#I mean I don’t blame her it’s just Boston and New England like | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hauntedjpegcollection · 8 months

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elbows off

wc: 2741 au: exorcist au ch: lark, xavier, benji, tino

Gravel crunches underneath the car tires as it pulls into the rest stop diner parking lot—Xavier can tell just from a glance it’s the shitty kind. Sticky floors, tired waitress that refills acid black coffee without needing to be asked, a radio that weakly plays all the country hits and Christian rock exclusives. Back drop for a crime thriller, as abandoned as the surrounding area is. There’s trees on all sides, one road that just keeps going and going and going into a darkness that feels opaque and physical. A solitary flood light winks in the night, more illuminated than the hidden moon behind fat, gray clouds.

“Wicked fuckin’ place,” Xavier whispers, leaning forward with his hands spread over the dashboard. The inside reminds him of a lonesome painting, yellow washed with a faint blinking neon pink sign above it. There is only one other car in the lot and there is only one person inside as well.

“I love that about you,” Lark replies in a quiet voice. He cuts the engine, pockets the keys.

“Boston accent?”

“You appreciate everything like it’s something special.”

There is a pause not altogether awkward, but not nearly as comfortable as silences had once been between the two men. Xavier’s hands slowly slide away from the dashboard and land on his thighs. He’s in denim and a plaid button up that has holes at the elbows. It’s cold outside, but he doesn’t have a jacket yet. He’s tired from the drive even though he’d just been a passenger the entire time. He’s tired from the crying that came before the drive and the phone call to his parents that had made the crying happen in the first place—and he’s tired mostly because he’s not sure he’s doing the right thing anymore.

Or what the right thing even is.

But Lark leans over and slings an arm around his shoulder. His tattooed hand fists into rust colored hair and shakes. The wobbling of Xavier’s head blooms dizziness that makes the world feel momentarily surreal. They’re both smiling then, the only light source the flickering flood light and diner in front of them. The dark pools of Lark’s eyes are so familiar even though they have been absent from Xavier’s life for so long.

He leans across the center console and yanks them closer into a hug.

Then Xavier’s stomach growls loudly and Lark’s laugh is so loud in his ear, it almost hurts. But they don’t stop hugging, even as the laughter turns nearly to crying.

—

A little bell tolls above his head when Xavier walks through the doors. The plastic edges create a popping suction and then scrape across the tiled floor as the glass doors slowly close behind him. The smell of greasy food and coffee is so potent that his nose wrinkles automatically—he suppresses a sneeze, but just barely. The lone waitress behind the counter glances up. Xavier raises a hand and then points to a figure all the way in the corner. He’s used to the good hospitality of New England, meaning Xavier figures she’ll leave him alone.

Instead, she comes out from behind the counter with a laminated menu. Her smile is tired, but welcoming. She has pretty wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and startling white teeth. The beaten up, aged name tag pinned to her chest says DARLA. Xavier asks for a soda, and doesn’t even need the menu for his food order.

“Well, I like a man that knows what he wants right away,” Darla coos, swatting his shoulder with the menu she takes back from him. “Go on, sweetie, I’ll bring it out in a minute.”

Maybe its the friendliness that puts him on edge as he walks down the lonely, empty diner. He isn’t used to friendliness, is he? Xavier’s shoulders curl upward, as if remembering the harsh hand that fed him prior to—well. Prior to Lark coming and saving him, bleached blond white knight with lock picks. Maybe it’s the waitress. Maybe it’s easy to blame her (and it’s certainly easier on his traumatized mind, that doesn’t want to think about the other things easier to blame), but it’s also Benji.

Xavier stands a few feet away, staring at the dark silhouette in the corner booth. Nervousness rises in him; he imagines himself a glass half full. One part all the mixing’s of Xavier Wolffe and the other part this intense, storm like anxiety that mixes poorly. Mint’s in a coke bottle sort of situation. Benji’s back is to him, which might be a blessing. But it also lets Xavier stand there and linger.

His black curly hair looks windswept, as if the short walk from the van to the diner had been a perilous journey. It’s messy in a tousled way that looks undeniably pretty. Strands stick up here and there, like little snakes trying to escape. Benji’s shoulders curve, almost protectively inward as he sits there, staring down at his phone. Xavier unconsciously swipes a paw through his own hair, worried about how he looks. His tongue feels slightly numb.

“Behind you, sweetie.” Darla’s hand touches his lower back, making him launch into the air with a high pitched sound. She pays that no attention as she flutters by and sets a glass wet with condensation down onto the diner table. Xavier tries to get his heart to work properly with a fist rubbing furiously on his sternum, but then Benji glances back over his shoulder. He must have been expecting Lark, because his dark eyes start somewhere in the middle of Xavier’s chest.

Then they slowly, very slowly rise.

An electric jolt pins him there as Darla scoots around him, once more touching his side and making Xavier feel a sickly, unwanted peal of nerves. His teeth stay glued together so he doesn’t snap like some fucking injured street dog, but he isn’t sure he can handle that once more, so instead he quickly goes for the opposite side of the table. Xavier slides in, knees knocking and nearly sending his drink and Benji’s off.

He looks up to find Benji’s hand steadying both of them. The sleeves of his jacket have pushed up slightly, almost to forearm and Xavier can see little patchwork tattoos here and there. His mouth returns to feeling dry and numb, but he isn’t sure why. Benji retreats just as slowly as his gaze had taken Xavier in, until he’s slouched back in the seat, one hand still cupped around a mug of smoky smelling coffee.

“Lark is outside,” Xavier explains.

“Didn’t ask,” Benji replies, with a bit of a curl to his lip. He looks tired, or maybe that’s just the weighted effort of scowling all the time. Benji has never smiled at Xavier, not a real one anyway (and nothing like that wide open smile he gives Lark sometimes when they think it’s just the two of them, when Xavier is on the outskirts, looking in). There is always a mean sort of glint to him in every interaction—not that they’ve had many. When Lark had shown up, tall red headed stray behind him, Benji had—better not to linger on what Xavier had caught Benji saying to The Priest. It only gave value to Xavier’s own doubts. His fears that Lark was making the wrong choice, that he was making the wrong choice, that something was wrong about all this.

“Someone’s in a good mood,” Xavier mutters under his breath, reaching for his drink. The cool glass feels slimy to the touch. They’d had snacks on the drive. It had felt like a real road trip, with a good mixture of both music they enjoyed, chips and candies. Xavier’s stomach feels unsettled. He isn’t even sure who is paying for their meal here, so he feels even more nervous about the burger he’d ordered. Maybe he shouldn’t have.

“Thrilled, really, mate. Bells and whistles. Cheers.” He leans forward to clink his mug harshly against Xavier’s soda and then drains the rest of the coffee.

“You ever not acting like a stuck up asshole?” Xavier hisses, arms crossing over the table. He immediately takes up too much room and he notices—he can’t not notice—the subtle shift in Benji’s body language. The way he just barely leans back, retracts his arms just slightly. The small attempt to put even more space between them. Xavier’s heart sinks low into his stomach, where it burns the worst.

How much Benji must dislike him, to want even a centimeter extra of space.

“Maybe when you stop lookin’ like a sad abandoned puppy.” Benji’s voice is equally as acidic, but it’s cold toned. Even. Xavier’s lips curl back from his teeth, his eyes narrowed to slits.

“Enunciate,” Xavier draws the word out, making his hand a puppet to speak alongside. “If I have to be around you, talk without marbles so I can understand you.” Benji’s laugh is a surprised, harsh bark.

“’Ave you heard yourself, mate?”

“You—”

“Here we go, boys.”

Darla’s sudden appearance pops the unbelievably hot tension broiling between the two. Xavier practically flings himself backward to give the waitress space to put down the plated food. His heart goes off rhythm in his chest again, battering ram against all of his ribs. He didn’t even notice how sweaty his hands were until he’s rubbing them self consciously across denim clad thighs. The burger looks undeniably good, the kind of food you find at a hidden gem sort of spot.

A plate of fries gets put in front of Benji. He gives Darla a quick mumbled ‘thank you’. Manners, at least for a stranger.

“Y’all let me know if you need anything.” She gives them both a secretive smile and Xavier’s cheeks prickle with heat at the realization that she could probably hear them arguing. Benji seems equally as sour about it, chin tilted down to stare at crispy looking fries. He has dark, heavy brows that pull together the moodiness of his expression and features. His cheekbones are tinted darker with blush, eyes sleepy and annoyed. He is handsome, admittedly. Benji has a defined nose that makes him unique—soft looking facial hair that Xavier imagines would feel nice on the back of his knuckles.

He’s quick about picking up the burger and biting into it. His cheeks continue to burn.

Lark had abandoned him, just like Benji had said. Like a puppy, tossed into this diner with someone who is mostly a stranger. A hostile one, no less. Whatever long conversation he has with the priest outside, in the parking lot, was it worth this amount of awkward tension? Was Xavier being unfair? He bites into the burger with more viciousness and watches Benji’s face turn slowly in further annoyance.

“Don’t you have a coat?”

“What?” Xavier is shocked by the question, mouth half full of burger.

“Whatever,” Benji snaps. He still hasn’t eaten any of his fries. So Xavier leans over, slowly, deliberately. He picks one up and then tosses it into his mouth. He smiles as he does, to further watch Benji’s expression turn. His brows furrow harder, create lines between them. His nose scrunches, his mouth sets in a furious line. Xavier chews harder, feeling strangely victorious in that moment.

Until a booted foot connects with his inner thigh. Xavier’s eyes pop as Benji slouches harder in the booth. He looks wicked and annoyed and pleased to be bothering him. The pressure on his leg widens his knees, the mean touch sends a shiver up and down his spine in a way that crashes across the inside of his skull. He has to clear his throat and take a sip of his soda before he can come up with something nasty or clever or some action to make Benji feel just as—actually, Benji had probably intended for the action to make him feel angry but instead of anger, some sort of hunger sits inside him. Nothing to do with food.

Fuck you sits hot and ready behind his teeth after the carbonation of his drink, until Tino is suddenly sweeping into the side of the booth next to him. Xavier makes a noise that is not at all intentional, slaps a napkin over his mouth and slides even further to the other end of the booth. Benji’s boot knocks against his knee and then swiftly retreats as Lark sits down beside him, looking exhausted.

“Elbows off the table,” Tino chastises in a good natured voice, putting his hat down in front of him. He checks a watch on his wrist, handsome face pulled into a bit of a concerned expression. Lark had told Xavier that he would be debating on continuing the drive home or stopping to get a motel. Xavier didn’t have money for a room, so he was praying they kept driving.

“Yes, sir,” he mumbles in a quiet, respectful voice as he tucks his elbows off and to his side. His eyes flicker to Benji, whose mouth is now set in a deeply satisfied grin. The anger returns in a hot current, straight from his lower stomach and up his sternum, so Xavier kicks his own leg forward. Lets his dirty military boot sit directly next to Benji. He taps his thigh once, twice until a hand snatches around his ankle and shoves it further.

“Are you guys playing footsie under the table?” Lark asks in an incredulously entertained voice, so loud that it feels like it echoes the entire silent diner. Xavier hears Darla laughing somewhere and he immediately removes his foot. It lands on the linoleum floor with a loud smacking sound. Benji’s face turns an even darker shade of red, something that is so gorgeous looking under the harsh white light of the midnight diner. He gently slides the fries toward Lark, who looks instantly intrigued.

Xavier’s burger remains half finished.

—

Outside, there is a bit of a fuss at the van Benji and Tino are driving. Lark jumps in place, his breath fogging outside his mouth. Xavier stands beside him, not necessarily touched by the cold just yet. His plaid shirt is long sleeved, but not the length he usually likes, to tuck over his scarred knuckles. Even though there is a hole in the knee of his jeans, he doesn’t feel the bite of the wind just yet. But he does want to get back into the car. He wants it to just be him and Lark again, so he feels safe once more.

The van door closes with a loud sound, not necessarily a slam but close enough. Tino is grinning when he approaches them—it’s something knowing and soft. Xavier likes Tino. He liked him before he even met him, just from the stories Lark had told alone, but now he really likes Tino. Priests were a comfort for a Catholic, even if that faith was mostly fractured these days.

“Here,” the older man says, holding something out for Xavier.

“Uh,” he replies thoughtlessly as he takes the jacket. It’s a worn in, black denim. When he takes it, Xavier resists putting it under his nose, because he’s curious. His mother had always chastised him for leading life with his nose. There is the faintest tang of nicotine and something else, though, even just holding it. The scent is so oddly familiar. “Thanks—I’m sorry, Tino. I can—I’ll get my own stuff when we—”

“Pah!” He waves a gloved hand, laughing. “Benji never wears that one anymore, don’t worry.” Xavier’s fingers curl harder into the jacket. His eyes slide over Tino’s shoulder and to the van, but it’s too dark to see inside. The floodlight flickers, nearly going out once more, to shroud them all in the night.

“Aw,” Lark wraps an arm around Xavier’s waist, tugging them together. “What the fuck? I’m glad you guys are getting along. I told you Benji is a good guy.” Tino’s face turns to a bemused expression as he and Xavier look at each other once more (like they share a secret in that moment, that will be figured out soon down the road), then he’s waving and turning back to the van.

Xavier doesn’t put the jacket on, but…when he falls asleep on the last leg of the car ride, it’s squished between his cheek and the car window like a pillow.

#writing #exorcist au #lt #xw #bp #tl #xw x bp #this rewrite cured me

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kthynes · 3 years

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the caller you have reached (chris evans x reader)

pairing: chris evans x fem!reader

summary: chris was trying to drunkenly call the woman he loved and wanted to get back with but instead he reaches you, a shrink.

warning: swearing (sailor level), brief mentions of mental health

**IMPORTANT disclaimer: I won't be dabbling into the hard hitting topics of mental health in this short only because I'm not a certified health professional and so I can't be providing a written, unbiased, often characterized diagnosis towards any sort of mental health disorder because really, those types of sensitivities need proper care and output. With that being said, I do want to emphasize the notions of seeking help and not being afraid to seek help when needed. It's hard, but we all fight a battle and no battle is big or small or better or worse.

If my followers or readers do feel the need to privately chat with me, I'm here and I can you lend you an ear. Otherwise let's be kind and uplift another while we can. No harm in doing good and being better, that's for sure!

-end rant-

This short is dedicated to the following lovelies:

@princess-evans-addict

@mrs-djokovic

@slut-for-chris-evans

@saltyflowermakertaco

@bitchyslut99

@patzammit

@itskikiyooo

@maximeevansblog

Being a working adult is dreadful but the work you do is the most fulfilling kind of anarchy. You are a therapist, you work to heal and you work together with people who willingly reach out to you and your facility of care. There is that balance, the altering nuances in between that allows you to do what you do best. You advocate for good prosperity of mental health and accolade of teachable moments that fosters a safe space for your clients, not patients, but the people who deserve to be heard and not be medically categorized.

Your salubrious passion keeps you grounded. In your lifetime, you've seen the imperial impacts of poor mental health and it has been a detrimental drive in how you retreat and give back to a small found community.

"Okay." You exhale to yourself while leafing through another client chart. You're working off the clock, stuck in the renaissance of your homey office space while the outside world turns pitch black.

In the appropriate fields you jot down important takeaways from your last sit in session with heavy concertation and reasoning, you try to congregate a treatment plan all before you cellphone cries for you in venturous fashion.

"Hello?" You answer without checking the caller ID, tucking the device between your ear and shoulder so that way you could work and talk.

"Jenny!" The man boisterously shouts. "Jenny baby please talk to me! Let me make it up to you, let's just do this right, please. I'm fucked up here."

"I'm sorry but you have the wrong number." You infringe sounding like the posh, automated answering machine lady.

"Oh what the fuck Jenny — oh cah'mon don't do that, don't be like that baby." You re-verify a local number and it doesn't belong to anyone you know of. So you wonder who this man is but choose not to press further instead you tell him what is right from the knowing wrong.

"I'm not Jenny."

"Seriously?" He yells, forcing you to hold the phone away from your ear. "That can't be... This is—" He recites the number that is similar to yours but the last two digits are off.

"You got 42, not 53." It's an easy mistake to recall, a swipe of a drunken thumb could've mixed that up, so this time around, you're forgiving. Not that it happens often.

"Oh no. That's—" The mystery man trails, something about his voice discerns you, it's familiar but in a hindbrain way that you can't put a finger on. "Fuuuuuuuck."

"Wait hold on, hold up, is this Jenny's assistant, Nina?" You exhale sharply sometimes it takes more than one try and a side of convincing to get your point across and your passiveness was certainly to blame.

"No I'm not her assistant either."

"Then who the hell are you?" He exasperates. You make the snide mistake of telling him your name and he buffers for a bit.

"Oh. So you really aren't anyone of my concern then?"

"No." You mildly retort. "I wouldn't want to be anyways."

"Okay well I'm not sorry then because I'm here trying to reach my girlfriend and I can't get to her because I have you on the line being a smartass." With that accent of his you can tell he's a patriotic Bostonian. One of your own kind and that furloughs your need to engage in this mindless drivel, it wouldn't get you or him anywhere. At least that's what you tell yourself before shutting him down.

"Well then maybe you should learn to listen first, how about that?" You snap, dropping your pen before you note down angry nonsense into your actual work.

"Hey nowwww!" He yells as if he's trying to be Hank Kinsley.

"It's clear that you're drunk."

He brushes you off on the other end, enigmatic in what he wants you to know. "This is Chris Evans, you're talking to Chris-motherfucking-Evans, you hear?"

"I do now." You say tersely.

"Good." He huffs. "Good... Cause you know I'm in the middle of bumfuck nowhere and this is what I get. This is what I seemingly deserve, god you women I swear..."

Your face changes. You don't agree to be a lending ear but somehow Chris forces you to hear him out.

"I told her Y/N. I TOLD her that I wasn't ready to take the next step but that doesn't mean that I don't want to be with her. And now she throws it back in my face by getting with some other guy she once dated back in high school. And somehow, I'm supposed to be ok with it and move on, as she tells me. How the hell am I supposed to do that, huh?"

"I, um, I don't know what to tell you." You sigh somberly.

"Of course you don't!" His Boston twang begins to nerve you as there some remitting frequency of it. Hearing him obnoxiously go off, reminds you of all your shrewd New England exes who were his exact counterpart when soused. A ludicrous memory that you relive again with time and perfect harmony.

"Listen lady all I'm saying is that I fucked up. I know I did alright? I mean it doesn't take much denominational math and the plot of Lost in Translation to get that. I get it!"

Jesus. You whisper the lords name in vain as you lean your forehead against the palm of your hand while your elbow rested on top of the desk.

"So, let me get this straight, you think yelling at a random woman will help get further?" You question a little acutely for his liking.

"I don't know but it sure as hell takes off the heat, sweetheart." Something about a man calling you sweetheart grinds your gears and now your molars.

"Okay, alright, let's talk." You begin, sitting up a bit and tearing out a blank page from your memo pad; you were doing a late night consultation, a small hash out.

"Schuwaaaaa." Chris enunciates the word sure and to much of his mayhem, he’s sprawled out on the curbside, somewhere in the nowhere land of L.A. He contented but also upset and you were simply crashing his little pity party.

"What is it that you want from Jenny?" You professionally prod. "How about we start there."

"Wooooah, what is that we're doing here?” Chris gets mildly defensive with you. “I dunno you like that. If we're gonna talk then you'll have to get through my publicist first because right now I plead the fifth.”

You exhale a deep and fulsome breath. No one troubles you like him. It's sanctimoniously unnerving.

"I'm a shrink, my job isn’t meant to incriminate my clients well-being, or anyone else’s for that matter.” You address calmly. “So, if you do require some solicited advice then we can keep this call under strict confidence. You have my word, Mr. Evans and the paperwork that will follow shortly after this call.”

Silence. There is some shocking silence which is brief before you're catapulted with disbelief and more cackles. "Holy mother fucking shit. You're kidding me?"

"I can run you by my credentials if you’d like?” You mention stiffly.

"God I’ve reached a cuckoo hotline!" Wrong. That's a horrible thing to say and you'd think a man like him would've been more sensitive about his choice of words, inebriated or not.

"Far from it."

"Tell me something, alright? How many grown, adult men come crying to you?" Chris is edging with curiosity even though his eyes are betrayingly reddened after crying into a bottle of Dewars 18. He doesn't make that known to you and you never cared to ask.

"Enough to know that they cry." You simply state.

"Huh. So this is just another Tuesday for you then.” Chris scoff, the bottle making it to his lips and then swishing back down again.

"Comes with the territory except I don't tolerate drunkenness." You motely add. "Can you keep the bottle aside for the time being? Just until we're done here."

"That's understandable and oh yeah sure, sure, I won't touch it." You can hear the glass bottle 'clink' when coming into contact with the pavement.

"Now tell me about Jenny." You softly inquire.

"What do you wanna know? How we fuck or how we met?" Chris giggles like a naughty school yard boy.

"How did you two meet?" You slam the words urgently, nearly spelling out the cause.

"Oh! Oh. We met on the job." Chris chuckles punitively.

"Okay and did you guys connect instantly or was there a slow build up?" You involuntarily took notes for any PR rep of his that wanted solid evidence that would preside this call, cover your bases and your poor ass along with it.

"Instantly. Our chemistry read was off the charts." He explains with a slight hiccup. "Sorry."

"Great. So it was more so a work relationship that later grew into something more correct?"

"Pretty much."

"So when did you start developing feelings for her?"

"Um I'd say..." Chris tucks his chin, burps and then excuses himself before continuing. "Just before we wrapped up filming. But then I think somewhere in between all that I realized that she was my kind of girl, my... better half."

"And what made you come to that realization?"

"Well for one she has this infectious laugh that would have you laughing with her, there's that sound of beauty and pureness to it. And then with that, there were all the little things she'd do for me that made me think, like damn she's the one, she's it for me and that for better or for worse, I'd need her more than she'd ever need me."

Chris gets sad and you feel for him. Your pen stops moving when you were about to prescribe him some mind memory exercises. He was human. Humans hurt. Humans make mistakes. Humans stray but they also love. That's all Chris did. He loved with all of his heart to not expect the same love in return.

"You know Chris, we don't always get the love we deserve and sometimes its sucks. Sometimes you wanna kick it back with a bottle of Dewars 18 and shake your fists in the air." Chris quietly perks up at your choice of alcohol that you didn't know he was forcefully downing. He fashions a small half smile that you don't see but hear faintly. "But there's also a time and a place and things happen, people come apart, people get together, people do people and there's that fine line of letting life run its uneven course."

"I mean you sometimes have to not be okay to be okay again and I know that from my many years of helpful healing. It gets okay, never fully better and I think that's just how it is. You acknowledge your pain, your trauma and then you go on while being mindful of that transition."

"Wow."

"Hey, um, look, I actually have to get going. But if you can, just down the rest of that bottle and get yourself home."

"Are you sure?" Chris gawks.

"I mean you were already halfway through and it's not like I can physically stop you, right? And besides this is what I'm prescribing to you. I want you to acknowledge your pain, drink away your sorrows and then smash that bottle so you can be relieved from that trauma and hurt. After that you need to fix up and start new, have a mature conversation with her, if you can and then have your feet hitting the ground again. Don't fall into the routine of heartbreak even if it becomes too hard, you hear me?"

"Loud and clear."

"Good." You sniff and start to put things away. "I know you're a good guy Chris, from how you are on TV and in interviews, I'm amazed by how articulate you are. You have the right mindset so I have no doubts that you'll fall back in any way. But if you do, please don't hesitate to reach out, I might have to hand you off to another cohort but nonetheless it can be worked out even if it does feel like you might be sparring on your own. You'll get the help you need."

"Great, thanks." Chris responds in his conscious state of thought. He feels pathetic with himself and that doesn't have you galling over the fact, instead you let him be.

"Do you need me to order you an Uber? Cab? Call a friend for ya?" You laugh easily and Chris hears it clearly, smiling in return.

"An Uber would be nice. I'll try to share you my location."

"Sure, on me and that'd be great."

"Thanks."

"No problem... And your ride should be here in two minutes, just look out for Raul in black Elantra." You inform him after checking your phone.

"Nice."

"You have a goodnight now Chris."

"You too." The line cuts and you're given a piece of your life back. You gather your belongings, flip off the light switch and make your way home. There's some truth and some brokenness in every situation. You knew Chris was going to be OK even if he didn't consult you afterwards. For you, there was no need. He's a smart man and he proves this over a prolonged period of time when he finally finds himself back on the market and then eventually in a relationship with a faceless and very loving woman from his own hometown.

He was finally happy, making you serendipitously glad that you were the caller he had reached.

#chris evans fluff #chris evans imagine #chris evans x reader #chris evans

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frank-hauptman · 3 years

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Frank, Rose, and Josephine spend their final day together in Winthrop, MA. Eight years later, Frank and Josephine retire quietly to the Leander where they don't have to worry about things like betrayal.

An adios to Frank. Inspired by the various tasks we’ve had throughout the group. Inspired, also, by this song (x).

WHEN: June 2021 & July 4th, 2013 WHERE: Meridium & Winthrop, MA, USA

He remembers the day and every single one before it with clarity, but he’s not worried about the big details, he can’t imagine he’ll ever forget them. What slips away, year after year, are the smaller things. The way Josephine’s knit cap rubbed against his cheek as she slept in his arms, tired out from the kisses and cuddles she’d gotten from Rose’s parents. His arms still feel the weight of her, but the knit cap…

Sometimes he can’t remember if it’s purple like the first crack of fireworks on the starry sky above, or if it’s a dark red to celebrate the holidays, a playful nudge to Rose’s name.

Did Rose laugh about it, or scoff? Did they match Josephine’s cap to her coat, or did they do something to celebrate the holiday? Did they buy in the store, or is it a gift from his mother?

The memory feels further and further away with time.

…

Josephine sleeps quietly, her tiny head tucked into his neck. His cheek itches from her knit cap against his cheek, but he loathes adjusting her. Waking her from a nap promises a long day for them, and they have several hours to go still until the fireworks start. “It’s not too late for us to call it a day,” he tells Rose as they walk along the pier in Winthrop, scanning the boats for a familiar face or sight. His brothers are here somewhere.

“Is that what you want?” She pauses the stroller, foot against the break, tucking unruly strands of curly hair behind her ear. Her dark eyes flicker to his face, the knowing smile on her lips bringing a familiar crinkle to the corner of her eyes.

“No.”

“Then we’re here. What on earth is Xavier wearing?” Rose asks, bemused, waving at the tall, lanky man at the end of the pier. Xavier swivels around at the sight of them. For a second, Frank can’t see what she means. Xavier looks same as ever with his untidy dark hair, too bright clothes, and a smile much too enthusiastic for such serious eyes.

That is until he sees the vest. If Christmas is the time for ugly sweaters, Independence Day is for a time of ugly vests in Xavier’s mind. This flashes red, blue, and white at random intervals. “I just bet your father loved his vest,” Rose murmurs, and he laughs. His father has never much cared for American holidays; it’s probably the only thing he and Frank agree on. His father tends to be livelier whenever they are in England.

In his enthusiasm, Xavier nearly slips off the dock in his haste to gesture them over. He catches himself on the pole, and then abandons his attempts at waving to sprint down to them.

Rose sighs. He can’t blame her. His brother is twenty-four, loud, and more accident prone than anyone Frank knows. Every day Xavier avoids a catastrophe is a lucky one.

“Frank! Rose! Jo—Oh, she’s asleep.” Xavier skids to a stop, disappointed. “How come I don’t get to see her when she’s awake? I’m good with kids, too!”

Frank muffles a laugh, trying not to wake Josephine. Not that she’ll sleep long with Xavier here; his brother is only quiet when writing, and even then, prone to rambling as he works. “Didn’t you babysit Oswald’s son?” he asks, rubbing a hand up and down Jo’s back to keep her asleep, sending Rose an amused look. Her nose wrinkles, but her lips snapped closed without a retort. For now.

“I lost him once. In my defense, it wasn’t my fault.”

“He was two,” Rose interjects, skeptical.

“Yeah, the terrible twos. I nearly chased him around the city. Oswald thought it was funny, though, when it turned out he was asleep in the pantry. And, hey, I was like fourteen!”

Frank laughs. “You’re not setting a good track record.”

“Again: fourteen. I’m a fantastic uncle now, you can just ask Eli. I’m definitely his favorite uncle since Professor Hauptman is too busy to visit us,” he says with a snort. “I still can’t believe you two are sticking around. I thought you’d leave Boston behind a long time ago.”

He and Rose exchange a confused look, silently communicating. A time or two, they considered what it would be like to leave, across the pond or across the country, but each time they talked themselves out of it with little argument or persuasion. Boston was their home. He can’t imagine walking down the road and not knowing there was some memory attached to it.

Rose ventures the question. “Why would we? My work is here. Frank’s work is here.”

Xavier shrugs. “I know dad isn’t the easiest person to have around. He still asks when you’re going to come home, you know,” he admits, hands in his pockets.

Frank says nothing for a beat, eyes focused on the ground, lips pressing into a thin line. His family wonders often when he’ll change his mind and come home. They think his love for Rose and Josephine is a switch, turned on and off at will. It isn’t. It’s like breathing. He doesn’t feel it, nor does he think about how it works, he’s just thankful it happens.

“I know you aren’t, though. Only a fool misses the way you two look at each other. They’ll get the message sometime,” Xavier says, moving to slap him on the back. Rose clears her throat and Frank glances at baby Josephine in explanation. His brother nods, a lopsided grin on his face. “Don’t worry about it. They’ll get the memo. I mean, the only thing they read is those.”

He’s not so sure. His father is stubborn, and the closer he gets to this new family he’s building, the more his old one tries to tug him away. They won’t succeed, he knows. Them accepting defeat, though? It’s less likely.

…

When he thinks about his family, he’s never thought of his brother as a threat. Xavier and Oswald look alike with their big blue eyes and long, lanky frames. Of the three Hauptman brothers, Frank alone got their father’s broad shoulders and square features. His brothers were taller, and their faces sharper than his own, a touch of red to their dark hair. He thinks of them, and he thinks of the dimpled smiles and dirt smeared faces from his youth.

He doesn’t think of them as anything other than younger brothers. Family. As much the results of their families’ callous upbringing as Frank himself. But like all the other memories he has on the island, Frank wonders if these memories are slipping away. He wonders if the island is taking the bad ones as much as the good.

What does he really remember of it? It’s windy, his hair whipping around his face, and Oswald stands on the deck. Is he smiling? Or is he frowning as he usually is? The more Frank tries to remember it, the less he can grasp it.

…

Oswald is smiling at him in the same perplexing way he always does. Like he’s listening to a joke no one else can hear. Water splashes against the hull of their boat. They bob on swiftly moving waves, and lesser men would find it nauseating. He ignores it, well used to the feeling, still watching his brother. Still waiting for the question on his face. “What’s on your mind?” Frank asks.

“Father’s been waiting a long time for you to pick up the mantle.”

“I’ve never been one for business. He’s better off picking you, you have a hunger for it.”

“I know.”

They fall silent.

Oswald stops the boat, but says nothing, battling something. Frank sighs, back leaning against the railing. “You can tell me, Oswald. I’m not going to be mad at whatever you think.”

His face twists, smile drooping at the corners. “I know I’m the better choice. I want the Hauptman’s to go farther. I don’t want to be old money, losing more and more each year. I don’t want to fall into obscurity. But I know with you at the head of the family, we will. You don’t want the money or the reputation, do you?”

Frank thinks the answer is obvious. The last time he looked at their name and saw it with awe, he was a boy. A boy who might have grown into Oswald with his baffling smile and hard eyes, or like their father, a man who regarded his children with little more than scorn, who looked at his granddaughter with disgust. “No, I don’t. I’d be happy where I am. Rose and I, we’re happy as we are, I don’t want money to change that. I don’t want Josephine to grow up as we did.”

“Given anything we wanted?”

“Loved when it was convenient,” Frank corrects.

“Father won’t let you go. He thinks you’ll connect the dots. I don’t know why he won’t let you go. Does he think you can do better than me? Does he think I won’t have the family’s best interest at heart?” Oswald asks, beginning to pace. “Frank, there’s no future for me if you don’t leave.”

Frank taps his fingers. “Leave where? My home is here.”

“As long as you’re here, he’ll always think you’re going to turn into his heir again.”

“You’re talking like being heir matters. This isn’t the olden days anymore. I’m sorry, but I’ve already told him I’m not coming back. He’ll accept that someday.”

Oswald’s eyes are steely. His smile fades. “I can’t wait that long. I’m already in the hole, Frank. Couple more weeks, I’ll be running home begging for scraps.” Frank leans against the railing, running a hand over his face at the words. His brother continues, smile still gone, a look of contemplation on his face. “I need him to let me in, I need him to pick me. I can’t live like this.”

“Bloody hell, Oswald. What do you mean it’s gone? What have you been doing? No, wait.” Frank holds up a hand, forestalling the explanation he can see brewing. “I don’t want to know. It was foolish. Money like this can change people’s lives, Oswald, and you’re squandering it.”

“Better than you. You pretend it doesn’t exist!”

“I know it exists; it doesn’t need to be flaunted. I put aside for Josephine and for security. The rest is spread to others however I can give it.” Scholarships for students who need it, meals for neighbors who can’t feed themselves, rent for friends who struggle in ways he doesn’t – Frank tries to help where he can. Tries to live up to the revelation he had as a boy who nearly drowned and saw the fragility and importance of life.

Is it selfish to not do more with it? To not pick up the reins when his father leaves and change lives for the better? Frank runs a hand over his face. Oswald is silent, staring at Frank with keen eyes. “Why did you have to bring this up now? I haven’t seen you in so long, Oswald, and you want to fight.” He’s making Frank doubt. Not his choices, but on whether he’s living up to be a good example to Josephine at all.

He doesn’t want the Hauptman name to be left in the hands of his father or his brother. Frank turns his back to him, looking out over the water. Far in the distance, too small to see, he knows Rose and Josephine wait.

“I know father won’t ever pick me as long as you’re here,” Oswald concludes.

Frank blinks. It’s not what he thought his brother would say. “What does—” Something strikes the side of his head. His vision blurs, his head spinning. Their sail is broken, he thinks, holding a hand to his face. “Are you okay?”

Another strike. Frank collapses against the railing, blood trickling down

It’s not the sail.

He doesn’t realize how similar they are. Same height, same build, same dark hair. But as Oswald heaves him over the edge, the difference is stark. “Oswald!” he shouts, pushing to the surface, choking against the water flooding his lungs. He treads water, but only just. A spray of water announces his brother’s departure, and the wind carries the words back to him: “Goodbye, Frank.”

He shouts again. A plead, even, born of desperation as the boat sinks farther and farther into the horizon. For a moment, he stays afloat and kicks, fighting for a way back to shore. Relentless waves batter him, pushing him to and from, and a powerful one surges over his head, sending him down, down, down. He can’t find up. His vision wavers. His head pounds.

Rose! he thinks, finding the surface. Josephine!

He sinks.

…

“Daddy!” Past memories are snatched up in the wind on the beach. Josephine darts up to him, tiny fingers clutched around shells. They are large, pale things in her dark hands. Lackluster, even, if it wasn’t for the brilliant smile on her lips. “I found my seashells!”

“I’m proud, sweetheart. Do you have the bag for them?” he questions, looping rope over one of his shoulders. Their collapsed shelter – the future he and Rose attempted to build – is near depleted of their things now. He imagines this will be the last time he ventures this far from the Leander.

She nods very importantly and carefully deposits them into a ragged sack. Bits of colored thread are weaved onto the outside in the shape of a shell with a crown, a gift from one of the elder survivors on the Leander. Frank smiles when he sees it. Josephine closes it tight and then resumes prodding at the collection of items near their shelter. She prods one pile thoughtfully. “Why are we leaving these?”

Frank hesitates. His eyes linger on the maps. It’s eight years of work held down by a mere rock. “I don’t need them anymore.” Josephine makes a noise. It’s so Rose-like that his head snaps up, half hoping he’ll see her walking from the jungle. “If someone might use them, we should take them along still. Do you want to hold them?” He doesn’t want to see them right now. If Rose isn’t among the people in the lagoon, then she’s out there still. Somewhere. Leaving the island wasn’t possible now with hope lingering in the air.

Tempting as it was to search for her, he knows his responsibility. Josephine can’t lose both of her parents.

Josephine, delighted at her responsibility, scoops the maps up and deposits them into the bag with her shells. “Okay!”

“Do you have everything?” Frank says, gathering the last of their things. “We’re going to be on the Leander for a while, sweetheart.” He needs to distant them from certain people; he needs the time to prepare answers to her inevitable questions, too.

Her head bobs, hair flying. “Let’s go!” she announces. He follows her and as she runs across the sand, laughing and singing about the life of a pirate, he captures the moment in his mind’s eye. So much of their time together has been stolen. With all the things Frank has missed over the years, he doesn’t want to miss another second.

#headcanon #misc #Rose #Josephine

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jamielea81 · 5 years

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Chapter 14

Description: You accompany your friends on a day trip to Animal Kingdom Theme Park where you meet Scott Evans by chance. This one afternoon leads to a year long friendship with both Chris and Scott over text messages and phone calls.

Pairing: Chris Evans x Reader

Warning: So much fluff. A few curse words.

Word Count: 6,435

A/N: And here it is, the final chapter of this series. Thank you to all of you who followed along, reblogged and encouraged me to keep writing. More Chris Evans series are to come. Special thanks to @panicfob who asked me if I ever thought about writing a series like this and @allaboutthebooz who told me about a Steve Rogers Disney series she was writing which in turn really got me into a Disney frame of mind. Please tell me what you thought of the series! There will be two one-shots that accompany this. One will be posted next month with the second posted in March. Stay tuned.

*Italics are internal thoughts

Catch up with Chapter 13

In retrospect, moving to New England in the midst of winter probably wasn’t a wise choice. When you moved to Florida all those years ago it was during the summer. It appears your timing is never right. You’ve slipped on icy sidewalks more times than you can count as it seems no one is nice enough to salt and sand the sidewalks surrounding their houses and businesses. You haven’t quite mastered public transportation so you take your chances walking the snowy roads for coffee and grocery items. You’ve learned parking really is a hot commodity until you get of further into the suburbs. For now, you’ll take the extra steps on your health app as they continue to grow.

Speaking of timing, Chris wasn’t even in the state when the moving truck rolled into town. You knew he wouldn’t be and it was probably better that way. You weren’t moving in together, so adjusting to the change without him would only further help you adjust with being on your own. The only caveat to that is you were rarely alone. The Evans clan had seemingly adopted you without your consent. Surprisingly, you were enjoying your adopted Massachusetts family.

When Chris told Lisa about your thoughts on moving to Boston, she asked to speak to you before you went home to Florida during your visit in October. If you were nervous the first time you met her, you were in full panic mode this time. Chris telling his mother everything was something you would need to get used to. God forbid you two have a huge fight at some point and then have to see his mom shortly after. Nope, that wouldn’t be awkward at all.

Chris drove you over with Dodger in tow. The two of them played outside while Lisa fixed you a cup of coffee and essentially asked what your intensions with her son were.

“I’m thinking about moving here to give Chris and I a fighting chance. The distance is hard, Lisa. You probably already know this, but he has flown to Orlando to see me three times in the last month and a half. He’s already busy and this is only wearing him down more. I don’t want that.” You took a breath, ignoring your coffee completely. “I’m not one of those women who’s trying to weasel her way in to his life. Chris and I were friends first and if this whole thing goes to hell, I hope we’re still friends because I’m not giving him or Scott up.”

Lisa smiled, stood up, pulled you to your feet and hugged you. “I think everything is going to turn out just how it should,” she said.

You sighed in relief. “Thanks, Lisa.”

“You should come for Christmas!” she blurted out after releasing you.

You chuckled softly. “My mother would kill me if I didn’t go home to Minnesota.”

“Well, we wouldn’t want that. Come the week after for New Year’s.” Before you could say no, she continued. “I insist.”

Looks like I’m going to Boston for New Years.

“Okay… We should probably check with Chris though.”

“Trust me, if you’re here, my son will be too.”

Christmas in Minnesota was interesting. A lot of the time was spent talking and explaining yourself. Your brother still wanted to kick Chris’ ass and you couldn’t blame him. The two of them hadn’t met and he was pissed when he saw those photos on TMZ. You made a mental note to get Chris and Heath together to bond. Heath didn’t know Chris like you did and he didn’t understand that the two of you had discussed your relationship at length and were committed to each other.

While your mother was sad that you had chosen not to move back home, she was happy for you and understood the need for a change. She teased you relentlessly about moving somewhere with a true winter. After graduating from college, you declared that you’d never live in a snowy state again. Now you had tentative plans with Lisa to apartment hunt next week.

Your father was another story. You weren’t above bribery so you took him to dinner at his favorite steakhouse. Hoping the appeal of an expensive cut of meat would put him in a cheery mood. It was Christmastime after all. His spirit should already be lighter.

When you changed jobs in October, you told him about it almost immediately. Gary didn’t appreciate being left in the dark. You never called him Gary to his face, but when you ever spoke about your dad to Jana, you referred to him as Gary much to her amusement. He wasn’t happy about the job change which was of no surprise to you. He didn’t understand why you would make a change when you had a great position with the paper. “This is just like you,” he had said. “You’re never settled.” It wasn’t a fair statement. You had been settled for years. Yes, you weren’t married and you didn’t own your own home, but you had a career and had been at the paper for years. You were well respected in your field. There was absolutely nothing wrong with moving on to a position that would bring you growth in your career as well as your personal life.

If you hadn’t broken the news about the move in a public space, there was no doubt in your mind that he would have stormed out.

“Why on earth would you move to Massachusetts? I thought Florida was where you wanted to plant roots. This is just like you.”

There he goes with that same line. You sighed loudly, poking at your steak with your fork. You lowered your face, refusing to meet his eyes. It was like your twelve years old again, dropping out of soccer only to be lectured by your father.

“When are you going to get your life together?” he asked.

You snapped, well, you snapped as much as you could in a restaurant full of people having a holiday meal.

“That’s exactly it. This is my life dad. I’m choosing to make a change that’s going to fulfill me personally,” you said sternly in a voice just a tad louder than a whisper. “And yes, it’s a big change and yes, it’s scary. But. But.” Picking up your glass of wine, you took a large gulp and set it back on the table. “This is what I need to do. If I’m going to fail, I will fail. But what if this turns out to be the best thing for me? I want you in my life to celebrate my successes, but I also need you if life chooses to spit me out.” Your dad leaned back in his chair, a tired expression on his face. “Can you just try to be here for me if I need you?”

“Of course, Y/N. I’m always going to be here. But I worry. What if you’re making a mistake?”

“Then it’s something I’ll learn from and I’ll just try again.”

The week of New Year’s you stayed with Chris. His home was now completely remodeled, so that was one less stressful thing in his life. It was gorgeous when it was half under construction, now it was beautiful enough to be featured in a magazine on home design. It wasn’t a mansion by any means, it was just a very nice, large, upper class, suburban home. Well, a suburban home with a state-of-the-art alarm system. The house was luxurious without being pretentious and you found it strange to feel so comfortable there.

Chris was flying out to Atlanta and then to Costa Rica for filming the day after you flew back home to Orlando. It was a stressful time for him but he made sure to tell you every night that just you being there was helping. Chris was also incredibly clingy the whole trip. You chalked it up to him wanting to spend as much time with you as possible and also the anxiety of starting up a new project. Especially one that would take him away from home for a couple of months.

Every day the two of you cuddled on the couch and spent nights tangled in the sheets. Chris had only been able to visit once in November, so the two of you were making up for lost time. It was your first Christmas together as a couple and you weren’t together for it. Both of you had Facetimed for hours after both your family parties had ended. It wasn’t quite the same, but falling asleep with your phone held close to your face was the next best thing.

“Celebrating the new year together is going to be way more magical than Christmas. Christmas is old news sweetheart,” he said the night before New Year’s Eve. Your lips so close together that you couldn’t help but lean forward bridging the gap in a soft kiss. “This year brought me you. Next year can only get better.”

Apartment hunting was not going well. Like, not at all. Any place that Lisa considered to be decent enough to stay in was well over your price range. Not just an extra hundred or two a month over your budget, but close to one thousand dollars over the monthly amount you wanted to spend. Lisa told you she would keep an eye out for listings and send them to you as she found them. This move was looking to be more difficult than you thought it would be. You hadn’t lived with a roommate since college, but if you wanted to live anywhere near Chris, a roommate is something you would have to get used to.

New Year’s Eve was probably the most fun you’ve had in a long time. Granted, you didn’t remember the whole night, but the majority of it was worth the headache in the morning.

Chris, Scott, Zach, Shanna, Carly and you had spent dinner at Lisa’s and played games with the kids until they went to bed after celebrating the New Year at eight that night. There was sparkling cider, confetti, and kisses from all the kids to bring in 2021. Chris had arranged a car to pick the two of you along with Zach and Scott up to take you to their friend Benji’s house for the rest of the evening. You weren’t entirely sure if that was really his name or if it was a nickname he picked up at some point. Regardless, Benji’s house was packed to the brim with people. Chris threw so many names at you as he moved his way through the house that you just started smiling and nodding. Hopefully you’d meet his closer friends in a much smaller and quieter setting in the future.

To say you were feeling quite shy was an understatement. Scott had talked you into buying a dress that was shorter than you felt comfortable with. Your butt was completely covered, but you usually didn’t show as much thigh as you were currently sporting. The gold number was long sleeved with a high neck that provided some warmth, but the back was cut low which added to the “sexy New Year’s vibe” as Scott called it. Scott dressed in a black suit and gold tie which was why he was adamant you buy the dress when you saw it in a shop window earlier in the week. Chris was another story. He didn’t want to dress up, opting to wear jeans and sweater that he later removed when he became too hot, leaving him in a plain black t-shirt. This is why Scott was your date for the night. Technically Scott and Zach were your dates for the night. More so Scott as the two of you coordinated. Chris had fun making a game of it by pulling you away from Scott several times over the night to kiss you in “secret” as he didn’t want your “date” to find out. It was cute and if you were being honest, kind of hot.

You didn’t want to get drunk. Wanting to remember the night was important to you not only because it was your first New Year’s with Chris, but because there were too many of his friends at this party. Giving off the impression of Chris’ drunk girlfriend wasn’t what you were aiming for, so you kept the drinking light. A couple of beers and you cut yourself off. You grabbed a plastic cup and dumped a bottle of water into. It was a trick you used to do in college when you didn’t want to get pestered about not drinking.

“Y/N! Sassy!” Scott called from the across the room.

“My date needs me,” you teased Chris.

His smirk said it all. You turned away from him and he promptly squeezed your ass. You chased his hand away with yours but laughed at his advances.

“Grumpy, what can I do for you?” you asked.

“This my dear, is Nicolette. Nicolette, this is Y/N,” he said, throwing an arm over your shoulder and bringing you closer.

You stuck your free hand out for her to shake. “Nice to meet you.”

“You as well,” she replied.

“So, Nicolette here needs a roommate,” Scott spoke, wiggling his eyebrows. “And since I know both of you, I know the two of you would get along.”

Taken aback by the sudden suggestion, you were sure your face looked somewhat shocked. You trusted Scott and you knew he wouldn’t set you up with a crazy person.

Nicolette laughed. “It’s true. I have a room available after my last roommate got married and ditched me. It’s a two-bedroom house with two bathrooms. I’m barely home, so it’s really kind of a house-sitting slash roommate situation.”

Now she had your interest.

“She’s a stage actress,” Scott said dramatically which causes Nicolette to roll her eyes. “She does a lot of traveling shows.”

“If you have time tomorrow, you can stop by and check it out,” she offered.

“Yeah. That would actually be great,” you replied.

The two of you exchanged numbers and Scott pulled you away shortly after, bringing you back to your boyfriend. “I got you girl!”

At midnight, Chris held you close with his chest pressed against your back and arms around your front. Benji stood on top of his pool table, large oversized wall clock in his hand calling out the last few seconds of 2020. Just as he shouted happy new year, Chris spun you around and kissed you, deep and slow. It went on for quite awhile as Scott eventually had the pull both of you apart.

The night was a blur from that moment on. You got dragged into a game of beer pong which later turned into four games of beer pong despite your objections of not being a great player. Scott and Chris passed you back and forth as their partner. The end result was always the same, you having to drink several of the cups with floating Ping-Pong balls inside.

The car service is called by someone, you’re just not quite sure who. All you remember is being pushed into the car and then out of it. Chris and you make it inside but don’t get further than his couch where you promptly push him onto it and straddle his thighs. The 2021 version of you is apparently very horny as you take control of the early morning hours of January first. The button of his jeans is popped open with the zipper quickly pulled down while your gold dress is pushed up over your ass. He’s all consuming and very eager for you to take control.

Chris kisses you like it’s the last time from the short-term parking ramp a couple of days later. Tears flow easily from your eyes as you say your goodbyes. He leaves for Atlanta tomorrow for stage shoots then on to Costa Rica. There are no planned visits between you as per his manager and assistant, there just isn’t time. He’s not set to be back state side until March. It’ll be a long three months that just happens to coincide with big changes for you.

Chris wipes your tears away with one hand while the other cradles your faces.

“Don’t cry sweetheart,” he murmurs, bringing his lips to yours in a short soft kiss.

“Why? Cause it makes your cry?” you asked, nose already stuffy from your tears.

He chuckles and blinks away his tears.

“No,” he said softly, licking his lips. “Cause I love you.”

Chris loves you. Chris loves you. You’ve felt it. You’ve been saying it in your head since Thanksgiving, but haven’t been able to say the words out loud. With your gloved hands, you pull his face to yours and kiss him. Pulling back, you rip off your gloves and drop them to the cold cement ground before grabbing his cheeks once more. The kiss is hungry and needy. You’re both out of breath when you part.

“I love you too. God, do I love you.”

Chris smiled softly, giving your nose a kiss. “I’m going to call you every day.”

“Babe…” you sigh out. “We both know that may not happen. You’re going to have days where your exhausted or have late shoots. Just-Just call me when you can. It’s going to be hard and it’s probably going to kill me, but when you’re back, we’ll be in the same state,” you smiled. “We’re only like forty minutes away from each other rather than a three hour plane ride.”

“We’ll make it work. I love you so much,” he said, kissing you again. “Call me when you land.”

You nodded, kissed him once more then walked to the terminal.

Carly was calling you for the second time that day. Her first message was asking about getting together for lunch. You weren’t trying to avoid her, but you had been starring at the same blank page for three hours. The deadline for your story on a protest that took place over college campuses across the US this morning needed to be submitted within the next two hours. Your head wasn’t in the game, so despite Carly calling twice, and Scott once, you were tempted to put your phone on silent. Chris had been MIA for two days now. He had kept to his promise of calling you daily over the last three months, even if it were just ten minutes to check in. You were trying to not let it bother you, but you’d be lying if you said you didn’t miss his voice. Production was delayed by two weeks keeping him in Costa Rica longer than expected. You’d been in Boston since the end of January and it was now the first week of April.

You shot Carly a text telling her that you were busy with work.

Y/N: Lunch tomorrow?

Carly: Of course. Good luck!

Nicolette was on the road working on a production of Aladdin, so you had the house to yourself. They were set to perform in Boston in May and she had promised you tickets. A perk of knowing one of the stars of the show. She was rarely home so it really was like living on your own with someone else’s furniture. You had donated or sold everything except for your bedroom set since you didn’t want to pay for storage and you weren’t entirely sure how long you’d be living with Nicolette. When you eventually moved out on your own, you’d have to start new, but that wasn’t anything to worry about now.

An hour later you were almost done with the article after turning on your “get shit done” playlist as you so perfectly named it. After proofreading it for the third time and two key strokes away from submitting it to your editor, there was a knock on your door. Despite living in the city for more than two months, you didn’t know anyone outside of the Evans family plus a few friends you’ve met through Scott and Shanna, but they generally didn’t show up unannounced. You chose to ignore it, assuming it was someone selling something or another for the scouts or a representative from a church wanting to spread the word of God. But the knocking wouldn’t stop. It was persistent and loud. You almost dove under your desk to hide, despite the shades in your room being drawn. After what felt like five straight minutes of knocking, you left the safe comforts of your room and walked to the front door. The sooner you answered, the sooner they would go away and you could take that nap after submitting the article.

Lifting a corner of the curtain on the living room curtain as inconspicuously as possible to see who it was, you audibly squealed and ran to the door. Throwing it open you screamed again much to Chris’ amusement.

“What the fuck are you doing here?!”

“Hello to you too sweetheart,” he chuckled, throwing his arms around you and pulling you close. Neither of you are saying anything, just enjoying holding each other. You snuggle your nose in the crock of his neck, breathing in everything that is Chris. One hand traveled up the back of his neck to his hair. The strands are longer and you can’t wait to play with them later.

“Missed you,” you murmur into his neck.

“Missed you so much, Y/N,” he replied, kissing your temple. “Can I come in?” he said with a soft smile.

“Oh my gosh, of course,” you can’t help but giggle out.

The next fifty minutes are spent christening your bed more than once, even though the two of you have had sex on your bed before. To Chris’ point, this is the first time he’s “banged” you on your bed in Massachusetts. His words, not yours.

With your face pressed against his chest, your fingers draw shapes through the hairs on his stomach. “I like the longer hair. It’s kind of sexy in a nineteen eighties kind of way.” Chris hums. “Maybe you should keep it.” You lift your head up to catch his expression. He’s smirking but shakes his head. “I’m serious. It’s kind of like how you had it in Red Sea Diving Resort. The ladies really dig it.”

His hand that was rubbing your back starts to dig into your sides until you can barely breathe as you’re laughing so hard. “The only” *tickle “lady” tickle* “that I’m” *tickle “trying to” tickle* “impress” tickle* “is you!”

“Mercy! Mercy! Mercy!” you shout until he finally ends his attack.

Chris pulls you back close and kisses your lips. “I never want to go that long without seeing you again.”

“I agree. I’ll live in your rental car on location if I have to.” He kisses your temple in reply. “M’happy you’re here, but I wasn’t expecting you for another week.”

“We pushed through. Long hours to finish up, but it was worth it. I love you so much sweetheart.”

You sit up until your seated on your bottom. Raking your fingers through his hair, you look him in his eyes. “I love you too. I’m so happy you’re home and I can’t believe we are living in the same state.”

“Same city practically.”

You nod in agreement, pushing a strand that has fallen over his forehead back. “I’m also glad Nicolette’s out of town.” Chris chuckles and closes his eyes. “You tired baby?”

“Yeah, had an early flight and then a long layover. Mind if I nap?”

“Course not. I’ve actually…Oh shit! I have an article I haven’t sent in yet!” You jump out of the bed, looking for something to throw on. You pick up Chris’ undershirt and slip it over your head. You hop back in the bed and give him a kiss before returning to your desk a few feet away and hit send. “I forgot to hit send before I answered the door.” You swivel in the chair to face him, point your finger at him. “You sir, are a distraction.”

“A damn good one,” he said so casually. Chris pats the empty spot on the bed. “Come nap with me.”

“Can’t refuse you.”

Spring turns into summer in no time at all. Chris spends more time in Boston than he does in Los Angeles. He told you that from the beginning, but with how much he works, you didn’t expect him to be home as much as he has been. When he is gone, it’s only for a few days. Despite having a roommate that is never home, most of your nights are spent at Chris’ places.

“Dodger misses you. He likes when you sleep in bed with us.”

“Oh, so it’s Dodger that misses me. Not you Mr. Evans?”

“Nope. It’s all Dodger. I just can’t take the whining. Promised I’d call you.”

“You’re such a brat,” you groan.

“You love me. Plus, my bed is bigger. It’s too much of a squeeze if I bring Dodger to yours. Cah’mon,” he groaned. “You know you want to.”

“Fine. Fine. I’m only coming over for Dodger though.”

When you arrive at Chris’ place and let yourself in because he insisted you have a key, you see the lights are dimmed and candles are lit throughout the living room.

“Babe?” you called out. Passing through the living room and into the kitchen. You see a couple of pans on the stove simmering away, but no Chris. You walk up the stairs towards the bedroom, pushing open the door. “Babe?” you called out again.

Chris is standing in front of the bed while Dodger lays on it. More lit candles are scattered on the dresser and night stands.

“Hi Beautiful,” he said, stepping forward and grasping your hands.

“What’s all this?” you asked.

“Happy anniversary.”

“It’s our anniversary?” you asked, head titled to the side.

“To me it is.” He took a big breath and smiled. “Now, I know we had a rough start, but on this day, one year ago, I knew I was head over heels for you. Technically, I’d say our anniversary was back in May. That’s when we started talking a lot more and of course that’s the month we first kissed. But it was July when I knew I could never go back to being just friends. It was July when I knew that I needed to hear your voice every day. It was on this day in July that I knew we were going to be something special.” Your breath was stolen from your lungs as cliché as that sounds. “I love you baby.”

Fat tears rolled down your cheeks, a few landing on your lips as you couldn’t contain the sappy grin on your face. You grabbed his face with both hands, smooshing his cheeks. “I love you, you crazy, wonderful man. Happy anniversary.”

Compromises were made as Chris dragged you to Red Sox games in the early fall and then to Patriot games in the early winter. You were forever a Twins and Vikings fan, even though they broke your heart every year. You played nice, accepting the jerseys he gifted you for both teams. The two of you flew to Minnesota to meet your family in late September. Heath and Chris attended a Twins game together as a truce in the new found friendship they were working on. They weren’t best friends, but you hoped they would grow closer. When the Vikings played on Sundays, Chris watched with you so long as it didn’t cut into his Pats’ games, but he refused to wear a Vikings jersey. The funny thing was, you rarely watched football or baseball, but found yourself getting really into it the more you played along with the non-existent rivalry.

In October you flew to Florida to cover Magic Kingdom’s fiftieth anniversary. Chris was off on a press tour on the other side of the country. You extended your stay since Chris wouldn’t be back for another week, opting to stay with Jana and Brooks rather than a hotel. The biggest surprise was Jana’s small baby bump.

“I’m going to be Auntie Y/N?” you asked, tears in your eyes.

“You bet your ass you are,” she said, tears in her eyes as well. “Way to make a pregnant woman cry.”

You pulled her into a hug. “Shush. And you should clean up that mouth before the baby gets here,” you snorted.

By the time you got back to Massachusetts, you had a week and a half reprieve before you were flying back into Orlando with the majority of the Evans crew for their annual Disney vacation. Lisa had invited you herself before Chris even got around to asking you. He later said he wasn’t going to ask because you had no choice in the matter.

“I can’t believe I’m going back as an actual tourist,” you whined to him on the plane.

“You were just there!”

“That was for work. Doesn’t count. I don’t even have my annual pass anymore. What is this bizarro world?”

“So dramatic. Should really be an actress,” he said, nudging you with his elbow.

The trip was great despite the long days in the park. It was a treat to have a Disney Cast Member leading your group around for most of the trip. It sure cut back on the time you usually stood in line.

The downside of the trip were the pictures that were posted online of you and Chris. The two of you did your best not to touch when out in public places, but you both found that hard. Chris would often place his hand on your back leading you from one spot to another. Even though you often sat with Scott or Carly on several of the rides, the ones where you sat with Chris were the ones that were posted. It didn’t take fans long to recognize that you were the same girl pictured with him two years before. Taking Chris’ advise, you didn’t read the comments online and avoided Twitter like the plague. Chris said you both needed to go on like you had been. If you both kept your relationship private, people would eventually lose interest. And they did for the most part.

Christmas was spent in Boston with the Evans family. You bargained with your mother for the week after Christmas and she agreed much to your surprise.

Despite Lisa’s insistence that you and Chris spend the night at her house Christmas Eve, Chris wasn’t having it. He wanted to go home after gift opening and spend it with just the two of you.

You barely made it in the door before Chris was wrapping you in his arms.

“What’s gotten into you?” you asked with a laugh.

He kissed your cheek. His warm breath tickled your nose, causing you to hunch, lowering your head and burying it in his chest.

“Move in with me.”

Huh?

He said is so casually as if he’s asking if you want a glass of water.

You pull your face away from his body and hold him at arm’s length. “You wanna say that again?”

“Move in with me. I want you to live here. I can’t handle Dodger askin’ every day.”

“Oh! So, it’s Dodger,” you said, poking his chest. Upon hearing his name, Dodger got up from the couch and came to stand next to you, his butt bumping against your leg. “I’m sorry Bubba, but I can’t move in. It seems that only one of the Evans boys that live here want me to move in. I need a unanimous vote.”

“Cah’mon. Don’t break his heart like that. He said you give the best belly rubs and frankly I can’t compete,” Chris said crossing his arms over his chest.

“I don’t know,” you said, finger tapping against your chin in thought.

“Fine…” Chris dramatically sighed out, rolling his eyes. “You have my vote too. Move in with us.”

You bend down to give Dodger a belly rub, avoiding Chris’ eyes. “Nah.”

“What?!” Chris shouts causing Dodger to get back on his feet and you to fall on your ass. You erupt in giggles. Dodger walks circles around you, tail wagging excitedly.

“You turnin’ me down? Is that’s what’s happenin’ sweetheart?” He drops to his knees in front of you, resting on his hunches. The laughs die out on your breath and you slowly start to breathe normally again.

“Ask me again,” you whispered.

One hand rested on his thigh, while the other runs through your hair taming the pieces that have fallen in your eyes. “Will you move in with me?”

You nod your head slowly. “Yes,” you answer simply enough.

“Yes?” he asked, big smile slowly forming on his face.

“Yes,” you repeat. You let out a big huff of air. “Now, take me to our bedroom.”

Before you’re even fully awake, your phone is buzzing like crazy Christmas morning. Reaching blindly to the night stand since Chris has extreme blackout curtains on the windows, you couldn’t see your phone if you tried. Technically, they were your curtains now.

Scott: It’s already been 9 hours and you haven’t called me about you livin’ in sin with my brother

Scott: Get dressed and come to breakfast at Ma’s

Scott: That’s an order

Chris had one arm resting over his eyes with the blanket pushed down to his waist. You turned to face him, kissing his bare chest until he starts to stir.

“How does Scott know I’m moving in?” you asked with a coyness in your voice.

Chris chuckles. His mouth full of sleep and his arm still resting over his eyes. “I sorta texted him when you were changing for bed.”

“You’re a brat. He texted me at seven this morning bitching that I didn’t tell him yet.”

“Sorry,” Chris said, removing his arm from his head and turning to his side to look at you.

“No, you’re not,” you scoffed.

He chuckled again, pulling you into his chest. “No, I’m not.

“Hey babe,” you shouted through the open door.

One of the guest bedrooms was turned into your office a month ago and you were still decorating slowly but surely. Chris wasn’t allowing you to pay rent which ensued into a big argument. He ultimately caved some with you paying for the lawn care as well as Dodger’s food. It was still no where near the price of rent you were paying at Nicolette’s, but you would take what you could get for now. You often did all the grocery shopping when Chris wasn’t home so he couldn’t object to you paying. With extra funds in hand, what wasn’t going into the bank you splurged on nice office furniture and some vintage Minnesota Twins pennants to hang on the wall.

“Yes, my love?” Chris said, standing in the doorway.

“Can you help me hang these?” You lifted two of the pennants, one in each hand and gave him a cheesy smile. “Please.”

“You’re killing me babe. You know how bad this makes me look? The Twins?” he scoffed.

“It’s my office. We can keep the door closed when we have company. You’ll live.”

He gave you a wet kiss on your forehead, grabbing one of the pennants from your hand. With your hand free, you wiped at your forehead and stuck your tongue out at him.

Scott had kept you busy all day with what he dubbed “Best Friend’s Day”.

It started with brunch, then on to shopping where you spent entirely too much on wool peacoat. You both got a hot stone massage followed by hot donuts from a shop you frequented before he dropped you back at your place.

“Tell Chris he owes me,” Scott said just as you shut the passenger door.

“He owes you?” you questioned. But it fell on deaf ears as Scott waved and drove away. “Why are my friends so weird?”

Unlocking the door, you stepped inside calling out to Chris.

“In here babe!” he shouted back.

Making your way to the office where you were certain you heard his voice, you saw that the door was partially closed.

That’s weird.

“Are you in my office?” you questioned just outside the door.

“Yes, now get your butt in here.”

Pushing the door open, you see Chris sitting on one of the two brown leather club chairs you had situated on the other side of your desk. On the wall above his head is a huge Red Sox logo that has to be at least three feet across. On the wall next to the window is a framed signed Tom Brady jersey.

“Welcome home sweetheart. I added some more décor to your office. Do you like it?” He’s got a huge grin on his face with his eyebrows raised.

“You are something else,” you said, shaking your head as you walk across the room taking a seat at your desk.

Chris gets up from the chair and strolls over to your desk taking a seat on it and facing you. “Something good?”

“Hmm. Not so sure about that babe. Is this what Scott owes you for? Was Best Friend’s Day a ploy to get me out of the house?”

He scratches the top of his head. “M’fraid I don’t know what you’re taklin’ about.”

“I’m sure you don’t.” You sit up slightly and grab on to the neck hole of his t-shirt, pulling him to you. “You’re lucky I like you.”

He kisses your lips and pulls back to look you in the eyes, despite your hand still firmly holding his shirt.

“I love you,” he said softly. He kissed your nose then each of your cheeks.

“I know,” you replied, letting go of his shirt and opening up your laptop.

“Did you-did you just Han Solo me?” he chuckled.

You looked up from the screen, a small smile playing on your lips. “You bet your sweet ass I did.”

“You’re gonna get it. You are so gonna get it,” he threatened. You shut the laptop and pushed back on your chair. “You better run!”

You were out of your seat as fast as you could, squeals of laughter spilling from your lips as Chris chased you through the first floor and up the stairs. “I love you!” you screamed between laughs. “I love you!”

“Damn right,” he said tackling you onto the bed you shared.

The End

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harry-styles-sunflower · 4 years

Text

Wandering Hands Part 1

Hellooo everyone! I hope you are all having a lovely day! SO this is Part 1 of Wandering Hands.

What it is: You and Harry become friends but you come with certain baggage that might make any other man run.

Word count: 6.2k

Warning: death and angst? (lmk if i forgot one!)

Pls reblog if you like it :) Thanks in advance for the support!

~~~

It was a long day after work and you had no one but yourself to worry about tonight. It was Friday, you were at Joe’s, the bar across your apartment. You’d come in regularly. Only about every other weekend. You were drinking your troubles away with a Manhattan. The bar wasn’t too full, it was only happy hour. You heard the bell ding behind you meaning someone walked in. Some man approached the bar as you finished your drink.

“Hello, can I get a glass of your most recommended wine?” You felt him look over at you, “and a refill on whatever she’s having” he paid Joe and sat a stool away from you.

“Thank you, you didn’t have to” you slid your glass away from you.

“No problem, I wanted to” you nodded and watched the tv. Joe served you your Manhattan and the man his wine. You knew it was a glass of his Château Cheval-Blanc because you had had it yourself once. 4 years ago.

“You know, I never understood baseball too much.”

You drank your drink and looked at him from the corner of your eye. Was he talking to you or Joe? You looked around you and you were the only one close enough to hear him and Joe was busy.

“It’s a good sport if you understand it” you shrugged.

“Care to explain it to me?” He moved to the stool next to you.

You swallowed your drink and looked at the screen. You had no interest in getting a good look at the man next to you anyway.

“English?”

“Precisely.”

“The Red Sox and Yankees played in London a few years ago.”

“Wasn’t home.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah”

“Well Um. 9 innings, 3 strikes you’re out. Guy on the circle in the middle? That’s called a mound. His position is a pitcher- “

“Isn’t that what you guys pour juice out of?”

“Yeah we use the same word for a lot of things, don’t interrupt,” he smiled at you, “he’s a pitcher. He throws to the guy across him, the catcher. Catcher signals him what kind of ball to throw in between his legs. He does it based off the batter’s weakness. There’re 4 bases. 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and home. When the batter hits it, he hopes no one in the outfield catches it or it gets out of park. If they catch it while it was in the air he’s out, if they catch it after it’s hit the ground he can run as fast as he can to whatever base is available. But like in order. Oh, also if someone in the outfield catches the ball, they’re gonna throw it to one of the basemen so they can tag the batter running. But if the batter touches the base before they’re tagged then they’re safe.”

He nodded along so you knew he was listening.

“Can I ask a question now?”

You nodded and sipped your drink.

“How do you know it’s a strike?”

“Oh, my bad. See the box on the screen? If it gets in there it’s a strike. Outside the box it’s a no ball but we usually just say ball.”

He nodded and gestured to your drink, “refill?”

“Oh no, I’m good. I need water” He ordered one for you and Joe gave you a knowing look and you just shook your head at him. You two were basically friends now. He’d gotten to know you over the past 4 years. You lived across the street for 5 but you came in 4 years ago. Joe came and gave you your water and you drank it slowly and watched the game. It was Yankees v. Red Sox. The Red Sox made a homer and you shook your head.

“Yankees fan?”

“Yep. We’re in New York. Kind of against the law to be anything else.”

He laughed and sipped his wine. He hadn’t drunken much, he gave you all his attention while you spoke. “My dad was a big Yankee fan. I’ve been one since the day I was born. My mom says she pushed me out and when the doctor put me in her arms the Yankees had won the game. We used to go to a game like every year when I was a kid.”

“Are they as fun as they seem?”

“Even better. During the commercials on tv, sometimes the outfield players play catch with the people on the side or they play a video of the players talking or play a game with the crowd”

“That’s pretty cool,” he put his hand in front of you, “I’m Harry by the way”. You looked at his hand and put yours in it and shook it.

“Y/n” you looked over at him. You finally took a good look at his face. He was gorgeous you couldn’t deny it. He had strong facial features. Short stubble and green eyes. They were bright. Different than your own dark eyes. He made eye contact with you for a few seconds before you turned back to the screen and drank your water.

“If you’re from England, are you here for business or pleasure?” It was New York, people came and went. Travelled. But in your small town about 30 minutes north from the city, no one really came through here unless they knew someone.

“I uh I’ve been here for about a year but I just moved to the area recently. Got a little tired of the city life, but didn’t want to be too far. I work as an editor at Simon & Schuster.”

“Wow. That’s a good job. Hell of a commute I assume?”

“About 1 hour every morning. It’s worth it. Sleep without the sound of horns or sirens”

“True.”

He turned on his stool to face you and you faced him. Your knees were touching.

“So, what do you do?”

“Teach. I’m a teacher. 7th grade social studies. Actually, I taught the Boston Tea party today” you smirked at him and put one arm up on the bar and leaned against your hand and one hand on your knee. Some fingers accidentally touched his knee but your knees were touching. You couldn’t prevent it from happening

“Ahh” he moved a pointed finger at you. You laughed and so did he. He had dimples. Cute. “Such a petty thing if you ask me” he shrugged.

You laughed and shook your head.

“A lot of history is petty.”

“Do you like teaching?” He put himself in the same position as you, his fingers brushing yours too.

“I guess. I love my kids and filling their minds with knowledge but the standards and requirements are a pain in the ass”

“Oh yeah, I’ve heard about that. Not too much freedom”

“Yeah. Like if I want to take them to a museum, I need to find a standard that validates that museum will teach them according to that standard”

“Wow. The museums here are basically free too right?”

“Yep.”

He shakes his head and sips his drink.

“It’s been like an hour and you’re still drinking your wine”

“Well Ms. Judgey, it’s a good wine. I’m savoring it.”

“It is good. I’ve had it. And I’m not judgey. I was just saying it must be warm now.”

“Eh. It’s still chill. Thanks for caring though” he grinned at you.

You rolled your eyes and finished your water.

“When did you have it?”

“Huh?”

“The wine”

“Oh, um four years ago”

“That’s precise”

“It was on an anniversary of something.”

“Wedding anniversary?” He laughed.

“Death anniversary actually.” His face stilled and he became pale.

“Shit I’m so sorry for laughing.”

“It’s okay. You didn’t know.”

“Shouldn’t have assumed.”

You saw him looking at you like he wanted to know who it was but would never dare to ask. You debated telling him. You turned back towards the screen, leaving his knees cold. He felt he had lost any chance he thought he had with you. He liked talking to you.

“Joe, jack and coke please”

He nodded and brought it to you. You chugged it down. Harry put his head in his hands. He had driven you to drink. Yikes.

“It was my husband. He died.”

He lifted his head from his hands and looked over at you. You were a widow. You looked so young. He felt bad you had to go through such pain.

“I’m sorry for your loss”

“Thanks. It was 5 years ago. I’m alright”

He nodded. Too scared to say the wrong thing.

“He was in the service. Died in Iraq.”

“Oh wow…” he was surprised you were opening up to him. Perhaps it was the liquid courage.

“Came with the territory, I guess. We were together for 10 years. Married for 5. Widowed for 5 now. If you’re trying to do the math we were high school sweethearts. Started at 15. Married at 20. He died at 25. Yes, I’m 30.” You drank your leftover water.

“Erm… Wow. Well you look good” he was nervous.

You laughed lightly and said thanks.

“Guess I scared you away now didn’t I?”

“No no! Not at all I just don’t want to fuck up and say the wrong thing.”

“Harry it’s been 5 years I’m good. I’m religious, I coped well”

“Oh okay.”

“Stop being nervous!” You laughed.

“I can’t help it!” He laughed lightly.

“I’ve got a big curveball for you,” you turned to face him and you put your hands on his shoulders as he faced you.

“I see what you did there. Curveball” he tilted his head toward the tv.

“Ooh yeah. I didn’t even notice. Well are you ready?”

“I think?”

“I have a son.”

It was what he thought. Didn’t know if he fully expected it though.

“Okay. Curveball caught? Strike? What’s the big deal?”

“Wait what? You’re not thrown off?” You were shocked. His face barely twitched or showed any surprised expression.

“No?” He shrugged. “It’s a child. I guess I kind of expected maybe something after you said you were together for 10 years.” He finished his wine.

“Fair enough.”

“So, where is he? If you’re here”

“In-laws. They take him every other weekend. Or just from Friday till Saturday.”

“You get along with them?”

You shrugged. “I think they thought I wanted him to sign up for the force. I didn’t. Obviously. It’s a death sentence. I just wanted to support my boyfriend at the time,” He nodded as you spoke, “but they love Sam and are always there for him”

“Sam huh?”

“Samuel. He’s 7”

“Good age”

“Yeah. He’s a lil sarcastic but I blame myself. I could be that way so he’s only doing what he’s learned. But he’s really smart. He’s obsessed with rocks. Been that way since he could walk”

“That’s cute I won’t lie”

“Thanks” you laughed. You liked his company. He was easy to talk to. You had found it easy to open up. He didn’t seem creepy either. Like he just wanted to get in your pants.

“Well it’s been lovely boys, but I have a little boy I have to be up for in the morning. His grandma wants to have brunch”

You stood up and so did Harry.

“Wait let me walk you to your car.”

You lived across the street but he didn’t have to know that. Joe hid his smile when you said “okay”. Harry paid Joe for both of your tabs and walked out with you. It wasn’t too late, 6 pm. You walked to your car and his was coincidentally in front of yours.

“So um. It was nice meeting you. I enjoyed your company”

You fiddled with your keys and looked up at him.

“Yeah I did too.” you said.

“Would it be too forward if I asked for your number?” he was biting the inside of his cheek, you could tell.

Guys had hit on you before. But the wounds were too fresh and Sam was too young. He’s still young but he’s smart, and he knows some days you feel lonely. As much as you convinced him that he was the only man you needed he knew the truth. You liked his company and conversations. So, you said,

“I don’t think so,” you held your hand out for his phone and he placed it in your hand. You put your number in as “y/n 🥃🍷”. Ball was in his court now.

“Cute” you both laughed.

“I’ll text you” he said

“Mhm” yeah. Sure.

“Are you gonna get in your car?”

“Oh, it’s fine you don’t have to wait” please don’t make me get in my car. I live here.

“What kind of gentleman would I be if I didn’t wait until you at least got in to your car?”

Okay you were a little impressed. Fair enough.

“Very true actually. Well bye, Harry”

“Nuh uh. It’s see you soon. I’m serious about texting you”

“Okay” you laughed and got in your car.

He got in his and you waited for him to pull out.

Once he was past the traffic light you got out and went up to your apartment. You called Sam’s grandma the second you got in. He picked up with an ecstatic voice.

“Hi ma!”

“Hi baby, how are you? Everything okay?”

“Yeah! We’re bowling. I’ve gotten 2 strikes!”

“Oh wow. Look at you!”

“Grandpa says dad was good at bowling”

Your heart broke just a little. It bothered you a little when they spoke about him to Sam. You knew he was their son but they didn’t know how much Sam cried sometimes wishing he got to know his dad. You only spoke about him when Sam asked about him or mentioned him.

“Yeah he was actually. When we were younger, we went on a date and he won one round and I won the other. But we were too broke to buy another round so we left it a tie” you laughed at the memory. Just 15-year-old kids.

“You were broken?”

“No sorry hon, I mean we didn’t have enough money to pay for another round”

“Ohh okay.” You forgot sometimes Sam was only seven because he was so smart sometimes.

“Yeah. Well can you put your grandma on for me hon?”

“Yeah okay. I can stay over?”

“Yeah of course. As long as you want to and don’t feel forced to okay?” You knew sometimes he didn’t want to because of how much they spoke about his dad. On those weekends you faked he had a tummy ache.

“Yeah okay. Here’s grandma” he passed the phone to your in-law. You could never say ex. Your husband wasn’t an ex.

“Hello?” Her tone was already unwelcoming.

“Hey, just wanted to confirm we’re still on for 11?”

“Yeah. I haven’t cancelled.” Translation: did I tell you we weren’t going?

“Okay. Sounds great. See you there”

“Okay” she hung up.

“Yeah okay bye. Geez” you slammed your phone on the table and rubbed your temples. She was always so rude to you. When he died, she said it was your fault he left. She apologized for that but it was still something she said. You can’t take words back. You left your phone on the table and went to shower. You just wanted to take a warm shower, relax your muscles, wear some cozy pajamas, drink some tea, and watch friends until you fell asleep. Friends never did you wrong. So that’s what you did. You remember to set your alarm for tomorrow but you also remembered you left your phone on your kitchen table. With a groan because you found the position and you knew you wouldn’t find it again, you got up and got your phone. You saw you had a text from a random number. When you unlocked your phone, the message said

H: Hey, it’s Harry.

You felt bad for making him wait but whatever.

Y/n: hey

You got back into bed, not finding the position again and kept your phone next to you. Your phone lit up about a minute or two later.

H: what’s up? Did you get home safe?

Y/n: oh yeah. Thanks. You?

H: Yeah, I did thanks. So, what’s up?

Y/n: watching friends, you?

H: Same actually. Nick@nite?

Y/n: Yup 😂

H: I’m happy they play this. Especially since Netflix took friends off.

Y/n: Same. Friends is like my bedtime story now. I watch it every night

H: favorite character?

Y/n: I think it depends the season? Like I love Ross in season 9 and I love the rest. I couldn’t pick

H: I agree.

H: Would you want to FaceTime?

You thought about it. Did you want to?

H: We don’t have to if you don’t want to. (Sorry for the spam of messages btw)

You laughed at the last bit.

Y/n: we can FaceTime :)

“Harry would like FaceTime…” you slid your finger across the screen.

“Hello”

“Hey” he smiled into the camera.

“You look cozy” he was wearing a brown robe thing w a hood from what you could see.

“Ooh I am,” he looked up at the tv, “why are birth control commercials so odd?”

They were playing a commercial for lo loestrin fe and the cartoon bought what was supposed to be lingerie and was showing her boyfriend you assume.

“I hated that pill. It was the worst one I’ve ever tried”

“Really?”

“Yeah it made me gain weight and tons of acne”

“It sucks that all that comes with just trying to prevent pregnancy”

“Yeah. You males have it so lucky”

“Well if they came out with a male one, I’d take it”

You laughed a little too loud.

“You think you’d be able to remember?”

“I’d just take it in the morning. Like a vitamin”

You noticed the way he pronounced vitamin. It was a little different. Cute different.

“I used to take mine at night, just before bed. It was easier that way for me”

He nodded at you and the show had come back. You think that maybe that whole conversation was TMI for your first FaceTime call. The episode The One in Barbados. You both laughed at Monica’s hair.

“Kind of didn’t like the whole Joey and Rachel plot line” He said while looking at the tv screen. It was like you guys were together in the same room and his company was nice on this lonely night.

“Yeah same. It was wack” he laughed at that.

“I think I love phoebe”

“Same, Regina Phalange”

“It’s actually princess consuela bananahammock.” He said with a straight face. You cracked up at his little joke and kept watching the tv.

A few hours later and friends was over. You and Harry were basically playing 21 questions.

“any pets?” You asked.

“Nah, I work too long” you nodded.

“Favorite flower?”

“Sunflowers or tulips”

“Interesting choices”

“Thank you” you smiled. You were now in bed laying down against your pillow, “do you live in a house?”

“Yeah. Small but yeah”

“I used to, but a year after he died, I had to sell it. I like the small space better. It’s more homelike for just us 2”

He nodded and listened. “What time is lunch with your in law?”

You liked how he didn’t say ex in laws. It was a small thing but you noticed.

“11:00”

“Oh okay”

“Yeah”

“Y/n, um. I’d like to take you out. On a proper date. But I know you’re probably really busy. So, um do you think you could let me know when you’re free? If you wanted to go out on a date with me that is”

“Yeah sure” you bit back your smile. You had never done this before. Well not after your husband. It would be your first date in 5 years. You just got a good feeling from Harry.

“Oh okay” he was a little shocked.

“If not this week, then the next. Maybe Friday”

“Yeah that’s good with me”

“Well uh, I’m gonna go to sleep Harry. It was nice meeting you today”

“Yeah it was for me too, meeting you. Goodnight. Sweet dreams”

“Yeah thank you. Goodnight” you smiled and hung up. You felt giddy and happy. You looked at your bedside table and it was a picture of you on your wedding day staring back at you. You knew he would want you to move on already. You smiled and contently fell asleep.

~~~

You woke up around 9:45 to give yourself enough time to get ready. It was nice being able to sleep in a bit. Sam was always up by 8. You remembered your conversation with Harry last night. You haven't had a conversation like that in years. You'd just recently decided that you'd be open for a relationship but you weren't on any dating apps or anything either. Going with the flow you guess. You got ready quickly and drove to the restaurant where you were meeting your boy and your in-laws. You stepped out your car and so did they. Sam looked around before running to you. You opened your arms for him and he hugged you tight.

"Ugh my baby I missed you so much last night!" you kissed his forehead.

"I missed you too ma," he kissed your cheek.

You picked him up and spun him around making you both giggle.

"y/n", your mother in law said.

"Lydia, how are you?" She held her purse in front of her as you put Sam down.

"I'm good, you?"

"Good."

Your father in law approached you. He was quieter and more reserved. The loss of his son hit him hard. The two were close. He did watch out for you a bit more than Lydia. Lydia's priority was Sam, William's priorities were you and Sam.

"Hi William, how are you?"

He gave you a hug and you guys walked into the restaurant.

"I'm good. How are you?"

"Good, thank you."

You guys got settled into a booth and you already knew what you all wanted. This wasn’t the first time.

"Sam told me his science teacher is being hard on him," Lydia spoke without looking away from you. She was looking at your clothes and makeup. Seeing if it was up to her standards.

"Yes, he told me too. I already told him what to do."

"And what was that?" Here we go. Here's the thing. Lydia was your husband's mother. When he passed, she wanted to be her grandson's mother as well.

You held in a sigh before speaking. "I told him to work hard during school but if she specifically targets him repeatedly to let me know and I'll handle it."

She nodded and stayed quiet. Thank God.

"Mami, your phone vibrated," Also, your husband was Italian. You were Hispanic so you were trying to teach Sam some of his Hispanic side as his grandparents taught him mostly his Italian side. They more so taught him stuff about the culture and food, but none of the language. They swore they knew it but you've never heard them speak it.

"Thank you for letting me know mijo, but since we're all together I'll check it later." you kissed his head.

You and your husband had done a good job. He was a perfect mix from both of you. He had brown curly hair, like you. Hazel eyes like his dad. Dark eyelashes like you. A button nose like his dad that was covered in freckles like yours. Plump lips like the both of you. The food came and you all began eating.

"We wanted to talk to you about something." you felt Sam put his hand on your knee. Uh oh. He was preparing you for something he knew you may not like.

"Okay, what is it?"

William spoke up, "Well, winter break is coming up and we wanted to take Sam away for a week."

You almost choked on your food. A week? Them? With your son? Were they insane? Okay maybe you were being a little dramatic but what?!

"Um, where?" you tried to seem open about the idea.

"Blue mountain. We would go snow tubing and other things in the snow." Lydia said.

"For a week? Snow tubing for a week? That sounds more like a weekend thing to me." you ate your eggs.

"Well we would look in the town for other things to do obviously," Lydia snickered like you had sounded ridiculous. She better not start with an attitude you thought. She was asking you for a favor not the other way around. So instead of giving her a direct answer, you said "I'll think about it." You needed to talk to Sam if this was something he wanted to do or they wanted to do.

You guys had finished eating and you all eventually said goodbye. Sam wanted to come back home instead of staying Sunday. Sometimes he just wanted extra time with you.

~~~

You were driving home from unsuccessful shoe shopping when you heard Sam's little voice come from the backseat.

"Are you mad?"

"No, I'm not mad. Why would you say that?"

"Because grandma was kind of rude to you when you said it wasn't a week long thing." Every year he became more observant.

"Well I mean I didn't like that but I'm not mad. I don't let your grandmother ruin my mood."

"Okay"

"Do you wanna go?"

"I don’t know… I do but not for a week. That's too long away from you."

Your heart warmed a little and you nodded. "I'd feel that way too."

"Did dad like snow tubing?"

"I'm not sure bud, we never went"

"Oh."

"That doesn't mean you shouldn't go. I went when I was younger with my mom and sister, we made it a girl's trip. It was a lot of fun."

"Really? What if we went just us two?"

"Hm I don’t know bud; I think your grandparents might get sad. I think I can tell them it will only have to be for a weekend and then you and I could go another time. Just us two."

"Umm okay that sounds good. I agree."

"Good." you pulled in front of your building.

"What was dad's favorite season?"

"Fall. He hated the heat, but he hated being too cold. And he'd get the worst allergies in the spring and he had this weird pet peeve for sneezing. It was kind of funny seeing him get frustrated though. He would look like he wanted to rip his nose off." You held his hand as you walked inside. He giggled at what you said. When you both got inside to your apartment you both took off your shoes and sweaters. You had a picture of your husband on a small table by your entrance. Every time you walked in Sam would say "Hi dad!" to it. He asked if he could watch some Disney XD for a bit and you said it was fine. You were going to make some dinner. You checked your phone and saw Harry had texted you. You were a little shocked he kept up with talking to you.

H: Hey, good afternoon. I hope brunch went well :)

y/n: Hey it did, I guess.

H: You guess?

y/n: Eh they want something, felt like a setup?

H: Ah. I get what you mean. Sorry it happened.

y/n: It's alright. I got my boy back so I'm happy.

H: Good. I'd love to meet him someday to be honest. He sounds adorable.

You thought about his text. How would Sam react? He's always saying for you to get a friend but what would happen when you actually did? It made you nervous to think about. You felt your phone vibrate again.

H: Uh sorry if that was too forward.

y/n: No, its fine. It was sweet.

H: Okay good.

"Ma?"

You jumped up slightly like you had been caught doing something bad.

"Who are you texting? You never text this much" he was grinning at you. He was happy?

"Um none ya beeswax"

"It is my beeswax when it's taking time away from you cooking my dinner," you gave him a warning look. Dang smart ass. Gets it from you. He mumbled a "Sorry" and sat up on the stool and leaned on your countertop.

"I made a friend that’s all okay?"

"A guy friend?" he smirked.

You turned to get a pot. "Mhm"

"What's his name?"

"Harry."

"I like that name."

"You would like any name if it meant I had a friend."

He giggled and nodded. "Does he know about me?"

"Of course he does. You think I could not talk about you?"

"Okay okay," he blushed slightly, "Is he nice?"

"Yeah he's pretty nice."

"Are you gonna go on a date?"

"Samuel! He's a friend!" you playfully yelled at him.

"Mom I'm not 5, I know you might want a little BOYfriend"

"Sam you are 7, and how do you even know what a boyfriend is." you were talking to him as you gathered all your ingredients.

"Grandma told me about boyfriends and girlfriends"

"Now what is she doing telling you about that?" you looked at him.

"Well we saw a couple at the bowling alley and they kissed and I said ew and she said it’s because they were boyfriend and girlfriend so she explained what that meant to me."

"Hm, okay." you trusted she gave him a good and appropriate definition.

"Do you have a picture of him?"

"We just met yesterday" you say as you open and close cabinets.

"Does he like baseball?"

"I actually had to explain the sport to him. He's not from here." you started cooking.

"Where's he from? Is he from where dad used to work?"

"No, way off. He's from a place called England."

"Where the Beatles are from!"

"Exactly," you smiled at him. He was a classic soul.

“That’s cool”

“Yeah his voice is different too”

“I wanna meet him” he put his chin in his palm, “It’d be nice to be around another guy that isn’t grandpa.”

“He uh actually said he wants to meet you too but I think we should wait a bit. I think I should get to know him better before you meet him” You stir your pasta in the pot.

“Okay” he tapped your phone screen, “he texted you”

“Thanks, nosey” you took your phone and read his message. You had forgotten to respond.

Y/n: hey sorry was cooking dinner for the hungry boy and I

H: it’s alright. What’s on the menu?

Y/n: pasta. Penne ala vodka with some shrimp. Probably some garlic bread too. Lazy meal

H: lazy? sounds glorious.

You laughed as you texted.

“Oooh he’s making you laugh!” Sam giggled.

You covered your face and told him to go to his room to make sure he had done his homework. Tomorrow you were going to Chuck E Cheese so he wouldn’t have time to do it then.

Y/n: we’ll see how it tastes

H: do you like to cook?

Y/n: I do but I run out of things to cook so I get bored

H: yeah same. I like to experiment though.

You were feeling a little confident and flirtatious

Y/n: maybe you could show me sometime

H: yeah. That’d be fine with me 😊

You bit your lip unsure of what to say. It had been a while since you were back on the flirting scene. You felt your phone vibrate again.

H: are you vegetarian or anything? Gonna think of some ideas from now.

Y/n: I don’t follow any specific diet but I definitely don’t eat a lot of meat. More of a seafood person.

H: gotcha ;)

Y/n: ;)?

H: don’t like it?

Y/n: eh it’s alright 🤷🏻‍♀️

H: alright?

Y/n: mhmm

H: you’re teasing me, aren’t you?

Y/n: just a lil bit 🤏🏻

H: 😂😂

You finished up cooking dinner and called Sam. He came down quickly and mumbled a small yum.

Y/n: I’ll talk to you later. Gonna eat now.

H: okay 🥰

You served you and Sam plates and you both ate quietly as you watched some tv. You would say you were pretty lenient with Sam. He was very mature for his age and he respected you greatly. He barely gave you a hard time. You think he got that from his dad. His dad always wanted to please you any chance he got.

“Mami, can I sleep in your bed tonight?”

“How come, hon?”

“It’s comfier” you laughed at this because you would say the same thing to your parents when you were younger.

“Okay. But you know you can’t always sleep in Mami’s bed. You gotta sleep in your own some nights.”

“Yeah I know,” he smiled at you.

“Alright. Well can I trust you’ll bathe yourself good tonight? I don’t have to help you?”

“Yes ma, I’ll remember to wash myself good.”

“Okay, remember to get in between your toes and everything”

He nodded at you. You two finished your plates and you sent him off to shower. He kept the door open just in case he needed your help opening one of the bottles. You remembered the first bath you ever gave him. He was so much smaller compared to now and his dad kept complaining about how slippery he was. You were only 23 with a new job and new home but you were both so happy with your little boy. You cleaned up the kitchen and went up to bed where your little boy was already waiting. He had turned on the tv and was watching friends. You showered quickly before getting in bed with him. He cuddled up to your side and laid his head on your chest. You massaged your fingers into his damp curls until you heard him snore lightly. You fixed him onto your other pillow and fell asleep on yours.

~~~

The weekend had ended and you hadn’t heard from Harry. That was before you remembered you were the one who hadn’t answered. It was now Monday afternoon and you were picking up Sam from school. You worked at a middle school just a block away. Sam hopped into your car and told you about his day.

"Can I go to Justin's house tomorrow afterschool?"

"Is Justin's parents okay with this?"

"Yeah, we'll do our homework first too!"

"Alright, you better do it because when you get home I'm checking it all"

"Okay!"

You guys walked into your apartment and Sam went up to shower. That was the routine after school. He showers while you make a snack, after that he comes down and eats while you shower, you grade papers while he does homework, and then if he's done you let him watch some Disney channel while you make dinner. This is exactly how your evening rolls out and you decide to text Harry.

y/n: hey sorry. Busy day yesterday. You wanted me to let you know when I was free and I'm free tomorrow after 3...

You stop typing, "Sam, until when are staying at Justin's?"

"Until like 6? He said his mom was gonna cook"

"Okay," you continue typing,

y/n: Hey sorry. Busy day yesterday. You wanted me to let you know when I was free and I'm free tomorrow after 3 until like 6. I know its late notice so no worries if you're not free too.

You finish cooking, eating, and cleaning and you still hadn't heard from Harry. He was probably mad at you now. You sighed aloud and thought well it was nice while it lasted. You went over Sam's homework with him and then made sure he brushed his teeth before bed. You tucked him in and gave him a kiss on his forehead.

"Goodnight my love," you pushed his hair back off his forehead.

"Goodnight mami, goodnight dad" he blows a kiss toward the picture of him and his dad on his bedside table.

You walked out his room leaving his door ajar and walked down to your room. You grab your book and climb into bed. It was the book from Jane the Virgin. You related to Jane in multiple ways. As you were becoming a part of the fictitious world of the character Josephine you felt your phone vibrate.

H: Banzai, 3:30pm, Be there or be square.

You smiled at his assertiveness. It was kind of cute.

H: If that's okay with you.

y/n: Yes, that's fine lol😂😂

He could never be too serious you thought.

H: watching friends?

y/n: actually reading.

H: what are you reading?

y/n: snow falling, it’s from a show and stuff.

H: look at the publishing company

You looked and sure enough it was Simon & Schuster. Wow.

y/n: Wow lol, I never noticed.

H: I've read it, it's pretty good. More of a girly book, I think.

Y/n: I can’t imagine you reading this tbh.

H: it was a hard manuscript to get through. Kept me on my toes.

You continued texting and before you knew it, it was 2 in the morning.

y/n: wow its 2am.

H: I know. Time flew. You're so easy to talk to.

y/n: I could say the same about you.

H: I'm excited for later

y/n: so am I, free food.

H:😐😐😐

y/n: I'm joking!

H: sure you are.

y/n: I am, I'm excited too because I miss your company, its nice.

H: I don't have a company

y/n: Harry

H: okay okay, thank you. Get some rest, you've gotta be up early.

y/n: true, see you later! 😊

H: see you🥰

~~~

Part two is up now!

#harry styles #harry styles writing #harry styles x y/n #harry styles fic #harry styles fanfic #wanderinghands #wh

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feverinfeveroutfic · 3 years

Text

chapter thirteen: black and silver

“Wow, what a story, honey.”

Sam had arrived into the harbor outside of Avalon right as the rains completely arrived, and she traded in a dollar for four quarters so she could call her mother and give a follow up as to what was going on with her. Once she had arrived at the harbor and took her back to her brand new house, Esmé thus treated her to a nice warm cup of a fusion of chai and black tea: it was tea time at the point anyway.

The house was a cute little cottage nestled in the low hillside that overlooked Avalon and most of the harbor right under a rouse of ponderosa pines and a palm tree: the small yard was decorated in small lush chaparral shrubs and bushes of bright pink pearly Catalina manzanita. Warm heavy wood lined the living room floor and the floor of the small but cozy kitchen; the wall behind them and the small comfy couch was a rich royal blue and carried a couple of framed photographs, one of which was Sam herself as a five year old girl. To the right stood the hallway which extended to her bedroom as well as the guest room and the spacious bathroom. Everything in that house was a warm amber or a royal blue, such that it reminded Sam of the shows in Boston and Providence.

“If I didn't know better, I'd swear we were in New England,” she confessed to her.

“Always wanted to live on Catalina,” Esmé told her as she lifted the tea bag out of the dark blue silver lined tea cup to ensure that it had completed steeping. “And I had a feeling you would like it, too. But the whole thing with Bill, though—that's—” She swallowed and Sam could see the agony in her face. “—I feel like I could've done something had you said something about it to me.”

“Well, see, that's the thing, though, Mom, is—I had no clue what he would do,” she confessed with a shake of her head. “He threw a glass at Belinda's head when they were getting me out of there. Missed her but he threw a glass at her, though! He actually locked me into the house at one point. The boys actually had to bust through a window just to get me out of there. They were about to go over to Germany, too—I'm glad they did because I know that man would've been furious about it. Surprised he never addressed it to me.”

“What's Germany like, by the way?”

“Beautiful. Just gorgeous—like Catalina or upstate New York but cleaner and a bit homelier, though. We were there for a week, and so Alex and I hung out for a full day together at one point. Went through the Black Forest and had authentic European beer on the train, too.” She dared not tell her mother that she left him there at the train station nearby the border to East Germany.

“I'll have to introduce you to him, though,” Sam told her as she held the cup of tea close to her chest. “He's really sweet, Mom.”

“As sweet as Joey was?”

“Sweeter. As kind as Joey is to me, I feel like there was something missing between us, like there needed to be something more there with us.”

“Did you feel any chemistry between the two of you?” Esmé asked her.

“Yeah, I did,” Sam replied. “But—I'm not sure how to explain it, though. All the touches and the little grins he'd show me—you've seen his crooked little smile.”

“Oh, yeah. Just like the man I used to know when your father and I were together at first.”

“Speaking of which... did you ever find him again?”

Esmé shook her head.

“I haven't seen him since your father and I got married,” she confessed. “And he was about to head back up to the northern half of the state, but that's—that's where it starts and ends, though. I couldn't exactly say where he had gone off to or what he planned on doing afterwards.”

The tag on the tea bag dangled off the silvery edge of the cup as she took a sip.

“Mmm—have you tried this tea, Sam? Locally grown. Practically everything here is locally grown and supported. We get things from the mainland, but it's rather endemic, though. It's especially the case over in Two Harbors.”

“This past summer, Louie and I took a road trip from the Bay Area back to Elsinore, and we went all along the coast, along the Pacific Coast Highway and the 1—and he showed me that one part of the Salinas River, right before it gets to the ocean.”

“Oh, I love that part of the state,” she told her, “all along the coastline. I considered moving to outside of Ukiah, right up close to the coastline up there but this place here on Catalina came up and it was an offer I simply could not refuse.”

“Nice little boat ride, too,” Sam added.

“Oh, yes. It's not often, though. Things are pretty self sustainable around here. I figured if it's really something that you wish for, like it's imperative that you return to the mainland, that's probably the one time you go across the Channel with the boat or with the sea plane. Some forty years ago, eight inches of snow fell on the mountain right over here.”

“Wow,” Sam raised her eyebrows at that.

“Yeah, you don't really think of an island off the coast of California as having snow,” Esmé chuckled. “But it happened. Hawai'i gets snow every so often, too, so does Seattle. And coincidentally, so does the Bay Area. It's nothing like Elsinore or the San Gabriels or northern Nevada, but it does happen every so often, though.” She took another sip of her tea and then shook her head and closed her eyes at the flavor. Sam took a sip herself: rich and subdued at the same time, and almost minty as well, and with a kiss of sugar to augment it a bit.

“Ooh, that's nice,” she remarked.

“See?” Esmé smiled at her and she pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose. “So what are they like? The other band you're friendly with now?”

“Testament? They're dark but they're not like... satanic, though. They've got skulls and things surrounding them and their image, but I promise you, they're not satanic, Mom.”

“What are they called again?”

“Testament. I mean, it's even in the name. It should be indicative that they're not satanic.”

“Sounds more like they're about to preach a sermon of sorts,” Esmé confessed. “Like I think of the Old Testament.”

“Preach and give us what for—but not in the way in which Bill did with me, though. Their church is one of—guitars and hard fast music and having fun, too. Having fun with all of us ladies, too.”

Esmé laughed at that.

“Oh, god,” Sam declared and she picked out a delicate pink petit four from the plate on the narrow coffee table next to them, “one time—this was last summer, actually—we were all touring over in Boston and a few ladies were walking past us on the sidewalk and they called the four of us—Marla, Belinda, Zelda, and me—all satanic for hanging out with a bunch of metal boys. And Zelda was like 'yeah, a band called Testament is satanic!' and Marla and I both laughed out loud at that.”

Esmé herself chuckled in response to that as she held her tea cup up to her lips once more. Sam took a bite of the little cake in all of its light fluffiness, and then one more bite of it.

“What are they called again?” she asked her.

“Who, Zelda's band? The Cherry Suicides. It conjures the image of a human sacrifice—like a virgin giving herself up—or simply a woman stabbing herself in the chest.”

“So violent,” she remarked with a shake of her head.

“But that's what makes them so awesome, though. That same night, we were in Boston, and they were allotted right before Anthrax and Testament's sets. They did this song called 'Dead Witches', it was like a seven minute long jam. One minute of hardcore punk and then their guitarist Minerva just launched into this big long solo. Given they're a punk band, their songs are usually only a couple of minutes. But right there, they just showed that they're as a big of a power house as the boys themselves, too.” Sam sipped on the tea again so as to wash down the petit four.

“They're all real nice, too. These four tough looking chicks all the way from Providence, but they're so kind, though. They love their fans and they're easily some of the most polite people I've met.”

“They've been through a lot, too, you said.”

“Yeah, they have! All the break ups and the drama with the record labels and—” Sam shook her head as she thought about Aurora. “Long time coming for them, though. I hope I get to see them again.”

“You're gonna have to go back to the mainland anyways,” Esmé pointed out.

“Yeah, I promised Alex I would.”

“You said he's sweet.”

“Yeah, he is. He's funny—he's the kind of guy you don't really like at first until he finds a way inside of you. He's got this little bit of gray hair over his brow, too. He turned twenty back in September.”

“Twenty years old and he's already going gray?” Esmé gaped at that.

“He's been going gray, though,” Sam pointed out. “I remember him telling me about it but I don't remember the full details, though, except he's had it since he was like fourteen. When we first met him, it was like this little sliver over his brow and now it's this little tuft. It's weird, too, like it's just this little tiny bundle of gray hair on that part of his head, and just that part of his head, too. The rest of his hair is completely solid black.”

“Huh.”

“Aurora told me her��grandmother, I think it was—had something similar to that. No idea what causes it, either.”

“Maybe it's a birthmark. It's a long shot, but it is possible, though.”

“Could be, but—who knows, really.” Sam shrugged her shoulders. “He's been dyeing it, too.”

“Can't blame him,” Esmé admitted. “A boy his age going gray so early—you might as well keep your hair uniform.”

“He says it ages him.”

“And it does, too. I remember the very day your father initially went gray—and yes, it aged him several years. I remember the day I started going gray, too. Can't imagine how it makes him feel.”

They sipped on their tea in unison and the rain outside fell even harder on the rooftop and porch outside.

“I'm gonna assume the other reason why you moved here,” Sam started again, “and not the coastline is because this feels like the quintessential place to write a novel.”

“Exactly!” Esmé declared with a laugh. “There's only a couple thousand people here and no one to bother me, either.”

“Except me of course,” Sam pointed out.

“You're not bothering me, sweetie. You never bother me—if there's anything I can genuinely take away from you living so far away for a few years, it's that I miss having you around.”

“Well, even though I consider New York as my home, I can always ensure a trip out here. I might as well ensure that, anyways: I've got friends out this way.”

“So nice of them to bail you out of there, too.”

“Yeah, I mean—Greg got me out through the back window the first time around and we got down to Alhambra without sparing any expense. And then Eric literally busted through a window to get me out of that house. And then they took me to Germany for a week.”

“And you like the Bay Area, too.”

“The Bay Area is stunning. They took me to the place where Cliff's ashes are spread out—and it just felt like a—a—a pilgrimage of sorts. Eric showed me where he was from. Louie and I took a road trip together down the coastline.”

“And Alex took you home.”

“And Alex took me home, right,” she echoed, that time in a soft voice. “And he was in Aurora's wedding, too...”

Maybe she had in fact been far too hard on him as she sipped on the tea some more. She thought of him over there on the mainland, with the guys all around him. She hoped that, since she was on Catalina with her mother and not over there with them, that Bill would keep his distance from Reseda. She knew that he was far and away from there, and yet that fear still lingered over her.

At the same time, she began to think about Joey again and moreover, how in the world he managed to find a new woman to substitute her back home back East. The only way he would have found out is if someone back there told him, and as far as she knew, Louie never approached him once. In fact, the more she thought about it, the less sense it made to her. The only way she could even so much as find out about it is if she sought answers from the man himself, and it would be a little bit before she got to see him again in Long Beach.

That is if she could.

Afterwards, Esmé treated her to a bite of dinner at one of the cafes there in Avalon. Given it was raining, they retreated inside of there and shared a pina colada, even in the middle of December and a week before Christmas.

If nothing, Sam was glad to be around her mother again, even if Ruben was up in the Bay Area from that point onward. If nothing, it would be a rather interesting Christmas there on Catalina with all of the manzanita and all of the endemic plants about there, much like on her road trip with Louie: her mother joked about having a small palm tree in the front room of the house for the tree, although it made legitimate sense to Sam.

She knew that she would have to get used to the idea of having a split household from then on: divided over the entire state of California and she considered on returning to New York when all was said and done. However, she had her doubts about that, especially with Joey having his hands on another woman.

She took a warm shower to rid of the feeling traveling had given her and then she curled under the covers in her old bed tucked away there in the guest room. All the while she thought about Joey himself. She pictured him with his hands all over that other woman and she wondered if Frank genuinely saw them hold hands with one another or if he caught a fleeting glimpse of them and put two and two together. But she couldn't help it: she pictured him with a long and lanky supermodel, not a stubby little dark haired woman such as herself.

She rolled over onto her back and she wondered if he would return to her if she was a supermodel herself. Long narrow legs with big stiletto heels. The perfect hourglass shape to her body and her breasts so perky that no one could resist them. She could have the boys all to herself if that was the case with her.

If anything, as she thought about it more, she wondered as to why all of the guys even liked her in the first place because with every glimpse in the mirror, especially when she stood there after her shower and examined her nude body, she just saw a plain young woman with dark hair and dark eyes. She looked just like every other woman on the street as far as she could tell.

Nothing discernible as far as she could tell, either: nothing like doll-like features with Belinda or ever changing hair like Marla, or even something interesting like premature grays or having parents who hailed from both sides of the Korean peninsula.

And she bounced around with her weight as if it was the easiest thing in the world: but at least this time around, she was on the downswing. She glanced down at her body as it lay underneath the covers: the tips of her feet pointed up down at the base of that narrow mattress. She let her hand slide over the sheet, towards the right side.

She could still feel Cliff there next to her. She could still feel his presence, even with his smell gone away from her olfactory memory and even with the feel of his body vanished from the caress of her hand.

She could also feel Joey next to her. They were so close a few times. She actually got to put her lips around him not once, but twice.

And then, just like that, he went off with another woman all because she didn't resemble to a supermodel.

So many questions and all she could do was fall right into a dreamless sleep.

It wasn't until she awoke the next morning to the dense marine layer and the feeling Christmas was upon her when she realized she hadn't seen the mysterious man for months, as if he had vanished from her dreams forever.

After breakfast, Esmé drove her back down to the harbor for the next boat ride back over to San Pedro.

“I'll be waiting for you, sweetie,” she vowed to her as she held her in her arms away from the rain.

“No idea how long the show will be, though,” Sam confessed as she ran her fingers through her dark hair.

“I'll be waiting for you regardless of it, though.” She flashed her a wink and blew her a kiss before Sam boarded that little blue and white boat with her purse on her shoulder and her questions ready for Joey; she also had her explanation ready for Marla and Belinda, even though she had faith Alex had told them about it. She took her seat on the starboard side and peered over the edge to the gray ocean waters down below.

Twenty two miles across those waters and with the marine layer overhead, and soon the edge of California emerged in view: the coast seemed to extend on either side of them for as far as the eye could see. Sam thought about the Highway 1 on her road trip and how it all felt so endless and eternal at the same time, even if it was obvious the end of it came soon enough.

As the coast became clearer and clearer, she spotted that car in the parking lot before the dock. Even from a whole mile away, she recognized his tall body and those jet black curls. She didn't even have to see that little tuft of gray on his head to know that it was him there.

They reached the dock and Sam bolted off of the boat first and she hurried up to him.

“It's the damnedest thing, I can literally see you a mile away,” she told him as part of her greeting to him.

“You wanna know something?” he asked her as he set a hand on her shoulder.

“What's that?”

“I can, too. A mile out and I saw you peeking over the edge.”

“You could literally see me?” she chuckled.

“Yeah! Anyways, come on—the doors don't open until way later but—you know the drill.”

Alex drove her up to Reseda with nothing more than the side streets. He was silent the whole way and she could only assume that he had told Marla and Belinda what had happened. But she could only assume regardless of it all.

They reached the club in question and he parked around the back in the alleyway, much to where Sam thought she was about to bow headfirst into the dashboard in front of her.

“Sorry—I'm still trying to get used to it,” he confessed with a shrug. She let out a low whistle.

“Well, at least you weren't speeding,” she pointed out. He climbed out first; she followed him up to the back door there. All the memories of the Stormtroopers of Death tour returned as he held the door for her. She walked into the back hallway there, where two women congregated around Greg and his bass guitar. He nodded at her and Alex, and they both turned for a look back at them.

So he didn't tell them because they just got there themselves.

“THERE SHE IS!” Marla declared at the top of her lungs.

Belinda's snake pendant glittered under the pale lights with each and every step of the way. She threw her arms around her first and then she gaped at Sam. Marla shook her head and gaped at her.

“What the hell, Sam? Why'd you bail on us?”

She was taken aback at that. “I did?”

“Yeah,” Belinda followed up as Greg joined them there at the back door, “after you got the news that Joey had left you for another woman, you just sorta—went rigid and then you disappeared out of the cafe and just started walking up the road. We tried to get you back with us, but you were like 'no! I'll get there on my own!' Didn't even tell us where you were going, either.”

“Wow.” She slowly rubbed her hands together at the sound of that. “I—I don't even remember doing that. I can't believe I did that to you.”

“You must've just blacked out,” Greg explained. “Like it hit you so hard that your mind went completely blank.”

“Yeah, I was thinking about that yesterday after I dropped her off at San Pedro,” Alex followed up, “like—it sounds like she just completely blacked out.”

“Yeah, you were completely checked out at that point,” Belinda added. “I couldn't even get you to pay any attention.”

“Well, yeah, I mean—Joey is my guy. At least, I thought he was.” Sam stopped herself because the tears were coming back to her. “Did—Frankie give any more explanation as to why he went with another woman?”

Marla and Belinda glanced at one another, and then the former shook her head: her neon green hair shimmered about under the bright light of the backstage area.

“No, he just said, 'tell Sam that—I spotted Joey with another woman, and they look in love, too. Probably more so than the two of them.'”

Sam closed her eyes and bowed her head a bit.

“If we see him, we're gonna have a long talk with him,” Belinda vowed.

“The three of us or just me?”

“We'll help you,” Marla promised her. “Aurora's not here right now—obviously—so she's way out of the loop.”

“Push comes to shove, since he took your heart from you—we'll take something from him,” Belinda added.

“We won't go that far,” Marla told her off. “Especially since there's more than likely a good explanation behind it.” She fetched up a sigh and shook her head again. “San Pedro, you said, Alex?”

“My mom lives on Catalina now,” Sam pointed out. “Remember?”

“Oh, yeah, that's right! Okay, so you went to your mom's house.”

“And Alex drove you there, too,” Greg added with a nod.

“I was driving down yesterday and there was traffic on the freeway when I got to Bakersfield, and I was like 'ah, jeez.' So I took a detour all through some farmland and I saw her walking on the side of the road. I was like, 'is that Samantha? Oh my god it is!' So I pulled over and got her in the car with me and I drove her there before the snow hit the Grapevine.”

“Drove me all the way down to the docks,” Sam added in a soft voice; something caught her attention out of the corner of her eye, and she spotted a man with his back turned to them. But she remembered his head of thinning black hair, still long and down past his shoulders. He was talking to Louie as she approached him from behind and tapped on his shoulder.

“Hey, Scott!”

“Hey!” He put his arms around her. “How've you been?”

“Been over at my mom's house—she lives on Catalina, now. Twenty miles off the coast.”

“Wow.” He raised his thick eyebrows at that. “So how's life in Elsinore? I heard some things about that.”

“I don't live there anymore. Marla and Bel got me out of there. I might find my way back to New York officially soon enough.”

“Cool!” He gave her a high five at that.

“By the way, how'd you find out about my living in Elsinore?”

“Marla. I saw her running down the street a while back and I asked her what was going on, and she told me to take her over to your old school—I was driving. She did some things in there and then she came back out and she told me what happened to you. She asked me to keep it between us and so I did.”

Louie raised his head and nodded at her.

“Hey—poison garden,” she greeted him. Louie hesitated and then he laughed at that.

“Poison garden!” He bumped fists with her and Scott looked at them both, confused.

“It's—a long story,” Sam told him.

“It really is,” Louie added, and then he laughed at something behind her. She turned for a look back at Greg and Alex with Marla and Belinda: Greg slung his bass over his shoulder and then he let it rest right onto his back.

“You're gonna do what Joey did, aren't you?” Louie joked as the three of them walked on over to that side of the backstage area.

“Nah—just wanna see what the crowd's gonna be like out there.” He poked his head out from behind the curtain for a better look out to the front row of the crowd: Louie and Alex joined in, as did Sam and Marla right behind them. They were met with a sea of heads, a few of whom near the front had little elephants on their sleeves. It took Sam a second to realize that those were the Republican elephants with their red make up and the little white stars on their feet. Alex had his eye on all three of them and he frowned at the sight of them.

“What's up?” she asked him.

“Yeah, this new album is definitely gonna be titled that,” he assured her. “Practice What You Preach.”

“This is bringing back all those memories of when we were first starting out,” Greg added, “we were playing in clubs up in the Bay Area. And there were a bunch of people who were talking about Reagan and we weren't having any of it.”

“Oh, yeah, it's definitely gonna have that title.”

The bunch of them backed away from there and Alex snapped his fingers.

“What?” Sam asked him, and he gestured for her to follow him. But he only led her to the little table tucked in the corner right behind him where he had set down a black backpack for safe keeping.

“I forgot to show you this, by the way,” he told her as he unzipped the front pocket, “—when I took you down to San Pedro yesterday.”

He flashed her a Polaroid photograph of a silver menorah on a table somewhere. All around the base stood a series of little yellow marigolds: each of the eight candles were lit with those pure yellow flames.

“Candles—lit for me?”

He opened his mouth to say something but he was cut off by Greg singing off key to something. Alex turned his head in his direction as Greg slapped and plucked at the thick bass strings.

“What's all this?” Alex demanded.

“Nana na na na! Nana na na na!”

“Greg!”

“Huh?”

“What're you doing?”

“Sorry, I was just singing. We are getting paid to do this, you know, Alex.”

“True.”

The back door swung open again and Alex set a hand on Sam's shoulder so as to get her out of the way. Chuck and Tiffany stepped inside, away from the fine drizzle that began to fall over Los Angeles.

“I saw our pals from Slayer in the crowd here,” Chuck pointed out.

“Where's Slayer?” Sam wondered aloud. “Where's Slayer? Where's Slayer?”

“I didn't see them, either,” Marla added.

“They're there, though,” Tiffany assured them, and Chuck's face lit up at the sight of Sam.

“Hey, Sammich! C'mon over here. I got something to give you.”

“Well, it's from me and him both,” Tiffany corrected him.

“What is it?”

He kept his hand behind his back and he showed her a thoughtful look on his face.

“Close your eyes and hold out your wrist,” he told her. She did just that and she felt something smooth brush against her skin. He tied something right atop his wrist.

“Okay,” he told her, and she opened her eyes. He had given her a bracelet of black onyx beads and fire opal sugar skulls.

“Oh my god, Chuck, it's beautiful!” she gasped.

“It's a friendship bracelet. I got one, too!” He showed her the twin bracelet on his wrist as well and she threw her arms around him.

“Thank you,” she whispered right into his ear.

“And thank you,” he whispered back to her.

“Hey, if nothing, we can name our new album Poison Garden,” Louie joked to Greg and Alex.

“No!” Sam whirled around and she pointed over at Louie himself, and he lunged back a bit as a result.

“No?”

“That's 'not' to you!” Scott called out from across the floor and Marla and Belinda both cackled at that.

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ugly-crying-over-bucky-barnes · 5 years

Text

Roguish Women Part 2

Summary: Kate Rosseau is an American who fled to Paris to escape her past life. Now she's dancing and playing the part of a courtesan at the Moulin Rouge. There she meets Tommy Shelby who thinks she can be useful in expanding his empire. But has he been blinded?

Part 2: Tommy and Kate debate and reach an agreement.

Tommy helped Kate out of her fur coat upon entering the hotel suite. The luxury of the ornate room wasn’t new to her. She had spent plenty of time in lavish rooms being spoiled by expensive food, fine wines, and Egyptian cotton. The black, white, and gold embellishments of the Art Deco style was familiar to her. She was used to the light of glittering chandeliers and passing by her reflection in the many mirrored surfaces.

Although the expensive decor wasn’t any comfort to Kate. Not when she had to fake affection and love. In fact, the atmosphere of hotels had begun to make her nauseous. She knew what was awaiting her.

But it still wasn’t exactly clear if those were Tommy’s same intentions. He had expressed interest in what she knew but not her services. Still, he was a man. A man who had become accustomed to the finer things in life and that no doubt included expensive courtesans.

Kate had changed out of her stage costume before departing with Tommy. She left under the guise that he was an expensive client who wanted to take her somewhere a little more intimate. To complete the appearance, she left in a seductive jade colored dress. The one made of silk that left little to the imagination and had a scandalous open back.

Tommy noticed this very quickly as she walked over to the sofa. The silk shifted with every movement, clinging to her body and revealing the curve of her hips. He cleared his throat and hung her coat up on the rack by the door. He was careful to maintain his appearance of business by leaving everything on but his coat. This wasn’t a situation to be comfortable with. He still knew very little about this woman.

“Drink?” Tommy asked while moving to the liquor cart by the large windows. He looked down on the lights of Paris still sparkling in the night.

“Do you have wine?” Kate settled on the plush sofa, grateful to be off of her sore ankle. She reached down to take off her heels and inspect the area. Luckily there didn’t appear to be much swelling.

“Merlot.” He answered after inspecting the lone wine bottle among the liquor.

She made a face. “I prefer Chardonnay. Don’t particularly like red. I’ll just have gin.”

Tommy poured her a glass of gin and whiskey for himself. He walked over with the glasses and set them down on the table by the sofa. He took a seat across from her so they could talk.

“Do you have someone back in England, Mr. Shelby?” Kate wondered. It seemed unfathomable that a handsome and wealthy man like himself wasn’t married. But perhaps he’d simply taken off his wedding band while he was in the Moulin Rouge. Some men did that, some didn’t seem to care and left them on. Kate wasn’t sure which was a worse sin.

Tommy’s mind went to the blonde barmaid he left behind in Birmingham. Grace had captured his attention but it had been a long while since he’d allowed himself to succumb to love. He hadn’t opened his heart up since he lost Greta. But he was getting dangerously close to that territory with Grace. “I’m not married.”

“Hm.” Kate didn’t remark on his answer. But it led her to believe there was someone. It was anyone’s guess why he was keeping it a secret.

“Tell me what you know about the Americans.” Tommy redirected the conversation.

She took a drink of the gin and grimaced at the taste. “I don’t understand why Europeans like their gin so bitter.”

He crossed his arms over her chest and stared at her. For a moment, he doubted his decision to bring her back to the hotel. She could’ve been reading his reactions and telling him what he wanted to know. Could this all be a ruse to get something out of him? Blackmail? Maybe she wanted a free ride to England or even back to America. What if she didn’t know anything?

Kate raised an eyebrow at his expression of displeasure. “Are you always so serious, Mr. Shelby?” She asked.

“I asked you a question.”

“And I asked you a different one.”

Tommy’s jaw tightened. “I’m not here to play games. Either you know something or you’re wasting my time.”

Kate looked slightly amused despite his intense tone. “I grew up in South Boston. They call us Southies. There’s a group there that runs all of the bootlegging operations.”

“The Gustin Gang.” Tommy nodded as this wasn’t news to him. “I’m aware. I’ve done my share of research.” It was necessary to do such investigations if he was really going to expand overseas.

“Then you’ll know that they’re weak. Easy to take over if you’re strong enough.” Kate leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “But if you’re so smart, Mr. Shelby, then you won’t need my assistance.”

He balked a little. Yes, he knew about most of the active gangs that controlled the smuggling operations on the east coast as well as Chicago and Detroit. But he didn’t have enough intel to know how they operated or what their weaknesses and strengths were. “I brought you here to give me information.” He replied without explicitly saying that he needed her help. Admitting that would only give her power.

“There are Italians in the North End, lots of them. It doesn’t matter what city you’re in, Boston, New York, Chicago, the Irish hate the Italians and vice versa. Neither of them like to share control. They’re looking for allies, strong allies.”

Tommy considered what she was saying. It was much like London, various gangs all pushing and shoving each other for a larger piece of the pie. Would the Americans find a relationship mutually beneficial? Could he even trust them? Could he trust that Kate wasn’t looking out for her own interests?

“That’s very vague.” He responded.

Her confident demeanor wavered a little. “Well, more in-depth information could get me in trouble. I don’t want to risk that for a man I don’t know very well.”

So they were at a stalemate. Both of them standing with their backs against the wall so neither of them could stab the other when they weren’t paying attention.

“You were in the war,” Kate concluded.

He eyed her for a moment before nodded. “Yes.”

“Where?”

“Here. Northern France.” The break in the conversation gave Tommy a chance to find his cigarettes and light one.

Kate watched him. Each movement deliberate and firm. He was a man who hid his weaknesses well. But that didn’t mean he didn’t have any. All men had a weakness. So did women. “You must hate America for coming so late.”

His blue eyes didn’t meet hers as he lit the cigarette. “There were many people to blame. I’ve got more important things to deal with now.”

Little did he know, the woman in front of him had been through trauma. No, she hadn’t been in an active battlefield but she’d fought her own personal wars. Came across enemies who were ruthless. Suffered enough to warrant building up her defenses.

Tommy decided to throw her an incentive. He wasn’t there to talk about the war. “You want to get out of here. If you can’t go back to America would you want to come to England.”

Although she perked up, Kate was suspicious about his intentions. She hadn’t given him enough information to warrant a reward. He’d been vague about his relationship status. Maybe he wanted to bring her along as some sort of toy. “I don’t want to be a whore.” She replied. “Not here, not in America, and not in England.

“What else are you good at?” Tommy replied callously even though he didn’t intend to come off so harsh.

She scoffed, her eyes widening in disbelief. “You mean what am I good at beside fucking men?” Her voice was incredulous.

“I didn’t-”

“I’m not an object, Mr. Shelby, I have plenty of redeeming qualities. Or do you have your head so far up your own ass that you can’t see that?” She demanded.

He subtly rolled his eyes. The woman was testing his patience. “Are you using me?”

“Are you using me? ” She retorted.

Another stalemate. Neither of them looked away or softened their glare. It was as if the world had never seen such a dramatic clash of personalities. A mysterious woman who held valuable information, although it was questionable how she acquired it. And a man who wanted nothing more than to rule an empire but had severely lost his trust for others.

Kate decided to break the tense silence. “Mr. Shelby, you must understand that I fled America for a reason. I’m not looking to stir up the pot again and have them out for blood. They have no issue sending men to come and find me. If I give you information that can be traced back to me, then I have a problem.”

Tommy prided himself on being a good judge of character. He rarely trusted anyone that was outside of his immediate family. It was easy for him to pick up on tells that someone was lying. And he saw the hint of fear hidden behind Kate’s slate-colored eyes. He cleared his throat and stood up to pour himself another whiskey. “Say I were to trust you. You gave me the information I want and in exchange, you come to Birmingham with me. I can give you work at my company. Legitimate work.” He clarified before she argued with him again. “If your information checks out and is valuable, you’ll be compensated. And if there’s a threat on your life, you’ll be under the Peaky Blinders’ protection.”

Kate fidgeted and was a little uneasy with the proposition. But it was the only lifeline she had to get out of Paris. She had men promising her large sums of money before. Enough cash to leave the Moulin Rouge and find a life of her own. But they were hollow promises that were never kept. They promised to bring her home and provide her with everything. But what was expected from her in return made her sick.

Tommy could be holding out. Maybe he would break his promise once he got what he wanted. Maybe he would bring her to Birmingham and still treat her like a whore. Still, the walls were closing in on Kate. She didn’t have another option. It was a calculated risk, but it was a risk for Tommy as well. Maybe that was why she stood up and reached out to shake his hand. Sealing the deal.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Tommy was quite the picture sitting outside of a cafe. Sat at the small table, he was enjoying the Parisian sunlight while nursing an espresso and smoking. He stretched out his legs a bit to keep comfortable. Activity bustled around him, men in fine suits, women dressed in the highest fashion, and mothers lugging along crying children. The romantic allure of the French language enveloped him and strangely eased his tension.

Tommy assumed that coming to France would only trigger negative memories from the War. The rapid-fire foreign tongue that mixed with English in the trenches. The scent of their cigars. But the city was different enough to make him forget. Well, at least push the thought aside for a moment. He could never forget.

A bright lilac covered cloche hat caught his attention. Tommy didn’t know whether the peacock feather stuck in the hat’s band was real or not but it certainly looked the part. Tightly wound blonde curls peeked out from underneath the short brim of the hat.

Her blue eyes found his before he saw her hat. Kate walked towards him, maneuvering through the passing crowd. “Mr. Shelby,” She greeted and plopped herself down at the cafe table across from him.

“You can call me Tommy.” He replied.

I pegged you for more of a formal man.” Kate dug into her black purse for her compact mirror and lipstick.”

Tommy watched her pull out the mirror, a small disk embellished with emerald stones. Most likely they were fake, and some were missing from the circular pattern. Her lipstick was a dark red. She flipped open the compact mirror and began to apply it. He saw her eyes poking up above the edge of the silver-plated mirror. That’s when he noticed the shadow under her right eye and the knot on her forehead. Injuries that certainly hadn’t been there when they’d spoken the night before.

That morning, they had met in the lobby of the hotel the Peaky Blinders were staying in. Kate informed Tommy that she would be going to the Moulin Rouge to speak with her employer. He offered to go along with her but was turned down. Kate didn’t trust the British man yet. There was no need for him to be involved with her resignation. Mostly because she knew it would be ugly. Her boss, not the owner of the club but the manager, had a strong temper and often lashed out at the women. Especially women who were trying to escape their lives of night entertainers.

“Who did that to you?” Tommy kept his tone even. He didn’t want to make it a spectacle of pointing out her injuries, lest she clammed up and denied anything happened.

Her eyes flicked over the rim of the mirror to look at him. “Do you care?” The hand applying her lipstick paused, her lips parted slightly.

“Yes.”

Kate sighed and finished touching up her makeup. With a snap, she closed the mirror and shoved it back into her purse along with the tube of lipstick. “Some people don’t like to take no for an answer.”

The cryptic answer didn’t satisfy Tommy. “Who did it?” He repeated firmly.

A bitter smile crossed her face. “What? Are you going to act the knight in shining armor for me?” She accused. “Rest assured, Mr.-Tommy, I’ve met my fair share of men who had no issue roughing up a woman. They call it equality.”

Tommy frowned. “That’s not how I operate.”

The dark conversation about abusers appeared to amuse Kate in a twisted way. Perhaps she had become so accustomed to the brutal nature of some that she expected it. It simply became a way of life. Either she fought back, which was appropriate in some cases, or she expertly covered up the marks with powder the next morning. She didn’t fight everyone who aggressed against her. She chose her battles wisely.

“How do you Brummies operate then?” She inquired.

“If someone lays a hand on you then they lose their hand,” Tommy replied bluntly. “That’s what being under the protection of the Peaky Blinders entails.”

“Why’d you call yourselves that?” She dismissed his explanation of his policy regarding abusers.

He raised an eyebrow but reached up to slip off his flat cap, passing it over to Kate. “Razor blades sewn into the brim.”

Kate examined the gray cap and gently pushed back the seam to see the blades hidden. She lightly pressed her thumb against the sharp edge, making an indent across her fingerprint. “Huh, so you blind people.”

“When it’s necessary.” Tommy took the cap back from her and placed it back on his head.

“So, what work do you have for me?” She folded her hands on the table, leaning slightly forward to address him.

“It’ll all be explained once we get to Birmingham.” He answered and reached into his pocket to pull out a few coins for the coffee. “Until then, you should start compiling all the information you’re going to give me. I’d rather not leave a paper trail but if you must write things down to remember, then you may.”

“How gracious of you.”

He continued talking, skipping over her snarky remark. “Until then, I’ll have you meet me brothers and a few of my men who are here. For now, you’re simply my new hire. They won’t need to know you’re an informant.”

“You keep secrets from your family often, Tommy?” Kate tilted her head to the side with a simpering glance. “That doesn’t make for good business.”

Again, Tommy chose to disregard what she said. “I’ve already bought you a ticket for the ship. We’re leaving tomorrow morning at eight.”

Kate waved over the waiter and ordered a coffee in French. She crossed her legs and picked up Tommy’s silver tin of cigarettes without asking. He didn’t stop her, instead just pulling out his lighter and offering it to her. After a few drags, she smiled coyly. “You must be excited to return to your sweetheart back home.”

Tommy knew that he’d left his relationship status vague. He’d done so intentionally. “I don’t have anyone back home.”

“I think you do.”

“Is that so?”

Her smile grew a little as he teased her. It was as if he wanted her to show off her intelligence, to prove herself. “You have a past; anyone can see that in your eyes. I also know you’ve had your fair share of whores. So, when you’re alone in a hotel suite with one of Paris’s finest and you don’t try anything, it usually means you’re holding out for someone. It’s honorable.” She shrugged. “Not many men have your...restraint.”

He frowned. This wasn’t the conversation he was looking to have. But he figured it wouldn’t bode well if he arrived from Paris with a woman in tow. Grace would surely have a few questions. “You’ll meet her once you’re in Birmingham. She works at the bar I own.”

“What’s her name?”

“Did your boss do that to you because you said you were going to leave?”

Kate smiled. It was fairly entertaining to her, the mental games that Tommy seemed to play in conversations. The man clearly liked control even when simply talking to another person. “So, what if he did?”

Tommy pondered the idea. Would he be willing to risk getting revenge for a woman he hardly knew? Would he let a man who worked with vulnerable women get away with hurting them? It seemed like a good job for Isaiah and Finn. Get their feet wet a little bit. “Then he’s a bad man.”

“Were you like this before the war?”

“Like what?”

His composure fascinated Kate. At the Moulin Rouge, men didn’t like when the women asked questions. There were several reasons. He was a high profile man who was risking a lot to have a little fun at the club. He felt talking interrupted the show. Or he simply didn’t see women as humans. Sometimes it was all of the above. But Tommy didn’t seem to mind the questions, even if he never answered them.

“Like you want to make sure every bad man pays for his sins.”

He exhaled a stiff snort of laughter and let his eyes wander out to the street. “I think I know how you came by all this information you claim to have.”

Her lips quirked up into a smile. “Oh?”

“You don’t drop an issue.”

Kate grinned. She thanked the waiter who came over with her order. “Merci, I am on his tab, and make sure he leaves you a generous tip.”

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

“Tom, of all the bad fucking ideas-”

Tommy waved a hand at the liquor cart. “Take what you’d like and sit down, brother.”

Arthur grimaced but did pour himself a drink before going to sit where Kate had been the night before. After a hearty swig, he held his hands up as if waiting for Tommy to hand over the explanation. The explanation of why suddenly a French whore was joining them on their return journey to Birmingham.

“She’s got information about the Americans. Things we can use against them once we expand overseas.”

“Expand overseas...hang on when did we discuss this?” The eldest Shelby demanded.

“I’ve been playing with the idea. We’ve got the ability and we shouldn’t limit ourselves to Birmingham or London. Shouldn’t fucking limit ourselves to the continent.”

Arthur frowned and finished his drink. “Think you’re biting off more than you can chew, mate. We’ve just done a deal here, why can’t we fucking focus on what we’ve got in Birmingham for the time being?”

“You can focus on Birmingham, but she’s going to give us good information. I’m not saying we’re going to make a move on America tomorrow. It’ll take time.”

There was obviously no point in trying to talk Tommy out of his decision. “Right, so what is she gonna do? Just sit ‘round your office talking? How’d you know we can trust her?”

“We can’t.” Tommy admitted coolly. “But I’ve offered her a job in the company. One that’ll test her loyalty.”

“So you’re risking our family and company because she might have some information on people we ain’t even fucking fighting with yet?” Arthur was appalled at the idea.

Tommy leaned over the back of a chair with a glint in his eyes. “Yet. Arthur, yet.” He smiled slightly. “But when we do start fighting, we’ll be ten steps ahead of them. They won’t know what fucking hit them.”

The desire for power in his brother’s eyes wasn’t unfamiliar, at least not in recent months. It seemed more than ever Tommy was itching for any opportunity to grasp more power. And it was far too late to try and cool him down. “You’re a fucking madman, Tom.”

“And yet you keep following me into battle.”

Permanent Tag: @sansajonsastark @giftofdreams

Masterlist

#tommy shelby #tommy shelby x oc #tommy shelbyxoc #tommy shelby imagine #tommy shelby one shot #peaky blinders #peaky blinder imagine #peaky fookin blinders #peaky blinders fanfiction #fanfiction #ofc #oc #moulin rouge #arthur shelby #grace burgess

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bloodthirstymoonstone · 5 years

Text

Square One (ooc ramble)

So I thought I’d make a quick post talking about my continued journey into getting my Spicy Mental Health™ treated and how all that’s going. TLDR, I may have isolated the problem as to my noticeable decline with attention span over the past year or year and a half, but the good thing is that there’s probably a very easy way to fix it! Which is definitely good to know!

It gets pretty long winded and vent-y, too, though, so be warned. This is just a Real Ass Scoot Moment With Scoot Being Real, so keep that in mind.

So here’s a realization I made quite recently about my medication. For the longest time (I’m talking nearly 10 years or so) I assumed I didn’t have ADD, I just had anxiety and depression which was mimicking those symptoms. I believed this strongly, and for years despite getting legitimately diagnosed back in middle school (I think I was 13), before my anxiety diagnosis when I was 16. I think this is due in part to a REALLY BAD reaction to the drug Ritalin, which is notorious for making you feel like you’ve drank 10 coffees all at once. I honestly think that experience traumatized me so badly I truly thought I just didn’t have ADD at all.

I also probably believed this, in part, due to the anxiety medication I was on later, which did a great deal more to helping my condition. I won’t say which ones I was on because that would be TMI, but when I moved to Boston in 2016, I was on three different medications to treat my anxiety and depression. One was ancient and I’d been on it since I was first diagnosed back in 2009. One that was prescribed later when my Rock Bottom™ years started (I’m guessing 2011-2012). And then one I got at the tail end of my Rock Bottom™ years, in March of 2014. That last one might have been the one that Defeated The Evil and go the monkey of rampant, unchecked depression off my back for good, as well as a few key lifestyle changes.

Sometime when I moved here, I got a psychiatrist that, in retrospect, was fucking terrible for me. She barely listened to me at all, would shut me down when I came up with solutions she didn’t like, and ultimately discouraged me so much that I stopped doing anything more than going to her to get refills, and totally stopped going to therapy all together. I didn’t want to talk to anyone about my problems anymore, including her, because it was just so discouraging going to her about anything that she tainted the whole process for me. She shamed me for my weight, for not being social and making friends in a city and a part of the country I was totally unfamiliar with, and just never ever seemed to listen to me.

The most egregious case of this is when she fucked with my medication. Remember that list I just gave on the three types of meds I was on when I moved up here? Yeah, now I’m just on the last one. She took me off of the first two in 2016 (I think? Maybe it was 2017 -- my memory is shit), completely against my wishes, and she went totally cold turkey with it, too. I went to her, telling her that I ran out of those two maybe 10 days or so ago and though I wasn’t experiencing any withdrawal symptoms yet, but I’d really like to get back on the combination that had already taken me so far, and she literally refused. Saying “Oh, well, you’ve been off them both for so long already, so let’s see how it goes. I really don’t think you need to be on that much.”

It struck me as weird and panic inducing, even then, but she was adamant about it, saying that she didn’t want to risk me getting Serotonin Syndrome from taking so much medication for depression at once. Which, alright, fair enough, but she didn’t even try to ween me off of them. She just cut me off. But I trusted her judgement as a professional and certainly didn’t want to get sick or even die from taking too much medication, so I listened to her. And I never had a huge, unprompted depressive episode, so hey, maybe things were alright!

There’s a catch though. The second drug I was introduced to, approximately in 2011? Remember that? Yeah, guess what. I did my own research recently and came to find out that it’s also been known to aid significantly in patients that have ADD but don’t want to be put on stimulants like Ritalin. Because if you have anxiety as well as ADD, it makes you painfully aware of that racing heart sensation. For the past 2+ years, I’ve felt my attention span slipping in ways I couldn’t understand or control, all because someone who didn’t really know me (remember, I’d only moved to this region a few short months before I even saw her) decided to play God with my life and not listen to my totally justifiable fears.

I feel like all that time, all those abandoned threads and plot ideas, all the shit that I blamed myself for because I just couldn’t understand why it was so hard to pay attention suddenly!!! Is all her fault. I listened to everything she told me to do and then got so conditioned to never questioning her or talking to her about my problems anymore, that I didn’t even raise the difficulties I was having that were adversely affecting my life for what seemed at the time to be no reason at all. I feel cheated and angry. I might have cried a little bit when I realized it.

The good news in this is that, 1) I don’t have her as a psychiatrist anymore THANK GOD. Last I heard, I think she was leaving the practice (probably because she was treating other patients as terribly as she was treating me), but she’s definitely no longer with the business I frequent. I’ve only met with my new psychiatrist once, and he already seems so much more kind than her, and I’m grateful for him. And 2) getting back on the medication that I was yanked off of should be an easy enough process. I really just have to talk to my new guy and tell him what I want. I’m not interested in going back on the first, because afaik, it wasn’t doing much for me anyways, and maybe serotonin syndrome actually is a problem I should be worried about taking all three at once. But at least I’ll have the two that helped get me through Job Corps and the most stressful move of my life helping me out again.

More than that, I’ve started going to therapy again, and that’s a huge relief as well. I miss my old therapist, but she seems to have moved to another office of the same company that’s slightly further away, but I love the new woman I go to see. She’s so friendly and easy to talk to, and she’s also from out of town, so we get to crack jokes about New England Drivers™, which is always fun, lol. More than that, she’s helped me see that there are good qualities to me instead of All The Things I Want To Fix, like my creativity, sense of humor, and passion for caring about and defending my friends and those I care deeply about.

If we’re being honest, when I look back at these past years, it still kind of hurts. I can see quite clearly the break where my dwindling attention span started impacting my life and my presence in the RP community (technically it happened before I went indie, which means you guys have been dealing with 2 Braincell Scoot this whole time... My deepest apologies), and how it just kept getting worse and how frustrated I was with myself and things I couldn’t change about it.

But that’s also the good thing about all this. I can and will get better, hopefully sooner rather than later, and I hope you guys will be around to reap the benefits. I love you guys, and hopefully I’ll be able to get to some replies soon! Either on this blog or any of the three others.

#long post #ooc #ramblings #tw: medication #lmk if it needs any other tags idk #tw: vent

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qqueenofhades · 6 years

Text

breath of ash, bone of dust

So. A few nights ago, an anon asked if I could be tempted to write a Kastle Hades/Persephone AU. And, well. Here we goddamn are. I don’t know if this will show up in the tags because of the link, since Tumblr is a terrible trash website, but I had to put it on AO3 because it is 25,000 FRIGGING words.

Rated soft M. I regret both everything and nothing.

The wind is blowing from the north today, and that always means that shit is going to get a little weird. Karen Page doesn’t know exactly why that is, other than that it’s drawing down the fae from the rest of New England, and growing up in a tiny, rural town in Vermont, she learned early on not to mess with it. There were always strange lights or sounds at dusk, something lurking just beyond the bend, a strict folk wisdom that if you went into the woods at twilight, you didn’t know where or if you’d come out. Don’t look a stranger in the eye, if he walks toward you on an empty road. Don’t look out your window too long past dark. It wasn’t as much as some of the places in, say, the Appalachians, where you can’t breathe without taking Them in, but it was there, those pieces of small-town lore that your city-slicker friends laugh at when you tell them. When Karen first moved to New York, it took her months to be willing to be out at midnight. Just didn’t seem worth the risk.

New York, for that matter, has a very different sort of magic: loud, grimy, haphazard, unapologetic, not easily visible on the surface but there as soon as you scratch down. It’s not like Boston, which is a city absolutely ridden with ghosts. You can’t take two goddamn steps in Boston without the scent of pipe smoke drifting from some Revolution-era tavern (plenty of people swear they’ve pounded back brewskis with Sam Adams himself, only realizing it when he disappeared at the end of the night), without the distant war-whoops of men dumping tea in the harbor, without a tinge of Victorian witchlight illuminating cobblestone streets in the Back Bay, and pretty much anyone who ever went to Harvard being glimpsed strolling across the Quad. The shadows of whalers and fishermen flit along the coast, calling in thick New England accents to bait the longlines. Someone came in shaken from a stormy night in Eastham, on Cape Cod, and reported that they’d just seen a big three-masted ship break up – well, they did, but it was the famous pirate Black Sam Bellamy, and the wreck of his Whydah in 1717. You don’t even want to know what happens in Salem. Mount Washington in New Hampshire, known for its ferociously high winds, is definitely a door to somewhere (Oz?), but nobody has ever been sure.

If she’s honest, Karen was hoping to leave all that hedge magic behind when she moved to the city. She wanted somewhere where reality could generally be counted on to run as it’s supposed to, where people scoff at superstition and don’t end up hexed for it – a place that felt grown-up, away from all the children’s stories and formless boogeymen of her youth. New York could be relied upon to be brash and abrasive and thoroughly non-magical, she thought – which, at least in the first two departments, it is. But she’s not so sure that she has escaped the latter after all. It pokes up in tendrils, curling shoots. For example, you really should put a buck in the violin case of that red-haired man who occasionally busks in Times Square station, and tends to wear green. You’ll have spectacular good luck if you do, and absolutely terrible luck if you don’t.

(Perhaps, Karen thinks, it would be easier, so much easier, if she could just blame the monsters for what happened to Kevin. And yet she can’t, and it makes her wonder if, no matter how far she runs, she will ever be able to escape the monster she most wants to flee.)

Karen has managed, more or less, to live a refreshingly ordinary life in the city, though far from uneventful. There’s been the situation with Union Allied, her old employer, and plenty of other ones. She now works as an office manager at Nelson & Murdock, a local law firm in Hell’s Kitchen that. . . well, the best word for its business practices is “idiosyncratic.” Its chief, and indeed sole, attorneys, are two lifelong best friends, Franklin “Foggy” Nelson and Matthew Murdock. They were born here, went through Columbia Law together, and have a fierce and genuine commitment to doing true public-interest work, for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged members of their community. Unfortunately, this does not pay many, or indeed any, bills. They’re not quite run on tin cans and string, but sometimes it feels that way.

[read the rest on AO3]

#mcu #kastle #kastle ff #hades and persephone au #i have a lot of feelings

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let-it-raines · 6 years

Note

Love your stories! They're so extraordinary and you're one of my favorite authors! Here's a prompt for you "You fell asleep on the plane and I started making funny faces at your kid to keep him amused and the steward mistook us for a couple." Thanks!

The gif totally applies if you use your imagination, I swear. Also, thank you for your kind words, Anon! For you to say that is so sweet, and it caused a smile to bloom on my face when I got this prompt a few weeks ago as well as right now :D

After being home in London for three months, a part of him wants to stay with his family, his mum, Liam, and Liam’s wife and children, but a much larger part of him aches for the familiarity of his flat in Boston that he’s lived in for the past decade. That is home to him now, and he knows that the ache of missing his family will fade until it is bearable the longer he is away from them and the more miles he puts between them. He’s thought about packing up and moving back across the pond more times than he could count over the years, but something has kept him living in America. He has just never been quite sure what that mysterious call to stay has been. Maybe it is the novelty of living somewhere new, though Boston is as familiar to him as London now. Maybe it is the fact that as much as he loves his family, England holds some of his worst memories. Or maybe it is simply because he’s built a life for himself in America. He has a job he actually enjoys, mates to spend time with, and a place to rest his head that is all his.

However, none of that keeps the sting of saying goodbye to his family from affecting him as he boards the plane that will take him home. Some of that is likely due to the fact that it is five in the morning, and his head pounds behind his eyes so ferociously that his eyes may as well come out of their sockets. As he settles down into his seat, a blessed window seat for the long journey ahead of him, he thinks that maybe the flight won’t be so bad. Maybe he’ll get some sleep. And then a woman and a small babe that can’t be older the half of a year slide into the seat next to him, and while they are quiet now, he knows that they won’t stay that way for the next eight hours. He doesn’t blame them for it. That is simply the nature of children and is to be expected when you spend any amount of time with an infant.

He is just so damn tired.

The woman and her lad are mostly silent for the first hour of the trip as her boy sleeps and she watches a movie on the screen attached to the seat ahead of her. He finds that despite his tiredness and the pounding of his head, he becomes distracted by his neighbors. He can’t outright stare at her without making her uncomfortable (and frankly being creepy), but he does manage to pick up on a few things. She’s got long blonde hair that is twisted into intricate braids that remind him of the way Liam’s wife wears her hair. He’s never quite understood how women do anything but a simple braid down their back, and he’s curious about it as stray pieces of her hair fly away from their constraints and land near his shoulders in the cramped seats. He believes that she has green eyes hidden under the blonde of her eyelashes, and he wonders if her son has matching emerald orbs as well. The lad’s got a small hat on, but his brown hair pokes out underneath it from where it’s gotten mused during his slumber. He must get that from his father.

Where is his father?

It’s none of Killian’s business, but when you’re trapped in a flying vessel for hours on end you become fascinated with your seatmates. He once rode next to a woman who was allowed to bring her cat with her, and she spoke to the cat for the entire three-hour plane ride.

He’s mildly allergic to cats.

It was hell.

Just as he gets lost in his musings, the lad begins to stir, his small eyes fluttering open to reveal the darkest brown eyes he’s ever seen in a child so young. He looks nothing like his mum, and that shocks him a bit as the only children he knows are the perfect combination of their parents. But he also doesn’t know much about kids, so he wouldn’t use himself as an example of infant expertise.

The lad starts to fuss a bit, small cries emanating from his mouth, and the woman’s eyes shoot away from the movie screen to look down at her boy.

“Oh crap,” she mutters, taking her headphones out and adjusting him while she reaches down to look for her bag that’s stuffed under her seat, shuffling through the contents trying to find whatever the item is that seems to be alluding her. She’s obviously flustered and trying to balance everything in her lap while the plane hits a bit of turbulence doesn’t help he cause.

“Love?” he questions, tapping on her shoulder so that she’ll look at him, her green eyes (he was right) blown wide like she’s been shocked until they squint and her brows furrow almost like she’s angry at him.

“I know, I know. I’m annoying for bringing a baby on a plane, but I’m trying to keep him as quiet as possible, I swear.”

She’s obviously not had good experiences traveling with her son before, and he doesn’t want her to think he’s cross with her. He simply wants to help out for everyone’s sanity.

“It’s not that. I was just going to suggest that I hold the lad for you while you search through your bag. Or maybe I could search through the bag to help you find whatever it is you’re looking for if you’re not comfortable with me holding him.”

“Would you,” she begins, her lips parted in surprise, “you’d do that? You’re not pissed that you’re sitting next to the woman with the crying baby? You actually want to help.”

He was at first, but that’s just because he was bloody exhausted. He still is, but he’s pushing that aside. “I’m not pissed, no. He’s nothing but a wee one. He can’t help that he’s crying. You can’t either.”

“I mean, he’ll stop crying if I feed him, but I can’t find my nursing stuff to take to the bathroom. Plus, the entire plane is shaking, and I’m pretty sure I’ll get yelled at for moving around. Or I’ll bust my ass.”

He reaches up to scratch at his ear, suddenly nervous for a reason he can’t quite pick out. It’s like he’s scared of what this woman who he doesn’t know will think of him, and he’s never been one to worry about others he’ll never see again. “If you’d like to switch seats with me for more privacy, you can feed him here. It’s not a bother to me, but I know others can be prickly about that.”

She rolls her eyes before she smiles, and something in his stomach stirs. “You have no idea.”

He and the woman manage to switch seats with only a little fuss and one pointed stare from their flight attendant before she’s feeding her boy, the cries stopping and the woman sighing in relief.

“My name is Emma, by the way. I feel like if you’ve seen part of my boob you should probably know that. Though, I can say that hasn’t always been a true fact.”

He chuckles, mostly because he doesn’t know what to do as he did, in fact, accidentally see part of her breast, but also because the lass manages to have a sense of humor when at least fifteen people on this plane likely want to yell at her.

“I’m Killian, and I fear if I show you something equal I’ll both be a horrible human being and get arrested.”

“So your chest is that scary then?”

Oh, she’s feisty then. He can appreciate that.

“Like Wolverine’s.”

Emma snorts, and as awkward as it is, he finds himself smiling at her. “I don’t know if I’d constitute that as scary, just hairy.”

“That’s scary to some women.”

“A human being exited my body, so I don’t think something as simple as chest hair is going to scare me. To be honest, I kind of like it.”

He kind of likes her.

He and Emma talk for the next couple hours of their flight. He learns that she was in London visiting her brother who had yet to meet his nephew due to the distance between London and Boston. He’d offered to pay for her flights so that she could come, and she accidentally let it slip that it was the first time she’d had any help with Henry (that’s the lad’s name) since he was born. That’s what allows him to piece together his question about Henry’s father and where he is. Okay, so only some of the questions. He’s got many more about how a man could leave a woman as captivating as Emma and a child as precious as Henry, but it’s none of his business so he presses no further.

He does check to see if she’s wearing a ring, though. He can’t help himself.

She doesn’t share much about herself, but she doesn’t have to for him to know that she’s brilliant with a quick wit and very obviously gorgeous. He finds that he may be a bit infatuated with the woman he’s just met, and even if she is the dreaded “woman with a baby on a plane”, she’s the best seatmate he’s ever had.

Take that cat woman who was most definitely not Halle Berry.

Emma would probably be better than Halle Berry anyways. The altitude may be causing him to lose his marbles.

About halfway through their flight, Emma leaves with Henry to change his diaper, and when she comes back, he finally notices the bags under her eyes that most likely match his.

“Emma, love, I can hold him if you want to take a nap.”

She hesitates and brings her bottom lip between her teeth while she studies him. She’s obviously not used to help, and he can understand her not trusting him fully. He’s a stranger, and she can’t just be handing her baby off to anyone, even if they are on a plane where he can’t run off with the lad.

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

“Okay, just, um, if he starts fussing and I don’t wake up, wake me okay?”

“You’ve got it, love.”

Emma hands Henry over to him, and after she checks to see that he won’t fuss being in Killian’s arms, she settles herself down against the window, propping her head on the sweater she’s bunched up and falling asleep more quickly than anyone he’s ever seen fall asleep while on an airplane. It’s almost like magic.

“Alright, lad,” he bounces Henry up and down on his leg until he’s adjusted enough in his lap, “let’s see if we can find something colorful for you and me to watch while mummy sleeps.”

If you’d asked him five hours ago if he’d spend part of his flight watching cartoons and quietly singing nursery rhymes while he tickles a baby’s stomach and makes funny faces, he’d have said no. He’d have said bloody hell no, actually. But he’s somewhere over the Atlantic with a woman’s head resting on his shoulder as she sleeps (his heart rate is most definitely not beating at a normal pace anymore) while her child clings to his neck and is softly puttering against his skin, the both of them drooling onto his shirt. He doesn’t…mind it, actually. He kind of likes it, likes the fact that he’s helping out a kind soul simply because he can.

Plus, it keeps him busy, and the time seems to pass by much more quickly, and for the first time in his life while flying, he doesn’t actually want that.

Emma’s been out for about an hour and a half when the flight attendants start making their rounds for drinks, and he’s not sure if he should wake her or not to see if she wants a cup of coffee. He doesn’t get the chance, though, because the attendant is speaking to him before he even realizes it.

“Would you or your wife like a cup of coffee? Water? A soft drink?”

“Oh, um, she’s…I…she’s not – ”

“Coffee,” Emma mumbles beside him, picking her head up off of his shoulder before rubbing the sleep out of her eyes with her fists. He misses her warmth almost immediately. “I’ll take a cup of coffee.”

“How do you take it?”

“With as much cream and sugar as you have, please.”

“And you sir?”

“I’ll take it black.”

The attendant hands them their coffees in disposable travel mugs, something he appreciates it because it’s already easy to spill a cup of liquid on a plane when it’s just himself, but he cannot imagine what it would be like to drink one with an infant. When the attendant finally leaves, he looks over to Emma to see her practically inhaling her caffeine, the scalding heat of it seemingly not affecting her while he places his down on his tray to cool.

“I’m sorry that I didn’t correct her on you being my wife. I didn’t mean anything by it. I was just…I was startled, and it seems I forgot the English language. A bloody waste of thirty years of learning it if you ask me.”

Emma simply chuckles into her cup before placing her hand on his forearm and squeezing. Heat courses through his entire body, and he’s not sure if it’s from Emma’s touch or the fact that she was just holding the hot coffee and her hand is physically hot.

Both. It’s both.

“Don’t think anything of it. It’s easier not to correct than to try to explain. I had about fifteen people compliment my brother on his ‘adorable son.’ Henry looks nothing like David, but you put a man and a woman together with a kid and bam, they’re married.”

“Seems much less complicated than going to the courthouse for a license.”

“Yeah, but the nine month waiting period is a bitch.”

He barks out a laugh that not only causes everyone around them to look at him but for Henry to wake up as well, his eyes widening and frantically searching for something familiar until he finds Emma, his chubby little arms immediately reaching for her when he spots his mum.

“Hey, baby,” she coos, putting her coffee down on her tray before taking the lad out of his arms. “Were you good for our new friend? Yeah? I didn’t hear you cry once.” She turns to address him, worry suddenly in her eyes that causes them to widen. “He was good, right? Like, you’re not going to hate me for the rest of this flight for having a fussy kid and drooling on your shirt. Sorry about that by the way.”

“Think nothing of it, love. Your boy drooled on my other shoulder, so I’ve got two reminders of you to wash when I get home.”

“I never asked earlier. Are you…do you live in America or are you just visiting?”

“I live in Boston. Charlestown more specifically.”

“Dorchester,” Emma replies, a smile blooming on her face, and he can’t help but return it. “Maybe we’ll see you around if you’re up for people drooling on you some more…not that I drool often, just to clarify.”

“So it was a one time thing then?”

“Let’s go with that.”

Talking with Emma causes the flight to be over at an even quicker pace, and before he knows it, he, Emma, and Henry are heading toward baggage claim, Henry’s diaper bag over his shoulder and Henry on Emma’s hip.

“You don’t have to carry it, Killian.”

“It’s not a problem, love. It’s what a gentleman would do.”

“And you’re a gentleman?”

“Aye, I’m always a gentleman.”

His luggage comes first, and he goes to grab it while Emma points out her red suitcase for him as well, and he returns to she and Henry with two suitcases, a car seat, and what he hopes is a normal smile on his face because this woman and her son have him all flustered in a way that he hasn’t been in years.

“Would you, uh, would you like to share a ride home, love?”

Blush rises in her cheeks before she shakes her head no, and he tries not to be too disappointed in that. “My friend is picking us up, but thank you.”

He simply nods his acknowledgment, not knowing what else to say until Emma pulls her phone out of her pocket and types something out before thrusting the device in his face.

“You can put your number in there if you want. I figure if you can have a good time with me and Henry on a plane, imagine how well we’d get along when not so constrained.”

“Swimmingly. We’d get along swimmingly.”

He waits with her until her friend arrives in a bright yellow bug, and before she leaves, she presses up onto her toes and leaves a kiss against his cheek, her lips warm and soft against his skin. A shiver runs through his entire body, and he prays that Emma doesn’t notice the gooseflesh rising on his arms and the hair standing at attention on his neck.

“It was nice to meet you, Killian Jones. I’ll text you.”

And then she heads over to the car, setting up the car seat and buckling Henry inside before he hears her friend say “who’s the hottie and why isn’t he getting in the car with us?”. Heat rises in his cheeks while Emma throws her head back to laugh, her neck extending and her braided hair falling against her shoulder before she winks at him and they drive away, like a bright yellow dot in a sea of gray.

Unknown number: You want to get some coffee that’s not stale sometime? My driver has agreed to babysit.

Killian: Tell your driver that the “hottie” says he appreciates her for doing that. It’s a date, love.

The next time he flies to London, Emma’s sitting beside him with Henry in his own seat next to her. They booked their tickets together, and when the flight attendant asks him if his wife would like some coffee, he says yes without hesitation.

#cs prompt #cs fic #captain swan #captain cobra #captain cobra swan

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justanoutlawfic · 6 years

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Trying Not To Love You: A Detective Snowing Story

A direct sequel to You Have More Friends Than You Know. Back then, I thought this would stay platonic, but then I fell in love with this ship romantically. @loboselinaistrash sent me a plot twist prompt for this verse about what would happen if Killian pushed them away when he discovered his feelings and this is the result of that.

Trigger warning for gun violence mentioned, but it doesn't go into too much detail of the shooting.

Also on AO3

Killian walked into his house and heard…nothing. That was odd for him, considering he had a rambunctious 3 year old. Sure, his daughter was in the final stages of recovering from her tonsillectomy, but with Emma over pretty much every day, she was definitely on the mend. Snow and David had insisted to come by to help him out and he was grateful for it. They cooked, help make sure his house didn’t fall apart and especially helped make sure that Alice and Emma hadn’t gotten into too much trouble. They especially came in handy when he had been called into work for an emergency, assuring him that they could handle both girls on their own.

He headed into the kitchen and found David doing the dishes. He was a handsome man, there was no doubting that. Years of working on a farm had shaped his body in ways that probably some couldn’t realize. He still kept in good shape, besides running around as detective, he went to the gym three times a week.

Killian quickly shook the thoughts out of his head. He had known he was pansexual since he was 13 and he knew that David was bisexual, but the latter was married. The ship had sailed. Besides, there was nothing wrong with just being attracted to a married person physically right? It’s not like he wanted to be with him like that.

“Hey,” David’s voice interrupted his thoughts. “I made mac and cheese, there’s some leftover in the fridge. Snow made a salad too.”

“You got Emma to eat a salad?”

“Well…no. But Alice ate it.”

Killian laughed. “Good.” He looked around the kitchen. “Where are the girls?”

“Emma passed out on the couch while they were watching Robin Hood, Snow took Alice to get her ready for bed.”

“I think I’ll go see my little girl before I eat.”

He headed around the corner and lingered in the doorway of Alice’s bedroom. Snow sat in the oversized easy chair he had bought for the room, way back when it had just been a nursery. Alice was snuggled up on her lap as they read from one of her favorite books, Robin Hood. He knew that they had just watched the Disney movie according to David and yet Snow didn’t mind reading the exact same one to his daughter again. She was so patient and loving, she always looked at Alice with this joy in her eyes.

Snow was just as beautiful as David was handsome. She had once had long black locks, but after Emma was born, she claimed it was too hard to maintain and had a pixie cut ever since. It suited her face and allowed her eyes to shine brighter. She had a gentle voice and a smile that could probably stop any person in their tracks.

Killian had read about polyamory in college. He knew it was far different than polygamy and worked in different ways. Sometimes, it meant that the couple had an open relationship and could sleep with others if they wanted. Others, it was having a committed relationship that was equal between three people or more. They weren’t as rare as people would think, but they weren’t exactly very public.

The truth was, Killian knew he was in love with David and Snow. He had been for a while now, but there was no way he could just bring it up. They’d think he was some kind of freak, suggesting that he could join their marriage. Worse, they’d pity him and their friendship would never be the same.

Yet, it hurt too much to even be in the same room as them. To have them so close, yet so far. He was falling for them more and more by the day. Alice was growing closer to them as well, he knew she looked to Snow like the mother she never had. When she was a baby and Emma was learning how to talk, she had copied her in calling Snow mama. Killian had panicked, but Snow just patiently smiled and explained that she was just copying Emma. Eventually, Alice got used to calling her Auntie Snow.

No, he couldn’t allow his daughter to get hurt.

Nor could he allow himself.

Snow looked up at him and smiled. “Well, look who’s home.”

Alice’s eyes drifted up and she beamed brightly. “Papa!” She jumped off his lap and ran into his outstretched arms.

He swooped her up and cradled the back of her head with his hand, his prosthetic resting on her back. He had lost his hand when he was mugged in high school and over the years, technology had improved and now he had one that worked nearly similar to a real one, though it’d never be completely the same. “Hey there, Starfish,” he whispered. “How was your night?”

“Good. I ate all my dinner.”

Killian couldn’t help but smile at that. She hadn’t been eating much since the surgery. “That’s good to hear.” He kissed her temple.

Snow rose to her feet and walked over to them, kissing Alice’s head. “We’ll get going. Unless you need anything else?”

He cleared his throat, biting down on his lip, hard. “No, we’re um…we’re good. You’ve done enough already.”

“Alright, we’ll see you soon.”

She walked out of the room, shutting the door behind her. To Killian, that would be the last time he’d see her.

David didn’t think much of it when he didn’t see Killian around the station as much at first. They normally worked similar shifts, “Dad shifts” as Leroy Dreamer called them, which meant they could be home for their kids. Yet, he also knew that their boss wasn’t always as understanding and sometimes they worked the less desirable ones.

Then Killian stopped responding to their texts or phone calls. When they ran into him at the diner, he left quickly. If Emma asked her parents to let Alice come over, he’d have some excuse or another when David cornered him at the station. Alice was a fairly healthy child, how many doctor appointments could she possibly have?

“Do you think we did something to offend him?” Snow asked her husband one afternoon when Killian had declined their evite to Emma’s 4th birthday party. It wasn’t like him, at all.

“I don’t think so? I mean, we cleaned his house that night after we took care of the girls. We left him dinner. It’s not like we did anything to piss him off.”

“It’s been a month, I’m just getting worried. This isn’t like him. Is he still working weird shifts?”

“No, Weaver told him he had to cut that out. Now, he just works different positions than me. Like, if I’m doing paperwork, he goes on patrol. Or vice versa. We used to patrol together. If we do have to work together for whatever reason, he won’t talk to me.”

“This is just weird. If we hurt him, I wish he’d just come out and say something about it.”

Their concern turned to anger when Killian finally returned one of their texts.

It’s nothing you guys did. I just don’t think that it’s best that we’re friends anymore.

David and Killian had been best friends for nearly 8 years, he and Snow for 4. He was cutting off their friendship for no reason, for nothing. They decided to give up. If he wanted nothing to do with them, fine. They’d take a hint.

“Mommy?” Emma asked one afternoon when they were at the party store. “Is Alice coming to my party?”

Snow paused, biting down on her lip. She knew that the girls still saw each other at pre-school and would play. As angry and hurt that she was over Killian’s text, she didn’t want to hurt her daughter. “I don’t think so, sweetheart.”

“But Alice said she wanted to come.”

So, clearly Alice didn’t know what was going on either. “I know, baby, but her daddy said they’re busy that day.” She paused again before crouching down in front of her. “You know, you can still play with Alice at school, but I don’t know if you’ll have playdates anymore.”

“Why not? She’s my best friend!”

The defeat in her daughter’s voice broke her heart even more. “She is. It’s just…I don’t think her daddy wants her coming over anymore. There’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Uncle Killian is acting silly,” Emma said with a huff, crossing her arms over chest.

Snow let out a deep breath and kissed her daughter’s head before standing up. “He is. Hey, how about you help me pick out the favors for the party?”

Killian sat at his desk, knowing that if Weaver walked by, he’d be in trouble. He was using his computer to look at zoo fare and hours for the day of Alice’s birthday. Typically, he’d have a party for her, but that just didn’t seem right this year. She wanted to invite Emma so badly, but that would mean talking to Snow and David, not that they would even want to talk to him. After his text, David had given up trying and was giving him the cold shoulder. Killian didn’t blame him one bit, he was acting like a jerk. He just had to protect Alice’s heart and his own.

So, he had promised Alice that instead of a party, they’d do something even more fun. She had asked if Emma could come, of course, and it broke his heart to tell her no. He hoped in time that just seeing her friend at school would be enough. It had to be. He figured to make it up to her, he’d take her to the Franklin Park Zoo and New England Aquarium in Boston. They typically visited Massachusetts at least once a year since it was just a 4 hour drive away and those were two of Alice’s favorite places. It’d make a perfect birthday celebration.

His mind flashed back to Alice and Emma’s first birthdays. They had a combined party for them with all their friends to celebrate making it through that crazy year. Snow’s arm was thrown around Killian, telling him if they could survive this, they could survive everything. They were best friends, they’d raise their girls together.

So much for that.

Suddenly, the station’s frequency radio buzzed and he could hear an officer’s voice coming through it. “Detective down, need backup on Mifflin.”

Killian jumped up with another officer and they rushed to the scene. By the time they got there, the shooter had been taken care of and was in the back of a squad car. Killian walked closer to the sidewalk where he noticed Mayor Mills was in tears. He had never seen her so upset before. She was explaining that there was a sudden break in by her former running mate and that there was a detective that had been the first to respond to the call.

“Greg would’ve shot me for sure,” Regina sobbed. “If Detective Nolan hadn’t pushed me out of the way, I’d be dead by now.”

Killian’s blood ran cold and he saw his friend laying on a stretcher, being carried to the ambulance. The man he loved, the man who had been his best friend since their freshmen year of college. The man he had pushed away, to protect his own heart…was now bleeding on a stretcher.

“Someone has to tell his wife,” Weaver was saying to some of the other officers at the scene.

“I’ll do it,” Killian spoke up. “It…it should be me.”

Snow would always remember what she was talking about the moment her husband was shot. She had been so excited that day to hang up pictures of Emperor Penguins that Emma had helped her pick out. They were supposed to be going to an aquarium the following week and it reminded her of Alice, who loved going to those so she could see all the different sea creatures, especially the starfish. She had come to love that little girl and to know that she’d probably never get to hold her again, broke her heart.

Her door opened and Jasmine, her aide, stepped in…followed by Killian dressed in full uniform.

“Mary Margaret,” Jasmine said, using the name that only the school ever did (her mother had nicknamed her Snow as a child and it just stuck). “I’m going to take over for a while. You need to go with Detective Rogers.”

Snow folded her arms over chest and followed him into the hallway.

“What’s going on? You haven’t spoken to us in two months outside that cryptic text and now you ruin my lesson plan?”

“Snow,” Killian’s voice broke and pain filled his face.

Slowly, she lowered her façade. “What’s going on? Is Alice okay?”

“She’s fine. It’s David.”

Snow blinked. There was a part of her that had always been preparing for this day. When she had begun dating David, he was a rookie on the force. She had known who he was when she took his name, a police officer. There was a chance of this happening and yet, she never thought it could happen. Not to him. Not when they were happily married, with a nearly 4-year-old.

“No,” she whispered.

“Snow…”

“NO!” Her voice grew sharper. “You are not doing this Killian…you are not telling me…”

“I don’t know if he’s okay. He reported to Mayor Mills’ house to deal with a break in report…Greg Mendel shot him. He’s being taken to the hospital.”

Snow’s knees grew weak and she nearly collapsed to the ground. Killian wrapped his arms around her and kept her upright, tears in his own eyes.

“Come on, I’ll take you to the hospital.”

Snow was silent the way down to Killian’s car, but clung to him for dear life. For once, the roles were reversed. He had depended on her so many times after Eloise left and for once, he could repay the favor. She didn’t have time to appreciate the irony, all she could think about was her husband.

The ride to Storybrooke General was just as silent, but she snapped into action as soon as they rushed into the E.R. She ran right up to the desk where Nurse Ratchet sat.

“My husband, Detective David Nolan was brought in,” she said.

“Have a seat, the doctor will be right with you.”

“I…I can’t take a seat! I need to see my husband! I need to know he’s okay?” Tears streamed down her face. “Did you…did you see him? Is he okay?”

“I’m afraid I can’t give that information, Mrs. Nolan. You’ll have to wait for the doctor, he’s in surgery with your husband right now.”

“Can’t give me that information? I’m his wife!”

“Snow,” Killian rubbed her back. “Come on, it’s not the nurse’s fault. Let’s just go over there.” He turned to the nurse. “Have the doctor come get us as soon as you know anything.”

“Of course,” the nurse said, eyeing Snow who looked on the verge of a breakdown.

Killian lead Snow to the corner and she began pacing.

“He’s going to be okay, Snow,” he whispered.

“How can you say that?!?” Snow exploded, ignoring the looks that the people in the waiting room gave her. “He was shot! This wasn’t supposed to happen! He…he promised me it wouldn’t!”

“I know he did.”

“I can’t lose him, Killian.” Her voice broke again. “He’s…he’s everything. To me, to Emma. Oh my God, Emma!” Her eyes shut and she leaned against the wall. “How am I supposed to tell her that her daddy got shot?”

“You won’t.” Killian put his hands on her shoulder. “Because he’s going to make it out of this. We’ll tell Emma and Alice that he just needed to see a doctor, but that he’ll be fine. It won’t be a lie, because he will be. Do you hear me, Snow? You’re not about to become a widow today.”

He wrapped her back into his arms and as much as she wanted to pull away, she didn’t. She knew that he easily could’ve sent Weaver or Humbert, but he didn’t. He came himself, because he knew she would need him. She wrapped her arms around him and sobbed into his chest for as long as she needed to. Once she calmed down, he got her some water from the nurse’s station and they slid down into chairs. Eventually, the nurse told them where David was having surgery so they could go and wait in the proper waiting area. Killian kept his arm around Snow at all times.

Three hours after they arrived, Dr. Whale finally came out of the back and lead them into his office. Snow clung to Killian just as tightly, tears in her eyes.

“The surgery went fine,” Whale said “We got the bullet out of his stomach and we were able to partially remove the other, but he’ll be fine with it inside of his shoulder. He is a very lucky man, if it had gone even just a few inches lower…well, we won’t worry about that.”

“But he’s okay?” Snow asked.

“He’s going to be. He lost a lot of blood and we had to do a transfusion, but he’s out of the woods. He’s stable right now and alert.”

Snow and Killian let out simultaneous breaths of relief. “Will he be able to return to the force?” Killian asked, knowing that’d likely be all David cared about.

“In time. His shoulder is going to require some physical therapy.”

“Good. I know that’ll make him happy.”

“Would you like to see him?”

Snow nodded and looked to Killian to let him know that he should come with her. Whale lead them down the hall to David’s recovery room. He was hooked up to a few machines and was pale, his shoulder in a sling. Snow bit down on her lip, but moved forward, sitting next to him. She took his hand and felt him squeeze it.

“You’re okay,” she whispered.

“I’d never leave you,” he hoarsely whispered in return. His eyes flickered open and he saw she had been crying. He attempted to reach up to touch her face, but let out a hiss of pain. They had given him morphine as soon as he asked for it, but it still hurt.

“No, don’t do that.” She took his hand and kissed it. “I’m fine.”

“I must’ve scared the shit out of you.”

“Yeah, you did, but now I know where Emma gets it from.”

He partially smiled and then looked over when he saw Killian lingering in the doorway. “Kian?” The old nickname for his best friend slipped from his lips.

“I responded to the call when it came through that a detective was down.” He looked at his watch. “Look, I should go get the girls from school. I’ll take care of Emma for the night. I’m sure Weaver is going to want to talk to you about what happened, but I’ll keep him off your case until you’re feeling a little better. Mendel’s locked up, so you have nothing to worry about.”

There were so many things David wanted to say. He wanted to scream at him for shutting them out. He wanted to ask why. Why Killian was doing so much for him after he had chosen to shut them out? But the truth was, the morphine was exhausting him and he just wanted to sleep.

So, instead, he just whispered, “Thank you.”

That night, Killian distracted the girls. He told Emma that her parents were just handling some adult matters and fixed them some grilled cheese, letting them eat it in front of the T.V. They watched both Lilo and Stich movies, put on a hula show in the living room and for a minute, it was like old times. He hadn’t realized how much he had missed Emma, how much he loved her just as much as he did Alice. Shutting them all out hadn’t healed his heart, it had only hurt it.

Later on, when he tucked both girls into Alice’s bed, he knew what he had to do. He had to tell Snow and David the truth. Even if it was too late, even if they didn’t feel the same, they deserved that much.

So, after dropping the girls off the next day and promising Emma that she’d see her mommy that afternoon, he headed to the hospital. David had been moved to a new room to help his recovery and according to Snow, he’d be released within a week. He’d have to rest a lot and he was already starting physical therapy, but was doing well. Weaver had come by to get David’s testimony, but everything after he arrived at the mayors’ house had been a blur. Luckily, Regina had calmed down enough and could give one that would help put Mendel away for a long time.

“What is going on?” David asked Killian after their half hour of small talk. “Why did you push us away?”

Killian sighed, running his fingers through his hair. “I was trying to protect myself.”

“Protect yourself? From what?”

“I…I’ve had feelings for both of you for some time now. At first I thought it was just because we raised our girls together, but in time I realized I had fallen for you.” He sighed once again. “But you’re already together and I was afraid that telling you would ruin our friendship. In the end, I screwed it up anyway.”

Snow and David looked at each other, but Killian couldn’t read their faces. He waited for them to laugh or to throw him out of the hospital room. To ban him from ever seeing their daughter again. To his surprise, Snow just smiled.

“And you don’t think we’ve felt the same?”

Killian did a double take. “You can’t be serious.”

“Killian, we’ve had feelings for you, for years. David learned about polyamory in the same class you did. We just thought if we brought it up…you’d think we were weird and that it was all about sex. So, we settled for being friends.”

“Not having you in our lives these past couple of months proved what we thought,” David said. “Being apart from you hurts.”

Killian felt like he was going to pass out. “I can’t…I can’t believe this is happening.”

“We love you, Kian. Always have, always will. And if you’re willing to give this a shot…so are we.”

“I pushed you two away.”

“And that hurt,” Snow said. “But…we get it and we love you. We don’t want to lose you again.”

Things didn’t start off right away. David was still in the hospital for another week and Killian was helping Snow with Emma. When David was discharged, Snow and Killian took turns accompanying him to physical therapy. But when he was cleared to at least go on a date, they all went out to dinner. And when he was cleared for sex…his first time back at it was his first time with both Snow and Killian.

They told the girls six months in, expecting them to be confused, but they were just thrilled. And one year to the day that David had been shot, they all stood on the beach in front of their closest friends and family. They couldn’t legally be married, but in that moment, they agreed to love and care for one another as if they were. That was the day the marriage of two, became three. They’d go onto adopt each other’s girls. Nothing could stop them now.

#detective snowing #detective snowing au #snow white #mary margaret blanchard #detective rogers #wish hook #david nolan #david charming #prince charming #falling for you verse

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politicsiscomplicated · 7 years

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Instead of Punching Nazis, Steal Their Target Audience From Them

If America today is analogous to Nazi Germany, the people I'm arguing against act like we're in 1938, with annexations of our neighbors and Kristallnacht looming near. We're not. We're not even in 1933 at the beginning of the dictatorship yet. We're still somewhere in the 20s. The Nazis are clearly, obviously evil, going around attacking people and screaming about how the Jews/liberals/non-whites/foreigners/etc. are ruining the country, and even have some friends in high places. But most of the country still isn't willing to vote for them. We the enemies of Naziism, all of us from ultra-conservatives like Orrin Hatch all the way to leftists and progressives like many of you my friends are, aren't in the place of some underground resistance movement fighting a guerrilla campaign against the omnipresent Nazi menace. We are right now all in the place of the other political parties that fucking failed to fix Germany by peaceful means after WW1. And there are a lot of disgruntled but politically detached people out there who aren't Nazis but might be persuaded to vote for Nazis if we don't get to them first with better ideas.

We saw this last year when millions of disgruntled former Obama voters and millions of voters who said they normally don't vote at all came out to support a notoriously incompetent asshole who stumbled into being the first major presidential candidate since Wilson to receive the endorsement of the Klan and not disavow it. Never forget that Hitler didn't gain power through coercion like Mussolini or revolution like Franco. He was the leader of a major political party, elected partially because of terrorism, but also largely because his party was able to convince the public that they could solve their problems. The Nazis and their ideological cousins in the alt-right are competing with us now to win over the people who are, frankly, ignorant of or disinterested in politics and therefore vulnerable to Nazis winning them over by presenting their mix of paranoia and outright lies nicely.

The people we are competing with them over, or ought to be, are the people I've heard ranting my entire life — and I know, any of you New Englanders, that you have heard them too, and are probably related to some of them — about "reverse racism" and "handouts", and how the Clintons are secret murderers, and so on blah blah blah. They're wrong, and they don't understand what we're talking about. But that's not how we respond to them. Instead, we respond to them by writing them off as unfixably hateful and accuse them of lying rather than not understanding. We push them away into the waiting hands of Nazi propagandists. Nazis, like the toxic right-wing talkshow media, respond to them by egging them on to embrace and use their anger, Emperor Palpatine-style. Any chance we give the Nazis to portray themselves as the victim of leftist aggression is another voter who, when it is time for our equivalent of the 1932 elections, will go to the polls and support the Nazis even though they may not personally be a Nazi.

But the propaganda is out there, and the rallies are happening, and they have an audience. Clearly something must be done. So what is to be done about the Nazis themselves? How can we possibly avoid seeming to engaging them as equals, which would give them the same false balance legitimacy currently enjoyed by creationists and anti-vaxers and climate change deniers? Not through preemptive violence. We should certainly be willing to fight in self-defense, or in the defense of another we can help, but remember, there is already a narrative out there of "violent leftists" who need "law and order" brought down upon them. The president himself buys into and spreads this. We need to make him look ridiculous.

When the NAACP took up the case of Rosa Parks, rather than any of the other people who defied bus segregation before her, it was because they and Parks understood how easily-swayed people are by victim-blaming. When a bad thing happens to someone, it seems to be a baked-in human instinct to examine the victim to see why they "provoked" something bad, rather than examining what's wrong with the offender to make them think victimizing someone could possibly be okay. They sought out a person about whom the fewest negative things could be said. This is an effective tactic. It anticipates and shuts down the stupid but popular arguments people are drawn to. By showcasing the most clear-cut, inarguable cases of injustice, that bulk of disengaged public sees that a system they were previously indifferent to ought to be actively changed or destroyed. By fighting only defensively, I believe we can preempt any attempt by the Nazis to use that tactic on us. Make it clear that the victim of an act of racist or other bigoted violence did nothing to provoke it, and you turn the public's outrage on the offender, and maybe even on the ideology that encouraged the violence.

It is also worth remembering at this point that, as Jon Stewart put it, the bias of the mainstream media is towards sensationalism, conflict, and laziness. They want someone to get pundits enraged at because enraged pundits get them viewers or listeners or readers, and viewers or listeners or readers get them ad revenue. Let someone make a heinous speech and the news cycle will be about what a fucking piece of shit that person is. Punch someone making a heinous speech, and the news cycle will be fake-balance arguments about how there's "anger on both sides".

So what about "fighting" metaphorically, by disrupting the lives of Nazis (or Nazi-allies)? Public shame will do something, right? Well, maybe, if you get the right person. A friend did a back-of-the-envelope-type estimate using some demographic data about this. If we assume for the sake of argument that every alt-rightist is a white American man, distributed randomly among all white American men in general appearance, and we have pictures of every single alt-rightist based on estimates of how many of them there are, and we only make mistakes 1% of the time in matching the alt-rightists' faces to the faces of all white American men, the number of innocent people we falsely identified as alt-rightists would be over 24 times the number of correctly-identified alt-rightists. Indeed, we've already seen some false identifications based on pictures of people from the "Unite the Right" rally. (And just a few years ago, internet vigilantes also came to confidently wrong conclusions about the identities of the Boston Marathon bombers in exactly the same way, by poring over mediocre-to-poor-quality photos of the event, although thankfully police realized quickly these were incorrect.)

And even if you do get the right person, are you sure you want to actively encourage managers to fire people for their activities outside of work? Remember those people I mentioned earlier who are outraged about "reverse racism" and so on? Some of those people are managers. Some managers will fire Nazis because, quite accurately, they understand that Nazis are bad. But other managers will, based on the same encouragement, fire Black Lives Matter protestors. It's not hard to find examples of political commentators or even politicians calling BLM black supremacists or even terrorists. Because you know what? People don't make rational decisions based on what is actually true. Ever. About anything. They make vaguely-approaching-rational decisions based on what feels true.

You may trust yourself, or a really good boss you have, to make this sort of decision. I may even agree with those judgements. But recall the worst boss you've had, or the worst boss someone you know has had. Someone obnoxious, petty, ignorant, mean, or clearly looking for an excuse, any excuse, to fire someone. Now imagine how they'd react if you said "you should fire people for being hateful outside of work". They might fire a Nazi, but I'd place my bet on them firing a BLM supporter, or someone with a different religion than them (because, of course, disagreeing with someone's religion is blasphemy, and blasphemy is hate speech!), or someone who is very much not a Nazi but the manager falsely thinks they are because they just read a wrongheaded book or blog post that argues that some group of people actual Nazis hate, like gay people, or completely mainstream moderates, are the "real" Nazis.

If you really feel compelled to take matters into your own hands, proceed with the extremest of extreme caution, understand your own ignorance and failures and biases, admit to and suffer the consequences of your mistakes if you harm the innocent, and absolutely do not fire unless fired upon.

The last several days of arguments I've seen, and occasionally participated in, online have just gotten nasty and frustrating. So this post is all I intend to say on the topic. I am sick of being misconstrued by people I would otherwise firmly agree with. I would just like to remind them that I understand exactly what is on the line if the Nazis actually win; just off the top of my head, there are at least three, maybe seven if you really reach, reasons I will be sent to a concentration camp if America truly follows the trajectory of Nazi Germany. That's why I am so emphatic that we must head off the Nazis. We must stop them from using the media to their favor, and we must win over their target audience of people who are vaguely upset and frustrated but do not know at whom their frustration should be directed. We must reach out to the angry but not very politically engaged public and do a decent job of explaining ourselves to them and debunking Nazi paranoia and lies before the Nazis have the chance to suck them in first.

#Nazis #Punch nazis #alt-right #political strategy #the media is stupid #people are stupid #don't be stupid

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theticklefox-blog · 7 years

Photo

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds at the Wang Theater, Boston MA, 10 June 2017

Before anyone gets too annoyed, I’ll apologize upfront that there is no video of Nick or of the concert itself in the video compilation or photos I took... yes, a lot of people did take video and no one seemed upset, and I’ve done so at concerts when I could do so briefly and discreetly. But... I was in the second row for this. Which, due to the design of the orchestra pit seating and the fat the first row is much smaller than those behind it, meant I was de facto in the first row, ie right up against the stage, as the one photo I took before the concert began demonstrates.

I had no idea my seat was so amazing, as I’d bought it months ago and didn’t have the ticket in hand until I went to fetch it at Will Call. Then, in video I DID manage to get, I kept being transferred from usher to usher and being escorted further forward. Audience members with “Pit” seating even had to be wrist-banded. As it turned out, Nick himself was having none of this elitism and wanted to circulate freely among as much of the audience as possible. Since more often than not I’ve been stuck further back, I had no issue with this. In fact I felt like apologizing for being so tall and in the front... I kept ducking down to make myself smaller whenever Nick approached my end of the stage. Once the show started staying in my seat was no longer an option at any rate, as Nick encouraged everyone to surge forward closer to the stage, so I ended up right against the stage. I should emphasize that everyone in the crowd was lovely, there was no pushing, shoving or crushing of the people in front. We all just tried to make room for each other as best we could.

Amid all of this, my purse got lost in the shuffle. It was completely safe, and I retrieved it (and the shirt I’d bought and stuffed inside it) from under my chair once the show ended, but it was logistically impossible to get at it in the crowd situation. Even if I could have, I doubt I would have. See... at least once during every song, Nick Cave was looming directly over me. I mean DIRECTLY. As in looking right down into my eyes. As in dripping sweat onto me. As in once accidentally stepping on my hand and then kneeling on my shoulder (and the gentleman beside me) to get at the people behind us. Again I want to emphasize I enjoyed every second of this, and it was unlike any concert experience I’ve had in my life. I very briefly made eye contact with Bowie at a Tin Machine club gig in 1992 (at a dive bar called The Sting in New Britain, CT of all places) but... he never got close and certainly didn’t sweat on or step on me. I’ve never been physically touched by a Muse, or anyone so influential to my creative imagination. Nick always engages with the audience like no one else, and had when I’d seen him previously... once or twice I’ve been pointed at, and at a 2002 concert he seemed to be lip-reading one of his more obscure, verbose songs off me. But... nothing like this. Not remotely. And I haven’t even gotten to “the good part” yet.

But, to my point about taking pics or video... in the middle of any sort of ecstatic experience, it’s best not to be experiencing that through the filter of one’s phone. It would have seemed inappropriate to me. That experience will be seared into my memory for the rest of my life... in a way that my mediocre cellphone camera (which sucks at low-light shooting) could never capture. If anyone did take video discreetly, I’d love to see it. I haven’t had time to run searches for other fans’ stories, but I look forward to doing so.

Before the concert, I’d thought this might be a more somber, distant affair than previous Bad Seeds gigs because of the family tragedy Cave experienced a couple of years ago. I wouldn’t have blamed him if he never toured again, or at least took a long break. When I heard about the current tour last summer, I thought it would probably involve more somber reflection and less direct engagement with the audience...I couldn’t have been more wrong about that.

The concert started half an hour late because various security personnel kept coming out, scoping the orchestra area and planning some sort of logistics. In retrospect I realize they were trying to make the audience more accessible to the audience, though never to the extent he seemed to wish... he seemed genuinely upset there was no rope ladder to the upper balcony. He might have been a nightmare for the venue’s security... but all of us fans loved it.

He performed a good-sized chunk of The Skeleton Tree, as well as three songs from Push The Sky Away (“Higgs Boson Blues”, “Jubilee Street” and the title track) and a selection of well-chosen “greatest hits” from every album but the three from ‘03-’08. I didn’t compile a setlist (again, too caught up in Having An Experience) but he performed “From Her To Eternity” (most of this one directed at a strikingly beautiful raven-haired woman who bore a distinct resemblance to Cave’s wife, Susie Bick), “Tupelo”, “Red Right Hand”, “God Is In The House” (a perfect selection for New England and its brand of dreary quietude), “Into My Arms”, “The Mercy Seat” and a 4-song encore, “The Weeping Song”, “Jack The Ripper”, “Stagger Lee” (whose crazy fan interactions based around... erm... acting out some of the song lyrics were even crazier than I’d seen before. It is strangely cathartic belting out that profane tale with a huge crowd though.) and “Push The Sky Away” to end on... which I found fitting.

I’m sure I’m leaving out a lot of things, as one does when trying to recollect an ecstatic experience amid a return to one’s dull ordinary existence. (Also, I wasn’t even trying to list the songs in order.) When I was planning to go to the concert I thought... pie-in-the-sky what would be the most amazing thing that could happen... and I though maybe if he touched my hand, that would be the most I could hope for. Maybe I’d get close enough. On the last tour he’d been amid the crowd (on some other fans’ shoulders this time) reaching out at those of us further back, but I totally chickened out on rushing forward to touch his hand. I thought, fuck it, this time I’ll try if I get the chance. You never know when a chance will be your last. I’ve lost so many people I loved (both personally and as a fan) in recent years and had my own health scares.

During the second song, “Jesus Alone” (from The Skeleton Tree) Nick leaned out over those of us to the far end of Stage Left (or House Right) and swooped his hand down over us. I reached up and my fingers grazed his, and... I know it sounds like a goofy cliche but I felt a charge run through me. I thought, well, I got what I came for, now I can just relax and enjoy the show. Of course there was no relaxing during that particular show... all the other stuff I mentioned--the other contact-- came later, whenever he darted over to our end of the stage. The hand-stepping was my fault... I was trying to crouch down so he could get at the people behind me and reflexively grabbed the edge of the stage to balance myself, and his pointy-toes shoe came right down on my fingertips. It still smarts a little but... it’s really cool. I’m not a masochist but... still... really cool. He’s a very thin man anyhow, and didn’t put much weight on it.

During “Stagger Lee” Nick started pulling people up on stage to dance with him and act out various bits of the song. At first I though he was selecting all the pretty girls (and a few pretty boys, one of whom he ballroom-danced with) but then it became clear he wanted as many audience members as would fit up onstage with him. I demurred, figuring I’d already had more than my fair share of his attention. But then during the break before the final song, some fans who’d been behind me climbed up and motioned that I should follow, and dragged me up onto the stage, and I in turn helped a few more people up. Then we all sang “Push The Sky Away” to all the people stuck up in the balcony. It was amazing. I’ve seen Nick Cave six or seven times now, and his fans are the loveliest people I’ve ever been in a crowd with... I’ve always gone to his gigs alone (as none of my friends or family are fans) but I’ve never felt alone while there. And this concert was more astonishing than all the others put together...

But the best part came during “Jubilee Street”... In planning to attend I was torn between which concert shirt to wear... the two finalists were both grey, to go with my favorite jeans. I ended up going with the lyric shirt for “Jubilee Street” since I’d bought that on the previous tour and really loved the song. In the lobby a pretty blonde who was much more dressed up for the occasion said, “Oh, that’s my favorite!” (I never wear dresses to concerts... or much at all really. I don’t have gender ID issues, but I’ve never been very “girly”.)

Anyhow I was thrilled that Nick included the song in the setlist, as on previous tours he hasn’t always done a lot of material from recent albums prior to the newest... but he still evidently values Push The Sky Away, and I rank it among his best work. During the performance he sauntered to my end of the stage again, then suddenly swooped down, grabbed my by the back of the head and brought his forehead up against mine. I was... I really have no words. I was left literally experiencing the final refrain of the song:

“I'm transforming/I’m vibrating/I’m glowing/I’m flying/Look at me now!”

youtube

#nick cave #nick cave and the bad seeds #jubilee street #boston #concert #Gentleman Doll #adventures #ecstatic experiences

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eretzyisrael · 8 years

Link

HOW A PRO-PALESTINIAN AMERICAN REPORTER CHANGED HIS VIEWS ON ISRAEL AND THE CONFLICTBYHUNTER STUART FEBRUARY 15, 2017 12:17

A year working as a journalist in Israel and the Palestinian territories made Hunter Stuart rethink his positions on the conflict.

The author walks past Ofer Prison near Ramallah, during a Palestinian protest outside the facility in November 2015. (photo credit:COURTESY / JONATHAN BROWN)

IN THE summer of 2015, just three days after I moved to Israel for a year-and-a-half stint freelance reporting in the region, I wrote down my feelings about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A friend of mine in New York had mentioned that it would be interesting to see if living in Israel would change the way I felt. My friend probably suspected that things would look differently from the front-row seat, so to speak. Boy was he right.

Before I moved to Jerusalem, I was very pro-Palestinian. Almost everyone I knew was. I grew up Protestant in a quaint, politically correct New England town; almost everyone around me was liberal. And being liberal in America comes with a pantheon of beliefs: You support pluralism, tolerance and diversity. You support gay rights, access to abortion and gun control.

The belief that Israel is unjustly bullying the Palestinians is an inextricable part of this pantheon. Most progressives in the US view Israel as an aggressor, oppressing the poor noble Arabs who are being so brutally denied their freedom.

“I believe Israel should relinquish control of all of the Gaza Strip and most of the West Bank,” I wrote on July 11, 2015, from a park near my new apartment in Jerusalem’s Baka neighborhood. “The occupation is an act of colonialism that only creates suffering, frustration and despair for millions of Palestinians.”

Perhaps predictably, this view didn’t play well among the people I met during my first few weeks in Jerusalem, which, even by Israeli standards, is a conservative city. My wife and I had moved to the Jewish side of town, more or less by chance ‒ the first Airbnb host who accepted our request to rent a room happened to be in the Nachlaot neighborhood where even the hipsters are religious. As a result, almost everyone we interacted with was Jewish Israeli and very supportive of Israel. I didn’t announce my pro-Palestinian views to them ‒ I was too afraid. But they must have sensed my antipathy (I later learned this is a sixth sense Israelis have).

During my first few weeks in Jerusalem, I found myself constantly getting into arguments about the conflict with my roommates and in social settings. Unlike waspy New England, Israel does not afford the privilege of politely avoiding unpleasant political conversations. Outside of the Tel Aviv bubble, the conflict is omnipresent; it affects almost every aspect of life. Avoiding it simply isn’t an option.

During one such argument, one of my roommates ‒ an easygoing American-Jewish guy in his mid-30s ‒ seemed to be suggesting that all Palestinians were terrorists. I became annoyed and told him it was wrong to call all Palestinians terrorists, that only a small minority supported terrorist attacks. My roommate promptly pulled out his laptop, called up a 2013 Pew Research poll and showed me the screen. I saw that Pew’s researchers had done a survey of thousands of people across the Muslim world, asking them if they supported suicide bombings against civilians in order to “defend Islam from its enemies.” The survey found that 62 percent of Palestinians believed such terrorist acts against civilians were justified in these circumstances. And not only that, the Palestinian territories were the only place in the Muslim world where a majority of citizens supported terrorism; everywhere else it was a minority ‒ from Lebanon and Egypt to Pakistan and Malaysia.

I didn’t let my roommate win the argument early morning hours. But the statistic stuck with me.

Less than a month later, in October 2015, a wave of Palestinian terrorist attacks against Jewish-Israelis began. Nearly every day, an angry, young Muslim Palestinian was stabbing or trying to run over someone with his car. A lot of the violence was happening in Jerusalem, some of it just steps from where my wife and I had moved into an apartment of our own, and lived and worked and went grocery shopping.

At first, I’ll admit, I didn’t feel a lot of sympathy for Israelis. Actually, I felt hostility. I felt that they were the cause of the violence. I wanted to shake them and say, “Stop occupying the West Bank, stop blockading Gaza, and Palestinians will stop killing you!” It seemed so obvious to me; how could they not realize that all this violence was a natural, if unpleasant, reaction to their government’s actions?

IT WASN’T until the violence became personal that I began to see the Israeli side with greater clarity. As the “Stabbing Intifada” (as it later became known) kicked into full gear, I traveled to the impoverished East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan for a story I was writing.

As soon as I arrived, a Palestinian kid who was perhaps 13 years old pointed at me and shouted “Yehud!” which means “Jew” in Arabic. Immediately, a large group of his friends who’d been hanging out nearby were running toward me with a terrifying sparkle in their eyes. “Yehud! Yehud!” they shouted. I felt my heart start to pound. I shouted at them in Arabic “Ana mish yehud! Ana mish yehud!” (“I’m not Jewish, I’m not Jewish!”) over and over. I told them, also in Arabic, that I was an American journalist who “loved Palestine.” They calmed down after that, but the look in their eyes when they first saw me is something I’ll never forget. Later, at a house party in Amman, I met a Palestinian guy who’d grown up in Silwan. “If you were Jewish, they probably would have killed you,” he said.

I made it back from Silwan that day in one piece; others weren’t so lucky. In Jerusalem, and across Israel, the attacks against Jewish Israelis continued. My attitude began to shift, probably because the violence was, for the first time, affecting me directly.

I found myself worrying that my wife might be stabbed while she was on her way home from work. Every time my phone lit up with news of another attack, if I wasn’t in the same room with her, I immediately sent her a text to see if she was OK.

Then a friend of mine ‒ an older Jewish Israeli guy who’d hosted my wife and I for dinner at his apartment in the capital’s Talpiot neighborhood ‒ told us that his friend had been murdered by two Palestinians the month before on a city bus not far from his apartment. I knew the story well ‒ not just from the news, but because I’d interviewed the family of one of the Palestinian guys who’d carried out the attack. In the interview, his family told me how he was a promising young entrepreneur who was pushed over the edge by the daily humiliations wrought by the occupation. I ended up writing a very sympathetic story about the killer for a Jordanian news site called Al Bawaba News.

Writing about the attack with the detached analytical eye of a journalist, I was able to take the perspective that (I was fast learning) most news outlets wanted – that Israel was to blame for Palestinian violence. But when I learned that my friend’s friend was one of the victims, it changed my way of thinking. I felt horrible for having publicly glorified one of the murderers. The man who’d been murdered, Richard Lakin, was originally from New England, like me, and had taught English to Israeli and Palestinian children at a school in Jerusalem. He believed in making peace with the Palestinians and “never missed a peace rally,” according to his son.

By contrast, his killers ‒ who came from a middle-class neighborhood in East Jerusalem and were actually quite well-off relative to most Palestinians ‒ had been paid 20,000 shekels to storm the bus that morning with their cowardly guns. More than a year later, you can still see their faces plastered around East Jerusalem on posters hailing them as martyrs. (One of the attackers, Baha Aliyan, 22, was killed at the scene; the second, Bilal Ranem, 23, was captured alive.)

Being personally affected by the conflict caused me to question how forgiving I’d been of Palestinian violence previously. Liberals, human-rights groups and most of the media, though, continued to blame Israel for being attacked. Ban Ki-moon, for example, who at the time was the head of the United Nations, said in January 2016 ‒ as the streets of my neighborhood were stained with the blood of innocent Israeli civilians ‒ that it was “human nature to react to occupation.” In fact, there is no justification for killing someone, no matter what the political situation may or may not be, and Ban’s statement rankled me.

SIMILARLY, THE way that international NGOs, European leaders and others criticized Israel for its “shoot to kill” policy during this wave of terrorist attacks began to annoy me more and more.

In almost any nation, when the police confront a terrorist in the act of killing people, they shoot him dead and human-rights groups don’t make a peep. This happens in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Bangladesh; it happens in Germany and England and France and Spain, and it sure as hell happens in the US (see San Bernardino and the Orlando nightclub massacre, the Boston Marathon bombings and others). Did Amnesty International condemn Barack Obama or Abdel Fattah al-Sisi or Angela Merkel or François Hollande when their police forces killed a terrorist? Nope. But they made a point of condemning Israel.

What’s more, I started to notice that the media were unusually fixated on highlighting the moral shortcomings of Israel, even as other countries acted in infinitely more abominable ways. If Israel threatened to relocate a collection of Palestinian agricultural tents, as they did in the West Bank village of Sussiya in the summer of 2015, for example, the story made international headlines for weeks. The liberal outrage was endless. Yet, when Egypt’s president used bulldozers and dynamite to demolish an entire neighborhood in the Sinai Peninsula in the name of national security, people scarcely noticed.

Where do these double standards come from?

I’ve come to believe it’s because the Israeli-Palestinian conflict appeals to the appetites of progressive people in Europe, the US and elsewhere. They see it as a white, first world people beating on a poor, third world one. It’s easier for them to become outraged watching two radically different civilizations collide than it is watching Alawite Muslims kill Sunni Muslims in Syria, for example, because to a Western observer the difference between Alawite and Sunni is too subtle to fit into a compelling narrative that can be easily summarized on Facebook.

Unfortunately for Israel, videos on social media that show US-funded Jewish soldiers shooting tear gas at rioting Arab Muslims is Hollywood-level entertainment and fits perfectly with the liberal narrative that Muslims are oppressed and Jewish Israel is a bully.

I admire the liberal desire to support the underdog. They want to be on the right side of history, and their intentions are good. The problem is that their beliefs often don’t square with reality.

In reality, things are much, much more complex than a five-minute spot on the evening news or a two paragraph-long Facebook status will ever be able to portray. As a friend told me recently, “The reason the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is so intractable is that both sides have a really, really good point.”

Unfortunately, not enough people see it that way. I recently bumped into an old friend from college who told me that a guy we’d both known when we were freshmen had been active in Palestinian protests for a time after graduating. The fact that a smart, well-educated kid from Vermont, who went to one of the best liberal arts schools in the US, traveled thousands of miles to throw bricks at Israeli soldiers is very, very telling.

THERE’S AN old saying that goes, “If you want to change someone’s mind, first make them your friend.” The friends I made in Israel forever changed my mind about the country and about the Jewish need for a homeland. But I also spent a lot of time traveling in the Palestinian territories getting to know Palestinians. I spent close to six weeks visiting Nablus and Ramallah and Hebron, and even the Gaza Strip. I met some incredible people in these places; I saw generosity and hospitality unlike anywhere else I’ve ever traveled to. I’ll be friends with some of them for the rest of my life. But almost without fail, their views of the conflict and of Israel and of Jewish people in general was extremely disappointing.

First of all, even the kindest, most educated, upper-class Palestinians reject 100 percent of Israel ‒ not just the occupation of East Jerusalem and the West Bank. They simply will not be content with a two-state solution ‒ what they want is to return to their ancestral homes in Ramle and Jaffa and Haifa and other places in 1948 Israel, within the Green Line. And they want the Israelis who live there now to leave. They almost never speak of coexistence; they speak of expulsion, of taking back “their” land.

To me, however morally complicated the creation of Israel may have been, however many innocent Palestinians were killed and displaced from their homes in 1948 and again in 1967, Israel is now a fact, accepted by almost every government in the world (including many in the Middle East). But the ongoing desire of Palestinians to wipe Israel off the map is unproductive and backward- looking and the West must be very careful not to encourage it.

The other thing is that a large percentage of Palestinians, even among the educated upper class, believe that most Islamic terrorism is actually engineered by Western governments to make Muslims look bad. I know this sounds absurd. It’s a conspiracy theory that’s comical until you hear it repeated again and again as I did. I can hardly count how many Palestinians told me the stabbing attacks in Israel in 2015 and 2016 were fake or that the CIA had created ISIS.

For example, after the November 2015 ISIS shootings in Paris that killed 150 people, a colleague of mine ‒ an educated 27-year-old Lebanese-Palestinian journalist ‒ casually remarked that those massacres were “probably” perpetrated by the Mossad. Though she was a journalist like me and ought to have been committed to searching out the truth no matter how unpleasant, this woman was unwilling to admit that Muslims would commit such a horrific attack, and all too willing ‒ in defiance of all the facts ‒ to blame it on Israeli spies.

USUALLY WHEN I travel, I try to listen to people without imposing my own opinion. To me that’s what traveling is all about ‒ keeping your mouth shut and learning other perspectives. But after 3-4 weeks of traveling in Palestine, I grew tired of these conspiracy theories.

“Arabs need to take responsibility for certain things,” I finally shouted at a friend I’d made in Nablus the third or fourth time he tried to deflect blame from Muslims for Islamic terrorism. “Not everything is America’s fault.” My friend seemed surprised by my vehemence and let the subject drop ‒ obviously I’d reached my saturation point with this nonsense.

I know a lot of Jewish-Israelis who are willing to share the land with Muslim Palestinians, but for some reason finding a Palestinian who feels the same way was near impossible. Countless Palestinians told me they didn’t have a problem with Jewish people, only with Zionists. They seemed to forget that Jews have been living in Israel for thousands of years, along with Muslims, Christians, Druse, atheists, agnostics and others, more often than not, in harmony. Instead, the vast majority believe that Jews only arrived in Israel in the 20th century and, therefore, don’t belong here.

Of course, I don’t blame Palestinians for wanting autonomy or for wanting to return to their ancestral homes. It’s a completely natural desire; I know I would feel the same way if something similar happened to my own family. But as long as Western powers and NGOs and progressive people in the US and Europe fail to condemn Palestinian attacks against Israel, the deeper the conflict will grow and the more blood will be shed on both sides.

I’m back in the US now, living on the north side of Chicago in a liberal enclave where most people ‒ including Jews ‒ tend to support the Palestinians’ bid for statehood, which is gaining steam every year in international forums such as the UN.

Personally, I’m no longer convinced it’s such a good idea. If the Palestinians are given their own state in the West Bank, who’s to say they wouldn’t elect Hamas, an Islamist group committed to Israel’s destruction? That’s exactly what happened in Gaza in democratic elections in 2006. Fortunately, Gaza is somewhat isolated, and its geographic isolation ‒ plus the Israeli and Egyptian-imposed blockade ‒ limit the damage the group can do. But having them in control of the West Bank and half of Jerusalem is something Israel obviously doesn’t want. It would be suicide. And no country can be expected to consent to its own destruction.

So, now, I don’t know what to think. I’m squarely in the center of one of the most polarized issues in the world. I guess, at least, I can say that, no matter how socially unacceptable it was, I was willing to change my mind.

If only more people would do the same.

#Israel #Journalism

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amirdawar · 7 years

Text

ORIGINS & FAMILY:

Name: Amir Yusuf Khan Dawar.

Nickname: None.

Birthday: August 1st.

Age: 36.

Gender: Male.

Place of Birth: Chelsea, London, United Kingdom.

Places Lived Since: Karachi, Pakistan. Riyadh and Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. Oxford, United Kingdom. Boston, New York, and LA, United States.

Current Residence: Knightsbridge, London, United Kingdom.

Nationality: British.

Parents’ Names: Fatima and Muhammad Khan Dawar.

Number of Siblings: One younger sister, Faiza.

Relationship With Family: Family is the most important thing to Amir, by far. I went into a lot more detail about their relationships here.

Happiest Memory: The birth of his first niece, Ayeza. It wasn’t that long ago, but in an extensive history of happy memories with his family, that probably stands out as the best. He loves that kid more than life itself.

Childhood Trauma: Amir was bullied pretty badly growing up. In KSA with his dad it wasn’t an issue, but whenever he returned to London to see his mom, the kids weren’t kind. At all. They didn’t like him because he was overweight, Muslim, nerdy... Different. It made him feel guilty because he loved to visit Faiza and his mother, but during extended trips, he’d always be wishing to go back to his dad so he could get away from them. It’s definitely stuck with him. I’m sure he’s mostly over the confidence issues now, but I think it definitely scarred him. Contributes to why he’s so driven and desperate to prove himself successful.

PHYSICAL:

Height: 5'10”

Weight: 160lbs.

Build: Athletic. Not built like a monster, but he works hard to look good.

Hair Color: Black.

Usual Hair Style: As long as it looks neat, he doesn’t really care.

Eye Color: Dark brown.

Glasses? Contacts?: Contacts. Very rarely wears his glasses in public.

Style of Dress/Typical Outfit(s): Seeing him without a suit is a rarity. Going to Savile Row with his father when he was young was a tradition. To this day, he won’t buy a business suit from anywhere else. Huntsman or William Westmancott is his preference.

Typical Style of Shoes: Can’t go wrong with a good pair of Oxfords.

Jewelry? Tattoos? Piercings?: No tattoos or piercings. Always wears something from his impressive watch collection, but no other jewelry.

Scars: Only two. One from having his appendix removed, and another on his wrist from being bitten by a snake as a kid.

Unique Mannerisms/Physical Habits: Cracks his knuckles all the time when he’s stressed. Occasionally just to annoy his mother.

Athleticism: Because his appearance was one of the things he got bullied about most, he worked very hard to change it when he got to university. That routine has stuck with him. He rowed for both Oxford and Harvard competitively, and still keeps up the practice when he has time. Is a good distance runner. Enjoys playing cricket, and polo; the latter of which is a huge social thing for his family when they’re all together in London.

Health Problems/Illnesses: Amir is a Type 1 Diabetic, and also has a really bad allergy to peanuts.

INTELLECT:

Level of Education: Very high. Was homeschooled for much of his time in Saudi Arabia, but was sent back to England to study economics at Oxford. He continued these studies at Harvard, where he eventually began working towards a Ph.D., before suspending it to start investing in property, instead. Amir hopes to return to it one day, and perhaps go into lecturing when he’s older and ready to slow down a bit.

Languages Spoken: Urdu and English are his joint first languages. His mother made sure that her children learned both growing up. Also speaks Arabic and French fluently. Is currently teaching himself Mandarin for business purposes.

Level of Self-Esteem: Medium. I don’t think he’s too full of himself, and his childhood still weighs on him a bit. But he doesn’t hate himself. He realizes that he has a lot of good qualities he can be proud of.

Gifts/Talents: Aside from a talent with his profession, nothing else. It’s a shame, because he loves music and wishes he could play an instrument, but he can’t pick it up for the life of him.

Mathematical?: Absolutely. The man is a genius with numbers.

Makes Decisions Based Mostly On Emotions, or On Logic?: Logic. People often think he comes across quite cold because of it.

Life Philosophy: Take responsibility, don’t make excuses.

Religious Stance: Raised Muslim. Was very observant when he lived in Saudi Arabia—obviously, and some of it has stuck with him—but when he returned to the UK for university, it slipped. His parents aren’t happy about it, but they’re also not the type to force strict religion on their son. That being said, he does make an effort to be involved with the traditions and holidays, and never drinks in front of his parents. He knows they appreciate it.

Cautious or Daring?: Daring when it comes to work. Can’t be cautious in business, or you’ll never get anywhere. In his personal life, though, I think he’s a lot more hesitant. Tends to overthink things more.

Most Sensitive About/Vulnerable To: I think his reputation is so hugely important to him, that bad press is one of the things that really gets to him. He can’t just let it roll off his back like the others. People trying to tear him down after how hard he’s worked upsets him. Family is a weak spot for him, too. Amir’s also sensitive to people bringing up his failed relationship with Lara, as it’s still an incredibly raw topic.

Optimist or Pessimist?: An optimist, but not naively so.

Extrovert or Introvert?: In business, extroverted, because that’s where he feels most comfortable. He has no problem taking charge and putting himself out there. Less so in social situations. He’s not shy or detached, but sometimes he needs a little prodding to let loose and get involved.

RELATIONSHIPS:

Current Relationship Status: Single.

Sexual Orientation: Heterosexual.

Past Relationships: The only two that are relevant are his first girlfriend, Lital Chadad, just because of how serious it was, and his ex-fiancée Lara, because he literally thought he would spend the rest of his life with her. When she cheated on him, it broke his heart, and he’s still genuinely distraught about it.

Primary Reason For Being Broken Up With: Doesn’t spend enough time with them.

Primary Reasons For Breaking Up With People: When they’re only in it for the money, which happens more often than he’d probably admit.

Ever Cheated?: No.

Been Cheated On: Yes. Multiple times by Lara.

Level of Sexual Experience: I mean, he’s not Damon, but he’s not Théo? Pretty high. (keeping this in, fight me.)

Story of First Kiss: On one of his trips back to London when he was around sixteen, a pretty girl from his sister’s tennis club had kissed him after one of their matches. Amir had thought he was so lucky, until he’d found out kissing him had been a forfeit for losing a bet. They’d laughed about it right in front of him. Stuck with him for a while.

Story of Loss of Virginity: It was with Lital on a drunken night out during the first few months of his time at Oxford. It was awkward, because he wasn’t exactly experienced on the girl front, and he certainly didn’t expect that she’d want to speak to him afterward, let alone ending up in a five-year-long relationship.

A Social Person?: I think so, generally, yes, though less so as of late; working to avoid his problems has also left him becoming slightly reclusive. I imagine he has quite a lot of friends. Doesn’t have trouble keeping them around, either. Though because he gets so busy, he’s fully aware that he needs to make more effort with certain people. That doesn’t mean that he doesn’t enjoy time on his own. I think he treasures those moments of peace in his crazy ass lifestyle.

Most Comfortable Around: Obviously his family. Also his best friends, Revati, Bashira and Ashraf.

Oldest Friend: Bashira bint Mahmoud al-Ghazi, who incidentally, is also one of his ex-girlfriends. A daughter of one of his father’s Saudi friends. Amir has known her for as long as he can remember. Ashraf Khan, another Saudi friend, follows in close second. They’re an inseperable trio.

How Does He Think Others Perceive Him?: Uptight. Too serious. Smug. A bit of a snob. Work-obsessed.

How Do Others Actually Perceive Him?: Probably about right.

SECRETS:

Life Goals: To find the perfect balance between life and work, like his father seems to have done. Not currently working out for him.

Dreams: To eventually settle down and have a family of his own, though admittedly, I think he’s beginning to feel a bit hopeless on that front. I wonder if he thinks Lara was his last real chance, given that he’s getting older and has already wasted a considerable amount of time on dead-end/failed relationships.

Greatest Fears: Something bad happening to his family. Losing Lara. Loneliness. Being remembered for failure. Snakes.

Most Ashamed Of: How things ended with Lara. I think he probably blames himself. Wonders if maybe he’d tried a bit harder, she wouldn’t have gone to Théo.

Secret Hobbies: Cooking, though I don’t think he’s as good as he thinks he is. Working on it, for sure.

Crimes Committed (Was he caught? Charged?): Squeaky clean.

DETAILS/QUIRKS:

Night Owl or Early Bird?: Night owl, definitely.

Light or Heavy Sleeper?: Light sleeper, much to his frustration.

Favorite Animal: Fennec Foxes. Faiza had one growing up, and he was always jealous. Also tigers. Definitely tigers.

Favorite Food: Cheesecake, bitch. Also falafel. And dark chocolate.

Least Favorite Food: Tomatoes.

Favorite Book: One Thousand and One Nights

Least Favorite Book: Anything by Proust. Fuck Proust.

Favorite Movie: Ben-Hur.

Least Favorite Movie: Probably one of the terrible Bollywood movies Revati makes him sit through. Bad friend.

Favorite Song: Sympathy for the Devil – The Rolling Stones.

Favorite Sport: Cricket.

Coffee or Tea?: Tea. Always tea. Drown him in tea.

Crunchy or Smooth Peanut Butter?: Neither because death.

Type of Car He Drives: I mean, he drives all the cars, but his favorite is the Aston Martin DB11 that his father gifted him.

Lefty or Righty?: Left-handed.

Favorite Color: Green.

Cusser?: Occasionally. Usually only if he’s really annoyed, or exasperated. Not the kind of person to just curse for the sake of it.

Smoker? Drinker? Drug User?: Drinks—though not excessively—and only smokes then, rather than all of the time. Has never used any drugs.

Biggest Regret: Lara. All of it.

Pets: Since moving back to London, he actually decided to get a pet for the first time. It’s a service dog that can sense when his blood sugar is too low; something that happens a lot, since he’s been so focused on work to try and forget about his clusterfuck of a life. He’s a golden retriever named Raza.

#character development #didn't have to change as much as i thought but here it is for anyone who wants to use it!

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