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olko71 · 1 year

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House prices are falling, so why can't I afford a home?

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By Dearbail Jordan

Business reporter, BBC News

This week has been a game of two halves, economically speaking, for prospective housebuyers.

On Tuesday, the Nationwide building society said that house prices had recorded the biggest annual fall for 14 years.

Then on Thursday, the Bank of England hiked interest rates yet again.

Falling house prices should be good news for first-time buyers.

But with mortgage rates remaining high, things aren’t quite as simple as they seem.

Are house prices actually falling?

It depends on how you look at it.

In the year to July, house prices dropped by 3.8% – that was the biggest annual fall since 2009, according to Nationwide.

However, the average price of a home in the UK remains high. It hit £260,828 in July, which is only marginally lower than the all-time record reached last August.

The housing market heated up because of the Covid pandemic, helped by a stamp duty holiday.

After being forced to work from home, cooped-up people decided they wanted more space inside and out, prompting a rush of buying, selling and moving.

The average house price is now £45,000 higher than it was in February 2020, the last full month before the pandemic struck, according to Nationwide.

Andrew Bailey, the governor of the Bank of England, has said house prices are falling.

But don’t expect a bargain just yet.

Mr Bailey pointed to the fact that the number of mortgages that were approved in June rose to 54,700 – the highest since last October – while total borrowing for mortgages rose from £19bn in May to £20bn in June.

Higher approvals and borrowing will support house prices in the coming months, said Mr Bailey.

“Yes, there is an adjustment,” he told the BBC. “But I think we should avoid preaching crisis at this point, it’s not that.”

In fact, in its most recent Monetary Policy Report, the Bank said that house prices are expected to fall only “modestly” in the coming months.

Why are mortgages so expensive?

The interest that a bank charges you to borrow money for a house is heavily influenced by the rate set by the Bank of England.

Since late 2021, when the Bank of England’s main interest rate stood at just 0.1%, it has been putting up rates to try to stop prices rising so quickly.

Inflation, which measures the rate at which prices are rising, is easing but at 7.9% in June, is still nearly four times higher than the Bank’s 2% target.

On Thursday, the Bank increased rates for the 14th time in a row, taking them from 5% to 5.25%.

Mortgage calculator: how much will my mortgage go up?

Interest rates: How a rise affects you and your money

When will interest rates go down?

Recent rate rises have had a big knock-on impact of the cost of mortgages.

The average interest payment on a two-year fixed deal is currently 6.85%, according to financial data company Moneyfacts. For a five-year fixed mortgage, it is 6.37%.

By comparison, between July and September 2021, the average two-year rate was around 2.5%.

But there has been suggestions that the current interest rate level could be the peak for consumers, with banks and building societies starting to actually cut mortgage rates.

Mortgage rates are determined by what financial markets think the average UK interest rate will be over the next two or five years.

The five-year rate is sometimes lower that the two-year rate is because investors might forecast that interest rates will come down at a later date.

But that is not a certainty and on Thursday, the Bank of England warned that it may have to keep interest rates higher for longer to control inflation.

I’m a first-time buyer – what now?

It’s a bit of a rock and a hard place situation.

A couple of years ago, the biggest problem facing first-time buyers was the deposit they needed to get on the property ladder, according to Nationwide.

Roughly speaking, between July and September 2021, the average house price was £208,757, and the average annual earnings for a full-time worker was just over £38,000, according to the Office for National Statistics.

A 10% deposit would be £20,875, which would be equal to 55% of average annual pay at that time – “an all-time high”, said Robert Gardner, Nationwide’s chief economist.

“If you fast-forward to now, the deposit requirement is still high by historic standards,” he said.

“It is not quite as high as it was relative to earnings because house prices have come down and people’s incomes on average have gone up.”

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While average wages have risen – up 7.3% according to the latest data from the ONS – they continue to lag behind the cost of living.

Mr Gardner said: “The thing that has really changed is the typical monthly payment is now significantly higher than the long-run average because mortgage costs are significantly higher.”

Even if a first-time buyer managed to put down a higher deposit of around 20%, Nationwide estimated that a first-time buyer earning an average annual wage with a mortgage rate of 6% “would see monthly mortgage payments account for 43% of their take home pay”.

The building society said that a year ago, monthly mortgage payments accounted for around 32% of take home pay.

So is there any good news?

Mr Gardner said that even though the unemployment rate is expected to rise – from 4% to nearly 5% in 2026 according to the Bank of England – it will hopefully remain low by historic standards.

Added to that, if wage growth remains solid “our expectation is that house prices will fall a little bit further and are likely to lag behind earnings growth for a good while”.

“Over time what that will do is improve affordability, especially if mortgage rates start to moderate as well, which they may well do once the Bank rate passes its peak,” Mr Gardner said.

What happens if I miss a mortgage payment?

If you miss two or more months’ repayments you are officially in arrears

Your lender must then treat you fairly by considering any requests about changing how you pay, such as lower repayments for a short time

They might also allow you to extend the term of the mortgage or let you pay just the interest for a certain period

However, any arrangement will be reflected on your credit file, which could affect your ability to borrow money in the future

More on this story

UK house prices fall at sharpest rate for 14 years

4 days ago

What is happening to house prices?

4 days ago

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copperbadge · 3 years

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Can I ask about how you saved up for your home? Got any good websites or tags? I've found down payment calculators which seem like massive amounts to save. But there's always phrasing about needing to keep some cash but never how much. And creepily enough most the websites about it seem to be operated by the lenders. Who I'm less inclined to trust as they're the ones who are going to make money from this.

Oh man, I'm not gonna lie, I could never have bought my home without money from my parents, who inherited it.

We're not a particularly wealthy family and for much of my life we were on the poor side of middle class, but my stepfather's father made some strong investments in the 70s that started to pay off in the 90s, and when Mama Tickey died she left a fairly significant amount of money to be split among her children. So my parents and I made a deal: they would make me a no-interest loan of $10K (it ended up being $12K when all was said and done) to make a down payment on a home, and I could pay it back when I sold my home. Since then I have actually managed to start paying it back sooner (The price of the fridge I bought them is getting knocked off my debt, for example, at my suggestion) but yeah, if I'd had to save $12K up myself I would only just now be actually hitting that goal.

Now, all that said, I CAN offer you some advice! What you want to look into are the special deals that first-time homebuyers can get, like FHA loans that require a much lower down-payment as long as you live in the home for at least five years (to prevent house flipping). If I had gone with one of those loans I would possibly have paid more in interest in the long run if I didn't refinance, but I could have made a down payment of only $3K. You will probably need to talk to lenders to get this kind of information, but I would also check any local housing authorities or HUDs, and look around in your area for housing assistance programs.

I found my housing assistance program through a lender, who said "You'll need to take two workshops, one in fiscal responsibility and one in homebuying, before you can apply for a mortgage." You should NEVER have to pay for this kind of workshop, and they gave me a list of places that offered them, and my assistance program was the first one that offered them free. The program helped me determine what I could afford, found me a lender that would work with me as a first-time homebuying and offered special loans for those, helped me get a realtor to find the home and a lawyer to get all the paperwork done. (For reference they are the Resurrection Project.)

My best advice is to go to wherever you do banking, as long as they're not horrible and offer mortgages, and ask to speak to a mortgage advisor. (I would also recommend finding a local credit union that offers mortgages and talking to them because they tend to be less predatory than banks.) Explain that you're super new to home buying and need some guidance in how to get a good mortgage with a low down payment, and ask what kind of loan options there are for first time buyers. If they can't help they can probably send you to someone who can.

And good luck! It's a heinous journey, trying to buy a home, but three years on I really think it was worth it for me, and I'm happy I went through it regardless of what a pain it was at the time.

Readers, feel free to chime in, just remember to comment or reblog rather than send asks in response to this ask!

#housing #housing advice #home loans

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doberbutts · 3 years

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i might be mixing you up with someone else i follow, but didn’t you just buy a house?? i want to but Don’t Know How, and was wondering how i go about getting pre approved. i have a couple credit unions/mortgage companies i can call, but like what do i say? “yes hello can i please have a note saying you’ll give me money if i need it?”

I am currently in the process of buying a house. At this point there's like 3 more things that need to happen and then I close on the house, sign the paperwork, get the keys, and I'm golden.

In order to get pre-approved if you have never bought a house before I would also wager you likely don't have 20% of total cost of the house PLUS closing costs saved up, as that'd be somewhere around 30k USD for a house costing 100k USD and that is considered fairly cheap in my area. This is what stops a lot of potential first time home buyers because unless we have wealthy parents or super well paying jobs, almost no one in my age bracket and earlier has this.

Luckily there are multiple solutions formed by the government to help you with this. First is FHA, which I'm using to buy my house. This allows someone with a decentish credit score to put down only 3.5% of the cost of the house (so, that down payment is 3.5k USD plus closing which would be somewhere around $7k USD total for that 100k USD house by comparison). You only qualify for it if you are a first time home buyer so since you have never bought a home before, provided your credit is alright this option is available to you. FHA does have a longer process because it requires a state-approved appraisal that YOU get to pay for, and the appraisal can fail a house for a number of reasons as it's intended to verify the house is relatively safe and intact to live in. Peeling paint, broken windows, and wires not safely grounded in the basement are common points of failure, but a house will also fail FHA if it has any major mechanical or structural issues such as a leaking roof, a bad foundation, plumbing or electrical issues, etc. It's somewhat annoying but it's meant to protect you as these problems can range from easily fixed with a 50USD part to a major health and safety concern with your house crumbling down around you while you're still on the hook to pay off that loan.

Most states have assistance for people with lower income to purchase their first house. The house must still pass FHA standards but states with these programs will also sometimes straight up give you or loan you the down payment and closing costs if you give them a nominal amount of money. Here in this state, it's 1k for that type of assistance. Unfortunately due to the way income works in this state, despite me making over the required amount because I make it in commission and tips it doesn't 'count' towards income to be weighed against the cost of the house. Super annoying because I pay taxes on that income regardless of if it 'counts' but whatever. So this option was not available to me but may still be for you. My state tacks the amount you're short onto your mortgage loan, so technically you're just saving up 1k USD to get your house. As said there are income limits with this and stricter credit limits but it can be a lifesaver if you qualify for it.

There are also programs through the USDA for development of agricultural land if rural is more your thing. I had considered this but income limits seemed very strict and I didn't want to fuss with it. Certain USDA programs allow you to qualify for a mortgage putting NOTHING down on the house, while others it's a significantly lower amount than the average, so if you like agriculture I would look into that but I don't have much experience with it myself because it didn't seem feasible for me. Some programs require you to have an 'income generating farm' so if you want to live out your cottagecore dream that's a nice foot in the door, others just want rural land to continue to be lived on and maintained so if you just want to live out in the sticks somewhere (me me me me me) then that's what you're looking for.

Overall my advice is to figure out which, if any, of these programs can be applicable to you and look into them. If you decide on one, then you must find banks that work with these types of loans (they MUST be certified to do so, if they are not they cannot help you and an honest bank should be able to tell you yes or no). From there be prepared to give them a shitton of paperwork proving residency, income, employment, debt, etc because they look into eeeeeeeverything. In the mean time clean up your credit as much as you can and try to lower your debt amounts if possible as income-to-debt ratio is killer with this stuff.

Good luck! It's a bad market for buyers right now but it's doable!

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stars-trash-18 · 3 years

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Home lll

Ngl this was kind of a filler chapter. but it’s what I got, if anything this will give you more background on reader and the planet’s history.

Again please message me about corrections about anything, especially if I use anything gendered or with racial descriptions.

You did as promised, you delivered some crops and spare farming supplies. After that you turned your focus back home. You went about as normal, getting Attila to school, smoking meats, tanning hides, and prepping everything else for the monthly market. The town several miles from your ranch had a weekly market for smaller sales, but once a month they had a large fair to sell bulk items for better prices. It helped keep some income during the weeks coming in and when the fair happened it brought in tourists or larger buyers to bring in the bulk income for many of the families, including yours.

Over the years you had gained the reputation of being one of the better ranchers to buy livestock off of. You cared for them like they were your own children and made sure that everyone walked away with a decent price, whether or not you gained a profit or broke even.

Because of this the fair became one of the only markets you showed up to, you'd bring your products and had the city wives falling over themselves for the leather and furs, the galactic ranchers trying to outbid each other for whatever prized bull you brought with you, and the smaller families happy when you turned the wealthier business to them. Because, although you had a wider range of product than most other farmers, you made sure to make a sly comment about others like, "The Ferdorick's leather products are some of the finest, if you decide to buy from me i'm sure they'd make this hide into a wonderful jacket,".

Something you valued so much more than the core worlds was the community that surrounded the outer rim planet, in planets like Coruscant people walked by the needy everyday. But here if someone needed shelter or something to eat the locals would give it to them, whether they were one meal away from the same fate or not, they still extended a hand and gave what they could. They did it for you when you ran, when you first landed with Attila balanced on your shoulders wondering what to do it was the Ganoris' who set you up in their spare bedroom, the Ferdoricks who taught you how to tan hides and gave you your first 5 head of cattle, and the Actorias who gathered the materials and taught you how to build and thatch. You were a stranger who was more dangerous than they knew, but they extended their hands to you and you work so that you can prosper and help them too. So when the Armorer landed on your doorstep you wondered if it would be wrong to turn her away, because you were tired of seeing people.

You enjoyed chatting with those you knew, but seeing so many strangers more than once a month made your social batteries drain. But you reluctantly invited her in and sat across from her at your table as you went about preparing the morning coffee. Already preparing yourself for the long day ahead. She sat regaly for someone who was so weary weeks prior, she reminded you of the tall bamboo stalks from your ex’s estate with how she could go from being bent with stress to tall and strong. She only watched you carefully as you moved around your small kitchen and rested a hand onto the table, only moving it to say no when you offered her a mug.

“How can I help you today, is everything alright?” you inquired carefully, blowing the steam away to cool the sweet nectar of the gods.

“Everything is alright in our new home, it’s been a long time since we’ve been able to call anything that,” she receded, her voice filled with warmth at her family’s good fortune before she continued.

“I’m here to ask if you would be willing to help us again, we’d like to gain some income but don’t know how we’d be received by the community and we’d prefer to stay as hidden as possible,” she breathed a heavy sigh when she finished. You blinked at her owlishly for a moment before giving her a calming smile and leaned back in your chair.

“I’d be glad to help, from what little I know of Mandalorian culture your people are famous for their care of those they consider family and it’s the same here,” You paused to sip your coffee before further explaining, “ There’s a story that the natives tell, the natives that have been here long before space exploration, that this planet was steeped in war but over time as the war dragged on the blood spilled by the fallen started to poison it, causing more to die from starvation than battle itself,”

“They came to the agreement that to preserve themselves they had to merge, it took many years but finally there was peace and balance, they shared their knowledge with each other and valued cooperation and helping others and that has remained the same since, they are wary of outsiders but would still help them at any cost, because with all the bad in this galaxy they hope to heal it one person at a time,” you finished before pausing again in thought, “But don’t mistake the peace for weakness mandalorian, the people of this planet will still fight if it’s the last thing to do, because though they prefer peace if you threaten their homes and family they fight like you wouldn’t believe, now onto the business at hand,” you chimed as you pulled your datapad in front of you.

“That was insightful, all the same. We'd like it if one of our own accompanies you to the market so you can show them how this planet works,” She replied thoughtfully, tapping her fingertips onto the table briefly in thought. “We understand that there are a few threats to you at the monthly fair but Paz has volunteered to accompany you to help carry your goods and some of ours with the added benefit of protection, from what i’m told you’re more than capable but at this moment it is the only labor we can provide,” she clarified. “ We'll give you a percentage of our sales since by extension we’re using your reputation to do so and to compensate for you teaching Paz the ropes, because what he learns with you he’ll bring to us,” she further revealed.

You huffed a laugh before waving your hand at her, “nonsense, here knowledge is free and openly shared, I’ll send you the coordinates for the public libraries and can have Attila look out for your children if you ever decide to put them into the school, besides you have more mouths to feed than I do and I could frankly use an extra set of hands at the market so this will go towards you’re payment for the land,” you receded. The armorer jolted for a moment at your news, her breathing seeming to stutter for a moment before she straightened further.

“Very well I accept the terms, I must ask however why you show us such hospitality,” she prodded, you understood what she really meant. She was trying to find any ulterior motive, and you could see why with how the mandalorians have been treated throughout their history. So you only thought for a moment before answering her, setting your mug down and looking to the floor to try and keep the memories at bay.

“I was running from someone who wanted me dead and to take my son, I was an intelligence officer for the resistance during the war so I knew that this planet would be the safest and furthest away, when I got here all I had was a small bag with necessities and little Attila slung over my shoulders,” You breathed in heavily to try and build a wall around the memories that flashed into your mind, trying not to get thrown into an episode, “I had nothing, but the people here took care of us, they helped me and as the saying goes taught me to fish,” you smiled softly at the memory of the elderly patriarch of the Actorias lecturing you.

“So to repay them for their kindness is to pass it forward and no one is more deserving than the Mandalorians, you guys were really screwed over by history,” you finished with a slight chuckle and turning back to the mandalorian matriarch, who sat rigidly. She rose from her seat at the table and placed her arm over her chest and bowed slightly.

“That was all I needed so I’ll take my leave, but know that you have a clan of mandalorians in your debt, those who threaten you threaten us,” she said like a vow before she swiftly turned and walked out of your home. Using the jetpack you didn’t even notice light up as she took off back towards the bunker.

~~~~POV switch to earlier that week~~~~~~

“Paz you don’t have to be the one to accompany the rancher, we can send one of our more experienced merchants to better learn the trade,” The Armourer explained with a hand to the front of her helmet in exasperation.

“I know, but if you send me it’ll be better to gauge how the people would react to us, I can also provide security,” He stressed, adamant about being the one sent to learn.

“From what you told me they are their own security, you just find them attractive,” Din teased his brother playfully, earning an elbow to the side gap in his armor from Paz and a groan from the Armourer.

“Enough you two, Paz if you’re so enthralled with the rancher I’ll grant your request now both of you out,” she reprimanded before waving her tongs at them in dismissal so she wouldn’t have to deal with their childishness.

As they left Din passed his brother with one last jab, “try to learn a little Verde”.

#paz x reader #paz vizsla x reader #paz vizla imagine #paz vizla x reader #paz series #home series #home lll #paz vizsla

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theforce · 3 years

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how were you able to buy a house in your 20s

i've worked since i was 14, i've lived at home since graduating from college, i pay my share but not as much as i would pay renting a place of my own, i've left jobs bc they weren't paying me enough and got new jobs, i've done side jobs like clockwork and i realized what i was good at early on and focused heavily on selling that talent. i've also been very lucky in a lot of ways.

i spent my early 20s paying off student loans and saving the rest, mid 20s paying off my car and saving the rest, and now in my late 20's (oh where does the time go) i was able to save up .... drum roll please .... thirty thousand big ones to put as my down payment on a 200k condo (15%) keeping my mortgage below $1k a month bc i'm a first time buyer with a pretty good credit score

so if you look at it this way i've worked 14 years now $30,000 divided by 14 years is saving $2,142 a year or $178 a month and this is not possible in every circumstance and there was months i was just struggling to get by and saving was important to me but living my life was also important to me i know that saving money is for rich people and not working class people like me so i went out and had the drinks, i went on small vacations i’ve made great memories in my 20s and i’ve went months without depositing anything into my savings but i always had it in the back of my mind broken down to a smaller number which helps to see things more clearly I think.

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prorevenge · 4 years

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Mock my mother’s death? I bankrupt you.

So this could be a very, very long story. I’ll try to summarize where and when I can.

My now ex-wife Kate and I moved to an apartment in 2010. The house as a whole a renovated town house split between two sides with two apartments on the bottom and two apartments upstairs. I wasn’t the biggest fan of the apartment as it was a much older building that I had ever lived in but I quickly adjusted to the wood creaking throughout the night. On the initial walkthrough we noticed that the only problem was that there was a dip in the bathroom ceiling. The landlord, Jay, promised he would get fixed ASAP.

One year to the day when we moved in there was a loud crash at 4AM. The bathroom ceiling had collapsed and there was tiling and wood all over over the floor and in the bathtub. Now Kate was typically the aggressive one, while I was more passive and laid back, and she kept calling Jay throughout the day. When she got in touch with him at around 9PM she explained what happened and insisted that it be fixed immediately. He rebuffed with him yelling that his girlfriend was a lawyer and he didn’t need to do anything. Now this is where I got mad. I went outside and called him myself. I feigned a relaxed demeanor and at first he began trying to talk to me as a “bro” and kept saying “Dude, I’m gonna get someone out there but it’s gonna take a few weeks..” When he couldn’t sway me that way he began yelling about his girlfriend and her knowing the law. What he was unaware of was that I had read the tenant laws in my state and so as he tried to lie I waited until he was finished and I recited the law stating that, if an apartment was considered uninhabitable then the landlord needed to pay for the tenant to stay in a place until it was resolved. He tried to say that our upstairs neighbor Phil was the super but he wasn’t sure if he could get down there that night. He put me on hold, then came back a few minutes later and said that Phil and his girlfriend were out of state. I rang Phils doorbell and asked, with the Jay on speakerphone, if he was assigned as the super. He laughed and said “No.” Dejected, he said he would have people out there the next day (previously he said they were busy for at least three weeks). There’s more to this incident but it lead to two conclusions:

If you’re going to lie then there has to be a consistency in your lie AND make sure that the people you lie to DON’T communicate with each other.

This is where a feud started between me and my Kate versus him and his mother (she was the original landlord and gave the house to him so he could begin to profit.)

So forward to a year later. Jay stopped coming to the house and his mom began doing the pick-ups. Around this time my ex- and I had been laid off and we were working with social security for food, health, and housing insurance. We were approved for all three in April but we would not get the check until May. When our typical check wasn’t in the landlord’s mailbox he immediately gave a summons saying that he was taking us to court for eviction. The day we went to court he had no lawyer and, going before the judge, here’s the summation:

Judge: Does the defense have a means to pay within 90 days of non-payment? Us: Yes judge (hands over paperwork showing that he will be paid for April and May) Judge: I see no problem. They are breaking no laws. Why are we here? Jay: Well your honor, they have been bullying- Judge: I don’t care, unless they are breaking a law then this case is dismissed.

Suffice it to say Jay and his mother’s were NOT happy. Around this time in my life things were tumultuous. My mother, who had been battling lung cancer succumbed to it in June . This happened at roughly the same time his mom came knocking looking for payment. I explained that I would leave it in the mailbox when we got back from the funeral home and to please just respect my right to mourn. She took her fingers and began rubbing them together, pretending to play the smallest violin.

I will never forget what she said next “Oooh, my mommy just died. Woe is me. She probably had it coming. I don’t care if your entire family is dead. I want my money.” She smiled smugly, proud with what she had just said. I saw red and my heart jumped into my throat. I went, grabbed the check, and handed it to her in absolute shock that anyone would say something so...fucked up? She had finally managed to push a button that very few people I’ve known throughout my life have seen. I went into rage mode but not in the way you would expect.

THE REVENGE: We were always told that if a health inspector came by to not open the door. I waited until Aug. since that was when the lease was going to run out and we knew they would not extend a renewal. I walked up the block to town hall to ask for a health inspection of our property. It was scheduled for several days later. Now it’s important to know several things:

I was friends with all of the tenants. Phil had moved out with his fiancé but the new tenant was Dani upstairs in our side. Tom and Hana on the other side of the downstairs floor had moved out and Jay was still looking for new tenants. The only one who wanted to stay out of this was Rose on the upper right apartment.

I had gotten a key so I could let the inspector in Dani’s apartment and I knew that I could use the back staircase on the right side to let him in on Tom’s, now vacant apartment.

I also knew that Dani was moving out in September along with Kate and myself.

The inspector came and it was glorious. He checked the exterior of the house first noting that wires were exposed, there was an old empty dryer along with other odd clutter in the backyard. I bought him inside the shared entrance and, as I was counting on, he noticed that the last inspected dated back to 1994; 18 years. This meant that for each year he did not have an inspection there would be appropriate fines. For our apartment we had black mold growing in our bathroom and the bubble in the ceiling had begun to grow to problematic proportions. Upstairs, Dani’s apartment was suffering from leaks in the ceiling and it looked like her bathroom ceiling was also on the brink of collapsing. We then went to the basement. The boiler was on the verge of exploding, there was flammable items along with gasoline and a pack of matches sitting right beside it. Two things that I did not know was 1. The fire door that separated the two sides did not close all of the way rendering it moot and, on the right basement side there was a toilet. A toilet that had blown up. It had coated the surrounding walls and the leakage prevented us going up to the floor via the right side. The entire time the inspector was photographing and writing constantly.

We stepped outside and he said he needed to come back. When I asked why he said he had run out of space to write down all of the infractions (he had filled the front and had written an entire page on the back portion). I kindly and coyly asked “Well, how much will it cost right now?” He scratched his head and said “Around 20-30k from what I can see but it’s probably going to be higher as this house was never licensed to be split into apartments.” I thanked him and he was going to come back with the county inspector.

So we moved out and but I got the rundown from Rose. Because he was the current owner he owed all current fines and no one new could not move into the empty apartments until everything was up to code. Because three out of four were vacant he was losing 4,500 in potential rent. He handed the property back to his mother and had to claim for bankruptcy. Now here’s the other thing. Every time an old tenant left and a new one was coming in an inspection was supposed to be done. Now that all of the financial burden fell on her they looked into the records and was she was fined for each time she had broken that rule 750/per. By the end of the year Rose had moved out so the place was hemorrhaging money. I sat back, proud of what I had done, and left it be.

Haha, no, fuck that. I wasn’t close to done yet.

I felt like I had destroyed Jay but my real target had always been his mom. I learned that she had about eight properties throughout three towns in my county. I went to each one, spoke to the tenants, and said I was a concerned tenant from another property and asked if they had any problems with their apartments. EVERY person I asked described the apartment in very poor to intolerable levels and that the mom was effectively a slumlord. She would ignore problems unless someone turned to litigations, she was threatened that they would summon the inspector, or, more often than not, the people would move out, she’d refuse their deposit, and sink those into repairs. People rarely fought back because she knew that the occupants were of upper, lower class minorities. So, being the concerned person I was, I want to the inspector of the other two towns and asked for an inspection to be done with at least one, if not more, would be awaiting the inspector when they came. Turns out that she faced pretty much the same infractions on every apartment she owned. It turned out she actually had 12 apartments but I initially only knew about the ones that fell within my county. The remaining properties in the next county over were given a heads up for a surprise inspection. From what I can tell Jays mom had been in the landlord business for about 35-40 years. That collapsed quickly.

Since we moved literally one block down the road from our old one I got to see Jay lose his primary source of income and have to claim bankruptcy BUT also saw that his mother was also trying desperately to find a buyer for all of the apartments so she could pay off the fines. I learned two years later that she too had to file for bankruptcy. Jay and his mother camped out in front of our next apartment two days in Oct. of 13 before she filed for bankruptcy (I’m guessing to scream at me and/or Kate) so I called the cops and said that there were strange people standing in a no parking zone and they kept looking up at the second floor. A cruiser swung by and told them to leave.

I know I should have used the two months I spent monitoring everything to find a new job but this was the one and only time I wanted to cripple a person where they hurt the most; their wallets. I think I got my point across. None of this would’ve happened if you had just fucking fixed the ceiling before it collapsed Jay!

Th;dr: Had a couple of slumlords, they pushed me to a place where I snapped, and so I went a bit crazy and bankrupted the slumlord AND his slumlord mother as well.

(source) story by (/u/Theliterside)

#prorevenge #by /u/Theliterside #pro revenge #revenge stories #pro revenge stories #pro #revenge #last10

135 notes · View notes

atlafan · 4 years

Note

Hii ok u dont have to write this if it doesnt inspire u but I’ve been watching Selling Sunset on Netflix & I’ve been waiting impatiently for the 3rd season cuz it’s just so good lol but i was wondering if u could write something about rich real estate agent H? Maybe helping the MC buy her first home and they hit it off? Ur the only 1 who writes these diverse Harry’s & I can’t stop thinking about real estate H showing her expensive houses & like doing NaughtyStuff with her in an empty 1 lol xx HC

a/n: this has been in my inbox for a while and I’ve been wanting to get to it, so here it is! there is smut, but it’s more tame than you requested. Hope you still like it!

Sold

You weren’t sure how you were able to do it, but you finally had enough money for a down payment on a home. You scrimped and saved for years as best you could, you paid off the majority of your student loans, you built up your credit, and now you felt ready for this very adult step.

Your parents weren’t sure why you weren’t content with just renting. “What if you meet someone?” They’d ask you. “Then they could just move in with me, or we’d find another place. It’s an investment!” You’d reply. They had this vision in their head that you’re supposed to buy a home with a partner. It was the twenty-first century, you didn’t need anyone to help you...or so you thought.

The pre-approval process at the bank was lengthy, but thorough. They’d need to see your W2′s from two years prior, they needed to know how long you’ve been at your current job, and basically just how much money you had altogether. The mortgage specialist at the bank was very kind.

“So, you’re doing this all on your own?”

“I am.” You smile.

“Have you got real estate agent yet?”

“No.” You shrug. “You don’t really need when you’re the one buying do you? I can just call whoever’s showing the house and work with them.”

“Maybe in small towns, but in larger areas like this you’ll want a realtor, trust me. It doesn’t cost you anything either way. They can top shop, help you negotiate, all those kinds of things.”

“They also like to show you houses out of your price range.” You scoff.

“Not the honest ones. I get it, at the end of the day, they’re out there to make a quick buck, and the more the house is, the larger the cut they get. But I know a guy, he actually helped my son buy his first home. He was absolutely wonderful, and he’s a shark.” She goes through the many business cards on her desk. “Ah! Here it is, Harry Styles, he works for Greenfield Real Estate.”

You take the card from her and scan it over.

“Don’t they sell, like, really nice homes? They work with people looking for mansions.”

“Just give him a call, and tell him I sent you. You won’t regret it, trust me. Your pre-approval is only good for ninety days, so you’ll want to contact him soon.”

Your head was swimming, but you knew she had a point. Half the houses you favorited on realtor.com or zillow were sold already. It was a seller’s market for sure. Maybe you would need someone to help you negotiate...but did it have to be a man? Couldn’t you find a female realtor? You spent years becoming the strong, independent woman you came to be, and now it felt like you’d be surrendering to some stereotype.

However, after perusing on the Greenfield website, you see a picture of Harry. You bite your bottom lip, swallow some pride, and dial his number.

“Greenfield Real Estate, this is Harry.” You weren’t expecting the British accent, or the deep voice and drawl that came with it. “Hello?”

“Um, hi! Yeah, Doris at Hills Bank gave me your card...I’m a first time home buyer.” You want to smack yourself for how stupid you sound.

“Oh, I love Doris! I’ve worked with her a bunch. I actually helped her son buy his first home last year.”

“That’s what she told me.”

“Right, so, picking a realtor is sort of like dating, you wanna make sure you pick the right one. Why don’t we meet up for coffee somewhere locally so we can get to know each other a bit.”

Pushy, he was already wanting to meet you. Probably to have you sign your life away to be his client.

“Sure, we could do that.”

“Are you local? There’s a place on Bleaker Street that has great coffee.”

“Is it Monte Alto?”

“Yeah! That’s the one. When are you free?”

“I could meet you Friday during lunch my break.”

“Sounds great, I’m assuming noon?”

“Correct.”

“By the way, you didn’t tell me your name.”

“It’s Y/N.”

“Alright, Y/N, I’ll see you Friday at noon at Monte Alto.”

You take a huge breath after you hang up.

Friday rolled around, and you weren’t able to step out of the office until nearly 11:50. It would take a little more than ten minutes to get there, and you hated being late. You were happy you had at least looked up what Harry looked like so you’d be able to spot him once you were there.

Once you’re there, you see a man sitting on one of the cushioned chairs, looking out the window. It had to be him.

“Harry?”

He looks over at you and smiles. He stands up to shake your hand.

“Y/N?”

“Yes, hi, sorry I’m late, I’ve had meeting after meeting this morning. Fridays aren’t usually this busy.”

“No worries at all. Tell me, what’s your order?”

“Oh, I can get it myself. I’m gonna grab a bagel too.”

“Good idea, I’ll do the same. Now, what’ll you have?”

“Really...I can-”

“I know you can, but I invited you here, it would be rude to have you pay. Do this with all my perspective clients.”

“Well, don’t I feel special.” You say sarcastically. He chuckles softly as you both get in line.

You both order your drinks and food, and wait awkwardly for your names to be called, then you sit back down.

“Thank you.”

“You’re more than welcome. So, tell me, what’s your dream home?”

“Oh god, um, nice big kitchen, I love to cook when I actually have time. A room for entertaining. I’m usually the one to host friends. Two stories, a garage, three bedrooms would be ideal, but I’ll settle for two-”

“No settling.” He smirks. “Go on.”

“Um...well, so, three bedrooms, ideally I’d like a master with an en suite, but who doesn’t?” You watch as he makes notes on a little pad of paper. “I’d like a yard, but it doesn’t need to be huge. Bonus points if there’s a deck or patio, maybe even a pool, but I can live without those things.”

“And you’re buying this just for yourself, correct? No husbands or boyfriends I need to know about?”

“You know, I could have a girlfriend.”

“Shit, I’m sorry you’re right, um-”

“Relax, I’m teasing.” You chuckle. “But to answer your question, I am doing this alone. I feel like I’m ready for a house, so I want one.”

“Thought I put my foot in my mouth for a second there. I need to learn to just say partner.” He picks up his drink to take a sip, and that’s when you notice he has perfectly manicured nails. Interesting. “So it seems like you know how to be realistic about what you want, and you also have a dream list. What about projects, do they scare you?”

“I’m good with painting or even having to put new flooring in, but I’d like to stay away from any major reno.”

“Gotcha.” He makes another note. “And what price range are we working with here?”

“Let me just make a note on my phone, I’d rather not say out loud in case someone tries to rob me.”

He smiles and nods. He squints at your screen and makes a note.

“Great, good for you. What do you do for work?”

“I’m a physician, I work at a doctor’s office not too far from here. I’ve been there for two years, and I love what I do.”

“That’s great. So, Doris talked with you about balancing a mortgage and paying down your student loans?”

“They’re mostly paid for, actually. I got a lot of scholarships for my undergrad, and during med school I was awarded a pretty decent grant.”

“Perfect.” He scribbles some more notes and then puts his pad and pen down. “What do you want to know about me?”

“How long have you been a realtor for?”

“Six years, been with Greenfield since I started.”

“What made you get into it?”

“Love seeing people happy.”

“What about when someone buys below the asking price?”

“Doesn’t happen with me, not when I’m selling anyways. However, when I’m helping someone buy a home, well, let’s just say I’m pretty good at negotiating.” He smirks. “You’d be in good hands with me, but if you wanna shop around some more I’ll understand.”

“Do you work with first time buyers a lot?”

“Sometimes, it depends. I know a lot of them like to work with me. They’re usually young, I’m young. Makes for a more relatable experience.”

“Okay.” You look outside and think for a moment. “I think I’d like to work with you.”

He smiles big at you.

“Are there any homes you’ve had in mind that you’d like to start looking at? I can definitely see what open houses are out there too. People tend to make offers fast, but don’t let that scare you. The home has to feel right, if you want it, I’ll make sure you get it.”

“There were a few I’ve seen on realtor...” You take your phone out to show him. “I’d like to not have a super long commute either if I can help it.”

“Are you looking to grow into this home or is it more of a starter space for you?” You give him a funny look. “I just mean, like, would you be open to a condo or something like that.”

“Only if it was detached and didn’t have a high HOA.”

He nods and looks at some of the other homes you had favorited.

“So what I’m gonna do is go back to my office and run a few searched. Then I’ll text you a link to the home I find, and you can tell me which ones you like. Don’t be afraid to tell me you hate them either. Then if there’s a couple you wanna see, we’ll set up a time that works for you, and then I’ll contact the other realtor, sound good?”

“Sounds great.”

You shake hands again before leaving. As you make your way back to the office, you feel relieved. You had someone you could ask questions to, and someone basically on your side. Harry was nice, a salesman at heart, but nice.

Saturday morning you get a text from Harry.

Harry Styles - Hi Y/N, it was great meeting you yesterday. Here are some places I think you might like. Let me know what you think!

You liked how formal he was. You tap the link he sent you. The first couple were duds, but there were a few on here that actually peaked your interest.

You - Could we three of the home? The bottom three on the list.

Harry Styles - Sure! When would work for you?

You - I don’t work on Mondays, so that would be easiest. Timing doesn’t matter.

Harry Styles - I’ll contact the realtors and see what we can put together.

You - Thanks so much!

You felt really excited. You wondered if maybe you should invite your parents to come look at the houses with you, but maybe you would save that for a second look through once you actually find something. A house can look much different in pictures than it does in person.

Monday morning, around 9:30, you meet Harry at the first location. His car was parked in the driveway. He gets out when he sees you pull in. He had two coffees in hand.

“Morning.” He says to you. “Got you a coffee, I remembered your order.”

“Oh! Um, thanks.” You take it from him.

“I’ve already gone in and unlocked the doors and turned the lights on. The other realtor isn’t here, which is perfectly fine. Take your time, feel free to walk around outside before heading in too.”

You smile and nod. The front was beautifully landscaped, and there was a gate leading to the backyard. He follows you out that way. You listen as he explains when the home was built and why the people were selling it. There a nice deck that had been recently put on, no pool though, but there was room for one. You go up the stairs of the deck and go in through the sliding glass door.

“Kitchen was recently renovated within the last five years. All appliances come with the place.”

“It’s beautiful.” You run your fingers over the nice granite counter tops.

As you scope out the rest of the house, you’re not as impressed as you were with it when you first walked in. The bedrooms were small, and barely had any storage. The basement wasn’t in the best condition either.

“Definitely a no, but a good first experience nonetheless.”

Harry looks down at his watch as he nods.

“Wanna follow me to the next place then?”

“Sure.”

Same thing happened at house number two and three. You just weren’t wowed. You sigh heavily as you lean against your car.

“Don’t get discouraged, Y/N. It’s better to know what you don’t like. We can keep looking. When I go into the office tomorrow I can run another search. Maybe we can look at some condos.”

“That might be good. Maybe somewhere with people my age? It would be cool to be in a little community.”

“Definitely.”

“Thanks...I hope I haven’t been a pain with the things I don’t like.”

“Not at all. This is a really big purchase, you should get what you want.”

It took three more weeks of meeting up with Harry on various days to find a place you liked. On a Saturday evening, he brought you over to a condo that was detached, had a garage, a community gym and pool. It had three bedrooms, and two and a half baths. One being an en suite for the master bedroom.The kitchen was gorgeous and flowed into a dining/living area. You were thrilled.

“Harry...” You look at him. “It’s perfect.”

“Really, you like it?”

“I love it!” You squeal and hug him without thinking. “Sorry.” You blush.

“It’s fine, it’s exciting.”

“I’d like to put an offer in. The price is rate and the HOA is reasonable. It’s not too far from work. I’d be able to entertain, the backyard is fenced in. There was even security at the gate! This is my home, I can feel it.”

“Fantastic. The paperwork can take some time. Would you wanna fill everything out over dinner?”

“Um...sure...”

“Plus, it gives you a chance to see what places nearby are like. We passed some nice restaurants on the way here.”

You follow him to a nice pizza place a couple of miles away. He bring a large packet of paper and a couple of pens in with him.

“On the way here I called the other realtor to let him know an offer was coming their way.”

“Thanks.”

You both get seated and are given some water. He takes the papers out and explains what you would need to sign, and what your offer would mean. Harry said you could definitely low ball the sellers, so you asked for about $15K less than the asking price.

“They probably won’t accept, but most people don’t on the first offer. This just gives us a good starting point.”

“And you think the six grand in closing costs is good?”

“Yeah, totally reasonable. That’ll be about half of it. Sometimes, you can get more money off after the home inspection. Once a price is settled, you’ll want to schedule that right away. I have some names of some great home inspectors.”

“Would you be there for that?”

“I would. I’m there for all of it. The other realtor will be there too.”

“Okay good. I’d feel better with you there.”

As you begin to sign the documents, a waiter comes over.

“Good evening folks, can I start you off with anything to drink?”

“I’d love a glass of rose please.” You say.

“Just a Corona for me, thanks.”

The waiter nods and leaves you be.

“Did you want to just split a pizza?” Harry asks looking down at the menu.

“Sure, what do you like? I usually just get green peppers and mushrooms.”

“Works for me. Would you mind this cauliflower crust?”

“Not at all! I prefer that, actually.”

‘Perfect.” He smiles.

When the waiter comes back, Harry orders your pizza. He watches as you finish up all the paperwork. He checks over everything to make sure you signed everything.

“I’ll get this all scanned and sent over tomorrow.”

“Do you ever take a day off?”

“Yes and no. The realtor world is funny. Sometimes I’m in the office all day and then I wont hear from a client until 8PM. I’m not helping someone buy, I’m helping someone sell. I’m always busy.”

“Sorry to take up your Saturday night...”

“No, don’t be. I’d just be home working.” He shrugs and takes a sip of his beer. “It’s your Saturday night I’m more worried about.”

“Oh please.” You laugh. “My friends know I’ve been busy with this, they understand. Besides when I showed them who you were...” You stop yourself from finishing the sentence.

“No, please, go on.” He smirks.

“They just, they saw your picture on the Greenfield website, that’s all.” You blush.

The waiter comes over with the pizza, and thankfully it breaks a bit of the tension. You each take a slice and dig in.

“This is delicious.” You say.

“Yeah, never been here before, I’ll definitely have to come back.” He takes another sip of his beer. “Once that condo is yours, I fully expect an invite to your house warming, by the way. I like to know my clients are good to go.”

“I definitely won’t be a stranger.”

When you and Harry are done, he walks you out to your car. He gives you a small hug goodbye as well. You felt like you just had a date, but there was no way you did.

After going back and forth twice, your offer was accepted. You set up a home inspection with one of the names Harry had given you. He meets you at the house when it’s time, and you’re able to meet the other realtor. A woman, who was a little too delighted to see Harry. You felt jealous when they hugged. However, he stayed close to you and took notes while the inspector was talking.

You made sure to ask a lot of questions. There were no major things that alarmed you. All of the information was just a lot to take in, and you were feeling slightly overwhelmed. You should have brought your parents, or another friend. Was Harry a friend at this point? As the inspector was putting together a full report for you, and getting your email, the other realtor was talking to Harry.

“So, I thought you were only in the selling game right now.” She smirks at him.

“Once in a while I take on a buyer.” He shrugs. “It’s good commission.”

“Yeah, thanks, can’t wait to split it with you.” She rolls her eyes. “But I do love when our paths cross.”

“Mhm.” He looks over at you and then back to the realtor. “The previous owners took great care of this place.”

“Yeah, they did. The only reason they moved is because they’re daughter had a baby and they wanted to be closer to her.”

“Ah, classic.”

“Are you doing anything later?”

“Um…well…Y/N is probably going to have questions and stuff, so I’ll probably be busy with her for a bit.”

“Okay, but, like, tonight, are you free? We could grab a drink.”

“I…”

“Harry?” You say, walking over to them. “Everything’s all set. He said I should have the radon and water tests by next week.”

“Perfect. You’ll be able to make a final decision and add anything to an addendum then.”

“It was nice to meet you.” You shake the woman’s hand.

“Same to you. Look forward to hearing from you soon.”

“Y/N, I took a lot of notes, is there anything you want to go over?”

“Yeah, that would be great.”

“See ya Margaret, we’ll be in touch.” He shakes her hand and leaves her standing there, shocked.

Harry walks with you outside, and you agree on a bar to meet up at. You both grab drinks and Harry goes over his notes with you. He gives you the name of a good plumber since you mentioned you’d want to update a few fixtures.

“What about a painter? Know of anyone that can help with that?”

“You don’t need to waste your money on a professional. Painting’s not that hard.” He chuckles.

“Well, I am not very skilled when it comes to that kind of stuff. Plus, I won’t really have the time to do it myself, and I’d wanna get it done before I move.”

“You could get all done in a couple of weekends no problem, you just need some friends that know how to paint.” He puts a toothpick in his mouth and fiddles with it. “I know how to paint.”

“You do?”

“Sure.” He shrugs. “Sometimes sellers need to fix up their houses quickly. I’ve come to the rescue on more than one occasion.”

“That’s nice of you.”

“I don’t make any money if I don’t. No one wants to be an ugly house.” He takes a sip of his drink. “I guess what I’m saying is, I could help you paint. You’re about to have a mortgage payment on your hands.”

“Pending the inspection report.” You smirk.

“Right.” He smiles.

“Did you offer up the same service for Doris’ son?”

“No.” He says smugly. “He already knew how to paint.”

“That other woman before, what was her name? Margaret?”

“Yeah, what about her?”

“I heard her ask you out…”

“She didn’t, she wasn’t…uh…” He scratches the back of his neck. “Sometimes we go for drinks if we end of working on the same house. Nothing more than that really.”

“So, you’re not, like, seeing her.”

“God, no. That would be a major conflict of interest.”

“Do you always go out for drinks with your clients?”

“Sometimes…I know some people have clients over to their home to do paperwork, but I didn’t think you’d feel super comfortable coming over to some guy’s house you barely know.”

“How considerate of you.” You giggle.

“Did it bother you that she asked me out tonight?”

You nearly choke on your drink.

“What? No, why, uh, why would it have bothered me?”

“Because…if someone had done the same to you in front of me I would have been bothered, but to be fair, I’m a pretty jealous guy.” He finishes his drink and orders another one.

“How many times does this happen?”

“What?”

“You hitting on your clients.”

“Is that what I’m doing?” He fake gasps. “And no, I don’t usually do this. I’m a little embarrassed, actually. Not very professional of me to have a crush on your client.” Your eyes widen and your jaw drops slightly. “Sorry, I hope I’m not making you uncomfortable.”

“No! I…I’m just a little surprised that you’re into me, is all.”

“Why? You’ve got a great career, you’re super independent, and you’re really funny.”

“How do you not already have a girlfriend?”

“I’m really busy, like, all the time. I’m able to take vacations here and there, but you see how much I work. Any time I date it doesn’t last because people don’t understand the job. You’re a doctor, you get it. You must be busy going to classes trying to stay up to date on everything.”

“I am, I’m definitely busy a lot…but I make time for friends.”

“So do I. My friends don’t get offended if I have to cancel or reschedule, or they at least don’t take it personally.”

“I get what you’re saying…dating is hard when you have a demanding job.”

“Exactly.”

“So…are you going to ask me out?”

“Can’t, not until this is all done at least. Conflict of interest.”

“Oh.”

“But when I do, are you saying you’ll say yes?”

“I guess we’ll find out when you ask, won’t we?”

Harry helped you go over the inspection report once you got it. You asked for some money towards getting the furnace serviced, and the previous owners thought it was a reasonable request. You were able to close a couple of weeks later. Typically the realtor comes to the bank with the buyer on the big day.

“Harry!” Doris squeals as she hugs him. “Great to see you.”

“Same to you.”

“Love when we get to see each other like this.”

“Same here, how’s your son?”

“Oh, he’s great. Y/N, have a seat. We have lots of things to sign.”

You sign what you need to. Doris gives you a gift bag with some wine glasses. Harry hands over a bottle of champagne to you as well. It was very exciting. You were officially a home owner.

“Thank you so much.” You shake Doris’ hand before leaving the bank.

Harry grabs your wrist once you’re both outside.

“Congratulations.”

“Thanks, I literally couldn’t have done it without you.” You give him a quick hug. “My parents are gonna meet me there soon so they can check it out. I think they wanna take me out to eat to celebrate.”

“That’s great.” He clears his throat. “What, uh, what are you doing tomorrow?”

“Continuing to pack.” You laugh. “But, um, I could make myself available in the evening.” You smile.

“I’m having a little pool party tomorrow. Bunch of my friends are coming over, I’d love to have you over too, if you felt comfortable.”

“That sounds amazing! Can I bring anything?”

“Just your beautiful self.”

Your parents were very impressed with your new purchase. You did well. Saturday morning you continued your packing adventure, trying to make sure you properly labeled your boxes. You needed to make sure none of your medical journals got lost.

Even though Harry had offered over and over to teach you how to paint, your parents offered to pay for a painting crew for you, just to make things go faster. Once that was done you’d be able to move. You search your dresser for a suitable bathing suit. You weren’t sure how much skin to actually show.

“Ah ha!” You find your green, strapless one-piece that had a cute cut out in the upper part of the stomach. You’re also able to find a cute cover up dress to throw on over it.

In the latter part of the afternoon, you drive over to Harry’s. You were impressed by the neighborhood he was able to live in. All of the houses were huge. When you pull up to his house you wonder what he needed such a big house for. Maybe he entertained a lot too, just like you did.

You – just pulled up!

Harry Styles - come right around back!

You walk around to where you can hear music playing and people laughing. There were plenty of people already in Harry’s large in-ground pool.

“Y/N!” Harry waves over to you.

Damn, he has a lot of tattoos. You think to yourself.

“Hi, Harry!”

He comes over to you and kisses you on the cheek without really thinking.

“Glad you could make it. Make yourself comfortable. Plenty of food, plenty of pool.” He chuckles.

Harry’s friends were really nice and welcoming, you didn’t feel too out of place. His eyes couldn’t help but scan over your body the second you took your coverup off. Turns out Harry was a master on the grill. He made sure to pay attention to while still being a good host to his friends. It was a fun party. As the night dwindled you wanted to make some sort of move.

“You know, I’ve seen your entire backyard, but I’ve yet to be given a your of your home.”

“You’d like that?”

“It’s only fair, you’ve seen mine.” You wink at him.

He leads you inside.

“Well, you’ve seen the kitchen, obviously.”

He takes you through the first floor and then leads you upstairs. He explains that he has all the extra rooms so his family has their own space for when they come to visit.

“And this is my room, but you don’t have to-“

“No, let’s see it.” You smile.

He smiles back and opens the door. Your jaw drops when you see how much space there is. There were two closets, both filled with nice clothes.

“Come check out the bathroom. I had some work done to it last year.”

“Why do you have a double vanity?”

“For guests.” He blushes. “My last girlfriend actually, she liked having her own sink. Apparently I have too many products and they can get in the way.” He clears his throat. “Anyways, I had everything redone last year. I know a great bathroom guy if you ever wanna update anything.”

“You have a guy for everything.” You giggle. “And you do have a lot of products, two sinks makes sense.” You walk out and back into the bedroom. “So…”

“So…”

“What date number would you consider this to be?”

“Legally, the first…not legally…” He grins. “Think I’ve lost track.” He steps closer to you. “My friends liked you.”

“I liked them.” You wrap your arms around his neck. “And I like you.”

“I like you too.” His hands move to your hips. “And I really like this bathing suit. Haven’t been able to take my eyes off you all day.”

You both smile and continue to make eye contact. Harry looks down at your lips and leans in. He presses his lips to yours, and you find yourself grasping at him to pull him closer. You couldn’t remember the last time you were intimate with someone, but it had definitely been too long. You were ravenous. You open your mouth him and he groans into you. You both shuffle back to the bed and fall on top of it.

“If this feels too fast, just let me know.” He breathes as you move to straddle him.

“Harry, I want you.” You cup his cheek and he moves to kiss your palm. “But, if it feels too fast for you, we can cool it.”

“I want you too, I just wanted to make sure you didn’t feel pressured or anything.”

“I don’t, but thank you.”

You lean down to kiss him again. His hands move to the back of your bathing suit.

“Gotta get this off you.” He grunts.

You get off him to stand up.

“I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”

“Seems to be our little theme.” He smirks.

Harry stands up and takes his trunks off. Your eyes grow wide when you look down at his hard cock. He steps towards you and helps you out of your swim suit.

“I have a fun idea.” He says as he kisses down your neck. “We’ve been in the sun all day, let’s go hop in the shower.”

You smile at him and nod. He leads you into the bathroom and gets the water in the shower going. He yanks you inside and gets you under the warm water. He backs you up to the wall and press you against it. His hands roam your body as his lips find yours again.

“I’ve thought about this so many times.” He says.

“You have?”

“Mhm, there were so many times in the houses I showed you that I just wanted to take you right then and there.”

He nips at your jaw as his hands knead your breasts. You wrap your arms back around his neck. You feel his hard cock press against your hip and it makes you whimper. One of his hands slides down your stomach. He looks at you to make sure it’s alright and you nod yes.

Your head rolls back against the tile as his fingers slips between your legs. His thumb works your clit while he works two of his fingers inside you.

“Oh my god.” You gasp and grind your hips toward his hand. You reach for his length and start to pump him.

You both were panting. You have to let go of him to clutch onto his shoulders as you release around his fingers.

“Please.” You moan. “Fuck me. I have an IUD.”

Harry kisses you and hooks one of his arms under one of your legs so he can push in at a better angle. You bite down on his bottom lip, causing him to groan loudly.

“You’re so fucking sexy.” He says into your ear as he thrusts in and out of you.

“You feel so good, Harry, fuck.”

He pulls out of you, turns you around, and presses back inside. His chest was flush with your back. You claw at the tile as he rocks in and out of you. One of his hands snakes around to rub your clit and the other works one of your breasts.

You feel a flood of things wash over you, but mostly it was another incredible orgasm. You could get used to this.

“Shit, I’m gonna come. Where do you want it?” He grunts.

“Inside me.”

“Jesus.” He groans and releases inside you. You moan out at the warm feeling.

“This is the softest robe in the world.”

“Glad you like it. You can wear it anytime.”

You both were cuddled up in his bed, munching on some fruit while watching TV.

“Do you have parties like this often?”

“Only when I’ve finally told a tougher home.”

“You were working with someone while working with me? How did you find the time?”

“Babe, I was working with like six other people.” He smirks.

“Doris was right, you are a shark.” You laugh.

“Gotta be able to afford this place, right?” He tucks some hair behind your ear. “You’ll stay tonight? I’m a cuddler.”

“Of course.” You giggle. “I’ll have to have you over for my next game night, you can meet all of my friends.”

“Like I said, I fully expect to be invited to your house warming.”

“That too.”

“But I’d be happy to meet your friends. Are they doctors too?”

“A couple of them are, yeah. We met in med school. Wouldn’t have made it through without them.”

You two stay up for hours, legs tangled in each other, telling each lots of things about one another. It was easy to talk to Harry, it had been since you met. He felt the same about you too. You both knew it wouldn’t be so easy to just get together. Harry’s schedule was unpredictable, and your days were long and tiring. But, neither of you really cared because you both felt like you found your person.

Harry loved game nights with your friends. He was a tad competitive, but it just made for more laughs. You both liked having your separate spaces, but you enjoyed when he could actually spend the night, or when you could spend the night at his place. Neither of you took it personally when the other was too busy or too tired either. Once you felt truly settled, you wrote Doris a thank you note for setting you up with the best realtor and the love of your life.

#harry styles #harry styles imagine #harry styles fic #harry styles x reader #harry styles x y/n #harry styles y/n #harry styles fluff #harry styles smut #harry styles smut fic #enjoy!#realtor!Harry

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mostlysignssomeportents · 4 years

Text

QE, inflation, slave labor and a People's Bailout

The Obama administration inherited a vast economic crisis. They responded with Quantitative Easing, pumping trillions into the finance sector to rescue the banks that had knowingly gambled on bad mortgages, losing so much they were about to go under.

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/24/the-fed-launched-qe-nine-years-ago--these-four-charts-show-its-impact.html

At the time, deficit hawks predicted inflation, which is a commonsense prediction: inflation is what happens when the amount of money chasing goods and services goes up faster than the supply of those goods and services, creating bidding wars.

They were right...and wrong. What we got was asset bubbles, especially in housing markets, driving up the price of putting a roof over your head rewarding speculators and landlords, especially Wall Street landlords.

And Obama's handling of the financial crisis put a lot of us under the thumbs of landlords! Obama bailed out the banks, but not the mortgage holders, kicking off waves of foreclosures.

Thanks to lax oversight, banks that had cheated to originate or service mortgages were able to cheat on foreclosures, too - stealing houses from borrowers who were up-to-date on payments or who were entitled to forebearance.

https://web.archive.org/web/20101017014628/http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20101014/bs_yblog_upshot/is-david-j-stern-the-poster-boy-for-the-foreclosure-mess

I mean, literally stealing houses by the hundreds or even the thousands. The very same people who created the great financial crisis got bailed out, rather than punished, and used their new lease on life to commit even worse crimes with total impunity.

The houses that were foreclosed (and sometimes stolen) were flipped to Wall Street, who LOVE financial products based on peoples' homes. After all, people will move heaven and earth to keep shelter over their kids' heads.

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/02/blackstone-rental-homes-bundled-derivatives/

Corporate landlords built a sturdy, three-legged stool to guarantee the flow of rents to their investors.

I. Jack up rents to consume the majority of tenants' income:

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2017/09/wall-street-owns-main-street-literally.html

II. Cease maintenance, knowing that your tenants have no recourse if their homes are crumbling and unsafe:

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-housing-invitation/

III. Perfect the eviction, heretofore an American rarity:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-03/wall-street-america-s-new-landlord-kicks-tenants-to-the-curb

America's housing crisis - substandard homes rented at unsustainable costs to people who had their own homes stolen from them by the same investors they're currently paying rent to - is a major legacy of QE, and it's definitely inflationary.

But it's a highly selective form of inflation. Many people won't experience it at all: if you owned your house before the crisis and weathered it, the asset bubble has made your home more valuable, while falling interest rates let you refi at rock-bottom rates. You're great.

You're paying less than ever for a home that's worth more than ever, but that's a spillover effect of the main show, which is the process by which millions of Americans were robbed of their homes and then moved into high-priced slums to the benefit of the 1%.

Both Obama and Trump have boasted of the economy's performance since QE, pointing to soaring share prices - share prices that are totally decoupled from company performance. Companies lose money and still gain value.

Indeed, predatory companies (like Grubhub, Postmates, Door Dash and Uber Eats) that destroy profitable companies (restaurants) while still losing money are booming in value.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/05/18/code-is-speech/#schadenpizza

Investors understand that consumers have no money, due to rising housing costs plus crashing wages, largely thanks to the "gig economy," a polite term for "worker misclassification."

Companies that get bailouts would be stupid to spend the money on jobs or new productive capacity to make stuff no one can afford to buy. Instead, they buy their own shares and declare dividends, driving up share prices.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/10/20/the-cadillac-of-murdermobiles/#austerity

We have seen an incredible market bull-run since the Great Financial Crisis, a run that has largely continued since the pandemic. It's the other asset bubble: a bubble in investment assets.

Corporate leaders claim responsibility for these rises, but the reality is that it's the predictable result of bailing out banks and companies rather than workers and homeowners.

Société Générale's analysts say that about half of the stock market's gains since 2008 can be attributed to QE.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/without-qe-the-s-p-500-would-be-trading-closer-to-1-800-than-3-300-says-societe-generale-11604688442

Top-down bailouts have multiplier effects. The banks are made whole, then they get to steal our houses, then they get to steal our rents, then they get to goose their share prices.

This is how the super-rich got even richer, before and after the pandemic. It's also why the tiny minority of Americans with adequate retirement savings saw them swell - it's another spillover effect of the great upward transfer of national wealth.

Why does all of this matter now? Well, between my writing my first paragraph and this one, Biden was declared, giving us what the Biden campaign signalled would be "Obama's third term."

Biden's taking office amidst a financial crisis that's far worse than 2008.

Biden has a long track-record of giving legislative gifts to the finance sector at the expense of the American people. They called him "The Senator from MNBA" for a reason.

https://www.gq.com/story/joe-biden-bankruptcy-bill

If he addresses this crisis the same way that he did in 2008 - the way that Congress and the Senate addressed the crisis in 2020 - by bailing out finance, not the public, we're seriously fucked.

Sure, the stock market will continue to rise and rise, as will house prices.

If you are in the 1%, you will get SO MUCH richer. If you're in the 10%, your retirement savings will swell, your mortgage will get cheaper, and your house's value will go up.

For everyone else: evictions, foreclosures, soaring rents, worse wages.

Last week, California voters passed Prop 22, safeguarding the right of gig economy companies to misclassify their workers as contractors and pay them sub-minimum wages, withhold benefits, evade payroll and unemployment taxes, etc.

Uber/Lyft spent $200m to secure that win.

As Prop22's promoters remind us: Gig work is the new unemployment benefit: it's a private-sector jobs guarantee, work you can get at the tap of your screen. It's a perfect labor market - workers effectively bid to offer the best price to perform servant work for others.

The more workers there are, and the more desperate their situation is, the lower the payments go. A lot of those savings are siphoned off by the (money-losing, stock-soaring) gig companies, but some of it is passed onto customers.

This is by design.

Since the Reagan years, neoliberal regulators and lawmakers have hewed to a radical anti-monopoly theory called "consumer harm." Under "consumer harm," monopolies are only a problem if they drive up prices.

Since gig companies lower prices, they are totally kosher - even if they secure monopolies through predatory pricing.

But there's an even more insidious side to "consumer harm" and the gig economy.

Misclassifying workers as independent contractors converts a brutally exploited workforce into a collection of "small businesses." If they get together and demand higher wages, THEY violate the consumer harm standard. They're a group of companies fixing prices!

We're 12 years into the QE experiment and it has demonstrated the relationship between government money-creation and inflation: inflation isn't the result of government spending, it's the result of government spending that leads to bidding wars.

Giving trillion to the rich created inflation in the things that rich people buy: our houses (out from under us) and stocks.

Now, imagine what a People's Bailout could do.

Imagine replacing the gig economy job guarantee (a workfare program with no workplace protections, job security or minimum wage) with an actual Job Guarantee as described by the economist Pavlina Tcherneva:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/05/05/the-hard-stuff/#jobs-guarantee

Federally funded, locally administered: good jobs at inclusive wages that served community needs proposed by community groups and approved by local governments.

Would that be inflationary? Recall that inflation is what happens when the number of buyers goes up and the supply of things they're buying doesn't keep up. Inflation is the result of bidding wars.

For a jobs guarantee to be inflationary, there would have to be a bidding war for the US workforce. That is the opposite of what we have now.

https://wolfstreet.com/2020/11/06/picture-emerges-of-a-weird-recovery-to-still-historically-awful-levels/

The reason no one wants to buy Americans' labor is that no one has any money to buy the things Americans make with their labor. The only people with money - the wealthy - primarily buy our homes out from under us, and stocks.

QE for the wealthy has made the economy incredibly perverse. Productive companies are being driven to bankruptcy by gig economy companies that lose money. Millions of workers compete to provide services for the lucky few, for dwindling wages.

Workers can't afford to buy stuff so companies have no reason to make stuff and so they become finance grifts, until they collapse, like Hertz did (after it converted itself from a car-rental company to an accountancy trick company):

https://pluralistic.net/2020/05/27/literal-gunhumping/#hertz-uranus

The gig economy jobs guarantee can't last. Eventually the number of workers bidding to serve the wealthy will exceed demand by such a wide margin that wages turn negative - the depreciation and payments on your gig economy car will exceed your income.

But a real, public sector, federal Jobs Guarantee? Yes please.

Paying workers good wages to do productive things that their communities need will create demand for the thing companies have decided not to make anymore.

In other words, it will enable companies to make profits again, and it will drive out the companies whose share prices soared on the expectation of losses (accompanied by dividends and buybacks). It will dampen the stock market, but improve the economy.

This will mean the end of those spillover effects - soaring house-valuations and 401ks for the lucky few - but those came at a VERY high price - vast un- and underemployment, the gutting of the productive economy, crushing debt for the majority.

America bought those house price rises and 401k gains at a steep price: it cost the nation its resilience and political stability.

If the goal of QE was to secure middle-class Americans' retirements, it was spectacularly wasteful.

A tiny fraction of QE's trillions went to middle-class retirements, while the vast majority went to making the 1% far, far richer. Most middle class Americans still don't have secure retirements - their dotage will be spent competing for gig economy jobs.

For the price of QE, the US government could simply have guaranteed the necessities of retirees: shelter, food, care. This spending would crowd out jobs, sure - the worst-paid, most precarious jobs, from fast food to gig economy "jobs."

It would make America into a country of secure and prosperous people, instead of food-delivery drivers and dog-walkers.

12 years of finance bailouts and 0 years of People's Bailouts have only exacerbated this, and the pandemic metastasised it.

When it comes to stimulus, America can't afford a third Obama term. We need to demand better of Biden - we need to demand a People's Bailout.

For almost* all our sakes.

*Offer not valid in America's richest ZIP codes.

#pluralistic

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talesmaniac89 · 4 years

Text

The Classifieds

Pairing: Past Dean x Reader

Summary: What lengths will Dean Winchester go to when he runs out of options to save the people he cares about? Is he willing to let go of a part of himself to save his family?

Triggers: Hurt, Coma, possible loss/death, open ending, no resolution, angst, No happy endings here guys. This is just angst for the sake of angst.

For sale: 1967 Chevrolet Impala

Lovingly restored black ‘67 Impala needs a new home. This 327 four-barrel beauty comes with a newly installed 502 Big Block 550 Horsepower Engine to give you that extra bit of push. Though it has a mileage of over 600,000 miles travelled, this beauty runs like new after several full fixups, constant servicing and a lot of TLC. Registration is up to date as of January this year.

With its souped-up engine, new paint job and fresh set of tires, this baby looks like it just rolled off of the assembly line. Both the exterior and interior of the car have received a near perfect restoration with a few small exceptions; there’s a green army man toy stuck in the ashtray, a few Lego pieces are rattling in the vent when you turn on the heat, and there’s a small carving in the rear window sill. These are all minor interior flaws that can easily be fixed by the buyer.

I’ll share details like the VIN, classic car ID and answer any other questions directly to any prospective buyers.

She’s been with us since ‘73, and never let us down. Baby’s part of our family, and we’re sad to let her go, but I’m hoping the new owner will love her as much as I have.

Price: Best offer

---

Taking a shaky breath, Dean held back the tears that burned in his eyes, blurring his vision as he read through the classified ad one last time before motioning to hit send. His finger shook over the enter key as he squeezed his eyes shut and swallowed the lump in his throat. He didn’t want to do this, but he had no choice.

Baby meant a lot to him, of course she did. But she was only a car, and if he didn’t let her go, then he could end up losing so much more. Selling the Impala was his only choice.

He needed money. A lot of money. For (Y/N) and Sammy. Their last hunt in Chicago had landed them both in separate hospital beds after prolonged contact with a djinn, and they weren’t waking up. Even after Dean killed the fucking monster that had them trapped, they both remained unresponsive, and they were fading fast. Only kept alive by modern science and a team of hardworking doctors and nurses.

Still, Dean was in the business of saving people. And if ganking another monster of the week wasn’t gonna cut it, then he’d do whatever else he needed to do to fix this. He wouldn’t let his little brother, or the woman he loved more than life itself, die in that hospital. He couldn’t lose them, either of them.

But, their stay and continued treatment required money. More money than he had. More money than he could ever hope to get from his measly collection of fake credit cards, poker games and hustling some poor fool at the local dive bar.

Which was why he was balancing Sammy’s computer on his lap as he sat, defeated, on one of the uncomfortably hard waiting room chairs. One finger hovering over the enter button as he tried to breathe through the growing lump in his throat and the helpless panic lodged in his chest. Either way, he’d lose something. But this way he’d save his family; the only goddamn good thing left in his life.

Swallowing down the bitter defeat, he let his finger press into the enter key with a little more force than necessary. Sending his ad in to the classifieds with nothing more than a dry, low sob goodbye.

Dean would scrounge up every damned cent needed to keep his family alive. Even if it meant selling the only home the Winchester brothers had ever really had.

Because the Impala was their only real home, more so than the bunker could ever hope to be. Yet, what was a home without people to live in it? If he lost his family, then the bunker, the Impala, or any other place he tried to run away to would just be a coffin. Somewhere to lie broken, bruised and defeated as he waited for the world to catch up and realise his heart stopped beating the day that fucking djinn landed Sam and (Y/N) in that hospital bed.

“Goodbye Baby… I’m sorry,”

---

“…Winchester?”

Someone was calling his name, but Dean was too far gone to listen. His red rimmed eyes stayed laser focused on the online listing. Dry and burning after minutes spent staring unblinkingly at the picture of his Baby that topped the ad. The picture was just one of many, the first he could find without Sam or her in it, but it still meant so much to him.

In it he could see every single moment he’d spent behind the wheel of that car.

He could see nights spent by (Y/N)’s side, stargazing on Baby’s hood. His hand painting patterns on her bare arm as they just… Existed together, not talking or hunting, just living. Her head resting on his shoulder as he whispered promises of forever into her (Y/H/C) hair.

He relived every time she’d helped him fix his Baby back up, handing him his tools with that tempting sheen of moisture trapped against her neck and collarbone from the heat of the Kansas sun. Endless drives, with Sam calling shotgun; using his longer legs to his advantage and leaving the fiercest huntress Dean knew in the dust while she grumbled about deserving a front seat view for once.

He could feel the steady and safe vibration of the steering wheel under his fingers and heard her singing along to his mixtapes. Her head leaned back and (Y/H/C) hair moving slightly in the small breeze from the open window. (Y/E/C) eyes hidden behind closed eyelids and a small lazy smile, just barely visible through the rear-view mirror.

That one picture, topping the classifieds ad, held it all; every moment on the road so far. And there’d been many. More than he could ever hope to count.

From the desperate rushed rescue missions and races against the clock, to the lazier road trips after a fight well fought. The easy drives would always be his favourite moments. Just sunshine, warming the air around him as he drove his family back to the bunker. Safe in the knowledge that he’d kept them all out of harm’s way once more.

He’d spent so many long days on the road, he could picture it all perfectly. Even in the pixelated picture of an empty car. (Y/N) would be lounging in the backseat, humming along to his music. Stretched across the leather seats as Sam tried to talk both Dean and her into agreeing to change the classic rock music blaring through the speakers with a podcast or audio book. Giving his all to another convincing argument, fit for the former Stanford student, and still failing miserably every time.

“Driver picks the music, shotgun shuts his cakehole,”

Dean flinched slightly at the sound of his own voice. He hadn’t meant to say the words out loud. Even the cracked, whispered version that left him. Yet, as soon as the words were out, he could nearly hear the echo of Sammy’s quipped “Jerk” in response to the golden rule. Barely catching the ghost of it with a trembling, empty smile before it was crushed under the louder sound of cold professionalism above him.

“Mr. Winchester?” The doctor repeated, sounding slightly annoyed at his lack of response and waving the papers in front of her as she waited for him to take them from her. The admission forms.

There were two of them. One for each of the two people he loved more than life itself. Lying in separate hospital rooms, only kept alive by machines and wires. Alive, but not really living, for as long as he had money to keep funding those fragile lifelines.

“Please fill in the fields for their insurance and the payment plan section. If there’s any issues…” The doctor said, voice free of judgement or blame as he lifted tear stained eyes to catch hers.

“No… You’ll have your money. Just… Save ‘em doc. They’re all I have,”

Dean didn’t have time to sit around feeling sorry for himself. He needed to get the money. He’d do anything to save his family. Hell, he’d have already sold his soul three times over if he had anything left to actually bargain with. And his baby, the Impala that had been their home, would never be the same again without Sam’s constant attempts to change his music or (Y/N) signing along from the backseat or making his baby brother roll his eyes at her bad jokes.

Though he’d yet to get an offer on the ad. And he needed money fast.

Cas had tried, but his weakened grace couldn’t help them, and there were no other last-minute interventions there to save the day. After all, saving the day was what the Winchesters did, and Dean was two soldiers short of a full team.

No, he couldn’t sit around hoping someone would come rescue them and he couldn’t shoot or punch his way through this problem. All he could do was cling to his phone and hope someone offered to buy a piece of him. One he thought he’d never part with. Hell, at some point he’d even dreamed about handing the keys over to his own child one day, one with green eyes and (Y/H/C) hair, to let the Impala live on when he retired somewhere calm and quiet with (Y/N).

A dream he now realised was foolish to even hope for.

Keeping his eyes on the picture of his Baby on the laptop screen, Dean’s hand tightened around the papers. His voice shook as he prayed out loud, just as much to the classic car on the screen as to the doctor in front of him.

“Please save my family,”

Tags:

Dean Winchester Tags: @ria132love @woodworthti666 @defenderrosetyler @akshi8278 @justanotherwinchester @lyarr24 @torn-and-frayed @all-will-be-well-love @wearesuchstuff1 @thefridgeismybestie @adoptdontshoppets @starsandmidnightblue @punof-agun

Forever Tags: @deanwanddamons @winchest09 @hobby27 @awesome-badass-cafeteria-sauce @sea040561 @donnaintx @alwaysdreamingforthebest @thatmotleygirl @chocolateheart @superfanficnatural @flamencodiva @starryeyeseunbyul @waywardbeanie @supernaturalenchanted @ellewritesfix05 @emoryhemsworth

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daily-dose-of-imagines · 4 years

Text

Hitmen AU! | Head Canons | 19+ [Haikyuu!!]

𝕹𝖊𝖐𝖔𝖒𝖆 [PART i] [PART ii] [PART iii]

Part 3 of the hitmen head canons for Nekoma~!! Next team to be set up will be Aoba Johsai~!

» » Admin Ko

»»————-　♔　————-««

S̷o̷ ̷I̷n̷u̷o̷k̷a̷

This precious baby-- oh my god practically Hinata’s equal in terms of energy and excitement

Like Tanaka and Taketora, the pair met on the streets except instead of brawling they had a rather--- exhilarating first meeting?

Let’s just say it ended with a broken store front and two very angry motherly figures from both respective teams

anywho, let’s get into the gritty bits. This boy, is deadass the all-rounder.

He may not be as noticed or remembered like the other members, but it definitely adds to his skill set as he’s able to easily and swiftly move throughout the field without any sort of issue.

Once tried to teach Lev how to be sneaky and holy fuck he’s never gonna forget that day

His main specialty is being the ‘1st Warning’ when payments are late after their services have been completed

is pretty good at holding a decent conversation with the buyers, but talks better with his fists when they become a little too... confident

A chorus of chuckles. The shaking of hands and leisure smiles were shared across the room as the 5 individuals greeted one another before seating themselves at the table. Some of them jesting at the youngest in the room as the figure could only let out a laugh before seating himself at the head of the table.

“Greetings, I’m here as a representative for my business. I’ve been told by my senior that you all are looking to use our services?”

The question fell quickly, as he wasn’t really here to sit and beat around the bush. That came for later, to test and see how the clients here ticked and who would be the first on his list for a visit. Of course the responses were initially normal, though as time ticked on and their demands were being placed on the table, tensions began to arise as a handful of them began to get cocky.

Their statements running freely with no consideration to the sinister smile that began to form on the young man’s usually sweet face. Within a moment’s notice, one of the ruder clients found the ground to be their new best friend as they sputtered and choked against the heavy weight around their throat.

“Let this be a reminder to you all, that even if I am young...I know exactly what I’m doing.”

A toll baby oh my god

He has messy bedhead, but he usually styles it up since it’s easy and efficient

Looks lanky from a distance, but is pretty well built for all that does

he has one tattoo on his body and two basic studs

is very baby faced

with his s/o, he honestly doesn’t show or indicate any signs of being a part of the more darker parts of the world

he’s very affectionate and cuddly with s/o too~!

Whenever he gets into familiar territory while on a date with s/o he’ll quickly convince them to go a different route or to do something different for their date

T̴a̴m̴a̴h̴i̴k̴o̴ ̴T̴e̴s̴h̴i̴r̴o̴

Calm and collected like Kenma, he is Kenma’s student prodigy whatever you wanna call it

helps with the cyber end details and transactions as well as cyber attacks if any other organizations try to hack or expose their little corner

makes little mistakes here and there tbh, but Kenma fixes them quickly and shows him tips and tricks to counteract the problem

besides training with Kenma, he also works in the lab to make and develop more equipment for missions as well as products to sell to potential clients

doesn’t necessarily engage on the field, is usually back at base help from home

gives heads up and advice from information he sees on the dark web when handing off assignments

Skimming over the information once more. The young male couldn’t help but furrow his brows in confusion. It was odd. The coding, the message, the timing. All of it just told him that there was something more at play. That this purchase was hiding a much more bigger, sinister scheme.

“...Odd.” Indeed it was, of course he’d run it by the older strategist when he went to collect the assignments to pass out. Yet he couldn’t help but once he brought it up a war would break out within their sanction.

He isn’t as tall as the others, nor is he the most buff but he does make up for what he lacks physically by helping create equipment and making sure his teammates will be safe on the field

definitely frequents sparring matches with the other rookies to keep in shape

doesn’t have any tattoos but does have an industrial

with his s/o he can be a little...secretive

he doesn’t want to expose them to the work he does nor possibly get them hurt so he can be pretty vague

like Kenma, any chance he can be with s/o he’ll do so most likely in doors and just chatting and catching up with a show in the bg

L̷e̷v̷ ̷H̷a̷i̷b̷a̷

god this child-- plz help this clutz

very mischievous and sly, when he holds conversations with anyone it always feels like he’s trying to pry something out of them.

aspires to be an all round ace like Inoka is, but honestly is a big clutz

accidentally almost killed Inoka first day during shooting practice

Yaku deadass beat this tall boi’s ass to the ground

he goes through the most training and the most skills

definitely makes up for his mess on the field, despite still making mistakes here and there, he shows improvement every time he’s assigned a new mission.

Out of all the skills he’s learned, he definitely likes the skills of interrogation

he enjoys seeing their victims squirm and beg for forgiveness

“Oh come now~. This isn’t so bad right? You just need to pay the money and let us know who your second supplier is~!” A gleeful voice echoed throughout the desolate chamber as the seated individual trembled in the metal chair. When no response was given, a sharp click of the tongue was heard as a cry of pain cut through the tense air. The clang of the metal chair hitting the concrete floor as a boot pressed the victim’s head tortuously slowly into the ground.

“I’m not here to keep playing this little game...I know you’ve been selling our information to a competitor...and honestly none of us like that. Though...it is good to say that you’re not the only one selling secrets~.” A wicked grin, and pearly whites were tattooed into the victim’s mind as the horror of their darkest deeds were being sold. Though this group wouldn’t do such a thing...right?

“I know what you’re thinking...and honestly, it’s not true~ We made quite the pretty penny~.”

the tollest boy in their group

his silver hair is usually slicked back to keep a more professional look, but tbh he has it down

has a large variety of tattoos over his body along with old and fresh battle scars and bruises

he’s more lean than bulky but incredibly toned from his intensive workouts

with his s/o he’s a big prankster and a tease

loves to hold things out of reach and steal kisses from them

is always wrapped around s/o and follows them like a lost puppy at times when he really wants affection

Y̴u̴k̴i̴ ̴S̴h̴i̴b̴a̴y̴a̴m̴a̴

The most quiet member and shyest member

rarely ever causes issues in the group tbh

he’s yaku’s favorite since he’s the least problematic rookie

despite being the shyest member, he really wows his members by being the eyes and ears.

During recon or sniping missions he’ll be the eyes and ears for the members by updating them in real time of what the target is doing and what things they will need to notice for.

Is one of the better gun handlers in the rookie group

“Target is heading off course. Distracted by a guest in the common room.” Sharp and quick, the usually soft voice spoke confidently as brown eyes analyzed the situation and how to move on from there. An annoyed sigh left his lips as he skimmed over the live CCTV footage before updating the assassins on the field.

“High chance that enemy organizations have infiltrated the assignment. Proceed with caution. Odd amount of cars coming up.”

Furrowing his brows, the male continued to debrief the team coordinating and helping them get through the mission with as little issue as possible before letting out a pleased sigh as the target laid dead. The assassins immediately retreating as the veteran driver grinned, starting their car and returning to base.

One of the smallest members

isn’t too bulky or too lean but rather average in terms of build

has no piercings or tattoos, but does have a good chunk of scars and bruises from constant sparring and training to keep his stamina and defenses up

his hair is usually pulled back to keep out of his face whenever he skims over feed to relay to the others

he’s very sweet around his s/o

taking the time to listen to them and spending as much time as he can with them

a bit more honest than the others where he’ll tell them a bit about their job

#haikyuu x reader #haikyuu imagines #hitmen au #au #haikyuu!!#nekoma #nekoma x reader #so inuoka x reader #tamahiko toshiro x reader #lev haiba x reader #yuki shibayama x reader #inuoka x reader #toshiro x reader #haiba x reader #shibayama x reader #so inuoka #tamahiko toshiro #lev haiba #yuki shibayama

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thelightofthingshopedfor · 4 years

Text

just once, just fucking once I would like to have a reasonably productive long weekend instead of spending most of it too stuck in decision paralysis to actually do much of anything until I reach a point where I feel like I could very well break down crying because I’m too overwhelmed with everything I need to do but I still don’t actually do most of it because the decision paralysis is a huge part of what makes me so fucking overwhelmed in the first place

like. right now probably the most urgent thing is a semi-complicated Etsy commission that the buyer would ideally receive by Dec. 10, which probably means sending it Dec. 7 at the absolute latest. so I should be working on that, right? but it’s going to take a while so it’s a time commitment, especially because it seems kind of pointless to get out a lot of messy supplies to only work on it for a few minutes. and I need to order parts for a different order--well, at least that’s quick. I also really need to reapply thermal paste to my CPU as soon as I can because I think the fan’s getting louder and that can’t be good for anything in there, and theoretically it won’t be that hard, but realistically I’m sure it’s going to take a while and I have to look up a little info on how to do it, first--and it involves my PC being out of commission while I’m working on it, so that’s not something I can do halfway. and while my PC’s open I really need to replace my dead hard drive, which wouldn’t be that hard except I want to install the new one alongside the old one so I can try to clone the dead one onto the new one, which will definitely take time on both the hardware and software sides of things, but it needs to happen sooner rather than later because, again, there’s a lot of stuff I can’t do until I get that done. and I need to send the recent invoices for Hazy’s dental appointment to pet insurance to see if they’ll pay anything, and that should be quick, but nothing ever stays simple. and, shit, I should really do some actual work this weekend because I didn’t get enough done before...and I still need to decide what to do about the vision therapy thing now that it’s clear the best they can do for me is a payment plan for like 36 expensive appointments, ugh. and ah shit I signed up for Yuletide and I’ve done almost nothing, and that’s due...Dec. 17? fuck, that reminds me, I gotta go get a new notebook from my room because I just finished this one, I mean that’s quick and easy but it also means I now have two notebooks that mostly aren’t typed up, which is bad because I can’t do anything with the contents until they’re typed up and of course they’re not backed up (unless I put them in my fireproof safe, and then I’d never get them typed), and typing those is going to take forever, and yeah I’ve been meaning to make it easier on myself by just doing like 15 minutes a day but I haven’t done that at all and they really need to get typed--and, well, I could just do a 15-minute stint, sure, but that seems silly when there’s so much that needs to be done--and, ugh, I’ve sorta been ignoring my email for the last three days and I need to go through that because otherwise I’m guaranteed to miss something I won’t want to miss, but that takes time and it’s going to mean opening up more tabs when there are already too many tabs open (there are always too many tabs open) and I need to deal with those too, and a good share of the emails are probably about Black Friday sales that I’ll probably want to do but that means more tabs and more decisions and shit there’s all that stuff in my Etsy cart that I should really buy sooner rather than later because sometimes Etsy stuff disappears or sells out and then I’ll be sad and frustrated with myself and also some of the things I want to buy are for gifts, which reminds me that I have almost no Christmas gifts yet for anybody, and my birthday is soon so I should probably make some kind of list myself but actually why am I focusing on that at all when the Georgia runoff elections that determine Senate control are in barely more than a month and I need to be writing letters/postcards to voters since I don’t want to phonebank and time zones actually make it really impractical anyway? I was going to do that in a reasonable way this time too, just a few letters a day like I meant to before, use up a lot of these stamps and stuff I still have--and ah fuck it’s been a while since I’ve called my own legislators about anything, I need to do that, that’s theoretically quick because voicemails cut me off at two minutes, although to be able to do that I also have to do at least a little research so I know what’s the most important thing to call about and what to say so that’s more tabs and more time, and I still haven’t fucking reposted the tiny little Endgame fix-it fic I wrote at the end of August, let alone finished anything since then

and I would, on some level, like to work on one of the many, many writing projects that is theoretically close to being done, or one of the recent ones I started because I foolishly and incorrectly thought it was something I could bang out quickly

and on some level I would also like to work on more stuff for Etsy that could be pre-made so it’s not another stress point when I get orders, especially because several things are holiday-specific and some wouldn’t even take that long, but I’d still be choosing to do those instead of more urgent things

and none of that even begins to touch other stuff, like my room that continues to be a disaster and I need to sort through my shit so I know whether I can relist my most popular Etsy item (if I even want to, which I don’t right now because stress), not to mention all the stuff I need to clear out by listing on eBay, and I could do at least one part of that (flatten the boxes I’ve saved for shipping) without committing to a week-long project but even that part would take a solid chunk of time that I should be spending on something more urgent

and we can’t even put up the fucking tree until I move some of my shit away from the spot where the tree goes, which is tough because a lot of it is from work or otherwise theoretically temporary stuff that doesn’t have an actual home, so that’s going to take a while, and then putting up the tree is also going to take a while, and my room is already a disaster so I’d need to clean in there to make room, which would take forever, and for that matter my areas of the living room are generally a disaster too, as always

and while I’m thinking about stuff I brought from work, let’s go back to how I need to do some work stuff because I’m lucky enough to have a decent job with good insurance that can be done from home and I’m still just like...kiiiiiiinda endangering that by not being a functional adult in general? which is at least partly because my brain is a dumpster fire that doesn’t seem to be improving (which is something else to worry about) but regardless of the cause I still have to do something about it? oh yes and speaking of the good insurance I’m kinda endangering by being a fuckup, haha sure hope this knot under my jaw doesn’t turn out to be...you know, the type of bad thing that a knot under the jaw could turn out to be! which is another very good reason I need to stop being a fuckup so I’m not maybe endangering the job that would pay for that, along with all my other medical issues! and also the entirety of our rent because my mom’s really high-risk and the only available jobs she’s qualified for aren’t safe for her to do!

and my knee hurts! and my elbow hurts! and my neck fucking hurts, my head and neck always hurt and I think I’ve been sleeping even worse than usual lately, partly because neck pain and partly just my body fucking hates me, it’s always a problem and I don’t know what to do about it anymore

and now it’s after 8:30 pm and obviously I’ve done none of this, and I’m still tired, and my head and neck still hurt, and there are still so many things I need to do but I can’t choose because the time-consuming things are the urgent ones but I don’t have the time or energy for them and choosing a specific thing (an urgent time-consuming thing, or a less urgent but much quicker thing) means actively choosing not to do one of the other things, and it’s all important, and I can’t fucking choose, and I’m pretty much at a point where I can continue running ever more painful and crazy-making circles in my brain trying to make myself decide something or I can say “fuck it” and do something that would be fun but not urgent or important at all, which I shouldn’t do, so for fuck’s sake I should just pick even one productive thing to do and then maybe let myself do something fun and then get to bed at a good time for fucking once but I still can’t fucking choose and I want to either cry, scream, or possibly hurt myself, and none of this is healthy or productive

and I think possibly my therapist is getting impatient with me for not making much progress and not really having specific goals for our sessions aside from “I hate that my brain is Like This and I want it to not be Like This and no I haven’t done most of the things you’ve suggested and no I don’t have a good reason why, I just want the meds to work so everything won’t be so fucking hard and yes I know that wouldn’t be something you could control even if it was in your wheelhouse, which it isn’t, but I get overwhelmed so fast and I know I need to do better and be better but I don’t know how”

and I wrote this instead of actually doing anything, apparently, because there was at least some chance that dumping it all out would make me feel better or help me see more clearly what I actually need to do, but I think I actually made myself feel worse by articulating just how overwhelmed I am, mostly by things that objectively aren’t actually that difficult or important.

and I still can’t fucking choose.

#brains behaving badly #adhd #I am just...so fucking sick of my brain being...this

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loquaciousquark · 4 years

Note

I hope you're doing well! I know you posted about a stressful situation last month, and I hope it's resolved itself. Sending good wishes you you and Hamlet!

Thank you so very much for checking in on me! I really do appreciate it. An update to that post under the cut.

Carol, who moved in with me on May 28, is still here. Right now, we have set a tentative move-out goal of the first or second week of August, but this is pending an apartment application that she hopes to finalize on Monday and a job situation that is a complete mess.

Basically, according to my limited understanding, Carol is licensed to teach in Florida. Alabama has a reciprocity clause with Florida, but it must be applied for. Carol has recently begun this process, but her teaching license(s?) is (are?) set to expire in December unless she passes certain exams. She’s already passed one for...general middle and high school teaching, I think, but failed a math exam. She has an art history exam Monday afternoon and expects to pass. I hope so, because she’s been doing nothing but watching Netflix and shopping for houses for the last few days in her new 2017 Jeep Cherokee.

I remain unspeakably grateful to my parents for teaching me financial literacy, because until I witnessed Carol’s decision-making, I had no idea how hard it was for some people to not spend money unwisely.

As a reminder, Carol is dead broke. She has $153,000 in debt across student loans, medical bills, Czech and US taxes, and some personal loans she would like to repay to friends for helping her. She is unemployed and has no support from her family and has relied on couch surfing at friends’ and acquaintances’ homes since last summer for housing. Since moving in with me, she has been trying to find somewhere to live that would accept her with all her debt and her nonexistent US employment history for the last ten years. Based on what she’s said, I think she has about $9k in the bank--or did, until last week.

In short, she needs a car, a job, and a home, and as far as I can tell she doesn’t care which order they come in.

Two weeks ago, she was offered a position in a rural town about 30 minutes from where I live. It’s a small, very country town which desperately needs a special education teacher, something I think Carol really does have a passion for. However, because she hasn’t finished the reciprocity licensure application yet, they’re having a lot of roadblocks with her paperwork, compounded by the fact that when she left Prague last year, she left all her important documentation behind: things like her birth certificate, her social security card, and her letters of recommendation, which for some reason she did not have electronic backups of. The principal has been trying to get what she needs from Carol for two weeks. Carol is constantly saying that things are “in process” but has nothing to show for it.

As far as we can tell, the job is still hers, but the school year starts August 13th and she still hasn’t been approved by the Board of Education because the paperwork is still not finished on her end. She did not attempt to replace her birth certificate or social security card until they needed it for the application. (Her friend in Prague--and I am beginning to realize she uses the word “friend” for anyone she’s met longer than sixty seconds), who frantically packed up all her belongings when she realized she would not be able to go back to the city, cannot ship her belongings or go through them for the important paperwork until next summer, as she and her husband are currently vacationing in Rome for a year.

Carol decided last night she is also going to apply for some online Department of Defense position--I didn’t understand the details and don’t really want to know, except that it’s also teaching and some administration. We’ll see how it works out. She is growing increasingly annoyed at the principal’s requests for paperwork completion, which baffles me.

So, job: shrug? Maybe?

Car next, then, but this whole mess also goes back to the financial literacy thing. My parents have always been extremely frugal (pennywise, as my dad would say), and from childhood they made it very clear to us to not buy things you couldn’t afford. They’ve never had a car payment in my memory, and they paid off their house about ten years ago. This means they drove a lot of junkers for a very long time, and for a very long time we had very few vacations, but now they’re fully financially stable and debt-free and my mom has a car that she drove off the lot brand new that they paid cash in hand for.

If I had been in Carol’s situation, I would have found a cheap, mostly reliable used car that probably wasn’t going to explode on me and drive that as long as I could while saving up for housing. I did in fact drive her to look at several used cars, most of which would have been even outside my expected budget (hers, as it happens, is larger even than that, because one of her overseas friends was willing to contribute $5000 to the cost of a vehicle). (I paid $6500 for my current car, a 2004, in college in 2012 with 70,000 miles on it at the time, and have driven it ever since.)

She rejected all of them because they did not have good “energy” and “feelings.” One she was willing to buy at $3700, but told the seller to go pay for his own inspection (once I explained to her what mechanical inspections were as a concept), so they ghosted her. She also is extremely afraid of head gasket failure--I don’t know why, since she knows nothing about cars--and has assumed all vehicles she has driven are on the verge of it, so after the first week she refused to even look at a vehicle without a warranty.

This means she exclusively limited herself to used dealership options, which I’m just going to come right out and say was monumentally stupid. I don’t know if any car dealers follow me, so I’m sorry if I am misperceiving this, but in my experience almost every dealer I’ve gone to has been aggressive, manipulative, and extremely predatory in their interest rates. I cannot think of a riskier course of action in abject debt than to try to cut a deal with a car dealer for the sake of a warranty I doubt will cover that much truly expensive failure in the long run anyway.

On Thursday, Carol bought a $20,000 2017 Jeep Cherokee from a dealership down the road. I don’t know what she put down. I do know she did not use her friend’s money (why not??) and I know her interest rate on the car loan is 4%, which she is extremely proud of and which horrifies me. She also “persuaded” them into a limited warranty that will cover the vehicle up to 100,000 miles (currently at 42k, and they ~only offer it for cars under 40,000 miles~). I can’t tell you how bad an idea I think all this is.

Thursday night, as she was regaling me with stories of her negotiating prowess, she also tells me she has decided to buy a house. She’s sick of renting, and somehow, someone somewhere managed to get her approved for up to $120,000 in a home loan. She already has $150k in debt, another $20k from the car, and now wants to buy a house. She was delighted that she could make the minimum 7% down payment, even though it would wipe out every cent she has left and leave her less than $500 to her name for moving expenses, utilities, food, title registration, etc. afterwards.

She doesn’t even have a secure job yet.

However, this plan seems to have fallen through. She went out with a realtor several times this weekend and came home the last time in great, heaving sobs, because she can’t find the 3bed 2bath she wanted in her price range. (For reference, most homes in this area go between 200k - 250k right now for 2-3bed 2ba, and the closer you get to the city--I have about a 20 minute commute--the higher it gets. My next door neighbor sold her 3bed 2.5ba for >300k three months ago, and Carol knew this.) She was absolutely devastated that the only things in her range were “tiny little ugly flipped houses” and “the ghetto.” The realtor basically said she wasn’t going to waste any more of her time. Carol repeatedly told me how grateful I should be that I got in at the price point I did a few years back, because no “normal people” could ever afford to break into the market again.

I tried to tell her that it was because I lived in with a roommate in very cheap housing and then a cell of a 1bed 1ba apartment for eight years while I saved money, but if nothing else, I’ve learned I’m not allowed to compare our situations or histories or offer advice of any kind except “go ahead and buy what you want,” because that only makes her cry harder. In the end, she has decided to give up on the house for now and settle for the absolute last thing in the world she wanted, an apartment with a lease.

To be honest, until she has a signed contract in hand, I half-expect this lease to fall through as well. I have tried to offer what I think is sensible advice and been ignored or rebuffed. I have tried to offer a sympathetic ear and ended up with her sobbing uncontrollably on me--heaving, body-wracking sobs--over and over again with me trapped in my own home, providing endless emotional support for a girl I don’t even like. I have tried to encourage her to do the things she wants to do, since she’s going to do them anyway, and when she gets “negative energy” after the purchases (buyer’s remorse, I think, that one little inkling of sense saying maybe it wasn’t a great idea to buy a $20,000 car or an $1100 brand new iPhone without a job), she blames it on the exact thing I said I thought might be good and makes me feel like I have now directly contributed to a negative outcome after poor decision-making.

For the record, when she says these things to me she is not saying, and has never said, them directly at me. She has never blamed me in any way for a negative outcome. She is not consciously trying to manipulate me or abuse me or take advantage of my help. She has never once asked me for money or job connections or for me to use any of my stability to unfairly or unethically get her something she needs. She is just completely absorbed in her own (rightfully absorbing) mess of a situation, and I think just completely unaware of how much of an emotional black hole she has become. There are no problems except her problems. There are no needs except her needs, and everyone around her has to understand how hard she has it at all times.

So, we’ll see. I am praying that the apartment works out next week. The owner seems to want to work with her, which is a hopeful sign. Good thoughts would be appreciated.

Aside from all of this, work has gotten extremely complicated. I’m not going to go into all of it now, but one of my jobs is to create an extremely detailed schedule for students in clinic. This is used to schedule patients in each service--if we have this many students, we can have this many patient slots per half-day, etc. Last week, two students were out unexpectedly, one who broke her arm the day before she was supposed to begin, and one who had a terrible anxiety attack and thought the symptoms were actually COVID. That student was tested and cleared negative, but Student Health requires a two-week quarantine anyway, so she was not allowed to return.

This meant that we now had multiple patients per day with no one to see them. We tried to reschedule as many as we could, but we still ended up with multiple overbooks. This is extremely stressful for me as both a provider, an instructor, and a human being who hates having other people wait on her in a professional capacity. We got through the week, but not without several painful bumps, and it’s looking like there will be more soon.

I also woke up to an email this morning that one of my favorite students (yes, I have favorites, I’m sorry), had a completely unexpected death in the immediate family and had to rush home. This is a very, very sweet, very smart girl who has worked unbelievably hard over the past year to do well in this program and in my courses, and I am just devastated for her. One of her friends is willing to cover her clinic, so the impact will be minimal on that side, but to have this happen during this country’s hellhole handling of this pandemic...I can’t even imagine it.

All of this isn’t even touching COVID. The President’s side has won in that sense--I don’t even register the numbers anymore--but as of last week our dean sent out messaging that implied that with our state’s failure to contain the spread, new discussions were going to be happening soon regarding our August start. We already had committed to full hybrid scheduling: all lectures online, in-person labs only where absolutely necessary to continue advancement in the program, and those labs limited to two per room with full PPE, but if they decide even that can’t happen, I don’t know what the fuck I’m going to do. I cannot make competent doctors over Zoom. I can’t. At some point they have to touch other people and look at other people’s eyes. They have to be able to check real, in-person blood pressure. They have to look at genuine eye movements and ocular surfaces in person and I cannot and will not let them enter clinic until they have the practice and the time and the practicals behind them. I fucking refuse to endanger the public for sixty years because someone in an office somewhere decided a timetable is more important than a patient keeping their ability to see, and I’m ready to fight administration on this if they try to push it.

But if I win the fight, what next? They just...don’t enter clinic next year. They don’t enter my program. I don’t know what they do in the meantime, as this lab meets four mornings a week and the lecture twice. The course is delayed until next year or whenever we have the virus under control again, and suddenly my fall semester sure looks like I’ll be being paid to stay at home and count carpet fibers. I don’t think they’ll fire me--no one else wants to teach my course anyway--but if I win this fight I might put myself right into furlough in the process.

I could be borrowing trouble, I know. They could come back and say that after review, our system and safety protocols (all extremely conservative) are indeed safe enough and we can proceed as we want. They could say that our limited in-person option for lectures (we have several gigantic lecture halls that could easily socially distance) is the only thing that needs to go. They could say that we just need to have smaller lab groups--hellish on me, but doable.

But it’s one more element of stress in my life that I just can’t handle worrying about right now, which is why I’ve been bouncing back and forth between random fics and oneshots (that mermaid one was feverishly written on a single evening Carol spent at her mom’s house) and pouring an ungodly amount of hours into Animal Crossing. At least there I have some control over what happens next.

Sorry, guys. I know this is not the happy update I was hoping for. I’ll try to check in again next month and we’ll see where things end up.

#quark rambles #carol #coronavirus for ts #covid-19 for ts #update post #not a happy one for those who can't handle that right now #anonymous #quark replies

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jaxsteamblog · 4 years

Text

Cave of Two Lovers

Click here to read the full fic on AO3

The next pick-up day, Katara woke up and didn’t want to get out of bed. The days after Zuko’s birthday party had been weird, to say the least. When she pictured him bringing in cookies, or clipping thorns, it was impossible to then imagine him standing next to that woman, Mai.

It didn’t occur to her that incessantly thinking about Zuko was the actual problem.

She just didn’t like it when things didn’t fit, she supposed. While Mai hadn’t been outright rude to her and Suki, she certainly wasn’t the type to be nice. Zuko was nice.

Putting her hands on her face, Katara groaned.

Katara stopped for coffee on the way in, wanting to avoid the whole tea situation. When she got to the flower shop, she didn’t see Sokka’s car. Slightly concerned, Katara got out and jingled her keys in her free hand.

There was a note taped to the back door.

The tape pulled free with a pop and she opened the hastily folded note while sipping her coffee.

Kat- Had to leave for a slight emergency. Can’t text, running to car. Close up after Z gets flowers. Love, Sokka.

Frowning, Katara put the note in her mouth and used her key to get into the shop. It was dark in the back room and the hum of the air conditioner sounded like the call of an ocean animal. Putting down her keys and coffee, Katara fished her phone out of her purse and unlocked it as she walked to the front.

What’s going on? Call me.

Katara shed her purse by the workroom door and slipped her phone into her pocket. As she turned on the light and walked to the counter, she finally pulled the note from her lips. She read it again, hoping that if it were something serious he would have let her know.

With the shop being quieter, Katara could hear the van pull into the alley. She sighed and went back through the workroom, getting to the door just as Zuko hopped out.

“I just got here and Sokka is out for,” Katara paused as she thought. “Something.”

“Is everything okay?” Zuko asked, walking to the door. Katara shrugged.

“Honestly, I don’t know. I’m waiting for him to call.” She replied. Zuko nodded and rubbed the back of his neck. He started to say something just as Katara turned to the back door.

“It looked like a small order though. We should be okay.” She said.

“Yeah. After how much the party was, Uncle felt like scaling back a bit this week.” Zuko said. They walked inside and Katara helped Zuko with the vases, filling them as he went back inside and to grab the flowers. It didn’t take long at all to get everything loaded and secured.

“Hey, since the shop will be closed, do you have some free time this afternoon?” Zuko asked and slid the van door shut.

“I mean, yeah. Why?” Katara asked.

“There’s a new exhibit at the art museum downtown. I’ve been wanting to go but I need someone to take with me so I can lecture them about art styles.” Zuko answered.

“Okay, but I need to go grocery shopping first.” Katara said, shifting on her feet.

“Can I get your number?” Zuko asked. Katara bit the inside of her lip and nodded, watching as Zuko pulled out his phone from his pocket. She took it, just entering her number to let him add her name. When he got it back, his fingers moved deftly over the screen.

Her own phone dinged in her pocket.

“Alright, text me when you’re done?” He asked, replacing his phone and smiling at her. Katara’s fingers stretched wide for a second down by her leg. She nodded.

“Yeah.” She replied and Zuko’s smile widened briefly. She watched him get into his van and salute her before driving off.

Katara watched the van disappear around the corner and went back inside to lock up.

“Everything’s fine.” Sokka reassured her as Katara cradled her phone between her cheek and her shoulder. She scanned her groceries at the self checkout and glared down at her milk carton.

“You still haven’t told me what happened and it’s irritating me.” She hissed into the phone.

“Only because you’ll be mad.” Sokka replied.

“I’m already mad.” Katara jammed her card into the payment pad and entered her PIN.

“I went back to the flower market because I heard that Jimmy’s friend had a source coming in from the eastern provinces with a small shipment of panda lilies. You know how much I can sell these babies for?” Sokka explained in a rush.

Picking up her tote and sliding it over a shoulder, Katara moved her phone to her free hand.

“You ran out and couldn’t call me for panda lilies?” She retorted. After a brief pause, she continued. “Wait, you got them?”

“Three-quarters of the shipment! I couldn’t afford all twelve.”

Katara nodded to herself as she exited the store and went out to her car. “Are you going back to the shop?”

“Absolutely not.” Sokka answered firmly. “I don’t want to get robbed.”

“How cutthroat is the flower business?” Katara unlocked her car and placed her groceries in the backseat. All of Sokka’s clothes from the party were still in there; luckily the summer heat baked away any smell and now they were just limp.

“The best flowers bloom in blood.” Sokka said with theatrical menace. He cleared his throat and went on. “But seriously, there are a lot of people in the area who would want to move these. I’m going to try and find a buyer today.”

“Make sure to take Suki with you.” Katara said and got into the driver’s seat, immediately turning over the engine to get the A/C started.

“Hey, I am fully capable of protecting myself,” Sokka said. “But yes, I will be bringing Suki.”

Katara snorted and said her goodbyes before leaving the grocery store parking lot. While she waited at the side street, waiting for a pocket to open in the cross traffic, Katara chewed the inside of her cheek.

“Okay Booble, text Zuko.” She said and turned.

---

Katara waited outside of the museum and stared up at the large posters strung up across the face of the building. There were advertisements for the exhibit Zuko had been talking about and it looked fairly interesting. However, after standing in the afternoon sun, Katara was mostly looking forward to air conditioning.

“Have you been waiting long?” Zuko’s voice came up behind her and Katara turned. The lack of visible sweat on him made him seem cool, and Katara shivered at the thought.

“Yes, can we go in now?” She replied hastily. Distressed, Zuko walked quickly to the museum steps. They rushed to the ticket booth and Zuko bought two entrance passes. It being the beginning of the week and with little activity at such a hot hour, Katara supposed there weren’t many people staffed. Unsurprisingly, the ticket salesperson also punched their passes.

“Here you go.” Zuko said, handing Katara her pass. Her fingers brushed against his hand; he was cooler than she.

“You’re lucky, we’re getting the vents fixed so we’ll be closed the rest of the week.” The woman in the ticket booth said.

“The vents?” Katara repeated.

“Yeah, the air conditioning went out on us this morning. We got out some industrial fans but that’s just to get us through today. Enjoy!” The woman said.

Katara looked reproachfully at Zuko, who looked decidedly away from her.

The museum itself was grand, with ceilings that towered over her as practically far away as the sky. The stone around her was cool and offered some relief from the heat; the biggest problem was the lack of air circulating. She could hear various fans humming away like a hybrid of cicadas and jet engines. Just a constant, irritating wash of white noise.

“Have you ever been to Omashu?” Zuko asked. Katara shook her head and Zuko started walking to the side gallery.

“I’ve wanted to go see the cave there.” He added.

“The Cave of Two Lovers?” Katara asked.

“Yeah. Do you know the legend?”

“No, it’s just what the posters said.”

“Oh.” Zuko looked momentarily dumbfounded and they walked into the gallery in silence. There was a massive box fan at the door, angled to blow air into the room. Two large oscillating fans were standing like sentries at either end; both of them looked like they could take down a child if they fell.

The art on the walls, however, was simply breathtaking.

Done in a traditional style, watery brush strokes moved across multiple large canvases.

“Oma and Shu belonged to two different villages who had always fought each other. The war raged on for so long because a mountain separated them, making it difficult for either side to claim victory.” Zuko said as they stopped in front of the first canvas. As they moved around, he narrated the story. How the two lovers met atop the mountain, how they learned earthbending from the badgermoles to make a maze of tunnels, and how Shu was killed in the war between their homes.

As Zuko related Oma’s grief and how she used her earthbending, something the others had never seen another human being do, Katara felt goosebumps ripple over her skin and tears stung her eyes.

Finally, Omashu was created and an entire city-kingdom lived peacefully, laying on the foundation of stones carved out by a grieving woman.

Sniffling, Katara dabbed her nose with the back of her hand.

Zuko looked at her and then glanced around the room. “The whole exhibit is about them. Want to see the other pieces?”

They walked through a few more galleries with Zuko in fact talking about art styles and historical periods. Artist names popped up as frequently as place names and Katara stopped trying to discern the two types.

“Are you sure art isn’t your thing?” Katara asked at one point. Zuko laughed but didn’t respond.

After making it through four rooms, Katara was hot and tired. She said as much to Zuko and he turned about, looking around the room.

“Look, there’s a dark room there. We can at least cool down while I pull a map up on my phone.” He said, pointing to a door that was propped open across from them.

Katara looked in and saw paint cans in the dim light.

“It doesn’t look like this room’s finished.” She said.

“Want to go somewhere else?” Zuko asked.

“No. It has a bench. None of these other rooms have had a place to sit.” Katara said, feeling her feet start to throb as she stood still.

“Okay.” Zuko replied and they both entered. Zuko held out his phone with the flashlight on and they saw that this exhibit was far from being done. Drop cloths were haphazardly draped over painting supplies and a large ladder leaned against a wall. A push broom and large dust mop rested against the door frame and they jostled as Katara stepped in, pushing the door in a bit.

As she moved to sit on the bench, Zuko paced around the room, holding up his phone.

“I cannot get a signal.” He said. Katara watched as he stretched himself upward, leaning precariously over piles of hidden tools and paint to point his phone at the top of each wall. Noticing the lack of a tremble, Katara realized he must be very limber.

“Does this place not have wifi?” Katara asked, now taking her own phone out. There was a loud wooden clatter and the room darkened, causing her screen to illuminate a bit more.

Then there was the sound of metallic clatter.

“Well, that’s not ideal.” Zuko said.

Katara stared at the x over her bars on her cell phone screen.

“Zuko.” She said.

“Yes.”

“Did you knock over the brooms?”

A hesitation. “Yes.”

“And it closed the door?”

“Mmm.”

“And it’s locked?”

Silence.

“Zuko!” Katara whirled around and saw Zuko standing at the door, both hands wrapped around the doorknob.

“I’m sorry!” He said.

“We need to get out of here! What if they close up and we’re stuck in here all week?” Katara asked, panicked.

“Look, that won’t happen. If it, uh, if it comes down to it, uh,” Zuko let go of the doorknob and started pacing in front of the door.

“Can’t you freeze the hinges or something?” He asked.

“This place is too dry! Where am I supposed to get the water from?” Katara asked. Zuko, his hand hovering in the air over his hair, stopped and looked at her.

Katara recoiled, blushing. Seeing her reaction, Zuko held up his hands, blinding her with the flashlight.

“No! Oh no, I’m sorry. No, I didn’t mean, I’m sorry. Katara, I thought.” Zuko walked briskly to her and she swatted at him.

“Turn that stupid thing off before it drains your battery.” She snapped. Zuko obliged and spun a flame from his fingers, holding it in the palm of his hand.

“I was just trying to figure out how much we’d have to, I don’t know, spit on it. But that was also a stupid idea.” He said. Katara gaped at him, dumbfounded, before the corners of her mouth started to pull upwards and she laughed.

Chuckling, Zuko moved around and sat next to her, finally running his free hand through his hair.

“How are you so dumb?” Katara asked through her laughter.

“Azula is the prodigy. I was just lucky to be born first.” Zuko remarked. The bittersweetness in his voice stopped her mirth. Looking at him, she noticed how the shadows from the fire made his face look thinner.

“You’ve got that kind of family huh?” Katara questioned. Zuko nodded.

“Is that why you’re with Mai?” She went on. Zuko faced her, looking confused.

“What do you mean?”

Oh spirits he’s with her by choice. Katara thought and was glad that the dark room hid the tells of her embarrassment.

“It’s just, you two seem pretty different.” She clarified. Zuko sighed and focused on the flame. He started to fidget, shaping it with both hands.

“We didn’t use to be. I was just as emotionally drab as she is. Then this happened,” Zuko said and gestured to his face. “And then the end of the war. I don’t know.” His hands returned to the flame and he pulled on it, making the orange ball grow larger. “I wanted to look forward to things and enjoy them, the way my uncle enjoys his tea.”

At the mention of the war, Katara’s throat dried and she shifted away from him. Sensing the movement, Zuko leaned over a bit to look at her.

“Are you okay?” He asked.

Katara nodded; she balled one hand into a fist on the bench, the other went to the necklace sitting snug at her throat.

“I lost a lot in the war.” She replied, her voice husky.

“Sokka told me about it. I’m sorry for your loss and, well,” Zuko suddenly sounded tense. “I know you might not want to hear it from the enemy but, I lost people I loved too.”

Another question jumped up from her chest but Katara caught it in her teeth, biting down and catching the tip of her tongue with it. He was as old as Sokka and would have been that young during the war. But they had both been young when they had done what they did.

And so Katara couldn’t bring herself to ask because she didn’t want to know the answer.

“You’re not the enemy Zuko.” She said.

“Well, I did get us locked in here and we might die.” He replied. Katara huffed out a breath that might have been a laugh and stood. Walking slowly to the opposite wall, she squinted at the paint.

“I think something’s here. Bring the light over.” She said. Zuko walked over and Katara stepped back as the image expanded in the light.

“It’s the curse.” Zuko said.

“What curse?” Katara asked in alarm.

“The tunnels the lovers made were created to entrap those that would follow them. Basically, it says that you will be trapped if you don’t trust in love.” He said.

“So how do you trust in love?” Katara asked. Zuko frowned as he thought, his gaze lingering on the large painting before trickling down to the floor.

“The rest of the myth talks about how the love is the brightest in the dark. How in the worst of times, the two found the greatest love.” He said.

Katara looked at the painting. Two figures knelt across from each other, kissing. In the middle of the war, far below the earth, literally in the most impossible place, two people were free to love each other.

“Or.” Katara started. Zuko faced her and she turned to him. “Or we just remember that badgermoles are blind.”

“And?” Zuko asked. Silently, Katara stepped forward and placed her hands on the backs of Zuko’s. Rolling his fingers inward, he extinguished the flame and they stood in darkness.

His hands were warm.

“Look.” He whispered. Unable to see him, Katara still turned around. The open room seemed vast, but a faint spill of green made her look up. Dots like hanging crystal, glowing in green light, illuminated a path. It ended at the locked door, but began behind the ladder.

They shuffled slowly to the ladder and pulled it past the edges of the green path. Their eyes, having adjusted to the faint light, picked up the lines of a door in the edge of their vision. Zuko pried it open, disrupting more paint cans, and they were suddenly in an alcove. A man coming out of the bathroom across from them jumped at their sudden appearance before scowling at them and walking off.

Sheepish, Zuko and Katara hurried out, closing the door behind them.

“You owe me lunch.” Katara said. Zuko laughed and rubbed the back of his head.

“Deal.”

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#zutara #fanfiction #jax writes #modern au #zutara month 2020 #the fic that prompts built

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stusbunker · 4 years

Text

What Lingers Within: Six

A Supernatural Fan-fiction Mini Series

Featuring: Past Dean Winchester x Female Reader

Written for: @thisismysecrethappyplace

Prompt: Amnesia

Word Count: 2396

Beta’d by the amazing @itmighthavebeenintentional

Aesthetic by @thoughtslikeaminefield

A/N: Set in season 11. Flashbacks are still in italics. No new warnings for this chapter.

Series Masterlist

^*^*^*^

The neighborhood Dean found a motel in did little to settle your raw nerves. The sleek car earned a few stares and a solitary whistle when it pulled into the crumbling parking lot well into the dark of night. You noticed both Dean and Sam flashed their weapons, which were kept at the smalls of their backs, before Dean headed into the office to set you all up for the night. Those loitering in the stairwell and among the other cars had eyes on you and Michelle all the while, until he returned for you and their bags.

Lord knew what you looked like as Dean and Sam escorted you and Michelle into the pay-by-the-hour room. You didn’t know why you were so bothered by it, being a murderer was worse than being a prostitute.

That damning truth had barely registered before you caught on that Dean had been waiting for your answer to an unheard question.

“I’m sorry, what?” You scrunched your eyes closed in an attempt to focus.

Your vision slowly unclouded around Dean’s insistent face. “You okay? Here, have some water.”

Suddenly a cold plastic bottle was slipped into your hand; they kept a cooler at the ready in the backseat you had noticed when they took you for breakfast. Always prepared, like boy scouts or doomsday preppers.

You took the water and realized all three of them were watching you.

“What?” You wiped a trickle from your chin and waited for the conversation to resume.

“First thing, you need a change of clothes and we all could stand to eat,” Dean went from looking at you to pointing at Sam.

“Why don’t I take Michelle to Y/N’s place? Grab her a few things?” Sam offered, and you couldn’t help notice the blush on your cousin’s face.

“But I still need to grab my truck. Drop me off and I’ll handle Y/N’s essentials. That way you can grab food and we can all meet back here,” Michelle smiled brightly. If you weren’t still in some state of shock you would have groaned at her.

“You sure? They might expect her home, tried it there the first time,” Dean bowed his head, but stopped just short of pursing his lips at Michelle.

“I’ll be fine, in and out. No one will know what I am up to until I am already out the door,” she reassured him, her stare held enough tenacity to choke a pitbull.

Dean smirked and rolled his eyes in jest. “Fine! Stubbornness runs in your family too?”

“You could say that,” Michelle sighed before pulling you in, hip-to-hip. “Just keep an eye on her while I’m gone?”

It was your turn to roll your eyes, but the warm strength in her grip was sorely needed. You squeezed her waist and tipped your head onto her shoulder for the briefest moment of reprieve.

“I got her,” Dean promised, pulling you into his arms by way of your drooping water bottle. You fell forward against him, awkwardly bumbling until he locked his arm over your shoulder, pulling you to stand, almost mirroring the position you and Michelle had shared.

“Right,” Sam sighed. “Ready?”

“Lead the way, handsome,” Michelle giggled as she waggled her fingers over her shoulder.

Once the door latched behind them, your stance became increasingly unnecessary and you broke away from Dean’s sturdy side to guzzle more water. It was impossibly hot in the dingy room.

“Why don’t you take a shower? I’ll check and see if the police have anything, or at least anything we need to worry about.” Dean dropped eye contact to the laptop on the small breakfast table. He seemed almost apologetic.

“Can I get a shirt? I don’t think Michelle is gonna make it back with my stuff before I’m out,” you clarified.

“Let me guess, not just any shirt, you want a flannel?” Dean raised his eyebrows.

“T-shirts just show off all the wet patches,” you mumbled as Dean went to dig through his duffle. He sniffed a navy one before balling it up and tossing it to you. You caught it, high on your chest.

“Thanks,” you grew quiet as you turned to the yellow light of the small bathroom, slipping your fingertips over the downy fabric.

“Anytime,” Dean murmured to your back, too low for you to catch.

^*^*^

“Hey, anything?” Sam asked, walking in with two bags of burgers and a six pack.

“Nothing, so far. Michelle make it to Y/N’s place okay?” Dean asked, knowing Sam wouldn’t just drop her off. He made room at the table, but didn’t take his eyes from the screen long.

“Yeah, seemed to, I clocked her until I reached the turn off,” Sam rushed out before taking a big bite from his burger.

“Oh man, that smells amazing,” Dean whined, digging into the bag for his own. The men ate in silence, possibilities weighing on both their minds.

“You think she’ll be good to go once Michelle gets back?” Sam asked, testing the waters.

“Don’t have much of a choice, our cover’s blown and she’s got blood on her hands. I don’t trust these cops to follow innocent until proven guilty; she doesn’t have the pockets Katelyn does. Did.” Dean breathed deeply, trying to focus back on the momentary indulgence of his food.

“So, we take her with us? Set her up at the bunker?” Sam considered aloud.

Dean coughed, nearly spitting out his food. Sam let his brother work through his dramatics with a pointed mouth.

“She’s not cut out for this, Sam. She shouldn’t have to live under the radar,” Dean muttered, the guilt and regret lacing every word.

“No one should have to live like this, but we do it. And she can too.” Sam cocked his head.

Dean shook his head, his tired eyes begging his brother to stop pushing. “We’ll, uh, we’ll get a hold of Jody, see if she has room.”

“Who’s Jody?” Her voice broke into their conversation, the steam wafted from the bathroom bringing with it the scent of generic soap which mixed awkwardly with the grease of their dinner.

She stunned Dean into silence, between her bare legs and his shirt hugging her, and the hole he was digging himself into, he was frozen. Sam simply sighed before he dove into explanations.

^*^*^

Cedar and chamomile merged with lemon oil and teak, the dark wood floors of the house they were being shown seemed to expand in all directions. Dean had no idea how long this process would take, but as a car guy, he knew to check the guts of the house first and move outward. New furnace, updated electrical, refurbished crown molding, original floors and only five years on the roof, it seemed too good to be true.

But then he thought about mortgage payments and realized that was the dose of reality he was expecting to find in the plumbing or an air duct.

She had the realtor wrapped around her finger, which he appreciated because his bullshitting skills had staled a bit over the months out of the game. He wandered as they discussed the window sills or the light fixtures or the backsplash for the thirteenth time since arriving. Private showings were easiest, less pressure than an open house and more wiggle room. Dean liked the freedom to roam and to peak in the hidden corners for rot or signs of spirits.

Buying a house was a big step, Bobby had warned him, like Dean needed it. But the look she gave him as he eyed the first hot water heater had sold him on the idea. They weren’t just looking for a house in a buyer’s market, they were building a life together.

With a real home to start out in.

Was this the one? Would he ever be certain? He knew he wanted to keep her happy and safe, but could any house be the end all?

He’d never thought one woman would be, maybe he’d just keep going through the motions and see what stuck.

^*^*^

The enormity of what had happened seeped into every thought; each moment held a new revelation or decision.

You were a fugitive; your life would no longer be simple, boring or safe.

Somehow, you were now dependent on an ex you didn’t know and his brother. Who were monster hunters that lived off of fake credit cards. You were waiting to wake up, because this nightmare just wouldn’t end.

Michelle had been gone for two hours and even Sam had become rattled by her delay.

“She should have at least called by now,” you had been insisting on looking for Michelle for nearly an hour. If not one of the brothers, you’d threatened to go yourself.

“No, something doesn’t feel right. It could be a trap.” Dean was firm, but the exhaustion was fraying his patience all the same.

“It’s still ringing through to voicemail,” Sam sighed, as you watched him take the phone from his ear once again. He gave you a grim, tight lipped smile and you flopped down on the bed by Dean’s feet.

You tugged the bottom of the flannel down so you didn’t flash your underwear, neither of their pants could fit over your hips so you waited for your once grimy pair of leggings to drip dry.

This was all your fault and if something happened to Michelle on top of it, you wouldn’t be able to live with yourself. Just as another info-mercial started playing on the outdated television set, a hurried knocking ricocheted through the room.

Dean and Sam were up and armed in the blink of an eye, Dean stood himself between you and the door as Sam slinked to the entryway, ducked to the peep hole before he tossed the door wide open. Michelle burst in, terrified, face drawn and hands freezing as she pulled you into a tight squeeze.

“What happened?!” Dean broke the confused silence.

“The cops are looking for you, or at least they are camped outside your apartment. I got stopped on my way in. Told them I was expecting you soon. They warned me to be careful, to let them know if I see you, because they had some follow up questions. Questions, my ass. After twenty minutes, I snuck out by the alley. I walked, that’s why it took me so long. Sorry.” Michelle explained.

“No, that’s good.” Sam gave Michelle his best reassuring face before grimacing over her head to Dean.

“Were you followed? And why didn’t you call?” Dean nearly barked and you and Michelle both recoiled at his tone.

“I left my phone in my truck. I wasn’t expecting to have to dodge the cops,” Michelle snapped back as she pulled the canvas bag off her shoulder and shoved it at you. “This is a week’s worth of clothes, go get some pants on.”

You didn’t miss the challenging glare she shot Dean and Sam. Sam had the common sense to look sheepish. You got redressed in a rush, keeping the flannel as an outer layer over a faded concert tshirt and your favorite pair of jeans. By the time you got your hair to cooperate; you were almost feeling like yourself again. You needed to be ready for whatever came next.

Michelle was okay, but this was far from over.

When you exited the bathroom, three pairs of eyes zoned in on you, the tension in the air was palpable.

“What?” You shifted and dropped the bag by the table, Sam had already repacked his laptop.

“Ready to go?” Dean asked you while looking at Sam.

“Go? Go where?” Your gaze locked on to the space between the brothers.

“Don’t know yet, but Michelle is gonna file a missing persons for you. When she does that, we should be at least a state away,” Sam patted your cousin’s back, but quickly removed his hand. She was not happy they were taking you away. You couldn’t blame her, but at the same time, you had no choice. Prison was the last place you wanted to figure your life out.

“You okay with this?” You asked Michelle, ignoring Dean’s impatience as he grabbed your bag in one hand and the rest of the burgers in the other.

“Are you certain that you are safe with them?” Michelle pressed.

“Yes, I don’t know how to explain it, but they aren’t going to hurt me. They get nothing by helping me with this, Chelle. They’re just doing it because they can.” You shrugged, looking at Sam as he eased his stuff off the table beside you and followed Dean to the car.

“You call me as soon as you stop. Then again at the next place,” Michelle warned.

“I’ll call, but I can’t leave messages. They’ll be tracking your calls.” You explained apologetically.

“Right, God, I don’t know how you know to think of all this stuff,” Michelle nodded in agreement.

“Same way you knew to haul ass across town on foot, too many crime shows and sheer gut instinct.” You teased before opening your arms for one last hug.

She smelled like the city at nighttime, crisp and gritty at the same time.

“Be safe,” Michelle warned as you headed out the door.

“You too.” You stopped. “Thanks, for everything.”

“Don’t worry about it, go, before they leave you behind.” Michelle insisted and in that moment you knew without a doubt, that would be a fate worse than prison after all.

You crawled into the backseat of the massive black car and settled yourself in the dead center of the backseat. Dean cocked his eyebrows at you in the rearview and you exhaled.

“So, where we headin’?” You asked whoever would answer.

“South Dakota,” Dean answered.

“Kansas,” Sam corrected.

“Okay, I’ll let you figure it out, but I gotta pass out. Sam, remind me to call and hang up on Michelle when we stop,” you bunched up Dean’s flannel and curled up on the cold leather seat.

“Can do,” Sam tossed back at you. They grumbled between themselves, but you didn’t bother trying to listen in. You had made your bed, the least you could do was actually get some rest before you had to lie in it.

^*^*^*^

Series tags: @tiggytaylor @vicmc624 @kalesrebellion

General SPN tags: @flamencodiva @dolphincliffs @dontshootmespence @thoughtslikeaminefield @fangirlxwritesx67 @dawnie1988 @cosicas-cuquis @foxyjwls007 @tumbler-tidbits @defenderrosetyler @ericaprice2008 @princessofthefandomrealm @wingedcatninja @mrswhozeewhatsis

^*^*^

Read On: Chapter Seven

#what lingers within #dean winchester #supernatural #supernatural fanfiction #dean winchester fanfiction #dean x reader #dean angst #case fic #amnesia

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