#Hitchhiking across the world

[killerlookz]

Olive Green Couch | Spencer Reid

description: when your best friend drags you to a party to meet a boy she's been fawning over, you find yourself completely bored and unimpressed- good thing you've stumbled upon a strikingly handsome (yet awkward) young graduate student named Spencer who seems equally as unhappy to be there to share your misery with.

pairing: grad school! spencer reid x f! reader

content: uhh mostly fluff, drinking, reader is described as wearing a mini skirt and wearing high heels.

word count: 4,242

If I have to hear one more Weezer song I'm going to be sick. You think as the slow drums of Undone pour out over an all too expensive speaker system for a frat house.

The MIT frats were nothing like you experienced before, they were- for lack of a better term- a complete and utter sausage party. You can't remember the last time you'd seen this many men in a single room. If you weren't so bored maybe you would appreciate this as a reprieve from the usual maintaining "ratio" of the state school frat parties you'd been to. But even now you'd prefer that if it meant you wouldn't have to deal with another sloppily drunk man explaining the plot of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy to you. Rich, pretentious, too smart for his own good MIT frat guy or dude-bro, alpha male, business major state school frat guy- it didn't matter; they were the same side of the same misogynistic coin.

You look down at the shot-glass sized solo cup in your hand, staring at the clear liquid inside. Maybe just one more shot and you'd finally start to enjoy the state you were in. You hoped maybe six shots would be the perfect number of drunk to enjoy yourself. You screw your eyes shut and throw back your head as you lift the cup to your mouth. The cheap vodka burns the second it touches your tongue, and you wince as you feel it travel down your throat and to your stomach. Your body shivers involuntarily as the warmth in your belly grows.

You face forward again, looking across the living room for your best friend- the one who dragged you here in the first place. You had suggested bar hopping or trying to get into a club, you didn't buy her a fake ID for no reason. But she insisted on coming here instead. Here- to this sweaty house filled with... well... dorks. She came here looking for some guy- Michael... Matthew... Miles.... shit, you couldn't remember. It didn't matter, you were here now, and she had ditched you to fend for yourself.

You take a step forward and all the alcohol you had drank prior seems to hit you a once, "Woah" You can't help but say out-loud as you catch your balance and wait for the room to stop spinning.

You take a few more wobbly steps forward before acclimating to your new, tipsy state. You make your way through the dimly lit house, trying to find your friend amongst the crowd and rowdy conversations. Observing the bodies that populated the house you suddenly felt insecure, and insanely overdressed- why was everyone wearing jeans and a t-shirt? Maybe a mini skirt was the wrong choice for tonight.

You make your way to a back room of the house, occupied by maybe only 10 people by your inebriated brain's estimate. There's an ugly looking olive green couch in the middle of the room- it' had obviously been through a lot but and you hated to imagine what had happened on that couch over the years, but right now it looked like the most comfortable thing in the world. You walk over and plop yourself over onto the couch, the cushions having a lot less give than you expected.

The beginning riff of Someday by The Strokes plays just outside of the room, and you groan- turning to the guy who you had just realized was sitting next to you.

"Do you know who's Dj-ing this fucking thing- can you tell them to play some Britney or something?" The words fall off your tongue, sloppily.

The boy sitting next to you turns to look at you, a confused look drawn upon his face, "Huh- me?"

Shit. He's kind of cute- In a dorky sort of way. His brown hair is perfectly unkempt, and small curls form at the back of his neck. His jawline is sharp, and his hollow cheeks accentuate his prominent cheek bones. His eyes are dark, and he looks a like he hasn't slept in years- you figured with the workload MIT students probably have- it would make sense if he actually hadn't slept since getting there. Truth be told, all things combined he looked a little sickly- he was obviously lanky maybe scrawny was a better word- his button up shirt seemed a little ill-fitted for his body, and his tie poorly tied. Still- you couldn't help but notice he was hot. The first hot guy you'd seen all night.

"Yes, you, pretty boy." You smirk.

His face reads as even more confused upon your clarification.

"Oh um," He looks down at the half-drunken beer that sits between his legs, shakes his head before looking back up at you, "I-uh I don't know the DJ, and I- um, also don't know who Britney is." He responds, a small nervous tremble in his voice.

"Spears?" You let out a small laugh, "You know like- Hit Me Baby One More Time." You half sing.

"Oh-" He looks off to the side, "No" he faces you again.

"Go figure," You scoff, still, keeping a smile on your face. "Say- are you in this frat?"

He shakes his head, "Oh- no, I'm a grad student."

"A grad student?" You respond, your eyes widen in shock no shot the man you were looking at right now was any older than you. "How old are you?"

"21" He responds, almost nonchalantly- like it wasn't some insane feat. "Well," He clarifies, "I'm actually in my third graduate program, I already have a PhD in mathematics and chemistry, from Cal Tech. I'm working on my engineering one now."

"Jesus," You smile, "So what, you're like some sort of genius, huh?"

"Well, I don't believe that intelligence can be accurately quantified- but I do have an IQ of 187, and an eidetic memory, and can read twenty thousand words per-minute."

You stare at him in awe for a moment, "So, a you are a genius?"

He gives you a small smile in response, "Yeah- I guess." He nods.

You're suddenly intrigued, only twenty-one years old and already a doctor twice over.

"So what brings you here Doctor...uh..."

"Reid," He nods and presses his lips into a line. "Oh! But, don't call me doctor you can call me Spencer."

"Well then, what brings you here, Spencer?" You correct yourself with a smile.

"My friend- uh he wanted me to come with him, he's meeting some girl here and he didn't want to go alone. I kind of got dragged along."

"Well," You grin, "It must be fate that we're here together on this ugly green couch, because if you could believe it- I'm here for the exact same reason except my friend- she's uh, meeting a guy here."

Spencer takes a small sip of the beer he had been holding, wincing as the liquid touched his lips. You figured he probably wasn't much of a drinker, he probably had things much more important on his plate than getting drunk and partying.

"Not much of a partier?" You ask to confirm your suspicions.

"Mhh," Spencer hums, mouth still full of beer, he shuts his eyes tight as he swallows thickly. "No." He shakes his head violently. "What gave it away?"

"Oh!" You bite your lip... "Nothing!" You say, innocently, voice steeped in sarcasm.

"It's okay," He laughs, "I know I look like a dork."

His laugh is infectious, and you can't help but smile in response. And Damn- he's really cute.

"Oh! Don't say that," You swat your hand at him, "I'm sure you get tons of ladies."

Spencer tilts his head to one side, in obvious disbelief of what you just said,

"I don't really appreciate the sarcasm," He says, his eyes narrowing at you.

"Sarcasm?" You pout, "No- I mean it Spencer, what you're like a genius. And I mean- you're not bad to look at," You bite your lip, "Not at all."

Spencer shook his head, "I was a child prodigy in a Las Vegas public school, and until now, I've always been way younger than everyone in college- my experience with girls is practically in the negatives."

"Oooh!" You smirk, "Vegas," You raise an eyebrow.

"Mhm," He takes another sip of his beer, his face more relaxed this time.

"You think I'd make a good showgirl?" You wink

"Oh- um," Spencer is suddenly blinking rapidly as his head scans you up and down. You can't help but feel a little bad at the way you have him flustered,

"I'm kidding! You don't have to answer that." You reassure. "Negative experience with girls, hm?"

"Yeah- I-uh, I haven't even had my first kiss yet." He says, looking down at his lap, refusing to make eye contact with you.

"No?" You say, still shocked, even given his prior explanations of his experiences with women, "Well..." You start, pausing for a moment, "If you ever want that to change let me know." Maybe that last part was meant to be a joke, but truth is you kind of really hoped he said yes, right there, right now.

"What?" He looks back up at you, eyebrows furrowed, "No- I don't need a pity kiss. I don't even know who you are."

"It is not a pity kiss, and I'm y/n, I go to UMASS, the Boston campus- like 15 minutes away. I'm 20, and uhhh... Well, the rest you can find out later." You wink, "Now you know me!" You smile, perking up from your spot on the couch.

"Well- uh. Nice to meet you y/n" He gives you an awkward tight lipped smile. "Are you- um- enjoying your night."

"God no," You scoff. "Does that make two of us?"

Spencer nods, side moving his eyes to look around the room. It had gotten significantly more crowded since you'd came in here, you hadn't noticed, you'd been too focused on getting to know Spencer that you kind of forgot you were at a party to begin with. It didn't seem to matter now anyway, you were intrigued beyond belief and wanted to know more about Dr. Reid.

"So, why'd you leave Caltech? The weather is certainly a lot nicer than it is here," Your body physically recoils at the thought of having to go back outside to the brisk New England fall after the party was over.

Spencer shrugged, "You can only get so many degrees at one place before you need a change of scenery. I've been at CalTech since I was like- fourteen."

"Fourteen?" Your eyes widen, thinking about what you were like at fourteen. You certainly weren't CalTech material, that's for sure. "When did you graduate high school?"

"1993," He smiles and nods, "Twelve years old"

Spencer had a charming humility about him, he was the smartest person you'd ever met but he spoke in a way that made it feel like it was every day that someone could graduate high school at 12 and have two PhDs by 21.

"What do you plan on doing after college with that pretty head of yours?" You ask, your slightly intoxicated brain unable to stop you from instinctively reaching out and fluffing his hair. Spencer's eyes flick up towards your hand and he gives you an awkward smile paired with a small laugh.

"Well- I uhh... I've been in contact with this guy- well from the FBI, the BAU... Behavioral Analysis Unit. We came into contact after my second dissertation, he was shocked at how young I was, having done so much- he suggested I come to the academy when I was done with this one." Spencer explained, he talked in a way that made him seem unsure of himself, like he, himself didn't fully understand how it happened.

"God," You muse, "The fucking FBI? Could you get any cooler?"

"You know," Spencer remarks, "I think that's the first time anyone has ever used to word "cool" to describe me." The tone in his voice is light, it's clear he's happy about that fact, but you can't help but feel your heart break at the statement.

"Cool even sounds like a little bit of an understatement to me. But you know... I think I'm a little too intoxicated right now to think of a synonym, so cool it is!"

"Do you have any plans for after college?" Spencer asks, nervously running a finger around the rim of the glass in his lap.

"Nothing as cool as the FBI," You shrug, "Actually, nothing concrete, really. Has me feeling a little inadequate in a room full of geniuses."

"Oh trust me," Spencer scans his head around the room, "Not all of these guys are geniuses."

"Well- they're complete nerds at the very least." You giggle.

"I think I qualify as a nerd too." Spencer smiles back.

"Oh you definitely do," You say, scooting closer to him, taking the beer glass out of his hand, "But you haven't tried to talk down to me about some movie everyone's seen, or some album everyone's heard like I'm some dumb idiot bimbo yet." You huff, finishing what was left of the liquid in the glass with a single gulp. You slam the cup down on the coffee table in front of you, "And even if I was a dumb idiot bimbo- what makes them think I'd care about whatever they'd have to say about OK Computer. We've all listened to Karma Police, big deal!" You realize you're getting a little heated over this and cut yourself off, "Anyways," You smile, "What I mean is you don't seem like some self important loser."

"Oh," Spencer furrows his eyebrows, "Thank...you?"

"Do you want to get out of here?"

"Y-Yeah, Yeah we can go." Spencer nods.

You stand up from the couch, wobbling a little bit as your legs lift you up. The room, is blurry, for a moment all you can see are vague blobs of color instead of people. You shut your eyes tight, blinking them open to fix your blurry vision. You glance over toward Spencer, who's grabbing a tan suit jacket that had been draped over the back of the couch. He slinks the jacket on over his thin frame.

"You alright?" He asks, concern in his eyes. He must have been able to read the drunk all over your face.

"Y-Yeah I'm fine, lets go," You nod, reassuringly. You could handle your liquor, besides you hadn't drank that much tonight.

The two of you head for the door, wherever it is. Spencer was leading the way, and you hoped he had a better sense of direction than you did. The music is suddenly a lot louder as you exit the room you were in, and you suddenly feel a lot drunker. The sudden change in feeling causes you to stumble a little, bumping Spencer in the back. High heels and alcohol were never a good mix.

"Oh- hey," Spencer stops suddenly, turning around to smile at you, "Are you sure you're alright?"

You look around the room, at the hoard of people, the room thick with a combination of weed and cigarette smoke. You've never felt so lost in your life when did it get so crowded in here? The obnoxious yelling of frat guys mixed with the music turned to a volume you were sure would get the cops to show up is absolutely ear-splitting.

"Can you hold my hand?" You ask Spencer, needing his guidance more than you realized.

"Uh, yeah, yeah." He nods. You reach your hand out for Spencer to grab, and it takes him a few times to correctly slot his fingers between yours. You smile a little, watching him try to figure out the perfect hand-holding position. He couldn't be more pathetic if he tried- it was kind of adorable.

Spencer's hand is warm, a little sweaty against your palm. But his grip is tight and reassuring as the two of you walk the rest of the way out of the house.

As soon as the front door opens a brisk wind hits you, nipping at your exposed flesh. Goosebumps already dot up and down your skin, the only warmth you feel is Spencer's hand wrapped around yours, and you knew that warm sensation would end as soon as his hand got cold too.

With a little hesitance, you step outside to brave the cold. Your heels click as you carefully make your way down the concrete steps in front of the house. You stare down at your feat as you make each movement, fearing accidentally rolling your ankle or falling. You'd probably take end up Spencer down with you.

"Hmm," Spencer hums, noticing your trepidation, "Here," Spencer untwines his hand from yours and places an arm around your back, reaching to your other side, but barely touches your other arm, just holds firm enough for you not to fall.

You reach the bottom of the stairs, thankful for Spencer's help,

"You don't have to hold me so far away you know, you can pull me a little closer." You turn your head to look at him, "I mean it is kind of chilly out."

"Oh-uh," Spencer's arm pulls to hold you just a little bit closer, "Better?" His grip is still pretty weak around you, and you sigh.

"You know, Spence, I'm still pretty cold." You frown, staring down the suit jacket he was wearing.

"Do you want to go back inside? I didn't even have a full beer the entire time I was there- I can go get my car real quick and drive you home if you want. It's only a block or so away." Spencer responds, his voice quick, and nervous- it was obvious he was eager to solve the problem of you being so cold.

"No," You laugh, shaking your head, "I'm cold is kind of girl-code for, you should give me your jacket."

"Oh!" Spencer laughs, "Oh- I'm sorry, yeah- here, here have it." Spencer speaks earnestly as he slips the jacket off of his shoulders. He shivers as the loss of the fabric leaves him in only a thin button up and you can't help but feel a little bad for asking him to give it to you. But he hands you the jacket with a smile on his face, which lingers even after you put it on. It provides a marginal amount more of warmth than what you felt prior.

"Better?" Spencer asks.

"Mhm," You nod, "Thank you."

Spencer only gives you a tight lipped smile and a nod in response.

"So," Spencer starts as the two of you begin walking, his hand slipping into yours almost instinctually, it catches you a little off guard, and you feel your cheeks run hot at the gesture. "Where are you headed?"

"Oh- uh, back to Boston I guess," You squint your eyes, thinking, "I usually take the bus, the stop is up that way." You point up ahead in front of you.

"Let me go with you," Spencer says quickly, "I mean- not to your place, but let me ride the bus with you, I don't want you going by yourself."

"Why not? I'm a big girl, I can take care of myself." You retort, trying to hide the fact that secretly, butterflies are growing in your stomach at his eagerness to take care of you.

"I just want to make sure you get home okay." His hand grips yours tighter.

"Okay," A small smile draws at your lips, you don't want to fight him on it anymore, truth was you'd love nothing more than to spend a little bit more time with him, even if it was a short bus ride.

The streets of the city are utterly dead, not a sound to be heard except the whistling of the wind and collision of your high heels and the pavement. You wonder what time it even is, how long had you even spent at that stupid party?

The bus is just as empty as the rest of the city. When it arrives, nobody but you and Spencer are on, the two of you sitting patiently under the bright fluorescent lights for the bus to move. The lights are straining on your eyes, and the horrendously carpet-patterned seats might hurt your eyes even worse.

"What stop do you get off at?" Spencer asks, being the one sitting the closest to the button to let the driver know when it's your stop.

"University Drive."

The lights dim as the bus driver pulls away from the stop you'd been picked up at, and you're able to relax your eyes once more. You let your eyes relax until all of a sudden they're closed and then-

"Hey," You feel your head being jerked, "We're here."

"Hmm?" You grumble, slowly opening your eyes.

Your stomach drops, and you're absolutely mortified to see your head is rested on Spencer's shoulder. You whip your head off from where it laid and quickly stand up from the seat.

The bus ride was fifteen minutes, you couldn't believe you fell asleep. Much less fell asleep on some guy you barely knew. You're a mess of worry as you exit the bus, thinking about how awkward you probably made Spencer feel. You're so caught up in your thoughts you barely notice how cold it is as you step outside.

"Hey, look, I'm right over there." You say, pointing to the large dorm building behind you.

"I'll walk you to the door." He smiles, and your panic immediately slides away.

You walk with your head down, looking intently at the sidewalk under you as you head forward to your building, trying your best to keep in a straight line. You had to admit, you were pretty upset your time with Spencer would be ending in just a few short minutes from now. You tried to scheme up a plan to get Spencer to stay longer, but no ideas would stick to your brain. You sigh, crossing your arms across your chest as you approach the front door.

You whip around to look at Spencer who's trailing just a few inches behind you.

"Well," You sigh, "I guess this is it." You pull your mouth to one side in a small pout.

"Yeah- I-uh, I guess so," He shrugs, "I had a nice time tonight, thanks for, making my first party experience a lot better than i was expecting." Spencer's hands are shoved into his pocket, and he rocks back and forth while he talks, unsure of himself as his eyes dart all around you.

"Of course," You grin, letting your hands drop down at your sides, "Say," You cut yourself off, and shove your hands into the pocket of Spencer's coat, fishing, until you find what you were hoping for. You pull out a pen from one of the coat pockets, and grab Spencer's hand. "I want to see you again before you become some big tough FBI agent." You smile, scrawling the digits of your phone number on the back of his hand. "Call me sometime?" You hold his hand up for an extra moment, before letting it drop back down.

"Mmmhm, yeah," Spencer bobs his head up and down vigorously.

"Okay, good. Goodnight Spencer," You smile, giving him a small wave.

"Goodnight y/n" He smiles back, as the two of you turn around to go your separate ways.

You notice as you turn back around that you're still wearing Spencer's jacket, part of you has the urge to call out to him to give it back, the other part of you wants to keep it- if he wants to get it back, he'll have to come see you again.

"Wait! Y/n!" You hear Spencer from just behind you. You frown a little, thinking your plan to keep Spencer's jacket had been foiled and he was calling to get it back from you.

"Yeah?" You whip your head back around.

"Did you mean it when you said to let you know if I wanted to have my first kiss- and that you'd change that I've never um-"

"Uhh..huh," You responded, a little to eager as an uncontrollable smile began to tug at the ends of your lips, "Are you asking me to kiss you Spencer?"

"Maybe," His voice breaks, unable to look you directly in the eyes.

You raise one eyebrow, "Maybe?"

"Ahem. Uh- I mean- yes."

Before you know it, you're tugging at his tie, pulling him close to you. Your lips are on his, just a peck at first, Spencer is hesitant. He is unsure of what to do with any part of his body, his lips move carefully, his hands unsure of just where they should be, they rest on your hips- before they move right under your shoulders. You make the decision to tilt your head and deepen the kiss. Spencer's lips are soft with inexperience, he has absolutely no clue what he's doing, yet you can't get enough.

The two of you pull away slowly, neither one of you wanting to give up the kiss- but you eventually have to surrender to the night and to the cold. You place one final peck on Spencer's lips.

"Now you have to call me." You giggle, unable to hide your excitement.

"Yeah-yeah," Spencer nods, eyes wide, his lips are shiny and his cheeks a pretty shade of pink. "Absolutely."

"Goodnight Spencer." You say once more, before turning around to head inside.

A/N: whew! when I tell you I spent all day writing this i mean all day! that's okay though... im obsessed with grad school! reid. anyways..... thinking about making a (potentially smutty) part two to this ;-)

[dittolicous]

re: volo appearing in every legends game regardless of in-game importance can go a couple different directions

hitchhikers guide to legends you shouldn't know - weird traveler man who knows just a bit too much about local regional legends and is a little too coy yet never strays far from the side lines

dramatic heros tale cracks the egg - in each game he gradually becomes both more heroic, aiding the protag overtime, and softens, his final appearance ending with him commenting on changing his name to signify him changing his ways - why 'cynthia' has a nice ring doesnt it?

always the bridesmaid never the bride - he keeps trying to team up with legendary pokemon all across the world - with varying levels of villiany involved - and almost succeeds UNTIL SOME PIMPLY FACE PRETEEN FUCKING KICKS HIS ASS AND BEFRIENDS LOCAL GOD IN 3 MINUTES FLAT. EVERY GODDAMN TIME.

cant an immortal man get a break - hes kind of over all that legands drama and keeps hoping to find a nice peaceful retirement home.... but the fucking gods cant chill out for five damn minutes and of course some idiot local has to piss them off - oh fuck him another teen girl just fell out of the sky-

[johns-prince]

if you don’t mind, what are some of your favorite soft mclennon moments?

JOHN: I used to try to get George to rebel with me. I’d say to him, “Look, we don’t need these fuckin’ suits. Let’s chuck them out of the window.” My little rebellion was to have my tie loose with the top button of my shirt undone. Paul’d always come up to me and put it straight. [x]

PAUL: There’s a story that I used to straighten John’s tie before we went on stage. That seems to have become a symbol of what my attitude was supposed to have been. I’ve never straightened anyone’s tie in my life, except perhaps affectionately.

The Times Profile of Paul McCartney - 1982 [x]

“And John and Paul thought back to the time they’d been in Paris before. Flat-broke, unable to afford a taxi, without funds for a decent meal. ‘Maybe we’ll buy the Eiffel Tower this time’, said John with a grin.”

“The Beatles in Paris.” Beatles Book Monthly Magazine No. 8 (March 1964). [x]

““Okay, okay,” I said, “don’t go on, John.” I felt a surge of embarrassment because my instrument was the cause of such hilarity. “Look guys, that’s enough. What have you two been doing while we’ve been struggling to get here? I hope you’ve done some practising and got the song list sorted out?” I was getting more and more annoyed as this episode was dragging on. “Yeah, yeah, don’t worry Len. Paul and I have got it all sorted out. Haven’t we Paul? Paul! Paul! I said haven’t we Paul?” Paul McCartney looked up with a wry smile and paused. “Tonight will run just like clockwork. I am going to give the audience the best rendition of ‘Guitar Boogie’ they have ever heard this side of Garston.” “Hey, this is a new twist,” I said. “Paul just cracked a joke. He must have a sense of humour after all, John, shall we have him in the group?” John was enjoying the banter as ever. “Yeah, we’ll give him another try and if you don’t get it right this time, Jimmy,” Jimmy (James) was Paul’s first name, “then…” John waited to see the expression on Paul’s face. “Then we’ll,” again a pause, and by this time we were hanging on John’s next words, “then we’ll have to send him for some more guitar lessons!” Paul joined in the laughter and at that we were all back to normal.”

— Len Garry, John, Paul and Me: Before The Beatles. (1997) [x]

“One of my great memories of John is from when we were having some argument. I was disagreeing and we were calling each other names. We let it settle for a second and then he lowered his glasses and he said: “It’s only me.” And then he put his glasses back on again. To me, that was John. Those were the moments when I actually saw him without the facade, the armour, which I loved as well, like anyone else. It was a beautiful suit of armour. But it was wonderful when he let the visor down and you’d just see the John Lennon that he was frightened to reveal to the world.” [x]

“Whatever bad things John said about me, he would also slip his glasses down to the end of his nose and say, ’I love you’. That’s really what I hold on to. That’s what I believe. The rest is showing off.” [x]

“I remember being shocked one day when John started worrying about how people would remember him when he was gone. It was an incredibly vulnerable thing for him to come out with. I said to him then, ‘They’ll remember you as a fucking genius, because that’s what you are. But, you won’t give a shit because you’ll be up there, flying across the universe.’” [x]

“If John Lennon could come back for a day, how would you spend it with him?”  “In bed.” — Paul McCartney answers questions for Q magazine, 1998. [x]

“John and I grew up like twins although he was a year and a half older than me. We grew up literally in the same bed because when we were on holiday, hitchhiking or whatever, we would share a bed. Or when we were writing songs as kids he’d be in my bedroom or I’d be in his. Or he’d be in my front parlour or I’d be in his, although his Aunt Mimi sometimes kicked us out into the vestibule!”

— September 26, 1997, “Paul McCartney - Meet The Beatle” by Steve Richards [x]

“We were recording the other night, and I just wasn’t there. Neither was Paul. We were like two robots going through the motions. We do need each other alot. When we used to get together after a month off, we used to be embarrassed about touching each other. We’d do an elaborate handshake just to hide the embarrassment… or we did mad dances. Then we got to hugging each other.”

— John Lennon, The Beatles by Hunter Davies [x]

Q: “What musician and composer do you respect most?” Paul: “No, I don’t know, really... John Lennon!” John: *mock-shy* “...Paul McCartney.” [x]

conversations with mccartney, paul du noyer [x]

“It was 8:30. I could hear people talking about the likelihood of a storm later on that evening. I can remember hoping that it would clear up before my cycle ride back to Wavertree. Up to now it had been an eventful day but very tiring and as a group, although committed to playing, we all wished that we could pack up and go home. All of us apart from John Lennon. I think that meeting Paul had whetted his appetite and by the time we went on stage for our session at 8:45 he looked refreshed and seemed to have a new sparkle, as though he had had an injection of renewed optimism and enthusiasm as he played and sang through our usual repertoire that evening. […] I went outside for some air and a smoke; John and Pete decided to come with me. We stood outside pulling on our cigarettes, enjoying the breeze that had risen with the oncoming storm. “Do you know, John,” remarked Pete as we stood outside, “I’ve never heard you sound as good as you did just then. I know you’re going to say that I’m not very musical but I could hear the difference. I can see that something’s happened to you. Even the skiffle numbers which I know you’re not that keen on sounded good. You seem to have put more effort into them.” “Pete’s right, John. I couldn’t help noticing it as well,” I said. John was silent for a few minutes, just enjoying his smoke. “I guess someone took the trouble to share what he knew with me and it’s just given me a little encouragement for the future, that’s all.” “Oh I see, you’re getting a little sentimental in your old age, aren’t you,” joked Pete, who had never seen his life-long friend in that light before. “Don’t be thick, Pete,” replied John, who seemed almost back to his normal abrupt self. “Come on, I need a drink.”” — Len Garry, John, Paul and Me: Before The Beatles. (1997) [x]

[x]

Paul's persistence and endless patience for John while he was dealing with the death of his mother Julia:

But Paul seemed to have limitless patience for John, sneaking away from his classes to drink coffee at the Jacaranda coffeehouse, or else spend the afternoon nursing pints and punching rock ‘n’ roll songs on the jukebox at Ye Cracke pub. Certainly, Paul preferred hanging out with his friend to grinding through lectures and assignments at his schoolboy’s desk at the Liverpool Institute. But the hours they spent together held an emotional significance, too. For even if they rarely spoke about the pain of losing their mothers, the mutual feelings of loss—and the rawness of John’s wound—gave them a connection that was as vital as it was unspoken. It was, Paul said later, a “special bond for us, something of ours, a special thing.” … “We could look at each other,” Paul said, “and know.”” 

…

John, however, had other things on his mind. Though the fall of 1958 and well into 1959, John was far too busy engaging in art-school life—if not exactly his studies—to think much about playing in a rock ‘n’ roll band. He had started dating another student, a quiet blonde from the relatively posh Hoylake district on the Wirral, named Cynthia Powell. She proved a warm, stabilizing influence, which helped mitigate John’s ongoing grief and rage.

He had also grown particularly close to one of the school’s most promising students, a blazingly talented painter named Stuart Sutcliffe, whose emotional portraits and densely wrought abstracts had already caught the eye of the university’s instructors, along with the gallery owners, artists and critics who orbited the bohemian section that bordered the campus. John had been drawn to Stu’s talent, too, and when his classmate invited John to move into his large, if downtrodden, flat around the corner from the college in a row of once-elegant homes on Gambier Terrace, the two art students became even closer. The flat became a hub for their college friends, a reliable address for drinking bouts and all-night parties.

 Nevertheless, Paul made certain not to be a stranger. He was a regular around Gambier Terrace, often toting his guitar to spur a little playing and singing, and if circumstance permitted, a bit of songwriting. John remained an eager music fan, and generally enthusiastic partner for playing and singing. But his disinterest in the band, prompted at least in part by his deepening friendship with Stu, frustrated Paul. 

…

John was moving on, and not in a promising direction. George, for his part, had grown sick of waiting and joined the jazz-and-skiffle centered Les Stewart Quartet, though he made it clear to Paul he’d be back with the Quarrymen whenever they resumed playing. Paul, on the other hand, wasn’t interested in playing with anyone else. For whatever combination of emotional or visceral reasons, he couldn’t seem to imagine a musical life that didn’t include John Lennon as his primary partner.

So he persisted, dragging his guitar to Gambier Terrace, making himself a fixture amid the empty beer bottles, overflowing ashtrays, shattered Vicks inhalers, and paint-splattered clothes.

If John didn’t evince any interest in being in a band, Paul would simply wait, guitar at the ready, until he did.

— Peter Ames Carlin, Paul McCartney: A Life [x]

[just-a-torn-up-masterpiece]

the good samaritan

kinktober 2023 masterlist

natasha romanoff x hitchhiker!reader

18+: drugging, kidnap, restraints, gag, smut; noncon kissing, dubcon fingering, brief daddy kink, corruption

wc: 1.8k

Making your way home in the dark had never been something you wanted to do, especially not with a phone drained of its battery and an evening chill littering your skin with goosebumps. The breeze and the sporadic rumblings from behind the greying clouds let you know the best was yet to come. Freezing droplets dampening your face as soon as they fell.

You’d never have even considered trying to flag down a driver but you’d not been stranded in a building storm before. And the knowledge of the safety of the area didn’t quell the fear in your mind when your outstretched arm lifted a thumb over the edge of the pavement. You pulled your jacket around yourself as much as you could as your shoes gathered water, scuffing against the concrete of loose slabs, idly kicking pebbled debris into the road with headlights reflecting in the coating of rain.

Some had the cheek to begin to slow down, maybe offering a pitied shrug before their tires spat water from the tarmac and they sped away. The bobbing of your legs didn’t do much to warm you up, bouncing on the balls of your feet for any semblance of movement as you watched each exhale form before you in puffs of white.

It was a Corvette that finally came to a stop beside you, sleek and black metal shining with raindrops and a window rolling down to show the smiling face of a helpful stranger.

“Hi, honey. Need a ride?” Her voice was husky and smooth with fiery hair framing her face and emerald eyes glowing beneath the lamplight.

“Please. If it’s not too much to ask.”

“Of course not,” she grinned, charming and kind. “Here, get in, you’ll catch a chill.”

She reached across to push the door open for you and the warmth was much needed to combat your freezing state. The scents of leather seats and spiced perfume swam around you and her smile looked even prettier up close.

“Thank you so much - my phone battery died and there’s still a long walk back to my apartment so you’re really doing me a favour.”

“Anything to help a damsel in distress,” she smirked and your cheeks heated embarrassingly. “I’m Natasha.”

“Y/N.” Her hand was strong when she shook yours with the small creak of her leather jacket as she reached over to you.

“Are you in a rush to get back to a boyfriend or anything?”

“Oh, no.” You shook your head as she pulled away from the curb. “Just an empty house.” And that was your first mistake.

“Then how does hot chocolate sound? I know a diner not too far from here and it’ll do good to warm you up.”

“Yeah, sure. That’d be nice actually.”

Perhaps, in retrospect, leaving the diner’s table to go to the bathroom wasn’t a wise idea. But, the kind eyes and conversation of the friendly woman across from you made you comfortable. There was no creeping thought in your mind that you’d return to finish your drink as she watched intensely, that once you were in her car again the music on the radio would fade in and out of your mind, growing cloudy and as blurred as the headlights of the other cars driving towards you.

Accepting a ride from a beautiful woman wasn’t something you’d apprehended with a sense of nervousness, it had come naturally to you to regard her kindness gratefully without fear you’d lose all semblance of judgment and clarity when she missed the turning that made its way to your street. Any utterings of her mistake were hardly audible, just slurred mumbles falling from numb lips as your heavy head leaned against the window.

A friendly offer can only be so friendly you suppose, things in this world seldom come without a price to pay - a darkened shadow overhead. Gracefully taking her offer caused your eyes to blink open a while later, confused and unaware of the time to follow.

Her bedroom’s ceiling light was harsh against your bleary sight and tears soon fell at the sinking in of the reality of the situation you’d been harshly dragged into. It didn’t take a completely focused head to notice the tightness of rope bound around your wrists, nor the coolness of the air against your skin - the breeze from the slightly cracked window that would not be felt if you hadn’t awoken in your underwear.

The wooden frame of her bed was uncomfortable against your back and the redhead merely smiled at the way you attempted to fight for freedom.

It took a moment to comprehend it all, to take in the sight of the foreign room you’d been brought to, the feeling of material clenched between your teeth and the eyes that regarded your half-naked body. The pleading look you directed towards Natasha through your eyes that spilled tears along your cheeks made her huff a humourless laugh.

“Don’t cry, honey,” she cooed, reaching a hand to cup your cheek with a softness you didn’t expect. She wiped the droplet from your skin as though she truly cared and in the haze that was your befogged mind you couldn’t help but slightly succumb to her whims.

Mumbles of your pleading for reprieve - questions of why - were muffled and obscured with the makeshift gag she’d forced past your slack jaw during unconsciousness. Why was she doing this? What was she planning next? All posed without answer. You couldn’t help but take in the sight before you, despite the vulnerably exposed pose she had you in, the contours of her biceps with each move she made and the vest top that pulled tightly over her chest.

“Like what you see?” she mocked, watching where your eyes drank her in. Perhaps you won’t be so hard to break after all.

Your body shook with fear and Natasha adored the sight. She loved how helpless you looked, glistening eyes begging, shrinking into yourself with small flinches at her every move.

“I’m not gonna hurt you,” she breathed. You let her pull the fabric past your lips, swiping your tongue over the chapping skin. Somehow, you believed her. “You’ve just gotta behave, okay? No screaming. Just sit and look pretty - can you do that for me?”

“Y-yes,” you nodded, failing with the attempt you made to wipe your face from tears. “Yeah, I can do that.”

You didn’t want to get on her bad side. You didn’t want to imagine the kinds of things that she might do; it wasn’t too difficult to appease her considering the kindness she’d already shown you. You wondered what someone might think if they caught a glimpse at the inner workings of your mind - the fact that you weren’t as terrified as you probably should be. That the attractiveness of the redhead deterred such emotion.

“Good girl,” she smiled, bringing a freshly cracked open bottle of water to your lips to help you drink. It was a cool relief against the dry and scratchy throat that had developed.

“Why are you doing this to me?”

“No. No questions,” she returned quickly, looking at you with a harshness she’d been keeping at bay.

“You can’t just do this,” you muttered. “You drugged me - brought me here against my will, you-“

Anything else you were about to say was soon halted with her lips on yours. She was strong and her kiss didn’t differ. The weak push you gave her did nothing to get her away from you and the rough hold she had on either side of your face didn’t let up, whatever she wants she takes and you were no different.

It was pure luck that the woman had come across such a pretty thing just begging to be captured. A crime of opportunity. The sweetness in your eyes and the comfortable conversation only let her know she’d made the right choice. She watched you unknowingly swallow down the hot chocolate she’d laced and observed musingly at the drowsiness that set in, taking in the uselessness of your slumped limbs in her passenger seat.

And now she revelled in your unmoving lips against hers, the way you stiffened up before finally giving in. Your lips moved with hers reluctantly, tentatively at first until you couldn’t help but be lured into her, to let her push her tongue against yours dominantly and take the sweet, forbidden fruit she craved.

With the way she took control of your mind you stopped shrinking away, even trying to pull her closer with a fumbling hold on her shirt. She smiled against you and let you pull her into you, taking her place with her knees either side of you with her teeth biting into your bottom lip when she pulled away for breath.

“See? I’m not so bad, am I, sweet girl?” She murmured against your throat, licking her tongue across the thin skin, scraping her teeth and digging them in to leave her mark behind.

You shook your head in response, letting her use you while you sighed out in pleasure despite every sensible part of you willing yourself to realise this was wrong. But if it was so terrible, why did it feel so good? Why did the touch of a stranger ignite a fire within you that only lovers had? How could you let her inch her hands downwards if this was so wrong?

Her fingers stroked down your waist as though she was familiar with the terrain, nails digging into the skin until they reached your underwear.

“I’m gonna break you down,” she rasped against your collarbone. “Bit by bit.”

She pushed the damp material that covered your cunt aside to swipe her fingertips through the slickness of your slit. “Until all you know is me - all you can remember is me.”

She toyed with your clit that ached with a filthy desire to be paid attention to, focusing solely on the bud while you moaned out at the feeling. She took you by force and consumed you entirely and it made your head swim - your stomach clench in a begging need for release.

Each action of her digits pulled you into a dangerous ocean of pleasure, bringing you headfirst into a new reality you don’t want to escape anymore.

“All you need to know is how good it feels when daddy fucks you,” Natasha breathed against the shell of your ear, completely enamoured with the sounds she pulled from you and the rutting of your hips. “You’re my little toy now, sweetheart. All for daddy.”

The roughness of her voice and the heat of her breath on your neck was too much to handle; the pace she’d kept up on your swollen clit brought you over the edge into an orgasm that had you seeing stars and you rewarded her with pathetic murmurings of her name.

Before you’d even had a chance to catch your breath it was stolen again with her lips on yours. She was eager and ravenous and you were going to let her take all she wanted, giving yourself up to the older woman who wanted to devour you whole.

When you pulled apart once more you locked eyes with hers, the darkness that had taken over them was unmistakable and it let you know that she wasn’t quite done with you for tonight.

[piratefishmama]

Fake it till you make it | Part 11

“Be careful, Eddie” were Wayne’s words as he hugged his nephew goodbye, knowing he wouldn’t see him for a whole week and honestly still being a little worried about it “if you think even for one minute that something’s off, just… just get out of there, alright?”

“I know, I know, I’ll bolt through the woods and hitchhike my way home, I know the way, Wayne, I got this.” He could read a compass, he’d be able to get a map from any gas station and head home, he was resourceful, an adult, he could handle himself.

“Damn right you got this, son. But… be careful in other ways too, alright? Steve’s a charmin boy, but… remember this ain’t real.” Eddie had bitten his bottom lip at that one, brows furrowed in thought, those big brown eyes of his swirling in emotion, he never did hide his feelings well, it’d always be a little real for him. “Protect this” Wayne poked his chest with a gentle prod, right over Eddie’s heart “okay?”

“Mhm, I will…” he’d try to anyway. Steve really was… charming. An his kisses? God his kisses… but also... it really was the closest he’d ever been to what romance ought to be, what a relationship ought to be, he never thought he’d have that.

The world didn’t appear to be moving fast enough for him to truly experience romance as most people did.

He had to remember that he didn’t have that.

“Eddie! C’mon you’re in the back with me!” Steve called from the garage door, behind which the car was rumbling, their bags packed into the back, Steve’s parents already inside, ready to go. The longest Eddie had ever been away from Wayne since arriving in Hawkins, was three days during a weekend trip to Indy with the band to play at a slightly bigger venue than the Hideout as a one off.

A favour for his favourite gay bar when a live act they’d scheduled pulled out last minute. It hadn’t gotten them a lot of exposure, but it’d been a fun and enlightening night for the band.

“Best get on, son, I’ll see you in a week. Call when you can alright? Don’t care if you wake me up or about no damn time zones, just call, I’ll answer, an if I don’t, you know the plant’s number.” Tight lipped, strained smile, Eddie nodded quickly then turned on his heel and graced Steve with a brilliant smile, game on.

“I don’t wish to alarm anyone, but... did we miss a turning?” Eddie may have been unusually quiet for the first leg of their journey, nerves having hit him like a truck the second they pulled out of Loch Nora, but he was paying attention to his surroundings.

And those surroundings, were all too quickly, Fort Wayne International Airport.

“You don’t honestly expect rich people to drive the whole way to Canada do you?” Steve’s voice was amused and came from so very close to his ear that he actually jumped, quickly turning in his seat, back plastered against his side of the back seat, eyes wide as he took in and processed what Steve said. “Plus, what would you rather do, spend nearly two days in a car with my parents—”

“We’d make wonderful road trip companions, don’t be rude Steven” came his mother’s interruption

Steve ignored it in favour of continuing his point “—orr… around ten hours in one of those with a brief stop off in Chicago.” Steve leaned inward, uncaring of personal space as he pointed to a plane, ascending into the heavens from the runway.

“I don’t—” he didn’t know. He’d never been on a plane before. Trips like that, across country, they were the stuff of road trip legend, but Steve had a point…

Two whole days of a trip stuck in a car. Or just ten hours. Eddie’s eyes skipped to the window again, to the plane now disappearing beyond the overcast cloud cover.

“It’ll be okay, Eds, I’ll sit right next to you the whole time, you’ll be okay.”

“What if we crash? What if it falls out of the sky? What’ll you do?”

“My best to keep you safe.” It was so earnest, coupled with Steve gently taking his hands and giving them a squeeze, eyes so full of raw honesty, of understanding, it hit Eddie directly in all his soft gooey bits. “I’ll hold your hand through the whole ten hours if you want.”

“Even during the stop in Chicago?”

“Hah, yeah baby, even during the stop in Chicago.”

“They’re a lot more openminded in Chicago too!” Lynda spoke up without turning her head, allowing Eddie to not get stuck on baby for too long “might get a few looks from people passing through the airport but nobody will say anything, and if they do, they deal with us.”

“If we had enough time during the stop we’d have taken a trip around the city, let you boys see some of the sights we’ve seen, but alas, our connection gives us an hour at most depending on everything being on time, and that’s just enough time to get us from one gate to the next.” John added as he pulled into the long stay parking lot. “Maybe some other time, some other family trip, eh Eddie?”

Eddie’s wide eyes turned to the front of the car, then back to Steve again, lips parted ever so slightly in surprise. Not surprise over the words used, but the feeling those words caused. Family trip. They were including him on future family trips.

Steve’s eyes quickly snapped from him to the front of the car and back again, then a warm smile blossomed on his lips. He lifted his hand and ever so carefully brushed a stray curl back behind Eddie’s ear, and asked so softly as his thumb lowered to brush along his jawline. “Right, Eddie?”

“Y-yeah… yeah I’d… I’d love that.” He turned his head fully toward the drivers seat, he’d never been too good at hiding his emotions, so maybe he was just a little choked up when he accepted the offer “I’d really love that.”

“Great!” The car came to a stop in one of the many parking bays, ignition off, driver side door opened “It’s settled then.” Settled. Eddie would privately mourn the knowledge that it’d never come to fruition, but… on the surface he could pretend he was excited for a future trip for the sake of the ruse. “Now boys if you could get the bigger bags out the trunk that’d be a big help! This back of mine isn’t as sturdy as it used to be.”

“You’re forty-six and go jogging almost every morning, don’t be stupid John.” Lynda whapped her husband with her handbag in gentle, semi-amused admonishment before getting out of the car.

Followed by her husband who, in a hushed tone replied with “don’t tell them that, Lynda, save us the work.” Leaving the two boys to breathe soft laughs between themselves before they too joined the older couple out in the parking lot.

“Steve...” Eddie hissed as they neared check-in.

“What?”

“I have weed” said through his teeth.

“What?” Steve paused.

“I have weed… I have weed in my suitcase.”

“You have what?!” Steve rounded on him, sentence ended with a pointed hiss

“I didn’t know we’d be flying to Canada, Steve, maybe you should tell people when you’re planning on launching them into the troposphere in a death tube!”

“Why would you bring weed on a holiday with my parents, Eddie?!”

“SHHHH, be quiet. I thought I might need it to chill out if I was freaking out at some point during the week like right now, I could really do with it right now.”

“Oh my god.”

“Steven? Is something wrong?” Lynda’s voice had them both snapping to attention, eyes wide, caught in the act. Luckily she had no idea what that ‘act’ was.

“Nope! No, uh, Eddie’s just gotta… use the bathroom real quick.”

“Well, there’s bathrooms in the business class lounge he can—"

“No! It’s uhm, it’s urgent, can’t wait, he’s uh…”

“Nerves, it’s uh, it’s nerves, I think imma hurl” she looked between them with a small frown on her face, assessing them both, it seemed like whatever she found wasn’t worth arguing about though, because she waved them off with a quick flick of her wrist.

“Alright fine, hurry up. Steven you know where the closest ones are go on now quickly before we’re late for check in, we’ll double check everything here.” John was already pausing to check through all their documents like a regular airport dad, it was the third time he’d done it since entering the airport.

“Alright let’s go, Eds, lets deal with your little problem.” At least he was soft-handed when he manhandled Eddie to the nearest bathroom, patchy suitcase with a squeaky wheel wobbling away behind them. Once inside, he checked each stall individually, before quickly turning on a wide eyed Eddie. “Where is it?” Eddie pointed down at the suitcase, and Steve snapped to action, lifting, and placing Eddie’s suitcase down on the slightly damp row of sinks. “Did you pack any liquid soaps?”

“Uhhh…” Eddie was too busy staring at the flex of Steve’s arms as he just. Lifted that whole very packed suitcase in one hoist. Fuck.

“Any shampoo? Conditioner?”

“I—I feel like my answer is going to make you mad so I’m just not going to answer.” Which on its own, was a pretty damning answer, and Steve’s expression told him as such “I don’t have a twelve step hair care routine like you do, Steve! I just… I have drug store shampoo and conditioner and that’s really only when it’s on a two for one sale! Usually I just—"

“If you say you water it down to make it last longer I’m going to throw the first thing I find in this suitcase at you.”

“Shutting up. I just thought I’d buy it there if I needed it, or just borrow yours, I know you brought some, right?”

“Yes.”

“Well then, I figured that… if I borrowed yours it’d make it seem like I just… wanted… to smell like you?”

“You just made that up.” Eddie just smiled, all teeth and dimples, scrunching his shoulders inwards in an unfairly cute display of mischief. “You’re a menace, Munson. Get your stuff out of there for me. Don’t ever put weed in checked luggage.”

“But—”

“TSA does random checks on checked luggage all the time, an while they’re not usually looking for weed, it’ll get launched and you might get fined. Whereas you can hide weed in just about anything in a carry on, just shows up as vague blurred shit on the x-ray scanners. Just be cool when you shove it through.” Steve was rummaging in the front of his own bag now, “be cool, and act natural.”

“You sound like you’ve done this before.”

“Mn once or twice, Tommy was a dick, but his cousin worked for the TSA for a few years, gave us all kinds’a neat tricks to get things through the airport.” Tommy’s cousin had gotten fired and a year inside for attempting to smuggle narcotics out of the confiscated items lock up, but that was neither here nor there. “Gimmie what you have.” Hand outstretched, Steve waited until Eddie placed the single baggie containing three roll ups and a few loose buds “Christ Eddie.”

“I knew I’d be nervous! Stop being mean to me!” Steve rolled his eyes before taking the three roll ups out of the baggie

“Your smokes, give em.” Plenty of room in the pack to slot the three roll ups, and as for the buds, Steve emptied out his travel sized bottle of hand lotion into the sink and stuffed the whole plastic bag into the little bottle, then screwed the lid on tight. Nobody would look twice at a rich kids hand lotion. “Now wet the ends of your hair.”

“What?”

“Your hair butthead! Wet it, we told my mother you’d be in here hurling your guts up, so… you got some in your hair, it’s a good extra to add to the ruse, now do it.”

“So my own boyfriend wouldn’t even hold my hair back if I threw up? Where’s the romance, where’s the commitment, where’s the care and—”

“Dude you have a lot of hair, I doubt I could get it all in my hand at once.” Although now that thought was in his head… could he? Could he get a good fistful and hold it there? Not important. “I’d drop bits.” A flimsy argument, he wouldn’t drop anything.

“Uh-huh, sure you would, big boy.” Eddie quickly dampened the tips of his hair, and ran a wet hand through his bangs quickly in a bid to fake flop sweat, theatrics over and done with. “Zipper-up, let’s get this show on the road, shall we?”

Part 13

[lunchboxpoems]

TO BE BRAVE, I LOOK TO THE DAFFODIL

To be brave, I look to the daffodil. A stupid flower, I’ve always thought – too eager to enter a world not fully thawed. Shrinking  after just one cold night. I surround myself with pluck. Always one for adventure: running naked  across campus into a stranger’s car as rite of passage, jumping into the freezing bay. Hitchhiking home but afraid to speak in class. To order in my mother’s tongue, my mother’s food. I let the dark take on its own shapes, unchecked. No, I am not brave, but I like the people who are. Who never overprepare or let their anxieties  stop them. For whom things always work out.  I’m chasing the high from one novelty to another, wanting adventure but so unwilling to find it on my own. Instead, I lose myself in people who live unafraid. Bravery by osmosis. This might be the truest thing I say today and it scares me. To admit that on my own, I was never wild. All this time I thought the daffodil’s dropped  petals, the green leaves that remained, marked an ending.  But underground she is rebuilding for next spring.  For when she’ll dare, again, to push through the frostbitten earth. Year after year, it goes on like this.

SUSAN NGUYEN

[somehow-a-human]

Moonlight Serenade & Good Omens &... Lost...?

DO NOT ASK NEIL ABOUT FAN THEORY.

First off: I am a certified former band kid. I've been playing the trumpet for 17 years. I did marching band in high school & college, I served pep band march madness basketball realness, I'm a bona fide concert hall bitch, and I considered becoming a professional musician.

Because of this, the music of good omens is something I have been ACTIVELY avoiding! The risks of hyperfixating and spiraling into it are HIGH!!! I spent so much of my life deeply entrenched in music, all genres, all time periods & It's hard not to have a proclivity toward it. But I also expect it to be a huge topic and a deep hole to inevitably fall into.

But could I hold out forever? no. and something finally pushed me over the edge. Wait for it..... Lost. Yep. The fucking TV show Lost. WAIT WAIT, don't leave! STAY WITH ME!

Why Lost? And what does it have to do with Moonlight Serenade and WHAT DOES IT HAVE TO DO WITH GOOD OMENS?! Well my lovelies continue under the cut with me and keep an open mind...

Okay so... Lost. Yes, the insane 2004 mystery plane crash island adventure drama. It's a wild ride, and a masterpiece and a little bit crazy, but overall pretty damn good. I've been on a rewatch spree and wouldn't you know it... parallels between lost and Good Omens kept popping up in my brain!! I mean they are both detailed intricate mysteries so it makes a tad bit of sense but there was one little detail that *might* be a *clue* so I figured I'd make a post cause why not? I promise you don't need to know anything about Lost to follow this!!

First off, what are some of the recurring themes of Lost the TV show you might ask?

Life & Death

Timelines & Time Travel

Literary Allusions (Catch-22, The Bible, A Tale of Two Cities)

Prophecies & Premonitions

Symbolism of Black & White

Yeah okay, that tracks, but look there are 121 episodes of Lost and 12 episodes (so far) of Good Omens so there's bound to be some overlap for these two ineffable mysteries.

You'll be thinking about now, "BUT WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH MOONLIGHT SERENADE?!" I'm getting there, shhh, lemme pet your hair gently and keep giving you background information to build it up shhhh...

If you've never seen Lost there is a very good chance you're mighty confused at this moment, so let me reassure you, you don't need to know anything about it to understand the connections I'm going to make. A brief synopsis is: Oceanic flight 815 crashes on an island. The plane crash survivors quickly discover the island is more than it seems to be and holds many secrets and mysteries. A lot of people die, most of them are murdered, it's giving Lord of the Flies. That's honestly all you need to know.

Time Travel & Alternate Timelines

Time travel is cannon in Lost. It's super confusing and I'm not even going to try to explain any of it here. It's honestly just not worth it. If you'd like to try and read about it, the abridged version is here, but I don't think the details are important. Just know it's real and confirmed and exists.

Okay so, In Lost season 2, episode 13 "The Long Con" two of the plane crash survivors are trying to find a signal on a radio they've found. While scrubbing they come across a signal playing Moonlight Serenade by Glenn Miller. One character mentions it must be from somewhere nearby, but the other counters that this type of radio can pick up signals from anywhere in the world. There is a beat and then another character jokingly adds "Or any time. Just kidding, dude."

It's later confirmed that the Lost characters in 2004 are indeed picking up a radio signal from 1940 that is playing Moonlight Serenade, a product of time travel.

Congratulations, you've made it to the point where I'm going to bring Good Omens into the mix. In season 2, episode 4 "The Hitchhiker" we open seeing Aziraphale driving back from Edinburgh late at night/early morning. Uncomfortable with the darkness and silence he asks the Bentley to "play something that's got a bit of swing? I'm in the mood for something modern."

The Bentley obliges the angel, as she always will, and we are shown a shot of the radio specifically lighting up, so we know she's tapped into the radio to play this for Azi.

But hold on. Aziraphale asked for "modern"? Moonlight Serenade is most certainly not modern. It was recorded in 1939! I'd say in 2023 it's anything but modern, maybe not in Aziraphale's long lived opinion, but certainly in the Bentley's opinion, given she's only a 97 year old car.

I think you can see now what I'm saying here. I think the Bentley picked up a radio signal from 1940, maybe 1941? Episode 4 is of course our 1941 blitz magic show bullet catch flashback extravaganza, so... it makes sense. I know we like to headcanon Crowley and Aziraphale listened to A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square in the bookshop in 1941 after the bullet catch, but what if they heard Moonlight Serenade on the radio instead?

What does it mean?

I think it could be a *clue*. A reference to this small moment from Lost and a nod to the first hint of the canonization of time travel in that series. We know Crowley can control time to some extent and we can see some evidence of time discontinuities and possibly time weirdness in season 2 so is it a hint that timeline funkiness IS happening? Do I want to get into the fact that the main character in The Hitchhiker, the Twilight Zone episode this episode is named after, is actually dead? No I don't, not now anyway.

SO! There it is... weird little connection that I couldn't get out of my brain. It just seemed a bit too... ineffable.

As always this is all for fun and all for fans! Don't ask Neil about these things, they're for us to have fun with. And something else that I don't think some people on here understand about meta-analysis; the goal of it is not necessarily to be correct. It can be, if that's your thing. Refuting peoples posts, theories, analysis, and headcanons because you personally don't agree with them and telling them they're wrong and stupid doesn't achieve anything. Meta-analysis is an exercise in critical thinking and creative writing. You could write meta about how Spongebob is a critique of the loss of christian values in modern society and you wouldn't be right or wrong, you'd just certainly be a person who wrote that for sure though. Just, be kind to each other, share ideas, you're allowed to disagree with someone's ideas or have different ones of your own but don't be cruel in saying so, don't call someone stupid, that's just silly.

Love you all, do something kind for yourself today <3

ps. The moment I see Michael Sheen with blonde hair come January I'm gonna bark like a dog, that's all. Thanks.

[weirdmarioenemies]

Name: Insectiride

Debut: Mario Party 6

Mario and friends get up to all sorts of shenanigans! Many of these are dangerous shenanigans, and I would prefer not to get involved with them. If I were to fall in lava or be hit by a barrage of hammers thrown by a turtle, I would Die! I lament this fact, but I am no scrimblo. However, some of the antics are good safe fun, and that includes the act of racing in funny bug-shaped vehicles! I wish I could do that in real life!

Though there is a snail among these insects, for the sake of simplicity, I will call all these creatures Bugs. I usually reserve that term for arthropods, but I don't feel like saying "creepy-crawlies" a bunch of times in this post like some kind of Talking Flower. So Bugs. There are some people who'd call a snail a bug without even a disclaimer! Can you imagine that?

Players begin Insectiride by choosing their vehicle out of the four unique options! I think I played this minigame once and I THINK I used the grasshopper. I think it still might be my favorite! I'm sorry to this snail, but I don't like it much. It looks like pizza, and I like pizza a lot- I regularly observe #pizzafriday- but it's just not the sort of thing I'd like a snail's skin to remind me of.

Each of these bugs has its own control scheme! The player on the ladybug must press the indicated button ten times quickly to make it crawl forward a bit. The player on the grasshopper must press a sequence of various buttons to make it hop forward a few times. The player on the stag beetle must press each indicated button that appears one at a time, each press making it push along a bit. And finally, the player on the snail must press A when its body extends fully to make it pull the shell along behind.

When playing this with humans, there is probably no one Best Bug to reliably choose, since human reaction time must be taken into account. If playing against ambitious robots, however, there is absolutely an imbalance! In tool-assisted speedruns, Grasshopper is the winner, followed by Ladybug, Stag Beetle, and poor Snail in last...

Mario Party 6 is a Koopa Kid Game! And there is official art of him riding the funny ladybug mechanism! I'm glad he got to have fun here. We all know he isn't having fun where he is now... in the Purgatory Zone... poor kid. Oh well! That's life!

Those were the only four bug vehicles present in Insectiride, but in Mario Party 3's Ridiculous Relay, there was another! Way before all the rest! Here we have a Skeeter-inspired contraption, allowing the operator to maneuver across the surface of the water! I think this would be the main mode of transportation in Wet-Dry World, for those who are not already Skeeters. Between being a mecharthropod and having a strange control scheme that must be displayed to the player, I would not at all be surprised if this was an inspiration for Insectiride!

Now don't think you're getting out of this post without some real Bug Facts! Humans, of course, are much too large to ride on a bug. To be small enough to ride a bug, you would have to be a bug yourself. And some bugs do indeed do this! This is phoresy, the interaction in which one animal will latch onto another animal for the purpose of travel. Usually, the hitchhiker will be a tiny arachnid such as a mite (including ticks), or my favorite arachnid, a pseudoscorpion!

Phoresy is EXTREMELY funny to me. A teensy little critter will just grab onto the leg of a fly or something, and away they will go! Hang on tight! This is a type of symbiosis known as commensalism, where one organism (in this case, the one hanging on) benefits, while the other (the host) is largely unaffected. Humans riding horses is another example of phoresy! A human can be like a mite sometimes. Ok, see you later! *grabs onto a hoverfly's leg and flies away*

[vinelark]

Hi I feel like you always have the best batfam fic recs, so I was wondering if you have any recs for any Dick and Tim bonding fics (especially fics that deal with the fallout of Dick giving Robin to Dami)?

hi! so glad you like the recs, i'm always happy to give them 🥰  every time a friend expresses even a passing interest in one of my fav characters i have to stop myself from like, creating a fic rec spreadsheet on the spot.

that said, i got stumped by the second part of this one. i was like oh yes definitely, i totally have read fics for that, and then…could not dig any up from my brain or my bookmarks. i feel like there's a fic on the tip of my tongue, but in the meanwhile, if anyone has any tim & dick red robin reconciliation recs (holy tongue twister, batman) i too would love to see them!

and here are some tim & dick recs in general:

🎄 only you will have stars that can laugh by silverwhittlingknife

set early in tim’s tenure as robin; dick realizes tim is about to be alone on christmas, and they end up spending the holiday together. i love how tentative both dick and tim are about this for different (and at times similar) reasons, and how heartwarming and cozy it ends up being. lots of reflection on family in all its forms and a really good tim & dick dynamic.

🚗 I’d Fly Far Away From Here by Sohotthateveryonedied

in a somewhat similar vein, a oneshot set during tim’s robin era in which tim hitchhikes to blüdhaven after a fight with his dad. dick and tim are two people who technically aren’t brothers yet by law but already are at heart, which doesn’t make it any easier to navigate conversations about tim’s home life or either of their relationship with bruce. (they make it work, though.)

🩹 Not So Large But Definitely In Charge by dottie_dc

tim and dick get tossed into an alternate gotham where there’s no batman or justice league, but find their way to bruce and alfred anyway. this has great tim-under-pressure pov, and the amount that he and dick care about each other even through their arguments is palpable. there’s also a fantastic (and at times gut-wrenching) sequel by JackHawksmoor focusing more on dick & the bruce of this different world. (cw for: past major character death aka alternate universe dick grayson)

🤖 Very Pleasing to My Optical Sensors by waffleelrond

another early robin!tim fic, in which tim gets injured and dick steps in to translate bruce's bruceness about it. it's tentative and sweet and a little silly, and a great bite-sized fic to read when you want to see the two of them just starting out as brothers.

🌌 To an Athlete Dying Young series by SonoSvegliato

at a glance from the summaries this appears like a tim & jason + tim & bruce series (and it is!), but the tim & dick scenes land it on this list for sure. i'm a broken record here with the early-robin!tim & dick recs but man i love them here; in the second fic there's a sequence where dick is teaching tim how to grapple across rooftops that sticks in my mind as one of my top favorite bonding moments for them. (heads up that the series currently ends on a cliffhanger—it's not finished yet!)

🦉 the once and future robin by AstraEllis

and as proof that i can in fact rec something other than early-robin!tim, here's an au where instead of becoming batman's robin tim ends up adopting a talon!dick grayson from another universe as his older brother. and becoming his robin. and then finding his way to the batfamily. i'm fascinated by the tim and alternate-universe-talon!dick relationship in this, and the questions of identity/personhood that it tackles by virtue of the story it is telling. plus, talon!dick's connection to robin as a concept despite the alternate universe aspect is really sweet.

also circling back to red robin reconciliation, i do have these two longfics open in my many tabs to read/finish; both tackle the post-rr era and the dick & tim of it all in their larger plots, so i'll toss in Extant by Kgraces and The Return by lurkinglurkerwholurks to check out too!

[hitchhikers-guide-official]

"Any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still know where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with." Full quote below.

Happy Towel Day to all the hitchhikers out there!

"A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Party it has great practical value– you can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapours; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a mini raft down the slow heavy river Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or to avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (a mind-bogglingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you– daft as a bush, but very ravenous); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough. More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitchhiker) discovers that a hitchhiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit, etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitchhiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitchhiker might accidentally have ‘lost.’ What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still know where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with."

(The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams)

[itspdameronthings]

Will hearing his cousin’s voice after all of these years hurt his soul. His buddy was always there when he needed advice on things. Taught him how to be the older brother. When Jay left to pursue his Olympic dream,and going to jail for the reason Will forgot about. Now he is on the phone. Went outside to chat so the others can't hear,” Now you call you no go for nothing scumbag! Hiddin from the world doesn't fucking help! I should know! Been there and done that! Benny needed ya! Not to mentionLittle Bit Remember her?! Fragile girl ya promised to look after Benny and I when we were in the Army?!” Jay tried to get a word in but it was no use! Till he yells,” I fucking get it?! Shit! Was in a bad place?! Was messed up after picking up that crazy hitchhiker ! Thought.. I loved her man! Reason for the call. I'm aware of the crazy mother situation. Wanna help okay? Maybe.. I can ya know stay with Benny and Little Bit so you can do what you were planning! Let me try to make things right? Ready to come out of hiding.” 

Hiding? Is that what Jay calls it? More like running. Will can't really blame him. Seen this behavior in Santi many many times. Reason why he took the FBI job. Thought he wasn't a good man for you. Finally he realized that you are his rock. Reason for living. Benny too. Which he never admitted to. Started to have feelings for him soon after the three of you got together. Took a breath,” Where are you? I can come over to pick ya up.” Taking a deep breath,” I'm at the diner across the street from your

Okay y'all this is the preview for the next chapter of never letting you go. Hope to write more when I get home from work. Y'all enjoy!

Taglist @rhoorl ,@laurfilijames ,@musings-of-a-rose @romanarose

[dailyunsolvedmysteries]

Christopher McCandless, The Man who Hiked to Death

Born February 12th 1968, in Inglewood, California, Christopher McCandless was immediately plunged into a chaotic family. His sister, Carine McCandless, documented in her book ‘The Wild Truth’ that they shared their home with six half-siblings. Carine also alleged that her parents were abusive, both physically and verbally, toward the McCandless children. She documented how her father was an alcoholic, and their mother often fed off his evil energy, inflicting her own abuse upon them.

The McCandless never stayed in one place for long as Walt McCandless worked for NASA as a rocket scientist, taking him across the U.S. Eventually, the family settled in Virginia long enough for Christopher and Carine to graduate.

Following his graduation from university, Christopher knew he needed to travel. He had spent much of his childhood moving from town to town, state to state, and this had a profound impact on his outlook on life.

He only stayed in one place for a short time, seeing the beauty in exploring the world. In mid-1990, Christopher left Virginia for new pastures and began driving West. He stopped in towns and cities along the way, picking up odd jobs to make ends meet.  By April of 1992, Christopher was itching for another adventure, and that is when he decided to make his way to Alaska, the final frontier of the U.S. 

Incredibly, Christopher managed to hitchhike from Carthage, South Dakota, to Fairbanks, Alaska, a whopping 3,000+ miles through Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia and Yukon, Canada. Eventually, he arrived, and he began planning his largest expedition yet. He wanted to hike through the Denali National Park. The park covers over 6,000,000 acres in the middle of Alaska. Communities are few and far between, with many Alaskans congregating near large towns and cities.

Despite the harsh weather conditions of Alaska, Christopher McCandless seemed ill-prepared. Fellow hikers and locals recalled seeing Christopher arrive in Fairbanks carrying only a backpack. He also stood out for his ‘Hippie-like’ appearance, choosing to remain unkempt and dirty. April 28th 1992, would mark the last day that Christopher McCandless would ever see the seeds of civilisation. 

That day, Jim Gallien was flagged down by Christopher, who was looking for a ride to the Stampede Trail in the Denali National Park. Gallien later told author Jon Krakauer that he had doubts about the 24-year-old’s survival from the start. When he got into his car, Christopher had minimal clothing and a backpack. Christopher explained that he was carrying a 10 lb bag of rice, a Remmington semi-automatic rifle and a pair of Wellington boots inside his bag.  Gallien was, in fact, so concerned that he offered to drive Christopher to Anchorage so that he could purchase the necessary equipment for him. He knew how harsh and unforgiving the Alaskan landscape could be, and per population, it has an alarmingly high missing persons rate. Throughout their drive, Christopher assured Gallien that he would be fine and had hiked many times before. 

It wasn’t until months later that Gallien learned Christopher’s real name, as when he had picked him up, he had simply given the name ‘Alexander Supertramp’. The only item that Christopher accepted from Gallien was a map. Before leaving, Christopher asked Gallien to snap a picture of him at the Stampede Trail, making this one of the last photographs ever taken of Christopher McCandless.

For two days, Christopher hiked the Alaskan wilderness, soaking in the beauty of the Denali National Park. After a gruelling march, Christopher made it to an abandoned blue and white bus. Whilst the exterior was rusted and hadn’t been loved for some time, Christopher recognised it was the perfect shelter and base camp. He wasted no time setting up his gear and prepping his new home.

The blue and white bus that would become a notorious tourist hotspot was not Christopher’s intended finish line. According to his diary, which was later discovered with his body, Christopher had planned to hike through the park and to the Bering Sea. Christopher remained at the blue and white bus for two months, eagerly journaling every step. Christopher wrote in his diary that he had begun consuming the roots of the Hedysarum Alpinum plant.  Christopher also detailed in his diary how he had trapped and hunted small game and wildlife. He had successfully hunted a moose/caribou with his rifle. However, the meat was rotten by the time he came to consume it. With just 10 lbs of rice and foraged plants, Christopher rapidly began losing weight. 

The lack of food and people was beginning to get to Christopher, who heavily documented his trip via his journal and camera. On July 3rd 1992, Christopher packed up his things, leaving the blue and white bus behind.

With a map in hand, Christopher hoped to reach civilisation once more, but the landscape had changed and he became distressed and returned to the blue and white bus to wait out the days until the river froze over once more. 

On July 14th, he also began to incorporate the seeds of the Hedysarum Alpinum plant into his diet, as was documented in his diary. The meagre diet of plant material and small animals was nowhere near enough to sustain Christopher, who continued to waste away. As he continued to weaken, he lost his energy and ability to forage further afield for plants and fruits. 

Christopher McCandless made his final diary entry on what he noted as ‘Day 107’. The entry simply reads, “Beautiful blue berries.” Author Krakauer noted that days 108 through 112 had / (slashes) but no words, and after Day 113, no more entries were made. Sometime around these final diary entries, Christopher wrote, “I have had a happy life and thank the Lord. Goodbye, and may God bless all.” It is clear Christopher knew his end was coming, and he had made his final preparations and peace with his fate. 

 It wasn’t until September 6th 1992 that the grizzly truth would be revealed.

That day, hikers in the Denali National Park came across the blue and white rusted van that Christopher had once called home. 

These hikers had the same idea as Christopher and were eager to use the bus as shelter.

When they approached the bus, they found a note taped to the door which read “Attention possible visitors. S.O.S. I need your help; I am injured, near death and too weak to hike out. I am all alone; this is no joke. In the name of God, please remain to save me. I am out collecting berries close by and shall return this evening. Thank you, Chris McCandless, August.” 

As they moved through the bus, they saw the familiar outline of a human in a sleeping bag. After reading the note, they hoped that Chris had managed to survive, but all hopes were dashed when the stench of decay overcame them. The hikers took a closer look, and their worst suspicions were confirmed. Christopher McCandless was deceased, his body decaying in a sleeping bag in the back of a rusted-out bus. 

Alaska State Troopers and Denali Park staff were summoned to the bus where Christopher’s body was recovered. His family were notified of the terrible news, and preparations for his body to be returned to Virginia were made.

Christopher’s passing marked a turning point in the culture surrounding hiking and travelling. He had wilted away in the wilderness when a bridge and cabin were within a few miles of his location. 

[dismies-art]

While I'm here, I've also got this version of an AU my friends (say hi to @revismyname) and I have been cooking for Batman!

This is Vienna Esperanza (She/They), our universe's Batman. Her backstory (abridged) is under the cut.

Robin + Joker posts OTW! We've been concepting Two-Face, Alfie, Man-Bat, etc but they're coming at whatever pace we make them LOL

* Keep in mind that this backstory is the first one I wrote for her. The key concepts have stayed the same, but a lot of the smaller stuff has changed as we've started to really make the verse more unique!

This version of Batwoman was not born rich. In fact, she was born in poverty to a loving yet troubled family---when she was eight years old, her parents were shot by a thug in an alleyway. Batsy was taken in by a family friend, Alfred, but eventually, between 13 and 15, disappeared for about 15 years to go do her Batman backstory stuff.

Given that she didn't have the resources to travel the world like Batman, this Batwoman actually hitchhiked across America and learned how to survive in the woods---like, proper survive, and got really smart about inventing and shit while she did it.

When she got back, she made the whole Batman getup; HER gadgets are a lot different than Batman's---for example, she doesn't use a batmobile, but a motorcycle (batbike, I guess?), has enhanced boots that let her climb on walls (particularly ceilings--she likes to drop down from above! Hi bat rave video), probably uses tranquilizer darts or something idk

Either way, she's like. Yassified Batman I Guess. Any characters that center around Bruce Wayne's backstory are tweaked to fit hers! For example, Robin is just some kid she picked up off the street who she let stay in her apartment who found out about the Batman gig and made her take a sidekick.

She's also in a goth band. A goth band named The Long Halloween. Start clapping!!!!

[myhauntedsalem]

Roadside Ghosts

All across America, and in many other parts of the world, there are haunted highways and back roads and many people report encounters with the spirits and ghosts who roam these often lonely roads.

Seemingly seeking a way home, or trying to hitch a ride to the destination they were heading for when death severed them from their mortal bodies.  Still, other people report seeing phantom cars that disappear as they reach a certain curve or area of a road, or even ghostly wagons being pulled by wispy horses and driven by spirits dressed in period clothing.  Many folks have reported picking up a hitchhiker only to have the shock of witnessing the seemingly solid, living person transfigure into the image of a rotting corpse before completely fading away.

One such place is in Tompkinsville, Kentucky.  Tompkinsville is located in the south central part of Kentucky, about twenty miles southeast of Glasgow, Kentucky.  There is an old road outside of Tompkinsville that is called the Meshack Road.  Tompkinsville is a small town itself is located just a few miles north of the Tennessee border.

For many years, people who have lived in the area, and even tourists who know nothing of the area’s history, have been reporting encounters with a ghostly young girl associated with this road. One of the many similar reports tells of two young men were on their way to a local weekend dance that was always held in town on the weekends back during the 1950s. One Friday evening while they were on their way to the dance they saw an attractive young woman walking along Meshack Road. They offered her a ride into town and she accepted. She looked liked she was dressed for a night out on the town, although the dress looked somewhat old-fashioned, and they decided to invite her to go along to the dance with them. Reportedly, she danced with both of the young men that evening, and there were witnesses who remembered seeing the woman, noting that she was a stranger to the area.

As the dance ended, the young woman agreed to let the boys drive her home, but only if they would let her out at a certain area. It was pouring the rain when they left the dance hall and one of the boys offered her his coat. He told her that he would pick it up later.

The two young men dropped the strange girl off at a small, somewhat run down house along Meshack Road and a few days later, the young man went back to pick up his coat. He walked up on the porch and asked the middle-aged woman for the girl he had dropped off a few nights earlier. The woman told him that while she had once had a daughter, she had died in an accident on the road a few years earlier. She told the confused young man  where her daughter’s body was buried and he went to the churchyard. There he found his coat draped over the gravestone.

There is another strange phantom that is also reported to haunt Meshack road. For many years, people who have traveled along this road have reported that they have felt an unseen presence holding tightly to the waist of a person riding a horse or riding a motorcycle. This unseen entity holds onto the rider’s waist for about a mile and then disappears. No one seems to know who or what could be behind this strange occurrence.

There are many other such tales all across America, and such places always seem to have been the site for traumatic and/or violent, unexpected deaths.  Perhaps, one day, these poor lost souls may find their way to their destinations, or perhaps, they will forever walk the lonely roads and byways where they met their end, forever reliving their last moments. Perhaps, one day you will meet one of the roadside ghosts of America.

[justforbooks]

David Soul, who has died aged 80, stormed to fame in the 1970s as half of the television “buddies” detective duo Starsky and Hutch, who careered across Los Angeles in their red and white Ford Gran Torino, over the roofs and bonnets of other cars, and through piles of cardboard boxes.

“When the Starsky and Hutch series was showing, police on patrol duty were adopting sunglasses and wearing their gloves with the cuffs turned down,” claimed Kenneth Oxford, a British chief constable. “They also started driving like bloody maniacs.” In south London, a council lowered a wall after fans of the tyre-squealing screen action used it as a launchpad to jump on to parked vehicles.

While Paul Michael Glaser played the streetwise, cardigan-wearing, junk food-eating Dave Starsky, Soul’s character, Ken “Hutch” Hutchinson, was the quieter, yoga-loving, healthy-eating one – two cool cops looking after each other as if they were brothers.

Over five series (1975-79), they patrolled a rough area populated by muggers, drug dealers, sex workers and pimps. They also fraternised with Huggy Bear (played by Antonio Fargas), a snazzily dressed, “jive-talking” informant with his own bar.

Soul traded on his newfound stardom to return to his first love, music. He recorded the ballads Don’t Give Up on Us (1976), a No 1 in the US and UK, and Silver Lady (1977), another British chart-topper.

His television career continued, but the starring roles rarely resonated beyond his homeland. An exception was the miniseries World War III (1982), in which he played an American cold war colonel trying to avert a nuclear holocaust. It also chimed with his political and social campaigning, which included supporting the anti-nuclear movement.

He took up the tempting offer to play Rick Blaine in Casablanca (1983), a five-part TV prequel to the film classic, in the role originally played by Humphrey Bogart, but it proved a flop.

Soul found renewed success – particularly on the West End stage – after moving to Britain in the 90s. He even hit the headlines beyond the review pages in the title role of Jerry Springer the Opera (Cambridge theatre, 2004-05), taking over from another American actor, Michael Brandon, as the “shock” talkshow host.

The BBC’s decision to screen Richard Thomas and Stewart Lee’s musical, complete with thousands of swear words, transvestites, tap-dancers dressed as Ku Klux Klan members and a nappy-wearing Jesus, received more than 60,000 complaints from viewers.

Soul simply relished the chance to fulfil his “dream to play in the birthplace of English-speaking theatre” after failing to “cut the mustard” when auditioning on Broadway.

He was born David Solberg in Chicago to June (nee Nelson), a teacher who had also performed as a singer, and Richard Solberg, a Lutheran minister of Norwegian descent. His father’s work as a representative of the Lutheran World Relief organisation during the reconstruction of Germany after the second world war meant the family moved to Berlin in 1949, returning to the US seven years later to live in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, where David attended Washington high school.

He then acted in plays while studying at Augustana College, before moving to Mexico with his family. Influenced by his father’s work, he initially had plans to join the diplomatic service, and learned Spanish and studied Latin American history. He was also taught to play the guitar by Mexican students.

After a year, he hitchhiked to the US, landed a job singing Mexican folk songs at a coffee shop in Minneapolis and set his sights on a career in music. He also gained some acting experience with the city’s Firehouse theatre company.

While talking with friends about the metaphorical masks people wear, he came up with the idea of wearing a real one while performing so that the music stood on its own merits, and billed himself “David Soul, the Covered Man”. The William Morris Agency signed him up after hearing a demo tape, and he soon had bookings. One was in The Merv Griffin Show on TV between 1966 and 1968, when he eventually dispensed with the mask. More significantly, a talent agent spotted his acting potential.

He had a regular role in Here Come the Brides (1968-70), a comedy western series set after the civil war, as Joshua Bolt, one of the brothers running a logging company in a male-dominated Seattle frontier town and importing marriageable women.

A guest star, Karen Carlson, became Soul’s second wife (1968-77), following the dissolution of his first marriage, to Mirriam “Mim” Russeth, in 1966, three years after their wedding.

Soul was then popping up all over American TV in guest roles himself, and had a short run in 1974 as Ted Warrick, the defence lawyer’s assistant, in Owen Marshall, Counselor at Law, before wider fame came in Starsky and Hutch. By then, he was living in an “open” relationship with another actor, Lynne Marta. When he moved on to his third marriage, to Patti (nee Carnel, 1980-86), former wife of the 60s pop idol Bobby Sherman, he hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons.

In 1982, having already struck Patti several times, he returned home drunk one night following a day’s filming on Casablanca – which he correctly feared would bomb – and hit her repeatedly. He was arrested on a charge of misdemeanour battery, but a judge spared him jail on condition that he underwent therapy. Soul admitted to having a violent streak and, although he and Patti were reunited, the marriage was soon over.

He kept working, landing starring roles as Roy Champion in the cattle ranch soap-style drama The Yellow Rose (1983-84), the private eye of the title in the TV movie Harry’s Hong Kong (1987), and “Wes” Grayson, leading an FBI forensics team, in Unsub (1989), but his star was on the wane. Another marriage, to Julia Nickson (1987-1993), also failed, before he had a relationship with the actor-singer Alexa Hamilton.

Soul’s career was revived when in 1995 the theatre producer Bill Kenwright was looking for an American to star in the comedy thriller Catch Me If You Can on tour in Britain. He played Corban, a newlywed whose wife goes missing. There were other tours and Soul was in the West End as Hank in The Dead Monkey (Whitehall, now Trafalgar, theatre, 1998), Chandler Tate in Alan Ayckbourn’s Comic Potential (Lyric, 1999-2000) and Mack in Mack & Mabel (Criterion, 2006).

In between, he had one-off roles on British television, including as a locum surgeon in two episodes of Holby City (2001 and 2002), a Boston detective helping to investigate his wife’s murder in Dalziel and Pascoe (2004) and a criminology lecturer in Inspector Lewis (2012). Soul and Glaser had cameos in the 2004 film spoof Starsky & Hutch, alongside Ben Stiller as Starsky and Owen Wilson as Hutch. In the same year, Soul was granted British citizenship.

He is survived by his fifth wife, Helen (nee Snell), whom he married in 2010, and five sons and a daughter.

🔔 David Soul (David Richard Solberg), actor and singer, born 28 August 1943; died 4 January 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[yellobb]

Y’all I just found out about the 1904 Olympics marathon and I am losing my mind over how batshit insane it was. Buckle up y’all because this is one hell of a story

For some historical context, the 1904 Olympics were held in St. Louis and it was the first Olympics hosted in the U.S. It was paired up with the 1904 World’s Fair, so there was a hell of a lot going on in the city at the time

First, let’s meet some of our contestants:

American Thomas Hicks and four other Americans were all experienced marathoners

American Fred Lorz, who was able to compete after placing in a “special five mile race” sponsored by the Amateur Athletic Association. He did all his training at night

Ten Greeks who had never run a marathon before

Two South African men from the Tsuana tribe who were in St. Louis as part of the World’s Fair. They were apparently the first black Africans to compete in the Olympics, which is super cool. Less cool was the fact that they weren’t wearing any shoes

Cuban Félix Carbajal, a 5ft (1.5m) tall man who had fundraised his journey to the Olympics. This man got to New Orleans, lost all his money on a dice game, then had to walk and hitchhike his way to St. Louis. Mind you, that is almost 700 miles. He shows up to the race, having not eaten in 40 hours, dressed like THIS:

This man gets another bullet point because apparently his trousers were all the way down to his boots when he got there. Another Olympian took pity on him and cut them with scissors

Now for the race itself. It is in the 90s (32 degrees Celsius) and humid. For some god awful reason, they decided to start the race at 3pm, so it’s the hottest part of the day. The course is only 24.85 miles (40km) long instead of a standard 26.2, but that doesn’t mean this was an easier race. On the fucking contrary, it was hellish. I’ll let the Smithsonian article about this explain it because they do it much better than I ever could:

Now, I’ve never ran a marathon before, but I looked it up and the current recommendation is that water stations are placed every two miles.

The race is a go and things are off to a nasty start. American William Garcia almost becomes the first fatality of an Olympic event because he inhaled so much dust that his stomach was hemorrhaging. He was found unconscious by the side of the road by a local couple and had to be hospitalized. Apparently he would have bled to death if he’d been left for an hour longer.

But the dust isn’t the only issue. Apparently, Len Taunyane, one of our South African participants, gets chased a mile off course by wild dogs. He still placed 9th.

Probably my favorite participant is our boy Félix. Félix was stopping to chat with spectators in the middle of an Olympic race. At one point he stopped a car because he saw that the riders were eating peaches and asked if he could have some. They refused, but he snatched two anyway and ate them while he ran. He later came across an orchard and stopped to eat some apples, but apparently the apples were rotten, so he got stomach cramps and took a nap. HE STILL GOT FOURTH PLACE. That’s how much of a shitshow this race was, and we’re not even done.

Fred Lorz starts getting cramps around the 9-mile mark and decides to hitch a ride with one of the cars that is guiding them. He’d been leading the charge for a while and was a crowd favorite to win.

The other leader of the pack and favorite to win, Thomas Hicks, started having to use a support crew at the 10-mile mark. He was begging them for water, but they refused. He somehow managed to keep trucking along, though.

Seven miles from the finish line, Hicks’ handlers started feeding him egg whites mixed with strychnine, which is literally rat poison. There were literally no rules against performance-enhancing drugs yet, so this was apparently above-board.

Lorz gets out of the car he was riding in after 11 miles and just,,,, kept running????? He finished the race and was declared the winner. He was about to be given a gold medal when “someone called an indignant halt to the proceedings with the charge that Lorz was an imposter.” Lorz claimed it was all a joke and that he wouldn’t have actually accepted the award, but was still banned from competing in future marathons. That is, of course, until this decision was overturned in time for him to run in and win the Boston Marathon the next year.

Now Hicks had seen Lorz pass by. He was not doing too hot at all, but finding out that Lorz had been disqualified and he was still in the lead helped his motivation. He was given another dose of egg whites and strychnine with some brandy to wash it down, which, sure. Why the fuck not at this point?

At this point, he began to hallucinate. He started to believe that he had 20 more miles left to go instead of just two. He kept begging for food and rest, but his handlers just gave him more brandy and two more egg whites because of course he was. By the time he made it to the finish line, he was literally being carried by his handlers while his feet shuffled, but that was apparently good enough and he was declared the winner.

It took four doctors and a full hour for Hicks to recover enough to even leave the area after the race. He apparently lost eight fucking pounds during the course of the race. Hicks pretty much retired from racing after that (I wonder why) and became a professional clown, which really is just the cherry on top

Of the 32 people who competed in the race, only 14 finished. After everything, they literally almost removed the marathon as an Olympic event because it was deemed “indefensible on any ground but historic,” and honestly? After reading all that fuckery, I can’t even blame them.

Another note about Félix, because this man baffles me: apparently he was sponsored by the Greek government to compete in a 1906 marathon in Athens, but he never turned up. Newspapers in Cuba claimed he died, but he just??? Showed up a year later in Havana perfectly fine. Turns out he managed to get the date of the marathon wrong.

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