#I WAS ABOUT TO GO TO BED WHEN MY BRAIN LITERALLY THREW THIS MENTAL IMAGE OF THAT VIDEO AT ME

[misteria247]

*BUSTS DOWN DOOR AGGRESSIVELY*

TURTLE VIDEO, OF THE TURTLE GETTING HIS LITTLE SHELL BRUSHED DURING HIS BATHTIME-

THAT BUT WITH 12 TURTLE TOT LEO.

[kariachi]

Okay so I wrote this Pern crossover, featuring dragons in the Ben 10 universe and our one and only Beirith.

Here’s some more fic in that universe.

~~

Kevin woke to the already familiar feeling of someone else’s panic in the back of his mind, heaving a sigh before he bothered even to shift position. At three weeks old Beirith had already shown herself to be sweet as sugar, soft as rose petals, and prone to panic. This was, he was sure, part of why she’d bonded to him- what in the galaxy would she ever face that he didn’t find old hat?

‘Kevin! Kevin there’s a thing!’ The image of a small, shiny brown creature sitting on the stairs flashed behind his eyes. Presumably the only reason it hadn’t bolted was because it was as confused as to what she was as the other way around.

‘It’s called a cockroach, Bei. Call Zed, she’ll handle it.’ Kevin’s lack of concern calmed her, though he could damn near feel her shuffling uncertainly in place. After a long moment a small bugle rang through the apartment, followed closely by the slicking of Zed’s claws on the stone floor as she bolted over from wherever she was.

‘She ate it,’ he was informed. ‘Are there more?’

‘Probably,’ he answered. This was the sort of thing that happened when you were forced to abandon your apartment for nearly a month. Bugs tried to get a foothold. ‘We’ll clear them out later today.’

‘Okay…’ Sighing again, though not unfondly, at her apprehension Kevin forced himself to sit up, fumbling for his glasses. A quick glance at his phone said it was nearly noon.

‘It’s nearly lunch, why didn’t you get me up?’ The couch squeaked as one of the two jumped onto it.

‘You were still tired after last night.’ Kevin cringed. Try though he might, there was only so much of his mental health shit and trauma that he could shield someone who was literally attached to his mind from, especially when he was so prone to nightmares. Twice the night before he’d been woken up from shit he couldn’t remember but knew was bad to Beirith dropping as strong a sense of love and safety as she could into his brain.  She couldn’t do anything about his trauma and illnesses, something she was very pouty about, so she had decided the least she could do was try to counter whatever his ‘mean, rotten’ brain threw at him with just how wonderful and beloved she thought he was.

He didn’t know if it was helping, but if it made her feel better it was good enough for him.

‘That doesn’t mean you have to go hungry,’ he threw back before being hit with the realization that she wasn’t. His bottomless pit, who he’d last fed over twelve hours ago, wasn’t hungry. ‘Bei?’

‘There was stuff in the cabinet.’ The image of one of the lower cabinets- which she shouldn’t have been able to get into given the baby locks and her lack of any suitable manipulating appendages- sitting open and devoid of the rice and pasta he kept there flashed behind his eyes. ‘It didn’t taste very good.’

‘No, I suspect it didn’t.’ How? Why? If she could get into the cabinet she could’ve gotten into the fridge where there were plenty of meaty leftovers- a thought he immediately regretted as he felt her file the knowledge away for later. Shaking his head, Kevin threw his legs over the side of the bed and forced himself standing. Hopefully, she wouldn’t get sick off the stuff, though if she was feeling fine…

“You know,” he called out, “when my mom said I’d have a kid just like me someday? I assumed an entirely different situation.”

[bbeelzemon]

pirate captain and her giant man-eating parrot

[noritoshiikamo]

nii-chan series! gojo satoru x fem!reader tw dark content, non-con, gojo-nii being manipulative, pseudocest, penetrative sex, female receiving oral, virgin reader, spitting in the end

tagging: @booksweet @fushigurocockslut @lazy10ieiri @sassyeahhhh @cotton-curse @miss-ryomen @duskamethyst @haikyutiehoe @ninefuckingoneone - ok truth be told idk if yall okay or not with this kind of content if you see your name is missing its bcs im scared to tag everyone jwbekrf and im literally running on coffee and no sleep so just take it kjhrfkhjrkbr and its series bcs lmao i wanna make geto next

- niichan series! gojo satoru

everyone always say satoru is just going to abandon you, he's a child trapped in an adult body, he couldn't take care of you.

but you know your older brother well better than everyone else. you know who to run to when you had a bad day in school, the one who's willing to run to store late night to get you last minute art supply, to cook and to cloth you; satoru has been nothing but a good brother, despite being related nothing by the paper signed by him.

he made sure to sent you to proper college, had proper apartment (which he always crashes by) and a credit card with his name embossed on for you to spend. all under one condition, you need to listen to every single word he said. and that's all you did.

when toru-nii said "you need straight As," you'll bent your back backward, staying up and scoring your exam and got yourself into university of tokyo. satoru got the bragging rights to your smart brain. and when toru-nii said, "no changing your hair style and dyeing your hair," you took it to heart when you keep your boring old style while you watched your friends switched colours every month only for you to say no when they offered too. "nii-chan might get angry," you said sheepishly as you offered to help with theirs instead.

but when toru-ni said, "no boyfriend until i said so," it was kinda hard for you to oblige when you've been eyeing this boy in your class for so long. it was hard to ignore his pretty blue eyes and spiky black hair, he has the mysterious charm to him but every time he smiled at you you felt tingles all over you. he walked his two dogs around your neighborhood and made sure to call you when he passed by so you could pet his two huskies.

the first time toru-nii caught you with him, he let it off. you knew him well, he'll sulk and throw his bitch fit but still crawl into your bed at night to apologize, pulling you in his arms before gently kissing your forehead. "he's a friend, toru-nii. i promise," you were honest about that as you nuzzled into his neck, his arms tight around you.

so you sneaked around. making out in the university's library before your last class of the day, the sneaky "my brother's away on business trip" so he could stay in the weekend. you haven't done anything yet, you toyed around, feeling him in your mouth, he went down on you, but you never get enough time to move into more serious thing.

you touched yourself to the mental image of him but always toru-nii will end up creeping in your mind. what annoys you wasn't his stupid face replacing your sweet crush, it was the fact that it only fueled you harder as you circled your clit harder, imagining his rough palm on your tits as you bit down on your lips as your orgasm approached. you got all warm up harder around toru-nii now, he seems to catch that. his hand lingers on your waist more, his kisses got closer to your lips and he spend more nights in your bed longer than his own.

"i'll cook dinner tonight, don't be late."

his voice startled you from what you were doing in the bathroom. you snapped out of your mind, mentally beating yourself as you threw toru-nii's shirt across the room that you've been holding under your nose. you pushed your hair away from your face, focusing on getting ready. reaching for your cologne only to notice his own sitting uncapped. it couldn't be so wrong, he has a lot of perfume laying around as you spritzed a couple along your neck and clothes. toru-nii smells so attractive, you like the way the scent lingered on you.

"i have one class only, i won't be late," you grabbed your stuff and ran pass him. you backtracked, stealing the toast from his hand before running out. satoru stood there, completely mesmerized. was that my cologne she's wearing?

you spend your day with the boy you liked, he recognized your cologne as something so different but he likes it. you stayed back, completely forgot your promise to toru-nii as you hung out at the nearby coffee place. it was until he offered to walk you home when you realised you were late. "shit, shit, shit, he's going to be so angry," you panicked as you shove everything in your bag.

the black haired boy chuckled nervously, "why? you don't have another boyfriend waiting for you is it?" he followed you around, insisting to walk you home. "you don't understand, toru-" you startled, glued to the ground as you stood feet away from toru-nii. you could already see the disappointed look on his face, but it worsened when you felt the boy's hand on your waist.

"should i walk you home?" he asked and you shook your head, eyes glued to your big brother. you could heart your heart beating rapidly against your chest. you've only seen toru-nii angry once and it was years ago. toru-nii is mean when he's mad. "m-my brother's here," you shrugged off his hand and smiled nervously, "i have to go." you rushed towards your big brother, ignoring his sharp glance as you rushed immediately to his car.

satoru doesn't understand what you see in this boy. he knows the kind of boy he is, what he wants with his little sister is nothing but what's underneath your clothes. with his hands shoved in his pocket, glasses sat low on the bridge of his nose, he shot the boy a smile before walking away. not before giving him a warning to stay away from you. "he's just a friend," you repeated that sentence a million time but toru-nii no longer believes in that. you could see his jaws tensing as his feet pressed harder on the pedal. he's ignoring you again.

you sunk into your seat, eyes glancing out. you felt his hand resting on yours, lacing it together before bringing it up to his nose. his cologne is gone. he let go of your hand and focused on driving as silence overwhelmed you. like a little kid, you followed him up to your apartment when you arrived. toru-nii had never been this angry before.

"get in," he muttered, unlocking the door. you glanced at him, not wanting to anger him more as you stomped your feet inside. tossing your shoes aside, hanging your coat, it didn't take long for you to be pushed against the wall. he pinned you against the wall, hands around you neck with another beside your head.

"all you have to do is listen to what i say. have i not done enough for you?"

"nii-chan," you whined as his grip tightened.

"i raised you, supported you and all i asked is just a small favour. prancing around with boys like that like a little slut, are you even a virgin?" he hissed as he unbuttoned your jeans. "i am!" you cried, fingers dug in his forearm as his fingers caught your clit. he found it amusing the way your body tensed up as his fingers slowly moved against your bundle of nerve. but then realization dawned on him; you've done this before. "he touched you, didn't he?" he asked, too calmly for your liking. you shook your head, denying it but it was clear in your eyes. his hand around your throat tightened.

"don't lie to me, y/n," he muttered, face so close to yours, you could feel his heavy breathing.

"we didn't do anything, we didn't fuck, i'm a grown woman, you can't police me on whether i can touch myself or not."

he scoffed, "so you touched yourself to him huh?"

"it's none of your business!" you hissed, slamming your fist on his chest. pulling his hand out, he dragged you by the neck before tossing you on the bed. you coughed as you struggled to catch a breath, but toru-nii didn't have time to wait. "as long as you're under my roof, living off my money, it's my goddamn business, y/n-chan," he gave a mirthless laugh as he pulled you by your ankle. grabbing you by the neck, he pulled you closer, "did you think about him when you touched yourself?" he whispered, eyes nothing but delirious and anger.

you shook your head, tears spilling on the corner, "i promise, it's not him, okay, it's you, it's you i promise i think about you." his eyes softened a little as you reassured him. tossing you back on the bed, he climbed on you, his eyes lingered before he leaned forward, his lips brushed so gently against your lips. you both know it's wrong, but why does it felt so good? his kiss came off needier than you as your fingers intertwined.

your clothes came off so easily and it felt odd as toru-nii's eyes lingered all over your bare body. he won't let your arms over your bare chest, your hands pinned above your head. he wanted to see all of you. his own clothes came off next and it was just like you imagined. you couldn't help but to press your thighs together when his cock sprung out. running the tip over your glistening slit, before slowly pumping himself, enjoying the way your hole spasming over a single touch is throwing him off the edge.

"nii-chan," a soft fuck escaped his lips with the way you're mewling for him. snaking hand underneath your thigh, he pulled you closer to the edge of the bed. "did he touch you?" he asked as he traced his cock along your slit. he loved the way your moan escaped your lips every time the tip caught on your clit. he could feel your legs trembling.

"n-no, he touched my clit that's all."

"tsk, tsk, he should've known better to not touch what's mine," satoru voiced his dissatisfaction as his thumb replaced his cock. you sounded so pretty, eyes rolled back as he kept a steady pace on your clit. your droopy eyes, your hand around his wrist as he edged you so easily to your orgasm. "toru," you whined, heels buried into the bed as you struggled to squirm away. he wasn't stopping, he wanted to cleanse you of other men's touch. your body belonged to him, he's going to make sure you know it tonight.

you were delirious, back arching as your stomach tightened, mix of moans and his name repeated on your tongue as he felt the throbbing of your clit, you came. he didn't stop, until you begged him too, not used to being overly stimulated. but toru-nii could change that. he slipped two fingers in, satisfied with the tightness of your cunt clenching on his fingers. the white remains of your orgasm drooled out with every pump of his fingers.

"so tight, baby, don't worry, nii-chan is gonna make you nice and loose," he cooed gently, pressing his lips against your thigh, "i don't want to hurt you." his breath felt warm against your loins, one sly lick of his tongue on your clit send you jumping. "toruu! w-wait, no,no-" you whined, but he paid your pleas no attention as his lips suckled gently on your sensitive clit. you never felt like this before, it all felt so new to you. you never went for second after you're done, and toru-nii hasn't even put himself in. your loud pleas and moans echoed the room as he pinned you down, tongue tracing and prodding.

"you'll come again, i want to taste you so badly," he cooed, lapping faster on your clit. the fingers and tongue switched when he felt your jerking legs, he wants to feel your sweetness on his tongue as you came. your hand half kneaded, half pushing his head away. you felt like you could break when his tongue fucked you faster.

"nii-chan, please please, i can't, too much too much," you begged, his speed didn't decrease or faltered at all. your grip to the sheet where whitening as satoru managed to coaxed out your second orgasm. your face warmed up from the loud lewd slurping of your big brother.

"fuck, you tasted so sweet," he made sure you'll see as he licked his fingers full of you clean before hovering over you, "you see, this is why you don't go around prancing with other boys. they'll only hurt you."

his lips traced kisses all over your belly and breasts. he kissed your collarbone and neck before tracing his tongue along the column of your neck, "nii-chan can't let that happen, i can't let them hurt my little sister," you gasped as you felt his tip prodded your clenching hole. he held you down firmer, shushing as his lips moved from your jaw to your burning ear. "niisan will make you feel so good you only need me in your life okay? remember when you promised me forever?" he kissed the shell of your ear, "well i'm claiming it tonight." his hand clasped over your lips as his cock split your virgin cunt apart.

your screams muffled, eyes so glossy from the pain and pleasure with your toes curling into the sheet. satoru hushed you repeatedly, caressing your side gently as he promised it'll be alright. other men would've ravished you immediately after knowing you're virgin, but not your brother. he didn't move immediately, focusing on letting your cunt swallowing him whole. he felt a little resistance from your cervix, annoyed that he couldn't fit in you whole. he sat on his knees, your hips hoisted up onto his thigh.

"toruu," you cried, "s'full." you're right, he could see the prodding of his tips on your lower belly and he's obsessed with the way it look.

he wants to be in you forever. his thumb gently circled your clit, relax rolled off his tongue repetitively. you were clenching so hard around his length, he didn't want to have to fuck you hard, toru-nii didn't want to hurt you. his hand on your thigh, gently caressing it left a trail of burning along your skin. "m-more, please," you whimpered meekly, your hands curled against your chest.

he loves the way you got all choked up when he first moved. every thrust punching air out of your chest he had to remind you to breath. he was getting as delirious as you with your cunt swallowing his cock so good. his hands tightened around your waist, you could feel the bruises forming but you couldn't give a fuck. you just want him to keep going and going.

"niisan! s'good, more," you could barely string up words, something he found so cute. "so dumb for your big brother's cock, huh?" his hand moved to grab one your tits, roughly squeezing it as he picked up his speed. he could take more time with you later, you're his after all. satoru just wanted to fill your cunt with his seeds and watched your cunt struggled to keep it all in. all these idea of breeding you had his cock twitching. he pressed his hand on your throat, focusing your dreamy eyes on him.

"you're so good to me," he pressed a kiss on your trembling lips, "so so so good, what do i do with good imouto like you?" his thumb slipped into your mouth. a quiet fuck escaped his lips as you sucked on the thumb slowly. "god, you're so perfect, you'll let me fill you up so good right?" you nodded eagerly, releasing his thumb with a pop.

"please fill me up, niisan, please, please."

how could satoru say to to that pretty pleading face?

he focused on his thrust, it was getting sloppier now. your arousal leaked out with every thrust, pooling underneath the bed with strings connecting his pelvic to yours. your legs draped over his, his hands holding on to your thighs to steady himself. he's so close, he's about to cum. he rolled his eyes back to the sound of your desperate whine telling him you're about to cum and the loud echo of the clapping of your skin together. satoru was about to be overstimulated as you. but it will all be worthy.

like a responsible big brother, he made you cum first. milking out your third orgasm, you were almost gone, drowsy from pleasure. your cunt were spasming around him but he wanted you wide awake. he wanted you to see how he filled you up. it was as if your body was trained to relax when his fingers wrapped around your neck. "nii-chan is so close, i'm going to fill you up good okay, baby?" you gasped as the hand tightened.

like a good little sister, you begged. tongue lolling out, drools all over your chin and cheeks kind of beg. niisan, fill me up, please you make me feel so good, no one makes me feel better than you, toruu-niii, please cum in me.

it didn't take satoru long before his own body tensed up, his speed faltered as loud cuss escaped his lips. ropes after ropes of his thick warmth spurted all over your wall. you thought his cock on you felt good, but the spasming of his cock as he filled you up felt even better. your big brother looks so good undone, chest glistened in sweat as he heaved, his white hair sticking to his forehead with only the white of his eyes visible.

it took him awhile to come to his senses, cock still buried in you as he leaned forward to kiss you on your forehead, "such a good girl for me. you're ruined, no other boys will want you anymore. you're only good for your big brother, understand?" his fingers underneath your chin. you nodded. he cupped your jaws, prying it opened and you watched excitingly as spit dripped down from his mouth on your tongue. you swallowed like a good girl he praised you to be.

"nii-chan loves you so much okay? you don't need any other boys, nii-chan is here for your forever."

© all content belongs to noritoshiikamo. do not modify or repost.

[petri808]

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30-Epilogue

Lucy POV. TW: Panic Attack, Mental trauma/coping, PTSD

The university and Lucy’s professors had been really wonderful about everything, even offering to convert her classes to an online option so she could continue. She wasn’t happy about the idea of taking a sabbatical from college, but there was no way she could manage. Not only was it difficult for her to leave the apartment because seeing anyone that remotely resembled Touka sent her into a panic attack, focusing on anything at all was a struggle. Night after night it haunted her dreams and spilled into her waking moments. She’d run scenarios through her mind, all the what if’s, should haves, could haves, often leading to horrifying outcomes. They’d survived, yes, but at what cost?

She didn’t feel the same anymore as if a part of her did die in that apartment or fled to a hidden part of her brain too scared to come back out. The once happy, positive person had become a nervous wreck unable to control her emotions or outbursts. Lucy’s bedroom became her safe zone from everyone, even those closest to her, ashamed and insecure of their judgement. In her heart she knew friends like Levy or Natsu wouldn’t judge... but tell that to her broken mind, because her brain was the one in control at the moment, and insisted they’d look down on her.

All the irrational thoughts. It was her fault for not being careful, her fault she was kidnapped. Lucy knew Touka was growing dangerous, yet walking alone, at night... utterly stupid. She should have been overzealous at protecting herself, but oh no, stupid girl didn’t want to believe anything would actually happen. Until it did. And now she was even more pathetic and weak for not getting a hold of her emotions, for not controlling it instead of it controlling her. The danger had passed. They were alive. Touka was in jail. It should be over, but it wasn’t. Lucy couldn’t move past that night, stuck in an endless loop of fear. So many nights she’d wake up in a panic covered in sweat, the fading images of red... blood... like dripping down a tv screen in a horror movie. It was Natsu’s blood she saw and his screams when the knife had sliced him open.

The first week after the event had been difficult, sitting through an interview with Gajeel, and reliving all the mental wounds. It took several hours to get through it all despite the man doing his best to go easy on her. Each time painful parts came up, Lucy felt the anxieties rise, the mental blurring, the shaking, literally a physical shaking of her body in an effort to dispel the rise of adrenaline coursing through her veins. Interviews are best done without any other potential witnesses in the room to avoid cross contamination, but after Lucy’s first two attempts to talk to investigators failed, Gajeel was forced to allow Natsu in with explicit instructions to sit quietly and say nothing while the woman talked. Of course, Natsu’d been fine with that, he’d do anything to help, even if it was just holding Lucy’s hand. But it only added to her embarrassment. Surely Natsu will eventually tire of having an unstable girlfriend.

Then there was the therapist Levy helped Lucy to find which she hoped would help her to quickly get over the events and move on. So, when the woman explained that such traumas take patience and time to process, Lucy was devastated. It almost felt like nothing was going her way anymore, falling dominoes with no end in sight. She felt so ashamed for having to see the woman in the first place, and now she’s told it would be a long journey towards recovery. Just great! What’s next?!

“Lu?” Levy knocked before opening the bedroom door. “Are you gonna eat your dinner in here again? It’s ready.”

With the curtains drawn, Lucy’s room was dark and the only light available was a small desk lamp next to the bed set to a low setting. She peeked out from under her blanket. “I-I’ll come out in a minute, thanks Lev.”

As soon as her friend closed the door, Lucy exhaled in relief. She knew Levy was worried about the amount of time she stayed holed up in the room, so to dispel some of those concerns, Lucy would join her roommate for meals. She quickly applied a gauze wrap, threw on her long sleeve hoodie, and left the room. It made her feel safer to be shrouded and covered up, so gone were her skirts and tank tops, and hello to long sleeves and pants. If she could cover her face from the world, it would make her happy. Even her overall hygiene suffered. Lucy would forget to bathe or wash her hair for days on end, and it took Levy or Natsu with gentle prodding to get her to do it. She would wear the same clothes for a week if it wasn’t for Levy who made sure she changed at least every couple of days. Hell, she’d starve if her roommate wasn’t feeding her. This was a frustrating cycle, not having the mental energy to take care of herself, then feeling bad because they had to help her with things, which made her feel even worse.

It tore at Lucy’s heart to watch Natsu going through this process with her. She knew he was going through his own struggles, not just mental, but physically healing from his wounds. And here she was, the basket case of instability. Bless him, he never gave up no matter how distant she grew, but after that night, Lucy really didn’t want to talk about anything out loud, not that night, and certainly not the true extent of her pain from it. Both Levy and Natsu knew only what she couldn’t hide from them. Like the panic attacks, and since she really didn’t want them to see her go through one or what she’d resorted to, to calm herself, so the safest solution was stay quiet and not trigger them in their presence.

To show his dedication, Natsu even went with her to her therapy sessions and waited outside the office. Lucy knew it was costing him money to do this, because she couldn’t ride a train which meant cab rides every single trip. It bothered her a lot, but she did her best to hide it, and besides there was one small measure of security in having him at her side when she needed to venture out into the public.

“So, the nightmares are still a problem?” the therapist questioned Lucy. “Are you sure you don’t want to try a medication? It would help to ease them until we can get things under control.”

Lucy gripped to the hem of her sweater. “I just don’t wanna become addicted to that stuff...”

“That’s understandable. But not all are addictive, and I’ll be here to make sure it doesn’t get out of hand.”

“I... I don’t think I’m ready.”

“Okay, that’s fine,” the woman smiled. “Remember I’m just here to help you, at your pace. I won’t force you take anything you don’t want to.”

“Thank you.”

“What about the breathing and relaxation techniques? When you feel the anxiety rising, are you trying out the steps?”

“I try... I don’t think I’m very successful at it.”

“Does it work sometimes?”

Lucy pauses for a few seconds in thought before nodding yes.

“See, that is progress!” The woman encouraged excitedly. “Two weeks ago, it didn’t help at all, and now it works sometimes. It’s a big step forward Lucy.”

“Doesn’t feel like it is...” Lucy mumbled.

“I know it’s hard to see it for yourself, and that’s okay. These things take time and practice. Do you remember what I said about these things?”

“Not really.” Which was true. During the first week when the therapist explained the processes, Lucy had stopped listening as soon as the woman said it would take time.

“Let me ask you a question. You like to write stories, right?”

“Yeah.”

“When you first started, were you able to just write perfect stories.”

“Pfft, no.”

“Then how did you get better at it?”

Lucy rolled her eyes, knowing where this was going. “Practice.”

“Yes! The PTSD requires learning new coping skills as well as unlearning irrational ones. To do both takes practice. The more we work at it, the easier it will get, I promise. One day you’ll be able to look back at this experience and feel stronger for it.”

She really wanted to believe the woman, but it was so hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel! Tears well up in Lucy’s eyes, seconds before they start to flow down her cheeks. “Why is this so hard?! I just wanna get back to normal!” She could feel her anxieties rising. “I... I-I don’t wanna talk about it anymore! I just wanna forget it ever happened!”

The woman reached over and took Lucy’s hand, applying a strategic amount of pressure while rubbing her thumb over the webbing in a counter stimulus. She softened in tone. “I wish I could say that would work, but in order to get past it, you need to confront it. Together we’re gonna turn the boogieman into Casper the friendly ghost.”

It was such a weird way of putting things, it caused Lucy’s mind to snap out of the anxiety and snort a sniffling laugh in response. “Casper the friendly ghost?!”

“It was the first thing to pop into my mind,” the therapist laughed too. “The point is, we’re going to work together and slowly bring you to a place where this no longer scares you.”

“O-Okay...”

The rest of the session was tough, and Lucy had come close to a panic attack several times, but as a trained therapist, the woman stepped in at the right times to bring her levels down again using breaks and breathing routines. Sure, with a professional in front of you, it wasn’t as bad, but doing this on her own, the attacks were still winning. At the end of the session, the woman suggested a new technique to try out based on Lucy’s love of writing.

“You’ve heard of art therapy, so just think of this as a different form of creative therapy. Writing a diary is helpful to get out your feelings out in a healthy way. But let’s take it one step forward to use your skills in fiction writing. I want you to try before the next session, writing a story where you interject your emotions, feelings, whatever you want into the characters and story. Kind of like your character becomes you, but now you get to control what happens to them after the trauma they endure.”

“Wait, so you want me to write about a character that goes through what I went through?! Like torture my own character?!”

“Yes, to put it bluntly. Take your pain and unleash it onto the fictional character. It’s a much healthier way of releasing your anger or frustration in something that can’t really be hurt. Do whatever you want to them. But remember you also get to give them the ending you want to. It’s about utilizing a tool you’re already comfortable with and taking back some control. It’ll be normal if you cry, scream, and get upset through the process, but that’s okay, because instead of holding it all in, you’re getting your feelings out.”

Lucy slumped back in her seat. It sounded strange, yet at the same time made a bit of sense to her. Angst type stories were not really her forte, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t do it, especially since pain is all she was channeling at the moment. She sighed. “I’ll try.”

“And that’s totally okay. All I ask is that you give it a try.”

[pochapal]

rank every year of the 2010s from best to worst i want some pochapal lore

[warning for discussion of my fucked up mental health and my myriad traumas. we’re really opening the pandora’s box here gang]

ok time for me to overshare on the internet again! super long post because i can’t shut up and you asked for it. anyway, by objective ranking: 

#1: 2012 - halcyon era, my personal peak. spent the whole year writing hunger games oc fics with my deviantart fanfiction besties whom i still think about all the time and always hope are having the best possible day. if you were here for this era understand i still hold you so closely and dearly in my heart <3. 

#2: 2013 - god i was such a good example of a human being back then. was the year my writing like actually took off and i had a healthy balance between creative stuff and a social life (said social life consisting of spending lunchtimes at school breaking into classrooms and discussing fandom shit with five other people. reading homestuck updates in the music room on one person’s really shaky mobile data...legendary). highlight of the year and maybe my life was in the april of 2013 when i got out of failing to submit a hard deadline essay by telling my english teacher i wrote a whole novel over the two week break and then producing said novel. god i wish i had that level of like. fucking confidence back me back then knew what i wanted and how to get it. 

#3: 2010 - the last year of childhood. i was 12 and played pokemon all the time with my friends and went places and had a moderately successful youtube channel and it didn’t matter that i was bullied so badly at school because i was basically high off life. summer of 2010 was so good specifically. i’d used to get the bus with a friend and go see movies and break into historical sites and get into normal childhood mayhem and maxed out my pokewalkers twice a month and i was buzzed because i had two (2) whole friendship groups to choose from and that was such a huge deal to me the terminal social outcast. it was so simple and carefree and even though everything and everyone involved in this era grew up to suck except for one specific person i kinda really miss it.

#4: 2018 - this was the first year i wasn’t depressed to the point of nonfunctioning. it was 20gayteen, i was on antidepressants, i was as close to thriving as i got at uni (going into town with people once a week, attending art and culture events, getting good grades across the board), i started to write for fun again, i got my cat whom i love dearly, i was exhibited in my uni’s city’s literature festival, GOD i actually nearly attended a pride event that year can you imagine. this year was basically my life’s second peak. miss getting the 8am train and daintily sipping on a cherry coke to keep me from passing out. wish this time could have lasted longer.

#5: 2019 - kinda absolute middle of the road year not for lack of anything happening but because the overwhelming amount of good and bad things cancelled each other out. so like there’s the fact that i was at the top of my uni game this year, was basically making the first steps into a professional writing career (covid i will never forgive you for killing all that dead </3), finally saved up enough to buy myself a gaming pc, and the summer after the homestuck epilogues, but equally 2019 was the start of the Pochapal Gender Fiasco which is by far the most horrible thing i am still currently undergoing and i burnt myself out mentally about halfway through the year (being stuck overnight in a hospital for a panic attack absolutely horrible horrible irredeemable) and then got like super death plague flu that i was sick with for three months (literally recovered less than a month before rona hit. god’s cruel karma.). so like...it kind of averaged out? the good shit was good but not as great as other years and the bad shit was awful but nowhere near as terrible as it could have been. gotta give a shoutout to 90% of my current mutual cohort for following me in 2019...omelette route gang make some noise !!

#6: 2014 - oof. this year essentially marked the start of a four year long downward mental health spiral because everything fell into awful alignment. i’d just turned 16, finished secondary school, had all my friends up and ditch me at once, was home alone for a whole summer, and was hit with Sudden Intense Body Image Issues that i couldn’t explain until uh. after very recent developments lmao. this one goes out to the me of july 2014 who did nothing but lay in bed and listen to the same two marina albums on a loop because fuck i’m attracted to men and also my facial and body hair are really starting to come in and if i think about this for too long i will literally kill myself because oh god i can’t handle getting older which is clearly and definitely the issue going on here. my brain fucking broke super hardcore and it’s a miracle that an overeating disorder was like the worst thing i walked away with. 

#7: 2015 - downward spiral year two!! i was so volatile this year it was such a mess. i was totally socially isolated after a brief stint of falling in with a group of people at the start of my first year of sixth form until january where in quick succession a) it turned out every single one of these people was friends with the person who sexually assaulted me whom i obviously had a lot of complicated feelings towards and b) baby’s first crush came out as bisexual but in the “women and also trans women” kind of way which tore me up so terribly in ways i couldn’t begin to understand. no words for the experience of seeing a girl kiss a boy and crying so hard at night you threw up because you could never be her no matter how much you wanted it. actually kinda get the sense what was going on there was bigger than just some crush lmao. then after that i was so mentally ill i basically attended school less than half the time and it was the only year in my life i failed my exams. i ended up having to resit my entire set of first year a level exams because jesus christ was i in such a bad way it was a miracle i even showed up to them. all i did was either have anxiety attacks or enter bedbound depressive slumps for weeks at a time. but it’s okay because it gets worse.

#8: 2016 - downward spiral act iii: the spiralling. prefacing this by saying that i actually had two whole good months (april - may) in that i was functioning enough to do my exams and finish school with decent grades. the rest was super extra mega terrible. my school attendance for year 13 dipped below 65% and literally the only thing that kept me from being kicked out was the fact that i was naturally smart at the subjects i took and also because the school would have a lot to answer for after letting me get to that state despite having a hefty file on how damaged i was. keep in mind every single part of this was fully untreated btw - i was just floundering around and letting it all fester. i spent three solid weeks going to school but locking myself in the bathroom all day every day and having mental health episodes then going home like nothing else happened only to continue the breakdown that night. then things got kicked into fucked up overdrive when i moved out to uni and was cut off from what little support structures i did have. it was so bad all i did was cry all the time and never went anywhere to the point where three separate sources recommended me to the wellbeing and crisis counselling service that i stopped going to after two sessions because i was fucked up in ways cbt techniques could not even touch. at least i tried to make an effort for the first two months of uni which like. good for me?

#9: 2017 - what lieth at the base of the spiral. helltrench year. i was at literal rock bottom. i stopped going to class, i didn’t hand in a single piece of work. i lied to my parents and would book trains each day only to go back to my student flat and sit there and contemplate suicide. like i would just slump on the floor in a catatonic state and vividly contemplate one of four or so ways i could end my own life. i only didn’t because i wanted to wait until the summer to collect my last student loan and transfer it to my parents as an apology for my death which obviously didn’t end up happening. honestly i can’t remember much of the first half of 2017 that’s how bad it was. i remember taking a gender studies class and the teacher made it Weird that i was the Only Male Student in the room and then she sent me a scolding email after i walked out halfway through a class and never returned. apparently i got into a lot of online discourse in this year but i don’t remember anything other than being put on a blocklist by the milkfic author over ace discourse which is funny if you have the context. mostly i just baited terfs and weirdo freaks to get them to say horrible things to me as what i guess amounts to some kind of digital self harm. anyway breaking point came in late august when i got kicked out of university and then nobody could ignore it any more so there was no choice left but for me to seek out help and recover enough to function which luckily i did. i really Do Not remember 2017. you could tell me anything about that year and i’d probably believe you.

#10: 2011 - extra circle of hell for this little fucked up gem of a year. on the surface it wasn’t actually that terrible, until the Summer 2011 Domino Effect Of Bad Shit. up until like may/june it was a pretty all right year! i was 13 and had a surprisingly successful youtube channel uploading pokemon soundfont remixes to an audience of i think ~350-400 subscribers at my peak? anyway then i got hit with the early summer triple combo of childhood friends moving away, cute and quirky sexual assault at the hands of a person in my friend group, and then having some Really Great and Super Appropriate interactions with adults on deviantart. like obviously there’s the actual ptsd-inducing event which totally disrupted and killed the person i was right up until that moment and reshaped every facet of my life for better or worse (there’s an alternate timeline where that didn’t happen and i got into electronic music and/or coding instead) but really it’s the events that followed in its wake which were kind of more fucked up. so like all of a sudden i was super aware of my body and me growing my hair out and being mistaken for a girl in class suddenly became this Less Innocent thing and i ended up spending hours overnight going to transgender questioning forums and looking up hrt timeline videos and having the wikipedia article on tracheal shaving saved because it was a life raft to me whose voice was imminently gonna deepen and i was simultaneously reeling with constant trauma flashbacks and the whole thing was so so fucked up. then i was on deviantart and i don’t remember exactly how but a small group of furry guys ten to fifteen years older than me started messaging me and encouraging and requesting me to produce nonsexual fetish stuff for them and talking to me about stuff like if i’d ever thought about growing up to be gay and i didn’t think anything of it for a long while because they called me a very talented writer and it felt so good to have someone be nice to me after being so alone and isolated for months on end. anyway the only reason i got out of that before it got bad was because they invited me to one of the big furry sites and i was weirded out because i thought it was a porn site and thinking about sexual stuff was a huge trauma trigger so i just ended up blocking them all and pretending like it didn’t happen. at the time half this shit didn’t bother me but in retrospect holy fuck 2011 was such a damaging year. to think if like three events didn’t happen i wouldn’t be the fucked up mess you see before you today.

god fuck this turned out super long but i’m not apologising because this was a therapeutic exercise for me and also constitutes as one of the biggest pochapal lore dumps of all time. come get your food or whatever.

[marueonmain]

WINDFLOWER

part six ~ to be more normal ~

(part one) (part two) (part three) (part four) (part five) (part six)

A/N: I want to thank each of you who have continued reading and supporting me through all these parts (that’s almost 12k words total!) and I hope you keep wanting to stick around until the end. Stay safe. Stay healthy. 

Summary: Alex visits with James & Fraser in a bid to distract himself from thinking about his feelings toward Y/N. George is concerned.

Pairing: imallexx x reader

Warning: Implications of Disordered Eating Habits. References to a Real/Imagined Domestic. An Absurd Amount of Pining.  

Word Count: 2.4k

Subdued shades of orange with the occasional single brushstrokes of pink projected through his bedroom window and painted him in light. A bird chirped, and another chirped back in a cycle of communication lost on other animals. Alex did not realize the change outside his window until the light gradient settled on a loud yellow and created glare on his monitor.

It was sunrise, and he had just finished editing for his most recent video. Where the hours of work went was unclear as it played back with the same level of effects as other videos on his channel. But the hours showed in his fringe, darkened with grease, and in his hands that shook from low blood sugar.

Sleep was for the strong – for those who executed enough psychological control to shush their thoughts. To untie their mental boat and let it drift into the oblivion sea. Alex was not one of those people. Quieting his internal monologue required medication that put him in a state not unlike how he imaged it felt to be roofied.

Or else he did not sleep.

And Alex did not sleep that night. Not because he needed to edit or because he was so busy he did not realize he was tired. No, none of that. He knew he was tired: exhausted even: his limbs felt heavier as, throughout the evening, his blood was spliced and diluted with concrete mix.

Why did he not take his medication? Why not sleep? He did not want to be trapped in ~the dream~ again.

Despite his fundamental understanding of the uncontrollable manner in which the unconscious forms dreams, Alex was consumed with guilt for dreaming about kissing his friend's girlfriend. So, he punished himself: not allowing his mind rest nor his stomach food as he threw himself into his editing.

He would not allow himself think about it long enough to come to the obvious conclusion – that the real issue was not the dream itself. Despite what imallexx edits might guide someone to believe (with their cutesy music over compilations of smiling pictures or clips of him laughing), Alex was a young man in his twenties. And young men (who enjoy kissing) think and fantasize and dream about kissing.

And far more than kissing but regardless... He had dreamed about kissing his friends' girlfriends before: or at least Mia that one time. Ok, two times. He had dreamed about kissing cute men he saw on the train. He had even once dreamed about kissing Princess Leia.

It was natural. But Alex's thoughts about Y/N felt damning, felt wrong. Perhaps because it was the first instance in which he thought he had a chance to get the girl. Not that he would do; he refused.

It hit him. If he were always doing something else, then he would simply not have time to think about it – about her. Alex grabbed a pencil off his desk and his JoJo Siwa notebook and wrote a schedule for the coming week.

His hand cramped from furiously trying to keep up with dictating the information as it spilled from his head. He finished writing, but there were still stretches of time to fill-up including that entire morning. Was he desperate enough to disconnect from himself that he would risk the Budweiser Bug to visit his other friends outside his apartment building? Yes.

While rummaging around his bedroom for fresh(er) clothing to wear, Alex swiped a hat off his desk and concealed his unwashed hair with it. Not his tiktok bucket hat nor his iconic pink one, it was a lilac snapback with an image of lavender embroidered on the side. He rang Fraser.

“Hello?” Fraser answered with a voice bogged down with exhaustion. 

“How’re you doing?” Alex greeted.

“Um.” (a pause – a processing delay) “Fine. Good. Yeah, what about you?” 

“Trying to keep busy.” He tucked his wallet and keys into the pocket of a pair of joggers he found hanging, oddly enough, over the towel rail in his bathroom. Changing into them required a series of short jumping motions as he used just one hand. “You have any videos to film that I could jump in on?”

“Well I’ve been brainstorming ideas for a new series called…”

At the bathroom sink: Alex did not wait for the water to warm before splashing it over his face. He did a quick once-over and washed his cheeks and forehead with hand soap. Picking up his toothbrush from its holder stirred an uneasiness in him, he could not explain; he brushed his teeth and spit without rinsing.

Returning into the conversation he caught the middle of what would sound like a rant or passionate tangent if he did not know that was just how Fraser talked, “…and I’ve been working on a script for something on social repose—”

“Another needs to be stopped?" asked Alex.

Fraser laughed, letting it linger before continuing, "You got me. It's not done, but I could definitely use you for some reaction bits."

"Great! I'll be setting off within the hour." Ambling around – as is the norm during phone calls – Alex found himself in the kitchen. Half-full liters of lemonade, grocers bags, and dirty dishes cluttered the counters. He worked around the rubbish to make himself scrambled eggs with ham.

Fraser asked, "And you're sure about leaving the apartment? With the Bug? We could do a discord-call."

"Might as well get in some time on the train before things shut down."

"Alright, mate," there was a smile behind Fraser's voice, "just don't get arrested."

With their call ended, Alex finished cooking. He ate his entire breakfast in the same amount of time it took him to pull on his shoes.

During the train ride, he turned his phone's volume to eighty percent and blasted his music through his earbuds. His playlist was a mixture of two to three alt-rock or indie pop bands with a sprinkling of mainstream hits: a calm and comfortable backbeat throughout. No outlier tracks that burst into hard-hitting or exceptionally fast beats – nothing that might pump-up his adrenaline or be useful to scream along with in a fit of anger. That was not the connection he made with music in his formative years. Music to him was something to drown out that pesky internal monologue when lying in bed for too long – doing nothing – but perhaps pondering on some heartbreaking or otherwise emotional line in a song.

He arrived at Fraser and James' apartment when it was still technically morning. Knocking on the door, he was greeted with frantic barking and his tired ~obviously hungover~ friend.

After fussing over Kenji, Alex spotted the camera set-up in the kitchen and took his seat. Fraser and him watched several of social repose's music videos: covers of emo electronic, synth-pop songs, and a lot more original EMD songs than either man guessed – and all were dreadful. Neither could sit through a single video for more than forty-five seconds, and most of the footage they shot was just of their mouths hanging open in a disturbed shock.

Nonetheless, it was a great distraction. Alex liked feeling like he was helping out smaller channels – even if it was just those who were his friends.

Only as Fraser was cleaning up his equipment and Alex was sitting on the couch playing with Kenji, did James clamber out of bed and stroll out of his bedroom.

"Ow. What was that?" Alex asked in an exaggerated voice when the shiba nipped at yet another one of his fingers. Turning his attention to James, he asked, "Has he been biting a lot recently?"

James answered in his softer and calmer 'tired' voice, "He only bites sometimes. His brain is probably just locked on the idea of food right now; this is around the time Fraser usually feeds him."

"I just wanted a picture for instagram." Alex tried to find a good angle to hold his phone. He pushed Kenji to sit on his lap for a nice picture (which was sure to get hundreds of comments and love heart emojis), but the shiba was far too hyper to sit still. The few useable photos he got were of Kenji biting at and tugging the strings of his hoodie. "Come on, Kenj."

"Reckon he knows what you're doing with your phone, just mugging you off on purpose."

Alex hung around the apartment for the rest of the afternoon: enjoying an ubereats lunch and having James crush him at mario kart...multiple times in a row. The three talked youtube and the continuing aftershocks and effects of the ad crisis, and Fraser asked for feedback on a few video ideas.

An hour or two from sunset, Alex said his goodbyes and caught the train home to his apartment. Upon unlocking the front door, he was met with an interrogation.

"And where have you been all day?" asked George standing with his feet planted shoulder-width apart, and his arms crossed over his chest – the spitting image of a disapproving parent to a reckless teenager.

Smiling his fang-displaying side smile, Alex challenged, "Why do you need to know?"

"Sammy came over to film the opening pokemon cards video, and you weren't here. Neither of us could get a hold of you. Do you even care about my upload schedule?" It was a half-humorous rant with an eerie sense of latent seriousness.

"Phone died." He shrugged, not looking his flatmate in the eye and certainly not wanting to admit the truth – he put his phone on do not disturb earlier that morning, muting most everyone, including George and Sammy.

There was not an ounce of belief in George's expression, "Fine. Where were you, though, for real? You never leave the flat, let alone disappear; almost called Will and got a search team going."

"I was just filming with Fraser." Alex bent over to take off his trainers. There was a click from his shoulder when he did – alarming for such young bones. "We should host something soon."

And he meant soon. As talk of a complete social shutdown, rather than just more public health advisements, dominated news outlets; the thought of non-essential businesses being made to close their doors was frightening. And what was worse than the eking paranoia seeping into every day, was the horrifying realization that the pubs were considered non-essential.

Uncrossing his arms, George's posture shifted to be more normal. His brow furrowed as he seemed to examine his flatmate heavily; even so, he nodded in agreement. "Sure, we could do that."

"Great," Alex chirped and started toward his bedroom.

George grabbed his arm as he tried to walk past him. His hand clasped tight enough that his fingers touched his thumb, and nails would have dug into the pale skin – if he had nails that is. Both men were silent amongst the awkwardness of the interaction.

Sidestepping out of the armlock, Alex waited for George to speak.

"You're doing ok. Right, Al?"

"Yeah. I'm ok."

"But, you'd tell me if you weren't."

"Of course." Alex left to his bedroom. It was in a bad state, but he did not bother himself with picking clothes off the floor or taking food wrappers from his side table to the kitchen bin. He pulled his phone from his pocket and checked for messages: sure enough, there were eleven messages from George: ranging from asking where he was to blaming his laziness for ruining their chance to film.

Alex flopped himself onto his bed and started to scroll through his photos with Kenji. There was not much choice, so he took the least blurry one and posted it to instagram – with a bright filter and a sarcastic caption that took him longer to come up with than he would have liked.

Fifty minutes he spent scrolling through instagram, occasionally checking back to watch the likes on his photo go up and to reply to some of the first commenters. It was mind-numbing in the good and proper sense.

Until he saw it – and it was not his fault, he just happened upon it – and it sent his thoughts into hyperdrive.

A post. A photo. Y/N sitting on her sofa in the dark with the one light source (presumably her television) from behind the camera casting a blue light across her face. One hand clutching the blanket in her lap as the other hand was held up. Jewel-like eyes peering through her fingers and connecting with the camera. A smile playing purposefully on her lips.

If Alex's thoughts at that moment were put into a blender, they might still have come out making more sense than they did in his head. Eyes. Lips. Blue. Watching? Angelic. Eyes. Fingers. Dancing. Blue. Lips. Taste. Lips. Soft. Photographer. Photographer.

Before he might ask for the app to load more photos, Alex's burst of energy and hectic but classic over-thinking was interrupted. From above him came the sound of muffled shouting. He held his breath, stilled as if a prey animal not wanting to be spotted, and focused an ear to the noise.

There were no words he could pick out, but from what he could tell – or from the details he filled in – it was not a light argument of few words but something that might supersede a genuine scrap. And it was coming from Sammy and Y/N's apartment.

As he listened, his imagination wandered. Alex visualized himself, rushing to Y/N's aid and wrapping his thin arms around her in more emotional comfort than physical protection. He saw her turn to him with wet eyes and a red nose before burying her face into his shirt. It would be uncomfortable – as it is to be around distressed people. Yet it would be comfortable – as she would fit against him so well.

Again, his imagination wandered. Alex visualized himself as the one shouting at Y/N and growing angrier as she refused his hard-hitting gaze. He saw her turn to him with wet eyes and a red nose before hiccupping out a sob and dashing from the room. No. That was not right. It was wrong. He would not— could not do that.

[bang-and-a-blintz]

Through the Darkness

CHAPTER SEVEN - RED AND BLUES

Fandom: Dracula (2020)  

Relationship: Dracula/Roxana(OFC)  

Rating: Mature  

Warnings: None  

Word Count: 3,708

In hindsight, Roxana probably shouldn't have had three strongly poured bloody marys. She should have switched to something less filling after a big meal; like a vodka soda, if she felt like keeping to the same liquor, or a gin and tonic to stir things up. Unfortunately, all the tomato juice and grits and bread and sausage and eggs did not mix well with the sight of someone's throat being literally torn open.

It was nasty, but at least now she could jot down 'successfully grossed out a five-hundred-something-year-old vampire' in her list of lifetime achievements.

"Well, that was…unexpected." Dracula said after a moment, his hands hung in the air like they were held up by marionette strings, "Revolting, yes, but I have to admit, this is a first."

"I…um, I would apologize, but -"

"Yes, you should be sorry! This is an Ermenegildo Zegna." He growled lowly and the Italian name slid off his tongue in such a way that it sent shivers down her spine. Not entirely unpleasant ones, she'd be loath to admit.

"Who cares about a suit? You just ended that man's life!" She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and took a few steps back to distance herself from the vampire. "Besides, you clearly can afford another one."

Dracula rolled his eyes and sighed, his hands now working on their own accord as he began to carefully peel the ruined jacket away from his body. "It's not about the money, Roxana, it's about the craftsmanship and quality of the items; think of the countless hours spent meticulously sewing and sizing each individual article of clothing. All of that dedication and hard work tossed away just because you can't stomach a little bit of blood."

"Unbelievable." She began to pace in a small circle, dragging her nails quite viciously and repeatedly through her unruly locks. "You care more about some bits of fabric than a human being's life."

After shaking off the chunks from the coat, he placed it sloppily over the corpse and started working on his vest. There was that ferocity that he recognized in her, it reminded him of Agatha, and it was that Van Helsing fire that was not so easily snubbed. "You will come to learn, my dear, that death is part of the journey. It is the finished masterpiece. Think of it as your magnum opus! It is the very thing that defines the meaning of every life and is nothing that you should be afraid of."

"You're missing my point completely and, for the record, I'm not scared of death."

Dracula was relieved to find the button-up shirt underneath his vest to be unscathed, but also a little more than slightly intrigued by her statement. He would, how they say, put a pin in it and return back to that later. "Then why are you so upset? It's not like you knew him."

She groaned and threw up her hands in exasperation. Roxana was not about to try and teach an old vampire new moral tricks, that was well above her pay grade.

Rolling up his sleeves, the Count set out to retrieve his belongings from the pockets of his jacket and then fitted the dirtied clothes onto the dead body. For the final touch, he slid his Ray Bans over the man's glassy eyes. "Ah, good enough, I suppose."

Dracula took a step back to view his handiwork while absentmindedly wiped the remaining blood from his face. Roxana stopped her pacing to stare dumbly at the sight before her. The mugger was propped up against the wall with his head drooped down to the side, covering the neck wound so it looked like someone who had little too much fun and passed out on the sidewalk. Not an entirely uncommon sight in this city.

"Please tell me you're not just going to leave him here."

He looked at her with raised brows, "And what would you have me do?"

"Clean up after yourself!" Roxana cried out. The adrenaline rush she got from witnessing a murder had not completely dissipated so now she was left grasping a bout of minor hysteria. "I would think that would be obvious!"

Dracula laughed, "That's rich coming from someone who just upchucked her dinner all over one of my finest suits!"

"Because you decided to floss your teeth with some dude's carotid artery."

"Why are you surprised? You know what I am!"

"Well, excuse me if I was a little caught off guard because it's a hell of a lot different seeing a vampire up close and in action as opposed to a tiny, shitty computer screen!" She was nearly shouting, oblivious to the desperation in her own voice as he drew closer. Her neck craned upwards to try and boldly keep eye contact while his grin grew to make him look like the cat who caught the canary. "Stop smiling like that!"

"Make me." His tone was teasingly low, those eyes wicked and sharp. She noticed how lively Dracula looked after he fed. It was unsettling.

WHOOP! WHOOP!

They jumped apart as sirens suddenly yipped at them and a bright flashlight waved back and forth between their faces. The dark street was instantly flooded by the red and blues spinning on top of the police car.

"Oh, fuck me." She murmured with wide eyes. Her hands instinctively started to raise a little before she forced them back down, reminding herself to act casual.

Dracula leaned over slightly, "Is that an invitation?"

"Please shut up." She hissed back, shooting him a glare. "And no, it's not."

He made a facial shrug and then smirked, tossing her a casual little wink just to rile her up. The short, frustrated huff he got in return was satisfying enough.

"Everything all right here?" The cop rolled down his window and peered out at them. "And how about your friend over there? He's not looking so great."

The light shined over the dead guy leaning against the wall and the pair froze, glancing at one another.

This was her moment, she could tell the officer about the murder and maybe he could protect her against…the vampire. Oh, who was she kidding? Dracula would quicker snap her neck and drain the officer before risking the chance of exposure like that.

Meanwhile, her inner moral soldiers battled fiercely inside her brain over whether or not she should even say something about the murder. On the one hand, the count was a vicious blood-sucker who killed a man in a blink of the eye without any remorse, but on the other hand, it was technically self-defense…on her behalf anyway.

Logic eventually won when she realized that even if she did rat him out, it was highly unlikely the cop would even believe the truth. She would sound like a crazy person. The mental image of Dracula laughing and waving while she, hands uncomfortably cuffed behind her back, watched on with teary eyes as he grew smaller and smaller in the distance because the cruiser she was detained in drove off to the nearest prison…or an insane asylum. Whichever was closest.

Be killed or incarcerated? Neither were ideal. So Roxana went for door number three instead.

Dracula saw the look on her face. The look of a scared little rabbit getting ready to bolt. He had already tensed in preparation for her to make a sudden move but, to his surprise, that peculiar look vanished and Roxana smiled.

"All good here, officer! And yes, unfortunately this drunk pleb is with us. We were just about to get a ride back to the airbnb, sir." She shrugged her shoulders with a laugh. "It was his first time on Bourbon Street."

"Yes, I do believe he had one too many bloodys," Dracula was pleasantly surprised by her change in demeanor and happily played along. "Poor man vomited all over himself before we could find him a bin. Such a lightweight."

The officer squinted a little and they waited with bated breaths as he took a moment, which really felt like ages, to decide whether or not he believed their story.

"Alright then," He said at length and pointed to Dracula, "You make sure they get home safe now, ya hear?"

Roxana's eyebrows rose in disbelief while the Count grinned toothily, stepping over to her. She felt his hand slide up her spine and rest in a light grip around the back of her neck. "Of course, officer. I'll take care of them."

With a nod, the cop turned off his lights and drove back down the street, making a left at the next corner. Roxana let out a breath she didn't know she was holding and dropped her shoulders.

That was a close call.

"My, my, your heart is racing, Roxana." Dracula murmured into the darkness that had enveloped them once more. His thumb brushed over her pulse point and he was thrilled when it spiked at the touch. She went to move away but halted her step when she felt his grip tighten, those claws threatening to make a cut. He turned her to face him and firmly, but gently tilted her head back to force her to meet his stare.

"That was your chance. Why didn't you say anything?"

"Please," She scoffed and jutted her chin out defiantly, "We both know it would've been pointless."

"Still," He spoke softly, his head angling back as he observed her, "You could have told the police officer the truth."

"And have you kill us both? I think not. Remember, the foundation showed me those videos and I know you're immune to bullets. So what good would that have done me?"

Dracula stared at her for a moment and then wetted his lips slowly before speaking, inching closer and closer towards her face. "For the last time, I'm not killing you yet because I wish to get to know you, but if you keep bringing it up, I might feel inclined to change that timeframe."

"Well are you going to be this intolerable all the time? Because if so, then just get on with it, I'm in no mood to play a long con here, big guy."

"No, I do believe the fun has just begun."

"Great. Just great." Roxana was truly done. She could still taste the bile on her tongue like acid, it made her feel disgusting, and she wanted nothing more than the day to end. "Now, if you'll let me go, I'm in desperate need of a shower, a toothbrush, and a bed. Maybe a nightcap too because the last twenty-four hours of my life have been absolutely fucked."

Acquiescing her request, Dracula released his grip and allowed her to distance herself from him once more. He watched as she dragged a hand down her face and heaved a sigh; her blue eyes almost shined in the darkness up at him as she gave him a tired half-assed glare. She then turned and started walking towards Canal Street.

"Where are you going?"

"Home." She called over her shoulder, her manners be damned. "Goodnight, Dracula."

The Count gawked when she didn't even give him a second glance and he did nothing but watch as she made her way to the end of the street and disappeared around the corner. He truly did not understand that woman. Perhaps it was ingrained in the Van Helsing blood to be habitually nonplussed by his vampiric prowess.

He pulled out his cell phone with a sigh as his thoughts drifted to the dead man wearing his now-ruined five-thousand-dollar suit and about a quart of said Van Helsing's DNA. Dracula needed to get rid of that evidence before it came back and bit him in the ass. No pun intended.

"Hello, my lord, how was your day today?" Renfield sounded chipper as ever.

"I need you to dispose of a body."

Dracula grinned from ear to ear as he listened delightfully to the unfiltered frustration in Frank Renfield's long-suffering sigh.

—

What a day, Roxana thought as she shuffled onto the streetcar and plopped down in one of the wooden seats. With a lurch, the machine squealed and rattled as it moved forward along the track. She winced; the benches on these particular modes of transportation were incredibly unforgiving on one's posterior.

Blankly, she stared into nothing, not paying attention as the buildings passed by. The events of the night played on repeat in her mind. A real vampire killed a real person right before her eyes. Was this really real life now? She was too exhausted to try and figure it out.

She felt like an outsider looking in on her body as it ran on autopilot. Her hand pulled the string to stop the car and somehow her feet managed to take her all the way to her front step without incident.

Fifolet meowed at her incessantly by the door but it sounded muted and far away as she unlocked it. Robotically, she made a beeline to the bathroom and shed her clothes along the way. Not even waiting for the water to warm up, Roxana stood unflinchingly under the cold spray and began to clean herself as the temperature increased to the cusp of scalding. She scrubbed and scrubbed until her skin was red and raw. When she was finished, she pressed her forehead against the tiled wall and closed her eyes, simply listening to the water roar around her.

Without thinking, she lifted her hand up to gently wrap her fingers around her neck and couldn't stop her mind from wandering…from remembering the distinct sensation of another hand. His hand. She could almost still feel the vast expanse of his palm grasping her jugular and those impossibly long fingers curling nearly all the way around. Or how he leaned so close until he was just a breath away and anytime she would inhale, those fingers would tighten ever-so-slightly against her flesh.

Roxana's eyes shot open and she dropped her hand like it was on fire. Goosebumps lit up her arms and legs, despite the scorching water. Slamming the nozzle off, she threw back the curtains and began to dry off with furious gusto.

He was a vile creature. A feral beast. Not even human. The mere memory of his hands on her should be enough to appall her entirely. It must be delirium, she thought stubbornly, shaking the abhorrently traitorous images from her mind. She wrapped the towel around her head and strode towards the bedroom.

"I just need to go the fuck to sleep." Roxana muttered to herself and swiped the half-empty bottle of bourbon from the counter on her way. She collapsed onto the bed once she reached it, but sleep did not find her. Instead, she laid awake through the early hours of the morning, watching the ceiling fan spin on and on and on. She steadily knocked back the remainder of the liquor until the corners of her visions blurred and her eyelids became too heavy to keep open.

By the time the sun had risen in the sky, the bottle had rolled underneath her bed, long since emptied, and her light snores could be heard along with the chirping birdsongs. Fifolet patted over and curled up next to the woman, resting her paw gently on her outstretched arm and knowing that her human would be needing comfort now more than ever before.

—

The rest of the week flew by without any sort of batty drama and Roxana was grateful for it. She had a light workload with only two dinners scheduled and each went off without a hitch. All felt to be back to normal within her world. The weather wasn't comfortable yet, unfortunately, so she spent most of her free time relaxing at home. Not that she was using the cold as an excuse to stay inside and away from a certain someone. Nope, not a chance.

After that night, she had woken up with a righteous hangover and truly believed she had made up everything that had occurred in those twenty-four hours, but the textual evidence on her phone proved otherwise. Dracula had messaged her just once, to make sure she had made it home after their encounter, which she had to begrudgingly admit was rather sweet. Other than that, she was surprised to hear nothing more from the Count.

Roxana was cherishing the peace and quiet while she could. She knew that this whole interaction with Dracula was almost one-hundred-percent going to end up with her premature death. It wasn't hard to understand that hanging out with vampires and certain mortal peril basically went hand in hand. Not to mention the pesky fact about her being directly tied to a bloodline of women who had quite a lot to do with this ancient warlord and, spoiler alert, both of those women were killed...by him. So she intended to enjoy the calm before the storm.

Her phone went off next to her as she was boiling a pot of water for her own dinner and she saw an unknown number flash up at her.

"Hello?"

"Ah Miss von Hels, this is Keres Grimaldi. How I appreciate you taking the time as I am sure you must be terribly busy." The cold, feminine voice on the other line was not who Roxana had expected.

She blinked and then glanced around. The only plans she had this evening were drinking a bottle or two of wine, eating pasta, and watching some mind-numbing sitcoms. Yes, she was terribly busy. "Oh, no, not a problem at all. What can I do for you, Miss Grimaldi?"

"I would like to go over some of the details for this upcoming dinner." Keres' tone was icy and authoritative, leaving no room for nonsense or frivolous chatter. Roxana had a hard time imagining this woman throwing any sort of convivial party. "First, I believe you are aware of the delicate situation I am in, as head of the council, and the reason I chose your restaurant as the location once more is that I know that you will handle these delicacies with the same discretion you do with all of your soirees. Your clientele is famous and you appear to have the subtlety to maintain secrecy."

Roxana could not tell if this woman was being deliberately facetious or if she just always had the demeanor of a robotic bitch. Realizing very quickly that she wasn't about to get many words in, the chef put the phone on speaker and began to record the conversation so she could go back over it later to write the details down in her schedule. Work smarter, not harder. With a smile, she continued stirring the sauce as Keres plowed onward with her demands.

"The dinner will take place on the last Friday of the month, just two weeks before Mardi Gras. We shall be seating ten and you will provide meals for only five. It will be just you there and no other employees during the dinner, absolutely no exceptions."

"Okay, I'll have them leave before the clients arrive. You understand that includes my valet, right?"

"Yes, the transportation will be taken care of, therefore parking will not be an issue."

Strange, Roxana thought to herself while pouring the pasta into the strainer. "That works. Anything else? Dietary restrictions?"

As the words left her mouth, she winced and silence filled the room. It was a perfectly normal question under any other circumstance, but perhaps not this one.

"I noticed the other night that you seemed to be familiar with Mr. Balaur."

"I…um," She wasn't sure how she should answer the woman, "It was the first time I had met him, but I guess you could say we have mutual acquaintances."

"Miss von Hels, you are aware of his vampiric nature, are you not?" Well, Keres was certainly not tiptoeing around the subject.

"…Yes."

"Good, that's one less tedious explanation. I will provide the necessary dietary requirements, so you need not worry yourself over that. As for the mayor and his partners, you will want to contact them and decide on a menu that will suit their needs."

"Easy." She poured another glass of wine and took a long drink. "Anything else?"

The line was quiet for a moment and she had to check to make sure the call hadn't ended before Keres spoke up, "No, that will be all for now, Miss von Hels. Thank you for your time."

"Thank you for calling, Miss Grimaldi, I hope you have a great rest of your evening." Roxana really appreciated clients who were straight to the point, for it was often a headache to deal with indecisive people.

"One more thing," Keres' voice made her hand stop midway from pressing the end button, "Watch yourself around him. I've spent some time with Mr. Balaur in the last few years and I have never seen him look the way he did at you and this concerns me, not for your wellbeing of course, but for the future of our council. I will not have him go feral again, not under my watch, so if you know what is best for yourself, I would advise you to attempt to maintain a distance and use the utmost caution."

This caught Roxana off guard and her brows furrowed, "Then why are you having the dinner at Sanguine, if you are so concerned about this?"

Keres let out a laugh and it was anything but joyful. It lasted a beat too long for something that couldn't even be considered humorous and continued to send chills fluttering down Roxana's neck with a foreboding sense of danger.

"Oh, I know better by now than to try and take his toys away."

Taglist:

@festering-queen​ @vissidarte213​ @moony691​ @allis143​ @torntaltos​ @apocalypsenowish​

[ncityofangels]

Shoot Out (Mafia!AU Jooheon x fem!Reader pt.2)

a/n - Sorry this took me so damn long to write, we all know I’m shit at updating properly. Anyway, I don’t really have much to say on this one. Hope y’all enjoy. <3

Part 1 <---

Summary - You meet Jooheon on a whim during a traumatic accident in your life. You don’t know what he does for a living, but you know he’s well off. As things progress you start to doubt where all the money comes from. One night you walk in on him handling mob business and get pulled into a life of crime and treachery. Things are good for a while, you being the Bonnie to his Clyde, but soon you start to question how far would you go for the one you love?

Word Count - 1.8k

Genre - some fluff, mostly angst towards the later chapters, maybe a sprinkle of smut who knows ;)

Warnings - definitely some “vulgar” language.

The pain woke you up. The sharp sting of a wound you barely recalled receiving. You assumed someone had given you painkillers to allow the little bit of rest you had actually gotten. You awoke to a bizarre and unfamiliar landscape. A four poster bed with ivory satin sheets enveloped your body. “What the hell?” you whispered. The last thing you remembered was walking home after work down a dim avenue on your way to your apartment complex. The homeless person. An image of a battered old man asking for money flashed through your brain. That’s when you really felt the stitches holding the gash in your side from continuing to gush blood. “Damn that hurts like a bitch” you whispered to yourself again. You still couldn’t tell where exactly you were, but it was nice enough to have a fully decorated guest room, so it most definitely couldn’t be a hospital. “Stab wounds tend to do that”. You heard a voice from the corner of the room, and realized there was someone standing in the doorway. A tall man with chestnut brown hair, a broad figure and a serious expression joined you in the room, shutting the door behind him. “Who the hell are you? Where am I?” You panic, immediately jumping to the worst possible scenario you could muster. That of course being that you were sold into sex trafficking and were only ‘saved’ so you could service men. This undoubtedly was not the case but you wouldn’t figure that out until later. You could tell your sudden outburst surprised him. “Well….um….I’m Shownu. This is my boss’ house. We found you bleeding on the street...uh….we have a kind of on-site doctor here and this was closer than the hospital so…” the tall man, apparently named Shownu responded. You were still suspicious about the whole situation but you decided to drop it for now, the pain in your side once again returning. You lifted your thin shirt to reveal the large bandage taped to the side of your torso. While you observed your wound, Shownu kept talking. “I was told to tell you that since you’re a guest here you’re invited to dinner tonight. There’s a dress in the closet for you to wear, and the table is set at 6. After that, if you desire, transportation will be arranged to take you back to your apartment.” he finished, proud of himself for properly delivering the message to me. You went to tell him that dinner wouldn’t be necessary and that you wished to go home as soon as possible; however, you didn’t get a chance to reply, as the boy had already escaped the room. “I guess I don’t have much of a choice” you thought to yourself. You gently rose from the bed, making sure you didn’t irritate your laceration, making your way towards the towering wardrobe that was placed in your room. You open the wardrobe to reveal an emerald green lace cocktail dress and white stiletto heels. “You have GOT to be kidding me.” I said to myself. “They do know I literally just got stabbed, right?” I sighed. Obviously this wasn’t something I was going to be able to get out of. I began to carefully undress out of my ‘shady mansion surgeon’-issued clothes and slip into the small piece of fabric provided to me. “This is weird as fuck, but what the hell”.

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Jooheon POV

“I delivered the message, sir.” Shownu said, plopping himself down in one of Jooheon’s office chairs. The superior responded with a nod of his head, nothing more. “If I may ask boss, why exactly are we involving ourselves in this?” Shownu continued. Jooheon paused the ledgers he was working on and glanced up at his employee. “What kind of mob boss would I be if I just let an innocent bystander bleed out inside the boundaries of my empire?” Jooheon joked. In all seriousness, he knew well that she could become a liability. If word got out that there had been a murder within feet of one of his tenants shops, many friends to his ‘business’ could pull out of transactions for fear of their inventory being compromised. Murder was second nature in his line of work, but any news of a non-mafia related crime spike could jeopardize future negotiations. “Speaking of the events of last night, did you take care of the man that caused this?” Jooheon asked. Shownu raised his head, responding “I think it’s safe to say he won’t be a problem anymore”. Jooheon looked satisfied. “Good. Now I want you to do one more thing for me”.

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Y/N POV

Once you were dressed, you finally liberated yourself from the confines of your room. Shownu never told you where to go for dinner so you turned down multiple hallways and ventured down a bunch of stairwells before finally coming to what you thought may be the right place. As you explored, you noticed the beautiful rustic yet modern designs in the house. From the wooden beams extending from the floor to the ceiling, to the cozy furniture included in every room. The design of the house definitely made it feel a lot more like a home, despite the size. Once in the dining room, you sit down in one of the many chairs at the table. The food was surprisingly already served and ready to eat; however, your host had yet to arrive. “Nice of you to invite a guest to dinner and not show up” you whispered to yourself, a little irritated that you got dragged to dinner with this guy and he had the nerve to be late. “Sorry about that, I had some…..business to take care of.” A man, assumedly the host of this dinner and the owner of the house, walked towards the table from a room you had yet to see. Shit, he probably heard you make that comment. He had sleek black hair and an intimidating face, but something about him was attractive. He was wearing a black suit with a green undershirt, coincidentally matching your dress. Everything about him was contradictory. His face was serious, but in some ways very soft. Like his true demeanor was hidden behind a daunting facade. You wished you could stop analyzing every little thing about him but it’s like he had a gravitational pull. “I’m Jooheon” the man said, taking his seat at the head of the table. “I’m…” You went to respond to him but he cut you off. “I know who you are”. You guessed he’s not the most well-mannered person you’ve ever met. “How exactly do you know who I am?” you implored. “We got your purse back” He responded, stuffing his mouth with whatever food was on his plate. Alright then, not a big talker either. You slowly started to eat your food, sensing that you weren’t going to get much out of him right now. At least the alfredo you were eating tasted pretty good. As all food should when it comes from the kitchen of as grand a house as this one. “How’s the wound?” Jooheon asked, restarting whatever ‘conversation’ we had initiated before; however, you were done playing games, you wanted answers. “What made you think you could just bring me to your house and patch me up instead of taking me to the hospital? I’ve never met you before” you stated. Your question was abrupt but he maintained his composure, unshaken by your urgency. “I’m sorry the accommodations I made for you aren’t suitable enough. I remind you that I could have let you die on the street without as much as a lift of a finger, so I would appreciate a little thanks in that regard” He threw back. You were shocked. How was this man already so good at throwing things back in your face. You finished what little was left on your plate and effectively dodged the response you received from your host. “I think I’ve overstayed my welcome. If it’s not too much to ask I’d like to be taken home now.” You quickly responded. Luckily, he had finished his dinner too and was noticeably irritated with your presence. “I think that can be arranged.” He replied. “Wait by the front door. I’ll call for an escort. I hope next time we can meet on better terms, Y/N” With that final statement, he retreated back to the hallway he originally entered from. “Hopefully I won’t get so lucky” you whispered to yourself, making your way to the entrance to the estate.

Once in the car, you thought of the events of the past 24 hours. First you were mutilated by some random homeless man. That was fun. Then you were taken to this random rich man’s house to get operated on by a currently unknown surgeon. After that you had dinner with this random rich man in his luxurious home. Now you’re finally on your way home. Honestly, this was the most adventure you’d gotten in years, but you just wanted to crawl into your own bed, in your own clothes and go back to your normal life. You arrived at your apartment pretty quickly, thus making you think that you weren’t too far away to begin with. You made a mental observation of that fact and tucked it away in some filing cabinet in your brain. Once you came to a complete stop, you hopped out of the expensive car, thanked the driver and walked up to your door. You already sensed that something was off, but you didn’t realize until you let your eyes drift around the entrance to your house. The first thing you noticed as your eyes moved upward was the brand new, state-of-the-art electronic door lock that was now installed on your door. But that wasn’t all. Security Cameras. All around your complex. Your landlord was cheap as hell so you knew he didn’t buy them. “What the hell is all of this?” you whispered softly, wondering how all these gadgets found their way to your doorstep. The last thing that caught your eye was the bouquet of white roses placed on your ‘Welcome Home’ doormat. You slowly leaned down to pick up the arrangement, carefully not to jerk too much as to bother your bandage. You noticed a familiar label attached to the wrapping around the flowers. They were from one of your favorite floral shops nearby, Lily’s. As you examined the bouquet you noticed a white card dangling from one of the roses. “Let’s see who these are from” you said, delicately opening the card to reveal a short message. “Rest up. We’ll be seeing each other very soon. -J”.

[inkribbon796]

Jackieboy Man Origins: Chain Letter

Another Origin story, I did one for Silver a while back and I wanted to do one for Jackie.

Summary: For an Irish web developer, it’s been a long night. A long night that turns into a strange morning when he wakes up in the hospital and no memory of how he got there.

~::~ 25 Years Ago ~::~

   As a young man was dragging himself and his friend back from a haunted, twisted mansion in a half-dead hypnotic stupor, an Irishman was sitting at his computer in the dark early morning. Unseen to him, something in the wires of his computer were waiting, watching him for the slightest mental distraction, a fatigue to help it.

   For the man at the computer, it was late. Later than Sean usually liked to be up. Especially in the cabin he lived in with its thin walls and out in the middle of absolutely nowhere, Ireland.

   At the moment he was getting a call from his old friend, Chase. Both of them worked as coders and web designers for the same company.

   “Look, it’s not that I don’t believe ye,” Sean told him. “It’s just that yer full of shite.”

   “Hey, I did what I could, an’ it’s not workin’,” Chase answered, contacting him over the phone.

   Sean audibly groaned,  “Fine, send it. If it’s because yer wife downloaded another virus again, I will personally come over to Brighton and kill ye and yer computer.”

   “If yer gonna buy me a new computer, then bring it,” Chase dared.

   Sean groaned, “I’ll tell you when I’m done with it. Prolly gonna be done later in the week. I’m tired as shit.”

   With a goodbye and a couple barbed insults, Sean hung up. He was about to shut down his computer and go to bed. Closing up programs until the email from Chase came in.

   “Come on,” the Irish man groaned, and against his better judgement opened up Chase’s email and started reading through some of Chase’s notes.

   Two paragraphs in though his eyes started to get itchy, and his throat began to feel dry.

   “I’m tired,” Sean muttered, not meaning to say it out loud.

   “I’m tired.”

   Sean looked around, trying to find the voice.

   “Tired”

   The Irishman was looking around for his glasses, his eyes tired and having problems focusing. It made it look like the whole monitor was going fuzzy with static.

   “Tried”

   “Ugh,” Sean groaned, scratching at his own throat. “Arrrghhh!”

   “Aren’t you just sooooooo tired?”

   Sean stared at the screen, hazy with static and it seemed to be reflecting his smiling face back at him.

   “Ch—” Sean scrambled for the phone. Something was wrong, as if thousands of strings were being tethered to every muscle in his body. “Chase—”

   The Irishman’s head hit his desk and then . . . like a stiff marionette puppet being suspended by strings . . . he got back up again.

   The next thing Sean became aware of was lying down on a slightly cold surface, with a beeping noise echoing off the walls.

   “Ugh,” Sean coughed out, more and more of his body aching by the second. “Am I dead?”

   “No, but you’ll wish you were when the guards get back in here.”

   Sean startled and saw another of his friends sitting in the chair next to him was one of his friends, and his roommate, Marvin. “Marv, the fook happened to your face.”

   Scored down Marvin’s face were long claw marks, stitched to hold the wound closed. Marvin glared at him, looking like he was about to punch him in the face.

   “Yah get inta a fight with a cat or somethin’,” Sean tried to joke.

   Marvin leaned over him, glaring murderously at the other Irishman, pointing to his own face. “You did this to me?”

   “What?” Sean tried to sit up, but found out that he had both hands closely handcuffed to his hospital bed.

   “Yah scratched up my like a fookin’ demon cat,” Marvin spat at him. “Ye almost tore yer own throat out, an’ then ye tried to take my eyes out.”

   “I didn’t,” Sean tried to defend, but a sinking pit formed in his stomach. As if his body knew what he’d been up to last night, but for the life of him he couldn’t remember a single thing that had happened. The web designer was pretty sure he’d fallen asleep at his desk while working. “I wouldn’t—”

   Suddenly, Sean felt like a lump was forming in his throat, and it itched. The urge to reach up and scratch the skin of his throat was eating at him. His brain spiraled into a panic attack, and it felt like his body was physically spinning out of control.

   It took Marvin, two nurses, and a doctor to calm Sean down again. Now with Sean knocked out, Marvin was left to think. He’d known Sean for a long time, and the last thing he expected the other man to be, was violent. Marvin was pretty sure Sean didn’t actually have a violent bone in his body. He could get loud and belligerent, but never violent.

   But thing Marvin had stumbled upon while entering the cabin, that wasn’t Sean. It had taken everything Marvin had to convince everyone that Sean wouldn’t have purposefully tried to burn the cabin down, or attacked Marvin or the officers. Which got harder when his blood work came back clean as a whistle.

   But everyone was letting Sean rest. Sean was still sleeping while Marvin had to think. Yeah, he’d talked Sean out of getting thrown in a cell for arson and attempted murder. But that wouldn’t stop it from happening again.

   Desperate for anything to help, Marvin ran out to a store he typically got his candles and magic supplies.

   “Hey, Marv,” the girl behind the counter smiled at him, using his stage name since he could count on one hand the people he told his actual name to.

   “Hey, Clara, ye still got those weird doll parts?” Marvin was already running towards the back of the shop.

   She just stared at him, “Yeah, why? You inta puppets now or somethin?”

   Then she got a good look at the scratches on his face, “What the hell, man, what happened ta yer face?”

   “If I told you you’d stop me,” he told her, and handed her the money to walk out with his kit.

   “Be careful,” she warned him.

   “Will do,” he promised, and then rushed back to the hospital, smuggling in his kit back into Sean’s room.

   “Okay,” he took a steadying breath, over Sean’s still unconscious body. “This is such a bad idea, but yah can thank me after it works.”

   Then Marvin began working, trying to make the doll look as close to what he saw in the cabin. The dark, glowing green eyes, the slit throat, the wraith-like form. Once he was done with the life-sized model, he waited for the nurses to make their rounds and check on Sean. Marvin smiling, having the doll hidden from them in the bathroom. Cause a life-sized model of a guy was a sure fire way to get him supervised in the room at least.

   Then Marvin waited for them to leave before setting up the room for his Plan A: exorcise his friend and roommate. If he needed a Plan B, Marvin would burn that bridge when he crossed it.

   “Hey, Jackaboy,” Marvin tried to smile. “You awake?”

   No answer.

   Marvin frowned, then he took out a spellbook, “Good.”

   He uttered a quick summoning spell, standing outside the containment spell he’d drawn on the floor. Sean began to convulse and scream, his skin literally buzzing.

   Sean’s screams were so loud, the door flew open as a passing nurse came in, “What the fook?”

   Then a force of pure static electricity shot out of Sean, as a creature that looked almost exactly like the Irishman still passed out on the hospital bed, except for the gash on his throat. The being of malic and chaos just floated in the air above Sean’s bed.

   “Well, well, looks like I found myself a street magician too big fer his own britches,” the creature cackled. The nurse was still at the door, staring at the creature in horror. It smiled back at her.

   “Hey, you almost got my friend arrested,” Marvin tried not to show any fear.

   “Still got time fer that,” it dismissed.

   “Here’s the deal, ye go into this image I made, and I don’t destroy you,” Marvin threatened.

   The doppelgänger just cackled, sounding like Sean just with a crackling, static-like tone to it. “An what? Let yah rip me apart, I don’t think so Two-Bit Copperfield.”

   “Yer going to do it, or I’ll make yah,” Marvin threatened.

   It just laughed again, the very air charging with static electricity, and the creature lightly touched down on the floor, looking at the symbols and lines that were keeping him in. “Yah pay for those magic tricks?”

   “None of your business,” Marvin finally started actually getting brave.

   It took one of its feet and stubbed out one of the lines, blowing back the power onto Marvin, who flew into the wall.

   “Cause, ye got yerself ripped off,” it cackled and moved closer to stand over Marvin’s pain wracked body, the magician slumped against the wall as muscles in his body shook and trembled with electricity.

   “When you want ta learn some real tricks, call me,” the thing took its claws and scored a name into Marvin’s arm: ANTI. Marvin screamed in pain and watched the cop that had been taking questions early bust in.

   Anti looked back at him, standing up and walking back over to Sean’s bed. Marvin heard Sean make a confused groan. “Well, this place has gotten a bit stale. I’ll be seeing you around Copperfield.”

   Marvin tried to pull himself back up, his arm burning. “Wait,” he growled.

   “Hey, get away from them,” the officer barked, rushing for Anti.

   “No, I don’t think so,” Anti grinned, his head almost glitching. “So, buddy, yah got a gun or a TASER? Cause I’m itching to have some fun.”

   There was a loud grunt, and everyone, even Anti, looked over to see Jack struggling weekly against the cuffs tethering him to the hospital bed.

   In the distraction, the officer grabbed onto Anti, trying to wrestle him onto the ground, and got jolted with visible electricity for his troubles. The officer dropped and convulsed on the ground, screaming in pain. The nurse closest to the door rushed to him.

   “Aww, what’s wrong?” Anti smiled at Sean as he walked over to him.

   “No,” Marvin panicked, trying to weakly scramble with his good arm for anything to make Anti go away.

   “I’ll be with you in a second, Copperfield,” Anti summoned a dagger from almost a violent tear in reality itself and threw it. It perfectly nailed Marvin’s other shoulder. Effectively disabling him. Marvin screamed.

   Another dagger got the mannequin Marvin had made, electricity catching it on fire. “And there we go,” Anti’s smile got wider, “get rid of that eyesore.”

   With another step, Anti was leaning over Sean, barely out of reach as Sean. “Hello, well, it has been fun, but I’m tired of you. So, let’s have a little fun with you and your friends before I go.”

   “Get away from them,” Sean threatened.

   “Oh? Puny little human,” Anti cackled, grabbing the Irishman still cuffed to the hospital bed and started to jolt him. As the glitch demon shocked and coursed electricity through him, his whole body glitched the very air around him. “What ye gonna do about it?”

   Sean screamed and sudden his whole body seemed to move, as if every part of his body was just vibrating and shaking, rattled by the electricity.

   Three things happened almost at the same time, and to Marvin’s perspective they did. Time seemed to slow down as Anti reached for his throat. Sean gave a final tug and the cuffs came free. As quick as he could, Sean hit Anti in the face, what felt like electricity coming off his entire arm, but he didn’t see anything.

   The glitch demon recoiled back, mostly in shock, holding the side of his face and just staring at the Irishman who was struggling to get out of the hospital bed and to get in front of Marvin. Adrenaline was coursing through his body, keeping him upright.

   “Yer goin’ ta regret that,” Anti warned.

   “Get away from him,” Sean told him. “Yer not gonna hurt him again.”

   Anti cackled, his body glitching, “What are yeh goin’ ta do? Bleed on me?”

   Sean took a nervous step back, almost stepping on Marvin’s leg, Marvin was able to pick himself up enough to lean against Sean’s legs, placing a hand on the back of his leg, and starting to draw something, his hand shaking as he screamed out in pain.

   “When I kill you, I’ll enjoy it,” Anti promised.

   “If I hit yah once, I can hit ye again,” Sean threatened, just hoping that his body wasn’t nearly as hurt as he thought it was. The police officer seemed to finally be getting up, coughing and holding his arm. Sean hoped it might help get Anti under control, even if he didn’t think whatever Anti was could even be arrested.

   Anti just walked over, “I will enjoy tearing you apart.”

   Sean winded back for another punch, but when he tried to hit Anti, the glitch just stepped to the side. Giving Sean an amused, chortle.

   “Little fly,” Anti chuckled, the glitch demon’s eyes glowing, the iris of his mostly black eyes green. “Somethin’s never change.”

   Then, Anti scratched Sean across the chest, making him stumble back as Anti floated above him and gave him a smug look. Sean already felt drained, a mix of the painkillers, his throat, and the fact that he’s been mentally out of it for hours. But his body also felt absolutely wired with adrenaline.

   He lifted his arms but Anti froze, jolted by something. His eyes almost crackling with static. “You!” he snarled at Marvin. “What’d yah do ta me?”

   Marvin let out a chuckle. “Plan B, thanks fer jumping outta my friend.”

   With a harsh scream, Anti began to glitch and distort, screaming as he was trying to reach out for Jackie but burst into static and seeming disappeared.

   “Is he dead?” Sean gasped.

   “Prolly not,” Marvin coughed. “Should leave us alone fer a while, though,” Marvin slumped over onto the ground. Sean just sat down as two nurses raised over to them.

   “Well kid, yah off the hook,” the officer said. “I don’t think the boys are gunna take ghosts as an excuse. Sorry I couldn’ta been ‘a useful back there.”

   “No prob,” Sean told him. “I’m tired, can I got ta bed?”

   “Try to stay with me a bit longer,” the nurse told him, checking his eyes and all the deep scratches on him. The nurse that had been treating the police officer was now treating Marvin, calling on the radio for back up. Sean’s tied mind losing the voice in all the medical jargon.

   “What’dya do back there?” The officer asked. “I lost sight of yah and suddenly yah were in front’a yer friend.”

   “I just hit him, think it surprised him,” Sean admitted. “Marv’s got a spellbook or whatever the hell he calls it.”

   Looking over, Sean saw the cheap journal Marvin used to store and record his “notes” lying all the way across the room. “Give me a sec,” Sean said. “Maybe Marve took some notes on the bastard.”

   “Wait, you shouldn’t,” the nurse began but Sean was already up.

   He took a couple steps and faster than his brain could process it, Sean had slammed into the opposite wall, knocking him flat on his back. At the sudden loss of air in his lungs, Sean began coughing, trying to roll over but found that the adrenaline in his body was already starting to drain out. “Ugh,” Sean groaned in pain.

   The room went dead silent.

   Then, the nurse swore. “Did you just?”

   “Ugh, everything hurts,” Sean complained, and then passed out.

   Next thing Sean process was that he was in a new room, about three doctors in the room and sensors monitoring his pain. But at least, he had enough painkiller not to feel how absolutely destroyed his body probably was.

   “Hey, jackaboy,” Marvin greeted, he was sitting next to him, his shoulder and arms bandaged up. “So, quick question, yah have any secret identities I should know about?”

   “No, why?” Sean asked, already feeling pretty loopy.

   “Good, cause I’m pretty sure some suits have been in here, and they walked away with a lot of yer blood,” Marvin told him. “Mine too.”

   “Pretty sure, they can’t do that,” Sean reminded.

   “Well they just did,” Marvin told him, “I tried to fight them, but they were about to arrest me if I didn’t comply.”

   “Fer what? Doin’ magic without a license?” Sean tried to joke.

   “No, cause you went 0 to 15 with just yer feet, before colliding with a wall and took a chunk outta the plaster,” Marvin told him.

   “Huh, yah’d think I’d remember that,” Sean thought out loud. “But hey, if I did, I can maybe become a superhero or somthin’. Wouldn’t that be funny?”

   “He awake?” a woman’s voice got Sean’s attention.

   “An’ drugged ta hell,” Marvin warned.

   “Then this won’t take long,” she said and walked over to where Sean could actually see her.

   “Hey,” Sean smiled.

   “You’re Sean McLoughlin, from Althone, Ireland?” she looked at him, studying him up and down.

   “Yeah?” Sean answered. “Who’s askin’? Is this about the wall I broke?”

   “We’re more concerned with how the wall broke, than who broke it,” she corrected.

   “Shit,” Sean shrugged, immediately regretting it because of how sore he still was, even with the painkillers. “Ow. Why did I do that?”

   “Are you still hurt?” she asked.

   “Nah, it’s just sore,” Sean correct. “What were we talking about?”

   The woman didn’t seem to even be frustrated. “Do you know what happened, Mr. McLoughlin?”

   “Nah,” Sean dismissed. “I think there was some glitchy reject video game character, an’ now everythin’ should hurt, but doesn’t cause’a these awesome drugs.”

   She looked at Marvin, but Marvin shrugged, “Hey, guy’s as high as a kite, what do ye want from me?”

   “Mr. McLoughlin, my name is Agent Laine,” she told him.

   “Kay,” Sean smiled.

   “We’ll let you get back to sleep,” Sara told him. “I’ll be back.”

   “Hopefully with an actually reason to take our blood,” Marvin reminded.

   “Only if we find anything out of the ordinary,” she said and left.

   “Finally,” Marvin growled.

   “She doesn’t seem nice,” Sean commented.

   “Alright, you might not remember this, but last night you moved fast, like superhuman fast, and I did actual magic. It was amazing.” Marvin smiled. “Unfortunately the suits figured out.”

   Sean just laughed, “Yeah right, an’ I’m a superhero.”

   Marvin shrugged, “Sleep it off, I’ll try and keep the suits from locking you in a padded cell.”

   “Yer the best, Marv,” Sean told him, and they just kept talking, more joking than anything else until Sean got tired again.

   In five days Sean would run through town in a colorful, oversized hoodie and an old Halloween mask he’d find in Marvin’s box of things. In five days, Sean would race around the city, testing out his newfound super speed.

   But today there were just two friends in an isolated room, talking and laughing. Both of them enjoying the little bit of peace they had while it lasted.

[vipclifford]

dazed and confused pt.4

A/N: this was very self indulgent but idc

Calum’s fingers bounced upon the keyboard, none being pressed, leaving the document blank before his eyes. His copy of Les Miserables laid open by the side of his laptop, endless annotations and highlights filling up the novel. He flicked through its pages, looking for a suitable topic to write his essay about. Literature was fucking difficult.

Most thought to focus on the revolution, or Valjean’s character development over the chapters, but Calum wanted something else. Something creative. Something to show his professor he was truly invested in the course.

His phone buzzed, Calum’s brows furrowing st the sound. He was certain he had turned the sound off as an attempt to remove distractions. On the screen was a message from his mother. His daily Bible quote.

Calum sighed, hand rubbing over his face before setting the phone back down where he found it. He still hadn’t told his mother about Noah.

It was only natural, he thought. His mother was a devout catholic, attending mass every Sunday morning and helping out her Christian community whenever she could. A necklace with a wooden cross rested permanently on her collarbone. Growing up, his mother had started a small group with her close friends who had children around his age, making them meet weekly to discuss the word of God. He didn’t hate it, having eventually found friendship between the other teenagers in the group. It just wasn’t his favourite thing to do.

But now Calum was in college and he had just turned 19, and he felt so different from the young boy who had his communion for the first time.

He knew that his mother finding out about Noah would shatter her heart. He knew of the disappointment and shame he would bring onto his family. He knew that it could also sever the ties he had with them. He would be alone.

“Calum,” Michael spoke excitedly as he barged into his room. “My bro, my best friend, the coolest guy I know.”

“What do you want,” he replied monotonously, not looking up from the pages of his book. He was clever enough to see through his endless string of compliments.

“Crystal’s coming over tonight,” he explained, sitting down on the edge of his roommate’s bed. “So, you know. I think you might rather sleep somewhere else tonight, if you know what I mean,” Michael smirked, meeting Calum’s unamused look.

“You guys are like rabbits,” he complained, nose scrunching up in disgust .

“Trust me when I say that if you liked women you’d understand.” Calum simply rolled his eyes at his words, saving his blank word document before closing his laptop. “So?”

“I could probably crash at Noah’s if he’s not busy, I don’t know,” he shrugged, grabbing his phone. He swiped left on the notification from his mother, leaving his lockscreen on display. It was a picture of himself and Noah. His lips were happily pressed against Noah’s cheek as his boyfriend laughed about something he couldn’t quite remember. It was one of his favourite pictures.

“He’s literally in love with you, of course he’ll let you stay over,” Michael said as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. Which it was.

“No he’s not,” Calum answered all too quickly. It was Michael’s turn to roll his own eyes, unwilling to listen to his weekly speech about how much he rejected love. How it’s all just chemicals in the brain, loading you up with enough serotonin to make you delusional.

“Whatever, just piss off tonight, yeah?”

Calum twirled the metal spoon mechanically around in his cup of coffee. It was barely considered a coffee, for it was loaded up with enough milk and sugar to mask its bitter taste. Whatever Noah was talking about was going in one ear and out of the other, completely merging into background noise. Instead he watched the small tornado in his drink.

“You alright?”

He looked up to meet concerned eyes staring back at him. Calum nodded, taking a sip from the hot drink. ‘Still bitter,’ he thought, nose scrunching up slightly in disgust.

“My mind is just elsewhere, sorry,” he explained with a careless shrug, eyes scanning their small table for a small packet of sugar.

“Here,” said Noah, handing Calum a small packet of sweetener. He always scolded Calum for opting for sugar, telling him sweetener was a much healthier option that still got the job done. He took it defeatedly, too lazy to stand up to get the sugar he wanted. “You want to talk about it or be distracted from it?”

“I don’t know,” he muttered, pouring the sweetener into his drink. He swirled the powder around, refusing to look up and meet Noah’s gaze. “It’s something I should probably talk about but I don’t want to.”

“Maybe you’ll feel better if you talk about it?” Noah suggested, unsure of how to handle the situation. Instead they sat quietly for the next few minutes as Calum debated whether or not to speak.

“What was it like for you when you came out to your parents?”

“Uh, I was fifteen I’m pretty sure, and the three of us were sat at the table. They were both on their phones or reading a book or whatever. And then I said that I had something to tell them, and my mum asked me if I had a girlfriend. I said no, obviously,” he clarified with a small chuckle. “Then I just said ‘I’m gay,’ and they were like ‘okay.’ They didn’t even look up from what they were doing. They were just completely fine with it, acting as if I had just told them my favourite colour.”

“That’s good though,” Calum mumbled. “That’s exactly how people should react. Like it’s the most normal thing in the world.”

Noah grasped his boyfriend’s hand, fingers lacing before giving it a gentle squeeze. He stood up from his seat suddenly, fingers still interlocked as he suggested to ‘go for a walk.’

Calum’s arm was swung over Noah’s chest, bare leg tucked between his. The thin layer of sweat over his body made the sheets stick to his skin. A lazy smile pulled on his lips as he thought of what they were doing five minutes prior, fingers tracing the purple bruises on Noah’s collarbones. His boyfriend would occasionally press kisses to his neck, the stubble he sported tickling his skin.

“I don’t think I could ever come out to my parents.”

“Why not,” Noah asked a few seconds later, after letting his heavy confession simmer in the air.

“I can’t imagine a single positive outcome that would come from it. My family is very Catholic, they’d excommunicate me themselves,” he chuckled bitterly, his way of trying to make deep discussions feel less serious. “My parents would never speak to me again and I don’t want to lose them because of something I can’t even control. I didn’t choose to be attracted to men and I didn’t choose to be born into a Christian family. It feels like no matter what I do I can’t win.”

“Nobody is pressuring you to come out right now. You do that when you’re ready, when you feel mentally strong enough to deal with whatever consequences that may come,” Noah explained, fingers threading methodically through Calum’s hair. “And your pessimistic ass is only thinking about the worst possible outcome.”

“It feels like it’s the only one,” he murmured, rolling onto his back. Noah grabbed Calum’s hand and brought it up to his lips, pressing a soft kiss to his knuckles.

“Whatever happens, remember that you’ve got me, and all of your friends, and whatever future boyfriends you may have by your side to deal with it.”

“Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Imply that we’re going to break up,” Calum said with an obvious tone. He could see Noah’s lips stretch into a cheeky smile from the corner of his eye, instead choosing to focus on the ceiling.

“You don’t want to break up?” Noah grinned, rolling over onto his side face him.

“If I did I wouldn’t be lying here in your bed, babe,” he replied easily, ears burning red. Noah smiled at his words, deep dimples indenting his rosy cheeks. He placed a hand on Calum’s jaw and turned his head, forcing their eyes to meet. “What? Do you think we’re going to break up eventually?”

“I don’t want us to break up either,” he confessed before rolling over closer to Calum, joining their lips together in a sweet kiss. “You just don’t tend to talk about your feelings. So anything you let slip about how you feel about me makes me really happy.”

Calum found himself back in front of that same blank word document a few days later. His phone buzzed with a message from his mother, a Bible quote about perseverance.

He thought back to his conversation with Noah while his fingers typed and deleted a reply like a scratched vinyl. He threw his phone gently across the room and onto his bed as soon as he hit send, the device burning his hands like acid. Now he just had to wait for a reply.

‘Hi, mum. I’ve been dating a boy for the past few months. I know that you believe in God and that it says in the Bible that it’s a sin, but you don’t have to be scared because it also says that God created everyone in his image and that everyone is of equal worth. I’m sorry if this upsets you. Hugs from Calum.’

tag list: @aftermidnightclifford @alongcamethedevil @5sobsessed @rainingcal @calssunflower

[ilovetowritei]

Part 1 - The Flowers

I don’t really know how posting on here works. I wrote this this morning, and I am writing the second part now. 

I guess a warning for mention of depression, medication and mental illness. 

I love Grizz and Sam on the Society. I think their dynamic is beautiful, and Sean Berdy and Jack Mulhern do an amazing job bringing their characters to life. I also find it highly improbable that Harry is the only one that suffers depression given their situation.

*******************

Grizz had been tending the flowers.

For six months, without help or prompting, he had been weeding and watering, pruning and coaxing the delicate little buds to life. He wasn’t really sure why he did it - it just felt like something that needed doing. The flowers might not serve a useful purpose, but they served an emotional one. They were beautiful, and a part of Grizz knew that that was enough.

He’d been back from the expedition two weeks. The shock of Allie’s blood sliding down her face still hit him every time he walked into town. His friend, the only person who had been able to step up and face the reality of this new place. He’d grown to see her as fierce, but in that moment, her pale face beneath a black beanie, she was vulnerable, a seventeen year old girl afraid of the school bullies.

Except now, they weren’t just ruling the school hallways. Lexie and Harry ruled the town, decided who did what and when. They decided, quite literally, who would live, and who would die. Grizz had moved back into his family home, isolated on the outskirts of town. He’d spent his time cleaning up his home, drawing maps to the land and mostly, trying to work out how they were going to survive.

But today was different. Something was tugging at his heart. The pain of loss was bubbling up inside him, threatening to overflow as it had been since the buses had dropped them here. So he walked to the one place he could think of where life was beautiful and simple. He walked to the gardens out behind the library, where his flowers grew.

Caught up in his thoughts, Grizz didn’t hear the heavy breaths coming from beneath the shade cloths. He didn’t notice the footprints pressed into the muddy ground. He pulled each peg from the cloth carefully and then threw the cloth back.

“Sam?! What the fuck?” Beneath the shade cloth, Sam was lying in the flower garden. Frozen weeds and dying buds were spread out beneath him. The boy looked up.

It was this look that showed Grizz that something was wrong. The last time he had seen Sam, his blue eyes had been clear, tears leaking silently from their corners. Now, lying in the garden bed, Sam’s eyes registered Grizz without comment, settling on Grizz for a moment before turning their stormy gaze back up to the clouds. No tears, but no light either.

“Sam? What are you doing?” Grizz tried again. He wasn’t looking, couldn’t read the words tumbling from his lips. Grizz felt every ounce of anger and hurt seep from his body as he nudged Sam gently. He leant over him slightly and signed.

Sam. What are you doing? The words still felt clumsy in his hands. Still, Sam registered them. His own hands rose from where they rested on his stomach, drawing pictures in the sky that Grizz couldn’t catch.

Slow down.

Sam looked at him properly for the first time. Grizz felt his eyes boring into his chest, measuring his worth. I don’t want to be here anymore.

For a moment, Grizz stood confused. “Then hop up. Go home.” But even as he spoke, a part of his heart started to shatter.

On this Earth. Living. Sam spoke the last word quietly as he signed it. Grizz’s hands went to his head, raking through his hair. Even before, Sam had always been full of life. A strong steady present in the back of the room, signing his sass to Becca and offering up sardonic grins whenever he made eye contact. Those grins had squeezed the air from Grizz’s lungs. They’d been his first indication that this was a boy he should stay away from, someone that could actually make him feel something.

This wasn’t the same boy in front of him. Sam’s body was long and thin, his hands and face pale against the rich soil. He was shivering, and Grizz noticed that there were new angles to his body. Angles that hadn’t been there… He shoved the thought from his head.

Why? Grizz was glad that his hands couldn’t betray his heart the way a crack in his voice surely would have. Tears had started to slide down Sam’s face and finally Grizz broke, reaching out to wipe them from his face. He pulled Sam up into a sitting positioning knelt down.

Why? His hands shook.

“I don’t know what to do. Allie is gone. Campbell is in charge. He’ll ruin everyone. It’s not just my life he can fuck with anymore. It’s everyones. I don’t know what I’m doing. He won’t let me go home. Won’t let me get any of my things, or any photos of us and mum and dad. He won’t even let me get my tablets.” Sam gulped.

“Tablets?”

“Medication.” Sam’s voice was soft. Grizz’s heart plummeted.

“He’s stopping you from getting your medication? For how long now?! This whole time?!” Grizz’s voice rose with anger. Sam swallowed.

“I weaned myself off of them at the start. I figured that I couldn’t keep relying on them. But it’s creeping back. I can feel it, under my skin.” Sam looked up at Grizz in desperation. He couldn’t take it any longer. Grizz reached out and took his face in his hands.

“Sam. What’s the medication for?”

D-E-P-R-E-S-S-I-O-N  Sam finger spelled the word slowly, trying to convince himself that this wasn’t some dirty secret. He’d never expressly hid it. It just wasn’t something people knew, particularly when you couldn’t communicate with them. Becca knew, had been supportive in his rough patches. But here in this new world, he didn’t know how to reach out to her. Didn’t know how to explain that despite everything changing, the sluggish feeling creeping through his veins was back.

Grizz looked at him intently for a moment. He hadn’t seen Sam properly since the goodbye. Around town he had looked hurried and tired, a sight Grizz had attributed to life with Eden. He hadn’t seen the pain in Sams gaze, the mindless working of his fingers when his brain was working overtime. He pulled Sam forward into his arms.

“I came to look at the flowers. After we got dropped here. I would come and look and they gave me hope. But then they started dying. And it felt like all the hope was gone. You were gone.” Sam’s voice cracked as he broke into sobs, body shivering against Grizz. He was wearing only a button down and jeans. Grizz shrugged out of his puffer jacket, wrapping it around Sam’s frame. A part of him smiled at the image - Sam wrapped in something of Grizz’s, swallowed by the size and warmth. An image he had dreamed of in their other lives.

You liked the flowers?

Yes. Sam watched Grizz warily.

“A garden and a library.” Grizz murmured. Two places of beauty.

“Cicero.” Grizz looked at Sam in surprise, shocked that he had remembered.

“Yeah.” Grizz watched him for a moment. “Eden right? That’s the baby’s name?”

Sam looked down at the mention of his family. Becca had noticed his slide in the last few days, settling into a routine with the baby allowing her to finally see the pain building in her friends soul. Last night he had told her, about Grizz and thanksgiving, about Grizz’s pain and the way he had left. Becca had cried with him. And then flicked his ear.

“Sam. You’re an asshole.” Sam looked at her in fear. “Why didn’t you just tell me? We could have worked this out. I wouldn’t have told everyone you were her dad-”

“NO!” Sam yelled, standing abruptly. “I am her dad. She’s mine!” Becca looked at him in shock. His face was red, tears and snot dribbling down it.

“That’s not what I meant. Of course you’re her dad. From the moment you held her, you were her dad.” She looked at him, pleading for him to understand. This was their family. She loved him, so much so that she wanted him to be happy even if it meant braving the ridicule she knew would come when people found out who the father really was. “I just want you to be happy. Tell him. Tell him and tell him if he tells anyone else I’ll kill him.” Tears streamed down her face.

“I am her father.” Sam was nothing if not stubborn. His heart was full of love for this baby.

“And you always will be. But you will also always be gay. We can’t hide that from her, or from anyone else. So tell him. You’ll always be her dad. But he deserves to know. Because one day, she will know too.” Sam looked at her and felt his heart continue to break.

“Yes. Eden.”

Beautiful.

“Grizz…” Sam wasn’t sure what to do. How to say what he wanted, needed to say.

“I get it. They’re your family.” Grizz stood, heart shattering as he wiped his nose against his sleeve. Sam was a good guy. Which meant family had to come first. “Look, I’ll find a way to get you some of that medication okay? If things are getting bad, better you have it and we work out a solution from there.” He stood and turned to walk away.

Some flowers weren’t his to tend. Sam would never, could never be his.

[incoramsanctissimo]

So..you can answer this privately or post (or not answer at all lol). Up to you. But I just saw your tags in a post about pregnancy that said you don't mind sharing about your experience. Could you just talk a bit about your pregnancy, giving birth, breast feeding, raising a baby and being married? I realize that's like so much lol I just want to hear it from a young faithful Catholic woman. Thanks in advance :)

Absolutely! I’ll answer publicly in case anyone else is curious, plus I’m not really a particularly private person.

I tried to add the break but don’t know how to do it on mobile. I’m sorry guys, cause this is looooong. Scroll past if you don’t want to read a bunch of uncomfortable personal stuff.

First of all an unfortunate but essential part of the story is that I did not act as “a young faithful catholic woman” in the beginning, and it had a profound effect on all the rest. I’m not sure a person is supposed to broadcast their sins like this, but it’s essential to the story. I got pregnant a month before my wedding, which had been moved up from May to October in part because my fiancé and I were really, really failing in the whole chastity department and judged it best to just get married. AFTER that decision, I became pregnant. I started throwing up and feeling miserable and exhausted at four weeks, and got married at about five. It was not fun, guys. As soon as I saw that positive test I fully realized how irresponsible I had been and fully regretted my actions. I was constantly nauseated and threw up most days, couldn’t keep down liquids (so bad dehydration) and was deathly, deathly tired. Because of the hormones, I would feel nothing but a vague depression all day and then all of a sudden at bedtime burst into tears because I “couldn’t take it” or I had some worry about the baby’s future, though at that point I didn’t feel much emotion towards her of any kind. I was working a job I hated too, full time with an hour drive, and I had only gotten four days off the week of my wedding. I have to give my husband so much credit for the way he handled entering the married state with a pregnant, emotionally needy and physically drained wife. I was not in a bridal frame of mind at all and he just took it in stride. I had a much harder time adjusting to the married state. By the way, we were living in a large room in a house shared between my husband and two other guys, one of whom was the nightmare roommate par excellence.

In my second trimester things got a little better. I was able to eat more than pizza rolls and smoothies (yes, those were my 1st trimester foods), I quit my job and got a part time that was much much better, found out I was having a girl and began to actually feel a bond between me and the tiny bump that was starting to wriggle and press inside me: I had enough mental health to handle my husband getting laid off a week after I quit and to actually be some consolation to him for the month that neither of us had a job.

As the third trimester approached my baby was diagnosed with IUGR, Intrauterine Growth Restriction. They said the placenta wasn’t working correctly. I started throwing up again and having super painful episodes of what I thought was just really bad acid reflux. I got an average of four hours of interrupted sleep per night. I went for my 30 week appointment and told the midwife I was working a nine-hour shift that day, and she wanted me to call out but I wouldn’t. The next morning when my husband got up at five he found me curled up on the couch just crying because everything hurt so bad and I was so tired and I just really didn’t see how I could take much more. I called my mom and told her my symptoms and she said it sounded like preeclampsia. Then I called my best friend, who’s a nurse, and she told me to go to the hospital RIGHT NOW. Finally I did, though in retrospect I should probably not have been driving. When I finally got seen they took one look at my blood pressure and rushed me into the l&d emergency ward, where they had me iv’d and cathetered and being pumped full of magnesium before I knew what was happening. I asked when I’d be able to leave and they said “when that baby’s out of you.” I had severe preeclampsia and HELLP syndrome and I spent the next two weeks in the hospital. That day was Good Friday. I was supposed to make it to 34 weeks and then induction but two weeks in I had a night of the worst pain I’d ever had, and blood pressure they couldn’t keep down, and my liver was swollen and my kidneys were about ready to go, so they started the induction. The baby was struggling under the stress of the forced labor so I was once again rushed through the hospital in a bed to surgery and they performed an emergency C-section. Luckily my husband had gotten there earlier that day. He baptized our daughter as soon as she came out and I got to see her later on in the NICU. Her face and head were covered by a breathing machine and her body was so, so thin and tiny, but I knew she was beautiful. When I got to hold her for the first time she instantly became the whole world to me, and I was vaguely surprised at how painful it could be to have someone be your whole world — I had thought I loved my husband deeply but this is a whole new thing. She was in the NICU for five weeks and leaving the hospital without her was awful, but I visited every day and just held her against my skin for hours. She had a feeding tube and I wasn’t able to start breastfeeding her until about four weeks later, but when I finally was allowed to I was so proud of myself and her. I still love feeding her, I feel like it’s almost a way of communicating between us. I feed her everywhere and hope I can help normalize it even a little.

Our baby finally came home at what would have been 38 weeks and it was so exciting and so scary. I had of necessity unofficially quit my job when I was admitted to the hospital so now all of a sudden I was a stay at home mom, in a new house and a new town because we had moved to the country with my husband’s cousin literally the day I gave birth (thank goodness for helpful family members). I just spent my days cuddling and feeding my tiny one. She loves snuggles and in the early days refused to be put down, so I had her in my arms for about 19 hours a day. (I often wear her in a baby wrap, and it is a sanity-saver.) I still had episodes of that same pain I had experienced before I gave birth, and for a long time they were really bad, like screaming-into-a-pillow bad. My husband took me to the ER twice but they couldn’t find anything and it’s gradually gotten much more manageable. After a while I started feeling better overall and seriously taking on the responsibility of the cooking and the house as well, but I still spend a lot of time cuddling, feeding, singing and reading to my little girl, and I think it’s good for her. I don’t want her to ever, ever have the possibility of feeling unwanted or unloved, because even though I wasn’t quite ready for her and she put me through more physical and mental suffering than I thought I could handle — and in the process destroyed all my cute little mental images of maternity — I am truly and honestly so honored to have been granted participation in creating this beautiful, unique, new human being. I had read stuff about the dignity of sex but I didn’t really understand it until after she was born and I could fully appreciate that what we did led to this whole new person, with a personality and attachments and preferences and talents. And the best part? After my body and brain are (hopefully) completely healed, this privilege is granted to my husband and me not just once, but God willing many times over, and I am happy to go through it all again for another tiny human, because in more ways than I have words to say, it is worth it.

[kimnamjooonz]

Blank Space - Episode 13

Halo

Songs used in this chapter:

Into You - Ariana Grande

Love Me Harder - Ariana Grande

Halo - Beyonce

'Remember those walls I built, well, baby, they're tumbling down, and they didn't even put up a fight, they didn't even make a sound. I found a way to let you win, but I never really had a doubt, standing in the light of your halo, I got my angel now''.

They went back to the hotel without inconveniences. They weren't talking much but Sebastian couldn't take his eyes off Morgan and she was too busy pretending she was oblivious to that. Before Sebastian wished, they were on the seventh floor and Morgan was sneaking away from him. ''Hey, Morgan, wait a second...'' he was determined not to end up his night like last night, without sleeping thinking about her. But Morgan was way too sneaky and by when he had stopped talking the doors of the elevator were closing. She hadn't even said goodbye. Sweet, attentive, Morgan Llewellyn. ''Damn it'' he spoke to the empty elevator. ''This woman is going to drive me crazy.'' He went back to his room and started pacing around it. He didn't want to go to bed yet because he knew that he won't be able to sleep at all. Morgan's eyes seemed to be stuck in his head. He lost count how much time he had wasted pacing around the room when he finally decided to leave. He was not going for a walk or anything of the sort. He was going to the seventh floor to see Morgan. He didn't know why but something inside of him was telling him that it was the right thing to do. When he reached Morgan's room he noticed that he wasn't the only one there. There was also a dude with a tray that looked like he was from room service knocking on her door. And before he could chicken out and ran away, Morgan had opened the door, with her eyes going from the room service lad to finally land on Sebastian. Too late to run indeed. ''Well, well, well'' she had her usual side smirk on his face. ''Double dessert for tonight, I see. Thank you...Kevin'' she read the lad's name tag, received the tray and gave him a nice tip. ''You're welcome, Miss.'' he guy seemed to be very happy by the tip or by the sight of Morgan. ''What do you want me to do with him?'' he pointed at Sebastian as if he was a fanboy trying to sneak into Morgan's room instead of an international movie star. ''Do I call security?'' ''No, I'll deal with him. But thank you, Kevin.'' Morgan looked really satisfied. The guy left, leaving Morgan and Sebastian alone. ''Security? Really? Did he think I was an stalker?'' he was acting as if it was the most natural thing to be found outside his co-star's room at midnight. ''He caught you creeping outside my room, what did you want him to do? What are you doing here, by the way?'' He was finally paying attention of what she was wearing and he was losing his ability to breath. To put it simply, the only thing she had changed was his silver dress and instead she was wearing something that he guessed it was a babydoll that could be seen from under a short silky pink robe . She was still even wearing the same heels. It was going to be hard from him to take that image off his head. ''I just... needed someone to talk to.'' ''I guessed so.'' She uncovered the food that she had asked for. It seemed that only Morgan Llewellyn ate strawberries with chocolate at the middle of the night. ''Were you waiting for someone? Judging by your suggestive clothes and the weird food choice...'' ''If I had been waiting for someone I'd have let the room service guy take you with security, only for the fun of it. And don't judge my clothes. I will never allow that.'' ''That makes me think that maybe you were waiting for me'' he tried to melt Morgan with a seductive glance but she remained stony. ''Yeah, because I see the future and I knew you were coming.'' Of course she didn't see the future but Sebastian was way too predictable. He didn't know what to say and he was starting to feel a bit out of place in Morgan's room. ''Why don't you make yourself comfortable?'' she offered, after all, he had come only to talk. ''You said you wanted company and... I can give you that. Look, it's all fun and games but... if you need something, I'm here for you, remember?'' she squeezed his shoulder and then traced his arm only to hold his hand to guide him to her bedroom. He couldn't believe his luck. He had Morgan Llewellyn and a plate of strawberries with chocolate waiting for him. She placed the strawberries in the middle of the bed and lied beside them. ''Hey, you can sit here, I'm not going to eat you.'' He softly lied at the other side of Morgan's bed. ''So, what did you want to talk?'' He shrugged his shoulders. ''I don't know. Maybe I just needed the company. It can get lonely sometimes, you know?'' ''I know. I'm thousands of miles away from home and sometimes I feel that I'm always causing drama, no matter what I do. Ask my agent if you don't believe me.'' ''People love you, Morgan.'' and he had never seen drama surrounding Morgan and if there had been, Sebastian himself had been responsible for it. ''For now. I'm the newcomer and people want to see me living happily ever after winning Oscars, working for Marvel and married to you. We're selling the fantasy, Sebastian and it's working. But... what if it were to become a reality? They'd hate my guts. Look, Taylor Swift was America's Sweetheart once, then she was labelled as a serial dater and finally as a snake. I don't really want that to happen to me.'' And she was right. Sebastian knew that she was enjoying the love of the people while it lasted because they could turn against her, at any moment. ''I though you didn't care about people's opinions.'' ''I don't. But no one likes to be hated. However, if it becomes unbearable, I'll just grab my money, my dignity and get back to Caernarfon. No one can find me there.'' she grabbed an strawberry and bit it. ''You can get one for yourself. They are not poisoned.'' It seemed like at that time of the day and after a mentally exhausting event Morgan was letting her guard down. ''Why 'Morgan'?'' he asked, also biting a strawberry. ''I know that's not your real name. You don't have to tell me your real one if you don't want but... why did you chose that name?'' ''Morgan Le Fay. King Arthur's sister.''

An Arthurian legend, of course. Somehow that matched of what he knew about her. He remembered reading a King Arthur book many years ago and Morgan Le Fay was like the Thanos of the story. ''Wasn't she the like... the worst? Wasn't she responsible of the falling of the kingdom? Didn't she send someone to steal Merlin's powers?'' Morgan was quite surprised that he was so well informed about Arthurian legends. ''Well... yes, but at the end she tried to save King Arthur.'' ''But she couldn't.'' ''Well... no. She may be evil, but I like her because she's powerful.'' Sebastian had the sensation that Morgan was keen on justifying the villains. One more example to her questionable approach to life. But whatever it was, it was working and Morgan was winning at life. He grabbed his phone only to google about Morgan's name-giver. ''Here she is. Morgan Le Fay. Always pictured as an incredible beautiful woman with dark hair and impressive eyes. Sounds like someone I know'' ''I can't believe you're doing this. I chose the name because I like the way it sounded. And I also like the character. It's not that deep, Sebastian.'' ''Maybe, but it's entertaining. Oh, and here's a description of her! 'Morgan Le Fay, also known as Morgana, Morgain or Morgane... a witch that symbolises evil, hatred, revenge, ardent beauty, desire, temptation and above all, passion.'' Sebastian almost choked. It seemed like a certain someone had her stage name well chosen. Maybe Morgan Llewellyn wasn't the living embodiment of hatred and revenge (even though she was a little evil) but he totally agreed with the 'ardent beauty, desire, temptation and passion.' It matched so much with her that it was almost scary. ''What are you thinking?'' she asked. ''About why don't you tell me your real name. Because it's quite hard not to know it. It's like talking to a nameless face. I want to know who you really are, which is hard when I don't even know your name.'' She had a winning smile. ''If you want to get to know me, you should take your time. I won't tell you my name but I challenge you to find it out. And if you ask Taylor, Damien or Lucas it's considered cheating, okay?'' she extended her hand at him and he took it and shook it. ''Understood.'' She smiled with mischief, grabbed another strawberry and handed it to Sebastian. ''Bite'' she whispered. Goodness gracious, he thought. He was literally eating from Morgan's hands. He knew that she was toying with him but he didn't care. He threw the caution through the window and wasted no time to accept Morgan's offer, biting the strawberry in a painfully slow pace, taking his time to look at her face. ''Delicious'' he mumbled. ''I know'' She was so near him that he was starting to feel a bit dizzy. She was like a magnet and he couldn't even fight it. Every second he was closer to Morgan. Before he knew, she was playing with the chain of his necklace. ''I didn't know you had a chain round your neck'' her old fangirl brain was sparkling with curiosity. ''I just wear it under my clothes, that's why no one has seen it before. It was mum's, I think. It's a star and I associate it with the Winter Soldier, that's why I wear it.'' ''It looks good in you'' she placed her head on his chest and closed her eyes. Morgan had totally lost control of the situation. She had let her heart take the wheel and the result was that she was playing the seductress in front of Sebastian Stan, enjoying the closeness and looking straight at his eyes, giving a damn about his girlfriend, their careers, their agents and anything else. Maybe he had been right when he proposed that they should have eloped to Alaska. There was no way for Morgan's brain to take back the control. Once her heart was in it, she couldn't be stopped. And Sebastian wasn't helping, he had one hand around her waist and the other was playing with her hair. They lost count of the time they spent close to each other, without saying a word but saying everything that needed to be said with little movements of their hands. ''Why don't we watch something on TV?'' she proposed after a long time. She just wanted to keep him by her side for a little while longer. ''I agree'' he grabbed the remote, that was closer to him that to Morgan. He started changing channels, skipping stuff that didn't look promising. ''What about Outlander?'' he asked. ''Because I really love that show and I never miss an episode. Scotland gets me even though the last season is set in colonial America.'' Morgan was thankful that he had good taste in TV shows. Not even in that sense he disappointed. ''I really like it. It's in my top five of my favourite shows of all time.'' ''Good to know that'' he wrapped both of his arms around Morgan's waist and placed his chin on the top of her head. ''Let's watch it then.'' Half an hour later both of them were ugly crying with the episode. ''Forgive me'' she said, wiping the tears from her eyes. ''Don't worry'' he was burying his face into Morgan's hair. ''I couldn't keep my eyes dry either. But it was just so sad... poor Jamie has two kids and he couldn't be a father to either of them. And it wasn't even his fault... he was just the most unlucky guy on earth.'' ''This was heartbreaking.'' she turned her head to look at Sebastian. ''Real life drama doesn't move me but I'm a sucker for sad fictional stories.'' Both of them had their eyes full of tears. ''Are we being over dramatic or we really got sad?'' he asked. ''I don't know about you but it really got me sad. Not even the steamy scene at the end could take my mind out of it.'' Sebastian, who was still teary eyed, looked at Morgan with a mischievous smile. ''Quite a pity that Damien didn't want to include steamy scenes in our movie.'' ''You perv.'' she gave him a soft slap in his arm. ''Give it a rest. For once you're not going to be naked in a movie, you should be happy about that.'' ''Maybe... but I have the feeling that you're happier than I am.'' ''Of course'' she confirmed him. Lie. Lie. Lie. Lie. Lie. Lie. For years she had fantasised of doing a sex scene with him similar as the one he had done in The Bronze. Of course that Damien was never going to do that and instead he was going to make Morgan and Sebastian share quite a few kisses. They haven't started filming those scenes yet and sincerely Morgan was quite relieved with the delay. Kissing Sebastian Stan made her feel all kinds of nervous. ''I get to kiss you. I'd probably be the envy of half the male population in the world.'' he was looking very cocky at that moment. ''I can't wait.'' she said with sarcasm. But on the inside, it was no sarcasm at all. She really couldn't wait to kiss him. Sebastian seemed to be thinking the same. But his cocky demeanour was gone and instead was replaced with a vulnerable look in his eyes that Morgan had never seen before. It was incredible how fast he could change his emotions. ''Morgan... thank you for keeping me company tonight. I've been feeling so alone the last couple of months...'' he confessed, catching Morgan off-guard. ''I'm all the time surrounded by people but... they don't seem to get me. And then... you showed up and I swear I never hated you, even when I thought you were the most annoying person in the world, and you changed my life. You make me feel better with myself and you really calm me down.'' ''Wait a second'' she interrupted him. ''How do I do that? We don't spend much time together outside of the set and we're not even great friends. We're here together only because Damien sent us.'' He switched his position so he could be placed in front of Morgan. He had a hand on her cheek, in a little touch that was so intimate that almost made Morgan shudder. ''I don't really know. I guess it's just a natural reaction. We have good chemistry on set so it's not weird that we should get on well off set too. I think we're pretty compatible''. Morgan didn't know if he was being really vulnerable or if he was trying to use a weird technique of flirting. His eyes looked at bit sad but Morgan didn't rely much on that. He was an actor, just as she was and he could be pretty manipulative, just as she was. One manipulator knows another. ''In my opinion, a mess and a mess make even a bigger mess.'' But Sebastian didn't look cocky or pretentious. He looked like a man unsure of his emotions, who didn't dare to do what he should do: leave the girlfriend he didn't love and pursue the woman he liked. He wasn't a coward but he still didn't know if what he felt for Morgan was real or a simple crush. And he definitely didn't love Florence but maybe one day he would. She was a nice woman, very different from chaotic Morgan. He traced Morgan's cheekbone with his thumb. No, it definitely wasn't a crush or infatuation and not even desire. It was something that couldn't be defined as love yet but it was on the way of becoming exactly that. Morgan lifted her hands and stroked his hair, running her hands across his neck. Those little touches were somehow more intimate than kisses or anything else. She ended up lying on top of him and he had his arms protectively wrapped around her. She felt so safe and at peace that she wanted to stay this way forever. ''Tell me something else...'' he whispered. ''About your life in Wales. About the Morgan I don't know.'' Well, she was your avid fan, to begin with, Morgan thought. ''I was just an aspiring actress trying to make a living out of the thing I love the most.'' ''I imagined that you were that gorgeous girl that everyone wanted to take to prom and she ended up dating the most popular kid in the school.'' ''Gosh, no. I was too busy acting to try to be popular. I just kept to myself. And I could have never dated the most popular kid at school because that was my brother.'' Sebastian remembered seeing a picture of Morgan's brother and mistook him for a model. No wonder he had everyone at school swooning for him. ''And what about the second most popular?'' Morgan looked quite disgusted. ''Ew, no. That was Josh Barrowman who later dated Taylor and even proposed to her before we left for New York. He's horribly mundane, I swear I don't know what the hell was she doing with him. She deserves better, even when she gets annoying.'' ''Josh Barrowman... he sounds like an asshole'' ''You're right... he's an accountant.'' Sebastian's cocky smile was back. ''And Morgan Llewellyn would never have considered an accountant, am I wrong?'' ''You're not wrong. I'm only interested in actors.'' In one particular actor, she though. The one that never left her mind. He wanted to believe that he could be among those actors Morgan was interested in. Before he said something he'd regret later, he stopped with that topic. ''You should sleep, Morgan. It's two a.m. Do you want me to leave or to stay?'' Morgan looked at him with a side smile. ''What do you want, Sebastian?'' He immediately knew that Morgan was up for anything he wanted. ''I want to stay.'' Morgan just took off her robe and Sebastian could see with his own eyes that he had been right and she was wearing a pink coloured baby doll. ''You should take your jeans off unless you want to spend a really uncomfortable night.'' Sebastian had a playful smile on his face. ''You're quite bold Llewellyn. Do you want me to strip for you?'' he started to play with the waistband of his jeans. ''Ew, no'' she lied. Of course that her real answer was a blatant yes. She would have loved to see him naked if she could. ''Just take off your jeans, nothing else, for the love of God.'' His smile was still not fading. ''What if... I'm not wearing anything under my jeans?'' ''I can see your Hugo Boss boxers from here, Sebastian''. ''That was a failed attempt to be seductive.'' ''Definitely'' she agreed with him. Both of them turned off the lights at the same time and Sebastian wasted no time to wrap his arms around Morgan's stomach. He wasn't listening to his conscience that was screaming at him to stop with this foolishness because he was one step away from cheating. If he wasn't already. He put all of that away from his mind and focused on inhaling Morgan's scent. Morgan herself was relaxing into his arms, knowing perfectly well that this was a one time thing that won't be repeated any time soon. If it happened again at all. Better enjoy it while she had him for herself. Slowly, both of them fell asleep.

The next morning she woke up first, smiling when she noticed that she was still wrapped in Sebastian's arms. His hands were still delicately placed on her stomach and she reached out for them, felling as if she was in one of her fangirl dreams. And when he woke up, his feelings were more or less the same. He felt a bit dazed and he still couldn't believe that he was cuddling Morgan. ''Good morning'' he mumbled. She just wanted to scream over the sound of his sleepy voice. He shouldn't be allowed to walk freely on the streets being that sexy, even in the mornings when literally everyone was a disgusting mess. Apparently he was the exception. Anthony Mackie had been right when he had said that he was going to get arrested for killing all the ladies. ''Thank you'' she simply said. There were many things she wanted to say to him, like this was one of her best mornings she had ever had in her life and that she'd have loved to wake up next to him more often. They were in silence for quite a while, knowing well enough that their moment was ending very soon. ''I supposed I have to leave'' he whispered, letting Morgan know that this was the last thing he wanted. ''I'm sad to say that it's true, my team will be here soon and if they find you here our heads will roll.'' ''Your head will roll, Morgan. My team gives crap about what I do as long as I don't do anything inappropriate. Getting close with Morgan Llewellyn is one of the things I'm allowed to do.'' 'That makes me feel so much better'' she said with sarcasm. ''Now leave.'' ''Wow, that was fast.'' but Sebastian didn't hesitate to put on his jeans and almost run towards the door. After all, he didn't want to get Morgan in trouble. ''See you later.'' But it was too late because when he opened the door, with his messy hair and loose jeans, he was face to face with Lucas, who was looking at him with a raised eyebrow. And Sebastian couldn't blame him for being suspicious. ''I was just leaving'' Sebastian looked at Lucas' stony face. ''Just in case... nothing happened here.'' ''Yeah, I believe you'' of course Lucas didn't. Sebastian ran away as fast as he could and Lucas got into the room only to find Morgan lying on the bed with an elated expression. ''Will you believe me if I tell you that we kept our clothes on throughout the night?'' ''No but you can try. I can't wait to hear everything'' he got into full gossip mood and then got serious again. ''I trust your judgement... I think.'' Morgan hesitated. She didn't want to tell the whole story of that unforgettable night. But... telling a part of it was enough, for now.

P.S. Thanks to whoever that takes time to read my stuff, and if you like it, even better.

Tag List: @butteryoptimisticpeanut @biboenvivo @bundabear @ms-mahalo-marvel @c-ly-g @furiousgamer81 @colormekaykay @twabbitt @completelymads @missphittt @lady-marina94 @-wellthen-

[testedtransgressor]

Casablanca Sucked Anyways

Category: Fanfiction - Homestuck Characters: Dirk Strider Rating: T Warnings: Coarse language Originally written: 19 August 2017

Notes: A songfic (fic based around a song) that I wrote over a year ago. The song is called Casablanca Sucked Anyways, and it’s by A Day To Remember. This is set during the GAME OVER flash.

I've spent so much time trying to fix your life that I forgot about mine This time I'm putting my foot straight through the floor You wont be walking through any of my doors anymore

"It's over,"

He had said that, and he had meant it. But seeing how Jake had just laughed, like it was some joke, like his sugar-kicked idiot brain thought Dirk was toying with him, messing around. He hadn't had the luxury of the full effects of that asshole-level sugar high. And he had meant everything he had said, unlike what the other three were going on about.

Marriage? Babies?? They were fucking sixteen, for fuck's sake. And seeing Jake saying that shit, hell, probably even meaning it at the time - it had hurt him. Every time they'd had an issue, rather than trying to fucking talk it out like normal people, Jake had pissed off to LOMAX, ignored his messages. Usually he could be enticed back - not with an apology. Dirk had tried that.

It was always the first thing he sent, some rambling mess of him trying to explain how he was trying to get used to being around real, genuine, actual human beings, never mind that they were his friends. In fact, it was because they were his friends that he had thought they'd be so much more accepting. He'd spoken to them for years. In fact, in his entire life he had only ever spoken to five people - was it really his fault that he had expected them to understand him, after however many years he had spent talking to them?

So tell me what's so wrong with me That you could leave so easily You threw this all away for the chance to leave me

Yes. It probably was. He had expected so much of people, and when they hadn't turned out to be like he had expected, he had tried to manipulate them into being how he wanted. He could do it with robots, and he had tried to do it with his friends, and now look where it got him. He had driven Jake away. They had been on their death beds - literally - and Roxy hadn't been able to talk to him - she had felt like he was disappointed in her. How could he be? How had he ever suggested that, through his actions and words?

Because he had spent so much time trying to fix her. Same for Jake. He had tried so hard trying to make them fit the cookie cutter shape he had envisioned them and Jane fitting within, and had ignored their cries of protest when his own image of them hadn't matched with them as people. Essentially, he had treated them like his robots.

She makes me happy She sparks a light inside you've never failed to blow out Look at everything Look at all that you've become nothing more than a memory

They were better off without him.

He often thought this. It haunted him in the darkness as he tried to race back from wherever the fuck that space furry had zapped him to. Hell, they had probably found a way to get themselves out of trouble without him. All he had ever done was make them feel like they weren't good enough. Thrown an icy bucket of water on them whenever he had felt it necessary. Would they even want him around, now that they'd become god tier?

So tell me what's so wrong with me That you could leave so easily You threw this all away for the chance to leave me

Destroyer of Souls. That was how Calliope had described his class and aspect. Prince of Heart sounded like some guy who went around, proclaiming love and encouraging people. Destroyer of Souls sounded more apt for him. Hell, he tore his own heart out sometimes, or so it felt.

Even now, he was having a pity party for himself when he should be focusing on getting back to the others. Maybe it would ruin their day, though. But, after all, if they didn't want to be around him, there was really nothing stopping them from just up and leaving. Why should he care, anyway? If they left, then that was good. Good, because it was obviously good for them. Something they felt they needed to do.

You make me sick with every move you make When will you find your place in this world? Cause it will never be beside me again

Once this game was done, Dirk made a mental note to himself. Leave the others alone. Let them live happily, peacefully, without him affecting them. He could barely even stand his own company - and now, that wasn't Hal he was referring to. It was himself - him, Dirk Strider. The real one. He couldn't even stand his own thoughts as he raced back, and half of it was barely coherent as it were.

He had passed several messes of glitchy patterns, and skidded to a stop to avoid falling into one as it appeared suddenly in front of him - too suddenly for him to avoid seeing what it had to show. It had to be a doomed timeline, surely. Jane's god tier outfit wasn't meant to be red - and why was she wearing that tiaratop?

So tell me what's so wrong with me That you could leave so easily You threw this all away for the chance to leave me

As he got closer, the glitches became more common, and in them his worst fears were realised.

There had been no party in his absence. Just chaos and death.

He was floating, staring at the ruins of a red planet of fire and metal. Glitches surrounded him, showing him over and over again what he had never wanted to see. All he had ever wanted to do was keep them safe. Protect. And when they had needed that, he had been too wrapped up in himself to even try to get in contact.

Jake was dead. The apology Dirk had meant to give him died on his lips every time he watched his own damn sword cut through his heart. Like a fucking sign. Dirk had done nothing but hurt him, even when he wasn't there, and now Jake had died because of it. It felt to Dirk like his own hand had done it, forced the blade through.

And Jane. He had spoken with her, made amends, but he felt it wasn't enough - especially as he watched her death, over and over again. He should have destroyed that tiaratop. He should done something, something more than he had. But no, he had been too wrapped up in English.

The worst, by far, was his Bro. Seeing the man he had grown up idolising, basically worshipping, the man he had considered an actual brother - seeing him fighting for one of his own friends.

Dirk hadn't cried since he was seven years old, but he cried when he saw that.

He had already made up his mind. Of all of them, Roxy was most likely to survive. She was capable of fixing this. And if not, then what did it matter? It was a doomed timeline after all, he guessed. Why did he care so much?

He just wished he could have said sorry.

So tell me what's so wrong with me That you could leave so easily You threw this all away for the chance to leave me

[voldiebuns]

Fic: Not So Lonely

The Flash | Cisco Ramon/Harry Wells | Rated T | New Year's Eve, First Meetings, Alternate Universe - No Powers, First Kiss, New Year's Kiss, Party, Alcohol, slightly drunk Cisco Ramon | 1,037 words

Cisco's just about to give up on this New Year's Eve party when he (literally) runs into a hot stranger who is surprisingly willing to be his New Year's kiss.

I forgot until today that it was time for @heckyeahharrisco‘s Harrisco New Year's Kisses Anthology, so I threw something together last minute bc how could I not :D

Also on AO3.

Cisco wasn’t sure he knew anyone at the party anymore. Barry and Iris, who he’d come with in the first place — because Iris had been the one to hear that the CEO of Star Labs was having an open invitation New Year’s party at his own home — had gone home almost an hour ago, and Caitlin and Ronnie left not long after. Both couples had had “plans” for the night, something just for them, and he wasn’t invited.

Not that he was bitter about being the only single one in his group or anything.

He was starting to think he should just go home too, even though there were only a few minutes before the ball dropped. Being drunk and lonely and surrounded by strangers kind of sucked, but maybe it would suck less to be drunk and lonely and home alone. He didn’t really believe that, but had he mentioned he was drunk?

Caught up in thoughts of going home to wallow in his own unmade bed of loneliness, Cisco wasn’t watching where he was going until he bumped into someone, almost spilling the half full glass of champagne in his hand. He looked up to apologize and froze, feeling himself flush as he looked at the very attractive and very grumpy looking older guy he’d run into.

“Sorry,” he managed to get out, only stumbling over his tongue a little. His usual talkativeness, generally only increased by alcohol consumption, seemed to have deserted him.

The guy harrumphed and gave him a very judgemental look over the top of his glasses, which honestly only made Cisco blush harder. So far this guy looked just his type. He’d always gone for the type of guy who was hot but also kind of looked like they were annoyed by your very presence. Just ask his ex-boyfriend Hartley.

And because Cisco was drunk and lonely and had bad impulse control even at the best of times, the only thought in his mind was that he really wanted to climb this guy like a tree. After a few seconds of thought that was really just mental images of the two of them pressed together on silk sheets, he decided to say fuck it. There were only two minutes left until midnight and he really didn’t have anything to lose if he was rejected. So why not?

“I’m Cisco,” he said, with a lot more confidence than he was really feeling. “Wanna make out when the ball drops?”

The guy looked him over for a very long moment and just when Cisco was ready to give up and just go on to his very empty bed, the guy nodded and smiled a smile that would have had sober!Cisco’s danger senses tingling like crazy. Good thing he’d had too much to drink to pay any attention to that feeling.

“Harrison Wells,” the guy said, and something in that name sounded familiar. He didn’t have the brain space to remember why right now though.

“Cool, nice to meet you, Harry,” Cisco replied with a grin as the rest of the party goers started the ten second countdown. He laughed a little at the way the nickname made Harry grimace. “Ready to do this?”

“I’m regretting it already,” Harry said, deadpan.

Cisco might have been offended by that if it weren’t for the way Harry reached out to twine his fingers through Cisco’s hair and pull their faces together until there was barely a breath of space between them. Distantly, he heard the three, two, one and then Harry’s lips were on his and all thought completely left his mind.

There was a part of him that was wishing he was a little more sober, because he was pretty sure this was the best kiss of his entire life. Harry’s lips were dry but firm, pressing against his in a way that demanded the entirety of his attention. His knees were like jelly, and he was pretty sure it wasn’t entirely due to all the champagne he’d consumed.

When they pulled apart to breathe, Cisco was panting, and he was pleased to see that Harry looked similarly affected. It made him grin, especially when he noticed that Harry hadn’t moved away at all. His hand was still in Cisco’s hair, petting a little now and making him almost purr in pleasure. He always did like having his hair played with.

“So…” Cisco said, eyes darting down to Harry’s kiss-swollen lips. He really wanted to kiss the other man again, and do even more if Harry was amenable. “What now?”

“Now we head upstairs to my room,” Harry replied, voice going gravely in a way that had Cisco flushing hot all over again. “If you’d like, of course.”

Cisco nodded and grabbed Harry to pull him along before realizing that he really had no idea where he was going. Then Harry’s words finally registered and he froze. “Wait, upstairs?” he said, and if asked, he would firmly deny that his voice squeaked.

Harry shrugged, obviously amused by Cisco’s reaction. “This is my house.”

And that explained why he thought he’d recognized Harry’s name. Harry was in fact the Harrison fucking Wells, brilliant scientist and well-known antisocial asshole. Except for this party apparently, which Iris had said his daughter had made him throw for the good PR.

“Fuck me,” Cisco muttered, eyes wide as he tried to figure out how exactly he got himself into a situation like this. He blamed the champagne.

“That was the idea,” Harrison — no, still Harry, to Cisco at least — said with a raised eyebrow.

Cisco snorted out a laugh and did his best to shake himself out of the shock. Because there was no way he was losing this chance. Not when Harry was looking at him like that and his lips still tingled from those amazing kisses. He could deal with whatever else in the morning, hopefully after several rounds of equally amazing sex.

“Best idea ever,” Cisco replied with renewed confidence. “Now where’s your bedroom?”

Harry, thankfully, was all too happy to show him. Turned out Cisco’s New Year celebration wasn’t nearly as lonely as he’d thought it would be. And he was so happy about that.