim the ground. He swims his legs through the air as if walking until he can touch the floor securely.

And then he runs.

You’ve seen aerial object acts before, always an impressive series of poses and fluid movements entangled in the air. But the speed of this act is unheard of. The performer's body swings and swipes through the air like a knife, so sharp you think you can hear the whoosh as he moves. His wings continue to open and close at the perfect times, unfolding when he holds a specific pose, lengthening in tune with his routine and the quickening music. Even when he is curled into the lyra, they compliment the positions of his body. You realize they work through a mechanism attached to his arms, opening opposite to his elbows. You watch captivated as he gracefully slides across the wheel despite his speed, all the while it glides in a circle or twirls along the rope anchoring it to the ceiling. Your stomach drops with his precarious balancing and the surprise drops, always catching himself in the nick of time.

As he slows and the act winds to an end, he pulls himself back to the center of the hoop. He nestles into another lounging position, mirroring his entrance. The lyra rises and the music lulls, signaling the end of the act. Scattered claps sound around you, snapping you from your daze. You join the applause as it rolls through the audience. It was a stunning opening, setting the stage for what’s to come.

In the midst of the clapping, the music unexpectedly fills with faster, darker sounds. As deep bass thrums through the room, three figures wrapped in black silks unravel from the ceiling. They fall in sharp, jagged movements, rocking as they tumble through the air.

They slow as they finish their descent to the floor, and then to eventually rest on the ground. The silks lift into the ceiling, leaving the performers behind. They lay still for a couple moments before twitching, muscles and joints moving in rapid and jagged jolts. Slowly they rise to stand, legs and arms angled to appear twisted. You take in their costumes, tight tan fabric purposefully wrinkled along their bodies, with small, uneven lines of feathers—one figure’s pink, one green, and the last yellow. Their masks are small on their faces, disheveled and anxious. You think you recognize two of them, the small women from the day you dropped off your dress, the ones you saw last night in the festival. 

You watch curiously as they begin to struggle towards one another. They remind you of baby birds, naked and frail. Your eyes widen at the thought, putting together that they have fallen from the sky.

Their act is one of contortion, bodies twisting and bending in impossible shapes. They mold into one another, arms and legs tangling in a rolling knot. The show of flexibility is broken with a series of theatrical performances, futile attempts to fly or crawl over each other. It’s as haunting as it is awe-inspiring, striking you with distress and pity. It’s an incredible use of the act. The story is clear with these characters, their desperation for safety, for freedom. You feel sorry, yearning to offer help.

As their bodies slow in a display of exhaustion, they pile in the center of the stage. You see them breathe together, expanding steadily as one entity before compressing again. The moment is tender, intimate. Drawn out unlike usual performances. You know this is the end of the act, that you should applaud, but you don’t want to break the softness. The others in the audience seem to feel the same.

A fourth figure appears, sliding from the side of the stage and in the back. He’s tall and lean, toned stature showing through the tight fabric of his costume. It’s similarly wrinkled as the contortionists, but with a mix of purple and beige fabric. Faux scorched skin, you realize, as if stapled to itself. His costume is the least orderly, with black and red and white feathers clumped in his hair, indistinguishable.

In one of his hands is a staff, with a wheel of spokes standing from both ends. He twirls it slowly, tauntingly, as he starts to circle the bodies in the center. The lights dim as he stalks them, turned so his chest and head face his prey. The music plays eerie, sharp notes that clash with one another. Then it halts.

In an instant a flame bursts across the stage, tracing the circle of the man in purple. Your brain whirrs in attempt to understand how the act unfolded: all you can think is that his staff may have been leaking fuel along his path, unnoticed in the darkening stage. It doesn’t explain how the fire came to be, or how the staff lit itself.

The fire spinning is an act of intensity, a gut-wrenching scene of the larger figure taunting the small. He plays the role of a villain with ease, convincing even when you know it’s only for show. His body is one with his staff, rolling and twisting the length over his limbs. It runs along his shoulders and neck, twirls over his chest and through his legs, hooked over the top of his foot to be thrown back into the air. The two points of light dart throughout the stage, illuminating his face and chest and limbs for less than seconds at a time.

After one particularly fast and complex combination—topped with a downwards yank of the prop, releasing long swirls of flame into the air—you see another figure enter the stage. He has a smaller frame but a  similar intensity, as though stalking towards the predator. As he nears towards the light, you realize it’s Todoroki, his split-dyed hair unmistakable. His costume is deep blue with a high collar, the exact sort of fit you imagined when you first saw him. You grin.

He suddenly thrusts himself towards the remaining streaks of fire on the ground, pressing his hand against the flame. You watch in shock, expecting him to pull away in pain, but instead the heat is smothered in an instant. The bundle of contortionists spill across the floor, writhing to the side of the stage. They continue their struggle to freedom, their jagged movements persistent as they escape to the edge of your vision.

Todoroki finishes the rest of the flames while the taller man chases him with the staff. They leap and dodge one another, a choreographed fight that involves many close calls. Your heart leaps as you watch the edge of the staff swipe close to Todoroki’s face, illuminating his sharp but delicate features. He is unmasked, the deep red of his scar visible to the crowd.

A billow of fire erupts from his mouth, shooting past the spokes of the staff and into the air. It casts a torrent of orange glow across him and his opponent, flooding himself and the burned creature in a beautiful, warm light. It shines bright enough to see the details of the stage and audience for one brief moment. You realize Todoroki was holding the fuel in his mouth throughout the entirety of the fight thus far. Impossible. 

The fight continues, Todoroki and his opponent dancing with fire. It’s mostly a series of choreographed strikes and dodges, almost a game or dance as they circle one another: the staff one weapon and Todoroki’s breath the other. The flames on the end of the prop begin to wither as their movements speed, nearing the end of their performance. Todoroki closes it out with one final exhale, blowing blinding clouds of heat in an arc towards the audience. You blink back in surprise, warm air brushing against your face.

They stand in the center, bodies tense and shuddering with deep inhales. Their exhaustion plays into the reality of the fight, ragged breaths and hunched shoulders visible from afar. You think they look pained, that their struggle is beyond the performance.

The next act transitions easily, the fire show morphing into a chase with new characters—in full bird-shaped headpieces and wing-like cloaks—eventually through the air on a series of springboards soaring, twisting, flipping, and jumping propelled by each other’s landings. Two characters in particular catch your eye, with deep green and red costumes. You’re reminded of Midoriya, and think the height and frame of the green bird could align.

Your eyes widen when a giant net rolls across the stage behind the heavy duty seesaws. The fire artists slam down on the boards in sync, the new bird figures soaring. When they rise just enough to clear the net, it’s swiftly rolled underneath them to catch their landing. The springboards are then pushed out of the stage, marking an end to Todoroki’s performance.

The people at the base of the net—women in leotards, different shades of purple, paired with skirts full of feathers—lock the wheels before climbing the ladders up the side, joining the previous characters onto raised platforms. The two men untie the threads around their necks, slipping the capes from their arms and followed by the headpieces—now left only in lean pants. After setting them on the back of the platform and walking towards the edges at the center, you confirm that one of them is in fact Midoriya. The other has hair that matches his red costume.

The trapeze act should be impossible, especially with Midoriya and the redhead having just completed an entirely separate act. But it’s flawless, impeccable, unthinkable. The following acts are executed with seamless transitions that lead through a cohesive plot—a juggling act with a man who moves as if he has six arms, and a dual cyr act with men of a drastic height difference, the smaller one gliding easily and with incredible balance, and the taller spinning across the stage at incredible speeds.

At the end of their act, when the two roll out of sight, the lights and sound dim to darkness. A roar of applause passes through the crowd, this being the first real quiet gap between acts. There are cheers and hollers and whistling for several moments, an extended display of love. When the noise finally begins to fade away, a spotlight glows in the center of the stage, slowly illuminating a figure in red. You take a deep breath to ease the constriction in your chest.

It’s Momo.

In the excitement of watching, you momentarily forgot that she was performing, that you made her costume, that you’re a part of this show too.

She’s beautiful, standing tall with an air of elegance—a poise that commands the room. Behind her is a pair of feathered musicians: a purple-haired woman and an older blond man, with an electric violin and cello respectively. They draw a slow melody through the room, crisp notes floating through the speakers. Momo steps to the front of the room smoothly and carefully as if floating, the edge of her dress brushing right above the ground to cover her feet. You hold your breath as your eyes track the details of the costume, every ruffle of fabric and bounce of feather. 

The costume looks perfect on stage, not a ruffle out of place. You realize it’s the first time you’re seeing her wear it from a distance, to appreciate the hug of her waist and the curves of her figure. The darkness of the fabric is regal against her skin and her confidence. The sheerness of the chiffon brings out her grace, with a sparkle that brightens her edges, the glow of an aura. The orange swathes that trail behind her are like glowing footprints, the markings of a deity—the evidence that she walked across our earth.

Momo’s performance is beautiful, starting as a series of long, drawn out words in well-enunciated Italian. They’re sorrowful, a series of questions that ask where her friends have gone, if they’re safe. If they’ll come home.

The music increases in sound and intensity as she continues, words moving quickly through verbal images of where they could be, what they might be facing. Her voice is rich and smooth as it traces through forests and fields, of predators and monsters. Each note slides beautifully into the next, weaving between heavily grounded and delicately airy. She’s a master with her instrument, the strings of her vocal chords under her total command.

The song finishes with a plea for help. She moves her arms in fluid motions as she reaches towards the crowd, hands twisting and fingers curving as they move towards the sky. You exhale with melancholy at her display of emotion, the pain that strikes the beauty of her obscured face. Her movements become angry and desperate, sharp and jagged when she snaps her head and adds a rasp to her voice, a complete turn from smoothness of her original voice. When the build up to her longest note begins, you hold your breath in anticipation for her to spin.

The dark fabric of the dress skirt, with its layers of maroon, lifts to expose its white underbelly. A flock of matching white doves escape through the gaps, circling counterclockwise with her movement—pulling gasps from yourself and other audience members. She twirls for several rotations, the orange trails of chiffon spiraling beneath her as the birds disperse and rise until they disappear into the ceiling. As soon as the final bird is out of sight, she collapses on herself. Your stomach clenches in worry. She cradles herself against the ground as her note ends, the music following and coming to a lull.

A giant smile overtakes your face, tears brimming the edges of your eyes in joy. You did it, you hear through your mind, unsure if the words are for yourself or Momo. They asked and you delivered.

The crowd applauds once again when the lights dim. You wipe your eyes, months of work and stress feeling so incredibly worth it now that you’ve seen the final piece: a multitude of masterpieces and crafts that will be displayed again and again. Yours. Momo’s. The costume, the vocals, the music, the magic.

Your heart can be at ease.

The lights don't dim entirely, the faint outline of the musicians and Momo still visible. However, four more figures appear, dark silhouettes. They stand closer towards the audience, in front of the spotlight’s reach.

The act that follows is one of whimsical illusion—likely serving as an interlude. Two of the new characters walk into the light, revealing themselves to be the pink woman and the time-covered man from the beginning. They skip sprightly along the platform, followed by the two other characters that you realize are meant to symbolize their shadows. The shadow-characters carry large sheets that billow in their grasp. The blond’s shadow lifts their sheet over the violinist, smoothing her form in the draping fabric. Then they tug the top, enough to rustle the sheet, until it suddenly crumples to the ground—flattening as if there was no one there to begin with. The shadowy figures clap with joy, while the original clowns react with harsh gasps and frightened faces. 

Eventually the cellist is smothered under the sheet, and then Momo. You suspect it’s a typical trick of the floor, opening at just the right time for them to fall through. You hope your dress is still intact, that it survived the fall.

The illusion takes a darker turn, the shadows now chasing their physical forms. The smaller of the shadows succeeds first, vanishing the pink woman. After she disappears, her shadow jumps and spins in glee. You blink when she faces the front once again and is fully visible. The same happens for the blond who stole your boa—still snug around his neck as he is captured and melted into the floor, to reveal the face of his shadow.

The rest of the act is less predictable, the characters moving between the visible and obscured. There are more warpings of illusion, sleight of hand perfectly executed, but also tricks that you can’t fathom. At one point the man appears to step right through the woman, and later she skips behind the man to vanish entirely, appearing behind him a minute later on a different part of the stage. You watch with wide eyes, watching for any movement of the floor, but it never happens. You wonder what the people behind you see, if it’s a matter of angles.

For their final trick, they lay themselves in the center of the stage, draping the sheets over themselves. The pile sits still for several moments before it stirs—leaps to reveal three entirely different figures. The one who stands is a man with a large headpiece, the black head of a bird that engulfs his own. Emerging next is a woman swathed in white fabric, like a fairytale damsel. Her hair falls like a curtain of ivy along her back and shoulders. The last figure sits up slowly; a man with black hair and a costume of darkness, catching shimmers of light speckled across his suit, splotches of yellow feathers sprouting at his shoulders and elbows. As his head turns you can see his eyes through the mask—

They land on you.

Your breath hitches. It’s Sero, the one you danced with and the one you briefly encountered before the show. Despite the distance, you recognize the intensity of his gaze, one you could almost read as longing. When he looks away you feel a wave of relief, but it’s short lived. He continues to watch you, to come back to you.

Three pairs of thick, silk ribbons rain from the ceiling, and you immediately think back to your first impression of Sero—that he would look breathtaking draped in silken black fabric.

He does.

Despite the act being split between three performers, with moments to spotlight each of their solos, you can’t look away from Sero for more than seconds at a time. You catch enough of the other two to differentiate their styles—the woman’s display of flexibility and intricate wrapping techniques, and the man’s show of speed and intensity, body whipping and whorling through the air. 

They’re beautiful. But Sero, Sero flows along the aerial silk. 

Not a single movement is choppy or without grace, body as fluid as the threads of fabric in his grasp. His solo is one that centers his relationship with his act, how he tangles into its hold, how he can move his limbs in imitation of the unstructured garment—his body an extension of the silk, another curtain draping from the ceiling. He breaks from the cloth to suspend himself in the air, feet stepping as if he were walking through floating platforms. He swims upwards through the ribbons, body liquid and shimmering as he slides back down, rolling through tangles and knots, all the while fluffing up pockets and loops of fabric, billowing like the tail of a fish as it waves through the ocean.

Watching him move is like being hypnotized, like you’re seeing something you shouldn’t, because it doesn’t exist. The world behind him fades, time slows. It’s just you and him, like last night’s dance, his fluid and rolling movements as he guided you along, sending tingles through your chest and torso and arms. You have chills, shivers of warmth. It’s indescribable. Now you’re the one yearning to watch him, hoping he’ll meet your gaze again every time it breaks.

By the end of the act you are entranced, obsessed. Your heart is heavy knowing that his performance is over and you will have to watch someone else.

The rest of the show is still objectively stunning, filled with numbers that go beyond any performance you’ve seen before. Following the aerial silks is a man who walks his way on stage on his hands, then up a series of steps to a handstand board. You watch him perform his own act of contortion: slow and methodical and with extreme displays of balance, holding himself in precarious positions. He doesn’t touch his feet to the floor once, until the next act starts and sends sparks throughout the stage. It’s a show of explosive poi, a ball of sparkling fire tied to each hand at the end of a string, twirling around its equally volatile user. Another battle-like scene plays out.

Afterwards is a balancing act, with a man in a costume with a giant tail—the additional challenge seemingly impossible when he stands on a series of rolling objects that add up to more than his own height. The show ends with the display of two giant puppets: mechanical birds floating in the air, rooted on the back and shoulders of performers ambling around the stage. One appears sizzling with electricity while the other looks jagged and sharp, made from scraps of metal. They are joined by the bird characters from the beginning, your boa still around the neck of the blond man, as they’re led through the audience, leaning over to let the crowd gently touch the faces and wings.

When they climb back onstage the music shifts, signaling the closure of the story and show. Applause begins immediately, the crowd standing as soon as the first performer—the hawk—stands at the front for a bow, blowing kisses. He’s followed by the three contortionists before they step back for Todoroki, continuing as each act has their moment of acknowledgement. When Momo steps forwards you yell her name, jumping carefully between the others next to you to get her attention. She grins and bows, blowing a kiss to you directly. You pretend to catch it.

You yell again when the aerial silk group steps forward. Sero smiles happily before the crowd, bowing shallowly so he stands upright first. His eyes find yours and this time you’re ready for it, widening your grin when he meets your gaze. His hand lifts hesitantly before it twitches in a small wave. He stands for a moment too long, and another performer has to pull him back to the others. You smile stupidly, biting the inside of your cheek.

You linger when the crowd filters up the stairs and towards the exit, the room now brightened and flooded with excited chatter. Kendou told you to meet her after the show, but not where or how. You stay in your seat until the aisles clear, swiping through your phone to see if Kendou sent any updates. Once there’s an open path to the stage, you walk down towards one of the security guards to ask for permission backstage. Your ID and anecdotal evidence are met with skepticism, the guard blinking unimpressed by your efforts. Not wanting to waste your time, you turn to exit with the rest of the audience.

A soft yell of your name pulls you to turn back. You don’t catch the source immediately, but eventually your eyes land on wild green curls peeking from the curtain. You brighten and wave.

He frowns and shoots a hand out, beckoning you to join him. You shake your head and point to the security. The large Italian man sees this and then turns in confusion, bristling when his eyes land on Midoriya gesturing you over. He averts his eyes, facing back towards the front. You frown in confusion, not sure if that means you can pass.

Midoriya continues to wave for you, so you cave. Your first step on the stairs stage is cautious, gauging the reaction of your obstacle. After confirming he won’t interfere, you take them two at a time, scurrying to the curtain to slip through the gap. 

The wardrobe and backstage section of the tent has transformed since your first visit, now lined with floor padding and filled with a multitude of props and structures. It’s much livelier, packed with clusters of people in conversation, cheerfully stretching or lounging. Near the exit is a cage for the doves, their chirping softly floating through the background. You drink in the details of the scene, how people rest with one another. Todoroki and Sero stand in a quiet conversation, Ochako and the blonde girl she performed with are laying together on one of the sofas. Momo is absent, along with Kendou. Aoyama is present, helping the hawk character from the first act remove his wings.

You think they look close, comfortable around one another. You can only imagine the sort of tight-knit relationships that bloom from working on these productions for so long—training day after day on risky props, some of them constantly putting their lives in someone else’s hands.

You register someone speaking to you: Midoriya, having been rambling for some time now. You chide yourself for getting lost in thought.

“—but, what did you think?” he asks. You missed the entire prelude, but you have faith in your enthusiasm to deliver a good response.

“Midoriya, it was amazing,” you say with full honesty. “I think you were right—your show will ruin me for any other circus. The transitions between the acts were incredible, and it brought the storyline together so seamlessly—much more cohesive than any other production I’ve seen before. And, oh my god everyone is so impressive. The acts were so much longer than typical shows, and—you! How can you manage back to back performances?”

The thoughts spill out of you, your excitement uncontainable as you think about the production as a whole, recounting the many ways in which it surpassed your expectations. Midoriya beams as your response. His cheeks flush at your praise, but he collects himself as he explains the two acts and their importance to happen directly after one another. He goes into detail about balancing muscle strain: the springboards are exhausting for the legs, but the trapeze is demanding on his arms. He and his stage partner—Kirishima, you learn—manage to make it work through sheer determination.

“He’s one of few people who could make it work,” he tells you, eyes sparkling.

You’re about to respond, to ask for details on how they fleshed out the act, when a softness flutters past your face to land on your neck and shoulders. You reach for it, gently grasping your feathered boa—long forgotten while listening to Midoriya. You turn, expecting to see the blond man in the suit, but instead find Sero behind you.

He smiles with the same ease and confidence of your first meeting, mouth stretched lazily and eyes relaxed. He must be feeling good now that the first show has passed successfully. You feel warm.

“Sorry we held your boa hostage,” he says. You can see the thief behind him, watching with a curious smirk.

No good response comes to mind, your heart busy thumping when your eyes dart back to his. Your mind flashes with that beautiful silk fabric draping over him, his fluid motions as he himself through it like his body is equally malleable. The effect of his performance—that awe and fluster—still sits in your chest. You’re drawn to him, intrigued to know more.

“You were incredible,” you tell him. His eyes grow, mouth gaping in surprise. “I’ve never seen someone move that way on silks. Is it your main act?”

You don’t expect his shyness. It only appears for a moment, shoulders starting to hunch before he stands straight again and smiles brightly, with confidence.

“Yeah! Since I was a kid. I’ve trained a couple other acts—mostly balances and other aerial props. But aerial silk is the best.”

You nod readily. “Of course, it’s my favorite to watch.” It’s ultimately a dance with fabric, one of your first loves.

“Really?” Midoriya asks. “I didn’t know that.”

You laugh. “Why? Because it’s not in my interviews?”

He laughs nervously, hand coming to scratch the back of his head.

“Verde!” you hear Momo call, grabbing your attention. She comes behind Sero, now changed into a casual shirt and pants.

“Momo!”

She engulfs you in a hug, her body pressing into your side as you wrap your arms over her in return.

“Momo, your singing is beautiful. And the birds were stunning. I can’t believe we did that.”

She smiles, eyes shining while her hand grabs your forearm. “We did.”

Once again, as you did a few days prior, you have a longing to talk with her more, deeper. You want to share what it means to you, what you think it means to her. You want to let yourself blur the edges of her position as the performer and yours as the designer, to think about who you are together. But there are still prying eyes, an audience who won’t understand. You glance at Midoriya, his face full of warmth and joy. Then they drift to Sero, and catch a twinge of surprising melancholy.

The performers happily chat with you, some new ones butting in to introduce themselves. You finally get the name of the blond who took your boa: Monoma, who also laughs at your choice of outfit. You get to meet the third woman in the act with Uraraka and Asui—Toga. Names filter in and out, acrobats and production members stopping by. Catering arrives, a selection of classic dishes from one of the high end ristoranti nearby. The aluminum trays are opened to reveal a pasta dish, its fresh scent of pesto and vegetables familiar.

Some performers rush through their meal and leave, or move to the mirrors to retouch their makeup. For the next show, you realize. There are two every night, with a two hour break before the end of the first and the beginning of the second.

Midoriya and Momo part to retouch their costumes, and Kendou orders you to stay put—that she’ll retrieve you if necessary. You’re left with Sero, somehow rating pasta shapes. 

“Hey,” he suddenly says while you’re still mid-thought—musing whether farfalle or penne would work better for this sauce. You sense a topic change. He looks nervous, chewing his lip before speaking. “Are… Do you—”

He glances to the side and pauses, instead switching to a small smile.

“Hey ‘Roki.”

Your eyes linger on Sero thoughtfully, wondering what he was trying to ask, before greeting Todoroki. 

“I wanted to tell you that we’re about halfway through the book,” he says seriously, like he’s delivering an important message. “We just finished the chapter where Santi is pulled into Marco’s world.”

You beam with delight. He’s at the same part you’ve reached since you started reading it again, after dropping off Momo’s dress. “Oh yeah? What do you think? When I was a kid I would read that part almost every night before bed.”

Todoroki nods. “That chapter is my favorite so far. The imagery is quite vivid, and I found myself getting excited—like the kids.”

You hum in agreement before laughing. “I always had so much energy after reading that I couldn’t sleep. I have a dress inspired by that scene, I’ll have to wear it for the final show.”

“You know the book he’s reading?”

At the sound of Sero’s voice, you turn to him and nod. “It’s my favorite, since I was a kid.”

“Really?” he asks, face suspended in disbelief. “Me too! I’ve never met someone outside of my family who’s heard of it.”

Your eyes grow to match his, the two of you now staring at each other curiously. 

“Me neither,” you answer. You don’t even remember how you acquired it, whether by gift or if it was something that had always lingered in your peripheral until you finally took notice. It’s a mysterious little book, with almost no online presence. 

“Do you speak Spanish?” You ask, recalling Sero’s dancing. 

“Sí. Mi mamá es de Ecuador,” he explains. “A small town on the Northern coast.”

Ecuador. You’ve been before, to the capital for a parade. You smile at the memory. “Sudamerica? I’m from Costa Rica. Also on the coast, almost directly west of San José.”

He grins. “We’re both on the Pacific, then.”

You let your gaze linger on his face, the eager shine in his eyes. You want to ask more, to talk about family and life and culture. You get the sense that he does too.

“I thought you said you only knew a little Spanish?”

You blink in surprise at Todoroki’s voice, face heating at your lie. “I got nervous?”

He squints. “About speaking your native language?”

The disbelief in his voice makes you laugh, recognizing your own absurdity. “Maybe? I don’t speak often these days. It makes me sentimental.”

Sero hums. “Sí, speaking Español can make me miss home. Being in Italy has been strange.”

You agree—the transition was a difficult one for you when you first arrived in Milan. You could estimate most of what people said, but had no idea how to respond. You remember awkwardly stumbling through conversations, dealing with nearly a year of clumsily translating before you could speak with ease.

You continue your chatter about the book, enjoying Todoroki’s observations and thoughts. He’s serious about his reading, even for a children’s story. Sero is too, but he becomes quiet, focused on listening to your discussion.

A call for the performers ends your conversation, leaving you to yourself as they gather to run through the schedule. You hang towards the exit of the tent, curious to see the logistical side of the production. You feel a poke at your arm.

“Are you staying for the festival afterwards?” Kendou asks.

You shake your head. “Only for a little. I need to grab some fabric on my way home, but the shop closes at ten.” 

Kendou pouts. “You should come tomorrow.”

“I will,” you promise. You’re planning to come most nights regardless. “Do you think we could talk? About the… job?”

Her eyes nearly sparkle, like the twinkle of sunlight across ocean waves. “I can’t during the festival, since I’m working every night. Can you come during the show again? Aoyama can cover for me.”

You nod. “Yeah, is one better for me to come than the other?”

“Please—You’re welcome here whenever you want.”

“Don’t say that,” you answer. “Or I will be here everyday. You’ll get sick of me.”

She laughs. “Good. Maybe that means you’ll accept our offer by the time we leave Milan.”

You bite your lip at the comment, forcing your smile away. It’s a conflicting place to be, with your heart beating proudly but aching at the same time.

The show is flawless once again, still breathtaking even after seeing it hours before and only rewatching snippets through the screen backstage. You have the urge to interrogate the performers after their acts, brimming with questions and comments. But you notice their tiredness, always coming back panting, immediately chugging water or laying down. You watch Todoroki slosh a cup of mouthwash before sitting next to you with a bottle of juice.

“Your act is the most insane,” you tell him.

He nods.

You’re later joined by others, including Midoriya and briefly Momo, the chirping of the doves re-entering with the end of her performance. When the aerial silk performance starts, your eyes are once again glued to Sero. He’s still devastatingly beautiful during his number, aweing you with his routine. You don’t think you could ever be tired of the way he moves. You want to talk to him, to talk more about his art and of home, but he disappears when he finishes. You shovel down your disappointment. He’s most likely resting, or has other things to worry about.

When the show ends, there’s hardly a moment to breathe before the cast is changing costumes, from feathered birds into their eclectic festival jesters. You can only stay for another half hour, so you wave goodbye to those still in your vicinity, letting Midoriya know you’ll be back tomorrow in case you don’t see him tonight.

The festival is the same as the previous night, littered with lines of market stalls displaying work by local artists and artisans: Milanese food, traditional textiles, niche jewelry. You walk by Hoshi no Sākasu’s tent, the waffly scent of taiyaki a comfort in the chill of the evening. An array of Hyottoko masks are on display, their cheeks large and noses long, eyes varying from pinched closed to painfully wide. You want to walk slowly, take in the string lights and the classical guitar, but you force yourself to move along. The boutique that sells the lace you need won’t be open tomorrow, and you want to get started on the sleeves of the dress in the morning.

None of the performers make an appearance by the time you finish walking through a line of stalls. You carry along, turning through the next row and passing a table of wine sampling—a mix of sparkling and red. You pause and step back to ask for a sample of the Champagne blend, the little paper cup rough against your fingertips as you take a sip before continuing your stroll. 

By the time your sample is finished and the cup is tossed in the garbage, you’re walking through the last row of markets, nestled furthest from the street and closer to the duomo. It’s quieter on this end, away from the music and the clinking pans. This section hosts mostly artists, you notice while passing a display of watercolor paintings. They’re vibrant and rough, capturing candid moments of people, energetic gestures brushed onto textured paper. The woman in the booth is old, with crinkled eyes and grey hair tucked behind a cloth. She watches you blankly.

“Buonasera,” you say, smiling gently. She grins back, eyes nearly disappearing with the rise of her cheeks.

You continue forward, eyes catching a smear of crimson in your peripheral. You frown, stepping towards the center of the path to get a better look. It’s another market stall, but draped over with a deep red fabric, the folds swaying as people walk by. It sits unassuming in this quiet realm of the fair, with no indication of what sits inside. You figure it’s a closed stall, a vendor who couldn’t make it tonight. But your eyes catch the edge of the flap; it’s lined with green feathers. You look at it skeptically, not trusting yourself to make a logical assessment of what it’s for. The color is so vibrant, that punchy chartreuse that you always use. If you were more delusional you would think that it’s… for you.

You pace forwards, zooming by tables of pottery and sterling silver jewelry to reach the front of the tent. The slit in the fabric feels like it’s calling for you, waving slightly in a chilly breeze. The tips of your fingers brush the feathers, their softness tingling against your fingerprints.

A peek won’t hurt.

You slide the flap back gently, just enough to widen the opening and glance inside.

It’s dark, too dark. There’s only the blackness of the space you can’t see. The faint light trickling in doesn’t reach far, and it sits through the air like particles of dust, dull stars in a night sky. You start to lower your hand, deciding it’s an empty stall after all, when someone in the market bumps into you. You falter, losing balance and stumbling forwards to catch yourself.

The tent illuminates.

You gasp in surprise, the space inside appearing much larger than what the exterior suggested. Warm air coats your body, a surprise since you didn’t feel it spilling out the entrance. The air is thick, almost salty with humidity, and the noise outside completely fades away. It’s just you in a quiet room, with a warm dim light that coats a series of bookshelves. They’re littered with trinkets, unorderly but with the homey energy of clutter. You blink at the sight of a large, unbroken conch shell.

It calls for you, your fingertips delicately pressing against the bumpy surface as you lift carefully. By instinct you hold the opening to your ear, immediately sighing with a smile at the sound of ocean waves. You close your eyes, imagining clear blue water and white bubbles of seafoam, spilling out onto black sand.

Then there’s a series of bird calls, the screeching of scarlet macaws as they soar through the air. Your eyes widen, pressing the shell further against your face and covering your other ear to listen closely. You catch the faint sounds of wind and rustling palm leaves in the distance. It sounds just like home, like the coast. You pull the shell away skeptically, the noise cutting into silence, before pressing it to your ear again. The sensory immersion floods back full force, birds and waves and wind surrounding you.

Your eyes land on a jar on another shelf, half-filled with cacao beans. Reluctantly, you return the conch to its place and lift the jar, glass with a metal lip sealing it tightly. You give it a couple shakes, the soft rattle making you smile—memories of abuela cutting open a long pod, you and your sister greedily eating the sweet, white flesh of the fruit on the outside, spitting the remainder on a sheet for abuela to ferment.

You undo the clasp, glass top clinking against its body. You’re hit strong with the initial scent of vinegar before it fades into the rich aroma of dark chocolate. Again you think of home, one of your tíos helping you grind the beans by hand, twisting the crank for you when you wanted a break.

There are other trinkets, ones you don’t understand but wonder if they have their own story—who would pick them up with a similar fondness you carry now. They’re clustered tightly across the other shelves: a little smiling buddha with a round belly, a toy bird, playing cards, scented candles, candies, a carved wooden frog, rings embedded with jewels, a pocket watch, another jar, this one filled with mandarin oranges. You let your eyes roam around, taking in more trinkets and stories that you don’t understand. You pause at a bundle of shiny silk fabric, black as the sky tonight.

You lift your hand to reach for it, but your phone rings.

Cursing to yourself, you put the jar on the shelf and pull your cell from your pocket. The sound is your alarm, set thirty minutes before the boutique closes. Grimacing, you quickly debate your options: to stay and continue exploring your trinkets, or having to rush to get the fabric you need. Your heart yearns as you set the jar on the shelf. You tell yourself that you’ll come back tomorrow, that the more headway you make on the dress, the more you can play afterwards.

Before you exit, you sweep your eyes through the room once more, promising to the trinkets and yourself that you’ll return. You step outside reluctantly, swarmed by chilly air and the yearning to run your hands along those shelves and stories.

[nils-gold-34]

Golden Rhythm – A Day in Flow

The dorm was quiet when Nils opened his eyes. No alarm. No command. Just instinct.

His body knew the rhythm by now: wake before the gold, move before the noise, serve before being seen.

He slid out of bed, toes meeting cool tile. The light overhead was still soft—amber, dim.

His kit was folded at the edge of his bunk: shimmering compression shorts, a sleeveless gold shirt, hydration band coiled neatly beside his towel. Everything in order. Everything in place.

Franco was already waiting on the field.

Golden jersey gleaming in the morning sun, brown hair damp from a warm-up jog, he grinned as Nils approached.

“You made it, waterboy.”

“You’re early,” Nils said flatly.

They started without another word—jogging the outer pitch, breath syncing.

The sky lit slowly above them, gold seeping into cloud. Franco’s strides were explosive, wide. Nils ran tighter, coiled, precise. They circled twice, then three times. Sprint sets. Stretch drills. Core circuits to finish. Their sweat hit the turf in rhythm. A match with no scoreboard—just motion, just effort.

At 07:00 sharp, they bumped fists and split.

Franco peeled off toward the weight room.

Nils returned to his real zone of play—the undercurrent that kept the team alive.

He rolled the laundry cart into the locker room like a silent sentry.

The scent hit first—sweat, turf, adrenaline steeped into golden fabric.

Every shirt held a memory. Every sock, a trace of yesterday’s glory.

Nils handled them like relics, sorting by squad, by use, by position. Starters first. Then subs. Then bench.

The machines were already humming. He prepped each load by hand: detergent measured, golden-tinted. Steam hissed as the first drum sealed.

There was something sacred in the rhythm. No cheering. No lights. Just precision. Just discipline.

Franco’s cleats sat in the corner—mud-streaked, worn raw from last night’s finish.

“Third time this week,” Nils murmured.

Still, he bent down, cloth in hand.

He scrubbed them clean.

The shine mattered.

At noon, he found Franco in the strategy room.

The midfielder sprawled across two chairs, scrolling drill footage on the big screen.

“You ready to write a masterpiece?” Franco asked.

“You mean clean up your chaos,” Nils replied.

Franco tossed him a protein bar. Nils caught it without looking.

Together, they built the next training cycle.

Franco spoke in bursts—movement patterns, wing play, pressure breaks.

Nils translated chaos into control: hydration intervals, timing windows, energy spikes, fallback markers.

Every suggestion tested in the sim.

Together, they carved order from momentum.

Two hours passed like water.

“You ever miss playing?” Franco asked suddenly, between drills.

Nils didn’t blink. “No. I never stopped serving.”

Franco didn’t push.

By evening, the locker room pulsed with music and laughter.

The field was still hot from the day’s drills, but the fire pit by the gym burned brighter.

Golden flames licked the sky.

The grill sizzled under Franco’s hands. Shirtless, still buzzing with energy, he flipped burgers with absurd flair.

Nils stood nearby, quietly restocking the cooler—drinks arranged by electrolyte density, protein levels, carbonation tolerance.

It was loud. Messy. Alive.

“Didn’t think you’d show,” Franco called.

“I manage inventory,” Nils replied.

“That’s not what I meant.”

Nils passed him a wrap—golden foil, seared chicken, perfect balance.

Franco took a bite, then smirked.

“Y’know… you make this whole machine run, bro.”

“Not alone.”

“Still. Team needs you.” Franco paused. His voice dropped. “I need you.”

Nils didn’t answer.

He turned, eyes scanning the field—chalk lines still crisp. Laundry hung on racks, drying under the stars.

Drones in formation began cool-down laps. Bros laughing around the fire, cleats off, feet in the grass.

He took a breath.

The night hummed with gold.

Another day complete.

Another step in the rhythm.

He didn’t need to shine.

He just needed to keep it flowing.

Gold runs deeper than the pitch.

You feel it in your hands, in your breath, in your work.

The Army needs flow.

Be part of it cotact our recruiters:

@brodygold @goldenherc9 @polo-drone-001 @polo-drone-125

To read Francos POV make sure to follow him @franco-gold94

[irisintheafterglow]

More Than It Seams (Chapter 1)

summary: you're a hero costume tech working for one of the biggest fashion companies in quirk society, and the days until the most important fashion event of the year are dwindling fast. if you weren't stressed enough, a certain half-and-half hero keeps appearing with rips in his suit. (pro!todoroki x reader)

word count: 3k

cw/tags: swearing, mentions of needles, probably inaccurate fashion design vocabulary, strangers to lovers, no specified pronouns for reader

note: aaaaa ok first chapter of my first series. hope you enjoy!! i'm planning on this to be five chapters, and the second chapter I'm planning to release this friday. i <3 shoto todoroki

likes/reblogs/feedback are always appreciated!!!

She couldn’t be serious. You shake your head as if to reset your eyeballs and read over the two scribbled cursive sentences over and over until the reality of your situation set in. 

Hey, not gonna be in starting today for maternity leave. Don’t disappoint me. Xo, M 

You counted the days on your fingers and groaned, dragging a palm down the front of your face. 7:00 A.M was too early to find out you had to run a multi-million dollar business that wouldn’t hesitate to fire you if you disappointed at the most important fashion event of the year. The coffee maker beeped its readiness right on cue, and you debated making two cups instead of just one. You settled for one but left out a cup with your name on it for a possible second, and plopped down at your station. The sun was just starting to shine through the glass walls of the building you called your office, an odd combination of exposed brick walls and floor-to-ceiling windows. Crooked rows of work tables lined up on one side of the expansive area, with several dozen mannequins and rolls of fabric occupying the other side. A long counter separated the work area from the sitting area, where clients waited for their fittings on plush couches and sipped on complimentary sparkling drinks that M paid for instead of giving her workers a raise. 

“G’morning!” The other designer for the company swung open the gate allowing access between the work area and the sitting area, deflating when he saw you throw your head down on your desk in frustration and slam it a few times for good measure. “Or not…” A loud gasp of shock indicated to you that he had read the note, and a long string of expletives left his mouth as you lifted your head and nodded. “She has to be joking.”

You clicked your tongue in agreement. “She is not.” 

“HB’s in two weeks, and she decides now is a good time to have her baby?”

“If it were up to me, she wouldn’t even be the head of this place, or having another baby. God knows we don’t need any more of her.” Your coworker scoffs in disbelief, throwing his bag down on his desk and wheeling over a mannequin. “Hey, did you finish working up that fabric design for Cellophane’s suit? He’s supposed to come in on Friday and I think it’d be smart to have a sample of the fabric ready so he can tell us if he doesn’t like it.” 

“Yep, I’ll have that over to you ASAP. You don’t need to remind me what happened last year with Dynamight two days before the Ball.” 

You cringed at the memory of the Number Two Hero burning your work to ashes right in front of you and telling you to get a color that matched his eyes better. To be fair, the color that his stylist had chosen clashed with his skin tone and you respected Bakugo for recognizing that, but he could have given you back the suit to use as scrap fabric. “It’s the price of working with the best.” 

“You mean for the best,” he corrects, giving you a grouchy look before switching on his machine and beginning to hem the miles of fabric for Creati’s dress. You’d asked him if he wanted you to hem the fabric since your quirk would have it done by lunch, but he declined and said that you should focus on designing the remaining heroes’ pieces. The rest of your seamstresses trickled in as the morning progressed, filing into their stations with a polite “good morning” and picking up their scissors. Soon, the office milled with the familiar sounds of cutting fabric, sewing machines, and rolling mannequins, and you spaced out as you sketched your idea for Pinky’s updated costume. 

At 11:30, your receptionist sitting at the counter slammed down the phone in alarm, startling the entire room into silence. Her face was nothing short of panic, and you rose quickly from your station to pull her into a corner and figure out why she looked like she had received a bomb threat. 

“What’s going on?”

“Shoto is here.”

“Who?”

“Shoto. The pro hero. Is here,” she hisses at you through her teeth, her hands shaking with uncontrollable anxiety. 

You blinked at her. “Okay… and?” Pros showing up to the office themselves rather than sending assistants was uncommon but had been done numerous times before. Deku and Creati tended to visit a few times a month, and Pinky liked to stop by on Fridays to treat her favorite staff to ice cream. It was Shoto’s first time appearing in person, as he usually sent an assistant to drop off what was essentially his laundry; you’d always assumed that being a top-ranked hero controlling large sums of inheritance was just too busy to worry about his costume. Still, a customer visiting the office in person, no matter how attractive they were, was the least of your laundry list of problems.  

Your receptionist stares at you like you’ve sprouted three heads, and addresses you with an attitude that would have had her fired if M was in office. “What the hell do you mean ‘and’? It’s Shoto… the Number Three Hero. ProMagazine’s #1 ranked hottie.” 

“I’m aware,” you state a little impatiently, annoyed by her insistence that this was much more significant than it actually was. “I’m struggling to understand the fuss over just another client–” 

A chorus of shocked excitement washed over your staff as the elevator doors dinged and a lean, well-dressed silhouette entered the office. Several of your seamstresses had stood from their chairs and huddled together for moral support, whispering to each other about the stranger who had exited the elevator. Your receptionist’s eyes widen to the size of dollar coins, her hands coming up to your shoulders to push you toward the counter as she disappeared behind rolls of fabric. You rolled your eyes and took a breath, adjusting the measuring tape around your neck and meeting Shoto as he approached the vacant receptionist’s computer. His voice was polite and soft when he spoke, and you swear you hear your workers swooning behind you. 

“Hello, I’m here to drop these items off for repair,” he states, gently placing a small stack of folded fabric on the counter in front of you. You couldn’t help but notice how pretty his hands were, and how one ran through his two-toned hair, combing it with elegant fingers. His eyes were each an enchanting shade of blue and grey, and you found it hard to break eye contact with him. ProMagazine was definitely correct.

“Great, I’ll, uh, have this ready in just a bit,” you reply, gesturing towards the waiting area and encouraging Shoto to have a seat. Taking a deep breath in and out and shooting your staff a stern look to get back to work, you unfold the tattered costume on a nearby station behind the counter. His suit wasn’t in the worst condition, but the tears on the arms and chest area posed a significant safety hazard, especially if they continued to open. As hot as it would be to have muscle windows in Shoto’s suit, it’d reflect badly on you if you’d refused to repair the costume for the sake of professionally shot ab photos. 

After another steadying breath, you visualize a sewing machine dial in your mind, picking up a spool of strong nylon thread and running your thumb over the torn pieces of fabric; like clockwork, it repaired itself with a neat straight stitch wherever you touched. Your quirk is why M hired you in the first place since you could assemble three pieces in the time it took a machine to do one. You couldn’t send sheets of fabric flying like Best Jeanist, but your ability to telekinetically manipulate thread into stitches proved useful for a career in fashion design. With a few more reinforcement stitches to some worn edges and a quick polish of the suit’s buckles, Shoto’s costume was good as new. 

“Here you go; you’re all set.” He turns to look at you, surprised and preoccupied with examining the large posters of costumes M’s company had designed. Frames of initial sketches for his first professional costume were flanked by life-size prints of Pinky, Deku, and Red Riot’s attire. A plaque engraved with Creati’s endorsement message for the company hung in the center, surrounded by fabric swatches and Post-It notes scribbled with measurements. It looked like he had just finished reading through Creati’s statement when you informed him that his suit was ready. “I went ahead and cleaned off some of the grime from the suit’s hardware and sprayed it with anti-rust so it shouldn’t be tarnishing any time soon.” 

Shoto looks at you with an expression that you can’t read, gazes down at the repaired suit in front of him, and then back up at you. “Oh. That’s it?”

You release a slightly nervous chuckle to try to ease some of the awkwardness that had settled between you two. “Uh, yep. That’s it.” After another painfully quiet beat, your customer service persona finally kicks back into gear. “Is there anything else I can assist you with today?” 

“I don’t think so.”

“Well, it was a pleasure working with you today–”

“How does your quirk work?” His question arrives completely out of left field, and your brain short-circuits at his genuine expression of interest in your abilities. 

“Well, um, I can manipulate thread to follow certain stitch patterns, like the stitch selection on a sewing machine. See, like, here.” You point at one of the newly repaired tears in his costume, running a finger over the fresh seam. You’re keenly aware of how his eyes follow your finger and you attempt to keep your voice even. “I mended this panel of fabric torn down the middle with a straight stitch, which is the sturdiest stitch I can create.” 

“So you wave your hands and the threads start moving?” The boyish cluelessness on his face makes your heart flutter. A smile breaks its way into your expression. 

“I wish, but I actually have to be touching the fabric.” 

“I suppose it’s very useful for a fashion designer, then.” His face is carefully put together, but the tiniest hint of sarcasm bleeds its way into his voice. Was he… joking with you? 

“Definitely. I’m essentially a human sewing machine but without needles sprouting from my thumbs.” Your thumb pops up on its own accord for added effect, but then you realize what you just said and shove your hand back in an apron pocket. It was meant as a joke, but the macabre nature of your last quip slips your mind and a part of you dies inside when Shoto physically cringes at the grotesque image. Before you have the chance to apologize for such a distressing remark, he politely nods his head in farewell and gives you a soft “thank you” before returning to the elevator. 

Releasing a frustrated noise from your throat at the fact that you just scared off Todoroki Shoto, you lay your forehead on the counter between your elbows. The elevator button dings, and to your horror, you realize that he hadn’t left the office yet. Instead, he was looking at you amusedly over his toned shoulder. The corner of his mouth quirks up the tiniest bit as he watches your burning face attempt to regain its composure, and then he’s gone. 

“That was a shit show,” your other designer mutters under his breath, handing you another cup of coffee. 

Tuesday morning at 11:30 on the dot, Shoto visits again and catches your receptionist off guard, reducing her to a puddle of “How can I help you?” and “Can I get you a sparkling drink?” With your back turned to the doors, you don’t notice him immediately as you concentrate on draping expensive maroon fabric around Creati’s mannequin. Eyebrows drawn in concentration and holding a pin between your teeth, your hands work meticulously to create perfect pleats under the waistline of the bodice. It isn’t until your receptionist nervously calls out your name that you abruptly drop the fabric, Shoto’s mouth twitching as he watches you hurriedly place your box of pins on a nearby station and approach the counter. You lightly tap your receptionist’s shoulder, snapping her out of her daze to find Shoto a drink that you knew was out of stock and leaving you two alone again. 

“Shoto, it’s a pleasure to see you.” You try to mask the unease in your voice with a forced smile. “What can I help you with today?”

His face is blank, but his eyes shine like he’s analyzing you. “I ripped the suit again.”

Your face falls in comical disbelief. “Again?”

He shrugs. “I guess I need stronger stitches.” His heterochromatic eyes stare into yours, and you meet his challenge with a slight squint. 

“Guess you do.” You take the folded suit from his hands and drop the volume of your voice. “Or maybe you need to stop tearing my work.”

He huffs out a breath that sounds like a choked laugh and you smile innocently at him, hoping this interaction replaced the awkwardness of yesterday. Your hand gestures to the seating area again, but he shakes his head, instead crossing his muscular arms and watching you intently as you work. The damage to his suit could barely be considered a tear, and you don’t even bother using your quirk to repair it. You feel him staring at you as you easily patch up the suit with a backstitch, and you swear you could hear him hum thoughtfully behind you. Minutes after he entered the office, you slide the garment back to him with a satisfied smile. 

He does that thing again, looking at you, down at his suit, then back at you. “You didn’t use your quirk.” 

It was your turn to shrug. “Didn’t need to.” As entertaining as his presence was, it would have taken longer to repair it with your quirk, and you had three mannequins of patterns demanding your immediate attention. “Is there anything else I can assist you with today?”

Shoto dodges your question, instead scanning the seamstresses at their work areas trying not to stare at him. “You’re awfully good at getting people in and out.” One eyebrow quirks in question. He’s testing you, silently asking whether you were trying to get rid of him quickly. 

“With all due respect, a rip on a Pro’s suit is the least of my worries right now.” 

“What are the most of your worries?” You direct his attention to the three mannequins behind you, covered in multi-colored pins and beige pattern panels. “Red Riot, Pinky, and Cellophane’s Ball outfits. Need to have them done by next Friday, and I was just in the middle of pleating the skirt of Momo’s dress. It’s taking a lot longer than expected because I tragically only have two hands.” 

Shoto’s mouth opens in an ah of realization, taking in the elaborate construction plan of the layered asymmetrical gown. You couldn’t have predicted his reply to save your life. 

“May I help you?”

Your mind halts the production of coherent thoughts. “Oh, no, really. It’s okay. Don’t worry about it.” 

“Why not?”

“It’s not your job.”

“But there is something I can help with.”

“I mean, yes, but–”

“Then please, show me what to do.” You decide that it would be pointless to fight his stubborn determination, so you try not to notice the gasps from your staff as Shoto pushes open the gate into the work area and stands beside Creati’s mannequin. You knelt into the same position as before, sitting back on your heels as you searched for the last pleat you made. 

“So I just need you to hold the fabric in place so that it doesn’t unfold, like this,” you direct, scrunching the edge into a carefully measured fold. He watches you diligently, allowing you to reposition his hands so that you could effectively create a seam. His hands were soft beneath your fingers as you brushed veins and lean muscle. You push away the thought of what else he could do with his hands, refocusing on your work and delicately rotating the mannequin as you made your way around its waist. To your surprise, Shoto made soft conversation with you, asking about other Pros’ looks and the design inspiration behind them. Small talk flowed easily as you worked, and he proved to be much more witty than interviews captured. 

When you finished, Shoto ran his finger over the pleats you had just made in admiration. A glance at the rest of the mannequins leads to his expression becoming puzzled. “Where is mine?” He offers an open hand to you as you rise from the floor, and you revel in the cool touch of his palm against your tired thumb. 

You open your mouth to reply, but no words come out. The truth was, his stylist had ordered a simple black suit for him, barely different than the suit he wore the previous year and all of the years prior. Shoto’s media reputation had him notorious for attending as few public events as possible, and donning safe solid-colored suits when he did appear. His eyebrows rise in anticipation of your answer, still holding your hand, and you finally conjure up an explanation. “Well, technically, your look is already finished. It was one of the first looks we finished because of its simplicity.” 

“Simplicity?” He releases your hand, flexing his fingers like he was squeezing a stress ball. Shit, were your hands sweaty?

“Yeah, your stylist tends to request subdued designs for public appearances.”

A low hum is all you receive in acknowledgment, and a look of deep thought washes over his handsome expression. 

“Maybe I will aim for a different design this year, then.” 

And just the same as Monday, he nods farewell before heading back to the elevator, leaving you frozen by the mannequin. A split second before the doors slide open, he gives you a mischievous look and a single thumbs-up, a reminder of the embarrassing interaction from the day before. You roll your eyes at him and are delighted to see the corner of his mouth turn up again.   

The elevator doors shut, and you can’t help hoping he creates another tear in his suit for tomorrow.

[insanelyadd]

The Collector's Hat Sewing Pattern and Tutorial

Image of the pattern I made with measurements:

As a little heads up to people with big/small heads and/or more voluminous hair, this was based on measuring my own head which has a circumference of 22 inches which is dead on the average and my hair is completely straight and relatively flat. You may need to do some adjustments of these measurements because the final fit is very fitted, in that it can be easily put on and taken off but does not fall off on it's own under typical circumstances.*

This pattern is meant for knit or other stretch fabrics, I did not make a completed version with woven or stiffer fabrics, so quality may vary depending on the material you select. I recommend knits.

If you are new to sewing or this is one of your first projects you are doing without a physical pattern, I recommend following the given measurements and drawing it out on some type of paper first and then using that as reference for yourself. I am an outlier when it comes to not making patterns and drawing the shape of what I want out onto the fabric directly, and you shouldn't follow my horrible example. This hat is actually the first time I've even made a muslin prototype.

When you are going to cut out the pieces you need to make sure, like double and triple check, that if you were to lay them pattern/top side up, that they would mirror each other like in the above picture. If you don't then you'll have two lefts or two rights.

The first actual step for sewing is taking the straight lines from the V shaped notch in the top of the hat, and lining them up by folding the piece in half so the patterned/top of the fabric is on the inside of the fold, like in the picture above. You do this on one half at a time. When they are lined up sew them with a straight line stitch a 1/4 inch (1/2 cm) in from the cut, starting at the fold towards the top of the hat.

After that you want to lay them pattern to pattern, and pin them into place to make sure it's aligned properly on both sides. To reduce bulk I recommend making the excess fabric from the darts (the V cut-out) point in opposite directions, as shown in the above picture.

After you've sewn the sides together there is an optional step that I did to make sure the seam lies flat on the top of your head. I opted to sew both sides down onto the blue half of my hat because my machine was being picky and skipping stitches on they grey fabric if there was no blue fabric as well (I got around this on the hem by inserting thin pieces from the blue's selvage into the seam). But if your machine isn't being picky or you are hand sewing this, then you could split the excess and sew them down onto their corresponding half. Example above, as usual.

Optional step that MUST go here. If you are attaching a ribbon, or lace for a trim to edge you have to do it now. I do not recommend this step to beginners. I recommend sewing it down while rolling the edge to create the hem, and then securing the other side of the ribbon/lace further into the piece because this guarantees a better placement and straighter lines. If you are doing this step along solely the bottom or front edges then let the lace/ribbon stick out further than the edge of the fabric, so you can fold it under the hem.

The final required step is to hem it, just fold what remains of the raw edge and sew it down.

Final optional step is for adding little trinkets. I added trinkets to the front corners and the floppy bit in the back like the Archivists are depicted as having. I used embroidery thread and slid the needle to go between the seams and tied it off on the inside. If your trinkets are not detachable, like the little stars on my hat, you need to thread the needle through the ring before putting it back into the hat and tying off the thread. Thinner cord or thin ribbon could work as well.

*I actually just did some tests and I have to be tilted further back than lying flat on my back for it to fall off. I was able to bend over and look through my knees and it didn't fall off. I tested it's wind resistance against my two strongest fans and neither could knock it off my head even when I shook it. So I think it will stay in place just shy of someone pointing a leaf blower at you.

Enjoy these pictures of the finished product, including a glamor shot of me wearing it backwards while I fumble with my phone for a picture.

[softly-sirius]

Fred's Lucky Tie

Or, You give Fred a gift he cherishes for the rest of his life (1.7k)

Warnings: The reader is briefly mentioned to share a dorm with a girl. The reader wears a dress. Reader is mwntioned to eventually be Freds 'wife'

Your hands run up and down all the fabrics on display. Each was soft, but your fingers lingered on the dark purple silk. It felt cold to the touch and your pointer glided down the sample.

It was the perfect shade, perfect because it was Fred’s favourite colour. You had come shopping with your friend in hopes of finding some inspiration for your dress. Fred was always the better dresser of the two of you, even though his lack of funds didn’t often allow him to dress how he wished. 

He already had his robes, his mum had lovingly picked them out for him and after a few magical adjustments, he managed to get them to his liking. Only it didn’t stop you from asking the shop assistant for some of the fabric, it was pricey, and it cost almost an entire term's worth of Hogsmeade money, but you knew it would be worth it. 

Just like how spending the whole week trying to transform your dress into something suitable was going to be worth it. 

You already had more knowledge than most about spells to dye things, mostly hair, but a little about clothes too. It only took a day of tweaking with Lee’s help to get the colour exactly right. Then it was the exhausting back and forth of trying to get each measurement perfect, trying the dress on, taking it off again, making the adjustments and then checking to make sure you had done it right. You dared not try the spells while the dress was on your body after seeing the marks left on Hannah Abbot's shoulders when she tried to tighten her spaghetti straps one hot day at the lake. 

Compared to your dress, making Fred's tie was easy. You decided to make it by hand, just to make it feel extra special. You knew how much Fred loved the sweaters his mum made, even if he did think they were a little dorky. He still wore them all the time, far more often than you had seen Ron or Percy. Seeing him cherish those sweaters made you love him even more and it made you want to try your hand at some kind of craft. So far a tie has been the least daunting option. 

There was a girl in your dorm who loved to sew, she had a sewing machine she claimed was passed down in her family from generation to generation. It had been bewitched to never make a crooked stitch. When you asked her for help she seemed ecstatic, even telling you all about old ball traditions, while you hand-stitched with her supervision. 

It was the day before the ball and you were so nervous, not because you thought Fred would think you anything less than stunning in your dress. You were sure you could walk down wearing anything, a sack even and he would tell you how beautiful you were. You were nervously trying to make sure that your tie was perfect, ironing it over and over. 

You were both going to try on your outfits for the ball together in his dorm. Before you could even come up with an excuse for your suggestion Fred was beaming. “Just can’t wait until tomorrow, huh love?” 

You rolled your eyes at him, shoving him in the back as you sat on his bed. It wasn’t like a fashion show was unheard of between the two of you. If one of you got something new for a special occasion you would always do this. One of you would splay out on Fred's bed while the other modelled the new outfit. 

It had started when Fred and George had first joined the quidditch team, they had both been ecstatic and as the best friend you were, you asked to see them in their uniforms, cheering them as they both emerged, uncharacteristically shy in their second-hand uniforms. Until you had begun narrating on the sidelines. 

“And here come Gryffndor's newest beaters, their shirts can barely even contain their bulging muscles. The Slytherin team must be shitting themselves.“

Somehow it had become a tradition, even more so when you and Fred started dating. Fred hurried off to the bathroom, normally he would change in front of you, wiggling his brows and laughing as you would whistle or slap his ass. During a fashion show though, he never wanted to spoil the surprise. 

While he was gone you made quick work of stripping off and getting into your dress. He always took forever, he blamed his long limbs, so you knew you would have time. You grabbed the gift box you had put the tie into. 

You lifted the lid slightly, careful not to disturb the bow on top, wanting to check it was still perfect. You almost dropped it when Fred barged out of the bathroom, doing his best model pose. 

The two of you stared open-mouthed at the other. Fred visibly gulped as his eyes raked you up and down, dressed in his favourite colour. You weren’t much better, eyes widening at the way his pants clung to his thighs. 

“You look-”

“Merlin-”

You both erupted in giggles, a little taken aback by the cheesiness of it all. You both move instinctively forward, Pulled to the other as your hands reach out, your hand rests on Fred’s chest, playing with his lapel while his hands cup your face. 

He presses a kiss to your forehead, mind whirling wondering how he managed to be so lucky. You had been dating for so long now, but still, you managed to give him butterflies. He could never tire of your smile, your laugh, your theatrics. 

Fred had never understood how love could make people so foolish. As a first-year, he would laugh at the couples kissing in the hallways and cringe whenever his dad would give his mum a sloppy kiss on the cheek. 

Now he would look at his mum and dad and hope that you and he would be like that one day. 

He enjoyed doing everything with you. He loved pranking with you, hearing your laugh echo through the corridors as you would run hand in hand. He loved the times you would spend relaxing, sneaking into the prefect bathroom because you insisted he needed it after quidditch. He loved the feeling of you raking your fingers through his hair, to help him de-stress or when you would do it up in ridiculous styles to cheer him up. He loves listening to you talk about the things you enjoy, even when he knows nothing about them, how animated you get until you are completely lost in your world. Hell, he even enjoys arguing with you, the cute furrow you get in your brow and the pout you give him when you just need him to give in. He loves feeling you melt into him when he wraps his arms around you, even when you’re still mad at him, because you love him too. 

“I don’t think words can do your beauty justice,” Fred grinned. You duck your head bashfully, but Fred's finger hooks under your chin, bringing your gaze back up to him. 

You kiss him, lips sickly sweet as they peck his over and over again until you finally will yourself away. “You look so handsome, Freddie” You sigh, voice nothing but sincere. “But…” You trail off.

Still resting in your hand that isn’t pressed against his chest is a gift box. Too preoccupied with you to pay attention to anything else, it’s only now he finally notices it as you hold it out between you. 

“You got me something?” He hesitates and you can see it in his eyes. 

Gifts, except on birthdays and Christmas, can be a sore spot for him. He doesn’t have the money to buy you things, even if he wants to. It’s difficult to accept things when he doesn’t feel he has anything to offer you in return. Only he has everything you’d ever need, love, affection, and an endless supply of humour. 

There's only one exception to the unspoken rule of no gifts. 

“I made you something” You correct, smiling when he finally takes the gift from you. He opens his mouth, but you cut him off because you already know what he’s going to say. “I’m not expecting anything back, it’s more a gift for me than anything, I wanted us to match.”

“Oh yeah?” Suddenly all his hesitancy is gone and he’s ripping the box open like a kid on Christmas morning. 

When he holds it in his hand and feels the fabric, he looks from his tie to your dress. The colours perfectly matched. “This is…you made this?”

“Yeah, I..” You feel a little bashful as he studies your gift, taking in every little detail as he turns it back and forth. You scratch the back of your neck “ I saw the fabric in Hogsmeade and I thought of you,”  

His eyes catch on a homemade label with a red heart and your initials embroidered onto the lining on the back. His thumb rubs over it and when he finally tears his gaze away from the tie and looks at you instead your chest leaps at the redness of his eyes. 

You worry you’ve done something wrong, that maybe the label came across as possessive instead of as a symbol of all the love you sewed the tie with. He diminishes your worries when he looks you into a bone-crushing hug and he’s gushing into your shoulder about how much he adores it. 

You end up tying his tie for him, both of you internally relishing in the domesticity of it all. You kiss him all sweet once his tie is on properly. Both of you daydreaming about your lives when you finish Hogwarts. 

Fred uses any chance he gets during the ball to tell everyone that his girl made his tie for him. He boasts about how good it looks, along with how good you look and especially how great you look together. 

It soon becomes his lucky tie, he wears it the first day the shop opens and any important day after. If the two of you are having an anniversary he makes sure to wear it. He even insists he wants to be buried in it. You make him more things, a scarf with Molly's assistance, a waistcoat which took months to perfect and even more ties to add to his collection. 

He still never stops wearing the first you made him though, even when it looks a little worse for wear. He even wears it on your wedding day. Laughing as your hand tugs on it to bring him in for your first kiss as man and wife.

[mariacallous]

On a recent afternoon, a dressmaker named Sergio Guadarrama rummaged through a pile of fabric. He and his partner had converted the living room of their home, in Hudson, New York, into a bridal atelier. Rolls of satin were stacked under a worktable; a mannequin in a strapless gown made of Chantilly lace stood near an armoire. Scattered around were five sewing machines and hundreds of yards of organic linen, greige hemp canvas, ombré silk brocade, and all manner of other textiles. Guadarrama had the look of a man at ease—leather slippers, a loose denim shirt, and a big, bright smile—though his eyes betrayed a hint of exhaustion. After a few minutes, he found what he was searching for and held it up: a swatch of vintage flower-printed silk voile from Christian Dior. “This one is to die for!” he said.

The Dior fabric would be sewn into a custom wedding dress for a twenty-five-year-old bride-to-be, Keelie Verbeek, who had just driven down from New Hampshire. Verbeek arrived at Guadarrama’s house with her sister, her mother, two pairs of high heels, and her mother’s wedding gown (bespoke, purchased at a bridal shop in Cicero, New York, in the eighties), which she wanted to incorporate into her own dress, somehow. Guadarrama suggested that he could remove tiny pearls from the old gown’s surface and sew them onto the new one. “I can kind of sprinkle them in,” he said. Verbeek nervously glanced at her mother, who shrugged. Then she disappeared into Guadarrama’s bathroom for her first fitting, with a prototype made from cotton muslin. Kade Johnson, Guadarrama’s business partner and fiancé, cautioned, “We had to leave the toilet seat up, because the cat pees in the toilet here.”

A few minutes later, the bride emerged. Guadarrama eyed her up and down, took some measurements, made a few quick alterations, and then began to pepper her with questions about her bra. The dress, which cost nearly thirteen thousand dollars—typical for a couture bridal gown—would require six fittings in all.

As Verbeek changed back into her street clothes, the conversation turned to other elements of the wedding, which was going to be held, in eleven months, at the former estate of the sculptor Daniel Chester French, in the Berkshires. The reception would feature biodegradable confetti, small-batch Albanian olive oil, and, as Verbeek put it, “emotional-support chocolate.” Although she had already picked most of her wedding venders, including a celebrity makeup artist—recommended by Guadarrama—and a hairdresser from Maryland, she still needed a florist and a photographer, she said, and had been browsing the Knot, a popular wedding-planning platform. In addition to hosting gift registries and wedding websites, and offering reception ideas and relationship advice (“What to Know About Walmart Wedding Cakes,” “How to Prepare for Sex on Your Wedding Night,” “Dislike Your Spouse’s Last Name? Here’s What to Do”), the Knot is used by millions of couples to find their wedding venders, who pay to advertise on it. When Verbeek mentioned the Knot, Guadarrama shook his head and frowned.

“Should I not do that?” Verbeek asked.

“They’re doing some baaaad, shady stuff behind the scenes,” Guadarrama said. He started to explain, but the bride told him that she was running late for her next appointment, at the venue. She needed to decide whether to order custom floating lily pads for the fish pond, and to review where the turreted sailcloth tent and dance floor would be constructed.

After the bridal party left, Guadarrama and Johnson sat down at their dining table and told me that before coming to Hudson they had run an atelier in Manhattan. “We were having success after success after success,” Guadarrama said. They had dressed Kesha, JoJo, Tiffany Haddish. For the 2019 Tony Awards, they made Billy Porter a velvet Elizabethan gown from actual Broadway stage curtains. After a financial setback, the couple decided to move upstate and begin again—right as the pandemic all but shut down the bridal industry. Business tanked. On a chilly winter day in 2022, a saleswoman from the Knot called Guadarrama, in response to a form he’d filled out online. If he signed up for a premium advertising package, the saleswoman said, he could expect between eighty and two hundred and forty brides to contact him each month. Johnson thought this sounded implausible, but, despite his misgivings, the couple signed a yearlong advertising contract with the Knot, for five thousand eight hundred dollars. “We were looking at the Knot as a beacon of hope,” Johnson told me. “And it was the complete opposite.”

Guadarrama said, “The Knot was, like, the final nail in the coffin.”

Couples who are getting married tend to hear the same advice over and over: “Get good at forgiveness.” “Learn the wisdom of compromise.” “Don’t forget to chill the champagne.” When it comes to the wedding itself, the National Association of Wedding Professionals insists that every reception is better with balloons. The Association of Bridal Consultants recommends stocking extra toilet paper, just in case. If you want a quick cure for a rehearsal-dinner hangover, you can hire registered nurses to arrive with the hair and makeup professionals, carrying I.V. bags infused with vitamins or anti-nausea medicine. Cold feet? A man from Spain might be available to crash your wedding. (Going rate: five hundred euros.) “I’ll show up at the ceremony, claim to be the love of your life, and we’ll leave hand in hand,” he told a Spanish TV station. Marcy Blum, a wedding planner who has orchestrated celebrations for LeBron James, members of the Rockefeller family, Bill Gates’s oldest daughter, and, once, a woman who demanded that no other brides be present in the same Italian town on the day of her ceremony, told me, “I will spend whatever it takes of my client’s money to make sure there’s enough bartenders before I’ll put a flower on the table.”

Each year, Americans drop roughly seventy billion dollars hosting weddings. Most people think that this is too much—that couples are overspending, that venders are overcharging, and that the wedding-industrial complex verges on unethical. After all, many weddings are excessive and wasteful. (In New York City, the average cost is eighty-eight thousand dollars.) The wedding planner Colin Cowie, whose clients range from Tiësto (“Happily married,” Cowie boasted) to Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck (“I get them down the aisle fabulously, but they’re on their own thereafter”), told me that he hires hundreds of venders for every event: invitation managers, shoe-check attendants, babysitters, ice carvers, drone operators, and caviar servers. “Once, we built a church,” he said.

Even more modest affairs can involve a phalanx of venders; the average number brought on per wedding is fourteen. These small-business owners often begin as amateurs pursuing a side gig: students moonlighting as wedding photographers, cashiers doing calligraphy after work. Typically, surges of new venders follow layoffs in corporate America. “People cash in their 401(k)s, and they start a business,” Marc McIntosh, a wedding guru who regularly speaks at conferences like WeddingMBA, told me. “A lot of people go into this industry because they’re good at something—they bake good cakes, and their family says, ‘You should go into the wedding-cake business!’ ” But being good at something doesn’t mean you’re good at running a business. And running a wedding business is especially tough: there are hundreds of thousands of competitors; costs are rising, owing in part to inflation; and, for many venders, bookings and budgets have decreased by about twenty-five per cent. According to a recent industry survey, a third of all wedding venders said that they are doing poorer financially than they were a year ago. “Florists are the worst,” McIntosh said. “There are so many broke florists.”

A reliable way for a florist to avoid going broke used to be by advertising in glossy magazines like Brides or Martha Stewart Weddings. By the early two-thousands, wedding marketing, like everything else, was increasingly shifting online. When Blum started her planning business, in Manhattan, in 1987, she took out a small ad in New York. Ten years later, she had become the city’s unofficial wedding czar, and four friends who’d met at N.Y.U.’s film school approached her for advice. “They were, like, ‘We’re going to start this website about weddings,’ ” Blum recalled. “And I said, ‘That’s the cutest thing that I’ve ever heard. Let me introduce you to everybody.’ ” The website was the Knot, and the four friends created it with about one and a half million dollars in seed funding from AOL. “In those days, it was a joke,” Blum said.

Within a few years, the Knot was a juggernaut—the Yellow Pages of the wedding industry. By 1999, when it went public, two of the company’s co-founders, Carley Roney and David Liu, who are married, had become veritable wedding moguls. The couple started a reality show about wedding planning, launched a magazine, and purchased weddingchannel.com, an online bridal registry. Roney appeared regularly on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” and “The View.” In an episode during Season 2 of “The Apprentice,” contestants raced to open a bridal shop and sell wedding dresses. One team spent its entire marketing budget with the Knot—and won. “Our phone went off the hook after that,” Liu told me. “I’m almost ashamed, but, like, some of our success has to be attributed to idiot Trump and that show.”

In 2018, XO Group, the Knot’s corporate parent, was acquired by its biggest competitor, a company called WeddingWire, in a private-equity-backed deal worth almost a billion dollars. By then, Roney and Liu were out. The Knot Worldwide became a privately held company.

Last year, the Knot facilitated four billion dollars in consumer spending via advertising on its platforms. Most of the company’s revenue comes not from brides and grooms but from wedding venders. Nine hundred thousand venders in more than ten countries use the Knot, and many pay to be advertised to couples—“leads,” in industry parlance—seeking their services. Ronnie Rothstein, who, at eighty-two years old, is the C.E.O. of Kleinfeld Bridal, one of the largest wedding-dress retailers in America and a mainstay on the reality show “Say Yes to the Dress,” told me, “Every wedding vender needs a qualified lead.” He went on, “Most of these businesses are family businesses, and they need help to get as many people into the door as possible.”

After Guadarrama signed his advertising contract with the Knot, he started receiving a flood of inquiries from couples. Many of the messages seemed bland or formulaic. “Hello—we are getting married,” one groom wrote. A bride asked, “Could you send over some more info about the products and services you offer?” Guadarrama always responded immediately, and repeatedly followed up. At first, he was optimistic. But, week after week, he never heard anything in return.

Curious to learn more about the vender experience, and being a weekend cake baker myself, I decided to fill out a vender contact form on the Knot’s website to get some basic information about the contract terms. A Knot representative soon called me. She was encouraging about the brides and grooms who would be spending money on my fictitious wedding operation. “People do go over budget sixty-two per cent in your particular area,” she said. After a long discussion about pricing and placement, she said that, if I wanted to take my business to the next level, a twelve-hundred-dollar-per-month advertising package might be appropriate. (Later, the Knot characterized this call as an attempt to “entrap and bait our salesperson” and accused me of being “ethically challenged.”) I also spoke at length with dozens of wedding venders across the United States. David Sachs, a wedding photographer in Northern California, started advertising with the Knot in 2016, after giving up on becoming an actor. “The Knot was the biggest directory at the time, so I figured I would just do what everyone else was doing,” Sachs told me. Initially, he got some clients from the site. “Sales were higher than expenses, and that was good enough for me,” he said. But after a few years brides stopped reaching out, and he called his sales rep to complain. A new, pushier rep talked him out of closing his account and persuaded him to upgrade to the most expensive advertising tier. “I started spending a thousand dollars a month,” he told me. Then a torrent of leads arrived, via the Knot’s online vender portal. Often, he’d talk to the potential customers by phone. “It felt like all the brides were reading from a script,” he said. “I could hear other calls in the background, and they all had the same lilting tone. That’s when I realized, they have a literal phone bank of people who are faking leads.”

When I asked the Knot about this, a spokeswoman said, “We do not tolerate fraudulent practices.” She went on, “The Knot Worldwide does not employ any individuals or teams who act as fake couples to send fake leads to venders. We have no financial incentive to engage in such conduct, and it is antithetical to our business.” But more than twenty wedding venders who advertise with the Knot told me that they’ve received inquiries from what they believe are fake brides. Matt Pierce, a wedding photographer in Texas, said that he’d exchanged e-mails with someone who was getting married in a few days. Pierce called the wedding venue, he told me, and the woman who ran it said, “You, too, huh? You’re about the twelfth photographer that’s called here today about a wedding this weekend.” There was no wedding.

Documents I obtained from the Federal Trade Commission reflect that, since 2018, more than two hundred formal complaints have been made about allegedly fraudulent activity on the Knot and WeddingWire. One vender wrote, “I paid around $12,000 and got absolutely nothing to show for it.” Another said, “My business is on the verge of going bankrupt. I would happily pay for the service [if] it was providing me what was promised, but it has not.”

Venders have also shared their grievances on several private Facebook groups, one of which features a stock photo of an enraged bride wielding a pistol. (Sample posts: “Hi! New victim here!”; “I’m in a war with the Knot”; “Can we get together for a class-action lawsuit?”; and “You know what would be more powerful than a lawsuit? A Netflix documentary . . .”) Venders in the group suspected infiltration by Knot employees. A post read, “We found two spies here who worked for The Knot. They know about us. And, they should be scared.” A couple of years ago, an online petition was launched in an effort to spur regulatory action. “This petition is going to congressional leaders,” the organizer wrote. Comments from signatories include:

Mike Cassara, a wedding photographer, influencer, and podcast host, told me that he and his co-host, Lauren O’Brien, regularly receive D.M.s on Instagram from wedding venders who complain about “fake brides” and “bad leads” from the Knot. He told me, “Their stories are endless! If this was five people, I’d question it. If it was ten people, twenty people, even a hundred people, I’d question it. But we’ve had thousands of people saying the same thing: ‘They’re ripping me off.’ ”

As I was reporting this story, the Knot had multiple outside communication firms correspond with me. One of them got in touch through a representative who had a résumé that included “successful presidential pardons” and “hostage and kidnapping recovery.” In the past six months, I contacted more than seventy current and former employees of the Knot, because I wanted to better understand the wedding venders’ claims. Almost all who agreed to speak with me requested anonymity, citing N.D.A.s or fear of retaliation. One former saleswoman said that, after her venders had complained to her about lead troubles, she recognized that many of the leads seemed like they might be fake. But she was working on commission, and it wasn’t in her interest to let clients out of their annual contracts; if she lost too many, she might lose her own job. Bretta Thompson, an Indianapolis-based wedding planner and officiant who advertised on the site, told me, “It was like pulling teeth to get anyone at the Knot to contact me. It would take weeks to get a response back, via e-mail, and then it was always my fault.” Another former saleswoman put it more plainly: “We fucked over venders.” (“We strongly dispute these claims,” the spokeswoman for the Knot said.)

Many venders I spoke with told me variations of the “fake brides” story, and took it upon themselves to conduct investigations, which produced results that were sometimes difficult to verify. Nicole Hobbs, who worked as a wedding photographer in Nashville, said that she had been contacted by people who, upon further inquiry, had already exchanged vows. “I was even able to confirm that one of the ‘grooms’ was actually a married minister in a different state,” she claimed. Darryl Cameron II, a part-time d.j. in Cleveland, Ohio, said that he’d received dozens of fake leads from the Knot. “These folks are real,” he told me. “But I’ve looked several up in the county database, and they’re married already!” Jeffrey Caddell, who owns a wedding venue in Alabama, told me, “All I can say is, it’s very fishy when you have hundreds and hundreds of leads and only a handful of responses.”

In David Mamet’s play “Glengarry Glen Ross,” a beleaguered real-estate salesman explains that he isn’t closing deals because his boss has been giving him bad leads. “I’m getting garbage,” he says. “You’re giving it to me, and what I’m saying is, it’s fucked.” Most leads for most venders in most industries don’t ever amount to anything—it’s hard work chasing down a lead, as any salesperson will attest—and the wedding industry is particularly challenging. Brides are regarded by wedding professionals as fickle and elusive. Marc McIntosh, the wedding guru, told me, “A couple planning a wedding has a to-do list, and everything on that list is something they’ve never bought before, from a company they’ve never heard of before. And they don’t have a lot of time.” Ronnie Rothstein, of Kleinfeld Bridal, said, “When a girl gets engaged, she’s gonna talk to everyone.”

Not every wedding vender hates the Knot. Allison Shapiro Winterton, a wedding-cake baker, considers it a “very honest business.” Steven Burchard, a d.j. and magician who runs a nationwide entertainment company, said that during engagement season—between Thanksgiving and Valentine’s Day—he usually receives about a dozen leads a week from the Knot. He follows up with each of them numerous times, and many do end up booking him. “You’ve gotta remember, there are tire kickers,” he told me. “Is that a fake lead? Or is it just someone who isn’t interested?”

Jeff MacGurn, who owns a wedding venue in the San Jacinto Mountains, told me, “The Knot’s great! And I’m uniquely positioned to comment on that.” In addition to operating the venue, MacGurn works for a digital-marketing firm. “When I’m judging the Knot, it’s not me saying, ‘I think it’s working.’ I know it’s working,” he said. “There’s a return on investment, for sure.” By his estimate, each lead from the Knot costs between twenty-two and thirty dollars. Most couples reach out once, then never again; booking a single wedding might require as much as nine hundred dollars in ad spend. “I can sit here and blame the Knot for bad leads,” MacGurn said. “But oftentimes I would look at my process, and I’d be, like, this is why we’re not closing”—not following up enough, not following up quickly enough, asking a prospective bride too many questions. Other venders, he noted, could stand to improve their tactics.

But, for many venders, so few leads have worked out that their tactics seem beside the point. They believe that the Knot inflates its lead numbers by allowing couples to simultaneously send form-letter inquiries to multiple venders. “People are getting leads that aren’t really for them,” McIntosh told me. “But, when it comes time to renew, the Knot can say, ‘We sent you five hundred leads this year,’ even though only five were really for you.” The company’s spokeswoman explained, “We have a tool that makes it easier for couples to reach out and start a conversation with venders using templatized language.” For instance, if a couple browsing the site decides to ask for a quote from their dream d.j., they will afterward be presented with a pop-up that invites them to send auto-populated messages to several other venders. The spokeswoman cautioned that venders “may misinterpret” such messages as spam, but that “spam is not a widespread problem” and “less than one per cent of leads delivered to venders in the U.S. were reported by venders as spam.”

Rothstein, who has advertised with the Knot for more than two decades, told me he was confident that the company wasn’t intentionally sending bad leads. “We don’t find them to be dishonest whatsoever,” he said. Rather, in recent years, the Knot simply stopped working well for them as a lead-generation platform. “They’ve become less effective,” he said. Jennifer Shipe, Rothstein’s chief marketing officer, said that she could spend Kleinfeld’s advertising dollars better elsewhere. Recently, she had her team manually compare every e-mail that originated from the Knot with the e-mail addresses of brides who booked appointments at their stores. “I don’t think we got anything out of it,” she told me.

Several days after I spoke with Shipe, Rothstein called me back—“I spoke to the Knot today!” he said—and clarified that a few of the leads might have led to appointments, about one tenth of one per cent of them, not zero. “We have a fucking phenomenal relationship with the Knot,” he said. “Neither one of us wants to fuck up that relationship.” He went on, “The leads don’t work, but I get great editorial from them. There aren’t that many magazines anymore. They’re it—numero uno! There’s no place else to go.” Many unhappy venders were reluctant to have me publish their names—or even their stories—in this article, for fear of retaliation by the Knot. Laura Cannon, who runs the International Association of Professional Wedding Officiants, told me, “They dominate the market.” Dozens of Cannon’s members have received suspicious leads from the Knot, but were too scared to say anything publicly. She continued, “You feel like you’re in an abusive relationship. I’ve thought about leaving the wedding industry, because what else can I do? It’s their industry now.”

Recently, I asked Tamas Kadar, the C.E.O. of a fraud-prevention firm, to review a few hundred e-mail addresses associated with suspicious leads from the Knot. He told me, “It seems like ten per cent of them are not real. We look at their digital footprint—their social-media profiles, how old is the e-mail account, does it appear elsewhere on the internet. And for ten per cent of them it’s, like, someone just opened an e-mail account.” Kadar also identified what he described as a significant vulnerability: unlike many other online services, the Knot doesn’t require users to verify their e-mail addresses when they sign up. “You don’t even have to have access to the e-mail account,” he said. “This could be why venders are facing so many nonexistent leads. The Knot doesn’t conduct the right kind of verification to make sure they don’t give fake leads to their customers. This is a basic step.” He went on, “I could just ask ChatGPT Operator to go to this website, type in a fully random e-mail address, and open an account and send a hundred inquiries to random wedding venues.”

Rich Kahn, another ad-fraud expert, told me, “It’s possible they know they have a problem and they’re doing nothing about it. And it’s also possible they don’t know.” Kahn explained that more than twenty per cent of the six hundred and forty billion dollars spent globally on digital marketing each year was effectively stolen via bots and “human fraud farms”—people at computer terminals, often overseas, who generate web traffic and inflate marketing metrics by making fake Facebook profiles, clicking on Google ads, or even sending fake leads. “In digital marketing, a portion of what you’re buying is not a real audience,” he said. “But that’s not a defense. It’s on you to do something about it. If you’re a big brand, you’re supposed to be protecting your clients.”

One night last fall, after a rooftop business mixer at a hotel in Manhattan, a woman in a long, flowery dress looked down at her heels and grimaced. “These puppies are barking!” she said. A few colleagues laughed knowingly. The women, who all worked at a Mississippi dress boutique, had been on their feet for days, at previews and runway shows connected with Bridal Fashion Week. Outside the hotel, as the group waited for their Ubers, one of them turned to a woman standing nearby and, making small talk, asked, “What store do you own?” The woman, Jennifer Davidson, was dressed in a chic black dress and gold-studded heels and carrying a Chanel purse that she had borrowed from a friend for the evening. She replied that she had spent about two decades working at the Knot. The woman from Mississippi laughed, then said that she had closed her Knot account after receiving dozens of dubious leads. “We were, like, ‘There’s no way these are legitimate,’ ” she told Davidson. The woman’s daughter, who co-owns the shop, chimed in: “We still get fake leads! It’d be, like, ‘Can you tell me more about your services?’ And I’d be, like, ‘Well, we’re a bridal store—what do you think we do?’ ”

Davidson, who was for many years one of the Knot’s top salespeople, was not about to defend the company. In 2015, she came to believe that it had been defrauding its biggest advertisers. By her account, the digital ads that she and her colleagues were selling were not reliably showing up on the Knot’s website. Macy’s, David’s Bridal, Kleinfeld Bridal, Justin Alexander, and even the N.F.L., she felt, had together been duped out of millions of dollars. When she alerted a vice-president at the company, John Reggio, who now works at TikTok, he told her that the Knot’s technology was flawed. “The website is duct-taped together,” Davidson recalled him saying. (I repeatedly reached out to Reggio for an interview; he declined, then said, “Please stop emailing me.”)

Davidson’s colleague Rachel LaFera reported the same issue to an executive, who exploded, LaFera recalled. “She grabbed me by both of my arms, and she started shaking the shit out of me, red-faced, spitting, saying, ‘You have to stop, just stop! You’ve got to stop bringing all this up. Stop it!’ ” LaFera said. “I was so in shock.” (When I reached out to the executive for comment, she replied, “😩,” and then said that she had mistook me for someone else. Later, she said that LaFera’s recollection was “untrue.”)

In 2017, Proskauer Rose, a prominent white-shoe law firm, was brought on to investigate the alleged advertising fraud. Executives and employees, including Davidson and LaFera, were interviewed, and the firm found no evidence of “widespread misconduct.” The Knot told me that, in the course of investigating Davidson’s allegations, a “material weakness” was identified in the “internal controls for the national advertising business” which affected approximately a hundred and sixty thousand dollars in ad purchases, and that advertisers were made whole. The Securities and Exchange Commission also conducted an investigation, according to the Knot, “and did not pursue any action.” But Davidson believes that employees lied to government officials and mucked up the S.E.C. investigation. (The Knot said, “There is no evidence to support an assertion that any employees were untruthful.”)

Davidson, LaFera, and Cindy Elley, who is Davidson’s sister and also worked at the Knot—the trio call themselves “the Knot Whistleblowers”—have an end-to-end encrypted e-mail account to field tips. In the past eight years, they say that they have contacted more than a hundred and fifteen current and former employees and secretly recorded many of the conversations with the aim of persuading the S.E.C., and possibly other government agencies, to mount a new inquiry into the company. (If the S.E.C. collects damages from the Knot, the trio stands to make up to thirty per cent of any potential recovery, thanks to a program that rewards whistle-blowers for coming forward.)

I went to visit Davidson at her home, near Charleston, South Carolina. She and I sat on her patio, and she played me several of the recordings, all of which she insists were obtained legally. (“We put our Nancy Drew hats on,” she said.) In one tape, LaFera can be heard chatting with a former Knot executive at a restaurant in New York. The two had met up to share war stories from their time with the company, and LaFera had worn hidden mikes that were taped to her shoulders. “Getting out was the best thing,” the former executive said. Another recording featured a former employee, Dave Harkensee, who oversaw a team of sales reps at the Knot. Harkensee said to Davidson, “We actually send out messages on behalf of these couples that don’t even realize we’re doing it.” He went on, “It’s almost, honestly, gaslighting these venders, saying, ‘Hey, we’re sending you leads. You’re just not able to convert them.’ But it’s actually, like, these are not viable leads. These aren’t legit at all.” (Harkensee denied that this conversation took place. The spokeswoman for the Knot said, “We do not send leads on behalf of couples without their consent.”)

In 2023, the New York Post published an article about Davidson’s initial allegations. “The Knot has been accused of systematically swindling clients for years,” the piece read. Weeks later, Forbes followed up: “How Wedding Giant the Knot Pulled the Veil Over Advertisers’ Eyes.” That year, the trio reached out to the office of Charles Grassley, a U.S. senator from Iowa who is an advocate for whistle-blowers. (Grassley is also known around Capitol Hill as something of a matchmaker. Per the Washington Post: “Forget dating apps. Sen. Grassley’s office has produced 20 marriages.”) Last week, Grassley, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to the acting chairman of the S.E.C. and the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, asking them about wrongdoing at the Knot. “I have recently been alerted of alleged deceptive business practices by the Knot from several Iowa small businesses that suspect they have been defrauded,” he wrote. “What steps have you taken to investigate the allegations? I would like to know, and I’m sure all these small businesses would as well.”

In the living-room bridal atelier in Hudson, Sergio Guadarrama elaborated on the setback that had led him to the Knot. In 2019, he was cast on the reality show “Project Runway.” The appearance backfired; he came across as a villain, and the dress orders for his business, Celestino Couture, plummeted. “People came up to me randomly in the street and said, ‘Oh, you’re that fucking guy,’ ” Guadarrama recalled. Moving upstate had seemed like the best way to get a fresh start. Then came the pandemic, and then came the Knot.

After signing up, Guadarrama and Johnson sent their first payment to the Knot—about five hundred dollars, money that should have gone toward their rent. “That was a lot of fucking money at the time, especially when we had no money coming in,” Johnson said. They got fifteen leads, but a month went by with no responses. One spring afternoon, Guadarrama called the phone number listed on a lead. He said that the woman who picked up told him, “I never signed up for the Knot! I’m not even getting married. Who are you?”

I contacted all the suspicious leads that Guadarrama had received from the Knot, and only a few people replied. Of those who did, one woman told me that she would not have sent a message to him because she had already bought her dress—and her ex-fiancé lived in Hudson. “It makes zero sense that I would want to go to Hudson,” she said. Then she logged into her account and found that a message had been sent to Guadarrama, likely via the pop-up template outreach feature, which she had forgotten all about. Another woman told me, “I never heard of Celestino Couture.” She wouldn’t have contacted the business, she said, because when Guadarrama received her supposed inquiry she had already made plans to buy a wedding dress in Europe.

Guadarrama tried to cancel his contract with the Knot, but the company refused to let him out of his yearlong commitment. So, like many venders I spoke with, he closed his bank account to prevent the Knot from continuing to withdraw payments. When I asked the Knot about this, the spokeswoman said that “contract terms are clearly disclosed by our sales representatives,” who are “trained to specifically mention that no number of leads are guaranteed.” Other venders told me that they’d cancelled their credit cards; some uploaded banners to their Knot profiles that read “DON’T USE THE KNOT” and filed complaints with the Better Business Bureau.

Carley Roney and David Liu, the company’s co-founders, trace the increasing number of lead complaints to the private-equity acquisition. Liu stepped down from the Knot’s board a few months before the deal. (Roney left the company in 2014.) “We felt like twenty years of our lives had been flushed down the drain,” Liu said.

“It’s a tragedy to us what’s become of our life’s work,” Roney added.

Before the acquisition, the Knot was generating about twenty million dollars in cash flow each year; as part of the deal’s financing, the Knot Worldwide took on hundreds of millions in debt. “To pay the interest on that much debt would essentially cripple a business,” Liu said. Any company in that position would need to cut costs and generate a lot of revenue. Liu wouldn’t comment directly on the allegations of fake leads or fraud, but that kind of financial obligation, he said, would mean that “the experience of the consumers is gonna suffer.” He added, “Who ultimately loses? The brides—and the local venders.”

In March, a Knot employee named Thomas Chelednik addressed a ballroom full of wedding venders at a Hyatt Regency in Huntington Beach, California. He said that the company was not sending fake leads to people, and that he would quit his job if it were. The next day, Raina Moskowitz, the Knot’s new C.E.O., held a virtual town hall. “We’re in a moment where I think celebration and communication and community matter more than ever,” Moskowitz said. She then answered pre-submitted questions, which were read aloud by a colleague: “A planner named Dolly asked, ‘What are you doing to stop the fake leads created by the company and giving false hope to venders?’ ” Moskowitz suggested that the venders were mistaken. “You get a lead, but you don’t hear back—and that can be incredibly frustrating,” she said. “It might be perceived as fake, but I just want to name it as ‘ghosting.’ ” She went on, “It doesn’t feel great, ” and announced that the company is testing a new tool that she hopes will address the problem. (The Knot’s spokeswoman said, “We are continually improving our spam-filter capabilities.”)

Before Guadarrama and Johnson extricated themselves from their contract with the Knot, they were selling their possessions to get by—“our clothes, our shoes, anything that we could,” Johnson told me. But their circumstances have since changed. In 2023, the couple, along with a business partner, opened two slow-fashion boutiques, which have been successful. Their wedding-dress business is, for now, a side hustle. They still chase every lead.

Keelie Verbeek, the twenty-five-year-old bride-to-be, had been window-shopping for chocolates and antique glassware in Hudson when she wandered into one of Guadarrama and Johnson’s boutiques. She tried on a vintage Ulla Johnson dress, as Henry, her fiancé, lingered nearby. The dress wasn’t for her, but before she left Johnson commented on her engagement ring. “Did you know we also make wedding dresses?” he asked.

Verbeek laughed. She had spent six months trawling Instagram, TikTok, Facebook Marketplace, and even the Knot, searching for the perfect dress. As Henry drove them home, Verbeek scrolled through Guadarrama and Johnson’s Instagram page. That afternoon, Guadarrama and Johnson received an e-mail from Verbeek: “I was hoping to be able to book a bridal consultation.” Excited, they followed up immediately, and, to their surprise, someone actually replied. 

[geniusboyy]

Covenants and other Provisions

Chapter 53

The Sight

     Ford had been gone for a day and a half—gone in the way a room is gone once the lights are cut, present only in negative space and residual energy. The body remained, but the animating force had retreated somewhere deep, below the floorboards of consciousness. In his place, Bill moved.

     The cabin bore the marks of what had come before: the neglect, the fracture, the collapse. The scorched aftermath of breathless panic still clung to the air—metallic, sharp, and sour with the memory of a mind seizing shut.

     Bill stood in Ford’s frame at the center of it all. Ford’s hands—his hands now—braced on either side of the doorframe, fingers spread like measuring tools. He inhaled.

     The kitchen was in ruins. All the cabinets and drawers hung open, dishes stacked on every surface, broken porcelain still glittering like salt across tile—baseboard to baseboard. Bill surveyed the wreckage with a mild, almost parental disappointment.

     “Well… look at this mess,” he murmured aloud, voice curling over Ford’s vocal cords—warm, coaxing, proprietary. “No wonder you’re so fidgety.”

     He rolled his neck, cracked his knuckles once—then stepped into the wreckage.

        He began in the kitchen.

     Plates disappeared beneath scalding water; milky grease bloomed, then vanished beneath a squall of soap. The rhythm was meditative. Scrub. Rinse. Stack. Just as he’d seen Ford do. Each cleaned mug was a small, incremental spell—proof that these hands were capable of gentleness.

     Cobwebs came next: whisked from ceiling corners with the broom’s bristles, delicate ladders collapsing at a touch. Shards of the mug—every pale-blue fragment—were swept, then swept again, until the tiles showed no trace of fracture. 

     One piece he kept aside. Just for a moment. He let it ride the pad of Ford’s thumb, watching the razor edge press into the skin—not deep, not breaking the surface, but just enough to feel. 

     He dropped into an open trash bag with the rest. Then tied the bag and set it beside the others lined neatly by the back door.

     The floorboards sighed beneath bare feet—clean now, no grit to catch between toes. Bill opened the windows a crack, just wide enough to let the stale air bleed out. The breeze stirred the edges of papers, coaxing motion into what had gone inert.

     He folded blankets. Straightened the cushions. Lined the pencil jars by descending height, then rotated them so each label faced outward. He adjusted the angle of the desk lamp, nudged the typewriter two centimeters to the left, then stood with both palms pressed to the desktop—hovering above the curated altar of Ford’s labor, the museum of his mind.

        He stood like that for a long time.

     All afternoon, the cabin reshaped itself around him. By the early evening, only the hum of the refrigerator and the occasional call of a loon disturbed the silence. A set, staged for the moment of return. Bill stood in the doorway and admired the effect.

     Dependency, after all, was easiest to forge in moments of gratitude.

     He lifted a hand, turned it palm-up: still, it trembled—faintly, a tremor belonging to muscle memory, signs of a nervous system still unsettled: not ready, not yet. 

     The shower hissed to life with a clatter behind the walls—pipes rattling, steam beginning to ghost through the air. Ford’s shirt slid off one arm, then the other, before the fabric dropped to the floor in a loose heap. His jeans followed. Socks peeled.

    He looked down at the body that hosted him, studying with clinical tenderness. He let Ford’s fingers trail lightly across the hollow just below the navel, then down over the pronounced line of one hipbone—the subtle pulse beneath the skin, the twitch of muscle. The body responded to touch, even without him.

     “Beautiful machine,” Bill whispered, then guided Ford under the spray.

     Water sluiced away three days of sweat, smoke, and neglect. It cascaded down the broad slope of Ford’s shoulders, raced the curve of his spine. Bill soaped each limb deliberately, knuckling lather into forearms, down calves, over the joints of each finger. He worked into the curls until they slackened, heavy and soft. 

     He admired Ford’s proportions from this angle: the heft of his biceps, the gentle swell of his belly over the muscle packed beneath, the coarse hair that cloaked his limbs and torso like bramble. A small shiver traced up Ford’s spine. Not Bill’s doing, not entirely—the body remembered how to respond to being looked at.

        Bill smiled. But there was no time for deeper indulgence. Pleasure, after all, was best when shared—and Ford, for now, was still sleeping.

     After the shower came the nails. Bill trimmed the ragged half-moons, shaping them with concentration before scraping a week's worth of soot and oil out from underneath them.

     Dressing came next—a plain shirt pulled snug across the shoulders. Dark jeans, slightly loose in the waist. Black leather belt to match black leather boots—well-worn but comfortable. Bill relished the decision-making. Ford rarely indulged in such things, but Bill did. He watched himself in the bedroom mirror, hands on Ford’s hips, appraising the lines of the outfit, the way the fabric sat on each contour.

        Hello gorgeous. 

     He slicked the damp curls back from Ford’s brow with a slow sweep of the hand, smoothing the wildness into place like calming the pelt of a restless animal. Ford’s face emerged more fully in the mirror now—ordered, composed. Presentable.

     Bill felt the hollow in Ford’s gut—flaring more with time. Bill pressed a palm against it, frowning.

  The body was past empty. Several meals deep into deficit, running on nicotine, stress, and whatever was left of adrenaline. That wouldn’t do. Not if he wanted Ford to find everything perfect when he came back.

        Bill moved back toward the kitchen.

     He opened the cabinets with cautious optimism—rummaging—but found little. A box of baking soda, the husk of instant potatoes. In the fridge: half a carton of gray-water milk, three ancient carrots, a jar of mustard, a single egg floating, cracked, in a carton like a drowned survivor.

        He considered the rat kibble.

     A sigh rattled through Ford’s nose as Bill shut the fridge.

     Then his gaze caught something on the door: a cheap little magnet calendar. One date marked in red—June 15th: Ford’s 33rd—Inked in stuttering ballpoint, unmistakably Fiddleford’s handwriting.

     Bill thought for a moment, counting on Ford’s fingers before grinning. “Birthday boy.” he mused.

     A quiet laugh slips out—low, dismissive. Cake? Friends? The nearest companion Ford had now was a resentful lab rat and the demon rifling through his pantry. No fanfare. No candles—poor thing.

     The hunger twisted again—sharper now. It didn’t care about pride, or detachment, or intellectual disdain for holidays. The body still wanted.

     Bill opened the fridge again, as if it might’ve refilled itself in the last thirty seconds. Nothing. He shut it harder this time and rubbed Ford’s face with one hand, stretching the skin downward over the bone.

     Well. No getting around it. He’d have to go out. A risk—but risk tasted better than spoiled milk.

     Bill stood in Ford’s mirror again—studying the reflection: the tilt of the shoulders, aiming for the neutral stance Ford affects. Straightened, slouched, straightened again—toggling through postures until the seam between Bill’s Ford and Ford’s Ford felt close enough.

     Voice next. He cleared Ford’s throat, trying a greeting:

     “Hello. Just the usual.” too high—edges like glass. Not even close. “Ah—hello.” Lower now. East Coast vowels, dried out and clipped at the ends. He tacked on just a hint of derision, the kind Ford couldn’t help when he felt cornered by small talk.

     Better, although the cadence still catches on Bill’s innate swagger. 

     “Hello—hello…” he tried, a third attempt, this one sharper, shaped into Ford’s usual brusque economy. “I’m Doctor Pines.” He added—and smiled again at the echo of authority.

     He tested the walk next. Ford’s gait was purposeful, forward-leaning, heavy on the heels. No swing in the arms. No bounce. Bill mimicked it down the hall—but every now and then, a dancer’s swivel snuck into the hips, a flicker of theatrical flair in the wrists.

      Close enough, he thought. Who’s gonna notice?

     He tucked stray curls behind one ear, then pocketed Ford’s wallet and keys.

     A rinsed-clean evening began to unfold around the cabin as Bill descended the front steps. The gravel driveway still glistened where the rain hadn't yet burned off, each stone catching light like a dull shard of glass in the setting sun. 

        Gravity Falls was winding downlight by light, window by window. Shopfronts locked up with rust-bitten clatters, their gates dragging across concrete like afterthoughts. Kids on bikes raced each other home, their laughter high and erratic in the dusk, trying to outrun the streetlights as they blinked to life—one by one, like watchful eyes along the road.

     Outside the garage, a pair of mechanics shared a cigarette. Grease smudged their knuckles and the hems of their uniforms. One of them said something that made the other bark a laugh, half-shouldered and sharp. Bill passed by them, slow, watchful, and let his gaze linger.

     He watched the world with a collector’s detachment—the way an entomologist might observe a jar of ants: noting the loops, the patterns, the tiny predictable collisions. He felt no kinship with these people. Only a sharp, sparking curiosity. What ticked behind their eyes? What rote mechanisms held them here, anchored them to this soggy little corner of the universe?

     A woman in gumboots dragged a reluctant Labrador past him. Bill smiled—perhaps too broadly—and said—perhaps too boldly—“Hello.”

     The woman startled slightly, gave a tight, obligatory nod—but the dog stopped cold. Its ears went back. Hackles lifted in a bristle. It gave a low, confused whine and backed away from him on stiff legs, the whites of its eyes glinting. 

     Bill’s grin deepened. Sensitive creatures, he thought—filing it away like a sugar cube in Ford’s pocket.

      He kept walking.

     The diner sat squat on Main Street, huddled beneath a flickering neon sign that buzzed like a bug zapper on its last leg. Grease-glossed windows blurred the inside into warm shapes. Inside: the dull clatter of dishes, the low drone of a jukebox trapped between eras.

      Bill adjusted Ford’s shoulders, rolled them once to settle the posture, then pushed open the door with the kind of casual weight Ford might use. The tin bell overhead tattled out a shrill little report.

        A few heads turned.

Bill walked slow, deliberate. He counted the seconds between each stride. He moved Ford’s legs with care, folding into the nearest booth with precise adjustments—calibrating the crook of one knee, the lean of one elbow, the angle of his spine against the vinyl backrest. He placed both hands on the table, palms down. Just so.

     A waitress appeared beside him in the next breath—apron smudged, cheeks ruddy. “Well I’ll be,” she said, with a surprised laugh. “Professor Pines. How are you?”

     Bill’s gaze dropped to the name tag: Susan. He thumbed through the catalog of Ford’s expressions and settled on something mild. He folded it over Ford’s face like a sheet. “Have we met?” he asked, tone dry, voice scraped just right.

     She tilted her head. “Sure—Reggie’s, a few months back… It was brief.” She said, then she chuckled. “You probably don’t remember—you were pretty stoned. Coffee?”

       “Yes,” Bill replied.

     She poured. The spout whistled a little as it filled the mug—Bill nodded his thanks. She lingered a beat longer, then turned at the sound of the bell behind them.

         “Well, speak of the devil—hey, shug!”

     The shift came a moment before the voice—like a change in barometric pressure. A subtle ripple in the molecules behind him. The smell arrived first: Patchouli. Dense. Herbal. Aggressively nostalgic. It rolled across Bill’s borrowed palate in blooming waves.

     “My, my…” said the voice—smooth as lacquer, low and amused. “Stanford Pines. Fancy seeing you out and upright.”

     Bill straightened. Ford’s spine realigned with a quiet pop. He flexed Ford’s jaw once, testing it for poise, then let a slow breath slip through Ford’s nose. The expression he turned over his shoulder was calm. Controlled. Precise. 

        “Reggie,” he said.

     A smile—small, deliberate—touched Ford’s borrowed mouth.

        “It’s a pleasure.”

     Reggie’s laugh unfurled—slow, oaky, touched with smoke—before he slid into the booth opposite, folding his fingers beneath his chin with a catlike ease.

  “Is it office hours?” he teased lightly, eyes sweeping upward—tracking the neat part in Ford’s hair, the pressed shirt, the way he sat straight-backed like something mounted for display. “It’s been too long.”

     Bill lifted the mug. Steam wreathed the lenses of Ford’s glasses. “I suppose it has.”

     “You suppose?” Reggie echoed, smiling with just a touch too much tooth. His hand slipped into a pocket, procuring a dainty pack of Virginia Slims. He held one between his teeth, then thumbed another before tilting the box toward Ford. 

     Ford was never one to turn down a cigarette—so, Bill accepted, reaching forward and plucking it out of the pack. Reggie lit his with the flick of a lighter, then passed it off—watching Ford do the same.

     Bill inhaled the delicate smoke—Reggie’s cigarettes were far more forgiving than Ford’s, minty, smooth—and Bill was frustrated by the fact he liked them.

    Reggie’s eyes flicked around the diner, feigning distraction—but it was a deliberate circuit, returning almost immediately. When they landed, they stayed. “I remember our last meeting fondly,” he said softly. “You let me ramble—had me thinking you’d bought every word... Then bounced before the check arrived.”

     “Bad habit,” Bill said, nudging Ford’s glasses up the bridge of his nose with one practiced finger. “I’ve got a lot of those.”

     Reggie’s eyes scanned Ford’s face. “You never stopped by for another visit.”

     The remark pricked. Something flared—territorial, proprietary—at the hint that Ford had been expected, wanted, waited for. That he had left a door open.

     “Busy season,” Bill replied, mouth curling around the rim of the cup as he drank.

     “I understand,” Reggie said. “These days no one has time. At least… not serious people—like you.” he said carefully, his arm slithering across the back of the booth. “People on the verge of changing the world…” He tilted his head, drawing the sentence out to its bleeding edge. “Or am I wrong?”

     A pause held between them. The ceiling lights hummed faintly above—then flickered, not enough to draw attention, but enough that the molecules shifted. Bill felt the catch: the tug of something real behind Reggie’s words, a twist in the frequency.

     Reggie leaned forward slightly. “You look tired, Professor.” The words lulled. “You should take it easy.”

     “There’s no gratification in things that come easily,” Bill replied, dry as chalk.

Reggie hummed. “Indulged by your own intellect—like a yuppie is indulged to a pocket full of marching powder.” he said, his grin widening. “You’re like a man possessed.” 

     Ford’s nostrils flared. But the gaze—Bill’s gaze—didn’t waver.

     Reggie leaned in, a subtle shift. Just enough to make the table feel smaller. “Sucked inside your own head. Floating through this little town like a ghost.” He grinned. “Though you’ve still managed to make a name for yourself.”

        “Oh?” Bill asked, teeth just behind the smile.

     “Reclusive. Brilliant. Impossible to approach.” Reggie ticked them off like vices. “Short-tempered. Maybe dangerous. There’s a rumor you laid out Buck Davis in the Dusk 2 Dawn parking lot last fall.”

     Bill tilted Ford’s head, squinting with mild disdain, then waved a hand. “I’m a victim of circumstance,”

     Reggie laughed, a burst of warmth against the tension. “I would expect nothing less from a Gemini.” He tapped the table. “I like it.”

     Bill didn’t laugh. He didn’t even blink. He didn’t like this performance. Acting like he knew Ford—he didn’t.

     The quiet pressed closer. Grease hissed on the diner griddle. The jukebox tripped into something torchy and faint. Reggie let the hush settle, let the air draw tight and warm—then folded forward, forearms on the Formica, voice pitched just low enough to be swallowed by the next booth’s background chatter.

        “Still seeing someone?”

     Bill’s lashes drifted half-mast—then lifted. “Every night.”

     A satisfied sound vibrated in Reggie’s throat. “Except tonight?” He worried his lower lip with one small bite. “Must be my good karma.”

     Bill set the mug down. Porcelain touched saucer with a clean, intimate sound. The smile that followed was sharp. Small but dazzling. Moonlight on a knife’s edge. “Or mine.”

     The overhead bulb flickered once, just enough to deepen the shadows at the edges of the booth—and both men, predator and unwitting interloper, leaned infinitesimally closer, as if the air itself had tightened the leash.

      Reggie’s cigarette glowed ember-bright as he dipped two fingers—deft, sure—into the inner fold of his jacket. Ash drifted like saffron dust while he drew a card from the silk lining—matte black, edges kissed with metallic sheen, lettering stamped in lunar silver. He laid it down between them with two ringed fingers—an elegant, theatrical gesture—and slid it forward half an inch.

     “In case you ever tire of your… current arrangement.”

     Bill let Ford’s hand drift down. His humb brushed the embossed letters—Reginald L. Carabali—followed by a short list in precise serifs: 

· Astrology · Chiromancy · Parapsychology · Discretion

     And beneath that: a single phone number. The kind that never appeared in a phone book. The kind you didn’t find. The kind that found you.

     A whimsy-résumé, novelty to most. But to Bill, it was unmistakably an invitation—one addressed to Ford, not the occupant.

     “Karma’s a curious ledger,” Bill murmured, letting the card slip from Ford’s fingers. It fluttered once—then settled on the table with a hush of contact. “It very rarely favors the impatient.”

    “No hurry, Professor. We have the whole night ahead of us.” Reggie crooned, tapping ash into a saucer, smoke coiling upward in lazy arabesques. Then he straightened, his fingers drumming once on the table’s surface. “How about something stronger than caffeine?”

     Bill tipped Ford’s head, considering. He echoed the offer in a single raised brow, a movement Ford had perfected for debate and rejection alike—

        “It is your birthday, after all.”

     The expression Bill held dropped from Ford’s face a fraction too fast. “How did you know that?” he asked, a chill slipping through Ford’s tone.

     Reggie didn't miss a beat. “Fiddy mentioned it a while back,” he said. “He had something planned, I think, but…” A slight shrug. “I guess duty calls.”

     He let the moment breathe—then added, smooth as rum, “Maybe that’s more of our good karma.” he said, his knuckles grazing Ford’s wrist.

     Bill felt the contact like a blade slipped beneath his skin. Possessive heat flared: he did not want Ford handled. Not like that. Not by him.

     He studied Reggie through the veil of Ford’s lashes: He certainly was attractive—that was undeniable. A devastatingly symmetrical face with high cheekbones. Dark, radiant skin, the kind that collected all the colors around him, making every hue his. That dense, curling smile tightly lined by a meticulously groomed pencil moustache. His hair—puffy coils illuminated at the edges by cafe lights—crowned his skull like an umber halo.

     Bill took all of it—the rings, the voice, that signature scent clinging to his deliberately casual denim jacket that lingered long after he left—as a threat.

  But it was that pause, that hitch in Ford’s breath—the unguarded flicker of tension—that gave the game away.

     “Come on, Professor.” Reggie coaxed. “Have a drink with me.” 

     He picked the card back up—twirled it once between his fingers—then leaned forward, slipping it into the breast pocket of Ford’s shirt with slow precision.

        A quiet, daring intimacy.

     “Don’t make me ask twice.”

     Bill’s pulse flickered under Reggie’s hand—one beat, hard and hot—then steadied. “Alright,” he said. “But you’ll have to keep up.”

        After that, things unspooled fast.

     Susan’s gave way to Murphy’s, then to El Rey’s Cantina, then to Zoots—One drink became two, then four, Each stop darker, louder, a little farther from the rust-rimmed city-line sign. The air grew thick with old smoke and bass, with sweat and neon and stories no one would remember in the morning.

     Bill let Ford’s body drift toward the deepest hole the woods had to offer, a dowsing rod for experience. Reggie matched him pour for pour, emptying tumblers with a showman’s flourish. Spirits—liquid or otherwise—posed no threat to him.

     Then the fourth stop: a windowless place Reggie described as a little out of orbit, where they could ‘be themselves’. Bill learned quickly: this meant the building was full of men unafraid to touch each other in public. Inside, everything pulsed violet. Low ceilings, higher heat. Bodies touched without flinch: hands on hips, fingertips under chins, laughter looping around chain smoke.

     Bill found the concept silly—the issue humans raised about sexuality. They crowned it king, yet weighed it down with rules and rituals. Fear dressed as etiquette. Fascination laced with shame—it was confusing. It was stupid.

     Although, it also came with a sense of exclusivity. A secret world only a brave slice of the population managed to see—and now that included him.

     He moved like liquid in Ford’s frame. On the floor they became orbitals: Reggie’s palm flattened over Ford’s ribs, heat moving through damp cotton. Bill let it linger, counted two, three, then set his fingertips against Reggie’s sternum—no shove, merely a teasing reset of distance. 

     Reggie only grinned, pupils blown wide in the strobing dark.

     Moments later they collided again in a slash of light: Ford’s curls slick with sweat, Reggie’s lips shining mezcal-sweet. Their faces hovered inches apart—two masks illuminated by the intermittent seizure of strobes.

     Reggie’s breath was hot against Ford’s cheek. “What is this little game you play, Professor?” he shouted over the beat. “Or are you really this hard to get?”

     Bill hooked one finger through a belt loop at Reggie’s hip and tugged him closer. Reggie gasped—hands landing on Ford’s shoulders, gripping tightly. Bill slid Ford’s palms down to Reggie’s waist—guiding his movements with ease, rolling him through the rhythm like tidewater pulling at driftwood.

     “I didn’t have you pegged for a dancer,” Reggie murmured breathlessly, nose brushing Ford’s jaw. “What else are you?”

     Ford’s canines flashed, made feral by strobe. He leaned until his teeth grazed the shell of Reggie’s ear, just as Reggie’s parted mouth found the throb in Ford’s throat, and he whispered:

              “A demon.”

        The syllables plunged through Reggie’s skin like a needle of ice. He froze.

     Then he pulled back just enough to see Ford’s eyes—strobe-flecked, dark, utterly unblinking. 

     Recognition flickered. Something in Reggie’s expression twisted—humor fading, replaced by something weightless. He stared.

     And Bill let him. He didn’t move, didn’t explain. Just stared back

     Music snarled around them, bodies jostled, lights strobed—but between them was a static hush, dense as snowfall, drowning everything out. 

     Finally Reggie’s throat worked around a swallow. His shoes scraped against the sticky floor as he stepped back—slowly, his eyes never leaving Ford’s face.

     Bill just tipped his head—almost courteous, allowing the medium safe passage.

     Reggie turned. The narrow corridor of the bar seemed to telescope before him—walls pulsing inward with each beat of the bass. The EXIT sign burned like a tiny red stitch at the far end, pulsing in time with his breath.

     He pushed forward, slipping through weaving dancers, all sweat and blur and blurting laughter. Someone knocked into his shoulder and apologized loudly—he didn’t answer. Didn’t hear. The air was thick with heat and synthetic fog and fear. 

     He reached the door. Laid a hand on the crash-bar—paused.

      Against instinct, against reason, he looked back. Ford was still there, exactly where he’d been left, motionless in a sea of bodies. 

     The dancers spun and reeled around him like leaves caught in a whirlpool, but he didn’t move. Not a finger. Not a breath. His hands hung loose at his sides, shoulders easy, relaxed. But his eyes—those eyes—gleamed over the rims of his glasses.

        And then he smiled—slow and unsettlingly wide and far too pleased.

     Reggie’s stomach flipped. He pushed through the door with a shove that rattled the frame and slipped into the night, leaving the door to clang shut behind him.

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