#Point Of Sale Texas

[nexinov]

Find and buy your ideal POS system in the state of houstan. At Houston POS Systems, we specialize in the future of affordable point of sale systems and merchant services for every area of business. We cover the entire state of Texas and we are distributors for several POS solutions onsite and online. With our line of point of sale texas products, we have solutions that will check all the boxes for your company’s requirements, no matter how big or small your business is. Give us a call, and we would love the opportunity to discover more about your needs and help you find the right solutions for great achievement. A fresh approach to discovering your business needs for a restaurant POS system and credit card processing services across9. With so many options available for merchants, we make the decision-making process informative, fun, and simple by providing onsite or remote demos of our products. We focus on asking the right questions, understanding your business, and finding the best merchant services is our specialty.

[cable-supplies]

Find and buy your ideal POS system in the state of houstan. At Houston POS Systems, we specialize in the future of affordable point of sale systems and merchant services for every area of business. We cover the entire state of Texas and we are distributors for several POS solutions onsite and online. With our line of point of sale texas products, we have solutions that will check all the boxes for your company’s requirements, no matter how big or small your business is. Give us a call, and we would love the opportunity to discover more about your needs and help you find the right solutions for great achievement. A fresh approach to discovering your business needs for a restaurant POS system and credit card processing services across9. With so many options available for merchants, we make the decision-making process informative, fun, and simple by providing onsite or remote demos of our products. We focus on asking the right questions, understanding your business, and finding the best merchant services is our specialty.

[mintmodutile]

Point of Sale (POS) systems have become an integral part of modern business operations, providing convenience and efficiency in managing transactions. However, one critical aspect that cannot be overlooked when implementing such systems is security. In a technologically advanced era, where cyber threats are on the rise, it is essential for small businesses in Houston to understand and explore the security features of point of sale houston to protect themselves and their customers.

[harrywavycurly]

I NEED to know what it was like with Harry following her around the book store holding her stuff for her and maybe he’s asking for baking advice?🩷

Hiii lovey!! I’ll give you a little something with them in the bookstore because I just know Harry was so excited she even invited him in the first place, so enjoy💖

-find all things Southern Comfort here✨

A/N: Harry is in charge of carrying things while you wonder around looking for books that you think you’ll actually read✨

Harry can’t stop smiling. He knows he probably looks a little odd standing in the middle of a used bookstore with a tote bag with the state of Texas on it over his right shoulder and your pink and gold coffee mug that has “cup of ambition” painted on the front of it safely in his left hand, and no matter how odd he knows he might look he can’t find it in him to care. He is taking his job of holding your things very seriously as he watches you pick up a book and turn it over to read the back of it, he raises an eyebrow as you squint your eyes and bring the book closer to your face making him wonder if you wear glasses and just forgot them or if you need to get some.

“Sugar what does this say?” Your voice pulls him from his thoughts as you take a step towards him and raise the book up so he can take it with his free hand. You smile at him as you reach over and take your coffee mug from him so you can take a few sips while Harry looks over the back of the book, you reach up on your tiptoes so you can point to the top corner of the book. “Is that the price?” Harry looks where your finger is pointing and he also finds himself squinting in an attempt to try to read the absurdly small writing.

“It says five dollars I think?” You roll your eyes as you snatch the book out of his hands making him chuckle at your obvious dislike of the price. “Is it not on sale like the others?” He asks as you give him a smile when he reaches for your coffee mug so he can hold it once more while you put the overpriced book back.

“No it’s regular price and while I love a good romance novel I just don’t think one about a cowboy named Richard is worth that much because honestly what cowboy is named Richard? And it says he’s a calf roper and they ain’t nothing but bad news and I just know he’s gonna wreck that poor Mary Anne and not in the good way so back to the bin with him.” Harry feels his eyes go a bit wide as you explain what the book was about and he doesn’t know why the idea of you reading romance novels just makes his cheeks get pink. He knows everyone enjoys a good romance novel but here you are in your shorts and sweatshirt that has “let’s go girls” on it in bright yellow letters and your sunglasses holding your hair out of you face talking to him about cowboy smut.

“Richard is a horrible cowboy name.” He agrees making you laugh and Harry smiles at himself at the fact he made you laugh as he follows behind you when you go down the row and stop at a bin that’s labeled “friends to lovers” and Harry begins to wonder if the two of you have been in the romance section this whole time and he’s just been too distracted to notice.

“What’s your favorite trope honeybuns?” You ask him as you pick up a book and give it a once over. “I’m thinking you’re a slow burn kinda man.” He doesn’t miss the teasing tone of your voice that always seems to make your accent thicken and he grips your coffee mug a little tighter as you turn around so you’re facing him and it’s not until then that he realizes just how closely behind you he’s been standing because the top of the book in your hands touches the middle of his chest.

“I uh don’t uhm-”

“This one seems good it’s about Francine who is good friends with David who honestly sounds like a dream boat and they get trapped in a cabin during a snow storm and it’s the wildest forty eight hours she’s ever had but will their friendship survive?” Harry is enamored with the way you can somehow make the synopsis of a fairly uninteresting book sound so intriguing and while most of it has to do with your accent it’s the way it mixes with the softness of your voice that sucks him in and he knows he would be perfectly content standing here all day listening to you read to him.

You look up at him as if you’re silently asking him if he agrees that the books sounds good and all he can do is nod even though if he’s being honest it doesn’t sound that interesting to him but he can tell you seemed into it. You smile as Harry removes a handle of the tote off his shoulder so you can toss the book into the bag so it can join the few others you had found during the half hour the two of you had been wondering around the store. It takes all of Harry’s willpower not to grab your hand when you turn and begin to walk further down the row of bins, but he knows this is exactly why you handed him your things because it’s your way of setting a boundary with him and he is a gentleman after all so he’s going to respect it and just slide his hand into the pocket of his shorts to grab his phone as he follows behind you. He doesn’t think before he snaps the photo, it’s nothing scandalous it’s just you leaning over the bin of “slow burn” books with a small smile on your face and he can’t help but chuckle to himself when he notices you’re on your tiptoes trying to get to the back of the bin clearly reaching for a specific book.

“Honey can I borrow your-”

“Here you go love.” You smile when Harry just reaches over you and grabs the book you were struggling to reach since it was at the very back of the bin, handing it to you with a smile. His hand lands on the edge of the bin while he looks over your shoulder so he can glance over what the book is about. “Does that say Trisha and Harry?” He asks making you giggle as you nod your head and move the book so he can get a better look at it.

“He’s in love with her but he’s scared to tell her so he drags it out for damn near a decade but when he does finally tell her it’s on her wedding day.” Harry feels his mouth slightly drop at the dramatics of this plot and he already knows you’re going to want to add it to the tote bag.

“Her wedding day? What a twat.” You laugh and shake your head as you turn around and look up at him making him momentary forget how to breathe at how close you are.

“You kiss your momma with that mouth Harry?” Harry feels his cheeks get hot as you slide the book into the tote. “Always forgetting you’re supposed to be a gentleman.” You tease as you take your mug from him and take a few sips as you reach up and playfully tap his chest with your free hand. “Come on sugar let’s go see if they have any books on baking.” With that you shoot him a wink and Harry drops his hand from the edge of the bin so you can walk away from him and towards the cook book section.

“God she’s good.” He mumbles to himself as he finally find himself able to speak, he runs a hand through his hair and lets out a sigh of content before he turns and heads off in the direction of the aisle he just saw you disappear down.

[janeyseymour]

Dancing On My Own (Tiesto Remix)

Summary: You're a Cowboys fan in Eagles territory. Melissa finds out.

WC: ~2.05k

You have a secret- a deep, dark secret that you never ever want your fiery, die hard Eagles fan girlfriend to find out. You’re terrified of what will happen if she does. You’re a Dallas Cowboys fan. Okay, so maybe you were a second-hand Cowboys fan, but your dad bought you one of the jerseys because he absolutely adores them. And when you go home to Texas (how you ended up in the one state, one city that hates Dallas more than anything, you’ll never know), your dad always drags you to a game.

Upon moving to Philly, you took down every indication that you would ever associate yourself with the team that the Eagles love to hate. You couldn’t risk becoming an outcast before you even start your new life here.

And it did you good. You somehow land in the heart of the city, and you work for a school that absolutely bleeds Philadelphia. The principal adores the Eagles, Mr. Johnson is constantly yelling ‘Go Birds!’, Janine has a few trinkets in her room for each of the Philly Sports teams… even Gregory has come around to love Gritty. And then there’s Melissa Schemmenti. She’s had to go to court for throwing a corn cob at Ben Simmons when he pissed her off, she has ins with those who worked the demolition at the Linc,  she’s a season ticket holder for the Phillies and the Eagles… and she absolutely detests the Cowboys- more than most Eagles fans too. She’s gotten into more trouble for heckling the Dallas team than she’s willing to admit- knocking over portapotties when Cowboys fans are in them, throwing Philly cheesesteaks, hurling eggs and Molotov cocktails at the bus. 

And yet, she’s your girlfriend. How? You’re nearly perfect. You’re smart, you’re funny, you can sing and play instruments to make her swoon, you’re a wonderful teacher and great with the kids, and you’re more than easy on the eyes. And that was what she knew of you before she fell madly in love with you. 

With the season coming up, your girlfriend is more than excited. She’s been waiting for the season tickets to go on sale, but even then… if she doesn’t get them the legal way, she knows a guy.

She does end up getting them. Of course she does. And as soon as she does, she’s coming into the teachers lounge doing her happy dance and making her way over to you. She kisses you soundly before proclaiming that she is 100% taking you to an Eagles game.

“And,” she notes. “I’m gonna make sure it’s a good one… Eagles versus the fuckin’ Cowgirls! Go birds!”

She’s met with a chorus of ‘Go birds!’ right back, but you stay quiet.

She turns to you with a curious look, amused grin now gone. “Babe, aren’t you excited?!”

You shrug. “I just… haven’t ever really been into football?” you offer weakly.

“Well, I’m gonna make sure that you have a great time there. I’m gonna get you an Eagles jersey, a Jalen Hurts one, and you’re gonna have the damn time of your life!”

Again, you shrug your shoulders, looking unsure.

“Aye, if she ain’t gonna use the ticket for good, I’m right here!” Mr. Johnson points to himself. “You know we’ll have a good time.”

“Nah, Mr. J,” your girlfriend rolls her eyes. “I’m taking Y/N, and she’s gonna leave the Linc a die hard Eagles fan, right?” She looks at you in a way that tells you there’s no convincing her otherwise unless you want to out yourself right now as a fan of the Cowboys.

You just nod, knowing you can’t have this conversation in public- you do not want to be shunned by the rest of your coworkers. You could potentially lose this job; Ava has fired people for less despite the fact that she really couldn’t afford to fire them and that’s why both you and Melissa are teaching two different grades at a time.

That’s the end of that conversation.

Until she comes over to your apartment that night, ready to cook dinner for you and stay over. 

“You gonna tell me why you got so weird about going to a football game with me? Is it because we might see our students at the game?” she asks. “Because if it is, I promise you… you know Philly is pretty cool about LGBT stuff.”

“I know, I know,” you say softly. “I’ve just… could we go to a baseball game instead?” You never pledged your allegiance to any baseball team, so you would be willing to wear a Harper or Nola jersey.

“I mean, I could get us tickets to a game,” she tells you as she puts the meat into the pan to start cooking. “But I really love football and the Eagles, and that’s something I want to share with you.”

“Does it have to be a game with the Cowboys?” you ask.

She turns to you at that. “Those are the best games.”

“I-” you sigh. Deciding to just rip off the bandaid, you take off the Abbott sweatshirt that you’re wearing to reveal the Day Prescott jersey your dad had given you the last time you visited your hometown. 

Her jaw drops, and her eyes fill with a fire. “When the fuck were you gonna tell me that you were the enemy?” she seethes.

“Mel,” you say softly, trying to calm her down.

“Don’t ‘Mel’ me right now,” the redhead hisses. “What the fuck?! What the actual fuck?!”

“Melissa, honey,” you continue. “Please-”

“I- no,” she stops you from getting any closer to her when you attempt. “Don’t. Don’t you even fucking dare.”

She’s out of your house before you can say anything else, and the only thing that you can hear is the flank steak sizzling quietly in the pan on the stove.

When you get to school the next day, you head straight for her room to try to talk to her again.

“Melissa,” you knock on the door, a cup of her favorite coffee in your hands as a peace offering.

“No.”

You set the warm drink on her desk, which she promptly smacks into the garbage can under her desk. She stands hastily and storms out of the room in the direction of the staff room.

“Melissa, please!” you beg as you chase after her. “Please!”

“I have nothing to say to you,” she hisses as she rips her arm away from you when you catch her gently. She storms into the break room and heads right for the coffee mugs.

“Please!” your voice cracks, and everyone that is already gathered there turns at the commotion.

“Ooh,” Ava says. “Trouble in paradise. Spill.”

“This one-” your girlfriend, if she even still is after your reveal last night, points to you and looks at you with disgust. “-is a Cowgirls fan, and decided not to let me know until last night!”

“Boo!” Mr. Johnson heckles you. You give him a nearly murderous look.

“Just let me explain!” you plead.

“You have nothin’ to explain! You’re a traitor!” the redhead barks at you before turning back to the mugs. She slams the door as she closes it, slams her coffee mug down on the counter, and storms her way to her seat next to Barbara. She makes it so that there is absolutely no way you could sit next to her.

All eyes are on you, and you hate it. So you do what you know how to do: run.

You avoid the second grade teacher at all possible costs for the next few days, giving her the chance to cool down. Finally, at the end of the week, you attempt to talk to her.

“I don’t know what you want me to say,” she huffs. She doesn’t even bother looking up from her nails. She doesn’t even give you the chance to explain yourself. “I ain’t dating no Cowgirl.”

You cry the entire way home. You lost your girlfriend, and all because of some stupid football team.

You call your father that night, a sobbing mess.

“You were dating an Eagles fan?!”

“Dad,” you cry. “Please. I don’t- I just need you to tell me that it’s all going to be okay.”

“It is,” he promises you. “But, seriously?”

You hang up on him.

He calls back a few minutes later, apologizing for his words. You forgive him of course. You love your father more than anything. 

“If you really love her, you’ll get her back… even if it means you betray our team,” he tells you.

“R-really?” you whisper.

“You’re in Philly now,” your dad sighs softly. “If you can’t beat ‘em, and the lord knows you can’t because no one can beat Philly fans, join ‘em.”

That’s all you need to hear to know what you’re going to do. “Thank you, Dad.”

“Of course, kiddo. Just know that when you come home to visit, you are back on my team.”

“I know,” you chuckle through your tears. “But if I bring Mel back home, there is to be absolutely no football talk.”

“Deal,” he laughs. “I’m not trying to get our house lit on fire.”

You thank him again, tell him you love him and hang up. 

That weekend, you go out and buy a bunch of Philadelphia sports apparel; your credit card statement this month is going to be a doozy. But if it means you’ll get Melissa back, it’ll be worth it.

On Monday, you show up in your baseball gear, rooting for the Phillies as they play against the Cincinnati Twins. It gets the redhead’s attention, just slightly. But she turns her head when you look in her direction.

You wear your Flyers gear the next day. That gets Gregory’s attention.

The Sixers are the next. Janine grins.

You had even bought a Philadelphia Union jersey that you wear on Thursday. Jacob tells you how massively underrated they are and that he thinks they deserve to have a bigger following.

When you come in on Friday, not clad in Eagles gear like Melissa thought you would be, that is the final straw for her. She has you backed into a corner telling you that you can pretend to bleed Philly all you want, but at the end of the day you’re just a traitor.

You let her get up in your face, red with anger. You know that you didn’t wear it because you’re saving it for Monday- when they play.

You actually managed to get a ticket to the game, one next to hers- not that she knows it. You thank Barbara profusely when she’s able to get you the name of Melissa’s guy and where her tickets for this game are. Your plan is to show up in your new Jalen Hurts jersey that you spent a fortune on and win her back. You don’t want to lose her. Never. 

You race home after school to change out of your green shirt that you wore to school and into your Hurts jersey and a pair of leggings. You grab the baseball cap that you bought and pop it on your head before heading out to your car.

You park your car for the ridiculous amount of money they’re charging before going to find your seat. 

As you approach though, you see someone new with Melissa- someone you’ve never seen before. She has an arm around the woman’s waist like the way she used to hold you. You convince yourself it’s just a friend and continue on your way to your seat. But then she plants a kiss to the new woman’s lips, and your world shatters.

You might be at a football game, but you should be at a Phillies game with their unofficial anthem playing.

I'm in the corner, watching you kiss her, oh no

And I'm right over here, why can't you see me? Oh no

And I'm giving it my all

But I'm not the guy you're taking home, ooh

I keep dancing on my own

So far away, but still so near

The lights come on, the music dies

But you don't see me standing here

[wosoimagines]

Told You So

part 6 of rivals

Jo gets her first start of the Victory Tour in her home state, and the team finally gets to meet her family.

2,832 words

previous part| |next part

“Guess what I’ve got.” 

I grinned as Hope tilted her head to the side. I tapped at my chest. 

“Hope you brought all the good trash talk today, Solo. You’re not gonna stop anything I throw at you.” 

“Yeah, whatever you say, Pip.” 

I pouted at the nickname. I was sure that I would have grown out of it by now, but Hope had been adamant about making sure it stuck around. 

“Jo!” I whirled around to look at Becky who did not look happy with me. “Stop taunting the goalies. Get to work!” 

“But that’s no fun,” I whined, although I was already starting to move to the opposite side of the field to get ready with the rest of the forwards. “You don’t have to be so boring all the time.” 

“If you don’t get your butt over there, I can really be boring for you,” Becky assured, “I’ll make sure you do all of your school work on our off day.” 

I shook my head at that as I started to jog across the field. 

“Always ruining my fun,” I grumbled knowing that the mic would pick it up. “I’m sixteen. I think I’m allowed a little fun, right?” 

My eyes found the camera that was following me as I gave it a little shrug. 

Once I reached the other forwards, Christen was quick to join my side. We didn’t initially say anything to each other as we warmed up. That was until Christen tried to nutmeg me, but I moved my heel just enough to keep the ball in front of me. 

“You’ve been spending too much time with Tobin,” I said as I pointed at her. 

Christen shook her head at that. 

“You’re in a really good mood. Your exams go well?” 

“I was exempt. All A’s.” 

“That’s good. Get you into Stanford with those grades.” 

“I know some others who would object to that.” 

Christen rolled her eyes at that. I had been hearing everyone hype up their own college, but I ultimately hadn’t decided where I was going to go just yet. 

“So, what does have you so happy?” 

“We’re in Texas. This is my home game. Jill told me she’d start me since I saved up all my tickets for the year so my family can come.” 

“You had to save up all of your tickets?” Alex asked behind me. 

I glanced over my shoulder to look at her before nodding. 

“But that’s almost thirty tickets,” Christen pointed out. 

I furrowed my brow in confusion. I hadn’t been shy about talking about how big my family was. 

“I have twelve siblings. That’s why they couldn’t go to the World Cup. There’s just way too many of us.” 

“You have twelve siblings?” Alex asked. I nodded. “Did your parents never hear of a condom?” 

“To be fair, I was a complete accident,” I admitted. “Marley was born when my parents were nineteen. Five of my siblings were born back-to-back years.” 

“You were an accident?” 

“Yeah, no one told my parents how long they should have actually waited after my dad got a vasectomy. Nine months later and there I was.” 

“They’re all coming?” 

“Yeah! And my niece, Sky. I can’t wait for you guys to meet Sky. She loves the team.” 

“Oh, yeah?” 

“Yeah,” I nodded. “She watches all the games. I think she’s the only one who knows more about soccer than you just need to get the ball into the back of the net.” 

“Well, then I can’t wait to meet her,” Christen said as she ruffled my hair. 

I grinned at that before we were all called to huddle so we could start our drills. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

“What do you mean you aren’t coming?” 

I ran a hand through my hair as I paced in front of the foot of my bed. 

“I have an important interview scheduled, Jo,” Mom said causing me to scoff. “It could boost the book sales. And our family is expected to be there to support me. We’re supposed to be showing a united front.” 

“Yeah, because nothing screams united like missing your youngest daughter’s victory tour. I don’t even know why I try to invite any of you. It isn’t like I’ve been asking the team to save all of my tickets for the games throughout the year to make sure everyone in the family could come.” 

“You’ll have other games,” Dad cut in. I shook my head at that. They didn’t get it. They never did. “Us missing this game isn’t going to kill you.” 

“When was the last game of mine you went to?” I asked. Both of my parents went silent. I couldn’t even remember myself. “You couldn’t come to the World Cup, which is the biggest stage I’ll ever play on. You didn’t come to my national team debut. Those I could somewhat understand because they weren’t in Texas. But this? This game is in Texas. It’s San Antonio. It’s only three hours and you’re telling me you won’t even make that trip to watch me?” 

“We have more important things,” Dad said. I tried to blink away the tears that were starting to pool in my eyes. “We’re trying to think about the family.” 

“How about for once in my life, you think about me? It’s always been the family. No one has ever been there for me. Not really!” I snapped. I let out a laugh of disbelief. “The only person who has even cared to learn anything about the sport I love so much is Sky! You couldn’t even name half of my national teammates. You’ve never cared about soccer past whether I was a good player or not. The only time you’ve had something to say to me was when I lost. It’s never when I win. 

“I won the World Cup and I stayed silent when no one in this family besides Sky celebrated it because I knew that this game was going to happen. Silly me for believing that this family would actually show up to celebrate me for once! I had to watch as every single one of my teammates was able to celebrate with their family while I was left alone! You will never understand what that’s like!” 

“You want to talk about never understanding?” Dad snapped back. “You could never understand that sacrifices that your mother and I have made for this family!” 

“That’s your responsibility! You’re the ones who decided to have a family! It’s up to you to take care of us and make those sacrifices! I’m not the one who should be suffering just because I was the kid you never wanted!” 

“We’ve never said we didn’t want you,” Mom defended. I didn’t fight the tears this time. “You and most of your siblings weren’t planned but we have always wanted all of you.” 

“Do you?” 

Both of my parents went silent at that. They had never shown true interest in what I was doing. 

“You both have a funny way of showing it.” 

Before either of them could respond I ended the call. I tossed my phone to the side, not caring where it ended up, before throwing myself on the bed. I curled into a ball as I grabbed a hold of a pillow. I let out the loudest scream I could muster up as I just let the tears fall from my eyes. 

I didn’t even think too much about it when the pillow was pulled away from me and replaced with a person. I didn’t mind either even as someone else hugged me from behind as well. 

“It’s okay,” Becky soothed as she rubbed my back. “It’s okay. You’re okay, Jo. You’re okay. You’re safe.” 

It didn’t take much to deduce that the person who had pried me away from the pillow was Alyssa. Especially once she started to run her hand through my hair. And with the emotional toll talking to my parents had already taken on me, it wasn’t long before I was falling asleep. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

I blinked my eyes open before I wiped my face. I frowned as I glanced around at the room. I tried to get my bearings, but it just felt like I couldn’t get over how disoriented I currently was. I could have sworn that Becky and Alyssa were here, but there was no trace of them. 

I reached over to grab ahold of my phone where it was sitting on the nightstand. I didn’t even remember picking it up after I had thrown it to the side. But then again, I wasn’t even sure what time it was. 

8:17 pm. 

Shit. 

Dinner was nearly over. I scrambled from the bed and into the bathroom. I turned on the sink and quickly washed at the tear tracks that were on my face. I couldn’t let any of my teammates know that I had been crying over something so insignificant. They had finally just started to look at me as if I was actually worthy of being on the team. I couldn’t let anything risk that. 

Once I had decided that my face was cleaned off enough that I wouldn’t get any questions, I grabbed a hoodie that was sitting on the desk chair before pulling the hood up over my head. I didn’t even bother with the elevator. I was much more likely to run into some of my teammates that way. The stairs were much safer. 

I made it through the doors of the mess hall that we had set up downstairs just before they stopped serving our meals. I was a bit surprised by how empty the room already was, I knew that most of the team liked to hang around and just chill with each other. But Becky and Alyssa were sitting at a table with each other with an extra plate. 

Becky was the first one to spot me and waved me over to join them. As if I ever ate with anyone else. 

“Feeling better?” 

I froze at Becky’s question. So, I didn’t make up Becky and Alyssa being with me in the room. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” 

I refused to look at either of them as I focused on my food. 

“Jo,” Alyssa started as I tried to shovel my food in my mouth as fast as I could, “it’s okay to be upset about it.” 

“Seriously, guys,” I said, once I swallowed the food in my mouth, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” 

“So, you don’t want to talk about a call with your parents made you cry enough that you eventually fell asleep?” 

I pushed the plate of food away from me as my fork clattered against the table. I met Becky’s eyes as I clenched my jaw. 

“I’m sorry you had to see that,” I said after a moment of silence passed between the three of us. “I’m usually much better about making sure no one has to see that.” 

I didn’t waste any time standing up. I knew that I could at least hide away with Rose and Sam. We had, after all, gotten close while at the U-20 World Cup a year ago. 

“Jo.” 

Alyssa tried to catch my hand, but I was quick to shuffle away from the two of them. 

“I’m not hungry anymore.” 

I didn’t give them any time to say anything else as I left the mess hall. I knew that I would regret not eating my dinner, but I really wasn’t in the mood to eat right now. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

“So, you know that we love having you,” Sam started, causing me to raise my eyebrows at the taller player, “but Becky keeps asking us to make sure you’re fine. Like multiple times a day.” 

I rolled my eyes at that. I had initially thought that Christen was just messing with me when she told me that I would never be able to escape Becky and Alyssa being my team moms now. 

“Did something happen that we need to know about?” Rose added. 

“Everything’s fine,” I assured. I had been so adamant about making sure that I wouldn’t be anywhere near Becky and Alyssa the past couple of days that I had even knocked out all of my homework for the entire trip. “Becky’s just dramatic. Really wish she’d learn that I don’t need a second mother.” 

“Hey,” Rose said, drawing my eyes from my phone to her, “Becky’s just worried about you. It’s a little unfair for you to be upset with her when we all are.” 

“Yeah, well, there’s nothing to be worried about.” 

“Jo,” Sam softly said, “You’ve been avoiding Becky and Alyssa for the past two days. Something obviously happened. Becky seems really worried about you.” 

“It’s nothing.” 

“Look, we’re not asking you what it’s about,” Rose said, as she grabbed my phone when I went to look at it again. “We’re just asking that you check in with Becky. Sam and I don’t mind you staying in our room, but we are getting tired of Becky constantly asking us how you’re doing.” 

I sighed at that. I knew that it wasn’t Rose or Sam’s fault. It wasn’t even Becky or Alyssa’s fault. 

“Yeah, sure,” I said. Becky at least deserved to know that I wasn’t mad at her. “I’ll talk to her tomorrow. After the game.” 

“Jo-” 

“After the game,” I reaffirmed when Rose tried to say anything. “I just need to make sure that my head is in the game since I’m starting.” 

Rose and Sam looked between each other before Rose nodded in agreement.  

“But you have to talk to her.” 

I nodded at that. It was a fair demand if I was going to still be here in their room. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

I grinned as I jumped up onto Sam’s back. The older woman grunted but she steadied herself. 

“I’m not a horse, you know.” 

“Come on, Sammy! I scored a hat-trick. Gotta keep these legs fresh.” 

“Try an ice bath.” 

I shivered at the thought. 

“No thanks,” I said to Sam. 

Sam huffed, but she didn’t fight to get me off her back. 

“Saw that your family is here,” Rose spoke up. I nodded at that as my eyes found where my family was sitting in the stands. “You weren’t lying that it’s huge.” 

“Did everyone think that I was?” I asked. Sam and Rose both nodded their heads causing me to huff. “No one ever believes me. Not even my friends at school. Am I really that hard to trust?” 

Both Sam and Rose froze at that. 

“Not hard to trust,” Becky assured me as she and Alyssa joined our little group. “But twelve siblings is a lot. Kind of hard to wrap your head around.” 

I slid off of Sam’s back. I knew that I needed to talk to Becky and Alyssa without anyone else butting into our conversation. 

“I can explain it all to you if you really need me to when we get back to the hotel.” 

Rose and Sam both shook their heads at that before making their exit to greet the fans. 

I looked at the two for a moment before rubbing at the back of my neck. 

“I was never mad at either of you.” 

“We know,” Becky said. She reached out to place a hand on my shoulder. “We were never upset with you. We just worry about you, Jo.” 

“Yeah, and the whole running off didn’t help,” Alyssa added. Becky was quick to elbow the goalie’s side. Alyssa glared at Becky. “Hey! I’m just trying to tell her that she worried us more by running off then just talking.” 

“I’ve never had anyone to talk to,” I admitted. Both of the older players looked at me. “I have twelve siblings and not a single one is that interested in soccer. Plus, Elvis and Mick are the closest to me in age and they can be assholes.” 

“Siblings usually are,” Alyssa agreed. “But they’ll always be there for you.” 

“I’m just not used to it,” I said. They two looked between each other causing me to motion to them. “People actively caring about me. I mean, they care. My family. I know they do, but there’s so many of us that things just don’t seem as impressive anymore.” 

Becky reached out to pull me into a hug along with Alyssa. 

“Well, you’ll always have us. Promise.” 

I squeezed the two a bit tighter before Alyssa forced her way away from us.  

“Okay, go spend some time with your family. After all, Becky didn’t convince them to come just for you to ignore them.” 

I paused at that as I turned to Becky. 

“Thank you.” 

Becky nodded before pushing me away. 

“You’ll have to bring Sky to the locker room with you,” Becky said with a grin. “Go enjoy the time with your family.” 

I nodded before rushing off over to where my family was. 

[goatpaste]

Alrighty, this has been something I'v been putting off for awhile because I really just wanted to save all the money myself but I just dont think its gonna be able to happen anytime soon and I'm tired of putting it off for Daisy's sake

but this is officially the Donation Post for us to start pooling together money to move daisy up from Texas to Pennsylvania. I'll bore you with the details under the cut but in the mean time here is links and info on the ways you can support the move!

[My commissions are Open] [My Etsy is Open]

[My Kofi were i offer PWYW commissions as low at 3$]

[My Toyhouse has designs for sale on it]

[You can Donate here and all the saving made toward this will be going directly into savings]

These are all the ways you can directly support us and help us work toward the goal of getting Daisy into a safe and better environment! I know not everyone is going to be able to chip in but anything helps even reblogs and sharing around! We've been talking about this move for over a year and I want to try and move her by the end of this year at the latest.

For more info on our specific situation and bit more details, please read under the cut

Daisy has been my friend since we were 6 years old, she is like a sister to me! We've been at each others side through thick and thin and I care about her so much.

Daisy's home life has never been the best and her parents are nightmare people who are a blight on the general public but as well as Daisy's home life.

Daisy doesnt have the ability to drive, work or save her own money even when she did work as her mother would take the money she earned constantly, and was ultimately the reason Daisy was unable to keep her job.

So for Daisy's end she has no ability to save and moving funds, it will primarily be on me to round up the money.

We are not 100% sure how much we are going to need at this moment in time but have a rough estiment.

Were hoping to get Daisy's mother on a good mood and have her pay for Daisy's plane ticket. We are going to be unable to move all her stuff and will just have to pack as much as she can into a large suitcase and fly up. So we will not have to pay for the plane, but will have to pay for bedding, and everything else she will need once up here. we have some temporary arrangements Via my bed and couch and potentially picking up a blow up mattress. But my current apartment is extremely small and not much room for two people let alone just me. Not sure how long I will be in this space while Daisy is up here if at all.

I may potentially reach out to my step father and ask him to dip into the savings he has kept for me to get Daisy furniture and necessities. But im avoiding that for as much as i can as im not on the best terms with my dad.

I will start looking for a bigger place for us to live together once we start getting in a comfortable area on savings. As the only money maker currently i will be needing savings to afford a place for us to share that will of course be much more expensive than where i am right now. Daisy will start looking for a job once she is/has moved up here and hopefully we will be able to support ourselves at that point, it will just be the first little bit of time we will need a cushion.

this is one of the areas im not 100% sure how much were going to need but certain in the thousands area knowing rent for a place big enough for two individuals.

after that its just gonna be us figuring it out.

but this is the situation as it stands right now, we are trying to help a trans woman out of her shitty living situation and across the country where her friends who love and care and want to support her are. We dont know exactly how much its going to be, but its going to be a lot and were really just looking for a bit of support!

thank yall so much!

[avastrasposts]

A Baker's Dozen - Six

Twelve Pedro boys, twelve stand alone short stories, all set in the same bakery.

Hello!

I can't believe it's already the halfway point for A Baker's Dozen, Pedro boy number six is waiting in the wings. But before I let him in I just want to say a massive thank you for all the love all you lovely people gave Ezra. It was a bit sadder than others but there always a chance of him re-appearing...

I'm dropping chapter today seeing as tomorrow is New Year's Eve, from next week I'll be back on my regular Sunday evening posting.

Also, don't miss all the #pickledpena fics that'll be posting on January 1st! And follow @pickled-pena to see them all in their pickled Peña glory.

Happy 2024 all you lovely people!

Series Master List

He puts out the cigarette just before he steps through your door on a quiet afternoon. You’re busy placing some fresh coffee cake in the display case and he’s the only customer in the shop. Crouched down, almost out of sight, it gives you a few seconds to observe him as he looks around the shop. He’s handsome, dangerously handsome, and holds himself with a nonchalant air of confidence that makes you think he’s aware of how good he looks. No man would wear jeans that tight if he didn’t know his body could pull it off, his generous package clearly framed by the crotch of the dark wash denim. A black, short sleeved, shirt stretches across his broad shoulders, one too many buttons undone, yellow aviators nonchalantly hanging from the neckline. And as you drag your eyes away from the freckles of his chest and up to his face, you’re met by his dark eyes, an almost scowl marring his handsome features as he locks eyes with you. 

You stand up, placing the now empty tray on the counter and put your customer service smile on, squashing a nervous squeal in your belly. 

“Hi, welcome, how can I help you?” you say, wiping your hands on your apron as the man approaches. 

“I’m lookin’ for a bakery that does Mexican things, I need a Tres Leches cake,” he says, his eyes leaving yours and scanning the shelves of your display case as you shake your head. His Texas drawl is subtle but the low register of his rich voice emphasizes it and sends a little shiver down your spine.  

“I’m afraid I don’t have any for sale today, but I can make one for you, if you’d like to order?” you reply and you’re surprised when his face seems to fall and he sighs deeply, annoyance rolling off him like the warm scent of his aftershave. 

“Do you know any Mexican bakeries in town?” he asks, “I’m sure yours is good, but I really need the cake today.” He puts his hands on his hips and you’re momentarily distracted by the way his shirt stretches, the buttons hanging on for dear life as his wide shoulders spread even more. 

“Sorry,” you reply, “there’s not exactly a big Mexican community in this town, so no bakeries that do Tres Leches regularly. Maybe you can find another cake that will suit the occasion?” 

The man drops his head, briefly looking at the toes of his dress shoes before he meets your eyes again, his brow furrowed.

“It’s got to be a Tres Leches, sorry.” 

“Then I’m afraid I can’t help you,” you say, shrugging and expecting him to turn around and leave. But instead he remains in front of the counter, looking at you as you start straightening the cups on the counter, just to have something to do, the man’s intense gaze is unnerving.

“Fuck,” he hisses under his breath, sharp enough for you to startle, and his eyebrows shoot up, “Sorry, that wasn’t at you. And thanks anyway.” 

He turns and yanks open the front door, exiting out onto the street where he stops, looking left and right before glancing back at you through the window. He locks eyes with you for a beat, and then he stalks off, long legs in tight jeans disappearing down the street. 

He stays on your mind for the rest of the afternoon, not because of the need for a specific cake, but because of the way he’d reacted to being denied it, disappointment that seemed to hit something more than just missing out on what, you supposed, was a special request from someone close to him. Women, especially brides-to-be, could be very emotional and stressed about the specifics of their cakes, but you’d never heard a man curse when he couldn’t get the cake he wanted. You wonder if you should maybe make a Tres Leches cake, just in case he comes back, but decide against it. There are plenty of bakeries in town capable of making them instead of you, he’s probably not even coming back to your bakery anyway. 

By the next day you’ve forgotten about him, the day running past fast as your shop assistant handles the steady flow of customers that Saturday’s always bring. You’re busy in the kitchen baking the last batches for Sunday and planning the week ahead, getting your orders in. As a spur of the moment decision, you add a couple of cans of evaporated milk and condensed milk, the Tres Leches man popping up in your mind as you scroll through the whole seller's website. . 

On late Sunday afternoon you start cleaning the shop and the kitchen, the foot traffic always dies down the last hour before closing on Sundays and you send your shop assistant home.You use the last hour to reset everything for Tuesday, Monday being your day off. 

The sound of the bell on the front door rings as you’re on your hands and knees in the kitchen, wiping out the back of a counter under your workbench.  “I’ll be out in a second,” you call out to the customer. 

“No rush,” a dark voice comes back to you, the Texan lilt familiar. You stand up so fast you almost bang your head on the bottom of the shelf, stumbling to your feet and smoothing down your apron and your hair. There’s a small mirror on the wall just by the door into the shop, so you give yourself a quick glance, hastily wiping the sweat off your forehead and rubbing away a dusting of flour on your cheek. 

“Hi,” you say as you step into the shop, “how can I help you? I’m afraid I still don’t have any Tres Leches cake.” 

The handsome man is still wearing jeans so tight they look painted on, but this time they’re a light wash denim and his short sleeved shirt is white, the yellow aviators hanging even lower in the deep V of his chest. 

“I wanted to apologize for that,” he says, stepping up to the counter, “And I’d like to order one, if that’s alright?” 

“Sure, that’s fine, I’m closed tomorrow but I could have it for you by Tuesday afternoon if that works?” 

“Whatever suits you,” he replies, some of his earlier confidence coming back as he not too subtly lets his eyes give you a once over. “I’m sure it’s worth waiting for.” 

“Didn’t seem like it on Friday,” you say, biting your tongue as the words slip out. The man gives you an unreadable look, you’re not sure if he's insulted or not. 

“I’m sorry,” you blurt out, “that was uncalled for, I’m sure you had stuff going on that made the cake an essential part of your Friday. 

“No, I apologize, I was rude,” he replies, shaking his head, “I was just having a bad day, I…” he trails off, rubbing a large hand over his clean shaven cheeks under his neat mustache, dropping his eyes to the floor before he looks up at you, his eyes suddenly doleful and tired, “I’ve just been a bit homesick lately, and Tres Leches was my mom’s favorite cake, and mine too, she used to make it for my birthday. She passed a few years ago and I just wanted to be reminded of her.” 

“I’m sorry,” you say, “I’d be very happy to make you one, but it probably won’t be as good as your mom’s.” 

“I look forward to trying it though,” he gives you a crooked smile, “All your stuff here looks delicious.” He waves his hand over the display case but he’s looking at you and your apron suddenly feels very warm around your body. 

“S-so Tuesday afternoon works for you?” you ask, clearing your throat and the man nods with a smile, like he knows the effects his looks, and his tight jeans, are having on you.

“What name should I put on the order form?” you ask as you grab a pen to fill it in.

“Javier Peña,” the man replies, stepping forward and leaning on his forearms on the counter, watching you note down his name, “I think you should write down my number too,” he says, looking up at you, “just in case you need to call me, for whatever reason.” 

The image of a baby cow looking up at you through thick lashes flits across your mind as he smiles, his eyes are deep brown and suddenly very innocent looking despite the very suggestive tone of his voice. 

“Oh you’re good,” you chuckle, letting him take the pen and jot down his number, “Do you really want the cake, or are you just flirting?” 

“Can’t I do both, cariño?” he grins, pushing off from the counter and winking at you as he comes to his full height, making you look up at him again. 

“Sure, but you’re only getting the cake,” you smile back at him and now it’s his turn to chuckle, a dimple on his cheek as he regards you with a playful look. 

“I’ll be happy with just the cake, but I’ll keep hoping,” he replies, still grinning as he pats down his jeans, pulling out his wallet from his back pocket, “What do I owe you?” 

“Pay on delivery,” you say and he arches one of his eyebrows with a cheeky smirk. 

“So that’s how I get you to use my number, will you chase me down if I don’t turn up on Tuesday?” 

“Something tells me you’re used to women chasing you down,” you say, trying to keep your heartbeat under control as he cocks his head, another arched eyebrow, “so I should probably just play it cool and count on your turning up for the cake.” 

“When do you close up on Tuesday?” he asks, the corner of his mouth quirking up, as he puts away his wallet. 

“Seven, but the cake will be done before then,” you reply and he nods. 

“I’ll be here before seven,” he says, “you can count on it, cariño.” He winks at you again and you curse the butterflies that immediately take flight in your belly. 

He gives you a wave as he takes a nonchalant step back towards the door before turning, his tight jeans giving you a perfect view of his tiny butt, you’ve really never seen any guy wear jeans that tight and you can’t help but let your eyes linger. 

‘Really…’ you think to yourself, ‘how does he even walk down the stairs in those jeans?’ 

A Tres Leches gets better the longer it can sit in the fridge and absorb all the liquid that’s poured over it, so you get started as soon as Javier leaves. By the time you’ve cleaned up the kitchen and done your usual Sunday night prep, the sponge cake is cooling on the counter. 

Ordinarily you wouldn’t come in on your day off but the Tres Leches needs three types of milk poured over it, so at lunchtime on Monday you stick your key in the lock and turn off the alarm to the shop. 

“Hey, I thought you weren’t open today?” a deep voice says behind your back just as you punch in the code. 

“Oh shit!” you shriek and spin around, your hand on your heart, as Javier’s hands come out to steady you. 

“So jumpy, cariño,” he chuckles, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.” 

“You’re sneaky, jeez,” you gasp, hitting the off button on the alarm that’s still beeping, “please, give a girl a warning before you jump out like that.” 

He follows you into the shop, apologizing again as you flick the lights on. 

“I’m sorry, I was just on my way to grab some lunch and I saw you open up the shop, I wanted to say hi and thank you for making the cake,” he smiles and you feel his hand come out and gently brush over the small of your back as you walk past him into the kitchen. The warmth of his hand makes you stutter, trying to keep your cool at his proximity. 

“T-that’s fine, but the cake isn’t done yet,” you say, “and the shop isn’t open, I’m just here to pour the milk mixture on it.” 

“You should’ve told me to pick it up on Wednesday instead, I don’t want to make you work on your day off,” Javier says, leaning against the door frame of the kitchen as you open the fridge and take out the cake. 

“It’s fine, this is quick, I’ll be done in ten minutes, then I’m leaving again,” you say as he watches you with those dark eyes, they follow you around the kitchen as you take out a pan and the three types of milk needed. 

“You have plans for the afternoon?” he asks, crossing his arms and the blue shirt stretches tight across his shoulders. You can’t help but glance at the way it hugs his biceps and he notices, his body settling into the pose a little bit more, thick fingers drumming against the taught fabric over his arm as he smiles at you. 

“Yeah, I have a date at the fair,” you say, pouring the milk into the pan and turning on the heat, from the corner of your eye you see him shift and straighten up a little. 

“A date huh…” he says, “Your boyfriend?” 

“No, just a blind date, a friend set us up,” you reply, stirring the condensed milk into the regular milk. 

“Ok, I hope you have a nice time then,” Javier says, his brow furrowed, standing up and thumping his fist lightly on the doorframe, hesitating for a few seconds, “I’ll come by for the cake tomorrow, have a nice afternoon.” He abruptly turns and you hear his footsteps retreat through the shop before you have a chance to say goodbye, leaving you surprised at his sudden departure. After finishing the cake and cleaning up the kitchen again, you leave the shop and lock up. Javier’s sudden departure still seems strange to you, you don’t know him at all, but he’d suddenly seemed offended by your date, even jealous. He’s a flirt, and you couldn’t help flirting back a little, but you really don’t think he’d be jealous of your blind date. Would he be?   

The next day you’re not sure if he’ll come for his cake after all, but you are hoping he will. The blind date had been a miserable affair and you bowed out after suffering through a painful hour of stilted small talk about small business taxes. Javier’s crooked grin and tight jeans had been on your mind throughout the afternoon as your date droned on.. 

Towards the end of the day you take the cake out and cover it in whipped cream and decorate it with fresh strawberries. And thankfully, a few minutes before seven the doorbell jangles and you look up to see Javier walk through the door, giving your heart a little jolt of excitement. But although he’s not exactly scowling, the yellow aviators cover his eyes and the corners of his mouth are downturned under the edges of his neat mustache. It’s a stark contrast to the bright pink shirt he’s wearing today, the color clashing with the apparent mood he’s in. 

“Hi Javier,” you say, giving him what you hope is your flirtiest look, wanting to coax him back to the flirtiness he’d displayed on previous visits, “I guess I won’t need your number after all,” you say, giving him a sweet smile as you watch his lips quirk up in response. 

“Maybe you should hang on to it, in case that new boyfriend doesn’t work out,” he smirks, coming up to the counter and leaning on the display case, long legs in tight jeans casually crossed as he gives you an appreciative glance up and down. You’d removed your apron a little bit earlier, changed into a nicer top, fixed your hair, only stopping yourself as you considered adding lipstick. 

“No, that was a bad date,” you scrunch up your nose at him, “I had to make up an excuse after an hour.” 

“Too bad,” he says but his crooked grin leaves you in no doubt about the fact that he’s very much not sorry about the failed date, “You should’ve let me take you out instead, I would’ve made sure you didn’t need any excuse to leave.” He gives you a quick wink, taking off his aviators, and you feel your cheeks heat up as he smirks and swipes a thumb over his bottom lip. 

“About that cake, querida?” 

The casual pet name ramps up the heat in your cheeks another notch and you’re grateful for the chance to turn around and head for the kitchen.

“Yeah, sure, let me get it,” you throw over your shoulder and yank the fridge door open, carefully sliding the cake box out. 

“Here, I boxed it for you, but have a look, make sure it’s what you wanted,” you say, putting the box in front of him as you get back to the counter 

“I’m sure it’s perfect,” he replies, but he still slips the paper lip from its hold and flips up the lid. He looks down at it for a beat and the casual confidence slips from his face, replaced by something you can’t place, almost as if he suddenly disappears from the shop, finding himself in another setting, looking at another cake. 

“Is…is it as you expected?” you ask timidly when he doesn’t move, his eyes still on the cake, and he blinks and looks up at you, his eyes soft and warm.

“It’s perfect, just perfect, thank you,” he replies, his tone suddenly sincere and raw in a way you didn’t expect, it’s just a cake. But he looks down at the cake again and there’s a play of emotions across his face, as if the thoughts in his head are dancing across his features in the space of a few heart beats. You let him have his moment and carefully start tidying up the counter around the till and turn to start cleaning the espresso machine when he clears his throat. 

“This is…uhmm…” he trails off and you look back at him, he’s still got his eyes on the cake but as he rubs a large hand over his jaw he looks up at you, “Do you wanna have a coffee with me? And some cake?” 

“You wanna cut the cake now?” you ask surprised, you thought it was for a special occasion but he nods. 

“Yeah, as a thank you for going out of your way to make it, coming in on your day off and everything,” he gives you a nod towards the coffee machine and grabs a couple of plates from the counter, “Although I should really be serving you but that coffee machine looks pretty advanced.” 

“I’d love to have coffee and cake with you, Javier. But are you sure you want to cut it now? I thought it was for something special?” 

“It was, or it is,” he says, coming round the counter with the cake and putting it next to you. “My mom used to make it for me and on Friday it was ten years ago since she passed….” 

He pauses and adjusts the cake with one hand, the other hooked into the pocket of his jeans, fingers drumming against his leg as you wait for him to continue. 

“I was feelin’ kinda homesick, wanted something to remind me of her,” he clears his throat, looking up at you again as you put down the cloth you’ve been wiping the machine with. His mood on Friday makes sense now, but you never would’ve you have guessed the reason behind it, and you push down the urge to put your hand on his arm. But he seems to shake out of his reverie and he gives you a crooked smile. 

“So how about that coffee, cariño?” 

“Sure,” you smile back at him and you see his eyes soften again, “How do you take it?” 

“Strong and black,” he replies, “Show me where you keep the knives and I’ll get us some cake, at least I can serve you that.” 

You show him and he gives a low hum when he slides the first slice onto a plate, “It smells just like I remember.” 

“Good, I hope the taste reminds you of her too,” you smile. It feels like he’s a different person now, still confident and flirty, and dangerously handsome, but you’re seeing a more human side, something underneath his winks and smirks as you watch him expertly wipe the knife and cut another clean edged slice and slide it onto the plate. 

“If you ever need a part time job, let me know, with those cake skills I’d let you serve my customers,” you remark, jumping up onto the counter next to where Javier’s standing. 

He snorts at your comment, picking up one of the plates and hands it to you, “Trust me, cariño, you don’t want me anywhere near your customers.” 

“No, true, those tight jeans might be a bit distracting for female guests,” you say, “I’d never get anything sold.” 

You bite your tongue, trying to stop your giggle, as you see his eyes widen, the spoon hoovering in the air over his cake slice as he tries to process your words.

“Really, cariño,” he says eventually, shaking his head as he pushes the spoon into the cake, “I didn’t think you minded them, considering the way you’ve been staring at my ass,” he gives you a wink as he puts the spoon in his mouth. 

“Yeah, that’s what I’m saying, I know how distracting they are,” you laugh, “It’s a good thing you left yesterday, I would’ve messed up the cake if you’d kept hanging around my kitchen in those jeans.” 

Javier hums, distracted by the cake as he looks down on it, waving his spoon at it as he chews and swallows. 

“This is delicious, cariño, just as good as my moms, it tastes just like hers.” 

“Thanks, that’s the best compliment I could get,” you smile at him, taking a mouthful of the cake for yourself as Javier reaches for the cup of coffee you’ve placed next to him. 

“Mhm…” he grunts, “strong coffee and Tres Leches, best thing I’ve had in a long time, hermosa.” 

He smiles at you over the edge of the cup, his chocolate brown eyes making you feel flustered as he keeps eye contact when he’s put the cup down. 

“Relly, the best I’ve had in a very long time…” he says, “and the best company I’ve had in a long time too. Tell me, would I really distract you that much in the kitchen?” He takes another spoonful of cake and keeps his eyes on you, staring you down as he cocks his hip and leans on the counter, suddenly very close, making your nerves thrum just under your skin. You can smell the cake on his breath, the coffee from the cup on the counter and his faded aftershave, still lingering on the collar of his pink shirt. 

“You…I-I think you know what you do with those tight jeans, Javier,” you reply and his lips quirk up in response, the corner of his mustache twitching as his eyes move down to your lips and linger there. 

“Why don’t you tell me, cariño?” he smirks, “What do my tight jeans do?” 

You almost roll your eyes at him, the confidence is oozing off him but you can’t deny that he can back it up as he parts his soft looking lips and moves around your legs, stepping in between them, trapping you up on the counter. Your breath hitches as he looks up at you again, his eyes leaving your lips as the tip of his tongue comes out and lightly wets his own. 

Quietly inhaling, you decide attack is the best tactic, and reach out, putting your hand around the back of Javier’s head. 

“Are you going to talk about your jeans or kiss me, Javier?” you ask, and you just have time to see the glint in his eyes, before he leans forward. 

His hand comes up and grabs your jaw, cupping your cheek as his thumb moves across your lips, holding it for a beat before he’s on you. His lips are as soft as they look, molding to your mouth, gently probing to let him in. Your hand tangles into the thick hair at the back of his head, holding on as he pushes forward, widening your legs around his hips, pressed against the cupboard. With a low moan you part your lips to his tongue and he responds, a groan, as he wraps his free arm around your waist, his hand finding your hip and pulling you towards him. The jeans do nothing to hide his growing arousal as you slide right up against his crotch, his kisses are soft but the way he holds you tight, is heated. 

You hook your hand into his belt loop and tug him closer, feeling him roll his hips against you as the taste of the cake and his strong coffee overpowers your senses, his tongue sliding around yours. He’s exploring, his large hand sliding over your jaw, the rough pad of his thumb caressing your skin and finding spots that make you moan and tremble under his touch. It doesn’t take him long to figure out that a gentle nip on your lower lip makes you arch your back and press into him. He makes the most of it as his hand slides up to splay flat over your shoulder blades, holding you close as he continues to explore your mouth.. 

Heat is making your core ache, he’s hard against you, the texture of the denim rubbing against you with each lazy roll of his hips and you have to pant into his mouth, pulling back from him to catch your breath. 

Javier kisses the corner of your mouth as you tip your head back with a groan, drawing a deep breath, and then moves over your jaw, his teeth scraping over your skin, his tongue coming out to taste and lick as he trails kisses down to your neck. When he sinks his teeth into the flesh just under your ear you whimper and grip hard at his hair, hearing him groan against you. He places a wet kiss on the mark his teeth have left and straightens up, looking down at you with half closed eyes. 

“I fucking hated that blind date guy,” Javier growls, still standing close enough for you to feel every twitch of his hard length between your legs, “I should’ve told you to ditch him and asked you to come out with me instead.” 

“I would’ve ditched him, Javier,” you reply, letting your fingers trail over his five o’clock shadow and brush the edge of his mustache.

“So let me take you out tonight instead, finish what we started, cariño.” 

His hands are distracting, one rubbing firm circles over your back, down to your hips, kneading the soft flesh. The other one still on your neck, caressing your cheek, your hair, his thumb tracing the outline of your lips as he keeps his eyes locked on yours. 

“I have to get up at three am, Javier,” you whisper, his lips finding yours again and you lose your train of thought. 

“Rain check,” he mumbles against your mouth, “What are you doing on Sunday night? You don’t work on Mondays.” 

“There’s this guy,” you reply, smiling as he pulls back a fraction to look down at you, one eyebrow raised, “He wears these really tight jeans and I think I should find out if he’s got the goods to back them up”.

“Oh he does,” Javier growls, tugging you closer and making you open your mouth to his eager tongue, pulling a breathless moan from you as he wraps his arms around you again.  

Part Seven

Tag list: @harriedandharassed @inept-the-magnificent @sheepdogchick3  @readingiskeepingmegoing @noisynightmarepoetry @survivingandenduring @vabeachazn @amyispxnk @oberynslady @vabeachazn

[valyrfia]

I am VERY skeptical about the RBR Charles thing but they (see: Charles, RBR personell of all kinds) keep being SO WEIRD AND SUSPICIOUS about it

Yep yep yep. I go through cycles of being completely convinced and then calling myself delusional, but the fact remains that Max changed his tune on being teammates with Charles recently, Charles keeps talking about Max in interviews praising BOTH his performance and the car, Christian Horner is posting Max and Charles on Instagram as is the RBR account. I genuinely believe Red Bull are at LEAST trying to seriously poach him.

I'm still unsure as to whether they're working towards 2024 or 2025 (as Red Bull have proven with the recent talks with Lando, they're more than happy to buy out someone's contract), but I am leaning more towards 2025, and I believe that Charles at RBR is a real, serious possibility in 2025. Let me explain why.

First, Checo still has a contract through 2024 and while Red Bull aren't always great with honouring contracts, I think the recent popularity and love they've witnessed first-hand for Checo in Texas and Mexico might change their mind on letting him go early. Ultimately, Red Bull Racing is marketing for Red Bull, and Checo obviously brings in sales in North America, and them mistreating Checo might lead to a sales dip in that region. This is why I think, despite the media frenzy, RBR are highly unlikely to drop Checo for 2024. There is no way that RBR is renewing Checo's contract, but at least he can see it out and they can part ways without much damage to either of them at the end of the F1 2024 Season.

Charles's current contract with Ferrari is also up at the end of the 2024 season. Again, even though 2023 has been absolute dogshit for Charles and Ferrari, I don't see that contract ending early. For one, Charles has apparently been promised that the 2024 car will be developed according to his needs and preferences, and it is ridiculous to leave a team who has made you that promise, even if that team is as flakey as Ferrari. I think Charles is waiting to see if the team does change in 2024 before he pushes for contract renewal. It's important to note here that contrary to popular opinion, I believe the ball is completely in Charles's court here when it comes to renewal. He is the Ferrari golden prince, he is Ferrari in a way that no driver really ever has been before, I think it was evident in Monza this year most of all. Carlos drives for Ferrari, and Charles is Ferrari and you could see it in the way that the tifosi treated them. They love Carlos, they adore and worship Charles. This is how Charles managed to convince them to build a car for him in 2024, and it's how I believe Charles is putting off the contract negotiations. This is a key point. Carlos's extended media team and family have complained several times about Carlos not being able to begin contract negotiations because of Charles in some way and Ferrari unwilling to negotiate with Carlos until they've settled Charles (I think this is due to the fact that they only intend to keep one of them and they'd like it to be Charles, but that's an essay for another day). So Charles has himself in a position where he doesn't have to commit to the team unless he sees that it is going to grow in the way he wants it to.

To quote Charles, "I view it in a way that whenever I won’t believe in the project anymore, that probably will be the time when I’ll have to go away. Because it’s in these kinds of situations that you don’t get the best out of yourself, that you don’t help the team as much as it needs to be helped. But this is definitely not the case at the moment. I believe in the project as much as I’ve ever believed in the project before. Especially since Fred arrived. So for now it’s clear. Then it’s also clear that I want to win. But I believe in this project and I’m sure we are working in the right direction.”

So maybe 2024 happens and Ferrari brings a championship-contender car, in which case Charles signs with Ferrari, they get rid of Carlos and probably bring in Alex Albon as a n2.

But I'm not interested in that outcome, I'm interested in what is (in my mind anyway) the far more likely outcome, sheerly due to money and Ferrari internal politics (which again, whole other essay!) which is that nothing really changes for the better at Ferrari. Maybe Charles gets a win by sheer luck and a slightly better car, but overall the strategy continues to not favour him, and Charles in general loses faith in what he refers to as the project. And we know from Charles himself that when this happens, this is when he goes away.

So I've presented an argument for why Red Bull are going to let Checo see out his contract, I've presented a strong possibility for why Charles might be looking to leave Ferrari at the end of 2024. Now I'm going to try and convince you of why out of all the options it'll be Charles joining Red Bull.

First of all, from Charles's point of view regarding teams. I'm going to rule out Alpha Tauri, Haas, Williams, Alfa Romeo, and Alpine, either because they're junior teams or I don't see them willing to fork over huge amounts of money to get Charles onboard. This leaves Mercedes, McLaren, Aston Martin, and Red Bull.

Out of all the non RBR options, I'd say that Mercedes is the most likely, but both their drivers are signed until 2025. There is always a possibility that Lewis Hamilton decides its time to leave the sport and buys himself out of his own contract, but I think that's not likely to happen next year.

Similar to Mercedes, both McLaren drivers are signed until at least 2025 and both look likely to honour that contract. Red Bull have tried to poach Lando multiple times, and Lando doesn't seem too keen on it yet, so we can assume that he intends to at least see his current contract out. Aston Martin is slightly trickier because I see them as being willing to fork over the millions needed to get Charles Leclerc to drive for them, but on the other hand they don't look close to producing a championship car, and Charles Leclerc is not switching away from Ferrari to not win a championship.

So, this leaves RBR as Charles's best destination for 2025 were he to leave Ferrari. Not only do they have a seat opening up, but they also have shown themselves capable of constructing recent championship-winning cars, and outclass every other team almost every weekend on strategy at the moment. Now that we've established that Charles's team of choice would be RBR, the final point of the argument has to be establishing why Charles would be RBR's driver of choice over let's say, Lando or Daniel.

To me the answer is simple, as so eloquently illustrated by my great friend and scholar Nat (@tsarinablogs) in her The PR of Lestappen in 2023 Essay (also known as Lestappen Gate 2023), Charles is not just good at PR, he's brilliant, and Red Bull isn't a racing company, it's a marketing venture. Having Charles on board would be their greatest asset and Charles has done much to make himself desirable, from being personable in almost all fan interactions to building a solid digital following, to being sometimes sneaky and subliminal with his sponsorship messaging (him always putting on APM Monaco immediately after a race, even before the podium and interviews, hell even Charles and Privateplanegate yesterday), to signing with a literal US entertainment agency. I cannot stress enough how the timing of the WME signing is not accidental, this is Charles making himself be seen as a highly desirable PR asset. Charles has the second highest following on social media out of any current driver, second to only 7 TIME WDC WINNER LEWIS HAMILTON. That sort of audience, and the kind of exposure it can bring to your team and your brand is insane.

Also, as an addendum to Nat's essay using something she herself brought up to me yesterday: any PR for RBR is good PR because it means that Red Bull as a concept is sticking around in people's heads, which means they're more likely to notice and buy the drinks off the shelves. Extrapolating from this we can see that Red Bull signing Charles would ultimately be better marketing than Red Bull signing Lando just because of the absolute uproar it would cause. Whether you think that Red Bull saved Charles from Ferrari, or Charles betrayed Ferrari for Red Bull, or Charles saved himself from Ferrari, or Red Bull as the Big Evil Team poached the Prince of Ferrari, there's a compelling narrative in there and people will talk about it for years to come.

Finally, not to talk about the driving aspect of motorsports, but Charles is the best fit for Red Bull driving-wise as well. Him and Max have spoken in the past about how they both prefer very similar types of car (ie. strong oversteer, borderline undriveable to anyone else) which would make car development much easier for the team. Christian Horner has also been pretty candid about wanting two n1 drivers à la Lewis and Nico (although without the toxicity), and whether you believe that Charles matches Max in equal machinery or not, Charles's racing record is a lot stronger than Lando's or Dan's (the two other possible competitors for the RBR seat). Charles fits the bill, driver-profile-wise, of the complement to Max that Christian Horner is looking for.

So, long story short, I am watching Ferrari VERY closely these next few months. If the SF-24 doesn't make Charles happy, I am going to make a bold claim that we will see Charles Leclerc driving for Red Bull in 2025.

[heavenlybackside]

This Day In History May 8 1886 American pharmacist John S. Pemberton developed Coca-Cola, a drink he originally billed as a cure-all tonic.

On May 8, 1886, Dr. John Stith Pemberton invented Coca-Cola, forever changing the history of eating habits around the world. The drink’s name refers to two of its original ingredients: coca leaves and kola nuts (a source of caffeine). Since he was a pharmacist from Atlanta he had access to a variety of chemicals and natural ingredients. One day, he prepared a dark coloured liquid and decided to take it to his shop, Jacobs' Pharmacy, to mix it with carbonated water. At this point, a test was needed. So he had the customers of the pharmacy taste it, who greatly appreciated the delicious and refreshing drink. From that day Pemberton put the forerunner of the current Coca-Cola on sale at five cents a glass as a takeaway drink.

The logo as we know it today was invented and designed by Frank M. Robinson, Dr. Pemberton's accountant, who thought that the two Cs would have made a nice advertising logo. The Coca-Cola brand - written in its famous italics font - was born with a first advertising campaign dedicated to the drink appeared in the newspaper The Atlanta Journal, inviting citizens to try this "popular new take-out drink". The advertising campaign for the product launch appeared on the first awnings of the shops, on which the words "Drink Coca-Cola" stood out. But the beginnings were not exciting: in the first year they sold just about nine glasses a day.

In 1887 John Pemberton registered the copyright of Coca-Cola Syrup and Extract with the US Patent Office. A year later, disheartened by the lack of success of his invention and never fully convinced - and aware - of the drink's potential, he gradually sold the company's shares to various partners. Shortly before his death, he sold the rest of Coca-Cola to Asa G. Candler who bought back the shares of other holders until he acquired complete control of the company.

Together with his brother - John S. Candler - Frank Robinson - John Pemberton's former partner - and two other partners, Mr. Candler opened The Coca-Cola Company, with a start-up capital of $100,000. They invested a lot in marketing with free coupons, promotions, souvenir fans, calendars, clocks, cup holders and so on. He did everything to advertise the brand and make it famous. In 1894 the first factory was born, in Dallas, Texas and a year later Candler made a famous announcement: "Today Coca-Cola is drunk in every state and territory of the United States". Under Candler’s leadership, sales rose from about 9,000 gallons of syrup in 1890 to 370,877 gallons in 1900.

[daydream-believin]

Like A Boiled Frog (You Don't Even Scream) [ch 1]

notes: might proofread this before i post this to ao3 but here have the raw milk version (pasteurization is for losers amaright)

series summary: every time you think things cant get any more batshit, hurricane throws another pile of guano at you. every time you think the hole cant get any deeper, you fall further. and you’re not sure what frightens you more: the town itself, or your increasing reluctance to leave.

or: au where mike has that pizza shop for wayyy more than a week and you find yourself a horror protagonist. or at least one’s love interest.

chapter summary: get haunted bitch. now go drive to utah in a manic episode. go meet a nice walking corpse, maybe it'll fix you. or make you worse. probably that second thing lmao

word count: 7985, oh dear (thats with me cutting out some stuff lol)

warnings: uh, swearing, manic behavior, self-harmful thoughts/behavior, mention of hallucinations/hearing voices, shit this is sounding bad, i mean its canon typical violence so idk man no lifeguard on duty

You know how in Source Decay, John Darnielle says / I wish the west Texas highway was a mobius strip / I could ride it out forever / when I feel my heart break? / Well, that guy’s a bitchass snake oil salesman for romanticizing this. Fuck that guy.

Although, this is the first time you’ve ever been able to set a cruise control and actually just leave it at that. What with there being no other cars on the road out here at this hour for you to run into. You even forgot about it at one point.

Little puffs of fire danced in your peripheral vision, like fairies flitting about. It was easy to spot them out in the night air, all those pumpjacks that littered the desert. There was nothing but these small fires, with the tiny, dotted additions of the glowing red eyes of windmills to light up the way for miles.

And you tried not to think about how if you broke down, no one would be around to find you. Every now and then you would startle at the shadowy specter of a tumbleweed crossing your path, but you were acutely aware of just how alone you were out here.

On that train of thought, your gaze fell to the passenger side, to the little bear toy you had buckled into a seatbelt like it was a person.

“Can you believe this, Fredbear?” you asked the inanimate object.

Fredbear did not answer, of course. Would be insane if he did, right?

Hmm …Why did part of you expect him to.

***

The august sun was beating down hot on your back as you walked home that day. It seemed like a lifetime ago, but it was only last week.

The neighborhood was as full of life as it always was. The kids running around in a game of tag, the teens playing basketball, and the adults walking their dogs. You could hear some faint music playing in the distance, most likely from the stage setup in the square downtown, not too far away.

There were many yard sales set up, it being the thing to do on a sunny Saturday afternoon like this. Despite your very strong instincts to rummage through all the boxes in these sales like a raccoon looking for dinner in a dumpster, you were broke, with no money to spare for impulse purchases on random junk. And thus, being a mature adult, you walked right past them.

That is, until a yard full of children’s toys caught your eye. One of your cousins’ kids was turning 6 in a few weeks. Might as well buy presents now before you forget again and have to rush to the store in a panic 8 minutes after the party had already started, sweat rolling down your back as you search the toy isle for something the birthday boy would like, while your phone keeps buzzing in your pocket nonstop because both your cousin is texting and your aunt is calling to ask where you’re at because you were the one who was supposed to be picking up the pizza.

 I mean, just a hypothetical scenario here.

You didn’t really find anything good as you dug through the bins of miscellaneous action figures and toy cars. As you could recall, the kid really liked Iron Man right now. And sharks. Alas, you found no Iron Mans or sharks in those bins.

The other table’s baskets were full of stuffed animals. You could maybe get lucky and find a stuffed shark in there. But stuffed animals are notorious for being hard to clean; and yard sale plushies sometimes come with more than just one new friend. You weren’t about to be the reason your cousin had to fumigate her house for bedbugs. Again. So, you decided to close this case for now and skedaddle on out of there.

You took another look back at the table as you walked away.

Well.. The toys you could see at the top of the bins did look like they were well taken care of… It couldn’t hurt to just look, right?

Yeah no. You found no sharks unfortunately. What you did find, however, was this funky little teddy bear wearing a top hat and bowtie.

A real character, that one. The bright gold fabric of its body made it stand out amongst the other toys. The smile stitched onto the bear gave it a weird, smug look. And you hadn’t seen a plushy with eyebrows before.

That being said, this thing’s aura was so... unsettling. You stared into its black eyes, that seemed to stare right back at you, with a strange feeling twisting in the pit of your stomach.

“You like that one, do ya?”

You almost jumped out of your skin when the old man running the sale spoke to you. You had Not heard him come up beside you like that. Creepy.

“Yeah, it’s…” you tried to think of a positive word, “very intriguing. Looks like it’s ready for a party.”

“My granddaughter called him Fredbear. Found him over in Utah, many years back. In a yard sale, just like this one,” he gently took the bear from you, and looked down at it wistfully, “My granddaughter..  liked how smartly dressed he was. A perfect guest for her tea parties. You were right about that…”

The old man stared at the doll for a little longer after the conversation faded. You felt extremely awkward now. Perhaps you really should have just left without unearthing this obvious sentimental piece.

“My grandchildren are no longer here with me,” you felt a little uncomfortable with how he phrased that, “so, I’ll tell you what. Promise me you’ll take care of him, and he’s yours. Free of charge.”

“Oh, I couldn’t. I’d be happy to pay for him, really,” you felt bad taking free stuff from the elderly.

“No,” he said with a tone of finality, placing the bear firmly into your hands, “the day’s almost over. I’d like to help this old friend move on. It’s time.”

Well that somehow was both sweet and foreboding at the same time.

So, you thanked the old man and started back on your walk home, Fredbear cradled in your arms. He waved goodbye to you. The grandfather, of course, not the teddy bear.

You probably aren’t going to wind up giving this one to your cousin’s son. There was something about it that told you not to. Maybe it was the way the old man talked about it. You felt compelled to take care of the plush yourself. Kind of like an honor thing. Or a pity thing.

It smelled a little funky. But that’s nothing a little TLC couldn’t handle. And some dish soap.

Maybe you were just. Feeling a bit childish lately. Too small and easily broken. Moved to tears by little things that didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. Disregarded and treated like your fears weren’t real.

Deeply afraid.

Yeah, you’d give Fredbear a nice soak in the sink with a fun dish soap bubble bath. And maybe after that, you’ll both feel a little better.

You were alone in your apartment that night, as your roommate was always gone these days. And when you made your tea, you brought Fredbear a mug as well. A little tea party, for old time’s sake.

Looking back, maybe that was your first mistake.

***

Static rolled from your radio. You gave up on fiddling with it hours ago, but you’ve got nothing better to occupy your mind now.

You turned the knob absentmindedly, never really expecting to get anywhere. Or any signal, that is. A muffled country song here, the broken-up voice of a DJ there, nothing strong enough to stay for more than a few seconds. However, a few seconds of a clear transmission was all you really needed when you rolled past a certain signal.

“zZz-Hurricane—“

Now that was a word that got your attention. Not that you were anywhere near the coast at the moment. You know, unless the person reading this is looking to buy some oceanside property in Arizona. In that case feel free to slide into my DMs.

“zZZ-Peach Days! -Zz celebratio— zzZ-year—peaches peach—-ZzzZ-Heritage-zZ,” you let your gaze flicker downward, towards the dimly lit red text of the frequency number display as if that would provide some more insight.

And then suddenly, the fuzz was completely gone, as if you were near the tower itself,

“So Hurry On To Hurricane City!” the spokesman encouraged cheerfully. You could practically here the giant pageant smile in his voice as he delivered his slogan. This man was your friend, obviously. Then, however, his tone shifted as he closed the ad copy, “Because you know the party can’t start without you…”

You held your breath as the silence dragged out a few agonizing seconds, until “ZZZZZZZZ!!!”, in a jolt, the transmission went completely out. Explosively. You even flinched.

You stayed on the station for a good twenty minutes after that, waiting to see if you could hear anything again. You could feel your heart pound against your ribs until the terrifying feeling faded. There was nothing else but static, of course, and for so long you almost thought you must have imagined it. If not for the way those dull words repeated in your head, over and over.

THE PARTY CAN’T START WITHOUT YOU.

THE PARTY CAN’T START WITHOUT YOU.

THE PARTY CAN’T START WITHOUT YOU.

You hadn’t really had a destination in mind when you took off. No goal other than to get out of there as fast as you could manage. The idea of the West had been bouncing around your brain a lot lately, hence your current trajectory, but you really hadn’t had a clue where you were supposed to be going when you left.

I mean, you still didn’t have a destination. You had no clue what that advertisement was even about. Where they were even fucking talking about. Hurricane City?

Yet, somehow, you knew those words were meant for you. Not anyone else. you. There was a party and the party was waiting for you.

Guess you’d have to look for a map or something in town. Perhaps use the library computer. Man, you would regret throwing your phone into the lake in a fit of passion as you left town, but honestly, this is the longest you’ve known peace in quite some time. Just gonna have to live a little retro for a while. Not the worst thing in the world.

You’ll get a new one later, once you’ve settled in to… wherever you’re going. Whatever new home lies over that horizon for you, you guess.

The sun was breaching the beige skyline of sandy shrub brush as you finally rolled over the state line. You needed to eat. Your stomach growled loudly at just the thought. Funny. You hadn’t even thought about eating in the last.. twenty hours. Which means you should be absolutely shaking right now. Yeah, that’s why you’re shaking. That’s it. You’ll pull into the first diner you see.

You were hoping to at least be in Roswell for breakfast, but there was no way your body was going to be able to keep running if you waited that long. Looks like it’s just going to be the first place you come across.

Hopefully they don’t put green chilis in their pancakes or something.

That sounds insane but it’s an actual thing you’ve seen before in this state, trust. There are no laws nor gods when it comes to Hatch green chilis.

***

Your sleepy brain was not ready for the bell that rang as you walked through the door. Embarrassingly enough, the tinny noise startled you. You almost tripped, to be honest. Thankfully your wobbly Bambi legs held up as you managed to catch yourself.

The hostess wasn’t in sight as you awkwardly stood in the entrance, but there was a whole heap of noise coming from the kitchen.

“Hold on just a second, Sweetpea!” a voice called out to you.

Well, guess you’re holding on a second.

Your eyes scanned the top of the walls, perusing the vast cookie jar collection that the owner had accrued over the years. They were never dusted, despite being on shelves that lined the top of every wall in the tiny shack of a diner, and thus you could easily tell that a few new additions had been made. You know, because those cookie jars were way less filthy.

That’s gotta be a heath-code violation.

After you heard a bit of garbled yelling, the hostess rushed out to take her place in front of you. Smoothing down her polka-dotted apron, she grinned at you.

“Table for two?”

You blinked. It was too early in the morning for fully intelligent speech.

“Uh. No. Just me today. Thank you.”

Her big, bedazzled cat-eyeglasses fell a little farther down her nose as she scrunched her face in confusion, “alright then. Just the one of you today...”

She grabbed a paper menu as she led your shambling body to a table near the window. Which was shut away with ancient looking vinyl blinds that you were too afraid to open, lest they crumble and the cost of replacing them be put on your on tab.

She had already disappeared back into the kitchen by the time you got yourself in a seat. You glanced around the room. You weren’t the only patron here, as a few tables held a few bodies, but you were the only one without your face buried in a newspaper. And to be expected honestly, you were the youngest person in the room at seven in the morning.

The hostess, who was also the only waitress in this tiny local business, placed two glasses in front of you. The dull sound they made hitting the table drew you out of your revelry. There before you were two cups, a steaming mug of fresh coffee and a short glass of milk. You looked up in confusion.

“Don’t worry, it’s whole milk. Builds strong bones.”

That... wasn’t your concern.

You looked back at the cup in confusion and by the time you turned back, she had already moved on to the next table, refilling mugs and having loud banter with the other customers. Her regulars, by the sound of it. You felt too apathetic to try and call her over again.

You shrugged, to no one in particular, as you did not have a breakfast partner with you, despite the waitress’s insistence otherwise. Wait, was she mocking you? Eh, maybe it’s just supposed to be for the coffee. Nevertheless, you would not be drinking the milk, so you just left it there.

Despite the prevalence of the local newspaper in the room, there wasn’t a dispenser or anything at the front of the restaurant, like there usually is. As you drummed your fingers on the tablecloth, bored out of your mind, you kinda regretted throwing your phone in the lake a bit more. Maybe not the best of moves.

But hey, at least you aren’t constantly quelling the incessant buzzing you’d be hearing if you’d kept it.

You busied yourself stirring your coffee while you looked over the menu again, just for something to read. Of course, you were ordering a waffle. Because this was a diner, and, yeah, you do like waffles. And pancakes. And French toast. Doodoodoodoo can’t wait to get a mouthful.

That voice kept echoing in your mind. The party can’t start without you.

“More coffee, Babycakes?” the waitress snapped you out of your thoughts.

“Oh! Yeah, thank you,” you moved the mug to the edge of the table, closer to her, “Say… I know this is an out-of-pocket question, but have you heard anything about Hurricane City? Maybe something about peaches?”

“Oh!” she snapped her fingers, “You mean the Peach Days. It’s a little heritage festival they put on every summer in Hurricane, you know. It’s a hoot, my family makes a trip out there every few years or so for it. Not this time of course, clearly, since I’m here talkin’ to you and not in Utah—”

“In Utah?”

Of course, it was Fucking Utah again.

“I know it’s soundin’ far, but it’s only ‘bout a day’s drive from here. Two days if y’ain’t crazy about following an itinerary like my husband,” she brushed a hand over her apron before you lost her attention to the other customers, “I swear that man would plan out a schedule for every second of the day if he could…”

After she wandered off to go top off more mugs, you lamented the fact that you still hadn’t ordered yet. That’s what you get for being nosy about peach festivals, you suppose.

Thankfully though, soon enough you had your hearty breakfast and were back in front of the wheel, on your way to the friendly neighborhood Walmart. Where hopefully no cops or employees would bother you as you crashed in the parking lot.

You took Fredbear to the backseat with you for good luck. Maybe it was the gold color, or the fancy getup he had. Maybe you just needed a cuddle buddy to not feel so alone in this parking lot swarming with people.

Much to your disdain, it was now a bit into the morning hours, and the sun was fully up.

You had tried to find as shady a spot as possible, but it’s not exactly like trees grow in this biome. At least not naturally. Windbreak tree lines were definitely a thing, but those protected buildings people cared about, and this was a Walmart. Nothing around here but concrete, rocks spray painted blue, and cigarette butts.

So after tossing and turning in the bright blinding sunshine for way longer than you should have, and making promises to higher deities was proven to be unfruitful in your attempt to find some semblance of peace, you finally just had to admit defeat. And here by rescinding any aforementioned promises to higher powers.

You laid Fredbear back down on the seat and tucked him in with the blanket when you got back up. At least one of you could be cozy and well rested. Unfortunately, it wasn’t going to be you, however.

Well, it’s far from the first all-nighter you’ve pulled without having time to take a nap during the following day. Sleep deprivation isn’t real, silly. Teachers just made that up to scare you. It’ll be fine.

***

You know you never really realize how much we structure our lives around other humans until you take a drive through the middle of nowhere. How essential it is to have enough gas to make it to the next town. From town to town, your life becomes segments. Only within the eyesight of other humans are you ever safe. Only within the bounds of the settlement can your soul be settled.

Gas stations become oases. Which is the plural of oasis, apparently. Anyway, you start seeing them like mirages. Dingey, weather-worn gas pumps become as good as a sparkling illusion of precious water in the Sahara. The empty shells of buildings you passed by, long since forgotten, became like mausoleums in these graveyard towns. Villages. Hamlets. Mostly hamlets.

“Are we there yet?” a small and very annoyed voice called out.

You had just written it off as your imagination until you heard the noise of shuffling fabric. Normally your audio hallucinations aren’t that detailed. Paralyzed, you held your breath, not daring to make any noise that would distract your ears from hearing whoever, whatever, was in the back seat. Your mind went to stories of skinwalkers and misshapen monsters and hitch-hiking serial killers.

“… Are we there yet?” the voice repeated, admittedly sounding even smaller to you now.

Yep, that’s a real person alright. Or a real thing. Your eyes were probably bloodshot from the way you haven’t blinked this entire time, just staring straight ahead on the desert highway. Taking a deep, shaky breath to steady yourself, you turned down the rear-view mirror…

Christ almighty. You had a stowaway.

Your stomach turned immediately. God, come on now, don’t puke up what little you had on your stomach. You need that.

“Hey Buddy,” you tried to sound as friendly as you could, “What’s your name?”

Clad in a little striped shirt and cargo shorts, he started kicking his feet in impatience, which would be cute if it weren’t for this situation y’all are in, and the adrenaline pumping through your veins, “We’ve been in here forever,” he whined.

If this was a skinwalker, he was a pretty darn adorable one. And definitely not a hitch-hiking serial killer. At least you hoped. But no, this was a greater form of terror: responsibility.

“Haha, yeah, we have been in here really long, haven’t we? How long do you think we’ve been driving, can you tell me?”

When did you pick up this child. When you got gas in Gallup? Albuquerque? Dear lord, if he’s been in here since Roswell, you’re about to have the world’s biggest headache on your hands, both metaphorically and physically. But there’s no way he’s been in here for fucking 10 hours, right? right??

Okay, okay. Maybe you’re just a little panicky right now and not thinking straight. Maybe teachers hadn’t been making up sleep deprivation just to scare you after all. You have been purposely not drinking anything for the lack of available restrooms. People get dehydration hallucinations, right?

The boy just stared at you, blankly. Probably fully realizing you were a stranger and not whoever he thought you were. In lieu of answering you, he started fidgeting more with the toy bear you had had in the back. You really hoped that hadn’t been what lured him into your station wagon in the first place.

Don’t be getting shy on me now, kid.

You put your blinker on, ready to merge off the road and onto an incoming rest-stop that you thanked your lucky stars for.

“Honey, can you tell me what your phone number is?”

He looked up at you, finally tearing his attention from the bear, and you could see gears turning in his head.

“…435-555-1987?”

You repeated it back to him, and he nodded. Alright, time to find that payphone.

Said rest-stop payphone was thankfully near a picnic table so you could sit him down and be able to watch him carefully the whole time you made this call. Because judging by the fact this situation was happening at all, he was a slippery one.

You got out of the car and opened the back door, but he was hesitant to get out. Which, fair, you are a stranger trying to get him to a second location.

“What’s up, Bud?” you tried your hardest to not sound like a predator but boy was that a real nebulous idea, wasn’t it?

“Fredbear wants to come too,” he mutters.

“Well, sure then, let’s bring him, we’ll have a little picnic.” With no food, but hey, whatever lie it takes to get him sitting on that bench.

It was really cute the way the kid set the bear down on the table and positioned it like they were going to have a picnic together. When you find this kid’s parents, you’ll let him keep Fredbear. Toys like it when they’re given to new children, right? Wasn’t there a movie about that or something. Wincing at the grubbiness of the payphone, you reluctantly dialed the number.

“Hello, Jeff’s Pizza on Main St, are you ready to order?”

You closed your eyes, counting the seconds as you breathed in for 4 seconds, held it for 7, and released for 8.

“Hello? Are you there?”

“Yes!” you practically shouted into the receiver. So much for calming down, “please don’t hang up,” you pleaded.

“Listen, we don’t take solicitation,”

“No, uh, sorry. I’ve found a lost child who told me this was his number. Is the owner of this restaurant by chance frantically looking for their son?”

You heard some muffled conversation happening behind the phone, “Well, no, I don’t even have any kids… and I uh, am currently understaffed. Im the only one here.”

you cursed under your breath.

“Uh, alright, well…” you could tell this was getting really awkward for him.

“Could you tell me where y’all are, I’m unfamiliar with the area code,”

“Uh, Hurricane, Utah?”

… If you weren’t on the phone, you fucking swear you’d be screeching at the top of your lungs like a chimpanzee right now.

“Thank you, you know, just in case he’s just remembering an advertisement he’s seen or something,”

“Oh, okay,” there was a pause, “well I hope you find the parents or, whoever,”

“Thank you,” you’ll put him out of his misery and hang up.

“Are you sure that’s your number, Hon?”

“Uh-huh,”

“Why don’t you tell me it again, maybe I dialed it wrong,”

“435-5--” his face scrunched up in concentration, “435-555—I don’t know…”

You tried not to look visibly stressed at this answer.

“Do you know where you live?”

He moved the bears paws along with whatever little game he was playing, before looking up at you, head tilted in confusion, “Hurricane?”

Okay. Police time. If not for him, for you. The skinwalker possibility just went back up. Because, honestly, he had to have gotten in your car as a coyote or something. No way you wouldn’t’ve noticed a whole ass child entering your car.

“How does ice cream sound, huh Buddy?”

“I want ice cream!” he said hastily as if you’d change your mind if he hesitated.

“Ice cream it is then, but only if you’re good for me and the officers, okay? And tell them everything you can remember. You’re smart, right?”

“Uh-huh,”

“Great,” you smiled over clenched teeth.

After herding him back into the car, you had to take a moment to gently rest your head into the steering wheel. And it took everything within you to not smash said head into it. Or scream in agony. No, no, we mustn’t scare the child.

Tuba City wasn’t too far away. The police station was downtown, as most are. Luckily, across the street there was a paleteria with a courtyard area. The little guy got very excited when you got pulled into the parking space, so eh, what the hell, ice cream first. Maybe after a treat and some playtime in the courtyard he won’t be as wiggly and will be able to tell the cops what he knows about just where the hell he came from.

The noise of the bell chiming made you flinch as you two walked into the paleteria. You hadn’t thought you were that tightly wound right now but apparently you were wrong. The lady behind the counter greeted you warmly, and you responded in turn, trying to play it cool.

God, imagine if she got an off-vibe from you and the kid and called over the police from across the street before you even have a chance—

Deep breath. Okay. The kid you had started referring to in your head as just “Little Boy” was leaned against the display case, his breath fogging up the glass in front of him and probably leaving little handprints for the shopkeeper to clean later.

“I’m sorry about that,”

“That’s… Okay. What can I get you?” she seemed a little confused. Strange, but you brushed past it just as quickly as she did.

“Ah, what do we want?” you asked Little Boy.

He excitedly tugged on your pantleg and pointed to the popsicle he wanted, looking up at you with puppy dog eyes. He doesn’t need to convince you, but you quickly realized you were not going to be able to say no to any else after this if he deployed the same cute begging look.

“One of those cute little Tweety Bird faces,” you pointed.

“Anything else?” she handed you the popsicle and you gingerly took it.

“Nah, that’s it” you were too nauseous to eat right now.

You paid, throwing the change into the tip jar, and turned to give Little Boy the popsicle she handed you.  The words caught in your throat as you looked down to find your pantleg absent of any tugging by any Little Boy. You quickly scanned the tiny paleteria. He was nowhere to be found, anywhere in the room.

“Uh, did you see where the kid went?” you tried not to sound too panicked.

She was taken aback, also quickly looking around the room to find no one, before shaking her head, “Did you have a kid with you?”

You furiously nodded in confusion,

“I’m sorry, then I didn’t see them,” she pointed to the glass door that led to the courtyard only a few feet away from y’all, “Try outside, maybe?”

You burst outside, searching the area in a panic, but you couldn’t see him anywhere. Not hidden in the tangle of the garden, not splashing around in the fountain, not at, under, on top of, or around any of the tables.

You went to call his name, but your voice caught in your throat when you realized you didn’t have a name to call. And.

And.

Something hit your shirt. A water droplet. You looked up into the clear, blinding blue sky. Your nerves tickled as another droplet ran down your cheek. Oh, you were crying. Huh.

You took the closet seat you could find, counting the things processed by your 5 senses. It’s all you could do to not start bawling for no reason. Maybe you’ll calm down and be able to think straight soon.

Why can’t you think straight? Everything feels so fuzzy.

You should be terrified, and in a way, you were. In your heart of hearts, you knew the truth: Little Boy wasn’t real. Or at least turned back into a coyote and ran off.

As you stared vacantly into the open air, you realized you still had a dripping popsicle in your hands. Supposedly “Tweety Bird” shaped, it just looked like a yellow skull missing its mandible bone to you. How fitting.

You pulled it to your mouth. Yum. Tasted like AAAAAAAA. Or orange, according to the package.

Attempting to lick the melted yellow liquid off of your hand, you accidentally stuck the ice pop on your face. Great. Now you’re sticky all over.

God, you’ve really gone and lost your fucking marbles this time, haven’t you.

There was a bulletin kiosk a few feet down your field of vision. On that bulletin kiosk was an old poster, barely visible as it was buried under layers of other flyers. It caught your eye and seemed to burn your retinas. What little you could see was the word Freddy and part of what looked like a version of the bear you’d been toting around this whole little expedition, but that was enough.

Something clicked. You looked down at the bear hanging by your side in your other hand. The kid had shoved it into your arms so he could more easily lean on the display case, right before he disappeared the very moment you took your eyes off of him.

You know, you hadn’t really felt alone since bringing Fredbear home. And not in a good way.

Guess the name you should’ve been calling was Freddy.

You had to get rid of that bear.

***

You had been walking home like you always did, same route. But you noticed something peculiar about this time. The house that the old man had his yard sale in was now stripped of all decoration, with a For Sale sign proudly standing in the grass. No cars, and no blinds or curtains on the windows, so you could see into the den which was now devoid of any furniture.

You’ll admit it, you crept around to the other windows, searching for any signs of life at all in the empty rooms. None. No furniture, no people, no trash. The yard sale was yesterday. How did they clean this place out so thoroughly in the short amount of time between when you’d seen it last and now.

A little confuddled, you went home as usual. While strange as hell, this wasn’t a missing person’s case or anything. And it’s probably why the man was so adamant on giving you Fredbear because it was the end of the day. He had a deadline. He was skipping town.

God, you wished you could just skip town.

You frankly thought nothing of it when you unlocked the door to your apartment to see Fredbear was already seated on the couch, like he was all set to marathon whatever 30-year-old cartoon you wound up watching that night. And it’s not like your roommate hadn’t done something like this before, move a stuffed animal or action figure into a funny position for you to find later.

You hadn’t seen him much lately. Or like, at all. The only reason you knew he was still alive were the dirty dishes in the sink, dirty clothes on the floor of the bathroom, and the aforementioned moving the bear around.

Looking back now, was he moving the bear around?

If you locked the deadbolt that can’t be unlocked from the outside, you’d be guaranteed to catch him in person for once. But you weren’t willing to go through the trouble and emotional toil of doing that, however.

In the name of feeling less like a ghost haunting your own home, getting yelled at for intentionally locking your roommate out might be a wee bit counterproductive. Sure, you’d be seen and spoken to, but the harshness of his words and tone would send you into a worse episode than you were already in.

Well, at least Fredbear seemed ready to keep you company tonight...

The fact that they put unskippable advertisements on streaming services you’re paying for in the first place is criminal. Or at least regular cable tv in a trenchcoat.

You got a drink while they prattled on about luxury cars you couldn’t afford and real estate companies you weren’t going to have the privilege of patroning any time soon. Embarrassingly, as you poured the pitcher of water into a glass, you got a little distracted.

The cheap glass’s glass was only about a millimeter or two thick. You could easily just crush this cup in your hand, in one swift movement. The muscles of your arm began tensing up at the thought.

But thankfully, a loud, blaring advertisement coming from the TV snapped you out of it. And so, you promptly decided to Not Do That, because picking all of those tiny glass shards out of your flesh would be a bitch. And that was not how you wanted to spend a perfectly good Sunday night. And of course you didn’t need the questions at work tomorrow.

You returned to the couch, curiously, and you swear, that damn teddy bear followed you with its eyes. Even though they were a shiny, solid black, and the idea itself would be insane.

As you settled back down, you grabbed the remote to turn down the volume of the cheery music playing. Mysteriously, it wasn’t just a commercial with bad sound mixing, the TV itself had been turned up. Now that it had your attention, the thing that was being sold to you seemed to the state of Utah. You know, those Visit [X] ads that were commonly played between cooking shows and ghost hunting documentaries.

“Oh hey, you’re from there, right?” you poked at fredbear. And immediately felt pathetic. God, you’ve got to stop talking to inanimate objects and like get a boyfriend or something. Geez.

The imagery on the screen was just, you know, normal southwest stock footage:

A drone shot of Zion national park

Old men golfing

Owls living in holes they’ve dug into cactuses

Rock archways

A family laughing as they shared a pizza being served to them by a man in a bear suit that looked just fredbear,

“Oh, well there you are, I guess.” you once again absent-mindedly spoke to your toy friend.

Kids swimming in a fancy resort pool

A Navajo cultural event

More rock archways and red sandstone cliffs

Kids crowding around a claw machine filled with toys just like the one sitting next to you

Kids crowding around a stage as an animatronic band played

Kids crowding around a birthday cake, the light of candles bouncing off their faces as they sang along…

The fake sounding voice of the announcer rung out, “Visit Utah! You know the party can’t start without you!”

Your mouth felt dry. Good thing you now had that glass of water.

***

Of course, you did what any smart, sane person would do and feverishly ripped through the layers of old flyers to get to the advertisement for what you now knew was Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza Place. A themed diner and nickel arcade that made most of their money hosting birthday parties, by the looks of it. You knew the type; you had been an American child once too.

Good thing none of the cops were hanging around outside to fine you for littering, because the amount of paper you just released into the breeze was in fact criminal.

There was a short list of locations at the bottom of the poster. They had a few scattered over Utah, or at least they used to, judging by the harsh weathering of this poster. The closest one being in Bigwater, explaining why this poster was out here in Tuba. But the word Hurricane stood out to you like it was lit up in neon. It burned like sunlight.

It appears you are in fact on your way to Hurricane, Utah. As if you didn’t know that already at this point, you being out on the canyon rim instead of your much preferred and beloved Rockies. Well, congratulations bitch. You’ve only got another three hours to go. Better get going. Have fun!

***

Oh, this place was creepy as hell. Or it’s just late at night, and you’re sleep deprived and paranoid. In the spirit of being honest to yourself, ‘sleep deprived and paranoid’ has always been your natural state of being, but right now it’s definitely ramped up to an eleven.

But even though it’s been close to 48 hours since your last brain-reset, this place still had a certain energy about it. Like New Orleans, or the woods around lynching bridges did. That spooky oh I am Not Safe here type of energy.

The gas station-man gave you a real weird look when you stormed in and asked where the Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza Place was. Normally you would’ve chalked it up to you being a clear foreigner asking for directions as if it’s 1995, to a children’s arcade close to midnight nonetheless, but now you weren’t so sure.

You eyed the fridge full of wine in pint sized bottles and little juice cartons. But nah, you probably needed to have a quick reaction time to whatever was waiting for you in this Venus flytrap you’re willingly walking into. You grabbed a Monster instead and you know what, yeah, that probably wasn’t the best decision either. If you weren’t high strung before, you definitely were now. You felt like you could punch a bear. A Freddy Fazbear.

You bought a local map alongside the energy drink, feeling like you were gonna need it. Man, low-tech was actually kinda annoying after a while. You got the gas station-man to begrudgingly mark Fazbear’s down onto it for you. Apparently, it and all other locations within town had closed down some twenty years ago. Not many people are still around who remember why, he said, but it had something to do with the faulty animatronics. Teenagers told ghost stories and dared each other to spend the whole night in the dining room. But otherwise, beyond the rumors, the original Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza Place was just an empty, scorched building. And the other various locations like Jr’s or Circus Baby’s had been sold off, passing so many hands who knows what businesses were in there now. But you could still kinda tell, if you paid attention, in the same way you can tell if something used to be a Pizza Hut.

What you really wanted, according to gas station-man, whose nametag read Gary, was this new location that was opening soon, simply named Freddy’s Pizzeria. It’s set to open for business in September, so you’re lucky. He marked it one your map as well.

You don’t know why Gary was so nice to you. Maybe it was the harrowed look in your eyes. Maybe it was the twitchiness. Maybe Gary is just very bored of this tourist town and was looking to fall madly in love with a random troubled soul he met at midnight in a gas station and would wind up running away with to some far-off place. If that was the case, sorry Gary. You were too busy with the metaphorical torture labyrinth to care about romance at the moment.

You couldn’t decide if the haunted Fredbear would want to see an old location or the new one. You asked, but of course the fucker didn’t answer. Just sat there with his smug grin and glassy eyes that followed your hand movements. So, you quite literally tossed a coin. A new mint, the face side had Eleanor Roosevelt on it. And she marked the fact that you were going to try the new location first, and then try the original building next. Cool.

***

Your patience was kinda at its limit here, you’ll admit. You really should get some sleep soon. Or eat. Since you were hellbent on getting here and nothing else, the only thing on your stomach besides that wretched Tweety Bird popsicle is half a monster energy. Guess you’ll go by a fucking Denny’s after this. If you survive.

If you were going to die horrifically, you’d really rather the forces that be make it snappy. This was getting ridiculous.

You pulled into the parking lot. The building clearly wasn’t new but had been freshly painted. Nothing creepy so far. As you stared down the building, sizing it up, you noticed there was one car parked in the front, and a few of the windows were lit up.

Cool, so there was someone in there. Great. That makes, well whatever this is, much harder.

The door was locked.

You could hear music playing from inside. You banged on the door as loudly as you could manage, and it still took a couple of minutes before the music stopped. And then a very disgruntled man in coveralls was in the doorway, tiredly asking just what the fuck you wanted at this time of night.

He smiled to cover up his rudeness, but the smile stretched a little too wide, inhumanly wide, and a shiver ran down your spine.

You took him in, unashamedly raking your eyes over his form. He stood awkwardly, as if ready to bolt at any moment. What you could see of his build made him out to be weirdly skinny. That unnaturally wide smile gave way to some exposed teeth on the left side of his face. His eyes were shadowed by his bangs in the backlight of the door, but you swore they almost glowed themselves. His complexion was greyish and bordered on almost purple in this lighting.

Despite all this, he was still pretty handsome. Well, you did always think some of those creepypasta guys were boyfriend material. Maybe, you wouldn’t mind getting chopped up into little pieces if this guy was the one doing it. Okay, and maybe you’ve been sleeplessly chasing ghosts too long.

Startling you, he reached his hand to grab your shoulder, a little too fast.

“Hey mate, are you okay?” He asked nervously,

It snapped you out of your stupor, realizing you had yet to say a word to him, “Uh, yes, I just wanted to…”

How do you even fucking ask this. “Hey, can I bring a stuffed bear to your dining room so maybe it’s spirit will leave me alone? Maybe conduct a séance or something?” Seriously, did you even know what you were doing here? Shit. Okay.

“I wanted to ask if I could check out your facility?” came out like a question because even you had no clue what you were saying.

“Come back tomorrow in the daylight, then,” he began closing the door, shaking his head in annoyance, “or perhaps when we’re actually open.”

“NO!” you slammed your foot into the door as he closed it, “AAGH!”

“Jesus Christ! WHY.”

Dear lord, this man now 100% thinks you’re a crackhead.

“Just, don’t close that door, okay,” his brows scrunched together as you grit your teeth to swallow down the pain, “I need you to help me.”

“I really don’t have any money to spar--”

“I’M HERE BECAUSE OF A GHOST,” you interrupted. Finally, you managed to get that out somehow, if nonsensical.

A look of recognition flickered in his glowing eyes. He lowered into your space, kind of intimidatingly. Or intimately. Yeah, no, this was hostile, don’t fool yourself.

“What kind of ghost,” he asked suspiciously.

“Uh,” shit, okay, “the weird, haunted doll kind? Uh, like the ones the McElroy brothers are always bidding on on eBay. Or maybe this is kind of a Ben Drowned kinda situation, I’m not completely sure.”

He blinked, “okay, I only understood a few of those words, but—”

“It’s a Freddy teddy bear that really wanted me to take it to Hurricane, okay?” You really were at the end of your rope at the moment, “I have literally driven here for days straight on no sleep and barely any food and I need this Unauthorized Fucking Thing to find it’s eternal peace or kill me in some horrible way so I can hurry up and get on with my goddamn life,”

“Uh, see… the thing is,” he started to retreat back again, slowly moving his hands like he was trying to calm down a spooked animal.

 You realized what was about to happen, and it must have been visible in your eyes, since his huge unnatural placating smile returned,

“I actually don’t want anything to do with that, sooo…”

“PLEASE—” you reached out in blind panic, but he dodged it. (now if only you could’ve dodged the scooper like that Mikey)

The door slammed in your face.

Your breathing was ragged and fogged up the glass as he locked it again. You stared up at those glowing pinprick pupils of his as he gave you an apologetic little wave goodbye. And then he fucking made a big show of pointing at the closed sign before turning tail to disappear back into the darkness of the empty restaurant.

Okay.

Just a little setback. You’ll go to the older location first, now, and come back when this asshole is sleeping. Can’t be too hard to bust out one of those windows, and you doubt he has an alarm set up already. It’s his fault, really. If he didn’t want property damage, then he should’ve just let you in. Not like you haven’t warned him that you were desperate or anything.

Just gonna go to the other location. You’ve got your map, you’ve got a tank full of gas, and you’ve got chutzpah.

Now what you don’t have? Is a car that will start.

[babygirlwolverine]

Adventure

They were driving through Texas when Cas saw a sign for horseback riding.

“Dean, look, we have to stop!” Cas said, his hand squeezing Dean’s thigh affectionately.

An hour later, they were side by side, riding the trails on a private horse ride.

“You’re a natural,” Dean grinned, reins loose in his hand as he glanced at Cas.

Winking, Cas murmured, “Must be because my husband’s a cowboy.”

Dean’s heart skipped a beat, and he blew Cas a kiss.

Cresting a hill on their trail, something caught Dean’s eye; a property with a for-sale sign glinting in the sunshine.

~

“You sure about this?” Dean asked, hand slipping into Cas’ as they stepped onto the porch of the house, looking out across the ranch.

They’d talked extensively about retiring; moving out of the Bunker and finding a place of their own. Something about this ranch… it felt like home.

Cas’ smile was pure happiness as he replied, “Absolutely.”

Dean pointed out towards where the horses were tied-up on the fence. “Gonna build you some beehives over there, and a garden out back.”

Using their joined hands, Cas pulled Dean into a kiss, murmuring against Dean’s lips, “I love you, too.”

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Matti Friedman

The little book may have been kept by a Jewish family in Bamiyan, the curator suggested, with different people adding new texts as the years passed. The hands of at least five scribes are evident in the pages. They were influenced by ideas and writing coming from both major Jewish centers of the time—Babylon, which is modern-day Iraq, and the Land of Israel, where Jewish sovereignty had been lost seven centuries before and whose people were now under Islamic rule.

The previously unknown poem shows the influence of a familiar biblical text, the erotic Song of Songs, according to Professor Shulamit Elizur of the Hebrew University, the member of the research team in charge of the poem’s analysis.  But it also shows the impact of an esoteric Jewish book that wasn’t part of the Bible, known as the Apocalypse of Zerubbabel. This book is thought to have originated in the early 600s, when a brutal war between Byzantium and the Sasanian empire of Persia generated desperate messianic hopes among many Jews. Whoever wrote the poem in the Afghan prayer book had clearly read the Apocalypse, Elizur said—giving us a glimpse of a Jewish spiritual world both familiar and foreign to the coreligionists of the Bamiyan Jews in our own times, 1,300 years later. The previously unknown poem shows the influence of a familiar biblical text, the erotic Song of Songs, according to Professor Shulamit Elizur of the Hebrew University. (Museum of the Bible)

Chapters of the book’s journey from Afghanistan to Washington are unclear—some because they’re simply unknown even to the experts, and others because that’s the way the people in the murky manuscript market often prefer it.  

When the book was discovered by the Hazara militiaman, according to Hepler, the tribesmen didn’t know exactly what it was but understood it was Jewish and assumed it was sacred. The local leader had it wrapped in cloth and preserved in a special box. At one point in the late 1990s, it seems to have been offered unsuccessfully for sale in Dallas, Texas, though it’s unclear if the book itself actually left Afghanistan at the time. 

After the al-Qaeda attacks of 9/11 triggered the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, the book disappeared for about a decade. In 2012 it resurfaced in London, where it was photographed by the collector and dealer Lenny Wolfe. 

Any story about Afghan manuscripts ends up leading to Wolfe, an Israeli born in Glasgow, Scotland. I went to see him at his office in Jerusalem, an Ottoman-era basement where the tables and couches are cluttered with ancient Greek flasks and Hebrew coins minted in the Jewish revolt against Rome in the 130s CE. It was Wolfe who helped facilitate the sale of the larger Afghan collection to Israel’s National Library. “The Afghan documents are fascinating,” he told me, “because they give us a window into Jewish life on the very edge of the Jewish world, on the border with China.” 

When Wolfe encountered the little prayer book, he told me it had already been on the London market for several years without finding a buyer. In 2012, the year he photographed the book, he said it was offered to him at a price of $120,000 by two sellers, one Arab and the other Persian. But the Israeli institution he hoped would buy the book turned it down, he told me, so the sale never happened. Not long afterwards, according to his account, he heard that buyers representing the Green family had paid $2.5 million. When I asked what explained the difference in price, he answered, “greed,” and wouldn’t say more. (Hepler of the Museum of the Bible wouldn’t divulge the purchase price or the estimated value of the manuscript, but said Wolfe’s figure was “wrong.”)

The collection amassed by the Green family eventually became the Museum of the Bible, which opened in Washington in 2017. The museum has been sensitive to criticism related to the provenance of its artifacts since a scandal erupted involving thousands of antiquities that turned out to have been looted or improperly acquired in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East. The museum’s founder, Steve Green, has said he first began collecting as an enthusiast, not an expert, and was taken in by some of the dubious characters who populate the antiquities market. “I trusted the wrong people to guide me, and unwittingly dealt with unscrupulous dealers in those early years,” he said after a federal investigation. In March 2020 the museum agreed to repatriate 11,000 artifacts to Iraq and Egypt. 

[vylad243]

Hazbin Hotel but as quotes me and my family have said

~☆~☆~

Vox:Why are there more people at the beach for July Forth than Canada Day? Are there Americans celebrating July Forth in Canada?

Velvette:*leans over* There's a Texas plate

Vox:Of fucking course it's Texas

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Alastor:Just because he has straight in his name, doesn't mean he is straight

Harmony: (not out to her dad yet that she's genderfluid) What?

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Vox:What do you think about politics, car? *skips song*

*The Audacity starts playing*

Vox and Velvette:What the fuck?!?

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Alastor:I am god

Vaggie: *absent-mindedly* Yeah we know

Charlie:WHAT?

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Alastor:Please raise your standards

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Vox: *Plays Insane*

Niffty:This sounds like an Alastor song

Vox:Boy do I have some news for you

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Niffty:I want your Alastor pin

Vox:I paid good money for this shit

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Husk:Who wants to see my cut?

Angel:Me!

Husk:*flips him off*

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Angel:I dunno. I want the cat house to have a bit more room

Husk:*from across the yard* You know I don't like it when you talk about your pussy with other men!

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Husk:I used to go around proposing to different girls with rings at the bar and she said yes

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Valentino:How dare you go to an Aaron Pritchett concert without us!

Velvette:Yeah!

Vox:You guys weren't even born when it happened

Velvette:You should have had us sooner then!

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Rosie:I find women hot. I think I'm gay.

Alastor:Everyone finds women hot. Including all girls. They're nice to look at while men are the monkies of the world

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Lyric:Yeah, why did you have this many kids?

Alastor:We both thought I would die first

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Vox:Holy shit I bought Tim McGraw for four dollars! What a sale. Can't wait to force him to make more music

Alastor:That's an album

Vox:No, it's Tim McGraw himself

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

Lyric:I'm God.

Alastor:No, I'm God. You're Jesus. You're my daughter

Lyric:No, you're my daughter and I'm God

~☆~☆~☆~☆~☆~

If you guys can guess which ones were stuff my parents said, you get a cookie

BONUS POINTS IF YOU GUESS WHICH ONE WAS SAID ON CHRISTMAS DAY

[snowviolettwhite]

Several Sentence Sunday

Tagged By the lovelies @anewkindofme and @im-overstimulated-and-im-sad

(Reworking the first chapter of don’t have to be sorry for leaving and growing up) Not finished with it yet but here is a sneak peak. Name from Harry Style song Matilda.

9-1-1 early 2010s Alternative Universe Fan-Fiction.

Where Buck, Eddie, Shannon and baby Christopher runaway from home to California. Buck and Eddie join the fire academy and soon after the 118, Shannon is studying to be a therapist and they are all roommates barely, adults at eighteen years old and raising Christopher and coming into adulthood together.

Eddie and Shannon were born towards the end of 1992 so they graduate in 2011.

Buck was born in summer of 1992 so he graduated in 2010.

----

It is January of 2011. Public schools across the nation of The United States Of America are still out for winter break from Hershey, Pennsylvania to El Paso, Texas.

Evan Buckley, Buck is the blonde and blue-eyed rascal. It has been nearly a year since he graduated high school and still does not know what he wants from life. He has tried college is dropping out and not returning for the spring semester. He mostly did it to get his parent off his back and away from them.

He has some money saved from over the years from doing chores, birthdays, mowing lawns and gardening around town, shoveling snow, yard sales, lemonade stands and many more little odd jobs.

He is always getting himself hurt and in trouble. He was on the football team. He made a lot of friends but never got close enough to let his walls down. He is the baby of the family but the only person who ever pays attention to him is his big sister Madeline, Maddie Buckley. She is nine years older than him. He does not know what he wants concretely. But he knows that he wants to help people and make the world a better place and just wants to be happy and be loved and find his passion and have stability.

Edmundo Diaz, Eddie is the young teenage dad to be who got his best friend turned girlfriend pregnant. Eddie just turned eighteen in November and Shannon only turned eighteen in October. They are not even eighteen and half years old. He is the middle child and is the only boy in his family. He was the sanest compared to his sisters which, pulled away the attention of the fact he struggled a lot in school. He excelled in other areas like sports and the arts and other hands-on-activities until this past year.

He wanted to be nurse when he grew up but saw the pain it was to get into college and financial aid and everything with his older sister, Adrianna. He needs to figure out how he is going to support the baby and Shannon and himself. He just wants to be left alone in peace with his best friend and baby boy and to have fun, at least for now.

“Edmundo Diaz, young man you will listen to me right now. How could you let this happen?! You and Shannon are still kids in the school. You cannot even take care of yourselves. The last time you tried cooking dinner you nearly set the kitchen on fire. You cannot be trusted to drive by yourself and still need help with your homework You cannot act like a man, you still act like a child. How are you supposed to take care of a baby?”

Shannon Macdonald is the young teenage mom to be. She wants to be therapist when she grows up. She wants to start a new life away from all this chaos and stress and hang out with her best friend and baby and make new friends and find new interests.

She is the best friend of Eddie Diaz.

They say if you want to be treated like an adult act like an adult. How are you supposed to act like an adult when you are still being treated and spoken to like a child. You are barely an adult at eighteen years old just graduated in high school or still in it, being dragged home by the cops and being scolded at the front door or being at by your parents yelled in your childhood bedroom to the point of tears and clutching your clutching your worn-out stuffed animal or getting into screaming contest with two middle aged adults to the point your voice gives out and wanting your mom to make it better.

“You’re too soft! You need to grow up!”

“You’re too soft! You need to grow up!”

“You’re too soft! You need to grow up!”

“I hate you!”

“I hate you!”

“I hate you!”

---

Tagging But No Pressure: @the-flaming-nightmare. @aroeddiediaz. @babygirl-diaz @lochnesswriter @missmagooglie. @tommykinard6

[skunkox]

Country Lovin Darlin and Rambles.

Is this gonna be self indulging? Very much so. I'm starting to realize no one can stop me, but hear me out real quick. Forgive me if you do decide to read all the way through. It's a lot. 🥲

Before moving to Dahlia, Darlin' used to spend half their summers with their grandparents in Texas. Sorta old money/ retired folk. Big land, but not too much on it. Plenty of room for the shiftsr grandchildgren to play. Passively still making money via whool sales. Yeah, there's other animals, but it's not a giant operation. They do have other empowereds working as ranch hands for them, though.

Anyways, a good moth or so out of each summer as a child, Darlin would help around the ranch, learn to cook and bake, and even participate in town events. (I'm telling you the fucker can cook. Just not for one person.)

Lazy Sunday mornings were spent in front of the TV with their grandfather watching old westerns or things like "The Andy Grifith Show," "Little House on the Prarie," and "Tales of Wells Fargo".

Not even halfway into they stay, they'll have developed a country accent. They still struggled to get be friends with most of the kids their age. Was it because they picked up a garden snake like it was just a piece of rope? Was it because they alegedly chased a kid girl with it that had been giving them hell? Who knows.

I wholeheartedly believe that Darlin was a pageant kid at some point in their life. Regardless of how ruff and tough they are, they were a cute kid. Don't pay the bandaid brand character bandaid any mind.

This is where I say this is really just my version of Darlin and a little bit of Sweetheart. It's Redunk Time.

Specifically for my version of Darlin (fem), "Southern Bell" like fair competitions are what her grandmother would enter the kids in. The one day out of the year she's happy to put on a frilly dress and bows. Not a whole lot of confidence for themselves on stage for the most part, though.

Diving more into the idea that Darlin and Sweetheart used to be friends before the move idea. Sweetheart has gone with them once or twice. Especially when the older cousins were visiting for less time, if at all. The old wolves like a full house, so they had no problem hosting another empowered child.

Sweetheart loved taking pictures and video of their adventures. Still currently holding footage to a misshap of sorts that they swore to never tell anyone about. They also have footage of competitions from the fairs. Including the pageants. Do they plan on telling the pack? Yes. (That's a post for another day)

The duo thought it was weird that the they would be leaving at separate times. They noticed the soured moods of the grandparents but the older wolves couldn't bring themselves to say anything on it in the days leading to their departures. Sweetheart took the flight home alone. Darlin was under the impression that the family was taking a short trip to California before summer ended.

Much to their distraught, their parents had either been moved and or found new jobs in Dahlia. The move was in the works for nearly half a year and they had no idea. Their older siblings knew, but they did everything their parents told them. They got no warning that they wouldn't see their friends anymore. That they wouldn't be attending school that fall with the same kids. That they wouldn't even get to say goodbye to their old house. No proper goodbye to Sweetheart.

Summer visits to Texas were just about haulted. Their parents wanted Darlin to better acquaint themselves with the other pack children. This was a struggle for years.

Sweetheart moving to work for the department and finding themselves with Milo was one thing. But the first time they happened to see each other in a pack meeting was rough. They knew almost instantly who each other were.

Sweetheart had seen a photo in Milo's living room. It was framed next to a lamp. The picture was of Christian and Amanda who awkwardly sat side by side. Hands just nearly touching. On one end of a log. David sat facing forward while Asher sat crooked with an arm thrown over David's shoulder. Both had been laughing. Milo and Darlin had been on the ground and back to back. Darlin had thrown up a rock sign with a small smile, attempting to no ruin the picture with their resting pitch face. Milo sat leaning on one knee, trying his best to look cool and composed.

To make a long story short. Both played dumb as to knowing each other for one reason or another. It wasn't till the Quinn situation, and Darlin coming back to the pack did the two start to speak. It took it all being over for them to finally become close again.

Back to the country thing

Hearing Sam speak for the first time really took them back especially at the end of their conversation with "Didn't your mama teach you not to talk to strange men in the dark, all alone?"

It felt familiar. It disarmed them and put then at ease. Sam's voice is something Darlin couldn't and still can't get enough of. They slip into an accent every once in a while. To them it feels right. Some slips happen in front of the pack and they've been teased for it. Sweetheart knows thr truth and is waiting eagerly to spill the beans on their country loving friend.

So... didn't mean for this to be as long as it is. Really putting a lot into Darlin's character cause it feels right. I like old TV. I mean sorta staticky box tv vibes. My grandfather was into a lot of it. My mom started me on LHOTP and I recently discovered a live channel for it and only it.

I really do apologize for how messy this all looks. It was an accident. Anyways, some bits and pieces of this will eventually be drawn out. Got weeks worth of stuff to do for this Fandom alone 😭