#actually the tangible reasoning for this is that i’m walking six miles every day and i can’t do that so i’m sleeping as compensation

[arthur-r]

hopefully i finally have fixed the past several weeks of getting 6 hours (as a person who needs 9-10 hours to function) but this is wild

[onechicago-upsteadrhekker]

the trouble with wanting (is i want you) - part two

Friends!!!!! I’m here! I’m back! 

I can’t apologize enough for the long wait! It certainly wasn’t intentional, but alas that is the life of a college student and unfortunately school comes before upstead as much as I wish it didn’t!

I hope part two gives you all the feels and makes up for the long absence, however, I do have something to share with you that may make you want to kill.

Part two turned into part three...

So, SURPRISE! This isn’t a two-shot; it will definitely be a three part story and I am happy to say that part three is written (mostly, I have to tweak a few things) so that will be up sometime next week depending on my school schedule.

Thank you again for your patience and I sincerely hope that you enjoy this chapter that contains no real plot, a lot of fluff and mutual pining!

As always, let me know what you think in the comments!

Tagging: @imjustwritingg, @anniesardors, @thetwit, @angelsjedi, @chichichicken, @carissalizz, @maya-asturias

Let me know if you want to be added to this list for part three!

Read on AO3

The next few days are filled with mandatory walking sessions, pain meds every four to six hours and Jay’s smiling face. He was the only reason why she wasn’t absolutely losing it because while she despised hospital stays in general, hospital stays in another city filled with people she didn’t know were downright insufferable.

But he’d made it go from something akin to glorified torture to slightly tolerable.

The bullet wound was starting to heal and the incision from where they’d had to remove her spleen was looking great according to the nurses and everything seemed to be on the right track healing wise, but anything regarding this thing that she and Jay had going on? She had no idea.

One would think getting shot in a different city, causing one partner to literally drop everything and come rushing to the other partner’s side would end in heartfelt confessions and relationships born at hospital bedsides.

But that’s not what happened, and Hailey was seriously starting to wonder if she and Jay were ever going to be on the same page. Or at least read the page aloud because she was fairly certain he felt the same way about her that she felt about him.

Because just partners don’t fly eight-hundred miles to be by your side even if you are hurt.

Right?

And it didn’t help that he was there with her almost twenty-four seven, giving her no time alone to process what he was telling her without words because before this, it had just been subtle glances and warm smiles, teasing words and affectionate eyes.

But this. Flying eight-hundred miles. It was tangible and real, and she couldn’t quite believe it was really actually happening, but then he was there, bringing her her favorite foods from restaurants she’d found during her time in New York and barely going back to her hotel room for sleep, staying by her side to keep her company and catch her up on five weeks’ worth of Intelligence news.

He was there for every lap around the hospital floor and every dressing change. He was there to shoo out the nurses when they were starting to get on her nerves and he was there, rubbing her hand softly when the pain of her bruised ribs made it hard to breathe.

And then there was the way she was constantly being referred to as ‘Jay’s wife’ instead of her own name much like when she was back in grade school and her teachers would call her ‘Sam’s little sister’.

He’d made quite the impression on the nurses and for some reason neither she nor Jay had set the record straight on the actual status of their relationship since that first day when he was mistaken as her husband.

(It was probably the same reason that they hadn’t talked about what Jay flying to New York meant. And to be honest, Hailey was sort of hoping that Jay would set the record straight on their relationship, if only to let her know where they stood.)

And she definitely wasn’t going to acknowledge the dangerous little thrill she got from hearing herself referenced that way or think about what it would be like for real. Nope, not a chance or she might never come back down to reality after having narcotic-induced dreams of three little words, ‘I do’s’, freckled little faces and laughing green eyes.

But then it’s so close, she can almost taste it and it should scare her, but it doesn’t.

Because she can feel it in the way he grins at her and in the way he tells her goodnight at the end of a long day of keeping her company. It’s in the way his arm brushes hers when he’s helping her sit or stand and it’s in the way his eyes hold hers for far longer than he should; his green eyes swimming with hints of the things she dreams.

But until she hears it. Until one of them gathers the courage to actually say the words and put a name to what they already know and feel, then she’s going to wait and guard those dreams carefully because she knows deep in her heart that when they return to Chicago, it will have either worked out or it won’t at all.

She’s not sure exactly when the pieces will fall into place or if they’ll even fit together but she knows they are at the point of no return. And honestly, that scares her the most because no matter what happens, it will always be Jay for her.

Because he was her home, and he had a place in her heart no one else could ever have and that terrified her because she knows that she’ll never get over him if for some reason it doesn’t work out between them.

She tries not to think like that because she’s pretty sure what she’s seen in his eyes is something that looks a lot like love, but it’s hard to be totally optimistic when it seems like the universe is always keeping them not necessarily apart, but not really together. At least not in the way she’s pretty sure both of them want.

So, she sits in her hospital bed, watching him laugh at her attempts to renegotiate her discharge date with the nurses and listens to him chatter about what Will’s been up to and how much he hated being tossed between Kevin, Kim, Adam and Vanessa while she’d been gone even if he liked working with each of them.

They’d been flying crooked he told her and that her not being there threw them all off so he’d be happy when he could take her back home and so would everyone else. In fact, they’d told her as much when Kim had facetimed Jay the day after he’d arrived in New York to get proof of life and see for themselves that she was truly going to be okay.

It was sweet and nice, and it made her realize how much she really did miss her team turned family even if she already felt like she was home just because Jay was beside her.

He was beside her and he was there with her and every time he looked at her over the beeping of the heart monitor she was hooked up to, everything else faded from view. The facetime calls with their friends, the friendly nurses checking up on her every few hours, the general hustle and bustle of hospital life happening outside her room.

It was just them and she’d be lying if she wasn’t looking forward to her discharge date for reasons other than just being out of the hospital because she knew then, she and Jay would truly be alone stuck in a hotel room in a city that neither one of them knew.

And that, she knew, would be the true test.

*

On the morning of the third day she’d been in the hospital, Hailey was given the news that she’d be released by that afternoon. If she was physically capable, she’d be jumping for joy but because of the dozen stitches in her side, she’d had to settle for celebrating internally.

Moving was still slow-going and she still felt overly tired far too early in the day, but she was confident that a night in her own bed (or at least the bed she’d been sleeping in for the past several weeks) would do her a world of good.

And she wasn’t going to think about how Jay being potentially next to her would probably make her sleep better than she’d ever had.

She didn’t know exactly where Jay had been disappearing to when he’d left the hospital at night, but she’d given him the key to her hotel room and he always came back looking well-rested so she felt safe assuming he was sleeping in the same queen bed she’d been occupying for the past five weeks.

Hailey wasn’t quite sure what would happen tonight when it was time for him to go to bed, but she wondered if this was the day they were going to finally get it right, nestled under the bed covers, whispering dreams and promises, her side aching but her heart so full.

“Here, let me help you with that,” Her gaze flicked up to Jay who had entered the room and was walking towards her, his hands already reaching out to help her pull on her coat. Hailey looked up at him as he focused his gaze on putting her left arm carefully through the sleeve of her jacket.

She wasn’t sure if a person could have reversed déjà vu, but the action brought her right back to another hospital room in a different city when she was still reeling from the panic she’d felt surrounding Jay’s terrifying brush with death.

When she’d helped him pull his familiar, worn black jacket over his sling right before she almost told him she loved him.

And now here they were again, except this time it was him helping her and this time she knew they weren’t going home without having the conversation they should have had then.

“Thanks,” She murmured softly, trying to ignore the way her heart raced when he briefly squeezed her hand.

Hailey gingerly sat down on the side of the bed, already worn out and sore from the morning’s activities of getting ready to leave.

“I called a taxi. It should be here any minute,” He grabbed her duffle and sat it beside her, “You sign the discharge papers?”

“Yes, thank God,” She muttered accepting the pair of Sperry’s Jay was handing her.

He chuckled softly, “You are so impatient.”

She shot him a look, “I’m sorry. And who was the one practically begging me to spring him from the hospital the minute he was awake and talking?”

He had the wisdom to look sheepish, but he couldn’t hide the wide smile threatening to take over. Clearly, they were both happy to be leaving the hospital room behind.

As Jay busied himself with packing the last few items into the duffle he’d brought Hailey the day he’d arrived in New York, he can’t help but watch her. She’s moving slowly, but she seems pretty alert for someone who got shot and had relatively serious surgery only four days ago.

Her eyes are bright if not tired and her hair is haphazardly thrown up in her signature high pony, but Jay still thinks she’s the most beautiful girl in the world and he almost tells her just that.

His mouth is open, forming the words when she turns to him after sliding on her shoes, catching his gaze with eyes narrowed in suspicion, “What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

And he thinks this is why he can never tell her how he feels. She’s always taking the words away with a flash of blue and a dash of blonde because he wants his future to look like her so badly, it terrifies him. And even when he does finally find the words, he knows he will never be able to tell her with words just how much she means to him.

His lips quirk and he shakes his head, turning his attention back to the duffle to zip it up before nodding towards the open door of her hospital room, “No reason. You ready to go?”

For a second, he thinks she’s going to push, and they are going to have the conversation they need to have right here and now, but then she doesn’t and some part of him feels disappointed that they are making themselves wait once again.

He’s not even entirely sure why because nothing is holding them back now. Not really. They are finally both in the same city with no kidnappings, rigged elections or anything else threatening to tear them apart and yet, they are still walking that very fine line of partners and best friends to something openly affectionate and loving and real.

It’s almost too perfect because while he rushed here in a state of panic, not knowing what he would find, Hailey, for the most part was okay and now they were stuck here with basically nothing to do but wait till she could fly without risk of infection or complications from surgery.

He’s not sure if he should be worried, waiting for the other shoe to drop or thrilled that the universe seems to be giving them a hint that it was finally time to take that leap of faith from partners and best friends to something more.

*

“Hailey, you are clearly in pain.”

After the short taxi ride from the hospital, they were finally in the hotel room and now firmly engaged in a battle of wills.

Hailey was currently giving him a glare that reminded him of the way she would silently warn him from across the bullpen to not do something he might regret or when they were down to the last couple of fries during a long stakeout and he was reaching for them.

Generally, he didn’t win the fights when she wore that look but today, he was determined to stand his ground.

“Jay,” It was practically whined and while he understood her reluctance to take the pain meds she’d been prescribed, he couldn’t stand watching her in pain.

In the few times that Hailey’s been injured during their partnership, it hadn’t been too serious, and she usually had a good attitude about doing what she needed to do to recover. So, seeing her like this, pale and tired and just not her normal, spunky self, broke his heart and he wanted to do everything in his power to fix it.

Starting with the meds she’s determined not to take.

He was happy to at least see the trait that was so undeniably Hailey in her eyes because otherwise, she looked like a lifeless shell of the badass detective he knows she is. The oversized pillows she was propped against makes her seem so tiny and she almost blended in with the sheets she was so white.

If he was being honest, she was starting to look worse than she did when she was in the hospital and that definitely concerned him enough to possibly make him take her right back there or at least call Will for his opinion.

Sighing, he uncrosses his arms to move from where he’s been standing a few feet away from the end of the bed holding the prescription bag in a clenched fist.

Her eyes track his movements as he comes to gingerly sit down at the edge of the bed, leaning over on his forearm to look at her closely, “Hailey,” He shakes his head, “Please just take them. At least so you can get some sleep. You look exhausted.”

For a second, he thinks that she’s going to keep fighting him, but then he sees the weak mask she’d had in place slip, the dull look of pain and exhaustion becoming clearly present in her eyes.

“Okay, fine,” She sighs out wearily, and he’s a little surprised that she conceded that quickly even if he knew he’d already won, but then she cocks her head slightly, “What do I get in return?”

Yeah, he didn’t think he’d won that easily.

Jay pushes the flirty and slightly suggestive response that instantly pops into his head to the back of his mind. There would be plenty of time for that later, or at least he desperately hopes so because he knows that now is not the time to start anything of that nature.

When he tells Hailey what she deserves to hear, he wants her feeling halfway decent and looking healthier than she does right now.

If they were in Chicago, he would bribe her with Bartoli’s, but they weren’t. They are in New York and she’s already made it quite clear that the pizza here is a tragedy, so he doesn’t think she’d want that particular food even if he could find a copy-cat deep-dish place.

So, he goes for the next best thing, “What about some Greek? It probably won’t be anything like Greek Islands, but I’m sure I can find a decent place. I could grab you some Pastichio. What do you say?”

The way her eyebrows furrow and her bottom lip sticks out adorably makes him want to kiss the pout away, but he doesn’t.

She shakes her head, “I don’t want Greek.”

Jay bites his lip briefly and refrains from making a comment on the childish tone of her voice as he regards her carefully for a quiet second.

He would never admit it, but he knows he’s a much worse patient when their positions are reversed so he’s more than willing to put up with her stubbornness because he knows it’s just a way to cope with the pain.

And besides, he loves her. He would do whatever he could to make her feel better.

“I’ll get you whatever you want as long as you take your medicine, so why don’t you tell me what it is you’d like to have,” He pushes himself up off his forearm to sit upright, but he still holds her gaze.

She sighs carefully, picking at the covers before answering him, “A Snickers bar.”

Jay raises his brows.

In the years he has known her, he doesn’t think he’s ever seen her eat a candy bar. She could down a piece of chocolate cake at an event, or the random chip bag she’d found during a stakeout, but he doesn’t think he’s ever seen her eat the overly processed candy bar before.

“You like Snickers bars?” He can’t help the slightly disgusted tone of his words.

Hailey’s expression instantly morphs into a defensive one, “A girl can have guilty pleasures, and this just so happens to be mine. Now, you said you’ll get me anything if I take my medicine, so you’re lucky it’s not something like a new gun. Or a car.”

Jay rolls his eyes and Hailey desperately wants to swat him but she’s already in a significant amount of pain so she doesn’t think that would be the wisest decision.

“Relax, I will get you your Snickers bar. I promised, didn’t I?” He smirks a little as he moves off the bed to grab his coat that’s thrown over the back of the desk chair, “I just can’t believe I didn’t know you liked candy bars.”

Shrugging a little, she tries not to wince at the pain that small movement caused her, “I don’t indulge in them much; only when I’m not feeling good or if there’s literally nothing else to eat.”

After gathering up his wallet and phone, Jay stops in the middle of the room to regard her for another moment. He shakes his head, “What else don’t I know about you, Hailey Upton?”

She gives him a little smirk of her own, “Lots of things, I’m sure. I was once told I was aloof about my personal life.”

“And just when I thought I was getting to know the person under that tough exterior,” He feels the smile creep over his face, and he doesn’t care that he probably looks like a man hopelessly in love because he is.

He watches as her own expression softens and for just a moment, their eyes meet. A thousand words of unspoken love pass between them and he can see his entire universe in those captivating, blue orbs just as she can see a million promises in his.

Hailey shifts and winces at the sharp pain it causes her, cursing herself for ruining the moment. Those pain pills she’d tried refusing were looking pretty good right about now as the throbbing intensified around her still tender ribs.

Jay noticed her discomfort. He always does, and she could see the concern so clearly on his face it made her heart swell in love. He’s the most caring man she’s ever met, and it’s one of the things she loves most about him.

“As soon as I get back, you’re taking your meds,” Jay frowns, rubbing his thumb briefly along his hairline before dropping his arm, “I’d give them to you now, but I’m not sure I should leave you alone with narcotics in your system just in case. And besides, you need to take the antibiotics with food, so I’ll pick up something while I’m out.”

She just nods, picking up the remote for the television, “Sounds good. I’ll be here watching whatever trash I can find on TV, so hurry back.”

Jay gives her one last smile that warms her from head to toe before he opens the door and walks out.

*

When Jay walks through the hotel door about an hour later, he has the overwhelming urge to call out a ‘Honey, I’m home’, but he doesn’t want to wake Hailey if she’s sleeping and he’s not sure how she would respond to the term of endearment even if it is said teasingly.

It’s funny how that is the thing he feels would be crossing the practically non-existent line they have towing for the past several days. Or weeks really if he’s honest with himself.

As it turns out, she’s not sleeping but still in very much the same position he’d left her in. The TV was on, a rerun of ‘Happy Days’ playing quietly but she doesn’t seem to be paying much attention. Instead, she’s looking down at the phone in her hand, clearly scrolling through something before glancing up at him.

Her eyebrows rise as she takes in the various Target bags he’s carrying in both hands. Hailey let her phone drop in her lap, more interested in what Jay had bought because all she’d sent him out for were Snickers Bars, “Did you buy the whole store?”

He frowns at her as he finds the bag of take-out Chinese he’d ended up getting for their late lunch-early supper to set on the nightstand, “No, I did not, but I did get real food and,” He holds up the other bags he was carrying, “I got you your Snickers.”

Whatever else he’d bought was forgotten as she beamed up at him, already reaching for the candy bar he was digging for throughout his purchases. When he finally found what he was looking for, he tossed it to her, and she immediately ripped open the wrapper.

He makes a face as she bites into the sugary chocolate, “I still don’t know how you eat that crap.”

She responds with an eyeroll because her mouth was too full to make a witty comeback.

“You could at least wait till you ate actual food first,” Jay arched a disapproving eyebrow, his nose wrinkling as he watched her make an obvious display of enjoying her treat. He shakes his head and deposits the Target bags on the lower end of the bed to pull out the bottles of vitamin water he’d bought for her.

“Here, I got your favorite and a couple of new ones for you to try,” He handed her the blackberry flavored one before retrieving the pill bottles that were sitting on the nightstand beside their bag of food.

He read the instructions on each bottle then opened the oxycodone to dump one out, “Okay, you can have one right now and,” He checked his watch, “One at around seven then another at eleven.”

Hailey frowns, but takes the pill out of his outstretched palm anyway, “I hate the way these make me feel. My head feels fuzzy, and I can’t think clearly.”

Jay gives her a sympathetic smile and offers a simple, “I know” because he does know, but he also knows that if she has any hope of getting rest tonight, she needed to be well medicated.

“Maybe tomorrow we’ll try going all day without pain meds, okay? I just want to make sure you have a good night’s rest tonight since it’s your first night out of the hospital,” He tells her as he shakes out an antibiotic pill and then the iron supplement the doctor had prescribed her with for the next few days to hand to her.

Nodding, she knocks the three pills back and takes a swig of her vitamin water. Meeting his gaze, she reaches out to grab his hand and gives it a tight squeeze, “Thank you, Jay.”

The heavy tension that settles over them is now a familiar one and it’s almost comforting in a way as she tells him with her eyes how grateful she is for him.

After a few moments of silence, she clears her throat and withdraws her hand, turning her attention to the bags of stuff piled on the bed, “So, what’d you get?”

Jay blinks, shaking himself out of the trance they’d just been in as he rifled through the things he’d bought, pulling them out to show Hailey, “Well, I did some research and according to WebMD which was confirmed by my brother, weighted blankets can help with muscle soreness and speed up the recovery process.”

“I also got some ice packs,” He dumps out about a dozen before reaching in yet another bag, “And I picked up some of your favorite movies as well as a couple of pairs of fuzzy socks because I know you didn’t pack any and the hospital socks are terrible.”

The tears that spring to her eyes aren’t unexpected because the fact that he knows and remembers how much she loves wearing fuzzy socks when she’s at home decompressing tells her how much he cares even if he hasn’t really said it out loud yet.

The research, the weighted blanket, the movies, the treats, the socks; it’s slightly overbearing, but it’s sweet and it’s so undeniably him that it makes her heart hurt with the love she has for him.

She gives him a soft smile, “For someone who claims to not know me, he sure does take care of me and brings me all of my favorite things.”

“Well, after four years I would hope to know some things,” Jay smirks at her before moving to put the ice packs in the small fridge/freezer combo they had in the room.

He looks back at her over his shoulder, “But, I somehow missed your Snickers habit and it makes me wonder what else I should probably know, but don’t.”

Rolling her eyes, she watches as Jay moves back over to the bed, going for the food he’d sat on the nightstand.

“You know you’re not exactly an open book,” She points out with a wry smile.

He’s not an open book, it’s true, and even though she’s teasing him about it, she knows him better than anyone. Maybe better than even Will knows him. Maybe better than he even knows himself, and it’s ironic because the way she knows him better than anyone is more so through his actions and not his words.

She knows his heart through his acts of compassion. She knows his mind through his steady emotions. And she knows him because he lets her see the deepest parts of himself, unspoken secrets swimming in his eyes and dark memories whispered over drinks.

She knows the things that matter and the same could be said about the things he knows about her, but now that it’s being brought up, she does wonder if there are any meaningless habits she hasn’t bared witness to.

If her mind goes straight to those of a personal nature such as nighttime routines and shower preferences, then she’d never admit it.

“Well,” He handed her a container of Shrimp Lo Mein, “We’re stuck in this hotel room with basically nothing to do so,” Jay sat down on the bed, facing her with his own container of Chinese, “Let’s play a game.”

Hailey arches a skeptical eyebrow, “A game?”

“Yeah,” Jay nods as he takes a bite of his own Lo Mein, “Like one of those ‘get to know you’ games since we apparently don’t know much about each other.”

She frowns, a little unconvinced at this plan and what it could entail, but she’s curious and the slight woozy feeling she feels from the pain meds makes her ask, “What kind of ‘get to know you’ game? Like truth or dare?”

Smirking, he shakes his head, “No. Although, that could be extremely entertaining.”

“Uh-uh. No way am I drinking a bottle of hot sauce or jumping off the balcony or some other insanely difficult thing that you would think was easy,” She takes a bite of her food, trying to shake back the loose hair that keeps falling into her face, “I just had surgery.”

He’s full-on grinning now, chuckling at her impassioned response, “Nothing like that. I was thinking more along the lines of 21 Questions.”

Hailey tries to take another bite of her food, but her hair gets in the way again. She’s starting to get frustrated at the locks that keep falling into her eyes and mouth, making it hard to eat.

Sticking her chopsticks into the take-out container, she uses the now free hand to push her hair behind her ears as she shrugs, “Alright then. We don’t really have anything better to do other than watch movies and eat takeout anyways.”

The way his eyes sparkle at her answer is worth all the cheesy questions she’s sure he’s going to ask.

He stands up, shoving a used napkin into his now empty takeout container and she’s always amazed at how quickly he can down food when he wants to, “We can alternate asking questions and we don’t have to ask exactly 21 questions. It can be more, or it can be less.”

He throws his trash away and starts cleaning up the bed, moving all of the empty Target bags and the stuff he bought off to one side, “Is there anything off limits?”

She hesitates before saying no, shaking her head because while her natural inclination is to keep everything close to the vest, she knows there is nothing that she wouldn’t share with Jay if he asked her.

He makes her feel safe, and she’s constantly finding herself telling him things that she’d never said out loud before anyway, so she already knows that he will guard her secrets and feelings and thoughts deep in his own heart as if they were his own.

It’s like he knows what she’s thinking because the way he smiles at her is so gentle and the secretive sparkle in his eyes is what tells her that the same goes for him.

“You wanna go first or do you want me to?” Jay cocks his head, looking at her as he tears into the weighted blanket.

“You can go first,” She goes to take another bite of food when her hair falls into her face for what feels like the hundredth time.

She sighs internally, her frustration going unnoticed by Jay who had turned back towards the movies he’d bought, opening each of them as he tells her he has to make this first question a good one.

Pretty quickly after waking up from surgery, Hailey had found putting her hair up in its typical ponytail an almost impossible task because every time she raised her arms to gather her hair up, her stitches would pull, and her ribs protested loudly.

After several failed attempts that left her eyes watering, she ended up having a nurse put it up for her and she continued to ask for it done in the mornings before Jay arrived at the hospital to keep her company.

But now, there was no nurse to gather up her long, annoying hair when it keeps falling in her face and even though she’s stubborn enough to try it, Hailey knows if she pulls on her stitches or possibly breaks one, then she’s going to be paying for it tomorrow all because she wanted to put her hair up herself.

She sighs again, this one audible as she sets her Chinese container on the nightstand, “Jay?”

“Yeah?” He turns to look at her, his brows furrowed in concern.

Hailey bites her lip sheepishly as she snaps the elastic band around her wrist against her skin, “Can you put my hair up?”

He looks surprised for a moment before he smirks at the slight blush dusting her cheeks at having to ask for help with a task this simple, “Of course I can, Hailey.”

She hands him the ponytail holder as he walks over to the side of the bed, “But I will warn you. I’ve never done this before.”

She wants to tease him. Maybe tell him he’d better start practicing now if he ever hopes for a daughter one day, but it feels too on the nose when she wants that daughter to be hers too.

So instead, she smirks at him as he moves behind her to start gathering her hair up in awkward chunks. Hailey glances at him out of the corner of her eye, fake gasping, “Don’t tell me that the brave and noble Detective Jay Halstead, the man who jumps over moving cars and shoots sniper rifles doesn’t know how to put hair up in a ponytail.”

“Oh, shut up,” He grumbles good-naturedly, still trying to smooth her blonde hair into his loosely closed fist on top of her head, “It’s not like I’ve really had the opportunity or need to practice.”

Chuckling, she lets him concentrate on pulling her hair through the elastic and tries not to get lost in the feeling of his fingers in her hair and the warmth radiating off him. Her eyes flutter close and she marvels at how gentle he is even with the strength of his hands, well-conditioned in the act of squeezing a trigger.

And just like when making those shots, the precision in which he does everything is still there as he carefully tightens the elastic, securing her hair into place.

Hot breath hit the back of her now exposed neck and she can’t help but shiver. Before he’s stepping away, she swears she feels his hands brush her skin and she wonders if he’s equally as affected as she was by his closeness.

But before it can turn into anything, he’s smiling and settling back into his spot at the foot of the bed, gesturing to the ponytail he’d just completed, “It’s not as good as you do it, but I think it’ll pass.”

“I’m sure it’s fine, Jay. It’s out of my face and it’s not like anyone will see it,” She grins at him as she picks up her food, intending to finish it off now that her hair won’t get in her way.

Jay frowns teasingly, “Hey, and what about me? Am I not someone?”

She smiles softly in amusement, “You’ve seen me in worse states and you’re not just anyone, you know that. You’re my best friend, Jay,” She hesitates because she knows that’s not strictly true. He is her best friend and he’s her partner but he’s also the man she loves, and it would be so easy to let the truth slip out.

Looking at him, she sees something in his eyes that looks like hope or maybe anticipation and she wonders if he thinks she’s going to tell him the one secrete she just can’t seem to get out. Maybe she would have told him if they sat there for a few seconds longer, but his phone buzzes and the moment is gone before it really even began.

Hailey wonders if phones are going to be their downfall.

She thinks she sees disappointment flash across his face, but she blinks and he’s looking at his phone with a serious expression.

“Is everything okay?” Her brow furrows as she watches him type out a quick response and put the device back into his pocket.

He shakes his head, sighing, “That was Kev. The Latin Players are on the verge of waging war against a new up and coming gang called The Jets.”

Interjecting, Hailey raises a brow, “As in West Side Story?”

“Yep,” Jay lets out a wry chuckle, “Anyway, the team flipped someone on The Jets’ side, and it looks like they are possibly willing to play ball so Kev was asking for some background info on my Latin Player connect because Intelligence is going to attempt to negotiate a truce before it can escalate to a full-blown gang war.”

She groans quietly, all too aware of the potential complications and ramifications that come from this type of violence, “That’s just what the city needs. A gang war.”

He huffs in agreement, dropping his head in disgust and she can see the tension in his shoulders. Even eight-hundred miles away, the crime and the innocent people that inevitably gets tangled up in it affects him.

Hailey frowns, her eyebrows furrowing in concern. She reaches out a hand to lightly touch his bent knee, “Jay.”

He looks up at her and the empathy she sees in his eyes makes her heart swell in what’s becoming a familiar sensation. Love and pride and admiration and respect for this man she has the privilege to know.

Her eyes soften and she smiles gently at him, an earnest look on her face, “If you need to go home, go home Jay. I’ll be alright here by myself. I don’t need you to take care of me.”

If the situation wasn’t so serious, she might have laughed at the way his eyebrows shoot up in surprise, clearly not expecting those words to come out of her mouth.

Recovering, his eyebrows furrow and he shakes his head adamantly, “No way. They can get along without me. I’m not leaving here without you and I don’t care if you think you can take care of yourself because who’s going to help you change your bandages or make you take your medicine or keep you company?”

He challenges in a slightly playful manner, but the eyebrow he raises dares her to contradict him and she knows he is serious, “Besides, I need to be here if I want to keep my own peace of mind. I don’t work well without you, so I’m not sure how much help I’d be anyway.”

She knows that no matter the circumstance, Jay would always perform above and beyond the call of duty, but she also knows that this is his way of telling her that he needs her and the way he was willing to stay with her in New York makes her heart stutter in yet another way.

Before she can dwell on the feeling any further, he’s smiling again, his eyes crinkling with mischief, “Now back to the game. I think I have the perfect question for you.”

Sorry it ended in a bit of an awkward spot, but I decided to split it into two parts when I hit 10,000 words and I still wasn’t done yet lol so I didn’t know this was going to be the ending of a chapter.

I’d love to hear what you thought and stay tuned for part three!

[barryhuff]

Nostalgiaholic - The Remix

When I used to look up at the night sky alone as a child, I imagined a sinister, infinite, black, blanket sprinkled with glitter. Although, when my eyes followed the tip of my Uncle Jon’s finger, as he both traced celestial, stick-figures in the same sky and narrated their mythic, Greek stories, space always transformed from that lifeless blanket and into a destination to be explored. 

Jon, at times, was so inspired by space and space travel, he filled canvases dedicated to the filtered visuals he discerned.  As a dedicated science-fiction nerd, his paintings certainly had their share of stylized spaceships, laser beams, and explosions.  But as an equal part, planetarium-loving, star chart-studying, telescope-owning, amateur astronomer, Jon’s celestial backgrounds were wild, bubbling layers of greens, whites, blues, and reds, instead of a simple, flat, all-consuming blackness. Those paintings showed the cosmos as a tangible, topographic map ready to be explored, and not a deep, infinite sea of loneliness. 

That being said, I used to daily study a picture Jon painted of an astronaut floating upside down in the aurora borealis lights of Jon’s interpretation of space.  The figure held tight to the lifeline coming from his spacesuit at the waist with his left hand.  However, the same lifeline extended from the suit like a piece of floating spaghetti getting smaller, until it vanished in the distant horizon.  His right hand (so big that it appeared to explode from the canvas), desperately reached out for salvation.  

The reflective shield on the helmet hinted at the impending doom of the astronaut.  The reflection didn’t show a ship or even another hand reaching back, instead there were simply more endless miles of lively, colorful flashes of the space setting to die alone in.

No matter how much I wanted to imagine hope for the character, there was none… at least for him.

I often wonder if Jon’s painting was inspired by one of his favorite movies, the 1968 Stanley Kubrick classic 2001: A Space Odyssey.   When it finally, came on network T.V. one Saturday afternoon in the 1980s, I was excited to see it.  Hell, if Jon liked it, I would certainly like it.

False.  It turns out there were two barriers to me enjoying 2001: A Space Odyssey --  Star Wars and silence. 

One summer, my brother and I bragged about watching Star Wars 47 times on HBO.

I thoroughly enjoyed "The Bar Scene".  Especially the part in which a handsome, tanned, mischievous Han Solo (brown, feathered hair parted evenly in the middle) tried in vain to smooth-talk the twitchy-trigger-fingered, reptilian, green-faced, bug eyed, intergalactic thug Greedo (bald head).

Shit, reciting Greedo’s opening line to Han for anyone who’d listen (“Oo-nah too-tah, Solo?”) is still one of my favorite past-times.

In Star Wars, everyone could cover vast distances in the dark, dusty, intensely cold, INFINITE vacuum of space. It’s as easy as a con-artist pulling a few levers, confidently bellowing the order, “Punch it, Chewie”, and going faster than light without having to even buckle a seatbelt.

In reality, distances in outer space were not so easily traversed.

The Earth’s moon is 238,000 miles away. It took Neil Armstrong and the fellas six days to get from Earth, to the moon, and back, all while being cooped up in basically a large, flying port-a-potty. Their spacesuits looked about as comfortable as wearing every outfit in the average American’s good-credit-infused, stuffed closet AT ONCE.

This detail of space travel was not lost ‘Stanley Kubrick’s flick.  Even though there are a beautiful array of stunning special effects, it often felt like the audience traveled each second of the 365 million mile trip from the Moon to Jupiter.  There were no visual cues of a blurring landscape to both gage speed and generate a sense of movement.  The stars are perched in the background like apathetic teenagers forced to sit at the table during dinner, when they’d rather be in the solitude of their own rooms.

Body movements and conversations in the film were also slowed, as if everyone was walking in a filled swimming pool.  Mix in a relaxing soundtrack of orchestral music, and it’s the perfect lullaby capable of depowering my movie-watching enthusiasm.  In fact, the first five times I tried to watch the movie, I would fall asleep at an early scene featuring a space stewardess silently laboring down the aisle in her gravity “grip shoes” on her way to ultimately retrieve a floating pen for a sleeping passenger while composer Johann Strauss’s famous waltz, The Blue Danube, rhythmically chants in the background.

A few years ago, I tried one final time to watch the movie. And this time with the help of a streaming video platform, I was able to pause, re-group, pause, re-group, pause, re-group, and finally watch the movie my uncle loved.  

The striking thing about the movie is how quiet it actually was.  For much of the movie, there are no musical cues to warn of danger or intrigue.  Dialogue was conducted over the subtle drone of machines simply doing their mundane jobs of keeping the enormous spacecraft running during its long flight to Jupiter.   Life and death sequences were not given intense music accompaniment like traditional horror movies.  It’s as if Kubrick was saying, “People’s lives aren’t being scored by some musician to bookmark key events.  Life is merely something that happens -- even in space.”

It’s this absence of audible hints that makes 2001: A Space Odyssey uncomfortably realistic, as if the audience was watching a livestream of a computer gaining sentience, refusing to die (be turned off) and fighting off his oppressors (the flight crew).  

I’ve read that when a “vacuum” exists, somehow all of nature rushes to fill that empty hole.  So it’s funny that many science experiments happen in conditions that closely resemble a vacuum, in an effort to ensure results unweighted by additional stimuli.  Interestingly enough, because the movie is set in the vast, unforgiving, vacuum of space, Kubrick’s storytelling, in essence, becomes an experiment to determine if audiences will stay engaged without the traditional musical trappings.  Indeed, this stark story about the thrilling birth of strange, other-worldly life injected energy into overall science fiction mythology, and also into my young uncle.

Over the past 11 years, I have written a fairly regular Facebook post titled Reasons I Know I’m Getting Old.  When I started this, Facebook seemed to simply be a 21st century photo album, in which many people posted similar, stiff, smiling, posed pictures and inspiring quotes which suggested my extended online community was living their own collective happily ever afters.

But it was boring...

I mean, I loved my kids too, but were only my kids getting whoopings and other childhood punishments?  My wife was awesome too, but was I the only person still having trouble translating to her the humor in my daily fart symphonies?  Was no one else dealing with the often deflating, drudgery of the work-place?  Was parenting a lifelong crap-shoot for me only?  Because there was no connection to what I was seeing on my finger strolls on my phone, I was having a hard time wanting to even own a Facebook account.

Therefore, on April 14, 2009, I conducted an experiment:  How would my friends respond to a post that showed some dissatisfaction?  Nothing political or religious, just everyday grumblings.  I wrote:

“[Barry Huff] is dragging in from coaching his daughter's basketball team only to be greeted by Cap'n Crunch and a [sic] yet another pile of papers to grade!”

It received nine comments (four of those were my own).  And one of those commenters hinted that they understood the challenge of managing the grading paperload.

Facebook soon became a sliver into my reality normally hidden, when I walked into my home and shut the door for anyone who wanted to see access.  Initially, reposting fill-in-the blank lists, or other people’s videos, didn’t interest me.  I just wanted folks to know it was okay to not have all the answers.  Here I was, boogers and all.

But the experiment gathered a more scientific component in March 2020 -- the addition of an actual vacuum.  

In March 2020, the United States of America instituted a national quarantine in the hope of limiting the possibility of infection from the rapidly spreading “severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)”, shortened simply to the “Coronavirus”.   I suspect that the horrified wails of a certain mexican beer company sharing part of the same name as the virus (after having carefully crafted years of popular commercials associating its product with serene, relaxing beach scenes) are still heard by masked customers now filling their shopping carts with other adult beverages.  Thus ensuring (at least in a few inebriated minds) binge drinking episodes without sudden, beer-birthed, pockets of community spread.

During this quarantine, the noise of my life (reporting to a building to teach, side-hustles, sporting events, car travel, movies, fast food) disappeared.  And with that sudden vacuum, came the desire to collect and revise the writings I posted about the uncertainty of navigating adulthood.

And while I still worry if I have the skill to create something that gives a clearer picture of my true self to my wife and kids, each vignette is a piece of the mosaic of my humanity.  And hopefully, this collection of blessed fallibility won’t be unnecessarily camouflaged during the stories told at my funeral one day, as attendees gulp down heaping portions of smothered pork steak, collard greens, macaroni, and apple pie piled on their sagging, disposable plates.

[haloud]

any other rose

ao3

With Dad in a coma and Flint nowhere to be found, Alex takes a leave of absence from Roswell to check on the other ducks in this particular row. He goes alone, though Kyle offers to come with him, puffing his chest up like that jock he used to be, only this time it’s to protect Alex from theoretical threat, and it’s frankly fucking adorable. He doesn’t even tell Michael he’s leaving until he sends him a text at a rest area a hundred miles away to tell him he’ll be back within two days.

This is something Alex has to do for himself. He needs information, something more tangible than what he can read off his computer screen, before he declares open war. His family may be hateful to the core, maybe, maybe, but a lot can change in relatively little time, and Alex just—can’t keep walking blind not knowing who his actual enemies are.

As Flint so eloquently put it, Alex has always been the black sheep of the family. His brothers, well, they toed the line much more skillfully, and grew closer together because of it. When Alex sets out to track down his two oldest brothers, he first runs into a wall. The eldest, Harlan? His military records check out up until the very recent present, then he just disappears. Definitely concerning, but maybe he just turned into a doomsday prepper and is living in a bunker made out of nonperishable food somewhere in the Midwest.

Robert, in contrast, doesn’t appear to be hiding his tracks at all. His whole life unspools for Alex in a perfectly neat paper trail—which is funny, because Robert is the one who hasn’t spoken to anyone in the family since 2013, making the possibilities frankly endless. Deep cover? Maybe, but his credit card activity is bland and consistent every statement Alex rifles through. A fight or falling out with Dad, Harlan, or Flint? Well, Flint doesn’t have the backbone to really ‘fall out’ with anyone, and if it was a fight with Dad then the old bastard would have taken it out on the rest of them tenfold. Harlan is a distinct possibility, but what might be so bad that both of them would drop off the grid, with Robert maintaining a convincing facsimile of civilian life?

No, there are two possibilities that Alex deems actually likely.

First: Robert is as neck-deep in conspiracy, murder, and torture as Dad and Flint, and he cut off contact with the family as a minimalization of risk. If one arm of Project Shepherd gets discovered, then a manufactured estrangement offers plausible deniability that the others had no knowledge of it whatsoever.

The second possibility has Alex pacing his floor at three in the morning more nights than he’d like.

(Why? Why? The world went dark around him as he stared at his computer screen with his hand over his mouth, staring at the name of a niece he’s never met. Aubrey Alexandra Manes. Why?)

A phone call would be too much warning, would give Robert time to hide or come up with a story. So Alex just finds his address, gets in the car, and goes searching for answers. What he finds is a simple ranch house six hours out of Roswell, one with a flag hanging from the porch and a slightly overgrown yard full of soccer goals and Barbie jeeps and other childhood detritus.

Maybe Robert knew to expect him somehow; maybe he just wasn’t expecting a car in the driveway at this time of day and therefore came out to inspect it. Either way, Alex doesn’t even make it up the porch stairs before Robert opens the door and brings them face to face for the first time in a long, long time.

“Alex!”

The shock would almost be funny, if Alex wasn’t bracing for either a punch or a bullet.

“Hey, big bro,” he says, curling his mouth in a deliberate smile. “It’s been six years since I got a courtesy Christmas phone call. What’s new in your life?”

Face thunderous, Robert steps over the threshold and closes the door behind him. “Cut the crap. Believe it or not, I’ve been following your career. I know you could find out anything you wanted about me, and hell, I know you probably did. So it’s you that needs to start talking.”

Alex nods pensively. Reevaluates. Strange, to be properly estimated by a family member. It is true, though—Alex never would have gone in blind, and the research he did produce some interesting results.

Six years ago, Robert stopped coming to holidays. He stopped picking up the phone. He made polite, manly excuses whenever their dad pressed him, but he made those excuses every single time. And what did Alex find when he went looking? A birth certificate for a little girl, dated 2013; immunization forms; preschool and elementary registration; another birth certificate dated two years later. Aubrey Alexandra. So yeah, Alex knows, as if the yard cluttered with toys wasn’t enough of a clue. What he doesn’t know is why, so that’s what he’s here to find out.

“What’re their names?” Alex asks casually. He keeps his hands still at his sides, empty and loose. Not a threat. He has no interest in making Robert fear for his family, and if he’s being generous, he knows that Robert has no more reason to believe Alex isn’t working under their father’s orders than Alex has to trust him.

“Hope and Aubrey,” Robert says, the like you don’t already know hovering understood between them. He takes a step forward and shoves his hands in his pockets, shrewd soldier’s eyes scanning Alex just as much as Alex scans him. It’s a little strange, more so than Alex expected, to discover that Robert actually is a stranger now, not frozen at eighteen and stocky and mean-spirited.

Robert doesn’t move forward like he’s making threats. He presumably came outside because he felt either surprised or threatened by an unexpected vehicle in the driveway, but he isn’t even wearing a holster. Not even the suggestion of a weapon on his person. Is he the kind of military father who locks his guns away? Their dad was never that conscientious—presumably because it builds character for a little kid to accidentally shoot himself; either that or he just assumed his boys were too scared to go near anything of his. A fair assessment.

But what is a fair assessment of Robert? Maybe he just thinks girls can’t handle exposure to guns—safer parenting, to be sure, but still indicative of a toxic mindset. After all, Robert would’ve gotten suspended three times for snapping girls’ bra straps if dear old dad hadn’t intervened every single time.

“And are they why you’ve been MIA all this time?” Alex asks, point blank.

“You’re going to have to tell me why you’re here before I give you any information about my children. That’s non-negotiable.”

“Fair.” Alex holds his hands up in surrender, then lowers them as Robert takes another step his way.

“Are you here because of dad.” The question falls flat, like he doesn’t really want the answer. Robert’s face is inscrutable, his tone still thinly pleasant, but something darker lurks beneath the surface.

“In a manner of speaking.” Alex tilts his head and looks his brother up and down. Robert’s put on a little weight since the photos Alex saw from his last deployment; he’s got laugh lines around his eyes. They’re all of them getting older, but Alex—once again wrong-footed, and he’s getting increasingly frustrated with himself—Alex never expected Robert to wear his age so openly. “I’m doing a little reconnaissance. You see,” this time it’s Alex who steps forward, “Last time I saw Flint, it was in a secret torture prison our father has been running for decades, and he had a gun to my head. Harlan appears to have gone off the grid, so one can only guess what’s going on there. Which leaves…you. I thought it was high time we had a little reunion, bro.”

Genuine shock flicks over Robert’s face, and his eyes dart up and down Alex’s body as if looking for injuries. He is a military man, however, so the emotion is quickly replaced with more grim impassivity. “What kind of information are you looking for? Are you in danger right now? God damn it, Alex, my family—”

“Aren’t home at the moment, and I will happily be long gone before they get back. This is about our family, not yours. Hope won’t need to be picked up from school until 2:30, and your wife takes Aubrey to Tiny Tots ballet classes after preschool from one to three every Monday and Thursday. No one knows I’m here; if you’ve really been following my career, you know I know how to cover my tracks. I didn’t come here to make threats, Robert.”

“Then why are you here? You seem to know pretty much everything already.”

Alex feels a pang of…actual guilt at the fear lurking on Robert’s face, in his defensive posture, in the way he clenches his hands compulsively in his pockets. Rattling off his kid’s routines like that…might have been an excessive show of force, and Alex grimaces at himself. Robert is a soldier, sure, but somehow…somehow Alex forgot that not everyone has been unraveling earth-shattering revelations for the past year. He dug into Robert’s life remembering the dick who did shit like flushing his toothbrush down the toilet and dying all his clothes pink because he was ‘basically a girl anyway, right?’, and he did it expecting to find yet another monster with Alex’s same blood pumping through his veins.

He needs to remember: high school. Ten years to the left. Alex nods sharply to himself. He went about this the wrong way—it’s a reunion, not an op. If it goes poorly, he walks out of here with better knowledge of his enemy and the exact same amount of family he walked in here with. Nothing to lose.

“I just needed to see for myself, I guess. The reason why you haven’t even talked to dad in over half a decade. Or me. I don’t know about Harlan and Flint, but I’m guessing they’re getting the same treatment?”

Robert thinks for a minute, then he jerks his chin towards the rocking chairs squeezed into the corner of the narrow porch. “I’m not inviting you inside just yet, but I’ll get us some beers. We can sit out here and talk.”

Alex takes a seat in one of the rocking chairs and rests his hands on his knees. In between the two large chairs are two little ones, painted all kinds of crazy colors, sponge-stamped with bunnies and butterflies and dinosaurs. A pang of—something echoes deep in his chest. Can you be nostalgic for something you’ve never, ever had?

“Okay.”

Robert sticks a beer in Alex’s face. It’s already open; Alex sniffs it, swishes it in his mouth, holds it on the back of his tongue before swallowing. Well, if Robert was keeping undetectable poisons around on the off chance he got to slip it into Alex’s drink, he probably wouldn’t be walking around without a gun. Alex takes a real swig and waits for Robert to start talking.

His brother doesn’t look at him, just stares into the middle distance as he says, “You might remember Alanna, my wife. I think you met her a couple times.”

“Of course. Dad didn’t ‘approve of her family,’” Alex says with a thin, sarcastic smile. The real reason, of course, is that Alanna is black, but Jesse would never be so uncouth as to say something like that outright. No, it’s always dogwhistle central with that man.

Robert snorts and spits in disgust, the largest show of emotion he’s displayed since Alex pulled into the driveway. “Yeah. Fucking hell. You and I both know how deep Dad’s hatred runs. For everyone and everything that doesn’t march to his fucking tune.”

Alex folds his hands in his lap and does a terrible job of keeping the knives out of his voice. “Of course. I just wasn’t sure how you would approach the topic. Of hatred, that is, since I was the only member of the family not invited to the wedding.”

It’s surprisingly difficult to get the words out. How many times is he going to have to go through this? First with Flint, now…Robert may not have pulled a gun on him (yet), but it’s still a piece of Alex’s soul that gets chipped away bringing up this old pain. ‘Don’t you ever get tired of being the black sheep,’ Flint said, and the answer is, frankly, not fucking likely, considering the standards set by the other Manes men past and present. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt to be alone, doesn’t mean he didn’t feel the lump in his throat and the pain in his chest when he saw the wedding pictures on Facebook and realized he was deliberately excluded.

Alex clenches his fists on top of his knees and gets pissed at himself for showing even that much of a reaction.

Robert cuts his eyes away, clenching his jaw. Finally, he says, “Fuck. God damn.”

“No, I get it.” Alex forces a laugh. “Couldn’t have the gay gaying up your big day. We’re not here to talk about me. Forget I brought it up.”

Shaking his head sharply, Robert says, “I’m airing old shit, and I’m doing it once, then we’re getting back on topic. I didn’t invite you to the wedding because Dad already invited himself, you had just gotten stationed far away from Roswell, and I didn’t want to put you back in his path. That’s the sum of it. End of story.”

An ugly laugh, a real one this time, busts out of Alex’s chest. God, that’s even more rich than Flint’s bullshit about protection!

“I’m serious,” Robert snaps. “’Lanna opened my eyes to a lot of shit, okay? I won’t pretend I was some kind of amazing fucking ally back then, but I wasn’t afraid of your gaying, got it?”

And Alex wants to fight back. He does. He’s still owed a fucking pound of flesh. But in the back of his mind, he thinks—Aubrey Alexandra. And it gets him back on track. It even lets him see the humor, because, come on, Robert saying gaying like that is pretty fucking funny.

“Okay. Apology accepted,” he says, one last snark because Robert never actually apologized, and the way he looks away again says he knows that. “Tell me more about Alanna.”

“Right. Well. So anyway, she knew what she was marrying. Dad gave her the fucking creeps, but she married me anyway.” He fiddles with the label of his beer and quite obviously tries not to smile. “And we did the happy family thing for a while. I was deployed; the distance was hard. She felt a lot of pressure to be the right kind of military wife, but she had zero support. I was wrapped up in myself. The missions, the medals. I was a shitty husband, a shitty partner.” He drains his beer, then stares at the bottle like its emptiness is a personal betrayal. “Between deployments, she gave me the ultimatum. Couples counseling—completely non-military—or that’s it.”

“You went to a therapist?” Alex blurts. Robert? The guy who would lurk outside the guidance counselor’s office and trip kids if they came out crying? Maybe Alex should have done a deeper dive into whether or not Robert could have had alien contact.

Robert snorts and shakes his head. “I deserve that. God I was an absolute fucking cock as a kid. And as an adult. But Alanna gave me something to fight for, and damn if she didn’t push me to fight for it. I don’t know. I didn’t understand half the crap the shrink said. But I listened. Followed orders. Not so hard.”

“But you still had some contact with dad in that time. You didn’t go radio silent until several years after you and Alanna married.”

“He’s not an easy man to say no to. When his number would come up in my phone…”

Robert’s jaw clenches hard and tight. Alex hopes he has good dental.

“I always picked up. Autopilot. But the shrink helped me realize trying to be like Dad was…well, in real terms, ruining my fucking life.”

Damn. Alex is gonna find this therapist and send an annual fruit basket.

“And then Alanna got pregnant?” he prompts; Robert nods curtly.

“Changed my whole life. Scared me shitless, too, I don’t mind telling you. I was just working out how fucked our whole upbringing was, and now it was my turn? God.”

“So that’s the story? That’s why it’s been six years since you acknowledged any of us?”

Robert looks at him dead-on for the first time since they sat down. He looks like Dad. He really does. The same squarish face, the same thin mouth, the same soldier stoicism. But there’s a softness in the next words he says that Alex never once heard come out of their father’s mouth, and it shakes something in Alex’s very core.

“I got kids of my own now, man. And I work with kids too, or around them. Eighteen, nineteen years old. And I think about how dad treated us. I’m not exposing Hope and Aubrey to that. Not ever.”

“Good reason to avoid Dad, then. But what about the rest of us? Harlan, Flint? Me?”

Shrugging, Robert says, “I talked to Harlan a while longer, since we were closest as kids. But he got weird, man, I don’t know. And Flint…ended up I couldn’t trust him one bit. If I talked to him at all, he’d hand the phone over to Dad, and I didn’t want this shit getting that messy.”

“And me?”

Aubrey Alexandra. A little slice of Alex’s world has been disorienting and surreal ever since he read that name. Aliens are one thing, but having a niece that’s carrying his name—Alex doesn’t know how to live in that world. He has to hear it out of Robert’s own mouth, this brother he didn’t know he had at all.

A huge sigh gusts out of Robert’s chest. He goes back to staring into the middle distance. It’s a long while before he says, “I told you already that I’d started realizing Dad was fucked up.”

He cuts off there like there’s something physical blocking the words, and Alex waits for him to continue.

Finally, he says, “That was a hard thing to come to terms with. I always thought Dad was what made us into men, you know? If times were hard, well, they had to be, to toughen us up. But it turns out Dad was just an abusive fuck. So then what good is any kind of lesson he ever taught us? What good is being any kind of man he’d be proud of, when I’ve got ‘Lanna and two baby girls I could be making proud instead?” He sighs heavily. “So that’s why. I wanted them to be proud of me, and there’s nothing to be proud of in the way I treated you. The way I let you be treated. I thought about calling you up, but I was too damn cowardly to dial the phone, and somewhere along the line I convinced myself it would be better if I just let you live your own life without fucking bullies sandbagging you.”

Alex takes a moment.

In that moment, Robert runs his hand over his close-shaven skull three times. He bounces his leg, stops himself, and bounces again. He brings his beer up to his mouth like he’s forgotten already that it’s empty.

And Alex just…breathes.

Flint carried his orders like absolution so he could sleep at night. With Robert being such an unknown after six years of radio silence, Alex thought he was prepared for all eventualities this reunion might come to, but turns out he wasn’t actually prepared at all. Not for the reality of the two little rocking chairs, allowed to be bright and clumsy. Not for a version of his brother that sees the world with open eyes.

“You going to say anything?” Robert finally says gruffly.

“I saw Aubrey’s birth certificate when I researched you.” Alex swallows and tries to wet his throat with the beer, but it’s gone flat. Ugh. Still, he won’t back down. “Aubrey Alexandra.” Saying the name out loud chokes him up, just a little bit, and he forces it back down like he learned to do a long time ago. “You could have just called me.”

Robert ducks his head to hide his own too-bright eyes, and that sheepish, honest gesture cracks deep in Alex’s chest to feed some very small, very young part of him.

“Yeah,” Robert mumbles. “I know I should’ve—asked you. Or just not. But I was all emotional ‘n shit. It felt right at the time.”

“All right.” Alex shoves his emotion unceremoniously aside. He has the information he came for, so it’s once more time for action. The fact is that no matter how skilled Alex is at covering his tracks, his presence has the possibility of putting Robert’s family in danger. Until Dad is dealt with for good; until Flint and Harlan are neutralized; Alex can’t be a part of his brother’s life, or his wife’s, or the lives of his nieces.

Something else to fight for, then. As if he needed more motivation.

Alex gets swiftly to his feet, and Robert mirrors the motion.

“You’re leaving?” He blurts out, and something like grief, chased by acceptance, runs across his face. God, Alex almost wants to do a double take every time he sees honest emotion in eyes like those. But it’s time he gave credit where credit is due.

“I should,” Alex says. “I promised I wouldn’t put your family in danger before I heard your story, and I intended to keep that promise no matter what you said to me. But now it is imperative that you listen.”

He puts his hand on his brother’s shoulder for what may be the first time in their entire lives. Robert swallows.

Alex says, “Do not change a single thing about your routine. Do not tell anyone I’ve been here. When it’s safe, I will contact you—and at that time, it’s your decision if you want me in your children’s lives or not.”

He can see every single question in Robert’s face. Pride and anger tense him up, but, miracle of miracles, Alex also gets to watch him let them go.

Fruit basket. Seriously. Maybe an Edible Arrangement, for the actual miracle worker.

“How much danger are you in?” Is all Robert demands, voice still gruff with emotion.

“No more than usual. Don’t you know I love to live dangerously?” Alex says breezily, but Robert doesn’t unclench. Great, just what he needs—another person in his life taking his safety seriously when there are things that need to get done. Alex gives a fond roll of his eyes and lets his hand fall off Robert’s shoulder.

“Thank you,” he says, honestly, as Robert follows him off the porch and to his car.

“Pretty sure you don’t get to thank me for anything ever. I basically owe you for life.”

“Well, then, get started on your debt and give me that ‘you’re welcome’ you owe me just now.”

“You’re welcome.” He hesitates, swallows a couple times. Then he raps the top of Alex’s car and chokes out: “Drive safe, kid.”

Alex drives home in a different world than the one he drove up in. He barely notices the miles fly by, and when he gets home to Roswell, everything still looks the same, no matter how impossible that is.

Still, life goes on. A week later, a letter comes for him at the base. The return address makes him furious—how’s Robert made it this long if he can’t follow a simple order for his own good?—but he can’t hold onto that anger as soon as he sees what’s inside.

The thick envelope contains three sheets of paper and a fridge magnet—just a generic #1 Uncle! design, but it still hits him hard right in the chest. The first page of the letter is covered in small, need script he doesn’t recognize—Alanna’s, most likely. The next page he unfolds is covered in a child’s deliberate print, and he puts that aside too, gently, reverently, so he can read it later and savor every word. The last page is covered in drawings, big and bright; god, he’s gotten more medals than he knows what to do with, but he’s never felt as honored as he does now by the fact that clearly Aubrey busted out a brand-new pack of markers for this. And the magnet—he’s going to put these on his fridge, like that’s something that exists in his life—and now it does, this part of his family he thought was closed off to him forever.

And his world is different now. A little brighter, a little bigger, a little fuller.

Now all he has to do is protect it.

[bleedingcoffee42]

Eureka AU- Part 4

This is fun, I’m enjoying writing this.  Halfway to 20k.  

  Pulling in some references of background FMA people who don’t get used much.  Dr. Jude is from the ‘Blind Alchemist’ OVA, Dr. Crowley from the Curse of the Crimson Elixir game.  And yes, Frank fucking Archer shows up so not much foreshadowing there.     

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 

xxxxxxxxxx

“Quite the amazing prototype.”  Captain Frank Archer reported after his test run with the Ultimate Eye.  The entire hour long experience in the fields around Eureka was breathtaking.    He encountered drone attacks, robots, some weird one eyed sex doll and multiple hazards and obstacles to tackle.  Each time the Ultimate Eye gave him the information he required to make every move, every shot count.   All fed right into his field of vision.  It was like living every video game simulation he every fantasized about bring to work.   Now it was a reality.    “General Raven, this is everything we have dreamed of.”

General Raven smiled and looked over at Mustang who was waiting for his response with a smug look on his face.   “I'll have to give it to you Mustang, this delivers on your promise to the budget committee and then some.”

“It's still a prototype, General.”  Roy said and held out the open pocket watch for Archer to put the contact lens back in.   He was eager to have the tech back in his possession before someone else ran off with it. “We still need to integrate a informational database that will support it.   Right now you're looking at topography maps, weather data, weapons specs and not much else. “

Archer reluctantly removed the piece and put it back in it's case.  “The thermal imaging is better than what we have now.”

“The lens itself is functional, but the computer needs to be fed the information to interpret it.”  Roy explained.  “It's only going to get better from here.”

“When can it go in production, as is?” Raven asked as Mustang snapped the watch closed and put it in his vest pocket.  He and Archer both watched that precious piece of tech disappear into his vest as if the sun just vanished behind the clouds and deprived them of the warmth and light they had been basking in.

“When it's ready.”  Roy replied and walked with the General out of the testing field and back to his car.  “As the database grows, the software needs to grow.   Then we can make adjustments with the user interface and product itself.”

“I didn't come all this way for a bullshit answer, Mustang.”   Raven said.  “I want a tangible date.”

“Give us six months.”  Roy said.  “It will be ready to be shipped and ready for it's experimental runs.”

“I plan to hold you to that.”  Raven said and got in the car.

Roy watched Archer get in with him, still smiling, and the driver left to take them to the hotel in town.   He pulled out his phone and called Riza to report in on the success.   Four months ago he would have just gone back to his office and celebrated his success alone by moving on to another project.   He would have gone home in a good mood and failed to share anything but the 'It went well' and probably would have left it at that.  Being in a good mood would put him at ease and he'd undoubtedly be the man Riza actually fell in love with, which would lead to the day culminating in great sex with his wife.   Then he would screw it all up the next day when Raven saw a not so promising sex doll/soldier wandering the fields with an leaking eyeball that was shot out screaming like a pterodactyl.   He would have been in a foul mood and brought it home.   He was glad he wasn't that man anymore.    He did wish his wife was here to shoot that Mannequin soldier as it was now humping a tree.   “Can someone please go get that damned thing or put it down?”

“I'll get it!” Dr. Crowley ran out from behind the observation screen to get his project before someone executed it.

“I expect a report on my desk in the morning as to why that thing now has the desire to want to fuck a tree!” Roy hollered and  of course that was the exact second Riza chose to answer her phone.  He heard her laugh and immediately his tension subsided.   “Hello dear.”

“How did it go?”

“Captain Archer is smiling, so I can't guarantee he didn't witness some homunculus kink.”  Roy said as Crowley tried to coax his creation away from the tree it was now clinging to.   He turned away.  He didn't want to know until it became a problem.  

“Frank archer?  Trust me, he's probably only turned on by the thought of tech that can kill people.”

“Comforting. Thanks dear.”  

“I need to check in with Raven before I call it a day.”

“Raven is heading back to his hotel.   Dr. Jude is packing up.   I'm heading back to my office to just check on a few things before I head home.”  He looked at his watch.   “Dinner at 4?”

“Will it be moist?”

“It's going to be fucking burnt if you use that word once more.”  He threatened.  

“See you at home.”

Roy smiled and hung up.    He knew his attitude had changed just sharing a little bit of his work burden with someone, damned near everyone had commented on it. That was saying a lot since most of the time people were scared to talk to him because he'd have some scathing sarcastic remark to put them on the verge of tears.  He was glad to have her as his partner in this, it made his life easier and better than he could imagine. He had to admit that having Riza by his side for even the most ridiculous tasks made things go smoother,  he even enjoyed joining her for her jobs even if they did spend their morning tracking down a homunculus.   As he heard one more horrifying screech, he really wished he insisted she stay for this trial so she could shoot that damned Mannequin Soldier.  

He looked across the test field and up to the hill where the Bradley's house overlooked the town.  They couldn't see anything as the test area was in a valley, but he could see it.   Fr the first time he actually looked at it as more than just scenery.  His thought about that house and couldn't help but compare it to their own home.  His home was modern, minimal and open.  The old house the Bradley's had was older, smaller but cozy.   A completely different feel to it.   It overlooked the town and wasn't lost among all the other houses that were lined up on the street.  He opened his contacts and looked for Mrs. Bradley and gave her a call as a thought entered his mind that felt right.

“Hello again Mrs. Bradley, It's Dr. Mustang.   Yes...everything is fine, actually I'm calling you on a more personal matter.  No....I don't need melon.   It's about your house, if you ever decided you wanted to sell your home, I would be very interested in buying it.”

Xxxxxxxxx

Riza was frustrated that she was going to be late getting home.  Roy was cooking, she hated to keep him waiting, but for some reason Raven had insisted she update her vaccinations per some recent bulletin that she didn't get or feel she needed to be included in.   He ordered it be done immediately as he had to bring the vaccination in a cooler with him from base to ensure it was delivered and given.   He mumbled about some kind of deposit and handed her the paperwork.  She sent Roy a text telling him she had to fulfill this obligation to her health records and would be late.   She was subject to the medical policies of Eureka itself, it seemed a little extra to be included in some field instructions when she was thousands of miles from any front.  She had been worried that maybe Raven was considering reassigning her, until she found herself with an entirely different problem.

Going to the infirmary was not a big deal, however one routine part of any exam for any woman was being asked “Are you pregnant?” by every medical professional for any ailment or condition.   This time, she had to admit that she was late and it was a possibility. She didn't tell Dr. Knox she hadn't gone for a home pregnancy test because she was waiting for one to arrive in the mail.  She was actually waiting in anticipation for her period, but that sounded like ignoring the problem and hoping it went away.  So she took the test.

Eureka was small and gossip traveled fast.   The last thing she wanted was to go to the pharmacy and leave with a pregnancy test.   She didn't want any false alarms and it's not like she hadn't experienced irregularities in her cycle before.   Especially here, where the scientists could literally be the cause of anything.   So she ordered one online and sent it to the office, hoping to ease her mind and make this easier on everyone.

She was on the pill and as far as she could recall didn't miss a single one.  However, she and Roy had been on hiatus for a month and she was not expecting to have sex during that time so it was possible she could have forgotten something.  Especially when she was dealing with that Barry situation and had a few sleepless nights.   So it seemed like a good place to finally just put her mind at ease anyhow.   Her doctor here was a professional and  patient confidentiality was a thing he took seriously.   She could just take the test, get her vaccination and stop waiting for her manila envelope from Amazon to arrive in the mail.  

“I have some good news.” Dr. Knox said.

Riza breathed a sigh of relief.   Well all that worry for nothing.

“You're pregnant.”  

Riza felt like he had kicked her in the gut.   Knox gave her a smile, a weird feature for the gruff doctor and he saw her reaction and she watched it fade away.   “I'm sorry, what?  You said good news?”

Knox grimaced. “Typically when someone waits to see the doctor for a pregnancy test they want it to be positive.”

“Are you sure?”

Knox handed her the test results.   He wasn't sure what she was asking for confirmation of.   “If you need to discuss options, we can do that, but I recommend thinking on it a while before you do.  Especially if  this wasn't planned.”

Riza stared at the words on the paper.  No it wasn't planned.   The last thing she expected was to have Roy stroll back into town two months ago and finish that conversation of theirs with sex on his desk.    It could have been anytime, but after that she was much more vigilant about her pills.   She just took it for granted that she didn't go lax on protocol while he was away, but she had so much on her plate at the time that....apparently she missed something.

“False positive might be a thing, but not in this town.  That's a guaranteed result from the Curtis Test.”  Knox said.  “Do you want me to do an exam?”

“No, I'm late for dinner. Thank you.”  She said and folded up the paper and gave him a weak smile.  Late for a lot of things.   She and Roy never even talked about kids.   They talked about a dog, but never kids.  When did she tell him?  AS soon as she got home?   After dinner?  Could she even eat dinner now that she was feeling so queasy from the news?  

“Just call me if you have any questions.” Knox said and opened the door for her.  

xxxxxxxxx

Roy was excited and he couldn't wait for Riza to get home.   Mrs. Bradley admitted she wanted to move closer to school now that Selim was ready to start school and agreed to sell him her house!   He couldn't wait to see the look on Riza's face when he told her he got them a home. Something for both of them  and something with a yard where they could have a dog!  So he ran over to the door when his phone alerted him to someone on the door step and startled her with a grin and “Welcome home!”

Riza's keys were still in her hand and she looked at Roy wondering why he was so excited.   Had Knox called him with the news?  No.  Knox would have never done that.   This had to be something else.   “Did the General increase your budget or something?  You're really excited.”

Roy let her come in and closed the door and then bounded in front of her like a puppy excited to see it's owner.  “I have a surprise!”

Riza was just at a loss for the source of his enthusiasm.   So all she said was a monotone, “Me too.”

“I bought us a house!”  He exclaimed.   “Bradley's farmhouse!  You said you liked it and it reminded you of your childhood home. I've been thinking about how this was just my house you moved in to.   It's not our home.   Hell, I know you really don't like it that much so I thought we could start over together with our own home and maybe a puppy!”

Riza stood there and blinked.   He...bought a house? For them.   It was definitely more thoughtful than just handing her the keys to his home, but it would have been more thoughtful to include her in the process.  She dared not tell him that she was just creating small talk and she honestly didn't like how much that house reminded her of her childhood home.   She didn't have a good childhood, she joined the military to get away from that house.     However, Roy meant well.   He was excited.   He was ready for a new life together and this was his way of committing to that.   He was giving up the house he custom built and crafted to his old lifestyle.   This was huge for him.  “I have something to tell you too.”

“You're bleeding.”

“What?”  Riza asked as he grabbed a tissue and dabbed at her nose.  She watched it come away from her face with blood from a nosebleed.  

“Are you alright?”  Roy asked and put his hand on her forehead to check for a fever.   He looked in her eyes to notice they were slightly bloodshot.   The nosebleed wasn't stopping.  “You said you went for a vaccination?   What were the side effects?”

Riza took the tissue and dabbed at her own nose.    She felt embarrassed.  She hoped she didn't tear up in the car when she was thinking about her condition.   She had to be flushed because she was nervous.   The nosebleed could be from anything.    “I'm fine.”

Roy took her wrist to feel for a pulse and she pulled away.   “You could be having a reaction. For god's sake Riza, I'm a doctor can you please...”

“You're not a medical doctor.”  She said and went for another tissue.  That was a lot of blood.  

“I know enough about biology to know that this is concerning.”  He said and pulled his phone out.  “What vaccine did they give you?”

“I don't know it was something the military insisted I have.  Some bulletin I didn't get because I'm not on base.  Raven brought it with him.”  Riza pulled the tissue away and grabbed another.  

Roy called the infirmary.   “I need to talk to Dr. Knox, now.”

“Roy.”  She reached out for his phone in a panic, thinking Knox would infer this was about her pregnancy and tell him before she got the chance.   As she reached for it though she got light headed and Roy grabbed her as she fell into him.

“We're going to the infirmary.”  He said and hung up his phone.  “Don't argue with me on this.”

[thebipolarbisexualnerd]

Five Times Jace didn’t kiss Alec and one time he finally did

Hey all!! This was prompted to me by @dahdarios and it took me so long to get it done.  First Jalec fic here so go easy on me guys haha.  Hope you all enjoy it and happy reading :)

~~~

Jace paces back and forth across his bedroom, glaring at the book laying innocently on his bed like it had personally offended him.  He had laid up reading it all night long, trying to find some loophole that made this sick feeling in his stomach leave him alone.  He curses aloud softly and runs his hands through his hair, pulling slightly at the ends.  The sky outside is darkening quickly and he needs to get his clothes on for the ceremony and stop torturing himself.  They had decided to do this months ago, the parabatai ceremony.  Alec is his best friend without question.  He’s also his only friend, but that was another thing altogether.  He keeps telling himself that’s the reason for these feelings he couldn’t explain or control.  It is the reason his palms have started to sweat every time he’s around Alec, and also why he’s dropped the staff three times this week while sparring.  

He didn’t realize what was happening until some boys had been visiting from the L.A. Institute two weeks ago.  They were all tall, tan, and full of muscle over every inch of their bodies.  They also tended to spar with their shirts off altogether, and that had been one hell of a distraction.  Hodge had left them to spar amongst themselves while he had to train these visiting strangers.  Jace had attempted to follow his orders by sparring with Isabelle, but that had proved to be a futile effort.  He beat her without the slightest bit of effort since she was too busy looking over at their visitors.  She kept smiling every time one of them glanced their way and was too distracted to be of any real competition.  He wanted to whack her upside the head and ask her what had gotten into her when Alec stepped in and told Jace to just spar with him instead.  

“Come on Jace, she’s too busy having a crush on those stupid boys to actually work.”  He had rolled his eyes and snatched the blade from his sister’s hand, who for once didn’t even protest at being left out of something.  They had spent the afternoon sparring pleasantly enough and it wasn’t until he was in bed that night that he had realized Izzy was the same amount of distracted that he was these days and that the cause was likely the same reason.

In short, he realized he was fucked.

“Hey,” Alec slips in his room easily with practiced ease, as they had been doing this for months.  Being close friends and slipping through doors in late hours when they were supposed to be doing something else, normally sleeping.  

“Hey Alec,” Jace says, the knowledge eating at him slowly like some kind of parasite.  He thought about telling Alec nearly all the time, of this feeling that had taken residence in his heart and just wouldn’t leave.  Then he has to think about what that would honestly help.  He would hurt Alec by telling him and not becoming his parabatai, since anything not platonic would be absolutely forbidden.  Chances are Alec would never feel the same way about him anyways, so the whole thing would be a moot point.

“Jace, are you okay?” Alec asks, his voice low and comforting the way it was after Jace woke up shaking and crying tears he couldn’t control.  Alec had seen him at his lowest so many times and Jace trusted him with everything...just not this.  “If you have any doubts about this….just tell me.  This is as big as getting married.  Well, in a way.”  Jace glances up to see a bright blush on Alec’s cheeks and it melts his heart.  “Jace, I know I’m not the best fighter yet.  I’m improving and I’m practicing and I will live up to-”

“Stop, Alec, stop,” Jace says quietly with a hand on his arm.  “I don’t have doubts.  I am lucky to be your parabatai.  The luckiest Shadowhunter in the world.  I want to do this, absolutely.”

“Thanks Jace,’ Alec mumbles as his eyes lock on Jace’s hand on his arm.  “I guess nerves got to me.”

“I’ll see you in there,” Jace tells him with an encouraging smile.  “Tonight Maryse brought out all the stops for dinner.  We can celebrate later and everything will be great.  You could even stay over tonight in my room….if you wanted.”

“Yes,” Alec says without hesitation.  What the hell was he thinking?  Inviting Alec to his bed when he felt this way?  Was he some kind of masochist?  When the ceremony was complete there was no backing out and changing his mind.  There would be no chances after this.  Alec would have to be his friend and his brother with no other ties between them.  

Jace didn’t kiss Alec that night, but he did bind his soul to him, and that would have to be enough.

~~

“Alright ladies and gentlemen, we are not yet done for the day,” Hodge’s voice booms across the the training room where Jace lays with Alec and Isabelle, trying to recover from the last set of burpees they had had to endure.  He loved being a Shadowhunter, but training was always going to be a pain in the ass.  

“Hodge, please, I’m going to die,” Isabelle begs with her large eyes peering up at their tutor.

“When you can successfully outrun a demon for six miles you’ll thank me,” Hodge says wryly as he helps her to her feet once again.  Jace doesn’t know if he’s this tired all on his own or if he is feeling some of it from Alec, who looks far more exhausted than his sister but he hasn’t said a word in complaint.  He strips his shirt off and Jace feels his eyes lingering, no matter how much he wishes they wouldn’t .  Alec was gorgeous with firm muscle all over his body bulking up by the day.  

“While I train our miss here on her birthday present why don’t you two go back to some basics with hand to hand combat?” Hodge suggests as Isabelle immediately lights up and runs to the cupboard on the far side of the room where her new whip is held safely in its velvet box.  

“Yes sir,” Alec says obediently as he trudges to the open space used for sparring.

“Can you at least admit to me you’re tired so I don’t feel like an idiot?” Jace hisses to him as he walks closely behind him.  

“You can’t feel it?  I’m surprised,” Alec says with a smirk in Jace’s direction.  “We’ve run four miles today on top of every other torture Hodge can think of.  Not to mention we were up until two last night.  Of course I’m fucking exhausted.”

“You’re sick,” Jace says suddenly, realizing why he feels so off today without a real cause.  “Your throat hurts and yoru body aches.  You’re sick.  Why didn’t you tell Hodge?  I wondered why you weren’t miles ahead of me during laps today.”

“Shut up,” Alec says lowly, even though Hodge wasn’t anywhere near them.  “It’s just a cold.  I’ll be fine.  This whole you reading my emotions thing is annoying.”

“Not like I’m good at it,” Jace sighs as he takes his place across the circle from Alec.  “You ready for this? I’ll go easy on your sickly ass.”

“Sick or not I can still whoop your ass,” Alec says confidently and if he smirked one more time Jacee was going to have to kill him, or himself.  Alec silently counted down and then they were going at it with everything they had.  Jace lived for the sparring and the physical, tangible way of touching Alec as much as he wanted without needing an excuse of any kind.  He loved the way he cound anticipate Alec’s moves as easily as his parabatai anticipated his.  They were the only two that could truly challenge one another in this way.  Jace had beaten Hodge soundly last week, and then promptly Alec had pinned him only moments later.  

Over the last half an hour they were going at it Jace only pinned Alec once to the mat while Alec slammed him for the third time into the mat.  Jace beat Alec at everything else, but hand to hand combat was his weakness.  It was probably at least partly because Jace is incredibly distracted with Alec pressed against him like that.  He looks up into Alec’s hazel eyes and for the millionth time thought about how beautiful he was.  His eyes darted to Alec’s lips several times and that was when Jace realized they were actaully alone in the training room.  He has no idea where Hodge had stolen Izzy off to, but the room was empty and Alec wasn’t moving from his position on top of him.  His hand was on Jace’s chest while the other held both his wrists.  Their legs and hips were pressed together snugly and he couldn’t stop looking at Alec’s full lips inches from his own.  Alec is panting above him and Jace can feel his breath on his face and for some reason it was driving him crazy.  They were both sweating profusely with Alec’s knee between his thighs and this position was actually quite ridiculous.  

“You let me win,” Alec says lowly as he licks his lips a few times.  Jace seriously wants to strangle him.  

“I was distracted,” Jace replies, not even remotely lying.  “I didn’t exactly let you win.”

“What the fuck could have distracted you?” Alec asks with a tiny smile.  “We’re literally alone in a room full of mats.”

Damn Alec Lightwood and his gorgeous….everything.

“My shoulder is starting to ache,” Jace replies instead of answering, feeling the twinge start to matter.  Alec seems to come back to himself and lets him up.  His parabatai still sits close enough to touch as they catch their breath.  Jace hates him and hates how his heart won’t stop racing since Alec is so close still and he can smell him so vividly, his aftershave permanently etched in his brain as the best smell in the world.  

“You okay?” Alec asks, likely getting mixed emotions through their bond and Jace never thought about how annoying it would be to have someone have an open book to his emotions.

“I’m good,” Jace says.  It isn’t the full truth, but he can’t say it’s exactly a lie either.  He is good as long as Alec is next to him, but the torture lies in that he can never be as close as Jace wants him to be.  “Do we dare go shower?  I don’ t know if I can do anything else today.”

“Pretty sure Izzy charmed him to let her out of training, so I”m gonna say let’s go for it.”  Alec reaches a hand out to help him up and once again they end up with their faces inchest apart.  Jace’s lips ache from how much he wants to kiss Alec in this moment.  He wants to feel Alec’s heart beating under his hands and feel his breath on his face for an entirely different reason.  

He doesn’t kiss Alec in the training room, even if his body is aching with the effort of holding back.  He doesn’t , but by the Angel does he want to.

~~

Five years go by and Jace wishes he could say his feelings were under control, but instead they grew by leaps and bounds.  They were eighteen and their lives were crazy.  Alec barely spoke to anyone these days, including him.  He had saved a mundane girl, turned Shadowhunter, and for some reason Alec wouldn’t even speak to him beyond their duties and during hunts.  Clary was spunky, fun, and fed his reckless side but she wasn’t Alec.  She didn’t bring him the peace he needed in his life.  Now that Valentine had reared his head all over again his nightmares were back once again.  He woke up alone and instead of someone coaxing him back to sleep he now went out to train before anyone else was up.  Alec always arrived shortly after he did, no doubt feeling him through the rune, but he never said a word to him about it.  

“Why are you sitting here cleaning blades with me?” Clary asks one night as they sit in the weapons room cleaning arrows and seraph blades.  Jace doesn’t let Clary touch Alec’s bow or his arrows as he cleans them meticulously, like somehow that would make their rift smaller.  “Isn’t this grunt work?  You’re the elite around here.”

“Nothing wrong with going back to the basics,” Jace says dully, hoping the rhythmic motions of cleaning will help his mind clear.  “Plus, you might do it wrong.”

“Did Alec send you in here to watch me clean things?  Seriously?” Clary asks with outrage in her voice.  “Does he really think I’m that much of an idiot? I can’t believe you two share a soul.  At least you’re decent to me.”

“Watch your mouth” Jace warns, voice low and menacing.  He only ever lost patience with Clary when she spoke poorly of Alec, and it happened more and more often the more awful his parabatai was to her.  

“Alec hates me,” Clary pouts, looking like a spoiled toddler in the moment and Jace could scarcely grasp just how much she had left to learn.  

“Alec hates everyone right now.” Jace responds.  “If he’s barely talking to me, then he isn’t talking to anyone else.”

“Just because he’s emotionally stunted and doesn’t know how to deal with a crush,” Clary scoffs as she sets another blade carefully where it belongs.  

“Alec doesn’t have a crush,” Jace says dismissively as he carefully finishes the last of his brother’s arrows and places them exactly where Alec likes them.  

“Wait, you don’t know?” Clary sounds impatient and her green eyes were fixed on him and wide in shock.  “You share a bond through your soul and you don’t know he’s in love with you?”

Jace sits there reeling, his head a complete mess and his heartbeat pounding in his ears.  She wasn’t right, couldn’t be.  There was no way she could know something that intricate about his parabatai when he didn’t.  Alec didn’t love him, couldn’t love him.  He made this oath with Alec to tie their souls together because he would never feel that way.  It was the only way he lived with himself the last six years every time he’s in Alec’s arms and never wants to let go.  The love he felt for Alec was destroying him slowly, and in a fucked up way that’s how he knew it was actually real.  It was the way Valentine taught him.  If it was something that destroyed you in a way you thought you would die, well that was love.  

“Alec doesn’t like men,” Jace says and only by careful self control did he control his hands from shaking as he finished up the last blades.  “You shouldn’t talk about stuff like that around here.  That’s dangerous with how the Clave is.”

“He may not like men, but he does like you.” Clary says confidently as she tossed the towel to the side and stood up.  “That’s why he’s been so moody probably.  You’re spending a lot of time with me.  SInce you assume he likes girls, I’m sure he assumes the same about you.”  She goes back to her rooms with a wave and a goodnight, hardly knowing that she had turned his world around.  

The next day Jace convinces himself to just tell Alec how he feels.  That maybe telling him will end this rift between them.  They can both stop being jealous of things that don’t exist.  He joins his brother and Izzy in the training room and before he can say a word Lydia Bramwell appears and they are announcing their marriage.  Jace once again is left with his heart breaking as he tries to read Alec as easily as he once had.  He can’t of course because they haven’t really spoken in days and everything is off with them and mostly awful.  

“You were supposed to tell them no,” Izzy snaps at their brother before turning away and stalking off.  Jace has no idea what slips between his numb lips before he follows her.  They end up in her room and he pulls his knees up to his chest on her bed.  

“He is such an idiot,” Izzy rants with hands on her slender hips, walking between the bed and the window.  

“What did you mean?  Who was he supposed to say no to?” Jace asks her, and is impressed that his voice stays so even when inside he is a falling apart mess.  If Clary just didn’t say anything last night he would have coped with this, but now the doubt in his mind won’t leave his heart alone.  

“Mom and Dad want him to marry someone the Clave has a high opinion of so we can keep the Institute in the family,” Izzy says in a heavy voice.  “He is an idiot and going along with their stupid plans.”

“He…” Jace clears his throat which causes Isabelle to give him a look.  “He might like her Iz.  She’s beautiful and smart and good at her job.  They seem to be friends.”

“Except she’s the fucking wrong gender,’ Izzy says with a roll of her eyes.  Jace’s heart stops for the third time in the last twenty-four hours and there’s no way that can be healthy.  That was the second person to say that Alec didn’t like girls, without even the slightest hesitation.  He may not trust Clary’s opinion of Alec, but he did trust Izzy.  

“I need to go,” Jace mutters as he darted out of her bedroom.  Isabelle was too angry to really even notice his hasty exit.  He walks quickly through the halls he calls home and tries to lock away the part of his brain screaming at him to go find Alec and tell him already.  Tell him the things he’s kept in his heart for six years.  Tell him that he can’t live without him, and that it has nothing to do with the rune on his hip.  He went to his usual spot to brood and he found Alec already there.  They did freakishly share a brain sometimes.  

Jace wanted to kiss him so bad….but not like this.

Not with Alec looking like the world is on his shoulders and has beaten him until he’s given up completely.  He knows that nobody except their totalitarian mother approved of this engagement and that Alec craves approval from others like air, even when he certainly never needs it.  Jace walks closer slowly and Alec’s bright hazel eyes caught his own and Jace quickly sat next to him and pulled him into a hug.  Alec isn’t crying, and maybe that makes it worse somehow.  This wasn’t fair, and if he didn’t like women then this marriage would do nothing but torture him the rest of his life.  

“You don’t have to do this,” Jace whispers him as he strokes his hair gently, away from any prying eyes of the Institute.  “But if you do, then I will treat her like she’s the love of your life.  I’m here for you Alec, no matter what.”

“Thank you Jace,” Alec says hoarsely as he hangs onto him tightly.  “I have to do this for the Institute, for our family.  If we lose the Institute we lose the only home we’ve ever known.  I’m not going to let that happen.”

“Do you love her?” Jace asks, if only to torture himself a bit more.  He knows this won’t do anything except hurt him either way the cookie crumbles.  If Alec says yes then it will feel like a stab to his already tender heart, and if Alec says no then it will feel like drowning in water so thick he can hardly move.

“No,” Alec says with his eyes closed and his lower lip between his teeth.  Jace rubs his back and hopes he can do something to make this not so torturous.  

“If you decide to do something for yourself this time, I”m here for that too.”  Jace hates how much he loves Alec’s muscles under his hands and he had started dreaming of bare skin under his hands and those runes under his tongue, tracing intricate patterns into his skin.  He bites his own lip harshly and forces his mind to forget those late night fantasies.  He couldn’t kiss Alec until he was sure.  Until they both were absolutely sure this was what they wanted.  

~~

Jace keeps himself busy the morning of Alec’s wedding to Lydia by making sure everything was getting done and he was everywhere but where Alec was.  He didn’t know how he was about to feel watching Alec on that altar with someone else, but he really didn’t want to find out until it was happening and hopefully the sight of Maryse and Robert would help keep him the fuck together.  He was avoiding Izzy as well, in case she had learned to read him as well as she read Alec.  Nobody knew his feelings, and he would do his best to keep it that way.  The one thing Valentine had taught him to a fault was how to hide his feelings from everyone else.  

Before he knew it Alec was in front of him standing by the altar and Jace was straightening the lapels of his jacket somewhat unnecessarily.  The crowd was already gathered and even though they had made up from their feud last night, Jace feels like things are off with his parabatai.  .

“Alright, you ready for this?” Jace asks as he hides his shaking hands behind his back.  Alec is getting married today and then that will be the end of chances.  He will be a married man and if Jace were to do anything it would not only break his parabatai bonds and oaths, they would break marriage ones as well.  He feels a knot in his stomach and it aches like nothing he’s ever felt before.

“As ready as I’m gonna be.” Alec replies, looking a bit nervous but nothing like the torture Jace was going through.  Alec may like men, but that didn’t mean he felt anything for a man in particular.  He tries to smile, but it falls a tad short.   “I’m glad you’re here with me.”

“Wouldn’t be anywhere else.” Jace squeezes his arms for a second before letting go and taking his dutiful place behind his parabatai to wait for his bride to show up.  He feels absolutely sick to his stomach as he watches this unfold in front of him.  He feels tears spring to his eyes and he hopes everyone will just take it that he’s so happy for his parabatai on the biggest day of his life.  

Then, Magnus Bane bursts in the room just as the rune to finalize everything is about to be placed on Alec by Lydia’s delicate hand.

Jace wishes that he would have been the one Alec was grabbing and kissing like that.  It’s a kiss that looks full of unspoken passion and longing.  It lasts what feels like an eternity as Jace is fixed to the spot.  He wonders what he ever did to deserve this form of torture.  

He didn’t kiss Alec, and Magnus Bane beat him to it.

~~~

Life is not destined to be kind to him it would seem as months fly by and the only thing that happens is getting kidnapped by Valentine and tortured for a few months.  He’s grateful he has been banished from the Institute, but not so grateful he’s wound up staying with Magnus.  He has no idea  what has been happening between the warlock and his parabatai the last few months, but he wasn’t ready to find out.  

Jace slowly sits up from bed and grits his teeth against the pain that radiated from his ribs that have so far been the slowest to heal.  He was mostly just exhausted all of the time and if he ever ventured out of this room he laid on the couch to watch a movie with Magnus.  He didn’t want to like Magnus, he really didn’t.  For all he knew Alec was in love with him and they were close to the marriage step themselves.  Shadowhunters fell fast and normally for good.  He was about to hobble out since he hears Magnus in the kitchen when he hears a knock on the door.  It was probably some client and Jace was not in the mood to deal with strangers  He pauses with a hand on the doorjamb and the other on the knob to see if whoever had come was here to stay.  

“Magnus,” Alec’s voice was piercing to him and Jace felt a flash of joy through his rune and his knees were threatening to buckle.  It would seem that the kiss at the wedding had lasted all these weeks and now Alec was here at his loft.  He didn’t pay close attention to their words, but he listened to the tones of their voices and wanted to die.  They both sounded so damn happy and warm towards one another as they talked quietly in the direction of the couches.  Once the voices stop Jace lets himself flop back on the bed and tries to ignore the pain in his heart and throbbing through his body.  The pain won’t let up and he rolls carefully on his side to bury his face in the plush pillows and lets the tears finally come that he never wants to let fall.  He cries for the way his heart keeps being broken over and over again.  He cries because of the pain he can’t escape asleep or awake.  He cries for the confusion and pain of the last few weeks that won’t stop assaulting him.  For the first time since he’d been a child he lets himself sob openly where nobody would hear him.  

He’s crying so hard that he doesn’t hear the door open or the quiet footsteps of the warlock over to his bed. He doesn’t hear Alec at the door, asking if he’s alright or Magnus telling him to give him space.  Jace only notices he isn’t alone when Magnus touches his shoulder gently.  He flinches away from the soft touch at first before relaxing a bit even though his cheeks heat up.  

“I brought you something for pain,” Magnus says softly as he hands him a vial of a purple potion that Jace vaguely recognizes as what he’s been taking the last few days.  He takes it with a shaking hand and downs it in one gulp, trying to keep a straight face at the awful taste.  Magnus swings his feet up on the bed and reclines against the pillows.

“What are you doing?” Jace asks in confusion.  “Alec is waiting for you out there.”

“Actually he’s here to see you,” Magnus corrects him mildly as he clicks his fingers to make a television appear at the foot of the bed, rising from the dresser effortlessly.  “I told him you needed some space for a while.  He’ll come back in the morning.”

“He isn’t living here yet?” Jace asks with a touch of bitterness as he curls into himself.  He really wants to be alone so he can feel this pain and have it be over with.  He feels the sobs wanting to rise again as he thinks about Alec living here with the warlock.  Kissing him and loving him and showing him the smile he had only ever shown himself and Izzy in the past.  

“Why would he be living here?” Magnus asks with his brows furrowing and confusion on his face.  “Blondie, what do you think is between your brother and I?”

“He’s in love with you.” Jace tries not to choke on the words, but the tears were still pressing and they slipped down his nose as he ducked his head and tried to make them stop before Magnus saw how weak he was.  

“Oh Jace,” Magnus says softly and the sheets rustle as he lays a hand on Jace’s bare back and guides him to lay down.  Jace isn’t strong enough yet to fight him off but he lets out a whine as Magnus shuffles closer and puts his arms around him.  He likes Magnus well enough, but only Alec had ever held him.  Only Alec had ever seen him cry.  He wants to tell Magnus to tell Alec to come back, but at the same time he isn’t ready to see Alec yet.  He doesn’t know how to be around Alec yet, when thoughts of him were the only thing keeping him sane on Valentine’s torture ship.  Magnus is rubbing his back softly and it all felt so wrong that all he wanted was Alec, but he couldn’t very well tell Alec what was causing his sobs and he hated lying to his parabatai.  “Jace, darling, I’m not dating your brother.”

“What?” Jace hiccuped softly as he was trying to stop crying, honestly he was.  His body just didn’t want to cooperate.  The medicine always worked quickly to make him quite out of it and his body quickly relaxed into Magnus’s warmth.  

“I’m not dating your brother,’ Magnus says again, but it didn’t make any more sense than the first time he said it.  

“You kissed himi at the wedding.  You.. you two like each other?” Jace says, though he wasn’t so sure this time.  

“I did kiss him,” Magnus agrees, seemingly happier now that he was calm and laying against him.  “That doesn’t mean we’re in love.  Alexander is a surprisngly good actor.”  Jace felt his own face contort in confusion.  “Jace, your brother and I became friends months ago, good friends rather quickly.  I am attracted to your brother, but he only has eyes for you.  It was quickly obvious that he was crazy about you and that’s what the memory demon told him as well.  He was confused and upset, but never attracted to me.  I couldn’t let him marry Lydia like that when he didn’t love her.  I showed up to stop the wedding, without much of a plan in mind if I’m being honest.  Your brother took it from there and kissed me quite thoroughly.  You’re a lucky man Mr. Herondale.”

“Alec loves me?” Jace mumbles as the medicine was taking over his will to stay awake and participate in this conversation fully.  “He really loves me?”

“He really does,” Magnus agrees as he turns on the TV, but didn’t move from holding Jace close.  Unfortunate Jace slips into sleep before he can think too much on that conversation.

~~

Jace hasn’t brought himself to talk to Alec still, even after he knows how Alec feels.  The fact that he returns his feelings is great, truly great.  There was still so many things to consider before they got a happily ever after.  There was the parabatai part of it which made it forbidden, and the fact that the Clave was not as progressive as they all may be.  Nobody would accept it and it would be an uphill battle from the very start.  Magnus keeps giving him disapproving looks for not so much as talking to Alec yet after weeks since they had spoken in the guest bedroom.  They were back to business as usual at the Institute, and Jace lets himself be comforted by routine.  

He never expects to see Alec up on the roof about to jump off.

He knows Alec has been hurting and confused thanks to the rune on his hip, but not to this extent.  Not enough to end his life.  Magnus told them it was all only due to a spell, but Jace didn’t believe it for a second as he sees Alec sitting on the floor crying and hiding his face in his hands with Magnus sitting at his side.  Jace feels unbelievable guilt as Magnus dismisses his sister, Clary, and his mother easily by saying Alec was having some emotional reaction to the spell.  Jace finds he can’t move, not with Alec in this state.  

“Shh, darling, you’re okay,’ Magnus says soothingly and Jace wonders how the hell he is so good at that.  How can be be better at comforting Alec than he is?  Alec was the other half of his soul and still Jace can’t find words to say.  

“I can’t anymore Magnus,’ Alec sobs softly and the words break Jace’s heart further.  “I can’t feel like this anymore.  I can’t feel this for him.”

“You won’t forever,” Magnus promises him with a kiss to his head.  Jace shifts awkwardly and the glare was unmatched by anything he’d seen before as Magnus looked over at him.   “I thought I told everyone that Alec and I needed a moment alone.”

“I can’t leave,’ Jace says in a voice barely above a whisper as he hugs his arms around himself.  “I can’t leave him like this.  I...  I want to talk to him.”

“Oh, now you want to talk to him?” Magnus asks scathingly, and it’s no less than what he absolutely deserves

“It’s okay,” Alec says.  His face was now dry of tears but the look in his hazel eyes told Jace this was far from the first time Alec had cried over this.  He bites at his lips and slowly walks forward so he can sit next to Alec against the low wall that Alec was standing on just a minute ago.  “Magnus, it’s okay.  Let me talk to Jace.”

“I’ll be right outside,’ Magnus squeezed his arm gently before gracefully and smoothly getting to his feet and leaving them alone on the roof.  The silence is a heavy one as they sit for a minute and let the wind be the only noise between them.

“This isn’t about the spell,” Jace says quietly as he feels the ache through his bond worsen a little as they sit here.  He has no idea if touching Alec will hurt or help in this situation.  They had been avoiding this moment for over six years and now it was here.  Jace has to just tell him how he feels, has to let him know that Alec isn’t alone in this.  He needs to stop holding them both back from what they want.  

“It isn’t,” Alec agrees quietly, his voice hitching on sobs still in his throat.  “I… I haven’t been okay for a while.”

“I know,” Jace says quietly.  He’s felt Alec’s anguish and decided to ignore it.  It was easier than trying to confront all these feelings between them that neither of them asked to feel, but had attacked them relentlessly anyways.   “I should have….well, I should have done something.”

“There’s nothing you can do,” Alec says miserably as he stares at his knees again.  “I… I have to figure out how to live with this.  I’m sorry that I feel like this.  It isn’t right or normal and I know it’s forbidden.  I can’t lose you, not like my father lost his parabatai-”

“Alec, come on, I”m not like your asshole of a father,’ Jace cut in and he stopped the barriers that they both put up to grip his arm and letting his hand trail down to Alec’s to squeeze it tightly.  “I’m nothing like that and you’re never going to lose me.  Not even if the rumors about me and Clary were true and I was madly in love with her.”  They shared a grin at the ridiculous thought that Clary could be with him when she was so obsessed with their sister.  “Alec… You’re my parabatai.  You’re the most important person in the world to me.  I.  Alec, you’re not alone in this.  You will never be alone, but you aren’t the only one who feels this way.”

“What?” Alec was staring at him with a blank expression and with tentative hope in his eyes.  “Jace… do you know what you’re-”

“I’ve known for over six years,’ Jace says and his heart is pounding in his ears.  He looks at Alec and instead of the nerves getting worse they slowly calmed.  This was Alec, his best friend.  This was the person he had come to trust with all his secrets and all his fears.  Alec had never let him be alone, even when he deserved it.  Magnus had told him weeks ago that Alec was in love with him and right now Jace has no idea what had taken him so long to just sit here and look at Alec exactly like this.  Look at Alec the way he deserved to be looked at the rest of his life, as if he had hung the moon.  “I’m in love with you Alexander Lightwood.  I don’t care if it destroys me, but you would never do that.”

“I never would,’ Alec agrees as he places a hand on Jace’s cheek and the blonde can feel it trembling against his skin.  “I love you Jace, i”m in love with you.  I have been for what feels like forever.”

“I should have done this so fucking long ago,” Jace mumbles as he finally lets his lips crash on Alec’s like some kind of tidal wave.  He kisses Alec like that boy has always deserved to be kissed.  It’s rough and hurried and messy and somehow perfect.  Alec smells like home and Jace can feel their hearts beat as one as one hand rests on the side of Alec’s neck and the other is on his waist.  

He finally kisses Alec Lightwood, and nothing has ever felt so right.  

[thatkatiecooney]

The 8 Steps of a CHARACTER ARC

You know that moment as a writer, when you've been charging through the story, high on how fantastic it is, and then suddenly. . .it all STOPS.  The next scene doesn't form in your head. You’ve got nothing. 

Behind your characters, a string of bright and captivating scenes mark the trail of that rocket of inspiration; ahead of your characters, a foggy expanse, stretching to who-knows-where, a few shapeless blobs that should be scenes floating in the nothingness. The rocket is dead, and not refueling any time soon.

Well, to everybody who's suffered this, or is currently suffering it, there's a way to navigate through that fog. A map. Directions and a destination.

Or, more specifically, events that form the underlying structure of the story. 

This post is going to focus on one facet of story structure: character arc. Structure is something people subconsciously recognize and expect, and if the story doesn't match those expectations, they feel cheated (though usually can't explain why). Every good story follows a structure. So if you know structure, you'll always know where to go next, and won't get lost in the fog. 

So here are the 8 steps of a character arc: 1) Hero: Strength, Weakness, and Need

This happens in the setup of the story, when the main character's ordinary world is being introduced. First, the main character's strengths must be displayed; we must be given a reason to like them, or if not exactly "like" them, empathize with them, and be fascinated by them. The reader needs to bond with the character, feel concerned about how it all turns out for them. Or in other words, feel that the main character is worth experiencing the story. There are easy traits that do this: courage, love, humor, being in danger, being unfairly treated, being highly skilled at something, having a powerful noble goal. (Courage is the one they all need. If the character doesn't have the gumption to actively pursue what they want, they are automatically a background character.) 

After this, still in the beginning of your story, let the character exhibit what needs to change. Show their weaknesses of character and self awareness. And lastly, hint at what they NEED to learn. Sometimes this is even stated to the character, and they don't understand it, refuse to believe it, or condemn it. Like "A Christmas Carol", when Scrooge's nephew says his speech about Christmas and how wonderful it is, and Scrooge replies "Bah Humbug!" 

2) Desire: This is the moment when the character knows what they need to pursue, in order to obtain what they inwardly want. It is not the inciting incident or catalyst, the event in a story that disrupts the ordinary world and calls the hero on an adventure. This is a separate step entirely, occurring after that catalyst has shattered life as the main character knows it. They believe obtaining this goal will calm whatever inner turmoil or conflict they're battling. And always, they're not quite right. Think of Mr Fredricksen: His goal is to get the house -- a  symbolic representation of Ellie and the life he shared with her -- to Paradise Falls, which he believes will heal his grief and guilt. It won't. Once he obtains it, the achievement feels hollow. But I'm getting ahead of myself. So on we go! 

3) Plan: Once in Act Two, the character is going to scramble for a plan of action. The inner want has solidified into a tangible goal, but they need a strategy to achieve it. This also spells out for the reader what to expect in that second act.  

4) Conflict: What's going to try stopping them? A hero with a goal is one thing, but to make it a story we need something that stands in the way. An obstacle. A force of opposition. If we didn't have obstacles, books would be as interesting as "Harry Potter and the Trip to the Grocery Store." (Although honestly, I'd probably read that.) After the catalyst has changed everything, after the character crosses the threshold into Act Two, everything from here on out will be laden with conflict. This is usually when enemies, or more accurately forces of opposition, begin to appear. Everything is accumulating to complicate the main character's pathway to achieving what they want. The forces of opposition come from not only the villains, but from the actions that have to be taken to achieve the desire. Whatever this action is, it's exactly what the main character is not suited to do, an action that pressures their flaws, exposes them to exactly what they need to become but can't right now. 

Like Stitch being forced to be the family dog. He’s not suited to this task.

5) Battle: The forces of opposition are amping up, growing stronger, fighting with greater intensity. The main character is taking the punches and working around them, relentlessly plowing forward. Hero and allies are usually punching back too.

6) Midpoint: This is the event where they first encounter what they need to learn, what they need to become. Something happens that forces them to behave in this new, life-saving way. But once they've seen it, they don't know what to do with this knowledge. 

7) Dark Night, Revelation, Choice: This is always the darkest point in the story, where all seems lost, and death -- of a literal or spiritual nature -- is in the air. And in this moment, something usually happens that makes the main character wake up to what is wrong, and what they need. More often than not, this revelation will arrive from the "love story" or relationship of the plot, and will be the thing that helps them pull themselves out of despair and see the light. And once this is uncovered, once the revelation of the truth about themselves is recognized, they are faced with a choice. Of course, they've been faced with choices in every beat of every scene, but this is the big choice that is going to determine if their story has a happy ending or a tragic one. The choice is this: "You are being faced the truth that you need to heal. Are you going to choose what you need, let your old self die, and become someone better?" And always, always, always this is a hard choice. The revelation must be significant to them. And it's never easy. It can't be. We don't write stories about heroes who make easy choices. Villains have it easy. Are you going to adopt this new way of living, adopt this truth, and let your old self die? Or are you going to stay the way you are (which feels safer and is much less challenging) but end up stuck in a sort of living death? Most of the time, of course, they choose the right thing. 

This moment is usually always the saddest scene in the thing. Like this scene with Stitch.

8) New Life: This is their changed life. After experiencing the trials of the story, after realizing what they need and choosing to be reborn, they are going to be different people -- and are going to live a different life. This is what follows the statement "And every day after . . ." What has changed? Show the audience how things are different, how things are better, because they want to see that. This is the resolution, the wrapping up of everything we've been through with the main character, and having this in the story is often what gives that feeling of satisfaction after seeing a really well-told story. 

So! To show off how this works, I've chosen the character arc of Carl from Up. 

1) Hero: Strengths, Weakness, Need

Strengths: Reasons to like Carl are packed into that heartbreaking opening sequence. By the end of it, we love him, love Ellie, and are crying our eyes out.

Weaknesses: Now Carl is curmudgeonly, grumpy, cold, and won't pay attention to a living soul. He's also plagued by grief, regret, guilt, and loneliness. (Which we are all 100% okay with, because we already like him.)

Need: He needs Russel. The statement of what he needs to learn isn't outright said (as it will be later) but Russel represents it. 

Step Two: The catalyst was when a truck knocked down Ellie's mailbox, Carl hit a construction worker in the head with his cane, and for this a judge declares him a public menace and orders him to go to Shady Oaks Retirement Village. The DESIRE is this moment. 

Carl escapes in a flying house, thousands of balloons lifting him skyward. He even says the desire of the whole story out loud, "So long boys! I'll send you a postcard from Paradise Falls!" The tangible goal is "live out the rest of his days in his and Ellie's house, on the edge of Paradise Falls, South America." ("It's like America . . . but South.")

Step Three: The plan and the conflict overlap, as they are wont to do. We have a scene where Carl is unfurling sails, setting a compass, and settling back in his chair for a smooth journey. But later on, after some conflict has arrived, we have Russel figuring out how to actually make it there. And after even more conflict has arrived, we have him telling Russel "We're going to walk to the falls quickly and quietly, with no rap music or flash-dancing."

Step Four: The moment he settles back into his armchair, high above the city, and here's a knock on the front door, nothing is going to be easy for Carl. First, we have opposition in the form of Russel. Then we have a storm. Then the house lands miles away from the Falls, so they'll have to walk it. Then we have Kevin, the giant bird. Then we have Dug. Which means they're also being chased by a legion of talking dogs. Which brings us to Muntz, the main villain, and Carl's shadow -- the representation of Carl's flaws, and the consequences of refusing to let go of the past. 

Step Five: This is the trek to the Falls. It's also the battle with every complication that arises. And it's also exactly what Carl is not suited to do. He's a curmudgeonly old guy, bent on living out the rest of his life alone. Well, the story says "Nope, Carl, that's not how it's going to be" and promptly gives him a surrogate grandson to take care of, a dog who adores him, and even a giant mythical bird. And he has to lead them all, if he's going to get to the Falls. 

Step Six: The moment when Russel invades Carl's heart. Which is what he needs, but he doesn't understand. (I have the scene beated out in the previous post.)

Step Seven: Finally, he gives in to the worst of himself and chooses his goal of living in his broken house on the edge of Paradise Falls. But somehow this doesn't feel like victory. He's still alone, next to Ellie's empty chair, and she is still beyond his reach. 

He picks up her adventure book, and leafs through the photographs, missing her; he pauses on the page scrawled with the words "Stuff I'm Going To Do", lets his hand rest on it, grief and regret overwhelming him. He begins to close the book, and the page shifts . . . revealing the edge of another picture. Surprised, he turns the page. It's their wedding picture.

Ellie added picture after picture of their happy marriage, the whole wonderful life they shared, all the things she did. And on the bottom of the last page is her last message to him: "Thanks for the adventure! Now go have a new one! Love, Ellie." Exactly what Carl needs. He doesn't need to be guilty, he doesn't need to regret the past. The past was beautiful, and she will never truly leave him. 

Choice: So, Carl can make the choice to throw everything out of the house to go save Russel. 

New Life: Sitting on a curb, eating ice cream with Russel.

In the credits, we see a whole new life -- or new adventure -- with Carl, Russel, Dug, and even a bunch of new puppies.

So, it's actually pretty simple. And once again, it's fun to develop your own stories like this, but it's surprisingly fun to analyze movies and books with it too. It improves your storytelling ability, I've found. Practice makes perfect.

I hope this post helps somebody out. It'll make the ten times I cried while writing it, while watching scenes from Up, worth it.

[hotcoffeeandbreakfast]

Two cold snaps in New Orleans and I am already disappointed I’m not getting a full Fall. Does anyone else associate the overwhelming influence of weather to a person’s mood? I wonder only because I spent most of the summer melting into a puddle inside of the koi pond house. The outdoors looked enticing, until I stepped out onto the deck to let Layla out — even she has been less than thrilled to spend time in the sunshine. On top of blistering light, heat so pooling you could drown in douses you. A day’s gorgeousness is only alluring on the surface; we are kept inwards, indoors during summer days to avoid exhaustion. And I want to feel alive.

The recent trip Neil and I took to Colorado changed my mind about the way I am rooted. I have always strongly believed that I am devoutly Louisiana in a subtly obnoxious way, unwilling to give up the peculiar looks one receives when you say, “I’m from Louisiana.” Y’all know, we’re special. If you’ve ever crossed Henderson Swamp with me, you’ve been asked, “Is there anything more gorgeous than the swamp?” because I truly think it’s a masterpiece of wonder. Such weighted darkness lives in the swamp, so the contrast of the crisp, chilling Rockies pierces me, steadily present.; as if my soul reached the correct temperature. I still feel the cool air, lingering at the back of my throat. I’ve been telling myself for two weeks now that I’m not dealing with the normal sinus infection you get when you’ve been in a foreign climate, that instead it is delicious leftover mountain air refusing to diffuse in my lungs. This thought has made me sad, haunted my dreams; I don’t think I have ever fallen so hard for a place, I can’t get the feel out of my mind.

  Louisiana friends that migrated northwest for longer than the winter: I get it. Colorado is a magical, sun-kissed, heaven-on-earth  state and I am currently trying to figure when/how I will be able to have a small piece of it. It’s all I can think of!

When I was a kid, my parents brought me to Alaska, Maine, and all over Canada. Did I love those trips? Absolutely. Seeing a glacier as a twelve year old is definitely the dopest thing anyone in your class did all summer. Unless they got to lick the glacier, that would be different. Do I remember instantly falling in love with these places? No. Winding up and down the side of the Rocky Mountains, which seemed to be continuously growing larger as we drove…well, that is something to fall in love with, to be humbled by. — AND FEAR!!! I screamed for at least an hour going up, louder after I saw the runaway truck ramps. –Neil will tell you that the second we took off on our six hour road trip from Denver to Telluride  all I could talk about was how immediately overwhelmed with inspiration I was. I sat in vocalized awe at the size of these massive, ever stretching mountains. The popping of my ears didn’t even bother me, my eyes were too busy to be bothered.

My previous encounters with Colorado-type terrain consisted of appreciating from afar, and I’m lucky enough to say that I’ve seen some beautiful places. I purposefully got lost in the Muir Woods once, a stunt my parents did not appreciate. The tour we were on wasn’t spending long enough in each area, which meant I was missing the opportunity to take an obscene amount of crappy photos (I was an avid disposable camera photographer). As soon as I heard we were loading up, I ran back to my favorite place for just one more picture, a little further than I remembered. “THE BUS IS LEAVING WITHOUT US TIFFANYJO,” my dad hollered at me as a ranger walked toward me. “IT’S A STUMP!” I could hear his frustration, I could see the ranger’s slight amusement, but was busy snapping pictures, winding as fast as I could. I needed to document this tree, dammit! This particular topiary had died, it’s stump indicating long life among beautiful friends; it devastated me. Though I honestly do not remember noticing in the Redwoods how the fresh air affected my breath and my brain, I remember feeling surrounded by friends in that moment too. I had several beautiful, refreshing, and daringly connective moments with the Pacific Ocean the handful of times we went out to whale watch while visiting British Colombia, that was life changing, yes. But never, in my adult travel experience, have I felt so nearly unhesitatingly changed.

Even on the 13,500 ft., 4 star, wildly vertical Wasatch Trail, I noticed a difference in the way I was fighting for my breath, the way I was thinking about it and physically doing it. Was I cursing Neil out in my head for encouraging a group of mostly new hikers on such an advanced trail? Yes. We endured forty-four switchbacks on shaky legs and empty stomachs. Had we taken that exact same hike under Louisiana climate conditions…..well lets just say it would have taken a considerably longer and we would have all been naked from heat and humidity by the end of it. Colorado was kinder to us. We stopped for breaks every thirty minutes or so,  all willing to kept going. We would be lined up on the trail, looking forward and back at each other after someone asked, “How much further?” No-one wanted to say, “I’ve seen enough, lets turn around,” because IT WAS SO FCKING PRETTY, honestly bordering ostentatious beauty.

Thirteen miles and six hours later, we were all exhausted but so so happy. We each milled about the mountainside house, quietly reflecting on the day as we prepared dinner. What we ate, I can’t remember; I was distracted with the reel. I thought of the gold confetti that fell on us most of the way before we encountered our first patches of snow; of Layla eager to meet other dogs on Bear Creek Trail and at the rock garden; of specifically the rock garden and the reminder that so many others have walked this trail before us, for no other reason than to be close to nature, to bathe in the freedom she gives.

  I spent our entire first day hiking feeling as though floating up and down mountains in someone else’s dream, only able to muster enough focus to keep from tripping constantly. Ever little leaf called to me, the snow glimmered. I wanted to touch everything. Us Louisiana kids packed for temperatures around 56*-64* and we were definitely met with winter temps, so for my rickety knees to work properly, I had to keep moving. We crossed a ramshackle mining bridge to get to the “top of the waterfall” and felt every inch of our lives possibly being risked; Neil would randomly say, “THE WATERFALL! It’s worth it,” when he could feel us all dying. I didn’t know there was a possibility that we might actually slip and fall to our death (though what a place to be buried). That night ended up being the most magical sleep of my life.

  Cornet Creek Falls was absolutely the most fun hike because it was so involved (at least for me) and I was ready for it. The day of rest we took in between Wasatch and Cornet was crucial for me, and for Layla, to be able to enjoy the rest of the trip. Elevation punched me in the face in the best way!  When we got to Cornet’s water fall, I went crazy wild woman and just started climbing up the rocks as fast as I could. I felt wild, totally inspired by the wild that surrounded me. I still can’t find words supportive enough to label the sensation of climbing feeling totally natural, of sliding on your bare palms and feet to just keep from seriously scuffing something up. I was a tomboy growing up, a climber…but I never dreamed at nearly 30 I’d want to climb EVERY fourteener before forty. Red dirt was flinging everywhere, I think Layla’s paws will always have a little red in them now. After playing for about an hour at the fall, we made our descent back down the trail, taking time to swing on trees and roam a bit. Neil and Zach wanted to climb a little higher than I did in an area just off the trail, but we stopped where there wasn’t much room to really rest, so I had to wedge myself in to the safest spot I could manage, and wait. It was a misty meditation, regardless of how nervous I was to be potentially, literally flying solo. Heavier rocks eventually started tumbling down and I DIDN’T HAVE TIME TO ROLL MY EYES. I had to press as far back as possible (without losing my footing and my hold on Layla) and hope that the boys weren’t about to get tangled in the trees bending around me. The real challenge came on this day when the rain arrived; we were thankful it wasn’t heavy rain but it was plenty cold which oddly motivated us to move faster on the way down! I immediately took a nap when we got home, and woke up to real, fresh, fluffy, falling snow. SNOW THAT STICKS! My mind was blown. 234567890th time in less than a week — was I dead and just reeling? No, this was tangible.

We finished up our trip with what seemed like a leisurely walk to Bridal Veils Falls, a truly breath taking experience at a pace that felt like a lazy river in summer.

  Layla often led the way on our hikes, excited by each step and smell and challenge by her favorite element. It was amusing to see the retriever that normally wants to lay around all afternoon practically sprint up these trails. She pushed herself yet seemed content no matter how long we adventured.  We encountered quite a few animals, though none as majestic as the giant elk that showed up in the DRIVE WAY after an afternoon house nap. Her spirit is not the same in Louisiana, and I absolutely feel her on it. Sometimes when she’s asleep and looks like she’s dreaming, I wonder if she’s dreaming of the next mountain or set of squirrels.

ya know…just talking a walk. 

The continuous, perpetual summer of the south removes the presence of change, therefore, we remain the same. I will never not be completely fascinated from this experience forward with the way my surroundings moved me. Louisiana motivates you to either get where you’re going in a hurry, as to avoid a sweaty, sticky mess, or to embrace the heat and move slowly, never feeling completely dry. To be brief, this year has been a whirlwind of movement, and while I’ve had quiet moments, I haven’t spent much time mentally celebrating the beauty that’s unfolding. My spirit set its wild self loose among the Rockies and will be, from here on out, totally unsatisfied with stones unturned.

The spirit can plant roots anywhere (this we know) and while I have blushed and  inwardly rolled my eyes at those that have called me “free spirited,” I think the definition is clearer now, though I still feel the term is often too blanketed. “Wanderlust” is okay, but I don’t immediately picture myself twirling in a field or ascending a mountain. — I think of Paul Rudd’s epic pep-talk in one of the funniest movies Jennifer Aniston ever pulled off. — I’m not bohemian enough to claim anything other than righteously curious and uncontrollably fascinated by the natural world around me. My continuous thought throughout the trip, a moment that pinches me just the way the cold Telluride morning would, is with me as I recount the moments now: I can climb a little longer.

And so can you.

Be affected by the world around you. Allow yourself celebration, healing, experience. YOU ARE WORTH YOUR DREAMS.

I want to take this hammock all over the world with you Neil!!! Let’s see everything together. ❤

Here’s a song from an album I heard in my head while hiking through the Rockies:: Lit Me Up

the patient recounts her dream Two cold snaps in New Orleans and I am already disappointed I'm not getting a full Fall.

[veosullivan406]

I said I wanted to move to Montana...

Three weeks ago today, I left Georgia with my truck packed full of my clothes, my boots, my saddle, two plants, and 2,003.8 miles ahead of me. In February, I accepted a job at the 320 Guest Ranch in Montana to work in their front office for the Summer 2017 season. Let me repeat that, I accepted a job in Montana. My childhood dream of living in Montana was a tangible reality the week before my 26th birthday.

I was overwhelmed with excitement and only a wee bit hesitant over the change. I had been praying and evaluating what accepting the position would mean for me in the weeks before I left and for the time after the work season was over. I'd have until October 15th to figure something out to allow me to stay in Montana rather than make the long trek back to Georgia. Granted, six months is a long time to spend in a place, and perhaps even before I hit the end of my tenure here, I'd be pining away for Georgia in all its splendid southern glory.

But somehow, I doubt that. I've been here three weeks and I'm already doing research on how to get an MT license and new MT tags for the truck.

I left dark and early at 4:00 AM on Wednesday, April 26th. Mom and Captain saw me off with a few tears and a hearty embrace. I had my GPS set for Sioux City, IA and plenty of snacks prepared so I could drive as far as I could only stopping to refuel. I knew leaving would be hard; actually those last few days before my departure were pretty emotional. I hadn't anticipated the outpouring of love and support from my family, friends, and members of the gym I'd worked at for six and a half years.

I did great driving until I hit Chattanooga and had to pull over to keep from falling asleep. One of the reasons I left in the early morning hours was so that I wouldn't fall asleep. But that monotonous drive after Chattanooga had lulled me to the point where my eyes crossed a few more times than I was comfortable with. I had to pull over and get a good stretch in before I continued on the road. I covered the edge of Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Illinois with decent time. Missouri, however, was long and wet. Once I passed under the Arch in St. Louis and rounded the city it was nothing but rain until Kansas City.  Cruise control was certainly my best friend on that leg of the trip. I grabbed dinner at Zoe's Kitchen in Kansas City, MO and turned northward to Sioux City, IA.

I29 is another long and monotonous stretch of highway that tested my patience. It was also turning cold and I was ready to be done driving. I did have one hiccup; Council Bluffs sent me the rest of the way to Sioux City with a speeding ticket. Thank you to the friendly, helpful, and understanding police officer who only wrote I was going 10 over in a construction zone... Whoops. There's a first time for everything, right?

Sioux City was in my sights after that and so was a lovely Airbnb room I had booked with intentions of a shower and an early bedtime. I was mindful of every speed limit sign after that - even more so than I was before - but kept the odometer cruising right along at the fastest I dared set it. I arrived a little after dark and knocked on the host's door around 8:30 PM. I was done with the first half of my journey; I'd be in Montana the next day. I set my alarm for 3:15 AM and was able to shut my brain off well enough to sleep soon after I slid under the sheets.

As well as I slept that night, my brain still rebooted around 3:00 AM and I was able to get dressed - more warmly than the day before - and get packed up and headed out at 3:58 AM. I have nothing against Iowa, but I wasn't upset about having to drive the remainder of the state in the dark. I kinda feel like I was able to get the gist of it from the day before. Sioux Falls, South Dakota was a happy juncture. Iowa may be directionally west of Georgia, but not as west as South Dakota felt. I left I29 and turned left onto I90 around 5:30 AM. I was on the direct route to Montana. I might have shed a tear. Which I quickly wiped away to focus on the drive. South Dakota welcomed me with a nice, stiff, constant headwind. Goodbye good fuel mileage, but hello the wide-open spaces of the West.

Sunrise greeted me from behind and lit my way to Mitchell where I stopped to fill up. I had the first real taste of the dry, western air at that point, which was also quite cool. I had left 70 degree weather back in Georgia and was headed straight into 40-something degree temperatures of late April in South Dakota and beyond. Despite the shock of it, I was actually pleased to feel the chill. It was familiar, and I had missed it.

South Dakota also felt a little repetitious. But not in the ways Missouri and Iowa had felt. It didn't bother me; the land would soon rise and fall in buttes and plateaus, and then rise and rise into mountains. Soon, the Wall Drug store signs began springing up, and all kinds of childhood memories came back to me. Backseat views of passing prairies listening to my walk-man, mom reading James Herriot with charismatic fervor in the front seat, and trying to spy John Dunbar's horse in the corral at the Wild West town were a few memories that came back to me in wonderful waves.

Something more climactic happens when you reach Chamberlain, SD and you begin the decent to the Missouri River crossing. I remember from all our treks across the country from Georgia to Montana that at that river crossing we knew we were in the west. After that point, the landscape begins to change dramatically and the realization of being in the homestretch really sets in. I'll admit to pulling over and letting a small flood of tears stream down my face. Tolkien's quote "Home is behind, the world ahead" came to the forefront of my thoughts. Here I was on the threshold of my childhood paradise which had become the home of my late 20's. Every mile beyond that point brought me increasing joy.

I had great weather leaving Sioux City even though it was chilly and a bit windy. I admired the Badlands from afar - poor planning on my part meant I had to stay on I90 instead of taking 240 through them - and made a pit-stop in Wall, SD. Rapid City, Sturgis, and Spearfish still had remnants of snow in some places - more so in Spearfish. Filling up there was brief to say the least. I also stopped at a two pump station with a casino in it. I didn't linger there long. From Spearfish I headed north to Belle Fourche so I could take 212 into Wyoming and on to Montana.

I hit the WY state line at 11:19 AM and the MT state line just after that. I most definitely cried tears of joy and a bit of disbelief. I had finally made it to Montana. I updated everyone of my progress, as had been my habit the entire trip. Of course I still had about five hours until I reached Big Timber, but all the responses were excited and congratulatory. Their support and encouragement was still strong and welcomed.

212 is a nice drive with plenty of wide vistas and a variety of landscape. It cuts off 100 miles of the journey, but consequently adds an hour to your trip time. Perhaps if it hadn't been raining, I would have enjoyed the drive more. But once I hit Broadus, the sun went AWOL and I was escorted by clouds until Ashland where they decided to pour rain on me.

I cannot say the drive from Ashland to Billings was enjoyable in the least. Mostly due to the rain and the actions of my fellow drivers - mainly the truck drivers. If I weren't dealing with the spray they kicked up from the road which sent my windshield wipers into a frantic tizzy, I was having them fly up and then ride my rear bumper because of another slow car in front of me - or, in several cases, another semi! I don't think I experienced a more stressful stretch of my journey as that one. Sure, I could have passed the slow vehicle...but no one thought putting their headlights on was a prudent choice in the pouring rain. Numerous cars surprised me when they came past the semi and then past me. Passing the slow poke was a no-go. I was not going to play blind chicken with any oncoming cars.

I90 came up fast after Busby. If I had been more aware, I might have ventured over the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument, but I was past it before I even knew it was there. Plus, it was still raining and I was running out of travel enthusiasm steam. I just wanted to reach Big Timber and get out of my truck. The rain was not helping either. I wanted to see Montana on my drive in and the dratted rain was forcing me to focus only on the road. All I could see was a 360 degree wall. No rolling prairie. No mountains.  I struggled to even see Billings when I crossed the Yellowstone - which was roaring with all the runoff. So I suppose that was an exciting sight. But I was still venting and pouting to family and friends that I was travelling in the rain.

I had to shut up and switch gears when I reached Columbus though. God hadn't forsaken me in any part of my journey, and He didn't fail me then. He parted the clouds over the Beartooths and my heart soared. They were standing off in the distance in all their magnificence and covered in more snow than I had yet seen on them. All the driving, shifting in my seat, hair-pulling traffic, aggravating drivers, energy drinks, early mornings, and each fuel stop made that view so worth it. And I knew from Columbus on would be a build up of excitement. Big Timber and the Crazies and my grandparent's ranch was only a short forty-five minutes away.

It spit rain on me here and there for the remaining forty miles or so, which I was thankful for as I reminded myself that it was washing the bug guts off the truck. But rounding that last curve before the first Big Timber exit, the Crazies met my gaze in all their snow-capped splendor and I was actually bouncing up and down in my seat with joy. Carefully, of course.

I turned off the interstate and headed towards the Fort to fill up with fuel. I notified my friends and family and social media outlets that I had made it to Point B - Big Timber, the long weekend stop before heading to Point C, Big Sky. I grabbed a bottle of wine and hit up my buddies. I sat in on what was supposed to be their band practice but it turned into a social catch-up. A lot of laughs later, I said goodnight, and made my way to bed. I fell asleep with the absolute delighted thought that I was finally in Montana and my solo adventure was just beginning.

V

05.17.2017

1