#I can’t stand alex (and it seems like no-one else in this book does either)

[javelinbk]

“John wanted to be with a woman. But he needed as well very, very much a friend. He needed a male friend. And my opinion is that Yoko, he managed somehow to combine both. He had a fear for pretty women running after him. Yoko was not very pretty, uh, at all, and he replaced a male in his life plus a female.”

Alexis Mardas, All You Need Is Love, Peter Brown and Steven Gaines (2024)

[naralanis]

little bumps in the road (pt. 19)

Previously, on LBitR...

Like her cell before this, the room Lena now occupied has no windows, only the bright fluorescent lights that emit a soft hum just loud enough for Lena to hear—something that would ordinarily drive her crazy with annoyance, but now just gives her something else to focus on.

There are no clocks, either, at least not that she could see, not even on the many monitors attached to her via an array of wires. Though, to be fair, her visibility is somewhat compromised by the limited range of movement the handcuffs afford her.

No one has come in to check in on her so far, not even a nurse doing their rounds or some hapless DEO agent—because she is very much not in a hospital, as much as it looks like she might be. Lena would guess she’s being held at the DEO, but she doesn’t particularly like guessing. She likes knowing. And what she knows is that she’s been here for what feels like forever and she’s starting to get antsy.

Not that Lena has much idea of how much time has passed; she tried counting the minutes in her head, but couldn’t concentrate long enough on the task to keep it up for more than twenty counts to sixty, which in her book, is long enough.

She half-expected Lex to come in at some point, even if just to gloat, but he hasn’t shown so far, and Lena figures he doesn’t need to. He’s already got his pieces in place—he controls both Lena and the Director of the DEO; he can just sit back, kick up his feet, and relax while he waits for the game to start up again.

For Kara to come flying into his trap.

Fucker, Lena thinks bitterly. She feels a little high—probably whatever pain medication she was given.

Her stomach growls, sudden and loud, and Lena realizes she has no idea when she had eaten last. But more than telling she’s hungry, the unpleasant sound tells her she’s been sitting here twiddling her thumbs (figuratively speaking, of course) for a few hours at least.

Tired of being laid up and useless, and entirely not in the mood to wait for Alex or whoever else to come in, Lena tries to shuffle down the bed, as much as the handcuffs will allow, to try to get to the bandages stuck to the side of her head.

There’s some incredibly awkward shuffling down the thin mattress and further into the cheap, staticky sheets, and the angle is far from comfortable, but eventually Lena manages to lean down just enough so her fingertips graze the edge of some gauze, right at her temple. She pinches it between her index and middle fingers—the only ones that actually reach—and slowly begins to tear it away from her skin.

It’s at this moment that Lena becomes exceedingly thankful for the invention of morphine—or whatever else it is they have her on, here—because after some poking around, she’s definitely reopened her wound. Her fingers come away bloody, and the whole spot feels raw and hot to the touch, but fortunately, she feels little more than pressure.

She’s very well aware that, as far as good ideas go, this one probably nears the bottom of the list (or perhaps isn’t in it at all), but her options are limited, after all. And to be quite fair, even if she doesn’t succeed, she’s already in this pseudo-hospital room—it’s quite unlikely her captor will let her just. Die.

The angle is mightily uncomfortable, which makes it less than ideal when it comes to actually digging into a head wound, and so far she’s felt nothing that resembles the minuscule implant in her skin, but Lena is nothing if not tenacious, not to mention stubborn as hell. Kind of like Kara.

“If you would like, I could provide you with the schematics to Lex Luthor’s mind-control implant without the need of aggravating your wounds.”

Lena jumps—as much as one can jump when they’re handcuffed to a bed—at the voice; she’d been so concentrated on her slightly insane task she didn’t hear anyone come in. Her bloodied hand snaps away from the wound on her temple in shock and hits the rail with force, enough to send her now-empty ice-chip cup flying to the other side of the room.

“Brainy!”

Lena cannot quantify the sheer relief she feels when she sees the stoic figure at her door, ramrod straight with his arms crossed at his back. His lips are tugging into a little smile, like he’s so clearly happy to see her, and for some reason that makes her want to cry.

She does cry a little, and it’s so pathetic, because her hands are still handcuffed so she can’t even reach out to wipe at them. But it’s the first time in weeks, maybe months, that someone other than Kara actually looks happy to see Lena, and she finds she’s wholly unprepared to deal with it.

“What are you doing here?”

He steps in, squinting at her and tutting under his breath as he sees her bloodied hand, head, and bandages. “Do you need me to tell you how exactly much you’re increasing your risk of infection by interfering with your bandages?”

Lena lets out a wet, choky laugh. “No, thank you. I’ll be good.”

He nods, lips tugging ever-so-slightly wider. It’s the closest to a beaming grin as Brainy can get, and Lena can’t help but laugh. Maybe she’s hallucinating. But she’s so, so very happy to see me.

“Good,” he says, looking a bit awkward just standing by her bed with perfect posture. Lena wouldn’t have it any other way. “I will call someone shortly to redress your wounds. Trying to remove this type of subdermal implant with a piece of glass only had a 9.7% chance of success, in case you were not aware.”

Lena lets out a little snort. “I figured the odds weren’t great,” she quips. Brainy’s now just close enough she can touch his elbow with her casted hand—the other one is erm, bloody. It’s a little awkward—Brainy, like Lena, was never the extremely touchy type—but he accepts it with a little laugh. “Brainy, Alex—she also has an implant; she doesn’t remember—”

“I am aware of the Director’s implant. I was working to disable it, but it seems you managed to trigger the return of some of her memories.” He raises his brow, and Lena can tell he is mightily impressed. “Well done.”

“Who else has them? Who else has Lex gotten to?”

“Only the Director, as far as we know. Lex hasn’t made many of them, but we are working on disabling the entire system.” He frowns. “I need your help,” he admits as if it both pains and delights him to need Lena’s assistance. “I found the schematics of the implant itself, but the system…”

“Works on the basis of a program I designed,” Lena groans.

Brainy nods solemnly, thankfully not saying anything further on the subject. Instead, he pulls a small tablet from his pocket, and taps at it until it flashes blue. He turns the screen for Lena to see, and her eyes have a bit of a hard time focusing on the diagrams slowly spinning in place.

“The implant cannot be removed without triggering an alarm,” Brainy begins, and Lena is glad to finally have someone who can get straight down to business. “As well as several countermeasures Lex put in place. Had you successfully removed it, it would have. Erm. Liquefied your brain. In essence.”

Lena lets out a low whistle through her teeth. “Talk about overkill. So I guess we can’t remove Alex’s either.”

Brainy shakes his head. “No. The only hope is by disabling the entire system, which unfortunately cannot be accessed remotely,” he sighs. “I’ve tried 346 times and haven’t gotten close.”

“Well, if we can’t access remotely, then the only other option would be to—”

“LENA! ARE YOU BLEEDING??!”

Brainy jumps back a full three feet, bumping into the monitors with a loud clatter, hugging the tablet to his chest like a kid caught stealing from the cookie jar. Lena yelps, startled by a blue-clad figure at the door to her room, mask off but scowl very, very much in place.

“Nia,” Lena breathes, but she doesn’t have the chance to say anything else before the young woman marches to her bed, looking exasperated.

“What the hell were you thinking—girl you made a whole-ass hole in your head, this is not the time to start poking around in there, if this scars I swear to god I am going to kill you before Kara kills me before Lex kills us all are you kidding me right now—”

“Nia,” Lena tries again, and she can’t even be bothered with the way Nia’s fussing over her torn bandages and slowly clotting wound, because she just wants to thank her, she wants to hug her, but most of all, Lena just wants to cry. “Nia—”

“Oh my god, are you crying!?” Nia yelps, her previous fury vanishing within a second as it turns to worry as she eyes Brainy, who looks completely out of his depth at Lena’s sudden sobbing. “Why are you crying??”

Lena wants to raise her arms to hug the young woman, but the stupid handcuffs won’t let her, so she just. Sobs. Like a little baby—it’s a little pathetic, but she can’t help it, because Nia’s here, Nia’s the one who took her to Kara. Their mad run across the country, the resentment that melted into companionship again, the laughs they shared along the way—it was all because of Nia.

Nia seems to understand, on a surface level, because she lets out a sigh, dropping the gauze she’d been unsuccessfully trying to stick back on Lena’s head, and just wraps her arms around her, tight and present.

“Thank you,” Lena sobs wetly against the crook of her neck. “Thank you.”

  << Previous || Next >>

[meneatyoghurt]

Wrote the thing. Did this quite quickly while simultaneously listening to Nicola Coughlan talk about her dream menu and haven't read over it at all because I have to go to bed. For @theviewofmylife and anyone else who wants to see this happen (but mostly for me).

Don't Let Go, I Need You to Hang Around

God help him, Michael is pretty sure he has a spring in his step. He denied it earlier when Isobel accused him of having "a wholly uncharacteristic amount of pep" and asked him if his dry spell was over. On any other day, he might be annoyed by her teasing and her complete lack of filter, but today, nothing can knock the wind from his sails. Alex is coming back.

When he had received the text two days ago, letting him know Alex would soon be on his way home, he'd immediately made sure to book the morning off. They've really worked on their friendship over the last year, and Michael is really feeling like they're almost there. Alex has been in and out of Roswell, but hasn't spent more than a week or two back home, and Michael feels like the distance has done them good for once. It's been a healthy distance, giving them time to talk without pressure, knowing that Alex is coming back.

He arrives at the town square with plenty of time to spare. Maybe he's a little too eager. But Alex is like his best friend now, and this is a totally appropriate way to react to your best friend returning home after spending most of the year away, right? Except that he doesn't want to come on too strong, cross any boundaries, and standing directly outside the bus doors as it pulls up definitely has the potential to fall into the category of 'too much'. So he goes to hide in Crashdown for half an hour so he can turn up just on time - and then gets lost in his thoughts and completely loses track of the time until he realises Alex's bus is scheduled to arrive in two minutes.

The bus is already there as he's swiftly striding back into the square, just about restraining himself from running. And then there Alex is, staring up at that god awful statue, looking a little like Alex at 17 but so much more beautiful as Alex at 30. Michael's across the street from him and nearly calls out, but then decides against it. Yelling at him in public, even if it's not in anger, doesn't seem like it would be a great welcome back.

But as he's about to allow himself to break into a jog, quickly checking either side for traffic before crossing, he catches sight of someone else getting to Alex first. Forrest, his hair no longer that garish blue colour, is stepping into Alex's space. His hand on Alex's arm, an intimate touch, makes Michael stop dead. It's not fair, he knows it's not. And yet, he can't look. While Michael is starting to feel like they might be in a good place, almost ready, Alex is clearly still seeing Forrest. They haven't talked about that. Michael had assumed it had fizzled out, with Alex barely even in Roswell and Forrest still here - Michael's seen him around, but hasn't acknowledged him. But it seems like they're still going strong.

He nearly turns and goes. Watching Alex and Forrest together is not how he wanted to spend his first moments with Alex after several months, after they've only spoken by phone, text and a single video call. Alex doesn't need him here, not with his boyfriend providing the welcoming committee. He can just go home, arrange to meet up with Alex later. Alone.

Except, that's not fair. He told Alex he'd be there, that they would drop off his bags and go for a drink. So, as Alex pulls away from the chaste but very public kiss with Forrest, Michael steels himself and keeps going.

Alex spots him as he's crossing the street, and Michael raises a hand, an awkward greeting mid-walk. He would be lying if he said that Alex's answering grin, his face lighting up, didn't spark something warm deep within him.

"Michael!" Alex nearly shouts, letting go of Forrest completely, and Michael's sure he hears excitement in his voice.

Before he can make the next move, awkwardly clap Alex on the shoulder or give the both of them a bro nod, Alex is dropping his duffel and grabbing hold of him in a hug. It's as natural as anything to let his eyes close, to hold on tight and breathe in his scent, feel his warmth. He loves him. Christ, he loves him. He feels Alex relax into the hug as much as he does, all loose limbs but firm grip. This past year has been healthy for him, even as he's had to confront some of Jesse's evil that he's been focusing on undoing. Michael has felt it for a while now, that Alex is happier, more adjusted.

How long should a hug last? Michael doesn't have a huge amount of experience with them, but he's pretty sure longer than three seconds is getting into embracing territory. With Alex still holding on and showing no signs of letting go, murmuring "I missed you" into Michael's ear, Michael can't help but open his eyes to get another look at him.

It's just that it's Forrest whose eye he catches. Standing awkwardly as Alex and Michael hold each other, Forrest doesn't exactly look happy to be playing the third wheel. But Michael's not letting go before Alex does, not even if you paid him. The scowl etched into Forrest's forehead says that maybe he should do, but Alex is the one who's in charge here. Then the fucker has the audacity to clear his throat, trying to hurry it along. Alex either doesn't hear or pretends not to.

And Michael continues to make eye contact with him. Very alpha male of him, but he's not backing down easily. It's maybe not as mature as he'd like to believe he's become over the last 12 months, but he allows himself a little smirk too. Maybe Forrest is here right now. Could be for another year. But in the end he's temporary. Michael and Alex are forever. Cosmic. Built from the same star.

[laviefantasie]

I Think About You

Pairings: Alive!Luke Patterson x Alive!Reader

Summary: Luke and Y/N had been the perfect couple, until they weren’t. Some things have definitely changed, but some feelings stay the same.

| MASTERLIST |

You sigh as you stare at the big doors of Los Feliz High School. Summer was officially over and the moment you had been dreading since then had finally arrived. This was the day that everything became real. No more avoiding the reality of your life.

You enter the school’s hallways with your head down, trying to cover most of your face with your beanie-free head. You wanted to avoid your friends for as long as you could.

It wasn’t that you didn’t want to see them, I mean Julie was your best friend, you just didn’t want to see him. Not after the breakup. You weren’t mad, you just weren’t ready, it still felt too soon.

You and Julie had been the best of friends since you moved to the house next door. Both of you connecting through music, always finding time to write songs together. That’s why when Julie was asked to join Sunset Curve — now Julie and the Phantoms — you were the first one she told and the first one to meet the guys.

Alex, Reggie, and Luke had instantly become of your liking which had sealed the deal for Julie to accept their offer, though as soon as the cute guitarist had taken the liberty to go through both of Julie’s and your stuff — even after you both had screamed at him about boundaries— he had found your songbook. After that, Luke would always go to you to talk about the songs for the band and then to write them with you. 

It had become a thing between you both.

Soon, songwriting dates became real dates and, as everyone predicted, you two started dating. But the band always came first to Luke — you knew that and always respected it— which meant that dates started to be missed unless it involved the band's songs.

It had become too much for either of you.

That’s why, after almost a year of dating, Luke and you had broken up with the promise of giving each other the summer to heal before having to put the band’s needs as their priorities. 

That’s why you hadn’t seen either of your friends, other than Flynn, through your whole summer.

Now though, the reality of the situation hit you with all its force. You and Luke were over.

With a sad sigh, you hug your songbook closer to your chest —the song you had written a few weeks ago feeling heavier in it— before making your way to your locker, which is located beside Julie's.

“Y/N”

You move your eyes to the source of your name, Julie staring at you with a soft smile before moving to hug you. You return the hug with a heavy sigh, you had definitely missed her.

“How are you?” she questions you as soon as she lets go.

You shrug your shoulders with a small smile before opening your locker, you didn’t want to be questioned about your mixed feelings right now. You were not ready for that.

“There is my underachiever and my failure”

Both you and Julie let out a laugh as Flynn positions herself in front of you both, you making sure to grab the books you needed before turning towards her with a smile.

“Hey, disappointment” Julie and you say simultaneously.

Soon, Flynn and Julie start to tell you about the summer gossip that they’d heard so far making you laugh as they mention Carrie’s Dirty Candy costume malfunction. Your smile disappears though as you see a hand position itself on Julie’s shoulder, a known leather jacket catching your attention.

“Hello, ladies”

Flynn and Julie smile at Reggie while you look at your surroundings in a slight panic, if Reggie was here it meant that the other two members of the band had to be close. You were definitely not ready.

“I... uh...” You stammer while starting to walk backwards, “I have... have to go to, uh... class! Yes! I have to go to class! See you at lunch!”

As fast as your feet allow you to, you run towards the music room knowing they won’t come after you and needing the quiet. 

You sit yourself down on the grand piano, letting out a heavy sigh as you do. How were you supposed to ignore your still very present feelings for the lead guitarist of Julie and the Phantoms if you had to socialize with him?

Your hands open your songbook on the song you had poured your feelings in before putting it in on the piano’s music rack. Your fingers soon grace the instrument’s keys as you build up the courage to play it.

With the thought of hazel-green eyes you allow yourself to play it.

“Last summer we met We started as friends I can't tell you how it all happened”

Memories of how Julie had introduced you both come to you at full force, his boyish grin forever imprinted in your mind.

“Then autumn, it came We were never the same Those nights, everything felt like magic”

It hadn’t taken you both too long for your friendship to become something more, every time you stayed up late writing songs and talking about anything that came to your minds had made sure of that.

“And I wonder if you miss me too If you don't is one thing that I wish you knew”

Before you can start the chorus you move your hands away from the piano your eyes filled with unshed tears. It was too much, too soon. You feel anger well up in your chest as you stare at the lyrics in front of you.

Without thinking about it, you rip the page out and crumble it before throwing it in the classroom’s trash.

Once that is done, you grab your stuff and leave the room in a hurry failing to notice the blond drummer that stood by the door with a broken look on his face.

He had heard and seen everything and he couldn't stop his heart from breaking after seeing how hard this was being on you. Especially since he knew how hard it was being on Luke too, even if he refused to show it.

With that thought, Alex enters the music room to grab the crumbled piece of paper from the trash. He was going to fix this.

Luke walked besides Reggie and Willie with a kicked puppy look through the school’s hallways, he was dreading the moment he had to see Y/N. Maybe breaking up hadn’t been the smartest idea, but he just didn’t want to hurt you anymore and he couldn’t make you his priority.

At least he thought he couldn’t.

After spending the whole summer without you things had changed. You had become his priority. You were all he could think about, you were what made him write and what stopped him from writing. You were his first thought in the morning and his last thought at night.

He had screwed the best thing he had and he didn’t know how to fix it, he didn’t even know if you’d want him back. You had been understanding when he had told you what he thought was best, even going as far as promising that the band wouldn’t be hurt by it only asking for the summer to be able to heal.

He had realized he loved you at that moment.

It had been too late though. And now, here he was walking through Los Feliz High School’s hallways without you by his side, a good enough reason to have a pouty face on.

That's why when Alex stopped his two best friends and boyfriend in the middle of their way to History class, Luke only glared at him. For once all the brunette guitarist wanted to do was listen to Mrs. Smith's awfully loud voice talk about World War II.

Although it seemed the blond didn't get the memo because he pushed a wrinkled paper to your hands, an urgent and hopeful look in his eyes.

Willie and Reggie look at the interaction with curiosity, Luke scoffing before looking at the paper. Eyebrows furrowing as he identifies the words as lyrics.

“I think about you every morning when I open my eyes, I think about you every evening when I turn out the lights” he reads in confusion “I think about you every moment, every day of my life. You're on my mind all the time, it's true”

He's about to push the paper back to the drummer's hands, his heartbreak feeling ten times worst after reading that song, but the realization that he knows that handwriting stops him.

That's Y/N handwriting.

That could only mean she had written this song, but Luke knew all your songs as he had gone through your songbook hundreds of times. That meant this one was recent.

"Does this mean what I think it means?"

Alex nods with a big smile, "Yeah. What are you gonna do about it?"

Luke reads the lyrics again and again with a big smile while the three other boys stare at him with equally happy looks on their faces.

"I'm going to get my girl back"

Julie, Flynn, and you walk towards your usual table at the cafeteria with your trays of food. You felt your heart thumping loudly in your chest as you prepared yourself to sit across the guitarist that owns your heart.

Luck appears to be on your side as you three sit across from Willie, Alex, and Reggie with no sign on Luke. You let your gaze wander through the cafeteria, your eyebrows furrowing in worry as you don't see him anywhere.

Was he not eating with you guys? Was he not eating there because of you?

You start to feel sick at the thought, hating the idea that you could make him avoid his bandmates. You shake those thoughts aways, he wouldn't do that.

"Alex, Reggie" You gain their attention "Wh-where's Luke?"

They turn towards one another with uncertainty and that is the answer you need. Suddenly your food looks no longer appealing, so you stand up from where you are seated.

A conflicted look on your face.

"Y/N/N?" Whispers Julie in worry.

"I have t—I'm not hungry anymore"

Alex and Reggie share a look of worry before standing up too, "You can't leave!"

Their outburst has you and the other two girls looking at them in confusion. What the hell? Before either of you can question your weird best friends, the sound of an acoustic guitar has you and everyone else in the cafeteria shutting up.

Though what has you shutting up is the fact you recognize the melody. With confusion, you see Reggie and Alex smile at something behind you before turning around.

Coming through the cafeteria doors with his six-string is no other than Luke Patterson.

“Last summer we met We started as friends I can't tell you how it all happened Then autumn, it came We were never the same Those nights, everything felt like magic”

Your heart tightens in your chest as you hear his raspy voice sing the lyrics that you had written in tears when you had realized you were in love with him after losing him.

“And I wonder if you miss me too If you don't is one thing that I wish you knew”

He moves towards you, not once breaking eye contact. You hear Julie and Flynn let out excited squeals behind you but your focus is solely on the brunette boy walking your way.

“I think about you every morning when I open my eyes I think about you every evening when I turn out the lights I think about you every moment, every day of my life You're on my mind all the time, it's true I think about you, you you, you you I think about you, you you, you you”

Luke's green eyes take you all in. His heart feels lighter once he finally lays his eyes on you. Boy, he had missed you. Singing and playing came easier, heck breathing came easier with you.

Once he had read the song you had written he knew he still had a shot and he wasn't about to let it pass him. He needed you. He was in love with you.

“Would you know what to say If I saw you today? Would you let it all crumble to pieces? 'Cause I know that I should Forget you if I could I can't yet for so many reasons”

The girls at Los Feliz follow the lead guitarist with their eyes, jealousy and awe in display as they see him look towards Y/N with complete adoration in his eyes.

“I think about you every morning when I open my eyes I think about you every evening when I turn out the lights I think about you every moment, every day of my life You're on my mind all the time, it's true I think about you, you you, you you I think about you, you you, you you”

Reggie and Alex fist bump one another as they see Y/N take small steps towards Luke as he keeps walking to her. They definitely had done their jobs as best friends.

Willie interlacing his fingers with Alex's other hand, both sharing a loving smile as Luke finally stops in front of Y/N.

“How long 'til I stop pretending? What we have is never ending Oh, oh, oh If all we are is just a moment Don't forget me 'cause I won't and I can't help myself”

Both of you stared deeply at each other's eyes, green meeting e/c. Your heart flutters in your chest as you see the vulnerability in Luke's eyes as he sings your words to you, knowing he feels the same way as you expressed in that song.

“I think about you, ooh, ooh I think about you, ooh”

As the song nears its ending, Luke circles you with you following his movements. A sweet smile takes over your face as he looks at you with so much love.

You didn't think he'd ever look at you that way again and that had broken your heart, but here he was looking at you that way.

“I think about you every morning when I open my eyes I think about you every evening when I turn out the lights I think about you every moment, every day of my life You're on my mind all the time, it's true I think about you, you you, you you I think about you, you you, you you”

As soon as the song finishes, the students start clapping but neither of the two notice. Y/N and Luke are too busy looking at one another not knowing how to start.

Everyone watches in anticipation, some even recording the whole ordeal with excited smiles.

" Luke, I..."

Whatever you were gonna say is cut off by Luke's lips pressing against your own, both of you melting at the feeling of each other. Both of your hearts start thumping loudly as Luke moves his guitar to his back to position his hands on your waist to deepen the kiss.

All the people around you, especially your best friends, clap and squeal loudly in excitement. Luke and you breaking apart when you both are reminded you're not alone.

"I think about you all the time too" he whispers close to your lips.

Your smile grows before you capture his lips once more, not caring about all the people watching you. You both break the kiss only to hug one another close, suddenly both of your hearts feel lighter.

Neither of you thinking of letting go anytime soon.

[whatareyousearchingfordean]

Come As You Are

Summary: Dean takes Y/n dress shopping for a hunt, both of them blissfully unaware of where it will lead. 

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Plus Size Reader

Word Count: 3.9K+

Warnings: Language, self-esteem and body image struggles, public intercourse, unprotected intercourse (wrap it before you tap it)

Author’s Note: This was written for an anonymous request, 

“Hey babe I don’t know if your taking requests but I had a groovy idea dean x shy plus reader where they have to get the reader nice sexy clothes but she feels really uncomfortable in them and refuses to leave the dressing room and dean confess how he feels and they have sex in the dressing room ? Fluff and smut” 

I truly enjoyed writing it so I hope it lives up to your expectations anon. Remember, feedback is like crack to writers, and we always love to hear what you thought xoxo Alex

Consider checking out a book from Alexandra’s Library!

A frown etched itself on her face as she ran her hand over the fabrics hanging from the racks. All of it felt foreign underneath her fingertips. Satin, chiffon, and everything else that was far more expensive than she was used to. Y/n’s wardrobe mostly consisted of denim and polyester blends that tended to fray after two washes. It was all that a hunter could afford, after all. 

“How in the hell are we gonna afford any of this crap?” She whispered to Dean, who was eyeing the rack behind her, the gowns in front of him all a deep shade of red. 

“Charlie’s miracle card, remember? There is no limit,” Dean raised his brow at her, a grin etched across his perfect face. 

“Fine,” she groaned. “I still don’t see why I even need to go dress shopping, I’m sure I could find something in my closet.” 

“I’ve seen your closet, and none of it is right for this case. You’ve got to distract the coroner for the night and you can’t do that in baggy jeans and flannel.” Dean huffed as he picked a dress off the rack. Y/n’s eyes went wide as she took it in, the hem was short for anyone’s standards, then add in the plunging neckline and this dress left nothing to the imagination. 

“That is so not happening,” Y/n pointed at the offensive garment, her stomach fluttering at the simple idea of even trying to slip into it. Every spot on her body that she hated would be on full display in that thing. Her thick thighs, the roll that sat on her bra just under her arms, and don’t get her started on her abdomen. 

“Come on, just try it. You never know ‘till you try it on.” 

“Ugh,” Y/n snatched the dress from his hand before stalking off to look at more dresses. There were a couple more options that she grabbed to try on that were closer to her comfortability level. Under normal circumstances, she wouldn’t be caught dead in any of the items in her arms. But Dean had this way about him, always able to convince her to do anything without question. Maybe it was the way his skin crinkled around his eyes or the brightness that always seemed to live behind those deliciously green eyes? Who was she kidding, it was all of that and then some. The huntress had fallen hard for him from that first meeting. Sometimes she wondered why she chose to torture herself. 

Dean Winchester was the cream of the crop when it came to hunters, as was his baby brother, Sam. The whole world knew who they were, including heaven and hell, so how could she be expected to resist him when he smiled at her the way he does. Or even when he made her coffee in the mornings just how she liked it and picked up chocolate and pain killers for her when he knew it was that time of the month. He was exceedingly attentive to her, something that she was sure he only directed at Sam. It was just another thing that surprised her about the legend of a man. 

Yeah, like an idiot she fell for the eldest Winchester. There was no stopping it even though she was certain that her feelings would never be reciprocated. Y/n wasn’t like the other woman that Dean went for when he was on the prowl at bars. It’s not that she was ugly, it was that she was plain at best. People didn’t turn their heads when she walked in the room, men’s gazes didn’t linger on her from across the bar, no, Y/n was merely average. That’s how she knew that Dean would never see her as more than a friend because he had never looked at her in any form of want. 

“Are you ready to try those on?” A sales woman’s voice broke her out of her unrelenting train of thought. Dean answered for her before she could process the woman’s words. 

“Yes, please.” He smiled brightly and Y/n watched as the woman’s face flushed under his gaze. Y/n almost felt bad for the woman who was now just another victim to his charm. The saleswoman at least would be able to relish in his attention, wondering about what could have been had Y/n not been there with him. Y/n on the other hand already knew her fate. But mostly, if she was being honest, she was jealous. 

Dean put his hands on her shoulders and guided her along behind the boutique worker who took them into the back of the store where the dressing rooms were located. The area was mostly quiet, just the music from the speakers could be heard in the space. Three large mirrors sat in front of a stage on the far wall, the rooms spaning out on either side of it. In the center of the room were three plush chairs for those waiting for others to sit in. 

The worker unlocked a door for her as Dean plopped down in one of the chairs. Y/n slipped behind the door, letting out a deep breath as it closed behind her. If there was one thing she hated it was trying on clothes. Nothing ever seemed to fit her right or look anything like what it did on the hanger. It made the task a constant battle with her self-consciousness. 

Y/n had always carried extra weight on her body. It wasn’t that she didn’t live an active lifestyle, she was a hunter, after all, it was the diet that hunters were accustomed to. It was fast food and dives in every small town in America. Not many mom and pop places tended to offer an egg white omelet, and it wasn’t her inclination to eat them either. So, she had always been bigger than most, and if she was being honest she had grown used to that. Maybe she used it as a shield to protect herself. Making connections with people as a hunter only tended to end in heartbreak, so this was easier. 

The hunter hid the scary red thing Dean had selected behind all the rest of her haul, hoping she would find something before she ever even got to the thing. Y/n stripped from her flannel and jeans tossing them on the bench in the corner. She also added her bra to the pile, knowing all of these garments necessitated that she did not wear one. That left her in her favorite pair of panties. They weren’t anything special, but they made her butt looked its best.

The first dress in the line up was a straight black dress that hit just above her knee. The neckline wasn’t anything too crazy but the sleeves rolled off the shoulders a strip of fabric wrapping around her bust. Y/n was able to slip it on and tug up the zipper on the side. With a slide of her hands against the fabric, she frowned at her reflection. Not that it would flatter any figure, in her opinion. 

“What’s taking so long in there?” Dean called out from his spot in front of the mirrors.

“I’m not coming out in this thing,” she called back as she began to take the dress back off. 

“Oh, come on sweetheart,” 

“Nope, next,” Y/n heard him huff even through the door and she imagined he rolled his eyes as well. 

The next dress was a deep blue color. It had a wrap and pencil skirt, with an asymmetrical shape between the hem and the neckline. She supposed it was pretty but it also kind of looked like she had wrapped herself in a towel. Mostly, she felt like the point in the neckline was going to stab her in the throat, and she was not sure how to be sexy when she was trying not to die. It was another pass for her. 

There was only one dress left, and at that moment she was wishing to whoever was listening that she had picked out a few more choices. Dean was whistling now, some Zeppelin tune she couldn’t exactly identify and she knew he was getting impatient. Y/n swapped the fabrics on her body, pulling the thin straps of the red satin piece up onto her shoulders. The dress clung to her skin, the fabric lightweight. 

“Y/n/n,” Dean’s voice was just outside the door, the new proximity of it startling her. “Come on, you have to show me at least one. I know you and you’ll just try vetoing them all.” Y/n swore under her breath because he was right and it pissed her off that he knew her that well. The zipper was out of her reach on her back and she supposed she wouldn’t be able to truly see what it looked like on her unless she zipped it up. 

“Fine, I need help with this zipper anyway,” she sighed and held the fabric against her naked chest while opening the door with her other. Dean was beaming when he came into view on the other side of the door. He snuck inside faster than a flea, the slamming of the door startling her again. 

Get it together woman, you kill monsters for a living, Y/n cursed herself. 

“Turn,” Dean instructed her with his fingers, and the woman obliged as she faced the mirror. Dean brushed her hair off her shoulder with his fingertips, the action barely distinguishable but it sent the hairs on the back of her neck standing to attention. With one hand holding the bottom stop, he used the other to tug on the pull tab, sliding together the teeth in one fluid motion. 

“Thanks,” Y/n’s words were soft as she made eye contact with the green-eyed hunter in the mirror. He ran his tongue of his bottom lip, pulling the plump flesh between his teeth as his eyes wandered over her exposed skin. 

Y/n visibly cringed as she looked at herself. Unfortunately, this was her favorite out of the three, but that didn’t mean she felt like she could venture anywhere in public in the thing. “Sweetheart, if that coroner hadn’t already been eyeing you up today, he would not know where to start when he sees you in this.” 

“Shut up,” Y/n scrunched her nose as she spun around to whack Dean’s shoulder. “You are so full of it.”

“Am not,” Dean scoffed, his eye softening before he continued. “Y/n, why don’t you see how beautiful you are?”

Y/n whipped around to stare at him, her arms crossing over her chest, not believing that those words come out of his mouth. Surely, he was playing with her…

“Have you looked at me, Dean?” Y/n slapped her hands against her thighs, emphasizing their jiggle upon impact. “I’m nothing special.” 

“I have looked at you,” His gaze traveled down her body again, his breath hitching slightly as he did so. “I’ve been looking at you for a while now.” The drop in Dean’s voice sent heat rushing through her body, the gravel undertone making her shiver. 

“Dean--” words escaped her as the hunter stepped into her personal space, pushing her back against the mirror. Dean’s left hand came to rest against the reflective surface just beside her head as he chewed on his lip. 

“I don’t think you know how hard it is for me to keep my eyes off of you,” he leaned into her, his nose brushing alongside hers. “And now, seeing you in this dress, I’m not sure I’ll be able to keep my hands off you.” 

A rush of confidence coursed through her blood as his hot breath fanned over her face and Y/n slipped her hands behind his neck, pulling his lips down to meet hers. The movement was anything but smooth, though the action sent both of the hunters into action. Dean growled as he nipped her lower lip and she opened up to him, allowing his tongue to invade her mouth. 

A moan involuntarily came from her as his hands moved to her hips, the heat of his skin seeping through the thin material where his finger pressed into her flesh. He stepped back, pulling her after him as he backed up and dropped to sit on the plush bench. Dean bunched up the material to her hips as he urged her to straddle his lap. Y/n used her hands on his shoulders to steady herself, the new bulge in his pants a surprise to her as she settled in his lap. 

“Yeah, and you thought I was kidding,” Dean took in the slight rise in her brow, leaning forward to run his lips across her jaw, taking note of the places that made her shiver. Her eyes were squeezed shut as she allowed Dean to explore her body and let herself just feel him. Dean raked his teeth along with the shell of her ear, causing her to buck her hips and both of them to groan.  

“Fuck,” her words were a breath on her lips as she repeated the action, the roughness of his jeans just enough friction on her aching sex. 

“That’s it, beautiful, take what you need,” Dean sat back and used his hands to keep her body moving against his own, watching the way her brows scrunched together in the center of her forehead. With a shift of his hips, he had her pushed back and straddling his left thigh, his hands still in their place on her hips. “Can you come like this, sweetheart?”

“I don’t--” a jolt of electricity had her halting her denial, instead she chose to just nod and place her hands against his chest to balance her movement. She could feel Dean’s heart hammering in his chest under her palm and the quick rise and fall of his breath. Even at this moment, she was disbelieving that he was that turned on watching her get herself off on his thigh, but she had the proof hammering under her fingertips. Y/n was biting her lip to keep quiet in the small room. “Dean, I’m so close.” 

“I’ve got you, come for me, Y/n,” he husked as his grip tightened, though she wasn’t sure how that was even possible, seeing as there was already gonna be bruises there later, that she was sure of. The sound of his voice reverberating in her head had the coil snapping inside of her, heat flooding her body as every nerve sparked and faded out. A rush of air left her lungs, her body slumping as her muscles relaxed post-orgasm. 

“Oh my god.” As her arousal ebbed from her body and the reality of what just happened came to her sense, Y/n clammed up and she tried to climb from his lap. Blood rushed to her face and her hands flew to her cheeks to hide the heat settling there.

“Woah, where are you going?” Dean stopped her from making a hasty exit, his eyes searching hers in question. 

“Dean, what the hell just happened?” 

A smirk replaced the confusion on his face as he leaned forward and nuzzled his face in her neck, tracing his tongue up her pulse. “You just got yourself off on my thigh while I tried not to cream my jeans,” he breathed in her ear. It was like he already knew every button to push on her body, his dirty talk doing everything she needed it to for her body to already be aching for him again. 

“I--”

“Shh, sweetheart. That was hot as fuck, and all I want now is to be buried deep inside that pretty pussy of yours.” 

“Jesus,” her eyes shifted to his, taking in the mischievous glint shining behind his iris. “You aren’t kidding.”

“Nope,” he popped the ‘p’ at the end of his word and Y/n nodded as she climbed off him. She turned her back to him so he could undo the zipper, and it took a second for Dean to catch on to her silent action. He jumped to the edge of the bench and tugged down the zipper before sliding the material down her shoulders. Dean hooked his fingers into the edge of her panties, placing a kiss on the dip in her lower back before pulling the soaked material to pool at her feet along with the dress. He stood then as she turned back to him and pushed his jacket and flannel down his arms, adding it to the pile of discarded clothes in the room. 

“Come, on we don’t have a lot of time before someone gets suspicious.” There was a quiver in her voice as she lifted the hem of his tee and tugged open his belt. It was taking everything in her to quell the shaking in her hands. Dean’s fingers came down to wrap around her wrists, halting her movement and she looked up at him. 

“Y/n we don’t have to,” he was trying to read her mind as he examined her face. The trepidation was seeping through her pores, but not because she didn’t want this. Hell, the painful ache between her legs told her how much she wanted this, but her brain couldn’t help to race through the million thoughts about what it all meant. 

“No, I-- God do I want this,” Y/n began chewing on the inside of her cheek as she tried to come up with the words to explain to him what she was thinking. But the longer the time passed the more nervous she grew, standing there stark naked and he’s still basically fully dressed. “I think I’ve wanted this for a long time now, but I’m just scared.”

“Of?” He urged her to continue.

“That this doesn’t mean the same thing to you,” Y/n cast her glance down, her eyes fixated on the way the fluorescent light glinted in the metal of his belt. 

“You think that this is about getting my dick wet for me.” It wasn’t a question, because she had all but spelled it out for him. “Y/n,” He put his fingers under her chin and turned her head back up to his, brushing his lips against hers, the action soft and unhurried. “I told you, I’ve been watching you for a while now, trying to learn everything I could about you. I would have done this the first night I met you if I hadn’t thought about what it would do to you. But I’m done being scared because I think I fell for you a long time ago and no amount of whiskey or other women could make me forget that. So I’m done fighting it.” 

“Yeah?” Her eyes were swimming with unshed tears now, and Dean answered her with another kiss, pulling her body flush against his own as he invaded her mouth. The pair only pulled apart when they could no longer fight the need for air. “Dean--”

“Yeah,” he breathed, dropping his grip on her to finish what she started with his belt. Y/n watched his movements, her breath getting caught in her throat as she watched him pull his length from its cotton confines. Dean signaled for her to turn with one hand as he stroked himself with the other. She obliged, of course, and Dean pushed her gently between her shoulder blades until her hands were pressed against the mirror. He nudged her legs to open a tad wider, meeting her gaze in the mirror. 

“Do we--” 

“I’m good if you’re good,” she told him, knowing where he was going with his question. He nodded to her before lining himself up with her entrance. Dean held her gaze as he entered her from behind, both of them sighing together as he became fully seated. Y/n closed her eyes as she tried to compose herself, her head falling between her arms. 

“Fuck, open your eyes, look at yourself,” Dean was biting his tongue as he swatted her ass to get her to lift her head again. She indulged him, looking at herself in the mirror before turning her eyes back to his in the mirror. “There you go,” he praised her, the words like music to her ears as he pulled back out and slammed into her hips. 

Dean set up a steady rhythm, careful to not shake the walls of the dressing too much with his movement. The couple kept their eyes on each other in the mirror, the moment the most erotic thing she could ever remember doing, but for the life of her, she couldn’t be bothered by it. Even from her vantage point, she could see how blown his pupils were, the black of his iris’ all but drowning out the green that she loved so much. To be honest, she wasn’t sure which she liked more now. All she did know was the feeling of him moving inside her and the way her muscles were shaking. 

A small knock had Dean stilling his movements, and Y/n stood up, pressing her back against his chest. He slipped an arm around her chest as she signaled for him to be silent. “You doing alright in there?” 

Y/n swallowed the lump in her throat and let out a breath, “Yeah,” she called back, afraid her voice would be too wrecked if she said anything else. 

“Is there anything else I can get you? Maybe some different sizes?” The saleswoman tried again. 

“Nope, I’m all set, thank you.” 

“Okay, just let me know.” The sound of her footsteps could be heard retreating from the dressing room, and Dean pressed his face into her neck, the pair of them chuckling. 

“Come on, sweetheart,” he adjusted their position, resuming the movement of his hips as he snaked his free hand down to rub against her clit. Y/n jolted in his arms at the contact, this time closing her eyes as he built her back up. “I’m right behind you. Can you come for me again?” Y/n nodded against him, her hands flying to his forearm as she felt herself jumping over the cliff, her mouth open in a silent scream. Her knees buckled and Dean had to adjust himself to keep her from falling, still fucking her from behind as her fluttering walls milked him to his own orgasm. He bit into her shoulder to keep himself from groaning out loud. 

“Sweet Jesus,” her body went limp in his arms as the pair of them caught their breath in the now muggy space. 

“Yeah, you are so not going out with that coroner tonight. We will find a different way.” Dean admitted as he pulled his now softening cock from her. Y/n flinched at the feeling and the subsequent rush of his release inside her. 

“What?” She turned to him as he began righting himself, not understanding why he didn’t want her to do her job.

“‘Cause you are all mine now,” Dean tugged her into his chest, his fingers around one of her biceps. “And I want to spend all night making sure you can’t walk tomorrow.” 

“Oh,” Dean laughed as she blinked at him, clearly lost for any sort of coherent answer to what he just told her. 

“Get dressed so we can get out of here and kick Sammy out of our motel room.” Dean tapped her ass again and she pushed him away from her, a stupid grin on both of their faces.

Forevers: @22sarah08​ @akshi8278​ @anathewierdo​ @atc74​ @awesome-badass-cafeteria-sauce​​ @callmekda​ @dawnie1988​ @deanwanddamons​ @ellewritesfix05​ @emoryhemsworth​ @flamencodiva​​ @foxyjwls007​ @hobby27​ @janicho88​ @jensengirl83​ @katehuntington​ @lyarr24​ @malfoysqueen14​ @mrsjenniferwinchester​ @msmarvelouswinchester​ @polina-93​​ @sleepylunarwolf​ @stiles-stilinski-24-dylan​ @smol-and-grumpy​ @superfanficnatural​ @supraveng​ @talesmaniac89​ @tranquility-or-chaos​​ @waywardbeanie​ @winchest09​

[robinofgothamcity]

♡ prompt: “your complexion is scaring me, please sit down.” 

♡ pairing: marcel barthel x fem! reader

♡ lyric inspiration: “cause i’m right here, darling i’m right here. close your pretty eyes, my butterfly, baby have no fear.” 

♡ note: not checked for grammar or spelling mistakes / 

you felt yourself getting dizzy once again, not knowing where the feelings was coming from. this was going on for the third week of you just feeling completely sick to your stomach and frankly, you had no idea why it was happening or why it hadn’t gone away yet. 

you fell back onto the chair with a thud, not feeling in any mood to get up and workout. as you took a sip of water and tried to regain your breath, you saw Fabian walking past you. you waved at him as he stopped in his tracks and saw your state of being. 

“you okay?” he asked, seeing the sweat coming down from your forehead, “just tired,” you murmured, taking another gulp of water. Fabian grabbed a chair and sat next to you knowing that Marcel would thank him later, “where’s your boyfriend?” he asked. 

pulling up your phone and saw the last text he sent you, “he’s training with Alex,” you told him, “why?” you asked. Fabian stayed silent for a moment, not knowing whether or not to confess what he was thinking, “you’ve been feeling like this for a while now, haven’t you?” you nodded, “ever think Marcel knocked you up?”

“excuse me, what?” you choked on your water at the wild thought as Fabian hit your back, “i’m just putting a thought out there. you’ve been feeling like this for a while now and i mean, my sister felt the same way you did when she got pregnant with my nephew,” he explained. 

there was no way you could’ve been pregnant with his child. you were on the pill and Marcel made sure he wore protection when you asked him too. “come on, you’ve got to be kidding me,” you murmured to him, not so sure on what to think of what he said. 

“if you aren’t sure, i can accompany you on the trip to the store,” he offered, taking his hey out of his pocket. you nodded and the two of you walked towards the parking lot, “what if I am?” you asked him quietly, “i genuinely don’t know how Marcel would take to the news.” 

Fabian could see the panic expression on your face as he started the engine. there was a store not even a minute out of the performance center and although he didn’t respond, he rubbed your shoulder in comfort, “listen, i can’t answer that question because i really don’t know how he would react either but i don’t think he’d be mad or upset about it.” 

you gave Fabian one final look before hopping out of the car and running inside of the Wal-Greens. you grabbed a few things and pretending that the pregnancy test was for a friend in case the cashier knew who you were by random chance. after she scanned you out and gave you your things, the two of you booked it back to the performance center. 

“stay right there,” you told Fabian in a threatening tone, “if I have to find out the news, you’re finding out right with me,” you added on. 

Fabian nodded as you walked into the single bathroom and locked it. the hallway you dragged Fabian too was generally a lonesome hall. hardly anyone that wasn’t custodial came down here and you knew that Marcel or anyone else wouldn’t come down here. 

after you took the test and put it back inside of the box, you walked out and timed the rest of the four minutes, “okay, we need to wait another few minutes and then i’ll find out if i become a mom or not,” you murmured, your eyes widening at the statement you made. 

you looked at Fabian with nervousness as you felt your phone ringing, “fuck, it’s Marcel,” you screamed in panic. you tossed him the phone and telling him to pick it up, “why? he’s gonna wonder why i have your phone to begin with!” he yelled back. 

Fabian, despite not wanting to answer it, picked it up, “hey Marcel,” he said as smoothly as possible, “Fabian? why do you have her phone?” he asked curiously. you yelled at him to make up a lie, “uh, she’s in the bathroom and left her phone on the table so i figured i’d picked it up considering it was you,” he said in a panic. 

Marcel’s eyes scrunched in confusion, not fully believing what he was saying. your phone rang off again, indicating that the time was up and your test would be ready with the answer. you grabbed your phone and hung it up, not bothering with Marcel at the moment. 

“ready?” he asked as he watched you fumble with the box. you gulped not, tears threatening to spill even though you had no idea what the test read. you took it out of the box slowly and grasped onto the side where the result was, not ready to read it yet, “okay, on three,” you whispered. 

Fabian counted to three and you lifted your hand up. 

positive. 

you stared to Fabian, your heart racing a mile a minute and the urge to throw up crawling up your throat. you found the nearest trash bin and threw up for a solid minute before pulling back up and seeing Fabian’s surprised expression as he held the test. 

“does that mean I’ll be the godfather or something?” he asked, trying to make a light joke. you smacked him on the shoulder, “shut the fuck up! this is not the time to make a joke, you ass! i’m pregnant with your best friends child!” you screamed. 

Fabian wanted to laugh, he really did but a part of him knew that if he did laugh, you’d probably beat his ass for it. you looked down to the Clear Blue test and sighed, not knowing whether to celebrate the news or to throw up once again. 

“Marcel’s calling you again,” Fabian informed you, seeing your phone ping up for the second time. you grabbed your phone and answered it, “hey babe,” you whispered, your voice wavering, “hey, i called you twice and Fabian picked up your phone the first time. you okay?” he asked. 

you stayed silent for a second, not knowing whether to slowly break the news or just make up a complete lie. 

“i continued feeling sick and was inside the bathroom for a while. i had left my things with Fabian to make sure it didn’t get taken or anything,” you lied, Fabian’s eyes widening in surprise, “i’ll meet you in a few, okay?” Marcel hummed in response before clicking goodbye, slightly annoyed at yours and Marcel’s attitude. 

you stared at Fabian, your heart racing as you heard footsteps coming down the stairs. your eyes widened in panic as you tried to hide the test when it revealed that it was actually Walter who managed to find you and Fabian down here. 

“hey Walter,” you greeted in panic. he looked between you and Fabian, confused and slightly accusatory, “what are the two of you doing down here....alone?” he asked, seeing the way the two of you were acting. 

you looked up to him finally and sighed. Fabian could tell you were on the verge of bursting into tears as you fumbled to actually say something, “she’s pregnant with Marcel’s baby,” he screamed in a confession. Walter looked at you in surprise as you shakily handed him the test, “what the fuck,” he whispered to himself. 

“fuck, i don’t even know how i’m going to tell Marcel about this,” you exclaimed to his two friends, “we’ve never spoken about children and we are in no way even ready for it. he’s in the midst of his prime wrestling career and i’m chasing the fucking women’s title,” you continued, “but there’s a part of me that’s excited and wants to keep it.” 

Walter and Fabian stared at each other as they remained quiet. this was one of the times that Walter wished his wife would’ve accompanied him on his trip over here. you still hadn’t gotten off the floor as Walter read the positive test on the ground. 

“listen, you should get home and take a break from all this. you stressing out isn’t probably healthy for the baby,” Walter finally said. you nodded, figuring that he was right, “i’m going home, i guess. if Marcel asks for me, tell him i wasn’t feeling good at all and had a migraine or something,” you got up from the floor and looked up at the two boys before leaving. 

you had purposely took a way out of the performance arena that you knew wouldn’t cross over into Marcel’s view. you drove home, taking the back way there as you tried to clear up your thoughts. the tears that had stained your face remained as you got into the parking lot. 

as you walked inside of you shared apartment and sat down on the couch, you couldn’t help but relive the memories you had with Marcel in your head. the two of you were pretty free spirited. you enjoyed going out with Fabian every once in a while and traveled when you were able too. 

there were times where the two of you had a designated drinking nights and got plastered beyond belief to release some stress or tension that was going on. 

all of those things would have to come to a halt as your baby was on its way. a part of you knew that Marcel wasn’t the kind of guy to just drop you and the baby but you also had no idea how he would react. he didn’t seem like the kind of guy to settle down into a family but the thought of a baby Marcel running around warmed your heart. 

with all your thoughts running wild, you hadn’t realized how much time had passed until you heard the front door jingling. the thought of having to tell Marcel the news made you sick to your stomach out of nervousness as felt bile crawling up your throat again. 

you instantly ran to the bathroom and threw up whatever else was left in your stomach. at this rate, you were throwing up water as you hadn’t ate anything since the morning and you managed to throw that up when you read the test earlier in the day. 

you heard Marcel walk into the apartment as he set his things down on the floor and came to find you. you had thought that you locked the door when you ran inside but that didn’t seem to be true when Marcel walked in, a look of worry and panic instantly crossing his face as he saw how you looked. 

“hey, hey! what’s wrong?” he asked, holding your hair back. you shook your head as you tried to stand up and push him off of you, “nothing, i’m fine,” you managed to say as you went to the sink to brush your teeth and clean your mouth. 

Marcel stood against the doorway, seeing the color of your skin drained. he had never saw you this way in the years that you were together with him and as you finally looked back up again, he could see that you didn’t look healthy in the slightest. 

“your complexion is scaring, please sit down,” he stated, helping you to the couch to sit you down. you slumped into the couch, feeling a migraine coming on, “you need to go to the hospital. you’ve been sick for nearly a month and you haven’t been getting any better!” he exclaimed. 

you sighed knowing that if you even tried to hesitate, Marcel wouldn’t let it go and probably physically drag you there himself. you looked up to Marcel and asked him to grab your backpack from one of the kitchen chairs. he looked at you in confusion but nevertheless grabbed it for you. 

“what i’m about to tell you might be news you aren’t prepared for so you might want to sit down for this one,” you stated as you had trouble looking at him. he remained confused but didn’t listen to what you said and remained standing, “Marcel, please,” you repeated, “no, i’m fine standing.” 

you sighed as you took a deep breath in and rummaged through your bag until you felt the pregnancy test in your hand, “don’t freak out on me, i’m begging you. i’ve been through enough today and if you are planning to do anything irrational when you find out, just leave,” you said as you took the test out and handed it to him. 

Marcel’s eyes widened, reading the test before looking at you. he remained silent for what felt like an eternity. a million thoughts ran through his head until he finally realized that he hadn’t said anything at all. you remained looking at him, trying to read his expression. 

“you’re pregnant?” he asked. you nodded slowly as he stared at the test again, “you’re not kidding? when did you find out?” he asked again, “of course not but today. that’s what i was doing with Fabian. he found me puking my guts out earlier and offered to take me to the store to buy a test and i was too scared to take the test alone so i made him sit with me to find out the results. Walter knows too.” 

Marcel looked at you, “why did you hide it from me? i feel like i should’ve been there,” he murmured. you sighed in slight annoyance, “i know but we’ve never talked about kids and i was scared. i’m pregnant. pregnant as fuck and i want to keep it,” you stated, emphasizing the ending. 

Marcel walked up to you and gave you a hug as you immediately cuddled up to him and let the tears go free, “i’m just surprised, baby. we weren’t planning on having one but i’m not mad or scared. that just means we’re going to be parents earlier than anticipated. nothing wrong with that,” he finally said. 

you smiled at him, happy that he was on the same boat with you, “so you’re happy?” you asked. Marcel laughed, “of course i am. you’re making me a dad! we’re going to be parents!” he exclaimed, “we just need to find a home and start building that nursery as soon as possible.” 

you brought him down for a kiss and remained that way for while before finally pulling away, “i’m sorry happy that you’re happy about this,” you confessed. Marcel brought you in for another hug as you put your head on his chest, “if we have a son, you wouldn’t mind naming him Axel, would you?” he asked with a serious tone. 

your heart fluttered as you realized he wanted to name your possible son after his father, “of course i wouldn’t mind. it’s a beautiful name,” you whispered back. he nodded in agreement as the two of you remained hugging in the middle of your living room. 

you knew you’d tell everything to Fabian and Walter later on but for the moment, you just wanted to remain in Marcel’s embrace. 

[caitlesshea]

in love with how your soul's a mix of chaos and art

Michael communicates telepathically until he meets his soulmate Alex and hears his voice.

Michael knows the humans find the way his people communicate telepathically weird. He knows they hate having an Antarian mind walk them when they want answers. 

He also knows that an Antarian will finally hear a human's voice when they find their soulmate. The sounds the humans make will become loud for the first time. 

They won’t hear every human after that, but they’ll hear theirs. 

The one that two universes have deemed their soulmate. 

The connection will work both ways after that. The human will be able to initiate the telepathic communications that Antarians usually do, and the Antarian will eventually be able to use their voice to speak to the humans. 

Michael wants to use his voice, but something stops him every time he tries.

His cousin, Isobel, says waiting around for his soulmate is a ridiculous notion, where his other cousin Max, thinks it’s romantic. 

Either way, Michael is determined to meet his soulmate. He just knows they’re out there somewhere. 

It’s almost like he can tell they’re getting closer.

“How long until the delegation gets here?” Isobel huffs and Michael shrugs. 

For a princess she sure is moody. 

“An hour, maybe?” Michael really has no idea, he can’t remember what his dad said the other night. 

“You don’t know?” Isobel asks, exasperated. 

“Why would I know Iz?”

“Oh I don’t know, your dad’s the General?”

“Yeah, don’t remind me,” Michael grumbles. 

“Oh, it’s here!” Isobel points to the tower that has lit up at the Port. 

Max is reading a book behind them, as Guards descend upon them and they start to make their way to the docking stations.

He sees his father with some of his high ranking officers standing near the entrance, with Isobel and Max’s parents, their King and Queen, off to the side. 

The humans eventually make their way off of the ship, shaking hands, and waiting for an Antarian to speak to them before moving on to greet the King and Queen. 

Michael can see the humans mouths moving as they communicate amongst themselves. 

He would give anything to hear one of them. 

He loses track of how many hands he shakes, how many humans he initiates contact with. Until one, who reaches out his hand to shake, and then before Michael can initiate a conversation he hears it. 

“Hi.” 

Michael looks up, in absolute shock, at the most beautiful man he’s ever seen. 

It takes the stranger a moment to realize why Michael is looking at him like that but then his mouth drops open.

“Oh shit,” the stranger says and Michael laughs. 

For the first time in his life Michael can hear his own laugh. 

“Hi,” Michael says quietly, his own voice gravelly in its cadence. It’s the first time he’s been able to use his voice to speak instead of his mind. 

He shakes the strangers hand, feels the sparks of their bond flare up between them and then is immediately bombarded with memories from Alex. 

A look into his past so they can have a future. 

It’s what the handprints they can leave on each other create, but this takes no effort at all. 

He knows Alex is seeing similar things about himself, learning his name, his likes, and dislikes. Learning what makes him tick, what makes him quiet. Learning what chaos he controls. 

Alex is beautiful. 

“I’m Michael.”

“I’m Alex.”

Michael smiles and before he can say anything else he hears Isobel and Max.

“Michael!”

“Michael!” 

He turns to look at them and gestures to Alex who smiles shyly at them both. 

Michael doesn’t get a chance to say anything as his dad is there ushering both Alex and Michael into one of their vehicles.

“You can speak at the palace. I’ll deal with this.” His dad, Rath, gestures between them and Michael nods. 

“Where are we going?” Alex asks.

“The palace,” Michael says, still not used to his voice. 

He opens up the connection between them, still more comfortable speaking this way.

“My father is the General of Antar.”

Alex jumps in the seat next to him as their vehicle speeds away from the docks.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Alex murmurs quietly back and his voice is just as beautiful in his head as it is when he speaks.

“Can I speak to you like this? At least until I learn to use my voice?”

Alex nods and Michael smiles. 

“We were making too much of a scene at the docks. My guess is my father will handle the rest of the delegation and then he will meet us back at the palace.”

“I’m second in command on the delegation.”

“You are?” Michael asks, pleased. 

“Captain Alex Manes.” Alex puts his hand out again and Michael shakes it, again. 

“Michael Guerin, son of General Rath, Engineer to Antar.”

“You’re not in the military?”

“No, wasn’t in the cards for me.”

“Hmm.” 

Michael perks up at the sound, always wondering what it would sound like when people rub their lips together.

Alex looks over at him and raises an eyebrow and Michael can tell he’s blushing. 

“Sorry. I just, I've never heard that sound before.”

“You’ve never heard any sound, right?” Alex questions, looking curious. 

“Right. We don’t until we meet our soulmate.” Michael blushes an even deeper shade of red than he already is and notices Alex swallowing. 

“Do you? Umm. Not want a soulmate?” Michael asks, a little scared of the answer. 

“I do, I’ve just never thought about it.” 

Michael can tell Alex is lying but he decides to let it lie for now. 

They pull up outside the palace and his mother, Nora, is waiting for them outside.

“Mom.” Michael hugs her and she puts a hand behind his neck. 

“Michael. Who is this?” She gestures to Alex who straightens and holds out his hand. 

Michael can see that his mother has opened a connection between them and he would give anything to know what they’re saying. 

“I like him,” She says and Michael smiles.

“Me, too.” 

“Everything okay?” Alex asks and Michael nods. 

They follow his mother into the palace, towards their residences.

“You live in the palace?”

Michael nods. “My mother is the King’s sister. Even if she wasn’t the General of Antar and their family also have a residence in the palace.”

“Huh.”

“I know our royal system must be strange to you.”

“This is all a little strange.”

Michael chuckles and Alex smiles at him. Michael wants to hear Alex laugh, wants to know what Alex sounds like when he’s happy and not just on duty or meeting his soulmate for the first time. 

“Come, sit. We’ll wait for your father and everyone else. I’ll grab tea.” Nora speaks to both of them and Alex startles again. 

“You okay?” Michael asks. 

“Yeah. I just didn't know you could speak to more than one person.”

“We can. We just have to project. I can teach you?”

“Okay.” Alex still seems skeptical but Michael decides to let it go for now. 

“I’m sorry this is all happening so fast. I’m just the first member of the Royal Family to meet their soulmate.”

“Your parents?”

“No. They love each other, but humans didn’t start coming to Antar until twenty three years ago.”

“Right, yeah. I was seven when my dad came.”

“Your dad's military?”

Alex nods and Michael feels a familiar anger settle in him at the memories Alex tried to hide of his horrible father. 

“I’m sorry.”

Alex looks up at him with wide eyes and then he swallows heavily like he just realized what their connection means. 

“It’s not your fault.”

“Still,” Michael says as he reaches out slowly with his hand and grabs Alex’s. 

“Your voice,” Alex clears his throat. “I like it.” 

Michael smiles at the blush that covers Alex’s cheeks. 

“Me too.” Michael’s surprised that he means it. He always thought he’d hate his voice. A new way of communicating, rusty from disuse.

“You’ve never heard it before?”

“No.”

“How?” Alex wonders. 

“I’m not sure exactly. I know whenever I tried to talk before it felt like there was something caught in my throat and I couldn’t.”

“I’m glad I can share this with you, then.”

“Me, too.” Michael smiles and they both look at each other. 

Alex giggles and Michael’s in love.

Michael gasps and Alex looks at him. He tilts his head to the side and Michael wants to mirror him but he holds still.

“You’ve never heard laughter before?” Alex asks quietly. 

“Not in the way you think.” Michael’s proud of himself for that sentence. The longest yet. His throat is getting a little sore from the speaking and just as he thinks he’s should drink something his mother floats tea over to them.

“Your father will be here soon, it seems Max and Isobel have news, too.” 

“Thank you,” Michael responds as he sips the tea, savoring the warmth against his throat.

Michael watches as she walks away and then turns back to Alex, who’s still staring after Nora.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, sorry, the whole…” Alex moves his hands in a circular motion, pointing to the coffee mugs.

“Ahh. It’s a family power.” Michael moves his tea cup closer to Alex and Alex smiles. 

“Family power?”

“Yeah. There are powers that every Antarian has and then some that are specific to families.” 

“Makes sense.”

“Mmm.” Michael savors the tea, his favorite, letting it soothe his throat.

“Does your throat hurt?”

“A little.”

“You can keep speaking to me telepathically. I don’t mind.”

“Really?”

“Really. That is if you don’t mind that I use my voice?”

“Not at all.” Michael smiles, pleased they’ve come to a compromise until they’re both more comfortable. 

Plus Michael could listen to Alex’s voice all day. There’s a soothing quality to it when he speaks out loud rather than telepathically. 

Michael always wondered if they’d be different and now he knows. 

He’s about to ask Alex if he wants to take a walk around the palace gardens, his favorite place, when the doors open and Isobel and Max barge in, with his father, and what looks like the high ranking officers of this round of Earth’s delegation. 

“Sir.” Michael can hear Alex say as he stands and salutes who has to be the one in charge. 

He can hear Alex’s side of the conversation but since he can’t hear the Major’s, he learns, he tunes them out in favor of his father, Isobel, and Max. 

“Seems all three of you found your soulmates,” Rath sighs begrudgingly and Michael turns his head to look at Isobel and Max, who are both smiling. 

“Liz! Kyle!” Alex shouts and then the two newcomers, Max and Isobel’s soulmates respectively, Michael learns they are childhood friends of Alex’s. 

An engineer and a doctor. Huh. 

“You two did good.”

“Michael.” His father chastises.

“What? They did.” Michael shrugs.

“So did you.” Isobel gestures toward Alex and Michael smiles.

Alex must realize he’s being talked about because he leaves Liz and Kyle and comes over to Michael.

“Yeah I did.” 

Michael grabs Alex’s hand, pleased at the warmth he feels. He looks at Alex when he says it again. 

“I did.”

[marchtomydrums]

In the beginning 6

Alex Cabot X Casey Novak X Reader

Alex’s POV:

Today has been extremely long and I’m ready to go home. Walking into my office I see you sitting on the couch crying.

“Y/n? What’s wrong?” Your headshot up at my voice quickly drying your tears.

“Alex, sorry I thought you’d be in court. I just came in here for privacy.” You stuttered.

“Why are crying?” I ask sitting across from you holding your hands in mine. You shake your head “Jack fucking railed my ass today. He doesn’t think I’m cut out for this.”

Anger spikes in my body. How dare he? Seeing you hurt and crying because of his words pissed me off.

“I’ll kill him.”

“No Alex, I have to deal with this on my own.”

“But he’s wrong. He doesn’t see you every day as I do. You can do this y/n. He’s full of shit.”

You chuckle at my words squeezing my hands.

“Well, I appreciate that Alex but again I have to do this on my own. I just came in here to be alone. They’re vultures out there.”

“Yes, I’m all too aware. Either way, don’t let Jack or anyone else cause you to doubt yourself. Take it in stride and keep fighting. Understand me?”

“Yes. Thank you.” You lean in to hug me and I kiss the top of your head. As you pull back I can’t stop myself from taking your lips into mine. I don’t stop until my lungs burn for air regretfully I pull away. You lean your forehead against mine our breath mingling together. You stayed like that for a while until you calmed down.

“ Sorry.” You mumbled quietly to me as if you were embarrassed.

“It’s okay. We all have bad days.” I tell you.

“What time is it?”

“7:30 why?”

“Shit! I missed the bus. I’ll have to wait for the one at 9.”

“I can take you home or you can come back to the house with me.”

“I would but I have an appointment tomorrow and the office is closer to my apartment.”

“Okay, well I’ll drive you home.”

“It’s out of your way. I’ll be fine.”

“You think I’d leave you here?” I ask you.

“Get your stuff, I’ll drive you home.”

The drive there is quiet. I keep looking between you and the road trying to see if I can read your expressions. As we pull up I notice it’s not a very good neighborhood.

“This is where you live?”

“Yes.”

I put the car in park as you quickly lean over to peck my cheek and try to exit the car.

“Wait!” I say tugging your arm. You stop to look at me.

“Can I come up?”

“Do you want to?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“I don’t know. This place doesn’t really seem like your scene.”

I chuckle “let’s go up.”

Walking into the apartment I notice how small it is. The layout is similar to a studio and I’m sure you pay an arm and a leg for it.

“Well, this is it?”

I take a minute to look around. Even though it’s small you’ve made it cozy. My eyes are drawn to the photos on the wall.

“These are beautiful.”

“Thanks.”

I stop to see the blush across your face.

“Wait. Did you take these?”

“Yeah. “

“Y/n these are really good.”

“It’s just a hobby.”

I smile at you as I continue to look around.

“You have a nice book collection. You read a lot?”

“Yeah.”

“Me too. This your siblings?” I question holding the framed picture.

“Yeah, two sisters and my brother.”

“You close?”

“Yeah. But I don’t really see them much since I moved.” You say sadly.

“Umm, you should go. Casey is probably wondering where you are.”

“Casey’s visiting her mom tonight. I already told her where I was. She said she was going to call you later on.”

“Oh.”

“But if you want me to leave I can.”

“No.! I just I don’t know Alex, I don’t know how to do this with you.”

“Do what?”

“This! I mean one minute your nice and you want to spend time with me and the next you’re tearing my head off. I don’t know what to do here.”

I’m quiet for a minute processing what you just said. Mentally kicking myself for making you feel this way. Why can’t I just open up to you? Why do I feel like I need to be on guard all the time? I look over to see you watching me.

“I’m sorry. I’m trying. That’s why I came up here. I want to know more about you. I want to have what you and Casey have. I keep fucking it up.” I breathe out heavily.

“Alex, you don’t have to try so hard. I get being guarded but like I’ve said before I won’t make Casey choose. You really need to figure out what you want.”

“I want you.”

“Well, your actions speak louder than your words Alex,” you tell me as you're about to walk off. I grab your arm stopping your escape leaning in to kiss you gently on the lips.

“I want you,” I whisper against your lips. I can feel your smile.

“Let's watch a movie. And ill stay the night if that's okay.” I ask you trying to prove to you that I want this to work. You nod your head yes and we do just that. As much as id love to touch you and kiss I refrain. I want you to be ready and sure before we do anything. I want to be able to love you the way Casey loves you.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Today has been rather quiet around the office much to your surprise. Alex has you copying some documents and running flies from here to there. You're about to head back to your desk when you see Casey standing across the room. You walk up beside her and lean over to see what she's looking at. There's a girl in Alex’s office, she is young and pretty. The two are laughing as they talk oblivious to the world around them.

“Whose that?”

“Emma something, she wants a job here.”

“And flirting with Alex is going to help her to get it?” I ask Casey jealousy evident in my voice.

Casey chuckles “I guess she thinks so.”

“Hmmph.”

“Yup. I'm just watching.”

The two of you watched as Alex and Emma talked. Emma must be a comedian the way Alex is laughing. You roll your eyes at the laughter that rolls out of Alex’s chest. Casey seems indifferent about it until the girl's hand is on Alex’s shoulder. Her body tenses up for a moment.

“You know if she gets this job she’ll be

Alex’s right-hand man. You will answer to both of them. “

“So you're telling me I not only work for the Ice Queen but Malibu Barbie as well?”

Casey laughs “that's a good one! We should call her that.”

You roll your eyes at Casey as Alex and Emma are walking out of the office. You both smile at the girl as she walks by before making a beeline to Alex’s office.

“Can I help you two or do you just like watching me work?” Alex asked looking between the two of you.

“Does she work here now?” you asked sharply. Alex is taken back by your attitude and is quiet for a minute.

“Yes, she does. She starts tomorrow.”

“Hmmph. “

“Is there a problem?”

“Nope. Not at all. Do you need me?”

“Uhh no. You can take lunch if you want. I figured the three of us would go out.” Alex says looking at Casey for some sort of explanation.

“I’m actually meeting my brother he's in the city for two days. So I'll see y'all later,” you say walking out the door. Alex looks over at Casey shocked.

“What the hell was that about?”

“You were flirting with Emma.”

“No, I wasn't!”

“Looked that way to us.”

“So you're mad at me too?”

“Nah, you know better than to cheat on me.”

Casey tells her nonchalantly. Alex chuckled shaking her head as Casey walked out of the office swaying her hips.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It's been a week since Emma started and she's already on your last nerve. When she's not asking you to go fetch her coffee she's talking to you about how hot Alex is. You've already told Casey to get the bail money ready because you are about to lose it on Emma. Casey assured you that Emma isn't Alex’s type however, Alex hasn't said a word to you about it. All day long they spend talking to each other and laughing. Meanwhile, Alex barely pays you any attention unless it's to run files or get coffee.

It's late in the afternoon and almost everyone has gone for the day. Casey left early to stay with her mom for the night and you are supposed to be riding home with Alex. However, Emma is still in there talking her up. Finally, Emma is leaving but not before talking to you.

“Your still here?”

“Yup, I'm here when Alex is here so.”

“Oh yeah. She's great isn’t she?”

“Yup. She's something alright.”

“Do you know if she's dating anyone?”

“What?!”

“Alex. Is she seeing someone?”

You're looking for the words but it seems that Malibu Barbie has rendered you speechless.

“Umm.”

“I think I might ask her out. She's hot, god I bet she's good in bed too.”

Emma is going on and on and all you can do is just stare at her in disbelief.

“Anyways, I'll see you tomorrow bye. “

You sit there for a minute replaying her words in your head. Jealousy taking over your body. You shot up out of your chair and into the office slamming the door behind you. Alex jumps at the noise looking at you confused. She called your name but you ignore her as you make your way behind her desk. You pull her up on her feet and kiss her. Your tongue demanding access in her mouth. You grab her ass pulling her closer to you Alex moans in your mouth. You pull back with your lungs burning for air. You look up at Alex who still has her eyes closed.

“Your mine,” you tell her pulling her body into yours.

“I never said I wasn't,” Alex says confused.

“Emma wants to ask you out. She thinks you are hot and good in bed.”

“Well, she's not lying.” Alex chuckled.

“Your mine,” you growled.

Alex looks at you with a smile, her eyes are a darker shade of blue.

“I'm yours,” Alex says nodding her head as she leans in to kiss you once more. This kiss is slower this time. Pulling back you rest your forehead onto Alex’s trying to catch your breath.

“I want you, Alex.” you barely whisper.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Y/n if this is about Emma I promise you that was never going to be a thing. I'd never do that to Casey or You. “

“I know that. It just pissed me off that she was thinking about you like that.”

“So we don't have to do this if you aren't ready. I don't want you to feel obligated or regret it.” You smile at Alex’s words seeing just how sweet she could be. Brushing her hair behind her ears you can’t help but stare at her.

“You’re so beautiful.” Alex blushes at your comment.

“I want you and I know that if I changed my mind you’d still hold me tonight. But I want you Alex. I need you.”

Alex leans in to kiss you again grinning from ear to ear.

“Let’s go home.”

[sweetiejunie]

Hiraeth

—.*•—

Genre: fluff, mystery <idk rly, mainly mystery and puzzles solving>

Pairing: n/a (for now)

A/n: Got inspired by a book (the inheritance game) im reading and decided to write a new series. I guess this post is kind of like a teaser to see if people would be interested in a series like this!

—.*•—

Summary: You were mentioned in a billionaires will. But why? Who knew you would need to solve riddles and puzzles to find your answer. And the Emmerson brothers? An interesting bunch, to say the least.

You know, growing up in an orphanage isn’t as bad as they put it out in the movies. Sure, you may not have had the most glamorous of upbringings and seeing other kids get adopted while you didn’t sucks. Oh, and seeing your classmates get picked up by their parents everyday after school kinda stung. But if anyone asked, you would always say your childhood wasn’t all that bad. Your days was always filled with laughter and games. And at the very least, you had Alex by your side. She was like an older sister to you. A sister from another mister.

You had fun playing with the other children and your guardians always tired to make everything fun. The quiet game, where you compete and see who could remain the calmest while your guardian went to look for a flashlight when the electricity went out. Who could make their sweets last the longest? Game. The pillow game where you build pillow forts and huddle together to save money on heat. The floor was constantly lava. Everywhere you went it was either a game of hopscotch or tag.

And as a result, you’ve always had a fascination with games. From board games to more physically demanding games. Riddles, puzzles and even games of chance, like the weekly casino games you and your classmates would host after school — not to the knowledge of your teachers, of course.

You sat, aimlessly staring out the window. Your fingers twirling and fidgeting with the necklace. A locket. You’ve never opened it; you never figured out how to. But it was always with you. The last and only thing you had from your birth mother. Your guardian didn’t know much about her either, they found you at the door, abandoned. All she knew was that necklace.

“Y/n, can we go play outside?” A chirpy little voice dragged me back to the present. It was valerie. She was one of the newer kids to join the orphanage and being one of the oldest, you felt a bit of responsibility to help care for them.

“Of course,” you smiled back. “It’s cold outside today, you should go wear that scarf i gave you last week.”

With a little nod and giggle, the small human happily ran back to her room. Only to reappear seconds later with the woollen cloth around her.

—*•—

You had barely made it to your class on time. That that was just how you lived your life. You had the horrible habit of pushing things to the limit. Even with your grades. If sacrificing your 95 for a 90 meant you could put more hours into your part time job, you would take it in a heartbeat.

You were in the middle of a math quiz when you were summoned to the principal’s office. You were trouble, you figured. Girls like you don’t get praised. You didn’t stand out from the other students. You didn’t participate much in school activities and you definitely didn’t waste your time on extracurriculars. While they were out winning medals and trophies, you were in the park playing chess with the neighbourhood indigent.

Walking past the secretary’s desk, you couldn’t help but notice a boy sitting on one of the benches. He seemed to do not much older than you. Pink, dyed hair. He was wearing a suit, obviously tailor made for him. Looked like someone that would need security guards with him 24/7. Much too privileged to be a student at a local highschool.

“Y/n, take a seat.” Principal Langston started. His welcome far from warm, but nonetheless you listened. “I pulled you out of class today cause this was a rather urgent matter i have to attend to.”

If this was about your weekly gambling you used to pay for valarie’s new scarf — and sometimes clothes for yourself as well— you hoped he would just get on with it. But other than that, you had no idea what else could you possibly have done to earn the administrative’s attention.

“It’s alright. But what’s the matter?”

Without another word, he picked up the phone that linked straight to his secretary’s. “Hilda, you can send him in now.”

Moments later, you hear the open and in walks the mysterious male from earlier.

“Mr Emerson!” Principal Langston’s greeted him with a handshake and a smile. A smile? Principal Langston never smiled. “Thank you for you patience.” Yet, here he was grinning as if he just met the queen herself.

Two-faced swine.

Letting go of the principal’s, much too eager, grip. “Mr Langston, if you would give us some privacy.” His voice was low. Smooth and precise.

Immediately turning to face you. His eyes, blue and icy, staring straight into yours.

“But it’s my office-“

“I believe we had a deal.” The boy cut him off, raising an eyebrow.

Without another word, principal left. Never have you seen someone talk to your principal that way. And you have definitely never seen anyone chase someone away with a simple raised eyebrow. You can’t say you weren’t happy to see it, it was about time someone put him in his place. But what the boy said was... off. It didn’t seem like a deal but more of a threat?

“Good morning ms y/l/n.” His eyes lingered on yours., far too long for comfort before walking around the desk and sitting at the opposite side.

You tried not to stare — but failed. Bright pink hair. Blue piercing eyes. Both of which contrasted his black suit. How could you not.

“How do you know my name?” You demanded.

“Allow me to introduce myself. I’m choi yeonjun. And-“

“Choi?” Didn’t principal langston just call him emerson? “And I asked how you knew my name.” You resumed openly staring at the mystery boy.

“Adopted.” He answered simply. “And for now, just assume that i know everything.”

His voice would have been a lullaby if it weren’t for the words it was used for. “A guy that thinks he knows everything.” You scoffed, still staring as if it was a competition to see who would look away first.

“A girl that’s sharp-tongued.” You couldn’t help but notice how the end of his lips twitched upwards. “As i was saying,” he continued. “I’m just here to deliver a message. You have proven to be a rather difficult person to contact, ms y/l/n.”

He placed his arms on the desk, his right hand playing with the cuff link on his left wrist. “My father, Mr Harold Emerson. He passed away recently.” He look a second to study your reaction — or rather, lack there of. “Does his name ring any bells?”

“No. Should it?”

“Well,” he was the first to break the staring contest. “It appears that along with our family, and people who have worked with him for years, you have been named in his will.”

He looked to you for a reaction. Once again, you gave none — other than the confusion that was going on in your mind. You were a decently intelligent person. But right now yeonjun might as well have been speaking german to you.

“My father was a wealthy man. No one knows what exactly he has left you. But my father had requested you be present for the reading. It has been postponed for weeks.”

“Why would i be in your father’s will?” The only question you could think of.

“That’s the elephant in the room.” Yeonjun stood. “I have taken the liberty to arrange the travel plans for you.” This wasn’t an invitation it was summons. “There will be a car to pick you up tomorrow evening.”

“Wait.” You turned in your chair to face him. “Can i bring someone with me?”

“If you must.” And without another word, he walked out the door.

Choi yeonjun. Arrogant, cold. He was here for one thing and one thing only. All that was made clear from the mere ten minutes with him.

.

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Let me know if you would be interested/ enjoy in a series like this!! Cause this would take a lot of planning if i were to do it 🥴

[bestillmyslashyheart]

map on your skin

Alex was late. The rest of the group was already settled in around Max’s living room by the time Alex finally sidled in, looking exhausted. He kept to the back of the room and nodded to Jenna to get started without bothering with pleasantries. Kyle tried to catch his eye to see if everything was okay but Alex avoided his gaze.

“Alright,” Jenna huffed, standing up. Next to her, Gregory shuffled a few large files and handed one to her. “This is what we found cleaning out the last of Jesse’s files. Mostly, it’s some nauseating research that I can promise you none of you want to look at,” Isobel and Max looked angry at the thought while Michael hunched in on himself, “but there is a decent amount of information that they managed to discern about where you guys come from and your powers and your anatomy, etcetera, etcetera…” She flipped open the folder in her hand. “And there are other bases.” Jenna whipped out a sheet that had a list of names followed by coordinates. “We’re not sure what, if anything, is still there, but there was definitely something there at one point.”

“We need to search them,” Isobel said immediately. She rose from her seat and ripped the paper from Jenna’s hand, earning herself a scowl that she promptly ignored. “There could be more people there, people like us.”

“Some of these places couldn’t hold prisoners, from what records we have they just weren’t equipped for it, but yes there are a few places that could have held other people at some point. But they all appear to be abandoned.”

“Caulfield appeared abandoned too,” Kyle had to point out. Jenna tipped her head in concession.

“There’s one more thing,” Gregory announced. He dropped his stack of files and unfolded a large piece of paper. Once open, he laid it on the table. Hurriedly, everyone grabbed their drinks and phones to clear some space.

Almost as one, they all stood up and leaned over it to look. “What is it?” Maria asked for the group.

Put simply, it was a mess. There were lines crisscrossing it all over the place with vague shapes underneath. Also, there were three large gaps, giant white spaces that broke up the lines.

“It’s a map,” Charlie answered. Everyone looked at her in confusion. She shrugged. “At least that’s what they believed.”

“A map to what?” Rosa scoffed. “It’s just lines.”

Isobel shook her head. “What are you talking about?” She reached out and dragged her finger across one of the lines. After a few inches her finger fell off the line until she was following something only she seemed to see. “It’s-”

“The stars,” Michael finished. He and Max leaned over further to look closely. “It’s an astronomical map.”

“I don’t recognize that star pattern,” Max mused. He turned his head to look at it from a different angle.

“Okay, what are you looking at?” Maria asked. The three aliens looked up at her. “It’s not a map, astronomical or otherwise.” She furrowed her brow. “It’s just a bunch of lines and blobs.”

Michael huffed. “It’s clearly a map.” He pointed at a blob. “This? This is-”

“We can’t see it,” Charlie cut him off. He glared at her but she ignored it. “It was made by some of the prisoners in Caulfield, and they could clearly read it, but humans can’t. Somehow, however they made it, it doesn’t translate in a way that our brains can comprehend. Whatever it is the three of you are seeing, we can’t.” She gestured at the humans in the room.

“What about the blank spots?” Max asked.

Gregory rifled through his folder. “Uh, they said something about…aha!” He pulled a sheet of paper out and read out, “The heirs will lead the way. Without them, hope is lost.”

“Well what does that mean?” Isobel huffed, crossing her arms. “Are we the heirs? Because we see big white spaces in the middle of this map.”

“Map to where?” Alex spoke up. Everyone turned to him but no one answered. “Where were they trying to go?”

“Does it matter?” Max sighed. “We’re missing half of it.”

Alex eyed the map strangely. Kyle watched him as Isobel and Michael started arguing with Max that of course it mattered. Behind them, Maria was pestering Jenna and Charlie as to why she couldn’t read it if she was part alien. On the opposite side of the table, Liz was oddly silent.

Suddenly, while Kyle was distracted by Rosa pulling out her sketch book and pencil, Alex crossed the room and forced himself gently in between the three aliens. The room fell quiet again.

Alex lifted up the edge of the paper and peeked at the back for a moment before flipping it. Rosa cursed as the edge of it came close to her face but she quickly grabbed it and helped Alex get it turned over.

“Alex, what are you doing?” Michael asked even as he too helped get it flat on the table. “What the…”

Kyle stood up again, unsure when he’d sat down. The map carried on to the back almost like it had bled through the paper but it looked different. A few blobs were in different places, a few lines missing or added.

Alex studied it carefully.

“How’d you know this was on the back?” Max asked, half an accusation in his voice.

Alex ignored him. He nudged Michael out of his way as he reached across the table to touch the two smaller white spots. “Liz?” He asked.

Everyone turned to Liz.

“Liz?” Max asked. Liz gave him a small smile before focusing on Alex, a considering look in her eyes. She didn’t move at first, her and Alex communicating silently over the expanse of the table. After a long moment in which the room seemed to hold its breath she leaned over and tapped the spot under Alex’s right hand.

“You’re sure?” Alex asked.

Liz held her hand up and waved it back and forth. “I’d have to check but I’m pretty sure.” She shrugged. “I’m not a cartographer so I could be wrong.” She jerked her chin at him in question. “You?”

Alex straightened up and tapped the large white spot in the middle.

“You’re sure?” Liz asked. There was a teasing lilt to her voice. Alex smirked and nodded. Liz sighed and tapped the third spot. “What about this one?”

“Might have to wait on that.” Alex started to fold it the paper up but Michael and Isobel both reached out and grabbed it.

“Woah what are you doing?” Isobel said.

Michael waved a hand between Alex and Liz. “What was that?”

Alex stared at Michael. “Do you trust me?”

“Are you going to answer my question?”

“Not right now.”

Michael stared at him for a moment but Alex didn’t blink. Finally, Michael let go with a huff. “Fine. Do whatever.”

Isobel looked at him. “Not. Not fine. This is ours.”

“And you’ll get it back,” Alex promised, tugging it gently from her hands and folding it up. I just need it for a few days first.” Isobel glared but a sharp look from Michael kept her mouth shut.

“Anything else?” Alex asked Jenna, Gregory, and Charlie. The three of them shook their heads. “Then I’m heading out. Good night!” He slipped out the door before anyone could stop him, the map firmly in hand.

“What the hell was that Liz?” Rosa asked as the door shut behind Alex.

Liz shook her head. “Don’t worry about it.” She looked at her watch. “It’s late.” It was barely 8pm. “I should go.” She leaned up to press a quick kiss to Max’s cheek. “Night guys!” With a wave behind her head, Liz followed Alex out the door.

—

Liz had only been to Alex’s house once since he’d been home but she didn’t have any trouble finding it. The Christmas lights on the tree out front, despite the fact that it was April, definitely helped. She parked next to Alex’s car and hurried to the front door, not bothering to lock the car behind her.

“Alex!” She called, knocking loudly.

“It’s open!” A distant call replied immediately. Liz tried the door and found it unlocked as promised and stepped inside.

“Should I lock it?” She asked.

“Up to you,” Alex replied. “I’m sure they’re right behind you and Michael will get in either way.” Liz left it unlocked.

The light in the dining room called Liz like a moth to a flame. She found Alex hunched over the table, cleared of everything but the map, with a marked stuck between his teeth and pencil in his hand. He had already started sketching in a few lines.

“Alex.”

Alex’s hand stilled. He hesitated, clearly considering his options, before he dropped the pencil and sank back onto a chair with a heavy sigh. He took the marker out of his mouth. “Liz.”

All of a sudden, Liz didn’t know what to say. She pulled out a chair and dropped heavily into it. “Alex.”

The corner of Alex’s mouth quirked upwards. “If you’re not going to ask…”

“Michael’s your soulmate.” It wasn’t the question it maybe should have been. It wasn’t a question at all.

“Yes.” It was said simply. Like there wasn’t a mountain of baggage that came with it. Like Michael hadn’t been dating Maria off and on for months.

What Liz wanted to say was ‘why did you never say anything?’, ‘why was Michael with Maria?’, ‘why aren’t you and Michael together?’, ‘how long have you known?’, ‘were you ever going to admit it?’, but what she said was, “Alex.”

Somehow Alex heard all the unasked questions. “It was easier.”

Liz didn’t understand that.

“Why haven’t you admitted it?” He asked. “It’s not like it’d be a surprise,” he teased gently.

She shrugged. “It never came up.” And it hadn’t. Everything had happened so fast and there had been the revelation of what happened with Rosa ten years ago, and then Max was dead and Rosa was alive, and then she got Max back only for things to get crazy with her dad, and it just never seemed like a good time. Announcing you’d found your soulmate, that you’d met your match, was supposed to be a time of celebration and Liz hadn’t really felt like making a big deal. It deserved to be special, it deserved an event, but there hadn’t been a good time for it.

Alex nodded like he understood.

“When did you know?” She asked quietly.

“First time I came back,” Alex answered. “After basic training, before my first posting. It, uh, it was about six months after graduation?”

“That was ten years ago.”

“It was.”

“How could you- I mean, why didn’t you-?”

Alex shrugged. “It’s complicated.”

Liz accepted that. Up until tonight, the only information she had on Alex’s relationship with Michael had come from Maria so she knew she was missing more than a few key bits of trivia. “You know,” she started after a long silence, “the first time I saw it? And realized what it was? I freaked out.”

“Yeah?” Alex laughed.

Liz nodded with a little laugh of her own. “Yeah,” she agreed. “It was right around when I found out what had happened to Rosa. I, uh, I walked in on him accidentally while he was getting ready for work and I saw it and I just…ran. Went home, drank a lot, and ignored it. Right then, he was the guy who framed my sister for an accident that killed two other girls and he’d covered it up for ten years. I couldn’t wrap my head around the idea that he was my soulmate too.”

She could still remember it vividly. Max had come around the corner in just his boxers, not having heard her come in or call his name, and splashed across his thigh was his mark. She was pretty sure she’d seen it once in high school, or at least the part of it that covered the top of his knee, but it hadn’t solidified then. But that day it was clear as could be, a mess of images on a grid background that should have been an amorphous blob to her eyes. That for a moment, she had wished was an amorphous blob. Because a person’s mark was only a solid image to their soulmate, to the rest of the world it was like a bastardized Rorschach test, and in that moment Liz had wanted nothing less than for Max Evans to be her soulmate. So she’d turned on her heel and ran out the door. It was only weeks later that she let herself get up close and personal with it.

Until today, Liz had never seen anything else like it in the world. It vaguely resembled a map but nothing quite like any she’d ever seen. Not until Gregory Manes unfolded an alien map that humans shouldn’t be able to read but Liz saw clear as day. Equally clear was the blank white spot on the side where Max’s mark would fit perfectly. It was the same size, same markings.

Three cars pulled up outside. The engines cut out and the doors slammed shut. Liz counted silently to ten. On six, Alex’s front door swung open.

“Alex!” Michael yelled.

Alex didn’t answer. He and Liz sat silently as the heavy footsteps pounded down the hallway until Michael appeared in the doorway. “What the hell?” Michael greeted.

“Hi,” Alex greeted with a glare.

Michael rolled his eyes. “Yeah, hi. You knew we were coming, you left the door unlocked.” Max and Isobel filed in behind him. “So tell us.”

Max looked to Liz, the question clear in his eyes. Liz looked to Alex, silently ceding the floor to him.

Alex stood up, his back straight and shoulders square. “Liz and I can read the map. And we each have one of the missing pieces.”

“How?” Isobel asked.

“Because they’re yours,” Liz answered. Isobel and Max turned to her in question but Michael hardly glanced her way.

“Alex?”

Alex sighed. “The missing pieces are your marks.” He pointed at the one Liz had identified earlier. “According to Liz, Max’s mark fits this blank space here. And this,” he pointed at the large one in the middle, “is yours, Guerin.”

“What are you talking about?” Isobel asked. “How do you know that? They said humans can’t read it.”

“I guess since we’re your soulmates and can see your marks, we can see the map? And where they fit in?” Liz looked to Alex and Alex shrugged. “Best guess?”

Max and Isobel turned to Alex then Michael. The sudden synchronicity was disconcerting. “What?” They both asked.

Alex arched an eyebrow. “Thought you said they knew?”

Michael shifted under everyone’s gaze. “It’s not like we talked about it but they knew.”

“Clearly they didn’t.”

“You really want to get into who knew and who didn’t?” Michael shot back.

Alex lifted a hand in concession. “Look, the important thing is Liz and I can fill in the missing pieces from yours and Max’s marks but we’ll still have a blank space unless…” he turned to Isobel.

“Don’t look at me, I’m the one in the room not hiding a secret soulmate.”

“I wasn’t hiding anything!” Max immediately protested. “You knew!”

“Yeah but not because you told me!” Isobel yelled back. “I had to figure that one out on my own.”

Liz tuned them out as she focused on Michael and Alex. She still hadn’t quite processed the revelation that they were soulmates, that they’d known for ten years they were soulmates and done nothing with that knowledge. The two men were communicating silently across the table, both leaning in towards each other but neither saying a word. Finally, Michael looked down at the map and traced the few pencil lines that Alex had started sketching in.

“You do this from memory?” He sounded disbelieving.

“You forget what mine looks like?” Alex asked, eyebrow arched.

“No but yours is a lot smaller.” Michael smiled. Alex rolled his eyes.

“Wait,” Liz sat forward. “How big is yours?” She’d never seen it but- “If it’s comparable to Max’s,” she traced the outline of the white space where Max’s mark fit and it was true to size, “how is yours…?”

Michael rolled his eyes and started tugging off his shirt. His undershirt quickly followed, hitting Isobel in the face as he tossed it aside.

“So gross,” she muttered as she flung it away. Liz didn’t hear her though because Michael turned around and showed her his back.

The entire expanse, from the tops of his shoulders down under the waistband of his jeans and curled over both his sides, was mess of mottled black ink. Liz couldn’t make sense of it because there were no spaces, it was like someone had slathered Michael’s whole back in black paint and just smudged the edges.

Liz whistled lowly. She’d never seen one so large. Most were much smaller. Even Max’s, which covered the space from his knee up to his hip, was considered large. Michael’s was huge.

Michael gave her another second to look and then he started to tug on his shirt, the undershirt forgotten on the floor.

“No.” Michael stopped immediately at Alex’s command. Liz looked over to see him with pencil in hand already sketching in more lines. Michael craned his neck to see over his shoulder.

“Really?” He asked. “You want to do this now?”

“Well you’ve already got your shirt off.”

“If you want me to take my shirt off, darlin’, all you gotta do is ask,” Michael leered. Alex shot him an icy look that froze Michael in his track’s. Instantly, his face fell into a frown and he turned to stare at the wall opposite.

Liz cleared her throat. “Do you have another pencil?”

Alex gestured behind him to cup full of writing utensils. Liz scoured through it until she found an already sharpened pencil and then turned back to the silent crowd. “Alright take your pants off.”

“Woah, what?”

“Hold on.”

“I’m out.” Isobel threw her hands up and left the room. “Have fun with your art project!” The door slammed shut behind her.

Michael glared at Max. “Leave the pants on.” Max rolled his eyes at him.

“Where exactly is Max’s mark?” Alex asked hesitantly. Max ran a hand over his thigh. “And how far up does it go?” He turned to Liz.

Liz considered it. “Probably best if we do that at home.” She looked down at the map. “His is smaller-”

“Yeah it is,” Michael interjected.

“Oh my god are you twelve?” Alex huffed. Michael smirked.

“As I was saying,” Liz continued, “the space for Max’s mark is a lot smaller so it might be easier if I do his first and then give it back to you to do Michael’s.”

“That would make sense,” Alex agreed slowly, looking down. Still, he hesitated.

“No?”

Alex flipped the pencil over in his hand and tapped the part he’d started sketching. “I’ve already started and Michael’s already here and ready, so why don’t I keep it tonight and work on it a bit and then I’ll bring it to you tomorrow. You can keep it as long as you need and then once you’re done I can finish up.”

Liz checked with Max and shrugged. “That works. After all, there really isn’t a rush, right? Since we don’t have Isobel’s section?”

“That’s true,” Max acknowledged. Michael seemed antsy though. “It doesn’t have to happen tonight.”

“In that case, why don’t you just keep it until you’re done and then pass it along?” Liz suggested.

“That works, too.”

“So are we doing this tonight or what?” Michael huffed. Alex nodded. “Okay then.” He spun around and sat on the edge of the table, back to Alex. “Sketch your heart out.”

“You two do that and let us know when you’re finished.” Max looked to Liz. “We skipped dessert?”

Liz smiled. “Don’t worry, I know a guy who makes great milkshakes.” He smiled back at her.  She stood up and looked around for her keys before remembering she’d dropped them on the table in the hallway on her way in. “You two need anything before we go?” Michael and Alex shook their heads.

“Have a good night,” Alex looked up from the map and gave her a small smile that Liz returned.

“Good night, guys.” She squeezed Michael’s bare shoulder in goodbye as she walked by.

“Night!” He called after them.

–

The house was eerily silent once Max and Liz left, the scratches of the pencil on paper the only sounds.

Alex worked steadily for about five minutes before Michael started fidgeting. “Guerin.”

“It’s too quiet.”

Alex pulled out his phone and hit play on his latest playlist, the music flowing a second later. “Now sit still. This needs to be exact.”

Michael was a perfect model for a little over ten minutes. And then he opened his mouth. “You told Liz.”

“Would you prefer I didn’t and left your map incomplete?” Alex shifted to get a better view of the part wrapped around Michael’s left side. 

“You’ve never told anyone.”

Alex shaded in one of the shapes he’d just outlined. Once he thought it might have represented a landmass but now he’s pretty sure it’s a planet. “Neither have you.” They’d never discussed it, not really, but they’d each come to the same conclusion, that their marks were theirs and no one else’s. So no one else needed to know. 

“Well secret’s out now.”

Alex hummed. He couldn’t quite see where the next line ended so he reached out without a thought and gently pulled at Michael’s skin to get a better look. Michael sucked in a breath but didn’t say anything, his back muscles tensing under Alex’s hand. Alex ignored it.

“So who’s gonna tell Maria?” Alex froze, the pencil digging into the paper. 

“What?” He asked, certain he’d misheard Michael.

“I said who’s gonna tell Maria?” Michael looked over his shoulder. “Because I doubt the others are going to come up with some other reason for how we fill in the missing spaces. They know which means everyone is gonna know which means Maria’s going to find out one way or another.”

“She’s your girlfriend,” Alex reminded him coldly. “You should be the one to tell her.”

“She’s your best friend.”

“Eh,” Alex replied. “She’s my friend, yes, but we’re not nearly as close as we used to be. And again, you’re the one dating her. The person responsible for telling her her boyfriend already found his match is her boyfriend.” He poked Michael with the eraser. “That means you.”

Michael sighed. “I don’t want to.”

“I know.”

“This thing with her is easy, that’s why I like it.”

“I know.”

“Bringing soulmates into it complicates things.”

Having a soulmate didn’t seem to complicate things all that much, Alex didn’t say. What he said instead was, “I know,” because he did, because Michael had told him as much every time the subject came up. “You still need to talk to her, though.”

Michael let out a breath and hunched over, his elbows on his knees.

“Guerin,” Alex admonished. “Stop moving.”

But Michael stood up. “I need a drink.”

“You really don’t.”

“I really do.”

He left the room and a moment later Alex heard his cabinet door open and shut. Just the one because Michael knew his way around Alex’s house nearly as well as Alex did.

Alex dropped the pencil onto the table with a clatter and followed. Michael greeted him with a glass of his own which Alex took and quickly drained before placing in the sink. “What’s the problem?”

Michael scoffed. “There’s no problem.”

“Guerin.”

“You told Liz.”

“I didn’t actually but she’s smart enough to figure it out on her own and I didn’t bother wasting my breath correcting her.” Alex drummed his fingers on the counter. “And so what if I did? I can’t tell my friend about my soulmate? I need your permission?”

“I thought we would decide together before telling anyone,” Michael confessed petulantly.

Alex blinked in surprise. “When the hell did we agree to that?” 

“I thought it was obvious.”

“Oh well it wasn’t.” Alex took a deep breath. “I’m sorry we didn’t wait until you got here to discuss it but I won’t apologize for telling her.”

Michael huffed. “Course not.” He drained his glass and placed it next to Alex’s. “Back to the art project.” 

Alex paused a few minutes in the kitchen. Normally, he loved being around Michael, even when they weren’t getting along, even when it hurt, but there was a tension in the air that he didn’t like. He didn’t understand where it was coming from but he knew a powder keg when he saw it and right now they were one.

“Alex!”

When Alex walked back into the dining room it was to find a naked Michael Guerin perched on the edge of his table. Alex stopped and stared, he couldn’t help it. No matter how many times he’d seen it, the view still took his breath away. Part of it was just Michael, absolutely, but part of it was the mark in its entirety. It covered the top of Michael’s ass, enough so that he really couldn’t display it unless he took his pants off, so Alex didn’t always get to see all of it. “I wasn’t doing that part yet.”

Michael smirked. “Well now you can.”

Alex made himself focus on the work for as long as possible but when he had to touch Michael to position him correctly for Alex to see everything, all hope was lost. 

The second his hand grabbed at Michael’s ass, Michael arched his back and pressed into it. 

“Guerin,” he warned. Or tried to.

Michael smirked. “You’re the one with your hand on my ass, darlin’.” Alex quickly removed his hand. Michael rolled his eyes and stood up, turning around to face Alex. Alex dropped his eyes low before forcing them up to Michael’s face. That damnable smirk was firmly in place.

“You have a girlfriend.”

Michael shrugged. “Only technically. We’ve barely talked in weeks, haven’t had sex in like two months. It’s done with we just haven’t actually said it yet.” He rounded the table. “Besides. You’re my soulmate.”

He stepped in close. Alex didn’t move away. “You were pissed at me a few minutes ago.”

“I’m still a little pissed,” Michael admitted. “So what?”

Alex pressed a hand into the center of his chest and pushed Michael back a step. “We’re not having sex.”

Michael arched an eyebrow, a slow smile spreading across his lips. “No?”

“We’re working on your map,” Alex reminded him. “That’s it.”

“Alex,” Michael groaned. He grabbed onto where Alex was still pressing against his chest with one hand and looped a finger through Alex’s belt loop with the other. One sharp tug and they were pressed flush against each other. 

Their lips brushed against each other in a whisper of a kiss before Alex pulled away. “If you don’t want to work on the map then we should call it a night.”

Michael looked upset. “So that’s it, huh?”

“What’s it?”

“We can tell people we’re soulmates but we can’t act like it?”

Alex stared at him. “Don’t.” His voice was hard. “You were the one who wanted nothing to do with me. You were the one who decided to date someone else. You were the one who said we shouldn’t be together. You don’t get to get angry at me for following your lead.”

Michael stared at him, his shoulders rigid with tension, before giving a sharp nod. “Fine. Right. My lead.” He stalked around the table, his clothes flying up from the floor to meet his hands mid-stride. Alex watched him tug on his boxers and jeans, his movements jerky.

“Michael,” he sighed. 

“We can do the map another time,” Michael replied without looking at him. “Like they said, without Isobel’s soulmate there’s really no rush.” He shoved his feet into his boots.  Michael grabbed his hat and plopped it on his head. “Good night, Alex.” His shirt was still in his hands when he disappeared down the hallway.

Alex groaned softly in the empty room. The front door opened. “Guerin!” The front door closed. Alex stepped into the hallway. It was dark but the lights from outside framed Michael’s hunched form well enough for Alex to see. “I’m going to bed.”

“It’s early,” Michael replied in surprise.

“It is,” Alex agreed. “Might have to lay there for a bit. Could get boring.”

Michael half turned back towards him. “Sounds like you could use some company.”

Alex hummed. “Probably could.” He turned and headed for his bedroom. “Lock the door and turn the lights off.” By the time Alex reached his room, Michael was right behind him. “No sex.”

“What?”

Alex took his pants off and sat on the edge of the bed to remove his prosthetic. “No sex.”

Michael hesitated in the doorway. “Fine.”

“Fine.” He set his prosthetic aside. “Take your pants off.”

“You just said-”

“I want to see it,” Alex rolled his eyes. He slid under the covers, his own clothes littering the floor to be picked up later. Michael helpfully shed the clothes he’d just put on and got in on the other side of the bed. 

Alex gave him a moment to get comfortable on his stomach before he shoved the covers down far enough that they only covered their legs and shifted onto his side. Carefully, he reached over and started tracing the lines of Michael’s mark. Michael shivered under the light touch but made no move to stop him.

Slowly, Alex made his way down Michael’s back, making sure to touch each line, every shape. When his finger had mapped the expanse, he leaned over and started again, this time with his lips. It was an old habit, one he’d started the very first time he’d seen it, and it never failed to relax them both. 

He knew every inch of Michael’s back. He knew it in his fingertips and in his lips. Every single marking was etched into memory, he’d hardly needed Michael to model it for him earlier. 

When he was finished, he stayed slumped over Michael’s back, his lips pressed to the planet at the base of Michael’s neck. In response, Michael, now a mostly boneless lump beneath him, turned his face to the side and craned his neck to reach Alex’s arm. In this position, he could just reach the mark nestled in the crook of Alex’s left arm. His mark was substantially smaller than Michael’s; a tiny, detailed planet with a sky full of stars behind it. When it first appeared, Michael had tried searching for the planet in the sky by using the stars as a guide but they didn’t match up with any known pattern. Alex had long accepted that it wasn’t anything specific, more an idea.

“Why isn’t it easy?” Michael asked quietly. “It’s supposed to be easy, right? Find your soulmate, live happily ever after. That’s how the stories go.”

“We’re not a story.” Alex traced the cluster of planets nestled over Michael’s hip. “We’re real, Michael. And if we want this to mean something, to be worth something, we have to work at it.”

Michael didn’t say anything for a long while. “Nothing worth having ever came easy.”

“No. It didn’t,” Alex agreed. He pressed a lingering kiss to the nape of Michael’s neck and rolled off of him. “Guess we need to decide if we’re worth it.”

Michael kissed Alex’s mark. “We are.”

[qvid-pro-qvo]

we meet now and then on a winter’s day (and i am all the better for it)

rafael barba x female!reader. 

word count: 13,187 (forgive me for either writing less than a thousand words or over 10k. one day i’ll learn moderation.)

rating: teen, for growing pains, and learning to love home no matter where you are (canon-typical mentions of sexual abuse/sex crimes). 

link to it on AO3. 

-

You’re too clumsy for your own good. 

Your limbs are gangly, your feet are too big, and every step feels like a struggle to stay upright.  It’s the worst of times, tenth grade.

And high schoolers are brutal, and you get a feeling it’s extra so in New York.  They don’t take no for an answer, they laugh in your face and spit on you (figuratively… sometimes). Girls trip you in their stunning shoes that your feet could never fit in, poke at your knobby knees, and boys don’t even bother with you.

You’re new, and a loner, and can’t keep your books in your hands, and it all seems to combine into an ugly cocktail, one that makes you lash out. Other loners usually have one thing wrong with them. You have two left feet and a name no one knows. Easy target.

So you don’t see the three boys in front of you, walking home, because your head is ducked and your knees ache from the way you fell in the middle of the damn hallway. And one of them for sure doesn’t see you. He’s walking backwards, his mouth running, but you don’t hear anything either, not what he’s saying, not his friends who try to warn him in attempts of Spanish and English. 

You feel the collision, though. It’s not violent, but the girth of his bookbag into your chest knocks you backwards onto your ass. You cry out in pain, one of your ankles catching underneath you, and it feels like something twists, hard enough to hurt. 

Well. It wasn’t as if you were having such a good day before.

“Jesus fuck,” you hiss, and when you look up, a boy is leaning over you. His green eyes are startling, and you think he’s apologizing, but your eyes have to blink away some reflexive tears to really see the way his lips are moving. You’re still dazed, but you realize that it’s three of them, leaning over you, and you don’t like the way they’re staring.

“That’s what you get for running your mouth, Barba,” a boy teases, reaching forward to punch the kid directly above you in the shoulder. He takes it, but he’s still focused on you, those eyes not giving you a break. It makes your face redden, and you dip your chin, clench your jaw.

“Shut it, Eddie,” he says quickly, and it takes you a moment to recognize the words. You just manage a tight smile and groan as you shift off of your ankle. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” you tell him. He nods at that, but he still doesn’t really take a step back. Just pulls up from his crouched position. “Really, just. Uh. Sorry, I guess.”

“You don’t have to give him an excuse,” the third boy informs her. “Hey, Rafi, give her some space, you don’t have to keep her on the ground.”

With that he pulls back, and you get a good look at them. The three of them are in uniform. You recognize the colors, your block a healthy mix of that particular school’s students and the P.S. you attended. The two behind the one who ran into you – what was it, Rafi? – have their ties undone, shirts untucked. The boy in front of you has his uniform perfect, however, and you watch as he lifts his hand to run through the front of his hair. He looks a little older, almost adult, and your limbs feel like the legs of a fawn, a jumbled heap. You know you look disheveled, in comparison, making you drop your eyes before you push yourself up.

“Can you stand?” he asks.

“Yes, I’m fine,” you bite out, and the day comes back to you in a wave, one that makes your eyes began to water. “Just. Leave me be, all right?”

“And leave you on the ground?” He scoffs like the implication itself is an offense. It’s as if he doesn’t recognize the scowl on your face as being directed towards him. “Come on, take my hand.”

He reaches out to you. His hand is almost shoved in your face, and you pull back for a moment before looking at the group of them.

They don’t seem… mean. Just… boys. Your mother’s voice sings in your head, reminding you that asking for help isn’t a weakness, just a fact of life. And while you wish that wasn’t true, the fact of life was also you were in a lot of pain.

With a sigh, you settle on reaching out and taking it, and when he starts to help pull you up the other two assist. You tried to ignore the prickle of your eyes, closing them as you were lifted from the ground.

However, your ankle gives out as soon as you put weight on it. You make it to your full height for a moment, before suddenly you’re falling forward again.

But they catch you. Rafi does, really, and the other boys help get you to standing. You ignore the look that the two of them give you, eye rolls and shared smirks.

“That ankle’s not going to take you home,” the Barba kid tells you. You glance down at it, wincing at the swelling, and he turns to his friends. “Let’s walk her.”

“Oh, no, did you break it?” Eddie asks, horrified, but that earns him a smack on the back of the head from the third friend.

“Que eres estúpido? Shut up, Eddie, it’s twisted at the worst.”

A snort left you. You can’t get a word in edgewise, the way they start clambering over each other, arguing, but you raise your voice, make yourself heard. “I’m just… hey, I’m just down the street, I can manage. You guys seem like you need to go somewhere.”

“Well, if you’re just down the street then it’s not a problem.” Rafi’s voice is matter of fact, and with a grin he reaches for your arm. “Alejandro, get the other side.”

“Rafi, no offense, but, uh, let Eddie handle that. You and me together will make her even more lopsided.” Alejandro has a grin, bright at the not-so-subtle dig.

“Eres el peor,” the boy mutters, and with a roll of his eyes, he pulls back, hands lifting in surrender.

Eddie and Alejandro laugh, and so do you, a little chuckle, more for the tone than the actual words. Their banter makes you forget your shitty day, focusing on the group of three as they tussle for a place at your side.

“Where do you live?” Rafi asks, and you point down the street.

“I’m the… fourth building on the right?” you guess, wincing as your foot dragged along the ground. “Fucking, fucking shit, lift it, lift.”

“You’re not exactly helping,” Eddie shoots at you, and your eyes roll, the urge to yank away overruled by common sense.

“I’m trying. Look, you can just leave me alone. It’s not broken, and I’ll make it,” you point out, but all that earns is a scoff from Rafi Barba, an eye roll as he turns to face the three of you as you hobble along.

“Not happening. Look, we’re almost there. Then we’ll leave you be, and you can tell your family how you were rescued by los tres mosqueteros de Jerome Avenue.” His eyes are alight with a kind of mischief, and Alejandro snorts next to him.

“Does it count if one of ‘em is the problem?”

You chat the rest of the way. They bombard each other with questions, and a couple to you, most of which you can’t manage to answer as they tease each other and poke and prod. A couple of times you stumble, but they’re there, keeping you upright, and Rafi makes sure that you don’t fall face first onto concrete. He walks backwards, then forwards, then backwards again, always making sure that you can hear him as he talks about whatever crosses the mind of the three.

It seems like a lifetime, but no longer than a minute or two. You walk, forward, forward, forward, and then you’re up against your building, leaning against it after forcing Eddie and Alejandro to let you go.

“I’ve just gotta buzz my mom,” you tell them. “Trust me, you’re free to go, I can make it.”

“Not likely,” Rafi’s incredulous at the suggestion, but you just roll your eyes. “You can barely stand up straight.”

He’s firmly planted. Eddie and Alejandro look more ready to skedaddle, bouncing on their toes as the cold hits them. Rafi is just staring, and you find yourself meeting his gaze, lifting your chin. “Look, I know you feel obligated, but I don’t make a habit of showing strangers my exact address –“

“And I would contend we’re not strangers. Acquaintances at the very least, maybe even friends. We know each other’s names; we’ve been quite friendly.”  

“Oh, yeah? You know my name?”

The silence is deafening. That wins it. Because Rafi Barba, in all of his urgency, in all of their chatting, never once asked. None of them did. Which doesn’t hurt your feelings. It’s easy to pull away from people you don’t know, and you’d rather just make it up the rickety elevators in peace. Crawl into your bed and die from mortification and exhaustion.

You asked for help. Now the help was over.

“Look, you did your good deed for the day, I made it home,” you counter, “now please, can I get there on my own?”

Just then, the door opens. Your mom comes out, sees your swollen ankle, and that should be their cue.

“Oh, sweetie,” she hummed. “No more dancing for a while, huh?”

“Dancing?” Rafi asks, and he looks between you and your mother with curiosity. 

“Nope, nothing,” you scramble to say. Those moments weren’t for anyone else, just the two of you. “Anyways, thanks so much, but I should really be getting upstairs, and… sleeping. Yes, sleeping. Okay, thanks again, bye!”

You turn to hobble away, hoping your mother will say goodbye and follow you. But instead, she just smiles at the boys and looks at each of them in turn, looking over their uniforms and identical grins, Eddie and Alex lingering back behind the real culprit.

“Thank you so much for bringing my girl home,” she tells them. Her smile is bright, almost incandescent. She has that way about her, your mother, the kind of face that everyone loves, the kind of laugh that everyone is drawn to. You wish you’d inherited that, instead of gangly limbs from a man you barely knew. “She always walks home alone, and it worries me every time.”

“Mom, they were nice and all, but they probably have lives,” you sigh out, and Eddie and Alex seem to agree. They already seem to be creeping away, but Rafi is stubbornly still. “Let them get home, get out of the cold.”

“Oh, all right, all right.” She reaches for you, wraps your arm around her shoulders, and you wince as it scrapes the floor again. “Thank you, boys.”

“We should get home, Barba,” Eddie calls out. “Tus padres estarán esperando, vamanos.”

Something passes across Rafi’s face. It’s quick, and dark, but it’s there, and he nods, his jaw clenching.

“Thank you,” you say again, and it’s a little more heartfelt, genuine. You even smile, a little, an effort to wash that sour look from his face. But you’re turning away, too, when you suddenly hear Rafi Barba call out to you.

“Your name?” he asks. “Just so I know what to yell next time we almost collide.”

“If he’s facing forward,” Eddie mutters to Alejandro, who you can hear snort and shove his toe against the sidewalk.

Your eyes roll, and you look over your shoulder at the boy. He waits, patiently, for the answer, even as Eddie and Alex start moseying down the sidewalk, and his smile is more a smirk, proud of himself when you give it to him, first and last.

He repeats it, gesturing to you and making sure he gets it right. And then he points to himself, his lips quirking again. “Rafael Barba.” He reaches for your hand, and when you hesitate, he raises a brow. Those eyes pierce you. “Not friends. But. Acquaintances?”

“Cute,” you retort, but you’re reaching to shake his hand without thinking about it, gloved hands warm in each other’s grip. “Deal.”

You don’t remember why the day was shitty anymore. Just that your ankle hurts, and you now know that his full name is Rafael.

-

College is complicated. College is sitting and studying in your dorm room and then sitting and studying someplace else. College is hitting your head as you wake up because you have the top bunk. College is crying with frustration over chemistry.

But college is also realizing you really like what the psych professor talks about. College is finally making some real friends, and mellowing out because of it. Your lashing out fades as your anger does, the realization that people can be kind. College is getting a job and not minding that either, because you don’t mind serving others coffee if you get it for free.

So you end up liking Hudson, overall. It’s nice. College, the feel, the people, they’re nice. And you’re close enough to home that you and your mom end up still having a little bit of a dance party every so often. New York isn’t too much of a home, it never will be, but Hudson and your friends and your mom are, and it’s… it’s good, for once.

The holidays approach. Your first real break is coming up, but so are finals, and so your eyes are forcing significant figures back into your brain as you walk to your mom’s place. You had promised her you’d take a break to have dinner, but as your eyes cross with the rules you’re realizing it’s becoming less and less likely that you’ll be able to stop and talk much at all.

Your feet start tangling. You’ve gotten better at walking (only took you nineteen years to really master it), but you’re distracted and frustrated, and it’s not long before you’re tumbling forward, knees scraping the pavement, elbow smacking against the ground. You’re lucky the fall is buffered by your heavy winter gear, but your arm goes numb anyway as you nail your funny bone. Your notes go flying, your knowledge of significant figures scattering across the walkway.

“Fucking shit,” you hiss, holding your arm against your body. It’s not broken, but it hurts like a bitch, and you start crawling over towards where your notes fell to start gathering them up when a pair of gloved hands join your sole functioning one.

“Thank you so much,” you start saying, not really looking up in case the bitter winter wind takes away your notes before you can reach them. “I’m so sorry you had to see that, I just wasn’t watching my feet.”

“It’s really okay. Are you all right?” a voice asks you, and when you look up to see the kind of stranger who would help a poor student out on the street, you’re assaulted by startling green eyes.

Suddenly a memory comes back to you, of a wintry street and an ankle that twinges now in remembrance. You don’t know why you remember, but it’s there, three years past suddenly right in your rearview.

“Are you all right?” he asks you, and you realize you’ve just been staring at him. But a name is struggling to come to the surface, and you blink a few times, still captured by those damn eyes.

“Uh,” you get out. Y’know. Intelligently. He just raises a brow.

“Do you… have these?” he tries, and you realize he’s been holding onto a stack of notes that he collected, holding them out to you.

It hits you, then, and you reach for the notes with such ferocity that he immediately drops his hand when you snag them. You remember.

“Rafael Barba,” you breathe out, blinking a bit.

A beat. “How do you know my name?” the stranger asks. But this guy isn’t exactly a stranger, and of course, he’s now seen you fall to the ground twice in one lifetime. Too many times, if the lifetime is asking you, but it’s not, and it’s still far from over.

You pull back, with your notes, absently trying to get them all right-side up. You’re seeing all of him now, kneeling on the ground, face red with the wind, and it’s definitely him. The slicked back hair, and he’s even wearing a sweater over a button up. Very Catholic school.

But all he knows is that a strange girl has been staring at him, openly, and just blurted his name out of nowhere. You scramble to explain yourself. “Sorry. I’m so fucking sorry, just – I – we’ve met,” you stammer out. “Briefly. We’re… acquaintances. I don’t even know how I remember, but you… you might remember my ankle better than me.”

You see him thinking. From furrowed with concern to suspicion. And then recognition, and he’s smirking and shaking his head, glancing around where the two of you are basically sitting on the concrete. He says your name, slowly, like he did that first time too long ago. “I was just thinking about how little things have changed,” he chuckles, and you smirk, shrugging. “Seems like I was right in more ways than one.”

“Well, I don’t think clumsiness goes away,” you admit, “and this time it wasn’t your fault, so you don’t have to walk me to my apartment if you don’t want to.”  

He laughs. It’s short, but bright, and you smile, cutting it with a wince as you slide the backpack on your shoulders. “Might have to, to make sure you stay on both feet.”

“I’m sure I can make it,” you assure him, but when you straighten out the elbow you injured, your face contorts, and he winces in sympathy. “I can walk this time, at least. No getting carried by los – los tres mos –“

“Los tres mosqueteros,” Rafael tells you. His voice is soft, and his eyes are ducking now, watching the sidewalk as the two of you start to stumble to your feet. He doesn’t say it with reverence. Is it… is it bitterness? “Well, solamente un mosquetero aqui, pero… I hope that’s enough.”

Self-deprecating. It makes your nose wrinkle. While college mellowed you out, it only seemed to harden Rafi. “More than,” you tell him. “But… I should be heading home. Don’t want my mom to think I bailed on her.”

“I can take those,” he offers, gesturing to your notes, the book you have. Never mind you have a backpack; he offers and you end up taking it. You don’t really know why at first, but as the two of you walk towards your apartment it starts to come into focus.

He’s grown into his voice, his attitude. He’s not just older, he’s grown, and you find yourself studying him, if only because when he talks it’s hard not to look away. He’s handsome, with those green eyes and firm voice and quick turn of his lips. The lift of his chin, as he listens, gives you a smile. But the smile feels flinty. Even after offering to carry your books, your notes, you realize it’s more out of manners than kindness. But he takes them, and you’re walking side by side for long enough that you gather some courage.

“School out of state, then? If you had to come back, for family,” you ask, to keep the conversation going, knowing that as you reach your door it’s over.

“Harvard,” he tells you, and your eyes widen at the tone. He says it with force, as if he has to keep reminding himself as much as he reminds other people. “I’m planning to go to Harvard law, too, after I take my LSAT this summer.”

“Same,” you shrug. He almost trips over his own feet at that, and when he turns to you with a raised brow you just smirk. “I’m fucking with you, obviously. Hudson. For psychology. Right now. We’ll see.”

You don’t plan on feeling bad about it. It’s what you could get, and you’re proud of it. But there’s something about standing next to a Harvard student that makes you get defensive, ducking your head. He has a little smirk, too, and you find yourself glaring.

“It’s what I could get, and that’s fine, you know. I just want to help people –“

“I know, I know,” he laughs, shaking his head, and there’s nothing mean in it. “Just… fucking with you.” It’s the hesitation that gets you, the little hiccup of years of repression, and you just snort.

“That’s right. Catholic boy. I remember,” The jab comes out without warning, and he just blushes a little. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell if you don’t.”

His head is shaking again, and when he smirks it’s at you. “Trust me, I think my mother will know even if your lips are sealed.”

“Not worried about God?” you laugh, and he mimes glancing around the whole street.

“Trust me, my mother puts the fear of God into me without any help from the Almighty.”

And then you’re in. The conversation starts flowing more freely. He talks about his family. Talks about coming home, to see his mother, his grandmother. There’s something warm when he talks about the homemade holiday meals, the Christmas mass the group of them will attend. It’s just small talk, but you also know enough not to ask about Eddie and Alejandro, to keep walking with him, keep the topics light. He asks about your family, and you tell him it’s just you and Mom, and perhaps a Christmas dance party around the plastic tree.

“Christmas dance party?” It’s skeptical, but your shrug at him, smiling at the memories of years past.

“Family tradition. I dance, my mom laughs. In the end, we end up usually knocking off some ornaments, maybe upturning a tray of cookies.”

“The whole thing?” Skepticism turns to incredulity, and you snort.

“I have a list of casualties. Three trays of cookies, one pan of brownies, a very nice-looking angel. This isn’t even counting the stuff at New Year’s…“

Rafael’s head is shaking, but you’re just dissolving into giggles as the list expands. All at once, you’re telling him about the time you tripped over an armchair right into a perfectly fine plate of muffins on Christmas morning, and he’s either too polite or too horrified to stop you. But in the end, he laughs. At you, probably, but he’s smiling again, and there’s no putting himself down anymore. Just listening to you take your clumsiness in stride.

Tt’s nice. At least you think so. There are bits of laughter that echo down the street, yours and his, and as your door approaches you find yourself dreading it a little. You missed your friends, and this was… close to something.

“Well,” you say, when the two of you arrive. The door is firmly closed, to keep the cold out, and you reach for the buzzer, turning back to look at Rafael with a smile. He hands over your notes, and you ignore the twinge in your elbow to grip everything firmly. “Thanks. For the company. Not thinking about finals was worth the tumble.”

“I was… also glad for the distraction. It’s been a while since I’ve been home and...” He doesn’t elaborate any further, but his face looks a little pinched, and you nod. Family… friends. It’s complicated.

After a moment, though, he’s looking at you as the two of you hear the door click unlocked. “You’ll get through it, though. Finals. I know it,” he assures. “And then it’s just seven more after that. Trust me, I have three left. It gets better.” He’s watching you, as you rub your arm, and though his brow pinches again, he manages a little smile. “It was good to see you again. Glad I didn’t end up doing permanent damage.”

“Well, I don’t know, future lawyer,” you tease. “Maybe once you get all rich and famous I’ll send something about damages your way. Remind you that I knew you when.”

He huffs out a little scoff, shaking his head. “Future psychologist, right? Don’t you want to practice what you’re going to preach? Forgiveness? Acceptance?”

“Where’s the fun in that? I’d rather humble you, Harvard boy.” When he scoffs again, it’s with a hand raised to you, turning back towards where you know his mother must live, the same direction he walked those years before.

As you move toward the door, pulling it open, you pause, looking back over your shoulder. He’s walking away, hands in his coat’s pockets, elbows shaking a little with the cold.

“Take care of yourself, Rafael,” you call out. “Happy holidays, too!”

Another wave, and he’s gone, and you find yourself thinking about those eyes a little later, distracting you from those significant figures you were so desperate to save.

-

Fuck grad school. Really.

You don’t know what possessed you, when you decided to go. Probably the same thing that possessed you to push to graduate a year early, and the same thing that encouraged you to decide on a doctorate at Fordham instead of a M.S. and moving on.

Masochism. Obviously.

But you’re stuck with it, and every three days you regret it. A new assignment, a long-ass reading, a book you want to throw out of your apartment’s window – it’s too much, and you don’t do enough, and pretty soon you’re drowning. On top of that working, so you and your mom can keep your apartment, buy her medication, and keep the world turning, things that start to feel impossible.

Does everyone feel like this? you want to scream in the world. Does every student after undergrad hate themselves?

You know the answer is yes, but you wish you could hear it from someone besides yourself. Because your mom, bless her, refuses to let you quit, still taking time to dance with you when you need it.

You just don’t want to fail. You can’t fail. So you keep pushing, and find yourself cooped up in libraries, in coffee shops, wherever-the-fuck will take you, doing what you can as long as you can, as much as you can.

There are places you end up frequenting, in the search for a place to get work done, and end up, like most grad students, in a coffee shop. The dim lighting sometimes hurts once you hit your page limit, but the coffee is cheap and strong, and they let you linger in a corner booth with your books all spread out on the table. It’s worth the carpal tunnel, the edges of the tabletop digging into your wrist, because you get shit done.

So it comes as a surprise that your safe haven, your perfect locale, is occupied by Rafael Barba.

At first you don’t even recognize him. When you first notice him, after all, he’s already sitting down, and you can’t see his face. He just looks like another student, after all, bent forward and buried in a book that is even bigger than yours. But when he stands to go get another coffee, and you catch sight of him, it’s immediate.

Of course, he doesn’t see you. Just goes back, sits down with a giant mug, and keeps chugging along.

You keep your smile to yourself, look down at the pages you’ve lost your place in and do your best to get back on track, but now you’re distracted, and Rafael is still just there. It would’ve been less shocking, maybe, if you had perhaps known he’d be in town? But now you’re just thinking about the last time you saw him, the way he laughed, smiled at you before he left…

Oh, fuck it. You just think he’s handsome.

But… it’s been a few years. There’s no way he remembers you, confirmed by the way you stand, to go get another coffee, and he doesn’t even glance up.

So you resolve yourself to doing nothing, acting on nothing. Besides, you have actual work to do, and the third cup of coffee should probably be your last before you’re bouncing off of the walls. But when you turn around, to head back to your seat, you definitely make an impression on Rafael Barba, and the impression is the massive stain on the front of his shirt.

“Oh, my god,” you cry out, and he can’t say anything, the two of you just staring at the mess. “I’m – I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you – oh, god, your shirt.”

“It’s… okay,” he sighs, and he seems to be in just as much shock. You move to grab some napkins from a table. His voice is dry, when he speaks again. “Isn’t a holiday back in the Bronx without some kind of disaster.”

You wince at the wording, but keep blotting, and then your handful of dirty napkins is useless. You pull back, and you think you’ve actually made it worse, but Rafael is just smirking at you.

“I think… it’s beyond help. But thank you for trying.”

The napkins hang limp from your hands. You feel like an idiot, but Rafael just keeps that smirk as you go to throw them away and turn back. When you do, he’s still standing there.

“I didn’t burn you, did I?” you ask him. “That was a fresh cup, I –“

“Really, it’s fine. A shirt. I’ll survive.”

He looks even better up close. Eyes bright, playful, smart. He seems to look you over with an appraising eye, and you don’t know if you measure up but you hope you do. There’s no hint of remembering, but there’s something, and you glance over at your table.

“Well. I owe you,” you say. “For the shirt, at the very least. How much is your dry cleaning? I have some cash.” 

He scoffs, and you’re thrown back to high school, that same scoff telling you that you can’t possibly stumble home alone. “No, that’s not going to happen. You’re not paying for my dry cleaning.”

“Then something,” you say.

He takes a moment. Looks over you. Eyes narrow as he turns to your table, the papers fluttering in the heater’s breeze.

“Coffee? We both look like we can use a break.” And then he smiles, and you’re swooning.

He ends up sitting at your table, brings his book over to stack on top of one of yours. The two of you get to chatting, just small talk, and about halfway through your coffees it seems to click with him.

“Do I – have we met before?”

You just chuckle, shaking your head. “Believe it or not, yes. This is not the first time I’ve stumbled in front of you.”

His eyes widen. “I couldn’t place you, I thought I was –“

“Crazy? No. It’s just been… years. And each time, somehow, I manage to take a spill.”

“Clumsy, then?” he asks, teasing, and you snort.

“I wish I could say you just catch me at bad times, but. Yeah. I’m a certifiable mess.”

He laughs, and you chuckle, and the two of you keep talking the hour away. By the time you’re done with your coffee you’ve ordered a pastry, too, and for some reason you keep doubting the fact that he’s been looking at you with bright eyes the whole time.

But when the meal is done, you end up packing up your books, getting ready to leave. You say it’s because you should be getting home, but really it’s because you think if you stay there in the booth any longer, you’ll do something crazy, like ask him out. But instead of letting you go, he offers to walk with you, and the two of you leave the shop together.

“So, you stuck around, huh?” he asks, and you can’t help but notice the tone of his voice. “You enjoy the Bronx that much?”

“I figured Hudson U was enough distance between me and my mom. Fordham had the program I wanted, plus, I could stay back and take care of her.”

He huffs a little laugh. Something about it rankles you, but you put it behind you, and the two of you keep walking.

After that, you start to notice other things. Like that fact that he doesn’t stop bringing up Harvard. At first, you deal with it, because yes, it is a big deal. A kid from the Bronx, ending up at Harvard Law? But he won’t, and can’t, shut up about it, and it makes you antsy.

Other ways, too. Talking about Boston like it’s the be-all, end-all. Mentioning how if he came back to work, he’d settle in Manhattan, not back home.

“I want to become a judge, at some point, and Manhattan’s the best way to get there,” he explains, and you nod, but it keeps… bugging you.

“I’m sure,” you concede. “But I don’t know. I like it here. The people, the town.”

When he scoffs, it’s almost cruel, and your heart aches at the way he dismisses it, all with a hand wave. “Yeah, but, Hudson isn’t doing anyone any favors. You should try to head out, spread your wings. Manhattan’s always in need of psychologists.”

Maybe it’s supposed to be nice, some advice. Yet, advice you didn’t ask for, and to you, all it says is that all he can remember about you is the unfortunate undergrad you went to. It infuriates you, makes you halt walking, your bag with all of your books jostling against your back.

“Oh, my god. You truly think you’re doing me a favor just by talking to me, don’t you?” you say, and he just rolls his eyes at you. 

“Of course not, that’s not what I meant.” But it’s the final straw, and no longer does Rafael Barba look handsome. He just looks like an ass.

Part of it is that you’re tired, stressed, overwhelmed. Talking instead of studying. But all you can focus on is his tone, his act. “You think you’re so much better than me. What, because you… you ‘got out of here?’ Out of shitty apartments and neighborhoods, and you can already see the big bucks?” you sigh, and Rafael’s brow only raises at you, looking down his nose at you like that’s how they’re trained at Harvard Law. Maybe they are – an image comes to mind of students preparing to pass the bar by practicing evil smirks and sharp looks.

“Look, I had to fight to get to where I am now, and I’m always fighting to stay there, you understand? I come home to visit, and I’m just saying that you could be wherever you wanted to be,” he tries, but you’re past rational thought. “Come on, don’t you want to get out?” 

“Barba, this is where I want to be,” you tell him, but when he raises his brow, you put your hands up in surrender. In the end, you’re too exhausted to be truly angry at him. You simply shake your head and begin the long trek back to your apartment, the glory of the coffee shop well behind you.

“Where are you going?” he asks, and you just shrug one shoulder as you walk away, turning to look at him over your shoulder. There’s a stinging in your eyes, but you tell yourself it’s just the bite of the wind.

“I’m not going to let you bully me, Rafael. I got enough of that in high school. If you want me to pay for your dry cleaning, or your shoes, I’ll do it, but I won’t let the payment of some spilled coffee be me spending time as your punching bag.”

“Bullying you? So, I’m bullying you now?” It’s incredulous, his question. 

You turn on your heel to face him.

“Harvard isn’t an excuse,” you snap. “Just because you got to go off and do great things doesn’t mean the people who stay here are somehow lesser. Like we’re not accomplishing anything. And right now, you’re really acting like it.”

A beat.

“And it’s Fordham, now, asshole. At least get it right.”  

You don’t wait around to hear his response. You’re walking off, and the only thing you hear is the wind whipping around you.

The ride back is lonely and the scent of coffee has gone rancid. It just feels like another slap in the face, a reminder that no matter how hard you work there will always be something, someone. You’re discouraged, more than a little. When you make it back to the apartment you share with your mother, you’re on the wrong side of miserable, and your reading that you’re already behind on gets more than a little neglected as you choose to watch something on TV, a warm cup of cocoa instead of the coffee you craved.

But it’s halfway through your own pity party that the way Rafael Barba looked at you makes your mouth curl into a sneer, and about two-thirds through the second movie that you realize you’ve wasted the day. Horrifying. All over a man who did nothing but look down at you, for being home, still.

A fire you needed, and looked for, when you started grad school. Besides helping people, why else did you want a doctorate? What was going to push you to getting that damn Ph.D. and across the finish line?

In the end, it’s the feeling of squirming under Rafael Barba’s gaze. Harvard Law or not, the fucker shouldn’t have looked at you like that. Shouldn’t have talked to you like that. And by the time you’re stomping over to your books and opening it with a vengeance, you’ve made a deal with yourself that no one will ever talk to you like that ever again.

Fuck Rafael Barba. He could have his juris whatever, settle in Boston or Manhattan. You were getting a practice, to help the people in your borough, and one of these days he’d have to look at you and refer to you as doctor who got her degree from Fordham whether he wanted to or not.

-

You should’ve gone with the slacks. The slacks don’t have a hem that needs to be tugged down every twenty seconds, that’s for sure, and the feeling of your skirt’s hem is all you can focus on. The way it slides up as you hustle to the elevator, the way it rides as you sit on the subway. By the time you get to where you’re going, you’re going crazy, your hair frizzing with the energy.

Not to mention, it’s fucking cold while you wait, your knee bouncing as you sit in an endless hallway, waiting for them to call your name.  

But you look better in the skirt. You feel better in the skirt, you rock the skirt, and for an oral defense you want to feel your best, so. It’s the skirt. The skirt, and those heels with a splash of color, and when you leave and get a good distance from the clear glass door you get to pump your fist and dance in the skirt.

You did it.

You’re going to be a doctor. You’re going to be a psychologist. Someone’s going to meet you, for the first time, and call you by your title, and come to you for help.

And you’ll be able to help them. On your own. Terrifying, but it gives you a rush, the strength of which makes your head spin, makes your eyes cross just a little. Your fingers move to text your boss, your mother.

“I did it.”

You whisper it to yourself the whole way back. All that’s left is the rest of your internship, and then you’re home free. You’re done. You’re a doctor.

“The worst part is over,” Dr. Olivet reminds you when you make it back to her offices, “but there’s still work to be done.”

“I know, I know,” you tell her, lifting your hands. “I still have to finish my work here, and there’s, you know, getting a job…”

“But you did it.” Her voice is warm, and you’re not afraid to give another little dance, and she obliges you with a hug.

It’s sweet. It’s more than sweet, and your eyes are brimming with tears. God, you have to call your mom. A text isn’t enough, you have to tell her everything –

A hand reaches out to stop you with a gentle touch on your arm. You hadn’t even realized you were talking out loud, but thankfully you’re done in an instant. “You can call her on the drive. We have a full day, then the Brooklyn DA’s office.”

The thought makes you wince. “Two birds with one stone, hopefully?” you ask her, but she just shakes her head, the excitement from the morning bleeding into preemptive exhaustion in the blink of an eye.

Long day is right, when it comes to the law. There’s never been a time when cops have been your biggest fans, but it seems the tensions are always high with them. Nowadays, at least with Olivet, the two of you prefer to go straight to the D.A., when he calls, simply because at least as an expert witness, there’s some respect.

Some. But it’s there.

But not always.

So, the two of you make the journey to Brooklyn, a forty-minute commute from Manhattan, and by the time you show up at the Kings County D.A.’s office, you’re already exhausted. The D.A.s that Olivet consult with are nice enough, you suppose, for lawyers, but only because they have to be. It’s part of the position, and if they want to be re-elected, they don’t want a reputation of being hard to work with. But the A.D.A.s tend to sprint first, ask too many questions later, and every moment is a battle.

But when you get there, head up to the office that Olivet was told to go, there’s a pair of striking green eyes that lift from their spot on a stack of files to meet yours, widening when yours do. They’re matched with a pale lavender tie, and a grey ensemble that compliments him nicely. You suppose it’s made for that, considering how it’s tailored.

The room isn’t posh. The opposite, in fact, a couple of chairs in front of a desk, a table to the side with various books to add onto the bookcase full of them. But there’s flair, and clutter in equal spades. It feels worked in, maybe even lived in, judging by the only other piece of furniture being a couch behind you.

It’s been a long time since high school and wintry streets in the Bronx, that’s for sure, for you and for Rafael Barba.

He stands when the two of you step into the room, and moves around the desk. You watch and wonder what he remembers from the last time you stumbled into each other, but his body language doesn’t betray a whole lot besides his exhaustion. You wonder if he can see the same in you, or if the tapping of your finger against your side is informing him just what you think of him. The great lawyer from Boston, here instead of the Bronx. Never going back home, just like he wanted.

His jacket is off, and you can see the vest and slacks of a three-piece suit as he moves to greet you, sleeves rolled up, a couple of blinks as he takes the two of you in.

“Mr. Barba,” Olivet says politely, reaching out her hand. “You’re the A.D.A. we’re working with, then?”

“Doctor.” His voice is formal, and when he shakes it, there’s a quick one-two before he releases, turning to you without hesitation. “Yes, I don’t think we’ve had the opportunity to meet officially. Rafael Barba, thanks for coming.”

“Mr. Barba,” you greet him, when he turns to you, and when the two of you shake there’s a twitch. “It’s a... pleasure.”

How’re you doing, Harvard boy? Still looking down your nose? is what you want to say, what you remember from him, but you manage a little self-control. You think he reads your mind, and it makes him nod.

“The pleasure’s mine,” he returns. So, he does recognize you, because the familiarity has to the be the unexpected warmth you hear. Or maybe amusement, because your last attempt at friendliness was resolved with little more than chills in the air. “Intern for what exactly?”

There’s a spark in his eyes, and you find yourself lifting your chin. No stumbling at this meeting, just two kids from the Bronx, all grown up. God forbid he thinks for a moment that you ran away and gave up. “For my doctoral courses at Fordham. In about four months, I’ll be a clinical psychologist like Dr. Olivet. She’s who I’ve been training under.”

You dare him to say something. To make a dig. 

“Fascinating.” It’s what he settles on. He seems actually impressed,, when he looks at you, and you try to ignore the way his smile makes your heart pound. It’s just because he’s a handsome man in a three-piece suit and smiling, not because he’s Rafael Barba. After all, Rafael Barba was pretty sure you’d never get out of the Bronx, and downright rude because of it. “Shall we get started, then? I want to know everything I can about this guy.”

“Of course,” Olivet returns, and the three of you get situated to get to work.

It’s long. It’s exhausting. By the end of the day, your head is pounding, and Olivet and Barba have exchanged enough words to fill a novel, trying to argue the benefits and the harm of taking this particular offender to trial. He wants to get an answer to his boss by the end of the day, and your boss is not one to make it easy for ease’s sake. You had taken the role of notator, going through the files offered and marking anything for Elizabeth, and the back and forth had made you dizzy. After all, after everything, Rafael Barba was a great lawyer, a fantastic prosecutor, according to a Google search during a break. Leave it to him to make your eyes blur.

“The precedent is set for it,” Barba repeats, for the third time. He’s gone from sitting, to pacing, to sitting again, his eyes closed as he runs a hand through his hair. “And the defense is going to argue that his illness is an excuse for his behavior.”

“I know what the precedent says,” Olivet returns, for the third time. “But I also know that while diagnoses are never an excuse for a behavior, they can explain one. It’s what the defense will argue. His impulse control without his medication – which he has a right to refuse – is significantly lowered –“

“But not completely. Mr. Nelson understands what he did was wrong, he basically confessed –“

Your eyes roll, and you find yourself speaking before you can think. “In an interrogation room in which his counsel, which he did not waive, was not present. Just because he has a diagnosis in the DSM-V does not make him any less deserving of a proper interrogation.”

The two of them turn to look at you, Olivet with a smile, Barba with a scowl. His face pinches as his eyes scan you, and you just stare back.

He may be where he belongs, in a three-piece suit, but you’re where you need to be, too. And he needs to make sure he understands that, because the last thing you’re gonna let him do is underestimate you again.  

“No one is saying that,” Barba starts, but you just raise a brow at him.

“If I’m looking at these transcripts correctly, something tells me the cops themselves said that. Look, Mr. Barba, Dr. Olivet and I might not be this man’s direct health care providers, but we still have a duty to advocate for him.” You glance over at your boss, and her hand is covering her mouth, but you see the edges of a smile in her tired eyes. “If I were a doctor, and an expert for the other side, I would make sure my team knew the violations that occurred in that room.”

The room is silent. When Barba looks at the doctor, she just drops her hand, the smile replaced with a somewhat-serious look that threatened an I-told-you-so. “I’d be saying the same thing. She’s right.”

A new energy flashes between the two of you, and when Barba contemplates his options, his lips a little pursed, it’s with you staring him down. It’s a sparring match, your gazes, and it’s a firm draw. That alone seems to perturb Rafael enough for him to relent, just a little. “I’ll worry about the… legality of the confession,” he sighs out. His pages flick to a different section, and he glances over it. “We’re all tired here, so I’ll wrap, but I need to know if he’s competent for the stand without his medication. That’ll be the last thing we cover today.”

“If he’s not a danger to himself or others, then getting him to take it will be difficult legally,” Olivet reminded him. “But. I’ll do an evaluation. See what we can determine while he’s off.”  

Another time, another date is set, for the evaluation. You and Dr. Olivet start getting ready to go, and the polite farewells are given and gone.

But before you leave, and the handshakes are made, Rafael looks you over, from head to toe. It’s quick, but you catch it, and it’s before he turns to Dr. Olivet and nods.  

“I’ll be seeing both of you, then? Day after tomorrow?”

If it makes your cheeks flush, you don’t mention it, especially not when he glances back at you again, gives you another handshake with a firm squeeze.

“Both of us,” you affirm, inform, and then you’re gone, Rafael Barba’s office behind you, something else entirely in front.

“You know, he never asked you your name, when we went in,” Olivet notes, on the ride back. It’s mild, nothing really there, but the two of you have worked together long enough that you know there’s a million unasked questions down that rabbit hole.

Your eyes don’t leave the windshield. “Oh, yeah. Uh, we lived on the same street. He – him and his friends, really – they almost broke my ankle, my sophomore year of high school.”

A hum from her makes you break from your trance, and you see the edges of her lips curl up. “No, no,” you clarify. “It wasn’t like that, it was never like that. I’ve only seen him, what, three times over the years? He’s just someone I see every so often. New York is the smallest city in the world, I guess.”

“Will this be a problem?” she asks next. You find your cheeks flaring again, turning from the windshield to your own window.

“Nothing there for it to be. Last time didn’t end so well, but… we’re past that. We’re adults.”

Right?

When she laughs, it’s a gentle prod in the direction you were already going, nothing more than fuel to the fire that you barely understood was being lit.

“Well, I know for sure he didn’t shake my hand twice, and I’m the one who’s going to be on the stand for him if this goes to trial. Maybe last time didn’t end as poorly as you thought.”

You refuse to think about it, though. For a little while. After all, it’s work that has to be done, and you’re not across the finish line, yet, so you show up prompt and on time two days later to assist Dr. Olivet with her evaluation and the conclusions that are inevitably drawn. You don’t end up coming until the end of the workday, and when you’re finished it’s well into evening.

“He’s unaware that what he said in the interrogation room amounted to a confession,” she tells Barba, afterwards. After watching the whole thing, the way that you and Olivet had slowly gained trust and revealed the truth, the clench of his jaw is mighty. “There’s no way he gave it willingly.”

“You’re certain?” When he turns to look, it’s at both of you, equally, his eyes flicking back and forth before looking back into the room where you had left him. His voice sounds exhausted, and for a moment you feel pity for him.

You open your mouth to speak, but he cuts you off with a hand wave. “Don’t bother. I know the answer.” His frustration is apparent, and you find yourself sharing a glance with Dr. Olivet before nodding. “So, we have nothing.”

“Nothing except someone who needs to return home to his family,” you tell him, and his shoulders slump. It’s not meant to be a jab, but when he looks at you again there’s something in his eyes that tells you he takes it as such.

“Right. Of course. I’ll talk to the captain.” He sounds so worn, and you almost feel sorry for him.Your smile is sympathetic, but he’s not really looking at you. There’s something that tells you to walk away, another part that insists you stay, figure this man out.

“Mr. Barba?” Dr. Olivet murmurs. “I’ll get a full write-up of what I saw here to you tomorrow, but we really should be going now.”

And that makes him straighten, his manners coming back to him as he gestures towards the door. “Right, yes, of course. Thank you so much for your help, Dr. Olivet. Miss Y/L/N.”

“Not a problem,” you say, and the two of you part. No fanfare. No nothing. Just. Done.

You don’t realize how distracted you are until you’re standing by Dr. Olivet’s car, ready to take the two of you back to her office, where you can return to the Bronx.

“Are you all right?” she asks you, and you realize you’ve been fingering the handle for a minute, as she rummages for her keys.

“Yeah, just. Thinking.”

After another minute, Olivet curses. “I must’ve left them inside. Do you mind if we head back in?” When there’s no protest, the two of you walk quickly to get out of the cold, and you find yourself hoping against hope that Rafael Barba is still in there, that there’s something more you can say.

Your head is down, your eyes are closed to protect from the wind. So you don’t see the door, nor notice when it swings out. Neither does the other person behind it, and you feel the edge of it nail you in the forehead.

You’re stunned, stumbling backwards. Your fingers come up to press on where the door hit you, and the person behind the door is muttering curses. A couple of hands come to steady you, and luckily there’s no blood on your hand when you pull it away.

“Are you all right?” a voice asks you, and you have to blink to let the face focus.

“Just when I thought there’d be no stumbling around this time,” you groan, and Barba’s small smile to you is brimming with concern.

“Completely my fault,” he sighs. “Are you okay?” You’re still blinking, but the dots connect, and you realize that Rafael Barba is the one who smacked your head.

Goddammit. And you just starting to like the guy again.

“I got a door to the face, I’ve been better. Fuck, I’ve gotta be careful what I wish for,” you groan.

“Let’s get you to a chair,” Olivet whispers, and the stars you’ll still seeing start to fade as you stumble to a seat in the entryway of the precinct. “Mr. Barba, do you mind staying here with her? I think I left my keys upstairs, and I need them to take her home.”

“Doc, you don’t have to do that,” you tell her, but the lights in the place are killing your eyes. Quickest concussion you’ve ever gotten, you assume, and Barba indeed tells her that he’s got you. Heels click away, toward the elevator, and even the ding makes you wince.

There’s silence, for a few moments. Quiet, as you hold your head in your hand. After a few moments, you’ve realized Barba’s left and returned, holding out a cold water bottle to you.

“Another thing I owe you for?” you ask him, and you must be imagining his wince as you hold it up to your forehead.

“I think by this point we’ve come full circle,” Rafael tells you. “I’m truly sorry, I just didn’t see you when I pushed the door open.”

A brow raised in disbelief, and you tilt your head up so he can see your scorn. “Aren’t the doors clear?”

“My phone,” he offers, and you scoff.

There’s silence again. His shoes are tapping against the tiled floor, and you switch hands as condensation drips down your arm. It sends a chill through you.

“Do you… need my coat?” he asks, and you can’t help but raise a brow at him again.

“I have my own coat,” you tell him, bluntly, and it almost looks like… wait.

Is he blushing?

“I know, just… do you – do you need another one?”

So. This is the great Harvard graduate Rafael Barba, stumbling over his words, offering you a coat. If anything told you he remembered what happened way back when, and felt bad about it, it was that. You’re chuckling a little now, the anger passing into disbelief.

“How bad does your head hurt?” he asks, horrified, but you just keep laughing, dropping the water bottle and leaning back in your seat.

It’s a full-on cackle right now. “You’re telling me this isn’t hilarious?” you ask him. Gesturing between the two of you, the bottle in your hand, the offer of the extra coat. “Every time we meet, something goes horribly wrong, doesn’t it? We can’t just have a coffee, I have to spill it on you. We can’t just catch up, I have to vow vengeance.”

He raises a brow at that, but you wave him off. “I don’t know. I guess I’m telling you that maybe this is what we’re meant to be, Barba. Bad luck for each other.”

Rafael murmurs something, in Spanish. Repeats it, even, but you can’t catch it.

“What?” you finally ask, and he looks at the water bottle next to you and shakes his head.

“I’m saying that’s not true. You’re not bad luck. You… helped me.”

It’s your turn to raise your brow, and you have a feeling if you knew him a little more, it’d be a perpetual expression. But he keeps plowing forward. “You know, when you walked away, last time? I watched you the whole way down the block. I couldn’t stop thinking about how you… said I was using Harvard as an excuse.”

He leans back. Tilts his chin up, and you find yourself watching the line of him. He seems to sink into the seat like it’s the first time he’s sat for a week.

“Excuse to do what, I didn’t know. So I tried to ignore it, and then… it just kept… sitting in the back of my head, the sight of you, looking at me –“ He cuts himself off, and you watch him sit up again, rest his elbows on his knees.

“What?” You prod him, move your knee to hit his, and he sighs, both hands over his face.

“You were right. Harvard was my excuse. It was a way out, but I forgot home on the way. Forgot my mother, in everything, my grandmother. Took steps away from them, and ended up losing sight of myself.”

All of that because of what you said? Something twists inside of you, and you shake your head, lifting the bottle back up to where a good bruise is forming. “You don’t have to feel guilty for working, Rafael,” you murmur to him. “For having a dream. I saw you, and I – I saw a guy who got it all, and I took my frustrations out on you. I’m sorry, for making you think that going out and accomplishing what you have means you’re not – not, y’know. You. I barely know you, for fuck’s sake.”

The curse makes his lips twitch, but he doesn’t look away. “But you never lost sight of home. You were always right there, where you needed to be,” he urges, and you shake your head.

“And that’s me. I love home. I love being home. But maybe you needed to get out. I don’t know your life,” you laugh. “I would love to, but I don’t and… and maybe you needed to step away from… family, from friends, to find yourself. Look at you, you’re an A.D.A. in Kings County. I know you’ve got headlines already. That’s just who you seem to be. You’re the Harvard boy. Don’t feel guilty about that on my account, it’s a big accomplishment.”

A pause.

“But the Bronx isn’t so bad, if you ever wanted to journey back every so often. Not a bad thing to remind yourself where you came from.”

“I don’t think I can forget,” Rafael admits. “Es en mi sangre, just like being a lawyer is.”

Then he smirks. “Plus, those pants still have a stain right on the hem. I keep meaning to throw them out.”

You snort, loud, and then shift to face him. It’s uncomfortable, the little bench the two of you are on, but the position is worth it. “Seems like you’re investing in good-fitting suits. Might be time.”

Olivet is taking forever, it feels like, but you don’t mind. This has been good, a resolution to things, and you don’t really want it to end. Even if it means that you can get home and nurse your head.

“You know, you’re the one who got me through my first year of my Ph.D.,” you blurt out. “After our last meeting I vowed you’d call me doctor. That’s what I meant… by vow vengeance.”

“So you…”

“Yeah. I guess that means you’re good luck, huh?”

He’s agape. “You pushed through grad school out of spite for me?”

“Yup.” The ‘p’ pops in your mouth, and his eyes flicker down to your mouth before he can stop himself.

And then, there’s a beat. And then he’s laughing. His laugh, when it’s light, and free, is contagious, for sure.  Shaking his head, running a hand through gelled hair. When he pulls it away, the mess makes it look softer, and you get the sudden urge to run fingers through it.

Damn concussions.

You have enough sense not to mention the craving. You just smile, and drop the water bottle in favor of shoving a hand towards him for a good shake.

He looks at your hand. It’s offered to him in a symbol of peace, but he looks so skeptical still, as if you’ll call him out on not calling home every now and again.

“Since I’m not your bad luck, then. Friends?”

There’s no hesitation. He’s grabbing your hand, firm and warm, and the one-two shake seals the deal.

“Friends,” he concedes, and the two of you sit on that damn bench, the silence more than a little comfortable.

His coat does end up around your shoulders, eventually. It’s nice, another layer of warmth with the windows to your back. It seems silly, but it feels like a shield, a layer of protection.

Olivet comes down eventually. She doesn’t comment on the second coat, but you see her head tilt a little as you stand, hand it back to him.

“You know where to find me, if you’re ever in town,” you tell him, and he nods.

“I’ll see you around, Miss Y/L/N.”

Your grin stretches across your face. It hurts your head, a little, but it’s worth it. “You’ll call me doctor, one day. Next time one of us almost kills the other.”

His smile back is warm. “I have no doubt.”

When you and Olivet leave, she’s just humming a little. You don’t say anything, but when the two of you get in her car, she pulls her keys from the depths of her purse, starts the engine. You realized that you didn’t see them in her hand when she left the elevator, and the dots connect even with the way your brain has been rattled.

The sight makes your eyes widen. “Were they –“

She laughs now. “Oh, you know things like that. Not a problem, we’ll just take you home now.”

“Now?” Your voice is cracking a little with the indignation.

“Now. If we hurry, I’m sure your dinner will still be warm.”

-

Rafael watches as Liv’s voice gently soothes the woman, her eyes flicking back and forth between the Lietenant and Carisi. There’s hesitation in her statement, the kind that makes the hairs stand up on the back of his neck.

When the two of them leave the interrogation room, he’s clear, or as clear as he can be. “She just confessed to murder, and right now that’s all the D.A. is going to see.”

Carisi’s response isn’t exactly friendly, but Barba looks up at the detective steadily, trying not to let his eyes roll. “You’re telling me you don’t believe her?”

“I’m saying that we’ve already had two victims recant their statements, for one reason or another. Their unwillingness to testify against Mr. Jones gives us very little in terms of evidence,” he sighs out. There’s a weariness as he looks at the woman, moving to lean against the glass and watch as she lays on the couch to rest. He wants to do the same, sometimes. Let his exhaustion take over. “I want to know what she knows about the situation, what she thinks. Otherwise, it’s a cut and dry case, and she gets locked away.”

“But she came to us, Barba,” Liv offers, looking at him with those pleading eyes of hers. They know how to sink right into his soul, and he ducks his gaze for a moment to collect himself. He has no time for being tired, and there’s something infectious about her conviction. But he needs more than a detective’s gut instinct and a lieutenant’s insistence. “We can’t just let her sink. She doesn’t belong in Rikers, she needs help.”

There’s a long silence, and Rafael finds himself sipping from a cup of coffee that has long gone cold. It’s Carisi that speaks up, those classes at Fordham law behind him. “What about a psychiatric evaluation? If an expert can sign off on her testimony, perhaps back up the fact that she was indeed abused, then as a battered woman…”

“Fordham law strikes again,” Barba quips, and then winces at his next sip. Such a shame the precinct couldn’t afford better coffee. Or more skilled coffee makers. “I can see who the D.A.’s office has lined up for those kinds of calls.” He looks between the two cops. “I don’t usually do the defense’s job for them, but this…”

“Is different.” Liv fills in the blanks, and he offers a small smile to her as he moves to the door. “I think we’re rubbing off on you, Barba.”

“God help us all,” he throws back, and her and Carisi’s chuckles are what leave him as he pulls out his phone.

The calls are straightforward. First to Carmen, who finds the list of names and numbers, and then to those names from his desk, seeing who is available as soon as possible for a psychiatric workup. There are options that she trims down, out of the goodness of her heart, leaving him with about ten that he can choose from.

But when he gets the list of names, there’s one name that stands out. One that reminds him of smiles shared across a cup of coffee and a pastry, one that makes him think of Catholic school uniforms and twisted ankles. One that makes nostalgia swirl in his gut. Or is that longing? Either way, it makes his lips purse.

Maybe it’s because in those moments, there were bright spots. Light in days and years that seemed to blur with a lot of struggle.

Or maybe it’s because he’s being dramatic. Either way.

He picks up his phone, prepared just for a consult. Nothing to yearn for, certainly. But he pretends not to notice when he looks up your office and gets a thrill when it’s in Manhattan, or swallow tightly when a photo appears on your website, and your eyes seem to gaze into his.

You’ve made a name for yourself. Any competent A.D.A. would feel comfortable with you in their corner. His fingers fly across his keyboard, looking into cases, finding what you’ve done. Your doctorate from Fordham is only the beginning, and he’s surprised he hasn’t seen you at charity events with all of the credits next to your name. Three years into practice, and he sees you headlining research into veteran populations, starting funds for LGBTQ+ counseling, lighting a fire in your community.

Any A.D.A. would choose you. Never mind the other names.

Yours ends up being the first number he dials. It rings twice, three times. Nothing yet, and his pen is spinning in his fingers. Four times, five times, and for a moment he thinks he’ll just have to try the number at the top of the list –

“Dr. Y/L/N’s office,” a voice answers. “How can I help you?”

It’s not you. It’s a secretary, or a receptionist, but her voice is kind enough. “Yes, is Dr. Y/L/N in? I’m calling about a consultation for the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.”

The little hum that the receptionist gives is… uncertain. “Unfortunately, she’s in with a patient. Can I take a message?”

He’s done his due diligence. He’s tugged on the heartstring, and now he should move on. Try the next name. But something makes him set down his pen, bite his lower lip. A whim, really, that makes him speak.

“Just tell her Rafael Barba called. And if she’s interested, to return this call. I’ll give you the number.”

When he recites the list of ten digits, however, it’s his cell phone. And there’s something in him that hopes you’ll call back with yours. For old times’ sake.

“All right. Thank you so much, I’ll be sure she gets it.” The receptionist hangs up, and Rafael feels like he’s run a marathon the way his heart is pounding.

Each call he gets the rest of the day is enough to get him tensing. Ready to lift and see an unfamiliar number, with your voice in his ear. What he gets instead is silence, and a couple of calls from Liv, during which he does his damnedest to keep the tension out of his voice. By the end of the day, he’s resigned to the fact that it’s simply a missed connection, two ships passing in the night. Another moment of dramatics, but he feels this one.

And then his cell rings once more. He doesn’t look at the screen, just answers and closes his eyes, ready to hear Liv’s voice again, or God forbid, Carisi.

“This is Barba,” he answers. That tension bleeding in once again, and the response he gets makes him a little breathless.

“Kings County not enough for you, Harvard boy?” you ask. It’s teasing, light, and it feels a little like he’s outside in the cold winter wind chill the way his nose surely must be red. “Now I know to send the damages lawsuit to Manhattan.”

His laugh comes out of him suddenly, and it matches yours. “I’ll give you the address. How are you, Doctor?”

You hum a little, and it buzzes against his ear. “Oh, it feels good to hear you say that, that’s for sure. But, honestly, I’m doing pretty well. I’m… doing what I love. Helping people.”

“Too good for the Bronx? Manhattan your mainstay?”

“Oh, please,” you huff. “My office is firmly in the old neighborhood. And on top of it, if I don’t come by every week, my mother has a conniption.”

“Glad to hear.”

And it’s just that simple for you. Rafael has always had his sights set on the future, but you’ve reached it. And you’re content, and still with one foot in the place the two of you grew up. It’s… right.

“What about you?” It’s a question he’s honestly unprepared to answer. He doesn’t linger on it too long, because he doesn’t want to sound like he’s lying, but the truth is perhaps too much to admit to an acquaintance.

No. A friend.

“Manhattan is a little like home now. A lot like it,” he admits. In that moment the SVU crew comes to mind, but he pushes them away. But I have a case here I’m ready to be done with. I’m trusting your receptionist gave you the gist?”

“What she could.” Your voice is no longer light, something firm in it that he recognizes. The tone of work. “The message wasn’t a lot besides your name and your title, but am I right in thinking I’m going to be evaluating someone?”

“It’s a woman who was a victim of sexual abuse. I need to know what your read is on her.”

You hum again, lower, contemplating. “Anything in particular I’m looking for?”

“I don’t want to influence you, or give any unnecessary details over the phone. Just know she’s in our custody, right now, and this case has been complicated.”

There’s a pause, and he does his best to emphasize what’s necessary, what’s true. “We’re trying to help her. Get her where she needs to be. I know it’s last minute –”

“I know the system, Rafael,” you murmur. You don’t hesitate to use his first name, and he tries not to think too much about how it sounds in your mouth. “Am I right in assuming that she’s potentially spending the night in the tombs?”

She’s not, but he doesn’t get the chance to respond, and he doesn’t have to. You’re telling him you’ll be there tomorrow, prompt, early, and he lets out a sigh of relief. Doesn’t mention that waiting for your call could’ve cost a valuable day’s worth of time.

“Thank you,” he breathes, “I owe you.”

“For doing my job?” you chuckle. “This isn’t a personal favor, we should make that clear.”

“For taking my call. Getting back to me so quickly.” For humbling me when I needed it. For being a reminder every few years that home isn’t a bad thing.

“Anything for a friend,” you return, and he ducks his head to hide his smile from the room.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, then. And I do insist I owe you. For the nearly broken ankle, at least.”

There’s a pause. He can hear your breath catch, and he hopes, hell, he prays that there’s a smile on your face as you think of him.

“Then, let’s not wait three years to meet again,” you tell him. There’s a click, surely a pen in your fingers, perhaps spinning like his. “I’ll take drinks, once the case is done.”

“How about dinner?” Rafael returns, and he stands to his feet, his window gazing out on the street below. He’s glad he’s not limited by the cord of his desk’s line. The cabs breezing by too quick on roads with black ice, the gusts blowing the flags outside One Hogan Place. “More equivalent, I would say, if we consider twelve years’ interest.”

“I’m also counting the spilled coffee, of course,” you add, and Rafael scoffs.

“Didn’t you spill that on me?”

He walks into it, he supposes, but he doesn’t mind. “Well, then, I’ll return the favor. Two-dinner commitment, and all before we hit fifteen years of acquaintanceship.”

“Friendship,” he amends, and your little laugh is what lingers with him, what he thinks about as he prepares for tomorrow.

“Right. Friendship. Good night, Rafael.”

“Good night.”

The two of you say friendship, as you rise the next morning. Say friendship as you meet, and Rafael introduces you to the precinct. Say friendship, as the case ends, and those dinners begin, with laughter and warmth even in a snowy Manhattan evening.

But at the end of those dinners, twelve years in the making, the friendship is only the beginning.

After all, you look stunning, in your dress and heels, a deep red coat that compliments your lip color. Your hair is pinned up, but some of it has come loose, during the night, and those strands frame your face perfectly.

“Maybe Manhattan isn’t too bad,” you laugh, as the two of you step into the night air, “if it means you get to eat like that all the time.”

“There are definitely some low points, but the high points make it all worth it,” he tells you. He can’t stop looking at you, even as you pause at the curb, side by side and turning to each other. “Back home, then?”

“You’re not the only A.D.A. I work with.” You nudge him with your elbow, hands in your pockets to block out the cold. “Other boroughs, other work. Not to mention that Monday’s coming up quick. Patients.”

There’s a stab of jealously in him. Thinking about you spending time with the other boroughs, with other A.D.A.s at his office. But for some reason, he can’t help but hope that the smile on your face is just for him.

He takes a moment to pull out his phone, stare at the date on the screen. “Well, tomorrow’s not Monday,” he tells you. “Do you… think you could spare a few more hours? Another day, maybe?”

Your brow raises at him, and he finds himself loving the arch of it, especially paired with your smirk. “What are you thinking, Barba?”

“A couple of drinks, maybe.” He nods down the road, trying to play it cool even though his heart is pounding in his chest.  

You’ve gotten the gist. The idea. He knows it, and you know it, but you’re daring him to act with the way you bite your lower lip. “And after that?”

It’s a dare he takes. Jumps at the chance to act on, one of his hand lifting to cup your cheek, the other reaching for your waist. He kisses you, there, on the curb, winter in full swing around you, and there’s nothing else can think about but the way you feel against him.

When it’s over, it feels unfinished. Mainly because a part of him doesn’t want it to.

“What do you say? Willing to stay in Manhattan a little longer?” he asks, a little breathless as he looks down at you. Your lipstick hasn’t miraculously hasn’t smudged, but he still lifts a hand to trace his thumb along the perfect lower line. “I know a place you can stay.”  

“I’m almost convinced,” you reply with a laugh, voice light. “But if you kiss me again, we can make that an absolutely certainty.”

[peterpatter-fest]

Day Six Fic Masterlist

Thanks for all of the excellent content that you all made for Lost/Angst/Underrated Moments! We appreciate your creative approaches to these prompts. Here are all of the fics that were posted for Day 6. 

How to lose your bassist? by Geci

AKA @reginaldpatterson

Rated G

Reggie often loses his clothes while poofing, but one time he loses himself.

Ride Or Die Till The End by InvisibleRaven

AKA @invisibleraven

Rated T

Ficlets for PeterPatter Fest! Fic title and all chapter titles will be from HwaYoun's amazing Crooked Teeth song.

Heartbeats, Intimidations by psyduckappears

AKA @psyduckappears

Rated E 

After a fight with Luke, Bobby goes, takes one of their songs, and becomes famous pretty much over night. They're all hurt, but Luke wants to get him back, no matter how much Reggie begs him not to do anything stupid.

It ends with him in jail and Reggie and Alex needing to figure out how to live the next two years with everything turned upside down.

Insomnia by Whattfisausername

AKA @whattfisausername

Rated G

Luke was worried about Reggie, more specifically about his sleep. Even more specifically, his recent lack of sleep. The pair was used to going to bed late, preferring to stay up writing songs, watching movies, cuddling, more than cuddling, etc. Still, they always woke up pretty rested.

Until now.

it's not the side effects of the cocaine, i'm thinking that it must be love by tiriansjewel

AKA @tiriansjewel

Rated M

The clock on the other side of the room read 6:15, the knot in his neck only worsened as he shifted in his chair, and a few feet away from him, Luke Patterson lay in a hospital bed, breathing but not alive.

Unexpected Proposal and Unexpected Feelings by missvega

AKA @favoriteliar

Rated T

Kissing practice. Because what can go wrong when you're secretly in love with your best friend and he suggests you practice kissing with each other so you can impress girls.

I Had The Best Time Falling Into Love by justyrae

AKA @astorytotellyourfriends

Rated G

When Luke runs away from home, his only option is to hide out in Bobby's garage. It turns out that he's not the only one with that idea.

I can’t lose you, so please don’t leave me by Geci

AKA @reginaldpatterson

Rated T

Luke Patterson is a good-looking guy really. He’s probably one of the most popular boys at school. All the girls are into this mysterious future rockstar. The thing is he must be really picky. He’s always with his two best friends Alex and Bobby, no one else. But whenever someone asks him out for a date or whatever, he keeps saying he already has someone. Probably a kind way to say no. Or most of the schools think so. He never goes to any party and is never seen out of the school with anyone but Alex and Bobby. So, Luke having someone seems hard to believe.

Sailing Alone Across Your Night Sky by goodluckgettingtosleep

AKA @sunsetcurveofficial

Rated E 

“Awe, but you’re not alone, Reg,” Luke says softly, and his voice gets so low, it does strange things to Reggie’s insides. “Because we always have each other,” Luke explains. Reggie lets out a little whine and orders more tequila. He knows he’s going to need it. “But you don’t kiss me. And I miss kissing. It’s fun,” Reggie says, turning back to Luke. His eyes look dark in the dim light of the bar, and Reggie thinks he could let himself drown in them if he allowed himself to let go. “I could, though.”

or, Luke and Reggie stumble into bed together after a night out, but have vastly different ideas on what it means for their friendship. It doesn't help that they can't seem to stop now that they've had a taste.

Betrayed by justyrae

AKA @astorytotellyourfriends

Rated E

Reggie and Luke broke up two weeks ago, but that doesn't mean that either of them are over it.

Come Find Me, I’m A Lost Boy by Artemis_Charmed 

AKA @artemischarmed

Rated G

♫ Is anybody there who can rescue Somebody like me 'cause I'm just waiting For somebody like you, somebody like you Without you I'm a lost boy Come find me, I'm a lost boy ♫

standing in the rain by nuandia

AKA @nuandia 

Rated E 

"Luke drags a thumb over Reggie’s cheekbone and his kaleidoscopic eyes glint with mischief and desire and something darker and all the more consuming and Reggie can’t breathe when Luke presses his mouth back to Reggie’s, swipes his tongue against his lips and bites them gently and crowds him in, until there’s nothing left but Luke. His world narrowed down to a point where he can’t tell what’s up and what’s down, but there’s Luke, filling all his senses, and that's enough."

Or, a glance into Luke and Reggie's unhealthy relationship to one another.

Luke’s Song Book by DaintyDuck_99

AKA @daintyduck99​

Rated T

A collection of songs for a variety of Peterpatter Fest prompts.

rough day at sea by charjace

AKA @wiildhcartsrun​ 

Rated T

Pirate AU 

[c-optimistic]

fall

Supergirl dies on a Wednesday.

Sometimes, when she’s alone in her office in the wee hours of the morning, still in yesterday’s clothing and unsure when she’d last eaten, she thinks about that, the utter normalcyof losing National City’s hero on a Wednesday. Somehow, the death on such a boring day of the week provides a sort of stark contrast that Lena has trouble wrapping her head around. After all, surely the hero and pride of National City would fall in a blaze of glory on a Friday night, a Sunday afternoon, even a Monday morning during rush hour.

But a Wednesday? Some time between mid-morning and noon? When nothing was happening except for the drudge of the week, the tireless churning of society?

She doesn’t understand it—has tried to come to terms with it with very little success. In her weakest moments, when she’s staring down the end of a bottle of whiskey or wine (before Jess or Maggie or even James Olsen pry the bottle from her fingertips and help her get home), she thinks the very banality of Supergirl’s death is evidence of its unnecessary nature, its needless, pointless, meaningless, asinine—

Supergirl dies on a Wednesday.

By Friday, the President herself comes to National City to mourn the fallen hero. She talks about the few short conversations she’s had with Supergirl, how everyone should be inspired and follow Supergirl’s wonderful example. A true hero, an exemplary citizen.

(Lena doesn’t go to the ceremony. She and Alex spend that afternoon in Kara’s apartment, sitting on Kara’s couch, Alex stoically staring at the television screen with silent tears running down her cheeks and Lena gripping her hand so tightly she thinks she’ll break fingers.  

After that, Lena doesn’t see much of Alex at all.)

The President dedicates a memorial to Supergirl, and donations come pouring in—people wanting to make it larger than life, much like the hero it’s meant to honor. People from across the country pour into National City in order to discuss how to best go about building the memorial, debating what Supergirl would’ve liked or wanted.

(Lena sits it all out though L-Corp is asked for the perspective, for their idea of what should be built—especially seeing as though the memorial would be so close to their building.

Lena has Jess allocate a sizable donation to the effort to build the memorial, claiming she only does it to get the pestering swarms off her back. She pretends not to hear Jess’s soft sigh, not to see the pitying expression.)

Supergirl dies on a Wednesday.

Not many know how. The secret is limited to a select few: Alex, who was her everything; J’onn, who was like a father; Winn, who was her best friend; James, who was her first love; and Lena—Lena who somehow stumbled into her life and never stumbled back out, now left alone and bearing more scars on her heart than she had any right to.

(Superman is there the day it happens, he is there on that dismal, ordinary, normal, Wednesday. He’s there when Supergirl gets hit, he’s there when she falls, he’s there when she doesn’t get back up. And in the cellphone footage that plays nonstop on every news outlet, Superman lifts her, tears in his eyes, and with a great heave, he shoots off into the air with Supergirl still in his arms.

What no one sees is Superman returning to the DEO. What no one hears is Superman’s toneless voice as he informs the five of them of his cousin’s death, catching Alex before she falls to her knees. What no one knows is that Lena thinks she dies that day too—that Superman meets her eyes as if he hearsthe sound of her breaking heart as it happens, that he watches her become a shell after losing yet another person she loves.)

Supergirl dies on a Wednesday, and it’s on a Wednesday two weeks later that the plans for the memorial is finally revealed. It’s to be a life-sized statue of Supergirl, the artist sketching Supergirl with her hands on her hips, smile on her lips, and it’s on a Wednesday that Lena stares at the drawing and wonders just how many people would recognize that if they placed a pair of glasses on the statue and hid the emblem on her chest with a pastel sweater that Supergirl would strongly resemble someone else.

Supergirl dies on a Wednesday, and in the days that follow the world mourns: the House of El coat of arms is everywhere, people begin quoting Supergirl left and right, and when they see Superman they avert their eyes so as to avoid the sorrow swimming in the depths of his gaze.

It makes Lena so angry.

Because Supergirl dies on a Wednesday, but more importantly, so does Kara.

x

“I hear you don’t leave the office,” Alex says without prompting as she walks into Lena’s office without any warning. Lena smiles weakly, motioning to Jess that the interruption is fine, and offers Alex a drink. (Water only. After an incident several weeks earlier, the two of them have sworn off alcohol, have been attempting to get their lives back in order—as impossible as that seems.)

“I hear you’ve been reckless.”

“Who snitched?” Alex asks, waving off the water and sitting down across from Lena, slouched heavily in the chair that Kara—

No. No. Lena isn’t about to go there.

“You tell me first,” she replies easily, shutting her laptop and giving Alex her full attention. “It was either Maggie or James. No one else comes to L-Corp late at night.”

“Winn’s been hacking into your security system,” Alex admits, shrugging when Lena’s mouth falls open in offense. “What? He’s used to keeping tabs on you. Has been since Kara—” Her mouth snaps shut, something steely appears in her gaze, and she becomes hard, her jaw clenched tight.

“Maggie told me about the alien you apprehended without backup,” Lena says, pretending as if she didn’t hear Alex’s slip, as if she didn’t witness the way Alex clammed up.

“I had it under control.”

“He was apparently three times bigger than you.” Lena eyes Alex’s leg pointedly, the ginger way Alex stretches it. “And how is nearly getting your leg torn off having anything ‘under control?’”

“He got a lucky shot in, that’s all. Also, I don’t know how I feel about my girlfriend telling you all this stuff.”

“Well I don’t know how I feel about Winn hackinginto my security system.”

“Fair enough, I’ll get him to back off if youpromise to go home and get a good’s night sleep as least twice a week.”

“I like that you know better than to ask for more than two nights a week,” Lena chuckles. When Alex merely raises an eyebrow, clearly in no mood for jokes (though none of them ever really are anymore), Lena deflates. “It still smells like her, the couch, my favorite throw. I just can’t, Alex. I can’t.”

(She doesn’t say that when she goes too long without sleep or if she forgets to eat once too often she sees Kara’s phantom presence—can see her curled up on the couch with a book, can hear her giggling over something she reads on her phone, can feel her warmth while mindlessly watching the news, can smell her perfume lingering in the air and her shampoo and something vaguely sunnyon the clothes she once borrowed when she claimed she was too tired to fly home.

Lena doesn’t say that in her darkest moments, when she’s alone and weak and feeling oh so vulnerable, she thinks that she’ll see Kara emerging from the guest bedroom, yawning even as she worriedly asks why Lena is sobbing. She doesn’t say that watching that door never open is tearing her apart.)

“It’s been a month, there’s no way—”

“So you don’t wear her favorite sweater anymore?”

Alex looks stricken at the accusation, clearly upset that Maggie would confide even this to Lena. The truth, however, is that as worried as everyone has been about Lena, they are all well aware that it’s Alex who’s lost the most—Alex who’s bearing the most pain, Alex who lost her entire world. Lena isn’t stupid; she knows Maggie and James don’t only check up on her out of some vague sense of lingering loyalty to Kara (the one person who had faith in Lena, who believed inLena, who once swore she’d always stand up for Lena).  

After all, who better to understand losing a sibling than Lena Luthor?

“That’s different,” Alex says fiercely after she manages to get her shock under control.

“Alex—”

“She’s not gone. I know it, I can feel it. My sister is still out there and she’s coming back.”

Lena sighs and Alex’s shoulders stiffen.

(It’s practically a play they enact by memory at this point. It’d started a week after Clark left. Alex had stated it as a fact, had talked about how Clark hadn’t let anyone see Kara’s body, how he was keeping his distance, how there were unexplainable reports from the south about random surges and strange miracles, how she sworeshe heard Kara’s voice one night, just outside her window.

And Lena—heartbroken, terrified, emptyLena—refutes each of Alex’s claims one by one, keeping her voice steady and calm, trying to prevent the swell of hope in her own chest. Because she wantsit to be true, she so wants it to be true, but that damn door never opens and experience is a hard teacher and Lena’s had plenty of lessons—enough that while she’s brave enough to admit what she wants she doesn’t dare give in to hope.

Lena isn’t strong enough to hope only for it all to be proved false, so she prays that Alex is strong enough for the both of them.

She wonders how long she can continue to be so unfair.)

“So it can’t be true that I still smell Kara on my things, but she’s definitely alive just because you feel it?”

“You don’t understand, I know my sister. I’ve always had a sixth sense when it came to her, when she was in trouble and needed me. And she needsme now. Lena, you have to believe me.”

(I want to, Lena doesn’t say. Show me how to hope, she doesn’t say.)

“Just like you knew Mon-El was trouble and told her to stay away from him?” Lena says instead, her voice becoming cold. (This too is a conversation she’s had many times with Alex, and every time, it’s ended the same way.)

“Fuck you, Luthor,” Alex hisses. She gets to her feet, only favoring her left leg slightly, all her pain forgotten in her anger, and she stalks out of Lena’s office without another word or a look back.

And Lena wearily reaches for her phone, dialing Maggie’s number.

“She’ll be coming to you now,” she says in lieu of a hello. “Let her know somehow that I’m sorry, okay? And thank her for looking out for me.”

“You could tell her yourself. You could tell her you don’t actually think she’s crazy,” Maggie says, her voice almost completely drowned out by some sort of commotion in the background. Lena idly wonders how the NCPD is faring without one of their greatest assets.  

“I actually don’t think she wants to hear anything from me right now,” Lena says, swallowing hard. “And I never called her crazy.”

“Look, Lena. I get it, okay? People process grief differently.” She lets out a sigh when Lena doesn’t respond. “I don’t know how little Danvers got stuck with two of the most stubborn women in the world.”

“The issue is she’s not processing her grief at all, Maggie,” Lena says, closing her eyes and ignoring the latter part of Maggie’s comment. She doesn’t wait for Maggie to convince her otherwise—she hangs up and tosses her phone aside.

After a long pause, she opens her eyes and swivels her chair around, staring out her window, somehow momentarily sure that she’ll see a flash of red and hear the light thud of boots against the balcony. But the moment is gone in a heartbeat, and Lena hurriedly wipes away the single tear that’s rolled down her cheek and returns to her work as if there’d never been an interruption in the first place.

(She doesn’t go home that night either.)

x

On the second month anniversary of Supergirl’s (and Kara’s) death, Lena decides she’ll take a lunch break and go for a walk. She tells Jess to take care of all her calls, to email her anything that’s urgent, then walks to the nearest café—barely a block away—buys Kara’s favorite sandwich and heads to memorial that’s still under construction, tentatively named Hero’s Park.

She sits on one of the wooden benches away from the bustling and the work, the sandwich going untouched as she stares at the one thing that’s already been completed: a life-size statue of Supergirl. The artist is talented, she thinks for the umpteenth time. They’d somehow captured Kara’s strength in the curve of her spine, her optimism in the uptick of her lips, her courage in the clench of her hands. Supergirl’s very essence had been distilled into stone, each inch exemplifying everything that made Kara great.

(Or perhaps that’s just what Lena sees when she looks at the statue because that was what she saw when she looked at Kara.)

“You didn’t come to game night,” she hears a deep voice rumble, and though she smiles she doesn’t turn to look at the man who’s joined her at her bench. “We all missed you.”

“Alex is upset with me, I didn’t think she’d want me there.”

“She’s sad, Lena. But she always wants you around.”

Lena sighs, turning to face James, studying his expression and his loose-fitting clothing before offering him another smile, this one self-deprecating, mirthless…broken.

“Why?”

“Because you’re something she has left of Kara. You and Winn.”

“Not you?”

“I came into Kara’s life thanks to Clark. You came into her life because she brought you into it.” He doesn’t seem sad or resentful and Lena knows why: it doesn’t matter how they came into Kara’s life, they were both just grateful that they’d ever been in her orbit at all. She stares at him a little longer then hands over the sandwich, actually letting out a laugh when he halves it and raises an eyebrow, waiting till she accepts her half and takes a bite before he begins to eat as well.

“So you tracked me down to tell me to come to the next game night?”

“Track down?” James huffs, shaking his head. “Lena, there’s no tracking with you. You’re either here or at the office.”

“But you were looking for me.”

“Yeah, but not about game night. Fair warning, though, Alex will probably call you sometime today about that.” He polishes off the last of his sandwich and leans back, his eyes on the memorial, something sad passing over his face. “Cat Grant is back,” he explains without preamble. “She feels…well, I think she’s guilty. She seems to think Kara’s—” He stops, clears his throat, and shakes his head. “She thinks it’s her fault somehow. So she wants to honor Supergirl her own way. She wants to coincide the opening of the memorial with a special issue of CatCo magazine.”

“And how does that involve me?”

“Apparently it’s ‘common knowledge’ that you and Supergirl were close. I don’t think Cat knows just how close you were, but she suspects enough. She wants to interview you, add the viewpoint of someone who knew Supergirl well.”

“And she didn’t ask you?”

“She did. But the truth is I don’t think I knew Kara in the end. We’d become so distant and I…” He stops and hangs his head, hurriedly wiping at his eyes. Lena tactfully looks away, remembering all the nights he helped her off the floor of her office and took her home, never once mentioning her weakness, never once taking advantage of the information he held over her. To see someone at their very worst and still think them strong…that was something Lena hadn’t had with anyone before James. And she likes it. She likes it enough that she surprises herself by reaching out and taking James’s hand, not looking over at him even when he squeezes back gratefully.

“I don’t know if I can survive an interview with Cat Grant,” Lena tells James softly, pulling her hand away and turning to him. To her shock, he’s grinning.

“I thought you’d say that,” he says, knocking shoulders with her. “That’s why I told Cat I’d interview you. As my last hurrah I guess before I move back to Metropolis.”

Lena frowns, filled with confusion and a terrible sense of sorrow that she’s losing someone she just found.

“You’re moving away? But—”

“I don’t belong here anymore, Lena,” he interrupts, and Lena doesn’t understand why he looks so carefree, why he’s so cheerful about that fact. “I came here to get out from under Clark’s shadow and I think somewhere along the way I lost myself. I wanted to be a hero like Kara, a hero like Clark, and I forgot that there’s more to being a hero than punching a few bad guys.” He tilts his head towards her, actually winking. “You showed me that, you know. You’re more of a hero than you know, and it’s just because you choose to do the right thing over what might be easy.”

“I think you’re giving me too much credit, James.”

“I think you give yourself too little credit,” he shoots back with good humor. “National City has been good for you. For me…well, for me I don’t think it was.”

“You met Kara here,” Lena reminds him softly, but rather than recant, James tilts his head back, staring up at the sky with a wide smile on his face, his eyes closing. She can almost see what Kara saw in him—he’s obviously conventionally attractive, but he’s also soft and gentle, kind, and patient. There’s a warmth to him that Lena appreciates, something she finds herself basking in because at times—when he’s chuckling or when he’s passionate about something—it reminds Lena so much of Kara. The very thought of losing him hurts more than she thought it would, especially now that they’ve become tentative friends, one of the many things Lena has because of Kara. “National City gave you that.”

“National City also took her away,” he says, his smile not fading and his eyes still closed. “I like to think that there’s an alternate world, another timeline that Kara is alive and happy. And maybe I met her and maybe I didn’t, but I think just knowing she’s somewhere in the world would be enough for me.”

“Yes,” Lena says without thinking, “I agree.”

“So.” James claps his hands together and sits up, finally opening his eyes and facing her. “Will you do the interview? Send me off in style?”

Lena looks over at the statue, eyes roving the intricate lines of Kara’s face. She stares into the lifeless eyes of the statue and for a moment they flash, looking blue and bright and vibrant.

Kara gave her friends, gave her a sense that she mattered, but most of all, Kara reminded her what it meant to be a hero: to do the best you could, with whatever you had. So Lena’s answer is a no-brainer.

“Of course, James. Whatever you need.”

And James’s answering grin reminds her so much of Kara that the ache in her chest—the one she hasn’t been able to escape since that Wednesday two months ago—twinges painfully, and Lena realizes that, with or without James, losing Kara is something she’ll never be able to get over.

x

Cat Grant actually cries (it’s caught on camera, a single tear rolling down her cheeks, and the photograph is tucked into the corner of the article about Supergirl and her wider influence—forever immortalizing herself as not only the person who named Supergirl, but also the person who said goodbye.)

Lena’s interview with James is everywhere the day the memorial opens. Quotes are read on news programs, social media blows up with it, shared again and again with varying opinions.

(“She’s a fake,” some say.

“She’s not like her family,” others write.

“Can you imagine, a Super and a Luthor?” some question.

“No, no, no,” many claim, “she’s in love.”)

Lena doesn’t pay attention to any of it. She goes to work, meets with her board members and investors, speaks to R&D, takes conference calls from foreign businesses, forgets to eat until Jess strongholds her into it, only going home when Winn or Maggie (or sometimes Alex, when she’s not surly, when she’s not still spouting her mad claims about Kara) drag her away from the office.

And time drags on.

They have a going away celebration for James, playing board games in Kara’s honor and eating so many potstickers that Alex feels sick. They tell stories, Winn gets drunk, and James hugs both Alex and Lena tightly, promising to stay in touch—promising to be around the second they ever need him. He tells Winn that being his partner was one of the greatest things he’s ever done in his life.

Alex stops mentioning her certainty that Kara is still alive, but bags appear beneath her eyes, Maggie claims that she doesn’t know where Alex is most times, J’onn tells Lena he’s worried and he wants her help in finally putting this all to rest.

Maggie gets a promotion and the night they celebrate almost feels normal, even if there’s a wide gaping wound, a space that they attempt to fill with music and laughter, an emptiness that is palpable and harsh.

Lena invites Alex and Winn to a symposium for technological innovations, and the three of dork out. Maggie fondly calls them her favorite nerds, and even James calls from Metropolis to tease them about it.

Before Lena knows it, another month has passed, and she wonders when it became so easy to pretend she’s just fine.

x

She dreams of Kara often.

In many respects, that statement isn’t altogether strange. She’s dreamt of Kara since the day she met the bumbling reporter. She’s dreamt of them being friends, dreamt of Kara’s laugh, dreamt of the day that Kara would trust her enough to unbutton her shirt and reveal her family’s crest.

(And these dreams weren’t just dreams—eventually they became grounded in reality.

Perhaps she should have known then, perhaps she should have realized a Luthor never would have a happy ending.)

She dreams of Kara often, that isn’t what strikes her. It’s the fact that this dream feels so real.

Kara sits on her couch, laughing as she pulls takeout containers out from a bag she’s set on the table, mumbling on about something and adjusting her glasses. And Lena can’t help it, she steps away from her desk—abandoning the work she just said she was almost done with—and approaches Kara, dropping to her knees in front of her.

“Lena?” Kara asks, looking worried, a crease appearing between her eyebrows, her glasses slipping down the bridge of her nose. She ignores it and Lena’s met with a breathtaking view of Kara’s blue eyes. “Are you okay?”

“I think I’m dreaming,” she says softly. Rather than frown or laugh like Kara usually would, Lena just gets a soft look. The crease between Kara’s eyes disappears and she tilts her head slightly to the side, actually reaching out and cupping Lena’s cheeks with her hands.

“Would it matter if it’s a dream?”

“But then you wouldn’t be real.”

Kara’s thumbs wipe at Lena’s cheeks, and it takes a moment for Lena to realize she’s dabbing away the evidence of Lena’s tears.

“I’m real, Lena,” she says, and Lena can feel Kara’s warm breath fanning over her face as she leans in closer. “I’m real and I’m here.”

(Dream-Kara smells like the Kara Lena knew. She smells vaguely sweet with a certain undertone that Lena doesn’t know how to describe other than bright. Dream-Kara is soft and warm. Dream-Kara is leaning dangerously close and Lena wonders if it would be wrong to give in, to close the last of that distance between them and find out what Kara tastes like—even if it’s a dream, even if it’s not real.)

“I miss you,” Lena finds herself mumbling, eyes fluttering shut, and she doesn’t have to wonder about the morals of kissing the dream-version of the woman she’s in love with because Kara takes the decision out of her hands entirely.

She kisses Lena hungrily, fingers threading into Lena’s hair and tugging her closer, and Lena isn’t quite sure if it’s her heart that’s hammering away or if it’s Kara’s. And when Kara releases her hair, when her teeth drag over Lena’s lips and her hands trace the contours of Lena’s body, Lena stops thinking about hearts. She accepts what Kara gives her, her own hands trembling as she desperately holds Kara to her, worried that if she releases her hold even for a moment the dream will dematerialize and she’ll be left alone again.

It’s a dream (and Lena dreams of Kara often) but damn it if it didn’t feel real.

“I’m here,” Kara tells her in between kisses—head spinning, heart pounding, world upturning, kisses. “I’m here and you’re gonna find me.”

x

“You were right!” Lena shouts, banging on the door with no thought at all to the time or how it must look. “You were right!” she shouts again, shocked when the door flies open before she can knock again.

“You better have a damn good reason for this racket, Luthor,” Alex hisses, putting her gun away and dragging Lena inside her apartment. She looks disheveled, a little more than half-asleep, and Lena considers for one moment that maybe she could’ve waited until the morning for this.

“You were right,” she says again, deciding this was urgent enough to justify pulling Alex out of bed. From the other side of the apartment, Maggie comes shuffling over, scratching at her cheek, squinting at the kitchen lights and Lena’s exuberance.

“What’s going on?” the detective asks.

“I don’t know, ask Lena, she’s the one who tried to ram her way in.”

“You were right,” Lena says again, not understanding how Alex still hasn’t caught on.

“I get it, I was right, but about what?”

“Kara.”

That’s it, that’s all it takes, that single word, uttered as barely a breath, barely a whisper, nothing more than a prayer. It’s one word and Alex’s eyes fill with tears, and before Lena knows it, the elder Danvers has rammed into her, engulfing her in a tight embrace, practically sobbing with relief.

“She’s alive,” Alex says, “she’s alive.”

“You were right, I’m so sorry I didn’t believe you before, I’m so sorry I didn’t trust you.” She wants to say more but Alex has pulled away and is looking at Lena like she singlehandedly saved Kara herself, while Maggie looks vaguely suspicious.

“What brought this on, Luthor?” Maggie asks, ever the detective. “What changed your mind?”

Alex steps further away from Lena, both of them turning to look at Maggie in unison, frowning at her tone. Maggie doesn’t shy away from their stares; instead, her back straightens and her arms cross her chest defensively.

“What?” she asks when Lena and Alex merely continue to stare at her. “It’s a legitimate question.”

“Except it’s not the one you’re really asking, detective,” Lena says, eyes narrowed. “Say what you mean.” She hopes Maggie will drop it, she hopes that Maggie will raise her hands in surrender and back off.

Maggie doesn’t.

“Fine. You were supposed to help Alex accept what happened, not make all this worse.” Maggie’s tone is cold and hard, slipping into the part she plays when she’s at work, and Lena thinks she can actually spot the moment that Alex’s faith in her girlfriend slips away. Because Maggie’s tone, stance, and stubborn gaze makes one thing abundantly clear: she does not believe them.

“She’s alive,” Lena insists, looking from Maggie to Alex, noticing the elder Danvers seems distracted, her eyes now on the ground, her hands shaking. “She didn’t die.”

“For fuck’s—we all saw what happened, Lena! We all saw the attack and the fall.”

“No, we only saw what they wantedus to see,” Lena says, ignoring Maggie’s scoff and focusing on Alex. “We were convinced Kara died, but what if someone wanted it that way?”

“The entire world thinks Kara’s dead, Lena!” Maggie says, her eyes on Alex as well though she steps between the two of them, as if blocking Alex from Lena’s line of sight would somehow protect her girlfriend from what Lena is saying. “You can’t tell me that there’s someone out there that can make the entire world hallucinate something simultaneously.”

“Not the entire world, actually. Just us. We were the ones that told the world she was gone.”

“That still doesn’t explain how we were tricked—”

“—that Martians can plant images or thoughts in people’s mind with their telepathy—”

“—unless you’re accusing J’onn there aren’t any other Martians to plant anything—”

“—and Martians aren’t the only alien species who have telepathic powers!” Lena finishes, throwing her hands up in the air. She knows her cheeks are likely covered in red splotches, a flush appearing on her neck and ears thanks to the combination of frustration and pale skin, and her chest is heaving, but she doesn’t back down. She can’t.

Kara is alive, and they had to find her.

“Alex,” Lena says, looking past Maggie’s disapproving face and staring at the elder Danvers who’s remained uncharacteristically silent on the matter. “I wouldn’t be standing here if I wasn’t sure. I looked into those reports—the surges and miracles you talked about. Kara’s out there, and she’s trying to get home.”

Alex looks up and Maggie’s shoulders deflate at the fire in Alex’s eyes—the determination, the vindication, the hope,shining brightly. “Finally,” she says, squaring her shoulders and nodding. “You finally believe me.

“Alex—” Lena begins, but Alex waves her off.

“Better late than never, Luthor. But we have a lot of work to do.”

“Where do we start?”

“With Clark. If anyone knows what really happened, it’s him. I’m just going to need your help.” She grins broadly and rushes off, heading towards her bedroom—to dress, to gather her things, to call Clark, Lena doesn’t know. She just wishes that Alex hadn’t left her alone with Maggie Sawyer.

“If you’re wrong, it’ll break her. If you’re wrong, I’m coming after you,” she threatens lowly, stepping into Lena’s space.

“Don’t worry, detective. If I’m wrong, it’ll be punishment enough.”

Maggie softens at the admission—said softly and reluctantly—and she takes a step back, letting out a loud sigh and rolling her eyes. “Falling for a Danvers sister. I guess you and I have more in common than I thought.” She studies Lena’s face for a moment, likely detecting something Lena has no desire to have anyone detect or understand, and without warning she steps into Lena’s space again, this time pulling her into a hug. She holds on tightly, apparently not bothered that Lena doesn’t hug her back, not bothered that Lena’s just a little stiff and more than a little awkward. “If you and Alex believe, it’s enough for me. Let’s go get our Supergirl back, shall we?”

x

“What changed your mind?” Alex asks as the elevator stops, smiling awkwardly at a frazzled looking reporter with a stack of papers in his hands, mumbling under his breath as he gets off on his floor. When the elevator doors slide shut and they’re alone, Lena leans her head back against the wall, watching the numbers light up on the panel as they pass several floors.

“I had a dream,” she answers honestly.

“Oh?”

(It sounds like an Oh?, a ‘Oh, you had that sort of dream?’ and it makes Lena blush.

Because, yes, that’s a part of it. But it was mostly Kara’s certainty that Lena would find her. It was the reminder that Kara always hoped—always had faith—and Lena owed it to her be the same way.

And to be perfectly frank, telling Kara’s sister about her feelings for the alien is a conversation she’s not keen on having.)

“Yes.”

“Not going to elaborate?”

“Kara always believed in me. And I believe in her. And by extension you.”

“Oh damn, Maggie was right,” Alex says, eyes wide. Fortunately, Lena’s spared having to think of a response when the elevator comes to a halt and the doors slide open to their floor. “After you, Luthor,” Alex says with a grin, motioning for Lena to go on ahead of her. With a huff, Lena does as she’s told, holding her head up high as they walk through the office, ignoring the looks—from shock to distrust to amusement—that follow them as they pass by cubicles. The whisperings of ‘Holy shit is that Lena Luthor?’ begin immediately, and Lena curses the entire place for the umpteenth time.

She really, really hates The Daily Planet.

They catch sight of James as they blindly walk around, and his wide smile and genuine happiness to see them puts Lena at ease despite where she is and who’s she’s surrounded by (vultures, the very vultures that destroyed her family’s name, dragging it through the mud, though admittedly, much of that dragging was deserved thanks to Lex and Lillian).

“He’s not here,” James informs them after quick greetings and a tight hug, pulling them into an empty room and closing the door behind him. “There was a fire and he went to help out, he should be back soon.”

“Thank you for this, James,” Alex says, looking relieved. “I know Clark’s your friend—”

“Don’t thank me, I looked at the footage like you said. You’re right, it’s fishy. And if tricking Clark helps us get to the bottom of it…” He trails off, clearly unwilling to state how he’s prepared to hurt his best friend in order to find Kara. “Do you think it’ll work?”

“Mr. Kent doesn’t trust me,” Lena says with an easy shrug. “I say it’ll work quite fine.”  Alex opens her mouth, almost as if she wants to reassure Lena that Clark’s alone in his reticence to trust the last remaining Luthor, but it snaps back shut when they hear a flurry and a sound of boots landing. (Lena’s sure Alex just had the same thought she did: for a moment—just a moment—they both convinced themselves they’d turn around and see Kara come in from the window, a grin in her face from the flight, her hands on her hips, hair windswept. Instead, they’re met with Clark Kent’s narrowed and suspicious eyes.)

“James? What is this?”

“We want to know where you took Kara,” Alex says before James can even open his mouth. Clark—Superman, Lena’s not really sure how to address him—stares as his best friend merely steps back and allows Alex to begin her interrogation.

“I told you the last several times you came here,” Clark begins heatedly, revealing where Alex was off to when neither Maggie or J’onn were aware of her whereabouts, “she’s gone. She’s in Rao’s light and you need to let her go.”

“My sister is not dead!”

“Alex,” Lena warns, worried they’ll be overheard. Clark seems to share the concern because he raises his hands in surrender.

“You’re sad,” he says bracingly. “I understand. I’m sad too.”

“Don’t you dare,” Alex hisses, “don’t you dare pretend you’re going through anything similar to me. I love her, I’d do anything for her. You gave her up! You sent her away! You abandoned her!”

“I loved Supergirl too—”

“Kara is not gone,” Alex interrupts, shocking Clark enough that his hands drop and his eyes flit over to Lena.

“Alex, what’re you doing—”

“I know who you are, Mr. Kent,” Lena says, rolling her eyes at the fear clear on his face. “I may not be like Lex in many respects, but neither of us are blind and glasses are not an adequate disguise.”

“Lex Luthor knows about—”

“We don’t have time for this. Tell us where you took Kara.” Lena must not sound as scary as Kara sometimes claimed she did, because Clark just groans.

“For the hundredth time, Kara is gone. I heard her heart stop.”

“Did you? Or did you just think you did?” James questions, leaning against the door. “You should listen to what they have to say, Clark. Because if they’re right, Kara’s in trouble and she needs our help.”

“And if I don’t?” Clark asks, his false bravado failing as his voice shakes even at the possibility of his cousin still being alive—at somehow having been wrong. Lena pushes aside the pity she suddenly feels for him—the sorrow that fills her at the thought that Clark has spent the last several months thinking he not only lost his only genetic relation, but one of his kind, leaving the weight of an entire civilization (not even rightly his), once on Kara’s shoulders, solely on his back—and steps forward.  

“If you don’t, Mr. Kent,” Lena says, her voice low and her tone cold, “I’ll do what my brother couldn’t bring himself to: I’ll tell the world who you really are.”

x

J’onn, Maggie, and James (as the Guardian) go over the details of the plan again, but Lena sits back, content to watch Winn argue a point, Vasquez and Lucy offering their own advice and suggestions.

It’s remarkable, really, how many people have been willing to put their hearts on the line in order to pursue this razor thin thread of hope that Alex’s faith and a bit of shaky footage has offered them. It’s remarkable how a few seconds of video—moments, mere heartbeats, really—show the relief on Clark’s face before it morphs into despair and that’s enough for all of them to practically move into the DEO and use the information Clark gave them to attempt to figure out where Kara could be.

(“I took her to the Fortress, I thought maybe Kelex could help somehow. But I had to leave—there was a plane crash over Bulgaria—and when I got back, Kara was gone and Kelex told me she’d joined her family in Rao’s light. I didn’t think to question it. I was sure I heard her heart stop.”

“If we don’t find her, it’ll be your fault.”

“I was trying to protect you, Alex. I didn’t want you to keep hoping for something that wouldn’t come true. I’m sorry. Let me help now.”

“I think you’ve done more than enough protecting, Clark,” Alex had hissed, and that was that.)

And though she knows it’s a waiting game at this point—already having done as much as she could by helping Winn design the program that could narrow Kara’s location—she feels useless and helpless. She wants to be moving, she wants to feel as if she’s accomplishing something, she wants Kara in her arms, wants to kiss her for real—admit how she feels for real.

She just wants Kara back, in any capacity. A friend, the city’s superhero, a bumbling reporter. Kara needed to come back.

“Hungry?” Alex asks, interrupting Lena’s thoughts as she plops down in the chair next to Lena, offering an energy bar. Lena shakes her head and Alex shrugs, unwrapping the bar and taking a large bite. “You know, Luthor,” she says between chews, raising one eyebrow, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Clark scared till you threatened him. I’m impressed.”

“It was all in a day’s work,” Lena says proudly before her shoulders droop. “I just hope Kara doesn’t hate me for it.”

“If anything, Kara will be too busy hating me to hate you. So I think you’ll be fine.”

“Why would Kara hate you?”

She regrets the question as soon as she asks it because it makes Alex’s smile and her cheerful attitude slip away almost immediately.

“It was my fault.”

“No,” Lena immediately denies, shaking her head. “No it wasn’t.”

“Don’t lie, you’re not good at it,” Alex says mirthlessly. “It’s something you and my sister share.”

“You didn’t do anything.”

“That’s the issue, isn’t it? I just…stood back. Allowed it to happen. Ignored the warning signs because of a charming smile and a few excuses.” She turns her head, and Lena looks down, wanting to spare Alex the embarrassment of seeing her cry—something she thinks the agent is tired of doing in front of Lena. “I was so involvedwith Kara’s relationship with James,” Alex continues, voice muffled. “We talked almost every night, we joked about it, I let her cry on my shoulder when Lucy came to National City. But with Mon-El—God, I didn’t even questionit. Didn’t even wonder if it was really something she wanted, but I pushed for it because I wanted her to have what I have. And when things started to fray with him, all the fights and the arguments…I just thought it was none of my business. I stayed out of it, and Lena, that’s on me.”

“You couldn’t have known he would turn out the way he did.”

“You mean violent? Aggressive? Selfish? Because I did know all that. We allknew that.”

“The only one responsible for Mon-El’s actions is Mon-El. And he got what he deserved.”

“He should’ve died. I should’ve killed him.”

“Except you’re not a killer.” Lena looks over at Alex, frowning at the strained look on her face and her tense shoulders. “Kara loves you and she wouldn’t want you to become a killer for her.”

“Technically, it wouldn’t be for her. It’d be to get rid of the worst thing to happen to this planet,” Alex says wryly, clearly attempting to joke and change the subject. But Lena’s more stubborn than Alex expects, and she doesn’t smile or even react to the comment.

“When Lex did the things he did I wondered if anything I ever accomplished would matter. After all, I’d always be tainted by Lex, his dark shadow always looming over me. In the end, it was Kara who made me see that what I do matters, that I was right in wanting to move away from Lex’s legacy.”

“Yeah?” Alex says disinterestedly, still trying to shrug this topic off.  

“Yes. Kara is living proof that regardless of all the terrible things that happen—to us or others—we still have a choice, we still have the opportunity to do as much good as we can, be as kind and accepting as possible, and change the world for the better.” Lena smiles, bumping shoulders with Alex. “You don’t pay back bad with more bad, Alex Danvers. You squash it out by overwhelming the world with good.”

“God, you’re a sap. You really love her, don’t you?” Alex says, and this time, Lena allows the subject change, ignoring the tears in Alex’s eyes.

“Yeah. I do.”

x

They get their first real break when a woman visiting family in India returns with stories of a super woman who could carry more weight than any of the men in their town, a super woman who’d single-handedly saved dozens after an earthquake caused the local hospital to collapse, reminding everyone of the fallen hero, Supergirl.

But when Lena prepares to pack, prepares to visit the area along with Alex, Lucy, J’onn, Vasquez, and others, she’s held back by Maggie.

“You and me are sitting this one out, Luthor,” Maggie tells her, leaning against the doorway to the DEO barracks where Lena’s been spending her time away from the office. She makes another mental note to give Jess a pay raise after she didn’t question why Lena asked for some of her clothes to be brought to the office—didn’t even raise an eyebrow when Lena came in every morning with yesterday’s clothing.

“Like hell we are,” Lena shoots back, resuming her packing. (Mostly it’s just essentials, a laptop to work, her phone charger to make sure she could keep up with the going-ons at L-Corp.) “I want to be there when we find Kara.”

“She might not be there.”

“Maggie—”

“I’m just being realistic. It might be a coincidence. And if it isn’t, haven’t you wondered why Kara hasn’t come back if she still has her powers? Why she’s been MIA for months?”

“Maybe she can’t. Maybe she’s hurt. Maybe she’s being threatened.”

“But she has time to help earthquake victims?”

“Dammit Maggie!” Lena shouts, at wit’s end, tired of Maggie’s endless cynicism. (And if a part of her knows it’s not cynicism but pragmatism—something Lena used to be known for, a cold logic she could apply to any situation regardless of her feelings, except apparently, when it involves Kara—she doesn’t dwell on it. She can’t.) “What do you want from me?” she asks, voice dropping to barely a whisper, collapsing onto her bunk and cradling her head in her hands.

“You’re worried. You’re scared. You’re hurt. I get it, Luthor, I do. But you’re not thinking straight. Kara’s a part of the DEO, she’s their agent, and recovering her is a mission for the DEO. Not for a lowly NCPD detective, and not for a CEO.”

“You wanted to go too, didn’t you? Who said no? J’onn? Alex?”

“Little Danvers is important to me, even if you and Alex think I’m a monster for being realistic about this whole thing.” She pauses, leaning her head against the doorway and closing her eyes briefly. “I want her to be alive too. I want her back too.” She opens her eyes and straightens, eyes determined. “I said you and Alex believing is enough for me, and I meant it. But someone has to be ready to pick up the pieces if all this goes wrong.”

“That doesn’t sound like faith, detective. It sounds like you’re waiting to play cleanup.”

“In my experience, faith doesn’t really work out.”

Lena drops her hands and finds herself smiling at Maggie, shrugging helplessly even as she resigns herself to remaining behind.

“Yes, my experience is like that too. But this is Kara. So I believe.”

Maggie snorts, shuffling over to Lena’s bunk and sitting down next to her, the two of them staring at the floor. “Like I said, how it is bubbly, happy Little Danvers attracted such stubborn people will forever be a mystery to me.”

“Probably because she’s the most stubborn of all of us.”

(And if it’s said almost like a prayer—a hope that Kara’s stubbornness gets her through this latest threat, this latest obstacle in her life as a superhero—neither Maggie nor Lena show any indication they notice it. They can’t.)

x

She spends her lunch walking in Hero’s Park.

The memorial is finished now, nearly six months after Supergirl fell to her supposed death, and it truly is breathtaking. The statue stands near a fountain that’s shaped like the House of El crest, a massive ‘S’ standing in the center, covered in words people have used to describe Supergirl. (Things like hero, brave, gentle, kind, friend, and even love.) It’s become somewhat of a tourist destination, especially after Superman came one afternoon to brush his hand over Kara’s likeness, as if he thought if he stared hard enough or hoped hard enough, the stone would dematerialize and leave a very real and very alive Kara in its place.

(He uses that visit to also come by the DEO and apologize again, offering his help again, and Lena wishes she could’ve seen Alex’s scathing response, even if J’onn accepted the aid—stating they’d need all the help they could get.)

James, Winn, and Maggie are with her, the four of them left behind, banding together in this moment, breathlessly waiting for news—for Alex’s return, if all goes right, with Kara. James keeps staring at the statue, Winn chatters nervously, and Maggie’s texting, her brows furrowed at whatever she’s reading.

Lena doesn’t ask—she worries it involves Kara and she isn’t sure she wants to know if anything’s gone wrong.

“We should have a game night to celebrate her return,” James says suddenly. “All you can eat pizza and potstickers and ice cream. Maybe some of that alien alcohol that can get Kara drunk.”

“And Monopoly,” Winn adds. “If she’s getting drunk we should play Monopoly, it’s always more fun that way.”

“And karaoke,” Maggie laughs, slipping her phone into her pocket and grinning. “Have you heard Kara sing? There’s a reason she’s called super.”

“We should invite everybody,” Winn continues. “From the DEO, Metropolis—drag Cat Grant into it if we have to. Maybe we could even get into contact with her inter-dimensional friends, Barry and Cisco and the others.” He smiles dreamily. “I can talk about the multiverse with them.”

“The first thing I’m going to do when Kara’s back is give her a hug,” Maggie says. “I miss Little Danvers’ hugs.”

“I’m going to spoil every single TV show she follows. It’s going to make her so mad,” Winn says happily, rubbing his hands together.

“I’ll just tell her that Cat’s back in charge and that Kara’s job is waiting for her if she wants it.”

“Lena?” Maggie question, coming to a halt and pulling Lena to a stop as well. “What about you?”

“I think I’ll just be happy she’s back,” Lena says, not meeting Maggie’s eyes and ignoring Winn’s blatant amusement and James’s raised eyebrows.

“Come on, Luthor,” Maggie presses.

“Yeah, Lena. There’s nothing you want to tell Kara?” Winn adds, holding back a smile.

“You know, the one obvious thing throughout all this, something you’d think one would want to confess if they got a second chance?” James asks, his eyebrows still comically raised.

“I don’t know what any of you mean,” Lena says resolutely, her chin jutting out even as she avoids all their eyes. “Kara being back would be more than enough for me.”

“Kara being back would be more than enough for all of us,” James says, actually letting out a laugh. “But take it from someone who’s been where you are—if you don’t tell her, you’ll regret it forever.”

x

Supergirl returns to National City on a Saturday.

It makes her wonder sometimes, this sole fact. Because Supergirl returns quietly, without fanfare, without buzz, rolled into the DEO on a bed, injured and unconscious, Alex gripping her hand so tightly that Lena is almost sure she’s impending blood flow.

(Over the next few days, the story—the truth—begins to come out. There’s talk of spores from a starfish-like alien named Starro. How this alien has hated Superman since he and others locked Starro away, how the spores were able to not mind-control entirely but suggest certain thoughts, how Supergirl had been trying to get back for months, resisting the spore’s effects as best she could. There’s explanations as to how Superman was exposed to the spores in the first place, how he came to be so sure that Kara died in his arms, how Kara managed to leave the Fortress of Solitude as weak as she was, as confused as she was.

And the strangest thing of all, Kara’s last words before she passes out after Alex removes the spores: where’s Lena?)

Supergirl returns to National City on a Saturday and it’s extraordinary in its simplicity, its easiness, the utter sense of rightness. She slips in as if she never left, as if she was never gone, as if no time has passed at all, and even though she’s laying on a bed underneath several sun lamps, Alex never straying too far from her side, she feels so permanent—so unmovable and untouchable.

Supergirl returns to National City on a Saturday, and by Monday the entire world becomes aware of it as well when she saves a school bus from getting hit by a man running a red light.

(It’s as if the world is upturned again, as if they entered some sort of alternate realty. The President returns to National City for a photo op with Supergirl, shaking her hand and exclaiming how glad she is to have Supergirl back. The memorial remains in place but is called a celebratory monument. People swarm into the park, hoping to get a photo with the statue and maybe even a flash of red as Supergirl flies by overhead.

Alex calls Lena at work and tells her that Superman comes to the DEO not even a day after Supergirl wakes up, exclaiming how grateful he is to have her back, and how much they need to watch ‘that Luthor,’ much to Alex’s amusement.

James visits and admits Cat offered his job back and he thinks he might take it, realizing after some time away that the distance from his friends wasn’t something he could live with.)

(Lena doesn’t see Supergirl after that first Saturday she’s back. She wishes she could stay by Kara’s side like Alex, but she manages little more than brief visits when she has the time, and after Kara wakes up, Lena’s assaulted by reporters asking her how she feels about Supergirl’s return, embroiling L-Corp in a conversation her company shouldn’t be involved in. She’s busyand Supergirl is busy—making up for all the lost time, zooming about all hours of the day and night, no job too large or too small for her help—and it’s okay.

After all, all she needs to do when she feels overwhelmed or sad or worried is close her eyes and listen to the superhero speeding about the city, or turn on the news and witness it for herself, for her heart to settle and her mind to ease.)

And while James, Alex, Maggie, and even J’onn ask if Lena’s seen Kara yet—ask if she wants help tracking Kara down, getting her alone, admitting the truth. But they don’t understand, Lena doesn’t need anything other than knowing Supergirl is around. They don’t understand that for Lena, Supergirl’s presence in National City is enough.

Because Supergirl returns to National City on a Saturday, but more importantly, so doesKara.

x

A week passes before Lena hears that oh-so-telling thud of boots against her balcony. It’s years of lessons drilled into her head about not reacting—never showing her hand—that stops her from turning around immediately, not rushing to Kara immediately, not gushing immediately. Instead she slowly shuts her laptop and smiles as Kara steps into view, her hands on her hips, her head tilted to the side.

“Are you avoiding me, Lena Luthor?” Kara asks, the first thing she’s said to Lena since before the fall, since before the world turned upside down at the loss of their greatest hero. She’s smiling as she moves to stand in front of Lena’s desk, arms crossing over her chest, covering up her House’s coat of arms. There’s an odd sense of tension between them, a silence filled with so much going unsaid, an awkwardness that only time and distance can ever really bring about.

“I could ask you the same thing, Supergirl,” Lena says as she stares at the woman who’s her best friend, the woman she’s fallen in love with, the woman she felt so lost without. She wanted Kara back, and now that she is, it’s frustrating that it feels so strange.

“Apparently disappearing for months on end is not a good idea,” Kara says, leaning back onto the heels of her feet. “Means a lot of work when you finally get back.”

“Something to remember the next time you decide to make the entire world think you’re dead, I’m sure,” Lena says, unable to keep her eyes off Kara, roving over the curls of her hair, the blue of her eyes, the lift of her lips, the tap of her fingers, even the set of her shoulders. Lena drinks her in, storing up for another potential drought, never wanting to forget the strength of Kara’s back, the crinkles at the corners of her eyes. She’s back, Lena reminds herself. This was what she wanted. This was the thing she hoped for.

“I’m sorry about that by the way,” Kara says, dropping her gaze. “I hadn’t meant—”

“To get betrayed by someone we all trusted and then be subjected to one of Superman’s enemies? You’re not the only one who didn’t mean for that to happen, Kara. And none of it is your fault.”

“I should’ve known better,” she says, hanging her head. “I didknow better but somehow he…” Lena watches as Kara trails off, struggling to find the words to explain what went wrong, and Lena finds that enough is enough. Awkwardness and tension be damned, she gets up quickly, rounds the desk, and pulls Kara into a hug (the first hug since before the fall, since before losing her best friend, since before her world turned upside down at the loss of the woman she’s in love with).

“I missed you so much,” Lena says, wanting nothing but to show Kara how amazing she is, how wonderful she is, how utterly neededshe is. “And I’m so glad you’re here.”

“I knew, you know,” Kara mutters into Lena’s neck, her arms wrapping around Lena’s waist pulling her closer. “I knew you and Alex wouldn’t give up on me. I knew you two would find me.”

And Lena knows that one day she and Alex will have to tell Kara about the drinking, about how everyone ignored Alex for months, about how it took a very realdream about Kara for Lena to believe as well. And she knows that one day—not today, but soon—Kara will have to talk about what happened to her, explain how it was that she fought off the spores that had so completely convinced Clark of her death.

But today, the first time Lena has seen Kara since the fall, since her supposed death, all that can wait. Today, Lena just holds on tighter to Kara, revels in her warmth, and lets out a laugh.

“I suppose Alex and I are just stubborn that way.”

x

The next time she visits Hero’s Park and the monument dedicated to Supergirl, it’s with Kara, the two of them arm in arm, Kara enjoying an ice cream cone.

“Lucy and James got back together,” Kara informs Lena suddenly, releasing Lena’s arm and turning around to walk backwards, one sticky hand holding onto Lena’s hand. “Lucy says they’re pretty happy.”

“I’m glad. James and Lucy deserve that.”

“They do. Honestly, I’m not surprised. James has been different these past few months, spending so much time at the DEO and with Lucy—it was obvious he wanted to try again.”

“I’m just glad James decided to stay in National City. I don’t think anyone would be able to control Winn’s cheating at game night otherwise.”

“I don’t think Clark’s quite forgiven James yet for what you and Alex did,” Kara says with a laugh, squeezing Lena’s hand when she looks away at the reminder. “I doubt James wants to go back to Metropolis anytime soon.”

“It’s not like I would’ve actually given away his secret. It’s not my fault he doesn’t see past my last name.”

“Exactly.”

“And I—wait. What?”

“I said exactly. I love Clark, but the man needs to relax a little bit more. All that stress probably isn’t very healthy.” Kara grins and motions towards Lena’s bench—the one she spent so much time on nearly a year ago. They sit down together, arms brushing, and like always, Lena’s heart rate spikes at merely the proximity.

“Alex says I traumatized him.”

“Pfft. Alex is the one who traumatizes people. You’re too…you for that.”

“What? What does that mean?”

“You know,” Kara gestures wildly over at Lena, her eyes wide. “You’re you.”

“I’m sorry, Kara, I don’t know what you mean—”

“—you’re aloof but really warm and kind behind all that standoffishness and it’s just…you. An oxymoron personified.”  

“If you say so…” Lena mumbles, not at all sure if she should be insulted or not. She’s not even quite sure if she wantsto be her, as Kara puts it. Mostly, she wishes she was anyone but herself.

“James told me to wait for you,” Kara says, making Lena lose her train of thought and turn to her in confusion, “but I’m sort of tired of waiting because, well, I’m not the most patient person ever.”

“No, you’re really not.”

“And the thing is, I’ve told Alex, but I haven’t told you because I was scared, but you being you…I mean, that’s what saved me.”

Lena laughs, rolling her eyes and bumping shoulders with Kara. “Are you talking about that attack on L-Corp earlier this week? For the last time, Kara, I didn’t saveyou, I just did what I had to do to. Besides, he was myformer employee, if anything it’s my fault that—”

“I’m talking about last year, Lena. About the spores and being stranded at the Fortress of Solitude.” That shuts Lena up, her mouth snapping close, her eyes somehow fixed on Kara’s uncharacteristically serious face. “I’d get these flashes of you,” she continues. “Of something you said, something you did, and I’d realize that whatever was happening wasn’t real. Because of you. Because youfelt real.” She laughs, returning to her normal, bumbling self, her hands adjusting her glasses awkwardly, her lips twisted into a wry smile. “You saved me from my own thoughts and I guess—”

This time, it’s Lena’s turn to interrupt Kara. Not with words, not with a look, but by leaning in and pressing their lips together in a kiss remarkably similar to the one she dreamed about, momentarily making Lena question whether what’s happening is real or not.

And when she pulls away to see Kara’s eyes flutter open, a thrilled grin on her lips, Lena finds herself falling yet again.

But in a good way—in the only way that matters.

[theriverpersonshadow]

Lamia Drama (Part 2)

See previous post for warnings and general info.

Credit for the lamia species (or at least the specific species, not lamia in general) goes to @vex-bittys

Keith decides to give this new girl a chance and introduces another lamia! DnD shall come whether Hux likes it or not. Coral boy is jealous.

< PREV | NEXT >

           Keith and Hux had just been talking DnD with each other when a girl with short, wavy blonde hair walked into the back. Keith’s flickering tongue caught the taste of sweat, dirt, and a variety of plants. Real plants, not like the fake trees, though he could identify some of the smells as the foliage they could keep here. His soul leaped in his chest, he could feel it immediately, they were meant to be.

           … According to who? Or what? Some bred in biological imperitive? It was just there to make him easier to adopt, right? But it felt real…

           No.

           He wasn’t going to leave Hux and the others behind. The woman didn’t seem to have even noticed anyways, so maybe he was just imagining it. Heck, he probably was. Then again, if anything was going to seduce him – something he felt was pretty impossible, he’d just never been interested – it’d probably be someone bringing their own books and homemade fucking cookies. Yes please. They smelled like chocolate and peanut butter – questionably healthy at best, but he’d take it!

           … He should probably answer the question, huh?

           “Yeah, nice to meet ya. Name’s Keith, I’m the DM,” Keith said, slithering down to her level.

           “So, you think you have what it takes to play with the big boys?” Hux said. “Heh. How’d you even find out about that?”

           “There was a sign,” the woman said. “My friends are busy with college stuff right now – I’m on break, doing work in a greenhouse and all – but my evenings are totally free. Kinda have to leave early though, have to be up before the sun. I love the job, but that part sucks.”

           Keith chuckled, “I feel you there.” He’d stay snuggled in a nesting mound half the day if you let him. What? Blankets are soft, and it’s not like he had to leave to read things. Beds and blankets make reading better if anything. Prime coziness.

           “I think you should look somewhere else,” Hux said. “We go until, like, two in the morning sometimes.”

           Before Keith could stop himself, he found himself saying, “Eh, we can end early for a little while. Or hey, maybe have a side campaign with you or something.”

           “What?!” Hux said, standing high as he could on his tail with his arms thrown out. “Dude! We’re halfway through Pipsqueak’s character arc or whatever! Can’t just push him aside…”

Pipsqueak was Trousle’s (a bitty Papython) mousefolk bard; he’d been looking for pieces of the Worldsong, a song that, once played, was supposed to give the musician power over all things. Pipsqueak had managed to get half of it and was facing down with Caterwaul, the Tabaxi bard, who had the other half. It was looking like Pipsqueak was questioning whether the song should be played by any. However it played out was going to be awesome, though it might or might not be the end of the campaign depending on how Trousle played it.

           Since when did Hux care so much about that though? He wasn’t exactly a roleplayer type…

           “I mean, if you guys are full or in the middle of something, I can just… not?” the woman said.

           “Nah, don’t mind Hux. It’s alright, uh… What’s your name?”

           “Oh! My bad. Call me Alex. You said it’s, uh… Key?”

           “Keith,” Hux said, unimpressed.

           “I am the actual worst at names,” Alex said, sighing.

           “Eh, it happens. But I bet we can work something out.”

           “We don’t need to work things out,” Hux grumbled, curling into a ball on the floor and sulking, hiding his skeleton half under a ball of black and red scales.

           Keith rolled his eyes. Hux never liked change and didn’t seem too fond of people. He was tolerant of the people running the place, but no one else. That said, it was no excuse to be a dick. “Hux, be nice. Sorry about him, he’ll warm up to ya. Why don’t I take you to meet the others? We can work something out. Not like we’re going anywhere…” And that was fine by him. Home was here with his own batch of misfits. “Get Liam, will ya Hux?”

           “Ugh, why do I have to?”

           “ ‘Cause you can never find Trousle.”

           “Why don’t I go looking for Oozy?”

           “I’ll bet you a week’s snacks that Oozy’s in his hammock.”

           Hux huffed and crossed his arms with an adorable blush on his face, flustered. He was, apparently, not willing to take that bet. As much as Keith liked to stay curled up all cozy, he had nothing on Oozy. It wouldn’t be the first time they had to carry him in the hammock to DnD night. Hecking cornies.

           “Thought so,” Keith said, chuckling. “I’ll go get Nikolai. Hope you don’t mind kiddos, Lex.”

           “Is Nikolai a kid?”

           “Nope,” Keith said. “Follow me.” He slithered past the jungle of fake plants, real plants, and various toys and hiding holes that made up the dim room he liked to call the “Chilling Room.” It was a little cool in here, but mostly he called it that ‘cause this area tended to be more quiet, lacking the toys and people-chairs that littered the rest of the back. Sometimes you just need a place to be a Snake and stalk your friends for a little while, or somewhere to just hide in a hole and listen to the same song until it was playing through your dreams in utter bliss. That second one seemed unique to him.

           “… I’m not gonna remember any of these names,” Alex whispered to herself. She stopped to pull some dead foliage from some of the plants, fingers working fast with practice. For a moment she paused then put a leaf in her mouth. “Stevia leaves the weirdest after taste. Not bad though. Also, why do you have stevia?”

           “Is that what that is? I think the Honeybos like to chew on it.”

           “Is that why they’re Honeybos? ‘Cause they’re full of sweet?”

           “I mean, maybe! Never bitten into one.”

           “Not even licked one?” Pause. “That’s a weird thing to ask, huh?”

           “I mean, I smell with that y’know. But some of them do smell kinda sweet.” He had the oddest urge to nibble a snake now. Logically he knew they were not just little slithering sweets, but a little voice in the back of his head whispered but what if they do taste like honey buns?

           Keith really hoped that voice wasn’t Alex’s. That’s just a weird thing to think. Even weirder if you aren’t a snake. “Do you stick a lot of random stuff in your mouth?”

           Alex kinda went quiet, staring at the floor, and Keith tried to stifle a laugh, stopping in his tracks to look at her behind him. “Oh my god. You have, haven’t you? What’s the weirdest thing?”

           “Probably either crickets, an agar plate – one of those things they grow bacteria on – or my salt lamp.”

           “Can confirm, those are salty.”

           “You too?”

           “Nope. But Trousle dared Liam to once and he swallowed the whole thing. We had to pull it out by the chord.”

           “That… That’s both amazing and dangerous.”

           Keith nodded, “Yep. Never dare a Mamba to do something unless you want to face the consequences.” Looking around, he brought out his phone and showed some pictures of Liam – a full sized Mamba – with light streaming from his mouth and tail as Hux and Nikolai (a King) tried desperately to pull the lamp out. Trousle was on the table, shouting encouragement but too small to actually help. “That’s why we’re not allowed to have salt lamps anymore.”

           Alex was snorting as she laughed, hand over her mouth and eyes crinkled behind glasses. “Oh my goodness. Reminds me of when I caught a baby rabbit and found out they can scream. I almost dropped it.”

           “Oh no!”

           “It tried to escape! But I caught it midair. And then it just stared at me, judging. Relatedly, gardening gloves have multiple uses. One of them is bunny catching. They have claws and will kick the shit out of you.”

           He’s tempted to mention that’s why he just eats them, but gets the feeling that won’t go over well. Since when does he care? He’s a snake, she should know this. It’s natural.

           “You like cute? C’mon,” Keith said. It was a short slither to the very back room. Alex stopped, staring at the “Staff Only” sign, but Keith gently tugged her through, “It’s fine.” The door opened up to a humid room with multiple little lamps scattered over eggs and newborns. The nursery. They were greeted with a variety of hisses and chirps from little baby snakes and a much louder hiss from Nikolai. The King’s hood flared upon seeing the stranger and he stood as tall as he could, clutching three squirming baby Pygmy (full sized, but still so small) to his chest protectively.

           Alex froze up, face going blank as she stared at the sight of King’s hood and fangs, venom dripping from them. Maybe Keith should’ve warned Nikolai first, but better late than never?

           “Alex, this is Nikolai. The most broody bastard you’ll ever meet. Nikolai, Alex. She wants to play DnD. And probably to also hold some kiddos, but who am I to judge?”

           Nikolai narrowed his eyes, somehow keeping hold of the Pygmy as all three attempted to go in different directions, unfazed by one of them trying to put his hands in Nikolai’s eyesockets. “Keith. We need to talk.”

[kassies-take]

A Page From Maggie’s Book

Can you do a Maggie Sawyer x best friend reader badass team up where reader is new to superhero work and decides to go on a ride along with Maggie to see how police handle threats or something? 

@healthtobination

A/n: Sorry it’s taken awhile for me to do this

Warning: Rape, violence

Maggie Sawyer x BestFriend!Reader 

Word Count:  1747

“Do I get a gun?” you asked after putting on bullet proof gear. 

Maggie scoffed, “you think I am going to give you a gun? That’s funny.” 

“It was worth a try,” you shrugged. 

“You don’t need a gun when you’ve got force fields.” 

“Are we going to stop a robbery? Car chase? Ooh a...”

Maggie chuckled. “You’re cute, I’m a detective officer not a patrol officer.”

“So what do you do?”

“First off, you don’t need this.” Maggie gestured to the bullet proof vest. “till necessary. Second detectives don’t have your typical police cars, we’re stealthy, we find information. Our ride is unmarked cars.”

“What information do you find?” You asked leaning against Maggie’s desk

“We find anything and everything about suspects, their high school, the clubs they join, the name of their family pet, their sister’s name, parents name, job, friends. Everything.”

“So what do we do now.”

“Research.”

You tapped a pen on your knee continuously. The constants ticks made Maggie look at you with a raised eyebrow. She rolled closer to the right side of her desk, took out a key and opened the bottom cabinet. The detective pulled out a thick beige folder and handed it to you.

“What is this?”

“Victims.”

“Victims? Of?”

“Look through them.”

The file revealed multiple women with rape at the bottom.

“All of these women were rapped?” You flipped though several pages.

“You’ve worked with Alex and Kara before, they both go way to fast into action. Punching their way into things. We go the whole way, we want the man responsible to rot in hell. We find evidence and we don’t hold back and we do it for them.”

“Kara and Alex catch the guy. Kara’s a reporter so she has to get evidence.”

“Most of the time, Alex or Kara catch the guys but they get away from lack of evidence. Little Danvers may have evidence but she does not get to control the jury, or how the other side uses the evidence.”

“Sawyer, come have a look at this.”

You followed Maggie down the hall. The other officer played a footage. A view over the city.

“Real-estate, so what.”

“Wait,” The camera flew closer towards a window. Past the window was a girl changing.

“This is disgusting,” you glared at the screen.

“We’ve got a peeping Tom,” Maggie crossed her arms.

“It gets worse,” the screen cut to a bed room corner showcasing the whole master bed room.

A blond millennial woman in a pink shirt and grey sweatpants, walked from what was assumed the bathroom towards the bed. Seconds later a man in a mask pushed her onto the bed. There was obvious signs of struggling from the girl. You turned away as the man ripped open her sweatpants and began thrusting into the woman.

“He’s not a peeping Tom, he’s a serial rapist.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You sat in Maggie’s passenger seat blankly staring at the the dashboard.

“Feet off the dash!” Maggie was as equally as pissed as your were.

“He clearly is the one in the video! Why can’t we use that?”

“We know it’s him, but for all we know it could be a man in a mask.”

“Ugh!!!!” You kicked at dash board. “You know what makes this more frustrating!”

“You kicking my car?”

“No, it’s that parents are more afraid of their kids being gay than they are of their kids being rapist or sex offenders.”

“At least your parents didn’t kick you out of the house.”

“You’ve got a point.”

~~~~~~~~~~

It has been a few days since you and Maggie saw those tapes. You were currently twirling your pen going over notes Maggie took home. You had refused to play any games, even when the rest of Superfriends told you it would be a good way to destress.

“Everything is a dead end right now.” Maggie sighed, explaing to Superfriends about the case.

“Did you guys talk to any of the victims?”

“Yeah we did, one of the ladies said he took her necklace.”

“Did he take anything else from them. You know beside this whole thing?”

“We’re looking through it now. We did find that he went to this coffee shop frequently.” Maggie responded.

“Any of the victims connect there?”

“No nothing. I’m gonna check it out tomorrow see if any of the employees notice him or look through cameras if they have any.”

“Bring me along?”

“Wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“I know this case is important but can we get on with the game?” Alex frowned.

You opened your mouth to say something but Alex stopped you before you could.

“I’m not being insensitive (n/n). I’m very annoyed and as pissed as you are. But the point of tonight was to get your mind off this and have a mental break.” She picked up the dice.

“Lena’s on her IPad going through projects, and Kara is writing an article.” You pointed your thumbs to the side.

Nia peeked over Kara’s shoulder. “Actually they’re sexting each other.” She sipped her wine.

“What now?” You peeked at Lena’s IPad.

“Little Danvers,” Maggie smirked.

“What! Let me have a moment with my girlfriend.”

“That moment better be CONSENSUAL!” You threw popcorn at Kara.

“Why are you only throwing popcorn at me! Not that I mind.” Kara popped a few piece into her mouth.

“Cause I expected it from Lena and not you.”

~~~~~~~~~~

“The workers say he comes often but doesn’t usually stay.” Maggie sighed.

“The other regulars say he just gets coffee and leaves.” You rested your chin on one hand.

“It’s not a dead end yet we can still check the cameras.”

The black and white video showed the suspect parking his car, walking into the coffee shop and leaving in the opposite direction. After several videos of the same action you and Maggie got up from your seats.

“Where ever he goes it must be in walking distance if he doesn’t take his car.”

“Mags... you know how in shows people rent out a storage unit to hide evidence or dead bodies.”

“Yeah what about it?”

“There’s one across the street.”

“Get ready with your shields.” Maggie pulled out her gun from her holster.

“We’re not calling for backup?”

“By the time backup gets here he could be gone.”

You followed after Maggie. Your heart beated against your chest. Clear honeycomb like patterns surrounded your two hands.

Besides a couple of people and a few boxes the units were sickenly quiet. The two of you reached a corridor with flickering lights. The circuit was either cut or it was done on purpose.

Your hands were shaking at the thought. Fear flashed across your face and the shields began to glitch. Maggie on the other hand pulled out a flashlight and sneaked with it over her gun.

Maggie slowed her steps as one of the units were opened. It was deserted yet filled with a twin bed, a few boxes, a blue bike, what seems to be a beaten teddy bear, water bottles, paper towels all lightened by a desk lamp.

“Dispatch this is 129F40, I’m gonna need back up at Studio Self Storage on Conova and Mar-”

A loud yell and a slam against metal met the officer and dispatchers.

“(Y/n!)”

Maggie joined kicking the man away after he threw a punch at your face. He was not giving you any time to recover and use your shields.

He moved his attention onto Maggie after you struggled to stand from the two head traumas you recieved. Maggie was good but he wrestled the gun out of her hands. He overpowered her and slammed her against another metal door.

Maggie pushed maneuvered her legs up against the wall and pushed him back against the other side. She threw punches.

You got up, crossed your arm on your shoulders and pushed forth a shield to move the man away from Maggie.

~~~~~~~~~~

“All officers and firefighters calling all back up, officer is in distress. Officer 129F40 is in distress.”

Dispatcher said over the radio. Alex immediately looked over at J’onn. “That’s Maggie’s number!”

They heard several grunts, as they immediately recognized Maggie and your voices. They also heard a whooshing sounds knowing that that was you and your shields.

Alex reaches towards her ear to activate the com.

“Kar-“

A gunshot echoed around the room before it went silent.

Kara rushed towards you and Maggie as she reached the self storage. She led the police and found Maggie sitting next to you. Kara rushed over scanning your body for the gunshot wound.

“She’s fine. She has a concussion and a few bad scratches.” Maggie said.

“A few? Her eye is swollen shut and her shoulder is dislocated, don’t forget to mention the other cuts on her face.”

You grinned at Kara. “We got him.”

Kara took a look further down the corridor and found a glaring bloody man with his hands cuffed through the bed frame.

~~~~~~~~~~

You sat on the bed at Luthor Family Children’s Hospital. You got most of the injuries from the first surprise attack. Your arm was in a sling and several bandages on your face. Maggie only had a busted lip.

“I can’t believe you two went in with no back up.” Alex scolded.

“To be fair, they did catch the rapist.” Lena said from one of the chairs. “And without the help of Supergirl.”

“What took you so long anyways Kara?” Alex looked over at her sister.

Kara turned red.

“You weren’t!” You looked between Kara and Lena.

“Well we still proved that National City does need police officers and detectives after all.”

“No we proved that Superfriends is a good team. Half of this duo doesn’t even get paid.” You were still upset. “But Kara could take a page from Maggie’s book, instead of ogling at Lena.”

“Hey!”

[wrestlingisfake]

Resurgence preview

It's been a year now since New Japan launched their US-based show, NJPW Strong. I'm sure the original plans involved running US tours with a mix of American regulars and visiting stars from the main Japanese roster. The pandemic, however, limited the scope of Strong, mainly featuring minor leagues on a closed set. It almost felt like a parallel universe with little relationship to the "real" NJPW. Now, finally, the brand gets to do a show in front of an actual crowd, and we get to see this concept the way it was meant to be seen.

The show airs live on NJPWworld (999 yen for one month--about $9.12 US) at 11pm EDT. Or, if you just cannot handle setting up your payment on a Japanese website, you can get the show on FITE.tv for $19.99 US. Both services should make the show available on-demand later, in case you want to wait until you're done watching Triplemania.

Lance Archer vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi - Archer is defending the IWGP United States champioship. The title was in limbo through most of 2020, as Jon Moxley was unable to schedule a defense in either New Japan or AEW. That changed in 2021, as thawing relations between the two promotions led to more Moxley title matches, until he lost the belt to Archer on July 21. Shortly before Archer's first defense on July 28, AEW aired a video of Tanahashi challenging the winner of that match.

This is Tana's first show outside of Japan since the pandemic began, and his first match in California in nearly three years. I'm not sure anyone expected him to be here, given that the New Japan of America operation has focused on building up North American talent rather than bringing in big stars from the home promotion. So this is a special treat for the live audience, above and beyond Archer coming in from AEW.

I expect a pretty straightforward match with Archer killing Tana with big power moves and Tana rallying for a big babyface comeback. In a vacuum I would think either man could end up with the belt. However, the real story to this match is that Tanahashi went out of his way to make a challenge for the US title, but not until after Jon Moxley lost it. So Moxley has accused Tana of ducking him, and it stands to reason that he'll confront the winner of this match to close the show. That feels like a formula for Tana vs. Mox for the title, maaaybe at the AEW pay-per-view on September 5. Everyone sure seems to hope that's where we're headed, so I don't think a lot of people will be pulling for Archer tonight.

Jay White vs. David Finlay - This is White's first defense of the NEVER openweight championship. It's also his first New Japan match since May, as the quarantine procedures for entering Japan have made travel pretty rough for the non-Japanese talent. As I recall, Finlay received this title shot because he pinned White back in March. Finlay hasn't been back in Japan since that tour. Both of these guys have been in Impact Wrestling as of late.

Originally, the idea behind White winning the NEVER title was to set up a match with Hiroshi Tanahashi at one of the Wrestle Grand Slam stadium shows that New Japan scheduled this summer. The aforementioned travel problems seem to have scuttled that, so now White is facing The Other Guy From FinJuice.

The biggest buzz I've heard surrounding this match is that Finlay appeared on Wrestling Observer Live to promote the show and ended up giving fans the impression that he wanted to go to NXT. I mean, Finlay could be fucking with us on that. But it's not a good sign when people are mainly interested in a match because they're looking for signs that one of the participants is fixing to leave the promotion. Not that it affects the finish, of course--Finlay could sign with NJPW for a million years, and he still wouldn't be booked to beat White for a title in 2021.

Tomohiro Ishii vs. Moose - This match kind of came out of nowhere. Ishii isn't exactly a top guy in New Japan but he's always right below that level, clobbering most of the roster and getting clobbered to set up new contenders. Most of the NJPW Strong roster would be underdogs against him. But then, Moose isn't on the Strong roster--he's coming over from Impact, where he's been pushed as a top heel for months. Moose is a 6-foot-5 big mean guy and Ishii is a 5-foot-7 big mean guy, so this should be an interesting contrast. It's easily the most interesting match on the show.

I'd like to see Moose win, since it'd be a slight upset and he could use the momentum for whatever he's doing next. But if he is gonna win, Ishii is going to convince you that he had to work his ass off to earn it. I'm looking forward to this.

Tom Lawlor & JR Kratos & Danny Limelight & Jorel Nelson & Royce Isaacs vs. Lio Rush & Chris Dickinson & Adrian Quest & Fred Yehi & Yuya Uemura - Lawlor is the NJPW Strong champion and his team is the New Japan version of "Team Filthy." The babyface team originally featured Brody King, but he was pulled from the card at the last minute due to "unforeseen circumstances", so Adrian Quest is substituting for him. That's a real tough break for the good guys.

There are several storylines at play here. Lio Rush stepped up as the next challenger for Lawlor's title, and they'll have that match at the August 16 tapings. Dickinson was kicked out of Team Filthy, and is currently aligned with Brody King's Violence Unlimited stable. Uemura had been working on the Japan roster as a Young Lion, but he's just begun his excursion so he has a chance to really express himself as a performer.

If Rush wasn't already positioned as Lawlor's next challenger, I might think this match could end with someone pinning Lawlor. As it is, though, it probably makes more sense for Team Filthy to win in a dominant fashion. Yehi and Quest are basically undercard scrubs, and Uemura just now graduated to that position. Rush and Dickinson aren't going to be able to carry so many weak links.

Juice Robinson vs. Hikuleo - Juice has spent most of 2021 teaming with David Finlay over on Impact, whereas Hikuleo has been wrestling on Strong and more recently on a few AEW shows. Given that Hikuleo is 6-foot-8 you'd expect him to squash everything in his path, but New Japan isn't afraid to have more established stars get the better of him. Whether Juice is one of those more established stars remains to be seen.

Juice biggest career highlight was winning the IWGP US title, and Hikuleo's was challenging for that title a few weeks ago. If one of them is going to be in the hunt for that belt, then winning this match should be step one. As much as I'd like to see Juice back in the chase, I get the feeling it'll be Hikuleo taking that role.

Karl Anderson & Doc Gallows vs. Jon Moxley & X - The Good Brothers (Gallows and Anderson) are the Impact Wrestling men's tag team champions, but their title is not at stake here. I think Moxley was originally booked to team with Syota Umino on this show, but travel restrictions prevented Umino from coming into LA. One way or another, Moxley will have a mystery partner that won't be revealed until the match begins.

The backstory is that Gallows and Anderson have been a thorn in Moxley's side every time he's tried to fight Kenny Omega, or really anybody in Omega's stable. With that in mind, the most logical partner would be Sami Callihan, who has a history with Moxley and unfinished business with Omega's group. People have been asking for a Moxley-Callihan reunion from the minute AEW and Impact started collaborating, and there's no reason it can't happen here. On the other hand, I wonder if that's something New Japan would do as a surprise, as opposed to advertising it ahead of time.

If Moxley's partner isn't Callihan, there's a serious risk that the live crowd will start chanting for Callihan and disrupt the match. So if they're going with someone else, it'd better be good. I suppose Eddie Kingston would be accepted, although again, why would that be something you do as a surprise? Personally, I'm all about Moxley and the cold, deadly eyes of Shooter Umino, so I know I'll be disappointed no matter what. :(

Anyway, it'd be stupid for Moxley's team to lose this match.

Rocky Romero & Fred Rosser & Wheeler Yuta vs. TJP & Clark Connors & Ren Narita - This is a pretty good sampling of the NJPW Strong midcard. Of this group, Romero has the most clout with the main New Japan roster. Rosser is still best known as WWE's Darren Young, the guy from the Nexus who looks exactly like John Cena. Yuta has been making waves on AEW, filling in for Trent Beretta with Orange Cassidy's group, so I guess he and Rocky are both Best Friends Twice Removed or something. TJP is a former WWE cruiserweight champion and Impact X division champion. Connors is one of the guys from the Gekiochi-kun ads--I think he's the one who snaps his fingers to teleport everybody. Ren Narita is the guy who used to wrestle Syota Umino all the time, but Syota is not on this show. :(

Alex Coughlin vs. Karl Fredericks - When Strong started, Coughlin, Fredericks, and Clark Connors were the three Young Lions from the LA Dojo who worked as prelim guys. Since then I believe Connors and Fredericks have "graduated," and Coughlin is still working on it. I'm pretty sure Fredericks is the one in the Gekiochi-kun ads that says "that's pretty cool." I don't remember what Coughlin does in those ads, so clearly he needs to get his ass in gear. Anyway, I guess Fredericks wins.

Bateman & Mysterioso & Barrett Brown vs. The DKC & Kevin Knight & Jordan Clearwater - This is scheduled as a dark match 30 minutes before the live stream begins. I've heard most of these names, but the only one I kinda know is Bateman from whatever goofy stable he's in at Ring of Honor. I dunno, I guess his side wins.