#What the fuck do you mean they’re being murdered by a fucking rockstar and a drill guitar

[overly-hubristic-mad-scientist]

I find it kinda ridiculous the lengths some movies during the horror boom went to in order to distinguish their slasher from the 5,000 other slashers at the time.

[erodasfishtacos]

Three Minutes

Prompt: Harry slips up and it’s only right his wife serves him a little punishment.

Word Count: 3.2 k +

Warnings: Language, Sexual Content (sexting, dirty talk, public, subby!h)

AN: I’m excited to share this!! I’m pretty sure I’m going to do a part 2. Let me know if you’d like to see this! I’m dedicating this to @harrywritingsbyme because she’s an amazing writer and you need to read everything of hers! Requests open ☺️

Reblog if you can!

Harry was dreading his interview with Howard Stern. The guy was an obnoxious prick who had no filter and liked to put people on the spot - it’s what he’s doing right now. 

You were off to the side, watching the interview next to Jeff. It was matter of time before Howard brought you up to pick and prod at your husband.

“So Harry, you’re married, yes?” Howard asks, typical sunglasses on and curly permed hair donned. His mouth a little to close to the microphone.

“Yeah, I am,” Harry smiles tightly, hands rubbing on this upper thighs. He spares a quick glance over to you.

“She’s here, right?” Howard looks over at you and winks, “Fucking gorgeous babe, huh?”

You roll your eyes at the interviewers remark and Harry’s isn’t pleased but nicely responds, “She’s amazing, way out of my league.”

Howard laughs, “Now I have to ask you, does she tour with you?”

Harry replies, “Yeah. For the most part, sometimes she’ll go off to visit family or friends for a bit.”

The interview smirks, “Does she get worried you’re going to fuck other people while she’s not there? I mean you have girls falling at your feet. It must be hard to avoid temptation.”

You blink owlishly, attempting to contain the offended scoff bubbling in your throat. Jeff snickers and you send him a elbow.

Your husbands face can’t hide his annoyance at the question, “Are you asking me if it’s hard not to cheat on my wife?”

“I mean you could have a line up of girls after every show willing to blow you. I couldn’t be satisfied going home to the same thing every night.”

The band is looking back and forth at each other - clearly uncomfortable. Mitch’s face completely blank - of course.

“Well, I mean - I think that kind of stuff like...people going crazy over you was exciting when I was a bit younger. But no, I mean I’m very much in love and also consider myself a monogamous person.”

“Man, I mean - some of the songs you write about her? Watermelon Sugar, that’s clearly about eating her out,” Howard laughs, the tune playing softly in the background.

Jeff nearly chokes on the water he’s drinking and you pat him hard on the back - as payback for making Harry do this interview.

“I don’t think I’ve ever had pussy so good I’d write about it,” the interview jokes crudely. The women interviewer tittering in the background at his antics.

Harry fumbles, “Uh-uhm, it’s not uh- necessarily about anything or any act like...in particular. Just about having a good time with the person you love.”

The female interviewer who stays mostly quite chirps in to break the tension, “Is it hard to be long-distance when she’s not on the road with you?”

“Not at all. Most of the time she’s with me but we’re lucky we have technology that helps us not feel so far away from each other.”

Howard smiles, “How do you not go crazy being without sex for long amounts of time?”

It’s odd how obsessed this guy is with sex. As well as painting Harry as some sex-crazed rockstar who can’t go a day without.

Harry then goes on to put his entire, big ass foot in his mouth. “Y‘know that’s uh-that’s what good about FaceTime and Snapchat.”

The interviewer grins like a predator at Harry’s admission. You’re face is bright fucking pink. You’re gonna murder him.

“Well you heard it here first, folks. The key to how Harry Styles - one of the greatest artist of his time- keeps a happy relationship with his wife while he’s on the road. Dick pics and FaceTime sex.”

Harry glances over at you, his face apologetic as he already knows he in trouble.

You’re not that embarrassed - it not like it’s a weird thing to do but you didn’t want him talking about it with a trashy talk show host. 

The interview is almost over which is good because Harry’s about to lose his temper after he’s asked about his step-father’s passing and the stalker who was harassing you two.

During the interview however, you get a wonderful fucking idea as easy payback for Harry’s little slip up.

After Harry’s tossed his headset and microphone pack off with a little too much force to be unnoticeable - he’s sliding up beside you.

“Baby love,” He murmurs sheepishly into your cheek, nuzzling there for a moment, and breathing in the scent of your shampoo.

“You did good, H,” You reply softly, landing a soft kiss to his lips before pulling back to brush his hair off his forehead.

“Y’not mad?” Harry asks warily, knowing he got nervous and gave a little too much information.

“No baby, not mad at all,” Your voice steady and believable. It was true - you weren’t mad, just a little annoyed.

He seems confused. He knows you like the back of his hand and usually, you get peeved when he says something in interviews you’d rather the word not know.

Like the one time he let it slip you had an affinity for hooking up in hotel pools after dark. Prat.

**

Harry multiple appearances that day and it ends in a dinner at a fancy restaurant in Beverly Hills with big wigs.

You were invited but declined, despite Harry’s pouting and whines for you to go. You were the only thing that made these work obligations go faster.

However, you had other plans and a little bit of revenge to play on your unsuspecting husband.

All in good fun - of course.

**

Harry sits down with a group of people from his label. They’re all dressed in tight suits and rolex watches.

Harry on the other hand is in a flowy button-up only halfway done and a tight pair is skinny jeans. Jeff is dressed pretty casually too.

They were talking about tour dates and had just received their appetizers when he gets the text from you. Your name in his phone as baby love.

Harry nearly chokes on his water when he opens the message to reveal an image of you nearly naked in your shared bed. You skin tone standing out against the baby blue comforter.

You have one of his vintage tees on as well as some creme boyshort panties. The shirt is lifted though, rumpled up by your collarbones to reveal your breasts.

Harry wants to drool over the picture but doesn’t want to risk anyone else seeing his wife in any state of undress. So he quickly responds.

Baby, I’m at dinner.

You reply with another picture. A hand tucked down your underwear, cupping your heat. He can see the outline of your fingers underneath the thin fabric.

Already have something you could eat.

Harry can already feel himself twitch in his jeans. Cut it the fuck out now

Another. Fucking. Picture. Comes through.

This time you’re completely stripped, tits visible with soft pink peaks, and a hand strategically covering your cunt. 

Make me, H.

It clicks what game you’re playing. You rarely sent anything risqué when you where together because you had each other physically.

Harry curses under his breathe, locking his phone and pushing back his chair a little too fast - excusing himself to the loo.

As soon as he clicks the lock on the single-person restroom, he’s pressing on your contact information and you pick up on the very first ring.

“You bloody brat, I’m out at dinner,” Harry hisses at you, giving himself a rough squeeze through his tighten trousers.

All he hears back is a breathy moan. He’d know that sound anywhere - you’re touching yourself.

“What the fuck are you playin’ at?” Your husband demands, but the clipped edge in his tone tells you how much it’s affecting him.

“Just a little payback, babe...for spilling our dirty secrets,” you hum innocently, deciding to send him another picture.

It’s a simple photo without context some might not even understand. It’s just your hand but your fingers glistening with your arousal. 

Harry’s hand is about to crush is phone into bits as his eyes roam the picture. He was nearly panting, already able to imagine the taste and smell.

He takes a deep breath before he threatens you, “if you don’t pull your desperate little self together right now- I’m not going anywhere near that needy cunt and I’ll make you spend all night choking on me.”

Instead of the typical, sad whimpers he expects to hear - he receives a patronizing, high-pitched giggle.

“That’s not how it’s going to work tonight, H,” you inform him in a matter-of-fact manner before continuing, “we’re playing by my rules.”

Your husband laughs in disbelief, echoing against the bleak bathroom walls, “and what those rules, sweetheart?”

“You’re going to go sit through your nice little dinner, rockstar. And I’m going to send you pictures, maybe some videos to watch to keep you entertained. If you don’t open them within three minutes each time and reply - you’re not coming tonight. The couch will have a blanket and pillow ready for you.”

If he was in charge, he’d laugh and remind you that you two have three lovely guest rooms he could choose from. But he doesn’t want to push it.

“Fuck,” Harry spits, having to cram his hand into his jeans to adjust himself so he doesn’t look like a pervert when he goes back out.

But he was so fucking game.

He’d do anything you wanted from him - no matter if he could embarrass himself in front of business partners or fans. He was besotted, whipped, whatever you wanted to call him.

“Are you going to be good for me, baby?” You coo tauntingly, from the other end of the line. Basking in his little huffs of air and the agitated lift in his voice.

“Yeah, m’gonna be good,” he murmurs gruffly, his demeanor had changed now that he wasn’t in charge any longer - always willing to let you be dominant when you wanted to be. 

It wasn’t often - but when you did, Harry would fall into a nice, fuzzy headspace of compliance and submission. He always wanted to please and this amplified all of his desires.

“Best husband I could ask for, you know?” You reward, knowing that the games are just getting started and you wanted to make this last.

“I love you s’much,” Harry automatically returns, with deep devotion and honesty. His voice as sweet as maple syrup.

“Are you hard, H?” 

He grips himself, like he’d just remember, “m’really fucking hard for you.”

“Snap an picture for me, pull yourself together, and then go back to your table - don’t forget the rules.”

“Yes ba-“

Then you end the call while he’s talking.

Harry’s a little shaky as he swipes onto his camera. He grips the thick outline of his cock, rings glinting in the dull lights, and takes a picture.

He hopes it’s good enough and quickly sends it before splashes some cold water on his face and thinking of anything but his naked wife laying at home in their bed - wet and horny.

Jeff gives him a side-eye when he sits back down, casually throwing a napkin over his lap because he can’t help the semi that refuses to go down all together.

“You alright?” His manager asks him, the others still in the throws of tour venues and vendors discussions.

Harry nods, lying easily “the missus couldn’t find her phone charger - thought I nipped it.”

“You do love to steal those,” his friends agrees before cutting off one of them men to suggest three days at Madison Square Garden instead of two.

Harry’s clutching his phone like a lifeline, anticipating the indicative text vibrations that let him know you’ve sent something.

However, despite how many times he checks, fifteen minutes pass and still nothing has sent from you. He almost starts to worry if you’re okay.

But just like the sneaky little thing you are, you wanted to give him enough time to calm down and relax before rilining him up again.

When it finally alerts him, he’s unlocking his phone and opening the message thread as fast as possible. 

The picture makes his jaw almost drop on the fucking carpeted floor. You’re in one the large closets in your home- the one that holds all of his Gucci suits in particular.

There is a massive floor to ceiling mirror in this room that you’re standing in front of. You’ve slid on one of his custom silk Gucci button-ups that has styles embroidered on the breast pocket without doing doing up any of the buttons.

He’s an absolutely goner for you in anything that makes you look like his property - the large engagement ring and wedding band on your left ring-finger satiates that feeling quite well.

It takes he a moment before he realizes what else you’re wearing. Your fucking collar. It sat tight around your neck, the expensive leather biting into your skin.

Your one hand was holding the phone and the other had a hand teasing at one of your hardened nipples through the silk fabric of the shirt.

He keeps his phone in his lap with a dim light setting so nobody can risk a chance at seeing such explicits pictures of what’s his.

You look so good with my name on you, baby. Please, want to see you in just the collar, take off the shirt.

Harry fumbles along with the conversation, that’s revolving all around him, “Yeah, I loved Argentina. Definitely want to got there again.”

Buzz.

How’d you already forget I’m in charge? Maybe I’ll just go to bed if you’re not going to follow instructions.

As punishment - if you can really call it that - in the next image you don’t have the collar on any longer and you’ve done up a few buttons on the silk shirt.

Harry feels panicked at the thought of you stopping. He was in a nice, soft headspace clinging onto anything you were willing to give him - desperate to make you happy.

I’m sorry, baby. I’ll be good for you. You’re so fucking sexy. I can basically taste you on my tongue.

“Harry?” Jeff draws him out of his haze. He’s looking at him expectantly, eyebrow quirked, and a martini in his hand.

“What did you say?” Harry asks, eyes itching to dart back down to the screen of his mobile.

“Would you want Kacey to open for you again in North America?” Jeff repeats with annoyance.

“Oh, uh-yeah, that’d be great,” he tells them without really think about it.

He should be paying attention to this pretty important meeting but he can’t when he gets another alert.

The video is back in the bedroom, your delicate fingers sliding down your torso with the button-up pooled around your ribs.

Your hand slowly, at a near crawl- traces down with the camera until the manicured tips of your fingers are at your mound.

Harry’s stomach is tensing in excitement as he watches your fingers dip into the part in your slick, swollen folds.

He has to bite back a groan when the video cuts off and he reads the text below the attachment.

Was this the pussy you enjoyed eating so much you won a Grammy writing about? Was Howard right in his interview?

If Harry was in charge, he would have delivered a few resounding smacks to your arse for how cocky you were being - despite it being the absolute truth.

Did he write and win a Grammy based on a song about how much he loved eating his wife out? Sure fucking did.

Baby love. Yeah, wrote it about you. Write all my songs about how much I love you and your body. Everything is yours.

Harry is so good when he’s subby - is the thing.

Harry was a sappy sod anyways, always ready to tell you how much he loved you and thousand of other sweet things. This just amplified all of his warm, fuzzy emotions.

Send me a picture of your left hand

He hesitates for a moment, still nodding along to the ebb and flow of the business talk but having no actual idea what they’re talking about.

Harry places his large, wide hand flat on the table in front of him. He knew why you wanted his left hand - you were just as possessive as him. 

You want to see his long, slim fingers that feel so good inside of you. You want to see the glimmer of his wedding band as well as the tattoo of your name on the outer curve of his hand.

He doesn’t think to turn off his flash. It ends up going off in the dimly lit restaurant and blinding the table, reflecting off the silver flatware. 

He looks like a complete knob - taking a picture of his hand but also something weird Harry may do anyways and upload to his Instagram.

The men blink a few times and look at him with a confused expression. Jeff jabs him roughly in the side.

“Uh, snapchat streak,” he mumbles, tucking his phone back into his lap and sending it.

You were cutting it close, babe. 2 minutes, I don’t like waiting. But fuck, who’s name is that on your hand, who’s that ring for?

You, you baby. All of its for you, promise. I belong to you, only you for the rest of my life.

The response is quick.

But...you have girls falling at your feet, lining up to blow you.

A direct quote for the interview today. Brat - she knew how he hated when people assumed or talked like he had no self control or morals.

Only want your mouth, your cunt, your tits. So bloody gone for you, baby. Please send me another video.

He really shouldn’t be egging you on.

Your being greedy but you’ve been following the rules so I’ll allow it.

The video does not disappoint. You’re hand is nestled down between your thighs, pinching at your puffy, stimulated bud. Just the amount of pain you like. It’s a short clip but it has him wriggling in his seat.

He watches it again but before he can finish it - Jeff is snatching his phone out of his shaky hands and tucking it into his own pants pocket.

The manager’s obviously sick of the lack of focus and honestly, how disrespectful Harry’s being which is something he usual never is.

“Pay attention,” he whispers with a sharp, irritated tone before clapping Harry on the back to play off the scolding to the group.

Harry feels a knot form in his stomach as his phone sits stagnant in his friends pocket. His wife sitting, impatiently waiting for his response that she’s not going to get.

He watches his vintage wristwatch as fifteen minutes pass, he hears a few buzzes from his phone that go unattended.

Harry’s not fuzzy anymore - well not in a good way. He has anxiety bubbling in his tummy and his semi had finally disappeared from nerves of disappointing you.

He decides to engage in the conversation to keep his mind off of what is waiting for him at home. He craved to look at those images and videos again. To have it in real life.

**

It had been three hours since he responded. The people at the table insisting on dessert and alcoholic coffees despite Harry saying he was exhausted from a long day of promo.

At the end of dinner, Harry would love to lie and say he’s recovered from his shakiness but he hadn’t.

After shaking the hands of the record label men, he walks to his car with Jeff. He gets a nice talking to before his phone is being placed back into his hand and he’s sliding into his obnoxious vintage Ferrari.

He takes a deep breathe before he unlocks his phone. The buzzes he heard where not all from you. A few from Twitter, his mum, Niall. There was only one from you.

Game Over. You lose.

—

Thank you for reading💕🥺

[cobaltusami]

Self conscious

Aaaahhhh this was so so SO much fun to write, Fuyuhiko Is my second favorite character from Goodbye Despair. I love this smol Yakuza boi so much. I wanted to do something sort of body positive, I'm not sure how well I did In that regard, But I love how this turned out either way. It's just so much fun to me. <3

Holy shit, It just occurred to me that this Is now my longest fic. and I wrote It In eight hours with breaks-- Dayum.

Also bonus fun points because Kuzuhina Is one of my favorite ships from the game-

Characters: Lee!Fuyuhiko, Ler!Hajime

Words: 4196 (It's a long boi)

Pairing: Kuzuhina

also mentions of MahiruXHiyoko

The sound of the ocean waves crashing against the sand, the warm sunlight enveloping his skin, the gentle cooling breeze dancing from tree to tree… It was almost relaxing enough to put Hajime to sleep.

Almost.

However, being pelted with a water balloon ruined that relaxing atmosphere.

He let out a shriek, jolting upright from his lying position on the newly soaked beach towel in the sand. His eyes darted around, offended, until they landed on the doubled over laughing perpetrator. Of course It was Ibuki.

“Bahahahaha! You should have seen your face! Ibuki thought you were going to have a heart attack!” She cackled, holding her ribs with one arm and pointing with the other.

Hajime should have known better than to relax, especially with Ibuki around. He sighed and stood up. “Yeah yeah, Very funny Ibuki…”

He felt something hard and plastic press Into his back, he quickly shot a questioning glance over his shoulder, meeting Chiaki’s gaze.

“It’s dangerous to go alone, Take this.” She whispered, He reached around and took the water gun from her. He winked and whispered his thanks, keeping the toy concealed from Ibuki’s line of sight.

“You think you’re sooooo funny, Don’t you Ibuki?” He smiled, shuffling closer to the laughing rockstar.

“Ibuki doesn’t think she’s funny, She thinks she’s hilarious!” She laughed, tears formed In the corner of her eyes. She was completely oblivious to her impending doom.

“Yeah,” He sighed, an evil grin on his face. “Well I think that this Is funny!”

The ‘this’ he was referring to, was blasting Ibuki in the face with a cold stream of water from the Water gun. She shrieked in surprise, still giggling as she brought her hands up to protect herself.

“Mayday mayday! Target has obtained a weapon! ABORT MISSION!” She went running off, With Hajime chasing after her laughing.

The other students laughed as they watched the two, joining In on the game by grabbing their own water guns.

Soon almost all of the students were enveloped In a water gun battle.

Well, Almost all.

Fuyuhiko remained in his spot In the shade under the tree, his arms crossed as he watched the others playing and having fun. Even Peko had joined In on the fight, throwing water balloons left and right like a friggin ninja.

He rolled his eyes with a fond smile watching their antics.

“Fuyu?”

He quickly stopped smiling as he looked away from the beach, looking up at a now dripping with water Hajime. “Y-Yeah?”

“Do you wanna join In? I’ll get you a water gun an--”

“No.” was his curt response. “I don’t.”

“Are you sure? You look kind of lonely over here all by yourself…” Hajime sat down In the grass next to him, pulling off his shirt and wringing it out.

Fuyuhiko glanced at him for a moment then quickly darted his eyes away, flustered. “I-I already said I don’t want to.”

“Will you at least change Into something beachy? That suit has to be uncomfortable.”

“No way!”

Hajime raised an eyebrow, questioning the urgency of his tone and the quickness of his response.

Fuyuhiko blushed, quickly thinking up a reason. “You’ll just shoot me with water if I do!”

He has a reason, but there’s no way In hell he’s going to talk about It. He’s insecure about his body.

“I promise I won’t?” the taller boy tried, thrown off by his odd behavior.

The young Yakuza shook his head. “No way.” he stood up and hurried inside the beach house, abruptly ending the conversation.

Hajime blinked in confusion. What was that about?

He wasn’t sure, But he knew someone who would be.

“Peko?” He approached the swordswoman, who was in the middle of cleaning off her glasses with a towel. “Can I ask you something?”

She looked up curiously, pausing her actions. “Sure. What Is It Hajime?”

“It’s about Fuyu.”

Her red eyes darted over to where Fuyuhiko had previously been sitting. “What’s wrong with Young master? Where did he go?”

“He went inside, He’s fine I think…” Hajime responded, putting the swordswoman at ease. “Does he have a fear of water or something?”

“Hm? Not that I am aware of. Why do you ask?”

“Because I asked him if he wanted to join us and he said no. Then he got kind of agitated when I suggested he change into some beach attire.”

She sighed softly, continuing to clean off her glasses. “Ah. I see now… Young Master Is, how should I put this… Self-conscious.”

“Self-Conscious? Of what?” He asked, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

“His body. He Is smaller than most boys his age.” She replied, putting her glasses back on and wrapping the towel around her shoulders. “He hates showing off his body.”

Hajime frowned as he looked back at the beach house, He wouldn’t have pushed him so much if he had known that.

“Don’t feel guilty. You had no way of knowing.” Peko said as she put a hand on his shoulder.

“I still feel bad though. I knew he felt self conscious about his height but I didn’t even think about his body.”

“Perhaps I should go check on him, If you are that concerned.”

“No! No It’s okay, I’ll go check on him. You go back to playing with the others.” Hajime interjected. This was the first time he’d really seen her let loose and have fun, He didn’t want to be the reason she stopped.

She gave a small tilt of her head. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I can handle him. Go have fun.” He smiled reassuringly at the woman, She gave one last skeptical glance before getting hit with two water balloons in the back by a wildly cackling Kazuichi and Ibuki.

She narrowed her eyes, Holding out her hand. “Hajime, I am going to need your weapon.”

Hajime chuckled at her dead serious demeanor and handed her the toy gun. “Don’t murder them.”

“I make no promises.” She replied, whipping around and pumping the water pressure slide on the gun. “Which one of you wants to die first?!”

Kazuichi and Ibuki screamed and went running with Peko chasing after them.

Hajime laughed and shook his head at them before making his way up the beach house stairs and into the building.

“Ugh,” Fuyu had lowered his book to see who came inside, but upon seeing it was Hajime he quickly brought it back up covering his face. “What the hell do you want? I already said I’m not joining you guys.”

“I know, I’m not here to ask that.” He replied softly.

He pulled out the chair across from Fuyuhiko and dragged It over to the spot at the table next to him before sitting down.

The Yakuza glanced up from his book again for a moment, a skeptical look on his face. “Then why are you…?”

“I’m here to apologize.” Hajime answered.

“Apologize?” He parroted, more confused than before.

“I didn’t mean to pressure you earlier, I just wanted to include you In on the fun.” He said. “I didn’t realize that you were self conscious about your body.”

Fuyuhiko’s face turned bright pink with embarrassment, His hazel eyes widening with surprise. “W-What?! I’m not fucking self conscious! Where the fuck would you get that idea!?”

Hajime blinked. “It’s okay to be self conscious, There’s nothing wrong with feel--”

“I am NOT self conscious! I just don’t like getting blasted with water!” Fuyuhiko shot back, crossing his arms stubbornly.

“Fuyu?”

“W-What!?”

“Take off your shirt.”

“Excuse me??”

“If you aren’t self conscious… Take off your shirt.”

Fuyuhiko kicked out his chair from the table, aggressively shrugging off his jacket and tossing it on the floor. Next he undid his tie and dropped it on top of his jacket. He did all this without breaking eye contact with Hajime.

Hajime folded his arms as he watched with a skeptical look, It was as if he was challenging him with his gaze.

The Yakuza started to unbutton his dress shirt but stopped halfway. Without his jacket to obscure his frame even a little, He already felt shy.

He crossed his arms and looked away from the brunette. “I can’t.” He mumbled under his breath.

“What?”

“I SAID I CAN’T!” He snapped, clearly flustered. “Are you fucking happy now!? Yes! CONGRATULATIONS YOU FIGURED IT OUT! I’m fucking self conscious!”

Hajime frowned and hooked his leg around Fuyu’s chair leg, Pulling him closer without any protests. “Hey, It’s okay. Everyone has something they’re self conscious about.” He reassured the embarrassed boy In front of him.

“Yeah right.” He muttered, still refusing to meet Hajime’s eyes.

“It’s true. Even I’m self conscious.”

Fuyu rolled his eyes. “You don’t have to lie.”

“I’m not.” He insisted.

“What do you have to be self conscious about? Look at you…” The tips of his ears turned pink as he blushed more.

Hajime smiled a little and reached forward, starting to button Fuyuhiko’s shirt back up for him. “I can’t make people laugh. I can’t tell a joke to save my life… I’m not funny.”

“It’s because you’re trying too hard. You’re someone who is unintentionally--” Fuyuhiko immediately clamped his mouth shut, flinching rather violently as he felt Hajime’s fingers graze his ribs accidentally.

Hajime paused what he was doing, his hands hovering over the buttons of the white dress shirt still. “What was…”

“N-Nothing!” Fuyu stuttered, pushing his hands back. “Listen… I appreciate the attempt to make me feel better but-- HEY!”

The blond yelped as he felt a few fingers poke experimentally Into his side, He reached down and grabbed his hands, holding them away from his body. “Will you fucking stop that!?”

The Yakuza didn’t appreciate the grin on Hajime’s face. “Oh, Fuyu… I might be able to make you laugh after all~” He said teasingly, trying to pull his hands free.

Fuyuhiko narrowed his eyes at the other boy, keeping his hands in a vice grip. “Don’t you fucking dare!” He hissed.

“Don’t I dare what?” Hajime asked innocently, batting his eyelashes at the smaller boy.

“Don’t fucking touch me!”

“I won’t.”

“Liar!”

“Will you relax? I’m not gonna touch you. Can I have my hands back now? I’m kind of losing feeling in them.”

Fuyu watched him closely as he slowly released his hands. Hajime made a show of shaking them to regain feeling. “See? Have I touched you?”

“N-No… I guess n-nahahaha! You fucking lihihihied!” Fuyuhiko giggled boyishly, doubling over in his seat to block as many spots as possible.

Hajime grinned as he dusted his fingertips along his exposed neck, when he brought his shoulders up to try to protect the sensitive spot he darted his hands into his partially open shirt and began tickling his ribs. “I didn’t lie, I’m not touching you… I’m tickling you. There’s a big difference.” He winked at the laughing boy.

“Ihihihif you don’t stahahahap right nohohohow, I’m going to kihihihill you!” The blond laughed, writhing under his torturously gentle touch.

“Ooh I’m so scared~ Is the big bad Yakuza gonna kill me dead In my sleep?” Hajime laughed, paying special attention to a sensitive spot near the bottom of his ribs. “C’mon, How am I supposed to be scared? You’re so adorable when you’re being tickled!” he cooed.

The young Kuzuryu’s neck and ears turned red from that, He brought his leg up to try to kick Hajime away. “Stahahap! Dohohon’t fahahahacking tehehease me you jeheherk!”

Not only did he not succeed In kicking him, Hajime caught his leg and held it firmly in his lap as he administered tickles to the top and underside of his knee. “I’m afraid that’s gonna be impossible, You’re just too cute not to tease~” He hummed In reply.

Fuyuhiko squealed and desperately tried to pull his leg back, laughing much harder than before. “N-NOHOHO! AHAHAHAHAHA!”

Hajime glanced down at his hand, noticing every time his laughter spiked It was because he was scribbling against the spot above his knee. “You have ticklish thighs, Fuyu?” He asked amusedly, now honing In on that spot.

Fuyuhiko spazzed out, His body flailing at the electric sensations coursing through him. Unfortunately that meant he also threw himself out of his chair.

As soon as Hajime realized what had happened he was quick to follow, Kneeling beside the still lightly giggling boy. “F-Fuyu?! Are you okay?? I’m so sorry, I didn’t think you would fall…”

He gently pulled the blond up into a sitting position and was checking his head for any injuries when Fuyu waved him off. “I-I’m fine…” He reassured, still recovering.

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you laugh like that, It’s nice. You should laugh more often.” Hajime smiled.

“Y-Yeah yeah… whatever.”

He thought about It. Maybe that wasn’t the worst thing he’s ever been through… It was actually kind of fun to let loose. He was still super self conscious about his body but for a minute he forgot about that, only focusing on the sensations and laughing.

Then again, Maybe It's the possible concussion talking.

He blushed as he shook his head. “I’m just glad you didn’t hear my real laugh.” He mumbled. “It’s really obnoxious.”

“Your real laugh?” Hajime tilted his head, his curiosity piqued.

“Yeah, when I laugh hard enough I snort.” He calmly replied.

“Okay, I have to hear that.” He laughed, slowly raising his hands.

“Keep your fucking hands to yourself.” Fuyuhiko narrowed his eyes half-heartedly. What he wanted to say was; ‘Go for it.’ but Yakuza pride and all that.

Hajime Isn’t an idiot, he can tell Fuyuhiko likes the attention but won’t admit it. And he isn’t going to make him uncomfortable by making him admit it.

“Who’s gonna stop me? You? I’m so scared.” Hajime smirked, quickly he pulled the Yakuza into his lap and pinned him against his body. “Now, Wanna make It easier on us both and tell me your ticklish spot~?” He asked teasingly.

Fuyuhiko squirmed, seeing If escape was even physically possible. It wasn’t. “Go to hell.” He growled, blushing.

“Suit yourself.” He shrugged, undoing the rest of his shirt buttons. Using both hands he ghosted his fingertips across the exposed sides.

Fuyu immediately began giggling again, his body actually relaxing under the soft touches. It wasn’t unbearable or torturous, but gentle and pleasant instead.

Hajime smiled at the string of bright laughter moving to his ribs brought about. He massaged his fingers in small careful circles against the ticklish bones. “Come on Fuyu~ There’s only a few spots I haven’t tried… If I have to find your tickle spot myself I’m really not gonna be nice~”

“Fuhuhahahahack you!” Fuyuhiko retorted, squirming aimlessly.

“That’s not very nice.” Hajime pouted, shoving his hands under the Yakuza’s arms. His fingers drilled and wiggled unrelentingly, which drew hysterical laughter from the smaller of the two.

“NAHAHAHA! STAHAHAHAP!”

“I would, But you sort of have my hands trapped and… Well, since they are, I might as well tickle you~” He teased, obviously pleased with himself for turning the tough Yakuza into a laughing heap in his arms.

“HAHAHAHAJIME! I WIHIHIHILL STAHAHAB YOU!”

“No you won’t.” Hajime smirked.

He continued to torture the blond student for a bit longer before ‘freeing’ his hands and brushing his fingers across his quivering stomach teasingly. “How about here? Is this a bad spot, Giggles~?”

The boy let out a shriek as he quickly brought his hands down over top of Hajime’s, trying to pry them away out of instinct. “Dohohon’t!” He tittered, blushing.

“Ooh, Looks like It is!” He declared, unfazed by Fuyuhiko’s attempts to stop him. His fingers gracefully descended on his soft belly.

Fuyu shrieked again, throwing his head back with loud bright laughter. His body jolted, and was sent flying out of his lap by the intensity of his flailing.

Hajime froze, did that seriously just happen a second time? He didn’t stay frozen for long, He sat on his legs to pin him down. “There, Since you’re on the floor you shouldn’t be able to fall for a third time.” He laughed at the ridiculousness of the situation.

Fuyuhiko’s face couldn’t get any brighter pink. He wrapped his arms around his midsection to hide his body and protect his stomach. “Okay, You found one of my worst spots… congratu-fucking-lations… Now let me up.”

“Oh no, I’m not letting you out of this. I warned you what would happen If you didn’t tell me, Didn’t I?” He hummed. “Although, I think Instead of being mean, I’m going to be nice instead…”

Although the tickles that he unleashed on his poor belly weren’t very nice. His fingers scribbled mercilessly against the sensitive skin.

“KYAHAHAHAHA! NOHOHOHOHO! STAHAHAHAP!”

“Look at this cute ticklish belly, It’s just begging for affection. And what better affection than tickles?” He grinned at the whine that slipped past his lips.

“THIS IHIHIHIHISN’T BEING NIHIHIHICE!” He whined between laughs.

“Yes It Is. I’m going to compliment every spot I tickle so that you feel a little bit better about your body by the time I’m done.” He replied. “I think that sounds pretty nice to me~”

Fuyuhiko covered his face with his hands, hiding his embarrassment.

“I like all the freckles across your skin, It makes you unique and It looks adorable~”

He switched to skittering his nails across his trembling stomach, drawing some higher pitched laughs from the boy. “I also like how your skin turns pink after a little bit of tickling.”

“BAHAHAHAHASTARD STAHAHAHAP IHIHIT!”

“Nope!” Hajime leaned down and blew a raspberry against his belly button.

“NAAAAHAHAHAHA! HAHAHAHAHAJIME N-NAHAHAT THAT!” He laughed hysterically.

Just as he said, He began to snort between laughs. It was absolutely precious to the younger of the two.

“So what If your frame Is smaller? At least you have all your organs and bones, like your ribs for example.” He winked, fluttering his fingers across his ribcage. “There’s definitely twenty four of em. Unless you want me to count~?”

“Nohohohoho! *snort* Don’t you fucking dahahahare *snort* You bahahahastahahahard!”

“Well, Maybe I better count. Just In case.” He winked, Starting from the bottom set of ribs he worked his way up teasingly, Counting as he did.

So this was how Fuyu was going to die? Not the most dignified death in the world but… There’s worse ways to go, he supposed.

“Yep! All twenty four ribs!” Once he finished he skittered his fingers across Fuyu’s neck. “Your skin is really soft and tender, Perfect for tickling~”

“I wihihihill ehehehehend you!” He giggled.

“Shush! Let me hype you up.” Hajime laughed, going back and forth between neck, chest, ribs and underarms. Keeping Fuyuhiko In stitches. (and snorting, much to his chagrin.) “So what If you're not as tall? I think your height suits you. Plus, It makes it easier to pick you up and smother you with tickles.”

“Okahahahahay! Okahahay! *snort* Ehehehenough! Plehehehehease!”

Hajime relented, sensing he’d had enough. He sat down on the floor next to him and watched his chest rise and fall as he gasped for air.

Fuyuhiko brought his hands up and wiped the tears away from his face with his sleeves. “Oh my… God…” he panted.

“So, Are you feeling any better?” He asked with a grin.

“Y-Yeah… Th-Thanks…” Fuyu blushed as he sat up. “But… If you tell anybody what just happened--”

“Don’t worry, It’ll be our little secret.” Hajime winked, smiling at the flustered Yakuza.

“I can’t believe you think I’m cute. I am not fucking cute.” he huffed, crossing his arms.

Hajime blushed. Huh, He didn’t realize how that might sound without the proper context… Of course he didn’t mean romantically initially but.

He also didn’t feel any need to clarify this.

Is this inner conflict between platonic feelings and romantic feelings what being bi Is like? (Yes. Yes It Is. at least In my experience--)

“I can’t believe you think you aren’t cute.” Hajime retorted. “If I find out you’re feeling self conscious or dissing on yourself again, I will find you, and I will wreck you with compliments and tickles.”

Fuyuhiko gave a cheeky grin. “Is that supposed to deter me? You think I’m afraid of you?”

Hajime smirked and stood up, offering his hand to pull him to his feet. “You should be. Because you said I found one of your worst spots, Not the worst one… which means I still need to find it. And when I do, there will be no mercy.”

Fuyuhiko shuddered internally as he took Hajime’s hand and got to his feet.

“I’m not going to pressure you but… I might have a temporary solution If you wanted to join us.” Hajime said, going over to where he left his swim bag. From it he produced a tee shirt. “You could wear this with your swim trunks so that you don’t have to walk around shirtless.”

The Yakuza’s expression softened. “I didn’t bring my swim bag.”

“Peko did. She thought you might change your mind.” Hajime looked up at Fuyu and smiled, standing back up. He set the clean shirt on the table and ruffled Fuyu’s hair as he walked past. “If you change your mind…” He lingered in the doorway, looking back at him. “I’d love It if you joined us-- Uh, I mean, WE would love it-- Oh, You know what I mean.”

Flustered, The usually tsundere boy hurried back to the beach, Leaving behind the smiling Ultimate Yakuza.

“There you are! You sure were gone a while.” Mahiru sighed. “What were you off doing anyway?”

“Was Young master okay?” Peko asked, suddenly at his side.

“Fiend, Why Is your face so red? Are you possessed by a demon!?” Gundham asked.

“Did someone say Demon possession?” Sonia practically bounced over, Her eyes sparkling excitedly at the prospect.

Hajime stammered, Trying to process his words. “I-I was at the beach house with Fuyuhiko, He’s okay Peko.” He answered both Mahiru and Peko at the same time before turning to Gundham and Sonia. “No, I’m not possessed by a demon.”

“Aww...” Sonia pouted momentarily.

“Then why is your face so red? Did you forget the Human uv protection barrier?” Gundham asked, crossing his arms.

Hajime blinked. “The what?”

“Sunscreen?” Sonia asked, Turning back to Hajime after Gundham nodded in response to her question. “His face does not look sunburnt. Actually his face looks like it is going back to it’s normal color.”

“So that means Hajime was totally blushing!” Ibuki giggled. “What went on In that beach house, I wonder.”

Hajime’s face went red again as he was swiftly reminded of the reason he was blushing in the first place. “Sh-Shut up Ibuki!”

“Did something happen with Young master?” Peko asked curiously.

“N-No, Of course not! I-- GAH!” Hajime yelled In surprise as he was pelted with a water balloon, He whipped around In the direction it came from, Expecting Soda or Chiaki to have thrown It but instead finding Fuyuhiko.

He stood there barefoot In the sand, wearing swim trunks and Hajime’s shirt, which looked baggy on him and obscured his frame.

Peko’s face lit up, As did Hajime’s. The others were shocked.

“Hey Dumbass! Don’t lie to them. The truth Is I was going to stay inside but he cheered me up and convinced me to join you all.” He smirked, winking at Hajime who smiled lightheartedly.

“Well, There goes my fun! Who said he could join us??” Hiyoko pouted.

Chiaki sidled up to Fuyuhiko, handing him a rather large water gun with a bright smile. “Upgrade unlocked.”

Fuyuhiko grinned and took it from her. “Target acquired.” He responded, Locking eyes with Hiyoko as he pumped the water pressure slide.

The dancer screamed and took off running with Fuyuhiko on her tail. “NOOOO! MAHIRU HELP!”

“GET BACK HERE YOU LITTLE SHIT!” Fuyu called after her.

Mahiru and Hajime exchanged looks, cracking up laughing at their friends. “I’ll get my girlfriend to be nice if you go call off your boyfriend.” She said jokingly.

Hajime blushed, laughing along with her. “Deal.”

“Hiyoko! Over here!” Mahiru called, taking off running after her girlfriend.

“Fuyuhiko! Stop it, she’s already deeeaaad!” Hajime called after his friend, Laughing. He took off running after him too.

Chiaki leaned against Peko, sighing dramatically. “I think we pushed them In the right direction today.”

Peko nodded, patting the Gamer’s head. “It was smart of you to bring Fuyuhiko’s bag. How did you know he would change his mind?”

“I had a feeling. Thanks for carrying it for me, It would have looked suspicious If I’d been spotted with it.” Chiaki smiled sweetly up at the swordswoman. “Good work getting Hajime to go check on him. I don’t think either of them saw us In the doorway.”

Peko faintly smiled, watching Fuyuhiko get thrown over Hajime’s shoulder and carried away from Hiyoko. “I don’t think so either. Not that they could have heard us over Young Master’s laughter.”

Chiaki giggled as she watched Hajime getting sprayed down with the water gun now. “Mischief managed~”

[disregardcanon]

rwby julie and the phantoms au featuring dead girl band rwby and jaune as the conduit. but like, jaune who just half-way cheated his way into music school

the year is 1995 and the girl band RWBY is a rising power in the indie music world. composed of four talented, each with a rich and interesting backstory for the public to latch onto, they’re well on their way to becoming LGBT icons- if not actual stars. weiss, blake, and yang are twenty and ruby is eighteen.

weiss schnee is the daughter of silicone valley tycoon jacques schnee, who made headlines when she cut off all her hair and ran away from home to join a queer girl band. she’s the second schnee daughter to leave home, winter having joined the military back in 1992. she’s the band’s lead vocalist, though she occasionally plays violin in tracks that they write it into.

blake belladonna is already a famous singer. she sprung onto the scene in 1992 in a duo known as “bellataurus”. acting as the full sonny and cher package, adam taurus served as both older boyfriend and older manager until blake broke from him and helped to form RWBY in 1994. she took her vocals, her piano skills, GUITAR skills, and her songwriting skills with her.

yang xiao long and ruby rose are legacies of the highest order. summer, raven, qrow, and tai formed a band when they were kids and they became some of the biggest rockstars of the seventies and eighties- and later some of the biggest scandals. raven and tai’s messy, public breakup after the birth of their daughter signaled the band’s death- but then the birth of tai and SUMMER’S child signaled an even bigger scandal. the tabloids had an absolute field day over the new baby.

yang learned lots of instruments, but mainly took up the drums from her dad. the same went for ruby, but she mainly stole qrow’s guitar and made him teach her to shred.

unfortunately, the media never stopped following the two kids around, even through ruby’s transition. in a mixed bag for the remnants of STRQ and their children, the media circus that followed ruby rose coming out as a girl in NINETEEN NINETY TWO. the remaining members of STRQ still had a lot of clout and fully put their support behind her, but transmisognyny’s a bitch and it still followed them everywhere. yang coming out publicly as a lesbian neither helped nor hindered the situation, but it did make ruby feel a bit less alone.

the girls formed their band about a year before their- uh, UNTIMELY deaths in 1995. this came 3 days after a confrontation between blake and adam, where she promised that she would never, EVER date him again. she wouldn’t even work with him again. she and her band were going to become stars and actually help make social changes, instead of them just bullying her into going along with whatever THEY want from her and keeping her mouth shut because politics kills careers. 

they’re playing the ORPHEUM! the theater where so many bands have gotten their big break! she doesn’t need him now and she didn’t need him then.

eating bad street hot dogs after the warm up for a performance that blake promised adam 3 days ago would be the best that she ever gave- well. that’s just a weird coincidence, right?

cue 2020.

jaune arc has recently gotten into his first semester at a prestigious music college in the LA area, close to his family’s home where he still lives. the garage/studio out back remains largely untouched. half of that’s because cleaning the place out would be a lot of work, but half of it’s because his parents feel bad about the idea of cleaning out all of STRQ’s old recording equipment that both summer and tai promised they “didn’t want anymore” while selling the house in the wake of their daughters’ deaths. 

it’s not like the area is really suitable as a garage, and the arcs can spare a little room just in case those people ever change their minds.. even though they haven’t in twenty five years.

jaune’s house isn’t completely empty because he still has one of his older sisters going to college in LA at the same time, but it’s preeetttyy empty. his parents are hands off at this point and don’t even wonder how their baby who never even took any music lessons has gotten into a school like this.

it’s not like he doesn’t sing and sing pretty well, but they’re not even certain he can read music. spoiler alert: he can’t.

jaune is actually VERY good at working by ear and performing, but his music education growing up was lacking. on all levels. his parents encouraged him to do sports as his primary activity and he had no time for anything else and his public school music ed did not get him what he needed to go to music school.

frankly, he doesn’t even know what a treble clef is called. so. he’s a bit behind when going into his college classes. he was only able to fake the paperwork to get into music theory II, but considering that he’s. uh, completely unaware of what those notes mean he’s a bit fucked.

he’s always just been able to pull the song out of his ass because he listened to enough music to learn stuff by ear, but now he’s supposed to work through all this stuff with notation and he MIGHT BE DYING

he’s assigned to a group project with ren and nora and pyrrha and, well, thank god pyrrha notices and is kind enough to try to fill in the cracks.

but there’s a lot of cracks, you know? he’s barely pulling the grades that he needs to not get kicked out of the program at the moment, and he’s not entirely sure how to go about getting an accompanist for his end of semester showcase and ren and nora are already working together (they both play guitar and sing together) and pyrrha’s a soloist and -

oh god, he’s going to get kicked out of this program, isn’t he?

pyrrha keeps talking him down out of the anxiety because she is very kind and has a very big crush because jaune still has noticed that she’s a pop star that wanted to (but is failing to) have a normal college experience.

she lets him borrow her copy of RWBY’s first and only album and lets him take it home to listen to it. he decides to listen to it in the studio because he knows that’s where music, at one point, happened.

and it of course summons the souls of all four girls. they have ghostly mischief as they try to figure out how to make things work, and realize that while people who aren’t jaune can’t see them- people can HEAR THEM. and then when they play along with jaune for his end of semester show case- they realize that people can SEE THEM when they play with him.

pyrrha is confused about why jaune’s hologram band looks so much like RWBY, and she’s a little jealous and hurt that he’s been keeping this from her while letting HER bear the brunt of helping him with his struggles. jaune doesn’t know how to say that yeah, those are the actual ghosts of RWBY.

petty drama, petty drama, the girls are feeling suffocated by the fact that they’re actually dead and can’t interact with anyone who’s alive. ruby decides to go clear her head and meets another, very sweet and enthusiastic ghost named penny who likes to skateboard. 

penny is very sweet and ruby has what is known in show biz as a CRUSH. ruby learns a bit about how this ghost stuff works from her (some powers, about the unfinished business being what’s tying them to the land of the living, that she is VERY GAY) and she comes back to her friends to say hello yes i know things now and am also gay. wasn’t positive about that before but it’s a fact now

here’s where i lose my thread and am too tired to find it again but other things

1. ironwood is the villain of this. if you’re familiar with jatp, he serves the same function as caleb covington if not the exact same motives. he seals souls to him by a contract but with the express purpose of building a safe afterlife for ghosts... by making sure that all of them are under his control. winter, who died in one of the united state’s middle eastern campaigns is his right hand ghost. 

weiss is majorly conflicted by this because. it’s winter, you know? it’s winter. and it seems like this guy is trying to make things better for ghosts, right? he’s got a homebase and he can make them visible sometimes and make it so they can eat food and lots of stuff. but it comes with a heavy level of control. 

he doesn’t go after the girls until later because he thinks that they’ll come back, but when he DOES... the fact that he owns penny’s soul and doesn’t see her or any of the souls under his control as full people comes up in an ugly way.

2. adam taurus is the trevor wilson of this, but waaaayyy worse. he did in fact kill the girls and pillaged what he could of blake’s songs to record and put out under his own name. he‘s a big star, but a fading one, and he has a few vengeful ghost coming for him.

3. winter is a ghost, but whitley is a ghost of himself. at this point he’s forty and still doesn’t even know what he wants because he’s molded himself into what his dad wants so thoroughly. getting him to realize that he wants more and wants things for himself definitely comes up. winter also helps take down ironwood and free the souls. eventually

4. jaune IS a necromancer. he’s going to be able to see penny and others and eventually can give ghosts the power they need to be seen whenever they want. RWBYJNPR eventually becomes a big band that plays together sometimes

5. raven only came back for a few days for yang and ruby’s funeral before disappearing. qrow fell from grace quite dramatically when he accused adam taurus of murder with no evidence and became the laughing stock of america. he kept trying to find something that would fill the holes in his life, but he hasn’t lucked out with that yet... except the alcoholism, maybe.

tai and summer are still together, but they’re pretty miserable and they moved far away from LA to get out of the spotlight.

RWBY gets summer, tai, and qrow back together on purpose... and raven shows up when she sees her dead daughter singing on national television. the STRQ reunion is awkward and stilted, but things get better from there.

strq instruments

summer: vocalist with some piano

raven and qrow: bass and standard guitar respectively with some vocals

tai: drummer with some vocals

6. pyrrha and jaune eventually actually become the great duo that adam tried to market himself and blake as. sorry not sorry

7. not sure how they do it but they DO prove that adam murdered them and all of them including qrow get Vindication TM

8. the bumbleby isn’t a big plot point but they were dancing around getting together when they died and it happens slowly once they’re back <3

[julessworldd]

Cheerleader and the future rockstar

Warnings: cussing, there’s a jock being an ass talking about the Oc in a gross, sexual way. arguing a little.

A/N: I don’t know much about Izzy’s family life, like his mom and brothers name. I think the one I had is right for his younger brother. And what year he finished high school, bare with me. Oc’s home life is sorta sucky even though she’s the rich cheerleader. she’s not snobby at all like the sterotype everyone has about cheerleaders. I will make a part 2!

@slashscowboyboots​ @roger-taylors-car​ @reigns420​ @awildkaitlynhasappeared​ @ginny-rose-sixx​ @izzysguitar​ since you liked the post last night about the upcoming fic :)

High school Au of Izzy.. Izzy falls for the cheer captain after, she offers her help on an essay in English. Here's the thing the cheerleader has loved Izzy since he grabbed her from falling down the stairs, sophomore year. 

Many know Jeff Isbelle or now Izzy for lots of things. He was the cool, stoner, who was planning on being a rockstar with his buddy, Bill Bailey. To some teachers he was hell on wheels, "The badboy" even though he barely talked. Jocks: Izzy was a creep, just another shadow, stupid stoner who needs to have better life plans. To Judith Channing Izzy was: her crush of two years, wanted to spark a conversation, but her red and black cheer uniform stopped her. Izzy hated the cheer squad because their "Loyalty" to the jocks, they were too happy for his liking at 10 am. Judith remembers when Tommy Lockeler tried to push her down the 3rd floor stairway after, she told him she thought he was nothing but a whore and didn't want to go on a date.  Felt like it was yesterday.. 

I stared at Tommy as he was putting his claim about him being a manwhore. His face got redder and redder by the minute.. 

"Keith told me you had such a tight pussy, Channing. Wanna let me test his theory out? Probably won't you're just a bitch", Tommy spat back.

"Fuck you, Tommy. You just proved my point right there! God, you're so stup-", I felt the air out of my chest leave as I tumbled backwards into someone's arms.  "Whatever", I heard Tommy stomp away. "Hey, hey. You okay?", I heard a soft but gravely voice ask. I opened my eyes to see a tallish boy with medium brown hair, hazel eyes holding me, face with concern. "Yeah, I'm okay. Thanks for not letting me bust my head open, uh?", I said, holding my hands flat on his chest, one hand clutching his Rolling Stones' shirt. "Jeff, but I go by Izzy. Aren't you that Channing girl?", Izzy said, pulling me up, pushing a hair out of my face. "Yeah, I'm Judith. Nice to know my hero's name, Izzy", I blushed.  Izzy grinned, "What made Tommy try to commit murder after lunch anyways?" I smoothed out my uniform skirt, "Just the guy I lost my-", I realized what I was about to say to the new guy. "My hat, this summer. Tommy wanted to- '', I said, but Izzy nodded and seemed to understand what my 'hat' actually was. 

"Well, Keith needed to keep his mouth shut. Tommy is just an asshole, he's a jock they're all the same'', Izzy grumpled. "Yeah, you're right", I said. "Judith! We're gonna be late to practice, come on!", Erin yelled down the hall. "Thanks again, I appreciate it a lot. See ya around, Izzy", I smiled. "No problem. Have a good practice, Jude", Izzy said, reaching into his jacket pocket for his Malobros.  I watched Izzy smirk and skip down each stair, his cute ass bouncing as he went down. "Judith!", Erin yelled again, taking me away from my hero. 

Crazy how that's been two years ago, Izzy doesn't recognize me or chose to at least. After that day, I had a big secret crush on the Johnny Thunders of Lafayette. No guy gets me like Izzy does, Izzy barely knows me but he has such a big affect on me.  I walked into Mr. Allan's senior english class, there was a seat by the window, behind this dark headed boy. I sat down behind him, judging if I liked this seat. It was close enough to board, not in the very very front, nice view outside. "Oh Mike?", the kid turned around. "Oh, you're not Mike. Hi", I looked up and it was Jeff Isbelle. "No, sorry. Is this seat taken?", I asked as my heartrate rose. "No, he came in for a minute, guess he left before I noticed", Izzy said. "Okay class, let's get started!", Mr. Allan clasped his hands together. Allan was going over what we would be doing in the class before we graduated in June. Same bullshit honestly. Read Shakeperse, write essays, read other dead guys' writings. 

Two weeks later, Izzy was still seated in front of me. Making 3rd period class time hell, if you call getting to see his beautiful self plop down everyday. "Alright guys, we finished McBeth and now I'm wanting you to write about how you took the play. I'm asking if you liked the ending, if not write how you would have ended instead. You can use the books, notes we took, even chapter tests I gave back. Due in two weeks", Mr. Allan stated before sitting back at his desk.  It was getting close to 4th period, meaning I could leave for the day, no cheer practice today too. 

"Hey Judith?", Izzy asked. "Yeah, what's up?", I asked from writing my draft. "Did you keep anything from this unit? I lost my binder", Izzy asked. "Yeah, what do you want?", I smiled. "Notes, I guess. I'm not sure how I wanna write this shitty essay", Izzy grinned. Damn what a beautiful smile. I handed him every note I took on the play, side notes, everything.  "Pretty smart for a cheerleader", Izzy said, grabbing my notes. "I liked the play really well, okay?", I fought back.  "If you say so, Judith", Izzy turned back around. 

I walked in the empty room, well thought it was empty. Izzy was sitting in a desk next to Mr.Allan's desk, "Oh sorry, sir", I started to turn around. "It's okay, Judith. Actually, I need you for something", Mr. Allan smiled. I stood next to Izzy. "With what?", I asked. "Mr. Isbelle said you gave him his notes, the first day I assigned this essay. I'm just wanting to make sure he's not lying is all", Mr. Allan said. "Jeff is telling you the truth, sir. He asked if I still had anything about the play and wanted my notes for a starting point, I guess. You said we could use anything we did for the play", I said, starting to get offended he would assume Izzy stole my notes and wanted to cheat. 

"Okay, Judith. Well, since you're here go sit down.", Mr. Allan breathed out, probably embarrassed and a 17 year old girl started him out. The ball rang making Mr.Allan go out for hall duty and talk to other teachers. 

"Hey", Izzy said, standing in front of me. "Hi, Jeff", I smiled. "Thanks for backing me up with dickhead. If I tell you this, will you promise me you won't go to practice and gossip about me?", Izzy said clenching his jaw, he looked really hot. "Of course, Jeff. What's up?", I asked, rubbing my thumb over my other hand. "Your notes helped some, but I'm still stuck. Maybe, it's writer's block I need you to help me crap out this dumb essay. Please?", Izzy said. "Yeah, no problem, Jeffrey. I have cheer until 4:45, but I can meet you somewhere after.", I smiled. Izzy stared at me for a second, "Sure, that's cool. I can give you my address, mom's working late." 

I pulled up to Izzy's place, couple cars were parked outside. I decided to stay on the side of his street and yard, leaving a place for his mother. Izzy stepped out for a smoke as I got out, pulling my brother's t-shirt down. "Boyfriend's shirt?", Izzy blew out smoke from his lips. "No, brother's actually", I said, slinging my bag on my shoulder more. "Oh. Didn't know you had siblings, you gave me the spoiled only kid vibe", Izzy deadpanned. "No, three older brothers and two younger sisters.", I said, feeling small and embarrassed by Izzy. "My brother is here, just ignore him the best you can. He brought home some hamburgers, if you're hungry.", Izzy said, holding the door open. It was an average, but comfortable home. Pictures of Izzy and his brothers, with their mother lined the walls and a few tables. Tv by the wall, couple couches, chairs. Something wet touch my shein, "Sadie! Down. I'm sorry I thought Kevin set her out.", Izzy started to pull Sadie away by her collar. "She's okay. I have two dogs myself, I'm in her house, she's just checking me out. Yeah, you're a pretty girl", I said, bending down to pet her. "What kind of dogs?", Izzy said, sitting on a chair next to Sadie. "German shepherd, named Phoenix, Golden Retriever, Jagger. Jagger is new she's my baby like Phoenix", I said giggling as Sadie licked my hand. "Cool", Izzy mumbled. "Do you wanna start your essay or let me see what you have? Might not have to even start over", I got up and stood by his chair. "Damn, you're really about that essay", Izzy got up, going where I amused his room. 

 "Boys, I'm home!", A woman's voice entered the room. "Oh hi, dear. I didn't know Jeff had a girl over.", She smiled. "Yeah, I'm helping him on an english essay. I'm Judith Channing", I got up and grinned. "Channing? Channing? Is your father's name Frank?", She asked. "Yes, that's him", I said. "I went to high school with him, how is he?" "That's nice, uh he's good. Still in Chicago", I said. "Chicago?" "Yeah, business trip", I said, hoping Izzy would dash in or holler for me to come to see his room. "Does Jeff know you're here?", She asked with a worried look. "Yeah, we met outside. He went to his room for his english stuff, guess he fell to China '', I giggled. "Tell me about it, damn boy takes forever. Jeff! Did you forget about Judith? Jeffery Dean!", His mother yelled. 

"Mom, hey. Though I told you to come with me, Judith?", Izzy said standing beside me. "How was work, Momma?", Izzy hugged her. "Hi, I'm Kevin and you are?", Kevin, Izzy's younger brother checked me out. "Kev, let her alone she's with me", Izzy said, standing beside me protectively. "You're way way out of my brother's leguage. Hey Mom", Kevin said. "Come on. Holler if you need anything", Izzy grabbed my hand, pulling me with him. He grabbed my bag on the way. "Crack your door, Jeff. I mean it!", his mother yelled.  Izzy's room was nice, typical posters, navy blue bed set, desk with papers and pens, small nightstand with a picture of his family, set of records by his recorder player. I slid my shoes off by his desk and sat on the chair. Izzy flopped on his bed, unamused. 

"So what did you think about McBeth?", I asked. Izzy shrugged. "Izzy, your perspective is gonna help write this essay. Tell me", I scoffed. "Just a crazy dude that got killed for letting his power go to his side over what a couple hags had to say. I liked when he got ambushed by the people", Izzy sighed, rubbing his hair around.  "Okay, see that helps. So,you liked the ending and we can stretch your thought out into five paragraphs", I said, looking for a pencil.  "Listen, Judith I'm not in the mood for a stupid play from a dead guy from 400 years ago. Mr.Allan can go fuck himself", Izzy scoffed out. "If you didn't want me over why did you ask for my help. I do have other shit to do, Izzy", I pinched the bridge of my nose. This fucker made me drive half way cross town for this essay. "Then why did accept to come over and help?", Izzy spat back. "I don't know? Probably because I always help people who need help. It's what nice people do anyways", I rolled my eyes.

“Why did I have to ask a smart cheer captain for help?”, Izzy groaned.

“Sorry to break your little stereotype of cheerleaders being dumb and only want to fuck. You know what, Iz? I’m leaving, who cares if you finish the damn essay. Not like you care if you fail or pass, L.A won’t care either way”, I stood by his bed at his nightstand. Izzy stared up at me with confusion. “How do you know wanna go to L.A? I’ve never had a conversation with you before english”, Izzy raised up. “Bill told me you were thinking about if after graduation, he asked my help for math. We have talked before, Izzy. Sophomore year, you caught me from falling to my death after Tommy Lockeler, pushed me down the stairs. You had a Rolling stones shirt on, your hair a little shorter, guess I landed in your arms on a good day.”, I said, with tears in my eyes. “That’s you? No wonder you look familiar besides being a cheerleader. I’m sorry for being a dick, you did come out of your way for me.”, Izzy stood up from his bed. “It’s fine, Izzy. Why don’t you just bullshit it? I’m not feeling too great”, I sighed, walking to his desk for my bag. “Wait. Please don’t leave, I really need your help. I really liked the book and I’m sorta stuck.”, Izzy grabbed my wrist. 

“Okay. If I see you slacking I’m out, Isbelle”, I said. “Sit”, Izzy said, pushing his office chair to me. “Thanks”, I smiled. Izzy pushed a hair out of my face, “Sorry, it was bothering me”  I blushed, before looking away from him. Izzy chuckled, “Something you hiding from me, Judith?” “Tell you what, if you finish the essay, I’ll tell you what I’m hiding, deal?”, I bit my lip. “Deal”, Izzy smirked. Izzy’s brain was flowing and his hand was scribbling on the paper like he didn’t need me over. “Anndd done”, Izzy said, throwing his pencil in the cup he had on his desk. “Let me read it first”, I grabbed the two pages. “You lied”, Izzy whined. I scanned his paper looking for details of the play, if he had the right grammar, punctuation. “Looks good, Izzy. I’m proud”, I laid the paper down. “Thanks, now tell me why you were blushing?”, Izzy laid his hand on my jean clad thigh. “Do I have to?”, I whined. “I did my part, so it’s your turn, Channing”, Izzy said, not breaking his poker face. “Okay, don’t get mad. I have had a crush on since you caught me that day, at times I’m happy Tommy attempted to murder me that day. You happy?”, I stood from his chair and paced besides his bed. “Judith”, Izzy said.

“Hey, Judith, calm down. I have to tell you something too”, Izzy said, grabbing my hand. “What?”, I asked, scared to death he was gonna kick me out. “I like-”, “Hey dinner is ready”, Kevin opened his door, looking down at our hands. “I better get home, mom’s probably worried.”, I lied, she didn’t give a damn about me and my whereabouts. “Okay, I’ll walk you out”, Izzy said. We reached my car, “Well,thanks for the help. Guess I needed to be forced to write”, Izzy said, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “No problem, I liked hanging out with you”, I smiled. Izzy nodded, “Be safe” “Sure thing. Night Izzy”, I said, unlocking my car door. Izzy stood until I turned at the stop sign from his house. I tried to skip school, to avoid the awkwardness between me and Izzy. He got really quiet after his brother barged in yesterday, at least he was nice enough to walk me to the car and waited for me to get on the main road again. 

I was headed to lunch but was really wanting to sneak out to my car and drive around for a while. Looking through the glass doors that lead to the front parking lot, I could hear my car whine for me to leave. “Fuck it”, I thought grasping the door and pushed it open. “Where do you think you’re going, missy?”, A deep male voice startled me. I turned around to see Izzy grinning. “Oh it’s just you. Come on, let’s ditch”, I smirked. Izzy nodded and opened the door. We ran down the stairs, to my car, laughing. “Why did you wanna skip? You have a good attendance record?”, Izzy asked, plopping into the passenger seat. “Just ready to leave, school was boring. I don’t have cheer practice today. You?”, I asked, starting the car. ‘Shattered’ The Rolling Stones played quietly. “Same reason as you, just fuck it. Didn’t take you as a Stones fan?”, Izzy smirked as I pulled out of the school parking lot and headed towards town. “There’s a lot you don’t know about me Izzy. My dog is named after Mick Jagger, remember?”, I smirked. Izzy nodded his head to the beat of the song, going through my cassette tape collection. 

We got out of my car and went to a pair of swings, Izzy groaned. “What’s the matter, afraid one of the stoners will catch you with the cheerleader?”, I smirked. “No, princess. Just haven’t swung since I was 9”, Izzy grumbled. “Suit yourself, Jeff”, I pushed my legs to swing. “You like cheerleading?”, Izzy asked. “It’s alright”, I said. Izzy lit a cigarette and watched me swing my legs back and forth. Izzy caught me as I slowed down, holding the chain, pulling me close to him. I looked in his hazel eyes, cigarette creeped on his breath. “After, I killed Kevin for bargin in on us last night. I got to thinking, we’re getting closer to graduation. I’m bailing this hoosier state, you’re probably going on to join a sorority at Purdue. I wanna tell you something”, Izzy said, breath fanning my neck. “What is it?”, I whispered. “I like you and wanna know if you’ll be my girl?”, Izzy nipped my bottom earlobe.  I pulled him into a kiss, holding his shoulders, “Thought you would never ask, Jeff” Izzy smiled down at me. “And I’m not going to college, Iz. I don’t have to pay to have friends, just so you know. Thinking about going to New York actually”, I whispered. “Wanna join me out west? Don’t go to New York, just cold as Indiana, baby”, Izzy held my waist. “I can do that”, I grinned, kissing his cheek. 

[lalainajanes]

for the prompt list: 12. “Welcome back. Now fucking help me.” / 1. Coworker AU / 16. "Sit in my lap" :D

Thank you! I was thinking the other day that I’ve never really done a musicians AU which is silly. So I made that happen here though it’s probs stretching “coworkers.”

The Beat Goes On

When Caroline steps on the bus, she stops immediately, only halfway up the steps. She surveys the scene – Kol, Marcel, Klaus, plus about a half dozen fans. Her eyes turn murderous. She hitches her bag higher on her shoulder, yanks her suitcase up the rest of the way, and storms through the living area. She’s whipped the curtain that hides their bunks closed behind her before Klaus can snag her attention.

A pity. He’d been hoping for her help.

He’s in no mood for company either. Partying all night is such a rockstar cliché – and completely unrealistic considering they need to be on the road in a few hours, then unloading their gear in the next city a few hours after that.

It’s their first headlining tour. They can’t quite afford a complete crew. It’s going well, with most shows sold out. They’ve had to put in a rush order for more merch. Klaus has high hopes the next outing will be a little more luxurious.

Higher hopes that one day they’ll have more than one bus. He’s willing to share with Caroline. Preferably something with an actual bedroom – not the claustrophobic stack of cots they’re currently enduring.

He can’t complain too much. Their current accommodations are far superior to the unreliable van and dingy motels they’d piled into on their first tour. They’d been the first of several supporting acts, had considered themselves lucky when they’d turned a profit by the end.

That profit had bought some decent recording equipment, the EP they’d put out after doing well on Spotify. A better tour had followed. Then another. Press, photoshoots. Then interest from a few labels.

Klaus has only spent a few nights of the last few years in his own bed. He has no regrets.

He sets his beer down, stands. Pretends not to notice when one of the women who’d been inching closer and closer swipes it immediately.

He’ll have to check eBay tomorrow. See what the going rate for his saliva is. He doesn’t bother to excuse himself.

Caroline’s stowing her belongings. Klaus would bet they have the cleanest tour bus in the history of the music industry. Caroline’s a bit of a psychotic neat freak. Over the years she has doled out vicious punishments when a “Close Cohabitation Survival Rule” (there’s an extensive list - laminated and prominently posted) is violated.

Kol had been the slowest to learn. To drive the lesson home, Caroline had snipped out the back pockets of every pair of trousers he’d packed. She’ then hidden all of his underwear. Had bribed, threatened or cajoled every man on tour not to offer a spare pair.

She’d timed it flawlessly, Kol hadn’t had time to run out to a shop, and they hadn’t been significant enough to have anyone they could send on an errand. Kol had done a show with his arse – clad only in a pair of Caroline’s lime green lace boy shorts, hanging out of a ruined pair of jeans. The pictures appeared online within minutes, Kol will likely be answering questions about his preference in underwear for the rest of his natural life.

Caroline’s plots had done the trick. Their belongings tend to stay organized, their floors are never sticky, and the bathroom is perfectly sanitary.

Her bunk’s curtain is closed, but Klaus sees a faint glow, knows she’s not asleep. He yanks the curtain aside.

He’s willing to risk stoking Caroline’s anger. He’s exceedingly good at soothing her.

Caroline glares and tries to pull the fabric out of Klaus’ grip. “Go away.”

He gauges how much she means it, finds little heat in her tone. And she shifts over willingly when he climbs in next to her, lifts her legs so he can curl his under them. Caroline had showered at the venue, had her hair braided and off her face. She wears an old pair of sweats (his) and a tank top. Klaus attempts to coax, “Come out and have a drink.”

Caroline’s nose wrinkles, “Pass.”

“One drink.”

“I’m tired. It’s crowded.”

Weak excuses. “You’ll miss the show.”

That piques her interest. Caroline hates to be out of the loop.

“What show?”

“Our lovely manager should arrive shortly, shouldn’t she? Why else would Kol have three girls who’s name’s he hasn’t bothered to learn draped all over him?”

She twists her head to stare at him, and Klaus is sorely tempted by how close her mouth is. It would be so easy to close the minuscule gap and press his lips to hers, to stroke the spot on her neck that always makes her eyes roll back and her hips shift close.

But they don’t do that anymore.

“Are you telling me,” Caroline says slowly, disbelief etched in every word. “That Kol’s concocted some teen soap style plot to make Bonnie jealous?”

“I did try to tell him it was unwise.” Though, if he’s honest, Klaus hadn’t tried that hard.

Caroline presses the heel of her hand to her forehead, a frustrated groan spilling from her throat. “I have been trying so hard to convince Bonnie he’s serious. He’s going to ruin all my hard work.”

“All the more reason for you to come out, hmm? Can’t have all of your most excellent matchmaking going to waste.”

He’s not even upset when she elbows him in the stomach because he knows he’s won. He slides out of the bunk, and Caroline twists, “I need to find my phone and stall Bon,” she mutters. Her tanktop slides up as she rummages through her blankets, and Klaus clasps his hands behind his back because the urge to run his hand over the smooth skin of her hip might be stronger than he is.

He has a plan, well thought out, and practically foolproof. He cannot rush. Caroline pauses when she notices Klaus watching, balances on her elbow, and shoves his shoulder with her free hand. “Get out there. Make sure no one does anything too stupid.”

“No promises.” Klaus knows better. He’s known Kol since birth. Reckless acts of stupidity are one of his brother’s specialties.

Caroline’s found her phone, has settled on her stomach. She’s frantically texting, so Klaus exits.

He immediately notes that several bottles of liquor have made their way out. That more people Klaus doesn’t recognize have joined them. Kol’s lost some clothing, has got one arm raised high, splashes of what Klaus is reasonably sure is bourbon splashing down, onto his bare chest.

It has all the makings of a disaster.

Unfortunately, for some reason, Caroline is slow to appear. Kol’s at his jittery, exuberant drunk stage, unable to sit still or focus on a topic for longer than a few moments. He’s telling stories that are only half true, gesturing wildly. A few of their visitors are enthralled. Marcel had slipped outside with a few people, Klaus hears his laugh drift in through the open door occasionally.

Two women have boxed him in. They don’t seem to mind that he has no interest in the conversation they insist on prolonging. They giggle delightedly at his clipped answers. Klaus has already taken photos, signed skin. Has his fingers crossed their not the type to rush off to a tattoo parlor.

When Caroline emerges from the back, Klaus has a moment of déjà vu. She barely notices Kol; her attention focused on him, and the people invading his personal space. She’s furious again, more so, Klaus thinks.

He’s always been confident in his plan but won’t say no to the ego boost her obvious jealousy provides.

It’s a small space; she’s in front of him in a few steps. Klaus smiles up at Caroline, grabs her wrist. She appears confused for a second – it’s been ages since he’s touched her in front of another person.

He hasn’t attempted it since being photographed, having the images splashed all over social media and picked apart, became a real possibility. Caroline had begun shying away once the tweets and the Instagram comments had started coming in. Some positive, a lot negative. Klaus had followed her lead. Had figured he’d let her get used to the fame, that he’d just have to convince her that they could be together publicly without ruining what they have privately.

He drags her hand to his mouth, distracts her by pressing a chaste kiss to the back of it. He hears a gasp to his left, but he doesn’t care, tugs harder until Caroline loses her balance.

She lands in his lap, and one of the women leaps to her feet with a yelp. Convenient, as it gives Klaus more room to maneuver. He wraps his arm around Caroline’s waist and settles her more comfortably, her side resting against his chest. He pitches his voice loud enough to be heard clearly by everyone in the room, “A bit clumsy tonight, aren’t you? It’s fine, sit in my lap.”

The woman who’d swiped his beer bottle is either drunk enough not to mind her tongue or unconcerned with basic manners. “Are you two?” She lifts a hand in a gesture that’s both vague and slightly lascivious.

Caroline squirms, but Klaus squeezes her hip, cutting off her denial with a whisper in her ear. “You took ages. Welcome back, now fucking help me.”

She pinches his stomach in retaliation. Klaus holds back a wince. Caroline ignores it, turns on the charm, smiling warmly at their nosy questioner. “Nope. We’ve just known each other for ages. Spent way too much time in tight spaces. Not a lot of boundaries when you’ve spent months crammed in a van, you know?”

Klaus could comment about the private time they’d managed to enjoy in that van occasionally but Caroline’s fingernails are sharp. He doesn’t mind wearing their imprints, but he’d prefer to earn those marks pleasurably.

“So, you’re just friends?”

“Bon-Bon!” Kol shouts, interrupting Caroline’s response.

(Probably a good thing. Klaus isn’t entirely sure he trusts himself to stick to his timeline if Caroline tried to claim they were just anything while sitting on his lap and wearing his clothes.)

He’s surprised when Caroline settles back against him, rather than leaping to his feet. Pleased, too. Her arm drapes around his shoulders, her fingertips tangling in his necklaces. She watches the scene unfolding in front of her.

Her touch is familiar, missed. Klaus closes his eyes to enjoy it while he can.

[imtryingmyfuckingbe]

Werewolf of Portland

Pairing: Dean x FBI!Reader

Word count: 10K

I’m not good a summaries, but I drew inspiration from anytime the boys give actual FBI Agents the “talk”, as well as that episode where Jody calls them out for using Bobby as their “supervisor”. This is a repost because I accidentally deleted the original, but it gave me time to edit it better. I’m thinking of doing a second part if I get enough feedback or requests for it, so please, please, please tell me what you think. I’m hungry for feedback haha. Also I know nothing about Portland or official FBI Badges so please keep that in mind as you read.

Warnings: Canon violence, profanity, and a plot twist I didn’t even see coming

Werewolf of Portland

The repugnant, putrid scent overcomes the clearing, spread by the gentle breeze. Despite the green grass littered with wild flowers, the unforgiving scent of rotten eggs clings to the workers’ hazmat suits. Flies buzz incessantly around the body, like that of an opaque blanket if adorned with beady eyes and veiny wings.

While the forensic cleaners work to gather the corpse’s remains for transportation, Agent Y/L/N stands at the edge of the control zone. Her day started at 4:39 in the morning, wherein she spent the next five hours scouring the field alongside her team. Even with her duties tended to, she refuses to leave the scene. The sparse clues yielded in the first examination plague her mind.

No fingerprints, no shoe prints, no footprints, no DNA; the list of what they don’t have extends further than what they do.

The body itself— what little the attacker left of it, at least— covered the majority of the scene. Torn to pieces, heart removed; remains scattered. She hopes the coroner can get something from her examination. The lacking evidence in addition to this being the fourth body found places an insurmountable weight on Y/N’s shoulders. 

The public’s outrage cries for the FBI to put the criminal behind bars, but they’re no closer to identifying witnesses, let alone a culprit. Y/N signs, running her hand through her hair. No matter the amount of cases she faces, no matter how gruesome, she never lets it desensitize her. If she becomes numb to the pain of blood and guts, she fails to invest herself in solving the case.

Turning from the scene, she instead takes in the myriad official vans and workers putting about. Her partner speaks with forensics, gathering whatever helpful information they can provide. A small side glance her way and the lift of his hand by his side, he beckons Y/N over. However, her lead feet refuse to move. Still engulfed in the horror show behind her, she takes a moment to collect her thoughts.

Y/N struggles to keep her emotions in check. Rage courses through her veins at the heinous acts humans commit, to fulfill sadistic pleasure or cure one’s demons. Unfortunately, in the FBI, she must swallow her anger and sadness, replacing it with a monotone voice and calculated expressions. Taking a breath, she departs from the border and heads towards Agent Colt. 

He finishes speaking with the worker, who leaves the partners in peace.

“They’ve got nothing. We’ve got nothing. Not for this one, not for the past three.”

She already knows this. A thought tickles the back of her mind, but she cannot name it. “All right. Maybe they got sloppy; maybe this time the coroner will get something. Anything.” Elijah rolls his eyes, pursing his lips and rubbing his chin. Y/N knows he’s saying We can’t base our investigation on maybe. Another sigh. “Fine, let’s run through this again.”

Elijah leads the way to their company car. “So, the heart. That’s the main focus. It’s missing.”

“Yes. This points to it being personal. It takes a lot of passion and hatred to rip through someone’s chest and remove their fucking heart. Which, another thing, the hearts aren’t just removed. They’re taken.”

“Right. Okay, haphazard blood splatter; no pattern. I’d say our killer is disorganized. Listless.”

“Not completely. I mean, there’s an even month between each murder. That leans more towards organized. There’s ritual. It’s not really first come, first serve, ya know?”

Elijah pauses at his door, fingers clasped tightly around its handle. He worries his bottom lip between his teeth, staring off into the distance. Y/N knows that look. She’s seen it in herself, survivors and fellow agents. He’s not looking at the clearing, but trying to connect the dots. Perhaps the weight of solving this doesn’t rest solely on Y/N’s shoulders.

As Elijah returns from his reverie and yanks open the car door, Y/N hears a deep, raspy voice greet the local law enforcement. Her partner settles into his seat, staring at her with drawn eyebrows and pursed lips. She holds up a finger.

Casting a quick glance behind her, Y/N finds two suits mid-introduction with the sheriff. The pair hold up identification booklets, much like the one in her pocket. Their suits hang too loosely off of their bodies, their dress shoes too scuffed. The longer she watches their body language, the larger the pit in her stomach grows. She turns around to lean against the car, keeping focus on the men. They talk for a moment more before the sheriff nods in her direction.

Y/N watches their shoulders tense, standing taller from the rigidness. Yes, she muses, something is off.

The window she leans against pulls on her coat as Elijah rolls it down. “Hey, you coming?”

Pondering for a moment whether she should let him in on her instincts, Y/N decides against it. “Yeah,” she leans down, poking her head through the window. “I’m going to stay here, actually. I want to see if I can squeeze anything else out of the uniforms.”

Elijah chuckles. “We’re uniforms too, you know.”

She returns the laugh. “Right, well, you head back to the office. Make a fresh pot of coffee, too. I’ll meet you there.”

He holds two fingers to his forehead before dramatically sweeping them across his face. “Aye, aye, captain.”

Y/N stands as he rolls the window back up, patting the roof. Elijah peels off while she returns her attention to the still-gawking men. Their postures only straighten as she nears; if they stood any more rigid she’d swear they were wax figures. “Harold,” she acknowledges the sheriff. He nods. “How’s it going on your end?” Y/N keeps the men in her peripheral but focuses on Harold. 

Harold’s eyes shift to the pair, then back to Y/N. “As I was telling your fellow agents—” at this statement, the men share a glance, “—still nothing.”

“Right, well I want to go over everything again. Give me a moment.” She finally turns to greet the supposed agents. “Gentlemen, to whom do I owe the pleasure?” Scanning their faces, she studies them for any quirk of the lips or perspiration on the brow.

The taller one speaks first. “I’m, uh, Agent Pert and this is Agent Bonham,” he gestures next to him.

Pert and Bonham? Really? She refrains from rolling her eyes.

Instead, Y/N doesn’t respond, using the pressure of silence in her favor. Harold clears his throat, uncomfortable with the tension. She ignores him, keeping focus on the men before her. Most of her suspects break under her gaze; very few can sustain their façade in an encounter with her steely eyes and stiff posture. Harold excuses himself,  unable to withstand her harsh eyes. The men continue to stare, neither willing to relent. Unfortunately, this renders them at an impasse. She, too, will not look away or speak.

Agent Pert concedes, taking the lead. “Right, well, we’re here from DC to investigate the murders. What have you got?” His voice imperceptibly wavers— if untrained, Y/N wouldn’t notice the quiver— the corner of his lip twitching. 

Ignoring his request, she commands, “Let me see your badges, agents.”

Another conversation through a shared look before they hand them over. They’re good, the badges. A smidgen off center of authentic. If not for the incorrect serial code and too high insignia placement, Y/N would accept them at face value. She closes the booklets and pockets them, earning a small Hey of protest from the short one. Cocking an eyebrow, she dares them to challenge her.

“Impersonating a federal agent is a crime, I’m sure you know.”

“Impersonating a— call our superior and check! Let me see your badge!” Crew cut exclaims, indignant.

“I’ll lend my badge after I’ve talked to your superior officer.” She wonders how far they intend to take this rouse. 

With their business card in hand, she retreats a few steps. As she dials the number the little whisper in the back of her head pesters her further. The questionable agents and unsolvable case remind her of… something. 

“Agent Willis,” a voice grunts.

“Willis? What’s your outpost?”

“Headquarters. Who is this?”

“Agent Y/L/N. It appears I have two of your agents here; I’m sure some wires crossed when you sent them down? What were your orders for Agents Tyler and Grohl?” 

“Who are you to question my authority, Agent?”

His growl pulls the pressing thought to the forefront of her mind. 2005, in Cincinnati on her first case. Similar to her case today: bodies piled up with no leads and peculiar circumstances. She ran into someone claiming to be FBI, too. Fresh from the academy with the weight of the world on her shoulders, she accepted his excuse of  bureaucratic miscommunication; why don’t we work the case together? 

She laughs. “Wait, hold on. I know you.”

“Noyoudon’t,” he spits out, too quickly.

“Yeah, I do. Fuck, what’s your name?” she mumbles, more to herself than him. “Singer! Ohio, we worked a case together. Culprit never caught and you went on your merry way.”

He blubbers, failing to produce a proper excuse. “I don’t know a Singer, Agent.”

She rolls her eyes, finally turning to face the men. The stricken look on their faces only further points to the truth. “All right, Willis. Even if that were true, you also don’t know your agents’ names. They introduced themselves as Pert and Bonham. Really, Singer? Rockstars’ names?” The humor of the situations drains, replaced with its severity. “All right, I’m taking your men in. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll stay put and wait for mine to come get you.”

“Wait— Y/L/N, right? Hear me out,” he pleads, urgency ringing clear in his voice.

“You have ten seconds.”

“Listen, they’re there to help. Your attacker ain’t what you think it is. I closed that case in Cincinnati, thanks to your help. But, it wasn’t a person. It was a vampire.”

She laughs again, this time wild and unbelieving. “Yeah, right. And this one is a fucking Chupacabra.”

“No, it’s not. We think it’s a werewolf.”

“You’re fucking nuts. No, I’m calling this in.”

“Y/N. Wait. Talk to them, please. People are still in danger. Their names are Sam and Dean. Winchester.” The desperation in his voice settles with unease in her chest. Her time on the force yields too much experience in discerning honesty from duplicity. 

Rather than respond, she ends the call and returns to the newly named Winchesters. They stand unmoving, shoulder to shoulder; if not for the wind tussling the tall one’s hair, she’d think they were statues. “So.” They squirm under her gaze. “Which one of you is Sam and Dean?” Their eyes widen at her remark, startled by her knowledge of their true identities. 

Crew cut juts his chin out and squares his shoulders. “I’m Dean. That’s Sam. Why don’t you tell us who you are and how the hell you know our names?”

“I’ll be the one asking questions, gentleman. I’ve half a mind to put you in cuffs. First, you impersonate a federal agent; second, your pal Singer brings up werewolves? Sounds like three peas in a pod headed for St. Christopher’s Asylum to me.” Neither respond. “Thirty seconds, boys. You have thirty seconds to make me believe you or the only way you’re leaving is in cuffs.” For emphasis, she pats her hip, whereupon the cuffs hang.

The pregnant silence leers on.

“25.”

Sam sighs, running his hand through his hair. “All right. There are things in this world that you don’t know about; that not many people know about. The bumps in the night, the clichés; most of them are real. Have you had anything happen to you that you can’t explain? Or had an unsolvable case?” He pauses for her answer, but she only looks on, hands on her hips. 

Vampires? Werewolves? What the fresh fuck? Her mind reels with the implications of his statement; even still, it doesn’t feel wrong. A few cases come to mind instantly: the serial killer who left victims’ eyes burnt out, people torn to shreds in supposed animal attacks by nothing from these parts. How many victims faced the unknown rather than human wrath? She can handle psychopaths, serial killers, the insane. She knows that evil; deals with it regularly. But the supernatural? No.

“Right, well, we hunt those things. We take them out,” he gestures between himself and Dean.

Y/N’s hands drop from her sides, falling limp at her thighs. “Just you two?” She whispers, cold and disbelieving.

“No,” Dean speaks up. “Not just us. There’s a lot of us out there.”

“Listen, I’m going to need more than just your word. I don’t know you, and I sure as hell don’t trust you. What can you give me that will make me believe you?” Despite not wanting it, she needs proof. Plus, if they turn out to be nuts, she can lock them up and toss the key; no harm, no foul.

They nod once, curt but understanding. Sam takes a step forward, hand raised in her direction. “This’ll take a leap of faith, Agent…”

“Y/L/N.”

“Agent Y/L/N. Let us work on this with you,” Sam implores. “And if we’re wrong, you can book us yourself.” 

“Sammy, hold up. Who’s to say we can trust her either? She’s just some Fed. Who’s to say she won’t cuff us anyway?” Dean protests, turning towards Sam.

While the two quietly argue, Y/N takes a step back. Running her tongue over her teeth in concentration, she ponders the options. Even if Sam offers her control, she knows their type: they won’t let her actually take the lead. Dean reminds her of her father, and that man never relinquished supervision. In order for this to work in her favor— seeking the truth, protecting the public— Y/N must fulfill the role as the dutiful public servant. Perhaps they’re not fucking lunatics, and this thing turns out to be real, she’d be way out of her element anyway. Still, she refuses to give up control.

Staring off towards the field, where the body once laid, she contemplates the little evidence recovered. Vics torn to shreds, no prints, no DNA. Local PD swears it’s a cougar, an animal indigenous to the area. Even still, animals are simpler than humans. They kill for sustenance or safety. The brutality of this kill, the length of the claw marks, lack of fur, ritual occurrences; it all points in the wrong direction. Y/N would quicker say some furry decided killing offers more sexual release over cosplay than call it a fucking cougar.

“If you expect me to try to trust you, or at least what you say, then I need your trust, too. This goes both ways,” she interrupts. The men cease their heated discussion, turning towards her. “I don’t like what you’re telling me. I don’t want to believe it. But… I trust my gut, and I think you guys are either great liars or telling the truth.” Sam smiles, but Y/N holds up a hand. “However, I will not put my eggs in one basket. I need insurance that you’ll hold up your end of the bargain. This means I’m taking point, and you guys are consultants. Anything you know, you tell me. Anything you find, you tell me. Anything you do, you tell me. Capiche?”

Sam nods before Dean, nudging his side to encourage his agreement. Dean tosses his hands in the air. “Fine. Where to next, Agent?” Venom drips with each word. 

“I need to get back to the station. My partner, Agent Colt, will be—”

“Colt? Agent Colt? The irony.” Dean interrupts. Sam elbows him again, and Y/N chooses to ignore him altogether.

“I’m going back to the station. I’ll talk to the Uniforms and tell them to give you anything pertinent to this specific scene. Anything to do with the others can wait until tonight. Meet me at Carlton’s, off of Hamilton street. I’ll bring the files for the other Vics.” She hands Sam her business card, not trusting Dean to keep it. 

“What about our badges?”

Y/N rolls her eyes, exhausted. “Fuck, man. I’m trying my hardest to ignore the federal crime you committed right in front of me. Prove you’re right and you’ll get them back. Until then, you’re consultants employed by the Bureau.” 

She pushes passed them, heading towards Harold. Their boots crunch on the gravel as they lag behind her. He halts his conversation with one of deputies upon their arrival. “Sheriff, these two are fresh blood from the academy.” She juts her thumb over her shoulder. “HQ thought this would be a good case for them to learn on the job. Tell them anything you know and let them case the scene. I’m going back to the station to meet up with Elijah.”

“But—” Harold begins. Y/N levels him with sharp eyes and pressed lips, stopping him in his tracks. “Right. Okay. Follow me, Agents.” Sam and Dean shoulder passed Y/N, catching up to the Sheriff with a few long strides. 

Y/N stands for a moment, hands in her jacket pockets, watching the two men. If this turns out to be a rouse— if she let two criminals onto the field with her permission— that’s her head. Shaking the thought away, she turns. She’s able to hitch a ride back to the station with the forensic profilers.

———————————————————————————————————

Elijah spared his questions when she returned, thankfully. Instead, he shoved a hot cup of cop shop coffee into her hands before continuing their earlier evaluation. “Right, can’t be disorganized, but he’s definitely passionate. That shows connection to the victims.”

Y/N sips her coffee. Forcing the bitterness down her throat, she also swallows her new knowledge. She must work this case like any other, for it might be. “You think it’s a man?”

Around the bite of an apple, he says, “Yes. Female offenders aren’t typically serial murderers; they’re passion killers. Black Widows, Angels of Death, you know the type.”

“I do, but Wuronous diverged from the typical female murderer.”

“Yeah, that’s one of many. Most other women utilized poison for their kills. The ME didn’t find any traces of cyanide, arsenic, or tetrodotoxin— nothing. Doesn’t fall in line with what we know.”

Y/N simmers. She knows this, of course. “Let’s keep the possibilities in mind.” She sifts through the crime scene pictures, lining up the photos of the different victims side by side. “Placement doesn’t seem to matter, so that leans away from obsessive compulsiveness. The offensive wounds support this, too.”

“Y/N, what are we reaching for? We don’t have a profile, a motive; nothing.”

“Not true. Let’s lay it all out, one more time. Hearts are taken, gruesome attack wounds, lower body left alone. Maybe these are passion killings, and the only thing in common with the victims is the killer. I mean, people come and go all the time here. Maybe they knew the Unsub outside of Portland. The ritualistic pattern of the murders makes me think the killer stalks the victims in the month down time; gets to know their schedule, comings and goings. They’re all aged between twenty-five and thirty-five. Maybe the killer is attracted to the ages rather than physical descriptions. Also—” Y/N stops, sighing.

Even as she tries to string everything together, she knows Elijah is right. Too much of the evidence contradicts any profile they could scrape up. Ritualistic but not obsessive, disorganized but keeps to a schedule, passionate murders between unrelated victims. Nothing points them in any definitive direction. They’re grasping at straws here. 

Sam and Dean creep to the forefront of her mind. She downs her coffee in one go. It heats her stomach, and she blames her rising temperature on the beverage rather than brimming anger. Clenching her fists, she crushes the paper cup. Elijah reaches over to rub her shoulder, massaging her tense muscles. “It’s okay, Y/N/N. We’ll catch this son of a bitch,” he encourages, misunderstanding her frustration.

She rubs her eyes, forcing them open. Wordlessly, Elijah fills hands here a new cup of coffee, topping himself off as well. They sit in silence, pouring over their respective files. The victims must have connections; even if Y/N allows herself to believe the Winchesters, she can’t believe monsters don’t have rituals. Psychology reaches further than humanity— scientists observe it in animals. In order to keep hope and keep going, Y/N trusts in the knowledge that all things in existence operate off of some code. 

Another sigh, another gulp. “One more time. From the first victim. Elijah, there has to be something.”

He purses his lips, clear indignation warring his exhaustion and winning. Even still, he nods. “All right, Vic One: Stephanie Lane, age 27. She worked at the local vet clinic on Broad Street. Usual nine to five, Monday through Friday. Killer got her leaving work Thursday night, July Fifth, around six p.m. Scratched her up, took her heart. Passerby found her body two days later.” He wets his lips, staring at her file.

Y/N nods in confirmation, already well aware of the facts. With a fine-tooth comb, they revisit each victim after Stephanie Lane. Jonathan Grism, Marcus Kent, and, the most recent, Gabrielle Shaw. All with varying occupations and seemingly no connections, aside from enjoying the casual run or grueling hike. Despite their apparent love of nature, the Unsub chose to kill them in their daily routine.  

On a whim, Y/N searches each date (July 5th, August 3rd, September 2nd, and October 1st) for any similarities in the dates, coming up short and further exasperated. Elijah keeps to himself while she abuses her keyboard, refusing defeat. Only on her fifth page of Google searches does she find anything worth noting; unfortunately it supports the Winchesters. Each murder occurred on a full moon. 

She slams her laptop closed, finishing her coffee and crushing her cup. “I need a break, Elijah. Just some time to clear my head and get fresh eyes.” She stands, tossing her cup into the wastebasket. Elijah leans back, clasping his fingers behind his head. “I’m getting some sleep. You should too. You look like shit.”

Elijah laughs. “Thanks, Y/N/N. You don’t look too much better yourself.”

She shoves his shoulder as she passes, shouting a goodbye over her shoulder. Elijah hollers something back, but she’s already out of the front doors. The crisp air helps the fog in her head, supplementing it with aches in her bones. Her boots crunch leaves with each step, and she forces her focus onto the noise.

Crunch, crunch, crunch. 

Werewolves?

Crunch, crunch, crunch.

The supernatural?

Crunch, crunch— smack.

A broad chest stops her, calloused fingers grasping her upper arm to steady her. Y/N looks up, palms pressing against a soft t-shirt, into effervescent green eyes. Dean grins down at her, the left corner of his lip tilted in an almost-sneer, if not for the mischief in his eyes. She rolls her eyes, pushing back against his firm chest. He releases her, hands up in mock surrender.

“Agent, fancy seeing you here.”

“Where? Outside of the station where I work? Must be kismet.” Sarcasm drips from her words like venomous honey, sickly sweet and sticky.

“Well, to be fair, you did say to tell you anything we find, so here I am.”

Her heart stutters, excited. They found something. This could be the end of the murders. Straightening her back and returning to Agent Y/L/N— locking Y/N into a tight box at the back of her mind— she faces Dean head on. “All right, what have you found?” Her voice lacks the previous emotion, all business and no play.

Dean sighs, a look flitting across his face and disappearing before Y/N can place it. “Walk with me.” He turns on his heel without awaiting her response, starting down the sidewalk.

She follows, despite the annoyance burning the bottom of her feet with each step. They continue down the street in silence, save for their steps and the seldom passing cars. While she wants answers, Y/N knows pestering delays the process. Dean seems like a man who has been through the ringer a couple times. If he shares similarities with herself, he won’t share anything until he’s ready— another form of control she wants to rip from his fingers.

By the time they reach the doors to the Sunshine Diner, Y/N must clench her fists to bury the frustration of unanswered questions. Dean holds the door, motioning for her to go in. In the back right corner of the restaurant sits Sam, typing furiously on his laptop. So. It appears Dean did search for her once they found something. Pleased at the notion, she lets some of the annoyance roll off her shoulders.

Dean settles in next to Sam, Y/N taking the opposing side of the booth. “So, get this,” Sam begins. “Your murders started four months ago, right? Well, turns out a small werewolf pack traveled from Washington to Portland because they drew too much attention to themselves. One of our connections in Seattle worked the case until they completely disappeared, no trace, no nothing. Within a month of leaving Washington, the Portland murders began.” He finished, peering at her through the too-long tendrils of his hair.

Y/N schools her face into indifference, despite her racing heart and sweating palms. He sounds so sure and calm, like they run into werewolves grocery shopping. Dean looks at her, too, sharp eyes searching for anything in her expression or body language. 

For a moment of reprieve, the waitress approaches the table. Rushed and rough, the trio relay their orders: Sam an egg white omelet, Dean the Bacon Supreme, and Y/N another black coffee; she ignores her shaking hands and clammy skin. The server jots down their choices, rushing off to the next table.

Y/N clasps her fingers together, leaning forward. “That sounds like a nicely wrapped present with a bow on top. I need your process. How did you come to this conclusion? Who is this supposed hunter?”

Sam squints at her, mouth  agape. “Those are your questions, really? Nothing about werewolves?” He turns to Dean, bewildered. Dean shrugs, looking all too comfortable for the topic of conversation.

The server returns with their drinks,  setting the three coffees and one orange juice in front of the respective customers. As if purposefully slow, she takes her time to offer creamer or sugar, unaware of the tension. Dean taps one of his fingers on the surface of the table while Sam makes polite small talk with the waitress. Y/N continues to study the men before her. Finally, the server leaves once more.

“Listen, if I’m going to believe your bucket of crazy, then I’m going to believe it. So, no. I’m not going to ask about werewolves, I’m asking about the details of your research. I need to know how credible you are.”

This time, Dean leans forward, staring straight into her eyes and speaking low. “The hunter we know in Washington, Richard, kept track of them enough to know their comings and goings. He put out the word through the Hunter grapevine that he needed help with the… extermination of the pack, but by the time anyone could come to help, they migrated south. To here. We know it’s this pack because the victims share the same hobby: doing shit in nature. Runners, hikers, whatever. It makes them easy targets—”

“— Except they weren’t killed on hikes or runs. They were killed after work or errands or—”

Dean continues speaking, as if she hadn’t interjected. “—This specific pack only eats the heart, a common characteristic of werewolves. However, a lot of them eat more of the body, and depending on what they eat points to which pack is most likely to be the attacker. These sons of bitches blend in, except on the full moon, where they go apeshit for hearts. Richard identified the pack leader; Sam found where they’re holed up in. Good enough for you, Agent?” 

She wants to slap the pleased look straight off of his plump lips and pretty green eyes. Instead, Y/N props her head up in her palm, keeping her eyes level with Dean’s, swallowing her ire and replacing it with feigned kindness. “Yes. When are we going to get them?” The thought of coming face to face with a monster rushes like winter water through her veins. She reminds herself she deals with monsters on the daily; hers only lack claws and fangs, and whatever else. The circumstances only vary slightly.

“We? There is no ‘we’, sweetheart. We kept you in the loop, like you asked, but you don’t know Jack from Shit about how the gank these fuckers. You do your job, and we’ll—”

Y/N raises her hand, silencing Dean. “Listen, sweetheart, I know the area. I’m guessing they’re staying at the Crest Apartments off of 205, right? Developers left it abandoned when the surveyors refused to clear it due to landslide likelihood. I know the woods, the city, everything. As for what I don’t know, you can teach me. I may not be trained in proper monster lore, but I know how to fight.”

Dean leans further forward, meeting her at the halfway mark of the table. He lowers his voice, speaking gruffly as if to admonish. “You might be an agent in the normal world, but to us you’re just a civvie. No matter what you think you can do, no matter what you think you know, you’ve never faced these things in real life. I’m not about to put your stubborn ass in danger just so you can prove a point.” 

Y/N opens her mouth to retort, but Sam grabs Dean’s collar and pulls him back. “Enough with the pissing contest. I get it: you’re both badass,” he interrupts, at his wits end. “Listen, Y/N,” he begins, softer. “I’m sure you’re good at what you do. You got the location correct without any intel, save for what you know about your city. But Dean’s right. If you come, you’re more of a liability than helpful.”

Y/N closes her eyes, taking a deep breath and holding it for five counts. When she exhales, she forces a smile upon her lips, albeit a bit sardonic, and opens her eyes. The men stare at her, awaiting her response. She stands, instead, straightening her jacket. “Gentleman, I’ll see you tonight. Bring an extra weapon, seeing as I’m sure normal bullets won’t kill a werewolf. Nine o’clock?” Rather than wait for a response, she nods her head and departs onto the street once more.

———————————————————————————————————

From the moment she stepped outside of the diner to the moment she parked her car behind Sam and Dean, her phone rang. Y/N assumed the alternating unknown numbers belonged to the brothers, likely wishing to dissuade her from joining their crusade. She ignored them, deleting any voicemails they left. She knows they’re right; she doesn’t know left from right when it comes to monsters. But it’ll be a cold day in Hell when she lets some terror run rampage in her city.

Instead, she chose to bide her time researching werewolf lore between several more cups of coffee. Luckily she came across a duo well versed in their knowledge: the Ghostfacers. Although they posted their most recent content a year ago, she assumes lore stays the same. Silver bullet, shot to the head or heart, werewolf down for the count.

Y/N alights from her car, closing the door. Sam and Dean stand at their trunk, rummaging through— an entire arsenal of weapons? Y/N still has half the mind to arrest them. First impersonating federal agents to knives and machetes and guns in a hidden compartment of their car? She forces anxiety down, instead choosing once again to believe Sam and Dean are not raging psychopaths. Every bone in her body screams to cuff them and book them; her entire career banks on capturing nuts jobs like these two.

Still, she makes her way to their car, stopping at her front bumper to lean on it. “So. Silver, huh?”

Sam turns to face her, loading his .45 absentmindedly as he takes in her appearance. Gone is her official suit, in its place jeans, boots, and a well-worn long-sleeve. Dean rummages through the trunk, ignoring her presence. “You researched,” Sam replies, more so a statement than a question.

“I don’t go in half cocked. Pun intended. Got any leftover bullets? I’ve got a .45, too,” she muses, patting her hip for emphasis. 

Dean sighs, rubbing his temple with his free hand, the other occupied with a magazine. “For the last time,” he begins, turning to face her, “I don’t want you here. We don’t want you here. If things get hairy in there, we can’t protect you, Y/N. You’re a liability. You don’t know—”

“— Jack from shit, yeah, yeah,” she dismisses, waving a hand. “Stow the crap, I’m coming. Now, do you want me going in defenseless or do you have silver to spare?” She stands straight, squaring her shoulders and holding her head high. 

Sam covers a laugh with a cough, his attention trained on Dean. Y/N forces her unwavering gaze onto him, who in turn rolls his eyes. His shoulders sag in defeat as he returns attention to his trunk. Wordlessly, he passes her a simple pistol, already loaded. She adjusts her grip, searching for a comfortable hold. 

“Thanks.” 

Dean barely nods his head. Y/N leaves the pair for a moment, returning her own gun to the glove box and locking it. 

Upon her return, Dean closes the trunk with a deafening slam, leaning against it. “All right, let’s get some things straight. We go in first, you follow. We’ll call clear and then we move forward as a group, understood?” Y/N wants to roll her eyes— Dean seems to forget she works raids on the regular— but she nods. “Good. We counted five. You see someone who isn’t us,” he motions between Sam and himself with his gun, “you shoot. Bullet to the heart will do the job.” He delivers a pointed look in her direction, awaiting confirmation.

“Got it.”

He looks at her for a moment, his eyes alight with enough fire to bore holes into her clothing. A familiar look hides behind his façade of rage; it rests on the tip of Y/N’s tongue. Perhaps a concoction of grief and hope. She sees it in herself when a case grows too heavy; grief for the pain and hope for the end. In this moment, Y/N feels like she knows Dean. 

The moment breaks when he shakes his head and walks heavy footed to the building. Sam falls in line with Y/N, resting a hand on her shoulder to slow her. She cranes her neck to look him in the eye, skin burning whereupon his palm rests. “He doesn’t want casualties. He doesn’t have the best way of showing it, but Dean cares about people. He’s got enough blood on his hands.” Sam squeezes her shoulder, sparing a tight lipped smile, before dropping his hand.

A few long strides puts him next to Dean, shoulder to shoulder. Y/N hangs back, processing Sam’s vague confession. She understands the need to protect others. The most pressing motivation for joining the Bureau stems from this desire. These men fight in a war separate to her own, but not dissimilar. They’re two sides of the same coin, both Y/N and Dean aching to save, save, save. 

She shrugs her shoulders, pushing the nerves building in her chest down to her toes. If Sam and Dean tell the truth of the awaiting horrors, she needs to ready herself. In matters of life and death, anxiety only increases the chances of death. Adrenaline only carries her so far before it peters out.

Dean stands at the front door, gun raised and legs parted. Sam stands to the side, hand on the handle. Y/N, as promised, stands back and behind Dean. With a nod from Dean, Sam pulls the handle, opening the heavy door. The brothers file in first, flashlights illuminating the unfinished floor and walls. 

Their footsteps echo as they clear each room, a foreboding cadence through the empty halls. Dean looks back at Y/N, ensuring she still follows. She keeps her gun pointed to the ground and her senses open. At the first corner, Dean holds his arm out. Sam and Y/N flatten themselves against the wall while Dean looks around the corner. He nods, stepping out into the open once more. 

A crunch from the right hallway drags Y/N’s attention from the brothers proceeding to the left. Peering down the corridor, she finds it empty. Just as she turns to catch up, another crunch sounds, followed by a squelch and a footstep. Looking behind her, Y/N finds Dean and Sam halfway down the hallway. “Dean!” she shouts as quietly as she can. He doesn’t turn. “Dean. Sam!”

Nothing. 

She sighs, frustrated. One side begs her to run down the hallway to warn them; the other implores her to follow her gut and the noise. Another wayward glance in their direction and Y/N turns right. She steps carefully, avoiding debris. Heel, toe. Heel, toe. 

The further she travels down the hallway, the darker it gets. Footsteps and low voices grow closer as she reaches another left or right turn. She presses against the left wall, sparing a glance down the right corridor. Empty. The left hallway, however, offers cover to three silhouettes crowding in front of a closed door. She startles back, heart hammering against her ribs.

Y/N holds her breath, calming the relentless anxiety in her chest. Breathe in, hold four seconds, breathe out. Rinse and repeat. She looks back to where she last saw Sam and Dean; they’re gone. Great. Now she's truly dug herself an early grave. 

With one last breath, Y/N turns the corner, aims and shoots. One of the people— werewolves— yowls in pain, collapsing to the ground. Yellow eyes glow in the dark, the only light from their end of the hall. Guttural growls roll from their chests as they stalk towards Y/N. She fires again. It hits the plaster, sending dust and shards flying. 

“Fuck.” 

The monsters pick up speed, running full force in her direction. She fires one more time, hitting one in the leg. It crashes to the floor, knees hitting the ground with a sickening crack.  The other continues. Y/N whips around, running down the hallway towards Sam and Dean— she hopes. Her feet thump with each step and she pays little mind to the trash and tools on the ground. 

A foolish mistake, it seems, as she stomps on an empty chip packet. Her right foot slips from beneath her, sending her careening to the ground. The side of her head smacks against the concrete. Her vision blacks for a moment before the pain spreads in webs from her cheek to her neck, down her back. The heavy footfalls of her pursuer sound muffled compared to the needling throbbing in her head. 

With a groan, she pushes herself onto her hands and knees. A hand on the wall stabilizes her, she clambers to her feet. An unfortunate time to do so; the werewolf runs full force into her, slamming her onto the ground once more. Autopilot takes over as she raises her palms to the man’s chest, pushing as hard as she can.

He snarls, snapping his teeth as he tries to reach her neck. Y/N blocks his throat with her forearm, using her spare hand to blindly search for her gun. Instead of the handle, she grasps a wrench. Good enough. With as much force as she can muster, she clobbers the werewolf’s head. He falls off of her, a hand pressed to his bleeding forehead.

In the second of reprieve, she spots the pistol a few feet away. She throws herself through the air, grabbing the handle before turning onto her back, the gun pointed towards the monster. 

He dives after her. Bang. The shot rings out through the hallway. His body tenses before relaxing completely, eyes half lidded and empty. Y/N rolls out of the way as it collides with the floor. Her breaths come ragged and short, but the fight persists. The unforgiving footsteps of her aggressors afford little time to catch her breath; she pushes herself up once more. 

Panting, but not yet done, she turns towards the thundering steps. Sam and Dean race towards her, guns at the ready. “Oh, thank God.” She drops her guard and lowers her pistol to her side, leaning against the wall to catch her breath.

Dean reaches her first, fire in his eyes and coating his words. “What the fuck is wrong with you? I told you to stay with us, Y/N!” He grabs her chin, calloused fingers tilting her face to get a better look at her wounds. He pulls back, lifting and examining each arm. Y/N, too spent, lets him search for whatever he wants to find. She feels the welting of a bruise on her right cheek and a trickle of blood from her forehead.

“I got— I got three,” she gasps, watching Sam turn the werewolf over. 

Dean releases her, shaking his head. She touches her cheek, wincing at its sensitivity. “Oh, how nice. You also almost got yourself killed. I swear to—”

“—Dean,” Sam warns. “There are two more. We can worry about this later.”

“I got— I killed one of the others, but the third one I just hit in the knee.” Admitting to killing something, despite it being a monster, settles heavily in her stomach. She presses her hand to her lips, forcing her lunch to stay put. 

No time to puke, Y/N, she scolds herself. 

Shaking her head, she compels herself to focus. She nods at Sam and Dean, who take their positions at the front once more. This time she has no intentions of abandoning their protection. They stalk forward, albeit not as carefully as before; the ruckus certainly alerted the rest of the pact to their presence. Turning the corner, they find the werewolf Y/N shot first. A trail of blood leads the room they convened outside of, the door open this time.

The trio step lightly and quickly to the room. Dean peers in before entering. Inside, the wounded werewolf leans against the wall, a hand pressed against his thigh. Dean shoots him on the spot, wasting no time. Another body lies in the corner, torn the shreds. Aside from the two corpses, the room yields no tell-tale signs of the rest of the pack. Even still, Sam and Dean survey every nook and cranny. Y/N hovers by the door, working on slowing her breath and calming her heart. 

She peaks out into the hallway, just in case. The darkness limits her view, but she can’t hear anything either. Her ears ring, a relentless low buzzing from hitting her head and firing her gun too closely. Dean places a hand on her lower back as he passes, alerting her to his presence. The warmth spreads through her body, even when he lets go and walks ahead.

“Do you think they left?” she wonders aloud. It’s what she would do, but packs could think differently than humans.

Sam walks next to her, looking at her in his peripheral. “Maybe. But we want to clear the whole building, no stone left unturned and all that.”

She nods, instantly regretting it. Her brain tumbles around her head, hitting the walls and throbbing. Y/N rubs her temple, but says nothing. Lord knows Dean would already have a smartass retort on the tip of his tongue. Instead, she concentrates on putting one foot in front of the other. 

They clear the first floor easily, no signs of the last two. Dean leads them back to the front of the building to the stairwell. The door refuses to open, no matter how much force they use. The handle turns, but something on the other side blocks its pathway. Sam and Dean brace their backs against the door, plant their feet on the ground, and push as hard as they can. It budges slightly, only enough for them to see inside.

One of the railings torn from the stairs leans against the door, while another, wedged between the railing on the door and the first step of the stairs, holds it in place. They’d have to get in there to open the door. The brothers try once again, opening it a smidgen further. 

As Sam and Dean discuss the next step, Y/N formulates her own plan. She knows the boys, Dean in particular, won’t like it. Stepping closer to them, she chooses to stand next to Sam, hoping for his support.

“Listen,” she interrupts. Both brothers run their attention to her, Sam’s eyebrows raised and Dean’s drawn down. For a moment, she wonders if they have other facial expressions or if they always look this perturbed. “I can fit in there,” she motions to the opening in the door, a crack about a foot wide. Dean opens his mouth to disagree, but she holds up a hand. “I’ll get in there and move the railings so you guys can get in too. Quick and simple. Won’t go off on my own, promise.”

Sam and Dean meet eyes, silently coming to an agreement. Dean pinches the bridge of his nose, sighing. “Fine. Be quick.” He sets his steely gaze upon her face. “And, I fucking swear, Y/N— if you go off by yourself I will kill you.”

She rolls her eyes. “Sure, you will.”

She shoves passed him, knocking his shoulder on purpose. He grumbles something under his breath, but moves out of the way. A deep breath in, Y/N sidles through the opening. She barely makes it, struggling to get around the railing. Once inside, she grasps the leaning railing, using her whole body to pull the steel from where it’s wedged. Inch by inch, she gets it out of the way. 

It hits the floor with a reverberating clang, settling in the alcove beneath the stairs. The other falls to the ground, closing the door with its force. Y/N sighs, throwing her head back in frustration. Fists bang on the other side of the door, Dean shouting her name along with profanities.

“I’m fine, you oaf. Give me a second,” she yells back, exasperated.

“Hurry up, Y/N.”

She groans, sinking to her knees for more leverage. Breathlessly, she retorts, “I. Am. Trying.” With a grunt, she pushes the steel into a vertical position. “All right, you should have enough—”

“Need a hand?” a low voice taunts from above.

Y/N looks up. An unassuming woman stands at the platform of the first level, hands on her hips and an all teeth grin baring her lips. “Dean?” she yells, urgent and frightened. The door opens with enough room for Sam and Dean to squeeze through.

Dean barges in first, gun raised. He casts a glance at Y/N, following her gaze to the landing. Mechanically, he pulls the trigger. The woman falls with a thud. Y/N lets out a breath, hands white knuckling the railing and eyes trained on the body. Sam grabs the metal while Dean pries Y/N’s fingers off, more gently than he’s been with her all day.

She looks at him, eyes wide. As much as she wants to act fearlessly, she’s seen more people— things— die in front of her today than in her entire life. Dean nods, as if to say It’s okay, we get it. She steps back, letting him take the railing. Together, the brothers shift it to rest upon the other. 

Y/N closes her eyes, clenching and unclenching her fists. Her nails dig crescents into her palms, the stinging centering her. Okay. Okay. I can do this. Her skin burns under the gaze of Sam and Dean, even if she can’t see them herself. Opening her eyes, she focuses on the men before her. 

“You good?” Dean asks, warm and low, a hand reaching out to her.

“Yeah. Yeah. Let’s go.” She motions before her, allowing them to take the lead again. 

Four down, one to go, Y/N reminds herself with each step. The task seems less daunting with the odds in their favor at three against one. On the second platform, they exit into the hallway. The builders didn’t get so far as to hinge a door to the opening, thankfully. The trio stalk down the corridor, straining to hear anything out of place. 

The end of the hallway yields a wall and two doors opposite of each other— one opened and one closed.  The brothers broach the entryway of the open room, clearing it with a quick sweep. Similar to how they entered the building, Dean stands in front of the closed door while Sam grasps the handle. Pushing it open, Dean rushes in, Y/N and Sam following closely behind. 

The door slams shut behind them. Y/N whips around, ready to fire and finish the job. She stumbles, lowering her weapon, jaw dropped. Dean steps in front of her, half blocking her from— “Elijah?” Dean looks back at Y/N, brows furrowed and lips parted. Sam rests a hand on her shoulder, steadying her. 

“Y/N, Y/N, Y/N,” he taunts, almost as if scolding her. “I see you’re running around with scum. I thought you were better than that.”

She shakes her head, struggling to wrap her head around the man before her— her friend— being a monster. “What— how…”

He rolls his eyes. “Wah-how? Blah, blah, blah. You were always so naive.” He twirls a knife between his fingers, a small smirk dancing on his lips. Y/N looks away, unable to handle Elijah being the culprit she sought so long to capture. “When they came to town all those months ago, I caught one of them. I was ready to cuff ‘em and book ‘em, like we’re trained. But Eddie, the one you shot in the leg, Y/N, presented an offer I couldn’t refuse.” His voice glides like silk over her skin. It takes everything not to vomit.

“Only downside is once a month I’d get a little craz—”

The shot rings clear in the air, stopping Elijah’s tirade. Y/N’s head shoots up in time to watch him crumble to the ground. He settles with a soft finality, folded over himself. Dean turns around, saying something, but she can’t hear him. She shakes her head, tears stinging her eyes. Her knees give out, collapsing. Sam falls with her, softening the blow.

She pushes off of him. “Get off of me, get off of me,” she screeches, banging her fists into his chest until he releases her. He holds his hands up in surrender as she scrambles a few feet away. 

Y/N rests on her knees, forehead touching the cool ground as if in prayer. Dirt and dust grind in her wound, she knows, but she can’t feel it. She can only replay Elijah’s fall. The separation of the man she knew and the man who he became felt too small. She never noticed a difference. He acted the same: kind, funny, a good agent. A good friend. 

Her sobs wrench in her chest, burning her throat. She wants to scream, but it comes out strangled, reverberating from the ground back to her— furious and despairing and inconsolable. Running her fingers through her hair, she grips the roots needing something to hold. Everything feels new in a terrible, sickening way. Just yesterday she believed she and Elijah would put the murderer behind bars. Now, she knows monsters exist. She fought one. She knew one.

Y/N breathes in, steeling herself. The man she knew died four months ago. She pushes herself onto her hind legs, wiping her tears. The burn of her fingers against her wounds calm her. Dealing with physical pain numbs the emotional. She presses her fingers to the bruise, hissing but reveling in the tenderness. 

She struggles to her feet, all too aware of the aches in her legs, and turns to face Sam and Dean. They stand by the door, leaning on the border. In her moment of desolation, they moved Elijah somewhere. Out of her sight. Not wanting attention, or Are you okay’s, she pushes past them, avoiding contact. Silently, they follow her to the stairwell and out onto the street. The cool air dries her tears and fills her lungs. For the first time since peering around that godforsaken corner, she can breathe. 

Sam and Dean keep a respectable distance, letting her lead them to the cars. Wordlessly, Y/N returns the gun to Dean’s grasp, leaning against her front bumper. She tilts her head back to gaze at the waning moon. 

“You good?” Dean asks, settling next to her.

She looks at him, really looks at him, for perhaps the first time. The green of his eyes highlight the bags beneath them. His laugh lines contradict the exhaustion heavy on his lips. His shoulders hang low, weighed down by the knowledge of darkness and pain.

Y/N sighs, accepting the beer he offers her. “I’ll be all right.” She means it. Maybe her monsters don’t have fangs and claws and familiar faces, but they’re monsters all the same. “You know what’s funny?” Dean raises an eyebrow, taking a swig of his El Sol. “I’ve seen worse,” she giggles. 

Dean looks away, shaking his head with a low chuckle. “Yeah? Like what?”

She sips her beer, too, thinking of a good story. “One time there was this weird inbred family that captured people and hunted them down. Had a barn with cages and shit. They kept their victims cars in a junkyard-graveyard thing, and—”

Sam and Dean share a look before busting out laughing. She glances between them, offended at their mockery. “All right, I’ll keep my stories to myself, then.”

“No,” Sam gets out between bursts. “No, we, um— we hunted those guys. Thought they were monsters. Turned out to be hicks with too much time on their hands.”

It’s Y/N’s turn to laugh. “No fucking way! Must’ve just missed each other.” She shakes her head, taking another sip.

“Small world,” Dean whispers into his bottle. 

They settle into a comfortable silence, the tension from the day drained. Y/N lets her mind wander— from meeting these men to now, and everything between. She tries to think back to before all this; before yesterday. The person who stood on the outskirts of the caution tape versus the person who sits on the hood of her car are miles apart. 

“Oh, that reminds me.” She pushes off of her bumper, unlocking her car. From the inside door she grabs two small booklets. Y/N passes the fake badges to the respective users. “A few tips: don’t use famous names. That’s the first thing that gave you away. Secondly,” she takes Dean’s badge back, opening it up. “Your official federal insignia is too low. It should be square with your picture. And your serial code is the wrong date. The first number—sometimes letter— is the year this was manufactured. We get new badges every two years, alternating between numbers and letters. Right now,” she says, opening her own booklet, “we are on letter Q.” She passes the badge back to Dean, who pockets it.

Sam nods, “Thanks for the information.”

“Yeah, I just love helping people—”

“— impersonate federal officers,” Dean and Sam interrupt, saying it in unison.

She laughs. “I’m glad you guys didn’t turn out to be crazy.”

In another pocket of silence, they finish their beers. Dean grabs the empty bottles, tossing them into a beat up green cooler while Sam turns to rest on the side of the Impala. Y/N readies herself to say goodbye, ignoring the ache in her chest. She refuses to admit it aloud, but she wishes she met them under different circumstances. She wishes she met Dean under different circumstances. 

Despite only knowing him for two days, Y/N can see herself in Dean. He bears the same weight she bears. Plus, it doesn’t hurt that his eyes remind her of fresh cut grass at the beginning of fall. Paired with his smell of cinnamon and gunpowder (a scent she knows all too well), she can’t help but want to know him. If they had met in a bar, she would definitely have taken him home.

Dean returns to her side, this time shoulder to shoulder. “You think you can handle that?” he inquires, pointing to her forehead and cheek.

She touches it gingerly. “Yeah, I think so.”

He nudges her shoulder with his, and she looks up at him. “You did well, tonight. Better than I thought you would, honestly.”

She grins, shaking her head. “Yeah, that’s what you get for doubting me.”

He looks ahead again, and she does, too. The sky brightens as the sun returns for its reign. The fatigue from the last twenty-four hours settles in, and, without much thought, she rests her head on Dean’s shoulder. He tenses for a moment, and she feels him look down at her, but he lets his shoulders sag again. He places a hand on her thigh, squeezing it gently, as if to say I’m right here. I’ve got you. 

At least, she hopes that’s what he means. 

The sun finishes its creep into the sky and the stars fade into a blanket of pink, orange, and purple. Y/N and Dean hop down from the hood of her car and Sam meets them between the bumpers once more. Sam dips down to hug Y/N first, wrapping his arms around her shoulders and squeezing tight. She fights not to groan when his grasp aggravates the aches in her bones. He releases her, casting a smile in her direction.

“Thank you for your help, Y/N. Here,” he passes her a torn piece of paper with two numbers scrawled across. One has an “S” next to it, the other a “D”. “These are our numbers. Call us if you run into anything else.”

She nods, grinning too. “The same applies to you guys. It doesn’t hurt to have someone on the inside.”

He pats her arm before taking his leave, settling into the passenger seat. Y/N turns to Dean. He doesn’t look like much of a hugger, so she extends her hand for a shake. Rolling his eyes, he grabs it, but wraps it around his waist. Dean envelopes her in his arms, holding tighter than Sam with one hand in her hair and the other barred across her shoulders. This time, she welcomes it, in spite of the pain. 

He lets her go, but keeps his hands on her shoulders. “I mean it, Y/N.” His voice is low and sinful. “If you need anything, call us. Call me.”

“Anything?” she drawls playfully. He nods, regardless. “Even just to talk?”

Dean laughs. “Yeah. That’d be nice.” His right hand travels up to her neck. She wraps her fingers around his wrist, not entirely sure of his intentions but welcoming anything. He pulls her close, pressing his lips to her forehead. “Get home safe, Y/N,” he mumbles upon releasing her.

“You too, Dean.”

She waits for him to get in his car before she clambers into her driver’s seat. Her bones creek as she settles. Twisting her keys in the ignition, she rolls the windows down and heads home. Werewolves of London blares across her speakers, and she laughs. Yeah. She’ll be all right.

Taglist:

@angelicthreads

[weaselsmuses-aa]

hey human hcs again because fuck it its revamp time

Ft: My muses && Some others that i just happen to have hcs for.

My muses + oc’s in collab w friends.

Topaz!!

Age: 16

Grade: Sophomore

Born in South Korea

Became something of a musical sensation back home, and is famous for her music mixing.

Became independent at 15, moved to the states a year later with the desire to see what America was like, hollywood in particular.

Lives in an apartment with Saphir, her senior classmate and good friend.

Pastel vibes

Sassy vibes (Much more sassy than gem topaz :o)

MomTM friend. She mediates and keeps the peace. Also will give great life advice.

Judges silently, but says nothing if she has nothing nice to say. (But she’ll think it.)

Currently has a job as a DJ at a local skating rink where her friends hang out. Gets them free food and games..

Hoping to make it big in the US so she can stay after she graduates.

Parents living overseas and helping pay for her life and schooling in the states.

She spends summers in Korea where she visits her family and tours, records music.

Part of the art club and spends a lot of time in the music rooms. She isn’t in Choir, Band or Orchestra, but is in music theory and guitar. Has a LOT of friends in all those programs.

Swiss (birth name: Sage)

Age: 16-17

Grade: Sophomore.

Swiss was born in Switzerland, but has also lived in South Korea for 5 years (where she met Topaz), London for 2, and now the US where she started high school.

Lives with her Father who is from Switzerland, her mom who was born in the UK, and her baby sister Kyanite

Class goofball and classic slacker but somehow still passes and knows the material.

‘ Whoops, I forgot my homework again’ type

Dye’d her hair blue at 14, pierced both her nose, lips, and several places in her ear. 

Depressed and tired. Brings rockstar energy’s to class a lot.

Punk Rock vibes, but wears her uniform rather well. Her messenger bag is tricked out with a lot of music festival patches and pins though.

Her and Topaz both are those kids that have earbuds and beats headphones on all the time. She gets in trouble for listening to rock in class. Or talking.

Has a band, and is the main drummer and back up vocalist.  The band was her idea, but she gives her friends a lot of freedom. Since drumming is her passion she doesn’t mind not being the lead vocalist.

Crushing on / Dating the richest girl in the school (Aquamarine ‘Marie’)

Doesn’t have a job, but thinking about getting a part time one at the record shop near her house.

Oversleeps A LOT. IS late to class a lot. Usually her detentions are from tardiness (or saying some smart ass comment to be funny and getting in trouble for it)

Very protective of her little sister, and gets along well with her in private, despite pretending that she irritates her.

No after school activities for her thanks. That stuffs lame. (Though she does wander in and hang out with the game club sometimes)

Kyanite (Ky)

Age: 14-15

Grade: 8th

One of the pretty MeanTM girls in middle school. Rather high on the social pecking order due to being an upperclassmen and being a cutie with an attitude.

Fashion sense a mix between soft grunge, a touch of punk and more flowing feminine outfits, or neat and prim /professional outfits. Whatever she decides, she likes to look good.

Very talented at doing her make up and nails, tends to have a lot of requests from other girls her age for help in that dept.

Looks up to her sister a lot more than she lets on. Lowkey wants to be involved in a lot of what she does after school. (She even begged her parents to let her dye her hair blue as well right after Swiss did (She was 12 at the time))

Love’s shopping and collecting outfits and cute little butterfly themed things for her room.

While she’s in the ‘popular’ circle of girls in her grade, shes not particularly stuck up when it comes to other kids. She can be mean, but its usually to just as entitled kids. She’s rather tame and even friendly with less popular kids in her grade. She’s very comfortable around them and enjoys not being put on a pedestal all the time

Romance obsessed. (Duh)

Wishes she could get a piercing and a tattoo like her sissy, but her parents only let her pierce her ears. 

A’s in most of her classes, but struggles in History. It’s a snoozefest to her.

Currently in band and debate team. (She plays flute)

Takes FOR-E-VER to get ready to leave the house. (Hey, its not ALWAYS swiss’s fault shes’ late.)

Best friends in school are Livie and Bebe.

Spends a lot of time after school for Band practice, Debate team activities, or supporting her bestie Bebe in her cheer practice.

Really likes sneaking in the upperclassmen building. No one’s cute in her grade :/ (according to her)

Likes to fake being sick so she can go home early. way too often.

Bonus’es! 

ft some of my other... (albiet co-op) oc’s / and aquamarine cus i can

Bebe

Age: 14-15

Grade: 8th

Met Kyanite in 6th grade and they instantly hit it off well.

Bubble gum pink hair, and really likes fashion. Always obsessed with wearing the cutest combo of clothes she can come up with.

Really sweet and bubbly on the surface, but she isn’t called a bubblegum bitch for nothing. She knows shes popular and will often trick the vulnerable into believing they have social status only to humiliate them when she sees fit.

A little bit bitchier than Ky. Not that she wants to be mean actively, she just kind of ......is how we say.....spoiled brat.

As long as her best friend cares about someone she does too.

When she actually does accept you, shes a very sweet and almost loyal to the point of irritation.

Crushing on Kyanite, kissed her at a party and has kind of never got over it.

Serial dater. Literally she has a new sweetie every week. its tiring.

Junior Varsity Cheer Team and Drama club are her life.

When she’s not doing those things, she’s spending her time in her Juniors bowling team. They go to tourney during summer.

Parents aren’t filthy rich but they are not hurting for money in any shape or form. Shes always got whatever she wanted.

Loves getting gifts, and will almost try and bug people into sending her stuff to homeroom during holidays. Either because she wants STUFF or for her own popularity.

Might be kind of bitchy but really does feel bad and get upset if people point that out about her. I wouldn’t say she /wants/ to be a bad person. her parents never told her no and nor how to not be self centered.

Very talkative and upbeat. Wants to inspire her friends and lift them up.

On the other end, is a big gossip and bad about spreading rumors and stirring up drama with people she isn’t a fan of.

Show her a cute animal and she’ll sob. I mean the whole 9 yards.

 Marie  . (Aquamarine.)

Age: 17-18

Grade: 12th

Born and raised in London for the majority of her life.  She’s also lived in France for 3 years during an abroad program her parents sent her to where she met one of her closest friends (Astrid)

Her parents are filthy stinkin rich and own a foreign luxurious fashion company and a luxury car company.

Livie is her baby sister and she often tries to pretend like thats not the case. (She loves her guys i swear)

Stuck up, bratty, and just an overall bitch. She RELISHES in it. Marie KNOWS shes mean, popular and has power and she’s proud.

“you can’t sit with me, you can’t talk to me, you aren’t good enough to even know me.”

Her desire for power has her gunning for valedictorian (cue her and satoshit fighting to the death), and she’s currently the president of student government. Thats right. She’s deciding school functions and your future you little peasant fucks.

Will shove her riches and status down your THROAT oh my goooodddd

Throws HUGE parties when her parents are out of town, uses it as a tool to make the popular kids/upperclassmen love her even more and show the ‘losers’ where their place is.

Always has to look THE best in the school, and will probably murder anyone who threatens to take her places as prom queen (i kid i kid.........maybe)

Hangs out with Astrid and Mae when they’re in town.

Has a type that does not fall in line with her image (coughcough Swiss cough) and will do a LOT to keep in a secret. But....listen....she also can’t hide it well. Like...not even a little. She gay.

She’s always seen with her posse of popular girls and her two primary school friends the topazes. They’re just the schools huge UNITS of lesbian quarterbacks, their fists as big as your face, they wont squash you, promise. (look at marie wrong once bitch.)

Will die of embarrassment of her sister livie. Unfortunately is responsible for her in a lot of ways. Driving her back and forth from school, taking her to school functions and much more. (She loves her....double pinky swear) But she claims they aren’t related. (no one believes this hoe) That don’t mean she wont DESPERATELY try to pawn her off for the day. Babysitter? Butler? Anyone? SOMEONE?

Will absolutely use Livie as a means to hang out with Swiss via playdates. Oh yeah, she knows their baby sisters are besties. It’s free real estate.

Has expressed to Swiss that she wishes they could trade sisters. ( I swear marie loves livie deep down in this essay I will----)

In a wealth measuring contest with Satoshit 24/7

Is CONSTANTLY going on overseas trips. She will never stop bragging about it.

Consumed mostly by Student Government and Theatre.

[headoverhiddles]

Hotel, Motel, Holiday Inn - Marilyn Manson x Reader [Smut]

Synopsis: You, your boyfriend Brian, and his best friend Jeordie are forced by lack of finances to share a hotel room one night while Brian's band performs in Miami Beach. You two have to be quiet not to wake Jeordie...

Notes: Set during Spooky Kids era!! Partially inspired by this video. **Twiggy wasn't a part of the band at this point in time, but fuck it. I wanted to include him.

July 17, 1992.

"I've got... thirteen dollars."

Everyone (aka you, Brian and Jeordie) is sitting around in a circle on Jeordie's messy living room floor.

You and your boyfriend look over to the bassist.

"Thirteen?" Brian sputters, "You stupid fucker, you had 500 dollars last night. Where the hell'd all that go, up your ass?"

Jeordie picks at a hangnail. "Hookers and blow." He begins to pat his leg, drumming a beat. "We should make that a song..."

"We have better things to sing about than hookers and blow," Brian snaps.

"I don't know, I think it'd go with your whole theme," you tease, resting your head on his shoulder. Brian glances down, gaze softening fondly as his fingers thread with yours.

"Yeah, says the girl who probably encouraged him to burn our valuable hotel money on dumb shit last night."

You giggle. "I promise, I had nothing to do with it. Besides, I was with you last night, remember?" Brian smirks, recalling the record you two set.

"Yeah. I remember making you come a bunch of times. What was the challenge again?"

"I dared you to make me come more times than my vibrator could in one night."

"Mmm, and did I pass?"

"With flying colours."

Jeordie whistles, then tries to flip one of the coins from the pooling pile on the floor. It pings off something then disappears into the pit that is his studio apartment.

"Twelve seventy five," Jeordie corrects, staring sadly behind him at the lost quarter. Brian shakes his head, scratching through his hair.

"Jesus Christ, what are we gonna do?! This is a huge stop on the tour. Daisy, Pogo, and Sarah are already there, and the Spooky Kids can't afford to cancel this show because we're... fuckin broke hobos!"

"I'm not a hobo..." Jeordie whispers, watching an ant crawl across his toe. Brian scrapes up some bills to count again, painted fingernails a blur as he shells them out. You count your own too, nodding.

"Okay. I've got 210. Together with your 600... we should have enough for airfare and hotel room, for one night."

Jeordie gives a punched out snort-laugh, staring at the ceiling like it's about to cave in. "Yeah, for one shared room between the three of us."

You and Brian look at each other, shrugging. Jeordie hesitates, then looks at you two in distress.

"Awww."

So, the next day, after successfully making it to the next stop on the Spooky Kids' tour by way of crappy budget airline, you get to the hotel to check in before the show. It's not awful-- it's a pretty good motel, at least.

"I can't wait til we can afford a tour bus," Brian growls miserably, flopping down on one of the double beds. It shoots his lanky body up four feet off the bed as the overly-loaded springs catapult him, and you double over with laughter. Though he looks ready to murder, your laugh is infectious, and Brian starts to chuckle too.

"What the fuck is this?" He goes on, picking up a towel folded into a swan. He turns it around, and pretends to stick his dick into it, humping it as he waddles around the room.

"It's a swan," Jeordie smiles, face smushed into his own bed opposite yours, "I requested the towels be made into pretty swans for us."

"Yeah?" Brian discards the towel in a heap. " Did you also request little chocolates be left on our pillow every night, princess?"

"Dammit. I knew I forgot something."

"Why did we let Jeordie book this?" you groan. "We all know I'm the responsible mom here."

"I beg to differ," Brian says, crawling over top of you and securing his stringbean limbs around you like a giant spider. "I'm more of a mom than you." You giggle.

"Says the man who just pretended to fuck a towel swan."

"What do you mean pretended? That slutty motherfucker's got my jizz all over him, he was begging for it." Brian grins, collapsing on top of you, and you shriek as he attacks you with kisses.

"Go put your makeup on, or you'll be late getting on stage! Then nobody'll ever know who the Spooky Kids are, and your career will never take off, all because you wanted to fuck your girlfriend. Again."

"I'll just tell the bouncers we were busy with hookers and blow, like proper rockstars," Brian murmurs, sucking a hicky into your neck. "They'll buy anything people like us feed em."

"Hookers and blow?" Jeordie perks up, turning to you two.

"No," you and your boyfriend both say at the same time.

Brian does his makeup with a little help from you, and Jeordie does as well. Brian's lower face is covered in red lipstick, and he’s got his striped pink and black leggings on, with an unbuttoned vest and a cat in the hat top hat on his head, long hair brushed out and down to his waist. Jeordie's got one of his green ragdoll dresses on, dreads done up in pigtails.

You three meet up with the other band members, all dressed and ready for the show as well, and you can immediately tell Brian is slipping into his stage persona when he tells the bouncer to go fuck himself on a butcher knife after being asked for ID. (You display the IDs you've got in your purse with many apologies after your boyfriend and his delinquent band waltz in like they own the place, despite the fact that they're only the opening act.)

You stand in the front row of the make-do mosh pit of the dive bar, all big smiles and support. Despite what your family warns you, you have the utmost faith in Brian and his aspirations, and even though he's got an absolute clusterfuck of personalities making up the band behind him, it's a wild wonder of a musical act, and you just know the five of them are gonna go places someday.

"Good evening, all you crazy motherfuckers here in Miami Beach," Brian points out to the crowd, "Let's fuck shit up!" Their opener, Thrift, leads to Lucy In The Sky With Demons, then eventually to everyone's apparent favourite, if the cheering is any guage-- Lunchbox. You like that song too, bouncing around and screaming for it like one of the fans for the night. Brian keeps looking at you, and halfway through the song, he pulls you up on stage, obscenely groping his hands all over your breasts and sucking on them through your bra. You don't mind-- you make a show of moaning, squeezing them together, until you eventually slap him off, wag your finger, and slip back into the crowd, to the laughter and heckles from the crowd.

The show goes later than expected due to the enthusiasm of the crowd. After the show, everyone hung around the bar for a bit too, drinking a couple beers and doing a few lines of coke to mingle with any ego-stroking fans or labels that may have been scouting. 

The guys are still all riding the high of the adrenaline and drugs, but it's 3 in the morning now, and since you three have not only one shared suitcase and one shared hotel room but one shared brain cell as well, you all decided it would be a good idea to book a 7 am flight home.

Well. Blame it on it being the most affordable return time.

Once you get back to the room, some Judas Priest is cranked on the tinny room radio because "fuck the other hotel guests, I'm Marilyn Manson", and the air guitars are broken out.

Brian inspects himself in the mirror, making Herculean poses and sticking his tongue out grotesquely, checking for warts or something. He pinches his nipples, scratching down his pale torso.

"I need more tattoos."

"The ones you have now are rad," you mention, kicking off your shoes, "But a few more would make you look even more badass."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, I already wouldn't want to fuck with you. More tattoos? I'd be terrified."

"I thought you were already terrified. You scream every time you see my cock."

"That's cause it's so big..." You playfully lick your lips.

"Yeah? You wanna suck it?" Brian unzips his pants. "Wanna suck on it, baby?"

"I wanna get into bed, is what I want to do," you yawn, peeling your top off and tossing it at Jeordie. Jeordie catches it and dutifully slingshots it into your great big shared suitcase. The neighboring hotel room tenants bang on the wall, mumbling something bitterly incoherent about turning the music down.

"I will kick down your door and skullfuck you, you entitled asshole!" Brian shouts back. The pounding stops abruptly, and you question how you haven't been arrested yet.

"Seriously, I think it's time for bed though," Jeordie mumbles, crawling under his covers like an elderly cat. He jumps and frowns at something on the wall, something you're glad you can't see. 

"Fine, grandpa," Brian rolls his eyes, and kills the volume on the rock station.

Five minutes later, you come out of the bathroom in one of Brian's oversized Black Sabbath T-shirts, and run a hand through your hair, walking over to get into bed with Brian. He's still scrubbing some of the eyeliner at the sink, and you beckon him. 

"Come here. I wanna cuddle."

Brian grunts, and rubs his face once more, walking over to the door naked save for his boxer briefs to make doubly sure it's locked.

"Only space for three psychos in this room," he says, then does a barrel roll into bed, sweeping the covers over you both. The light is turned out, and Brian snuggles into you from behind, wrapping his arms around your middle.

"Bri," you whisper. He hums into your hair.

"Yeah."

You flip around to face him, your noses touching. He blinks, and you bite your lip, reaching under the covers. He bites back a moan, and you lean in to whisper. 

"I'm wet for you."

Brian immediately looks over, and tosses a pillow at his best friend's head. "Hey Jeordie, fuck off for the night."

"What? No! I'm... trying to sleep..."

"The one night he decides not to get shitfaced and wander the streets," Brian sighs.

"It's no fun to do that yourself," Jeordie mopes. "Actually, that's not true. I'm just tired." 

"Fuck," Brian mutters. You two let a few seconds go by.

"Is he asleep?" you whisper.

"I think so," Brian mumbles back, then gasps as you cup him again through his underwear, reaching in with the other hand to wrap around his half-hard dick.

"(y/n), I gotta be in you," he hisses, "Fast." 

"Just... shhh..." you giggle, and he bites his lower lip, rolling on top of you under the covers. His long raven hair curtains around you, and he reaches down to pull his dick out. You wiggle your hips excitedly, holding onto his forearms, and he takes a condom off the bedside table, rolling it on. He winces at the contact, the touch of his own hand to get the rubber on enough to make him harden even more. He moans, finally pushing into you.

"O-oh..." you try to keep your voice down to a squeak. "Bri... Bri, Bri, Brian, fuck... I love your cock..."

"Call me Marilyn," he whispers.

"Hmm?"

"Call me Marilyn, I wanna hear you say it," he grunts, rocking his hips in again. He holds your wrists together above your head as his thrusts get deeper.

"God, please... fuck me harder, Marilyn," you breathe softly. His pace increases, both of you still attempting to be quiet so as not to wake your partner.

"Yeah... yeah, yeah," he whispers, "Fuck yeah, baby. You're so good for me. God, oh..."

Your eyes roll back as you smile in bliss, feeling your hands down your boyfriend's back as he does his best to make you come not in record quantity tonight, but record time.

"That feel good?"

"Uh huh..."

"Your pussy feel good now? Nice and full?"

"Yeah, oh my god. Mar... Marilyn..." You feel your orgasm coming, so you hook your feet just above his ass and smirk, thinking of something you know will do the trick. It may be dumb, but it's bound to work.

"It feels so fucking amazing getting fucked by the antichrist."

He buries his face beside your shoulder as his hips stutter, and you can feel him finish inside the condom, thrusting his hips erratically and quickly as he milks it. Each thrust is taking you closer, and you two breathe and pant together as Brian holds you, making you come with wave after wave of a gorgeous climax.

"Ah, fuck that was good," you breathe. Brian rolls off of you, depositing the condom and tucking it under his pillow. You wrinkle your nose. “Ew, man.”

"It'll make housekeeping smile. She can sell it on eBay, make more than we earn in a tour. Or she can jam it up inside her and call us for child support."

You giggle, and slap his chest lightly. He kisses you, and settles comfortably down beside you again, slipping his arms underneath yours.

"Do you think Jeordie's still asleep?" you whisper, stifling a laugh. Suddenly, a clear voice rings out. 

"If you two loud assholes think I slept through that, then you must think I'm fucking deaf," Jeordie blurts. "Assholes."

Brian starts laughing, even as his friend keeps calling him an asshole. "You're next," Brian teases, and Jeordie sighs.

"Leave me alone and let me sleep."

"Get the lube, (y/n), it's Jeordie's turn to be violated by the dirty man who broke into this hotel room, aka me."

"Fuck off!"

"Fine, fuck you, more dick for (y/n)," Brian grins, and you smile, holding him to you.

You listen to the white noise of the deteriorating air conditioner. The rhythmic rising and falling of his chest tells you he's passed out behind you, dreaming and adorable with his face pressed into the back of your neck.

You glance behind you. "Jeord, babe? Sorry for keeping you up. Really."

Jeordie just smiles. "Honestly, I was listening the whole time to see what his secret is. How do you make someone come that much? It's insane."

You giggle into the pillow, and Brian wakes up long enough to croak: "Cause I am the God of Fuck."

[ficclique]

Fic Clique hosts choices for our top fics of the decade - as featured in our Minisode from Jan 3rd. 

Brenna’s choices: 

Honorable Mentions: 

Worldwide Lonesome by loindexter (BTS) 

2018, 39k, Yoongi/Jin 

The biggest gut-punch I’ve ever felt from a character confession. The Jin of this fic has stuck with me every day since reading it. This fic examines sexuality in a way that made me feel seen & I love that.

Timeshare by Astolat (HP) 

2016, 14k, Draco/Harry 

This is sort of a stand-in for all of astolat’s drarry fic, which as a bundle are one of my top fics for the decade. They are fics that feel like instant-classics and the variety of characterizations, stories and tropes helped establish astolat as perhaps my all time favorite fic author. Timeshare won out above the others because it’s one of the fics that helped us decide to do this podcast! Thank you Timeshare! 

Top 5 picks: 

The Student Prince, by Fayjay (Merlin)

2010, 145k, Merlin/Arthur

A fic that has defined fanfiction for me. Perhaps the fic that first convinced me to love fanfiction. Something I keep coming back to and have reread numerous times. Funny, heartfelt, just different enough from the canon versions of characters. Perhaps the only University AU I will ever fully love. 

The Love Song of the North American Douchebag, by Gyzym (Star Trek RPF)

2013, 25k, Chris/Zach

If you want to hear me (and my lovely co-hosts) discuss this fic in depth, then I recommend listening to Episode 6! However, one of our listeners also submitted this as a top fic of the decade, so I’m going to add what the lovely Scout said: 

“JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, I HOPE I CAN SWEAR. I'm not even in this fandom. The world building is just THAT good. It's one of my highlights *because* of its power to draw me in as a standalone. So much fucking talent in the transformative work community. The banter, characterization, sardonic-ness of this – international impact baby!”

Not Easily Conquered (series), by dropdeaddream & whatarefears (MCU)

2015, 117k, Steve/Bucky 

An incredibly, precise, gut-wrenching trilogy. Each part is astounding both together and apart. A devastating exploration of love and dedication. One of those fics that created a Fandom Moment. I sobbed through the entirety of part 2 when I first read it. Womb to tomb, sweetheart. 

Azoth by zeitgeistic (HP)

2013, 88k, Draco/Harry 

A stunning exploration of magic beyond JKR’s universe. A timeless coming together of two characters. A frankly genius use of a plot device (and something as simple as a school project) to foster an incredibly touching and meaningful relationship, one in which they are not able to find what they need to complete their task until they find what they need in each other.  ALCHEMY BABY! 

Honeysuckle Arch by junkshopdisco (1d) 

2015, 46k, Niall/Harry 

Perhaps the most I’ve ever related to a character in fic. The Niall of this fic lives in my heart, and I feel like reading him helps me understand myself, and everytime I come back to it I understand him better too. It’s a touching portrayal of a character coming to terms with their sexuality in a way that feels completely grounded and who is surrounded by characters who love them, even if they don’t always know how to show it. 

Nicole’s choices: 

Honorable Mentions: 

Protostellar by ninamondays 

bts, 64k, pub 2019, Namjoon/Jungkook & Taehyung/Jimin

Space, cryogenics, fate, reincarnation, class struggles, revolution, climate change, character death. Having hope is punk rock. Processing grief is a slow and ugly process. [deep breath] Have I ever felt so profoundly touched by a fic while I was reading it?

the other thing by cornfields 

hockey rpf, 16k, pub 2015, Jamie/Tyler

An absolutely unflinching look at personal accountability and internalized homophobia. What happens when your self-hatred has collateral damage? It’s about healing but it’ll fucking hurt first. Bleached out vibes. Makes texas feel very big, and the world feel very, very small. A story I’d only trust a fic author to tell.

Top 5 picks: 

Murmuration by fringecity (indiachick) 

bts, 167k, pub 2018, Yoongi/Jimin/Taehyung

Film noir/murder mystery meets gritty sci fi and superpowers. Everyone is morally gray. You Will sob about Kim Taehyung. A masterclass in plot. Felt like a trilogy all wrapped tightly into one fic. A kaleidoscope. An unfurling. This fic mesmerizes.

The River and the Deep Green Bend by liquidmeasure 

1d, 70k, pub 2016, Harry/Niall

Dark tower au, but only technically. Makes me want to believe in the multiverse. An arid western, a sideways coming of age story, an elegy. The first time I’ve ever cried because an ending was perfect.

the undiscovered country by indigostohelit

hamlet, 56k, pub 2014, Hamlet/Horatio

What else can I say about this fic. What else can I Fucking say.

(note: we discuss this fic at length during episode 5) 

All Things Shining by Askance and standbyme

spn, 142k, pub 2013, Dean/Castiel & Sam/ofc

A story about miracles. Literary as hell, with long luxuriant scenes that never drag. Masterful characterization. The thing I wanted from spn fic—connection, plot, and a fic that not only can handle the lore of the show, but is willing to expand upon it.

Who Painted the Moon Black by throughthedark

1d, 95k, pub 2013, Louis/Harry

Hunger games crossover. Doesn’t just use the other fandom for setting, but entirely inhabits it. I had to stop partway through my reread because I knew I’d have nightmares, but this fic never stops hoping. Trauma is not an ending. This fic is certain of that the whole way through.

Reid’s Choices: 

Honorable Mentions: 

songs from the ash, by explosivesky, 2017

Critical Role, Percy/Vex, Keyleth/Vax, 54k, WIP (sort of)

rockstar/movie star AU 

A fantastic example of how fic can just standalone as really good original fiction. A lovingly rendered, devastating and beautifully crafted portrait of four broken people doing their best to navigate through their lives and around one another. 

delta, by sharpa, 2019

BTS, rapline ot3, 60k

What happens when you’re a public figure who gets unwillingly outed, and two people you used to love reach out to offer you sanctuary? You make Reid cry, that’s what. 

Top 5 picks: 

Salt on the Western Wind by Saras_Girl, 2013

Harry Potter, drarry, 60k

Immediately post war, bond

It represents a lot of what I was looking for when I started really getting into Drarry fic, which was an exploration of what canon wouldn’t give me. My favorite Drarry fics have always been the ones that let them dig into their shared trauma, and while this fic isn’t the heaviest one I’ve read, I think the fact that it’s set literally hours after the Battle of Hogwarts ends lends itself well to that concept. I couldn’t have a list of the decade without a Drarry fic, tbh.

The Great Sealand Takeover, by whalehuntingboyfriends, 2015

Roosterteeth/Achievement Hunter RPF, ot6 (gavin, michael, ray, geoff, ryan, jack), 365k

FAHC

When I think about fics that set the standard for a fandom, this is one of the first ones that comes to mind. This fic means a lot to me because it was my introduction to RPF, and in addition to its intricate plot and fandom-constructed lore, also was a take on poly relationships and found families in a way I had never experienced before, with themes of belonging and a love that transcends typical convention.

The Twice-Told Tale by arysteia, 2012

Marvel, steve/tony, 15k

This fic hits a sweet spot for me where it does have some of that 2012 tower-fic nostalgia, but I also think it holds up well in terms of what I (and fandom) find so fascinating about Tony, which is all this grief and trauma that he struggles so hard to process, and the way puts himself at the center of attention to obfuscate the fact that he keeps everyone at a long arm’s length.

There Was an Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe, by Shoshanah-ben-hohim, 2015

Hockey, Sid/Geno, Canon Divergent, 77k

& the whole series, including There is a Field, I’ll Meet You There, Alex Galchenyuk/Olli Maata, 131k

When I think about this fic I want to scream from every rooftop I’ve ever been on “please read this fic”. The way it weaves together details to provide a level of grounding and realism in what sounds like the most absurd concept for a fic just floors me. The empathy and compassion and fear in this fic just gets at the most tender parts of my heart, and the fact that it’s ostensibly a ship fic, and yet Sid and Geno spend nearly the entire fic with no communication, but instead are just holding on to the innate truth that they know about one another to get them through this crazy endeavour they’re on elevates the entire fic for me.

what comes after, by poppyseedheart, 2018

Roosterteeth/Achievement Hunter RPF, mavinseg (gavin, meg, michael, lindsay), 36k

Dystopia/Spy AU

When I first read this fic, I finished it and I put it down and then I spent a few days feeling like I was just sort of wandering around in a haze because every single thought was consumed by this fic. In addition to its impeccable worldbuilding and the tone work that it does with its setting, I don’t know that I had ever resonated so deeply with fic characters before. Reading this felt like someone had pried my ribcage open one by one and revealed the softest, most tender parts of me and then went “I’m going to write something that targets this.” This fic is an ode to loss and love, to mourning something that you once had and then hesitantly and clumsily opening yourself up to building something new, and recognizing that, impossibly, that new thing you built can somehow be better than what you had before. 

And I felt all of these things, I felt like my world had just been shattered by this new author I discovered… and then, somehow, I became her friend. Then through Nic I met Brenna, and now when I think about this fic I not only love it for being a work of art, but also for being representative of the thing that brought me to two of the most important people in my life, and that to me will always make it my favorite fic I’ve ever read.

[citialiin]

STUDY    :   ziggy stardust , baybee !!!  TAGGED BY    :   @ thatcertainnight​ ... thank you !!!  TAGGING: you !!!!!!!!!!!!!! i guess !!!!!!!!!!!!!! tag me in it so i can seeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!

—    BASICS.

▸     IS    YOUR    MUSE    TALL    /    SHORT    /    AVERAGE ? pretty tall ! 5′10″ -- not super tall, but when you add an extra 3+ inches due to high heels or platforms, he is Monstrously tall.  how thin he is also gives the illusion of extra height.  

▸      ARE    THEY    OKAY    WITH    THEIR    HEIGHT ? he’s fine with it -- he likes the respect that comes with the height.  

▸      WHAT’S    THEIR    HAIR    LIKE ?

bright, deep orangeish red -- looks like it’s dyed, but its au naturale, babey.  his hair is about shoulder length and curls at the end -- it’s swept back, out of his face, and usually held there with hairspray.  no mullet. citialiin is an anti-mullet zone, and for that i sincerely apologize.  

▸     DO    THEY    SPEND    A    LOT    OF    TIME    ON    THEIR    HAIR     /    GROOMING ? o absolutely.  he has elevated vanity into high art.  he has meticulous routines for hair, skincare, etc. and spares no expense in buying the best for his physical appearance.  it eats up a lot of time to look this good, but he would rather be late and hot than on time and unkempt.  he almost refuses to be seen without at least some amount of time to get ready -- this is also because he has to cover his weird alien forehead mark, lest his strange secret be revealed to the world.  

▸      DOES   YOUR   MUSE   CARE   ABOUT   THEIR   APPEARANCE   /   WHAT    OTHERS    THINK ? enormously.  in a sense, he doesn’t care what others think in that he obeys only his own fashion tastes only, as eccentric or weird as they may be. if people tell him some shoes are ugly but he steadfast believes that they’re great, he’s still going to wear those shoes anyways and mock you for having bad taste.  his appearance is a deeply important thing to him and a form of self-expression and individuality, which he considers tenants of his personality.  how he looks is a reflection of who he is, and he is cool and better than you. he is more apt to wear something hideous that he likes than something considered fashionable but he considers boring: luckily, he has pretty good (if not very bizarre) taste in clothes, and looks somewhat avant-garde, but also somewhat like a closet threw up on him.  

—    PREFERENCES.

▸     INDOORS    OR    OUTDOORS ?    indoors. ▸     RAIN    OR    SUNSHINE ?    sunshine -- but not too much, because he hates being uncomfortable. ▸     FOREST    OR    BEACH ?    neither. outside sucks.  ▸     PRECIOUS    METALS    OR    GEMS ?  both--together, preferably.  ▸     FLOWERS    OR    PERFUMES ?    perfumes. ▸     PERSONALITY    OR    APPEARANCE ?    he might initially say appearance, and while he certainly is very superficial, what truly makes him iconic -- and what he most likes about those who he is close to -- is personality and individuality.   ▸ BEING    ALONE    OR    BEING    IN    A    CROWD ?     both, but at different times -- he needs attention just as much as he needs privacy.  he can’t go too long without either.   ▸ ORDER    OR    ANARCHY ?    anarchy. ▸     PAINFUL    TRUTHS    OR    WHITE    LIES ?   white lies. ▸ SCIENCE    OR    MAGIC ?     science.  ▸ PEACE    OR    CONFLICT ?    peace. ▸     NIGHT    OR    DAY ?    night. ▸     DUSK    OR    DAWN ?    dusk. ▸ WARMTH    OR    COLD ?    warmth. ▸     MANY   ACQUAINTANCES    OR    A    FEW    CLOSE    FRIENDS ?   he has many acquaintances, and he has very few close friends, too; he prefers his friends, but he needs the attention and blind worship and endless compliments from the acquaintances.   ▸     READING    OR    PLAYING    A    GAME ?  reading.

—    QUESTIONNAIRE.

▸      WHAT    ARE    SOME    OF    YOUR    MUSE’S    BAD    HABITS ? the list is eternal!! there are things that hurt only himself: excessive drinking, staying up until four and sleeping until two, cigarettes, drugs, sex, the perils of Dat Rockstar Lyfe, but there are a lot of things he does that also affect others: he tends to be careless with people’s feelings and can sometimes be callously rude or mean.  it’s difficult for him to look past himself and be selfless, because he’s so stuck up and so lost in his own world that he never really manages to consider that other people feel just as deeply as he does until it’s too late.  he’s also gullible and naive, but hardly realizes this, making it pretty easy to manipulate him, not that he isn’t often also (unintentionally) manipulating others for his own selfish benefit.  most of these bad habits, however, are learned, and not necessarily innate to his personality; he was a much Nicer alien before he got lost in his lifestyle.

▸      HAS    YOUR    MUSE    LOST    ANYONE    CLOSE    TO    THEM ?      HOW    HAS    IT    AFFECTED    THEM ? not yet.  he’s only twenty six and has only been on earth for four years.  he has a very long lifespan, over twice what a normal human would live, so this is going to be an inevitability that he hasn’t considered either due to his short-sighted nature or because he intentionally isn’t willing to think about it.  

▸      WHAT    ARE    SOME    FOND    MEMORIES    YOUR    MUSE    HAS ? mostly memories of his various successes -- selfish things, like sell out concerts, iconic interview moments, climbing his shiny ladder of stardom.  but there are personal things that may not be quite as exciting to relive but that he considers important: meeting his bandmates for the first time, meeting anyone who he considers himself close to for the first time, hearing music for the first time, etc. he has so many firsts and they’re all in his very recent memory.

▸     IS    IT    EASY    FOR    YOUR    MUSE    TO    KILL ? o fuck no. he’s just some dude.  he would never hurt another person beyond maybe a punch or a slap if they made him really angry.  i think the planet he came from before he came to earth was so far advanced that any semblance of violence was just some primitive memory of lesser-evolved society; upon coming to earth, knowing that there’s still stuff like murder and whatever is horrifying and freaky to him.  it’s like if you went to go live with a tribe of chimps and you just  have to accept that your brethren regularly kill smaller monkeys and tear them apart as a means of bonding (i hate chimps. fyi)

▸      WHAT’S    IT    LIKE    WHEN    YOUR    MUSE    BREAKS    DOWN ? equally heartbreaking and laughably pathetic.  he’s a very dramatic, over the top person, but he’s also very genuine in some ways, so it depends: if he had a freak out over something insignificant, you’d probably think it was funny that he let himself get so worked up over some dumb thing and now he has like mascara tears and he’s sobbing that life is unfair and he never gets his way wah everything is awful he hates everything !!!!  but in the same vein, he has a lot of things to rightfully panic over: he’s far from home and utterly alone. so if he had a freak out over that, it would be a little more sympathetic, because he is under a lot of strange pressure, and even if he is a whiny dipshit, he deserves to feel sad for things that are genuinely upsetting. when he’s upset, however, spotlight’s on him, so you wait your turn to be upset when he’s done. 

▸      IS    YOUR    MUSE    CAPABLE    OF    TRUSTING    SOMEONE    WITH    THEIR    LIFE ? sort of -- maybe.  i think he trusts himself, most of all, but his more whimsical or romantic side likes to think that he could utterly give himself to another person.  but he’ll always be withholding some sliver, just because he’s Weird and Not Human and ideas of things like romance are very human-centric.  

▸      WHAT’S    YOUR    MUSE    LIKE    WHEN    THEY’RE    IN    LOVE ? strangely enough, equal parts terrible and equal parts very sweet.  being comfortable with another person clearly means that he has some level of trust in them and that he will likely allow himself to be rude, callous, talk too much, whine a lot, etc.  you’re supposed to take care of him !!! how can you not want to cater to his every weird ass whim and fancy !!! but in the same vein, i think he understands he has capital i Issues and if anyone could force him to change for the better, it would be because he loved them (whether romantically or platonically) and sought to make them happy.  i think the thing is that while he’s a very flirty or coquettish person, he isnt very keen on romance and tends to be weary of devoting himself in any sense to other people.  so it’s difficult for him to get to this point at all, unless you’re Real Special.  

[xxisxxisxxis]

Gateway Drug | Part Nine

Part Eight

Pairing: Douglas Booth!Nikki Sixx X OC

Warnings: Drug use, sexual situations, language

Tag List: @fandomshit6000 @lilmou5ie @tamedhearts @divaanya @allieburakovsky @kingbouji3 @evrsncnewyork  @6ixx6ixx @ratedrkohardychick91 @floregrohlssard  @oldschoolimagineblog @thanks2pete @abaldboi @swoopygorl @justjodeye @liith-ium @caos18blog @ytwahsog @shamlessobsessions @scarecrowmax @toadspleen @random-internet-user-4471

**Let me know if you want to be tagged**

———————————————————————

Nikki and I hit a small low after Tommy had caught us committing murder, which was something the both of us had grown accustom to getting away with.

Even after Tommy slammed the front door in our faces after we tried to talk to him about it, and everyone else ate their dinner in silence and then left, the atmosphere was still guilt ridden and it was driving the both of us to insanity.

So, we did what people do when they hit a small low: we ran like hell to catch a big high.

I try to keep my laughter to a minimum to avoid spilling the tequila that’s in my naval as Nikki snorts the coke he’s lined up at the top of my breast.

Once he’s done, he licks the salt from the center of my ribs, takes the shot from my belly button and bites the lime from my mouth.

I moan when he discards the lime, grabs a handful of my hair and pulls me up from laying down to kiss me roughly. My bright red lipstick is smeared and my mascara is smudged, my nails dig into his shoulders, as he pulls me to the edge of the kitchen counter and I eagerly wrap my legs around him to get him as close to me as possible.

In the midst of the our lust, Tommy’s outburst infiltrates my mind, pulling my attention away from Nikki slightly:

“...Tommy, will you please just stop and listen—“

He snaps around, nearly shaking, and points his finger at me.

“Don’t say a fuckin’ thing to me to try to make this shit better, Vivian. Just don’t. You spent years going on with fuckin’ bullshit about how your body’s a ‘temple’ but you give it up like a cheap trick to the first rockstar that makes a pass at you.” He snaps at me bitterly and I furrow my brows, at a loss for words as I feel everyone’s eyes burn in to the three of us.

“I-Tommy, I didn’t seek him out or mean for any of it to happen—”

“Where did you mean for him to put it then, your bible?” He retorts, cutting me off.

“Hey, this was my fault, I started all of this so if you’re gonna lash out at one of us it needs to be me.” Nikki argues, tugging me away from Tommy and stepping between us.

“I know damn well who started it.” Tommy states, looking at Nikki as if he could kill him. “You promised me you wouldn’t do this shit, Nikki.” Tommy starts. “You promised me you’d leave her out of the sleazy, fucked up shit you do, then you turn around and use her like a fuckin’ cum rag, knowing she’s too innocent to realize she’s being used because Nikki fuckin’ Sixx wants her and that’s all that matters.”

“...Vivian,” Nikki’s slight slurring of my name, once he pulls away, snaps me out of my memory and I look at him, his expression is almost child like.

“What?” I ask him, catching my breath and he blinks slowly, trying to put his words together in his mind.

“I wanna get married.” He says, and I raise my brows and laugh nervously.

“You are so far gone, you have no idea what you’re saying.” I argue softly, my fingers tracing at the skin of his jaw.

“I know what I’m saying,” he states and I shake my head a little.

“No, you don’t, Nikki. Even if you told me that when you were sober, I’d still think you’d have no idea what you were saying.”

“What?” He asks me, confused.

“We have no business talking about marriage right now.” I explain, even though he won’t remember this conversation when he wakes up tomorrow. “I just turned nineteen. You just turned twenty-four. We’re still kids. Especially you.” I point out and he rolls his eyes in an exaggerated manner.

“Bullshit.” He mumbles. “I wanna get married.”

I stare at him for God knows how long, not wanting to say “no” and hurt his feelings. I know he won’t remember any of this anyway, so I just nod a little and move a few strands of hair from his eyes.

“Okay.” I relent quietly. I end up gaining a dopey, enthusiastic grin in response to my statement.

He kisses me again, his tongue meeting mine hotly as my hands move to get his shirt off.

Once it’s tossed to the floor, my lips and tongue are dusting down his neck and across his chest, leaving the stain of my lipstick in its wake.

After a moment, he’s pulling me off the counter, throwing me over his shoulder and carrying me to our room.

I laugh at his caveman-like technique, but all humor ceases when my back hits the mattress and he stands at the foot of the bed, staring down at me with an unfamiliar look in his eye.

My breathing seems strangely calm under his intense attention, my eyes connecting with his. He steps to our closet for a second, returning with our Polaroid camera and I giggle, covering my bare chest with my arms just as he takes the picture.

“Viv!” He complains, realizing he only got a picture of me in lace panties, covering the “good stuff” with my arms, from anyone’s view.

“I’m not letting you take raunchy pictures of me to show off to Vince.” I state, disguising my apprehension with a small laugh.

“I’m not gonna let anyone else see ‘em.” He assures me. “I promise.”

I think about it for a moment, realizing we haven’t really done anything like this before.

Before I even know what I’m doing, I’m taking my panties off, listening to a quiet “fuck” come from his mouth. Just as I drop the lace fabric on the floor, his free hand is reaching out to touch at the newly exposed skin, causing me to hum.

One of his fingers slides into me, and my eyes roll back before closing, pleasure enveloping my body. In a moment, he’s adding another finger and curls the both of them, causing my back to arch and my hands to tangle in the sheets as I moan out loudly.

I hear the click of the camera and see the flashing light behind my closed eyelids and I honestly don’t care at this point.

With my eyes still closed, I hear him discard the camera and when he takes his fingers from me, I whimper and open my eyes to beg him not to stop, until I see him getting on his knees at the foot of the bed.

Before I can catch my breath, he’s grabbing my legs and pulling me to the edge of the bed, pressing small kisses to the inside of my thighs.

Once his mouth reaches between my legs, his tongue teases me, circling the one place I need for him to assault, but never doing it.

“Nikki, please.” I whine, my mind spinning as he drives me all sorts of crazy.

He chuckles a little, finding my wanton lust amusing.

I try to grind against him in hopes his tongue will get where I want it. It’s a lost attempt, though, when he holds my hips down with his hands and pulls away to tsk at me with a smug grin on his face.

I’m nearly in tears with how needy I am, and I finally get tired of his games and kick at him with my foot, sending him falling back on the floor.

Taking the opportunity, I’m straddling him in a couple seconds, my teeth sinking into his bottom lip as I try to relieve the ache in my core by moving against the evident bulge in his pants.

He sits up, hands grasping at fist fulls of my red hair as our teeth scrape together and I reach down between us to unbuckle his belt and get his pants off.

Once they’re off, I’m crawling back up his body, desperate to have him as close to me as possible. He’s laid back again, his hand holding at my waist as his other hand positions himself at my entrance.

My hand holds over his that’s on my waist, needing someway to brace myself. He pulls me down on to him, slower than I’m used to and it’s impossible to think of anything but him as I start to get my fix.

“Goddamn,” he groans out as I move down on him, his hand on my waist getting a tighter grip and I can’t form any words other than his name.

He lets me control the slower speed, until he finally gets tired of the pace and turns us over, moving in to me the way he wants to.

I let out small whimpers and moans, clawing down his chest, back and arms as I try to find a way to channel the pleasure reeling through my body that won’t piss the neighbors off and cause them to file a noise complaint again.

His lips and teeth attack my breast, causing my eyes to roll back and my legs to splay wider for him as a hot sensation travels through the nerves of my body to my core.

“Fuck, Nikki,” I pant out, my hands in his hair as he starts on the other breast, biting harshly before smoothing his tongue over the teeth marks.

Once he’s satisfied with my bruising chest, he kisses me for a moment, tugging at my bottom lip with his teeth as he pulls away and turns me over on my stomach.

The empty feeling of him leaving me is brief before he’s pulling my ass up by my hips and entering me again.

He’s merciless as he snaps his hips forward and completely recks me. My face is buried in the carpet, trying to muffle myself, as my back arches.

“Jesus fuckin’ Christ, Viv,” he grunts, pulling out all the way before pounding in to me and repeating it.

I’m on the brink of my end, the liquid pouring from me dripping on the carpet under us and I tighten even more around him.

I release, tears in my eyes as I claw at the carpet, gasping out as his tongue licks a drizzle of sweat up from my spine.

The familiarity of him filling me strikes when he hits his own peak and falls over on top of me, his chest pressed completely against my back.

We’ve indulged in our gluttony, our highs steady as we don’t bother mentally sifting through the hell we’ve created between Tommy and ourselves.

I roll over on my back, chest heaving with deep breaths. He’s high on quaaludes and cocaine, while I’m high on him, which is much more potent than any drink or narcotic I’ve ever been offered.

He lays on top of me, his shaky hand wiping the running mascara with his thumb before he lays his head on my chest, and eventually the both of us pass out.

I wake up the next afternoon in our bed, confused for a moment until I see Nikki’s gone. He must’ve put me to bed when he woke up.

I rub my eyes that are crusted over with gunk and I groan, remembering I never took my makeup last night, so my mascara’s mixed with my tears and temporarily glued my lashes together.

I stumble to the bathroom the best I can see, and get in the shower, wincing every time I make a certain move because of how stiff I am from the floor mixed with the impact last nights antics on my body. Once I’m clean, I get out and grab our only towel, wrapping myself in it before stepping to the small mirror.

I see my small cross around my neck, smiling at the fact he put my necklace back on me since last night. Reaching my hand up to brush my fingers over the small diamond encrusted crucifix, I notice a shining silver band on my ring finger and furrow my brows. I recognize it as one of Nikki’s rings and frown a little, not remembering him putting it there last night but decide it could have happened and I just wasn’t paying attention.

I go to find him, seeing him in the living room with his bass, scribbling down what I assume are lyrics on a worn out notepad.

“Hey, babe,” I say to him and he doesn’t look up at me, too enthralled in his work and I wait patiently for him to get to a stopping place, stepping to the fridge to grab a Coke. After ten more minutes I walk to him and take the notepad from the coffee table he’s leaned over, causing the pen he’s got to the paper to drag down the page, leaving a black line in its path.

“Viv, What the hell?” He says as if I’m crazy, a little upset I interrupted him and I raise my brows.

“I said ‘hey’ like ten minutes ago.” I put the pad of paper back down, taking the ring off my finger and handing it out to him. “I think you put this on last night.” I explain and he just looks at the ring and then back at me, not saying a word. “Well, here,” I motion for him to take it but he doesn’t. “You are so difficult.” I chuckle, grabbing his hand and sliding it back on his pinky.

I turn to head back to the kitchen, but he grabs my wrist and stops me, putting the ring back on my finger. I stare at it in confusion before looking down at him.

“There is no way you remember last night.” I state in disbelief.

The look on his face says it all as he discards my attention on him and goes back to his writing as if nothing’s happening.

I thought he had finally lost his damn mind, that all the drugs and alcohol had finally taken their toll on his mind and he couldn’t afford their steep price. If only his thoughtlessness remained in the boundaries of his intoxication instead of seeping into his sober mind, as well. I later found out he wanted to get married because it was surreal and he wanted to see what would happen. And I was the idiot that should have spoken up and told him “no, we would have no idea what to do in a marriage” but I was too caught up in a second-hand high I got feeding off of his silent proposal, and infatuated with the idea of being bound to him until death.

[sortyourlifeoutmate]

JoJo Rabbit

A film I did not know existed until my buddy was like “Hey you want to go see JoJo Rabbit?”

Now let’s make one thing clear right off the bat, just so we’re all singing from the same hymn sheet. I like to think of myself as a fairly sedate chap, though my rantings on here might persuade you otherwise. I’m fairly laid back, as a rule.

That being said, I despise Nazis with a passion that surprises me even now. They combine your common-or-garden fascistic bullshit (which never fails to get under my skin) with some truly, gobsmackingly awful racist bollocks, all crowned with that particular bugbear of mine: raving antisemitism.

So bear that in mind. I loathe Nazis.

And with that in mind also know that I am entirely behind any and all efforts to mock Nazis, to hold their ludicrous, disgusting beliefs up to ridicule and to make it clear that they’re not Orcs, they’re not some gestalt evil force, they’re just petty, unpleasant, murderous human beings who really, really should know better.

That’s the thing you see. When does a Nazi become a problem? When they should know better. Because a ten year old with no frame of reference who’s grown up being told that being a Nazi is ace and who gets a piffy uniform and a cool knife and whose only real friend is an imaginary Hitler does not really have a chance to know better.

And here is the film. JoJo - played by the MOST ADORABLE CHILD EVER - wants to be a great Nazi because, well, it’s Nazi Germany and that’s kind of what’s expected, but as circumstances go on the tissue-thin foundations on which Nazism is built have massive holes blown in them over and over again by reality itself as JoJo has to deal with, well, the fact reality is unkind to how Nazis think it should be.

I really, really, really liked this film. It’s a very well written, it’s well paced, it’s well shot, it’s well directed and it’s populated by actors who do a damn fine job all of them - from the kids on upwards! Even Rebel Wilson does well!

And it’s got Sam Rockwell, bonus points. Stephen Merchant too as a frankly deeply unsettling Gestapo officer.

And it handles the subject matter and CORE MESSAGE most capably. Things start out jauntily enough - the young boy is going on an adventure, after all! Learning how to do fun things in the wilderness! But the undercurrent is never far out of sight, and reality is always pressing in one way or another...

The tone darkens, as well it should, and while the humour (which is actually FUNNY) never leaves, it is tempered. It tempers as JoJo is exposed to more of what all this actually means.

Best exemplified, I feel, by JoJo’s imaginary friend who is, of course, Hitler. Why wouldn’t he be? Hitler was made to be a superman rockstar! That’s kind of the point. What small boy wouldn’t imagine him? But while this imaginary Hitler stars out as JoJo’s only real sympathetic ear and confident, he just gets...worse...as the films progresses.

Taika Waititi does the Hitlering and does it very well indeed, starting out as Oh That Wacky Hitler at the beginning of the film before veering off quite sharply into Oh This Guy Is Actually Quite Scary territory, as well he should.

Also! More hanged bodies than I would have expected. I always find the visual of a row of danling feet, uh, somewhat distressing. Probably a good sign.

But anyway, the length of my blather should give you some indication. I really liked this film, you might not, after Rise of Skywalker it was like a breath of fresh air. It’s a film made well by people who knew what they were doing and it carries forward the sterling, everfresh, ever important message:

Nazis are dangerous, ridiculous, fantasist lunatics. Fuck them, laugh at them, fuck them again you’re better than that.

[volleydorkscentral]

ANSWER ALL OF THE QUESTIONS IN THE UNUSUAL ASK GAME, YOU COWARD.

First of all: 

Second, questions under the cut: 

Spotify, SoundCloud, or Pandora? - Spotify! all the way. i hoarse my bf’s account so he can never listen but i don’t care it’s mine now it’s full of my music and my playlists and whenever i’m listening to it and it suddenly changes cause he tries to use it on his phone I call him, “are you using spotify?” “oh. i mean i can listen to something else?” “cool, thanks!” and i get my music back. :D

is your room messy or clean? - it’s somewhere in between. my actual ROOM (bed room, i assume) is pretty clean, except i never make the bed. but the house is .. a work in progress. it’s not dirty but it’s cluttered so my bf and I are having to work together to clear that and build shelves and stuff for more storage space.

what color are your eyes? - dark brown! (with little green flecks when I cry)

do you like your name? why? - Not really? i don’t hate it. My mom wanted to name me Savannah but they had her sign the certificate while she was still drugged from her c-section so it ended up as Crystal?? Idk. She named her dolls Crystal when she was a kid.

what is your relationship status? - dating for almost six years. 

how many times a week do you shower? uhhh idk. I don’t shower every day (unless i get gross). AT LEAST four times… but I don’t wash my hair every time cause that’s bad for my hair. I SHOWER WHEN I AM DIRTY.

favorite tv show? does Haikyuu!! count? that’s probably a given. HM. Well, we don’t have cable so I don’t watch a lot of NEW shows? …. OH. Duh. Fuckin me I’m a dumbass. Bob’s Burgers. I literally have it on ALL THE TIME. I don’t like silence so it’s ALWAYS on in the background if i’m not listening to music. I’ve seen every episode a zillion times. I can usually pinpoint every scene and the major lines/jokes.

shoe size? most brands it’s 5 1/2 

how tall are you? SHORTER THAN NISHINOYA BUT TALLER THAN YACHI. I’m like… 5ft-5’1 depending on how much my back hurts. (i used that earlier and someone said it was funny and i’m trash so i’ll repeat it here!)

sandals or sneakers? i wear Bobs LOL. (knock off toms) and i’ve got one pair of sneakers and sometimes I wear my ballet flats around even though my bf says they look dumb fuck u they’re comfy.

do you go to the gym? No. I used to, but where I live now it’d be like a 45 min drive. I don’t really LIKE gyms though? working out is boring to me. No matter how hard I try. I’d love to start dancing again for real.

describe your dream date - April 25th because it’s not too cold and not too hot. Okay but jk that’s a lie where I live it’s balls hot in april. Idk. I’d like to go hiking when it’s not very hot? Take my dog, let her run around. Take a picnic. Sit in a grassy field and talk about dumb shit cause we know each other’s dreams and hopes by now.

how much money do you have in your wallet at the moment? UHM. fuck like…. $27? i know there’s a twenty and a handful of ones. And a handful of change.

what color socks are you wearing? - NONE. MY FEET ARE COLD. FOREVER COLD.

how many pillows do you sleep with? - pft like 6.

do you have a job? what do you do? - No; I quit after being over worked, under appreciated, cheated out of my paychecks a few times, and no job still due to lingering health issues.

how many friends do you have? answered this already!

whats the worst thing you have ever done? - UHM. Idk i haven’t murdered anyone. I don’t like this question cause if i really try to answer it i’ll spiral into a frustrated, furious depression and self-hatred so… NOPE.

whats your favorite candle scent? i’ve got this candle i got from etsy that’s like… Scottish Highlands? It’s grassy and kinda MAGICY.

3 favorite boy names - i don’t really have favorite names?

3 favorite girl names - answered already

favorite actor? god idk. i’m so bad with names and celebrities. uhm. I really like don’t have a favorite. I LIKE a bunch. Benedict Cumberbatch; Freddie Highmore… uhm. uh. Hugh Laurie? 

favorite actress? IDK OKAY?? I LIKE a bunch but i don’t favorite?? I really like Gwendoline Christie. Uhm. Anne Hathaway makes me laugh. MAGGIE SMITH. how could i forget!??!

who is your celebrity crush? I LEGIT don’t have one.

favorite movie? CLUE takes the top spot most days.

do you read a lot? whats your favorite book? I used to read a lot more. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

money or brains?  personality, bitch.

do you have a nickname? what is it? not *really* but people online used to call me Chrys. My bf calls me ‘sweetie’ sometimes but he also calls the dog that so… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

how many times have you been to the hospital? - uhm. like the er? Once when I broke my arm. Doc in the box? Not since 2017.

top 10 favorite songs - PFT. Uhm. Jesus just let me die a little. Excluding all Disney; Not in any order:

No One - Biometrix

Danser - Lisandro Cuxi

A Single Moment of Sincerity (E) - Asking Alexandria (the band I was listening to when I designed my rockstar MC that I love so much)

The Annabel Trilogy (a series of 3 albums) - Alesana. Can’t pick a single song because they’re all a part of a huge story. Listen to them.

Chucky vs. The Giant Tortoise - Dance Gavin Dance

Anticoagulant - Sianvar

Ohioisonfire - Of Mice & Men

Coincidance - Handsome Dancer (Watch the Video for the love of god. THANKS ASH FOR THIS GEM)

Devil’s Backbone - The Civil Wars

Still Here - Digital Daggers (i’ve been listening it to a lot for inspiration for a new AU so… yup. That’s gonna be fun and painful)

do you take any medications daily? - yup

what is your skin type? (oily, dry, etc) - i got dry ass skin it sucks

what is your biggest fear? - uhm… physical fear? idk. Heights is a big one that I developed? I used to not care but a while ago I was walking on a bridge and I just… looked over and got FUCKING DIZZZY with nausea and fear that I was gonna fall and almost fainted. 

how many kids do you want? - HONESTLY… one or two.

whats your go to hair style? - tried to brush but gave up so just threw it in a claw clip

what type of house do you live in? (big, small, etc) - moderate? one story, four bedrooms. big ass yard though for the dog

who is your role model? - I don’t really have one.

what was the last compliment you received? - answered already

what was the last text you sent? - actual TEXT message? ‘as long as there’s someone with her overnight she’ll be okay during the day cause of the dog door and stuff. just play with her before you go to work and maybe hide some treats around the house for her to hunt for’ - texting my friend that’s gonna house sit while we go on a family vacation soon.

how old were you when you found out santa wasn’t real? - UH idk the age? i know I saw my mom writing scavenger cards though. My fam has never had a lot of money so to make Christmas more interesting my mom/grandparents (we lived with them till I was in 3rd grade) would make these elaborate scavenger hunts for me and my cousins to do to find our presents around the house or out in the barn or, on one memorable occasion, at the bottom of our pool! Good memories. 

what is your dream car? - one that RUNS and has badass AC and speakers

opinion on smoking? - hate it. please don’t do it around me. my bf’s family alllllll smoke all the time and i get so sick when i have to go on vacation with them and be around it for a long time. 

do you go to college? - i DID. I went to Culinary school and majored in Baking & Pastry

what is your dream job? - Author or Dog Trainer

would you rather live in rural areas or the suburbs? - rural as all hell. give me trees, cows, and horses. 

do you take shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels? Not usually? but usually the people i’m with do. 

do you have freckles? Not on my face (except one) but i’ve got more like… on my arms and just randomly all over but i dont think ‘freckles’ would be what anyone thinks of when they think of me

do you smile for pictures? - only if i’m forced to be in them

how many pictures do you have on your phone?  - HAHAHAHAHAHA. Well. Before I got my new phone it was over 10k. Now though its only about 2k. 

have you ever peed in the woods? - Only when I was camping. 

do you still watch cartoons? - ALL THE GODDAMN TIME

do you prefer chicken nuggets from Wendy’s or McDonalds? - neither. but i HATE WENDYS and can tolerate McD’s fries and they’ve got ballin’ sweet tea so I guess McD.

Favorite dipping sauce? this honey dijon creamy thing at my favorite French restaurant but idk what is is.

what do you wear to bed? - t-shirt 

have you ever won a spelling bee? - YUP. 2nd grade.  

what are your hobbies? - writing, crocheting, photography, reading, uh… i forget what else

can you draw? when i was doing it all the time i did ok? but i’m WAY TOO IMPATIENT now a days to do it. 

do you play an instrument? - no but i wish i did :(

what was the last concert you saw? - i’ve never been to a concert. crowds are icky

tea or coffee? - tea!

Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts? - already answered this

do you want to get married? - Yes pls

what is your crush’s first and last initial? - (bf, but I suppose i still have a crush on him? is love considered a crush?) J. Y. 

are you going to change your last name when you get married? god yes. my current last name is my shitbag of a sperm doner and i hate it. my mom kept it after they divorced only cause she thought her maiden name would be too hard for me to spell but i would give anything to have that name instead

what color looks best on you? - idk. i prefer black but i’ve been told green and certain shades of pink/yellow. 

do you miss anyone right now? - not until i thought about it, thanks

do you sleep with your door open or closed? open so my pupper can go in and out

do you believe in ghosts? not until i’m faced with darkness and creepy things 

what is your biggest pet peeve? people chewing their food loud. people not picking up after themselves. people interrupting me (but not in the excited, OMG way. that we can work though) but in the ‘i don’t care what you’re saying i’m going to talk now’ way

last person you called` - my bf to discuss plans for his brother’s bday

favorite ice cream flavor? cookies n’ cream!

regular oreos or golden oreos? DOUBLE STUFF OF EITHER

chocolate or rainbow sprinkles? FUCK SPRINKLES

what shirt are you wearing? a shirt that has my dog’s face on it :D

what is your phone background? - the art that Ash drew of Bokuto from my fic Just a Taste!!

are you outgoing or shy? - i hate talking to strangers but with my friends i’m pretty fucking loud and chatty

do you like it when people play with your hair? only people i know

do you like your neighbors? nope. he’s an asshole who neglected his dog and i wanna skin him alive

do you wash your face? at night? in the morning? i do my best to remember to do it at night but i always do it when i shower

have you ever been high? yup. 

have you ever been drunk? yup

last thing you ate? BIRTHDAY CAKE

favorite lyrics right now - idk? i guess the first lyrics that came to mind, even though they’re not my favorite, just ones that i like and were stuck in my head for a while: “All of the handsome fiction / will melt away / and when the flame burns brighter / Evaporate” Evaporate - Dance Gavin Dance

summer or winter?  WINTER FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. IT’S SO FUCKING HOT IN SUMMER I DIE EVERY DAY

day or night? both have their merits

dark, milk, or white chocolate? - all chocolate but i prefer white to just EAT. 

favorite month? uhm. uhh. November maybe? for NaNoWriMo. 

what is your zodiac sign - pftt.. i think i used to be a Gemini? i don’t believe in all that stuff 

who was the last person you cried in front of? - ….. my dog? but probably my mom and Grandmother when my GM basically said my bf didn’t love me and was a shit human being and i was a shit granddaughter for loving him. i was both upset and furious and i walked away from them. (my mom called and apologized, but i haven’t spoken to my GM since)

THERE ASH ARE YOU GODDAMN HAPPY. that took so long LOL (I hope the formatting came through I had to redo it on this tumblr page UGH)

[pjbehindthesun]

chapter 23: an hour and a half from now

Saturday, November 3rd, 1990

What does it say about me, that this is the most at home I’ve felt in this city since I’ve moved here? Leaning on a cold metal pole in the back of a shithole music venue by myself with nobody to talk to, just watching the people in the crowd who have no idea they’re being watched. Shit, I don’t mean it to sound all creepy like that, it’s just one of my favorite things to do: pay attention to people when they think they’re being ignored. That whole “dance while no one’s watching” idea? Makes for a solid evening of entertainment all by itself. Unless, like tonight, everyone seems to be here on a goddamn date. For the first half of the set, it’s just felt nice, the way no one’s bothered me all night, but it’s like a light switch flicked in my head and now all I can see is that everyone’s here with someone. Fucking great. Can’t even enjoy a show without reverting into a self-pitying, morose fucker. Maybe if I find a different spot in the club, I can try to force my attention back on the band. At least no one’s hassling me about shouldering my way forward. In a small enough place like the Off Ramp, no one really gives a shit.

Yeah, okay, this is better. The only people I can see are the handful of people directly in front of me and the band. They’re pretty fucking great, I never saw ‘em before… Jesus Lizard, I wanna say? Supposed to be out of Chicago, so we probably know a lot of the same people, although Beth was always way more into the noise rock scene than me…

Fuck. Stop it, Vedder. I hate this whole fucking break-up thing. Whose idea was it, anyway, not mine… I hate how everything reminds me of her. Or, I guess, I want to hate it. Truthfully, those painful little stabs of memory are all I have of her anymore, so I guess I should be grateful for them. I have a habit of hoarding them, like a collector, turning them over and over like cherished trinkets. How fucked up is that? Wait a minute… that’s not her, is it? There, the little brunette, up on the rail, in the white t-shirt that’s too big for her frame... fuck, it looks just like her from this angle, it’s got to be her… what the fuck is she doing here? She wouldn’t have come all the way up here, would she? For what reason? To tell me she wants to get back together? I shove between a couple of guys who are probably gonna murder me in an alleyway later, but it doesn’t matter, my hand’s on her shoulder, she whips around, and…

“M’sorry, thought you were someone else,” I mutter as the girl turns back to the music with a justified look of disgust, although there’s no way she heard my apology and definitely no way she cared. Of course it wasn’t her. What the fuck would she be doing in Seattle? What sense would that make? So fucking stupid. Doesn’t matter how many times I think I spot her in a crowd, it’s only wishful thinking. Stupid, invasive, immature dreams of her coming to find me, to tell me we’d made a horrible mistake. Just dreams. I can’t get myself outside the club fast enough. There’s a stack of the local circular on the counter by the door, so I grab one on my way out, hoping I’ll find something in there that’s actually worth thinking about, and shiver when I hit the damp outside air after escaping the stuffy club.

Maybe I should have gone out with Jeff and Mike after all, seen whatever show they wanted to see. Maybe I would have had a different set of distractions with them, done a better job keeping my mind off of Beth. Then again, seems like every time I go out with the guys, we end up hanging out with like a dozen of their closest friends in the music scene. Normally that’d be great, but I can’t shake the feeling that their buddies are always making fun of me somehow. I don’t blame ‘em, I’m probably fucking hilarious to them, a surfer in Seattle, a terrified frontman, the absolute antithesis of everything the guys had going on before, with Andy, just a…

...just a self-absorbed knucklehead whose problems aren’t shit compared to what I can see a little ways down the road from me. There’s a person, a woman, maybe, looks like she’s about my mom’s age, and she’s settling in for the night underneath the highway overpass. Okay, there’s one way I can quit being a mopey sack of shit and do something positive.

After giving her all the change in my wallet, the newspaper I wasn’t really reading anyway, the flannel under my coat, and the cut-off gloves I’d forgotten I had stashed in my pocket, I start back in the direction of home. Or Jeff’s apartment, I should say. Home’s a long way away. But I don’t get very far past the door of the Off-Ramp.

“Eddie?”

The door opens, carrying with it a wall of club noise and a familiar, mellow voice that makes me turn around.

“Oh, uh, hey Chris,” I greet him as he materializes out on the street, looming in all black. “You been here long? I didn’t see you, I woulda said hi.”

“No, you wouldn’t have,” he smiles, “but it’s cool, I probably wouldn’t have either. It’s just one of those nights. You probably know how that is. I figured you’d be over at Squid Row with Jeff and Cready.”

“Oh, uh, you know, I was just…”

“Hey, like I said, it’s one of those nights. I’m being an antisocial shit too,” his grin widens. “We could team up, you know? Twice the brooding.”

“The more the moodier,” I’m chuckling in spite of myself. Chris seems to do that -- put people at ease. If he wants to. I’m glad I ran into him.

“Where were you headed?”

“There’s this footpath over at Discovery Park, and it’s usually pretty kinda quiet this time of night. My wife, she’s a big fan of these ridiculous little dogs. You ever seen a Pomeranian?”

I squint, racking my brain. “Those the Chinese ones, the little ones that look like mops?”

“No, no, that’s a Pekingese,” he laughs at the characterization. “Poms are even less dignified, they’re literally just pom poms with googly eyes glued on. Anyway, Susan’s all about ‘em, and we just got one. Well, a new one, I should say, we already had one, so now they’re a dynamic duo. Kinda funny to watch them try and keep up with my shepherd in the mud,” he mimes short legs flailing and a tongue panting, and his long hair looks for all the world like a pair of poodle ears as it sways along, “so I go out there by myself with a bunch of shitty beer and watch ‘em run around until they’re too tired and I have to carry ‘em back, one under each arm. It’s really fucking therapeutic, you should try it.”

Is this guy serious? I know I’m new to Seattle, but you’d have to live under a rock to miss how big Soundgarden is around here. And this notorious rockstar spends his weekends roaming through forests like a lonely ghost with a pack of ridiculous hounds? That’s officially the coolest fucking thing I’ve ever heard another human being say.

“Well? You in?”

I bob my head once in agreement, trying not to smile like too much of a fucking maniac, and another easy smile spreads across his face.

“Yes! My car’s that one, the Galaxie. Fuckin’ radio’s stuck on a religious station right now, though, hope you’re feeling the right combination of gullible and guilty.” He points at something parked behind him on the corner before turning on his heels to head in that direction. A massive, battered, late ‘60s Ford land yacht. I don’t think I could feel more heartfelt and instant love for an inanimate object if I tried.

“Hey, if you’re into hiking, we oughta go tomorrow too, there’s that trail Cora and I were telling you about a while back, I don’t think she’d be too mad if we went without her… although on second thought, I don’t want her to kill either one of us, so maybe we should probably check and see if she wants in... ” he trails off as I break into a jog to try and keep up.

***

Sunday, November 4th, 1990

“Where are you off to at this hour?”

In the quiet and darkened apartment, Alex’s voice makes me bounce into the air from my seat on the couch where I’d been tying my shoe.

“JESUS! You scared the shit out of me!”

He watches me with a rueful twist of his lips. “It’s my apartment too, ya know. You got too used to it being empty while I was gone, huh?”

“No, it’s not like that…” ...except it’s exactly like that, I mutter to myself as I try to stop my heart from racing like a cornered bunny's… “I just didn’t think you were awake yet and I didn’t want to be the one to wake you. I figured you’re probably still tired. From your trip.”

“Nah,” he groans through a stretch, “wide awake. My body’s still on mountain time.”

“Hmm.” I return my attention to my laces in the absence of anything else to say to him.

“You didn’t answer my question, though.”

“Your…?”

“Where are you off to?”

“So long, Mom, I’m off to drop the Bomb...” I singsong absently while I finish tying the other sneaker’s laces. When I straighten up, Alex is looking utterly lost and more than a little annoyed.

“Come again?”

“Little bit of pre-nostalgia for World War III, that’s all.”

I bite my lip to shut myself up. Weapons of mass destruction and nuclear holocaust are maybe slightly less funny when we’re actually keeping so many secrets from one another.

“You’re so fucking weird.” Alex shakes his head in dismissal, not showing any signs of having gotten the joke. Stone would have thought it was funny. UGH, god damn it, speak of the devil. Why am I thinking about Stone? Stop thinking about Stone! Stop it! Quick, change the subject…

“Well, I was going to go for a run, if that helps answer your question.”

Alex nods and I breathe a sigh of relief. It’s the only excuse I can find for getting out of the house long enough to clear my head and sort through some of the chaos of the last 48 hours. Making sense of what Lucy was trying to tell me the other day. Deciding what to do about this gift Alex sent Patch. Figuring out what the hell I actually think of Stone now. It’s gonna need to be a long run.

“Can I come with you?”

“Are you feeling okay?” I frown as he circles his arms around me, my body staying stiff as he tries to coax me to relax.

“Better than ever. So can I?”

“You want to come with me.”

“Mmm.” He kisses the tip of my nose, and it's a struggle not to wrinkle it in response.

“Outside.”

“Unless you just want me to chase you around the apartment, I figured as much.”

“Run-ning,” I stretch my word out, unsure whether I've lost my mind or he has.

His bottom lip pokes out. “Don’t sound so shocked, you might hurt my feelings.”

“Sorry, I’m sorry, it’s just… I don’t think you’ve ever…”

“Who says I can’t start now?”

“No one, but…”

“But what?”

“I can’t guarantee there will be any bears or murderers chasing us, Alex, and I’ve never heard you say anything nice about weirdos like me who run for fun.”

“Are you impugning my athletic ability?” He laughs, grabbing my ass and making me contort away from him yet again. At the look of confusion on his face, it occurs to me that I'm being a colossal asshole.

“You really want to come running with me?”

“Mmhmm.”

“But… why?”

“Why what?”

“Alex. You hate running. And hiking. And being outside. And, like, nature in general.”

He shrugs and says, very simply, “yeah, but I love you.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh,” he grabs my ass again, and it’s all I can do not to grimace, “I missed you, okay? I kinda want to spend time with you.”

Well, it’s official, if I blow him off right now, I’m a sub-human. So much for my grand plan to figure out how in the world I'm supposed to tell him I don't really love him anymore.

“Yeah… okay. Let me, uh, let me get some stuff together and we’ll go?”

He lets go of me with a smirk and heads towards the kitchen, but pauses a few paces away and groans as he claps his hand over his eyes.

“Pull a muscle?” I ask, trying not to sound too hopeful.

“I don't even think I have running shoes.” He faces me with a sheepish look, pulling his hand back to ruffle his hair. That always used to make me melt, when he’d do that. Used to. Now it just seems like a juvenile gesture he drops whenever he’s trying to get out of trouble. I never used to understand how falling out of love with someone was possible. I dimly remember thinking Stone sounded like a total asshole when he explained having gone through it. But right now, he’s the only person I want to talk to about it. Which is deeply inconvenient when I’m supposed to be hating his guts. Stupid Stone. But on the bright side, now I have an easy excuse to go on that solitary run.

“Oh, well, that solves th --”

“I’ll call Brian, he runs, I bet he has a pair I can steal!”

Before I can finish my objection, he’s got the phone to his ear and has already dialed his friend. I sink back against the lip of the kitchen table while he and his friend haggle over a pair of stinky running shoes, his friend who he’s never introduced me to, his friend who suddenly symbolizes how thoroughly we established completely different lives the moment we moved to Seattle. Why did it take me so long to figure this out? Lucy’s been trying to tell me, even Patch tried to tell me… damn it, I should really call Patch.

“Okay, don’t move a muscle, I’ll be right back!”

Alex plants a slightly-too-rough kiss on my cheek before flinging on his coat and bolting out the door. I numbly make my way over to the couch to curl up and stare at the phone. This is as good a time as ever to call Patch, right? See what he really thinks about Alex’s $500 stunt? Make sure he isn’t going to hate me if I go through with breaking up with Alex? God, they’ve always been such good friends, how on earth do you break up with someone who’s become a part of your family?

But instead of picking up the phone, I pick at a loose piece of rubber on the sole of my shoe. I want to hear my brother’s voice, but I’m terrified that maybe, possibly, there’s a slim chance he’ll tell me exactly what I want to hear and then I’ll have nothing left to do but act. And anyway, as much as I need his affirmation, I’m afraid of hearing yet again how I’m making all the wrong choices. It’s not his problem to solve, any more than it’s Lucy’s. I can hear how exasperated they’re both getting with me. So instead of calling my brother, and bothering him with my bullshit and hearing his predictable answers, I sit in a giant pile of mope and pick at my shoes while I wait for Alex to come back.

A heavy pair of footsteps slows down as it approaches my door. That must be Alex. I don’t even look up. Until the owner of the footsteps knocks. Alex wouldn’t knock.

“Uh, it’s open?” I call from the couch.

When Chris cracks the door and leans to peer inside, his hair precedes him, cracking me up and shaking me out of my mopey idiocy.

“Smokey! Can I come in?”

“Always. What are you doing in this neck of the woods?”

“Funny you mention woods,” he smiles, bounding over to the couch. He hesitates for a moment at the pile of laundry I haven’t folded yet, which is occupying the entire cushion next to me, but after I shrug at him, he scoops it up and dumps it unceremoniously on the floor. One item, my favorite navy blue bra, stays hooked to the afghan, and I cringe as I watch him gently untangle it and set it down on top of the rest of my clothes, looking totally unfazed. He joins me on the couch, staring at the toes of my shoes and stretching his arm along the back of the cushion. “I’m heading out for a hike, just gotta pick up my date first.”

He reaches over and shoves my arm with his fingertips.

“Nuh uh, no can do.”

“Smokeyyyyy,” he whines.

“I have to study! And, uh, I’m waiting for Alex to get back so we can go for a run?” I wish I could have kept my voice from turning my statement into a question, because there’s a glint of understanding in Chris’s eyes that I don’t particularly like. But his voice is mild enough when he speaks. I like him for that.

“Sure, sure.”

“Okay, fine, I kinda don’t feel like being around people today, are you happy?”

“Hardly ever,” his mouth twists, “but I know the feeling. Kinda why we’re friends in the first place, right?”

The corners of my mouth tug up just as his have as I stare at him and reflect on how much he’s brought into my life since I scolded him on a mountaintop on a day when we both needed to escape into the woods. This friendship that has never demanded much at all, but always been easy to settle into again after a lapse. The reassurance that there’s always someone with whom I have this maladjusted ghosting habit in common. And the Mookie guys. I have him to thank for that too. I swallow the peculiar lump rising in my throat.

“So, what’s new with you?”

“Yeah, I miss you too. Not much. Just working on Temple stuff now that we’re home for the rest of the year.”

“Ah, right. How’s that going?”

“Excellent,” he enthuses. “Shouldn’t even call it working. Never quite done anything like it. Have you heard any of it yet?”

“No, not that I can think of.” I haven’t heard the guys play in a while, but I’m not about to go into that. “You guys have that show coming up?”

He nods. “Couple weeks. You’ll be there, right?”

I let out a sigh that I feel like I’ve been holding in for days and resume torturing my shoe. “Uhm, I don’t know, I’ll have to see, I might be working that night. What day is it?”

“The 13th,” his voice drops about an octave, “and just what the fuck do you mean, you don’t know? Stoney’s gonna shit a brick if you if you miss it.”

“Yeah, maybe.” I glance back up at him and flinch at his menacing expression. “I don’t know. Things are just... weird… there... right now.”

“You and Stone? Seemed pretty okay a few nights ago.”

I cringe in immediate regret of how publicly cozy Stone and I had gotten on Halloween. And if that’s all Chris knows, then he doesn’t know the half of it…

“Yeah, well, I don’t know, it’s weird now.”

“When was the last time you talked to him?” Chris presses, shifting his posture to face me more directly and still glowering at me.

“The other day, before he went home with the flu or whatever, Jesus,” I pat the arm of the couch, “is this a witness stand or something?”

“Okay, okay,” his demeanor relaxes. “Just be there, okay? This whole thing, I mean, the vibe of working on it has been really overwhelmingly positive, but it’s the kind of thing that’s still… I don’t know, it’s just important to me that you’re there, I feel like you’d get something out of it. And whatever’s going on with Stone, I’m pretty sure it’s important to him too.”

“Okay,” I mumble, fighting back the lump again, “I’ll see what I can do.”

Chris bobs his head. “Flu, huh?”

“What? Oh, right. I don’t know, he just looked like death warmed over and I’m pretty sure he went home right after we talked.” Another twinge of regret twists my insides, this time because it hasn’t even occurred to me in all my anger to check in on Stone and see how he’s feeling. He looked really, really terrible. Fight or no fight, he’s still my friend, and if I were the one to contract whatever bubonic plague is going around, I know he would be the first one to make sure I was okay. Especially since I think his parents are still out of town, which leaves him all by himself trying to take care of that dog and house. Shit, I should probably go over there.

Chris doesn’t point any of that out, though, thankfully. Instead, he silently looks around my apartment with interest, seeming very much all of a sudden like a cocker spaniel with a very short attention span. For everything this friendship means, it’s kind of weirdly emblematic that he’s never even seen my place before.

“Chris?”

“Mm?” he responds, not looking away from the bookcase in the opposite direction.

“You didn’t come all the way over here just to see if I wanted to go hiking, did you?”

“Nah, I’m actually here to pick up Eddie, he said he’d go. I think I finally sold him on our mountain.”

“Judas!!”

I aim a kick square at his hip, laughing as he intercepts my foot and disarms it by yanking off my shoe and throwing it across the room where it thuds against the opening door, missing Eddie’s face by inches.

“Whoa-oh,” he calls as he flinches, but his dimples dawn as a smile draws on his mouth, “who the hell throws a fuckin shoe?”

Chris grins back, yanking off my other one to lob it at Ed’s face, but it’s caught easily. Eddie throws them both back to me in a pair of gentle underhand tosses.

“So you coming with us or what, Cora?”

“Nah, leave her for dead, she’s a lost cause,” Chris chuckles as he stands up.

“Gee golly, mister, can’t imagine why I wouldn’t want to go hiking with you,” I drawl. Eddie’s eyes bounce back and forth keenly.

“Well, uh, too bad, maybe another time?” he says softly as plaintive wrinkles appear on his forehead.

“You bet. Just, you know, the boyfriend’s on his way home and we’re gonna go running, so it’s not a great time.”

“Oh, alright,” Eddie nods, but the wrinkles deepen in a way that tells me he’s about as believing of my excuses as Chris.

“No Jeff?” Chris asks as they head for my front door.

“No, he said it sounded cool but he said he’s gonna help Lucy do some stuff around the apartment today.”

“I bet he is.”

“Okay, you pigs, get out,” I shove Chris in the back toward the door, throwing all my weight against him, although he digs in his heels and I have no hope of moving him unless he wants to be moved. “You kill any more fucking time and you’re gonna lose the light, you know.”

“She’s got a very good point,” Eddie agrees, and Chris unlocks his knees, laughing as I stumble to keep my footing.

I’ve just shooed the two of them out the door when Alex comes home, carrying borrowed running shoes and still exuding the same smothering, sycophantic energy as when he left. I’m feeling extraordinarily stupid for not calling Patch to sort this shit out when I had the chance. Maybe after the run. On the bright side, Alex is in terrible shape for such a beanpole, and I’m confident I can outrun him, or at least make him wheeze enough not to have to worry about making conversation.

***

My head swims from the fumes as I take another deep breath and force myself to steady the paint brush, even though my arm is starting to ache from reaching so high, and my knees are getting sore from balancing on the sink basin. Whose bright idea was it to repaint a room with so much trim all by herself with no ladder? Oh right, that would be me. The white noise of the bathroom fan blocks out everything except the exertion of doing the work properly and the joy of seeing a new color stain a primed surface. Even if I’m not sure about the color just yet. I’m not really a blue sort of person. But this feels like a direction I wanted to follow. Any of the weird “improvements” I’ve done to this place, I’ve done by following that urge. I accepted a long time ago that I wasn’t getting my security deposit back. It’s fine. I’m not good at coloring in the lines or making up my mind. Let me make my messes and see what happens. It usually cleans up okay.

I crawl off the sink, hastily wiping the smear of bright teal paint off the porcelain with the damp rag tucked into the waist of my shorts, and look around. It’s… very blue. But the cabinet’s dark stain doesn’t look so dingy next to it, and I’ve got plans for the mirror that should warm the room up a little more. I’m refilling the tray when I hear the apartment door open and close, the sound of hightops being nudged off, and the familiar beat of heavy footprints padding down the hall to find me. Just the sound of him in my apartment has always made the place feel brighter.

“Whoa,” Jeff’s rasp reverberates off the walls, “you weren’t kidding, that’s… that’s fuckin BLUE.”

“Too much?” I spin around to study his face as he studies the walls.

“Nah, it’s cool. Vivid. It’s very you.”

“Ooh, your stock is falling, Jeffrey, I was just thinking to myself that it might have been the wrong color.”

“Why?” he pulls the headband out of my hair and begins to kiss my temple, the outside edge of my ear, and down along my neck to my shoulder. It’s a struggle not to wrap myself up in him, but my hands are still covered in paint. I manage to resist that temptation, but talking remains a challenge.

“Blue’s, uhm, it’s kind of a bummer…”

“No, no way, it’s so… like… sensitive, and strong, and… okay, I’m babbling, but can you blame me…”

“Yeah… but… like… the trim’s kind of glaring now, I don’t know what to do about it…”

Time to abandon any pretense of thinking straight, now that he’s got his nose in my collarbone like this. Maybe he won’t mind a little paint on his jersey...

“So this is you staying close to home, huh?”

“What?”

“Cora, all that shit. You bailed on all my ideas for plans, remember? Wanted to stay close to home?”

I frown at him, wondering where he’s going with this. There’s that neediness again. It’s not like him at all. So far, we’ve always been able to strike the right balance naturally, without putting any thought into it. We’re together when we want to be, we have space when we want it. And lately, Jeff’s been throwing all that out of balance. I wish he’d just tell me what the fuck’s going on… I wish he’d stop kissing my ear like that, or I’d remember to ask him about it…

“I still do… I think that’s for the best. But, uh, there’s a lot we can do at home, though, right?”

“I have some ideas…”

Before I can respond with some cute, pithy bullshit, he’s spun me around like I weigh nothing at all and pinned me against the wall, seemingly oblivious to the fact that it’s still dripping with wet turquoise paint. But I don’t give a shit either. I manage to reach my bare foot out behind him and nudge the paint tray out of our reach, ease him over so we’re both standing on the dropcloth, and give in to the full force of his kiss, trying to plant my feet as much as I can because my back’s slipping sideways in the paint. But my effort is unnecessary, because I’m not going anywhere in his grip. His hand lands flat on the wall next to my head before raking blue paint through my hair and dragging blue fingerprints across my throat, and it’s a race to see who can get undressed enough, fast enough…

*

Winded, and thoroughly slathered in turquoise, we splay out on the soaked dropcloth in a blissful, painted pile.

“Well, at least now I know what to do about the fucking trim color,” I nod at the formerly crisp, white door frame, which is now coated in Smurfy fingerprints from our failed efforts to keep our balance.

“I dunno, it’s a nice artistic statement when paired with your vertebrae sliding down the wall,” his fingers point out the trajectory of my body.

“I think I’ll just do the trim and walls and ceiling all the same color. You know. Very Masque of the Red Death.”

“Gothic, I like it.” He sighs, letting his head fall back and his eyes close. I squelch a little closer, remembering that we still have unfinished business.

“Jeff.”

“Present,” he sighs, not opening his eyes.

“Just checking.” Somehow, I still can’t bring myself to spit it out. “Uhm, you still willing to help me finish painting?”

“What else am I gonna do,” he muses with a contended smile.

After a farcical attempt at cleaning ourselves up, we continue to paint, halfway dressed, until the entire room is saturated in turquoise. My every pore and mucous membrane sympathizes.

“Anyone ever told you you’re a disaster with a paint brush?” he teases, watching me try to wash the paint from deep under my fingernails in the sink.

“Oh, yeah, it’s on my resume, actually.”

“Smartass,” he reaches out with a menacing blue paw, attempting to smear the arm I’ve just washed off, but I manage to dodge him.

“Missed me, missed me, now you gotta kiss me,” I taunt, feinting left and then right.

“Ugh, work work work,” he gives a gravelly laugh and abandons all pretense of not being able to catch me, wrapping me up once again and finding my mouth with his. But that annoying thought that there’s something we’re not saying still won’t leave me alone.

“Hey, hey, Jeff?” I kiss him back lightly but maintain my ground, until he finally quits and looks at me in confusion. “Why… uh, why don’t you just fucking say it?”

His grip on me lightens and his jaw falls slack, confirming that I was right to press the issue, that it wasn’t just my issue. I persist, “I know you’re all pissed about not making plans this weekend, I know you’ve got something you want to say to me, there’s some occasion you’re trying to manufacture, and either you’re really terrible at breaking up with me or it’s something I really want to hear, so either way, can you just spit it out already?”

Jeff’s shocked stare makes me wish immediately that I hadn’t said anything, damn it Lucy, things were fine, why did you have to put him on edge, here we go, the other shoe’s bound to drop, he’s gonna break up with me, come on, let’s just get it over with…

“Yeah, yeah, okay,” he starts to pull himself together, making my stomach lurch and my shoulders tighten as I brace for the bad news. “Uh, I just… I really fucking love you. A lot.”

Now it’s my turn to gape like a fucking idiot.

“You what?”

“Yeah, Luce, I love you, and I’ve been thinking it, like, forever, and I just… I don’t know why I didn’t say it already, maybe I just assumed you already knew or something, because we’ve been so good at like, not needing to say the obvious thing… but I’m kinda tired of not saying the obvious thing, because we’re not promised anything, and I’m tired of taking it for granted, so... I love you, and I don’t want to spend my time with anyone else, and I don’t want to have to walk downstairs to see you in the morning, it’s just too fucking far, okay?”

My mind is full of stammering thoughts as I turn over the logistics of what he’s just said, but all that I can manage to say out loud through the grin splitting my face is, “I love you too,” as I pull him into a still-not-quite pigment-free kiss.

***

This. This is what dying feels like. I’m sure of it. Oh, yuck, I’m pretty certain the color coming out of my lungs does not occur in nature. Dark. Why is it so dark in here? What the hell time is it? Jesus, I slept the entire fucking day, that's just grand...

At least there's no one around to witness how pathetic I probably look right now. This whole flu thing's not very big on dignity. Although, who am I kidding, I'd wear a robe and slippers everywhere if it was socially acceptable, and I’d kill for someone to bring me a cup of tea so I don’t have to slither out of this bed and get it myself. My fever finally broke this morning, in a disgusting, sweaty miracle, which is a mixed blessing because it's nice not to feel like a shivery rag doll anymore, but now my sheets smell like gross fever sweat and not the much more pleasant smell left behind on my pillow by Cora the other night. I wish her hair didn't smell so damn good all the time. It's really fucking inconvenient.

Ow. Crap. Dehydration headache. One of the downfalls of attempted hibernation. With a chorus of my most pathetic whines, I manage to get myself out of bed and over to the kitchen to nuke a cup of water for some tea. Just as I’m steeping the bag, though, there’s a knock on my door. Fucking great. I wasn’t serious about actually wanting someone around… unless it’s…

“Hello?” I croak, wincing at my sore throat.

“Stoney! You live!”

“Cornell?”

“You gonna let me in or what?”

“I don’t know, how’s your immune system?”

“Strong, like ox.”

Laughing and coughing, I open the door to let Chris in. He shoves a box of tissues into my chest and blows past me to set a quart container of some kind of murky liquid, which I eye suspiciously.

“Hot and sour soup, from Grand Palace. Foolproof cold remedy, I’m pretty convinced this shit cures cancer, or at least ebola or something. Cora told me you looked like death warmed over. Girl doesn’t lie.”

“Oh, uh, you… you talked to Cora?” I pick up the soup and inspect it more closely.

“Yeah, I, uh, talked to Cora.”

“Hmm.”

“Dude, eat something, it’s not gonna kill you.”

“Doubtful.”

“Pansy.”

“Pusher.”

My laughter dissolves into a choked cough again as Chris saunters over to the cabinet like he owns the place and grabs a couple of bowls.

“Hey, let’s sit out on the steps, it’ll help the black lung.” He hands me a bowl of soup and, in no position to argue, I snag the blanket from the back of my couch to wrap around my shoulders as I follow him onto the landing outside my front door where we sit and dangle our feet over the edge, like little kids. I’m feeling too rundown to admit it, but he’s right -- my chest feels better within seconds.

“Eat, man, eat, you’re looking so thin you’re gonna blow away out here.”

“Who died and made you my grandma?”

“I prefer the philanthropic, mysterious stranger vibe, but have it your way.”

I try a bit of the soup, which sticks in my gullet after a day of not eating or drinking, and I sputter into another full-body coughing fit.

“Gahh, why’s it so… viscous??”

“It’s the viscosity,” Chris beams, slurping up another spoonful. “Coats the throat, or something.”

“Yeah, I bet you say that to all the girls,” I choke, but the soup’s actually pretty good and not too heavy, so I have some more. We sit in silence for a while, which is one of the things I’ve always appreciated about Chris, before I pipe up against my better judgement.

“So,” I have to clear my throat again, “uh, how’s, how’s Cora?”

“She’ll be alright, I think. Seems pretty unhappy with you.”

“That makes it a day that ends in -y.”

“But she’s fine. Tried to get her to go hiking today, but she was going running with that Alex guy.”

“You don’t say.” Alex and physical exertion? What the fuck? Is this a fever dream, still?  

“Seemed weird, I mean, he doesn’t really come along for a lot, she does a lot on her own. And she didn’t seem too excited about the idea of him tagging along, I dunno.”

“Would you be excited about trying to outrun a wart on your ass?”

“Ouch. So, you hate him, yeah?”

“It’s not that I hate the guy, necessarily…” Chris’s eyebrows shoot up as I continue, “...just… you know… kinda always wanted to buy him a toaster for his bathtub.”

He tosses me a pity laugh. “Yeah, well, she’s not an idiot, don’t think she hasn’t picked up on that. Whatever the hell’s going on with you two, you can’t ignore him.”

“You’re telling me.” I hold up my hand to shush him when I hear the phone ring, and we both listen as the garbled sound of my answering machine comes through the door, but there’s no message.

“Stoney, what the hell happened, anyway?”

I squint at his face for a moment, torn between not wanting to drag everyone into this little drama that’s been playing out with Cora and actually wanting to talk to a friend about it. Jeff and Cready were zero help, but Chris has always been a better listener for the heavy stuff.

“We… kinda… I mean, she stayed over the other night, and…”

Chris’s eyes widen and his jaw drops, although he can barely contain the laughter that accompanies his surprise. “Oh!” he exclaims with glee. “You’re idiots!”

“Okay, (a), thanks man, good talk, real supportive. And (b), why are we idiots, exactly?”

“You slept with her even though you knew it was a bad idea! That's not like you. That's like something Mike would do. Or me. You’ve always got all the angles figured out. And Cora, she's like, got her shit together more than any of the rest of us. She should have known better.” He frowns, drumming his empty spoon on his kneecap.

“Yeah, well, she's sorta… new at this. And anyway we didn’t actually sleep together, alright, I mean, we slept together but not like you’re thinking.”

“Reeeeal convincing, Stone,” he teases. “Whaddya mean she’s new at this? Haven’t she and that guy been together since, like the dawn of time?”

“Yeah, but like, that’s it, that’s her whole story, and I think… I think she and I have something really good, and I think she knows that, but it probably really freaks her out to think about ending anything that’s been, you know, such a fixture for so long. I don’t know, I’m probably not making any sense.”

“More than you know. Just give her time, man. She thinks the world of you, and it really pisses her off to admit it. That’s a good thing, it’ll still be there after she figures out the whole ‘first love’ thing.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I whine, which devolves into more coughing, which cycles back into even more whining.

“On the bright side, you’ve really perfected that Tibetan throat-singing technique,” Chris cracks as he stands up. “You’d better get back inside. Anything I can do to help while I’m here?”

“Nah, thanks, the toxic sludge seems to be working, I’m feeling a little better already.”

Chris claps me on the back, betrays the slightest slip of a smile, and starts down the staircase without another word. I let myself back inside, free to moan and groan as much as I like in the absence of anyone to make fun of me for it, and shuffle my way over to the answering machine. The first message is pure auditory chaos, but through the cacophony, I gather that Mudhoney’s on a tour stop in Tijuana and that my answering machine tape should probably be burned after I listen to the message so as not to implicate anyone in a felony. The usual. That’s got to have been from earlier today and not just now -- Chris and I would have heard that excitement through the door for sure, but I wouldn’t put it past myself to have slept through it this afternoon. Whatever. I delete their message and listen to the second, much quieter one.

“Hey, Stone? uh…”  Cora’s hushed voice is interrupted by Alex calling her name in the background. I hear her give a sharp inhale, followed by a click, and that’s all.

[todisturbtheuniverse]

Hi. I noticed you sometimes post about Red Dead 2 and was wondering how you feel about Sadie Adler. I like how your brain works so I was hoping you had some thoughts about her.

Thank you, anon! That’s very kind. 

I have…lots of thoughts about Sadie, all pretty complicated, starting with: I both hate and love how she enters the story.

This got so excruciatingly long, and contains spoilers for the entire game, so please find my rambling below the cut:

So, Sadie enters: screaming in rage, in pain, in fear; throwing whatever she can get her hands on at Micah (thank you, I wish you’d murdered him during this throwing spree, you had the right idea from the start); rising from the ashes of a really sickening, awful event, that robbed her of her partner, her home, her life. There is something that always, always endears me to characters like her–characters who take the punch and spit out blood and teeth and still get up and keep fighting.

But there’s the other thing, which is–it seemed to me like it was heavily implied that she was raped, even though the Wiki is now trying to make me feel like I’ve gone crazy and says that she hid in the cellar to avoid her husband’s fate, making it sound like the O’Driscolls never knew she was in the house at all. No, Wiki, I played the game, and I heard the things, I saw the things. (”I was a married woman. You know what they did to me!” She targets one O’Driscoll specifically during the last mission to finish them off for good, too, and in a pretty brutal way; this seems like the clear assailant. He could have also been the one who tortured/killed her husband, I suppose.)

To be clear, I guess, it can be uplifting to see a survivor portrayed like Sadie: she survives. Not only that, but eventually, she goes after her revenge. There can be something really powerful about that, and it speaks to me, definitely, because of my personal history. 

But I also know that this narrative, that women only become powerful after great trauma–usually sexual trauma–is overdone. In fiction we often only get “strong women” after they’ve been violated somehow and are recovering from it. Even if it’s not explicit rape, it’s metaphorical rape (the origins of the slayer in Buffy, for example). I feel like this is especially egregious in Sadie’s case because so often, our POV character rides solely with the men on missions; there are a few other times that the women participate, but rarely in a combat role. So Sadie is our primary point of reference for what a woman who “breaks the mold” in this story looks like–and she has this backstory.

Like I said. There are aspects of this narrative that work for me, personally. But it is not for everyone, and the general narrative has been overused.

Anyway. Setting all that mess aside.

Sadie is angry, even during Chapter 1 and 2, when she’s still just confined to camp. She’s also grieving in a painful, raw, genuine way. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. She describes her new normal as “a nightmare I can’t wake up from” and doesn’t sugarcoat it when Arthur asks how she’s doing. I fucking love that about her. She lives loud; she’s not ashamed. I also love that, as far as I’ve seen, the rest of the gang doesn’t trivialize her pain; Abigail in particular goes out of her way to give Sadie a lot of comfort and understanding.

And she’s lethal, absolutely lethal, when she gets back out there. Ultimately this is a game about a group of people who do some really troubling things in the name of freedom, right? I’m glad she’s not excluded from that. I’m glad that when she chooses to be, she is one of them, full stop. Arthur and Pearson give her some shit before Arthur takes her out to Rhodes, but this is the only real hiccup in that transition that I remember. And this change makes sense for her; she talks about how she and her husband shared all the work, that she wasn’t relegated to women’s work and he wasn’t relegated to men’s work, so she’s not going to chop all these damn vegetables just because. She knows where her talents are, and she’s ready to use them.

But she isn’t just that. 

We so often see her losing her head–usually as it relates to the O’Driscolls–but after the robbery in Saint-Denis and all the big guys either dying or vanishing, she keeps the rest of the gang together. She leads. She helps these people get to safety, away from the Pinkertons, in the wake of Dutch’s incredible fuck-up. (I don’t want to overlook Charles here; the way it’s told, the two of them together keep the gang together, but I think it’s really interesting that these two relative newcomers are the ones who do that. Not any of the people left who have been with Dutch for longer, but Sadie and Charles, individuals who have each lost an awful lot before coming to the gang and clearly don’t want to lose more.)

She still forms these meaningful connections–with Abigail and Arthur, in particular, I think. I get the feeling that she’s only so eager to get John out of Jail because Abigail’s so broken up about it, because she doesn’t want Abigail to lose what she’s already lost; when Abigail approaches her and Arthur she doesn’t even hesitate. And she speaks for Arthur too, haha; “We will,” said immediately, behind Dutch’s back, no question, they’re going to get John whether Dutch thinks it’s the right time or not. She has this serious, fierce compassion for Abigail and Arthur. In Chapter 3 she tells Arthur that she’s not afraid to die, and I think she probably wants to go out fighting for a long while, but I also think these connections are the beginning of her thinking, hey, maybe I want to stick around. 

And that’s the greatest part, because we see that. We see that she mellows a bit by the epilogue–she is just as fierce as ever, but there are no more sudden shooting sprees when the plan didn’t call for one. She works hard. When revenge presents itself, when she can go after Micah in Arthur’s name, she does it. And she rides alone for a long time; just as I find her ability to still form connections after what happened to her really wonderful, I also find this, the fact that she’s now comfortable with being alone, really terrific. It’s not the life she planned and certainly not the one she wanted, but she finds an adventure in it, talks about going to South America and doing more incredible, interesting things. 

I don’t think she forgets those terrible months with Dutch’s gang, though. I mean, she’s someone who thrives on a grudge, on a vendetta. She never forgets what happened to Arthur. She bides her time. She waits for the moment she can have her revenge. She keeps her ear to the ground. And when she almost dies trying to accomplish it, she still won’t give up. She drags herself that last long way up the mountain to get to Micah, even while bleeding out, even when she could hardly stand. I could just bask in the glow of her fury, tbh.

And her love, too. She thrives with the gang, no question, but she shines brightest when she’s acting from that place of love, whichever kind of love it is: be it for her husband, or for Abigail, or for Arthur.

In short: I love Sadie, would die for her, please make a game where I can have her as the POV character and do all her amazing adventures in South America, thank you, Rockstar.