#I couldn't not add that last one apparently it's my brand

[thresholdbb]

Top 5 pictures of Janeway? this is not me trying to pass the work of collecting references for drawing onto someone else. no, it is a gift to have an excuse to present your top 5 pictures of Janeway (or Kate Mulgrew)

What an astonishingly difficult question to answer. I decided to limit myself to only the pics saved on my phone because otherwise I'd be here all night

Bonus pic (because of course):

[melanieph321]

Ruben Dias x Reader - Summary Fling Part 4/10

Part 5 and Part 6 are out on my Patreon for free!

Summary - Reader has landed a research job at a marine biology lab in Portugal. She is, therefore, staying with her sister and her sister's Portuguese boyfriend for the summer holidays. There she meets Ruben Dias who is on vacation with his friends after the 2024 Euros. However, the two meet under the circumstances in which Ruben believes that Reader is a prostitute.

Enjoy ☀️

The University of Algarve housed arguably the best marine biology lab in the country. Although this is where you'd be doing most of your research, it was the marine station, located closer to where land meets sea, that excited you on your first day at work.

"Y/N, you made it!"

You were welcomed to the station by a familiar face, Gavin Phillips, who you met earlier at the Zoomarine. He was the first one to welcome you at the door and made sure to give you a thorough tour of the facility.

"This is where we bring in our samples from the sea. We usually gather the data here before documenting our progress back at campus. And as for you, who's doing your research in marine ecology, I'll gladly let you know that this is where you'll spend most of your time."

It smelled like fish, the whole room did. It wasn't a welcoming smell, however, a smell that you'd have to get used to. The lab was impressive though. You watched how the students, dressed in white coats and sterile gloves, were tuned in as they worked at their assigned stations. They looked busy, but with a loud whistle, Gavin had them all drop whatever they were doing, shifting their attention your way.

"Attention everyone! I'd like to introduce our newest addition to this lab. This is Y/N, fresh off the plane from Sydney, Australia." Collective oh's and ah's spread amongst the students, who regarded you curiously. "Y/N is here to add knowledge to our marine ecology squad, so please, anything she needs, I expect you to assist her with that."

"Thank you Gavin." You said, immense heat patting your cheeks. The students all took their time to greet you one by one. One student was even chivalrous enough to let you use his equipment since yours hadn't arrived yet. It was a great first day, one that got you really excited for the future.

"Ugh. What is that smell?"

You returned home quite early that afternoon. You were excited to show your sister the white lab coat you had been given. However, she couldn't bring herself to be in the same room as you until you faithfully rinsed yourself off in the shower.

"And don't forget to shave your legs!" She shouted. "I'm taking you dress shopping."

It was a nice way to spend some quality time with your sister. The last time you were living together the two of you were teenagers, with zero assumptions and worries in life. Although your sister hadn't changed much since then, her financial status definitely had.

"Here, try this on," She said, passing you another outfit through the dressing room curtains. It was Versace and Michael Kors, all brand names that she was urging you to try on.

"Does it fit?" 

"It's too tight." You complained.

"Y/N, it's supposed to be tight. Tight is good."

"No." You pulled open the curtains, showing off your ensemble of stylish clothes. "Tight is painful."

"God, you're gorgeous. You have to wear that out of the store."

"What, no. Maki." It was too late. Your sister was quick to rush over to the counter and pay for your items. You wore it out of the store and shamefully made your way down the street.

"Stop it Y/N, you look stunning. Just look at all the men checking you out."

"I don't want to be checked out."

"No, not even by Ruben Dias?"

She got you there. "Ruben? What about him?"

"Well, apparently he hasn't stopped asking about you since the night you gave him the time of his life."

How could you forget? It was the time of your life too.

"How do you know that?" You asked.

"I dunno, Diogo has been hanging around that Beach Club a lot. It's where famous people like Ruben like to hang out."

"Ruben is famous?"

"Yeah, he's super famous and not just here in Portugal but all over the world.

"Well, what is he famous for?"

"For playing football of course."

"You mean soccer?"

It's not like you didn't know what it was. It just wasn't the most watched sport in Australia, that's all. You had no idea that Ruben was actually a professional soccer player. How impressive.

"He actually just finished playing a major tournament with his country. They got knocked out though."

"Out of the tournament?"

"Yeah, I bet he's totally bummed about it too. You should totally try and cheer him up by sliding in his DM's."

"You think so?" You did have a great time with Ruben, he seemed like such a cool guy. Perhaps it was worth it to shoot your shot?

"Here, let's send a photo of you and have him rate your new outfit."

"What, no Maki."

It was too late. Your sister had already brought out her phone and stepped back to take your picture. You had stopped in the middle of the street, posing against a peach colored wall.

"Yeah, he'll love this." Maki said, inspecting the photo before sending it to Ruben via instagram.

"He's gonna think we're stalking him." You said, resuming your walking. "Not at all. He likes you, I promise."

"How do you even—"

"He replied!" 

You rushed to your sister's side, checking her phone.

"So sweet. Ruben rates your outfit as ten out of ten."

"Really?"

"I told you he was into you and look—" Your attention was drawn back to the screen where three dots had appeared in the corner. "He's typing!" Your sister gasped. 

The dots were soon replaced by a message from Ruben, asking if the two of you were close to a place called Quarteira. Apparently Ruben was there visiting a friend.

"We have to go. It's only a twenty minute drive from here."

"But, Maki. I have work tomorrow." Although Ruben's offer was tempting, you shouldn't get distracted from what you really came to Portugal to do.

"Come on Y/N, I swear we won't stay long."

"Promise?"

"Through thick and thin." She said, once again urging you to seal the deal with a pinky swear. Once you did, the two of you hit the road, off to meet Ruben and his friends again.

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

Your heart raced as you walked through the streets of Quarteira, a beautiful city near the beach. It seemed like a nice place for a family vacation as plenty of children were seen roaming the streets eyeing the gift shops along the road. 

You were so nervous, but excited to see Ruben again. As you and your sister looked up the address that he had texted you, you were surprised to stumble upon a small villa. Not too extravagant, but actually quite homely looking. You could feel your nerves getting the better of you as your sister rang the doorbell. The door soon opened with Ruben appearing in the frame.

"You guys made it!" He smiled and was even more handsome and charming looking since the last time you saw him. "Please, feel free to grab anything from the cooler. We were just getting started on the grill. I hope you're hungry.

"Yes, starving." Your sister moaned, teasing you as Ruben led the way through the lovely house, overlooking the beach.

"You better not fumble this, Y/N. He is so hot."

"Please, Maki, don't be so vulgar." You said, although you were also thinking it. Don't fumble this. Fortunately the meet up with Ruben and his friends turned out to be a really lovely night. It gave you a chance to get to know him and him you. Ruben was kind and attentive, asking you questions about your stay in Portugal as well as your life back home. He told you about his own life, and his passion for football. And how sad he was about Portugal being knocked out of the European tournament that was still ongoing as you spoke. Nevertheless, you found yourself laughing and smiling throughout the whole night.

As the evening wore on, Ruben even asked if you wanted to stay the night at his place, or in this case, his friend's place. You hesitated, feeling a pang of guilt. You had to work the next day, and you didn't want to be late during your first week.

"I would love to Ruben, but I have to be back early tomorrow," you said, trying to sound casual.

Ruben nodded, understandingly and was actually quite impressed that you were studying marine biology here in Portugal. "No problem, I completely understand. Maybe we can plan another night together soon?"

"I'd love to."

Maybe this was the start of something special. You thanked Ruben for a lovely evening, the two of you saying goodbye with a swift kiss on the lips.

Driving back to Faro with Maki, you just couldn't help but feel a sense of excitement since finding a summer fling had definitely not been on your Portugal bingo card.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

*Part 5 and Part 6 are out on my Patreon for free!

[augment-techs]

Moving my ask. I think it was 26 or 15 and Lord Drakkon/Coinless Jason. It had to do with erotic branding or marking/claiming ownership. Just putting thus in the correct spot lol

There was a gallon sized pickle jar, in the fridge in Drakkon's old bedroom in the palace, full of blood kept fresh and clean to add to his food, a condiment for eggs and meats instead of barbecue or Tabasco.

There were flash-frozen packets in the freezer marked with words like 'liver' and 'thigh meat' and 'rump'--that last one having a disgustingly innocent little heart tacked on in the corner--without a trace of freezer burn, and another packet that looked like the liver that was half-eaten; a little note taped to the side that read 'use with dirty rice instead of chopped cauliflower; very rare'.

When Kimberly closed the door to the fridge, she really took the moment to read the little recipes posted on a notepad that was taped to the top of the fridge that only came up to her chest, wondering about the measurements, but also about the timetables attached that didn't seem to make a lot of sense...

She considered the words with the same levels of trepidation that she did with everything involving the fucker, who now sat in a room not terribly unlike the one he'd stored Jason in for years on end, (except his had one glass window and was all white; the very best kind of fuck you that had been inadvertent, but savored by literally everyone else). The feeling of something creeping up on her, like a little girl in a dark forest, a hard thing to shake off.

'Can't take too much blood; have to wait another week. Anemia causes loss of potency,' and, 'Maybe give J. some of the skin from the thighs at our next dinner,' and 'Infection. Need to wait until the whole course for treatment plays out. Might try another option, even if none of them taste right.'

And so the terrible handwriting continued on, not a lot of it making sense to Kimberly as she thumbed through; tips of her fingers feeling the indentations where Drakkon had pressed down too hard in something like anger and the pen spurted and blotched the ink.

Until she pulled all the paper up and found a collective of pictures there, in almost stylized black and white with a little pinch of other colors edited in, sort of like models used for headshots she remembered from when she was maybe ten and her mother thought she would do just as well in the pageant circuit as in gymnastics (before her parents realized that it would make their squabbling and inability to be in the same room as each other for a prolonged period of time especially apparent; gossip being poison for them before they moved to Angel Grove and made it a hobby).

The first one was Jason, haggard and maybe in his early twenties in the clothes he'd been placed in while in solitary confinement in the bowels of the castle prison where the softest thing he could touch was stone and his iron shackles, seated on the bed he'd been given, now in the highest room in the tower Drakkon built especially and just for him. He was so thin, his five o'clock shadow a mess, his hair greasy and washed out, and he looked downright pissed to be made to sit like a pet, but also like something was keeping him back from attacking the bastard. His eyes were fixed behind Drakkon with the camera, but Kim couldn't tell anything beyond that. There were no reflective surfaces in that cloistered set of rooms; Jason largely having to rely on Drakkon or what could have been called friends (something Kim still wasn't sure about; Jason had asked for them often enough when he'd been let out, but had also been cautious around them and..sort of sad) in Skull and Adam when it came to his appearance.

The second picture was dated a year later on the front in overly curled scrawl with a sloppy pen; Jason in the exact same spot, but with the light coming in from the window without bars, without glass, with only one way out. He looked almost like his old self, much stronger and clean and practically perfect but for the fake smile he was aiming at the camera in an attempt to play seductive and submissive; and of course Drakkon had made sure to take away all of his clothes for this shot, really get a look at the defined and healthy skin and muscle that he, doubtless, jacked off to more often than not.

The pictures after that was more posed, still on the bed and Jason still not wanting to do this in the eyes of anyone with a basic sense of decency, but Kimberly was brought to think very much of old ads made for Marilyn Monroe for movies where she was still dressed, but was little more than an empty headed bimbo that the executives of Hollywood loved thinking of her as. Though with Jason, Drakkon made sure that there was no clothing and he was displayed in every lewd way the tyrant could think of: propped up on his knees with his hands wrapped in striking red ribbons behind his back; curled around an oversized rabbit plushy as if half asleep and very sweaty from what the camera light gleaned off of him; standing with his arms holding onto a sheet hanging from the ceiling, his right hip on full display to show an ever present bite mark from Drakkon's own mouth that was constantly being reopened.

The last pictures at the bottom gave her pause, courage suddenly hesitant, and sent something curdled and heavy into the pit of her stomach.

More set up, more in order, less wild than Jason in his first picture, was Skull in his Red Sentry Captain's uniform, sans the helmet, standing straight and tall in what looked like a bathroom brought about in the palace; one of Drakkon's luxury suites for visiting warlords and despots and demons; one hand on his lance, and one perched on the shoulder of Adam Park. Adam seated on the rim of the expensive looking tub, in Black Sentry uniform, also sans helmet; legs crossed in an attempt to look proper, with his hands together in his lap. Both looking…resigned. Straight ahead like they were ordered to, and tired.

Bulk had shown Kim old history books with pictures as such; Russian Czars and empresses, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, those little princes locked in the Tower of London before vanishing in the night.

She couldn't stop her hands from shaking as she finally lifted them up to see the final photo, slightly bigger than the others, and more wrinkled and worn at the edges from continued adjustments.

...After Kim muscled her way into not vomiting down between her feet and onto the cold floor, she was left with a sort of memory of when her parents took her to a museum for a little bit of culture and could not help but draw comparisons between two works of art and the plight of the two who were, apparently, just as much captives of Drakkon as Jason ever was. Kim was left struck, insanely, by how much Eugene looked rather like John Sargent's masterpiece of Madame X; pale figure, smooth continence, extremely dark hair and altogether gorgeous under the sight of the artist themself. Except that woman in the portrait could not be further from undergoing the ministrations placed upon the spy. Drakkon had taken care to highlight and edit in just how RED Eugene's blood was against the marble white of the inside of the tub he'd been placed in, limbs limp and unmoving, and eyes glassy with what had to have been unending agony without the reprieve of medication or even basic drugs to numb him to the cutting. As for Adam (oh, and now she could understand why he seemed to stay so close to him even now, both sheepdogs with a bit of wolf blood or witch hares out in the open and watching out for weak sheep and rabbits against the snapping teeth of a dragon), Kim was still reminded of grand art in gilded frames. Something of a Titian portrait sprung to mind, a showcase of a Greek myth in which a very pompous satyr challenged the god Apollo to a music contest and lost, thereby losing his life by being flayed alive by the god and other satyrs as some mortal king looked on with interest.

Except there was no joy in what Adam was being made to do, hand much steadier than Kim's would have been as he stood on his knees over the tub, a pale imitation of the Dragon Dagger in hand as he sliced a mortician's incision in Eugene's skin, pulling back the edges like a pale wrap to see the pulsing insides.

There was a metal tray off to the side of the tub, stainless steel and with a China plate with stenciled golden flowers on it, holding pieces of extremely dark meat at the center, also edited to show the almost purple hue trailing blood drops that had landed on Eugene's cheek.

And apart from all of these grotesques, Kim's brown eyes had grown almost black with a little ring of dark Pink each as she zeroed in on the finger mark bruises ringed around both men's necks, a ring around Adam's that looked like black paint as his spare hand carefully pressed down just above Eugene's beating heart; and what looked to be dozens of bite marks all along Eugene that hadn't just settled against the skin like they had with Jason. Drakkon had bitten into Eugene and yanked. Her mind did her no favors, reminding her of the sound Drakkon sometimes made when he took a mouthful of rich meat and swallowed.

Putting the pictures back down with every part of her wanting to run away from the room as fast as she could, Kimberly could also not help but stand rooted to the spot, blankly staring at the fridge that had just moments earlier seemed to be entirely harmless, but as she took in frightened little rabbit breaths, seemed more like a collection of all the world's poison and disasters.

And then there was a memory…

[suspicious-whumping-egg]

A lot of those (control/manipulation starters) would be PERFECT coming from Raina's lips. Can I request more than one? "I'll talk slowly so you can understand. Do you need me to use smaller words, too?" and "Do you think anyone else would treat you as good as I do?" would go soooo nicely together with her. Also, please add me to the tag list if I haven't asked already? I love them 😅

I added you to the taglist as soon as I got the ask!!! Here’s part five of Alec and Raina!! Tws for intimate/possessive/controlling whumper, humiliation, dehumanization, past torture, past hand whump, and broken bones.

Masterlist here.

“Do you think anyone else would treat you as good as I do?” Raina cooed as she combed her fingers through Alec’s long hair and separated it into neat sections.

Alec narrowed his eyes. Raina sat behind him in a plushy armchair while he sat on the floor, and couldn’t see his expressions.

After stabbing a nail through my hand and whipping my feet til I can’t walk? Anyone could fucking do better, the bar is halfway through hell. But he simply shook his head politely. He couldn't risk the pain that would come with speaking his mind.

But apparently he was a bad liar, because Raina let out a disapproving tsk and pulled his hair ever so slightly. “Love, if I sent you to one of my friends for a week, you’d learn how kind I’m being,” she said coolly. “Most of them would break your legs after an escape attempt, or maybe cut your tendons. I gave you wounds that will last for a few weeks at most. How does that make you feel?”

Alec flinched just at the thought of his tendons being severed, the movement causing a sharp tug to his hair as he shuddered away from his captor. Raina wrapped a hand around his neck, pulling him backwards like he was a dog on a leash, so he sat against her legs once more. He wasn’t getting away that easily.

“I… uh…” Alec sighed, squirming ever so slightly at the touch without truly struggling. Although he was relieved he hadn’t yet been seriously injured, he owed her no gratitude—she’d been the one to kidnap him in the first place! But he knew what Raina wanted to hear, and that she’d hurt him if he didn’t say what she wished. “Thank you,” he inevitably muttered, his face flushing red.

Raina leaned down and pressed a kiss to his head, beginning to braid his hair back tight. “You’re welcome, love,” she said with a pleased grin. Molding him would be easier than she’d expected. He was already bending to her demands, telling her what she wanted him to say. All too soon, he’d be saying those things because he truly believed them.

Alec closed his eyes and enjoyed the feeling of fingers in his hair, pulling and twisting in a rhythmic pattern. For just a minute, he could almost forget that it was a captor doing his hair, rather than a lover. That is, until Raina tied the french braid off with a tiny elastic and reached down to take his wounded hand in hers, turning it so the brand was visible.

“It seems that it’ll heal nicely,” she mused, tracing a finger over the thin letters. “That’s good for you… If it was fucked up, I’d be trying again on your other hand.”

Alec resisted the urge to jerk his hand away, forcing himself still as Raina touched the fresh, throbbing burns. Agony shot up his hand and he let out a sharp hiss; his fingers closed around her other palm to prevent himself from snatching his hand back and cradling it against his chest.

Raina gave her captive a sweet, pleased smile. If his reaction was to hold onto her instead of pulling away, she was doing something right.

“Stay right here, now,” she said, bringing his hand to her lips and kissing the brand. “I’ll be back in a few.”

Alec resisted the urge to roll his eyes. He obviously wasn’t going anywhere, Raina had seen how he’d collapsed just from standing earlier. Or maybe she was just taunting him. He let out an annoyed hush when his captor was out of earshot and shifted to sit more comfortably on the hard floor.

But unfortunately, he didn’t have much time to relax before Raina was back with a pile of clothes in her arms.

“I’ve decided to do a little photoshoot,” she declared as she set the pile on top of the armchair. She plucked an outfit out of it— a pair of red leather pants and a cropped, powder blue turtleneck— and shoved it into Alec’s arms. “Get changed while I set up the camera,” she ordered him as she strode off to the basement.

Getting dressed was a terribly slow process when he was unable to stand up. The pants were wickedly tight, which didn’t help the process, and it took him what felt like forever just to get them pulled over his hips. The turtleneck went on next, a tiny piece of fabric that barely even covered his chest. Alec could see the glint of a mirror hanging from a wall around twenty feet away, but he didn’t want to see his reflection— and it wasn’t worth the effort anyway. He instead crawled over to the basement’s entrance before Raina could witness his struggle and dangled his feet over the top of the staircase. Just when he was beginning to suspect he was supposed to slide down the concrete steps, Raina reappeared, her smile eerily large.

“Aww, you look lovely,” she cooed. His face was flaming, which she’d been hoping for— the embarrassment looked great on him. It added just the right touch of helplessness to her already helpless captive. “Do you need some help with the stairs?” she asked, just the tiniest bit mocking.

Alec glanced away, his face flaming. He wouldn’t be comfortable wearing anything this revealing in public, let alone in front of a kidnapper. He’d rather melt into the floor and disappear for good. The humiliation was only made worse by the fact that he couldn’t even walk down some stairs by himself; but he nodded defeatedly. He’d caught on that she was taunting him, but he was too tired to care. There was no use causing himself extra pain.

Raina scooped her captive into her arms with a smug grin. “Good boy,” she praised teasingly. She felt Alec tense in her grip but he didn’t struggle or object, his clenched jaw and shaking hands made it evident that he was too terrified to do so.

When she carried him into a studio-like room, full of bright lights and with sets of chains dangling along the ceiling, wall, and floors; Alec let out a gasp and squirmed against her vice grip, desperate to get free even though he couldn’t run.

And rather than bothering to keep hold of him while he struggled, Raina was content to drop him on the concrete.

Alec fell with a harsh thunk, letting out a weak cry as blunt pain shot up his body. Thankfully, he’d tucked his chin on instinct and his head remained unharmed. But the rest of him wasn’t as lucky.

“Little shit,” Raina hissed contentedly as she pulled a strip of red leather out of her pocket. Alec noticed it matched the pants— a bracelet? But as she approached him, a cold shudder ran down his spine as he realized it was a collar.

“Don’t you fucking dare!” he snapped, scrambling backwards from her before logic kicked in. “Don’t you fucking put that thing on me!”

To Alec’s surprise, Raina lowered her hand and stepped away. “Alec, hon, I don’t think you understand the gravity of this situation.” She turned to the wall, one that was lined with weapons just like any of the other cells, and pulled a thick crowbar from its rack. Her captive was enough of a handful without the ability to walk, she didn’t need him regaining that in just a few days. "I'll talk slowly so you can understand. Do you need me to use smaller words, too?”

Alec shook his head, his eyes widening. “I- no- uh-” he stammered, making a useless effort to get his feet under him and stand. Pain flashed through the cuts at the weak attempt, stabbing up his legs. His feet continued to throb even after he’d collapsed.

Raina tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and waited patiently for him to fall silent, twirling the crowbar like it weighed as little as a baton. “Here’s the deal, love,” she said sweetly. “You’re mine. You don’t tell me what to do to my own property, alright? And every time you try to tell me otherwise, the reminders are going to get a little… more intense. To make sure you get the message.”

She stepped closer once again and crouched down, taking hold of Alec’s left leg and stretching it out so it was flat against the floor. “I was planning on just doing a nice little photoshoot today in all the clothes I got you,” she sighed. “But you force me to be so hard on you… why? Do you like seeing me suffer? Are you such a sick little masochist that you want to be punished more than you can bear? Alec, I know your limits. No one enjoys a broken bone.”

She raised the crowbar high, and Alec strained against the grip she had tight on his shoulder. “Please, please no- I’ll- I’ll be good-” he stammered weakly, squirming and struggling against her hold. But days of starvation had left him weak, and he couldn’t do anything but let out a pathetic whimper before the heavy metal cracked down on his leg.

Excruciating, white hot pain flashed through his vision, more than he could comprehend, as the bone snapped. A scream tore through his lips before he even knew it was his own, and the shriek tapered into hysterical sobbing. Raina said something, but he couldn’t understand, not through the agony pulsing through his leg and the nausea roiling in his stomach.

“Alec!” Raina snapped, and this time the word cut through his haze of torment. But his vision was already tunneling to black, and unconsciousness took him before he could respond.

Tagging: @painsandconfusion @hopepetal (if you wanna be tagged lemme know!)

[batarangsoundsdumb]

guess fucking what? my inbox is so fucking full right now i'm unloading all of this shit in one post.

For the 11th gotham memes: gothamites react to bruce being jacked in a tiktok he made with kids, like super yoked, ripped as hell

fucking hilarious thanks. i think i did it in one meme post, but i genuinely don't remember which one

i dunno which of the batfam would do this but one time i was sleeping over at a friends house and ended up on the floor bc the bed was so very small and i just stayed there because the rug was soft

that's a drunk jason move i don't know what to tell you

tim and jason are "i listen to pop punk" solidarity. whenever jason highjacks the batmobile theyll go on long ass car rides blaring mcr and paramore and then never talk about it again

as they should!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! tim: no jason it's my turn using the aux cord i gotta put on my jams jason: don't you dare put on weird shit tim: don't worry, you're gonna love this *plays fearless (taylor's version)

hear me out hear me out, red hood stans 🤝 nightwing stans t h i g h s

holy shit yes.

SNL au: Bruce breaks character when pretending to superman and says something like "I'm not superman! You've seen his gps!! It's from 2001!!!" @sabeanybabe

superman flies past the snl building the next day just to say 'actually it's from 2005, i'm not a heathen'

does your back hurt from carrying the batfam fandom

it hurts more from the exotic rock collection i keep in my backpack, but thanks for the concern.

I love your posts by why would you always leave the best parts in the tags?

as a treat for the people that check the tags ;) (and also because i'm committed to the short post aesthetic)

somehow your playlist was everything i never knew i needed. i mean it. this is my new favorite playlist.

and don't you dare get a new favourite playlist!

babe ur stoner tim playlist is exactly too perfect, earth is literally blessed by ur existence

babe thanks so much! i love my stoner tim playlist because it's just my usual playlist but people think it's an artistic choice that i put taylor swift and britney spears in there, when it's just what i unironically like listening to

JANDKSKDK BILLY RAY CYRUS ON THE STONER TIM PLAYLIST I LOVE IT IT

again it's not even an ironic choice, i know every single word and i genuinely like the song

The last chapter of Fundamentals of Casework has me crying at work. Thanks I love it @dudelookitsalesbian

oh babe, i'm sorry, but also, not sorry i love chapter 4 so much it's my lovechild with the 'mental illness' tag

soooo....stumbled on your tumblr by some stroke of fate??? read your DC fanfic first. which is PHENOMENAL btw. then found all the batmemes; the funniest thing EVER bc everyone forgets about regular old gothamites. kept scrolling and your blog pops up as recommended. clicked on the ao3 for shits and giggles and waddaya know?!?!? it's YOU!!! you're LEGEND!!!! ever seen that meme? it's a video of a cat that got into a baseball field and the two announcers get really invested in his escape attempt and start giving a play by play of the cat instead of the game. memeable moment: "GREAT stuff from the Cat!!!"

i seriously think about this ask every single day and it's so fucking funny to me that i've never seen the meme you're referencing, but i still find myself going 'GREAT stuff from the Cat!!!' whenever i see something funny. but wow i'm glad you liked this steaming pile of garbage

Fav dc character overall? And fav batfamily character?

don't ask me to pick between the loves of my life, but i can tell you i've cried about every single batfamily member and also wally west (my beloved)

What's your opinion on fans having a problem with batfam being "too big"? And some even claim that batfam is just "Bruce Alfred Dick Damian" and the rest of them are just "friends and allies" (source: reddit) Personally, I like batfam because of this reason but idk

stupid. a family can never be too big. i'm not that big a fan of like huge batfam stuff with everybody from every single universe, because as much as it's funny for bruce to have like 30 kids, it just feels a little too OOC for me.

This is the best tag I've seen involving the batfam, thanks for thinking of it

This is canon now @nctxrejects

lmao yeah i think at that point alfred has had to sit through like at least a dozen coming out talks and just has a pride flag collection in the attic that he pulls out whenever a kid comes out

idk why batfam hits different as compared to any other superhero family

bc it's found family and usually the other superhero families are almost all genetically related in one way or another

I don't know if you watch the umbrella academy but I saw your last post about batcest and saw the similarities. But the thing is (although I think it's weird) in TUA, they addressed it by saying "they were raised as weapons, not siblings" or something along those lines, which is simply not the case with batfam.

yeah i watched tua but i also thought it was ridiculous and they still treated each other as siblings so i didn't like the luthor/allison thing, and am glad they stopped doing that shit bc it fucking sucked.

Hot take: Batcest shippers are the same people who believe adopted siblings are not actual siblings

smoking hot take: batcest shippers are the people who watch 'my sister got stuck in the washing machine' porn

Duke was adopted by Bruce?

not technically no, but do i, tumblr user batarangsoundsdumb, look like i care?

True story but I had to change my freaking name because it used to be "Damien" and most people would go "OH LIKE DAMIAN WAYNE" like please I'm just tryna live

true story, but i don't actually think of damian when i hear the name damian, literally the first thing that pops up is damian darkh like bruh what?

apparently dc comics company supported comic stores by giving out new titles and stuff during the beginning of the pandemic to help them run and I just think that's wholesome

ah yeah that's so fucking cool, still don't like dc, the company, because this world is a capitalist hellhole and we're all owned by warner brothers or disney with no in between.

ayo looking at tumblr head canons and finding out bruce is actually a terrible father is a punch in the gut

lmao yes, in like 50% of comics bruce is a terrible father and it gives me whiplash

oooh I just saw the jason todd vs winter soldier post and the real question is: batman vs iron man

while iron man has like hundreds of cases of armor, batman could throw out an emp and have the guy dropping out of the sky in 2 seconds.

dickfast = fastdick = quickdick = quickie

magnum hot take

hey bata(?) just thought I'd let you know I have copied the obnoxious emoji and Billy Ray post for use on simping men going forth

thank you 😘🌷 (@spacebarsidecar)

why would you do that to your followers???? i get why i did it, but why would you???

what is scarecrow made the nightwing funko pop himself, like those diy-ers that paint over other ones

oh god no, horrible take, horrible take, that's a disgusting thought oh no

I see your HC that Bruce and Oliver fucked and raise you this: Dick and Roy ALSO fucked

yes they did and it was a horrible moment for jason to find out dick has fucked both of his best friends

"at this rate bruce adds like 1 child to his family every decade or so" Duke is introduced in 2013, Damian as Damian, not as an unnamed child, in 2006. And he is already 14 years old, Robins rarely remain Robins after 16 😬 It looks like a new Robin and Batkid will appear in a couple of years

i mean i can't wait? but somebody will probably die first tho, we're due for another major character death. my money's on either cass or duke this time.

BRO you're so right all of your Bruce's ex headcanons are amazing but they aren't ships, that's kinda wild. Like I don't want any peeks into how their relationship was I just want to see everyone make fun of them

lmao YES it's just i love bruce being a slut, like good for him.

I am in love with your posts your honour thank you

omg thanks are we like,, gonna kiss now?

The justice league needs to have a meeting to discuss how many of their members/partners have slept with bruce. Because through a combination of cannon & fannon (if DC wasn’t homophobic) we have AT LEAST: 1) clark 2) lois 3) oliver 4) dinah 5) john

Thats not counting villains or random civilians @dudelookitsalesbian

yes yes yes, they'll have a yearly meeting about how many of their collective exes could be out for revenge and batman's list just keeps getting longer.

tim was like "i'm drake now" and everyone was like ahh so your fursona is a dragon and tim was like pffffft no. ducks.

and what about it?

when steph's fighting livewire and she zaps her with lighting and nothing happens and then they both just. stand there awkwardly for a second and talk. yeah i couldn't stop laughing at that batgirl steph is the BEST

oh yeah that was fucking hilarious and i think it would be so cool and sexy of dc to give steph a little comic series,,, as a treat

Hi I absolutely adore all of yours "Bruce and Oliver very badly pretending they didn't fuck each other" memes

lmao i do too

I need you to know that “Bruce Wayne had frosted tips” is one of my favorite Bruce takes of all time it’s so galaxy brained. you’re right and you should say it

he also painted his hair blonde once when he was travelling and in conclusion, this is why he's being blackmailed by the gotham gazette.

you know my thing about gordon being branded as the only good cop in gotham is its a load of shit like arguably he's a good person and not working to screw people over or anything but the fact that he also works w. batman makes him a shit cop. like yea batman is better than the mob but its still illegal its still an abuse of power he just not making bank

babe, all cops are bad cops. (but yeah youre absolutely right, working with vigilantes makes you a shit cop, but also working against vigilantes just makes you an asshole cop yanno?)

ruh roh i think i’m about to add “so not yeehaw” every time i don’t like something

that's a very good vocabulary upgrade

somehow i feel like steph already knew. like babs obviously knew but i feel like bruce got high/drunk in front of steph and started telling his boarding school stories and steph was just like “oh you fucked up i’m never gonna forget this”

steph and bruce have weird uncle/rebellious niece dynamic and they just hang out sometimes and bruce will be like 'i once broke my arm when i tripped over a hedge when i was drunk so oliver drove me to the hospital on an electric scooter' and steph will just have to sit there with that knowledge in her head.

Hello I just wanted to tell you you are So right in all your steph opinions bc she is, in fact amazing and I think that's very sexy of you. Ps. Your Bruce/Oliver fic is hilarious

babe, thank you so much and yes steph is amazing and i love her and she deserves the world and she's the best member of the batfam hands down. also thanks

In Supersons we see a couple of kids that are implied to be Damian and Jon's children and the boy has laser eyes and can fly, so I asume he's not adopted. The girl, who calls Bruce grandpa, can also fly, btw. So it's canon (probably by accident) that Jon can have kids and he must have married one of Bruce's kids. (I'm hoping for Damian, mostly because any other of his children would be waaaaaaaaaaaaay too old.) @artemisa97

lmao that was probably an accident seeing as jon is a 17 year old superhero in the year 3000 (by the jonas brothers)

You know, I'm a die hard fan of your memes, but I gotta say one thing: if Gothamites actually took gas mask everywhere with them, then the Scarecrow would just be a weird dude in a weird costume, and not a villain oh so scary. DC really should just takes notes from you.

bold of you to assume there's no gothamite anti-maskers

How does it feel being the funniest person on this app?

horrible, next question.

I can't listen to Green Day or Billy Joel without thinking of your post about how Bruce got arrested at a Billy Joel concert @nightwings-kid

yeah that's your mistake, i on the other hand can't enjoy billy joel without thinking about the glee rendition of 'uptown girl'

I've FINALLY been watching the Batman animated series and I gotta say, after watching "the gray ghost" I am CONVINCED that Batman is a closeted super hero geek who was 100% freaking out the first time he met Superman and is just REALLY good at hiding it.

superman: so what do you do in your free time? batman, thinking about the superman fanfiction he's writing on the batcomputer: i have no free time

bruce and oliver be like boyfriends to co-workers 401k (do the justice leagues get 401ks??? not that bruce and ollie would need them, but-)

lmao yes just 400 thousand words of bruce realising 'oh dip oliver is such a fucking dumbass' (also i don't know what a 401 k is but i assume they don't?)

Gothamites would totally boo superman as he saves Gotham while batman is out. @meenje

he's like 'okay think about that next time you want to be saved from an alien octopus'

I just took long break from dc comics and I come back to see ric grayson ??

i think it's very cool and sexy of dc to see dick and just think 'you know what? let's just give him a traumatic brain injury' and then didn't develop his character in any real way

SPEAKING OF RIC GRAYSON, gothamites making confused memes out of ric grayson is much needed

'dick grayson is my taxi driver? can anyone explain what the fuck happened he looks like an italian plumber?'

i hate to say it but batfam are def "marvel characters" in that sense they are characters who are human but become superheroes unlike most dc characters who are gods trying to be human maybe this is why I like batfam

fair enough

[satrangee-ray]

The Snack of a Lifetime

Book: Open Heart 3 and beyond.

Pairing(s): Ethan × NB!MC {Dr Inara Hepburn (she/they)}.

Rating: Teen+

Summary: Inara barges into the DT room with some obnoxious snacks to force Ethan into taking a break. But is that all they have in mind, or will their brilliant plan saved for later take him by pleasant surprise?

Category: Fluff, banter, life decisions and celebrations 🎉😁✌.

Trope: Weddings and Proposals.

Warning(s): one or two swear words, mention of a sex act.

Writer's note: By the time this starts, Ethan and MC have already said their 'I love you's, are in a committed relationship, and more or less everyone knows about it. In my original HC for Inara and Ethan they don't get married this early, so this is kind of an AU cause I really wanted to write a proposal fic. Also the whole lawsuit drama didn't happen, cause I said so, and most sane people would agree.

Ethan wasn't used to receiving.

It was apparent in the way he interacted with the world, immediately getting suspicious of anyone who would remotely extend some sort of courtesy towards him. 

He knew if he ever wanted to have something for himself, no one but he would have to take initiative to go get it. And for two-way processes like relationships, he had no belief whatsoever on the legitimacy of such things.

That was until Inara waltzed into his life, and amazed him with the possibility that he could be on the receiving end of good things without having to worry about any strings attached. Be it love, or a blowjob, or "care", as he previously liked to call it– the best things life ever had to offer were simply falling into his lap, and he couldn't find himself complaining.

Inara cared, in the truest sense of the word.

She cared enough to take off his glasses and cover him up in warm blankets, whenever he would fall asleep with an open medical journal in his hands. She cared enough to know just how he liked his coffee, or to school his scotch habits whenever they would get a little out of hand. And presently, she cared enough to let him work overtime, by agreeing to grab lunch with Tobias instead.

Ethan couldn't afford to take breaks. These days, he had to work even in between shifts, to finish editing his second medical book decently before it's approaching release date.

.

.

(One month before Inara's board exams)

.

The diagnostics office sat deserted, except for one doctor. A wooden desk, with papers sprawled all around. Ethan pinched the bridge of his nose, as he kept his glasses aside.

Suddenly the office door swung open, and three figures strolled in. Two practically tumbled, giggling overenthusiastically. The third one was Harper, who calmly walked in holding a tray, and shook her head with an amused expression.

Ethan looked up, and saw Tobias and Inara, each triumphantly holding up all their 10 fingers at him.

"Ring Chips!" Inara squealed, running towards Ethan. "Si baked these last night, and brought them as extra snacks for her fourteen hour shift today, but of course, we managed to hog some. So dig in!"

Ethan cautiously eyed the bright yellow crisps looped through Inara's fingers, and said, "you're not expecting me to eat those atrocities, are you?"

"Did you just call Sienna's baked goods an atrocity? That's wrong on so many levels E, lemme just get her on the phone..."

"NO", Ethan replied on high alert.

"That's what I thought. Cause bold words for someone who struggles even with a pancake."

Tobias and Harper chuckled, struggling in vain to stifle it.

"Fine, give me one here", Ethan said, extending his hand towards Harper's tray which contained the particular baked snacks.

"Nope, that's not the way", Inara stopped him, slapping his hand. "If you're doing this, you gotta do it right."

A loud exhale escaped Ethan. "What now, Rookie?"

"E, you can't just pick one chip and eat it, okay? You gotta slip it through your finger, and try to grab it with your mouth, the childhood nostalgia way. Like this."

Inara brought their hand to their mouth, and swallowed one whole finger, sucking on it until the chip looped through it flew backwards into their mouth. They proceeded to chew on it, staring straight into Ethan's eyes. 

He was so screwed. 

Turning away from Inara's gaze with tremendous effort, he wordlessly picked up a chip loop from the tray and tried to slip it into his finger.

"Too small", Tobias remarked, and handed him another. "Try a bigger one."

This time the ring effortlessly slipped through his finger, sitting perfectly at it's base. Ethan stared at it, perplexed, for a few moments.

"Yes! Now consume it with your mouth", Inara's excited cheers continued.

Harper couldn't hold in a scoff, while the youngest doctor in the room remained blissfully unaware of the implications of their phrase.

Ethan's mouth opened in protest, but he realized it's futility immediately and decided to close it. Scrunching up his entire face, in disbelief that he was actually doing this, he lowered his head, and slowly raised his hand to his face.

When his finger holding the chip was well within his reach, he opened his mouth once again to grab it. But just when he was about to take the bite, Inara acted quickly and slipped the chip out of his finger, causing Ethan to bite into his own skin instead. 

"Aahh, Nars what the hell! Are you nuts?"

The three other doctors in the room unabashedly cracked up now, not bothering to hide their glee in Ethan being tortured like that.

Inara began stroking his beard softly, before leaving a quick kiss on his cheek.

Shades of light pink took over it in response.

"You should have acted faster, honey", Inara said, taking his hands into theirs. Another gentle peck landed on his lips.

"Now I'm already running late, there's this patient I have to check on, gotta yeet. But you better finish the rest of those snacks, along with the real food we brought you for lunch, and for God's sake, please look up from those damn papers for five minutes, and take a freakin' chill pill!" 

The last words were shouted as they rushed out the door.

Ethan and Tobias sighed.

"They're the best thing that has ever happened to you"

"Indeed", Ethan said in earnest. "I'll be very inclined to agree."

.

.

(Four months after Inara's board exams)

.

The gorgeous venue sparkled with chandeliers and boujee people in expensive suits. Small round tables, aesthetic chairs, congratulations in order everywhere. No, it wasn't the medical industry's 'it' couple getting married, it was the 'it' doctor, and the chief of medicine's second book getting launched instead. 

Ethan had walked into the Edenbrook atrium that morning like it was a war zone. His expression still spelt terror, as he uneasily shifted his glance between some of his guests, shooting small, forced smiles their way.

"Why do we always have to do this?", he had asked Naveen. "Why couldn't we just release the damn book in stores? Why host a useless social gathering with forty thousand rich snobs who are only any good at showing off and draining your energy?"

Naveen had shook his head and hit him with an assertive "it's necessary."

So currently, Ethan stood awkward to his bones, in the middle of this necessary evil. Until, a certain presence near the door cued him to look up.

It was them.

Pantsuit in a sinful vermillion, the colour glowing bright against their skin. Red bottom wedges, that only aided their boss status. Brunette locks framing their face, so impeccably contrasting the emerald eyes looking affectionately back at him. Those, which never failed to take his breath away.

Inara Hepburn.

His giver, his lover, his Rookie.

And Ethan couldn't be more mesmerized, or reassured.

"Need some help picking your jaw off the floor, Ramsey?" Inara quipped, as they strode towards Ethan, torturously slow.

"I– well…", he stammered, before clearing his throat. "Is that look the reason why you chose to arrive 'fashionably late', and drive separately to my book launch from our own apartment?"

"Yeah, definitely the look, but I daresay some other things as well", they said, placing a playful hand on Ethan's chest. "You'll soon find out."

He smiled warmly at them. "Is that a challenge?"

"Have you ever backed down from one?"

A reckless mistake of letting his eyes slip to their lips, and Ethan couldn't wait any longer. He wrapped his arms around their waist, kissing them hard and deep. Drinking in their mouth, their warmth, their sensations. Aching to draw as much energy as he could to power through this event, from his greatest source of confidence, his only constant supporter. 

"I love you so much, Rookie", he panted, after the kiss broke off.

"Some brand new information there", teased Inara, bumping their nose into his. "You know I love you too, E. Now tell me what's bothering you."

Ethan pulled back swiftly at that, and stared at them in astonishment.

"What?"

"What 'what'? It was all over your face when I entered, and you still don't look quite alright. What's wrong, love? I don't recall you being afraid of public speaking!"

"I'd address an audience in my dreams! I just don't understand what's up with these people who come up individually to congratulate me, and purposefully try to expand those two lines into a whole one-on-one conversation. Scandalous!"

Inara nodded vigorously in agreement.

"Such a mood, b*tch, such a mood."

Peels of laughter were shared again, at their effortless mutual understanding, and at the usage of Inara's all time favourite nickname.

"All the best", they wished, shaking him by the lapels of his coat. "Get out there, and kill it!"

.

.

.

About an hour later, applause sounded from every corner of the atrium. Ethan beamed, as he finished reading the last line of a snippet about his latest research from his book.

Clapping proudly from the crowds was Inara, a lover on a mission.

"Thank you everyone, for joining me here today", Ethan said, amongst cheers and buzzing words of encouragement from fellow doctors and other esteemed medical personalities. "I hope I will be able to add value to patient-care through my efforts behind this book. There are some people I would like to specifically thank for being of immense help on my journey till here, so let's begin. Dad, thank you so much for coming to support me. Means a lot. Maybe because of my personal outlook, I could never comprehend your brand of unconditional love, which you so freely offer without actively needing me to work for it. I know now how valuable and rare that is, and how it has helped me grow into the man I am today. For that I will always be grateful. Naveen, thank you so much. You know if I start listing 'what for', I won't finish."

A lighthearted chuckle spread among the crowd.

"You always keep saying my success is my own, but I firmly believe there was no way I would have been the doctor I am without your help and guidance. Thank you for being the excellent mentor and leader by example that you are, you still motivate me to become better everyday. And, last but not the least… Inara."

All eyes in the audience shifted towards one young attending, who was clutching her glass out of giddiness.

"I really want to say thank you, but those two words will never be able to express the amount of gratitude I hold towards you. Before you, my life was only ever about blacks and whites. Giving my everything into medicine, working late nights and coming back to an empty apartment with scotch in my hand, I thought I was doing it all right. But when I met you, got to know you, I… you left me in utter awe of who you are, both as a professional and as a person. I couldn't stop myself from falling in love, and in respect, with your brain, your mind, and your soul. I am so glad you were patient with me while I was busy trying to deny it. You continued to show that patience even until recently, when I was all cranky with writer's block. Now I know the great Dr. Inara Hepburn is also a published novel writer, so of course that bit might have come out of empathy, but nonetheless, I'm thankful for it. Today, I'm about to release a book I put my all into, the information in which might hopefully change the face of what I'm most passionate about – public healthcare, for the better. And I'd rather not share this moment with anyone else. So Inara, would you please honour me by coming up on stage to receive the first ever copy of 'Prognosis and Evaluation'?"

Inara couldn't speak, stunned into silence for a bit. They had no idea Ethan would be the one for emotional public speeches, and here they were, utterly moved, in for another surprise. So would he be, soon, they reasoned in their head, and gathered themselves. Keeping their drink aside on a table, they strode towards the stage, eyes shining with pride, love, and determination.

Determination to get this right.

Ethan took their hand as soon as they stepped on the first stair, and led them upstage. 

A copy of the book, new and shining, was lying, all theirs to hold.

'Prognosis and Evaluation: A comprehensive study.'

Their heart swelled at the words written on the first page of the book.

Typical Ethan's handwriting, somehow neat and gibberish at the same time.

'My love, my north star, I promise to never let you down' - Dr Ramsey Ethan <3.

Tears. Instantly, a whole lot of them rolled down their cheeks. They clutched the book hard and hugged it to their chest, holding on tight. Ethan held them in turn, locking their shaking frame in his embrace, as the crowd broke into a unanimous applause.

"E, I don't know what to say", Inara began, on being handed over the mic. "Si would have cried so much if she were present here, Naveen's already crying."

Their grandmentor smiled back at them through his tears.

"The thing is, I love success. I love standing in the spotlight, having my own life, and earning my own achievements. Despite that, there is always a deeper warmth in standing next to someone you love, when they accomplish great things, and shouting "my person!" Today, you've given me that opportunity, and I'm so grateful to you for it. I'm proud of you for believing in yourself, and speaking your voice not as a "mechanism of coping with the means of this corrupt world", but as a means to bring genuine change because you believe you can. I've always seen you try so hard to never let your loved ones down, and that effort is what I'm so here for. People like you are rare, and I'm glad I got one to myself, to constantly cheerlead for, now and as long as you'll have me. I'll never leave your side, Ethan. I'd love us to forever be each other's hype person. Not just in practice, but also… officially."

Three distinct gasps were heard in the room.

Alan, Naveen and Tobias let their pinkies lock into each other.

Ethan's eyes widened, as he took in the meaning behind their words, starting to sense what might be coming.

Doubt. Disbelief. Shock. Anticipation.

In the next moment, they were down on one knee.

"Ethan Jonah freaking Ramsey, will you marry me?"

Dead silence in the entire room, everyone taking in what just happened.

Ethan's hands flew to his mouth.

Minutes passed.

One… two… and five...

No one said a word.

Eventually, the entire audience burst into cheers and jubilation. Even in such a formal event as that, quite a few wayward whistles were heard.

And then there was the man of the hour, standing centre stage, shell shocked. Still trying to process everything.

"Inara... Rookie, I–"

He couldn't. Form words or coherent sentences. His entire focus was on the person and the tiny blue box in front of him.

"There's a ring in there for real?"

'Shit', he cursed internally. What a ridiculous question.

Of course this was real. Their love was real, they were real. He was to get married. What? Wow. Really?

Of course there would be a ring for real.

"Depends", Inara said with a wink. "On whether or not you say yes."

"Come on Ethan!" 

Encouragements burst from his acquaintances in the crowd, imploring him to say yes. His three musketeers, however, were heard the loudest.

'Yes', Ethan thought to himself. 'Yes.'

He had to say it.

"Yes", he tried whispering under his breath.

A first time, then a second.

"Yes. YES OF COURSE I’LL MARRY YOU!"

He exclaimed those words in ecstacy before dropping down on his knees as well, and pulled his lover in against him. He engulfed her in his arms, holding her so tight, it could knock the breath out of his chest. 

"Yes Inara, it would mean the world to me if I could marry you", he whispered again into her ear.

"Good thing I asked then, E", Inara whispered back, before squeezing him one last time and pulling away. 

"Ring! Ring! Ring! Ring!", the crowd chanted.

The widest smile ever was shot their way, as Inara once again took hold of the navy box. She waited for both of them to steady themselves, and Ethan found himself holding his breath. 

At last, the cover of the ring case slowly lifted, to reveal… 

A bright yellow ring chip sitting right into the slit of the fabric in the case. 

Confused noises of varying degrees filled the room. Only Naveen, Tobias and Alan watched the whole scene unfold with a twinkle in their eye.

Meanwhile, Ethan's expression progressed from utter cluelessness to gradual realization.

Oh! That ring.

"Wait, how did– how come that snack didn't rot in all these days?"

"Of course it did, love. Our original measuring tape probably decomposed long ago in some trash bin outside a gold shop, after having done its job. This is merely a replica, but you can call it a token."

"Nars… what do you mean?"

"I mean…", Inara said, inserting her hand into her suit pocket, to pull out a sparkling golden band, complete with five little diamonds on top. "May I have your hand?"

"Readily, Rookie… you already have my heart. Always, for as long as you'll have me."

Ethan placed his shivering palm on Inara's steady hand, and she took the opportunity to slip the golden band through his ring finger.

A perfect fit. 

With tears in his eyes, Ethan agreed.

"I'm getting married to you."

"I'm getting married to you!"

Inara squealed at the prospect, and Ethan decided on sealing their joyous sentiment by crashing his lips onto hers in a searing kiss.

The audience went wild, but they were all forgotten in the minds of the lovebirds.

"I can't believe I get to call you fiancé", Ethan wondered in amazement.

"Me neither", said Inara, joining their foreheads together. 

"Say what, we should ask Sienna to bake our wedding cake. Three tier, with a big old fondant ring chip on top."

"What? Ethan Ramsey wants a huge a** fondant snack on the top of his wedding cake! Are you sure he's okay?"

"Yes, he is, and he would do anything for his fiancé!"

With moist eyes and full hearts, they buried themselves again in each other's holds.

This time, with a mutual promise of a forever.

F I N.

Oukay so this happened. I kinda posted it. Shh, I need to breathe.

Thank you so much for reading, if you've made it this far. I hope I haven't damaged too many of your braincells.

Thank you @gaeipsstuff for naming Ethan's book. I would have never, seriously! Thanks for proofreading and giving a detailed analysis, it came extremely handy during the my edit sessions. Thank you @adiehardfan, @jeetushmannfeelz, you know if it wasn't for the both of you, this wouldn't be up on my Tumblr.

This is my first proper OH fic, with an actual story and shenanigans, so I've been super apprehensive about this. Hence, it would mean a real lot to me if you could tell me how you found it. Stay safe, do what you love, stan pixelated characters, and take hugs. Peace✌.

Tagging: @adiehardfan @irisofpurple @barbean

Others kindly let me know if you wanna be tagged!

[xxisxxisxxis]

Gateway Drug | Part Fifty-Seven

A/N: this is kinda raunchy. I'm not sorry.

Word count: 4K

Warning(s): explicit language, explicit sexual situations, mentions of drug abuse

Tag List: @unknownoblivion  @sinningsixx  @edwardtriggerhandzz  @lemmyjelly  @haileynicoleseavey17  @cierrasixx19  @oskea93  @mgkobsessed  @vamprlestat  @sharon6713  @itsametaphorbriansblog  @miriampraez  @allie-mcginn @xpoisonousrosesx  @rebeccaphillips14  @nicholeh7  @fandomshit6000  @lilmou5ie  @tamedhearts  @divaanya  @kingbouji3 @evrsncnewyork @6ixx6ixx  @ratedrkohardychick91  @floregrohlssard  @oldschoolimagineblog  @thanks2pete  @abaldboi  @swoopygorl @justjodeye @liith-ium  @caos18blog  @ytwahsog  @shamlessobsession  @scarecrowmax  @toadspleen @random-internet-user-4471  @solohqrry  @loveofmyloif  @sparxx27  @kaitieskidmore1  @cruecifymesixx  @ijustwanttokiss70srogertaylor  @emmaelizabeth2014 @meetthesixxter  @sixxsixxsexx @sublimeprincesswasteland @arianareirg  @girlnight-terror  @mcnibberachi

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LET ME KNOW IF YOU WANT TO BE TAGGED

1981

"...Shh." Nikki chuckles out in a smile, his hand over my mouth as he comes up for a second so I can calm down. "If your parents hear you, I'm fucked."

"I'm sorry, you've been going down on me the past hour, I'm really sensetive right now, and I thought you didn't care." I whisper, quoting him from something he's said before.

He just smirks.

"I thought about it and decided if we get caught, I won't be able to do this..." He tugs my nipple with his teeth for a moment, causing me to gasp out. "...or this..." he pushes two fingers into my slick cunt and I arch my back, the delicious friction causing my body to crave more. "...or this." He goes back to where he was, his tongue working at my swollen clit.

I take in a sharp breath, trying to keep from moaning too loud as he devours me and every last drop of sticky-sweet running out of me.

"Oh, fuck, daddy." I whine out, my hips bucking up, grinding against his feasting mouth, only causing him to move his tongue faster and more deliberately.

He hums at the sound, his dark eyes glancing up at me, his hands keeping my thighs spread wide open as he sucks at my clit, making my eyes roll back, my toes curl, and a wanton moan leaves my lips as my pussy tenses and relaxes repeatedly, wanting to be filled and abused.

Nikki finishes licking the cum from between my legs, before laying beside me as my exhausted body tries to wind down.

"You don't want me to do anything for you?" I ask him, taking deep breaths, blinking slowly at him.

He shakes his head, giving me a little smile, before pulling the covers up to my chin so I don't have to.

"No, Viv, getting to eat you for over an hour straight is repayment enough." He chuckles and my face burns red.

"Quit saying it like that." I cover my face with my hands.

"That's what I was doing, was it not?"

"I guess, but you don't have to be so..." I wrinkle my nose for a second. "...I don't know."

"Oh, so you can call me 'daddy' but when I call it 'eating', it's the end of the world?" He looks at me and I narrow my eyes at him.

"I don't know what you're talking about." I deny his accusation and he raises his brows.

"Oh, please, Viv, you scream it out like a bitch in heat almost everytime we fuck around."

"Fine, then, I'll stop." I shrug and he snaps his attention to me.

"I didn't say I didn't like it, it's just amusing to hear it from you, of all people, Saint Viv."

"Shut up, Devil Spawn." I shove at his arm.

"Ow." He complains, rubbing his hand over where I hit him, pretending to be hurt.

I roll my eyes and he mocks me, causing me to shove at his arm again.

"Do it again, see what happens." He threatens and I, spitefully, do it again.

I don't have time to react before he's snatching me onto him, grasping my wrists in his hands as he tickles at my stomach, causing me to double over and try to keep from waking my parents.

"Okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" I whisper yell and he stops, allowing me to catch my breath and he laughs arrogantly, his rough palms rubbing up and down my thighs, calmly, his smile slowly starting fade as he looks up at me.

"What is it?" I ask him, self-consciously pulling the covers back around me to cover my chest.

"You're beautiful." He says lowly, his hand coming up to brush my red hair from my face.

"Don't be weird." I say in regards to whatever the hell is happening between us.

We've only messed around a handful of times and I've been trying not to get attached because there's no point. I don't need him bullshitting me just for the hell of it.

"I'm being honest, Viv. You are."

"So is every other girl you have fun with. We're already fooling around anytime either of us wants it, you can stop trying to tell me nice stuff so I'll let you between my legs, Nikki." I laugh it off, but the sting of the truth strikes through my body.

"The other girls are nice to look at, but are grade-A hangers-on. They could give less of a fuck as long they're getting boned by a rockstar, they don't care." He replies.

Apparently the look I give him is one of doubt.

"I'm always right." He states sarcastically with a toothy grin. "So if I say you--despite being a pain in the ass--are beautiful, then there's no arguing about it." He adds and I try not to make my overjoyed smile obvious, instead leaning down, pressing my lips to his.

1987

"Another vehicle, Nikki, are you kidding me?!" I scream as he simultaneously says, "don't fucking start, Viv!"

He can't be serious.

"Do you not remember that notice we got about the $5,000 a day in heroin being spent, Nikki, or did that just fly over your head? We have bills, we have have things that we need to prioritize and what do you do?! Buy another car!"

He just ignores me, grabbing a paper bag from the fridge.

I give up on fighting, tears of frustration rolling down my cheeks as I grab my car keys to just get the hell out of here.

He had gotten a brand new Mercedes Benz after I had asked him to wait until we got more money from the album and the tour. He decided we had enough money and went for it.

I angrily wrap packing tape around the cardboard box packed full of Steven's things, seeing him flinch each time the tape let out a squeak from me manhandling it.

"You good, Viv?" He asks me cautiously and I glare at him.

"I married a junkie who's mission is to damn near give me a heart attack anyway he possibly can whether it's with his drug abuse or simply spending money we don't necessarily have." I state. "So, no, Stevie. I could be better."

"Oh...I'm sorry." He mumbles.

"It's called D-I-V-O-R-C-E. They're perfect in situations such as your's and could really benefit you and him." Izzy sarcastically let's out, raising his brows and I slowly turn to look at him with a death glare. "Or suffer, that's a good option, too." He shrugs.

"We don't want that." I state as Duff comes in the living room from the kitchen.

"Not what I've heard." Izzy scoffs back. "Sixx talks when he's smacked out."

"And what exactly does 'Sixx' say?" I ask, raising my brows.

I can feel Steven making motions to Izzy from behind me, and I turn to look at him only to see him pretending to rub the bottom of his jaw with his knuckles.

It's obvious he was just running his hand against his neck in a "stop" motion to Izzy.

"Uh, n-nothing." Duff puts in as an unsettling tension settles in, like the three of them are on a level of understanding that I'm not aware of.

"Guys, seriously, what does he say?" I ask.

"It's not really what he says as much as what he does." Izzy let's out carefully and Duff glares at him.

"What does he do?"

"Cries." Duff states.

"Yeah." Steven adds.

"Like a little bitch." Izzy sighs.

I look at them for a moment before deciding to not ask anything else.

"Okay, Steven, here." I finish taping his box of stuff.

"Thanks, Viv." He replies, picking the box up, and suddenly every nude magazine he owns is spilling onto the floor from the bottom of the box.

"Aw, dude, that wasn't suppose to happen." Steven states and I hand the tape to Duff when he offers to retape it, before plopping down beside Izzy.

The difference in Fred, Mick, Duff, Steven, Izzy, Slash and Axl keeping the Vanity situation from me, and Tommy, Vince, Doc, and Tansy, keeping it from me was that Vince, Doc, Tommy and Tansy were protecting Nikki.

Everyone else thought they were protecting me, instead they would constantly down Nikki about it, trying to get him to stop his shit.

It would have been nice for someone to tell me instead of having me looking like an absolute dumbass in front of God and everyone.

But I can see why they would think I couldn't handle that information at that time.

"Baby, c'mon, Tommy and I leave in a couple hours." Nikki pleads with me over the phone.

"Okay, so just days ago I was a 'psycho cunt' and you bought a brand new car a couple days ago just to spite me, and now I'm 'baby' again?" I question him.

"We fucked last night, Viv." He states and I sigh.

"We have sex because we're horny, Nikki, not because either of us are sorry for whatever we fight about." I point out and he groans.

"Just get down here and tell me 'bye', please?" He asks and I let out a breath.

"Fine, I'll be down there in a few minutes." I tell him, rolling my eyes.

How Nikki's logic worked:

Sex = apology.

I had accepted that, but a few months into '87, I realized sex didn't fix anything. It just swept it under the rug and allowed the both of us to pretend nothing was wrong.

The rug was starting to have so much dirt swept under it, it wasn't even laying flat on the floor anymore.

I shut the door of my car, Nikki waiting for me outside in his sunglasses, despite it being night out, his cocky smirk plastered on his lips at the fact that I came when he snapped his fingers, like always.

He holds a cassette out to me and I raise a brow, unamused.

"An apology for being an asshole." He tells me.

On the label reads "You're All I Need."

"Remember that song I wanted to write for you?" He asks and I nod, not necessarily knowing how to feel.

"I'll see you when you get back." I let out, giving a tight smile, opening my car door but he shuts it quickly, turning me to face him.

"That's it? No 'thank you', no 'goodbye' kiss, no nothing?" He questions me.

"I'm still upset over our fight Nikki."

"We always have bullshit fights, Viv. We say shit we don't mean all the time."

"Okay, but we're getting too comfortable saying hurtful things to each other, are we not?" I point out, and he sighs, shaking his head a little.

"We tried therapy, it didn't work, so. I don't know what to tell you."

"We went to a handful of sessions, Nikki, before you refused to go after Nona passed away." I remind him.

"Because we were both miserable in those sessions."

"Well, it's nearly one year later and we're still miserable." I state and he furrows his brows.

"Being married to me makes you miserable?" He hisses out.

"I didn't mean it like that, I just mean--"

"--Great, well, I'll see you in five days." He cuts me short, hurt over what I said, stepping to the door.

"That's not what I meant, Nikki." I follow after him and grasp at his wrist. "I meant the both of us are getting more and more unhappy."

"I'm fine." He pipes. "I'm sorry if you're antidepressant stopped working or something but I'm fantastic, Viv."

"You're fantastic?"

"Yep."

People who are doing "fantastic" don't self-medicate but okay.

"I'll do better." He says to me, smiling down at me reassuringly. "Alright?"

I nod, and he looks me up and down for a moment before catching my lips with his.

His Jack flavored tongue meets mine, eliciting a soft hum from me as his hands hold at my waist, my fingers lacing in his hair.

We take a few steps back and I feel my legs hit the front of my Corvette. I drop the tape to push his jacket off his shoulders when he nudges for me to sit back on the hood of my car, already knowing where this is going.

His lips trail down my neck, his teeth nipping at my hardened nipples through my dress, causing me to giggle and moan simultaneously, my fingers running through his teased hair.

He stands up straight to unbuckle his belt, the sight of his prick desperate to get out of his pants has a wave of pleasure sweeping up my back, my hand pulling my dress up to run over the soft fabric of my panties, the toe of my heel gently traveling up the inside of his leather covered thigh.

He stops me just before I can trace over the bulge in his pants, his hand gripping my ankle, his fingers of his other hand untying the lace of his pants.

I sit up, reaching my hand out to free his cock, but he grabs at my jaw, forcing me to look at him.

"No, no." He wags his finger at me with a slick smile and my mouth waters when he pulls himself from his pants, precum already beading at his tip.

He sees me eyeing it, purposely wrapping his fist around his shaft to jerk of a couple of times, causing even more of the liquid to leak from him.

"Go ahead have a taste because every last drop is going in that pretty pussy so you remember who's you are while I'm gone."

My core tenses up, evidence of my arousal wetting my panties at his words and I don't hesitate to swipe my thumb across his tip, enjoying his jaw tensing at the contact, before making a show of sucking my thumb into my mouth to lick it off.

He stares at me and I blink up at him, taking my thumb from my mouth, waiting for him to make the next move.

And oh, does he.

He's impatiently pushing my dress to my hips and yanking my panties off, holding at one of my legs as his fingers trail between my legs to my clit.

I let out a harsh breath when he lightly runs the pad of his thumb over the sensitive nerves, watching my face.

I have to bite my lip in order to keep from cursing at him teasing me, and he licks his lips before taking his dick in his hand, rubbing the head against my clit, watching as my eyes close and a whimper leaves my lips.

I feel my pulse in my core, and the ache of utter need has me giving him my best "fuck me" eyes I can muster up.

"Does my little slut wanna be fucked?" He asks and I nod, looking at him with my eyes half-open.

I shudder when he drags his tip to my hungry cunt, slowly, agonizingly, sliding into me.

My back arches as he gives me the time to feel his girth stretching me, and he grins, his head falling back, his hands pushing my thighs against the hood of the car.

"I will never get over how fucking tight you are." He tells me in an almost moan, pulling back out again and slowly sliding back in, time looking down to see himself thrusting in and out of me.

"So good." I let out softly, my hands pinching at my nipples through my dress and he starts to pick up the pace, causing me to gasp and moan with every thrust as he goes deep into me, hitting my cervix.

I remember where we're at and I put my hand over my mouth to keep from drawing attention from the street incase anyone can hear me.

Nikki doesn't like that.

"Keep your fucking hand down." He orders, pulling my hand from my mouth. "I want them to know you're getting fucked, I want them to know who's fucking cock you're taking inch for fucking inch." He states, and I moan quietly at his words, still not wanting to draw attention.

My walls tighten and loosen around him as he continues to drive into me, my sounds of pleasure getting louder and louder with my loss of control and Nikki's determination.

His fingers quickly go back and fort against my clit, causing me to let out an unexpected cry, my hand holding at his wrist to try to get him to stop but he won't.

"Good girl." He praises me for not trying to hide my pleasure, grunting at the feeling of my pussy tightening around him.

The wet sound of him moving in and out of me mixed with my cries and he cursing fills my ears.

"Harder, Nikki, please." I beg, a masochistic part of me not wanting to walk right for a couple days.

I don't have to ask twice, his hand's around my throat, his fingers roughly stimulating my clit while his prick mercilessly starts pounding into my weeping cunt, only causing me to moan the best that I can with him choking me.

The two of us look at each other in pure ecstacy and I smugly grin before opening my mouth, sticking my tongue out.

His hand grasps at my throat a little tighter as he leans forward and spits in my mouth, only letting his grip loosen briefly so I can swallow it.

Our bodies are now drenched in sweat and I'm growing closer and closer, squeezing around him so tightly I think he's having to force himself not to finish before I do.

I'm probably looking up at him like he's a god, mesmerized by the sheen of sweat covering his chest, his thumb of his hand around my throat softly swiping the skin of my neck, sweetly contradicting his roughness.

"Oh, daddy, I'm gonna come." I gasp out. It's been a while since I've called him that in bed and it's only motivating him to go harder. "Fuck!" I mewl, squeezing my eyes shut as I tighten around him even more before my orgasm hits and my pussy's spasming in hopes of getting every last bit of his load.

He groans from the sensation before I feel him push back into me, forcing himself against my cervix, hot cum coating the inside of me.

"What the fuck?!" Tommy screams in a high pitch, and Nikki and I startle, looking in the direction of the door to see Tommy and Vince standing there, just walking out, but being met with Nikki inside me, with his hand around my throat and me moaning.

I'm horrified, Tommy's traumatized, Vince is probably wishing he had his camera, and Nikki's...well...

"Hahaha!" Nikki let's out, pulling my dress down my legs so I don't flash Tommy or Vince. "Sorry." He says next, tucking himself back into his pants, picking his jacket up off the ground as I scramble to get off the car, wincing at the feeling Nikki's cum about to start running out of me.

My face is bright red and Tommy looks like he's about to cry.

"I came out here to tell you 'bye' and-and..." he can't finish speaking, disgust on his face.

"Nikki was telling you 'bye', too." Vince laughs out and I glare at him.

"I'm sorry we fool around, T-bone, jeez." Nikki chuckles.

"'Fooling around' is a blowjob. This," he grabs his own throat and pulls his own hair. "Is something I don't want to see Viv in."

"She's the one who's into it." Nikki argues and my eyes bug as I feel even more embarrassed.

"Nikki, what the hell?!" I ask him as Tommy looks even more worried.

"Aww, man, this is great." Vince sighs out, grinning.

"Viv, I love you, I'll see you in a few days." Tommy let's out, avoiding eye contact with me.

I don't want to face him at the moment either.

"Love you, Tommy, bye." I reply as he heads to their car that just pulled up.

I grab the tape from the ground and my panties, and Nikki takes the skimpy undergarment from my hand and puts it in his jacket pocket.

I just look at him.

"What?" He asks. "It's a token of your affection to remind me of you when I miss you on those cold, lonely nights."

"You'll be gone less than a week, Nikki."

"You want me to think of you or not?" He points out and I can't hide my smile, chuckling at his bullshit.

His eyes shift to the tape in my hand, and his face falls for a second as if he regrets giving it to me.

"Everything alright?"

"Yeah, um...just...don't take lyrics too seriously." He tells me and I raise my brows.

"What?"

The car honks the horn and he looks at them as Tommy's standing out of the sunroof.

"Dude, c'mon, we're gonna miss the flight!" He tells Nikki.

Nikki turns back to me, giving me a little smile, kissing me sweetly.

"I'll call you when we get to the hotel." He assures me, kissing me again.

"Okay, be careful." I say.

"I'm sorry, Viv, alright?" He says next, and I think he's apologizing for the "Wild Side" ordeal and buying a new car we could barely afford.

I'm about to say "I am, too" but he cuts me off, kissing me yet again.

"See ya, Sixx." He whispers, smirking to me.

"See ya, Sixx." I reply in the same tone.

With one last kiss, he's telling Vince 'bye' and making his way to the car.

I rub my lips together, noticing Vince has this amused look on his face as I step to my car.

"What, Vince?" I ask.

"Nothing. Enjoy the song." He tells me before walking to his bike.

I go home, clean myself up, change and head to the Franklin Plaza where Duff, Axl, Izzy, Slash and Steven are staying currently.

The second Steven opens the door, I'm waving the tape.

"He doesn't hate me!" I exclaim, handing the tape to Axl--who bet $50 that Nikki and I would divorce this year--as he's smoking his cigarette.

"'You're All I Need'." He reads the title, looking at Duff and Izzy who're on one of the suits' couches. "What, is it an ode to heroin?" He asks and I cut my eyes at him.

"Seriously, man?" Slash questions him, unamused.

"No, Axl, it's not." I state.

"Well, let's listen to it." Stevie excitedly says.

Soon enough we have it playing, hearing a beautiful piano ballad backed with Mick's guitar, Nikki's bass and Tommy's drums.

"The blade of my knife

Faced away from your heart

Those last few nights

It turned and sliced you apart

This love that I tell

Now feels lonely as hell

From this padded prison cell"

The lyrics of the first verse sound as with each passing second, everyone's looking more and more confused, glancing at each other while I try to make sense of whatever metaphor he's using.

"So many times I said

You'd only be mine

I gave my blood and my tears

And loved you cyanide

When you took my lips

I took your breath

Sometimes love's better off dead"

He can't be saying what it sounds like he's saying.

"You're all I need make you only mine

I love you so I set you free

I had to take your life

You're all I need, you're all I need

And I loved you but you didn't love me."

"Umm...Viv...I don't think this is about how much he loves you." Izzy speaks out.

"Laid out cold

Now we're both alone

But killing you helped me keep you home."

"I-Is he singing about killing me?!" I ask, nearly at a loss for words.

"I guess it was bad

Cause love can be sad

But we finally make the news."

"This bastard is singing about killing me!"

"Dude, didn't he actually try to kill you?" Steven asks me and I raise my brows.

"Tied up smiling

I thought you were happy

Never opened you--"

Duff stops the tape, snatching it from the player before tossing it on the floor and stomping it to pieces with his cowboy boot.

There's a long, long silence between all of us, and I force myself not to cry in front of all of them.

"I guess that fifty bucks is still on the table, then?" Axl shatters the silence.

[courtneyyharper]

10 Christmas Gifts ‘for her’ if you’re completely clueless

Since it's apparently time to start thinking about that time of year I thought I'd jump on and attempt to give you some help in an attempt to spark​ some ideas. Whether you're using this list for ideas for your other half, your mum or sister, or even if you are that person that likes something on this list why don't you send it over as a wee hint... the irony of this is that I've banned my boyfriend from looking at this list as there's a few spoilers on here for his gifts! (Hope he enjoys a wee eyeshadow palette😬).

So let’s start...

1. AIRPODS

I'm sure this will be a big gift this year and a perfect gift if you know they'll be getting a new phone or laptop! Perfect for a music lover or just the person that always needs to have the next big thing! I'd recommend planning to get a pair of these bad boys from Amazon or Currys during the Black Friday sale.

2. STUDIO LIGHT

A gift my mum got me unexpectedly a few years back and I haven't looked back. Not just for the MUA or photography student in your life but even just for every day make up application and I know my friends always use mine for checking their outfits or taking selfies before a night out! I've shown in the product photo how you can get a full sized one or a desk sized one easily on Amazon, your choice. Along this line would also be a Hollywood mirror, the big vanity mirrors with the bright lights installed but they can be hard to source as they're so popular and you need to make sure they're the bright studio lights. Top tip would just be to check the dimensions so you know what you're getting.

3. POLAROID CAMERA

I wanna say this is a cult favourite. I don't know many girls who don't have one of these now but if your gift recipient is one of them then it'd be a great gift! They're a great idea for Christmas, birthdays and anniversaries because it means you can capture the memories and of course ironically take a photo of the polaroid with your phone and post it to Instagram!! They come in a variety of colours and you can purchase accessories and refillable polaroid packs for other special occasions after, making it the gift that keeps on giving.

4. VINYL PLAYERS

Another gift that keeps on giving. If they're a real music lover and always have Spotify going in their room, and with the lack of concerts this year, this would be a very thoughtful gift. You can get these lads pretty cheap on Amazon or fork out for the pricey ones from UO. The only downside is that the actual Vinyl records themselves is where this gifts will cost you the most, but at least you'll always have an idea for next years present.

5. FOREVER ROSES

Now these guys can be quite boujee and I remember them being really popular a few years ago. If you type 'forever roses' into google or, probably better yet, Instagram you'll get a lot of companies selling gift sets of these specially preserved roses that can last for years. An incredibly romantic and surprising gift, this one can cost you big bucks but if you shop around enough you can get single roses for around £20 or major bunches for a few hundred but it's sure to win you major brownie points.

6. LUSH

This is the standard gift and perfect for a Christmas Eve bath. If you couldn't come up with this present on your own then please pay close attention to this blog because oh buddy you will need it! There are so many gift boxes to choose from at Lush and the great thing is you can't go wrong with any of them. Not to worry if you don't have a bath too because I also have you covered with these Lush sprays which are sooo good that you won't need to work out what their favourite perfume is for the third year in a row. (Also a great brand to support for its morals which is a bonus!!)

7. BLANKETS

Not only perfect for those cosy Winter and lockdown nights but also a great home decor item that is so popular on Instagram! These massive knit blankets can get incredibly pricey online, ranging from 20ish quid for a tiny one to a few hundred for the massive ones, so if you're willing to pay that then go ahead but top tip is to have a look in Home Bargains because they had these guys in all year for £25 and even Primark Home had a few in recently but I'd get ahead of the game for this one before they sell out...

8. JEWELLERY

Now I'm not a massive jewellery fan myself but some girls just go ga-ga for a princess ring. If you're wondering if your girlfriend/sister/daughter is one of them you can identify these people by their less-than-subtle 'just gonna post this here xx' social media posts sharing the Pandora sales. I know most boys get scared to choose jewellery in case the person 'doesn't like it' blah blah but chances are unless they've told you somethng they specifically want or you've been missing some massive hints (ie. ring photos 'accidentally' sent to you) then they'll appreciate literally anything you choose. It's the idea you've went and chosen something specifically for them more than the item itself that matters. If you like it, they'll like it more. The big site is Pandora and many sites like it will have 'Christmas Gift Guide' sections to make it super easy for you. Top tip: you could do a wee price low-high if this is just an add-on gift and although it's horrible to say they will most likely look it up and check how much you spent on it... sorry about that!

9. EYESHADOW PALETTE

Now this is one you will most likely skip over because it feels like delving into a massive jungle with no map and no water and actually no shoes and no clue whatsoever of where to start. That's what boys feel like trying to buy girls make up and I really can't blame you. In fact, if you haven't been told exactly what to buy then who could blame you but if you're really looking to impress and go the extra mile and know they like make up then I'm going to attempt to help you as best I can and try and keep it really simple! So, first of all you'll need to somehow have a look at their collection when they're getting ready or be super stealthy and just double check they don't have the palette you're going to get them.

This is important. Right, so question one is do they watch YouTubers do make up? Because if they do then simply find out who they watch and check if that influencer has a palette or collab with a makeup brand because then your job is done for you!! If they've told you all about the James Charles/Tatti/Jefree Starr drama that encapsulated YouTube in the past then find out who's side they support because all three of those guys have palettes! James Charles x Morphe Artistry palette, Tatti has her own brand, or if they came out supporting Jeffree Starr and Shane Dawson in the whole fiasco then the Jeffree Starr 'Conspiracy palette' is for you. To each their own. These two main palettes I've featured on the left below for you to have a look at.

The top right palette is the new HUDA Beauty Naughty Nude palette and it's the one I'd go for if you're really unsure still! It's a new release so doubtful they have it and there's no crazy colours so can be used by everyone. It would be my top recommendation for make up this Christmas.

The three below that are all YouTuber/Influencer collabs with makeup brands that have been pretty popular this year. From the left: BPerfect x Stacey Marie Carnival III Love Tahiti Palette is one to get if you know they love doing colourful and adventurous looks, middle: Carli Bybel Palette x Anastasia Beverly Hills and far right: BPerfect x Jah Makeup Artist Clientele Palette are both perfect for more simple looks or if they don't go wild with colour and are both from big brands so will be very much appreciated!

God, this really could have been its own post where I explained it a bit better but alas...

10. HAIR CURLERS/WAVER

Maybe they're not as into makeup and prefer hair, or maybe they just love both? Then a Beauty Works hair styler would be a boujee gift for them. So, for this you can do the standard version of the products (gold) or you can do the newer versions in the collab with Molly Mae (pink). It's up to you. These products are pricey but great quality. First is the hair curler (Professional styler) which is great if both you and they love their hair curly, and you can't go wrong with Molly Mae's signature bouncy curls. The second option is a new trend in hair his year, The Waver, which creates the mermaid waves that I've pictured Molly Mae wearing below (and yes boys they’re different than curls) and a great gift if they already have the curler. Top tip: is to get these lads while ASOS have 20% off because you're grabbing yourself a bargain or if you're really on a budget many brands do these products without the hefty price tag.

BONUS: GIFT ADVENT CALENDER

This year there is a major boom in the idea of gift advent calendars, so behind every door is a small gift instead of chocolate. Now what would be super adorable is to buy advent boxes online and fill them yourself with personalised gifts but luckily many brands have brought out their own versions! The best one I have saw so far this year is this PrettyLittleThing beauty calendar but it has been sold out for some time now! ASOS etc. are doing their own versions and there have even been adorable versions in the likes of HomeBargains and B&Ms where you can get candle or even alcohol versions.

Well, I hope this helped even a little bit! If you're really on the ball you'll have noticed I haven't included anything like the staple Primark pyjamas or everything seems catered towards girlfriends or 'for her' but not to worry I've many more versions planned, including 'for him', 'on a budget', and 'how to dress up your present'!

Happy (very early) Christmas!🎁🎄

[iamcinema]

IAC Reviews #19: Wishbone (2000)

Hey, is anyone still alive out there? I hope so.

Coming off of last year was a disaster, and well, we didn't enter 2021 on the highest of notes. I guess you could say I've been burned out and not having a ton of motivation to do a lot, even with how much I've been grinding on Letterboxd over the past few months. I think I'm ready to come back, and since there's a storm is brewing outside, let's make today a movie night...and boy, do I have a treat for you.

I think I've made it kind of apparent that I have a weakness for terrible, low-budget, trash fires. There's something oddly charming about them where they always find a way to lure me in, and given the scene on Letterboxd, there's a bunch of SOV masochists out there waiting to get their next fix. While digging around for material to cross off my lists on titles to find and add, I was reminded of a terrible, low-budget film that was shot in my hometown over 20 years ago. I'm full of fear for what's to come, and you should be too.

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Wishbone is a 2000 horror film directed by Timothy Gaer and co-created by Michael Fasciana, centering on a woman named Laurie who receives an unusual artifact from her eccentric aunt she acquired from a pawn dealer that causes those around her to disappear when they make wishes on it. Hmm, seems simple enough. Let's what we're in for, and I'm absolutely not ready because the IMDb page says this shit is over two hours long, despite a version on Youtube having it just a bit over 90 minutes. Let us pray.

Wishbone in One Gif:

This acting is might be the death of me, but I'm not sure what's going to be the catalyst that causes me to fall down the stairs and break my neck: the sound quality, the weird editing, or the music...oh, god what the fuck is the music doing? So much noise, noise noise!

Okay, so let's dig into this before I take too long of a break and I don't come back to this. I've already had to pause the movie a few times to catch my breath or just rewind and go back because there's a good amount that I keep missing because, apparently, the star of the film is the score and not Laurie. This is so, so slow. I've seen a lot of long horror movies, but at least with those, it feels like things are happening. Even Blood Lake had filler that did something to some degree, and with that, it was consistently bad. This movie doesn't even know what it wants to do. So, as a disclaimer, there's a good chance I'm probably missing some key details that I didn't hear because it seems that characterization isn't important if the music insists on talking over everyone.

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So, to date, this might be one of the worst horror movies (and movies in general) that I've ever seen and it might be one of the slowest things in the entire megaverse. This is over 90 minutes of, somehow, nothing and something happening simultaneously - if that makes any sense.

This takes its sweet ass time moving along and there's so little pay-off. The majority of the characters are either nameless or we aren't introduced to them in a way that matters enough for us to care about them. It's kind of like with Violent Shit and other low-budget slasher films where the majority of the characters serve no purpose but to be disposable. Next to the two main leads, Laurie and Joe, and maybe a few others, everyone is just forgettable and even then I couldn't honestly tell you anyone's name if it was explicitly brought up. IMDb isn't helpful either, and at this point it just makes me care even less. I'm not sure if my patience has been tested too much with this, but it's kind of sad that I'm more invested in seeing what the background characters are doing than Laurie and Joe - even though I can't really hear what the hell they're saying.

Yeah, I really can't move on without talking about the sound and the music. Why is it always the audio with these movies? This has an estimated budget of $100,000, or $154,779.43 today in August 2021. How do you have the ability to somehow not make this look like a potato for the most part, well for the day shots that is, but you don't have it in you to get a good mic and someone who knows how to mix and edit correctly? I would sort of understand if you spent the majority of the money on talent to cut corners, but this is just ridiculous. Did they use the cameras' built-in mics to catch the audio here?

I feel like I need to interrupt the movie constantly to tell them to speak up because if I turn up the volume, I'm just getting bombarded with this really weird soundtrack that doesn't fit. I shit you not, during one of the kill scenes, the music booming over it sounds like it was ripped from Kevin MacLeod's "lounge" library and then the reverse happens where ominous music is playing over a more touching scene - and that's not even a dig at Kevin as an artist. That's just how inappropriate and unfitting this editing is. The weird fucking thing about this specific kill scene is that it sounds like the audio is stacked, so there are two different instrumental tracks going on.

How do you fuck something as basic as tension up like that? The audio choices are so painfully inconsistent and it doesn't know what it wants to do. There are moments where you can hear the dialogue just fine, but then the music comes in out of nowhere to segway us into the next scene and it starts to muffle things out. If it isn't that, then the dialogue is just so soft that you'd think there was a pillow on the mic or we're hearing them from the opposite side of a sound-dampened room.

This is what I meant earlier when I said I apologize in advance if I miss anything crucial because I can't make out half of these conversations. So, I'm having to keep going back if I care enough or just having to pause and take breaks because there's only so much I can handle. This means that there's a good amount I'll blank on because I have to keep going back because I can't remember the majority of these no-named characters. Who the fuck are you people? Why am I supposed to care?

If I'm understanding the non-existent rules of the wishbone, you're connected to whoever dies in some way. So, why is any of this relevant to what's going on? If it's random, then it's another reason for me not to care just because some frat kids made a wish at some point. Again, who the hell are you and why am I supposed to lament over them? Why is there so much useless filler here? Did I mention that this is over 90 minutes long and there are *three* fucking party scenes? Party scenes are to Wishbone as ten-minute-long jetskiing and beer game scenes are to Blood Lake.

Oh, speaking of other shit that's annoying. Let's talk about general editing because the sound isn't the only thing that's a mess here.

I swear that almost every single scene in this ends with a fade-out/fade-in shot. Only one or two scenes come to mind where this doesn't happen, and the first time it did I thought my browser was freezing because it abruptly cut to black and then smash cuts to a party scene. I've never, ever seen a movie that abused this that much before and it's on par with something I would have seen made by a bunch of high school kids. So, when we have a moment where this doesn't happen and it plays out normally, it feels like a breath of fresh air. I'm sure this movie's run time could have been shaved down by at least a minute or two if this wasn't a problem, along with all the useless close-up shots that serve nothing to the plot.

It's such a waste of time. I'm so fucking tired. How was this movie's budget $100k? Did they spend most of it on renting the Scranton Police Department for a few shots or did it go towards their impromptu trip to Party City? I'm so tired and I don't care anymore.

Do you want to know what the real kicker is? With just barely twenty minutes left, the whole lore about the monkey's wishbone paw comes back and that's when Laurie and her friend Karen think something is weird. Isn't this whole realization trope that happens within the first or second act, not now with your Great Value brand version of the Dream Warriors?

Also, it's not specified how much time has gone by since the start, but it has to have been at least a week or two. It's incredibly weird how they paint the main characters and the unnamed background ones as such good friends that they don't think it's weird how almost all of them have disappeared - especially one girl who doesn't seem off-put that her boyfriend (or ex) disappeared after getting into an argument at one of the parties and none of his friends could reach him either at his own house.

The final showdown is an utter pain in the ass to get through because the conflict ends as abruptly as it starts and it's so unsatisfying. We get to see the face of our villain, I guess, and then more or less cut to our leads holding hands down the street set to the same looping lounge music we've been dealing with for over 90 damn minutes. Is everyone else who went with them dead? Did they live? Who cares! That's one thing the movie and I can agree on since we never see them again. We end on a shitty cliffhanger that's supposed to prepare us for a sequel, which thankfully never happened.

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And that was Wishbone. Holy fucking shit, I've never been so thankful for a movie to be over in my life. It's 11:07 PM as of tinkering with some minor revisions and I've been in purgatory with this for over five hours, and yet, it feels like an entire lifetime has gone by.

I've raved about how bad Blood Lake was with its incredibly bad pacing, but this is next level awful and a testament to bad filmmaking if I've ever seen it. I expect a lot of the things I complained about from super amateur filmmakers who are shooting on an actual shoestring budget, not people who had that much money to fuck around with. How did they have that kind of a budget, and the most they can give us is bad audio, Windows Movie Maker levels of basic editing, three wrap parties, and a few crumbs of gore that we could see?

This was physically painful to see and I'm in much worse shape having endured it than I would have been if I sat through something liked Boardinghouse, and that has a two-and-a-half-hour-long version tied to it. This is just a marvel and I mean that in a so-bad-it's-bad way, not like how SOV enthusiasts who love this stuff pine over. If I had to give one thing going for it, one single granule of gold that I enjoyed from this, it's the limited shots we get of the area so I could make a game out of seeing what local spots I recognized. If playing I Spy is the only way for someone to endure your movie, then I don't know what else to say.

Wishbone is a hot mess where shit's happening, but also nothing is happening at the same time. I wouldn't wish this on anyone. In fact, I wish this movie never existed or would die in the ether and never return to our mortal realm ever again. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go have a smoke and hope I don't get run over by a hearse tomorrow.

RATING: 0.5/10

[thedeadflag]

Christmas Kisses (WIP)

Okay, so here’s the first go of posting some WIPs from November and before. This was the festive fic I was working on for NaNoWriMo, with the incomplete sections cut away.

Hope you enjoy!

Raven Reyes had very little patience for unnecessary aggression in her friend group, especially when that aggression was just a smokescreen for something else. So to say that Clarke and Anya's ongoing abrasiveness was both exhausting and frustrating would be putting it lightly. She'd put up with it because Clarke was her best friend and Anya was growing to be a good friend as well, but it was time for it all to come to an end.

After a week of planning with Niylah and Lexa, she was sure that the latter's Christmas party would be the end of it. For better or worse, the conflict would be over for good. With a little extra help from Lincoln, Octavia, and everyone's favourite teenager Aden, she had high hopes that it would end well, even if it was sure to be a bit rocky.

Okay, pretty damn rocky.

She just had to hope that what her instincts were telling her was true. Everything was riding on that. Well, that, her tech, and the hope that Lexa would be able to handle any fallout from it all.

There was little that Anya hated more than winter. The bitter cold, the ridiculous piles of snow that would fall, the terrible driving conditions, the relentless holiday music that would seem to follow her everywhere she went, the depressingly few hours of sunlight...it was all miserable.

So maybe she just wasn't feeling it, standing in the corner of the living room at Lexa's Christmas party. If her favourite person in the world couldn't fully cheer her up in the middle of winter, she wasn't sure what could. Of course, the presence of one Clarke Griffin certainly didn't help anything, Anya's eyes turning to focus on a random wreath on the wall as the other blonde went to pull Lexa into a kiss.

She wasn't jealous, per se. Lexa was her best friend, and if she found happiness with Clarke Griffin, then that was that. Lexa's happiness was far more important than any crush or one-sided romantic love she'd been harboring, which was why Lexa and Clarke were together in the first place. Anya was a grown woman, she could handle her own feelings, and take responsibility for them. She wouldn't let them disrupt Lexa's life for even a fraction of a second.

Besides, as frustrating and grating as Clarke could be to her at times, the woman was radiant, was talented and passionate, wonderfully kind to most people who weren't Anya, and could always find a way to get Lexa smiling. Very importantly, despite the stormy emotions Anya seemed to bring out in the woman, Clarke never openly pressured Lexa to stop spending time with her, never gave Lexa ultimatums or tried to control Lexa or cut Anya off from her best friend, so that was vital and good. Add to that how Lexa clearly appreciated Clarke's curves, something Anya did not have in abundance like Griffin did, and there was just no competition. Ultimately, she could hardly blame Lexa for spending most of her time with her girlfriend. That was, after all, what girlfriends did.

Again, Anya could deal with her feelings. Any loneliness was her own responsibility, and any sense of abandonment was foolish and certainly not Lexa's fault, or Clarke's for that matter.

It just didn't make any of it easier to deal with. Winter, Clarke Griffin, Christmas, it all drained her so easily. Knowing she'd just have to put up with it, Anya made her way into the kitchen and poured herself some more apple cider, not wanting to get drunk tonight, or at least not while she was still at the party.

Maybe when I'm back home...I don't work tomorrow, so I could afford to have a solid hangover... She mused to herself as she turned and made her way back to the living room, not really paying attention to the people around her until the sound of jingling bells sounded above her, robbing the majority of her patience with it.

Raven had installed these absurd mistletoe sensors above every entrance or doorframe that would sound out when two people crossed under them at the same time. Honestly, Anya wouldn't put it past Raven to have a camera recording a set period of time from when the alarm sounded, to make sure everyone complied afterward. Why Lexa had approved them was an utter mystery to her, but when Anya turned her head and saw the other person, she had a feeling that 2017 really was the worst year ever, Clarke Griffin glaring back at her and looking entirely apprehensive.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Anya muttered in a quiet breath, eyes wincing shut as she tried to control the annoyance brewing inside of her at her atrocious luck.

"Don't blame me, you're literally the last person in this party that I'd kiss if I had a choice, but it's Lexa's house rule. All she wanted for Christmas was this damn party, so...whatever." Clarke shot back angrily, somehow having caught her words despite the loud rendition of 'Jingle-Bell Rock' playing in the background.

Anya shook her head in disdain, but knew that disappointing Lexa was not an option. Begrudgingly, she leaned forward, brushing her lips against Clarke's for a fraction of a second, applying only the tiniest bit of pressure before storming back off to her corner in the living room, needing some time to let her frustration with the situation flow out of her.

The softness of those lips definitely didn't haunt her thoughts for the next ten minutes.

Peaches. Of course Anya tasted like peaches. Anya had to taste like her favourite fruit; not blackberries, or dragon fruit, but goddamn peaches.

Clarke swiped her tongue across her lips, wondering why the hell Anya layered her lip gloss on so damn heavily, trying to ignore how the tiniest shred of tanginess had her wanting more. Not of Anya, certainly, but if she could find out the brand of lip gloss, she'd maybe be a little happy.

Maybe that would make the night a lot better than it had been. Lexa hosted a Christmas party every year, and so many old friends would come by that her girlfriend hadn't seen in forever, leaving her with precious little alone time with Lexa.

It wasn't necessarily bad, because all the guests made Lexa happy, and that was all that really mattered, but it made it hard for Clarke to stand still and hover, so she'd wander the house instead. She'd already been made to kiss Octavia and Bellamy under the mistletoe, and she kind of really thought that would have been the worst of it until her luck had run dry with Anya.

Truth be told, she couldn't hate Anya. At least, not entirely. Anya had watched out for Lexa, growing up. Anya kept Lexa safe from bullies during her awkward years, she'd been there to listen to and comfort Lexa when her parents were always away. She'd orchestrated an elaborate bit of social manipulation among their high school's major players prior to Lexa coming out, all in order to protect Lexa and make sure no one would consider hurting her. When Lexa needed start-up money for her business, Anya was there with her own money, and plenty of investor friends, to make it an easier process.

So she couldn't hate Anya, not when the woman loved and supported Lexa so intensely, even if that did make Clarke feel a little insecure, being a relative newcomer in Lexa's life. And it didn't help that Anya was usually so coolly polite to her, or that Anya and Lexa always had all morning on Sundays to themselves for some 'BFF' time.

Of course, those long hours with Anya made Lexa happy, so it didn't matter how she felt about it, especially since she was above jealousy or anything so petty as that. It's just that it would be nice to have a full weekend alone with her girlfriend sometimes, which Anya made impossible, even if she hadn’t really brought that issue up before.

Sometimes it had her wondering how she could compete, really. Sure, her logical mind told her that Lexa had chosen her, that Lexa was with her, that they were girlfriends. Still, Lexa and Anya knew each other from birth, had a life-long bond that was unbreakable, and Anya was so often her best self around Lexa, leaving most of her standoffish and cool behaviour when she was alone with Clarke. And as much as she might not like to admit it, Anya was absolutely stunning. After Lexa, Anya was still probably in the top five most beautiful people she'd ever met. Like, the woman could make anything look amazing, and turn anywhere into a damned catwalk, and Clarke wasn't sure that if Anya stepped on her face that she wouldn't do something embarrassing like moan or thank her.

Meanwhile, she had a tiny bit of a tummy, and the stress from the last six months of work had added a few pounds. Not that Clarke didn't appreciate and love her curves and softness, but she knew the kind of women Lexa trended towards. She'd met Lexa's exes; two of them immensely-toned soccer players, one of them a p90x junkie working on Wall St, and the other one was a stunt double that had biceps as big as Clarke's thighs.

To say she was an outlier, and Anya would be a regression towards the mean, would be entirely accurate.

So maybe there was a tiny bit of insecurity she had to deal with, but that was probably just because Anya looked good enough to eat, and apparently tasted equally delicious. If Lexa got a taste, she wasn't sure what would even happen.

"Clarke?" Aden's voice pulled Clarke from her thoughts to the boy standing politely nearby. "Lexa said you wouldn't mind doing a quick portrait of me and my girlfriend? Only if it's not any trouble."

Clarke knew that all her art stuff she kept at Lexa's was in the garage; definitely enough for a pencil or graphite portrait. Paint, she couldn't be sure. "It's not. Why don't you two set up in the recliner? I'll be back in a jiffy."

At Aden's nod, Clarke made her way through the living room and into the kitchen, knowing the garage was just around the corner. She was just nearing the doorway when someone must have tripped and pushed her accidentally, sending her reeling towards the doorframe.

Just as she was losing her balance completely in her regrettably steep heels, someone turned the corner into the kitchen just in time for her to collide into them, strong arms swiftly wrapping around her as they fell against the edge of the doorframe, jingle-bells sounding above them.

"Again?"

Clarke had been a half second away from apologizing and thanking the stranger for catching her, but the sound of Anya's voice, all saturated with disbelief and weariness, quickly had Clarke changing her tune.

"Don't blame me, someone shoved me at the doorway. Find the nearest plastered person and give them that glare, I don't deserve it." Clarke argued pre-emptively, jaw setting to the side and she stared up at Anya expectantly, the other woman thankfully helping Clarke back to her feet and stability. It was a little odd that the woman's arms hadn't left her waist, but Clarke was still teetering on her heels a bit, her buzz from earlier not cooperating with her shoes. "Well, at least you're not a completely heinous bitch."

"Oh, no? I suppose I still have something to strive for then." Anya shot back with a healthy heaping of sarcasm and a roll of her eyes. "Let's just get this over with."

It wasn't all that much different from the previous time, Anya's head leaning forward just enough for those aggravatingly peachy lips to graze her own. However, there was maybe a tiny bit more pressure this time around, Anya's lips lingering a fraction longer before the woman was storming off through the kitchen, leaving Clarke to her task again.

But as she moved through the house and into the garage, she could feel it. It'd been maybe ten or twelve minutes from the previous kiss, but she could feel the gloss on her lips. For whatever reason, Anya was determined to be wearing something tasty in case she got caught with someone under the mistletoe.

Or, maybe I'm just being paranoid...

It took a little longer than the few seconds expected to find her materials, not usually having two vehicles in the garage, Lexa having needed to move her things around a bit to fit both inside.

Still, she managed to find her art kit with all her pencils and pastels and graphite after a brief minute or so of searching. A few seconds later she had her art pad to match, and a head full of hope that she could give Aden and his girlfriend something cute for Christmas.

Clarke opened the garage door, only to bump straight into Anya, the goddamned sound of jingle-bells resonating through the space again. Clarke glared up at the device and swore she saw a camera. She'd have to interrogate Raven about it later.

"God damnit, what the hell is wrong with you? Are you stalking me?!" Clarke yelled, glaring down her girlfriend's best friend as Anya set a cooler down onto the ground and stepped deep into her personal space.

"Don't flatter yourself, princess. You know as well as I do that I was given the duty of shuttling the alcohol between the garage and kitchen, since I'm not drinking tonight. What the hell are you doing here?" Anya demanded, the venom in her voice coming off as an accusation, as if she'd planned this.

Clarke shoved Anya away, the woman colliding against the opposite side of the doorframe with a wince and the slightest of gasps. "Fuck you! Aden wanted a portrait drawn up, and my art supplies are all out here. Like I'd ever lurk around corners trying to lure you into a mockery of a kiss."

"Just stay away from me after this." Anya grit out, closing the distance, hand knitting in her hair as she was pulled closer, enough for the other woman's lips to press firmly against hers for a half second.

Clarke was too busy being dumbstruck by the presence of more damned lip gloss to do much of anything as Anya pushed past her and into the garage, seeking out the treasure trove of booze all the partygoers had brought with them. She held back a few choice words about the woman's persistence with the damn lip gloss, knowing it'd only give Anya more questions, and lead to more confrontations.

She shook her head and stormed off to the living room, the sight of Aden and his girlfriend immediately pushing any memory of Anya to the back of her mind. "Alright, let's do this. You two get comfy, okay?" Clarke asked them as she dragged a footrest over and sat on it.

That solace only lasted a minute, her tongue sweeping across her lip by habit as she sketched, dragging the tasty lip gloss with it. Clarke took a few seconds, closing her eyes, and tried to just empty her mind of the annoying woman she inexplicably kept running into, as well as the sort of delightful pressure of her lips the last time around.

It was still early in the night. She hoped her run of bad luck wouldn't continue much longer.

Anya let out a loud huff after her sixth trip to the garage to restock the tiny alcohol bucket. Lexa didn't want too much at the ready, so it kept running out pretty quickly, meaning she'd have to go get more. Which, of course, meant being extra cautious in case someone was about to run into her under another goddamn mistletoe.

Not that she hated kissing. Far from it, really, she just felt awkward kissing friends, and wanted to avoid kissing non-friends, and the whole thing made her feel horrible when she was set up to kiss someone who was partnered up.

Kissing Clarke Griffin three times already tonight was hopefully an anomaly she would avoid for the rest of the night, not just to spare herself the guilt of encroaching on Lexa’s relationship, but to spare her self-esteem. Honestly, if she hadn't been depressed enough before, Clarke certainly knew where to pick her shots, making her out to be some sort of gross creature. The woman would never initiate, never even apply the slightest pressure into the kiss, never even touch her unless it was to shove her away in repulsion.

Most people's remarks she could brush off with ease, but it was harder when those people meant something to Lexa. And Lexa loved Clarke, so what did it say about her that Clarke thought she was a heinous bitch, too gross and reprehensible to be anything but a last choice?

Maybe if the thoughts and words and actions weren't sincere, maybe if it was just a performance, Anya would be fine with it in some contexts far enough distanced from reality. It wasn't as if she hadn't dipped her toes into the occasional bit of kink and BDSM, after all, but this was actual hatred, this was someone who actually felt okay and righteous in demeaning her.

"Why so glum?" Lincoln asked, suddenly appearing at her side, shooting her one of those annoying inquisitive stares that made it a hundred percent clear that he was worried and determined to get to the bottom of it.

Anya shook her head, hoping to shake off the emotions written on her face as well. "Not glum. Tired. Been a long day."

"I don't buy that for a second." Lincoln noted casually, leaning up against the counter beside her. "What's up? Not enjoying the party?"

"It's packed. It's loud. This place is a mistletoe minefield. People keep asking me to find things for them. Octavia won't stop requesting Jingle-Bell Rock. Take your pick." Anya answered calmly, trying to achieve some level of zen to throw him off her scent, which her growing headache was making difficult.

No such luck. "Yeah, the mistletoe stuff's a bit much, but it's been funny. A lot of awkward kisses." Lincoln said, pinning down her real issue easily, not that he wouldn't have had she not mentioned it. He had a strangely accurate intuition. "Don't feel guilty if you got caught under it with someone's partner, Anya. I know you, but you have to let that go. It's all in good fun, it's not any kind of infidelity."

And okay, maybe she did find mistletoe annoying for that, even if she wasn't sure she'd go as far as calling it infidelity unless there was intent. It wasn't the real issue at hand, though. "I know, Lincoln. It just hasn't been good to me tonight."

Lincoln looked like he was about to respond when suddenly Octavia broke into her field of vision, tugging hard at her boyfriend's arm. "Lincoln! We need you in the living room!" Octavia yelled over the holiday music, giving him another tug.

He looked at her helplessly, clearly not thinking it was good to go. All Anya could offer was a roll of her eyes and a shooing motion with her hands, letting him know she was good with it, not that he didn't peek over his shoulder at her worriedly as Octavia ushered him away.

Lincoln really was a worrywart, but he meant well.

Her job done for the moment, Anya cautiously made her way out of the kitchen and to the small half-bath on the main floor to just catch some breathing room and clear her head a bit.

Anya opened her bag, redoing where her makeup had worn off, figuring it was as good as war paint out there, given the situation. Once she was satisfied, she began tossing all her tools and products back into her bag, only to hear a rapid knock at the door just as she clamped her bag closed and slung it over her shoulder.

Not wanting to leave some drunk person to vomit or piss out in the halls of her best friend’s home, Anya rushed to the door and swung it open, pushing past the person who immediately went to slip in. The bell sound jingled again above them from the mistletoe hanging just inside the room, but as soon as Anya saw who it was, she wasn't about to wait. She could disappoint Lexa this one time. Just this once, given Clarke had done so already.

"Anya, get back here, I need to pee!" Clarke yelled after her, stilling her halfway down the hall.

"Then by all means, Clarke, don't let me stop you." Anya spoke, staring over her shoulder at the other blonde, who was clearly both struggling physically and furious.

In need of something to wash the sour experience from her mouth, Anya found her way into the kitchen, pouring herself some apple cider and heating it up in the microwave since the main jug had long gone cool. Thankfully, some sort of Christmas karaoke was going on in the living room leaving the kitchen empty.

Anya checked her watch and groaned, knowing she had a fair bit of time left until the party would disperse.

Eventually, the microwave dinged, and she pulled out her steaming cup of cider just as Clarke stormed into the kitchen.

"You!" Clarke hissed, stomping over to her and deep into her personal space. "You will not ruin any of this for her!"

Anya honestly couldn't help but let out a sharp laugh at Clarke's gall. "I figured with your behaviour that I'd do you a kindness. Spread the blame around a little so she could put me in the proverbial doghouse instead." Anya noted calmly as she strolled past Clarke, hoping the tiny sun room at the back of the house was free.

"Are you kidding me?" Clarke let out with an annoyed grunt, marching after her. It was the sharp tug at her arm as she left the kitchen that had Anya spinning backward, hot cider splashing over her chest as she braced herself against the doorframe just in time not to stumble back into Clarke.

The sound of bells probably filled the air, but all Anya could hear was the blood thrumming through the veins at her temple like a battle drum as she controlled her reaction, not wanting to show pain in front of her apparent adversary. If Clarke was so insistent, then she'd take the searing pain across her neck and chest for now and be done with it. "Fine, Clarke. Do your worst."

"That's...I didn't mean...I don't want this any more than you do, but Lexa told us all the rules for the mistletoe. This is her day. This is her gift." Clarke insisted, as if Anya actually needed the reminder.

"I know, Clarke. I'm not stopping you." Anya growled, shaking her arm free from Clarke, leaving them inches apart, making sure that Clarke would have to put in all the effort needed, that she'd have to start from scratch.

Clarke glared at her, though that glare flickered after a few seconds passed, replaced with growing confusion. "Then let's get it over with."

"Yes, let's." Anya agreed, holding Clarke's hard stare, not moving a goddamn inch.

The other woman lingered, waiting, and let out a frustrated sigh after a few more uneventful seconds passed. "What are you waiting for?"

"You." Anya stated flatly, rolling her eyes at Clarke's immediate confusion. "Clarke, you've made it abundantly clear that I'm the last person you'd ever want to kiss out of anyone here, but I'm not going to do all the work. Each time, I initiated, I kissed, you just stood there and took it. I don't call that participation, and it's actually very uncomfortable for me, so unless you want to keep eating your words, you can buck up and get it done. Even a cheek kiss would suffice."

Clarke recoiled at the accusation, anger flashing in her eyes. "Excuse me, but maybe I'm not a fan of kissing someone like you!"

"And you think I want to kiss someone who thinks I'm heinous and disgusting?" Anya fired back, jaw setting to the side when Clarke just laughed.

"So this is all about your ego?" The woman asked with a cold grin. "Actually, of course it is. Why would I expect anything else?"

Unnerved by the strange accusation, given her ego had never really been anything worth noting, Anya leaned back against the doorframe, arms crossing her chest. "This is about you treating me like I'm some leper, like you're going to catch something from me. Grow up...if you can kiss Bellamy and still manage to treat him like a human being after he practically stalked you for four months, I'd think you could do the same for me, given I've never done anything to you."

Clarke's jaw dropped, eyes narrowing as the woman tilted her head to the side slightly. "You've never liked me."

"Jesus Christ." Anya let out with a sigh, shaking her head at Clarke's obliviousness. "You frustrate and annoy me to no end. You find subtle ways to complain about any time Lexa and I spend together when we're best friends. Your taste in music is insufferable, you put pineapple on your pizza, and you leave dirty dishes in Lexa's sink far too often for my comfort. And sometimes, yes, I don't like you...sometimes. Like now. But you are still a good person, Clarke. Wonderful, even, sometimes. Lexa would never love you if you weren't, and I never would have advised her on your first few dates if I didn't wholeheartedly approve of you. So get your head out of your ass for once in your damn life."

By the end of her rant, she was breathing a little heavily, and maybe the pain from the burn had forced some moisture to her eyes, but she stood her ground, waiting as Clarke's face twisted, all that hostility falling away to confusion and something else that Anya might have tentatively decided was regret if she wasn't so cynical.

"Really?" Clarke eventually let out, voice thick and low, sapphire eyes staring at her with an expression that she couldn't quite translate.

"Clarke, focus. You're the one who forced the kissing issue. Can we just do this?" Anya asked, exasperated and really in need of changing out of her top and to put something cool over her stinging skin.

Thankfully, the other blonde nodded, biting her lip before gently tugging at Anya's arms. Anya let them drop to her side as Clarke peered into her eyes, as if she was looking for something. What it was, Anya couldn't say as Clarke brought a hand up, cupping her face, thumb stroking her cheek, fingertips massaging the upper reaches of her neck, stealing away any wonder at what the woman might have seen.

Clarke's lips brushed against hers with achingly fleeting pressure once, twice, three times before finally meeting hers in an embrace that had her body reeling. If not for Clarke's other hand cupping her elbow, she wasn't sure how well her balance might have held up as soft curves pressed up against her, the hand at her cheek gliding back to comb through her hair and smooth down her neck with delicious pressure before Clarke stepped away.

Which would have felt wonderful in most other circumstances if Clarke hadn't run her hand across the newly burned skin as she stepped away, forcing out a regrettable hiss of pain.

"Anya, what's...oh my god, is your skin normally that red?" Clarke asked with growing panic. "Shit, of course it's not, come on, there's a first aid kit in the bathroom down the hall."

She quickly found herself being tugged out of the kitchen by the hand, Clarke leading her down the hall to the bathroom. Getting her burn treated, as minor as it might be, was probably a good thing, but her mind might have still been a little stuck on that kiss.

Still, she managed to push that to the back of her mind as they entered the washroom in single file, her long years of discipline more than capable of tamping down on any thoughts or feelings for now.

"How in the heck did you burn yourself, anyways?" Clarke asked as she gently pressed a cool cloth to the burned area, leaning in close enough to where she could definitely make out the woman's rosy raspberry-vanilla aroma. Before, in the haze of having to deal with another run-in with Anya, or in the frustration of being caught under the mistletoe again in general, the scent hadn't registered, but it was very pleasant and oddly fitting.

"Well, I guess it was shortly after I pulled my cup of apple cider from the microwave. I was leaving the kitchen with it, and someone tugged really hard at my arm, and it went spilling all over me." Anya answered, shooting Clarke a wry smile, probably to try and play it off like she didn't blame her, that it was all fine.

Clarke didn't embrace that message, lips curling into a deep frown as she pulled the cloth away to get some fresh cool water in it. "I'm so sorry, I was upset, and I didn't even see you holding the...wait, that mug?" Clarke asked in disbelief, just now noticing Anya was still holding her old Wonder Woman-branded mug in her hand.

"It's tasty cider. My favourite homemade recipe." Anya noted flatly, as if it was offensive to think the woman would have put it down.

"And it's been in your hand the whole time?" Clarke asked, needing some clarification, her pride riding on the answer a little bit.

"Well, yes. I went to the kitchen for a drink, so ever since then." Anya answered slowly, eyes narrowing in confusion as Clarke let out a burst of air, feeling like she'd just had the wind knocked out of her.

Honestly, that Anya could hold a mug of cider steady while being kissed? Said a lot about the quality of it. "I must be losing my touch. Shit. I thought that was a decent kiss."

"It was surprisingly great, actually. I can multi-task, Clarke." Anya shot back, appearing a little amused for whatever reason. Clarke halfway hoped Anya wasn't teasing her and had been truthful.

"Not great enough for you to drop your cup. And surprisingly? Did you think I'd be a bad kisser?" Clarke asked quickly, slightly wringing out the wet washcloth before putting it back on the burned area, taking some comfort in Anya's happy hum.

"I'd only asked you to treat me like I wasn't diseased. I didn't expect that. And no, I did everything I could to hold onto my cup, because if I dropped it, it would have broken, and I'd have to clean and sweep it up, and I would have broken something that wasn’t mine to break. Give yourself some credit that it wasn't easy at all for me, and you did get rid of my headache for a minute or two. Though I have to ask...why four kisses?" Anya clarified, the answers maybe not soothing her wounded pride entirely, even if it did feel better to hear Anya enjoyed it.

Clarke offered a simple shrug, knowing the answer was easy. "You called me out. I didn't kiss back the other times, meaning it didn't count. So I gave you three to make up for those ones, and the fourth for the mistletoe we were under at the time." She explained, earning a slow, thoughtful nod from the other woman. "You really helped Lexa with our first few dates?"

Anya's airy laughter caught her off guard, the sound both unfamiliar and appealing, a very potent reminder that she hadn't really spent a lot of time around Anya in the past seven months she and Lexa had been dating. "She was a wreck. Adorable, but a wreck. The first day she called me about you writing your phone number on the receipt, she was midway through a panic attack, rambling at length about the beautiful woman who'd buy a mocha latte and a cherry turnover." Anya said, eyes slipping shut as she smiled brightly. "Honestly, by the end of the call, I thought I'd gotten her courage up enough for her to call you. It'd been a two hour long phone-call."

Clarke's jaw dropped at the last detail. "You're kidding. She never talks that long."

Anya leveled her with a knowing stare. "About you? Of course she does. Why do you think our Sunday mornings run so long?" Anya asked, brow furrowing when Clarke let out a gasp, as if she could be so unaware of how her words were literally blowing her mind. All this time, she'd been envious, perhaps jealous, especially with how Lexa would talk at length about Anya, but hearing Anya laugh and smile about Lexa rambling adorably about her? She halfway wanted to rush out and throw Lexa into bed, even while her other half wanted to stay exactly where she was and hear more from Anya. "Anyways, so I go to bed expecting her to tell me the good news the next day at lunch. But instead, she doesn't show, and I get another call that evening. Another hour and a half. Rinse and repeat, basically, for the next six days until I finally dragged her into her bedroom, called you on her phone, and forced the issue. So yeah, I've been there the whole time. You won me over forty minutes into the first call, of course I armchair quarterbacked the first few dates. She was a mess."

Clarke was laughing by the end of Anya's spiel, finding it hard to believe her loving and relatively cool-headed girlfriend could ever be so fumbling. "She was not a mess. She was so calm and sweet and wonderful on those dates."

"Clarke, she started crying during that first phone call to me because she was imagining you two kissing each other goodnight. I love Lexa, but she only got more endearingly amusing from there on out. It took a lot of work to prepare her." Anya countered, wiping tears of laughter from her eyes as Clarke just gaped. It did make sense, though, since Lexa had definitely let a few tears fall when she'd kissed her goodnight on the first date.

Honestly, it only endeared her to Lexa more, even if that all raised a few pressing questions about Anya.

"I appreciate it, really. But...I have to ask..." Clarke started, watching Anya's humour vanish into a serious expression, leaving her wondering if Anya might have been psychic or something. Still, she had to know. "You're clearly carrying a torch for Lexa. Like...I don't blame you...and I will say that until now, I've actually been intimidated by that, by what you two have. That's...that's why I've been so hostile around you, I guess. But...I guess my question is...why didn't you try? You had every opportunity."

Anya's defeated sigh and tired eyes told Clarke more than enough, but when the words came, she felt appreciative that she could at least fill in all the blanks. "Lexa will never want me as a lover more than she needs me purely as a friend. It's that simple. I've always looked out for her, I've been her confidant, her 'mom friend'...you have to understand, her parents already regretted her when she came out as trans. When she came out as a lesbian, it was just her, alone. I was all she had for a time, so I never really had a chance to be that to her. I've always been her anchor. I still am, and I love her for it, and I don't regret it. I just know that asking her to love me the way she loves you would put what we have at risk, and she wouldn't ever risk it, so I won't ever ask her to." Anya explained at length, sniffling slightly as she nodded to herself and shot Clarke a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.

That wasn't the look of someone with much hope, or recent heartbreak. She recognized it from her mom's eyes whenever she'd talk about dad. Like an old, nagging shrapnel wound from the heartbreak that wouldn't ever really go away, and couldn't ever really get better on its own. That even if someone came by to piece it back together, some pieces just weren't able to be removed due to the risk. Some pieces would always hurt.

"I'll give her away at her wedding, and you'll make her happy 'til death do you part. And then you'll be her anchor, and I'll...I'll figure it out on my end of things. Because she'll be happy, and you'll be happy, and I'll keep being her best friend, and hopefully I'll find someone to call home, too." Anya continued with a voice that made at an attempt at being reassuring even as it was undermined by the thick unstable emotion her words trembled with. Anya tilted her head back as tears rolled down her temples, letting out a wistful sigh that had Clarke's heart feel like it was about to split. "Maybe someone who won't order pineapple on her pizza. That's the dream, I suppose."

It was about as ham-handed an attempt to lighten the atmosphere and distract from a person's overwhelming emotions as Clarke had ever witnessed, but she let it happen, laughing along with Anya, knowing the woman needed it, needed someone to share the moment with, if just for a little bit. And for someone as selfless and loving as Anya, Clarke was more than happy to do that, finding herself surprisingly partway wishing she could be that person for Anya if it didn't mean giving up Lexa or her beloved pepperoni-pineapple pizza.

She'd been so wrong about the woman. Anya had been best friends with Lexa for ages, so of course she'd keep Clarke on her toes and make sure she didn't grow complacent, make sure she kept treating Lexa as she should. Of course she'd play the part of the hard to win-over friend to see if Lexa was worth it to her, to see if any toxic issues like jealousy and insecurity would rule her instead of her love for and trust of Lexa. Maybe she hadn't passed with flying colours, but Anya still gave her a pass. Still approved of her.

"I'm so sorry." Clarke spoke as the laughter died down, letting Anya's exhaustion rise to the surface. The other woman's mouth opened to speak, but Clarke was faster. "Please, just...I'm sorry. For treating you like I did, for making you think I thought less of you. You're...kind of incredible. The complete package, and it wasn't that I was disgusted with you before, I just...you're really intimidatingly beautiful, and your lip-gloss is the tastiest thing ever, and I felt frustrated and guilty that you were making it hard for me. That I was supposed to see you as an enemy of sorts, and I still wanted to kiss you."

Clarke took a deep breath, trying not to feel shaken or excited by the sheer intensity of Anya's soft gaze. "So just...don't lose hope. Because if I could clone myself, I'm pretty sure my clone would swear off pineapple if it meant being lucky enough to have a shot at dating someone like you. There are women out there who're worthy of you, and if they wouldn't jump at the chance to be with you, they'd be idiots."

Anya just shook her head and laughed. "Your clone absolutely would not give up pineapple on pizza, we both know that. And I appreciate the sentiment but...it's not like I've been hung up over Lexa all my life and swore off romance with others entirely. I've been trying to date for the past four and a half years. I just have to hope someone will eventually want me enough. I'm sure it'll happen someday, I don't need any pity just because I haven't found the right one yet."

Clarke ran through her mental list of single friends, pairing each up with Anya and feeling a growing sense of revulsion at each imagined scenario. The thought of a double date with her and Lexa alongside Anya and Raven shouldn't have had Kill Bill sirens blaring in her head, and it certainly shouldn't have had her wanting to take hold of Anya, or dishing out some more amorous action.

She shook her head and took a breath to calm herself, only to still at the strange quiet. There was supposed to be karaoke. Clarke was suddenly unaware when the music had stopped. "We've been gone a while...weird that no one's checked up on us."

Anya opened her mouth to speak and promptly closed it, lower lip sticking out in a confused pout as she tilted her head, the gears clearly whirring in her head. "That is weird. I've been here for over two hours, and there was always someone coming by to talk to me or bump into me every five minutes. It was weird."

Clarke's eyes went wide at Anya's account. "Yeah, you know...the only time I ever really got any uninterrupted time was when I bumped into you. Like, even when I was drawing Aden, people were always coming up to me, asking me to get them stuff from around the house."

Anya rolled her eyes. "Ugh, tell me about it. I was given the job of ferrying booze from the garage to the kitchen, and Lexa's had me heading up and downstairs, going on veritable scavenger hunts whenever Octavia wasn't asking for my help searching for a lost earring, or something. Even when I escaped to the sunroom, I couldn't get a moment of peace, someone always tracked me down within a few minutes."

"Come to mention it, I really couldn't get much time with Lexa tonight. Whenever I could, she was always asking me favors, for me to go grab something, or help someone with something." Clarke noted slowly, some confusing pieces starting to fall into place. "I didn't really notice anyone else that was always on the go except you, really. Sometimes Raven and O and Lincoln, but I'd only really catch them moving around to come check on me, or go talk to you."

Anya's eyes narrowed in suspicion momentarily before the other blonde shook her head, smoothing out her expression. "It's a bit much to think up conspiracy theories."

Clarke shifted her gaze to the mistletoe hanging under the door frame's crown molding for a brief moment before shooting Anya an expectant stare. "Do you really believe Raven installed cameras just to catch a clip of Monty and Miller kissing?" She asked, feeling a shred of victory at how Anya's face scrunched up in clear bewilderment.

"Was that why she...no, that can't be right. She's caught video of those two on her phone before, I remember Lincoln talking about it a month or two ago. She wouldn't go all out with cameras for something like that." Anya answered, the revelation coming as a surprise, given how the two tended to seriously shy away from PDAs. "But...oh...oh. Fuck me." Anya let out with a jagged tone, clearly coming to some frustrating realization.

Clarke wanted to be happy she came to a disturbing conclusion not a few seconds later, but the whole conspiracy theory was getting a bit strange. "We were the only ones running around the house. Way more likely to run into people and trigger the mistletoe."

"More likely to run into each other." Anya added, frowning deeply as she let out a heavy breath. "Clarke, you...you should probably go find Lexa. Talk to her. See what's up, because this...I'm not sure what's going on, and I think it'd be dangerous for me to come to any conclusions."

Clarke nodded, knowing that was probably for the best. She had more than enough ways of getting answers. Still, she had a few things she had to do first, bringing the cloth back under a stream of cool water and wringing it out, needing to make sure Anya's burn was taken care of as she re-covered the sensitive area. Second, she searched around before sticking her hand in Anya's left pocket of her jeans, pulling out her lip gloss.

"First things first." She murmured, ignoring Anya's confused pout as she took hold of the woman's jaw and applied the gloss to her lower lip. Anya's eyes narrowed in confusion, but she rolled her lips together to spread it around.

"O...kay?" Anya asked with a single breathless laugh, Clarke just then noticing how tense the woman's body was, how shallow Anya's breathing was, how much her eyes were blown.

Well...I guess that answers that... She mused to herself as she pulled Anya into a kiss, setting a languid pace as she stroked the beautiful woman's face. She couldn't help but love the peachy taste, adoring how utterly responsive Anya was to each shift in angle, each change in pressure, feeling a deep seated thrill at the tiny mewl that left Anya's throat as she pulled away.

"If they wanted us to kiss, they can't be mad if we do, or if we like it." Clarke insisted, holding Anya's wide-eyed soft gaze, heart thrumming with all the courage and confidence she could want after that kiss. "You go rest up your head, maybe take some ibuprofen, okay? I'll find you when I have answers."

Entirely determined, Clarke spun on her heel and marched out of the bathroom in search of her girlfriend and answers.

Okay, so that was the first half or so of this festive little Clarke/Anya/Lexa ficlet. The Lexa POV section after this has given me a lot of issues, so it’s been in repair and I might just scrap it and avoid a Lexa POV altogether going forward. I wanted to see if I could manage it, and I could to a degree but it was rough and kinda stilted/wooden, and I wanted better than that. Still gonna be clexanya.