#and get yourself some angus young

[anyarose011]

Emotional Motion Sickness {Angus Tully x Reader}

Summary: When it's only you, your father, Mary, and Angus left behind at Barton for Christmas, you and the boy (who you were an asshole to, but in all fairness, he was one to you too) decide to get to know each other; whilst sneaking around the school.

Part 3 of ?? (Masterlist)

Warnings: Teddy Kountze (but not for long), swearing, underage drinking, mentions of past harassment, mention of pornography, and extremely long monologues that I think would be great audition material because I'm delusional :) .

Come get y'all juice (this shit was so much longer than I expected). This may be part 3 in the series, but this is part 1 of songs that are Agnus Tully/Reader coded. And also part 2 of you guys not being able to escape being an awkward teenager just because this is fanfiction. Enjoy!

Word Count: 7.1k

You didn’t talk to anyone the day after you told Angus Tully he didn’t have any friends (well…of course you talked to your father and Mary, but the boys? No; not even the freshmen).

It was warranted; you punched Teddy in the face, you ignored Jason, and Ye-Joon and Alex were probably afraid of you at that point. Angus had the biggest excuse of them all of course, and while you actually felt bad (to your own surprise), you couldn’t bring yourself to actually approach and apologize at the time. Call it pride, call it cowardice, but you suddenly felt so ashamed you couldn’t even speak to him.

So, save for the talks you had with Mary in preparing meals, the nighttime check-ins with your father, you kept your nose stuck in a book. You ignored Teddy’s glare (while also checking over your shoulder every time you passed by him), only gave slight nods to the younger boys, and Jason didn’t even bother talking to you about what he said the day before. Angus, apparently despite not talking to each other, had perhaps the most civilized of silent discussions with you. You would only make eye contact with each other…but somehow, just somehow, there was a bit of understanding between the two of you.

You also had given him your spare toothpaste along with his payment of chocolates and cigarettes for waking you up because you noticed that he was running low. He gave you this…look. Not one of disgust, but he was confused beyond belief, and you swore he was in his own little world as you talked about your reasoning and all he did was stare at you.

Weirdo.

The day after that, making it the sixth day of being stuck at the school, you were sitting on a stool in the kitchen, reading to Mary as she prepped for lunch. “‘Reader, I married him. A quiet wedding we had: he and I, the parson and clerk, were alone present. When we got back from church, I went into the kitchen of the manor-house, where Mary was cooking the dinner and John cleaning the knives, and I said— ‘Mary, have you ever been in love before?’”

You paused, looking up from your book and watching as the Mary in front of you was doing what the Mary in the book was doing; cleaning the knives. She glanced back at you upon your quietness, giving you the eye.

“And? What did she say?”

“I don’t know,” you shrugged. “I’m waiting for her to answer.”

Scoffing, she turned away. “You’re not that funny you know.”

“Yet you’re hiding your smile.”

“Am not.”

“Well have you?”

“Have what?”

“Been in love?”

She huffed. “I’m too sober for that conversation.”

“There’s some wine in the chapel-.”

Mary turned, pointing a knife at you. “-Don’t you dare.”

“What?! It’s not consecrated!”

“Still, you’re a baby, you can’t drink that stuff.”

“I’m going to technically graduate in a few months.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

Sighing overdramatically, you leaned against the wall. “Can you just give me a yes or no?”

She turned and headed back to the counter she was at, looking at you. “Yes, I’ve been in love before.”

“When you were young?”

“Am I not young now?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yes.” She began to chop vegetables.

“Was it scary?”

“Kind of.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “It happened later for me than most of my friends, so that’s probably why.”

Before you could ask another complex question, a humming noise caught your ear. You thought you were going insane at first until it had also apparently got Mary’s. After taking one glance at each other, you both followed the sound, and it led you to the nearest window.

Outside, in the sky, a yellow helicopter flew above you.

The next thing you knew, as you and Mary were rushing to the library to ask your father ‘What in God’s name is going on?’, you ran into everyone in the middle of the main hall, including a man you had never seen before.

Apparently, Jason’s father cracked and decided to come pick his son up for Christmas at the ski lodge. He also offered to take the rest of The Boys Left Behind. So, there you were after Mary left, deciding to stand outside with the rest of them as Jason, his dad, and your father sat in the administrative office, calling up everyone and their mother (quite literally).

“So, Hunham,” Teddy asked, his voice so grating you would rather claw your brain out with a fork than have to listen to him. “what’re you gonna do when all of us go skiing? Take some pictures?”

You shook your head, not letting it get under your skin. “No, I’ll probably spend time with Elise.”

“Elise?” The boys questioned.

“Yeah, we met in middle school.”

“Is she anything like you or is she pretty?” Teddy prodded.

Angus rolled his eyes. “I don’t think she’d really want to hang around a cesspool like you.”

Holy shit…he was actually standing up for you? Even after you told him he didn’t have any friends? Perhaps men hadn’t failed you completely (your most famous last words of this entire winter break…maybe not for the most part, but still).

You snorted, crossing your arms while still holding Jane Eyre. “It’ll be a cold day in hell before I let you meet her, Kountze.”

Before he could even attempt a comeback, your father came out through the door, and turned to the boys. “Well, good news gentlemen. I was able to reach Dr. Woodrup and your parents;” He glanced at Angus for a second. “Most of them, anyway. I recommend all of you go pack, have a merry Christmas.”

The rest of the boys, including Jason who exited with his dad, raced past one another; all except Angus. You could see how he tried to hide his growing disappointment and went to the first stage of grief; denial.

“Could you try them again?” He asked your father.

Paul Hunham took a deep breath. “Alright.” He turned to Jason’s father, both men uttering a ‘Merry Christmas’, before yours went back into the office. Leaving you outside with Angus.

He leaned against the wall, folding his arms. Well…this was your chance to try and be nice to him again.

“If they don’t pick up, just tell him to keep calling.” You suggested.

Angus looked at you, shrugging. “Yeah, that was my plan already.”

“I always annoy him until I get what I want. Usually works for me.”

“So why aren’t you in Copenhagen?”

“…You.” There was a silence between the both of you, and to your surprise, you had to bite your tongue not because of anger, but to stop yourself from laughing. You gave him a nod. “I hope you get to go skiing; even if Kountze will be there.”

Not giving him time to respond, you walked right past him to your room in the infirmary. In your mind, best case scenario, everyone would go skiing and you and your dad would somehow make it to Copenhagen; middle case scenario, everyone would go skiing but you’d be left in Barton with Mary and your dad; worst case scenario, you were stuck with Angus…at Barton, over Christmas break.

While he was the one that irked you the least out of the boys your age, you weren’t really in the mood to be with him until the middle of January.

It was as you were sitting on the edge of your bed, reading the rest of Jane Eyre, when someone knocked on your door. Glancing up, you saw Alex. Smiling, you asked.

“You ready to go?”

He nodded, then walked into the room, holding out your mittens. “Sorry I forgot to give them back.”

You took them, standing and smiling. “No, you’re alright. If I’m honest, I would’ve let you keep them while you were here.”

“Are you and Angus going to be okay?”

Giving him a look, you chuckled. “Well, if there’s a god, then hopefully that means he’ll go with you guys.”

At that moment, both of your eyes were drawn to the doorway when you heard heavy footsteps and watched as Angus Tully stormed past.

“Okay, guess there isn’t.” You grumbled, then went back to sweet. “Don’t worry though, we’ll be civil with each other.”

“I think you should be friends.”

Well…that was unexpected. Still, you snickered. “Alex, are you saying neither of us have friends already? And I thought you were nice.”

“No just,” he sighed. “I heard Ye-Joon crying a few nights go, Angus told him friends are overrated, and Ye-Joon told me that Angus had been kicked out of a lot of schools…I don’t know.”

You nodded, completely understanding. “I’ll be nicer to him; I promise you that. Now go have a great Christmas.”

He grinned from ear to ear, unexpectedly hugging you. After freezing for just a moment, you hugged him back before pulling away. You bid each other goodbye, and he went running back to his room to pack. A few seconds later, it was Jason who was in your room.

“Hey.” He greeted.

“Hello.”

He stood there stiffly, almost as if he was nervous for the first time in his life. “Um…I just wanted to say sorry.”

This intrigued you. “Oh?”

“Yeah.” Jason fiddled with the bag in his hand. “I didn’t mean to upset you; Teddy was an asshole, end of story.”

You gave him a smile. “Thank you.”

The silence between you was different; not one of comfort, but not exactly discomforting either. Though, it was becoming that the more time dragged on.

“You know,” he grinned, and you couldn’t tell if it was genuine or a joke. “if we hurry, I could probably sneak you on?”

You merely kept your face the same; a pitiful, upturned mouth. “Merry Christmas, Jason.”

He nodded, taking the hint, wishing you a ‘Merry Christmas’ back, and left. Not exactly the best apology to receive, but you were more than happy you got one. Also happy that he didn’t call you names for refusing his advances; bare minimum, but welcome to the early 1970s.

Teddy followed soon after him, and he stopped in your doorway, turning his head to you. He only managed to take a breath to speak before you beat him to it.

“I hope you fall off the fucking ski lift, snap your fucking neck, and never recover.”

He only smiled. “I hope your business goes well. Tell Daniel I said ‘hi’.”

And that was the last time you saw him that Christmas break. He did indeed fall off a ski lift and snap his neck.

He didn’t actually, but you wished he did. When he walked past you, Ye-Joon was next, and you both just uttered a quick ‘Merry Christmas’, before he left. Knowing that Tully was still in the room, you decided it was best to avoid him, and went back to your father.

“No luck?” You asked him.

He shook his head. “No luck.”

Sighing, you glanced down at the floor. Great…it was official; you were still stuck with at least one boy who would for sure not have his brain developed until he was thirty at the youngest (or so you thought).

“Do you want to see the helicopter take off?” Your father asked.

You nodded, not knowing what else to do. So, that was how you found yourself, your father, and Angus (who surprisingly crawled out of the room to also watch it take off), in the snowy quad, watching as the ‘Boys Left Behind’ became the ‘Boys Who Are Now in a Damn Helicopter Going Skiing’. You thought the last title had a better sound to it.

Your father sighs from beside you, turning to look at you in the middle, and Angus to your right. “Well, let’s make the best of it.”

He went in soon after that, leaving you and Angus alone together. You wanted to say something, you probably should’ve. Yet, in all honesty, you had nothing to say, and you knew that if you forced yourself to come up with something, it would’ve been bad.

So that’s why you didn’t even look at him when you left. That’s why you avoided him for the rest of the day, luckily being able to spend most of it with Elise and doing nothing but making Christmas cookies with her and miss Crane (even though she’d already made more than enough to give to the teachers. They were…fine when your dad gave you one), and muting channels from the TV and voicing over them.

You and Elise had done that since you were kids…which actually wasn’t that long ago when you were still doing it.

When you got back, you helped Mary with dinner, than all ate in silence; save for your father trying to make conversation about your day since you were truly the only one out of all of you to have an interesting day.

That’s when the four of you found yourself in the teacher’s lounge; you reading Little Women, your father and Mary watching The Newlywed Game, and Angus reading Popular Mechanics in a chair far away from you.

As you were disappearing into your second read of the book, it was Mary who brought you out of it.

“Your daughter asked me an invasive question today.”

You looked up in alarm at the accusation. Paul Hunham sighed, taking his pipe out of his mouth. “And what, pray tell, was it this time?”

“Asked if I’d ever been in love.”

Your father said your name warningly. Of course, you defended with. “We were reading Jane Eyre! If I was reading this,” you held up your book. “I would’ve asked if she ever rejected a man before. I already know the answer, but still.”

“You know the answer?” Mary laughed.

“You probably had to beat them off of you back in the day, you were so pretty.”

“Were?”

“Fine wine, miss Lamb.” You hung upside down, tossing your feet over the back of the couch. “You age like fine wine.”

 “Stop that.” She scoffed lovingly, then asked your father, almost as if it was a joke. “What about you?”

You looked at him. “Oh, I sure hope he’s been in love.”

“Well,” he said your name. “you know, it was purely for economic reasons at first, but then-.” The pillow you threw at him caused him to chuckle before continuing. “Yes, Josephine March, I was greatly enamored by your mother.”

“What was your favorite thing about her?”

“Everything.”

“Oh, come off it.” You rolled your eyes.

“Well then, if you’re going to be like that, then it’s her laugh.”

You sat up. “That’s such a basic fucking-!”

“-Hey!” Both him and Mary started.

In the corner of your eye, you swore you saw Angus smile for just a second. Your father continued. “I’ll tell you why her laugh was my favorite; it’s because she barely did.”

When you thought of it…she really only laughed around you. Were you that funny or did she just love you that much? Either way, you were more than happy about it. Your father continued.

“She announced in front of an entire class that she would more than likely laugh while being stuck in a brazen bull, then listening to my jokes. That was the first thing she said to me, and it’s still one of my favorite memories.”

Mary chimed in. “Not your wedding day?”

You and her shared a knowing look, trying not to burst out in laughter as your father just smoked his pipe, nodding. No time to unpack that.

“But you know, there’s more to falling in love than just with people.” He started soon to clear the air. “Imagine it, like a monk: forgoing sensual pleasures for the achievement of spiritual goals.”

“Spiritual goals, you?” Mary questioned. “What spiritual goals are we talking about? You go to church?”

“Only when required.”

“Exactly.” She mumbled. “Me having to save your daughter’s soul every Sunday since she was a kid.”

You only went because she’d take you and Curtis out to lunch every Sunday.

“When’s the last time you even left campus?” Mary asked him.

He almost looked offended. “I go into town all the time.”

“Oh!”

“For groceries, and errands, and various appointments.”

“Jane Bennett over here can’t drive and she gets out more than you.”

“Okay yes,” he sighed. “I don’t leave campus often. I don’t really feel the need.”

Mary nodded. “Let me ask you something. If you could go anywhere on earth, where would you go?”

“Well, we were supposed to go to Copenhagen…” nearly left your lips, but then your eyes caught Angus again, and looked away soon when his sight met yours.

“Oh,” your father grinned. “Greece, Italy, Egypt, Peru, Carthage, Tunisia now, of course. In college I started a monograph on Carthage. I’d like to finish that someday. A monograph is like a book only shorter.”

“I know what a monograph is.” Mary answered tiredly.

“Why not just write a book?”

That was the first thing you heard Angus say after hours of silence.

Your father shook his head. “I’m not sure I have an entire book in me.”

“You can’t even dream a whole dream, can you?” Mary asked.

If it were any other day, you would’ve laughed. But for some reason (that reason being you staring at Angus Tully), you didn’t. Still, once the two of you made eye-contact, you shot your gaze back to the TV, and then down to your book for the rest of the night.

What a strange person (he probably thought the same as you).

Your father agreed to let you sleep in the free room of the infirmary on account of the fact Teddy and Jason were gone. He made the joke too that you could “Finally sleep” as if you already hadn’t been sneaking out to get sleep. Still, even though you could no longer hear his snores, you found yourself more awake than ever that night.

When you were a child, you used to go on nightly excursions. Those being where you’d walk down the stairs of your old house and see everything in the dark; a familiar place becoming the unfamiliar and realizing just how taller everything was compared to you.

You cried the first time that you did it, and your mother rushed down to comfort you; your father, of course, slept like a rock. You still went on the little adventures though.

So…why not do it at Barton? Surely you were old enough you wouldn’t cry this time?

Tiptoeing through the halls and into your father’s room after throwing on your boots and jacket, you somehow managed to grab the keys and flashlight without him hearing you. Then you saw the bottle of whiskey by his bed; checks out.

As you were exiting through the hall, you passed by Angus’ room. You stopped in the doorway, contemplating. Would he be more pissed at you for waking him up, or for leaving him out? Well…only one way to find you.

In the same way you did on the first night, you shook him awake. He flinched a little when he saw you but wasn’t completely frazzled. “What?” He groaned, more so out of exhaustion than annoyance.

All you did was hold up the ring of keys to him.

That got him to sit up, and you managed to smile, tilting your head back to the door. It still astounds you to this day just how quickly you both could communicate without having to say a single word. He got on his coat and shoes, and the pair of you were soon off, traversing down the halls. Your first stop was the teacher’s lounge.

“I just want to check on Mary.” You explained.

“Why?”

“Because she checks up on us.”

And he didn’t argue; poor, tall child was just happy to have some freedom for the first time in almost a week. So, you both just quickly peered into the teacher’s lounge, and sure enough, she was sleeping on the couch with the TV on. You both tiptoed out of there and into the darkened hallway.

“Turn on the light.” He whispered to you.

“I’m trying.” You felt around for the switch, and then heard a ‘bump!’ in front of you followed by cursing.

“Shit!” Your heart jumped. “What did you do?!”

“Just turn on the light!”

You did, and you saw him hunched over, cradling his left elbow. You made a face. “You okay?”

“Yeah, just maybe turn the flashlight on before going into a dark place?”

Oh, hell no, you weren’t taking that amount of sass. “Well maybe you should stop being so tall and stupid. Jesus wept, you make the ground shake every time you walk.”

He scoffed, though an etching of a smile played on his lips when he knocked on the wall beside you.

“What’re you doing?” You asked.

“She’s not going to wake up. It’s fine.”

“Still, I don’t wanna risk it.”

“Okay,” he shrugged his shoulders. “then could I have the light? Seeing that you can’t handle it?”

Oh, what a little shit. Rolling your eyes, you handed it to him, to which he immediately turned over his shoulder and started skipping down the hallway, making quite a lot of noise.

“Angus Tully, I swear to God!” You rushed after him.

He led you into the kitchen, but you led him to the freezer and the large tub of vanilla ice cream the cooks only used for ‘Special Occasions’. You grabbed spoons off the counter and ate from the tub for a few good minutes without saying a word to each other.

When you were finished, he asked. “Where else were you thinking of going?”

 “I’m not sure.” You then glanced over to one of the ‘Staff Only’ doors. “I got an idea.”

After using the keys to unlock it, the door led down into a dimly lit tunnel. You went down first, the cold hitting your skin and you zipped your jacket up. Looking over your shoulder, you saw Angus still up at the top.

“Well come on, you’re the one with the light.”

That seemed to snap him out of whatever trance he was in, and he walked down the steps.

“How’d you know this was here?”

“That’s for me to know.”

And you just walked ahead of him.

He scoffed. “So, I don’t get to find out?”

“Nope.”

The tunnel was much longer than you initially thought it would be, but when you both got to the first door you’d seen, you were led into the sacristy of the chapel. Instantly, Agnus set down the flashlight and opened up the cabinet, taking out the chalice and jug of wine.

You snorted. “What a faithful altar boy you are.”

“Of course I am.” He responded, pouring the wine into the chalice and taking a huge gulp of it. “Want some?”

You tensed at first but responded quick enough. “Sure.”

He poured the wine into the chalice and took a small sip. It wasn’t as bad as when you first tried it; in fact, it was pretty good. You finished most of it after bringing it to your lips again.

“You’ve never had it before, haven’t you?” He grinned like the little shit he was (still is).

Shaking your head, you handed it back to him. “Just not in a while.”

You both got quickly bored in the sacristy after Angus had another drink of wine and went back through the door into the tunnel.

“Do you think someone died down here?” You questioned.

“If you’re trying to scare me, you’re doing a shitty job at it.” He answered.

“That sounds like something someone who’s terrified of ghosts would say.”

Sooner than you thought you would, and after a solid minute of you two going back and forth about the existence of ghosts, you found another door, which led you up into the auditorium. You’d only been there once for Curtis’ graduation the year prior, and you hadn’t step foot in there since then. Angus immediately went to the piano, sitting down at it and looking out to the sea of seats. You approached him leaning against the grand piano. He brought out a pack of the cigarettes you’d gotten him and a lighter.

“Mind if I have one?” You asked.

He nodded, placing a cigarette between his lips and then handing you one. He lit it for you, and you brought it up to your mouth. Somehow, you hadn’t coughed, and you were proud of yourself; you let your curiosity get the best of you, but it hadn’t killed you yet. Angus pressed a few keys on the piano, and you chuckled.

“You play?” You questioned.

“Not since I was ten. You know how?”

“Nope; all I know is Roman history and how to annoy men, apparently.”

“Can I ask you something?”

“Can I ask you a question after you do?”

“Sure.”

“Go ahead.”

He takes a puff from his cigarette before asking. “Why the book names?”

Chuckling, you shook your head. “It’s just always been a thing my mom did; they all mean different things. Countess Natalya when I’m being overdramatic, Jo March for my dad, Jane Bennett for Mary, Emma Woodhouse when I’m being stubborn, things like that.”

“Should I call you something then?” He teased.

“I’d prefer just my name from you, thank you very much.” You played along back, walking around the piano and plopping yourself down on the wooden floor. He soon sank down to be at your level, finding it awkward to sit above you. “Okay, my question.”

He nodded. “Shoot.”

“Why did you and Teddy get into a fight at the beginning of break?”

Sighing, he rolled his eyes. “Asshole stole my family picture and I knew it but he kept denying it; might’ve said some shitty things to him, but it’s not like they weren’t true.”

“What’d you say?”

“That he was a sociopath, and his family didn’t want him around.”

You almost choked on your cigarette but laughed. “Damn, that’s brutal.”

“Smith had to pull us apart, it was apparently that bad.”

Scoffing, you said. “You and him had to hold Teddy back after I punched him.”

“Asshole.” He muttered.

“Asshole.” You repeated.

Silence passed by the both of you for the hundredth time that day, and that was when you spoke up.

“I’m sorry I’ve been a bit of a jerk these last few days.” He arched his brow, and you just went on. “To be honest, you have been too, but I’ve been a bigger one; especially today. I wanted to say something before but…I didn’t want to be more of a bitch than I already was.”

He shook his head. “You’re not; I was kind of a dick when I first met you.”

“Kind of?”

“Okay, a lot.” He admitted. “It was honestly stupid luck I got that question when you first showed up at Barton, and I got carried away with bragging.”

“Don’t sell yourself short.” You repeated his words from a few days ago. “You’re actually the smartest out of all of them.”

“Really?”

“Not even close to me, but still.” You held out your hand. “Friends of some sort?”

He shook it. “Friends of some sort.”

You both pulled away, and after taking another drag of your cigarette you said. “I actually don’t know jack shit about you.”

“That a fact?”

“Yeah, and since we’re going to be stuck here for a while, I think that should change. How about this?” you scooted closer to him. “We ask each other questions. Simple at first, but more and more, we go a little deeper. How does that sound?”

He huffed. “Sounds like a regular conversation.”

“We get to refuse to answer one question.” You added. “Everything else after is free game. Sound more exciting?”

Angus nodded. “Alright, what’s your favorite color?”

“Pass.”

“Are you serious?”

“Fuck no.” You laughed, giving him your favorite color then asking him. “Favorite book?”

He responded much faster than you thought he would. “Catch-22.”

“Ah, a man of culture. Thank God, I thought I’d have to stop talking to you.”

Angus shook his head, chuckling. “If you could be an animal, what would you be?”

Ah…a bit of a stranger one, but you like that. You thought more on it, then gave him your answer. He nodded.

“Yeah, seems like you’d be one.”

“The fuck’s that supposed to mean?” You answered in a dead pan, and broke character the second you saw his face fall. “Just messing with you. Favorite childhood memory?”

He paused at that but didn’t show any sign of discomfort. Hesitance, yes, but he was taking more time thinking about your (frankly bizarre) question. Then, he answered.

“My dad took me on a fishing trip when I was twelve. Just for the weekend out in the woods with a small cabin. Talked to me about what it meant to be a man, telling me what he was like as a kid…I don’t even like fishing.”

The short story, even though it wasn’t yours, brought a nostalgic smile to your face for a moment. “I tried fishing once; not really my thing either.”

“Mr. Hunham took you fishing?” The look on his face made you laugh.

“Oh god no.” You shook your head. “Curtis did.”

Angus blinked upon the name. “Mary’s kid?”

“You’ve already asked a question.”

“What?”

“I just asked you what your favorite memory was as a kid, you asked me if my dad took me fishing. It’s my question now. Technically, I can ask two in a row because you just asked me what I meant.” It was your turn to have the shit-eating grin.

“I…” He tried not to laugh, unable to believe it. “So, our friendship is basically transactional?”

“Huh?”

“You’re having us say that if one of us asks two questions in a row, even if one isn’t really about getting to know the other-.”

“-It was about getting to know me; you asked if my dad took me fishing.”

“That’s a transactional relationship, not really a conversation.”

“Are you trying to explain to me what a conversation is, Tully?” You furrowed your brow, stomping out your cigarette. “Do you really believe women are that stupid?”

He shrugged. “Maybe, considering how you just asked three questions in a row.”

Never in your life (at least recently) had something thrown you off balance so drastically. You counted on your fingers, jogging your memory, and yes, you indeed answered three questions: freeing him from yours. You both made eye contact, and with the same, unspoken language, you both laughed. It took you a bit longer to recover, to which you then asked.

“Okay, and you can ask me two questions, do you genuinely think women are stupid?”

Angus shook his head, his cigarette on its last leg. “Everyone’s stupid in their own special way.”

“How poetic of you.”

“That’s the nicest thing you’ve said to me.”

“Shut up and ask me a stupid question because you’re so stupid.”

He threw the cigarette on the ground and stomped it out before turning to you. “Craziest thing that happened to you?”

Your face dropped for a moment at the question, before it soon morphed into a nervous smile. “It’s what made my dad start homeschooling me.”

Angus raised his brows. “If it’s not a fun memory than-.”

“-No it’s alright.”

“If anything,” you thought to yourself. “it’ll make me see who you really are.”

You set the scene. “You’ve been in eighth grade, right?”

“I though you said I could ask two questions-?”

“-For fuck’s sake, Tully.”

“Yes,” he grinned. “I’ve been in eighth grade, surprisingly.”

“Well, you probably remember how much we thought we were hot shit at that age, right?” You didn’t give him time to respond. “My friend Elise is Miss Crane’s niece, Miss Crane the secretary.”

“Yeah, I know who she is.”

“Elise only comes to live with her during winter and summer breaks. I met her when we were like twelve, and we were immediately inseparable. Summer of eighth grade going into high school, she takes this theatre summer camp hosted by some kids at Ridgeway.”

Angus scoffed. “That fucking shithole? My roommate had some of his friends over who went there; assholes.”

“Oh, that’s not the half of it.” You rolled your eyes. “So, one of the counsellors, I don’t know I think her name was like…Gloria, or something, really liked her, and invited her to a party she and the other theatre kids were having. She told Elise that she could bring anyone that she wanted. Elise thought that other campers were being invited, so she asked me because…okay shoot me, I liked theater growing up. Now Elise wasn’t going to Ridgeway for high school, but I was, so she thought it’d be great for me to meet the people. That’s what she told my dad and her aunt; that it was a part of the camp. God, we spent hours getting ready, I look at pictures that Miss Crane took of us, and we didn’t even look that good,”

You and Angus paused to relish your chuckling before continuing. “but what mattered was that we were excited. Miss Crane drove us to the house at seven, said she’d pick us up by ten, and then left. The only people there were us, Gloria, and two of the other counselors; one being her boyfriend, Bobby fucking Nolan. So, it was awkward for the first hour because, of course Gloria wasn’t supposed to invite two eighth graders, but it’s fine because she said ‘Elise is cool, so her friend’s probably cool’. I wanted us to call someone to take us home because there was a misunderstanding, hell, the counsellor that wasn’t Gloria’s boyfriend even offered to, but Elise said she wanted to stay. I wasn’t leaving her behind, so I stayed too. It actually got fun after that. It was more than obvious I was uncomfortable, so they asked me to pick a board game for us to play when waiting for other people, and I picked Clue. It went on for a while, and people started showing up, so it was really just me, Bobby fucking Nolan, and another random kid playing with us because the others, including Elise, left. Bobby said that I was purposefully hiding my cards because he assumed some things weren’t adding up. He did this the whole game, and he’d try to be teasing, but he always sounded like he was accusing me of murder. Which, okay, a part of the game but you know what I mean. I got fed up with it, so I told him a bit more aggressively that I wasn’t lying. This asshole reaches over and squeezes me here.”

Scooting closer to Angus where your face was just a foot away from his, you pointed to the base of your neck where your clavicle is. “So I freak out of course, and he just started laughing, saying he found out that’s a ticklish spot for everyone. My stomach started feeling weird, and I…a year before that, my dad told me that if I ever started feeling sick out of nowhere, whether it was because of a person or situation, than I’d leave. Doesn’t matter what, I’d just go. So, I say I have to go to the bathroom, get Elise, she sees that I’m starting to freak out, and we try to find Gloria, her friend, or just anyone who’d want to take us home. Bobby finds us instead, he’s lit, and he won’t let us out of his sight. He was joking at first, and I’m fucking terrified at this point, so Elise has to tell him we’re going home. He’s getting pushy now, and it takes him calling her a ‘bitch’ for people to notice. So, thank God, some of the others pull him away to calm him down because he looked like he’d start swinging, and one of the girls took pity on us and drove us to Elise’s house because we were supposed to have a sleepover. I was crying at this point, so I begged Miss Crane to call Mary, not my dad, she picked me up, I told her everything, she brought me home, told my dad, and the next day I told him everything I told Mary. He said I did the right thing in leaving and was pissed at the school. So, he called them, got most of the kids there in trouble; all except Bobby fucking Nolan. Because Bobby Nolan’s mom was screwing the principal, and technically besides underage drinking and minor harassment, he didn’t do anything wrong in the school’s eyes; so, he just got a few days’ worth of detention, but even then, that was probably wiped from his records…He was a freshman going into sophomore year, so if I went to Ridgeway, I’d be stuck with him for three years…everything else checks out.”

The silence was deafening. Angus had a face you had never seen on him before. “I…shit, that’s fucked up.”

Just like with everything else you did when things became too serious (because it was only then you realized that you just told him something that was somewhat traumatic and not funny), you made it funny.

“Oh fuck, you asked me about the craziest thing that happened to me. Sorry, I forgot to say that I was like a little tipsy throughout all of that.”

“What?!”

No one ever said you landed the punchline all the time. Still, you tried.

“Now I know that sounds bad-.”

“-It is bad. You were like what, fourteen?”

“…Thirteen.”

“Oh my god.” He groaned.

“How old were you when you first drank?”

“Sixteen.”

“That’s like three years.”

“It’s about maturity.”

“Oh,” you snickered. “and you have a lot of that?”

He shrugged. “Yeah, maybe I do."

Rolling your eyes, you said. “Go ahead.”

“What?”

“Ask your other question. No, that one doesn’t count, I’m actually tired of the rules I set up.”

He was still, understandably, thrown off about all that you told him. Still, he went. “How’d you know about the tunnels?”

“Curtis Lamb. We were friends for a while, and he told me he and some other kids would explore them. Mary never found out somehow.”

“Why’d you stop being friends?”

You shrugged. “We didn’t, he just died. Did your mom and dad get a divorce or…?”

You were always a hardball when it came to being blunt.

Angus tensed. “Pass.”

“Okay.”

“Can I ask about the letter?”

Oh…oh…

Well…what a spot you put yourself in…

“Pass.” You said without hesitation. Had he said that to get back at you for asking a stupid question or did he actually want to know?

Still, he respected it. “Your turn.”

And you decided to be slightly less bold, but not back down completely. “Have you been kicked out of school before?”

To your surprise, he wasn’t angry when you asked. A bit smug even. “Oh, who told you?”

“Alex.”

“Figures. Yeah, three.”

“Why?”

“‘Unruly behavior, instigating fights, stealing school property.’” He rolled his eyes. “If I get kicked out of this one, it’s off to military school.”

You nodded. “So maybe don’t then.”

“Seems like a plan.”

“When did your mom marry your stepfather?”

“Just last summer; that’s why they’re taking their honeymoon now. She’d only been with him for six months.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.” He shook his head. “Just lonely I guess.”

You furrowed your brow. “She had you.”

He didn’t say anything, he stopped looking at you too. Well, new tactic now.

“What you did was nice a few nights ago.” Like Pavlov’s dog, he looked up at you. “Helping Ye-Joon out.”

His eyes drifted. “It was nothing.”

“It was everything to him and it meant something to me. It meant that you’re not a complete asshole you try to be, and I don’t know why you try to be one, but you’re not.” You saw right through him, and you both knew it. Still, to save face a little while longer, you added. “I’m sorry too about saying you didn’t have friends.”

“It’s fine-.”

“-No, it’s not, because I felt like shit as soon as I said it, and it’s a shitty thing to say to anyone.”

He stared at you the same way he did when you gave him toothpaste, and it unnerved you even more. Had anyone ever apologized to him?

“Thanks.” Was his reply, and the two of you stopped asking questions. You both sat in the auditorium for perhaps a small moment’s silence when he said. “I uh…we should probably get back.”

You nodded, getting up. “Yeah, sounds good.”

The two of you tried to make it seem like you’d never been there and made your way back down into the tunnel. The walk seemed much longer than it had previously, the two of you not seeming to have anything to say until Angus went-.

“I threw out the skin mag.”

Well…the actual last thing you thought you would hear from him that night.

You stopped in your tracks. “Huh?”

He didn’t look at you as he confessed. “I stole Kountze’s cigarettes to trade for it and practically waved it in his face the first few days. I know it’s none of my business, but after he read the letter…I just felt bad about it.”

What on God’s green earth were you supposed to say? Apparently, after a few moments of stunned silence, you knew.

“…Thanks? On behalf of all women, I guess?” He nodded, still not looking at you, which only added to your anxiety. “We’re good, right? Still friends of some sort?”

“Yeah.” He finally met your eyes.

You nodded. “Nice.”

And you walked ahead of him as if trying to outrun the light. You both tiptoed through the halls, setting the keys and flashlight back in your father’s room in the infirmary, and went into your own separate rooms.

As you laid down to sleep, the strangeness of the whole evening played in your mind. You had been so vulnerable with him, and he hadn’t thrown it back and spat it in your face; he let you talk about it for so long.

He didn’t blame you for what happened.

You never told anyone about that besides the people involved…

But he didn’t do the same. Yes, your friendship (of some sort) didn’t have to be where each of you dumped a lot of baggage on each other…but you still felt odd doing so.

You felt something in your stomach the more you thought about the whole night; being alone together and exploring the school as if you were both main characters in a novel, telling secrets in the dark…

You didn’t feel sick though; at least, not like when a boy touched you for the first time.

[grandhotelabyss]

Advice/hard truths for writers?

The best piece of practical advice I know is a classic from Hemingway (qtd. here):

The most important thing I’ve learned about writing is never write too much at a time… Never pump yourself dry. Leave a little for the next day. The main thing is to know when to stop. Don’t wait till you’ve written yourself out. When you’re still going good and you come to an interesting place and you know what’s going to happen next, that’s the time to stop. Then leave it alone and don’t think about it; let your subconscious mind do the work.

Also, especially if you're young, you should read more than you write. If you're serious about writing, you'll want to write more than you read when you get old; you need, then, to lay the important books as your foundation early. I like this passage from Samuel R. Delany's "Some Advice for the Intermediate and Advanced Creative Writing Student" (collected in both Shorter Views and About Writing):

You need to read Balzac, Stendhal, Flaubert, and Zola; you need to read Austen, Thackeray, the Brontes, Dickens, George Eliot, and Hardy; you need to read Hawthorne, Melville, James, Woolf, Joyce, and Faulkner; you need to read Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Turgenev, Goncherov, Gogol, Bely, Khlebnikov, and Flaubert; you need to read Stephen Crane, Mark Twain, Edward Dahlberg, John Steinbeck, Jean Rhys, Glenway Wescott, John O'Hara, James Gould Cozzens, Angus Wilson, Patrick White, Alexander Trocchi, Iris Murdoch, Graham Greene, Evelyn Waugh, Anthony Powell, Vladimir Nabokov; you need to read Nella Larsen, Knut Hamsun, Edwin Demby, Saul Bellow, Lawrence Durrell, John Updike, John Barth, Philip Roth, Coleman Dowell, William Gaddis, William Gass, Marguerite Young, Thomas Pynchon, Paul West, Bertha Harris, Melvin Dixon, Daryll Pinckney, Darryl Ponicsan, and John Keene, Jr.; you need to read Thomas M. Disch, Joanna Russ, Richard Powers, Carroll Maso, Edmund White, Jayne Ann Phillips, Robert Gluck, and Julian Barnes—you need to read them and a whole lot more; you need to read them not so that you will know what they have written about, but so that you can begin to absorb some of the more ambitious models for what the novel can be.

Note: I haven't read every single writer on that list; there are even three I've literally never heard of; I can think of others I'd recommend in place of some he's cited; but still, his general point—that you need to read the major and minor classics—is correct.

The best piece of general advice I know, and not only about writing, comes from Dr. Johnson, The Rambler #63:

The traveller that resolutely follows a rough and winding path, will sooner reach the end of his journey, than he that is always changing his direction, and wastes the hours of day-light in looking for smoother ground and shorter passages.

I've known too many young writers over the years who sabotaged themselves by overthinking and therefore never finishing or sharing their projects; this stems, I assume, from a lack of self-trust or, more grandly, trust in the universe (the Muses, God, etc.). But what professors always tell Ph.D. students about dissertations is also true of novels, stories, poems, plays, comic books, screenplays, etc: There are only two kinds of dissertations—finished and unfinished. Relatedly, this is the age of online—an age when 20th-century institutions are collapsing, and 21st-century ones have not yet been invented. Unless you have serious connections in New York or Iowa, publish your work yourself and don't bother with the gatekeepers.

Other than the above, I find most writing advice useless because over-generalized or else stemming from arbitrary culture-specific or field-specific biases, e.g., Orwell's extremely English and extremely journalistic strictures, not necessarily germane to the non-English or non-journalistic writer. "Don't use adverbs," they always say. Why the hell shouldn't I? It's absurd. "Show, don't tell," they insist. Fine for the aforementioned Orwell and Hemingway, but irrelevant to Edith Wharton and Thomas Mann. Freytag's Pyramid? Spare me. Every new book is a leap in the dark. Your project may be singular; you may need to make your own map as your traverse the unexplored territory.

Hard truths? There's one. I know it's a hard truth because I hesitate even to type it. It will insult our faith in egalitarianism and the rewards of earnest labor. And yet, I suspect the hard truth is this: ineffables like inspiration and genius count for a lot. If they didn't, if application were all it took, then everybody would write works of genius all day long. But even the greatest geniuses usually only got the gift of one or two all-time great work. This doesn't have to be a counsel of despair, though: you can always try to place yourself wherever you think lightning is likeliest to strike. That's what I do, anyway. Good luck!

[spatialwave]

𝐝𝐚𝐳𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐟𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐝. 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐰𝐨.

“𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄 𝐇𝐔𝐑𝐓𝐒”

pairing: angus tully x fem!reader | benny o’donnell x fem!reader word count: 10.6k summary: school is out, and you’re free of the shackles of education, an entire summer in the horizon. after pickford’s end-of-school party gets busted, boredom and uncertainty strikes. instead of drinking and partying, you find yourself falling deeper and deeper into a love triangle you hadn’t meant to get yourself caught in — what will you do? who will you choose? warnings/tags: underage drinking and drug use, use of homophobic slurs, bullying, verbal assault, jealousy, love triangle. notes: not me writing this and actually getting obsessed with benny (cole hauser). still not beta'd, so apologies for grammatical/pacing errors!

(ao3 vers.) <- chapter one. chapter three. ->

Sharing a joint before coming home was not the smartest decision you’d made in your career as a high school student. The haziness had left your limbs heavy and your mind up in the clouds, your bed so incredibly inviting. In fact, so inviting that the moment you stepped into your room, you had curled up into your bed and nuzzled into the blankets.

Your body was heavy, but floating. All you could think about was Angus Tully, a smile spreading as your fingers pressed against your lips. You were lost in your imagination, mind stuck on wondering what it would feel like with his lips pressed against yours. How his body would feel pressed over yours, hands in his wild curls, legs wrapped around his hips so he’s flush against you. Heavy breaths and the taste of weed on your lips as your tongues brushed together.

Soon, you were far in a dreamless nap until you heard the clanking of pots and pans from the kitchen—your mother cooking dinner. The sleep had left you disoriented, your hair in a mess and arms achy from passing out in an uncomfortable position. You wished to fall asleep again.

With the evening sun moving down into the horizon and the night sky daring to take over, you couldn’t will yourself to get out of bed. All your mind could focus on was the day you’d just had, and you were nearly content with laying back down and imagining it all over again. The afternoon you’d spent with Angus and how you couldn’t wait to see him again, even with the plans of a party falling through. 

You would see him at some point, but when and where? 

Without the effects of weed, you were left with a knot in your stomach, a reminder of how nervous you were about the situation. It was easier to be inebriated and forget about the harsh reality of Angus being a ‘taken’ man, versus you being sober and seeing Elise’s face burned into your head every time you closed your eyes.

Eventually, after a few minutes of fighting off the urge to sleep and reminding yourself you wasted precious time, you forced yourself up in your bed and rubbed away the tiredness in your eyes. It took a forceful push for you to crawl out of bed and placing your feet on your carpeted floor, wiggling your toes as you slowly woke up and came back into your consciousness.

You wobbled over to your dresser and reached to your record player, putting the tonearm down and placing the needle onto the record–Dreamboat Annie by Heart. Your all-time favourite record.

The best decision you made since coming home was a hot shower that nearly burned your skin, ending it off with a quick rinse of cold water to jolt you awake from the grogginess that had consumed you. Music played through the closed door of your adjoined bathroom, lucky enough to score a better bedroom than Mitch, your younger brother. Softly singing along to the muffled sounds of Crazy on You, you dried off your body and let your wet hair cling to your damp skin, eyes looking over your body in the foggy mirror. You often tried not to look at yourself too much in mirrors, a practice that was ingrained into you as a young child from your mother reprimanding you from being ‘too vain’–ah, the joys of living in a catholic household.

Then, before you could act in vain, the pounding of someone knocking on your bedroom door furiously took your attention, and you wondered if your mother found out about you smoking with Angus and Slater. You hurriedly finished drying your body and moved back into your bedroom with the towel wrapped around you, body shivering at the difference in air temperature.

“What?” You snapped at the bothersome knocking, pressing your ear against the door, expecting your mother’s voice and the imminent disapproval of your actions.

“Angus is outside,” your brother’s voice spoke. He sounded tired, but you remembered he’d just gotten home from his baseball game–meaning you hardly had anytime before Kaye would be showing up. 

And here you were, in a towel, and the boy you’d been dreaming about waiting for you outside.

“Fuck,” you whined, hearing the footsteps of your brother move away, “thanks for letting me know!”

You panicked in your room, looking around as you dropped the towel and quickly dug in your dresser for clothes, anything remotely decent for the party. It was hard to slip on with your damp skin, but you’d eventually managed to get into high-waisted denim bell-bottoms and a cropped, flower-print halter top that exposed your belly. It even managed to make you look bustier than normal, you wouldn’t complain about that.

Your hair was still wet as you unlocked your bedroom door and made way for the front, spotting a shadowy figure through the small window on the door. Taking a calming, deep breath, you reached for the door handle and slowly opened it, peaking out of it first before committing to stepping outside.

Immediately, your eyes settled on Angus, the tall, lanky boy leaning against the column that held up the awning over the front door. Those brown eyes flickered up to look at you, a delighted smile adorning his lips as he pushed off the column and shoved his hands into his pockets. With a breathy, nervous laugh, you fully stepped outside and closed the door behind you, pressing your weight back against it as you forced yourself to meet his piercing gaze.

“What are you doing here?” You asked, hands tucked behind your body and fidgeting with them as you kept steady breaths. 

“I brought Mitch back from his ball game and wanted to see what you were up to,” he replied, still grinning shyly, “I know it’s only been a couple of hours, but I was here already. So, yeah… just wanted to pop-in.”

There was that awkward side of him again, a part of him you saw when no one else was around. A shy, awkward kid that you could only imagine was most of his personality when he was younger and far before he’d made it as a popular football player. Though, it was all speculation, you still hadn’t known much about his younger self—you’d love to know.

“Thanks for bringing him back… Did they get him?” You asked, cringing at the mere thought of your younger brother getting caught by the senior boys, exposed to harsh paddling.

“Uh, yeah, unfortunately.” Angus pulled his eyes away, “Kountze is such a prick, I told your brother to ice up for a bit or else he’d be having a hard time sitting for a few weeks.”

“At least he’s home now,” you sighed, arms crossed over your body as you sympathized with your brother’s pain.

Silence rose between you two, and you found yourself unable to look up at Angus. You could see out of your peripheral that it was the same for him, his eyes dropping to look at his feet.

“Don’t you have somewhere else to be?” You asked quietly, an amused expression on your face as you two connected eyes again.

“What? This doesn’t count as something?” He chided in return, stepping closer to you, and you almost wanted to ask if he could reach forward and slip his finger into your belt loop like he did earlier. Tug your hips together and talk some more, shameless flirting. You lived for his attention like it was a drug. 

Craved it.

“It is something, but I’m not sure how productive it is,” you laughed, reaching for the door handle behind you, “do you know if anything is happening tonight?”

Angus crinkled his face, signifying that plans were still a bust, “Not really sure yet. Probably going to drive around and see what’s up I guess, maybe go to the Emporium. I just gotta’ go home and change.”

Silence filled the space between you both again, leaving you dumbfounded and chewing on your lip as you racked your brain with something to say that wouldn’t sound stupid. You were drawing a blank, feeling like a young girl talking to a cute boy for the first time. It was easy for that feeling to come back when you were alone with Angus, a testament to how badly you were crushing on him.

“I should, uh-–” you murmured, clearing your throat as you twisted the knob, “go back in and get ready. Kaye will be here any second, and I haven’t even dried my hair.”

That roused a laugh from Angus, his eyes flicking up to your hair that had started to dry at the roots, a bit all over the place, but he liked the authenticity you displayed. He liked you at your best and at your worst, but this was far from your worst. He found himself wanting to stay put, to ask to go inside and spend the rest of his night hanging out with you instead of out driving around and drinking with the boys. Angus could already imagine what you two could get up to if you were alone—it filled him with excitement.

“I’ll see you later, then?” Angus asked, getting his mind out of the gutter, but not yet moving from his spot. He towered over you with that stupid smile, the one that made you want to wipe it away with your lips.

“Maybe,” you couldn’t help but tease, your hand pressing against his chest and pushing him back playfully, fingers relishing in the brief contact, “go on, I’m sure your boys are missing you.”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re right. My boys.” he chuckled, moving down the front steps and walking backward to keep his eyes on you, “Don’t you go missing me too much, alright?”

“I never do!” You called out to him through a big smile, watching as he slipped around the other side of his car and clutched his heart, as though you shot him. So dramatic.

Your feet had stayed firmly planted on the ground, eyes watching as he waved at you through his passenger side window before driving off down your block. You stayed there for a few minutes, watching the setting sun, before realization hit, and you ran back inside to finish getting ready.

Makeup and hair was your focus as you raced the clock, fingers careful as you applied colour to your lips and cheeks, coating your lashes in mascara to brighten the eyes and make you look alive. Those same careful hands moved to your hair, styling it several ways before you settled on something that kept it out of your eyes—nothing fancy. 

As your finger patted on one final layer of colour to your cheeks, after accidentally smudging your face with mascara and needing a fix, you heard the sound of a car honking outside. Quickly, you did one final look over of yourself in your full-length mirror, sucking in a deep breath and smiling. You looked fucking incredible. You were confident. There was nothing that could ruin your night.

“Goodbye, mom! I’ll see you later!” You called you as you slipped out from your bedroom, waltzing down the hallway excitedly. You had hardly seen her today, only at breakfast and a ten minutes earlier when you snuck into the kitchen and grabbed a small plate of food to settle your stomach before the night began.

“Try not to stay out all night, alright?” She called back, you could hear the sound of her doing the dishes, porcelain clinging together as she stacked the drying rack full, “And don’t be loud, you’ll wake up your grandmother.” 

“I promise.” You said, peaking your head into the kitchen to spot your mother, flashing her a smile that simply couldn’t let her be grumpy with you.

“Have fun,” she said to you, rolling her eyes as she put away the last of the dry dishes and watched you slip on your sandals and run out the door, feeling nothing short but free. The two of you always had a great relationship, but as you got older, you could tell that her emotions were starting to get the best of her. Soon, you’d be gone to college and off living your own adult life, she wasn’t ready to let that go yet, and sometimes you had to fight for a night with your friends.

Thankfully, she understood the importance of tonight. She was a senior at Lee High School once.

“Hey! Sabrina!” You cheered, spotting the freshman sitting in the back of Kaye’s Volkswagen Convertible as you jogged out of your front door, eager to get the night started. You slid easily into the passenger seat, settling in and turning on your side to look at the two girls, “how was the car wash?” You asked, a mischievous smile on your lips—thankful you weren’t there to watch the madness.

“Cold,” the freshman chuckled, playing with the ends of her hair as Kaye hit the pedal and the car lurched forward as you made way for a night of driving with the girls, “but I was cleaned off at least. I was starting to feel sick from the smell of mustard. I don’t know if I’ll be able to go to any summer barbecues this year.”

“Hope the other girls weren’t too hard on you,” you hummed in thought, leaning against the seat and watching over the brunette, who seemed much too sweet for her own good. You could already see the heads she’d be turning at school in the fall, you wondered how Darla would make do with it. She reeked of insecurity, the type of girls to get jealous over fresh meat coming in and whisking attention away.

“No, they were good,” she assured, “Then after Kaye dropped me off and invited me along tonight.”

“Wow, she does have a heart,” you spoke in feigned awe, earning a playful shove from Kaye, who glared at you from the driver’s seat.

After the sun fully set beyond the horizon, and you and Kaye had smoked a couple cigarettes and assaulted Sabrina with questions about the upcoming school year, you found yourself watching the scenery that passed by. You’d also mentioned to them how Pickford’s party was busted, unsurprised was that they’d heard about it already. New travelled sickeningly fast.

You smiled to yourself as you enjoyed the cool breeze on your skin from the top of the car being down, relief from the hot sun earlier that afternoon.

“So, you left with Angus early,” Kaye said, looking in the rearview and connecting her gaze with Sabrina, who wasn’t looped into the entirety of the drama, “Right, to get you up to speed, Miss Freshman, your favourite senior here is a conniving, two-timing woman.”

“I am not conniving!” You gasped, swatting at Kaye.

“Kidding! Kidding! I would never accuse you of anything bad. You’re allowed to have options,” She laughed, eyes on the road as you three cruised down random neighbourhood roads, navigating your way downtown to stop at Top Notch. You rolled your eyes, but did not interrupt, allowing Kaye her space to go on. She cleared her throat, “So, to sum it up into one sentence, she’s in a casual, steamy relationship with Benny, but has the hots for Angus, a certified popular quarterback who is already dating Elise… Saying it out loud makes it sound like a cringe-worthy romance movie plot. You are now a walking cliché, I hope you know that.”

Sabrina’s eyes narrowed slightly as she tried to keep up with the information that was being thrown at her, names she’d never heard of and scandals she didn’t quite understand.

“Okay, I would not consider me and Benny to be in a relationship, like, at all. Also, calling Angus a popular quarterback does not do him justice,” you butted in, looking over at Kaye with a quirked brow, “he’s a really sweet guy. He’s kind to me. Not just some popular boy. You know, he doesn’t even like being popular.” Kaye rolled her eyes at your comment, always having another opinion than your own, especially when it came to societal issues.

“That’s the curly haired boy you were talking to, right?” The freshman spoke up, tucking hair behind her ear that was blowing wildly in the wind.

“Yep, that’s him,” you smiled back at Sabrina.

“He likes you,” she smiled, a bit uncertain if her advice was warranted, “I mean, if I were a boy… I’d probably stare at a girl like that if I liked her.”

Redness filled your cheeks at the girl's words of wisdom, which left your stomach in knots.

“But he’s with Elise!” You groaned, letting your head fall back against the seat as you stared up at the night sky, “Love is so complicated. It’s like, does he want me or not? If he does, why won’t he break up with her? I feel so goddamn guilty because of her.”

“Easy, cowgirl,” Kaye chuckled, glancing back at Sabrina and clicking her tongue, “I don’t see why you’ve got your panties in a twist, you don’t even like Elise. I’d go as far as to say you probably hate her.”

“I do not hate her,” you lift a finger, not needing your words to get twisted, “And even if she was the world’s worst person, I would still feel guilty because I’m not a bad person.”

Kaye smirked to herself, fingers gripping the wheel a bit tighter as she listened to your concerns, “So… she does have a heart.” She returned the earlier sentiment.

“You’re an ass,” you groaned, lips twitching into a smile, “What do I do? Sabrina, what would you do?”

You turned in your seat again, eyes locking onto the younger girl and waiting to see what advice she would give. Sure, young teens were inexperienced in all sorts of ways, especially compared to your own, but they always said shit exactly like it was. Wiser than most adults gave them credit for.

The girl thought about it, weighing options in her head, “I would confront him about it,” she advised, “if he does really like you then he’d do something about it… right?”

You kept your eyes on Sabrina, pointing at her with a small smile on your face as you admired her intelligence and common sense, “You’re really smart, kid. You make sure that boys treat you good, okay? And if they don’t, you come and find me.”

“And find a boy that’s not dumb like Benny or Angus.” Kaye jumped in, earning yet another playful swat from you that had Sabrina laughing.

As you all drove down the emptying streets, you felt relief. Sabrina’s words kept repeating in your mind, knowing that the only way through the situation was with confrontation, how was Angus supposed to understand your concerns if he didn’t know what they were? Of course, you hoped that he would break up with her regardless before even attempting to flirt with you, but it’s not like you were the poster child for good morals. In the depths of your mind you kept thinking about Benny—you two were far from dating, having several discussions about keeping it casual, but you feared you two were far closer than what had been said aloud.

It had you thinking of his feelings, knowing that if you wanted to play your cards right and be moral well, you’d have to end things with him. Yet, like the fiend you were, you didn’t want to lose out on your back-up if it all fell through with Angus. 

At least Benny was good in bed.

Could things get any worse?

For distraction, you found yourself singing along to the radio, Black Sabbath, one of Kaye’s favourite bands that you’d grown to like. Hard rock wasn’t your forte, but you’d enjoyed the way you’d grown adept at liking things far out of your comfort zone. So long to the girl who only listened to pop albums, now your mother was concerned you were getting into the wrong crowd when you asked her to buy you an AC/DC record for your seventeenth birthday.

Kaye turned on the road, slowing down as you pulled into the drive-thru, pulling up behind a car full of some soon-to-be junior girls–ordering drinks and snacks for you all to share. That’s when you heard the familiar sound of a truck, your eyes pulling away from the chili cheese fries and toward the rumbling of an engine. None other than Darla and Elise, Shavonne having slipped out of the vehicle and running over to jump into the back beside Sabrina, saying her hellos to you all. She focused on properly introducing herself to the new girl as they indulged in some fries together in the backseat.

You, though, couldn’t pull your gaze away and found yourself in a staring match with Elise. With a clenched jaw, you felt anger course through your veins, a rush of jealousy taking over as your mind swirled with all those ugly thoughts of her and Angus together. Envy. You were morphing into a green-eyed monster.

There was so much pent-up energy in you that you wanted to get out of the car and march on over to confront her. To reveal that even though she appeared so naive and innocent on the outside, she was far from it. Elise was a secret mean girl—at least Darla was a bitch to your face.

“Hey!”

You jumped in your seat and turned to look between the three girls, eyes widening as Kaye took a sip of her Coke and looked between you and the truck that had pulled away from Top Notch. Your short-haired friend was too perceiving for her own good, having witness the entirety of your glaring match with the girls.

“Sorry,” you murmured, looking down at the basket of fries in your hands and deciding to calm yourself with a few bites of the greasy food. You needed to get a grip. You hadn’t even had a sip of alcohol yet, and you were already fearing that tonight you’d be an angry drunk.

“Elise and Darla hate you,” Shavonne said, stealing the large coke from Kaye’s hands, her energy so calm that you wouldn’t have been able to tell that she dropped big news on you two.

“What?” You snapped, spinning in your seat so you were on your knees and facing the two in the back. “What did she say? Shavonne, tell us.”

“I don’t know… you have to promise me you won’t get mad,” Shavonne murmured, blue eyes flickering between everyone, “They said something about both of you,” the blonde shot her gaze over to Kaye, who furrowed her brows in a mix of confusion and semi-offence. Mostly curiosity.

“So, you’re all talking about us behind our backs? I would have never guessed.” Kaye grumbled, though the smile on her lips proved how uncaring she was.

“I’m not saying anything until you promise me that neither of you will get mad,” Shavonne said from her spot, looking between her two best friends.

“I won’t get mad, I don’t care what they think,” you reassured her, eagerly leaning forward to hear the gossip. Kaye agreed quietly, eyes flickering into the rearview mirror.

Shavonne held off on her words for a few moments, slowly sipping from the Coke until she was satisfied and let out a long exhale, “Okay, fine. She said you’re a slut,” she pointed to you, “and she called you a dyke,” ending off her words toward Kaye.

The three of you all stared at each other for a few moments, Sabrina looking rather uncomfortable as she feared that you’d all erupt into anger and this would get worse than it already was. The silence was deafening, the sounds of others at the drive-thru somehow seeming quiet and muffled as the words settled in.

Then, you and Kaye busted into a loud fit of laughter, following shortly by Shavonne and an uncertain Sabrina, who chuckled nervously. She seriously didn’t understand high school drama, and she was already growing afraid at the prospect of it. If someone called her a slut, she’d cry about it for days!

“God, they’re so annoying,” you breathed out through a laugh as you settled back into your seat, only feeling the slightest tinge of anger. Mostly, this relieved you because any ounce of sympathy you had over Elise was gone like the wind. 

Sure, it was far from having good morals, but you certainly hoped that you’d be finding yourself with Angus somewhere tonight. Alone, and not so quiet. It’s what you both deserved.

“Did you see how Jason didn’t even say hi to me in class earlier?” Shavonne’s voice was loud over the wind as you girls drove down main street, the radio lowered, “I mean, he walked up to the door and saw me inside and didn’t even acknowledge my existence. He’s such a prick.”

“And here Kaye is trying to tell me that Benny is the worst in school,” you chuckled, glancing back to look at Shavonne, “Jason is a prick, though, he always tries to play hard to get as if you two haven’t been seeing each other all year, like, what’s his deal?”

“Right!” Shavonne exclaimed, taking another drink of the coke that was nearly gone, “And honestly, I’m doing him a favour by sleeping with him. I’m so out of his league.”

“He’s such a weirdo. He thinks being a football player makes him the most popular boy in the school,” you huffed.

“Well, it kind of does,” Shavonne sighed as she deflated into her seat for a moment, only a few seconds later puffing out her chest and sitting up straighter, “Screw him!” She exclaimed, lifting her hands in the air and shedding all worries as she forced herself to cheer out into the night sky. An easy way to uplift her energy. If there was one thing you admired about Shavonne, it was her ability of keeping herself out of the gutter. There was very little that could hold her down, and if it did, it never lasted.

“You tell him,” Kaye chimed in with a big smile, glancing in her rearview when she heard an engine roaring behind–the smile immediately faltering, “Speak of the fucking devil.”

All of you shifted in your seats to look back, seeing Pickford’s car rev up until they reached the same speed as Kaye’s. Inside sat Pickford, Jason, and some boy you didn’t quite recognize that was passing a bong back and forth with Slater in the back seat. Your eyes stared at Jason, narrowing slightly in solidarity with Shavonne’s disappointment.

Jason, who was sitting in the passenger seat, leaned forward to look past Pickford, “Hey, what’s going on?” He asked your group, a smile spread on his lips and completely unaware of the complaining that was going on between you four.

Your eyes lingered on Jason, a brow quirked—severely unimpressed. 

“What are you up to?” Shavonne called over, leaning against her door and locking eyes with Jason, a small smile on her lips. You caught her behaviour, holding back the urge to roll your eyes at how coy she was being after just talking bad about him—she was only human. 

“Oh, you know, smoking a little weed. Driving around,” he said casually, licking his lips as he focused those eyes on the blonde sitting in the backseat of Kaye’s car, “There might be a beer bust later on, just thought you’d want to know.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Cool,” Shavonne was trying so hard to hide that smile, but it was impossible. Again, you couldn’t blame her, Jason was a really cute guy. Why stay mad, especially on a night like this?

“Do you know where Angus is?” You called over, eyes flickering between Jason and Slater, figuring they were the last to see him. That was enough to garner everyone’s attention, even Pickford removed his eyes from the road to glance at you.

You hadn’t realized that your affairs were so public. 

“He’s back at the Emporium, man,” Slater said from his spot in the backseat, hardly able to keep his eyes fully opened and a goofy smile tainting his lips, “Hanging with Wooderson… I like that guy, man.”

You felt your cheeks warm up at the mere mention of his whereabouts, feeling the stare of Kaye from behind you. Couldn’t you have any peace? If Shavonne could immediately forgive Jason for being a bad not-so-boyfriend, then you should be able to lust after Angus freely! She did say you’re allowed to have options.

“Elise better watch her boy,” Jason said through a grin, wiggling his eyebrows at you. Just as he turned to look at Shavonne, his mouth opening to say his goodbyes—

“Check you later!” Slater said in a dorky tone as he snapped his fingers into guns, a big, toothy smile on his lips. Kaye sped up and down the street, you girls all laughing together as you barely heard Jason chastising Slater for ruining it.

“They’re such dorks,” Kaye shook her head, lifting a hand to adjust her rearview mirror, catching Sabrina in it, “How are you like it so far, Freshie?” She asked, both you and Shavonne’s attention landing on her.

“It’s fun,” Sabrina smiled, “I’ve uh, never had a night like this before. Do you drive around like this a lot?”

“Pretty much,” you answered, turning ahead in your seat as you looked down at your nails, too dark to properly inspects your cuticles, “There’s not much to do in the evenings unless there’s a party, so this is better than nothing.”

“We know this whole city like this back of our hand,” Shavonne said, grinning, “Do your best to keep an eye on it all, yeah? Someday, I’m sure you’ll be driving around with a cute boy looking for a place to park for some… alone time.” She nudged the younger girl, Sabrina blushing at the insinuation.

“Shavonne, do not inflict your teenage horniness on this poor freshman.” Kaye reprimanded playfully, turning down a quiet street.

“What? I’m allowed!” Shavonne snarked, smirking over at the younger girl, “Have you even had your first kiss yet?”

Those words caught your attention as you snuck a glance over your shoulder, smiling when you saw how Sabrina’s cheeks were bright red. That alone was enough admission of the truth, and you could only hope that her high school career was less dramatic than your own.

“We meant what we said earlier,” you said as you adjusted yourself, “Make sure you find a nice boy.”

“She was chatting with Tony earlier, asked her to propose to him.” Kaye chewed on her bottom lip, pulling the car through the neighbourhoods that were quiet and still. Families tucked away in their homes after dinner, porch lights flicking off and on to silently beckon their children away from their evening playtime and back inside.

“Tony?” You smiled brightly, knowing that the blonde boy was a friend of Angus’. You’d been invited to play poker with them a couple of times before, only having made it there once, “Now he is a nice boy. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a vulgar word coming from his mouth, you know.”

“Yeah, he seems nice,” Sabrina giggled shyly, tucking some of her curly hair behind her ear, “He’s just… older, though. Do seniors even like freshman?”

You and Shavonne laughed together, finding her words too innocent. She knew absolutely nothing of high school culture, and you were almost certain she didn’t have an older sister. To be this clueless was a nightmare and a half—you experienced it firsthand as the eldest sibling in your family.

“You have no fucking idea,” the blonde snickered, “I’m so glad you’re with us, Sabrina, you have so much to learn.”

The freshman was wide-eyed and looking between you all, “So… they do like freshman girls?”

“Yes, and it’s sickening,” Kaye said, “I might complain about Jason and Benny every day of my life, but at least they date girls their age,” she said, slowing down as she pulled back onto main street and pulled over on the side of the road where a garbage can was–shifting the car into park, “But Tony is actually a decent guy, so I’ll let that slide.”

Shavonne silently knew her assigned task, scooping up the garbage you girls collected over the past hour and hopping out of the vehicle to throw it away. Once back, she lit up a cigarette, settling back into the seat beside Sabrina and exhaling the smoke up into the night sky.

“Yeah, he’s not a pig like Teddy Kountze. You watch out for him, he flunked senior year, so he’s eighteen now and will still be trying to get with the freshman girls,” you warned her carefully, “and he’s a douchebag. There’s nothing good about him.”

Shavonne nodded to your words, passing the cigarette to you, “You know, my dad was twenty-two when he started dating my mom at sixteen,” she looked between you all, “Now that I’m seventeen it gives me the creeps. My dad was Wooderson’s age when they met, that’s messed up.”

“Do you think he’ll be still hitting on the girls when Sabrina is a senior?” Kaye piped up through a laugh, taking the cigarette from you and inhaling.

The freshman, again, look wide-eyed and nervous. It was endearing.

“Don’t worry,” you said to her through a chuckle, “trust me when I tell you that you’ll know who he is when you see him, and you’ll be rightly turned off. I don’t trust the girls that get with him.”

“Didn’t you sleep with him?” Shavonne kicked your seat.

“What? No! I said I thought about it when he asked,” you grumbled, “I have morals.”

“Obviously not enough to stay away from dudes that have girlfriends,” Kaye rebuked, an impish look on her face.

“I resent that baseless accusation,” you snorted, reaching down to put your hand on the gear shift, “Start driving.”

“Shit, I almost forgot to tell you!” Shavonne squealed, sitting forward so she could lean herself between you and Kaye, falling back slightly as the car sped back onto the road, “I heard from a little bird that Elise is thinking of breaking up with Angus.”

“Really?” You murmured, looking over your shoulder at Shavonne, “don’t lie.”

“I swear to god, she told me herself. She said that she’s getting bored, and she feels like she could do better for senior year,” your friend continued, delighted to see your interest, “But I don’t know if she’ll go through with it.”

“Why not?” Kaye piped up, brows furrowing as she listened to the gossip.

“Because she knows that miss love triangle over here has been hanging out with him,” Shavonne smiled, “Darla saw you two driving around last weekend and Elise is pissed.”

“What? There’s nothing illegal about driving around. We’re friends,” you complained, offended.

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, sweetheart, everyone knows that you and Angus have the hots for each other,” Shavonne grinned, “But just know that your little rendezvous are the reason that Elise has decided to hold off on breaking up with him. If you two waited just a few more weeks before spending all the free time you could muster up with each other, he’d probably be all yours for the taking.”

A heavy breath came from you, feeling regret pool inside your stomach and leaving it in a sour pit.

“What a spiteful bitch,” you mumbled under your breath.

“Well, look at it this way,” Kaye started, “if things were getting so boring between them that Elise was wanting to break up with him, then you could probably confront him about it, and he’d break up with her. The only question is, will you?”

Much like a whiny toddler, you pouted in your seat and forced your gaze away from your friends, “Yeah, whatever. I’ll think about it… we need to find some fucking alcohol.”

Kaye pulled onto a road that led past the Recreation Centre, where the freshman were having their own summer kick-off party. Not much of a party than it was a dance being chaperoned by a few parents and teachers, you could even hear the song “Love Hurts” by Nazareth being played loudly from the open doors—poor kids. 

Your eyes flickered ahead as Kaye started slowing down, further down the street you saw a vehicle pulled over on the side of the road with its headlights on and the sound of yelling. “What the hell,” you murmured, leaning over the side of your door to look past the windshield. It was Teddy Kountze’s car, cringing when you heard the cries of the boy as a paddle smacked against him.

Jason came walking from around the front of the car where the boy was pushed against a chain link fence, a smile on his face when he saw Shavonne sitting up and looking over at him. However, everyone's attention was faced over to Kountze, who was relentless with his paddling.

“Go easy on him, would you?” You called out, feeling your heart skip a beat when you realized it was Benny holding the other paddle. He turned over to look at you from afar, a smirk on his lips as you tugged your eyes away.

Jason only smiled wider as he walked closer, “Ladies,” he mused, opening the trunk of the car to reveal a sea of beer bottles and cans. He grabbed one of the glass bottles and a bottle cap opener, leaning back against the trunk, just about to open it until you spoke.

“Who’s the kid?” You asked, sitting up in your seat until you were nearly standing and looking overtop the windshield, cringing slightly as you saw Kountze paddling him a few more times, relentless in doing so. You could hear the cracks of the wood against the denim echo, pained cries coming from the kid.

“Oh, the kid there?” Jason hummed, smirking, “Some kid we saw walking around the rec centre that shouldn’t have been there,” Jason bit down on his bottom lip as his eyes focused on the blonde.

You were focused on Benny, who was walking around the car and standing next to Jason, grabbing one of the beers for himself. He was far from the hottest guy you’d ever seen, but you had grown attached to him, whether you realized it or not. That’s why you grinned when he looked at you, biting down onto your lip coquettishly as he returned with a smile of his own. Okay, maybe he was one of the hottest guys you’d ever seen.

There was something about these small town Texan boys that had you flustered.

It was easy to forget about your troubles when you had boys at your disposal, boys who could make you feel good for a night. So the looming responsibilities ahead were far from your mind and instead focused on the pleasure they gave you. That’s what you and Benny were good for each other.

And that’s how it started. A bit of flirting here and there within your first few weeks of arriving at Lee High School, until one day before a football game he came crawling to you with so much pent-up stress. You two had spent the entire night together, not falling asleep until the birds started chirping. That’s why you had to fight the urge to saunter toward him and forget about your worries of Angus, to indulge in what was comfortable for you. Ignoring your future, ignoring how the unknowing scared you.

“Can you give us some of those beers?” Shavonne called out to Jason, a smile on her lips.

“Why?” He grinned, teasing.

“Just give me a beer,” she groaned, her and Sabrina now sitting up on the backs of their seat, looking above you and Kaye.

“Get the fuck out of here!” Kountze’s voice was loud, the paddle smacking against the chain link fence loudly as the kid scurried off toward the cars. He was finally done playing with his food.

As Jason toyed with tossing over a beer to Shavonne, playing with her, he instead turned to the freshman walking past, “Here, catch, kid.” He said, tossing the beer bottle to him and smiling contentedly—it wasn’t by much, but Jason was one of the kinder boys. Not as kind as Angus.

“What did you give him a beer for? You’re wasting beers,” Benny grumbled, cracking open one of the white cans and taking a sip of the foam that nearly spilled out of the opening. His eyes flickered over to you again, smirking from behind his drink as both of you silently agreed on the fact that you’d be seeing each other later.

Far from your thoughts was Angus and the idea of breaking things off with Benny.

Was it so bad to see where things went first?

“This fuckin’ sucks,” Kountze whined, dropping his paddle into the open car door before walking over and picking up a bottle, “Last fuckin’ day of school, no fuckin’ party. No nothin’. Fuck,” as he spoke, his words grew angrier as he tried to open the bottle in his hand. When the cap wouldn’t budge, he huffed and tossed the beer, the glass shattering on the gravel road.

“You just wasted another fucking bee-”

“Shut up.”

In his hands, Jason scooped up four cans of beer, one falling out of his grasp, which Benny managed to catch. As Kountze pouted and drank his beer, leaning up against the trunk of his car, Jason and Benny bringing the rest of you each a drink. 

Coming up to the passenger side, Benny leaned against the door and gave you the beer he’d been dangling in his hand, smirking down at you and making you shift in your seat to look at him better. “You’ll be at the Emporium later?” He asked, his hands lifting to adjust the ball cap he wore, fitting it snug over his hair.

“Maybe,” you hummed, cracking the beer open and taking a sip.

“Don’t act like that. Will you be there?” Benny smiled, a low chuckle rumbling from deep in his chest, his hand reaching forward to play with your hair, something he’s never done before. It almost felt… domestic. Like you two were an exclusive item. You were certain he was only acting this way because you’d been distant lately, likely wanting to see more of you, and that treating you this way would make you go crawling right back to him. There was also the thought of jealousy, if others were already talking about you and Angus, you were one hundred percent certain that those rumours would have found their way to Benny.

You wondered if there was a rift in their friendship lately, from what you knew, Angus and Benny were close. They weren’t best friends, but they had spent years growing up together. That alone made you nervous.

“Okay, yeah. Fine. I’ll see you there.” You bit back a smile, setting your beer down into the cupholder between you and Kaye, thankful that the other three were being entertained by Jason the entire time. The last thing you wanted was for your friend to call you out about shamelessly flirting with two boys in one day. Like Shavonne would say—you’re allowed!

“So, who bought you the beer this time?” Your blonde friend asked Jason, only to be rudely interrupted by a car of freshly-graduated boys driving by with music blaring obnoxiously loud.

“Hey, Benny, you idiot!” A voice slurred loudly, one of the boys from the car, “You know I slept with your girl before you did! Sloppy seconds!” They shouted as they tossed a beer can that hit the side of Kaye’s car.

It happened so fast, everyone turning their heads to look at the culprits driving by, eyes wide and in shook.

They were lying, of course, the words spewed only because those boys were drunk and jealous of the football players. Why they were jealous of someone younger, you couldn’t comprehend—boys were weird. You were unfortunately caught in the crossfire, an easy target with Benny’s attention all over you. The words still stung you, though, your cheeks reddening in embarrassment. You felt a hand, Benny’s, press over your shoulder and gently squeeze it. Reassuring and protective.

It was unlike anything you’d experienced with him, and for the first time he’d grounded you. Weirdly, you felt like you could get used to that feeling.

“Bite me!” Kountze yelled out at the boys protectively, earning a ‘fuck you’ as they sped down the road, “Yeah, you wish, asshole!” Kaye chimed in right after, everyone angry and red-faced on yours and Benny’s behalf.

That was something you could check off—Kountze and Kaye standing up for you at the same time. Two sides of very different coins.

Shyly, you reached a hand up to rest over Benny’s, tilting your head back to look at him as you squeezed his fingers, noting the anger that was swirling in his eyes. The anger he tried to control for your sake. This moment was intimate, leaving you a bit breathless and with butterflies swirling around in your stomach.

You were now fully caught in a mess of boys and blossoming love, certain this night wouldn’t end well for one of you. Hell, maybe none.

“Why are guys such pigs?” Shavonne sneered from her seat, looking over her shoulder to where the car had sped off, now only a layer of dust in the air.

“Let’s get out of here.” Kaye murmured, shifting back in her seat and glancing over at you and Benny, motioning for him to move his hand from you, “You okay?” 

You nodded at Kaye, swallowing a lump down your throat and shoving away your bruised pride, “I, uh, I’ll see you later, then,” your words were directed to Benny. The mood deflated as you settled into your seat, feeling the boy’s gaze on you as he stepped back. You already yearned for his touch again, but you didn’t dare look over at him because you were pulled back into reality now, much too sober. Likewise, you grabbed your beer and took a long chug.

“Bye, boys!” Shavonne waved the football players off as Kaye pulled away, a smirk on her face as she gave a wink to Jason. Though, Sabrina and her were quick to ask if you were okay, leaving you to smile and nod, wanting nothing more now than to get wasted and forget about everything.

You left it up to Kaye to head to your next destination, can of beer in hand, as you sipped on it and listened to your friends chat amongst each other. Like usual, you had found yourself staring off into the scenery, your mind far from the present and up in the clouds. 

Closing your eyes and listening to the radio, you tried to keep your mind from wandering. You focused on your breathing, or how the small bit of alcohol in you had started warming your cheeks. Soon you would be at the Emporium, hopefully able to score some more beer and spend the rest of the night actually having a good time.

This was the last time you would ever let words affect you this much, you promised yourself that.

After driving around for another ten minutes and being overcome with a frustrating amount of boredom, Kaye and Shavonne decided that the Emporium would have better luck. You had forgotten all about Angus being there.

The four of you found yourself standing outside the building while Kaye had a cigarette and the rest of you practiced shooting bottle caps with a snap. Trying to show Sabrina how to do it so it would hit your shoulder. There was a shared feeling of ennui in the air, even radiating out from the inside of the Emporium. Nearly the entire student body had been waiting for Pickford’s party the last month, his house the perfect host for a night of wild teens needing to find relief after a brutal school year.

And there was only so much driving you girls could do in a night and so much beer you could get your hands—you were running out of things to do.

You, especially, could use a party. Somewhere to drink up cups of alcohol and shrug off those nasty words that stuck with you, even after Shavonne berated you for letting it bother you. You were stronger than this, but with your heart confused on what it wanted, and your brain stuck on morals, you were vulnerable.

“This is stupid,” you groaned, tossing the bottle cap in your hand onto the concrete sidewalk and leaning back against the exterior of the building, “Should we go for another drive?”

“I’m sick of driving. Let’s go see if we could score a pool table.” Kaye said, dropping her cigarette to the ground and butting it out with the heel of her shoe.

“And maybe a few more beers,” Shavonne said with a bright smile, likely the only girl in your group that was optimistic about what the night would bring.

As you turned to make your way into the Emporium, none other than Angus Tully stepped out, a cigarette fit nicely between his lips. You looked at his clothing, a purple button up triple his size that was tucked nicely into some white bell-bottoms. The familiar fluttering with your stomach made its appearance again, and long gone were those thoughts of Benny—not when the boy you’d been falling in love with was standing right in front of you.

“Hey,” you grinned, walking over to him and pressing a hand against the wall, “Fancy seeing you here.”

You swore you noticed Angus’ eyes brighten when he saw you, smiling as he pulled the cigarette from between his lips and walked right next to you, followed closely by Wooderson, and surprisingly, your younger brother. Obviously, Kaye and Shavonne weren’t the only girls who invited a freshman. You watched with a smile as he ran past you, eager to see a familiar face in Sabrina.

“You nearly convinced me that I wouldn’t see you tonight,” Angus snickered, leaning against the wall and looking you up and down slowly and with intent, “So, you did end up having the time to finish drying your hair. You, uh, look nice.”

“Thanks, you too,” you breathed out through a giggle, your entire spirit lifting now that he was around, “Did you hear anything more about a beer bust? We’re getting bored.” You motioned a hand back to Kaye and Shavonne, who were standing behind you and focused mostly on Wooderson.

“Ask this man right here,” he smiled, pointing his thumb to the older blonde, who was smiling at you with heavy lidded eyes and a permanent lopsided grin. 

“Patience, darlin’, patience.” He hummed, smoking a near-finished joint in his hands, as he took a few steps away and returned the interest in Kaye and Shavonne.

“So, what have you been up to?” Angus asked, looking down at you as he held up the cigarette and a lighter, giving you the first drag if you so pleased. The gesture was small, but it made you so fucking giddy that you had to try to hide your dorky little smile.

“Mostly driving,” you said, putting the cigarette between your lips and lighting in, inhaling the smoke that burned into your lungs, “we ended up running into Kountze, Jason and Benny,” you said, noticing the way he straightened a bit at the mention of the boy you’d been linked with recently, “They were beating on a kid so hard, that one seriously won’t be sitting for weeks.” 

“Christ,” Angus chuckled, taking the cigarette you passed to him and inhaling the nicotine he’d been needing, “I feel bad for the freshman boys, you know? Not saying you girls don’t have it bad, but after today they’re all free. All those boys that went running will be hunted for the rest of summer.”

“Aw, did poor Angus get paddled as a freshman boy?” You teased him, seeing the way he empathized, finding it rather sweet.

“Fuck yeah, and it hurt like hell.” He laughed, “I was an idiot and went running on the last day of school. If I could go back and tell myself to suck it up and get paddled on the first day, I would’ve taken ten lickings like a champ.”

You watched Angus with a big smile, chewing absentmindedly on your bottom lip as you stayed attentive, thinking back and wondering what kind of boy he was like when he was young. 

“Well, thanks for not being the kind of guy to take this so seriously,” you said, “You’re a nice guy, Angus. Far nicer than those stupid pricks that yelled at me today,” you huffed, “Can’t even enjoy a beer in peace.”

“What happened?” Angus questioned, and you could feel his energy change, like he cared about you—like he was worried. 

You found yourself getting shameful about admitting it, though, your cheeks warming up against as you cleared your throat and shrugged, “It wasn’t anything serious.”

“Tell me,” he urged, a serious look on his face, “Who said something? Was it Benny?”

“What? No. It was actually directed at him,” you cleared the confusion, but it didn’t seem to help, Angus’ face contorted in uncertainty, “Jason was giving us some beers after Kountze let the kid go, and Benny and I were chatting then some dudes drove past, drunk as hell, and yelled about how they’d slept with me before Benny did. Or something along those lines, I don’t know, it was really fast, and they were just being douchebags trying to get under his skin. It was a complete lie, I haven’t slept with anyone except Benny–” you were poisoned with rambling, it seemed.

“Are you okay?” Angus interjected, his eyes softening as he noticed your discomfort over the situation. His compassion made you tense up, almost half-expecting him to focus less on the verbal attack that insinuated you were sleeping around, but instead he was worried about how you felt. 

“Yeah… I mean, it was pretty insulting, but I’m okay.” You nodded your head, feeling so incredibly small under Angus’ gaze, but safe.

“Some dudes are total pigs,” he huffed, giving you the cigarette that you obviously needed, “hopefully that’s the last time they bother you like that.”

“Thanks,” you said quietly, taking a few much-needed drags from the cigarette, “I won’t let it get to me next time.”

“Good,” Angus smiled, watching you with a look of awe and love on his face, but you couldn’t quite make that out. You were far too oblivious for your own good, “I bet Benny was happy to see you.”

And there it was. You knew it was too good to be true—a night where Angus would forget all about your own ‘relationship’. You were kind at least, keeping your lips tight about his own situation.

“I wouldn’t say he was necessarily any happier to see me than usual,” you chuckled, awkwardly dropping your gaze, “We just hang out from time to time. It’s nothing serious.”

“Are you being honest?” 

You looked up, meeting those brown eyes, “What do you mean?”

“Is it nothing serious?” He questioned you, making you feel like there was no one else around you as he fixated on those words. You grew tense, the first time being questioned so analytically by him. 

This would have been the perfect time to explain everything, to bring up your feelings for him, and to let him know that you’d call things off with Benny as long as he did the same with Elise. But you could never do things that easily, could you?

“Uh, no. Nothing serious.” Is all you said, shrugging. In the back of your mind, you remembered the way you had grabbed onto Benny’s hand, holding it for reassurance as he was silently there for you. To you, it was nothing serious. To him? Well, you couldn’t be so certain what his intentions were, so technically, you weren’t lying.

“That’s cool,” Angus replied, his eyes dropping as he continued smoking–his mind elsewhere, and you wondered if any of your words actually stuck in his mind. You followed his gaze, looking down at your chest, which was manipulated perfectly by the halter top.

A laugh bubbled up from your throat, “are you staring at my fucking tits?” 

“Huh?” Angus was caught off-guard, looking up at you, cheeks pink, “No, not at all,” he was adamant in his answer, exhaling smoke from deep in his lungs as his expression faltered sheepishly, “…yes.”

“Yeah, some dudes are pigs,” you teased, earning a smile and gentle shove against your shoulder from Angus.

Things were cut short, though, your eyes slowly moving past him when you saw two familiar figures walking up toward the doors of the Emporium, your stomach twisting into knots. Darla smiled at Wooderson, giving him a wink as they walked past, Elise, however, was staring daggers at both you and Angus. Whatever nice girl facade she’d managed to play these past few months had completely vanished, you saw her exactly for what she was.

You swallowed a lump down your throat, pulling your eyes away from Elise as she took a drag from her cigarette and walked inside the Emporium slowly, leaving you and Angus standing outside awkwardly. Neither of you dared to bring up the elephant in the room, you were instead waving goodbyes to Kaye and Shavonne as they went inside, following Elise and Darla.

Soon, you, Wooderson and Angus were standing outside, your brother having went in with Sabrina to mingle with their peers. It wasn’t so awkward anymore, having taken up small conversation with the older man.

“So, you lived in California, right?” Wooderson asked you, putting a joint between his lips and inhaling.

“Yeah, Santa Barbara,” you replied, staying close to Angus’ side. You didn’t know Wooderson all that well, but you’d met him twice before today—all you knew was that he was an older guy who loved younger girls. And, he bought you beer once, so you owed him.

“California dreamin’,” he smiled, “bet you miss it, huh?”

“Every day,” you sighed, closing your eyes for a moment and able to instantly take yourself back to the coastal beaches.

You were rudely interrupted by the sound of squealing tires against pavement, opening your eyes to see Teddy’s car come speeding into the parking lot and stopping right in front. You met Benny’s gaze immediately as he stepped out of the car to let Jason out of the back. Though, you were far more perceptive than usual, catching the way his eyes flickered between you and Angus, unimpressed.

“Hey, Slater, you fuckin’ hippie! Give me some drugs, man!” Kountze called from the driver’s seat, his voice making a shiver run down your spine. Even though he’d kind of stood up for you earlier, he was still your least favourite human on this planet.

Slater had been sitting sideways outside of Pickford’s car, the two of them sharing a joint without a care in the world. Until Teddy showed up.

“Get some from your mother, man,” Slater returned wittily. You could see the irritation on his face, it was hard to get a guy like Slater upset.

“We just bagged your mother,” Kountze laughed loudly as Benny got back in the car. He hadn’t acknowledged you other than the lingering stare, and you knew that you’d be confronted by him sooner or later–you tried to ignore it.

“Okay. Fuck you, dick head,” Slater said, waving his hand at them as Kountze pulled out of the parking lot, the smell of rubber on pavement making you nauseous.

“Man of the woods, what’s going on? I haven’t seen you in so long.” Jason grinned, happy to see Wooderson as he ran up to him, greeting him in a way that made you crinkle your nose at their vulgar behaviour.

As you watched the two men catching up, you almost didn’t notice the way Angus’ hand had moved to the small of your back. You snapped your head to look at him, a knowing smile on his face as he looked past you and over to Wooderson. You chewed on the inside of your cheek and leaned into his touch, letting out a content sigh. This felt much too good, like this was normal. You wanted him to be your normal.

“I think I might head inside,” you murmured to Angus, looking up at him and ignoring Wooderson’s rant about younger women—loving the way he got older, and how they stayed the same age. You wished Kaye was outside to hear this, she would’ve jumped at the opportunity to argue with Wooderson about his predatory behaviour, but he would've taken it with stride.

“You sure?” Angus asked, keeping his voice low as he looked over you. 

Though, just as you were about to nod to his words, Pickford spoke up, “You guys wanna’ go for a spin?”

“Fuck yeah, shotgun!” Jason quickly snapped his fingers, grinning as he pointed at Wooderson and Angus, “Woods?”

“I’m here, man.” Wooderson replied, content with sticking around the Emporium, likely now that the girls were inside and ready to be flirted with. If you weren’t so disgusted in the twenty-year old’s behaviour, you likely would’ve been right with them and hoping he’d give you the light of day.

This was the best opportunity to usher a quick goodbye to Angus before disappearing and finding your friends, but you were looped right into the action.

“You want to come along?” Angus pulled himself from you, stepping toward the car and grinning, trying his best to entice.

You let out another long exhale, trying to act cool, but you were crazy excited. You hadn’t wanted to go inside to get away from Angus, rather, you were getting bored with standing around and doing a whole lot of nothing. Spending time with Angus? Yeah, you’d say yes to that any day.

“Yeah, why not?” You agreed, stepping alongside Angus and walking toward the car.

“Listen, I’m gonna’ give you shotgun,” Slater said to Jason as he got out of the passenger seat and motioned for the blonde boy to take his spot, eyes so small that you could barely see them. You could tell how red they were, though, “But I want you to know it’s only ‘cause I’m goin’ inside. You keep that in mind.”

Jason smirked, “Okay. Got it, Slate.” 

As they spoke, you slipped into the back of the car, sliding into the seat behind Pickford, with Angus settling in right next to you.

You weren’t sure what to expect, this being your first time hanging out with this group of boys, but you were certain that it wouldn’t be short of entertaining. You settled into your seat, sighing quietly as you felt Angus’ hand rest on your thigh, wishing there was no fabric blocking his touch from your bare thigh.

As you felt your heart doing flips in your chest, eyes locked in Angus’ brown ones, you wondered if he felt the same.

[clairenovakz]

art school blues (sam winchester x reader)

pairing: sam x reader warnings: general violence, grief summary: when your roommate is murdered, two fbi agents show up to solve the case. word count: 3.7k a/n: please send me feedback!! i would love to hear any of your thoughts :-) i imagine this is set around like season 3-4, or at least imagine a younger sam and dean. enjoy!

"Are you Y/N?"

"Who's asking?"

“I’m agent Angus and this is agent Young, can we ask you a few questions?”

“I already talked to the local police, why do I have to talk to the FBI too?” You asked, crossing your arms.

The two men lingering in your doorway glanced at each other briefly. The taller one - agent Young - turned and gave you a polite smile. “Ma’am, this matter has been turned over to the FBI, so we just want to do some routine questioning. It won’t take too long.”

You hesitated. They seemed a little young to be FBI agents, but you hardly had any reason to doubt them. You crossed your arms and sighed, stepping back to let them into your apartment. “Come in.”

The events of the past few days had been harrowing, to say the least. You moved the various blankets you had been bundling up in the past few days on the couch with to make space to sit. Agent Angus and Young sat across from you, both leaning towards you. You were already nervous about the FBI being in your dinky college apartment - even moreso now that they were looking at you so intently. Does it pay to be this cute? You wondered thoughtlessly, shyly checking out Agent Young’s perfectly tailored suit and the way his hands flexed when they rested on his knees.

You cleared your throat and began to recall what had happened.

You and your roommate, Tara, were at the library, studying for upcoming midterms. It was past 10 already - most students had gone back to the dorms and it was quiet. As an art history student, you’d been meticulously making flashcards and taking notes to help you remember the various artists and their works. Even though you loved art, you had a hard time remembering exactly where a lot of the work originated. Tara was quizzing you, while you took notes on the ones that you kept forgetting.

“Y/N, I think you’re good. The test is gonna be fine,” Tara reassured you, finally setting down the rest of your flashcards. She leaned back and stretched her arms, clearly cramped from hunching over a table for the past two hours.

“I know…” You groaned and laid your head on the table, the coolness of the wood feeling good against your flushed skin. “I just really can’t afford to get lower than a C on this one.”

“Relax,” Tara leaned down with you and you brought her eyes to hers. “I think all you need now is a good nights sleep. We should head out anyway, it’s pretty late. I think the library is probably closing soon.”

You sat up and nodded, beginning to gather your materials silently. Tara stood and pulled her coat on. “Where are you going?” You asked, realizing she was already stepping away from the table.

“Relax. Just gonna pee. See you in a sec!” She tossed her hair and began walking towards the bathroom.

You smiled slightly to yourself and finished grabbing your books, when the lights suddenly flickered. You looked around. No one was around. There were a few large paintings that were up on the walls, and you tried to pinpoint if they were anything notable, but you didn’t really recognize them. Figures. Maybe all your studying had gone to waste…

The light flickered again. You’d never seen this building have power problems, and it was beginning to unsettle you. You quickly slung your bag over your shoulder and headed to the bathroom to find Tara. 

“Tara?” Stepping inside the library bathroom, the lights went dark again, before coming back. It was eerily quiet. Swallowing thickly, you pushed open the first stall. Nothing. “Tara, hello?”

When you opened the second stall, you couldn’t contain your scream. Tara was there, but there was blood splattered all over the stall. Her body, completely covered in blood, was near unrecognizable to you. As you stepped back in horror, you turned slightly and saw a woman standing next to you. 

You bolted. Running to the library doors, you raced outside and called 911, hoping that this was some sick dream.

It hadn’t been. As you finished recounting your story, agent Young leaned towards you and put a hand over yours. “It’s okay, just breathe.”

You hadn’t even realized that you were trembling. You looked up at his warm hazel eyes, and nodded only slightly. “I haven’t been able to go back to my room since she died. It’s just too empty back there.” You gestured vaguely to the hallway, where your and Tara’s rooms faced each other. The couch was your home now, you were sure of that.

“I’m so sorry for your loss, Y/N.” Agent Young squeezed your hand.

You sucked in a sharp breath. “Do you need anything else, agents, or can I be alone now?”

“Would you maybe show us around the library?” Agent Angus spoke up, flashing you a smile. You thought for a second. Better to stay around your empty apartment, or actually try to get justice for Tara? Yeah. You knew what you were gonna do.

X 

The school library was taped off, but with no police around, the agents went under it and let you in after them. You had always loved this library - it was beautiful, architecturally, and you loved the warm and communal feeling you always got when you went in. Now, walking inside, all you could feel was a cold chill running up your spine.

It was big inside, with sprawling tables for students to study at and rows and rows of books. You looked up at the familiar paintings that lined the walls, and something caught your eye that you hadn’t noticed before. “Huh.”

Agent Young sidled up beside you. “What’s wrong?”

You pointed to a painting above the circulation desk. “That one must be new, I think. I don’t recognize it.”

The painting depicted a young woman with her arms folded over her legs, smiling serenely. Her hair was wispy and blonde, and she wore an elegant white dress. You didn’t recognize it.

Agent Angus went up to the painting to get a closer look. Just as you were about to ask what seemed so important, agent Young put a hand on your shoulder. “Would you mind showing me the bathroom?”

“Sure,” You lead him away towards the back, into a small side hallway that lead to both bathrooms. You stopped, suddenly feeling sick. “Um… would you mind if I waited out here, agent?” A pain-stricken expression crossed your face as you remembered what you had seen.

Agent Young looked at you softly. “You can call me Sam.” He said, before nodding. “I’ll be right back.” He stepped inside the women’s bathroom, leaving you alone.

You leaned against the wall and stared at your shoes. For the first time since you saw Tara, you noticed there was some blood splattered against the side of your shoe. You leaned down to try to scrape it off, and suddenly found that tears were pouring out of you. “Oh, God.” You muttered to yourself, curling in on yourself, trying to forget the tragedy you’d experienced. You didn’t have many people in your life - an unkind family and introverted lifestyle had led Tara to be your closest friend. And she was really, truly gone.

You didn’t even notice when Sam had stepped out of the bathroom, but suddenly felt arms wrap around you. You pulled him close to you, suddenly just wanting comfort that you hadn’t gotten. “Sam…” You gasped, trying to pull yourself together. “I’m s-sorry.”

“Don’t say that,” he replied, sternly but with genuine fondness. “You have nothing to be sorry for.” He squeezed you tightly, holding you to his shoulder as you cried out for a little bit.

You pulled back, looking at his face. He couldn’t be much older than you, still looking like a boy in a handsome suit. His hair, long and soft, tickled your cheek a bit. You were so close to him. He suddenly flushed with color and cleared his throat. “Here.” He held a hand out to you, which you accepted, and pulled you up. “You okay?”

You smiled a little. “Yeah, thanks.” Suddenly bashful, you didn’t know how to break the tension.

“Hey.” Agent Angus suddenly appeared, rounding the corner with an inquisitive look. “What’re you guys doing?”

“Nothing.” Sam said quickly, pulling away from you. You were suddenly offended, and you scoffed. Sam looked back at you and you realized he was still blushing, looking slightly disheveled and a little less put together than he had been. He looked away from you quickly, and you fought the urge to laugh. An FBI agent getting all flustered because of you? It was endearing.

“Look, I think we’ve got all we need from here. Let’s go.” Agent Angus motioned for the two of you to leave. You were glad to get away from here, and followed the two of them from a slight distance as you left the library. They seemed engrossed in a private conversation, so when you got closer to them you cleared your throat.

“Thanks for looking into Tara’s death,” You said, sincerely. “But I’m gonna go now if you really don’t need anything else.”

“Here,” Sam handed you a card. “Give us a call if you find out anything else.”

Agent Angus suddenly nudged him and Sam shot him the bitchiest expression you’d ever seen. You swore, if you didn’t know them, you’d think they were like brothers. You laughed a little at that. “Sure. Thanks.” You pocketed the card.

You couldn’t wait to eat takeout when you got home. It had been a long day.

x

“Y/N.”

You groaned.

“Y/N. Y/N. Please.”

You turned in bed, not wanting to open your eyes.

“Please, Y/N. I need your help.”

You shot awake, suddenly breathing hard. You swore you’d just… 

You blinked in the darkness. “Tara?” You whispered, feeling foolish. Her voice had been right in your ear, you swore. You felt sadness well up in your throat again. “Tara, are you there?”

There was no response. You threw your blanket off and got out of bed, knowing there was nothing else you could do about sleep now. You had to do something. Go somewhere.

When you started walking across campus, it wasn’t a surprise when your feet carried you back to the library. What was a surprise was that even though it was dark inside, you could see a flicker of a flashlight through the windows. Concerned, you ran closer, bypassing the tape once again. 

It was dark and cold out. You wished you’d grabbed a jacket. Somehow, being pressed against the front door of the library did not warm you up at all. It felt even colder.

Had that really been Tara’s voice you’d heard earlier? Or was it just a bad dream? You missed her. You wished you’d gotten to say goodbye, or anything at all, before you were never going to see her again. 

What were you really doing here? 

“I want answers.” You told yourself, placing a hand on the library’s door handle. “I need to know the truth.”

Bracing yourself, you slowly stepped inside. 

“Hello?” You called out, a half-yell because you were still afraid. Moving slowly in the darkness, you stepped closer to the bookshelves, wanting something to anchor yourself. “Is anybody in here?”

A creak sounded close to you. You turned around quickly, but saw nothing. “Hello?” You tried again, feeling like you were close to throwing up.

“Y/N.” 

“AGH!” You screamed suddenly, jumping when you felt a hand on you. You turned back and saw Sam there, agent Angus behind him. They were dressed in plain clothes and carried all manner of strange things, most notably two shotguns. You stared at them dumbfounded.

“What are you doing here?” Sam whispered, seeming slightly angry.

“Me? What the hell are you doing here?” You pointed at him. “Are you guys even really federal agents?”

“Great, this is exactly what we need.” Agent Angus groaned, slapping a hand over his face.

Sam glared at him. “Shut up, Dean.”

You didn’t relent. “Tell me the truth. What’s going? Are you really here to find Tara’s killer?”

“Yes.” Sam said. His hand was still on your shoulder, and he squeezed you slightly. “I promise, we’re not doing anything shady.”

“Then what-”

Suddenly, the lights flickered on and off, and you startled. Sam and Dean looked around.

“Dean?” Sam looked back. Dean was holding a small device that was aglow with light, which was making quite a lot of noise.

“There’s some major mojo in here, Sam. Get Y/N out of here.” Dean motioned to you, and you started moving towards the door, not wanting to question anything anymore. Sam came with you to the front doors, but just as you reached them, they slammed shut.

“What the hell?!” You cried out as you tried to open them, jiggling the handle to no avail. “What’s going on?”

“Shit, Y/N, stay with me, okay?” Sam said, slightly panicked as he brought you away from the door. The lights were flickering like crazy now, and you saw the painting above the desk shaking. 

“The- the painting!” You pointed out. Dean opened his bag and pulled out, to your surprise, a shotgun. “What the-”

He fired a round at the painting, and just as he did you saw it. The woman you’d seen in the bathroom when Tara died was flying out of the painting, coming right at Dean. When the shotgun round hit her, she disappeared in a cackle.

“That’s- the woman! The woman from the bathroom!” You looked at Sam. “What’s really going on here? Who are you?”

“No time, Y/N.” Sam grabbed a large canister from his bag and began shaking salt out of it on the ground, creating a large circle. “Trust me - just stay in this circle, okay? Don’t step out of it no matter what.” 

The two of you looked at each other and you weren’t sure how to feel. He wasn’t an FBI agent, for sure. And neither was Dean. They’d lied to you and gotten you to show them where Tara died. What could be more messed up than that?

Then you remembered how Sam had let you use him as your personal tissue. He’d seen how afraid you were and told you to stay with him. And when you looked into his eyes, you saw nothing but softness.

“Okay, Sam.” You said, calmly. “But you’ve got some explaining to do.”

He laughed. “Yeah. I know.”

The woman suddenly reappeared and shrieked, loudly. She was moving incredibly fast towards Sam, and Dean shot her again with the shotgun. Suddenly, the bookshelves made a tremendous noise. As you turned, you saw books flying out in random directions, pages being ripped all around. You screamed as the books came towards you, a few of them hitting beside you but never reaching you. The salt circle. It was protecting you.

Books were barraging Sam and Dean as they continued to fight the woman. You saw the painting in the distance shaking back and forth, as if it was alive. The woman suddenly pinned Sam down, Dean too distracted by fending off books to help him. You knew what Sam wanted you to do. Stay in the circle. 

But God, as you looked at him, you couldn’t stand by and do nothing. 

You grabbed a fist full of salt from the circle, breaking it. Running up with a scream, you flung the salt at the woman with a punch, spraying it everywhere. She dissipated long enough for you to grab Sam’s hand, pulling him up. “Y/N-” He started, looking at the broken salt circle with a helpless expression. “You shouldn’t have-”

“Shut up, Sam! You’ve gotta get to the painting!” You pushed him towards it, and he didn’t question you again, this time breaking out into a run. 

You followed behind, but books began flying out all around you. Dean, finally wrestled out of his own predicament, began running to you, trying to shove books out of the way as you were beginning to get buried in them. Suddenly, the woman was upon you, her face right up against yours. 

She looked haunted, and you saw now that her eyes popped out of her head, swinging wildly as she grabbed you. Her hands were around your neck, squeezing tight. You thought of Tara, and the blood that had spattered around the bathroom stall. You thought of Sam, his back disappearing as he got further from you, towards the painting. You could just make out Dean over the woman’s shoulder, trying to pry books off of you and get you away. There was so much noise and commotion you could barely tell what was going on, but you knew one thing felt for sure - you were going to die. 

Your hands reached out, desperately trying to claw away as the woman squeezed your throat painfully. You felt bile coming up as you tried to scream. Blood streamed out of your nose. Nothing came out of your mouth. You could see Dean mouthing your name, but you were shaking too violently to try to respond.

Suddenly, it all stopped. The woman was gone. The books laid motionless beside you. Choking for air, you found your breath returning to you all at once. You reached up and realized blood had been leaking out of your nose and the corners of your eyes, and your vision was cloudy.

Standing at the far end of the library was Sam, holding a lighter up and burning the painting of the young woman. But as you saw it now, you realized she had somehow morphed into a much older woman. The same woman who had nearly killed you.

“Y/N, we have to go, now!” Dean grabbed you roughly, pulling you up as you hobbled toward the door. The fire from the painting was quickly spreading, burning the wallpaper and scorching across the floor. 

“Sam,” You managed to choke out, tugging at Dean’s shirt as he dragged you. “What about Sam?”

“I’m right here,” He suddenly materialized beside you, also grabbed an arm so you could walk a little more properly. The three of you ran outside, smoke billowing out of the building behind you and blood completely dripping out of every orifice of your face. 

You laughed, suddenly and violently. Your head was spinning. “Sam..?” You managed to say, before you hit the pavement with a crack, and everything went black.

X

Beeeep. Beeeep.

The first thing you felt when you woke up was the stiff sheets beneath you. As your senses came back to you, you felt yourself clench and unclench your fingers. It was cold and uncomfortable.

“Hrr..” You managed to spit out a noise as you opened your eyes. The hospital lights blinded you momentarily, and when you sat up, you finally regained your bearings. You were in a hospital bed, an IV hooked up to you. Next to you was Sam, wearily sleeping in an uncomfortable looking chair.

You couldn’t believe your eyes. You couldn’t believe he was still here, couldn’t believe what had happened, and still… you felt grateful. Relieved that maybe it was over now.

“Y/N?” Sam blinked slowly, coming to as he heard you wake. He sat up suddenly, wiping at his mouth as if checking if he had drool. “You’re up.”

“You saved me,” you whispered, still in disbelief.

“You saved me first,” he replied, smiling softly as he held a hand out to you. An offering. You took his hand gently and squeezed it, smiling back at him.

“I have so many questions,” you said, looking around to see if Dean was nearby. “Who are you? What was… what happened? And the library.. Is it..?” You couldn’t seem to force yourself to stop talking as questions began spilling out of you.

“The library burnt down. Looks like the guy who killed Tara also committed arson.” Sam solemnly said, his mouth in a hard line. “You were saved just in the nick of time,” He shook his head, beautiful hair shaggily falling around his cheeks. “Or at least that’s the official story.”

“Mm.” You muttered, nodding. “And what’s the unofficial story?”

“You really wanna know?” Sam looked much older now, the weariness in his eyes aging him. “Because you don’t have to know if you don’t want to. I promise you it will make life easier for you if you don’t.”

You thought of everything you’d been through the past few days. You thought of that woman horrifically choking you to death, the books and the salt circle, and the burning painting. And you knew you wouldn’t be able to forget it as long as you lived.

“I want to know.”

“Okay, Y/N.” Sam looked sadly at you, your hands still intertwined. “Your library bought a cursed painting. The woman who painted it was murdered, and she was haunting the painting. When they hung up the painting, she manifested herself as a ghost and killed Tara.” 

“Hm.” You said, after a long pause. “So… ghosts are real?”

“Yeah.” Sam shrugged. “So is every other supernatural monster you can think of. It’s my brother and I’s job to kill them.”

“Soundless like thankless work, Sam.” You said quietly, leaning towards him. 

“You’re taking this surprisingly well.” He whispered back, leaning towards you. He seemed so hesitant. You felt like he wanted you to take the lead.

“I’m freaking out inside, don’t worry.” You replied, giggling slightly. “Or maybe the shock just hasn’t set in yet.”

“You’re a lot braver than you look.” Sam’s eyes crinkled as he laughed. 

“So if all that’s real…” You said, leaning in incrementally closer.

“Yeah?” His eyes were sparkling. You could see your whole future in them.

“Is this real too?” You leaned forward and kissed him. He stayed stiff for a moment, but suddenly kissed you back, embracing you slightly as you didn’t let go. You pulled back once, just enough to press your forehead against his and to see his serene smile, and then went back in for more. He kissed you with every ounce of his body, pulling at your hips slightly to bring you even closer. 

It didn’t matter what existed outside of this. To you, in this moment, it was perfect.

[strawburry01]

That's Not Me

Summary: Reader and Angus listen to your record collection and bond over music and parent problems (it's not very deep)

word count: 2k

Authors Note: this is actually the first stuff I've ever put on tumblr and I've currently been working on this as I'm insanely doped up on wisdom teeth painkillers so sorry if it reads weird. I'm trying to start writing more in general n shit so you have any weirdly niche or specific scenarios or desires pls just shout em out (i see you, you're valid). ALSO: Walk with me here, you're telling me Angus Tully wouldn't be a big fan of the Beach Boys? I know this sad ass mfer would eat Pet Sounds up. It's a short album, do yourself a favor n listen to it (or at least check out the songs I took the blrubs from for this) cause it's some GOOD STUFF. That's all.

You stood over the lone dresser in your room. Your prized possession of a small record player balanced precariously on top of it with your stack of records spread out across the rest of the top. You’d been collecting records even since your first year at St. Mary’s, despite the rules against it that the sisters there tried to enforce at every opportunity.

But they had left you here, alone, at Barton so it’s not like they could complain about it now. Nobody was even here besides you, that odd Professor Hunham, the sweet chef Mary, and that Angus Tully boy. It had been a few days since the rest of the boys had been picked up in a helicopter, leaving the four of you to the echoing halls of the empty school. 

You plucked the new Fleetwood Mac album out of your pile and slipped it onto the turntable before placing the needle gently down onto the black vinyl. Stevie Nick’s smooth vocals began to tinny out of the small record as you tapped your foot to the song as you continued to rifle through your stack of records. 

Your parents had left you to stay at St. Mary’s for break as they were stuck on some business venture in Germany. A pro of these trips, they funded your buying habits in exchange for your passive agreement when it came to these sorts of holidays. You missed the days when you were so young they had to just drag you along everywhere they went. You felt like a real family then. Now it just felt like you were a burden to them- another person for them to give their money to. 

“Where’d you get that?” a voice asked from the doorway, startling you out of your thoughts. You quickly swing to the doorway, still gripping the empty sleeve of Fleetwood Mac. Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, it was just the lanky figure of Angus, eyeing you with his arms folded. 

“Ever heard of knocking, ya’ prick?” you said, rolling your eyes as you turned back to the music.

“Where’d you get the record player?” he asked again, taking a step into the room. You shrug, keeping your focus on the records and not Angus deciding to invite himself in.

“I stole it from the confiscation closet at St. Mary’s”.

“Really?” he said in shock, almost impressed.

“No, of course I bought it you weirdo” you laughed. He looked much less impressed. “I bought the record player with my own money from working at the pool over the summer, but my parents have given me money for most of these records” you explain, gesturing to the stack. Angus took a spot right next to you, his air of cigarettes and old book pages wafting by you. He stands silently as he begins looking at each record. For him previously having taken every chance for a smart-ass comment at your expense, his silence was a welcome change. For a few minutes the two of you just stood, side by side, flipping over albums and making hums of approval.

“You have Pet Sounds!” Angus said, perking up, as he picked up The Beach Boys album. You can’t help but look over at him. The corners of his mouth are actually pricked up for once, like he’s actually happy.

“You like the Beach Boys?” you asked. He glances over in your direction with his big brown eyes with an incredulous eyebrow raised, in disbelief you would question such things. You can’t help but feel your stomach flip. Honestly how dare someone so annoying be graced with such eyes.

“Why wouldn’t I? They’re really good” he said as he turned back to the album, “d’ya think you can play it?” he asked as he handed it over. You take the album and slide the vinyl out as you place it onto the tabletop. Angus takes a seat at the foot of your bed, his hands shoved into his jacket pockets.

“Make yourself at home” you sarcastically said as you started the record, before leaning against the dresser, facing the bed. He laughs.

“Such a generous host” he quips as Wouldn’t it Be Nice starts playing from the album. The song seems to zone him out as he stares into the wall behind you, gently nodding along to the music. 

Wouldn't it be nice if we were older? Then we wouldn't have to wait so long

“What are you still doing up?” you ask, breaking him out of his trance. It was almost midnight, and Hunham would certainly kill you both if he caught wind of you two conspiring. 

“What are you still doing up?” Angus retorted, “it’s not very St. Mary’s of you to be up late listening to such devilish music” he mocked, waggling his fingers in the air for effect. You can’t help but laugh. He loved acting like your hijinks were an act against God ever since you’d been moved over for the break, all just because you went to St. Mary’s. 

“Oh please, the sisters have started praying for my ears because I listen to anything with a guitar,” you say as you swat at him. “They found my single Johnny Cash album and made me clean the dishes for a week to learn…something”. Angus snorted at that and shook his head as the next song faded in from the speakers.

“How have you not gotten kicked out yet?” he asked, “it seems like you just hate it there”. You half heartedly shrug and sit on the corner of the bed he isn’t occupying, your legs graze each other before he quickly moves it closer to his side. You’d be lying if you said your breath didn’t catch in your throat a little. It was a weird experience- being stuck in such close quarters with someone for about a week now. You had both started throwing crumpled up notes to each other during the mandatory class/detention time Hunham prescribed to you both. Most of the notes were just complaining about the situation, how cold it was, how bad Hunham smelled, how hungry you were, how much you wished you were both anywhere else. You drew Angus back a beautiful stick-figure masterpiece of the two of you laying on a beach, although he got pretty mad at how dramatically messy you’d made his hair.

 He would never admit it, but he kept it and used it as a bookmark. 

“I do hate it, but my parents have moved heaven ‘n hell to keep me there, so I’ve kind of just given up on getting out” you said as you looked down at your feet, swinging back and forth above the floor. He silently nodded, sitting with it for a moment before adding.

“My parents are just waiting for me to mess up so they can send me away” he said quietly, suddenly having a vulnerable air about him. He’d never brought this up before to you. Sure he was a bit of a prick, but he didn’t deserve to get sent off to another school just for being annoying sometimes. He balled his fist in an anxious tic on his knee, and before you can stop yourself, your hand is on top of his fist to try and calm him, or be there for him, or just show him he’s not alone, or maybe you did just secretly want to hold his hand, somewhere deep down.

“It’ll be okay” you respond back, softly. You both freeze at your hand resting on top of his. Everything goes silent except Brian Wilson’s voice coming from the record.

Being here with you feels so right, We could live forever tonight, Let's not think about tomorrow

He slowly unfurls his fist and gently begins to entwine his fingers with yours, his hands are warm, and vaguely shaky, like he’s ready for you to pull away at a moment's notice and act like this was all him imagining it. You wait a second before you gently lean your head onto his shoulder, the scent of cigarettes strong from his jacket, and you can hear him inhale sharply before realizing you’re not leaving. 

“You don’t have to pity me y’know. I’m an asshole to everyone, I get what I deserve”

“Shut up Angus”

“Okay” he said with a small laugh as he absentmindedly moved his thumb back and forth on your hand for a while before breaking the silence, “d’ya want to, uhm,-” he says before tripping on his words and going silent again. You can’t help but laugh at him getting stuck on his words, truly a first for him. You nudge your head so you’re looking up at him from his shoulder. He stares intently ahead, as if avoiding your eyes. 

“Want to what? Kiss? Do I really have you this nervous?” you tease him which draws a quick reaction from him. He glares down at you before his face softens and he looks away again. 

“So what if you did” he scoffs and suddenly stands, letting your hand go as he heads to the door. 

“Angus wait I’m sorry I didn’t mean it like that-” you say, starting to apologize and follow after him as you stand up. The record skips with an unfortunate scratch before continuing to play. You grab the cuff of his jacket before he can leave.

They say I got brains but they ain't doing me no good, I wish they could

“Angus wait-” you say as you try to pull him back. He turns and suddenly your face is in his hands and his lips are on yours. Before you can react he pulls back and lets you go, leaving him standing in front of you, waiting for your move. 

“I’m going now” he says before turning again to leave the room, acting as if he didn’t just kiss you. You slide by him and slam the door in front of him before he can actually leave. Your back props the door shut as you face him, holding out an accusatory finger.

“No- you’re not just going to kiss me and leave and act like you didn’t just do that” you say, feigning some sense of authority as you look up at him, your finger in his face. His lips twinge upwards again before he goes serious again.

“Should I not have?” he asks, “you were the one who put the idea in my head” he said with a smirk. You jab your accusatory finger closer to his face as you try not to knee him in the crotch right then and there. 

You open your mouth to reply, but before any noise can come out there’s a knock on the door.

“Miss? Everything alright in there?” Hunham asks from the other side of the door. While you stare at Angus in petrified horror for the next few minutes, he can’t help but look rather satisfied with himself. 

“Oh everything’s just fine professor, thanks for your concern!” you answer back, faking a cheerful tone as your eyes never leave Angus’s face, who is failing to conceal his laughing behind his hand, watching you struggle to maintain your cool.

“Mr. Tully doesn’t happen to be in there with you, is he? I noticed his room was empty,” Hunham adds through the door. You stare at Angus’s dumb smirk on his face, scrunched to the side of his face, with his stupid brown eyes looking down at you with a mix of attraction, humor, and misfortune. You grab his jacket collar and pull his face to your level, before swiftly kissing him with the fervor only someone knowing how much trouble they’ll be in for doing so could have. You quickly let go of his jacket and swiftly nudge him back before looking his speechless figure up and down and swinging open the door. 

You fake a large toothy smile for Hunham as you hold your hands in front of you, mustering up any energy you had left for the performance of a lifetime.

“Just showing him my record collection sir. I didn’t realize the Barton boys had such a passion for the music arts” you say, looking over at Angus from over your shoulder to see if he was going to be any help in this. He of course wasn’t and just stayed quiet as he brushed past you to the hallway with Hunham.

“A lovely collection” he murmured in the hallway as he finally made eye contact with you from behind Hunham who shakes his head and sighs.

“I wish you two wouldn’t be slamming doors at midnight, but the music arts is an exciting and important endeavor. Off to bed though, say your goodnights,” he said, as he elbowed Angus, certainly not letting the two of them alone again.

“Night” Angus tells you with his smirk, putting his hands back into his pockets. 

“Goodnight Angus, perhaps we can continue our conversation later tomorrow” you say, leaning against the doorframe with your own smirk looking back at him. Hunham tuts Angus back down the hall but not before he quickly winks at you, and you can only laugh at it all.

[ceilingfan5]

boy enrichment

happy friday! another one for @taznovembercelebration "YES"

“So like, I don’t know any of this nerd shit,” Taako says, flipping his hair a little. “But the lil’ man wants to play, and I want him to get to play, because the next time he gets the zoomies and I have to play Risk I’m gonna fuckin’ Risk It All, you know what I mean? No offence, Ango.” 

“None taken, sir! If I took offence at all of your flippant and seemingly disparaging comments made to distance yourself from real feelings and maintain the dangerously seductive comfort of irony, I’d be in a sorry state, probably!” Angus grins a great big gap toothed grin, not even looking at Taako, who just sort of accepts this as normal. Both of them look at Kravitz expectantly, and he, stunned, realized he’s meant to be formulating an answer and not just being more floored than the sad, sad fucking arcade carpet he won’t replace because he’d have to lose like, a WEEK of business. 

Also it’s vintage. 

“But I’m not!” Angus says, probably for Kravitz’s benefit, and also as a politer way to kick someone under the table, especially when you cannot kick under the counter of his game store. 

“Right,” Kravitz says. “So you want to play DnD.”

“Oh, more than anything, sir!” Angus does a little wiggle that betrays the absolute carbonated excitement lurking under his carefully controlled little bow-tie ass calm. “But even, perhaps, if it were possible to be more than anything and then more than that again, as how some infinities are larger than other infinities, as you may remember from the siren song of calculus, I really, really want to DM!”

“You want to DM?” Kravitz eyes the ten year old. Ten? He thinks Taako said ten. He might have also said five, and that’s definitely not true. Probably. No, definitely. Five is like double toddler. Right? Double and a half? “Dungeon Master,” Angus says helpfully, opening his mouth and taking a thrilled deep breath to elaborate ‘for Kravitz’s benefit’. 

“Right. Well, sh- heck, young man, uh, I admire your enthusiasm,”

“Don’t worry, you can swear in front of me! I’m perfectly well aware of what sort of words you say in what sort of situations. In fact, I’ve been learning a lot about code-switching, and-”

“Hey, lil’man, you gotta win the sale to infodump,” Taako nudges in a stage whisper.

“Right!!!!!” Angus straightens up, vibrating like a Looney Toons arrow. “Regardless, would it be possible to DM at your game store Mr. Kravitz? I promise I would follow any rules and guidelines you set out as appropriate based on your store code of conduct, even if they’re stupid, and Taako can help me bring snacks if that is acceptable!”

Kravitz laughs, getting the hang of it now. He gets it. Maybe he doesn’t get Angus specifically yet, or even kids in general, but oh, does he recognize this flavor. And he would fucking love to enable it as far as he’s allowed. 

“You know what, I do think I have an open table. I’ll put out feelers and see who’s interested. Do you mind a rotating party, or would you prefer to lock in for a certain amount of time?”

“Hmmmm,” Angus says, screwing up his face and clearly mentally flipping through his campaign notes. “Let me consider and prioritize.”

“Yeah, you consider and prioritize, maybe shop around a little, and I’ll chat with your, uh,”

“Taako,” Taako smoulders, which provides no fucking context whatsoever. Who are you to him. ELABORATE!!

“Taako,” Kravitz agrees with a smile. 

Angus bolts off so fast to look at the campaign books and dice that he leaves an Angus-shaped cloud behind, and Taako and Kravitz stifle laughter, because it’s still not like, a huge store, and the little guy probably hears everything he isn’t supposed to. 

“Precocious,” Kravitz says fondly. “You don’t know the half of it,” Taako sighs. “I can’t keep up with him half the time. But man, he cares so hard it wears a hole through me and when I eat it falls out of me like a cartoon skeleton.”

“So true.” Kravitz can’t help but laugh. They’re more the same than Taako may realize. They reek of the same vibe, like the kind of candle you wanna take a big bite out of. “He’s yours?”

“Insomuch as a stray cat is yours, you know?” Taako leans on the game counter and sigh, toying with his hair again, which Kravitz recognizes is a flirting technique and is somehow still kneecapped by. “Like, you can be like, hey, who the fuck lets cats outside? They’re gonna decimate the goddamn bird population, and then where will we be?”

“Ten percent less birdful,” Kravitz says, like that’s a reasonable thing any person has ever said on planet Earth, ever. 

Taako nods, which does nothing to discourage Kravitz’s bullshit. 

“But like, seriously, his legal guardians don’t do shit, and yadda yadda yadda,”

“Plot plot lore,  Kravitz agrees. 

“He’s mine, sort of. He comes and eats my food, at least, you know, when he doesn’t have to fight possums for it.” 

“Does the possum have a name?” Kravitz grins. 

“Garyl,” Taako says, whipping back just as fast. Fuck, Kravitz is obsessed with him. Damn, he had things to do. “He used to be a binicorn in another life, but he can’t escape the cycle, so he came back as a trash gargler. His favorite cheese is provolone.”

“Ooh, mild,” Kravitz says, so outside of himself at the moment that he could pause the livestream and do football drawings and commentary on his own stupid face putting these noises in this order. But Taako laughs, so it’s worth it. He looks at Angus, who is carefully inspecting the Bucket O’ Dice, and digging frantically for one he’s spotted in the very bottom. “I almost want to go open another pound of dice and pour them in, you know, for uh…boy enrichment.”

“Boy enrichment is the name of the game,” Taako agrees. “That tiger needs beefier meat pumpkins than cha’boi can provide. I can’t keep up with him, seriously. I was hoping maybe you’d know more about this shit?”

“Yeah, a little,” Kravitz massively understates, feeling a glowing, strong bond form between him and this alleycat of a kid. “I’d love to let him find his footing here, if you want. And if people want to be freaks about it, I’m not having it.”

“Fuck yeah,” Taako mumbles. “Knew I could trust a pretty guy like you. No one’s snapped you up yet?”

“Too goth and weird,” Kravitz laments, like he isn’t having a heart attack about being called pretty. “I’m as single as the day is long.” 

“Well, it’s Daylight Savings Time, bitch, and it’s about to get real dark.” 

“Are you-” Kravitz can’t help but laugh. “Are you announcing your intentions to pursue me?”

“Is it working?” Taako winks. 

“Yes,” Kravitz has to admit. “Yes it is."

[ID: a gameboard with 15 spaces, 1-5 taken up by stickers of a cat, a fish, "good worker", a door, and a dragon]

[mytrouvailles]

night in the woods is such an important game for me and i can’t ever explain as in depth as i want to but i just replayed it for the seventh year in a row so here we go

mae’s from a small town, a poor town. she’s got her close knit friends. and everyone else has got this perception of her that they’ve attached to her since she was young. lots of people bringing up her past and not even opening their minds to the fact that she may have changed, it’s just a bunch of no one’s forgotten who you are or what you did, you know. people that never even knew mae in the past, like lori m., know about what she did. it’s small town talk, and small town talk always moves around in ways you never want it to.

it takes forever in the game for mae to finally open up about why she left college, and it’s because of exactly what the small town folk have assumed of her: she hasn’t changed. she still has this illness and she represses it because that’s what she’s told to do, rather than process it, work through it like selmers says to. she represses it so deeply that we, the player, spend the entire game wondering what our character is going through. we see mae’s thoughts and feelings and what she says and doesn’t say to people, and yet she never mentions how difficult it is for her to feel alright, even internally. and it’s so devastating to have a repressed illness that you’ve shown so many clear signs of, one that you’ve been taught to ignore until your wires snap. one that takes so hard of a toll on your well-being, makes it impossible to do what seems so easy for others. and it’s so real.

i think that’s what i love most and identify most with this game, is that it’s real. from mae’s repressed mental illnesses to gregg’s insecurities with himself to bea’s losses and angus’ abusive home life, it’s real. there are people out there with lives exactly like these.

i’m from a small town, a poor town. i’ve known people like mae, gregg, and bea, and angus. i’ve known kids that were neglected, abused, ignored. i’ve known shoplifters and people that armed themselves on the street and who’ve lost their loved ones at the worst of times. i personally was not the kindest or well-behaved teenager, and i’ve watched the same people i was with then either grow into redeemable people or get themselves into something irreversible. and just like in the game, people act like they’ve forgotten about all of that. that’s small town polite right there. something happened and the signs were there, it was all the talk for a while. our moms told us not to talk to you. and suddenly you’re told to get over it without any sort of diagnosis, an answer. and everyone passes over it, even your closest friends, as if they have blocked it out of their brains for the convenience of not dealing with it. until you drown in it, and something else happens.

i’m in college now, and every time i visit home i get this feeling, one that nothing changed but yet everything did. i see someone i know with every step i take. some will serve me at the restaurant i go to eat at to catch up with my family. some will be greeting me at the only grocery store in town. some will have passed away and some will have been arrested. my high school friends have grown up, they’ve either worked or graduated college or are nearing there, they’ve set themselves up with full time careers and plans and relationships. and yet i feel as though i’ve regressed in life, i’ve decided to go to school for even longer to prevent growing up. i stayed here and got older, while you went off and stayed the same.

and it’s one thing to feel like you’ve made it no where compared to your lowest point, but it’s another to still have doubts of yourself after you’ve become a better person. you can move away, make new friends, find a loving relationship. you can start on a completely clear slate, but at the end of everything, it’s nothing but a facade if you don’t truly feel redeemable in your heart. you question how you deserve something so good, how you possibly could be seen and loved by people who know what you are, when you don’t even know yourself. i’m a good person, right? i have really up up days and really down down days, and i don’t know which it is until it’s over sometimes.

mae has no idea what she is, what her point is, there’s nothing but holding on to what she thinks is herself and her friends and her world, which is realistically so much different than how she sees it. gregg knows what he is, he knows what he was and what he wants to be. he knows that there are parts of himself that get in the way of truly believing he is good. i think that mae is in some sort of denial about learning who she is in her early adult life, constantly looking back at the past and pretending that things aren’t different when they are. where gregg is growing into himself, coming to terms with commitment and responsibility and making up for the reckless person he once was. still fearing to regress back into his more careless self, and destroy those expectations of maturity when mae is around.

throughout my seventh play-through, i found myself relating to mae and gregg more than any other characters. i have a feeling that as i have grown up, moved away, started taking care of myself as an adult, i see more and feel more for what mae and gregg each go through. mae is unhealthily attached to her hometown because attempting to start new had regressed her mental state. gregg seems to be doing all he can to get out of town, move away and start fresh. i believe that mae and gregg had grown up in their own fucked up ways, yet they have discovered opposite, personal reasons for moving past it all. they represent something that one person could always experience; they could ache for and return to familiarity, whether it’s real or not. but they could also beg and work for change. these are two feelings that i hold deep in my chest, and some days i feel one or the other, or both.

a small hometown is a bittersweet experience; it can leave you with a sense of safety, community, and flexible routine. but it can also be despicable, it can be suffocating, it can be nothing but another town, another mass of people to live far away from. mae and gregg represent this spectrum, from enjoying staying in one place to doing anything to get away from it. their reasons and their fears and their feelings are so real.

i am a woman in her 20s, who has always grown up with a complicated relationship with her hometown. i’ve never played a game that has ever hit me this hard, nor stuck with me for this long. i make it a point to replay it every year because it helps. i realize something new about these characters, i identify more with their experiences. it’s comforting, and it’s healing.

so when i tell people about this game, and i talk about getting a tattoo from it and they look at me like i’m crazy, i understand that they’ll never know why.

[deememm]

Hi, it’s been a while.

I’m absolutely gutted that I’m posting one of my favourite pics of this guy due to these circumstances. What started off as mindless watching during the second season of Euphoria, turned out to be a pocket of my life that I will never forget. It’s where I made such great bonds and spent almost day in and day out chatting and connecting with people of all walks of life for months. All because of Fez & Lexi, Maude & Angus, and Euphoria. I haven’t been active in the Fexi fandom for well over what feels like a year, but I’ve met some great people because of it.

But this isn’t about me, the fandom, or the show.

It’s about, Angus or shall I say Conor (let’s use his real name because he was just about as real as a person as you can get). It’s about a young soul who lived for the human experience and connecting with others. It’s about not giving a fuck as long as you’re being authentic and true to yourself. It’s about how much he impacted everyone he met with his energy and all those who were following and supporting him from afar. It’s about how short this life can be when sometimes everyday can feel like a lifetime. It’s about always being loyal to your day 1’s and never forgetting where you came from. It’s about showing up for the people you love and love you back, no questions asked.

Check up on your people. Love your people.

Fly high wherever you are, Conor. Bless bless one love.

Also, to anyone in the Fexi fandom that wants to chat. My DM’s are always open. 🤍

[annwrites]

"Tell me you love me," he commands. Tears sting your eyes. "I love you." "My name." "I love you, Angus."

"I'm so sorry," you say, choking back tears. "Stop fucking crying!" He shouts, shaking you. You squeeze your eyes shut, willing it away. Hoping that when you open them again, he'll have disappeared.

He’s not leaving until he learns what you look like, too. Feel like, maybe. He’ll have to decide that part once you let him inside. And you will. — You wouldn’t go to college. Wouldn’t become an engineer. Wouldn’t make enough money to try and give yourself, as well as your dad, a better life. And Angus doesn’t stay away from you. Instead, he becomes all you eventually have to turn to.

He, sharp rusted shards liable to cut soft delicate skin—bringing about malignant infection, while you yourself are more like a piece of thin linen—one sharp tug against a frayed edge, and you’ll wholly unravel until there’s none of you left.

You consider turning back around—that you've made a terrible mistake. You want the doctor to get her shiny phone out again, or her fancy laptop, and to contact the authorities. Instead of doing the smart thing, though, you walk over to him, and he stands.

You look at him again, to his neck—focusing your eyes, watching as his carotid pulses beneath the tanned skin. It's just when you're considering a sharps container mounted against the wall that there's a soft knock at the door.

You should ask him to leave. You turn to him. You open your mouth to do so, to tell him to go home—to the one that isn’t this one. And then he crushes his lips to yours.

Angus pinches your nipple gently, rolling it between his rough fingertips, his cock slowly filling with blood.  His lip twitches at the pleasant feeling while he imagines doing revolting things to you. — You glance up and see that his eyes are wide open as he stares at the ceiling, his pupils dilated. Some sick part of you desperately wants to know what’s going on in his head. Maybe you’d like it.

“Everything I do is for you,” Angus says, cocking the lever back. “Including this.” He pulls the trigger.

He tells you no one will ever love you the way he does. You don't think they could, either. Not after all the sins you've committed. You're tainted now, you suppose. Anyone else would call you sick. Think you're filled with disease.

“Like our old man? He was the first, wasn’t he? Couldn’t mind his own fucking business. Like when he caught us—you were so young then. I was just trying to teach you. Wasn’t nothin’ wrong with it.” He goes back to licking you again, cleaning you up. You’d been fifteen. Angus over twice your age at that point. 

You feel like a frightened little girl who's been forced to live inside a woman's body that you never asked for—you've been forced to do a lot of things; given even more that you don't want to have. You fear, frequently, that that's all you'll ever be: the girl in the closet, hiding from a monster that always knows how to find her. [...] You'd read once about a term...imposter syndrome. They seem to know what they're doing with the grown-ups parts they've been given to carry around. You don't. It just feels like burdensome, extra baggage to you. Sometimes it's more than you can bear. And instead of helping shoulder some of it, Angus just adds onto the straining weight of it all.

Sometimes...you go somewhere else inside while he tends to his carnal needs. Some place that you've never been, but feels familiar because you visit it so often. He can't find you there. It's the only place he can't.

You bite your lower lip—squeezing your eyes shut—before releasing it, sighing loudly, your slick walls clenching around his thick cock, teasing and pleasing him, until he slams an open palm against the cabinet next to your head, yelling as he comes inside you in one long spurt, filling you up with himself; with toxic sludge that you think one day might give you cancer. But you already have a tumor between your legs. It's why you suffer every day. 

You don't think you've ever drawn in a breath of air that hasn't been tainted with him.

You feel like a doll tonight. You do a lot of the time, really. Pretty on the outside—at least Angus says so occasionally—empty on the in.

You’re not strong enough to keep him if he wanted to walk away. But he likes you being weak. Weaker, at least.

No way the old man has cleaned up his act. He hopes he hasn’t. If he has… The thought makes him feel worse. He deserves to live the same shit lifestyle that he does. The same one he introduced him to. He’s responsible. For all of it.

Sublimation, Colubrina / Algedonic, R.H. Sin / Plainwater, Anne Carson / Cut, Caitlyn Siehl / Ask Polly: Help, I'm the Loneliest Person in the World!, Heather Havrilesky / The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini / @paulaxdiez / Japanese Breakfast, Boyish / holyaches / x / ciøta / amisouennemis / Two Girls (Lovers) (1911), Egon Schiele ; Going to Scotland, The Mountain Goats / lostaffections / The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath / holyaches / unknown

block quotes all taken from my donnybrook fanfic

[thesweetescapism]

Thinking of you and the rest of the people who were apart of the fexi fandom last year during this time. I’m thankful for all the memories made that we can look back on for happier times when we need it. Take care of yourself and you have people here if you need it ❤️‍🩹

Thank you anon, that’s very kind of you. Fexi is the first fandom I ever really got involved with. I’ve been a fan of different things in the past, read fic for it, even written a few but I never really did anything past that. Fexi was the first time I immersed myself within a community. I interacted with others, got to know some people, reached out to others I didn’t know and discussed the show and ships, even getting to the point of talking about non-fandom things and just everyday life things, the good stuff, the bad, the struggles, triumphs etc. I’m introverted for the most part, unless I really click with you and the easiest way to do that is through common interests and through Fexi fandom, I was able to come out of my shell for the first time in a long time.

I also was going through a rough time last year, I had a break up of sorts and my parents marriage was at very turbulent point and there was just a lot of toxicity around me. Fexi fanfic, tumblr and the connections I made through the fandom really and truly got me through some hard days - I don’t know what I would have done without it. I am so thankful for what this experience has brought me. I’m heartbroken over Angus as he was such a light, on screen and off. Although he is more than Fezco, the pieces of him he put into portraying such an amazing character has been such a big part of coping during the heavy times and that means so much to me. That might sound silly to the average person but all of you understand where I’m coming from because you are feeling it too - the sadness, the helplessness, the disbelief, the gratitude and the anger that someone so young, so kind would be taken from his loved ones so soon. I didn’t know him personally but I appreciated the parts of him he allowed us to see. I’ll always have the memories, the fics, the fan art etc. but nothing could ever take the place of Angus himself, the world truly lost a rare gem. Feel for everyone in the fandom who is mourning him rn. If anyone needs to talk, I’m always here to lend an ear and that includes you anon. Take care ❤️

[thechaoticreader]

Popular Books I Read and HATED

*Disclaimer: If you like any of these books, slay! I'm happy for you! These are just my own consumer choices, and imo negative book reviews are just as helpful as positive ones!*

This list is not long because I don't actively dislike many books that I read, and I have a very good sense of what I will and will not like, but there are some I had to read/were misled into reading so here we go:

1. Tender Is The Flesh

by Agustina Bazterrica

My rant review is above if you want more details but recently I've seen a few videos that articulate my feelings in a way that I couldn't before so im going to add a few reasons here that were not included in the original post:

It gave very Qanon and general antisemitic vibes: i.e blatant conspiracy made up by the "wealthy liberal elites" to encourage cannibalism for their own enjoyment (I know she's Argentinian however that doesn't mean im not allowed to get the ick from it)

Purposefully inaccurate depictions of meat industry and disrespect for farmers (context: im a vegetarian from farm country with a roommate who works in the cattle industry - Angus beef if you're curious - so im very familiar with the process and cannot say in good conscious that it is all bad -> just support local farmers <3)

world building makes little sense

COWS DO NOT EQUATE TO HUMANS NO MATTER WHAT YOU DO !!!!!!!!

the "disease" doesn't make sense (even if its made up who would believe it)

No themes were treated with the depth nor nuance they require (capitalism, feminism, veganism etc.)

I think thats all I haven't covered but this is the only book I have ever read where my hatred of it continues to grow with each day. I went out of my way and deleted it from my reader and get annoyed every time I see it. And for the record (because yes i'm salty) I didn't hate it because it was too disturbing, in fact I've read and loved worse and ive been an avid horror reader since I was (admittedly too) young. I hate it because there wasn't a well done story underneath the gore. I'll say it loudly for the people in the back GORY HORROR BOOKS STILL DESERVE A GOOD/INTERESTING STORY, especially if you want to try to put complex themes in it. If you cannot write a deep story but you're good at and enjoy gore, write yourself a lil 100 page splatter punk and we can all have a good time <3

Unlike with Tender Is The Flesh I don't have a ton of thought out critical reasons for the rest of these soooooo I'm going to give my highly subjective reasons -> I totally understand why some like them <3

2. The Handmaids Tale

by Margaret Atwood

hated the writing style

It didn't keep my attention

disliked the ending so much I actually threw it across the room <3

3. The Hobbit

by J.R.R Tolkien

hated the writing style

male centered fantasy is not my vibe

my ADHD cannot handle long incredibly descriptive sections in books -> I physically fell asleep multiple times while reading this book

honestly even with the movie I fall asleep every time

0/10 book I want to read

10/10 bedtime story

4. Lord of The Flies

by William Golding

hated the writing style

hated most of the characters (and not in a slay anti-hero way)

was forced to read it in high school and it single handedly sent me into a 4 year reading slump... I missed so many good books because of this and will forever hold a grudge

5. Romeo & Juliet

By William Shakespeare

I'm too jaded and gay to enjoy this -> every single character is so painfully stupid

tbh im just bitter that his (imo) better plays get less love than this one, its way over hyped

but I will give it points for boring me so much that I wrote my first fanfic (Romeo x Mercutio if you're curious ... no its not posted anywhere and it never will be <3)

sidenote -> Shakespeare plays I love incl:

Hamlet (duh im a depressed emo gay on Tumblr)

Macbeth (also duh, witches and female manipulator... need I say more)

Othello (a slow burn for the true crime girlies)

Measure for Measure (absolutely underrated, please please please look into this play -> I saw a production of it and it was incredible)

[an-otterly-adorable-being]

If it isn't too specific, I'd like to request some Mae Borowski x writer!reader (but specifically the "has hundreds of overly complicated stories they're trying to work on all at once and suffers proportionately for their hubris" type of writer) relationship headcanons, please

Man this reader is just like me fr fr.

Mae Borowski x Writer!Reader Headcanons

Fun fact: I'm this exact type if writer, and it's why I do mostly headcanons now. Hope y'all enjoy!

---------------------------------------------------

• Man, you really need to finish that story.

• Which one? Even you don't really know.

• Besides, you have this brilliant idea you just have to write!

• Yeahhhh, you don't exactly have a reputation for finishing projects.

• In fact you have, how many was it? 1,2,6,10,15... more unfinished stories than you can count on your hands.

• Still, on the rare chance you do get something finished, you'll treat yourself to the Clik Clak, or maybe even that new taco place.

• It was during one of these triumphs that you ended up running face first into a glass door.

• In your defense, the door had just been opened by a short cat.

• You, not expecting to be headbutted by solid glass, ended up falling over.

• As you got up you heard someone give, what you're pretty sure was an apology. It didn't really feel like one though.

• One of the four people standing nearby, the bear, helped you to your feet, and made sure you were okay.

• He, along with the other girl of the group, were fairly nice, actually.

• Meanwhile a shorter guy was giggling while the girl who hit you with the door looked mortified.

• You met eachother’s eyes, and she attempted to apologize again.

• "I...Can I apologize with, like, food, or something? We were going to the Clik Clak, if you want to tag along."

• After the tall lady, who you later found out was Bea, had to explain that she was the one actually paying, and that you didn't have to come if you didn't want to, you decided a free meal was the perfect cure for your bumped noggin.

• The group was actually fairly nice, if a bit odd.

• At the very least it was nice to meet more people around your age in Possum Springs.

• You knew Selmers, since she lived right across the street, but aside from that people in town were mostly in their 30s at the earliest.

• Well, not accounting for the Harleys.

• To be fair there were probably more people on town that were in that young adult range, but you didn't get out of the house enough to know for sure.

• Nah, sunlight is underrated, so writing Demon Tower fanfics was obviously a better use of your time than going outside.

• But these people were a nice change of pace.

• You became friends with them for a reason, after all.

• You could nerd out with, well, basically all of them, but mostly Greg and Angus.

• Bea was nice to just talk with when your mental health plummeted.

• And then there was Mae, the cat who knocked you off your feet in more ways than one.

• You never put much belief in the "love at first sight," thing, even though you had written it more than a few times.

• Even so, boy was your heart skipping fast when you first saw her.

• And now that you were talking with Mae regularly? Honey, if romantic attraction was alcohol, you'd be plastered.

• You can't explain it, neither can Bea or Angus when you tell them, but you absolutely adore this woman.

• After enough time you end up finally asking her out and, after a lot of disbelief, the two of you officially begin dating.

• Oh, and in case you're wondering, you do have a story started that is absolutely, 100% not two characters stand inside for you two.

[yourbelgianthings]

let ‘em know, kid

a short merle and angus fic :-)

On a cool, crisp fall afternoon at Lucas Miller’s Academy of the Arcane Sciences, Angus McDonald found his attention drifting from the lecture on planar cosmology to the red and orange leaves swirling down off the trees outside. He loved school and never usually had trouble paying attention, but he had some big things on his mind today that class wasn’t going to address. When the bell finally rang, Angus jumped up from his desk and ran to the courtyard to await Merle’s arrival. Tres Horny Boys, who all considered Angus to be their nephew, took turns visiting him on Fridays, and as a group on the rarer occasion that their schedules all lined up. Merle grinned and waved as he strolled through the arch, seeing the familiar young boy with round glasses sitting on a bench and kicking his feet that didn’t reach the ground.

“Hey there, Ango!”, he called.

“Hi, Uncle Merle! Aren’t you cold?” Angus had noticed the obvious: Merle was sporting his typical outfit of a Hawaiian shirt, cargo shorts, and Birkenstocks. He hopped off the bench and the two hugged.

“You’re right, I’m freezing! Consider yourself lucky I leave the beach at all, let alone to come here and see you,” Merle teased. Angus took his hand and ran back into the lobby. When they had gotten settled at a table in the cafeteria with hot drinks (a hot chocolate for Angus and an earl gray tea for Merle), Merle pulled a small box wrapped in colorful paper from his pocket and set it on the table between them.

“Mavis and Mookie made this for you, I actually don’t know what it is either.” His small hands excitedly ripped the paper off and opened the box to reveal a small spiral shell that had been threaded on some string to make a bracelet.

“Wow, look! It’s a shell bracelet, will you tie it on for me?” Angus asked excitedly. Merle obliged, and he thought back fondly on the gifts he had made for his crewmates on the beach so many years ago (that had been much uglier and received with far less enthusiasm). Usually, Angus McDonald was very talkative, it didn’t matter what topic he was presented with, but today, after opening his present, he slipped into an uncharacteristic silence, staring off into the distance and fidgeting with his new bracelet. As someone highly skilled at reading people, Merle noticed this change right away.

“Hey, Angus? What’s up, bud?” He gently waved his hand in front of Angus’s unfocused eyes.

“Uncle Merle, can I ask you something?” His high voice trembled slightly and his hands tightened around his mug of hot chocolate. “What happens when you die?”

Merle frowned deeply. “Ugh, what is that Lucas up to this time? Listen, Ango, if his weird mad science stuff is getting out of hand again and affecting you, we can transfer you to Taako’s school right away.”

“No, no!” Angus interjected. “Professor Miller is great! I’ve just been thinking about Johann...”

“Oh, of course, I see. Can we go to your dorm?” Angus nodded and got up, quietly leading the way across campus. When they arrived in his dorm, he hopped up on his bed and grabbed a large purple teddy bear wearing a silver wizard hat. There was no point bringing it up at the moment, but Merle knew right away it was from Taako. The Tres Horny Boys had an unofficial gift giving competition for Angus between themselves, and Taako always got really into it. Merle climbed onto the bed next to Angus and put his arm around him.

“Did you know I’ve died 57 times before? That’s not how it usually works though, and Kravitz isn’t a big fan of situations like that,” he explained.

Angus seemed unfazed. “There’s an exception for every rule,” he said in a low voice.

“I guess you’re right. Normally, when you die, you go kick it in the astral plane, but like you said, that might not always be the case. I get the feeling though, you wouldn’t have asked me if you were looking for a scientific answer, huh?”

The little boy’s serious eyes welled with tears, and in his confusion and grief, he somehow seemed both younger and older than his eight years. Angus buried his face in Merle’s shoulder and cried,

“I just miss Johann!” Merle rubbed his back and soothed him until he emerged again, rubbing his eyes. “We actually spent a lot of time together. Johann told me I was a good listener, and he felt less lonely having someone else around. He was a good person, I hope he’s happy since he got to see us win the battle.”

His words took Merle by surprise, their pure sincerity and kindness touched his heart. “I know he is, kiddo,” he reassured Angus. “It’s really hard to lose someone like that, but you’ll both remember each other and your time together, so in a way, the

memories help keep them alive, right? It’s the opposite of the voidfish, which Johann never wanted to be lost to.”

Angus nodded again, smiling now. “Yeah, everyone from the Bureau can help remember!”

“You’re a good kid, Angus, your Uncle Merle is proud of you.” They hugged again, and then Angus got out a board game, an infamously complicated one he liked to play because he always won (only Lucretia had ever beaten him). Merle groaned and protested, but Angus’s general adorableness won him over as usual. Fortunately, they only had time for one game before Merle had to get back to Bottlenose Cove for dinner with his family.

[its--fandom--darling]

uniform kink - s.h. x e.m. x f!r

Steve Harrington x Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader

KINKTOBER DAY 14 - UNIFORM KINK

TW: poly/throuple, uniform kink, threesome, unprotected sex, oral sex (m receiving), daddy kink, master kink, use of princess, good girl, sweetheart, language. 

“Come on out Stevie!” you called excitedly a giggle bubbling out of your throat. 

“Baby, do I have to?” Steve whined from behind the bathroom door.

“You lost the bet, this was the deal!” You said, crossing your arms. “Come on out lover boy.”

You hear him groan behind the door, “Fine!” The door swung open and out came a very pouty Steve, dressed in full Scoops Ahoy regalia complete with his little white sailors hat askew on his beautiful mane. “Is it everything that you wanted?”

You kick your feet, squealing with glee. “And more!” 

Jingling from outside the front door caught both of your attention and Steve quickly fixed you with a glare, “Don't you dare.”

You grin again and push yourself off the bed, sprinting past Steve and out the front door. “Eddie!”

He smiles at you. “Hey babe, what’s all this excitement about?” He asks, dropping his keys on the table and propping his hands on his coverall clad hips. 

You bite your lip, “Um, just that I have Steve in his old uniform in the bedroom and now my other man is here in his work uniform and I'm a very lucky girl.”

Eddie chuckles, “Yeah you are.”

“Baby, can I take this off yet!?” Steve calls.

You giggle, “No way!” You reach for Eddie’s wrist and smile, “Come on.” The two of you head back into the bedroom.

Steve looks up when you walk in with Eddie in tow and groans, “Baby, really, this is just mean.”

“What!? Eddie’s in his uniform too.”

“Yeah, but his isn’t embarrassing. I look like a - a- nautical school boy.”

You look between your boyfriends. 

Eddie chimes in, “Angus Young wears a school boy uniform to perform and he’s arguably one of the biggest rock stars alive, Stevie.”

Steve looks at Eddie and shrugs, “So.”

“So!? So? Steve, do you not know who Angus Young is?”

“Should I?” he murmurs, crossing his arms.

Eddie sputters, “He’s the guitarist for AC/DC. Come on!”

You giggle.

“I swear fuckin Tears for Fears and The Cure are fuckin rotting your brain.”

“Alright, boys, settle down. I personally happen to think that my boys look very, very handsome in their uniforms. Eddie, you look so hot with your grease stains and your hair up, your perfect forearms on display with the sleeves rolled up. And Steve, Stevie, your uniform shows off some of your best… assets. Plus it reminds me of when we met. I thought you were cute flirting with me then and I think you look even better now.” 

Eddie nods, “You do look good. Plus not just anyone could pull that off and manage to look like a total stud.” Eddie looks at you and winks.

Steve rubs the back of his neck, “I guess I never thought of it like that.”

You smile, “Listen, this is honestly a little fantasy of mine.” 

Both boys immediately snap their attention to you. 

“Oh really?” Steve murmurs, crossing his arms and walking towards you. 

Eddie smiles, “Stevie, think we should make our girl’s dream a reality?”

Steve smiles looking at Eddie, “Yeah I think we should, handsome.”

You feels your body light up with excitement, warmth filling you down to your toes. “You guys don’t have too.”

“Oh but we want to sweetheart,” Eddie coos, starting to undo his coveralls.

You swallow thickly and turn your attention to Steve, who had slipped behind you and placed his big hands on your hips. 

“Such a pretty baby, using winning a bet to get her rocks off,” he teases, fingers teasing the waistline of your jeans. 

“I wasn’t,”

Steve tsks, “Don’t deny it baby, you just wanted to see Daddy in his uniform didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“You got a twofer when Eddie showed up, didn’t you honey?”

You nod again, eyes turning back to Eddie. The top of his overalls hung around his waist and he was sporting a tank top underneath, toned arms on display littered with inked artwork. You feel the stickiness of your arousal in your panties. 

Steve's fingers pop the button on your jeans and his thick fingers sneak into your jeans, pressing against the wet spot on your cotton panties. “Oo, you really weren’t kidding. This turns you on, princess?”

You whine under his touch as Eddie tugs off his tank top. You trace his torso, admiring his build and landing on his happy trail.

“Eddie, she’s fuckin soaked.”

“Always knew you were a freak like me, sweetheart,” he says, crossing the room as he palms himself through the stained khaki fabric. 

You whimper as Steve pressed firmly against your clit. “Daddy!” You whine. 

“Why don’t you let me and Master take care of you? Hmm? Would you like that princess?”

You nod again, rocking your hands against his fingers.

“Words, sweetheart. Daddy and I need to hear you say it.” Eddie coos, coming to stand in front of you and cupping your jaw gently. You could smell the harsh soap that they used at the garage. 

“Yes, I would like that very much.”

Steve smiles at Eddie over your shoulder, “You’re such a good girl.”

Eddie pecks your lips, “The best girl.”

“So princess, how do you want to take it? You want me to fuck you and have Eddie in your mouth or the other way around?”

You hum, “Want Master in my pussy and you in my mouth Daddy.” 

Steve groans, kissing your neck. “Good girl, such a good fuckin girl. Now, princess, you gotta help us get undressed. Can you do that?”

You nod eagerly.

“Alright, princess, I’m gonna let you go and I need to you to do as you re told.”

“Yes, daddy.”

“Good girl, start undressing Master.” Steve’s hands leave your body and you throw yourself at Eddie. 

You drop to your knees and nuzzle his bulge through the coarse fabric. He lets a stained, ringed hand fall to your head as you begin to pop the rest of the buttons of his coveralls, kissing his pelvis and fiddling with the elastic of his boxers before tugging them down. You help him step out of the uniform, smiling up at him. 

He strokes your chin, “Pretty baby, you are such a good girl. Now go help Daddy before he starts to feel left out.”

“Yes, Master.” You turn and crawl over to Steve, who’d moved to sit  on the king sized bed that was tucked in the corner of the room, back resting comfortably against the headboard. 

“Come on up pretty baby,” he coos at you.

You climb onto the bed and rest on your knees, hands braced on your thighs. “Hi Daddy.”

“Hi princess, wanna help Daddy?”

You nod eagerly.

Steve looks over at Eddie who is lazily stroking himself as he watches the two of you with hooded eyes. “Eddie, baby, come join us. Take care of princess, while she takes care of me.”

Eddie nods, “I can handle that.”

You move between Steve’s spread legs and lay on your belly.

Eddie comes over and tugs down your pants and panties, throwing off the bed. Before his hands are moving up your torso, pushing your shirt up to free your tits. Steve helps take it off and drop it next to him. 

From there everything moves in fast forward, you’re scrambling to get Steve’s cock of his uniform and taking him eagerly into your mouth while Eddie is pulling you up, slotting your knees under you. You moan around Steve when you feel the hot head of his cock bumping against your core briefly before he’s filling you up slowly. The three of you moving with hedonistic abandon, the sounds of your pleasure filling the room until you all reach your climax. The three of you falling into a cuddle puddle on the bed, panting and grinning as you glowed. 

“That was amazing.” Stevie says happily. “Will definitely keeping this this around for quite awhile.”

You giggle, “My plan worked.”

Eddie grins, “Devious.”

Steve leans over and kisses you then turns to kiss Eddie too. “I should’ve known you were in on it too.”

“It’s been a long time coming, I deserve to appreciate your ass in those shorts. “

The three of you dissolve into a fit of giggle as the sun sank, filling your tiny apartment with a golden glow.

TAGGING: @persephone-is-here-omg​ @salimahbicharara-comun​ @bunnywritesmarvel​ @chaoticmunson​ @thisishellfire​ @daddy-cruise-princess​ @forever-rogue​

[mcdannoangelwolf]

Get to know me Tag Game.

Hello Yall. I've been tagged by @halevetica @merlin-wolfgang-trades-hale and @mayberrycryptid SOrry it took me so long to reply!

3 ships: (I'm gonna do 3 of my lesser talked about ships). Jack Dalton/Angus Macgyver (MacGyver 2016) Jack Carter/Nathan Stark (Eureka) and Gimli/Legolas (Lord of the Rings).

First Ever Ship: I'm gonna 2 ways here. Knowingly shipping and Unknowingly ship. Billy Cranston/Jason Scott from the original MMPR. ( I was too young to really know what I was doing. I just thought they were cute on screen together. Billy was my first gayby crush lol). Knowing ship was Gregory House/James WIlson from House.

Last Song: Some People Change - Montgomery Gentry (Yes, I'm a hick lol).

Last Movie: Die Hard (I'm working my way through the series).

Currently Reading: A book on meditation. I can't recall the title lol.

Currently Watching: Umm...Nothing really lol.

Currently Consuming: Homemade "Cheeze Its"

Currently Craving: Too much to name lol.

Ok I'm gonna tag, @inacatastrophicmind @cowandcalf @mymcdanno @lyndalynn and @powerfulweak And anyone who sees this and wants to play consider yourself tagged!

[aspenmissing]

𝙼𝚘𝚗𝚜𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝙼𝚘𝚟𝚒𝚎 (𝙿𝚝 𝟸)

The Impala drives down a road lined with trees and past a sign. Y/N in the driver's seat, per usual with Dean in the passenger and Sam in the backseat, leaning forwards with a map in his hands and a torch.

"The radio around here sucks," Dean says, reaching over and turning the music off. Y/N nods and keeps her eyes on the road while Dean turns his head to Sam. "Come on, man. Jobs don't get much sweeter than this, you know? Dead vic with a gnawed-on neck, body drained of blood, and a witness who swears up and down that it was a vampire."

"No, I -- I agree. It's a hell of a case," Sam says, lifting his head up from his map and nodding before going straight back down.

"A little more gusto, please," Y/N says, looking back at Sam. Dean points at Y/N as he spoke to Sam.

"See, we're on the same wavelength," he says, making Y/N chuckle. Sam closes the map he was holding and looks forward at the road in front of him.

"It's just... the world is coming to an end," Sam says, looking between his siblings, who nod. "Things are a little complicated, you know?"

"Yeah, well, we can't save the world, not today anyway," Y/N says, looking at Sam through the rear-view mirror, catching his eyes. "But what we can do is chop off some vamps' heads. Come on, man, it's like the good old days, an honest-to-goodness monster hunt. It's about time the Winchesters got back to tackling a straightforward, black and white case," she says. Sam looks at her in confusion as lightning strikes down from the sky.

==

By morning, the three arrive at the Oktoberfest 2008 Town square, where many people are walking around. They get out of the Impala, dressed as Federal Agents, straightening themselves up.

"We still got to see the new Raiders movie," Y/N says.

"Saw it," Sam says.

"Yeah, me too," Dean says.

"Without me?" Y/N asks, looking at her brothers with playful offense.

"You were in hell," Dean says as he and Sam look around, Y/N still looking between the two.

"That's no excuse," she says playfully, shaking her head. She looks away to see a cart with big pretzels and nudges Dean as he follows her gaze.

"Big pretzel!" They say in unison before walking off. Sam smiles, shaking his head at his older siblings' alikeness. Y/N takes two pretzels from the vendor while Dean grabs one.

"Thank you," Y/N says.

"Yeah, thanks," Dean says. Sam walks over to the two, and Y/N passes the other pretzel to Sam.

"Thank you," he says as the three take a bite of their pretzels. A woman in uniform walks past the three.

"Guten tag," she says, walking past them. Dean watches her walk away.

""Guten tag" yourself," Dean says with a mouth full of pretzel. Sam looks over at a man in a Sheriff uniform, talking to a couple. He nudges Dean and Y/N, gesturing to the sheriff.

"Mmm. Looks like that's our man," Sam says. The three walk over to the Sheriff.

"Sheriff Dietrich," Y/N says, causing the Sheriff to turn around and face them.

"Are you the guys from the fed?" he asks. Y/N nods. The three take out their fake badges, showing them to the Sheriff.

"Agent Kinsley," Y/N says and nods to her brothers, "Agents Angus and Young." She places her badge back in her jacket pocket, followed by her brothers. "We called ahead about your, uh, problem."

"Right," the Sheriff said. "Um... I'll tell you what, why don't we talk this out away from the crowd, huh?"

The Sheriff leads them to the morgue where he opens a door and pulls out a body that was covered with a sheet. Moving the top part of the sheet, it reveals a woman. He looks at Dean, Y/N, and Sam.

"Marissa Wright, 26. Just up from Lockhard for the 'fest. Terrible. Just terrible. It's the last thing this town needs at peak tourist season," Sheriff says, frowning.

"Definitely the last thing Marissa Wright needed," Sam says. Dean turns the body's head and sees two dark puncture marks on her neck like a vampire bite.

"What the hell?" Dean asks.

"Yeah, you got me," the Sheriff says as Dean, Y/N, and Sam share a serious look. "I mean, this killer's some kind of grade-A wacko, right? I mean, some Satan worshipping, Anne Rice-reading, gothic, psycho vampire wannabe."

"Sheriff, in your report, you mentioned a witness," Y/N says, looking back at the Sheriff.

"Yeah, I wished I didn't. But our witness insisted. That's Ed Brewer. Not exactly what you'd call reliable." The three siblings share a look before the Sheriff covers Marissa's face with the sheet and pushing her back in, Sam closing the door.

Y/N, Sam, and Dean head to a bar where the staff are wearing Oktoberfest costumes, and the entire bar is filled to the brim with customers and tourists. They head to the bar where the woman who greeted them outside is now handing glasses of beer to another woman as she walks away. The waitress looks at them.

"I remember you," the blonde woman says, crossing her arms.

"And I remember you..." Dean trails off, looking at her name badge. "Jamie. I never forget a pretty...everything." Y/N shakes her head and rolls her eyes.

"We're looking for Ed Brewer," Sam says, causing Jamie to look at him in confusion.

"What do you want with Ed?" she asks.

"Well, we are uh...federal agents," Y/N says, the three of them showing their badges. "Mr. Brewer was witness to a serious crime. We just need to -"

"Wait a minute. You're a fed?" Jamie asks. "Wow, you don't come on like a fed. Seriously?" Dean leans towards her.

"I'm a maverick, ma'am," he says. Sam and Y/N look at Dean and furrow their eyebrows at this. "A rebel with a badge. One thing I don't play by: the rules." He winks at Jamie, causing Y/N to scoff.

"Right, keep telling yourself that," Y/N says, sarcastically.

"Um, so where can we find Mr. Brewer?" Sam asks. Jamie points them over to a table that Ed was, and they sit across from him, who uncaps his beer stein and drinks.

"If I wasn't on a case right now, I would have downed that beer stein by now," Y/N mutters. Sam and Dean chuckle before the three turn serious again and look at Ed.

"I told the cops everything I saw," Ed says, pointing at the three. "No one believes me. Why should you be any different?"

"Believe me, Mr. Brewer, we're different," Y/N says, nodding her head.

"I spoke the God's honest truth," Ed says. "And now I'm the town joke."

"Marissa Wright's murder is no joke to us," Sam says. "And we want to hear everything, no matter how strange it may seem."

"We have a lot of experience with strange," Dean adds. Ed nods his head slowly before uncapping the beer stein and drinks again. He puts it down and gives them a thumbs up before talking.

"It was just after midnight," he says. "I just left here, and like I do every night, I cut through the park on the way home. At first, I thought it was a couple kissing. But she was... struggling too much. And this man, he was -- well, he was biting her neck."

"Can you describe her assailant?" Sam asks.

"Oh, he was a vampire," Ed replies.

"Okay, right," Y/N says. "And by that, you mean -"

"You know, a vampire," Ed says. Y/N nods.

"Uh huh."

"Yeah."

"So, he looked like -" Y/N starts.

"He looked like a vampire," Ed says. "You know, with the fangs and the slicked back hair and the fancy cape and the little medallion thingy on the ribbon."

"You mean like a Dracula?" Dean asks. Ed points at him.

"Exactly, like a Dracula. Right down to the accent," Ed says.

"The accent?" Sam repeats. Ed nods his head.

"Yep."

"What did he say?" Sam asks.

"You know, something like..." Ed raises his arm over his face as if he has a cape on. "Stay away, mortal! The night is mine!" He lowers his arm to his side. "You do believe me, don't you?" Dean, Sam, and Y/N exchange a look. Y/N shakes her head, standing up.

"I'm off to the bar. Meet you two there," she says, walking over to the bar where she meets Jamie. "So, you got a beer back there for me?"

"I don't know, Agent Kinsley, you off duty?" Jamie asks, smirking.

"And then some," Y/N replies, smirking back. Jamie chuckles and turns away from Y/N. Sam and Dean then come over.

"So, what do you two think?" Y/N asks as Sam picks up a napkin with a woman's lipstick print on. The three then lean against the bar facing the room. "Goth, psycho, vampire wannabe, right?"

"Definitely not our kind of case," Sam replies.

"Agreed. But who cares?" Dean says as the three walk towards a table. "Room's paid for, and it's Oktoberfest. Come on, brother. Beer and bar wenches." They take a seat at a table.

"Pretty sure women today don't react well to the whole 'wench' thing, Dean," Sam says.

"Definitely not," Y/N agrees, shaking her head.

"Hey, bar wench, get me a beer," Dean calls out to Jamie.

"Coming up, good sir!" Jamie replies in a sing-song voice. Sam closes his eyes and shakes his head.

"I stand corrected," Y/N mutters.

"Guys, Oktoberfest," Dean says, smiling at the two.

"There you two go," Jamie says, placing down two beers in front of Dean and Y/N before turning to Sam. "What can I get you?" Sam goes to answer, but Dean beats him to it.

"Oh, he doesn't drink. He's a Christian scientist. Doesn't even take aspirin. He's a real drag on stakeouts," Jamie laughs, causing Dean to smile more.

"You're funny," she says.

"I'm a lot more than that. I'd love to get a chance to show you the rest. What time you get off?" Dean asks.

"Ha ha. Like I said, 'funny,'" Jamie says before walking away. Sam and Y/N turn their heads to Dean, smirking.

"Yikes, that could have gone better," she says. Dean glares at her.

"Shut up," he says, taking a drink of his beer. Y/N looks over at the bar to see a young male leaning against it, talking to Jamie. Y/N looks him up and down, smiling.

"Now that's a specimen," she says. The brothers look at her confused before following her line of sight to the man. Dean scoffs.

"Seriously?" he says, shaking his head. He looks to Sam. "And you tell me to behave on cases."

"It is time to right some wrongs," Y/N says, taking a sip of her beer.

"Come again?" Sam asks.

"Look at me. I mean, I came back from the furnace without any of my old scars, right?" Y/N says, gesturing to herself. "No bullet wounds, knife cuts, none of the off-angled fingers from all the breaks. I mean, my hide is as smooth as a baby's bottom. Which leads me to conclude, sadly..." She smiles. "That my virginity is intact."

"What?" The brothers ask in unison.

"I have been re-hymenated," she replies, taking another drink.

"Re--?" Sam laughs. "Please. Y/N, maybe angels can pull you out of hell, but no one could do that."

"I mean they could," Dean says, shrugging. Sam looks between the twins, shaking his head.

"You two really do share brain cells," he says.

"Brothers, I have been re-hymenated," Y/N says, clasping the two on their backs. "And the lady will not abide."

"All right, lady. Well, you go do whatever you got to do, and I'm gonna go back to the room and get some sleep," Sam says, standing up.

"I'm gonna go too. Want a bright and early day tomorrow," Dean says, staring at Jamie. "Plenty of things to do." The brothers then leave the bar. Y/N stays seated and drinks her beer.

"Now, why is a beautiful lady such as yourself sat all on her own?" A British voice asks. She lifts her head up to see the man from before standing beside her.

"Maybe because I like to sit alone," she replies. The man smiles at her, shaking his head.

"You've got fire," he replies. "It suits you dearly. Mind if I sit?" He gestures to the seat opposite her. She shakes her head. The man sits in the seat.

"So, Tiger. Why are you sat alone? And why are you dressed in such a formal outfit while on a night out?" He asks, gesturing to her agent uniform.

"First of all, pal, don't call me tiger," she replies, squinting her eyes at him. "And second, I'm working right now and I work better when I'm alone." The man chuckles.

"Does drinking beer come with the job?" The man asks. Y/N shakes her head, holding back a smile but failing.

"Fine. I was working, but I'm off duty right now," she replies.

"Off duty? What are you, some kind of officer?" The man asks.

"I'm an agent," she replies, taking a drink of her beer.

"Well, Tiger, I can say that I've never met an agent who is this beautiful," the man says.

"I told you not to call me Tiger," Y/N replies, glaring at him.

"Well, what can I call you?" He asks. Y/N sighs and looks at him.

"Y/N," she mutters. The man smiles.

"Well, it's a pleasure to meet you, Y/N," he says, holding his hand out. "I'm Mike." The two shake hands. Y/N looks at her watch and sees the time, groaning and rubbing her eyes.

"It's been a pleasure talking to you, Mike. But I gotta go," she says, standing up. Mike follows.

"Can we talk again tomorrow?" He asks. "You know before I leave." Y/N shakes her head.

"I wish I could," she replies. "I don't think me and my partners are staying on this case."

"The case about the murders?" He asks. Y/N looks at him in confusion. "Word gets around quick." She nods her head. "So what's wrong with it? Is it too weird for you?"

"Not weird enough," Y/N replies.

==

The next day, Sam, Dean, and Y/N sit across from a woman at an outside table. The woman is slurping loudly from a large cup, and the siblings exchange a look. She places the large cup down, staring at the three.

"And then it just -- it just tore Rick into little pieces," she says.

"Ma'am, we understand how hard this is, but can you describe the creature?" Y/N asks.

"Oh," she says, taking another slurp of her drink. "It was a werewolf."

"A werewolf?" Sam asks.

"Mhm," the woman replies, nodding her head.

"You're sure?" Dean asks.

"Oh, yeah. With the furry face, and the black nose, and the claws and... " She trails off. "and the torn-up pants and shirt. Like from the old movies," she says. Y/N and Dean raise an eyebrow, their faces blank.

"Um..." Sam trails off, looking at his siblings before back to the woman.

"Well, okay, so... Thank you for your time," Y/N says, smiling at her as the three get up. The woman leans back in her seat and slurps at her drink again while the three leave her alone.

==

The three arrive at the morgue again to look at the body. They walk over to where the bodies are kept.

"First a Dracula and now a full-on movie time Wolf Man?" Dean says and looks at Y/N. "What the hell is going on in this town?" She shrugs. Sam opens one of the storage drawers and pulls out a body. He unzips the body bag, and the three groan in disgust at the smell.

"Damn!" Y/N says, face scrunched up in disgust.

"All right." Sam pulls out a pencil from his pocket and points at the body. "Whatever did this wasn't a psycho wannabe." He pulls out some shredded flesh from the corpse with the pencil. "Look at those bite marks. Right down to the bone... and deeper."

"Strong enough to tear a healthy man apart limb from limb. Could be a werewolf," Dean says.

"Yeah, except, look." Y/N grabs Sam's pencil and points it at the heart. "The heart's still there in one piece. They never leave the heart behind."

"Thus, I reiterate -- what the hell is going on?" Dean asks, looking between the two. The sheriff enters the morgue holding an envelope.

"Well, I was hoping you three could tell me. I just got a rush job back from the lab on those fibers we found on the body." He pulls out a plastic bag from the envelope. "Canine. Wolf hairs." Sam turns his head to Dean and Y/N, and the three exchange a look.

"I'm getting a headache," Dean says, pinching the bridge of his nose.

==

The three are sat in the bar they were in last night eating, the three-looking puzzled at their case.

"I don't know, guys," Dean says, looking at the two. "Looks like we've stumbled onto a midnight showing of Dracula meets Wolf Man. Is that it?" He takes a sip of his beer.

"I don't know. I mean, Wolf Man seems real enough. Makes Dracula seem a little less impossible, I guess," Sam says.

"Yeah, but werewolves don't grow wolf hair. That's just a myth," Y/N says, stuffing chips in her mouth.

"Yeah," Sam agrees and Dean nods.

"So, what? We've got a vampire and a werewolf monster mashing this town?" Dean asks. Jamie brings over another round of beers for the three.

"Looks like you guys are staying a while," she says, placing them on the table. "I heard about Rick Deacon."

"Yeah, this case just got weird enough for our department," Dean replies, staring at Jamie.

"Well, beers are on me," Jamie says. She looks at Y/N. "And, just so you know, I get off at midnight tonight. How about we have a girl's night out?" Y/N smiles up at her, nodding.

"Sure thing. I'll see you tonight," she says.

"Okay, then," Jamie says, walking away. Dean shakes his head.

"So unfair," he mutters. Sam and Y/N laugh as three lift the beers to their mouths, Y/N stopping.

"Hey, you think this Dracula could turn into a bat?" She asks. Sam and Dean look at her. "That would be cool."