#She has a bandaid that matches mine

[dreammeiser]

I got peer pressured!!! Into making!! A dogsona!! And you know what!!! She is a good girl, I can see the appeal of making one. Featuring my stinky feather beasts! I can imagine her being a cheerful and sleepy little muppet that will listen to you about whatever you’re hyperfixating on, and make you a nice cup of tea or coffee when you’re sad. I want to make her into a Sesame Street styled puppet sometime!

[agathaharkness-simp]

random robin buckley headcanons yea (ft. ronance and platonic stobin)

(i also projected extremely on her btw, it’s not my fault her whole personality is also mine)

- so we all agree that robin is at least neurodivergent right? anyways robin has so many rings and stuff to stop herself from picking at skin/nails. they don’t work as a distraction all the time but it’s better than having her fingers covered bandaids 24/7. steve would notice sometimes and give her something to occupy her hands or, if they’re someplace where they can’t goof around, he’ll let her play with his hands.

- robin loves having inside jokes with people but absolutely hates when she doesn’t understand other peoples inside jokes.

- robin is an abba lover.

- robin has a really messy room but still organized in a sense. everything is where you can see it, not put away in a drawer and forgotten, making it easier to locate her things. she will get upset if someone moves something and doesn’t tell her where they put it.

- her sleep schedule is not even a schedule at this point. there’s no pattern at all. she’ll be sitting on her bed with like dozens of papers for like a new language one night. and then a couple days later, she’s in steve’s car and telling him about the great 16 solid hours she slept.

- speaking of sleeping, she has the most bizarre dreams (like argyle in my jargyle hc’s) and will retell each dream as many times as it takes for everyone to hear about it. but as she’s telling this one person about a dream, she’ll remember something else that happened in that dream and then everyone gets the same story but slightly different from each others.

- won’t wear any other shoe except converse.

- has been rotating the same 4 outfits for like 2 years now. she’s very picky about whether this plain shirt should go with blah blah. she’s just gotta look cool in public.

- secretly loves her hair as much as steve loves his.

- robin obviously likes to doodle on things (her shoes) so steve and nancy will let her draw on them. they both got a little too trusting with the maturity of her art and then ended up with male and female genitals drawn all over them (she switched out her sharpie for a pen on those ones because she would feel bad after). she writes little jokes and would just wait for her victim to question it.

- she likes rocks. not like a full on collector but just likes to point them out when seeing a shiny one. ok yea she’s not a collector but she definitely does have some cool rocks in her room somewhere.

- robin is a warm person. her body temp could get so high that she just wants to climb in a freezer. on the other hand, nancy gets super cold. her hands, nose, and ears specifically. so naturally, nancy is always staying really close to robin like robin’s her personal heater. robin unintentionally flirts with nancy using her furnace hands. like nancy would be wearing earmuffs and complaining how she’s just getting colder by the second. and then in comes robin taking off nancy’s earmuffs and holding her hands on each side of nancy’s head. nancy sticks to robin like glue after that.

- robin hasn’t lost one single staring contest (not counting the ones who cheat aka steve, dustin, and max). steve has to warn everyone who goes against her because he’s seen her stare at a wall for 4 minutes straight during their shift in family video. only one person has gotten close to beating her and that was jonathon.

- steve and robin have matching best friend necklaces like the cheap necklaces that would break in a millisecond. yet they still treat it as if it were sack of diamonds. they agreed that they’d bring the necklaces to the grave with them.

- robin gets super excited for other peoples birthday. like she gets to show her friends how much she appreciates them with gifts on the day of their birth!!!! so steve would give her a whole bunch of cash and just tell her to go crazy. and so she does. after his shift at family video, he gets to his house and finds decorations on decorations. there’s presents set by the table and everyone is there. the byers + the hoppers, the wheelers (minus t*d), the sinclairs, and the hendersons. his house has never truly looked like a home more than it has in this moment. robin knew this too. and robin wasn’t surprised when steve tried to wipe his eyes without anyone noticing. robin then hands him a wimpy looking cake with a giant cake art rendition of steve’s hair. it was the best god damn cake steve ever had.

(anyways i think imma leave it on that giant hc that definitely felt like more of a short fic lmao)

[backboneofthevees]

@hiyahezralamb asked for a longer list of my lovebugbite hcs so here they r :3

hank and astrid have the shittiest sleep schedules, trishna goes to bed at 8:30 every night

atleast once a week they all sit together and read in silence (hank likes romance, trishna likes nonfiction, and astrid likes action)

trishna cleans astrid's room everytime she's there just bc she finds it fun

hank wears pretty dresses and his girlfriends both tell him all about how pretty he is

they like to go out into the woods near uranium and sit by a little creek together

they all like REALLY different music from eachother so they occasionally fight over what they play

trishna paints hank and astrid's nails pretty colors

hank carries around pretty bandaides for his little sister (a silly oc of mine and my pookie bears),, but he always ends up having to give some to astrid and trishna

hank has a pinterest board for things that remind him of his girlfriends

hank and trishna love pda,, astrid doesn't but she acts like she does bc it annoys ocean and makes the other 2 happy

trishna has a polaroid camera that she takes a few pictures of them with every once and a while

all 3 of them wanna get a kitty together SO bad

they have matching lockets bc hank thought it would be cute (it most definitely is cute)

they pass notes all the time,, they all keep every single note they get

trishna picks flowers for them

they call eachother all the time (ocean and astrid share a room and ocean thinks them calling is the most annoying thing)

astrid draws hank and trishna a lot

[nostradamus0]

the miasaurus rex: king of my lizards

read on ao3

The Doctor has stood at the bedside of suffering before. He’s witnessed more deaths than he can count and confronted the fragility of life within almost everyone he’s ever loved, and carried that weight as guilt. 

Now, he sits at the foot of his daughter’s hospital bed and everything is fine. Her cries have long since quieted, her tears dried. There’s a bright purple bandaid on the side of her jaw to match the violet of her wrist cast, and she’s perfectly safe. A bit giggly from the painkillers, but safe and smiling—not even in any pain. Yet his leftover fear is still twitching in his fingers.

A marker lands on the blanket between his knees. Navy against the sky-blue blanket.

“If you’re not too busy brooding a hole through the wall, we could use some help.” 

He looks up and they’re staring at him: Mia with a fistful of markers and an expectant, closed-mouth smile, and Rose with a soft understanding in her eyes and an outstretched hand, beckoning him closer. Offering a distraction.

“We’re trying to recreate scenes from Prehistoric Planet, but our girl’s drawing hand is out of commission and anything more than a stick figure’s out of my league.”

(God, he loves her.)

“You know the dinosaurs, daddy,” Mia chirps, and his heart grows a few sizes at the soft whistle-y noise halfway through dinosaur—the little temporary lisp she’s had for a few days now after losing her first tooth. “You can draw them.” 

She reaches over to press the pile of markers into his hands, and he scooches closer to join them at the head of the bed, the three of them pressed shoulder-to-shoulder. Mia drops her temple against his bicep and pokes at the green marker. 

“That one,” she says. “The Tyrannosaurus Rex is green.” 

Unfortunately, most of what they’ve drawn so far is green, and he can’t tell what any of them are supposed to be, let alone which one is the T-Rex. He loves his wife beyond words, but she’s not exactly an artist. 

“That may be,” he tells their daughter, uncapping the pink marker and hunching over her cast, “but the Miasaurus Rex is pink.” 

She giggles and her arm shakes; he accidentally streaks ink across his own palm. When she settles, he starts to draw, doing his best to invent a new species of dinosaur out of pink marker lines, impossible to make smooth on the bumpy plaster. For a few, long moments, everything is quiet. And then—

“T-Rex: King of the Tyrant Lizards,” Mia whispers, her voice full of the kind of drama that only a six-year-old can effortlessly wield. (She’s become quite fascinated recently with the etymology of dinosaur names, which is even cuter than it sounds. In his completely objective opinion, of course.) “Mummy, what does my name mean?”

“‘Mine.’ It means ‘mine,’” Rose says, but she glances up at the Doctor from where she’s been weaving a small braid into Mia’s hair, and her eyes say ‘ours.’

“King of My Lizards?” Mia asks after a thoughtful pause, her eyebrows scrunching together. 

“That’s right, my sweet girl.” Rose finishes off the braid with a hair-tie from her wrist and tucks it behind her ear. “They’re all yours.”

“So much so, in fact, that no one else even knows about them,” the Doctor adds, capping the pink marker and reaching for the black, ready to give the very first Miasaurus Rex some eyes and a smile. The body, while clearly some type of dinosaur, is a bit wobbly and unsymmetrical, and one side of the head is significantly flatter than the other as though the poor creature had been dropped on its head. (Given the circumstances, he thinks, he’s done fairly well.)

“I’ll just have to grow up and find them, then,” Mia says, so decided and matter-of-fact that for a moment, it’s impossible not to believe that she’ll someday discover a dinosaur that never lived. 

The Doctor glances up from his in-progress invention of a species to meet his wife’s eyes, bright and warm, sharing in his awe that this brilliant little girl is theirs. They get to love her. They get to watch her grow and laugh and sit captivated by his stories of meeting real dinosaurs during his years of time and space. 

They chose her name because it means mine. But they sit all squished together in her hospital bed, creating a new dinosaur on her wrist cast and weaving braids into her loose hair and he thinks that no, ‘Mia’ does not mean mine. It means ours.

[quillerqueen]

Not a Universe Goes By (11/31)

(a series of fic(let)s for The Ted Lasso AU-gust challenge) #11: Health & Medical

Ted skims through the papers Rebecca has just handed him, detailing the booster shot schedule for the eligible players and staff—easier to organise in bulk, she explains, and with all of them getting it on a Friday before a free weekend, no one will have to miss any trainings or matches due to potential side effects.

“Coming with us, Boss? Team trip?” Beard asks.

“Oh, me?” Rebecca winces, her voice raising an octave. “Fuck no.” She clears her throat, hands clasped in front of her, fidgeting slightly. “What I mean is I’ve got my own—private—appointment already.”

“Are you afraid of needles or some shit?”

“Don’t be fucking ridiculous,” she dismisses, throwing Roy a dirty look, wringing her hands once more before she smooths out non-existent wrinkles on her skirt and marches herself out of the coaches’ office with her chin stuck up and a lofty excuse me, gentlemen.

Well then. Ain’t that mighty interesting. Ted knows armour when he sees it, especially on her—knows those fences, too, and how to jump over, even though he’s not had much practice lately.

He raises it tactically, in the privacy of her office, in their regular slot as she’s munching blissfully on her biscuits.

“Hey, Rebecca, would you mind if I tagged along to your vax appointment? It’s just, needles can be a bit eesh, ya know? Can’t go wrong with a bit of emotional support.”

“Oh. I—” she hesitates, glancing down to brush biscuit crumbs off her desk. “Would that make you feel more comfortable? If you and I went together?”

Ted doesn’t want to lie to her, he already feels bad enough for misleading her, but perhaps the distraction of having him there will make things easier on her, and why embarrass her by admitting he’s seen through her denial if she clearly doesn’t want people to know? 

“I’d like that, yeah.”

She stuffs the entire biscuit in her mouth, chews, and swallows before fixing him with a soft, determined gaze.

“Of course, Ted.”

Niles drives them in her Rolls, and Ted brings out his funniest anecdotes for her, warm all over when she seems to relax and forget about shots and needles for a while, throwing her head back with laughter.

She tenses as they enter the vaccination site, her smile forced—she lets out a small sigh when their arms press together as they wait for their turn, and he takes that as a sign that the contact gives her at least a teeny bit of comfort, so he makes sure not to move too far away.

“Wanna go first, or—?” Ted asks, unsure which order might make her more comfy.

“I can hold your hand?” she suggests, twisting one of them big rings she likes with shaky fingers.

“I—yeah, sure. Right. If you’re sure—”

“I really don’t mind. You can hold mine later,” she says bracingly, like the brave lioness she is, even though her voice betrays her just there with a single wobble he pretends not to notice.

It’s a quick process. Ted barely notices the nurse or the sting of the needle—the only reason he even knows when it happens is the way Rebecca’s hand squeezes his in a viselike grip. He smiles at her as they switch, though she doesn’t manage to return one of her own, and she seems grateful to be sitting down. Still she won’t say a thing, just anchors herself with his hand, holding firmly as Ted runs his thumb over her knuckles. She’s staring stubbornly at their hands until the needle goes in and she squeezes her eyes shut, shuddering as the nurse slaps a bandaid over it.

“There ya go,” Ted mutters. 

Rebecca looks up at him curiously, eyes widening, but she says nothing until they’re well clear of the building and back in her car, heading towards the Green.

"Ted, are you free tomorrow?”

“For you, Boss? Always.”

“Wonderful,” she gives him a dazzling smile. “We're going to the optometrist."

Shoot. Caught. Yeesh.

"I don't need glasses,”he says stubbornly because he’s been in denial for weeks and sure wasn’t planning on changing that anytime soon. “No siree, I’ve got perfect 20/20 vision."

Rebecca rolls her eyes, then raises a sceptical eyebrow at him.

"I'll wear mine if you wear yours," she says slyly.

Ted swallows heavily, his cheeks hotter than a summer barbecue.

How could anyone say no to that?

"Okey-doke."

[anemo-writes]

hello travelers! i’m sorry for the late of inactivity recently, i’m working on some of my one-shot requests and obviously that will take a bit longer than writing headcanons; anyways, the genshin impact characters would like to wish you a very merry christmas!! the rest of the characters are below the cut to avoid clogging, so be sure to check them out too<3 happy holidays everyone, stay safe!

much love,

~ anemo-chan <3

The (Playable) Genshin Impact Characters Wishing You a Merry Christmas

Albedo: Merry Christmas. Ah, that reminds me—I hope that you do not mind, but I have sketched a portrait of you and want to give it to you as a gift. When did I do this, you ask? Why, it was during our time together in Dragonspine. It would have been a shame to not create something to remember one of my fondest memories, no?

Amber: Hey! Happy Christmas—Oh, I meant merry Christmas. Anyways, I have a gift for you! I noticed your glider was getting a bit worn out, so I got you a new pair; why don’t we go for a test run together? What? Oh yeah, gliding in the snow probably wouldn’t be the best idea, would it?

Barbara: Hehe, do you like the dress I’m wearing?—I made it myself! Oh, that reminds me, I made you a matching outfit to go along with mine when we go caroling together—huh? You’ve never been caroling before? No worries, Idol Barbara will teach you all you need to know!

Beidou: Yo~ Merry Christmas! How does the ship look? The crew and I spent the last week trying to decorate it accordingly. Say, how about you aboard the ship and join us for a few drinks? There’s nothing like a few mugs of eggnog on Christmas!

Bennett: Merry Christmas! Huh? What am I holding behind my back? Haha, well it was actually supposed to be your present...until I accidentally squashed it when I tripped walking out of the store, that is. Maybe I should’ve asked for extra luck for my presents this year...

Chongyun: Merry Christmas. Please accept this gift of a flower made of never-melting ice—I carved it myself. Yes, I partook in an ice-carving class when I was younger, so I suppose it does look somewhat like a professional’s; I hope to grow better at it, however. Perhaps I’ll gift my next creation to you, if you do not mind.

Diluc: Merry Christmas. I hope you do not mind if I gift you a bottle of a new line of wine we are producing at the winery—if you happen to enjoy it, do not hesitate to let me know; we have plenty of other bottles and I would be happy to give you another bottle or two. Ah, there’s no need for you to gift me anything back; your presence is a gift enough already.

Diona: Would you mind trying this special batch of eggnog that I made? It’s non-alcoholic, so hopefully my father—I mean, you won’t be able to taste the difference. That is, only if you want to—it’s not like I’m asking you to do me a favor or anything! Oh, and merry Christmas...

Fischl: Well, if it isn’t the merriest of the holidays! It won’t do to prepare a present that you would possibly not like, so please allow me to accompany you on a journey to find a gift of your deepest desires! Come, you have my full attention—what is it that you wish for?

Jean: Merry Christmas. It is another joyous occasion to celebrate. Ah, I apologize—I haven’t had time to buy you a gift. Why don’t we go together to find something you’d like? Please do not care about the price, see it as something I must repay you for for not having it wrapped and ready for you to open already.

Kaeya: Merry Christmas. You don’t happen to believe in Santa, do you? Oh, you do? Now now, that is very interesting. Haha, of course there’s no harm in believing in such a legend; that is, unless you’ve been naughty this year? Who knows what Santa does to bad little boys and girls...

Keqing: Merry Christmas! Here is a specially-crafted latern fueled by a part of my Electro-vision; it’ll never run out of charge, so please use it on your journey to light up the darkest of your days. I truly hope you enjoy it, and may the next year be filled with better luck and prosper.

Klee: Merry Christmas, best-friend! Here, look! Mm, it’s a bomb I made especially for you—it’s shaped like an ornament. Isn’t it the best? Don’t let Jean see though!! I’ll have to go solitary confinement for weeks if she catches you with one of my latest creations!

Lisa: Merry Christmas, cutie! As a gift, I’ve crafted you an amulet to match with one I’ve made for myself, so be sure not to loose it! It’ll look bad on my part, and we don’t want that, do we now?

Mona: Ah, the starry night always look brighter on such a merry holiday, don’t you think? Oh, that reminds me—here, take this. It’s an object to help you look for certain gems along your journey; it will glow when near, so be sure to keep an eye out. Once you find it, polish it well, and it will shine as bright as the night sky.

Ningguang: I would like to wish you a very merry Christmas. However, I was not too sure on what to get you as a gift, so please enlighten me on your preference. Go on, I am listening; anything will do, if it is to your liking.

Noelle: Merry Christmas! While it is a very merry day, it is bound with overwhelming errands and things to do—but fear not, your dutiful maid is here to serve you! Purchasing presents, wrapping them, or whatever else you would like me to do, I will do it—I am yours to serve for today, so please do not be shy to ask me to perform a task today.

Qiqi: Merry...Christmas? Yes, I believe that’s right. Baizhu told me that during these times friends often gift each other things, so I have brought you a bag of herbal medicine to use during your adventures because we are friends.

Razor: Ah...it is holiday today? Christmas...it does not sound familiar to Razor. But if you celebrate it, Razor is more than happy to celebrate with you; come, we will go hunting to prepare for our feast tonight.

Sucrose: Merry Christmas! Take a look at this, I’ve finally perfected the formula to this potion of mine! What does it do? Well, I’m glad you asked—if everything works accordingly to the plan, it’ll formulate a box of your most favorite memories of the past year into a physical memento! Doesn’t it sound wonderful?

Tartaglia: Hohoho~! Merry Christmas, comrade! Oh, that reminds me!—Teucer has been asking about you recently, so why don’t you join us for dinner? I’ll even escort you to Snezhnaya myself—perhaps we can even find some enemies to kill along the way. Haha, surely you won’t decline such an invitation?

Venti: Merry Christmas, dear friend! What is it that I’ve prepared for you on this joyous holiday, you may ask? Well, you’re in luck—I’ve written a new song just for you! Hehe, don’t worry about repaying me back, this song is completely free! Generous, I know! If you want to help though, make sure this song is passed down for multiple generations—I spent a long time writing it!

Xiangling: Merry Christmas! Look, look! I’ve prepared the two of us a whole feast for tonight’s dinner—what’s the bandaid on my finger, you ask? Oh, it’s no biggie, I accidentally cut myself while chopping some of the ingredients—oh, forget it! Let’s dig in! Be sure to tell me which one is your favorite; I’ll add to the menu at the restaurant!

Xingqiu: Merry Christmas, my liege! I have brought you one of my most treasured books as a gift for this joyous occasion; there is no need for you to return it! It is for your keeping. May the next year and years to come be filled with prosper and mirth!

Xinyan: Woohoo, it’s Christmas! What a rockin’ excuse to shred some Christmas tunes, amiright? Oh, you’ve got a pretty good voice if I do say so myself! Say, why don’t you join me up on stage today? I’ll play guitar, and you sing! That’s sure to rally up a crowd!

Zhongli: Merry Christmas—although I am not too familiar with the exchange of gifts, I have collected a rare flower for you which is native to Liyue only, and only grows during this time of the year. I hope to be able to exchange gifts with you next year as well.

[backalley-requests]

The Proposal | Chapter Seven

The Proposal Masterlist

Summary: Proposal au, where Ivar gets swept away in a lie about a fake engagement to stay in the country and needs to convince everyone (including his family) that he’s genuinely engaged to a woman he works with

Warnings: mild swearing (I think)

Word Count: 3,022

“I was thinking,” Aslaug began. Most of the family was seated at a large table, breakfast on display and on their plates. “Me and Ragnar have talked it over, and we agree it’s in everyone’s best interest to have the wedding here,” she grinned.

The bacon in your hand never reached your open mouth as your eyebrows raised in confusion. Now? It felt entirely too soon, you looked at Ivar. He was seated next to you and appeared uneasy.

“Just think about it. Ivar, this is the first time you’ve come home in seven years. Who knows when’s the next time we’ll have an opportunity like this? And most of our family is here for your father’s birthday. He said he was more than on board with the idea.” Aslaug seemed so excited.

It wasn’t that you didn’t want to have a wedding. You already knew you would, but having it so soon made the whole thing more real. It used to be an abstract concept and now was a lot more.... here. “I think we’d have to talk about it,” Ivar replied cautiously.

Up until now it was mostly just playing pretend. You knew what you signed up for but this hit different. “But maybe?” You offered to soften the blow. Your leg bounced nervously under the table, and you found that your appetite was gone.

“I’ll let you two talk it over,” Aslaug decided with a nod of her head. “But it just makes sense. And it’d be a pity if I couldn’t be there for it.”

—

“We have to do it at some point, right?” You brought up when you entered the room again. You two were doing this. A lot was on the line. “Your family would hate if they weren’t there,” you bit your lower lip.

“Did you want to do it here then?”

Doing it here would make it feel more real. “I expected to get court papers and go back to my apartment and not notice a difference.” A wedding was something much more official.

Ivar nodded his head. “I’m okay with doing it now. The work will be done for us, mor has been dying to set up a wedding for a while.”

Were you okay with it? “Sure,” you nodded your head. “Maybe it’s better to just rip the bandaid off.” You shook your hands and limbs to get the nervous feeling out of you. Your stomach was twisted in all sorts of knots. Why was it so nerve wrecking now?

“You don’t have to describe our wedding as painful,” Ivar rolled his eyes.

“I’m just nervous!” You shot back quickly. Maybe part of it was that you still had the interviewer left, you forgot about him most of the time. Or maybe it was that you weren’t sure you had done enough yet.

“It’ll be a few hours of your life and we can just go back to our respective lives. Go back to normal.”

That was it. You didn’t like the idea of that. Before you came here it was easy to get the papers and pretend it didn’t happen. “You’re right, back to normal.” He would just be your boss you were legally married to. Tentative friendship aside, you couldn’t imagine going out for coffee with him. Once you two didn’t have to pretend anymore you just… wouldn’t.

“So then let’s just say yes?”

You nodded your head. “It’ll be kinda fun to dress up,” you laughed.

—

One agreement after another, neither you were sure you were entirely comfortable with. Why didn’t you say no earlier? That it was happening too fast, or that you didn’t love lying to his family.

There wasn’t a high stakes excuse, he just seemed like he wanted it and for whatever reason you agreed. But the sooner you ran through the wedding the sooner it would be over.

“Are you alright, dear,” Aslaug asked you in town. She had taken you there along with a woman named Torvi. She was married to Ubbe, as far as you could recall.

“I’m good! Just nervous,” you replied with an awkward laugh. A woman was gathering your measurements, an act that already lent itself to making one feel self conscious. You also didn’t really know anyone you were with.

Ivar wasn’t allowed inside, maybe that was for the best. Aslaug said something about it being bad luck and you didn’t bother fighting it. “Don’t be. It gets easier with each wedding, but everyone's a little nervous,” Torvi tried to calm you down. “People won’t gossip for years about if you tripped over your dress, or if your makeup was off, or if the dress didn’t match your—“ her listing things off that you never considered only increased your fears and Aslaug noticed.

“Torvi, dear, I think you’re making things worse.”

“I’m fine,” you insisted.

“All that really matters is what Ivar thinks of you. You don’t really know anyone else there, and therefore their opinions of you don’t matter,” Aslaug countered.

Torvi nodded her head. “And if he wants to marry you then you must be special. Especially after what happened with—“ Once again, Aslaug made the girl stop talking with a quick wack to her arm. “I’m just saying he’s clearly head over heels. He won’t sweat the small details.”

“What happened with who?” Curiosity was piqued. Ivar didn’t delve into personal details. It made sense, you two were hardly friends at best, but that didn’t make you any less curious. “Sorry— he just doesn’t talk about Denmark often.”

Aslaug and Torvi looked between each other for a moment until Aslaug sighed and threw her hands in the air. “Fine. But I don’t want to be here for it. It just makes me angry.” She walked out of the room and left you standing with Torvi.

“Ivar was in one other serious relationship I can recall. Sure, I think he had some affairs with a few girls but nothing real until Freydis. Nothing after her either, until you,” Torvi nodded her head.

You were changing in between suggested dresses, attempting new styles at an incredibly slow pace. Torch helped carry the weight of some dresses and zipped up the back every time. “What happened to her then?”

“Well she was beautiful and kind. He was madly in love. I’ve never seen him so love sick.”

There was no comfort that he had looked at you like that— not that you should’ve expected that. You shook her head back to reality as fast as you could. Of course Ivar looked at someone he actually loved differently than someone who just worked for him.

“Anyways, he had a whole proposal planned out. She turned him down and didn’t give a real reason why. We didn’t find out for a while,” Torvi admitted. “I think it was because she didn’t qualify for a US visa. Ivar was willing to drop his dreams of New York for her and she didn’t seem okay with that, something about not wanting him to change his entire life for her.”

You were silent the whole time. You never saw Ivar date people. You’d have known if he had in the last three years. It made sense why any short term flings didn’t last.

Torvi laced together a dress. “I wasn’t sure he’d recover— until you. So all’s well that ends well, right?” She leaned over your shoulder and grinned at you. “I wouldn’t worry too much about her. Aslaug just resents Freydis for breaking his heart. But I haven’t even seen her around here in years. She’s hardly a boogeyman.”

Why did that bother you so much? If Ivar was secretly in love with some other woman the entire time it shouldn’t matter. She turned him down anyways. But it did bother you. Ivar didn’t mention his past and you had to wonder if Freydis was why.

“I think this dress looks lovely by the way,” Torvi complimented.

—

The day just seemed so fast. Nothing was seemingly capable of slowing down information as it was thrown at you. It didn’t seem to get any better when you finally left the store, a dress sent in for alterations, to find Ivar at the nearby cafe you left him at talking to someone you haven't seen before.

“Ivar!” You smiled. Aslaug and Torvi had shooed you away while they worked on ‘something’. You heard through their whispers it had to do with a bachelorette party. The idea wasn’t exactly fun but they were too nice to turn town, so you already knew you’d agree with whatever they had to say.

You glanced over at the woman, she was beautiful and maybe that was why you felt the strong urge to sit incredibly close to Ivar. “Y/N, this is an old friend of mine, Freydis.” That made things instantly worse. The warm smile on your face turned cold.

“Hi, I’m Y/N,” you extended your hand to shake hers. Even her hand was soft and warm. You turned your head to face Ivar, seeing an urge to do something.

What if Ivar realized he didn’t need to return to the US if Freydis was here. You could go to prison, or lose your job at best. The man needed his priorities straight. Oh— who were you kidding! Freydis hadn’t even done anything other than show up today and now.

They spoke in Danish, only occasionally letting you into the conversation. You understood fragments of it. They were talking about their time at university, growing up together, when they dated. You were ignored and isolated from their chats and it bothered you.

Maybe you wouldn’t have cared at all if Torvi didn’t ignite a fear that Ivar was still in love with her. But he was already so much more animated and kind to her than he usually was with you.

“We’re being a bit rude to your girlfriend, aren’t we?” Freydis brought it up at some point, speaking in English for your sake.

“It’s fine,” you smiled awkwardly, waving it off.

“She’s not really my girlfriend,” Ivar admitted. “It’s complicated. She’s just a good friend. She’s helping me stay in America and get my citizenship official.”

You froze, every muscle in your body tensing up at once. Freydis laughed at the absurdity of it. “Then you must be incredibly kind as you are beautiful to deal with him. Ivar certainly has a knack for the dramatics, doesn’t he,” she smiled at you.

You took a deep breath and smiled back. “He also seems to have a habit of bad judgement calls. Ivar— I don’t care if she knows but the point of a secret is not sharing it where anyone can hear. Your mom and Torvi are in the same district right now. What if they were behind us?” You snapped.

Ivar frowned his eyebrows at you, “It’s not a big deal. Freydis wouldn’t share it and they aren’t here. Do you honestly think I’d be that reckless?”

“If I can’t share it with anyone how come you get to without discussing it,” you demanded. It bothered you. A lot. “We’re supposed to be a team.”

Freydis shifted uncomfortably, “I think this is my cue to go. Obviously things are a little tense. Look, I promise you two that I won’t go around sharing this.” She stood up and collected her things.

“I think that’s a good idea. You’re fine, Freydis. My issue is with my not-boyfriend,” you admitted, anger evident in your tone.

“Good luck with the wedding,” Freydis waved before leaving. Her walk was a little faster than a normal one.

“What the hell was that,” Ivar demanded the moment Freydis was out of ear shot. He turned to face you and it was the first time he looked at you since you showed up. His eyes were intense and narrowed in anger.

Your jaw tightened, “I should be asking you the same question. Why were you even talking to her? Let alone telling her our entire plan. You realize that I go to prison if it gets out, right? You can stay here and live out your perfect fantasy but I rot in a cell!” You stood up and wanted to leave.

“I’m not going to blow anything up! Freydis won’t tell. We’ll get married as we planned, divorced in three years. No one gets hurt.”

But you already were. And you couldn’t identify why.

“Oh and who’s gonna believe that we’re a real couple getting married if they just see something like that! You ignored me the entire time just to stare at her perfectly symmetrical face!”

Ivar’s face went from anger to confusion for a moment. “No one saw it. I’m not bringing her to my home or reintroducing her. It was one interaction. What’s wrong with me wanting to see an old friend.”

“But she’s not just your friend, right,” you reminded him.

Ivar froze and hesitated to respond for a moment. “How do you know that?”

You tried to calm down but you could feel yourself spiraling. “Torvi told me about her at the dress fitting. Everything she knew.” You bit your bottom lip, Ivar remained silent. “I’m your fiancée! Okay? So just— just stop looking at her!” You didn’t understand why it bothered you so much. You hoped it was just for appearances. “I just need this to go well. We’re supposed to be working together. That wasn’t together.”

“What happened to wanting to not argue,” Ivar challenged. “And over her? I haven’t seen Freydis in a long time. It’s not like I’m proposing to her.” Tears threatened to leave your eyes and Ivar’s face fell. “Whoa— hey, Y/N. It’s okay. I didn’t do anything. I don’t love her, I was just catching up. I didn’t think it would matter so much.”

You didn’t either. “Maybe.” You didn’t really have a right to care beyond him telling Freydis who you actually were. And if you were being honest that isn’t what you really minded. “I don’t know why it does. Things are just happening fast. I keep losing control over my life right now.”

Ivar wasn’t good at trying to comfort people, he awkwardly placed a hand on your shoulder and patted it. “You should’ve said something. I would’ve tried to help.”

You laughed softly and shook your head. “Yesterday you told me that you would've helped me if I asked for it.”

Ivar rolled his eyes, “well I lied. You should be used to that by now.”

“I don’t like her,” you admitted, “she’s way too nice.” There was nothing genuine to hate her for. She didn’t step on your toes or was rude. “I can’t even imagine you dating her. She doesn’t look like she could bite back.”

Ivar found it a little amusing. “I didn’t usually bite at her to begin with. Not that you’d know. Torvi shouldn’t have said anything. It wasn’t her place— and nor was it mine to tell Freydis the truth.”

“At least you admit it.” So what gripe could you have left?

“Were you jealous,” Ivar asked suddenly.

“No!” Your face got red at the idea. “Of course not. How could I be jealous of that?” Were you jealous?

“Okay,” he nodded his head. “Then I’ll just put this out there. As friends. I’m choosing to marry you. Not her, you. If I wanted to have married Freydis I would’ve.”

For some reason the words calmed you down a bit more. “Not that you could’ve, she's way too beautiful for you.” You found yourself easily relaxing into petty insults.

“You’re just jealous she’s better looking than you.” He knew a new way to get under your skin and didn’t hesitate to take a shot at you.

Your face fell.

“Just because I made a poor choice in who I choose to marry doesn’t it isn’t true. It’s my legs that are broken, not my eyes.”

“You are so mean!” Your voice filled with a bit of dramatic hurt.

“You insulted me first. And if I’m being honest, I’ve been incredibly patient with you today. So I deserved to say it. You went off on me for no reason. If you were anyone else I would’ve said something to actually hurt you,” Ivar replied. “Like how you have no family. Or you’re only so jealous because no one’s ever truly loved you the way you believe I love her— something to that effect.”

That’s when it occurred to you that Ivar didn’t respond like he normally would. Like he used to. He tolerated your display of anger and worked with you rather than get defensive and attack in any meaningful way.

“This is the part where you apologize,” Ivar nodded to you. “Or at least thank me.”

You didn’t want to. “You’re right,” you sighed. “Thanks.”

Ivar shrugged, “you’ve tolerated me when I’ve gotten angry over nothing. I figured I’d return the favor.” He took a moment before deciding to share more. “I broke up with her, by the way. Before I left. I decided that being here and knowing her was all I knew. I haven’t loved her for a long time. I certainly wouldn’t lose my job over her.”

Your eyes locked with his. “Torvi made it sound like—“

“None of them know. That’s why you don’t rely on rumors, Y/N. You could’ve just asked.” He didn’t seem to mind it. “You went off the rails today,” Ivar sipped his coffee and he eyed you. He was calm about it too. As if he didn’t mind this simple truth.

“I’m sorry.” It all seemed really dumb right now. “You’re right. It’s just all been… a lot. Things are moving fast. I thought you were just another thing running ahead of me.”

“You’re supposed to be the one keeping me in check,” Ivar teased. “It’s strange being the sane one for once.”

You rolled your eyes, “I slipped up once. Don't expect it to happen again.”

But that didn't solve the nagging in the back of your mind. Why was that the final straw?

—

taglist** @youbloodymadgenius @heavenly1927 @momowhoo

[hajimewhore]

Love Letter To You 💌 (Iwaizumi Hajime/Reader)

on [Ao3]

➸Rated T, fem!Reader, 7k+words  ➷Fluff, some angst, humor, confessions, misunderstandings, twins with Tooru   ➷You’ve had a longtime crush on Iwaizumi Hajime, and you can honestly say you don’t recall ever not having a crush on him. He’s your best friend, who also happens to be your twin brother’s best friend.

But that’s the problem, he’s still just your best friend.

What better way to tell him how you feel than through a letter confessing your feelings? Nothing could go wrong with that marvelous plan.

[Masterlist]

You let out a long sigh of defeat, scribbling across the page uselessly.

Realistically it’s a waste of ink if you’re just going to crumple the page and toss it anyways, but it provides some minor release of frustration at least.

Helplessly, you unlock your phone to google ‘How to write a love letter—‘ before entirely giving up on that idea.

Red faced and slightly embarrassed at the thought of resorting to a shitty wikihow article on love letters, you bury your face in your arms.

Taking that moment to collect yourself, you dive back into writing the confession letter to your longtime crush and friend, Iwaizumi Hajime.

Easier thought than done of course, but you’re sick of dancing around the topic and dragging it out.

You, Hajime, and your brother Tooru, are in your third year now. It’s better to rip the bandaid off, your older sister told you once.

But she’s married, and has Takeru. Needless to say you’re a little bitter to listen to her advice when she’s got everything sorted out, and when her husband was the one who confessed first.

You let out a whine of frustration, she is right in the end, she always is.

...Especially considering you’ve harbored this crush for quite some time now.

You sigh, tapping your lip with the edge of your pen.

Hajime isn’t one for dramatics, so simplicity is best. But there obviously needs to be more than ‘I like you’ scrawled on the page.

Instead, you decide to just write out a ‘I can’t believe I’m doing this but here goes nothing,’ (more like everything).

The line is followed by why you like him to begin with.

His strength, his passion, his humor, the other adjectives that follow suit, the fact he doesn’t let Tooru get away with being manipulative and bad mannered, all the good qualities that made you fall for Hajime.

And well, you’ve liked him for a long time. And you’d hate to let it go without ever having tried to tell him.

“Hey, can you—“

The previously mentioned bad mannered Tooru bursts in your room unannounced, and you let out a squeak in your surprise. You hastily shut the notebook to hide the letter.

“Tooru what the fu—“

“Can you stop yelling for a second? I need a face mask, I’m all out.”

“Can you learn to knock?”

Regardless of your irritation, you shove a face pack into his hands, while pushing him out of your room.

“Jeez, we shared the womb at some point but you cross the line at me coming into your room? We even used to share a bunk bed too! I miss those days.”

He sighs, but it’s cut off by the slamming door in his face.

“Thanks for the face mask!”

His voice is muffled through the door as you hear his footsteps echo down the hall.

Sighing in the relief of his absence, you slip the letter into an envelope and seal it shut.

You’re not even gonna bother to read it over, feeling far too nervous and embarrassed after having actually written out a confession to Hajime. And you don’t want to stress yourself more feeling self conscious about your handwriting, grammar, syntax, and whatever bullshit.

You wish you were bold enough to tell him to his face, feeling the letter might be a bit of a cop out, but you quickly disregard the notion.

Thinking about staring into his dark eyes and professing your love sends chills down your spine, you’re almost positive you’d bolt after barely stuttering out an ‘I like you.’ This way, you’re definitely able to get more than three words out. At least, that’s what you tell yourself to believe this is a good plan.

Now to just get the courage to hand it to him.

When the next day arrives, you find out you never actually gathered the courage to hand it to him.

The morning was spent with Tooru chattering away on the route to school.

Handing a letter to your childhood friend with a heart stamped over it in front of Tooru’s annoyingly perceptive eyes, directly in his field of vision, didn’t sit well with you.

For good reason, he’d definitely be clued in on your crush by the evidence before him. Not to mention Hajime would hate that kind of attention coming from Tooru.

In other words, it was the most inopportune time. You spent the entire walk pink faced and scowling, Hajime eyeing you with a brow raised and Tooru doing his best to lead the conversation for unusually quiet twin.

And that’s why you find yourself shoving it into his locker during practice.

The boys are busy in a set, and the coaches won’t notice you slipping away from your managerial duties for the moment.

“Oh. Oh fuck. I can’t do this!”

You suddenly panic, pressing your hands to your face in mortification.

“What am I doing?!”

But it’s too late, the deed is done, you’ve already gone and slipped the little letter containing all your secret feelings for Hajime between the slots of his locker. And there’s no way you can deface school property by taking a crowbar to the damn thing.

You shuffle out of the locker room, thankfully unnoticed. The last thing you needed in this state of utter disarray was to be caught red faced leaving the men’s locker room.

You just hope Hajime will set the letter aside and you can deal with the consequences later.

Or maybe he’ll set the letter aside permanently and forget of it’s existence entirely. That’d be a good option.

Except for the fact you would never know if he just forgot about the letter, or if he’s just ignoring the contents of it and in turn shutting you down and ruining your friendship and ignoring you for the rest—

The sound of whistle rattles in your eardrums and you jump, startled by the sharp noise.

“Clean up, boys! Head home, get something to eat, and rest well.”

Coach Irihata’s gruffly gives directions, and the team follows with a resounding ‘Yes Coach!’

You spend the entirety of clean up ignoring everyone. Not on purpose, no, but your nerves have absolutely skyrocketed.

When Matsukawa tried to say something to you, you nearly dropped all the water bottles. Thankfully, he caught the end of the box before you could create another mess to clean up.

Whatever he’d said to you went in one ear and out the other, as you caught Hajime’s hard stare at you.

“Sorry about that! Thanks, Mattsun.”

You bow out of the conversation, dipping out before anything else can be exchanged. Mostly so you can physically get yourself out of Hajime’s view, you don’t think you can handle seeing him after he finds what’s in that locker.

You wait outside, contemplating whether you should walk home ahead without Tooru and Hajime. If he stone cold rejects you, you might as well just do that. Knowing Hajime though, he’d never be so callus to you.

There are times he’s reprimanded you for having that patent Shittykawa personality, of course. You hate to admit it, and you’ll never be caught admitting it aloud, but you and Tooru are cut from the same cloth in the end. Though much to your affection, Hajime’s always been more gentle when he raps you on the head. You just hope he retains that same generosity when he inevitably rejects you.

He might just feel the same, though. Thoughts of Hajime pulling you aside to tell you he shares your feelings fill your head. You can almost feel him ruffling your hair, scolding you for being stupid to think otherwise.

The scenario makes you blush, and your hopes rise as you plop onto a bench and resolve yourself to wait.

“Shittykawa better hurry up. I don’t want to have to wait extra time, I swear I’ll ditch him.”

Hajime grumbles, swinging open his locker to pull out his casual wear.

“He said he wanted to talk to Coach Irihata.”

Hanamaki informs, but Hajime just scoffs at the info.

“Probably to get some copies of another team’s match. He’s gonna stay up watching it too, more trouble for his sister to wake him up in the morning.”

Hajime slips a sweater over his head, and the other laughs knowingly at his observation.

“Poor, sweet Oikawa-chan, cursed to be twins with someone as overbearing and overzealous as Oikawa.”

Hanamaki clicks his tongue, pulling a loose tee on, just barely missing the sour look Hajime sends him for the ‘poor, sweet Oikawa-chan’ bit.

“Ah! I-Iwaizumi-senpai, you dropped this!”

Kindaichi is delicately holding some sort of letter, presenting it to Hajime nervously. Why the boy is always so skittish around him he could never understand.

Hajime carefully takes the letter, examining it.

“This isn’t mine.”

He furrows his brow, he’s never seen the thing before.

“It fell out of your locker.”

Kunimi points out, and Hanamaki and Matsukawa choose that moment to tune back in.

“Did an Oikawa love letter get put in the wrong locker?”

Hanamaki teases, and Kunimi chooses that moment to tune out back out.

“What?”

“There’s a heart on it, it’s clearly some girl trying to confess.”

Matsukawa taps the heart sticker sealed over the top.

“Or guy!”

Kindaichi blurts out, and Kunimi rolls his eyes heavily at that.

Hajime goes to shove it into Tooru’s locker, ready to complain about his fanbase diving into the men’s locker room while they’re practicing, but Matsukawa’s swipes the letter from his hands.

“Hold on, you don’t know if it’s actually for Oikawa.”

“Who else would it be for?”

Hajime raises an irritated brow, already wishing he were at home.

“Could be for me.”

Hanamaki winks, tearing the letter open.

“No way, Hanamaki.”

“Oh yes way, Matsukawa.”

The two peer over the contents of the letter with excitement.

Kindaichi mumbles something about invasion of privacy and Kunimi eyes the situation from behind the locker, a little curious after all.

“Dear Hajime,”

Hajime blinks in mild shock at hearing the two words that sound from Hanamaki’s lips.

“Hold on—“

He reaches for the letter in disbelief, but the two swivel to block him out.

“‘I can’t believe I’m doing this. I’ve never done this kind of thing before, but I know you’d understand,’”

Hanamaki reads out, and Matsukawa chimes in,

“That’s cute, she’s embarrassed.”

“‘That’s what I like the most about you. You’re understanding, hardworking,” etcetera, etcetera, haha wait ‘You don’t let Tooru get away with being a brat’,”

Hanamaki practically busts a gut, and Hajime growls out trying to snatch the letter back but Matsukawa’s got it back in his grasp,

“She did not say that.... Hah! She did! Wow, this girl really likes you, Hajime~”

He teasingly refers to him.

“Hey, asshole, give it back.”

“We’re in too deep now, Hajimeee, sorry!”

Hanamaki sidesteps a smack that definitely would’ve left a bruise. Kunimi briefly thinks his senpais should be this level of eager to read in their studies.

“The stationary is really cute too, wish you could see it Haaajiiimee. It’s got little hearts and— no fucking way.”

Hanamaki cuts himself off, and at this point everyone is eyeing the trio’s shenanigans.

“Just give it back, dickhead.”

Hajime glares as Hanamaki points at something on the letter for Matsukawa to see. After a moment of analyzing he bursts into laughter alongside Hanamaki.

Hajime doesn’t think he’s heard Matsukawa laugh this hard about anything, and it’s kind of pissing him off how he’s only choosing now to start being more vocal.

“What the fuck are you laughing about?”

Hajime growls, feeling especially pissed he’s being left out of his own damn letter. The two bumbling, annoyingly tall fools wipe actual tears of laughter away.

“I-It’s not signed!”

Hajime gapes at the response, reaching for the letter again which Hanamaki so graciously allows him to take.

And true to their audio book version of the letter, it writes ‘Dear Hajime,’ at the top, kind words about himself, includes some badmouthing of Shittykawa that he momentarily appreciates, and at the bottom...

“You’re kidding me?”

“I’m sorry man, that sucks.”

Matsukawa pats his back in faux comfort, hiding his snort of laughter.

“And what’s this?”

In his distraction, he didn’t notice Tooru entering the locker room until he’s already plucked the letter from his hands.

“Hey fucker—“

He just got it back, but Tooru is already doing a second rendition of the audio book love letter.

“‘Dear Hajime,’ what the hell? This is so annoying!”

He puts the letter down to glare at Hajime, the look and tone of annoyance send a spike of anger in him.

“What are you on about? You get letters like this all the time!”

He’s ready to beat Tooru’s bratty ass but his response stops him in his tracks,

“Yeah, but not from my sister. I wish she’d write me heartfelt letters like this. But nooo, she’s always ganging up on me with you!”

Tooru angrily pokes him on the chest, but Hajime doesn’t retaliate. His world is spinning.

“What?”

“Oikawa-senpai, that letter wasn’t signed.”

Kunimi informs, very helpfully, and Matsukawa and Hanamaki eye each other with shocked expressions.

“Haaah? You guys are trying to tell me you don’t even recognize your own manager’s handwriting?”

His hands are at his hips, letter clutched between his fingertips.

“Someone as annoyingly perceptive as you might, but the rest of us are still humans.”

Hanamaki bites back, and Matsukawa snatches the letter in place of the dumbfounded Hajime.

“Hey, I didn’t get to read that!”

Tooru growls, but Matsukawa shoves his hand against Tooru’s face before he can lunge for it,

“....I think Iwaizumi’s the only one who should’ve read this.”

He mutters, reaching out to hand the letter back.

You lay seated at the bench, still, elbows to your knees and fingertips interlocked before your mouth. Your leg shakes with impatience and a swell of anxiety.

“What the hell is taking so long!”

You throw your head back with a cry, cupping your cheeks.

In an attempt to resolve the tension you feel coiling in your gut, you slide off the bench to your feet, reentering the gym to a find the stragglers.

Most of the team is already gone, but it’s strange how long the rest are taking. Normally, Kunimi is the first out with Kindaichi following close.

But you’ve yet to see either of them, or Mattsun and Makki.

Tooru is slow as always, that’s a given considering he’s late to practice half the time and late to leave, but Hajime usually keeps him in check.

You haphazardly swing open the locker room door, not caring if any of them aren’t presentable.

“Can you hurry up?! It’s cold out and I don’t wanna walk home by my...self...”

The end of your sentence trails off, losing its bite as you lock eyes with a wide eyed Matsukawa.

Who happens to be holding a letter, a very, very familiar letter.

Your cheeks turn a hot red at the realization, that’s your confession letter for Hajime.

You shift your eyes around the room to assess the damage. Kunimi and Kindaichi are averting their gazes nervously. Hanamaki and Matsukawa look like they want the ground to open up and swallow them whole, guilt written all over their features.

Tooru looks like he’s in the middle of a hissy fit, and you feel humiliated thinking he was here for what more than likely transpired, judging by the open letter in Matsukawa’s hands.

The thing that bothers you the most is Hajime’s slack jawed expression, opening and closing his mouth unsure what to say for once.

You can’t help but take heavy footed steps, the loud stomps echoing the uncomfortably quiet locker room. You feel as if your embarrassment and humiliation is tangible, the sheer awkwardness sitting so thick in the air you could cut it with a knife.

Matsukawa pales when you stand before him, and though he towers over you, he can’t help but feel intimidated by the anger stricken look etched across your face.

You swipe the letter from his hands, the paper sounds with a rip as it crumples in your shaking grasp.

You shift your gaze to Hajime, and Matsukawa almost sighs in relief at the attention being redirected off of him.

You glare, feeling the most contempt and anger for Hajime you’ve ever felt in your life. The petty arguments you had growing up can’t even compare.

“I-I— It wasn’t— I didn’t...“

Hajime can’t come up with anything to say. He’s never been one to stumble over his words, but the misunderstanding is set in stone while the guilt tears away at him.

He doesn’t even know why he’s feeling guilty, he didn’t even do anything wrong. Those lanky bastards stole his stuff from him, and he didn’t even know it was from you to begin with.

But that didn’t stop his heart from sinking when he saw the heartbreak and anger on your face.

“If you didn’t like me, you should’ve just said so. You didn’t have to show everyone!”

You yell out, voice unsteady, covering your face and willing yourself not to cry just yet.

You’re angry that they were reading the letter that was meant for Hajime’s eyes only. Angry that the red blush from the humiliation won’t leave your face, and it only serves to make you more red faced. There’s this sticky hot itch that’s burning at your skin. It’s starting to prickle the back of your neck, you just want to go home.

You thought Hajime would never do something like this, you were almost certain of it. He wasn’t the type to entertain locker room talk and banter about girls with his guy friends. And you definitely didn’t think he’d be the type to let your friends make a joke of you by reading out your stupid love letter.

You should’ve never written it in the first place.

“Hey, we didn’t know—“

Hanamaki tries but you’re quick to interrupt him,

“I’m not talking to you right now Hanamaki!”

He shuts his mouth the second he hears your scratchy voice. You didn’t even bother to look back at him, but he can probably guess the look you have on your face. He rubs the back of his neck, lips pressed into a thin line.

Kindaichi is looking at Hanamaki with a sorry expression, and Kunimi’s eyes have been trained on his locker the whole time, silently wringing his hands together.

You feel a pang of guilt wedge it’s way into your already complex fray of emotions, feeling bad for lashing out so hard on him. Feeling bad for making the first years so anxious.

The feelings are only brief. You disregard them when the image your Seijou teammates laughing about the letter inserts itself into your mind.

You sigh, lips pursing as you shift your watery eyes to your feet.

Why isn’t Hajime doing anything?

“Whatever. I’m going home. And don’t follow me.”

You give Hajime one last hard look before turning on your heel, storming out of the locker room.

You make sure to pitch the letter in the garbage on the way out, cursing the flimsy paper for causing so much turmoil.

You wait to exit the gym before you let the floodgates open.

Tears pour down your face, as you head back home.

At some point you stop bothering to wipe them away, since they just keep coming.

The sounds of the night fill your ears, cars passing by and wildlife calling out, but it’s still so quiet.

The lonely walk leaves you entertaining intrusive thoughts. How could Hajime feel the same way? It was foolish to think there was a chance, you’re his best friend, and his other best friend’s twin.

He must have felt so uncomfortable when he saw the contents of the letter. So grossed out he just had to show the rest of the guys in there.

The things Hajime did that once melted your heart nearly make you cringe, had it been platonic the whole time? And now you’ve misread it and ruined all those special moments, you’ve practically gone and reset your relationship status to strangers.

The head pats and hair ruffles. His rough hand, much bigger than yours, running through your locks or petting your head.

The rare, genuine smile he gives you alone. You swear you’ve only caught it on the volleyball court a few times, but it fills you with butterflies to see it in the comfort of your movie nights.

When you walk home together while Tooru is off gallivanting or practicing, he always makes sure to take you to your doorstep. Something you never understood considering you live next door to him, but it filled you with warmth every time.

The tears pool out harder when you think about how you’re going to lose all of it.

You let the thoughts snowball in your head, wondering how you’ll recover from this, how you’ll get over it, as the hot tears drip down you’re chin to the concrete.

The boys are left to stew in the silence of your wake.

None of them knew what to say, they only just realized it was their manager’s letter to Hajime moments before.

“Kunimi, Kindaichi,”

The two stiffen when they hear Tooru’s voice, his expression is neutral but his usual cheery tone is swapped for a terse, stern one.

“Get home. I know you two weren’t a part of this.”

The two nod tight lipped at their captain, collecting their bags. Kunimi keeps his eyes at his feet, and Kindaichi risks a glance at the upperclassman to see their faces turned down with regret. Hajime looks worse, brows furrowed and clearly distraught. He bites his lip before swiftly making his exit with Kunimi.

“Oikawa, you know we had no idea she wrote it.”

Hanamaki sighs, finishing what he didn’t get to say earlier.

“I don’t care, the damage is already done Hanamaki. You assholes are the reason my precious little sister is walking home, alone, to cry herself to sleep.”

Tooru’s gaze is as harsh as his words, the normal light in his honey brown eyes is traded for a darker look.

Normally, Hanamaki would correct Tooru by saying he’s only a few minutes older, but the current situation and the way his captain neglected to call him ‘Makki’ for once makes him abandon the idea promptly.

“I expect full handwritten apologies from both of you at practice tomorrow.”

Tooru demands, folding his arms across his chest.

“Honestly I don’t think she wants to see another letter—“

Matsukawa quiets himself as soon as Tooru whips his head to stare him down with narrowed eyes.

“Yep. On it. We’ll get to it right now.”

Matsukawa presses his hand to Hanamaki’s back and pushes him forward, briefly wondering if Tooru will let them leave the locker room.

But once their passed him, and out the threshold of the gym, they exhale deeply.

 “You’re awfully quiet.”

Tooru turns his attention to Hajime, and the furrow in his brows and his scowl only deepens.

“I don’t want to be scolded by you right now, Oikawa.”

Hajime’s voice is rough. Tooru merely shrugs, arms still crossed.

“Fine. I won’t then. You look terrible enough already.”

Hajime would glare at him if he had the capacity to right now.

Tooru raises his brow expectantly after a beat of silence, though Hajime doesn’t know what expectations he could possibly have for him.

He’s dumbfounded, shocked, irritated, guilt ridden, honestly feels like dog shit at the moment, but at the same time...

“She likes me?”

Hajime covers his mouth and mutters lowly under his breath, but Tooru hears his realization and rolls his eyes with as much drama as he could muster.

“Did you miss her whole rant?! Or did you not read the letter?”

Tooru huffs, taking a few long strides to pluck the tattered paper from the trash.

“Of course I did! It’s all I can’t think about right now!”

Tooru cuts Hajime off by shoving the letter into his chest roughly. Hajime reaches up reflexively to grab it, feeling a bit somber at the torn state of it.

“I’m going home. Don’t come over.”

Hajime doesn’t think he could face you in his current state anyways, or yours for that matter. He saw your watery eyes holding back tears, and doesn’t think he can handle seeing you cry because of him.

“And get your shit together by tomorrow morning, yeah?”

The way Tooru tacks a smile at the end of that sentence makes Hajime want to hit him, but he knows Tooru’s right to act so bitter. For once.

“Yeah.”

He mutters, carefully folding the letter.

“Oh,”

Tooru stops in his tracks at the entrance to the locker room, causing Hajime to glance up.

“If you break my sister’s heart, I’m beating you up.”

Tooru calls out, tossing the gym keys to him. Hajime catches it with ease, while gritting his teeth.

That’s fair. He’d honestly have to let him, he’d hate to break your heart. He hates that it’s breaking right now.

“And if you date my sister, I’m gonna beat you up.”

Tooru pokes his tongue out and flashes a peace sign. So it’s a lose-lose?!

“Just go home, Shittykawa!”

Hajime spins around to hide the flush growing on his cheeks, willing himself to not beat Tooru’s ass for today.

He sits on the bench gathering his thoughts, giving time for Tooru to get a head start. He’d rather not awkwardly trail a few steps behind him while contemplating his relationship dilemmas.

“She likes me.”

He finds himself repeating, pressing a closed fist to his lips.

“...and she thinks that I don’t like her.”

Hajime groans, covering his face in his frustration.

A knock sounds at your door, and you’re positive it’s Tooru. He has a pretentious way of knocking. You’re also positive you don’t want to see him.

You turn over on your side, burying your face into the plethora of blankets and pillows you’ve huddled yourself into.

If you pretend to sleep, maybe he’ll go away.

“I know you aren’t sleeping!”

Tooru’s voice calls through the door, with an annoying lilt.

Curse this damn twin telepathy or whatever the fuck you call it.

You slide out of bed wiping a few more tears, knowing he’s not going to leave unless he gets his way.

“How’d you know?”

You open the door, giving space for him to enter.

“Hah! How could you after getting so brutally humiliated, heartbroken, and embarrassed?”

He makes himself at home on your bed and you grimace at the sheer audacity of it all.

“I should’ve put on the deadbolt when I got home and locked you out of the house entirely.”

You take a seat beside him, eyes catching the convenience store bag on his lap.

“Kidding, of course. I think it was worse for them. The way you stared down Mattsun? I thought he was gonna pass out. And you shut Makki up real quick too. Ahh, they must feel terrible.”

He eagerly recounts, and you’re suddenly reminded of what a bad personality your brother has.

“Don’t remind me.”

You sigh, after having time to think about it you started to feel a little bad for the way you reacted, they clearly looked guilty, and they’re your friends too.

“Don’t worry, I chewed them out. They’ve got a surprise for you tomorrow.”

You’ve already been dreading tomorrow, but Tooru doesn’t give you time to question what he means by his comment. He’s rustling through the bag, piling your favorite snacks and ice cream flavor onto your lap.

“Ice cream too? I must’ve looked pathetic!”

Though ice cream seems like a classically depressing heartbreak treat to have, you smile for the first time that night.

“You still do! Eat up.”

He cheers, procuring a spoon seemingly out of nowhere. You choose to ignore that comment this time.

“I thought ‘It’s bad to binge junk food, and especially so late at night’!”

You recount part of Tooru’s endless nagging when he caught you and Hajime during a movie night. Truthfully you think he was just jealous and feeling especially spiteful that he wasn’t a part of it.

“It is, but I’ll excuse it this once.”

He turns his nose up bitterly, and you can tell he’s recalling the same memory.

“Thank you, Tooru.”

You’re speak softly, almost brought to more tears at how thoughtful he’s been after the incident.

“Don’t sweat it. And don’t get too bent out of shape over Iwa-chan. You know he’s a good guy. When he’s not hitting and insulting me.”

He frowns, rubbing his arm as if he got a phantom pain.

“He’s the best when he’s doing that though!”

You’re crying again, much to your dismay, and you turn away from Tooru to eat your ice cream in tears.

“Let it out. Tomorrow’s a new day, alright? And at least get some sleep.”

He pats your head, and you feel the bed shift as he stands up to leave the room.

“You too! Don’t think I didn’t see you with those Karasuno and Shiratorizawa match history dvds!”

You call out through your sniffling teariness, and he sticks his tongue at you before leaving the room.

You set the snacks aside with a sigh, leaning back against the wall.

Your head is practically swimming, feeling overwhelmed by the events in the locker room as well as Tooru’s kindness (and semi-crypticness).

You tried to heed Tooru’s advice for once and attempted to get some semblance of rest, but you ended up sleeping rather poorly.

And to top it off, you’re lacking extra sleep considering you woke up earlier than normal. That was intentional though, entirely so you could skip walking to school with Tooru and Hajime.

Especially Hajime. You’re not sure you can face him just yet. The thought alone makes you want to explode.

You toe your shoes on at the door and sling your school bag over your shoulder, braving yourself for the day that awaits you.

When you swing the front door open, in some grand cosmic scheme the universe has against you, who do you see sitting on the steps before your house?

Iwaizumi fucking Hajime, of course.

“Iwaizumi fucking Hajime.”

You huff, just who you absolutely did not want to see.

Your name leaves his lips in his surprise. Upon hearing his own name being so bitterly called, he quickly stumbles to stand up.

Hajime averts his eyes, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Hey.”

Is what he comes up with.

“Hey? How long have you been sitting out here?”

A frown tugs at your lips, and you try not to let your eyes water at the sight of his face alone.

“I figured you’d try to leave early, I wanted to catch you before then. So... maybe an hour?”

He runs a hand through his hair, and you try to hide your shock at the information. Upon closer inspection, it looks like he hadn’t slept much either. Though, somehow, he still manages to look that rugged type of handsome. You kick that dangerous line of thinking to the curb before it continues.

“An hour?!”

“I didn’t get the chance to talk to you last night, after... yeah. I wanted to give you some space.”

He trails off and you bite your lip, readying yourself for the rejection speedily approaching.

You simply nod for him to continue. You don’t think you can trust your voice right now, and you feel your knees turn to jelly, shaking from the anxiety resurfacing.

“Your letter,”

You glance up when you hear the ruffling paper from his pocket. When he unfolds it, you see that it’s been smoothed out and the rips from having been recklessly snatched from Matsukawa’s hands have been carefully taped.

Your heart swells at the sight of the repair, but you bite down the hope that’s starting to peak.

 “You didn’t sign it.”

. . .

“Hah?”

You blink at him, jaw dropping dumbly.

“You forgot to sign it. I didn’t know it was from you at first.”

He grins at your animated reaction, and you’re once again caught up in how handsome he looks with a smile on his face.

You quickly shake that thought, physically and mentally. Your cheeks bloom pink as you grab for the letter.

“I didn’t?!”

You’re eyes scan to the bottom of the page, and you notice that you in fact did not sign the damn letter.

How could you be so careless?!

You suddenly recall Tooru clamoring into your room for a face mask like some heathen that has no respect or morals for personal boundaries. You also remember that it caused you to scramble to hide the letter. After you’d been interrupted, you just sealed the note away.

“Tooru...”

You growl out, hiding your face with the page in your embarrassment.

Hajime laughs lowly at that, he doesn’t need any context to believe it turned out to be Tooru’s fault.

“Matsukawa and Hanamaki we’re dicks to steal it from me and read it, but we didn’t know it was from you until Shittykawa busted in and ranted about your handwriting.”

“Tooru...!”

You’re a broken record now, actively cursing your brother for his transgressions.

Hajime plucks the letter hiding your face to get a good look at you.

You’re mind practically soft resets at the cool expression and his dark green eyes.

“I’m sorry. This probably could’ve been avoided if I had just confessed to you first.”

He mutters softly, red starting to creep on his features.

“No, it’s not your fau— wait what?”

You must be hallucinating. That, or you’re unconscious and the part of your brain that handles dream production is being a huge asshole right now.

Hajime sighs, nervously running his hand through his hair again,

“I should’ve just told you I liked you sooner. Honestly, I’m kind of embarrassed you had more guts to do it first.”

“You like me?!”

You step closer, peering up at his face to find any tells for a lie or signs of a really convincing Iwaizumi Hajime imposter.

“It’s what I said, isn’t it?! Don’t make me repeat myself a third time.”

He presses his palms to your shoulders to take a step back, the proximity of your blushing and eager face is making him short circuit.

The fabric of your uniform sadly prevents any contact with skin, but you still feel yourself heating up at the touch of his hands resting on your shoulders.

“I... really?!”

“I think I’ve liked you for a long time, but I only realized it this year.”

It’s cute you can tell how hard he’s trying to maintain eye contact and keep a straight face.

You break out into a grin, wrapping your arms around his neck.

“Hajime! You even said you didn’t want to say it a third time, but you did anyways!”

You hold him tight and he stutters a ‘Shut up!’ at you, the normal bite behind the retort is completely lost.

You pull back a bit to catch his eyes, and his lips turn down in that usual scowl. You laugh softly, the expression is severely displaced in juxtaposition to his now brightly colored cheeks.

You stand at the edge of your toes and pull him close, lips catching his. The sound of his shock from the abrupt, bold action is muffled.

Hajime quickly leans into it, his wide eyes slip shut as he moves his hands to caress your neck.

Your lips part from his so you can peak through your lashes to see the expression on his face. You’re only briefly able to admire Hajime’s handsome features and rosy colored cheeks, before he chases the kiss to reconnect your lips.

It’s more than you ever imagined, and you’ve definitely imagined what it would be like to kiss Hajime multiple times.

His hands are steady, thumb delicately brushing your jawline, he’s leaned close to match your height, and he kisses so intensely, showing a rare sweetness that Hajime can only reserve for someone he trusts.

Before it can escalate any further while you’re both on the Oikawa doorstep with the Iwaizumi household next door, you separate with a content smile.

You’re eyes are practically glittering, arms still rested around his shoulders. His impassioned gaze stares intently at your every feature,

“You’re so perfect, how did I get so lucky?”

And you’re almost drawn into another kiss but—

“Are you two gonna block the doorway all day? We have school you know.”

Tooru decides to make his entrance then, and he would’ve wacked you with the door if Hajime hadn’t been quick to pull you closer.

“What are you gonna do? Beat me up?”

He gives a knowing look to Tooru, a shitty grin crossing Hajime’s features.

“...if it were any other guy, I probably would. But I’m glad she chose you.”

Tooru steps around the two of you with a soft smile, leading the way to school.

Hajime stutters, and let’s out a huff at Tooru’s unusual display of sincerity.

“That brat is trying to act like the better man. He sure changed his mind overnight...”

Hajime stalls for a moment, before deciding to slip his arm from around you and his hand into yours, threading your fingers together.

“Tooru will be Tooru.”

You shrug, enjoying the feeling of his larger hand laced with yours.

“You mean Oikawas will be Oikawas. You’re both brats with bad personalities.”

He snorts, walking forward and gently pulling you along.

“What’s that supposed to mean?!”

You retort, and Tooru, embarrassingly enough, happened to say the same thing in perfect unison.

Hajime laughs loudly at that, and despite the tease you find yourself laughing with him.

Leaning into his shoulder, the constant smile is starting to make your cheeks sore, but you find yourself looking forward to feeling it more often now that you’re with Hajime.

Bonus:

Hanamaki and Matsukawa stand before you the second you enter the gymnasium.

“Wha—?”

“Oikawa-chan. We’re very sorry we read your letter,”

Hanamaki starts and Matsukawa continues,

“It was wrong of us to do, and we feel really guilty about it,”

They simultaneously produce letters from their pockets,

“Please accept our apology.”

They say in unison, and you can’t help but let a laugh burst from your lips. You’re bent over and clutching your stomach, nearly in stitches when you see their deadly serious expressions.

“Did you guys practice this?!”

You snort, this must be what Tooru meant when he said these two tall bastards had a surprise for you.

You accept the letters nonetheless.

“I’m guessing this is Tooru’s doing.”

You carefully open the letters, pulling Matsukawa’s first.

“Who else would it be?”

He grunts out.

“I see you two did your homework!”

Tooru calls from the door, entering the gym alongside Hajime.

“They really did it, huh.”

Hajime slings his arm around your shoulder, and you feel warm at the comfortable gesture.

“We’re men of our word, of course we did.”

Matsukawa shifts on his other foot, resting his hand on his hip.

“Right, of course. You don’t mind if I read this out loud then, do you Mattsun?”

You’re eyes glint with mischief and Tooru cheers excitedly, Hajime muffles a laugh beside you.

“Actually, I do mind—“

“That’s weird I’m already reading it out loud DEAR OIKAWA-CHAN,”

Matsukawa rolls his eyes, the irony cuts deep here.

“What is this, a love letter?”

Tooru jabs and Hajime immediately sends Matsukawa a sour look,

“She’s taken.”

You almost stutter reading aloud the apology when Hajime’s grip tightens around you.

“So this is karma.”

Matsukawa mutters with a light blush of embarrassment, feeling thankful he kept his letter concise so he didn’t have to sit through much more of that.

“Ahh, you don’t have to read mine right now. Practice is starting soon. Look, Kunimi and Kindaichi are ready to start!”

Hanamaki thinks he’s being sneaky, dragging his underclassmen into the matter, but he honestly just made this so much worse for himself.

“I’ll wait.”

Kunimi gives a bored expression, face tucked into his track jacket lapels. Kindaichi just stutters his agreement beside him.

Hanamaki sends him a look that probably translates to something like ‘you little bastard I’m gonna make you work so hard this practice’.

“Well go on dear sister, I wanna see what Makki came up with.”

Tooru wraps an arm around Hanamaki, who’s feeling very tempted to throw Tooru off of him for making him and Matsukawa go through this mockery.

“I’m invested now.”

Hajime voice sounds close to your ear as he leans close, you glance up and smile softly to see him peer over your shoulder at the letter.

“It’s genius, really. I put my heart and soul into it.”

Hanamaki tries to brush it off, but you bark out a laugh immediately after.

“Hey, don’t laugh at my heartfelt apology!”

Hanamaki complains, but you can’t stop the laughter erupting from you.

“Yeah, don’t laugh at his heartfelt apology.”

Matsukawa aids, already having been on the receiving end of the jests.

“I’m sorry Makki but... you forgot to sign it!”

You point at the letter, and Hanamaki stutters as he reaches to give it a once over. Matsukawa just rubs his forehead at the irony doubling.

“Tsk, Makki, Makki, rookie mistake.”

Tooru pats his back comfortingly, but it feels more like he’s mocking him than anything. Which he definitely is.

“How could I have known it was from you?”

You stick your tongue out at him teasingly.

“You didn’t sign yours, you know.”

Hajime pokes your cheek and you flush. The absolute betrayal, from your new boyfriend no less.

“Hajimeeee, I know! But we’re supposed to be making fun of them, not me! I was humiliated enough last night! They need to feel it too!”

You point accusingly at the two in question, and they raise a brow at your display of contempt.

“Not everything has to be turned into some revenge plot, Oikawa twins.”

Hajime pinches your cheeks and glares at Tooru for good measure.

“He’s right, you know.”

Matsukawa points out, feeling especially inclined to agree considering him and Hanamaki were at the butt end of the counter humiliation scheme.

“The audacity—“

Tooru starts, and you chime in,

“The nerve, my own boyfriend!”

“My best friend!”

“You should be encouraging me.”

“You should be encouraging her, but also me—“

“Enough already, you brats!”

Hajime smacks Tooru in the gut, before gently tapping you on the head with his knuckles.

“Iwa-chan, that’s blatant favoritism!”

Tooru coughs out, clutching his side.

“Get used to it.”

He grunts out, and despite being reprimanded by Hajime, you gently touch the spot on your head he tapped with a soft smile.

You preen at the soft way he scolds you. The warmth of his arm wrapped around you, his gentle looks of content to you when he thinks no one is looking, it sends the butterflies in your stomach crazy.

It’s all for you, and it’s hard to believe that Hajime is finally your boyfriend now—

“THIRD YEARS, STOP LOITERING AND GET PRACTICING!”

A/N:

Tada! 🎉 my first official fic!

Hope you enjoyed! If you could tell, I love drama. And humor. My asks are open, so shoot me a message! ���・ᴥ・▼

[Masterlist]

[scuttle-buttle]

Mi querida Bee:

Today I achieved the great task of waking up (as you know I was up until 7 a.m. 😬) to go and see my cousin, because that is what one usually does on the first day of the year have a late lunch with friends or family. My cousin has 3 children, my mom told me that us reminded of them, thought she meant because they are two girls and a boy just like my sisters and me. Later we were with my sisters and my nieces in their playroom they were playing "the beauty salon" so they insisted on giving me a treatment too lol so my sister braided my hair and one of my nieces saw one of my scars when I fell so she insisted on giving me a band-aid, now I am the proud owner of a unicorn band-aid according to her that will make me heal faster- they also painted my nails I'm being nice they painted all my fingers later my little nephew appeared to see his sisters to make sure they weren't fighting and I realized... 😮 oh that's what my mom meant when she said that they reminded them of us 🤣 He told me that I shouldn't paint my nails because "it's not something that boys do" but since I'm not here for that kind of energy lol I told him that boys can paint their nails and his face went like really? 🥺 so long story short now we both have matching beautiful sparkling nails he was so happy he even went to showed it up to his mom and mine.

Today was a nice even though I was kinda sleepy all day

🔥-N

This is the absolute cutest thing okay. I would've paid to see that cuteness. Absolutely adorable. Wow 🥺 you get the award for the best uncle ever sorry I don't make the rules you must accept it. And we love shutting down toxic masculinity 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

I do think I need to know two things though:

What color are your sparkly nails?

Were there any hair bows or clips involved?

I've said it before and I'll say it again you are living my dream life 😭 meanwhile I spent the whole day still taking benadryl and putting on lotions and remedies to fight off my continuing allergic reaction. I live a sad life comparatively. Maybe what I really need is one of those rainbow unicorn bandaids

[buckysnumberonegirl]

Flash forward- Finders Keepers

Part 7

Read parts 1-6here

Warnings: plot development, fluff, angst

Parings- past!Hugh Drysdale x Reader, Gabe Jones x reader

Hi hi everyone who's reading this, I know this series is a long one and I appreciate everyone being patient with me as time passes. I’m quite happy with this chapter

Word count 1.4K

You weren’t sure what time it was when you got to Base camp. Walking into the building you ran into Howard who told you how sorry he was for your loss. “I met James a few times, he was a good soldier and a great man” Howard patted you on the back, excusing himself.

Gabe and the other commandos were all sat together having a drink. He stood and walked over to you when he saw you enter their room “Y/N what are you doing here are you okay?” As soon as he said it he regretted the question.

“Of course you’re not okay I’m sorry for even asking, come sit down with us” he walked you over to the table where the rest of the men were, pulling you onto his lap. You put an arm around his neck as the men all talked about your cousin. You thought back to when you were children.

With little wooden guns you ran around your grandmother's backyard, on a top secret mission no one really knew the point of. Bucky took the lead as you crossed the log that fell across the creek. Running up into the woods the three of you giggled. You heard Bucky “ come on Steve you can’t slow down or we’ll get caught!”

‘Bucky he needs to breath’ you rubbed Steve’s back before he shot up “I can do this all day” he took off deeper into the woods. The three of you made your way into the old treehouse, hidden deep within the woods, a safe haven for you. You all sat on the floor pushing aside leaves and dust that had settled. Bucky gave you a wicked grin as he pulled out a pocket knife “ I read in a book once this thing called a blood pact, I think we should do one” he looked between you and Steve. “How do we do it?” Steve seemed nervous about the whole thing, he looked at you and you blushed. “Well we cut our finger and then we shake hands and say a saying or something that we’ll be together forever”

‘I like it let’s do it!’ You reached for the pocket knife making a small cut on both your index fingers, Bucky and Steve followed suit the three of you shook hands together giggling about what you were doing. “I know what our saying should be guys, I’m with you till the end of the line”

You and Steve repeated the phrase and you all agreed. You pulled a tiny first aid kit from out of your pocket handing everyone two little bandaids. You heard your grandmother calling, so the three of you scurried down the later before taking off. Bucky shouted like a war cry “the three of us! Till the end of the line!”

You looked down at your hands, they were folded in your lap. Holding out your two index fingers a tear fell as you saw the small white lines that matched up.

You wondered if Steve could see the same thing.

‘Gabe honey I should get going’ you kissed him before sitting up waving goodbye to the rest of the group. They met you with a chorus of goodbyes and condolences. “I’ll walk you home Y/N, it’s late.”

You didn’t argue, walking silently through London. When you got to your apartment game kissed you goodnight “are you sure you don’t want me to stay?” He looked into your eyes, and for a moment you felt the weight of the sadness you carried lift. ‘I’m sure, go home Gabe, I’ll come by in the morning’ you kissed his cheeks and smiled at him as he walked away.

You twist the knob to your apartment doorways to slide your key into the lock, but it pushes open.

You walk inside, an aching feeling washing over you along with a sense of dread. Something is wrong. You go to flip on a light when you see a dark figure sitting at your table. “You know Dove I’m hurt that you’d move on so fast”

The voice was dark but you knew ‘Hugh what are you doing here’

“Oh please, You were mine first” he spat on your floor. “How many night has he been here Y/N. I can’t believe I believe you when you said you wanted to wait until marriage. I hope he was worth it” you felt panic rise in your throat. You remember Peggy telling you there was a button installed under your kitchen counter, if you could get to it you would alert base camp that something was wrong. ‘Hugh I don’t know what your talking about, Gabes spent the night but we never’

Hugh shot up from the table, walking over you in less than 4 strides. “Don’t lie to me dove, it’s unbecoming of a woman” he walked into your kitchen, opening the cabinet he pulled out two wine glasses. You took this as your opportunity, walking into the kitchen with him and hitting the button while he reached into the fridge for a bottle of wine.

When you slid your finger off the button it made the tiniest click.

Hugh looked up at you and sighed, pouring the wine and handing you a glass “drink with me dove we don’t have long now until your friends get here” he took a sip from his glass. “What did I just say, drink” his voice was angry. You took a sip, Hugh grabbed the bottom of the glass and tipped it up forcing you to finish it.

“You know my plan was to keep you here, my own little pet as the world fell into place. We captured your cousin to use him as motivation for you when you stepped out of line but of course your captain America saved him. Had I known that I would have picked a different location. You see little dove you never had any control over this. We needed you and your cousin to weaken the Captain. But you, you have exceeded my expectations by also getting one of the commandos to fall in love with you. The team will fall apart when you go missing” he stopped speaking, your head felt like it was full of water. You dropped the wine glass and felt Hugh grab you. “What a shame that your lover will get here to find you gone. But do not worry my little dove I don’t plan on killing you, just hiding you away until we get rid of some of our problems”

You passed out shortly after that. Hugh carried you to his car and watched the outside of your building with glee. Steve arrived first, running at an almost inhuman speed into the building. Followed by a car with Peggy and Howard. Peggy jumped out gun in hand and ran in only to come out seconds later Steve following her. In Steve’s hand was the note Hugh had placed.

Hydra is always one step ahead Captain Rogers. Give up now and the girl will remain safe.

You woke up in a cold room. Your clothes had been changed and you were alone. You had no idea how long it had been but you knew everything felt wrong. Hugh walked into the room, smiling. “Your captain is Dead my dear, gone from this world after his plane crashed.”

You screamed hitting Hugh in the chest with your fists until he grabbed you, pushing you against the wall of the room. “ Do not test me girl I am the only reason you are alive, anger me and they will kill you” a gunshot rang throughout the room. Hughs weight fell against you three men entered the room two of them lifting Hughs body and carrying him away. You looked at the trail of blood and felt tears stream down your face.

The man in the room offered you a tissue. “ I apologize my dear, he was a poor representation of what we are, although he is correct in that your Captain has been dealt with.” You looked at the red skull embroidered on his suit... Hydra. Another man entered the room looking at you. “What should we do with her sir”

The man who had given you a tissue gave you a smile “she knows too much I’m afraid, but she will be helpful in controlling the wolf…” he paused “put her on ice and bring her to Serbia we will use her if Soldat gets out of hand”.

You were grabbed and dragged down the hall. You screamed and begged to be let go but there was nothing. They restrained your wrists and placed you in a small glass cylinder, it was cold enough that the touch of the metal stung where it touched you. You felt it get colder and colder within a matter of seconds you could no longer move. Just before everything went dark you swore, that soldier looked just like Bucky. A thought crossed your mind as you felt the knives of ice press into you you smiled a faint almost peaceful smile, So this was the end of the line. Then, everything went black.

[syrupa]

Hello there! I hope you are fine. I jist found you and I need to say, since I'm gay for these girls I'm absolutely delighted! If match-ups are open, I'd like to have a romantic matchup!

So uh I'm 17, INFP, a pisces and a pansexual, I use she/her pronouns. My love languages are words of affirmation and physical touch.

For the hobbies; I love watching anime, literature, myths, listening and observing people, comforting people or just listen their rantings, reading, listening music and singing.... I am not that good at gardening and stuff but sometimes I do this as well...

For my personality, I'm that mom-friend that every friend group has. Need some painkillers? BAM! Need some pads? Do you need 1 or 50? You are hurt? Don't worry I have an aid kit. Your stomach or head hurts? Honey, don't you worry I have a various kind of herb teas with myself.

If someone needs a shoulder to cry on, that person is me. If somebody hurts my friends I go like "So you are saying that he/she/they broke your heart? Okay give me the names and addresses. Now."I would deal with them and then say "So do I need to break some more faces?"

But I'm actually very kind and smiley. I'm the kind of person who smiles at strangers, hold the door for them, talk with a waiter casually and smile at them as well. I never judge someone for their nationality, skin color, language, sexuality etc. And If I see someone bully another person for these reasons or another one, I stand against the bully and if needed I beat them. Yet, I'm one hell of an insecure and anxious girl and I bite my lips a lot and I also pick at the skin of my fingers when I'm absolutely anxious and always carry band-aids to cover them because a few people in my family( not my parents though) made me feel bad about them but still, I don't like showing this vulnerable state of mine to everyone so I bottle up everything.

I may seem like an cold and serious person at first meeting but over time I'm the biggest goofball and crackhead you can ever see! Sometimes I'm a bit sarcastic and tease my closest friends a lot- ofc I never offend them. I know what they are insecure about( if they are, WHICH isn't allowed on my watch.) and my friends always tell me that I kinda flirt with them but I never realize and When I actually try to flirt, I can't? But I also know how to be serious as well.

My ideal date would probably be an indoor one. Like cooking together, watching a movie or reading a book or just cuddling while some soft music plays in the background.

For my likes and dislikes, I HATE the unnecessary hate. Like, to everyone and everything. Be it black people, asians, LGBTQ+ people, animals, like anyone living! I believe that everyone's life( except a few shits' 😡😤) is a gift so I seriously don't understand hate. I also hate eggplant since I have an allergy and the last time I ate it, I did vomit for 3 days🤮

For the likes, I guess I cannot really pinpoint something but I love books and every meal with chicken🤤! I also love cleaning and tidying up too!

That was soooo long and I apologize for that! I didn't want to include more since I literally poured everything about me here 😅 Thanks a lot in advance and I hope you have a great day! Bye bye👋

I match you with...

Toru Hagakure

You'd meet on a public bus. The two of you sat next to each other, minding each others business. However, Toru noticed you picking at your fingers. She lightly tapped your shoulder and offered you a napkin to cover it with. You kindly declined, telling her that you had some bandaids but she insisted you have the napkin just incase. In the end you thanked her and took the napkin.

After that, Toru started some small talk. Of course, you went along with it. The conversation went very well. She was a pretty funny girl who had you laughing a lot. Your interaction went so smooth, from afar it would look like you've been friends for ages. When she had to get off, she asked for your number. You happily gave it to her and she waved you goodbye.

You and Toru would message and meet up with each other often. If you said you didn't fancy the girl you would be lying. She was funny, nice, and cheerful! Who wouldn't? It started out as a small crush. But of course, it turned into you thinking about her 24/7. You had even started to drop everything just to hang out with her. In return, she would do the same for you.

Your other friends would tease you for this. To them, it was pretty obvious you liked Toru more than a friend. Your friends also noticed how she was always talking about you. She would try to message or be with you every second of the day. She'd also buy you little gifts saying they reminded her of you. Hell, she would even leave lingering touches. They told you all of this, wanting you to just confess. But, you would always tell them that you probably didn't deserve a girl like her and how she was just being kind.

This went on for almost two years. Two years of hanging out with her every single day. Two years of hiding your feelings for this girl. Your friends had stopped trying to get you to confess, thinking this was a hopeless situation. But Toru's friends on the other hand had just started. Mina had came up with a dramatic idea for Toru to confess. The invisible girl obviously didn't want to go through with the plan, saying she'd confess someday. But that didn't stop Mina.

One night while you were studying, you heard a noise from your window. You quietly opened the window, expecting it to be a bird or something. When you looked out, you saw Toru and her friends outside in cheerleading outfits. Toru was clearly embarrassed as Ochako put on some cheesy love song on from a speaker. They proceeded to perform a quick dance. In all honesty, it was pretty bad. But you'd be lying if you said it wasn't cute. At the end of the dance, Mina had shouted that Toru wanted to take you out someday. Giggling, you shouted back that you'd love to go out sometime.

Although that was extremely cringy and cheesy, it was funny and made for a fucking fantastic story to tell.

Once you finally made it offical, Toru became very clingy. She loved holding your hand and hugging you when you're not expecting it. After long and hard days, she'd pamper your face in kisses. On sleepless nights, you'd cuddle with her and read her mythical stories until you both fell asleep.

She adores how reliable you are. She often feels like a background character in her own life and doubts her abilities to become a hero. You're quick to comfort her and make sure she knows her worth. Of course, she does the same for you. Checking up on you, complimenting you, comforting you, etc. Toru is basically your personal cheerleader for life. When you're insecure or anxious, leave it to your loving girlfriend to reassure you and kiss your worries away!

She started carrying bandaids around herself for you. Even though you always have some, she brings extra just in case. When you started dating her though, you'd pick at your fingers less since she always wanted to hold hands. Whenever you're biting your lip, she taps your shoulder and asks you for a kiss.

When you accidentally flirt with her she gets really giggly and nervous. She never brought it up cause she didn't want to embarrass you so she just took it. It's so cute that you started to flirt with her on purpose. Once she realized you were doing it on purpose, she playfully hit your arm and said something along the lines of, "YOU CAN'T SAY THINGS LIKE THAT [NAME]!"

Sometimes you and her lay down in her bed together while she rambles about her day. It's really relaxing for both of you. She likes to talk a lot and you like to listen. It's perfect! Also it's an excuse to hear her beautiful voice.

She started picking up on your motherly acts. Always providing everything people need with little to no hesitation, being the shoulder for her friends to cry on, etc. Toru really looks up to you and can say with confidence that you make her an overall better person.

Your playlist consist of many love songs. I don't make the rules. Also she encourages you to sing all the time. She loves hearing your voice. And when you two sing together? AAAAAAAA It's very cute and adorable. Everyone you meet is 100% at least a little jealous of your relationship.

Baking dates are her favorite! She's obviously not the best at baking but those dates are always filled with laughter and smiles. On those dates, you two try to make loads of desserts. Cookies, Cakes, Cinnamon Buns, etc. You both know it's not healthy but neither of you really care. The kitchen always ends up messy after these days. Once you and Toru decide it's time to call it a night, the day ends with midnight cuddles whilst a movie plays in the background.

[marwritesgood]

Changes | S. Harrington

Pairing: Steve x Henderson!Reader

Timeframe: Season 3

Summary: When Dustin asks his sister to take him to Scoops Ahoy so he can see Steve, she knows it’s time to break the news to him.

masterlist

A/N: Send your requests in! I’m finishing Season 3 as we speak.

“Henderson! He’s back!”

When Dustin kept nagging me to drive him to Starcourt so he could see Steve for the first time since getting back from camp, I would have never anticipated the greeting they gave one another the minute Steve bursted through the doors.

“You got the job,” Dustin exclaimed, grinning happily. I knew he was disappointed about not reaching Suzie, and his friends not welcoming the way he wanted, so it was nice to see him happy again for a change.

“I got the job!” Steve laughed back, matching Dustin’s enthusiasm, something I had gotten mildly used to during our time together over the summer so far. 

After the two exchanged a complex, yet extremely dorky handshake, I sighed and leaned against the counter. Robin and I shared an amused glance, before turning our attention back to the two boys who were giggling, for having completed their elaborate handshake which ended with them pretending to vomit. Classic.

“How many children are you friends with?” Robin asked from behind the register. I tried my best to stifle the urge to laugh, but Steve’s inability to respond to her question sent me reeling.

“Okay, alright,” he droned, acting like he didn’t appreciate mine and Robin’s amusement, however, his unfazed grin suggested otherwise. “Henderson, you look like you’re in need of some ice cream, yeah? On the house.”

“Alright,” Dustin cheered. I didn’t think it would be possible for his mood to improve even more, but ice cream has that kind of effect on people. “I could go for a banana split boat.”

“You got it,” Steve answered, before turning to me with a smirk. “I think I might need an extra set of hands though, since Robin’s working the counter-”

“Oh jeez,” Robin sighed, knowing exactly where he was going with this.

“Y/n? Could you gimme some help?”

“Suuure,” I answered, in my artificially sweet tone. I hadn’t broken the news to Dustin yet, that Steve and I were dating, and he was making it really difficult to hide with all of his smirks and side glances. “Dusty, go save us a table and we’ll bring it out to you, yeah?”

“Okay,” he answered, too overcome with joy and excitement to take note of anything weird in our behaviour. Thank goodness.

After Dustin began walking towards the closest empty table he could find, Steve took my hand and gently pulled me along as he hastily made his way to the back room of Ships Ahoy, making sure my little brother wasn’t looking.

“You haven’t told him yet, have you?”

“I tried to,” I said, trying to reason with him. We had agreed that I would tell Dustin about our relationship as soon as he got home from camp, but with his friends surprising him and him getting disappointed when he couldn’t reach Suzie, it got increasingly difficult to bring up. “But then Mike and El bailed on him, and he couldn’t get Suzie to reply so Lucas and Max still don’t believe she’s real, and I didn’t want to overwhelm him.”

“Babe, slow down,” Steve said softly, placing both of his hands on my shoulders and breathing deeply, so that I could follow.

“He was just really bummed out,” I explained. “And he was super excited to see you, and I didn’t wanna change that.”

“Okay, I get it. We’ll just tell him now. Together... After we give him the ice cream, yeah?” I nodded after chuckling lightly. “But, I gotta ask... Was he... The only one excited to come see me again?”

He didn’t wait a second, to pull me closer to him, and snaking his arms around my lower back. As he leaned in towards me, staring intently at my lips, I placed my hand on his shoulders and kept him from getting any closer.

“What are you doing? He can probably see our silhouettes.”

“Aw, c’mon,” he whined, frowning as he reluctantly leaned back. He still kept his around me, and gently tightened his grasp. “I haven’t seen you all week. Can’t I have just one kiss before we break your little brother’s heart?”

“Well I’ll be damned. Do my ears deceive me?” I gasped dramatically, before linking my fingers together behind his neck. “Have I been transported to an alternate dimension, or is the Steve Harrington actually begging?”

“You know what you do to me,” he leaned close and whispered in my ear. It was needless to say that, even after years of dealing with his bullshit, and almost an entire month of dealing with his whining, he still knew just what to say to make my heart jump.

“Tell you what,” I began, before slowing pulling away from Steve, who reluctantly released his grasp. “You help me get through breaking the news to Dustin, and I’ll consider ‘accidentally’ making my way over to your place after I drop him off at home. Deal?”

I hold my hand out for him to shake, the way we always would when making deals. A tradition that dates back to our time together in middle school. But, instead of shaking my hand, Steve takes hold of it, lifts it up, and kisses the back of it. Before I can react, he quickly turns towards the ice cream tubs, and begins assembling the banana split boat.

“You’re such a dork,” I laughed, before helping him with the toppings. 

After we finished Dustin’s banana split, I held the door open for Steve so he could take it to the table where he sat. We had been in the back room for at least twenty minutes, but Dustin’s excitement remained unfazed. This both warmed my heart and brought me a strong feeling of unease. 

“Hey Y/n,” Robin called out to me, as I followed Steve towards the table. When I turned to face her, she held out a cone with two scoops of my favourite flavour of ice cream. “For you... You look like you need it.”

“Angel, Robin,” I muttered, before eagerly taking the ice cream from her hands. “You are an angel. A whole fucking guardian one.”

She tipped her hat off, making me chuckle, before I turned to see Steve sitting with Dustin. I walked over to their table, and sat on the left side , so that Dustin was inbetween Steve and I. They were in the middle of a conversation about Suzie, Dustin’s girlfriend. 

“No way,” Steve said, shaking his head at Dustin, who lifted a heaped spoonful of ice cream to his mouth. “Hotter than Phoebe Cates? No way.”

“What was that Steve?” I asked in annoyance, daring him to call another woman hot in front of me again. He quickly realised I was at the table too, and smiled cheekily at me. “Hm? Oh, nothing,” he answered.

“So do you really just get to eat as much of this as you want?” 

Dustin was an easily mesmerised kid, I knew that better than anyone. The prospect of free unlimited food, however, was something he will forever be blown away by.

“Yeah, I mean sure,” Steve shrugged. “It’s not really a good idea for me, though. You know, ‘cause I gotta keep in shape for...”

I raised my eyebrows, and Robin did too from her spot all the way from behind the register. Was this really how he wanted to tell my little brother we were dating? Steven quickly noticed my expression of concern, and kept himself from finishing the sentence with my name.

“... the ladies.”

“The ladies?” Dustin repeated, amused by Steve’s response.

“Yeah, the ladies, Steve?” I repeated, in a more aggressive tone, with eyebrows still raised and eyes widened. Steve found my expression entertaining, and smiled playfully in response

“Yeah. The ladies,” he affirmed. “One girl in particular, actually. She’s about Y/n’s height. Works with Miss Byers at Melvald’s. I think you know her?”

“She sounds like a real catch,” I exclaimed, whilst smiling proudly.

“Ehh,” Steve muttered, tilting his head from side to side. I pretended to be angry, and glared playfully at him. He returned the favour. “She’s alright. Never lets me kiss her, though. And her family members are a little weird.”

“Is that so?” I asked dramatically, crossing my arms in an exaggerated manner.

“Oh yeah,” he answered, a bit too quickly for my likings. “She has this little brother-”

Before we could keep playing the little act we found ourselves playing, Dustin cut in. Only then did we realise how confused the poor kid must have been, and how horrible of a job we were doing in easing him into the news. Perhaps the bandaid approach was our only option.

“What’s going on? Am I missing something?”

“We... We have to tell you something,” Steve explained, before nodding towards me. Once Dustin turned to face me, I took a deep breath before beginning. 

“Buddy,” I murmured, causing Dustin to immediately groan as though he were in excruciating pain. “What?”

“You only call me buddy when you tell me bad news,” he said, and just like that his expression was completely drained of all the joy and enthusiasm he was initially overflowed with after his reunion with Steve. “So, what is it this time? Are you moving away? Is Steve terminally ill? Did you two go on a date while I was away?”

I suppose for a kid who grew up playing DnD, we should have anticipated he would be great at figuring out what people are gonna do or say next. When Steve and I remained silent, Dustin’s jaw dropped.

“You guys went on a date while I was away?!”

“No,” Steve answered defensively, trying to get Dustin to calm down. “I’ve taken her out on at least 7 dates while you were away.”

I lifted my hand up to my face and sighed. Robin did the same, having been able to see and hear everything that was happening. 

“WHAT?!”

“Dusty, calm down,” I said softly, placing my hand on his shoulder, less in an attempt to soothe him and more as a precautionary measure in case he stood up to do something. 

“My sister, Steve?... Really? Of all the girls in this fucking town, you decide to go for my sister.”

“Hey,” I cried out in offence.

“Ugh, you know what I mean,” Dustin says, frustrated. “Why didn’t you guys tell me? Y/n, you sent me two whole letters while I was away... You didn’t think the fact that you and Steve were sucking faces is something important to note in?”

“I knew you’d react like this,” I explained calmly, trying to mellow down the mood of our conversation. 

“Because everything is changing,” he cried. I glanced over at Steve briefly, and he looked just as gutted as I was. After taking yet another deep breath, I wrapped my arm around Dustin’s shoulder.

“Look, Dusty, I get that a lot of things are changing,” I began. “But change doesn’t always have to be a bad thing.”

“Yeah,” Steve chimed in. “And just because Y/n and I are- I don’t wanna say sucking faces.”

“Yeah, please don’t,” I warned.

“Just because we’re going out, doesn’t mean anything else is gonna change too,” he explained. “Y/n’s still gonna be your sister, and I’ll still be here for you whenever you need. If anything, things are changing for the better.”

I had to hand it to him. Steve would make a great mom.

“I guess it is pretty cool that you guys are sucking faces.”

“-Again, I do not like that phrase,” I muttered, making both of them chuckle.

“And I s’pose if anyone’s gonna date my sister, I’m glad it’s you, Steve, and not someone like... Like that guy you were talking about before- Matt Lewinsky.”

“Right?! That guy is so lame. Spent all of last season on the bench.”

“Okay, moving on,” I said, as I rolled my eyes. I had heard enough of Steve’s complaints about Lewinsky to last a lifetime. I was not about to sit and listen to another one. “Are you okay now, Dust? Are we good?”

“Yeah,” he sighed, before reaching for the rest of his banana split. “Just... Don’t... do couple stuff in front of me. I’m cool with you two dating, but that doesn’t mean I’m not weirded out by it.”

“So, you’re saying it’d be weird for you if I did this?”

As Dustin leaned over to finish his banana split, Steve stood up as much as he could, and leaned towards me, pecking my lips quickly, but long enough for my little brother to squirm. I giggled, both amused by Steve’s antics and relieved that our relationship was out in the open now.

“I finally got my fucking kiss,” Steve stated proudly, completely unbothered by how very visibly bothered Dustin was. 

Deep down, we both knew the kid was happy that of all the teenagers falling in love this summer, his sister and the guy he looked up to did so with one another.

[thompsborn]

Can I get 👉👈 a Flash centric one shot 👉👈 for the song shuffle thing 👉👈

you were good to me by jeremy zucker, chelsea cutler

leavin' isn't better than tryin'

growin', but i'm just growin' tired

now i'm worried for my soul

and i'm still scared of growin' old

you were good to me

and i'm so used to letting go

but i don't wanna be alone

you were good to me

god only knows where our fears go

hearts i've broke, now my tears flow

you'll see that i'm sorry

'cause you were good to me

you were good to me

[send me a character/ship/dynamic/etc. and i’ll put my music on shuffle and write a drabble/one shot based on the first song that plays!]

actually i’m gonna wait to take more shuffle song requests until after i finish the ones i still have in my drafts!!

-

i was debating how i wanted to approach this and then earlier today @peachy-keener sent me messages about flash x harley which i already lowkey shipped before but now,,,,,,,, But Now,,,,,, they live rent free in my brain. but this is flash centric!! this is less harleyflash and more PRE-harleyflash. also post endgame.

the ending is abrupt and not good but i genuinely cannot figure out how i want to move forward so that’s the end! that’s it!

(it isn’t stated explicitly, but peterxnedxmj)

-

tw: rough childhood implications for harley, descriptions of neglectful parenting and verbal abuse, cycle of abuse, getting kicked out of the house, loneliness. it’s a hopeful ending though!! even if it is abrupt and not very good!!

-

Flash meets Harley Keener after the worst morning of his entire fucking life.

They’re going back to school, because of fucking course they are—barely two weeks have passed since Flash reappeared on the steps leading up to MoMA, tripped over his own two feet in his haste to get a grip on his bearings, and prompty slips on a step and lands nose first into the concrete, a crunch filling his ears. The public hasn’t even gotten a full release about what the hell happened—just a basic press conference, where Steve Rogers, clad in stained sweatpants and with bags under his eyes, a side of him that the public has never seen, handed his shield over to a teary eyed Sam Wilson and promised transparency and honesty, the entire story from start to finish with nothing held back, as soon as they recovered enough to give it all.

Flash doesn’t want to go back to school, except for the fact that he definitely does, if only for the chance of semblance of normalcy.

Everything is different now, after the snap. Or, the re-snap—second snap, the return, the blip, whatever the hell people are calling it. He doesn’t care about what it ends up being called. He just knows that nothing is the same, now.

His sister wasn’t one of the ones who lived those five years, crumbled to ash (dust?)just like Flash did, and he despises the meer idea of Jesse staring down at her hands in terror while watching them disappear and him not being there to at least offer comfort, or something, but he’s selfishly grateful, as well. He didn’t miss a second of her growing up. She’s only thirteen to his sixteen, after all—had she lived, he would have come back to his baby sister being a year older than him, likely a completely different person, like all the shells of people he’s seen on the streets, shells that only ignite with life when they find the person they lost. Christ, Jesse could have been one of those shells.

Thinking about it makes shivers run down his spine, his stomach churn.. He hates it. He hates how close he was to losing that.

God, he hates them—his parents, or the sorry excuse of parents that they are. He hates that he’s coming back from being dead for five years to a step-mom and a step-dad, both of whom clearly despise the fact that they’re expected to help raise these two kids who are just lost and terrified and trying to adjust. They both moved to bigger houses—that are, at the very least, still in the same neighborhood and no more than a ten minute walk apart, making it a bit easier to handle when, inevitably, Flash gets shoved into his father’s care while Jesse is lovingly enveloped into their mother’s arms.

Their mother, who seemed to care at least a little bit beforehand—always kept bandaids and juice boxes in stock, just because he had a tendency of scraping his knee in elementary school and always wanted a juice box when he got home. Sometimes, she would brush fingers through his hair and promise that she loved him, even if she knew she was awful as showing it—even if she, willingly or not, would always love her daughter more. She had not loved him like a mother, no, but like someone who at least gave a shit about his general well being.

Something—well, again, everything—has changed since before, because his mom never even looks at him anymore, barely manages a glance in his general direction whenever he happens to be nearby, which has been a lot, because the custody battle—which, of course, his father paid great money to make a priority in the courts, and then blamed Flash for because of how far he had to dip into his wallet to make it happen—has taken most of the two weeks, even though it was that first day he was shoved into his father’s house, like they knew what they wanted, like it wasn’t going to be a battle until Flash and Jesse themselves spoke up about how much they didn’t want to be separated.

Of course. More things to blame Flash about.

Which his father—and his wife, Trudy—both do. Something they like to flaunt in his face at every hour of the day, like it isn’t bad enough that he put up a fight and still ended up separated from Jesse, like he isn’t about to go back to school with a still-healing broken nose and living in a house he doesn’t know in a room that was clearly never supposed to be his and—

He wakes up the day he’s supposed to go back to school and stares at an unfamiliar ceiling and none of the posters that he had up before he disappeared, an alarm clock that must have been invented while he was gone blaring obnoxiously in his ear. It immediately sets his teeth on edge, makes his shoulders tense.

Maybe, he hopes, school will be familiar.

But everything has changed.

The school, itself, isn’t completely different, of course—classes are where they’ve always been, even if the names on the desks have changed; bathrooms are still pretty gross and have that high school bathroom smell that, for the first time in existence, he’s kind of glad to come across, if only because it makes him feel like it’s still 2018 and he’s going to walk out the door and see faces that he actually know.

He opens the door and a tall blonde guy walks into it—nose first, of course, whips his head back with a yelp and brings a hand up to poke at his nostrils, looks down a moment later and frowns at the crimson shining on the tips of his fingers, and then looks up at Flash.

Instead of anger, he grins, all crooked and boyish, and says, “Hey, we match!”

“We...” Flash trails off, confused; this guy doesn’t even sound like a New Yorker. Has the normal New York accent changed, too? The dude sound souther, for fucks sake. “What?”

Bloody fingers point at Flash’s face—actually, really, at his nose, still bandaged. “That. Noses, y’know? Pretty sure that just broke mine, so—”

“Oh, god,” Flash groans, head dropping to his hands. “Please tell me you’re joking, man.”

Stupidly, the guy pokes at his nose again—this time, at the slightly noticable crook towards the end. He sucks in a sharp breath, winces, and says, “Well, it ain’t feelin’ all that great...”

Flash groans again. “Of fucking course I just broke someone’s fucking nose. Of course.”

“Uh...” The guy frowns, glancing down as a drop of blood falls on the tip of his shoe. “S’alright. You didn’t do it on purpose, so—”

Instantly, Flash chokes on a stupidly bitter laugh. “Not like that’ll matter,” he murmurs.

“So,” the guy goes on, either not hearing Flash’s interjection or choosing not to react to it, “I don’t see what the problem is, here.”

“Of course you don’t,” Flash says, laughing again. “No one—” he stops, brows furrowing as he shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter,” he says, shouldering his backpack with a sigh. “C’mon.”

The guy doesn’t follow when Flash starts walking. When he looks back, the guy is visibly confused. “Why am I following you to a random place, and why are you looking at me like I’m the one who’s being weird right now?”

“The office,” Flash says, instead of providing, like, a real answer. The guy looks even more lost, even looks over his shoulder like Flash is talking to someone else entirely. Flash sighs. “I just broke your nose, man. We have to go to the office so you can get it checked out and tell them what happened. Call home, too, probably, since you’re pretty sure it’s actually broken.”

The guy tilts his head. “We?”

Flash’s frown deepens into a grimace. “Yeah.”

“I think I’m a bit confused, here...”

Groaning once again, Flash gestures down the hallway, in the direction he had been trying to walk, and says, “We need to tell them—”

“That I walked into a door?”

“That I broke your nose!” Flash exclaims.

The guy crinkles his nose before immediately flinching and smoothening it out. “You opened a door. The door that broke my nose because I walked into it. That’s not your fault.”

Flash stares at him, beyond confused and borderline incredulous, but he’s also tired and he doesn’t know this guy or most of the people currently attending this school and his dad married a woman who hates him and his mom also apparently hates him now, too, and he’s living in a guest room that he knows was made specifically for Trudy’s parents to visit them and Jesse doesn’t like mom’s new husband (Flash doesn’t know his name; he wasn’t introduced to the guy and was always lost in his head whenever the judge occasionally brought it up during the custody ordeal) and she misses living together but she’s becoming less and less bitter every day, gushes about how much mom spoils her and peppers her face with kisses and cries while blubbering over how much she missed her and, Christ, no one missed him!

No one. No one wanted him to come back.

“Whatever,” he tells this stranger, no longer seeing the guy, no longer caring.

He doesn’t look back when he walks away.

-

Harley Keener—as Flash later learns, since he apparently has fifth period with the guy—is, of course, friends with Parker.

Parker, who Flash will never admit to admiring, will never vocalize how jealous he is of everything that Peter has, greets Harley with a small smile, and maybe, if Flash hadn’t instantly scoffed and looked away, he could have noticed the look of understanding and grief that the both of them wore.

Though, he can’t deny, seeing someone he actually knows makes things easier. Or, at least, it does for a few seconds, until he sees the way that Leeds is quiet, staring down at his hands a lot, looking at Parker like he’s looking at a gravestone, glancing at Jones, who is damn near stoic, with pain in his features. Until he notices all the ways that they’re different, too.

He sinks his teeth into his lower lip, tastes copper, and doesn’t pay attention to the teacher—who he doesn’t fucking know.

Nothing is the same, he thinks.

Not a single god damn thing.

-

Flash finishes his junior year with no friends, bimonthly weekend visits with his sister, and so much anger burning in his veins that he spits insults at anyone who crosses his path, people who don’t get it, who will never understand.

“You’re a fucking hick that’s probably here on scholarship,” Flash snarls when Harley tries to interfere a verbal beating of a random kid who looks like he isn’t old enough to drive just yet.

Harley’s eyes harden, and his nose—not as straight, now, as it once was, a constant reminder of the break that healed just a little bit wrong—crinkles. He looks conflicted about the situation, and Flash knows that Harley has, for the past few months, been nothing but a kind stranger that tries to talk to Flash in the halls, who always asks how he is and how his day is going and doesn’t even deflate when Flash acts like it’s a hinderance, because Flash doesn’t know how to accept kindness, to react when someone seems to give a shit about him.

Jesse cares—loves him, of course. But Jesse is making friends at her school, and she’s adapting in a way that Flash can’t seem to do.

Harley is a person, a random person, who shows interest whenever he has the opportunity to talk to Flash. Who acts like, maybe, he might kind of care, too.

“Do you think anyone gives a shit about you?” Flash asks—seeing Harley’s face in front of him, sure, but his words are directed at only himself, unable to accept the idea of a stranger caring about him. “You’re nothing,” he says. “You don’t fucking matter, alright? No one fucking cares!”

And then, Parker—in a blur of motion, something awful and protective battling on his face—is standing between them. His teeth are bared like an animal, eyes burning, as he spits out, “Do not talk to him like that.”

“Peter,” Harley tries, voice weak.

Having none of it, apparently, Parker ignores his protest, tells Flash, who is shellshocked by seeing Peter genuinely furious for the first time since tripping him in the halls as freshman, “I don’t give a shit what you say to me, Flash, I’ve put up with it for years, but you do not talk like that to—to anyone else, but especially not to one of the only family members I have left!”

A wounded noise rumbles from Harley’s throat, but Flash—Flash is furious. Because, really, at least Parker has people—he has an aunt who is a better parent than either of his have ever been, friends who are so loving and protective that it feels like they’re in love with the guy ninety-nine percent of the time, and Harley, too? Harley, who has tears in his eyes and Flash doesn’t know if it’s because of his words or Peter’s, who reaches forward and yanks Peter back towards him. “Peter,” he says again, more forcefully now. “It’s fine, dude. Let’s just go.”

Parker sets his jaw and glares at Flash like his life depends on it. Flash, of course, decides to open his fucking mouth and says, “Sure, just go back to people who probably hate you—”

He doesn’t know where he’s going with that, but he doesn’t get the chance to before Ned fucking Leeds steps in front of him and swings.

He starts summer with another broken nose.

Sure, he deserves it—but it sucks, nonetheless.

-

At the start of senior year, Harley approaches him and, for some reason, apoligizes

“What?” Flash says—the only that that comes to mind, sometimes standalone, sometimes followed by an even more incredulous the fuck?

“M’sorry,” Harley repeats. “Pete shouldn’t’ve yelled at you like that, and Ned—Christ Almighty, he’s a sweetheart, but him and Michelle would do anything for Pete, and when they thought you were sayin’ that shit to him, there wasn’t nothin’ that could’ve stopped ‘em.”

Flash frowns. “Dude... what the fuck?”

Harley mirrors his frown, tilts his head to the side. “What? Am I not makin’ sense?”

“You’re apologizing,” Flash says. “To me.”

Slowly, Harley nods. “Yeah, I am.”

Flash shakes his head. “Why?”

“‘Cause you weren’t sayin’ that shit to me and Pete, that’s why,” Harley answers, almost matter of fact and simple. “I know it.” All Flash can manage to do is shake his head again, not understanding what the hell Harley is talking about, until Harley glances away, brings a hand up to scratch nervously at the back of his neck, and murmurs, “I mean... I get what it’s like, saying somethin’ about someone else that you really mean about yourself... y’know?”

He doesn’t have any semblance of control when his features go blank, when his shoulders are drawn up, defensive, disbelieveing. “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

Harley smiles. He smiles. “Yeah, I know what it’s like to play stupid, too. Seriously—I get it.”

No one gets it, Flash thinks.

He doesn’t say it. Or anything, really.

All he does is walk away.

-

He walks away later that day, when Harley tries to approach him. He turns tail and bolts the second he sees blond hair in the distance, whether it’s Harley or not—does this for days, and then weeks, and then—

And then Harley stops trying to approach him.

Flash doesn’t get why that fact makes him heavy, his brain a taunting repetition of knew that no one cared, knew it, knew it, knew it.

Oddly enough, it hurts more than usual.

-

He graduates.

No one is in the crowd for him—his mother planned a vacation with her husband (still nameless, since Flash doesn’t care enough to learn it anyway) and Jesse that just so happened to line up with graduation. Trudy and Harrison stopped acknoledging him entirely a few months after he came back, unless out of absolute necessity and usually with scathing commentary that burn every single time.

A few people clap for him—and he knows, once he sees that it’s Harley and Peter and Ned and Michelle, that he doesn’t deserve it.

Too nice, all of them. Acting like they give a shit.

Always too damn nice.

-

It hits him, after he gets kicked out.

Hits him, suddenly, how badly he fucked it all up. How he took an opportunity that he didn’t deserve and pushed it away. Harley had wanted to be friends, had cared, whether Flash understood why or not, and Flash had been awkward and unsure and ruined everything.

He sits on the curb with a suitcase. Only one, because it’s all he had time to pack before being shoved harshly onto the streets.

Though he wants to, he doesn’t cry.

-

It’s a miracle that the number hasn’t changed.

It’s an even bigger miracle that Harley, apparently, never deleted his number after what happened, after obtaining it only because he had prompted Flash about wanting to join the Decathlon team and asked if he could text him questions about it later that day, before—

Well. Before, but after. Before Flash destroyed what he didn’t even gave, but after everything shifted, changed, began to hurt.

Miraculous doesn’t even begin to describe the slightly hopeful tone when Harley answers and, without hesitating, asks, “Flash? You there?”

Doesn’t deserve it—god, Flash should be getting spat on right now—but he needs it, now more than ever. Holding his phone tighter, he stammers out a shaky, “Y-Yeah.”

“What’s wrong?”

Maybe his voice gave it away. Maybe the fact that he’s reaching out at all. Maybe Harley just knows. Flash isn’t sure the how about it, only able to focus on making his tongue cooperate with him as he breathes out a broken kind of, “I’m sorry, I—about everything, but I—I have no one else to call and you were—the only one, y’know, who was—who was nice to me—”

There’s a faint jingle. “Where are you?”

“I don’t know,” Flash whispers, trying to blink through the tears that suddenly fill his eyes, swallowing roughly. “I just—I started walking, once it hit that I didn’t know where I should go, and I—fuck, I shouldn’t have called.”

“‘ey,” Harley says, tone—firm, angry. “I dunno what you’re thinkin’, but I’m the best person you could have called. I’m on my way, okay?”

Flash closes his eyes. “You shouldn’t.”

“Well,” Harley says, “I’m not turnin’ around.”

-

He doesn’t cry.

He doesn’t, untill Harley steps out of a car wearing pajama pants and a sweatshirt that’s inside out. Then, of course, he sobs.

Then, of course, Harley cares, like he never should have, and hugs Flash.

Jesse is the only person who has ever hugged him. His mother, almost, when he was really young, but—but no one else. No one.

In Harley’s arms, he melts.

[jitterbugperson]

Talentswap Au Pologue: Part 3

This isn’t getting much attention, but I’m still working on it! I really hope more people see this soon, I’m working hard on it and it’s a real passion of mine. Also sorry for any spelling/grammar mistakes, I didn’t read this over before posting this, I wanted to get it out quickly.

Kaede looks at the list in her hands, and goes through it quickly, not dwelling too long on anyone in particular. Each person got pointed to as she went through the list, allowing Kaito a few seconds to try and memorize and match names to appearances.

Kirumi Tojo, Ultimate Martial Artist- Light green long hair tied up with a ribbon, wearing a  short button up and tie with a few colored bandaids on her arms.

Himiko Yumeno, Ultimate Pop Sensation- Short bob of red hair, wearing a frilly light red and pink dress with several bracelets on her arms and pins in her hair. The one currently putting the colored band-aids on Kirumi’s arms.

Angie Yonaga, Ultimate Clairvoyant - White hair cut straight and short, wearing a  purple cloak, several piercings, scattered tattoos on her exposed skin of her arms, legs, and stomach. Currently talking to Rantaro.

Rantaro Amami, Ultimate Gambler- Short green hair, wearing a vest and bowtie, sleeve of tattoos. Currently listening to Angie ramble.

Gonta Gokuhara, Ultimate Moral Compass- Long green hair in a loose ponytail, very muscular, wearing a school uniform. Trying to get Ryoma to stop smoking

Ryoma Hoshi, Ultimate Biker Gang Leader- Very short, wearing a beanie and leather jacket, carries a pack of cigarettes. Currently smoking and being worried over by Gonta.

Tsumugi Shirogane, Ultimate Swimming Pro- Long blue hair in a high ponytail, wearing a baggy jacket and athletic shorts. Currently talking to Tenko.

Tenko Chabashira, Ultimate Softball Player- Dark green hair in a braid, wearing a star covered ballcap and a jean jacket with pins on it over a t-shirt and pants with holes in them. Currently talking to Tsumugi.

Kiibo Iidabashi, Ultimate Programmer- White hair, wearing a green and grey hoodie and headphones. Currently standing away from the others with his headphones on.

Korekiyo Shinguji, Ultimate Writing Prodigy- Long straight blue hair, round glasses, a small black mask over his mouth, wearing a sweater and jeans. Currently standing next to Kiibo, also away from the main group.

After going through the names, Kaede looks at him with a small smile.

“Got it alright?” She asks, still holding the list. Despite not fully memorizing the people, names, and talents in such a small window of time, he nods. 

“Yup.” He’s lying, but she doesn’t seem to catch on, simply folding the paper and putting it back into her pocket.

Kaito lets his eyes wander, gazing over the grouped up people. For the situation they were all in, they seemed surprisingly put together. At least no one was freaking out, so that’s a good sign. They were all ultimates though, so that is to be expected.

He cleared his throat, turning to Kaede.

“So, what now? None of us know how we got here, the windows are closed off, I’m assuming there’s no exit. And there’s no teachers, from what I’ve seen.” He questioned, almost into thin air as Kaede had no answers for him.

Thankfully, there was someone who could answer his question for him. As soon as he asked the question, an annoyingly high pitched voice called out.

“Ahem! Ahem! Mic check, one two! This is a test of the school broadcast system!

It rang out throughout the room, followed by a loud chime.

Ding dong, bing bong

Everyone turned their heads to the noise, and saw a monitor at the front of the room spark to life. Through static, a small, bear shaped silhouette could be seen.

“Am I on? Can everyone hear me? Okay, well then, to all incoming students, I would like to begin the entrance ceremony! We’ll be starting at about… right now! Please make your way to the gym at your earliest convenience. That’s all! I’ll be waiting~”

After the sing-songy voice cut off, everyone stood silent for a few moments.

What the hell?

“What the hell?!” Someone shouted out, speaking what everyone was thinking. Kaito turned to the voice, seeing Miu still staring at the monitor, her face one of confused shock. At her comment, everyone else looked around nervously, unsure what to do,

“Hey now, let’s just stay calm. This is probably just to get us excited for the entrance ceremony, that’s all.” The green haired guy in the vest and bowtie stepped forward, a calm smile on his face. Rantaro, Kaito reminded himself.

“A-Are you sure? This all seems too strange to be normal for a school, but I don’t know.” The kid with the headphones replied nervously, his headphones now dangling at the sides of his neck.

“I’m sure we’ll be okay Kiibo, I mean, we’re all okay now, right?” Himiko smiles at the taller student, who looked away, avoiding eye contact, and instead stared at the ground. 

“Yeah, alright.” Kiibo nods, and Himiko grabs his hand in a comforting gesture. 

As soon as she does that, there’s a scoff from the front of the entrance hall. Facing the noise, Kaito notices it’s the purple haired kid from earlier, looking at the scene with a small sneer.

Without saying a word, he turns around and walks out of the room, heading down the hall and towards the gymnasium, leaving everyone else behind.

Tenko and Tsumugi exchanged looks.

“What’s his deal?” The girl haired girl commented, snarky and obviously not a fan of his attitude.

“I’m not sure, but he does seem to have the right idea. If the entrance ceremony is starting, wouldn’t it be a good idea to head to the gym?” Tsumugi adds, talking to no one in particular. The others look around, before unanimously deciding that heading to the gym would be the best idea at the moment.

The group of 15 split into smaller groups as they walked down the halls, similar to the groups in the entrance hall. Maki and Shuichi, Tsumugi and Korekiyo, Gonta and Kirumi, Angie, Ryoma, and Rantaro, Tenko, Himiko, and Kiibo, and Kaito, Miu, and Kaede. Together they headed to the gym, the purple haired kid already there waiting for them. 

Next to Kaito, he heard Kaede speak up to both him and Miu.

“Don’t you think it’s odd we didn’t see any other students on our way here?”

Now that he thought about it, yeah that did seem pretty weird. Judging by the look on Miu’s face, she thought so too.

“Hey, you’re right. Where the hell is everyone?” Miu shouts out, a little louder than necessary.

The response she got was similar to Kaito’s in the Entrance Hall, replied to by the same high pitched voice.

“Hey there, howdy, hello! Is everyone here?”

Without waiting for anyone to answer, they continued.

“Good! Then, let’s get things rolling!”

As soon as those words were spoken, a small, animatronic teddy bear popped out from behind the podium on the stage, its body split into a half of black and a half of white. No one dared to move or speak for a few seconds, trying to take it in.

“Is that… a stuffed bear?” Korekiyo asked out loud, voice quiet and full of disbelief.

“I am not a stuffed bear!” The bear cried out, angry at that notion.

“I am Monokuma! This school’s headmaster.”

Just when I thought this day couldn’t get any weirder.

The bear stepped down from the podium and walked closer to the students, and the knot of anxiety that’d slowly been accumulating in Kaito’s stomach turned to outright dread as he realized how absolutely screwed they were. This was definitely not a normal school, much too weird for Hope’s Peak, and certainly not a school that made the tiniest bit of sense.

“Nice to meet you all!” 

After Monokuma finished his introduction, everyone stood still and quiet, just staring at the bear.

“Um, is anyone else seeing and hearing the same thing? I’m not hallucinating this?” Tsumugi asked, looking at the other for confirmation.

“I am not a stuffed bear!! How many times do I have to tell you!” He yelled out angrily, jumping out at her and causing her to flinch back.

“Eeeeek! Get away from me!!” She yelled, putting her hands in front of her face. Quickly, Tenko, who’d been standing next to Tsumugi, jumped in front of her, hands out wide.

“Back up little dude.” The green-haired girl hissed out, glaring at the bear.

“Stop it, both of you!! It’s not like it can do anything to you, even if it can… walk and talk, for some reason.” Kaede tried to reason, not wanting people to get worked up for no reason.

“No no, little miss jumpy over here has the right idea. I could kill you if I wanted!” The bear chuckled, causing a few people to exchange looks.

“Well, anyway, do you happen to know why we’re here, mister...Monokuma?” Gonta speaks up, ignoring the potential death threat in favor of getting some answers.

“Ah, yes! Of course, that is why I brought you all here!” Monokuma exclaims, and a few students relaxed a bit at the notion that their questions would soon be addressed.

Kaito wasn’t one of those. He wasn’t sure why, but he just felt…off. Something wasn't right here, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it.

Monokuma cleared his throat(?).

“Now, continuing with the entrance ceremony! First, we should address what your school life will be like here! Yes, this should be the first thing to talk about since you’ll be living the rest of your lives out here.”

He said it so calmly, yet Kaito felt his heart stop. Looking around at everyone else, they seem to have heard it too, all wearing similar expressions

“Yes yes, you students are the hope of this world! You will all spend the rest of your life designated only to the grounds of this school, protected from the outside world!”

“H-Huh? That’s not… you’re not serious are you?” Kaito spoke, now hoping that this was all an extremely elaborate prank like he’d thought in the beginning.

“I am one hundred percent serious, my little luckster! But do not worry, we have quite the budget, so your life here will be quite comfortable! You will be more than accommodated for here at the academy.”

“Wait, so we’re stuck here? With no way out?!” Tenko shouts, her eyes wide with fear.

“Yup! You’re all completely cut off from the outside world! You can call for help all you want, but you’re stuck within these walls for the rest of your life!”

The room was silent, everyone quietly panicking at the news that they’re stuck in here forever. What about their f”milies? Their friends on the outside? Their lives on the outside?

“Aww, why do you all look so glum! You all came here of your own free will, didn’t you?”

Well, he isn’t entirely wrong.

“I guess you’ll all be happy to hear, there is something I forgot to mention. There is one way out, and only one.”

Everyone perked their heads up at that, some skeptic, others willing to listen.

“I’ve created a special rule, allowing those who wish to leave the ability to do so! With some conditions of course.”

“Spit it out already, we’re tired of waiting.” Ryoma grumbled, looking heavily annoyed at all this stalling and back and forths.

“Hold your horses, I’m getting to that!” The bear shouted, angry.

“Now then, what I was trying to say is that this school has what is called a Graduation Clause. The lifestyle you all will have here is one of order, but should someone interrupt said order, they and they alone would be allowed to leave.”

Kaito quirked an eyebrow.

“Interrupt the order? What does that mean?”

“Ah, curious one, aren’t you. What I mean by that is, in order to leave, someone needs to commit a crime most unspeakable, one that would truly disrupt the natural order. Murder, to be more specific.”

At that, everyone’s face paled a good few shades.

“Asphyxiation, blood loss, snapping of the neck, cutting off all blood flow to the brain, get creative! It doesn’t matter the process, all that matters is someone’s heart stops beating! That is the only way to escape this school.”

Katio could feel his breath picking up, panic becoming the leading emotion in his head. Kill someone to leave? That’s insane!! He was losing his grip, heart beating out of his chest and his hands gripping the sleeves of the others absurdly tight. A hand dropped to his soldier, surprisingly calm. He looked up and saw the Ultimate Affluent Progeny, lips in a taut line as she stared at the black and white bear.

“What makes you think we’ll just go along with this? Do you forget we’re children? The chances of us getting the nerve to kill someone is absolutely absurd, and this is considering you’re telling the truth. Chances are, this is some trick, a prank of some sort. Why someone would go through this much trouble to prank us, I don’t know, but there is no way you would be allowed to do this, considering some of our home lives.” Kaede spoke with such confidence and authority, the kind Kaito likes to pretend to have but could never amount to. A kind of confidence bread by experience, one she could only get in the kind of life she lives.

The bear quirked his little head.

“You all keep acting like this isn’t real. What is it gonna take to convince you that you’re stuck here forever? Because this isn’t a joke you know.”

As soon as Monokuma finished his sentence, there was a short rustling sound, a blur of motion, and suddenly, Monokuma was being held in the air. Holding him up in a death grip was the short purple haired kid, an ice glare on his face.

“I don’t know what your game is, or what psycho decided it would be a fun idea to mess with us. Whatever your reason, I’m not a fan, so I’m giving you about ten seconds to cut this shit out before I destroy your little toy.”

“A-Ah! This is certainly unexpected!”

“10.”

“Hold on now! You have no idea what I’m capable of little boy-” The grip on the bear’s face tightened.

“9.”

“You don’t want to do this, trust me.”

“8.”

“Alright, if this is what you want!”

“8.” An autonomous voice joined in with the smaller boy’s counting.

“7.”

“7.” 

“Hey, m-maybe you should put it down.” Himiko stepped forward towards the boy and the robot.

“Stay out of this!” The boy snapped, causing Himiko to yank her hand back.

“6.”

“6.”

“She has a point, I feel like you should let go of the-” Kirumi tried to reason, but was interrupted.

“5.”

“5.”

There were some metal clanging noises.

“What the hell is that?” Kaito shouted out.

“4.”

“4.”

“Seriously man, put the damn thing down!” Ryoma shouted, but he was ignored as well.”

“3.”

“3.”

“2.”

“2.”

The metal clanging got louder, and Kaito moved before he could think, his panic fueled adrenaline making him do something he normally wouldn’t.

“1.” 

As soon as he spoke the last number, Kaito pushed the bear out of his hands, stopping him from destroying it. The boy turned to the much taller one, the icy glare now directed to him.

“What the he-!” He was cut off as metal spikes sprung out of the belly of Monokuma, shooting straight up and out to the spot the kid previously stood, and still would have if he had still been holding the bear. The spikes pierced through the air, ripping through the fabric on the short kid’s shirt sleeve and the side of Kaito’s sweater, cutting through the skin with the tips of the metal. Both let out a surprised cry of pain, and Monokuma dropped on the floor with a small CLANG.

Kaito gripped his side with his opposite hand, a pained grimace on his face as he stared at the bear. He heard a few startled cries from behind him, and soon felt a pair of hands on his shoulders. Turning around, his face met a worried Miu’s, with Kaede soon behind him.

“Holy shit, you alright dude?” 

Breathing heavily, Kaito nodded.

“Yeah...yeah I’m okay.”

No one had time to move much before the metal spikes returned to the belly of the robot, sinking back in and being covered up as though they weren’t even there in the first place. Monokuma sprung up with a hearty chuckle.

“Looks like you got saved before I could skewer you! Well, at least now you know that I am serious about this! If that nosy kid hadn’t saved your ass, you’d be good as a shish-kebab!”

He laughed again.

“Now, it’s important to know that violence against the headmaster is strictly against the rules! I’ll let you off with a warning this time, but anyone else who disobeys the rules won’t be let off that easily.”

Everyone was silent, the gravity of the situation finally dawning on those who’d been skeptical before.

“I’m not unfair though! I’ll be giving you all fully digital e-Handbooks so that you know the rules of the school and what not to do! Remember, there are surveillance cameras all over the school, so don’t even think about getting away with anything naughty.”

Dread settled over the entire gym, everyone staring down at the handbooks being held to them as Monokuma went down the line. Once all were handed out, Monokuma straightened out.

“Well then, that’s the end of the entrance ceremony! I hope you all have a wonderfully depressing school life here at the school, and I look forward to what kind of murders you decide to come up with!”

He gave us a small wave, his unnerving half-smile still plastering on his face.

“See ya!”

And like that, he was gone, leaving us all to our own devices.

“Well, shit.”

[maxgrayarchived]

Everything You Need in an Apocalypse Emergency Bag

    I was going to do a different post this month, something more writing related, but with the corona virus going on I’ve been slipping very quickly back into my zombie hyperfixation and now all I can think about is the apocalypse. [Fun fact: By the time this has been drafted and edited, that hyperfixation is gone. Hate it when they go so fast] 

My sister was reading that notice or whatever the governor of Virginia had sent out for the stay at home ordinance that came out on Tuesday, and it felt… Ominous. While we watched World War Z, I decided to finally start putting together my zombie apocalypse go bag. Mostly for fun, but just in case. 

    This post is going to kick off the start of a zombie related string of posts on my blog. They won’t come out back to back or anything, but every now and then I’m going to talk about zombies. Today I’m talking about everything you need in a go bag, and how you can put it together with only the stuff in your house. 

    The first thing you need to consider is your backpack. Now, anything will work, pretty much, but if you have some choices then I’d think about it. I’d suggest a standard backpack, because it’s easy to carry and likely already tailored to your weight and comfort. Some people might argue that a messenger bag is better, because it’s harder to rip off of you and lose. That’s a fair argument, but my rebuttal to that is that if a zombie grabs my bag to eat me, I’d rather shrug off the bag and book it out of there than go down with my stuff. 

    This is the backpack I’m using, which is my sister’s.

    The first thing you should grab should, obviously, be food. I picked a bunch of food that we weren’t really eating anyway, and most of those cans are from the dollar store. 

    After a few weeks of not eating, you become apathetic and increasingly susceptible to illness. A lot of people who are malnourished died from an infectious disease, not the actual starvation. Especially in the first few weeks of the apocalypse, if you find yourself needing to evacuate your home, you’re going to need all the energy you can to find a new base to wait out the chaos of the catalyst. 

    Next would be water, another thing we don’t even need to talk about. I suggest a water bottle that you can clip to your bag or your belt so it’s easily grabbable, and the biggest one without being cumbersome, but any container that doesn’t spill will do at the end of the day. 

    A smart idea (that you probably don’t just have laying around the house, fyi) is a water filter. In ZMZReloaded’s video on a zombie apocalypse go bag, he talks about how there are plenty of small, easily portable water filters that you can just pop in your mouth and use like a straw. If you’re serious about making a go bag, then this could be something to look into. If not, then it’s not a big deal. 

    Next: A med kit. I actually got a little upset when I found out the only medical supplies we have in my house are bandaids and midol, so I’m definitely going to buy an emergency medical kit and put it in the go bag. This doesn’t need to be explained, in the apocalypse you’ll get injuries from all kinds of things, and you don’t want to bleed out or get an infection. Buy the med kit, it would be useful whether an apocalypse happens or not. 

    Next on the list would be the things you need for hygiene, like a toothbrush, toothpaste, and soap. A lot of people forget about this stuff which is fair, because in the apocalypse the last thing you’ll worry about is if you smell okay, but you know the last thing you want in the apocalypse? A tooth infection. The need for a root canal. A uti. Stay clean. 

    A multitool. This goes without saying, you can do a lot with one portable little thing. 

    Matches/A lighter. I’d suggest the matches over the lighter, because I personally would prefer to have to look for more matches than refill a lighter. Maybe that’s dumb, but whatever. These are good for starting a fire, obviously, which you’d need to cook food, for warmth at night, for light in a dark building. Invaluable, really. 

    A flashlight would probably be better off for your light source, though, and I’d suggest getting one that you can strap around your forehead to keep your hands free. You’d look like an idiot but you could have an axe in one hand, a pistol in the other, and you’d still be able to see. 

I’d also always keep extra batteries on you, mostly for the flashlight but you’d never know when it could come in handy. 

    Binoculars could be useful, if the need arises. You can use them to scope out a building you need to scavenge in, to see if the new settlement you stumbled across is trustworthy, if the area is clear. 

    A knife. Obviously. If you’re not the survivalist type, grabbing a kitchen knife at the last minute could work just fine, but a combat knife with a sheath that can strap to your belt would probably be your best bet. Something easy for you to handle and that compliments your style of fighting. If you’re not comfortable getting too close, something with a longer blade. 

    Extra clothes, like socks and underwear, seems just as stupid as the hygeine stuff, but do I need to remind you about UTI’s? And ZMZReloaded mentioned in his video trench foot, which happens when your socks get wet. It starts rubbing all the skin off your feet and giving you horrible blisters, so painful you can’t walk. I, personally, put my zombie apocalypse outfit of choice in my go bag as well, so I wouldn’t be walking around in something stupid like fishnets and high heals when zombies break down our doors. 

    If you have long hair, a hairbrush and ties. This sounds ridiculous but my sister has super long, very thick hair, and it takes her like half an hour to brush it out. If she doesn’t brush it out and put it up, it gets in her face and it’s itchy and uncomfortable and that is not what you need when there’s zombies in your face. 

    Something I feel like never gets mentioned but could be extremely helpful would be a small notebook and a pen. Use it to write down grocery lists, notes on your surroundings and the enemies, notes to other survivors, to remember things to circle around to, to plan a rendezvous… When the world is ending, your brain is going to be a little all over the place, so don’t trust yourself to remember every important thing. Write it down. 

    Some things from a toolbox. I dunno. The first thing I’d be grabbing from our toolboxes would be one of those fucking hammers. But also if it’s portable, maybe just grab the whole thing? 

    Misc things. Something we don’t think about because of the lack of diversity in apocalyptic fiction is that we’re all our own people with our own needs. I have severe eczema, and I wouldn’t leave this fucking house without my medicine and a bottle of Atarax. Someone with chronic pain would probably want to bring their painkillers, because sometimes without it you can’t fucking walk. Think of something that you genuinely can’t live without, especially in an apocalyptic situation, and make a note to put it in your go bag. Don’t forget it. 

    Little candies. Just for fun. I put a bunch of lollipops in mine. 

    Lastly, your household weapon of choice. At my place, I have a wooden baseball bat from my late granddad, Danny, and we have a bunch of hammers for some reason. I’d also grab some knives from our kitchen. Think of things you have around the house that could cause some damage and make note of it. 

    The go bag I made doesn’t have everything on this list, but it’s made from shit I just collected from around the house. I didn’t spend any extra money on it and it took me no more than 15 minutes. 

    And that was it for this post. It was a lot different than my usual ones, but it was a long time coming and there will be more. I have a lot to say about the apocalyptic genre. 

    Stay safe, stay quarantined, don’t be an asshole. 

[sambergscott]

‘cause you’ll be safe in these arms of mine

Summary: Jake and Amy asking people to be godparents, inspired by a convo with @capnperaltiago who asked for me to write this <3

She asks Rosa two minutes after the plastic stick says pregnant.

Jake and Holt are out working a case and Terry’s taken the day off to be with his girls, leaving Amy in charge of the Nine-Nine. Hitchcock and Scully have already started a small fire, one of the uniformed officers lost a piece of evidence and there was a fight amongst two perps in the holding cell. And Amy can’t stop throwing up.

At first she blames it on work-related stress and then she thinks it must have been the Chinese she ate last night while watching re-runs of Friends. It’s not until Rosa pulls out a pregnancy test she picked up from the store that she realises it could be morning sickness.

They’re not even properly trying yet. Sure, she’s come off her birth control because she’s done enough research to know that it could take months to get pregnant after coming off them and they still can’t take their hands off each other, even after over a year of marriage, but neither of them were expecting anything to happen this soon.

She pees on the stick and, several anxiety-ridden minutes later, it comes back positive.

She’s pregnant.

And she panics.

This is what she wanted, what she’s always wanted, but what if Jake’s still not quite ready yet and what if one of them dies on the job and what if they can’t actually afford this and-.

“Santiago,” comes Rosa’s gruff voice, her hands steadying Amy’s quivering shoulders, “you two have got this. You’re gonna be the best parents I know.”

“Even better than Terry and Sharon?” She snivels.

“Yeah.” Then, quickly, “don’t tell them I said that.”

“Your secret’s safe with me,” Amy promises, zipping her mouth shut.

“Yours too.” Rosa mimics her zipping action, throwing the imaginary key into the toilet like she’s Steph Curry.

Amy laughs, a sudden idea popping into her head. It seems weird to ask before consulting Jake, before Jake even knows there’s a baby inside her, but it also feels right. She rips off the bandaid. “Will you be the godmother?”

The detective freezes, her mouth opening and closing like a goldfish. “Me?”

“Mm-hmm.” Amy smiles at Rosa’s surprise. They are complete opposites — Rosa likes motorbikes, Amy likes binders, Rosa likes leather jackets and big boots, Amy likes sensible pantsuits — yet they’ve become sisters, sleuth sisters, over the past nine years. There’s nobody else Amy would consider for the job. “You’ve always had my back and I think you’d have our baby’s back, too. Plus, if our baby turns out like Jake, you’ve always known how to handle him.”

Rosa snorts, then smiles back at her. Amy thinks she detects a few tears in Rosa’s eyes, but doesn’t say a word, not wanting to ruin the moment. Rosa eventually nods. “Yeah. I’m in.”

“C’mere,” Amy cries, the damn pregnancy hormones already making her emotions crazy as she pulls Rosa into a tight hug.

++

It’s Jake’s idea to make Charles godfather.

Amy’s a little… apprehensive at first, to say the least, considering Charles’ track record of being totally obsessed with every aspect of their personal lives. He’s sent her 75 emails about birthing tips, offering his doula services at the end of each one, in the last week alone. He came round their apartment one night to get rid of all coffee, alcohol, shame cigarettes and any other No-No foods during pregnancy. He’s already suggested the names Charles Peralta if it’s a boy and Charlotte if it’s a girl, which Amy vetoed immediately. Making Charles godfather would only allow him into their lives further. And she loves her husband’s best friend, she really does, but she doesn’t want their kid becoming obsessed with weird milk and beige-coloured clothes and the TV show Bunheads.

When Jake argues that nobody else is gonna love their kid more than Charles, Amy finally agrees. Charles will shower their baby with all the love in the world. And if Charles has any influence at all on his godchild, it will be that their kid will be just as big a fan of Jake as Charles is.

Unlike Rosa, they both agree that they can’t just ask Charles. It needs to be an event — like when Jake asked him to be his best man with sparklers and a big ol’ banner. Amy suggests they ask him on Halloween and they spend a full evening planning how it’s going to go down.

“This year’s object is this t-shirt,” Jake announces to the squad on the biggest night of the year, holding up a plain white t-shirt with the words “Amazing Human/Genius” printed in gold foiling. “Whoever has it in their possession at midnight will be declared the winner.”

Like Halloween V, Jake has the real prize waiting in the evidence lock-up. But he doesn’t tell anyone that.

When The Tramps (with Rosa in on Jake and Amy’s secret) barge into the evidence lock-up at two minutes before midnight, thinking they’re finally the champions, Charles is the first to lift the t-shirt out of the storage box.

(It was the one with the uneven dust pattern, just like when Jake proposed to Amy, just like he’d heard a million times over when he asked to hear the story on a bi-weekly basis).

He furrows his brow when he realises the words don’t say what they’re supposed to.

Jake and Amy jump out from behind a stack of evidence boxes and Charles shrieks. For a second they think they’ve caused yet another colleague to die from a heart attack, but he somehow stays on his feet.

“Amazing Godfather/Genius,” he reads the adapted text, trembling like a leaf. His eyes meet Jake’s, who nods, confirming that, yes, his wildest dreams have indeed come true.

“What do you say, bud?” Jake prompts.

“Yes! Yes! A thousand times yes!”

Amy laughs happily as she watches her husband and his best friend embrace, exchanging wide grins with Terry and Rosa. Their kid is a lucky guy or girl with their entire Nine-Nine family looking out for them.

There’s only one last thing to do.

++

They arrange to have dinner with Holt and Kevin to ask them if they will be the “god-grandfathers” of their unborn child.

(“God-grandfathers are not a thing, Peralta,” Amy had said when he first proposed the word, rolling her eyes.

“Who says?”

“The Merriam-Webster Dictionary, for starters.”

“Well, it’s a thing now,” Jake decided. He’d never cared for the Merriam-Webster Dictionary before, so why should he now? No use changing the habit of a lifetime. “It’s our thing. Because they’re our #Dads. I wouldn’t feel comfortable raising our kid without them.”

Her face softened, tears pricking at her eyes — those damn pregnancy hormones again — and she finally agreed. “God-grandfathers it is.”)

She’s incredibly nervous by the time they’re at the front door of the Holt-Cozner home, her fingers twisting the ends of her hair into a messy braid.

Jake places his hand atop hers, stilling her fingers. He gives her hand a supportive squeeze. “It’s gonna be great, Ames.”

They don’t bring it up until there’s a lull in conversation mid-way through the casserole Kevin prepared for them, unable to wait any longer. Even Jake is a little anxious, his leg bouncing beneath the table, when he broaches the subject.

“You know how Charles and Rosa are going to be our baby’s godparents?”

“Yes, I recall Raymond mentioning the fact,” Kevin responds. “Apparently it is all Detective Boyle talks about.”

“He’s very excited,” Amy says, amused. She finds herself less annoyed and more touched by Charles’ antics when they’re directed at others and not her or her email inbox.

“Well, Ames and I would love it if you two would have an important role in our kid’s life because, I don’t know if you’ve noticed because we’re super subtle about it, but we kind of consider you both as father figures.”

“We have noticed.”

“You are not subtle at all,” Holt assures them.

“Cool, cool, cool. No doubt. No doubt. No doubt. What do you say? Would you like to be the god-grandfathers to Nakatomi Peralta?”

“Please tell me you’re not naming your child after a building from your favourite movie,” Holt says disapprovingly.

“No,” Jake scoffs, then, under his breath, “Nakatomi is a character, too.”

“We would be honoured.” Kevin smiles lovingly at his husband, then at Jake and Amy. After a few seconds, his smile falls. “Although you are aware god-grandfathers are not a real thing, yes?”

“It’s our thing,” Amy repeats Jake’s words from earlier, beaming from ear to ear.

++

When their baby arrives, seven point five pounds of perfection, they have a lot of visitors, all wanting to feast their eyes on the precious addition to the family. The grandparents get first hold (apparently Victor and Roger had another arm wrestling match in the hospital waiting room to decide who got the very first hold), then Amy’s brothers that live in the city, then the godparents and god-grandparents.

Charles starts crying the moment he’s in the same room as her, only stopping when Amy threatens to make him leave.

Rosa smiles more than either Jake and Amy have ever seen her smile.

Captain Holt is quite simply enamoured with the little bundle of blankets, unable to mask his emotions in his usual robotic way when his god-granddaughter grips his pinky finger.

Jake and Amy exchange proud parent smiles as they watch their hours-old daughter with four of the people they trust most, knowing she will always be safe, loved and happy when in their arms.