#because he doesn't think about them? because it comes with the job.

[astonmartinii]

fresh out the slammer [guilty as sin part five] | charles leclerc social media au

pairing: charles leclerc x sainz!reader

no court cases, no ferrari PR jail... i'm sure nothing will happen, right?

MASTERLIST | SERIES MASTERLIST | TIP JAR

f1

liked by charles_leclerc, yourusername and 1,289,405 others

tagged: olliebearman, francocolapinto & pepemarti

f1: THERE IT IS!!! The 2025 grid is set with Ollie Bearman at Haas, Franco Colapinto at Williams and Pepe Marti at Sauber.

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user317: HOLY SHIT

user318: i hate to celebrate someone losing their job in this economy but FUCK THAT MAN WOO HOO WELCOME TO UNEMPLOYMENT CARLOS SAINZ

olliebearman: can't wait to get started (˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶)

user319: when are you going to recruit pepe and kimi to the leclerc family agenda

pepemarti: y/n has been my celeb crush since i was like 13 (sorry charles) so trust me idc about the spanish guy

olliebearman: he fully doesn't play about y/n, he even tries to read poetry (key word being tries)

pepemarti: you can shame me all you like but i think y/n would appreciate the effort

yourusername: you would be correct !

pepemarti: OMG ٩(^ᗜ^ )و ´-

charles_leclerc: i'll take you in if you promise you're over your crush on y/n, it would be very inappropriate

pepemarti: I AM I SWEAR

user320: i know carlos gotta be sick seeing the spanish youngster freak out more about his sister

yourusername: i fear he has bigger fish to fry right now

user321: @carlossainz55 BOO! did i scare you? i'm a job application

user322: being on the internet as a sainz fan gotta be torture at this point

user323: former delusional carlando fan here! he brought this upon himself lol

maxverstappen1: evil may be conquered but these three and kimi look like prime candidates to join the united front of hating

yourusername: we gotta get them started while they're young

charles_leclerc: i fear we don't have enough room in the house for all these kids

francocolapinto: do we really need the aussie?

oscarpiastri: i was here before you ???

yourusername: we can get bunkbeds?

olliebearman: does leo really need him own room

charles_leclerc: WATCH THAT TONE

kimiantonelli: i'm quite small if that helps

yourusername: looks like we have a new favourite

pepemarti: ????????

user324: see? carlos loses his job and suddenly all is good in f1 again... coincidence? i think not.

yourusername

liked by maxverstappen1, alexalbon and 1,945,209 others

tagged: charles_leclerc, olliebearman & kimiantonelli

yourusername: and the pieces all fall into place ...

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user326: this is a level of motherism we have yet to see in f1

user327: and mother in a literal sense these ones take her up to like five grid kids and one dog

maxverstappen1: don't erase her cat godson and goddaughter

yourusername: leo is almost fully cat trained ( ≧ᗜ≦)

albonpets: do not even think of coming for our brand

yourusername: which one am i talking to?

albonpets: HORSEY

yourusername: ... okay then

charles_leclerc: seriously?

yourusername: i'm not going to fight a (my favourite) albon cat charles, i may have the sainz last name but i'm NOT carlos

charles_leclerc: it'll be leclerc before you know it

yourusername: (˶ ˘ ³˘)ˆᵕ ˆ˶)

user328: no because at this point i can fully picture carlos having an argument with a cat

albonpets: we're down to tussle for y/n

user329: i'm dying, carlos lost so bad ALBON PETS ARE SHADING HIM

user330: guys are we ready for monza tho? y/n and charles fully back, the united front of hating back, italy don't play about charles... carlos girl i'd sit this one out it doesn't even matter that you're driving the red car

maxverstappen1: at least it won't be me being booed for once

carlossainz55: i'm not a bitch. if people want to boo me they'll only expose themselves as sheep

oscarpiastri: BAAAA

olliebearman: BAAAA

francocolapinto: BAAAA

kimiantonelli: BAAAA

pepemarti: BAAAA

charles_leclerc: parenthood is so precious

carlossainz55: you think i care that these little runts like you guys? they'll be out the sport faster than your other little pet american

logansargeant: at least i'm pretty

francocolapinto: sorry i can't hear you over my williams seat - you really thought that was gonna be yours huh 🤔

user331: obsessed with how carlos has just resorted to name calling because his only 'ammunition' against y/n is that she always wanted to marry charles and didn't want to work

user332: if that's illegal LOCK ME UP BABY

yourusername: they nearly did 😭

user332: oh yeah my bad g

charles_leclerc

liked by maxverstappen1, oscarpiastri and 4,398,400 others

tagged: yourusername

charles_leclerc: fresh out the slammer

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user333: LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOO

francocolapinto: VAMOSSSSSS

user334: this was actually insanely poetic, ferrari i'm still angry at you but thank you for this genius strategy

user335: today you are excused, tomorrow we go back to hating

user336: the north remembers

yourusername: never in doubt starboy - i love you, you deserve this so much

charles_leclerc: i love you more, this win is for you after everything we've been through

yourusername: you're too sweet - it's all you baby and the win is all yours, my prize is being. yours

charles_leclerc: so glad we could have all of our REAL family around us today

yourusername: i love you all ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝♡

oscarpiastri: i guess if there's anyone to lose to here, it would be my grid dad

francocolapinto: if you don't want the P2 i'll gladly take it off of your hands

yourusername: okay babies let's calm down and celebrate that we ALL scored points today

olliebearman: thanks mum and dad

pepemarti: did you guys see my F2 podium (๑>◡<๑)?

charles_leclerc: we did!

yourusername: well done pepe :3

pepemarti: hehehehehehheheheheehehehe

maxverstappen1: oh boy got out of ferrari jail and now we're ALL being subjected to the conjugal visits

charles_leclerc: stay outta my business

maxverstappen1: BROTHER 4 MILLION PEOPLE IN YOUR BUSINESS

yourusername: and four million people know my man is off limits

yourusername: @carlossainz55 stop paying instagram models to flirt with my man

charles_leclerc: @carlossainz55 what money are you using for this i had to close my DMs

user337: HE'S PAYING INSTAGRAM MODELS TO TRY AND FLIRT WITH CHARLES THE VERY GUY WHO HAD HIS CHILDHOOD RIVAL DELIVER LOVE LETTERS WHEN HIS PHONE WAS TAKEN ???

oscarpiastri: we never said carlos was smart

f1tea

liked by user339, user340 and 11,943 others

f1tea: the ramifications of the sainz civil war may be a lot worse than previously feared. carlos sainz does not have a seat for the 2025 f1 season and doesn't look like he'll be chosen for a reserve role either with bridges with red bull firmly burnt. however, one of the biggest effects of this 'war' has been on those who still choose to associate with carlos. it's been reported that mclaren have had to turn down a number of sponsors after they asked that it is only run on oscar's car and that lando norris is not seen with the brand. do you think we'll see lando jump ship from carlos or will mclaren become a safehaven for sainz?

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user341: mclaren? a safe haven for carlos sainz? the same mclaren that houses the first child of y/n and charles? i'd like to see them try

user342: finally the carlando PR spin is dead

user343: they way they both thought that was their ultimate get out of jail free card and now it's like incriminating

user344: isn't this all getting a little petty now? like y/n and charles are together and carlos doesn't have a seat? what's the point of keeping all of this drama going?

user345: tbf this 'drama' was never going away the moment they exposed themselves for trying to use their daughter/sister as bait to further carlos' career

user346: if that wasn't downright criminal then unlawfully suing your daughter/sister for everything she rightfully earnt WAS

user347: yeah just because 55 fans and the sainzs themselves want to bury that loss doesn't mean it's not like one of the first things that come up when. you google carlos - of course sponsors are not gonna want ANYTHING to do with that

user348: poor lando getting caught in the petty crossfire

user349: i mean he was shit slinging at y/n after austria and that girl has levels of voodoo only taylor swift can better

user350: he's also a grown man who has seen this all go down behind the scenes so he's made his bed and has to lie in it

user351: the way the sponsors are just piling up for charles as well karma really is doing a number right now

user352: his charm is so universal that oscar is becoming one of the most marketable drivers as well

user353: no but as someone who was on the ground at monza, it's BAD like people were wearing their sainz merch with the 55 or spanish flag covered up

user354: oh he got them acting like middle aged football fans it's BAD

user355: at least they haven't started burning stuff yet

user356: if he takes out charles i fear it won't take long

yourusername

liked by charles_leclerc, maxverstappen1 and 1,452,097 others

yourusername: my new poetry and letter collection, the alchemy, is out today and you guys already made it a new york times bestseller. my heart is so full! the last couple months made me feel like i would never get to love so thank you for showing me that everything is possible x

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user357: ma'am i am in love with you

user358: get in line buddy

charles_leclerc: i will run all of you over

maxverstappen1: thank you for the dedication, it was a traumatic time for us all

yourusername: you simply could've not read my private letters to my lover?

maxverstappen1: and where's the fun in that?

yourusername: a pigeon wouldn't have done this to me...

maxverstappen1: yeah well a pigeon also hasn't been your best friend for years and doesn't have a couch and cats to comfort you

yourusername: you make a good point

user359: she's really out here making me believe in love

charles_leclerc: the most talented woman in the world, i'm blessed to be on the receiving end of such words

yourusername: writing is so much easier with a muse like you

charles_leclerc: you're making me blush

user360: sure if my boyfriend was a greek god i'd also write good poetry

charles_leclerc: no you couldn't, not like her

yourusername: (˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶)

lewishamilton: congratulations y/n, what an achievement! however, i do think the real achievement here is getting this grid to read a book

georgerussell63: excuse me?

alexalbon: ... you got me but i wanted the tea ☕️

charles_leclerc: APPRECIATE THE POETRY PEOPLE

alexalbon: funny how the letters were back and forth... but none of yours made it to the book

yourusername: ALEX :(

charles_leclerc: i didn't want my sad ramblings to drag down her shine - i thought you would get that seeing how bad you are at golf compared to lily

lilymunhe: oop.

user361: where are the children

yourusername: eating my cake :(

maxverstappen1: they're actually being really cute and are all sat in a circle reading it (˵ •̀ ᴗ - ˵ ) ✧

charles_leclerc: gotta make sure they can read none of us finished school

f1

liked by landonorris, carlossainz55 and 2,309,450 others

tagged: maxverstappen1 & carlossainz55

f1: LAST LAP SHUNT! Carlos Sainz takes Max Verstappen out in baku and the two did not mince their words on the radio

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user363: not to be dramatic but that's lowkey attempted murder

user364: at this point carlos is trying to ACTUALLY recreate that list of crimes meme

user365: let's get his ass in JAIL then

oscarpiastri: if i speak i'm in big trouble

carlossainz55: speak it big man - if you wanna act like a big guy back it up

oscarpiastri: okay you are a narcissistic misogynist who can't bear being told no. you are a talented man but without your name you would be nowhere but you lack the selfawareness to be grateful for where you are which is why you don't have a job. you are reckless and dangerous and the very few friends you have will drop you when you no longer serve a purpose in f1

user366: oh shit babe came out swinging

oscarpiastri: i'm hearing a lot of CRICKETS?

oscarpiastri: exactly - pussy.

user367: thank you franco colapinto for bringing back drivers with zero media training

user368: once again i am asking for proximity chat in f1

user369: the sweet souls on twitter would NOT be able to handle it

yourusername: bro tried to assassinate my best friend but i'm the problem

carlossainz55: stop being so dramatic, if anyone was to purposely hurt someone it would be max - look where he came from

yourusername: first of all FUCK YOU

yourusername: second of all, max is stronger than you ever will be, how dare you try and use his childhood against him when you know he's nothing but a gentle soul

yourusername: thirdly, by this logic the reason i'm such a 'gold-digging back-stabbing whore' is because of YOU GUYS

user370: i am absolutely losing it at the fact that carlos is furiously typing these at the fia HQ

user371: i know his PR officer is TIRED

francocolapinto: sorry our uncle got sniped but we did also get points @olliebearman

olliebearman: JUST TO SAY WE WENT TO SEE MAX AND HE IS OKAY BUT YES THANK YOU FOR THE POINTS

yourusername: guys lets keep the inside thoughts inside

francocolapinto: so you're not proud of us (╹ -╹)?

yourusername: I AM, I AM, WE ARE (charles is on the podium he'll tell you later)

francocolapinto: ( ˶ˆ꒳ˆ˵ )

olliebearman: ( ˶ˆ꒳ˆ˵ )

maxverstappen1

liked by charles_leclerc, oscarpiastri and 1,387,300 others

tagged: yourusername

maxverstappen1: i lived bitch

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user372: they're gonna have to do a little more than that to take down the united front of hating

user373: 50g can't stop the grind for these dudes

maxverstappen1: i would call that man a bitch with my last breath

user374: them celebrating the end of carlos' career by doing a mukbang is killing me

user375: when the funeral food be good as fuck you be forgetting who died

carlossainz55: you guys really are so pathetic

maxverstappen1: i didn't try to pimp out my sister, make her homeless then sue her but that might just me be

maxverstappen1: also the data will prove what we all know btw

carlossainz55: that you're reckless just like your daddy?

maxverstappen1: at least i can admit my dad is an asshole and i distanced myself, your dad is just as much a bitch but you gotta parade him around because no one else can bear being around you

carlossainz55: the only bad thing my dad ever did in his life is help bring the spawn of satan into the world

maxverstappen1: whatever, enjoy your race ban bozo

user376: is max suggesting ... it was on purpose

user377: if it was carlos might just be as dumb as they all say because fool was about to get a podium

yourusername: THEY CAN'T GET RID OF US BITCH

maxverstappen1: you're a sick motherfucker if you're enjoying this sainz disasterclass well i only just got out of the medical centre 🤧🤧🤧

charles_leclerc: no but deadass we're sorry you got taken out

maxverstappen1: someone had to be the mercutio to you people's romeo and juliet

maxverstappen1: PLEASE DO NOT KILL YOURSELVES AFTER I'VE GONE THROUGH ALL THIS SHIT FOR YOU

yourusername: we can't leave you with all these kids

charles_leclerc: yeah that's a lot of kids to inherit

user378: christian horner i hate you but you gotta get on your zoom

oscarpiastri: where's my congratulations 🤨

maxverstappen1: @yourusername @charles_leclerc yeah you can keep your kids

charles_leclerc: we're proud of you oscar (don't beat me again)

yourusername: well done oscar (your verbal takedown was particularly impressive as well)

oscarpiastri: 🤭🤭🤭

fin

note: lol i'm back. i was busy with work and then in hospital. but we all love guilty as sin? will get to tagging soon one sec

[sacredsorceress]

logan howlett x f!reader / inbox

there is just something about logan being a gentleman.

sure he's the definition of rough around the edges and his patience is very thin with most people, but i just know that when he found his woman, he'd be the definition of chivalrous. he's old school: opening the door for you, giving you his jacket when there's even a slight breeze... and he won't mention any of it. he'll do it all wordlessly as if its second nature. and if you do point it out to him he'll just make a snarky comment in return or say nothing, instead wrapping his arm around you and pulling you close to his side because what is there to say? of course he takes care of you. he considers himself damn lucky to be the one to do so.

if some guy was rude to you, or god forbid, hit on you? he'd be on them in seconds, grabbing their shirt and asking them if that's how they think they should be treating a lady. (it's a rhetorical question and a warning. if they give the wrong answer? lets say you'll be cleaning blood off his shirt that night).

on nights where he drives the two of you home, he'll be constantly glancing at the passenger seat, rubbing circles onto your thighs. and if some asshole ran a red, forcing logan to slam on his breaks, his first instinct would be to fling his arm over you, holding you back against the seat. when you wake up from the commotion he'd just run his thumb against your temple and tell you in a hushed voice that "it was nothing, sweetheart. go back to sleep."

if someone on the team brought you up in a negative manner when you weren't there (rare, it would probably just be scott trying to get a rise out of logan) he'd turn red: "don't you talk about her" and "keep her name out of your goddamn mouth". because who the fuck thinks they can talk about his girl??

he's not big on PDA but that doesn't mean he's not touchy. anytime you'd walk up the stairs he'd let you use his arm as your own personal railing. before he left for work in the morning, no matter how late he was, he'd make sure to kiss you on the forehead before he left. and if he had a job where he'd have to wake up at the crack of dawn? he'd make sure to get out of bed as quietly as ever and if you so much as stirred, he'd brush your hair back with a "shhh" and a kiss before he got ready for his long day. but it would be okay because he could get through anything knowing he'd be coming home to you at the end of the day.

anyway as rough as logan can be, he's obsessed with his partner and wants to do nothing more than take care of them. and that my friends makes logan the ultimate gentleman.

a/n: just a little blurb because i am obsessed with this idea. my inbox is open if anyone wants to share more thoughts on logan cause ahhh!!

[heavysighing-dreamyeyes]

Outlier

You're the exception to everything Jason Todd knows about himself. He'll deal with that later. ~1.2k words

Jason Todd doesn't smile a lot. But with you it comes easy. It wasn't anything big that drew his awareness to the fact. You were just folding laundry with him while your favorite show played in the background.

It wasn't grand. It wasn't life changing. But he's grinning with all of his teeth, and he can't seem to wipe the expression off his face.

It's stupid, really, because all you did was offer to fold the sheets so he didn't have to. And now he's giddy. He'd be embarrassed, but he's too distracted by the melody you're humming softly.

He decides to be embarrassed about it later.

Jason doesn't talk a lot about himself. He talks to people, sure, talks a lot about cases and crime, and Gotham and the mission. But the deep and dirty personal stuff? He shies away from it.

Well, that's not completely true. Not with you.

He's talking about himself now, your head on his shoulder as you stare out at the city from the rooftop. He's not patrolling tonight, and you insisted on a picnic dinner to enjoy what's left of summer.

It's peaceful, and he hooks an arm around your back when you tug his hoodie tighter around yourself, staving off the slight chill in the air. He rambles a little more, he can't help it, he always wants to talk with you, listen to you.

He'd be insecure if you weren't so obviously engaged, prompting him to keep talking and sharing your own thoughts.

He decides to second guess himself later, and enjoy the shining lights of Gotham for now.

Jason doesn't hug a lot, but you're his exception. A hug hello, a hug goodbye, a thank you hug, a 'I'm glad you're okay' hug.

He cherishes them, wraps you up against him, and doesn't let go until he starts to worry he's making you uncomfortable. He'd probably never let go if he wasn't so scared of seeming desperate to hold you.

It's not– he doesn't mean anything by it, really. There's not anything more to it.

You're just warm, soft, and you smell like you. And Jason doesn't know anything more calming and soothing than you. So, if he craves the hugs you so freely give, isn't that okay? Wouldn't anyone feel the same?

He decides to wallow in his worries later, and focuses on the way you let him bury his face against your shoulder.

Jason knows a lot of things. Things about the world, life, people, space. Things anyone else would never even be the slightest bit curious about. But, sometimes, he just doesn't know what to do with you.

It's infuriating, the way you seem to care more about others' safety than your own.

There was no reason for you to go back into fire to try and help people out. There was no reason to put yourself in danger when he was right there to take care of it.

He has no idea what was going through your head when he hauled you out of the burning building. He would have dragged you by the back of your neck if it meant you just listened to him. If, for just a second, you considered that you could have died.

The thought makes him sick. The churning of his stomach isn't enough to distract from the angry look on your face. He wonders if he was too rough with you. He can't bring himself to regret it if he was when you start coughing from the smoke.

He knows he's too rough, this time, when he pushes you towards the paramedics and heads back to the fire.

He can break down later, throw his lunch up into the toilet later, because he's always too rough. But right now? He has a job to do.

Jason fights a lot. Breaks the bones of criminals, beats bruises onto thugs, shoots bullet holes into goons. But, he doesn't really fight with you. Tonight's different.

He doesn't think you should be so angry at him. He pulled you out of a raging inferno, after all. If anything, you should be giving him one of your hugs.

You're not doing that, though. Your face is scrunched up, and you're livid, and he can practically feel the tension between you two like a physical wall. He wishes he knew the right words to say that will make you see his side.

You accuse him of thinking you can't take care of yourself. (He's fully aware you can) You tell him he was reckless to go back into the fire. (You did it first!)

You snap that he was more preoccupied with pulling you out when there were other people in danger. (Duh. You're his priority. You could have had both feet out the door, and he still would have carried you out before anyone else)

You look completely fed up by the time you're done with your rant, and he's pretty sure he's only making the situation worse because he hasn't given you an answer.

It's not that he doesn't want to, it's just he doesn't have anything to say.

He wouldn't change what he did. He's sorry he upset you. But he's never been good with words or apologies, not even with you.

So he doesn't say a thing, just stares at you with clenched fists while he waits for the inevitable order for him to leave.

And he really is prepared to leave. He's surprised it hasn't happened sooner. He'll hate it. He'll probably even do something stupid over it. But he wouldn't force the weight that is his company on you.

He'll accept that this is what changes what he is to you. At least, he'll try. Later. Right now, he's focused on not crying as the silence drones on.

Your voice calling his name cuts through his thoughts, and his gaze snaps back up to yours. He hadn't even realized he'd dropped it. You step forward, and he braces himself for what's to come. The end of this. You and him.

But the end doesn't come. You cup his face– cradle his face and ask him why he looks so miserable.

Jason's good at running. Good at burying his emotions. He has to be. But you don't look angry anymore. You look concerned. You looked more worried than you did when he was last bleeding out onto your couch. So he spills his guts.

He stumbles out how he's too rough and too wrong and he knew you'd want him gone eventually but he's not ready to go and could you please just forgive him this once for not being what you needed him to be?

He waits for you to push him away. You don't. His shoulder slump when you wrap your arms around his waist and hug him so tightly that he has no choice but to believe that you want him to stay.

He doesn't hesitate to latch onto you and mumble nonsense into your hair. Promises that he'll be better. Different. Whatever you need.

You tuck yourself closer to his chest and tell him you don't need him to be anyone else but him. The rest of your reassurances are muffled into the fabric of his clothes when he clutches you tighter.

Jason isn't very good at admitting his feelings. But he wants to. With you.

He'll figure it out later. But for right now, he lets himself sink deeper into your hug, and all the serenity you bring.

[blackbirdsblackberries]

I Hate The New Hero!

Pt 5: What?!

Finally getting home from your patrol you sneak through the window of your bedroom and collapse onto your bed. After the call you decided that your patrol was done.

Frankly you're still coming to terms with the fact that Batman and his protogese are the same people who are essentially praying on your civilian self's downfall yet adoring your vigilante persona like it's the greatest thing in the world.

Though, now that you really think about it, it makes sense. Bruce Wayne is the richest man alive, he'd be able to afford to do this, they have the same amount of members as the heroes, same builds and heights, actually... Basically everything matches up.

Not to mention the fact that your senses goes off around both group members!

From outside your small room door you hear your parents arguing again - more like your mother yelling and your dad breaking things and stomping his foot. It was probably your dad's fault again. Don't get you wrong, you love your family! It's just that they're dysfunctional.

Your dad has a massive drinking problem that landed him working as a goon for Black Mask, he's struggled with his temper for years after he got hit a bit too hard in the head by Batman. Pair that with the fact that he's mute and he's a force to be reckoned with.

Your mom is always busy and rarely ever home, when she is she couldn't be bothered to interact with you unless you got into trouble. She grew up rich, often talking about how she went to the same school as Bruce Wayne and how she was a popular cheerleader before her life fell apart. She doesn't talk much on the topic but it's clear she holds distain for your father and, by extension, you.

You sigh to yourself, you need to shower. That means you need to get past them without them bringing you into it. Or you just don't shower for the night and have one tomorrow...

Your mom screams something out about not throwing knives and you decide to just shower tomorrow morning.

You change out of your costume and hide it safely under a loose floorboard, you change into your pajamas and get into bed. Today was a massive mental drain and physical drain.

...

You awake to a knock at the front door. Your parents usually ignore it and make you answer when someone knocks because "you're dispensable" as they say. Looking at the clock on the wall of the kitchen you see it's around 7am.

Groggily making your way to the door you look through the peep hole and see Tim standing awkwardly on the other side with a guy next to him, the guy next to him being so big and tall that you could only see a small part of his chest and arm.

You curse to yourself quietly, this is by far the worst luck you've ever had.

You open the door and look at the two. Now seeing the other guy the thing that stands out is a stripe of white hair on his head. Instantly you know it's Jason Todd.

You aren't an idiot. He's the only one in the family built like how he is - not including Bruce.

"What do you want?" You ask, annoyed. Tim chuckles weakly, as if nervous. "Wayne Enterprises wishes to give your mother her letter of departure." You blink once, then twice. "Huh? Letter of departure? The fuck does that mean?" You mutter, genuinely confused.

Jason scoffs, "it means your dear mother is losing her job, kid." He states uncaring of how blunt he's being. Tim elbows him and hisses something about being more considerate.

You don't listen, all noise becoming white noise. Why is she being fired? She works hard, she dedicates her time, she does her best! Is this because you have beef with Tim? That's not fair!

She's the only stable source of income, without that job you all would be living on the streets. You've heard AND seen so many horror stories about teens living on the streets, it's something you'd pray never happened to you. But now it's entirely probable.

So, in a moment of desperation you grip Tim by his shoulders "Please! You can't fire her! We'll end up homeless! She works all the time, she tries! My mother will improve if you ask, she needs this job. The whole family does!"

Tim seems shocked by this, his posture stiffening. Jason looks on guard, as if assessing whether he should step in, though he doesn't seem fond of the idea. You wouldn't doubt that he was made to accompany Tim as a body guard.

Tim opens his mouth, then closes it, then opens it again. Clearly he wasn't expecting you to beg for your mother to keep her job.

"Uh... Look, I don't mean any harm by it, it's just that we need to make way for brighter minds..." He stumbles slightly over his words as if making the excuse up on the spot.

You won't back down however. "Tim, please, I desperately need you to realize this. I. Will. Die. On. The. Streets." Probably not true because of your mutation but the fear remains. "Please, I'll do anything for you to not do this! I already promised Bruce to stop talking bad about Aranea!" You please desperately.

Tim glances to Jason who quirks a brow and shrugs. The sound of movement from behind you makes your eyes widen and behind you you see your dad approaching, you were probably too loud.

He glares at you before yanking your hair so you move away from Tim and remove your clutches on him. You hiss in pain at the feeling but bow your head down.

Your dad eyes the two boys before looking to the paper in Tim's hands. He instantly knows what's going on and storms down the hallways of the complex to do who-knows what. That scares you. Your dad is unpredictable.

After some silence Tim speaks up. "Are you okay? Your dad pulled your hair pretty tightly..." You look down, ashamed. You couldn't even bother putting your walls up and defending your pride. Your life is basically falling apart at the seams.

"... I'll do anything for you to not fire my mother..." You mutter meekly, a far cry from how you usually act, something Tim notices immediately. He sighs to himself, he debates the odds. Maybe if he doesn't fire (Reader)'s mother then they can be even. The feud can end, it was pointless on your part to begin with for hating someone so sweet and kind, then hating him who defends the innocent.

"Fine. Your mother can stay, but, it may not be permanent. I suggest she find elsewhere in the mean time." Tim states before walking off. Jason takes a second to stare at your relived form, the slight smile of disbelief and look of relief in your eyes. He then leaves with Tim.

You close the door to the apartment and sink to the floor. That was terrifying. You'll have find a way of telling your mother the news before she goes into work in two hours.

You're officially having the day off from school and patrol today.

[ridher]

jj's purposeful touches to fluster his sweet & shy coworker

you'd been working at the little drink shack sat in the middle of kildare for a couple of weeks now. recently moving into a house on the south side of the island, you needed a job to help out your family.

it wasn't too hard, mixing up smoothies, coffees, or lemonades for kooks and pogues alike — nobody minded where you came from with a face like that.

but perhaps the most exciting part of the job was the sun-bleached blonde-haired boy about your age, who more often than not was working alongside you during shifts.

his flirting was obvious — but no different from how he'd act towards practically any pretty girl stopping by for a drink. so, you didn't let yourself get invested, because that was just jj.

it's a day just like that, he'll say something, anything to get you a little flustered with a proud, cheeky smile before turning right around to flash a flirty wink to the girl across the counter.

you'd be lying to say it didn't sting a little bit. you trudged around with a pouty frown, trying to avoid him just because you didn't want to deal with any more of his teasing.

he notices when a stupid joke that would usually have you giggling all sweetly how he adored, instead was met with an unamused hum. it takes a moment to process it, brushing it off and letting silence pass for the next few customers.

you're stirring up a couple of lattes when jj has had enough. with the excuse of such a small workplace, he shuffles sideways behind you, placing his hands firmly on the sides of your waist, with purpose.

your movements stutter and you're suddenly glad to be facing away from him so your clear reaction to his touch isn't so obvious — at least that's what you think. his hands slowly slide off while dropping lower, hardly brushing over your hips before they're gone from your body.

jj's smirking, watching as closely as he can out of the corner of his eye to gauge your expression. he can't think of a time he's touched you and the experience has his own thoughts racing.

but you don't say anything, just serving up the iced beverages with a polite smile.

there's a lull around closing when jj takes another chance, approaching from behind, smoothing a palm over the small of your back and leaning over your shoulder to glance across scribbles of math he doesn't understand.

"what's up with you, huh?" he murmurs all seductively under his breath, warmth fanning across your neck.

"nothing." is what you manage to whisper, thumbing through a booklet to record the cash in the register. unfortunately, just his hands on your skin gets you all soft.

"mhm.. you think i don't know wha's goin' on?" he continues, moving to stand beside you with his hand still bracketed on your back as if to hold you in place.

"enlighten me, jj." you breathe out in a sigh, hands fumbling around with his presence surrounding you.

"ya like this.. like me." his statement is punctuated with a squeeze of his fingertips into the side of your waist.

confirming nor denying his accusation, you continue trying to stay focused on the task at hand — not wanting to admit it was true out of embarrassment.

"so does every other girl you talk to on this island." the not-so-subtle dig and admission uncommonly silenced the boy.

"nah, nah— ion care about them. talking 'bout you." at that you finally tilt your head to look up at him all doe-eyed with parted lips, nothing coming out as you register his words.

his smirk is lopsided and he tilts his head, eyes flitting to your lips as he tongues at the inside of his cheek — enamored by you.

his thumb swipes over your skin before he slips away to help a customer you hadn't even noticed, haze lingering on your face and lowering before reluctantly addressing the third party.

the unspoken confessions only serve to increase the already palpable tension in the small shack. who knew just the warm touch of the maybank boy's hand would have you rethinking all feelings towards him? he did, that's for sure.

[meo-eiru]

Elias with a reader who after the fifth time Elias's manager calls them to ask where Elias is sets up this arrangement. Reader will take Elias to all modeling appointments, Stays with Elias at all modeling appointments, and encourage Elias at all modeling appointments. Basically reader becomes Elias's manager and Elias's manager only has to do paperwork, book appointments, and check in with reader. All manager has to do is properly hire and pay reader. Manager gets less headaches, Elias gets more time and attention from reader, and reader can pretend this is normal cause it's their job. Would this actually work? Hug for Elias 🤗. Sorry about how long this is.

I actually quite like this scenario lol. I feel like if you're there with him the whole time Elias would actually pay more attention to what he's doing to appear cool and all the photographers would wonder why he's being so good all of a sudden. I think it would also be easier for him to get distracted because he would just try to run to you anytime the photographer looks away but his pictures would just have this shine they didn't previously have.

It's a bit bad for you if you're a jealous person tho because I can imagine his popularity would skyrocket almost immediately. Elias was successful enough to make a living but he wasn't successful enough to have everyone on the streets recognizing him. With his newfound success thanks to you coming to his photoshoots it would be quite hard to go on dates together.

Elias doesn't really mind it tho, he always preferred just staying in your house and making out the whole time. He doesn't care about the attention other people give him, he would much prefer only ever hearing your words of affection.

[shotmrmiller]

I'm not ashamed to say I've been thinking abt soulmate au's.

You know that one that's like 'you see your soulmate and you're able to see colors'? Just like everyone's seeing in black and white until they find their soulmate.

That but your soulmate (whichever one of the boys you want it to be) is colorblind and doesn't realize it, so you just end up following your soulmate around and they keep shrugging you off because they aren't seeing the colors you are.

Even better if they get with you as a way to pass the time, but are constantly telling you that you aren't the one they'll settle with.

or they saw color as a child, and when their best friend passed, it all muddled into nothing, just lifeless shades of grey but when you see them, you see a kaleidoscope of colors but they aren't interested in one that isn't their soulmate. okay but what about you? your future? is he gonna keep you from your one true chance at happiness?

he somberly looks at you and says that life took his away and it's not his job to make sure yours comes true. make do with the hand your dealt with, kid, just like i have.

[lost-in-fandoms]

https://www.tumblr.com/thicciardo/761905055702122496?source=share

Having big thoughts about Daniel being a photographer and Max being still a F1 driver kajgkajgksjjg. Maybe Daniel needs the money so he takes a job being a F1 photographer and it's not his passion exactly but it pays well. He is going to take pictures of cars going vroom, travel everywhere and being paid for it (so he can take pics of what he really loves. What it is? I don't know).

But he didn't know Max. Like, he was aware that Max was F1 world champion??? But he didn't expect Max to be so breathtakingly beautiful. So maybe he has a little crisis about it. Idksugid. I have to go to sleep but ESIIIIII DANIEL BEING A PHOTOGRAPHER 🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹

Hello lovely I miss you!!! I have been having big thoughts about this since I saw your ask last night, but I only have this little thing to offer. Might revisit in the future because I love this idea very much <3

Daniel doesn't exactly know how he finds out about the job offer. He thinks maybe Blake mentioned it to him, having heard about it from a friend of a friend, but it's not really important.

It wouldn't be a bad gig: being able to travel the world, mingling with famous people, filling his portfolio, and getting paid for it. Sure, cars and millionaires aren't exactly his preferred subjects, but he can look past it for that kind of salary and perks.

So he goes over his CV, trying to make himself sound more professional than he feels, and sends it. You miss every chance you don't take and all that.

He's not expecting to be called back, to be honest. Even fattening his portfolio with all the people photos he has, good or less good, he knows it's mostly wildlife and nature, not exactly what a formula 1 team might look for, and yet, two weeks later, he wakes up to an email with three suggested dates for an online interview and a we'd be excited to offer you a position as soon as possible.

And three weeks after that, he's stepping on a plane, flight fully paid and brain already adding up his new salary to the savings in his bank account.

--

The scanner beeps when Daniel puts his pass against it, a thrill of excitement traveling down his spine at the small sound, and then he finds himself in the paddock.

It's still early, so it's not as crowded as it will for sure become later, but it still makes him think of the savannah, people milling around minding their business, swayed from time to time by the sudden arrival of a celebrity or a driver, circles forming and breaking, flocks in the grass.

It settles his mind to think about this as another wildlife shoot, as if this wasn't a stepping stone towards his dream, but the open door to it already, and he makes himself smile by taking a picture of Lewis Hamilton like he would of a leopard, half hidden behind a plant, light catching his earring like a fleeting spot. Even the cars have something animal about them, growling engines and opening wings, wheels pushing the ground like running deer.

The Red Bull hospitality building (a waterhole, his brain suggests) welcomes him with air conditioning and handshakes, both from people he's met already the one time he has gone to the factory, and from strangers, too many names being thrown at him to try and remember them.

And then there's Max Verstappen.

Daniel hadn't met him at the factory. He knows who he is, obviously. Even if formula 1 isn't his preferred flavor of motorsport, he is not completely clueless about it, and he had brushed up his knowledge before coming here, just to try and make sure he doesn't embarrass himself. And yet, it is different to meet him in person.

Daniel had watched two videos of him to prepare himself: one about his racing, and one interview. The racing had been incredible. The interview had been so awkward and stiff Daniel had spent several minutes looking at the ceiling, trying to think about how to justify his yet-to-be-shot photos being shit without saying your driver is the worst model I've ever seen.

He doesn't look bad, of course he doesn't, he is actually quite handsome, but there's such a stiffness and coldness around him, one that screams rude entitled bastard from a mile away, and Daniel does not work well with that. He has actually been wondering if he had been chosen, with his warm toned photos and his soft focus, just to try and soften his edges a little.

So he's not surprised by the firmness of the handshake, or the quick Max as an answer to Daniel's hello I'm Daniel, it's great to meet you!, both exactly what he had been expecting, but then Max smiles and suddenly Daniel's fingers are itching for his camera.

Max's eyes crinkle when he smiles.

His cheeks bunch up, plush lips stretching wide, the freckle Daniel had already noticed almost disappearing, and suddenly it's prairie crocus in the alpine tundra, color and spring impossibly breaking the cold.

Daniel wants to capture the wrinkles by his eyes in golden light, wants to steal the sparkle in the blue, frame it like sunshine on the ocean, wants to take the blush on his cheek and print it, press his fingertips to every magnified pore. He can't wait to see him put on his helmet, wants to see the arch of his nose framed by the visor.

Suddenly, from mostly neutral bystander, he's turned into avid fan, desperately wishing Max wins, to shoot him through champagne drops.

Maybe this job will be his easiest one yet, after all.

[reyreadersblog]

ALRIGHT Y'ALL MADE ME DO IT!!!

My unpopular tig/tgg opinions!!

FIRST!

These are MY opinions and i'm allowed to have my own thoughts on certian things, just as you are, okay..? Just wanna..get this out of way, i know everyone is respectful in this fandombut still.

1. this is something that should NOT be an upopular opinion. AVERY IS THE MAIN CHARACTER FOR A REASON. okay? She is a girlboss, and she needs more appretiation, cus literally search up tig on tt rn. Everybody and their cat named Stewie is talking about Grayson and Jameson? WHAT ABOUT MY MG AVERY? And if you see any post about her, it's probably a hate vid about how Avery should've kept the money...SHUT UP. Read what she said carefully..."no one deserves that kind of power.." and then think about it deeply.

2. I DO NOT WANT TIG TO TURN INTO A TV SERIES (or even a movie). i can't name all the reasons 'cus then the the list would be endless. First of all, i know, I JUST KNOW, they'll choose the worst cast ever. And even if they find the most accurate cast for the Hawthorne brother i will still be dissapointed, because the images of them i have in my head...THEY'LL NEVER TOP EM. second of all, they will leave out important moments, just as simple as it sounds, and trust me they will, just like they do with most of the live adaptations of books. Third of all, SHIP WARS!!! I phisically can't with ship war, like I'VE HAD ENOUGH OF EM IN THE PAST WHEN THE BOOKS WERE STILL COMING OUT. And just the thought of Averygrayson shipper saying "yeah Avery and jameson were endgame in the books but they might change it in the movie..." GIVES ME NIGHTMARES. and overall, not everything needs a live adaptation yk? sometimes things just have to stay the way they are.

3. ...this is a bit contrevertial.and i don't want to sound like a hater since i've said this a multiple times before but Rohan's pov was my least favourite in the grandest games. Purely bcs whatever Savannah and Rohan had going on...don't get me wrong, i like Savannah (even tho she did and said some fucked up things) and Rohan, SEPERATLY. But them being together...idk man, they were too..."booktokish" for my liking, yk? and i do love banter and teasing, but they were like basic "i like you but i like winning more" "couple". Not to mention they were so random...like where did they come from? I remember when we first saw Sav and Rohan having the same symbols on their cards i was very excited, i expected a different dynamic between them...PLUS THE WHOLE GAME THEY JUST WANTED TO FUCK💀

4. Hating Alisa Ortega and loving Grayson Hawthorne is CRAZYYY, and i'm saying this bcs they're pretty similar in different ways. And the thing is people are mad at Alisa for "saying mean words to Libby" (she was literally doing her job, you would understand if you were at her place) MEANWHILE GRAYSON LITERALLY THREATENED A HEIRESS! (sayin this as a Gray stan) *sigh* y'all are something else🤦🏻‍♀️.

5. Ohh...this one is risky...BUT CAN Y'ALL STOP ACTING LIKE JAMESON IS BLAMELESS?? all i see is Grayson slander, AND I UNDERSTAND, he fucked up, but saying "Jameson was so much better than Grayson" is a lie, at least for me. (He was better for Avery tho) he fs made mistakes that fandoms chooses to ignore. Like lets not act like treating Avery like a toy wasn't wrong. Lets not act like him blaming Grayson for everything wasn't wrong. Let's not act like him reminding Grayson of Emily's death wasn't wrong. And i know that later on both him and Grayson had a great character development, but still, i've never seen anyone talk about this.

6. This isn't about tig. But LIKING JLBS WORK AND BEING HER FAN DOESN'T MEAN YOU'RE GLAZING HER💀 (talking about an argument i had a while ago...) like is it so hard for your brain to understand that it's called having an opinion. Idc if it's JLB or any other author, okay? Like i've read almost every Jlb's books and i love them, AND i also publicly talk about how much iblove her work, does that mean i'm glazing her? UHM NO WTF💀.

7. LET. PEOPLE. HAVE. PREFRENCE. (I'm talking about ships btw) . Someone prefers LyraGray over Averyjameson, and that's okay. Someone loves Averyjameson the most, and that's also okay, someone likes Libbynash more then Xandermax, AND THAT IS ALSO OKAY.

I'll probably do part 2, i have more to say i'm just really tired rn.

Also it's not proof read so sorry if there are many mistakes.

[icarusredwings]

Thinking about Logan trying to comfort Kurt's guilt.

It's a full moon. For the others, it's a pretty normal night. This isn't to say that they don't give it a second thought, or a tenth, but Kurt takes it upon himslef to find out the names of every single person that dosn't make it during their missions.

While most, Like Logan, would rather forget, Kurt had another job to do. It's his duty to make sure these lost and scared souls find heaven.

Walking up to the nearest church, Logan grunts, already halfway through his bottle since they've returned. He hears whispering. Small prayers that he's heard all before whether when muttered on the field or heard through the walls, his rosery intertwined between his 6 fingers, gripping it as if someone would rip it from him.

"I thought you'd be here.." he mutters.

Kurt doesn't answer him. But there he is, on his knees in front of a statue of Mary, tears soaking the fur on his face, hands together. The way the moonlight is coming in, it hits him in a way that makes him look ethereal. Like a blessing from above from the man himself. If only Logan believed in that kind of thing.

It was so ironic that someone so innocent, pure, and beautiful actively visited hell. Perhaps this was why. For he's seen what goes on and has chosen that he's seen enough.

Letting out a big sigh, He comes to crouch next to him, taking a swig of his bottle as he picks up the list. He wants to crumble it up or perhaps shred it, the handwritten swoopy german being nothing but a reminder of how much he failed too. Hero's weren't supposed to let people get hurt. Especially not almost a dozen.. 11 lives ruined. 11 loved ones ripped from their families grasp. And all because they weren't good enough.

Finishing his whispers, he goes to grab the page but Logan had already picked it up. Kurt looks at him with those big black hole eyes of his, almost begging him not to ruin his list, but he dosn't grab for it. He lets his friend look over it only to shove his head back again, drinking for a few seconds think.

"...Emily Stripe..." He read, shifting to actually sit his ass on the concrete step, grunting as he let his arms hang over his knees. "Jessica Stripe...Are they sisters?" He asks the praying man, begging for forgiveness and to help serve these innocent souls towards the stairs and the gates.

More tears fall down his face each couple of words. In the end, he bows his head and doesn't bother looking at him, his eyes glistening in the light. "They were..."

Logan offers him the bottle, and without hesitation, he takes it, starting to chug a quarter of it. "Woah woah! Elfs can't handle that much, ya'know!" He says, and Kurt mumbles something along the lines that he's German, alchool is in his viens from birth.

Taking the bottle back, He shakes it around, Giving a playful glare now it was almost gone. Putting it to the side, he wraps an arm over his shoulder, Kurt's tail wrapping around his waist as well. For a bit, they were just two guys, silently mourning the casualties of what it was like to have constant city villans at hand.

"...It ain't your fault, Fuzzball... or should I say buzzball. You okay there, Mr. Blue?"

"I.....I was so sure I could have saved them.."

"Not your fault, Bub."

"..But what if it is..? If I was just.. a bit better.. I could have saved them."

"Yeah... well, if it's your fault, it's mine too."

Kurt lays his head on his shoulder, wiping his face on his arm. Logan doesn't actually mind, but he knows he wants to play. "Augh! Did you just wipe snot on me!?"

Kurt smiles softly and says something Logan doesn't recognize.

It could be a million things, but deep down, he has a feeling of what it might be.

"Yeah, yeah.. whatever." Pulling him close he headlocks him to his chest and rubs his fist over his head, making Kurt whine and squirm. "Ah! Nein!"

"That's what you get for rubbing snot all over me!"

He scoffs, saying something else, but Logan only catches the end of it.

"Du bist vild, mein freund"

He remembered another scrawny german who said the same. Swallowing, he lets go, letting him lay against him.

"...You really shouldn't be smoking in here." He muttered after some time of them sitting, taking this time to make sure that the people on this list were not fotgotten.

Logan smirks, blowing some smoke into his face as he coughs drimatically and waves his hands infront of his face with a smile.

[satancopilotsmytardis]

Till the Last Drop

Pairing: Shigadabi

Rating: Mature

Summary: Commissioned by @dahvampire. Enji kicked him out on the street when he was eighteen, and Dabi was lucky enough to make good friends who helped get him back on his feet. But he can't help thinking every day that he will lose it all again, thoughts that only get worse when he starts dating Tomura Shigaraki. He doesn't know if he's had anything that has made him so happy, and the fear of it falling apart never ebbs.

Contents: Coffee Shop AU, No Heroes/Villains, Yes Quirks, mentions of Sexual Content

Wordcount: 8,327

The Last Drop Cafe is probably the only reason Dabi hadn't wound up in jail after his father kicked him out of the house. The fact that he'd set himself an a mountain on fire at twelve trying to just get his father to pay even a scrap of attention to him after his quirk proved to be so unstable, wound up in a coma until he was fifteen, and then needed to spend the following three years resuming his education and getting expensive treatments just to keep him alive, made him the disgrace of the Todorokis and a black spot that Enji wanted out of his house and away from his name as quickly as possible. On his eighteenth birthday, he had called Dabi into his home office offered him a single backpack, ten thousand yen, and the ability to leave that night while his siblings were setting things up for his birthday party, because if he left then and never contacted his siblings again, then Enji wouldn't also cut them off when they were of age. Fuyumi was already applying for colleges so she could become a teacher. Natsuo wanted to be a doctor. Sho was too young to have things worked out yet, but he didn't want to be the one responsible for him knowing that he would be penniless and on the streets the day he turned eighteen. He didn't even take the money. He just left with the clothes on his back and tried to make it work. His phone worked for a couple of days after he'd been kicked out, and he looked up every place that said that they gave help or housing to people who needed it. He sold his bricked phone at an electronics shop and followed some guides on what necessities to get upon being made newly homeless, and spent six months floating around trying to find something. 

Last Drop was on the list of places that would give people a free sandwich and drink each afternoon. Magne had been working the first day there and had given him the meal and he'd slunk out of the building, not wanting to have to have people looking at him in broad daylight when he knew his scars had worsened so much, the coloration getting darker and more purply now that he was not getting the medicine he'd been using before to try and keep them light and healing. Atsuhiro, the owner, had been there the next when he'd come back, and he'd asked Dabi to sit in one of the corner booths with him and talk. He hadn't been too pushy, but when he knew how old Dabi was, how abruptly he'd found himself like this, he'd told him about the apartment above the shop. It constantly smells like coffee and pastries, and was barely up to code, but it could be his. A job could be his too if he wanted it, until he figured out everything else. Dabi didn't have any other options, so he agreed. Magne had taken him out to get some new clothes and sheets for the air mattress that they'd pulled out of the closet for him, and he'd been able to shower and sit on the bed alone and safe for the first time in a three months and he finally burst into tears as he let himself actually feel what he'd lost. 

He hasn't spoken to his siblings since he left. He knows that Enji sent Fuyumi to a good college, one that she'll never be able to pay back on her own on a teacher's salary. He knows that Natsuo is in college now too, guesses that he's going to med school as soon as he can. Maybe someday he'll be able to sever ties with their father, but Dabi doesn't know for certain. He doesn't know what's going to happen to Shoto, but he was always Enji's favorite. He won't ever be able to take his claws out from his skin. Dabi does his best to not look into how their lives are going, because even now, even six years later, he still wants to go back to them. He still wants to tell them that he's still alive, that he didn't just run away and abandon them for no reason. So he can't look, because he doesn't want to ruin everything they are. 

Besides, Atsuhiro, Magne, and Jin are good to him, good friends. He's been working at Last Drop since the day that Atsuhiro let him in, and things are different now. He didn't feel like he belonged here, like he was anything other than a lucky charity case for three years. He got good at this job, he knows how to make almost every strange coffee or tea that's requested of him just from practice and memorization alone, but then he'd taken some of the money he'd been making and bought the ingredients to try and make his mom's black sesame cookies from scratch. He hadn't thought they would be worthy of selling, he was mostly just missing his siblings and wanting to give something back to Atsuhiro for taking him in. But he liked them. He asked him to make another batch and he'd had him do it down in the cafe's kitchen instead of his own. He'd made two dozen and they'd put them in the display case with the other pastries, and by the end of the day they were gone. Dabi thought that would be the end of it, but it wasn't. Atsuhiro showed him how to make scones and asked him to make another batch of his cookies. They sold out faster than they did the first day, and slowly but surely, Dabi took over working in the bakery, taking the early to mid-morning shift to get all of their pastries ready, and being in charge of developing new ones as their menu expanded over time. 

Last Drop is a home, a better one than he could have asked for coming from the one he'd had, and one that he doesn't mind also being his job-- even if that means he has to get up at four AM every day to start baking. 

///

Dabi is usually getting the last tray of baked goods into the case as Atsuhiro finishes grinding the beans for the day fifteen minutes before opening. After that it is a mad rush of the two of them moving around the space to keep up with orders through their morning rush. And then the lull going into the afternoon. Dabi's shift technically ends at noon, but he usually sticks around in the cafe anyway after Magne and Jin come to relieve he and Atsuhiro, mainly because he doesn't have anything else better to do. 

He usually drags a stool over from one of their tall tables and sits next to the dessert case so that he's mostly out of the way and chit-chats with the others, and that's what he's doing again when the bell over the door rings and in comes a high school girl. She's probably a first or second year, wearing a pale pinkish coat and red scarf, her hair tied up into two messy buns. She goes up to the counter, tucking her nose down into her scarf, and speaking up so that Magne can hear her through the fabric. 

"Hi," 

"Hello, what can I get for you, hun?" Magne asks. 

"Can I have a small latte and a raspberry danish, please?" 

"Sure thing, for here or to-go?"

"Uh, here, please." She pays, and Dabi is sitting right next to the case so he grabs the plate and puts the danish on even though it earns him a swat across the back of his head since he's not technically supposed to be working. The latte is quick to make and the young lady has selected a booth in the far back corner, facing away from the door. She's practically invisible to the rest of the bar, and when Magne looks back up from making her drink, she almost misses her. Another customer comes through the door, and Dabi takes the saucer and plate from her before she can protest, and heads over to the table. 

"Here you go, enjoy." He sets them down in front of her as she jumps, looking up from her backpack. "We have free wi-fi too, the login is on that card," he gestures at the miniature menu board that is pushed up against the wall. 

"Oh, thanks," She pulls her scarf up as she speaks, but Dabi lets it go. Maybe her mouth is affected by her quirk. It's not like he can't recognize being self-conscious about something like that. He leaves her be, and she covers her mouth whenever she eats anything, staying for a few hours as she does her homework. It's after dark by the time she goes home, but they don't comment on it, just keeping an eye. 

She comes back the next day, and the day after that. She orders a different pastry every day, gets her coffee, and then goes and hides in the back booth to do her homework. It takes two weeks before he, Magne, and Jin rock-paper-scissors to see who's going to go and actually check to see if she's alright, and Jin loses. It's probably a good thing it's him. He's got a massive scar across his face from a motorcycling accident, but it's not as gruesome or scary as all of Dabi is, and Magne, while she's a big teddy bear, she is still a bear and her anger is truly something to behold. Jin is a golden retriever, and he sits down, ready to ply her with a fresh pastry, and within the next hour she's laughing, and by the time she's left for the night they know that her name is Himiko Toga and that her quirk has made her an outcast. Her family is always happier when she's not home, and she doesn't have any real friends because they think she's strange no matter how she acts at school. She wants to go to high school in Tokyo. One of her neighbors who had similar problems but was three years older than her just finished his last year at a good school where he didn't have the same problems, but she has to be able to pay her way there because her parents won't help her. She's been studying hard to get a scholarship, but her test scores aren't good enough for that. So instead she's starting to look for jobs. 

Atsuhiro meets her the next day, and by the following weekend, she's behind the counter with him and Magne learning the ropes. 

///

Toga has been working with them for about a month, usually coming in right after her classes end and staying for four hours on weekdays, and six hour shifts over the weekend. She wants to get up to eight hours, but they want to take it up slowly. It does mean that Magne and Jin actually get a little more time off now that they have someone else working here, and Toga is actually taking to the work incredibly well. She talks to more people now than she ever did at school, and seeing how many people don't even notice her teeth so long as she's giving them their coffee, means that she is coming out of her shell more and more. She's a ray of sunshine, just as loud and bright as the others, and able to toe-to-toe with him in viciousness and trading insults when they're in the mood for it. She fits in perfectly, but she is not supposed to come in early for her shifts on the weekend. 

"Oy," he says as he takes out the tray of scones from the oven, "You're early." 

"I'm going to sit on my ass and eat your cooking fresh until it's time to clock in." She tells him brightly, not punching her time card, and hanging up her coat and scarf. She's practically bouncing on her toes. 

"What's got you so excited?" 

"My friends have a tournament in town this afternoon, so they said they would come by to see me during my break!" 

"That's not going to be for hours," he says with moderate exasperation as he smacks her hand away from the tray of croissants before she burns her fingers into nothing. 

"I know!" But her spirit isn't dimmed so he just rolls his eyes and keeps on with his prep as she starts up a stream of chatter. 

///

It's at their eleven thirty lull when their bell rings again. Dabi is pulling a double for Magne because she had to move her doctor's appointment for today if she wants to stay on schedule for her estrogen, and it's not like he doesn't live here. So he's chatting with Toga, leaning against one of the counters and debating if he's going to have his third espresso shot of the day, when the bell rings and two guys, maybe a few years younger than him, walk in. The heteromorphic reptile-person with purple hair and green scales stands out immediately, but the guy behind him isn't bad to look at. Long white hair that's half tied back from his face, pale skin, bright red eyes, and interesting markings around his eyes and lips that Dabi is guessing are from his quirk. They barely get in the door before Toga is practically hopping the bar and rushing over to them. 

"You're here!" She nearly knocks them off their feet when she tries to hug them both at once without having slowed down before reaching them at all. 

The lizard grunts and the pale one yanks his hands back and away from their bodies, a flicker of panic going across his face, his thumb curled in tight against his palm. "Toga, be careful, I don't have my gloves." Must have a quirk that is touch activated then. 

"Oh, sorry, Shiggy. Why not?" 

"New rules. They want to check them to see if they meet regulations." The guy says, his voice a low rasp. 

"That's stupid." 

"It is. But we thought you were working?" The lizard guy says. "Come on, can't be at peak performance without having more caffeine in our veins than blood." 

"Right!" Toga turns back to the counter, pulling the two older men along with her. "Welcome to Last Drop, what can I get you? We don't have energy drinks," she says very pointedly to them. They both get an Americano with a double shot of espresso, and Dabi lets her ring them up as he goes over to start on the actual coffee. She's already going a mile a minute as she starts to ring them up. "You should try a pastry! Dabi makes them fresh every morning." 

The lizard picks out his sesame cookies, and the other guy declines, "You know I don't like sweets." 

Dabi can't help snorting at that as he turns back with the first coffee. He doesn't mean to catch red eyes watching him. 

"I'm sure they're good--" he tries to backtrack, clearly guessing who he is. 

"No, it's funny because I don't like sweet things either." 

"He's just weird." Toga agrees. "Dabi, this is Tomura Shigaraki and Shuichi Iguchi." 

"Nice to meet you." 

"Hey, man." 

She gets their money, both of them dropping nearly the same amount in their tip jar, and she plates the cookies as he finishes with their coffee. As soon as she's passed over their order, she turns to him, "I'm going on my break!" 

"Go clock out you little gremlin!" He orders. She sticks her tongue out at him but does actually duck into the kitchen to do as she's told. He rolls his eyes and finds that he's not the only one, though he's a little surprised to see Iguchi doing it at his friend before he goes over to one of the empty booths. Dabi's not entirely sure what he did to warrant that response, but he goes back to work as Toga comes out from the kitchen to go sit with her friends. He's glad that she has friends other than them. It's pretty quiet today, so he makes her a cappuccino with way too much extra sugar and syrups in it, and gets her one of the miniature strawberry cream cakes that they're going to be retiring until strawberries are back in season. He also brings three forks. 

"Thanks Dabi!" Toga beams at him, because she doesn't hide her teeth anymore, and Dabi deliberately sets down the forks too, meeting red eyes with a smug smirk. Sure it's probably a bad look to mock a new customer, but on the other hand, it's very, very fun to poke so harmlessly at someone. 

He leaves them to catch up for her break, Toga taking her lunch while he deals with whatever trickle of customers come in and out until Jin's shift. When he gets in, Dabi goes and clocks out, hanging up his apron. He comes back out to, not sure if he wants to just spend all of his time hanging out up in his apartment this weekend, and finds that Toga is getting back to work, and that only Shigaraki is still inside, Iguchi waiting outside of the cafe doors as he taps on his phone. Toga giggles as soon as she sees him, which tells Dabi immediately that he's in danger, but before he can do anything about that, Shigaraki is coming up to him. 

"I hope this isn't too inappropriate," He braces for something wildly inappropriate to be said to him. "But I was wondering if I could get the recipe for that cake?" 

"Oh," Dabi blinks, "Oh, uh sure. God, that was not what I thought you were going to say." 

"That's because I chickened out about asking you on a date halfway through." Shigaraki gives him a rueful smile, and that is definitely not the smoothest way to ask someone out, but Dabi is pretty sure he would have done worse since he's never asked anyone out or been asked out before. 

It's probably not the correct response for him to let out a snort of laughter though. That probably doesn't do the other man's ego any favors. "Did you even like the cake?" 

"Not even remotely, which is no reflection on your baking skills. As far as I can tell, it was the perfect cake. But perfect is always going to be mediocre if you don't like whatever it is in the first place." 

"Okay, so what do you like?" 

"Video games, my friends, people watching, getting a more direct answer when I ask someone out so I know if I should be making a swift exit." 

"Ask me a direct question and I'll give you a direct answer." 

Shigaraki doesn't get annoyed with his attitude, his lips curling up into a smile that makes his whole face softer. "I have a tournament to get to, would you like to come watch if you're not already busy for the rest of the day? And afterward, when I win, I would like to take you out on a date if you're interested?" 

"That sure you're going to win?" 

"More sure about that than I am your answer." 

Dabi isn't sure about his answer either. This is a first, and he doesn't know if he should have his first date with one of Toga's few other friends. If it goes badly, he doesn't want her to end up caught in the crossfire. But... he's having fun bantering with Shigaraki. And he's never been to a sporting event before. He doesn't even know what he plays, he definitely doesn't look very imposing in his black skinny jeans, long-sleeved black shirt, red tennis shoes, and red coat. 

"Yeah, okay. You still want to pretend to want that cake recipe so I can go change?" He is never going to say that coffee and pastries smell bad, but he does typically try not to walk around radiating that smell in all directions once his shift is over. 

"No, but I can give you my number. We have to be at the venue early for registration and check-in, our part of the tournament doesn't start for another four hours. Toga's heading over after her shift, if you want to join her for the walk. And that way, if you change your mind, there's no obligation." 

Dabi appreciates that and hands over his phone so the other man can put in his number. "Okay, you better win though, because I'm not into cocky guys who can't deliver."

He sees a little heat go into those red eyes, something that makes Dabi think that maybe this guy will be able to hold up against his attitude. "I always deliver." 

"We'll see about that. You should probably go, your friend's waiting." He hands back his phone.

"Yeah, any dietary restrictions I should know about, other than being a baker who doesn't like sweets?" 

"I don't do fish." 

"No fish, no sweets, got it. I hope that I see you later." Shigaraki doesn't linger after that, turning to go meet his other friend outside, and Dabi watches him go, a little surprised with himself for handling that and agreeing to go out with him. 

And then out of the corner of his eye he sees Jin and Toga leaning against the display case and counter respectively, both of them with shit-eating grins. 

"Aww, ain't that cute," Jin mocks. 

"This is so exciting! You should wear your leather pants, oh and the fishnet shirt, and you should wear the nipple rings instead of the studs!" 

"One, fuck you, two, you're fifteen, stop having an opinion on my body jewelry." 

"Eyeliner too! I'll do it for you! It makes your eyes look so pretty!" 

"I fucking hate you." 

///

Dabi goes for his favorite boots, a distressed pair of black skinny jeans, a dark wash gray shirt tucked at the front to show one of his studded belts, and his favorite tattered leather duster that he got in a charity shop and has been holding onto no matter how badly frayed the ends keep getting, fixing any wear at the shoulders and elbows to keep it looking artfully worn even though he's pretty sure the coat is older than him. He does wear his eyeliner though. Toga's right, it makes his eyes pop. 

When her shift ends, she's practically bouncing as she gets him out the door and into a taxi to drive them to the... concert hall? He's about to ask what the hell kind of sporting event this is, when he sees the banner that has been posted above the doors. An esports tournament. Dabi has never been asked if he thinks that esports are a sport or not, but he supposes that it doesn't matter when he's here now. Besides, Toga knows where to go and brings them to a much, much shorter line to get in, Dabi half-stunned by the lines that have formed to get in, massive screens already set up outside of the building playing highlight reels of the games that have already happened to keep the people who haven't gotten in yet entertained as they wait. But they go right over to the VIP line and she hands over her ID and tells them that they're special guests of Iguchi and Shigaraki. 

It takes all of five minutes for them to have VIP wristbands, badges, a gift bag provided by a few of the sponsors, and an escort inside because they're allowed into a special viewing booth if they don't want to sit right down in the front row by the stage. They opt for the stage and when they're shown to their seats, whatever game was happening before Shigaraki and Iguchi's is still going on, so they sit and start to watch that, Dabi turning to Toga and saying, 

"I do not know shit about esports. What the fuck do I need to so that I don't embarrass myself?" 

Toga gives him the basics of the game that Shigaraki and Iguchi will be playing as they wait for things to get started. Teams of two, essentially virtual capture the flag, getting killed doesn't mean they're down for the count, it just means that they have to wait to respawn and after three kills, they're out of the game completely. If they get all the way through this tournament then they'll get two million yen. And this won't even be the first one that they've participated in, having done two before this that earned them enough money to pay through their first year of university and rent a substantial apartment near the campus. 

Dabi can't say that he fully knows what's going on throughout the many games that they watch, staying for nearly six hours as their team wins match after match. He barely gets it, but he's as on the edge of his seat as Toga is when the last match comes and Shigaraki's avatar dies and is eliminated when he blocks the other team's shot so that Iguchi's avatar can hold the point for the last couple of seconds that he needs to in order to secure it and win the match. Toga jumps up, pulling him with her, as the announcers start to rattle off their things and the crowd cheers. A massive thing of confetti goes off and showers the stands and stage with bits of the colorful paper. 

When the stands start to clear out, and Shigaraki and Iguchi have disappeared for their other post-tournament obligations, he and Toga are taken into a VIP lounge to wait for them. She's bouncing, thrilled that her friends won, and he's wondering if he should have worn something less casual for a dinner date with a guy who can make two million yen in a day. But when Shigaraki and Iguchi come to find them, they accept their congratulations from him and hugs from Toga, before Shigaraki turns to him and says, 

"I know a great tsukemen place near here, if you still want to get dinner." 

"How can I say no? You backed up the cockiness flawlessly." It earns him another smile, and Iguchi only rolls his eyes as Toga waves them off with a grin. 

///

Dinner is at a little hole-in-the-wall place with a cozy atmosphere where Dabi is served the best tsukemen that he has ever had in his life. They spend the entire meal chit-chatting, just getting to know each other. Dabi finds out that Shigaraki was adopted at age five after an earthquake leveled his family home, he's been gaming since he was seven, when a console was the first Christmas present his adoptive father got him once the papers were finalized, that he's actually pretty pessimistic about society as a whole, and that he literally destroys anything he touches with his quirk. Dabi tells him that he doesn't have any family he’s in contact with, he started baking and cooking when he was around five because it was the only chore he did that actually made him feel useful, that he thinks that the world is kind of shit too, but there are a few good people who make it worth it, and that he can burn anything to a crisp-- even himself. Most of it is pretty casual first-date kinds of things, and it's going well enough. They can talk to each other, it's even kind of fun. It's just that Dabi feels out of his depth and isn't about to own up to his inexperience. When they're finished, Shigaraki offers to take him home, and Dabi accepts that, the two of them grabbing a taxi and going back to the cafe. 

He invites the other inside with a slightly sadistic, "Come on, we skipped dessert," and unlocks the cafe. There are only a few things that he saves between days, and biscotti is one of them. Shigaraki has no fear of caffeine this late, and Dabi makes them both a cappuccino to enjoy with it, before they're sitting at one of the booths. 

"So why engineering and business?" He never went to college of course, but it does seem less exciting than making money streaming, going to tournaments, and apparently starting to do sponsorship ads the way Shigaraki does in his free time. 

"My father. When Spinner and I wanted to enter our first tournament, we wanted to go in on one of the bigger, more established ones, not the ones for amateurs. The one we wanted had an entry fee of three hundred thousand yen for teams without managers or an agency, which we couldn't get unless we auditioned, entered a training program, and all of this other shit that we didn't want to do and didn't have time for before graduation and our college entrance exams. Spinner wanted out of his family's house because his quirk was a random heteromorphic mutation and they never treated him very well, and I wanted to help, but my father doesn't believe in 'charity'." 

"So I made a deal with him, he would spot us the entry fee and in exchange he could pick my major and minor that I would get regardless of if we won, and give me a month of not meddling so that we could get our shit together so we could actually get past the qualifiers." He shrugs. "We won, but I'm locked in for four years, and Spinner used his cut of the money to come with me." 

"Kind of a dick move-- on your father's part, if you ask me." 

Shigaraki shrugs, "He wants me to succeed and be happy, but he doesn't always get that how he wants me to do it isn't going to work for me. Was your dad shit?" 

"Absolutely. Kicked me out at eighteen without warning and told me that if I ever caused him trouble he would--" he tries to remember what he told the others when they took him in, "Destroy someone I care about." 

"Absolutely a dick move." Shigaraki echoes his sentiment. "Did you ever get back in contact with them?" 

"No, he could still do it, and he will. They're better off without me around. I hope they have a good life." It's a little too heavy for a first date, he thinks, so he picks up one of the biscotti and dunks it in his coffee, letting them defuse the tension as Shigaraki follows his lead. They both take a bite once it's softened enough to not break their teeth, and when their mouths aren't full, "What do you think?" 

"It's not as sweet as the cake." Shigaraki says with true, perfect neutrality that makes Dabi laugh. 

"I'm going to find something that you like. Everyone has something." 

"Does that mean that I get to see more of you?" 

Oh. Dabi feels a flush trying to rise to his cheeks, but he's not about to be cowed or fumble this again. "You might get to see all of me tonight if you don't have any problems being kicked out at three AM, or sitting down here while I bake. My shift starts at four." He doesn't know what the etiquette for dating is, but he does know how to have a memorable hookup. 

"Maybe we should hold off then," Disappointment slips in. He had almost forgotten about his scars from how openly and readily Shigaraki had been flirting with him before. But maybe he needs more time to work himself up to see more of his fucked up skin. "I don't want to keep you up all night and have you burn down the cafe during your shift." 

Relief goes through him as he snorts. "Cocky." 

It earns him more smoldering red eyes and a small smile that screams with his overconfidence. "I've already proven once today that I can live up to it." 

"It's a coffee shop." Dabi says, pushing himself up from the table. "I'll have a drink if I'm sleepy." 

Shigaraki doesn't protest any as he stands as well, following Dabi upstairs to his apartment. 

Dabi didn't anticipate how no sleep, three orgasms, and being sore from taking the biggest cock up his ass he's ever had was going to affect his shift the next day, but Magne and Atsuhiro have a very, very good laugh over it when they see Tomura leaving just before they clock in. 

///

Tomura was Dabi's first date, but he's also his second, third, fourth, until it's really really obvious that they're dating. That he has a boyfriend now. He didn't think he'd ever have a home, friends, security, or companionship in his life, but he has all of them. 

And throughout the first month and a half of his and Tomura's relationship, he's expecting them all to disappear. 

It's a thought that comes to him the first time he's over at Shig and Spinner's apartment in the mid afternoon, when Duster comes back between classes, Spinner's still at his, and they fuck with the lights on for the first time. It's when he's certain that no matter what else they've done in the dark, that the moment that Tomura really sees him like this, that he's going to realize how disgusting he is and dump him. But he doesn't. He kisses his skin the same way he always does, teases him for how sensitive he always is, makes him cum so hard that he accidentally sets off the smoke alarms. They go out to dinner later and he heads back to the cafe since his shift is so early, half expecting him to block his number and ghost him completely. 

But Tomura comes by in two days while he's running around-- he and Spinner are actually getting sponsors and management companies who want them now-- to let Dabi make him try one of his other desserts, and to ask if he wants to go to a crane game place that Toga is dragging them all to later.

"I don't think I've ever played a single crane game in my life." He tells the other, but agrees anyway. The group of them have been having a good time hanging out together, and he wants to hold onto that for as long as he can. 

When they go to the crane game place that night, it's him, Tomura, Spinner, Toga, and Jin, and they all agree to a max spending cap of five thousand yen. Whoever comes back with the most prizes wins will get to pick where they go for dinner, and whoever has the least will be the assigned pack mule for the night. Dabi's spirits are slightly cheered by the fact that Jin says he's never played either. They get to the building and find two floors of the crane games, and Dabi immediately regrets what they've signed up for. They change their bills to coins and he and Tomura break off from the others to go down the rows, looking for any prizes that they might like. 

"Here, you should try this one, firefly." Tomura settles him in front of the game, the prize for which is a rabbit that is designed to look like a strawberry mochi. It's a standard claw game and Dabi at least knows how it works in theory, and Tomura shows him the controls. "This machine always grabs tighter after the third coin, so just try to get it into a good place before then." 

Dabi puts in his coin, "How often do you two come here?" 

Tomura guides his hands on the controls as the game starts, "Whenever we have to decide who's doing laundry or if I want the apartment for the weekend." 

"Yeah, how many times have you kicked him out for the weekend?" 

The question gets him a kiss against the back of his neck. "The only time that matters is this one, because when I win, we're going to your favorite soba place, dropping the others off at karaoke, and then you and I are going back to the apartment, and I'm going to fuck you in the tub the way you always want to until you're boiling the water." In his defense, their apartment is massive and the tub is no exception. 

"You are a terrible roommate and the only man on the fucking planet who is excited over the thought of getting third degree burns on his dick." Dabi lets Tomura guide his hand so that he positions the claw above the stuffed animal. He hits the button to lower it when it's in place and the machine whirrs. The claw closes around the bunny's soft body, but only carries it about an inch towards the prize drop before it slips out from the pincers. 

"A good boyfriend though." He gives Dabi a kiss on the cheek and puts in one of his own coins so that Dabi can try again. 

He gets lucky, and manages to get it up to the plastic partition in the machine, and the rabbit bounces against it and into the hole. Dabi is absolutely not expecting the rush of joy that he gets seeing it drop inside and realizing that he won something. 

"Perfect, firefly!" Tomura praises, giving him another kiss before letting Dabi reach into the slot to take the toy out. It's soft as a kitten, but it does have a plasticky smell to it that he hopes will go away. 

"Yeah, well, it'll be more impressive when I manage to do it on my own. Go make sure that you can deliver a good weekend." 

Tomura smiles and Dabi accepts the peck that he gets before he parts, saying, "If you're struggling at a machine, you can ask the staff to reset it, you can only win one of the big plushies per machine, and there are bags by the coin exchange if you need them to carry things. I'll stay on this floor until you're ready to go upstairs, just come find me when you're ready." 

"Okay," he lets the other leave and picks up his coin cup. Tomura moves down the row and turns a corner, disappearing, he's guessing to go to his favorite machines. He turns and starts to look at the other machines, other versions of claws, ones where he thinks he has to pull on the plastic tabs that have been attached to boxes, trying to find any that look interesting. It's a total waste of his coins, but he sees a box of assorted chocolates that he knows Tomura will hate, and that Toga will love, and he immediately stops at that machine and feeds it a coin. 

It takes him ten tries before he actually gets the box to fall into the slot, and after it does, he doesn't get that same flicker of happiness that he was before. Because that flicker has been fighting its way through his doubt since the first night that they spent together. Tomura likes him, he's good to him, but it's hard not to notice that he's going to make something of himself. He's going to be a proper pro at some point, probably some point soon, and he's going to graduate college, and then he's going to be able to get whatever job he wants after he has his esports career, if he doesn't make enough money to retire on it. Dabi isn't going anywhere. He is incredibly grateful for what he has, but he's not going to make more of himself than a barista and a self-taught pastry chef. He's lucky he even became that. He's not going to get any prettier either. When they go out, he still has people see his face and gasp, or turn away from him and whisper. He still gets stopped by cops when he's just going to the grocery store because they think he looks like a criminal. 

He's always going to be the person who doesn't fit in, who scares people, who is too prickly to make them feel comfortable. He's never going to be as smart as them, won't ever be able to afford to go back to school even if he wanted to, and he's never going to have a lot. He's been happy with what he's had so far, he's been happy with how things worked out when he didn't think he would ever get anywhere near any of this. Dabi knows that his job at Last Drop isn't going anywhere. He would have to fuck up astronomically for Atsuhiro to fire him, and they're not about to go under or anything. He knows that Magne, Jin, and Atsuhiro are his friends first and foremost, and even if things fall apart with Shigaraki, they aren't going to abandon him, while Toga might have to pick between them and her old friends. He knows he has enough money squirreled away that he won't end up homeless again if something unforeseen happens. 

But he doesn't know how he's supposed to handle the fact that Tomura could choose to leave him as soon as he realizes that Dabi isn't worth his time. That he's just going to weigh him down, smearing soot all over the bright future that is stretching out in front of him. He's never been in the position before where he had to decide if he was going to give up on something instead of waiting for it to end, but neither option makes him feel particularly good. 

Dabi's fingers hit cool plastic and he blinks, looking down at his coin cup. Two hundred yen left. He didn't mean to do that, absolutely didn't mean to wander around playing game after game as his mind whirled. Definitely lost. It feels like a horrible signpost from fate that he's going to lose Tomura too, even though he wants so badly, and so selfishly to keep him all for himself. He looks around for a single machine that he thinks that he might be able to get at least one thing out of, desperate to hold on for a chance--

"There you are," Tomura comes up to him, one hand with two large bags of prizes hanging off of it. "Are you ready to head upstairs?" 

"Uh, yeah," he feels his face heat, his stomach in knots. "I'm almost out-- guess you made this look way easier than it was." 

Tomura just smiles, "It takes practice. Besides, you have two things? So does Jin, last I saw. Toga's only got four. She wasted all her money trying to get a My Melody strawberry plush for some girl she's got a crush on." He looks into his coin cup and then whispers to him, "Let's sneak upstairs before the others notice. The gotcha games are up there, and you can get at least one more prize and beat Jin." 

"Okay." His chest hurts. He doesn't want to lose this. They go upstairs and Tomura shows him the line of gotchas that range from one hundred yen to play to two thousand. He can play two of the games and come out with the same amount as Toga, but he's still leagues behind Tomura. He's always going to be behind him, weighing him down. 

He looks along the row and finds one that costs two hundred yen to play. He should just get this over with. It's a mystery gotcha that says that it's stocked with classic arcade items like sticky hands and novelty erasers, to 'higher end' prizes like headphones, fidget toys, and possibly a voucher to play one of the expensive game machines. He puts in his coins and cranks the wheel, listening to the capsules inside shift around. One drops into the slot and he grabs it. It rattles in the capsule so he figures that it's not the voucher and pops it open. On top of the prize is a little piece of paper that shows it's an insect shaped phone charm, and that he could have won a grasshopper, cicada, rollie pollie, butterfly, or... firefly. Dabi isn't expecting the way that makes his heart start to race as he picks up the black plastic pouch the charm was stored in and tears it open. 

He doesn't know why he feels like he might cry for the first time in years when he sees the little black body, its wings spread open to show its yellow butt, which the paper says will glow in the dark. But Dabi has to take a second to figure out how to compose himself before he turns to find Tomura. The other man hasn't gone far, staying in the row of machines that Dabi will have a clear line of sight to. He sees him bend down to pick up his new prize and Dabi thinks about just... leaving. He could go first, and then it will be his fault in a more direct way when this all falls apart. Everyone will be mad at him for being a dick, and they won't ask him why he can't just let himself be happy for as long as he can hold on to this. 

But Tomura turns around and immediately spots him and smiles. It's such a good smile. It lights him up from the inside out. Dabi doesn't want to ruin that for him, not now. He can wait. He'll let Tomura shatter his heart into pieces if it means he doesn't have to break his instead. His boyfriend comes over to him, "What did you get?" 

"Here, you can have it," He says before he can reboot his brain to say anything smarter than that. 

His heart fucking breaks a lot sooner than expected when Tomura takes the charm out of his hand and laughs. "Oh, firefly, that's perfect. I got you something too." It's a miracle he reaches into his bags, digging down towards the bottom, taking his eyes off of him as Dabi has to blink back the slightly red mistiness in his eyes from how in his head he's gotten over the past... however long they've been here. "Something so that you can keep me close even when we're apart." He pulls out a little moth plush, just big enough to fit in his palm with a fake fur ruff around its neck, big red eyes, and soft flappy wings on either side of its body. His chest warms and takes it. 

"Thanks, Duster." 

Tomura puts the charm on his phone, and then pulls him close for a kiss. 

"If it comes down between Spinner tying with you, or me and Jin tying, tell them you got the charm too. I want to take a bath in the tub the two of you are fucking wasting." Tomura laughs, 

"Very underhanded, firefly. Absolutely." Tomura still has five more coins, so he cranks through five of the one hundred yen gotchas since it's starting to get late, and they know at least two of the others are also already finished. 

He's wearing his gloves, always does when he's going to be in crowds where someone could bump into him outside of his control, and he puts the bags all on one arm so that he can lace their fingers together before they head back downstairs to find the others.

"If you guys come here so often, what do you do with all the prizes?" Dabi asks as he tries to pull himself out of the heavy doubts that have been clinging to him so violently all night. 

"Toga gets to pick through all of the plush to find ones she likes, then we donate the rest of them to a charity that gives them to kids in hospitals as a part of their 'buddy' program." 

"Oh, that's sweet." 

"Don't start thinking too highly of us, all of the figures and other stuff we take to a resale place and put that money towards our practice tournament prize. Whoever has the best score at the end of the month gets to spend it on whatever they want." 

Dabi snorts as they make it downstairs and spot their friends standing off to the side of the exit. Toga is beaming, holding her plush close to her chest, and Jin looks defeated. Spinner's bags look smaller than Tomura's but that doesn't mean much when the size of the prizes range from the capsules to plushies the size of Dabi's torso. They count up the prizes, Spinner and Tomura absolutely sweeping the rest of them with ten actual prizes and then Spinner snapping, 

"Oh fuck you! Gotchas don't count!" 

"We never said that." Tomura snarks right back, unwaveringly. It's an underhanded way to win, and Tomura doubles down, saying that he'll win something with four hundred yen if the money he spent on the capsules doesn't count. He manages to win the prize that pushes him over the edge with one coin, and then just because he is such a cocky asshole, he also wins a second one with the last three coins.

They go to get soba, ditch their friends at karaoke, and go back to Tomura's apartment.

When Dabi's curled up against his chest, looking at the firefly charm glowing away on the nightstand, and Tomura presses a kiss against his hair and murmurs,

"Love you, Dabi," He can't manage to make his throat work to say it back, but he holds onto him tighter, leans up to try and kiss him harder. He doesn't know how long he'll get to have this, any of the good things in his life. But Tomura is the best, and he is going to hold on for as long as he can and savor every second of it. 

Thank you so much for reading!

[kentuckyfriedmegumi]

i wrote an entire analysis on yuji's and megumi's parallels throughout the series

what i think is interesting regarding megumi's and yuji's characters and how they are made to foil each other is that we see from the beginning how their stories are intertwined. from their very first interactions we see them save each other and that sets off a catalyst in how they save each other throughout the series, which is both selflishy and impulsively.

like we see them act without thought, both acting for their own reasons for why they decide to save each other. yuji's selfishness is different than megumi's though, of course. we see him act in selflessness to the point that it becomes selflishness. he WILL sacrifice himself for the greater good, regardless of those around him that care for him, because he thinks that the only thing that matters for his life is that he saves as many people as he can. this comes from the "curse" placed on him by his grandfather.

however, with megumi's selfishness, it comes from his own desire to live by his standards that he's placed on the world in his own twisted view of life due to his upbringing and life as a sorcerer. megumi doesn't think that everyone deserves to live the way that tsumiki and yuji do, and that's why he admires them so much. but this also ties into his self-imagery issues and how he thinks that he doesn't deserve to walk alongside him. this is where his self-destructive ideas come into play where he thinks that everything is fine as long as he can use mahoraga to save the ones he loves because his life doesn't matter as much as others.

we see this foil/parallel (i know this is an oxymoron, but they ultimately have differing beliefs while still acting in a similar fashion) grow between them throughout the series as the save each other and understand the other's struggles. megumi sees that yuji has gone through something after he's revived in chapter 33:

megumi: “itadori, you okay?” yuuji: “well, it’s a big job but i should be fine.” megumi: “no, something happened, didn’t it?” yuuji: “huh, what are you talking about?”

megumi can tell that something has been/is bothering yuuji, even after his insistence that he’s fine at this point, megumi has lost and mourned yuji, while yuji has lost and is mourning junpei.

there's also the classic scene in chapter 63, after yasohachi bridge where they both realize that yuji being alive means that curses are killing more people:

megumi: “don’t tell him.” yuuji: “hey! don’t tell fushiguro. don’t you dare tell him”

this is another instance of them trying to save each other/carry the other's burden as they act as foils. they both feel they are at fault for the deaths and while megumi doesn't regret it ("i never once regretted saving you"), yuji acts in a way that he feels is deserving of his life (in that he wants to "earn" his life because megumi saved him and he doesn't want it to be for nothing)

then of course we get to shibuya and yuji has his moment of giving up and feeling that he is undeserving of living because of the lives sukuna killed. he has his conversation with todo and he is able to pick himself back up, but he still feels like he needs to make up for every life lost. we see the parallel with megumi here in 256 where he tells yuji that he wants to give up. we expect him to get up right away like yuji did back in shibuya, but sukuna cuts them off and megumi doesn't fight back.

then of course their dynamic comes full circle as they both talk in 266, where yuji is able to relate to megumi in his grief and loss and tells megumi that he understands why he's made his decision. what i think is really beautiful about this chapter is that we probably expected the convo to go similar to yuji's with todo, where it's like "i know you're down now, but we must prevail!!" type stuff. but we don't get that with megumi and yuji because they understand each other at a very basic core level. we see yuji give him the choice to live or die as he tells megumi that he accepts him either way.

yuji and megumi are like yin and yang. they have very different motivations, beliefs, and ideals, but they ultimately work together and find harmony in their differences. i think the way that gege has written the two of them and their characters is really cool and it's that very reason why i'm so miffed that we don't get to see a true conclusion to their dynamic as far as this last chapter goes. i would really REALLY like to see a final, good, emotional conversation between the two of them because they deserve it.

[l-in-the-light]

Why is Law more stressed, more serious and often grumpy and annoyed in Wano? Thought he would be relieved after Luffy defeated Deflamingo 🤔he couldn't even relax at the banquet 😑

Broody Law is actually my favourite Law, which means I enjoyed him so much in Wano ❤ But why is he delivering behaving like that, indeed? Let's summarize the Wano experience from his side, shall we?

his alliance with Strawhats gets sidetracked because Luffy went to Big Mom to retrieve Sanji. He barely avoided a conflict (not really)

he's stuck at Wano, worrying his ass off for Luffy, hoping he's not left with half of Strawhats crew to take care for forever now

everyone is dying of hunger and getting sick in Wano, because they can't stop drinking water from the polluted river

Luffy finally arrives, Bepo gets sick, Luffy in the meantime does The Worst Thing Possible and Law's efforts to patch up the situation do not work out

Luffy snaps and runs off to fight Kaido

Kaido bombs away Strawhats and Hearts crews while Luffy and Law are already near town and can't do shit about it

he fails to stop Luffy from fighting Kaido

he fails to stop Kaido from putting Luffy in prison

freaking Hawkins getting in his way

crews turn out to be fine, but freaking Kinemon soon leaves to find remaining Akazaya samurais. Now the whole raid plan and making sure it's not exposed is Law's job. On top of that, he needs to take care not only of his Heart Pirates, but also Strawhats, because their captain is in jail. Two crews, a raid plan and the weight of 20 years of revenge is all hanging on Law's neck.

freaking Germa (he's a Sora follower, ok)

he almost throws it all away when Hearts get put in prison

he's got accussed that his crew is crap and he should just kill them off, all that coming from his very own allies he's been taking care of for last couple of weeks!

freaking Hawkins again

getting tortured (just another monday morning amirite)

finding traitor and making sure the raid doesn't fail in the process. Is Luffy finally out of that prison, what is he doing there? Or maybe, that's for the best, he can't make the situation even worse...

Luffy arrives late to the raid and late to the rooftop battle

Luffy brought freaking Eustass Kid to the raid

Luffy is ordering him around in front of freaking Eustass Kid

Luffy tells him to get along with freaking Eustass Kid

Zoro-ya almost died on his watch

Kurashi-ya (literally) caught him in a middle of an embarrassing blunder

Eustass Kid is behaving like a newborn baby and Law has to babysit him

LUFFY BROUGHT FREAKING BIG MOM TOGETHER WITH HIM

now it's Law's job to fight Big Mom. He didn't sign up for this!

Luffy nearly drowned in the sea while fighting Kaido

Luffy lost and died while fighting Kaido

Luffy got revived and won against Kaido

Law had to make bigass room, bigger than anything he made in Dressrosa, probably cutting down on his lifespan in the process

Law has to take care of stuff no one cares about after the raid succeeds, which is taking care of the ships, searching for the poneglyphs (no one but him cared for that in the middle of the raid!) and probably patching many, many people up

he ends up stranded with Robin in some moldy underground chamber for hours, while being seriously exhausted, sleep deprived and in the middle of recovery from his injuries

he doesn't join in the banquet out of spite (no one told him about Jimbei joining the Strawhats. Is Law a joke to them?!), besides just in case a certain Luffy would assault him there, make him go all night long eating and playing around and celebrating, all the while probably bugging him to become a 100% part of the Strawhat crew or at least extend their alliance to together forever status.

And that's just the major things listed! I'm sure I missed some details here and there.

Overall, I think he was stressed and exhausted, because he was carrying a lot of responsibility (and the stakes were extremely high!), at certain points almost the whole raid plan's success was depending solely on him, while others merrily ignored the dangers. He also had two crews to take care of for the whole arc, constantly worried himself over Luffy, got pissed at Eustass Kid and had to cooperate with him (he hates that dude!), and at the end of it his world got almost turned upside down in worst possible way (Luffy dying and raid failing as the result, and the vision of all of them dying flashed before his eyes).

As Bepo reveals to us in the midst of Winner Island escape, Law wants to stay behind with his crew even if it kills him and needs to be reassured that no one is dying there. That suggests Law doesn't deal well with people close to him dying, which shouldn't surprise us after what happened in Flevance and later also to Cora-san. I'm sure Wano hit Law harder than we expect, because there he was, finally believing in people again (Luffy), only for Luffy to die on him as well. Old issues must have resurfaced and his fear of losing people worsened as the result.

I think we should cut him some slack, shouldn't we? Wano was definitely not a walk in the park for Law, especially psychologically-wise. Though to be fair, he could relax and laze around a bit, we see it happen, right before Strawhat Luffy waltzes into the country. That was the last time we saw him actually calm and resting, so I guess that alone gives us another answer to your question as well ;)

And then his alliance ended, and we know Law doesn't like dramatic things, which also means overly emotional goodbyes. It was probably pretty difficult for him to part ways and maybe he thought it would be easier if he avoided Luffy for most of the time after the raid finished. And then Chopper went and almost blew all his efforts up with his warm send-off! Law owes a lot to Strawhats and his debt is only getting bigger, but it won't change his withholding personality.

Did Law find peace after Mingo was defeated? Not exactly, because I don't believe Doflamingo was Law's end goal. Just take a look at his reaction when Luffy finally wins:

Everyone is crying and celebrating, but Law's face looks like this instead. Does this look like a face of a person who finally got rid of his demons and is set free? What about Flevance, are we forgetting that? Law has a lot on his plate, Mingo was simply one of the obstacles in his way (but an important one!). If you want to know more about what I think about Law's end goals, I wrote about it here: https://www.tumblr.com/l-in-the-light/761556630027616256 (the topic starts somewhere around the second picture). That's why I don't think he is at peace or that his revenge is over and we shouldn't expect him to completely "move on" or reach perfect closure just because Mingo is now out of the picture.

There's one exception though. I do believe Law is showing his emotions more openly after Dressrosa. And I think it's actually a sign of him healing and partially moving on.

Because just look at this. Law was always annoyed with his beloved Cora-san as well, and yet we never doubt he loved him dearly. In Wano Law is acting the same way towards the Strawhats, openly showing when he's annoyed and angry. That's how he shows affection and worry. Compare it to Punk Hazard, when he's always holding back, stoic and cold, keeping his comments and reactions to bare minimum. Dressrosa changed everything in Law's emotional department. And the result is that he did open up to his allies.

Also I feel like it's my duty to remind the world about this, often overlooked, fact: so far Law celebrated in the feast exactly one time, in Dressrosa. He didn't join in on Punk Hazard, Zou or Wano. So it's not really a "Wano thing", but more like Law almost always choosing other things over feasting ;) personally, I think it's because of that "30 minutes on festival" rule he had in his household as a child. He's probably not used to just playing around for hours. Besides, we should never underestimate Law's pettiness. Not joining the celebration might have been as well just a petty payback of his, for every offense that happened to him in Wano, lol.

I'm not sure if you liked my answer, anon, but I hope you at least smiled a bit when I tried to mimick Law's grumpiness in this post :D

[fae-morrigan]

Someone put a post (where they admit they straight up dont know these characters lol, and also spell damian as 'damien' so like. yknow.) in the tags saying that if you're a fan of Jon & Jay, you shouldn't buy super son. Well, as the crowned CEO of Jay & Jon, I'm here to tell you guys that you absolutely should.

Super Son did the amazing thing of hitting several marks that I predicted while still managing to surprise me in how they hit them. Which is high praise for any story: A great narrative should be able to both meet reasonable audience expectations (i.e, staying in character, setup payoff) WHILE STILL throwing in curveballs that tell you something new.

There's a lot I want to analyze and get into, namely how I think the rooftop conversation between Jon & Nia is really brilliantly done in what it says about both characters, but mainly I've been thinking a lot about how great those last few pages were and how I think Sina absolutely nails how Jon & Jay's specific issues interact with each other.

Jay's always been a blunt person. From their first meeting back in SOKE 2, hes said what he thinks, and rarely does he try and soften himself. More than that, his bluntness is often a shield from vulnerability, which Jay struggles with the whole scene. It makes total sense, after what hes experienced (re-traumatization at the hands of a friend) that he's displaying that trait again.

Jon, however, is immediately vulnerable. This is the most poignant confession of the issue: Not even in the amazing sequence of Nia helping him make a place in the darkness (look, its back, thanks isabel!) do we get this admission of fear.

And Jay, like always, embraces him. Sidenote, LOVE how they got in the thing Jon does where he's constantly tucking his face in people's shoulders during hugs.

But the moment ends, and we get here. First of all, cold af. I could feel the aura before I turned the page.

Second of all: Jay is totally valid in feeling this way. And it makes perfect sense that he would.

Sara was his everything. Getting her back was one of his main motivations in SOKE. Because of Nia's actions, she died horribly (do you know what happens to a person when they fall from that sort of height? I do. Its AWFUL.) for an unjust cause. Of course he's glad she can't hurt anyone else!

And that's when we get to my FAVORITE PART! Oh how I love this bit. Because like. You understand why Jon's angry- Its a harsh thing for Jay to say! Nia was the one who kept him sane while he was trapped in his own mind! But Jay, like always, is RIGHT: Jon DOESN'T get it. How could he?

Jon Kent will NEVER, ever, be put in this position. Out of universe, his parents are Clark Kent and Lois Lane. They'll ALWAYS come back. Hell, the fact they'll always come back is something Ma LITERALLY says to Jon in SOKE. He will never, ever have to know this pain.

In universe, Jon's a white american. Despite being queer, despite being an alien, he'll never know what its like to be this kind of collateral, delegated as pawns in a greater war for 'freedom'. That is what killed Sara at the end of the day: imperialism.

This next bit hurts my heart. Great job, guys!

For one: Jon claims he's not excusing the mistakes Nia made, but by downplaying it like this... yes he is. But did you catch that part? Right at the start of that bubble?

"I'm going to fight every day to make up for my own part in this."

That's where it clicked for me. Something I had been hoping for since Nicole first called them twin flames.

He's projecting.

Of COURSE he's defending Nia. Of COURSE he wants Jay to forgive her. It isn't just about the fact that she gave him support, it isn't just the dreams, its the fact that... well. If Jay can't forgive her... how could he EVER forgive HIM?

THIS is where the fact that Jon and Nia are so similar as character SINGS. They become mirrors to each other, evaluating their own self worth through the other, at the unintentional expense of the people they've hurt.

Jay's right, though. Again. Its almost like he's the embodiment of the truth or something. He doesn't HAVE to do anything.

When he starts crying though, I immediately was RUINED. This is the first time we have EVER seen him cry before during his entire existence of a character. And its not really even because his mom is dead (though yes, that) and its not even because of the argument. Its because Jay fundamentally wants to be understood, and he's not getting that.

Which is important for the next bit:

I want to first backtrack a bit to Son of Kal El again, specifically, issue fourteen, right here.

Hello, two-panel sequence that succinctly describes these two as characters. How convenient you are for me, a guy analyzing a work that isn't written prose.

Jon isn't good at letting go, for better or for worse. The things he cares about stay with him, and when something or someone tries to exit his life, he clings to them with all his might.

Jay however, both selflessly and selfishly, is willing to let go first if he thinks its better for the other person. To me this line so effortlessly summarizes who Jay is- he's a person who's accustomed to not having things, and will leave before it hurts and he gets too attached.

And that thought is ALL over this scene. Jay, who begins to let go, Jon, who both literally and physically CLINGS to jay, practically begging him to stay.

(Sidenote. This is like, the third time Jay mentions breaking up when Jon starts acting up. Good for you king, keep that white boy on his toes, let him know he ain't all that.)

Every little detail of this four panel sequence is killing me. "My worst nightmare is not having a home with you in it." His greatest desire. The thing that kept tipping him off in every fake reality Nia constructed for him- Jay's absence. Him wiping the tear of Jay's cheek. Jay walking away from him.

But what really gets me is how on this page, Jon talks about them as 'we', while Jay is firmly stuck in 'I.'

This is what made me LOSE MY MARBLES at three in the morning. Just utterly fucking off my rocker in a straightjacket talking to myself.

Because this is what JON wants. But is it what JAY wants?

Jon never asks.

What about what Jay fears? What about the life that HE wants? What if he doesn't want San Francisco? What if the life he wants is the life he HAD before everything went wrong? Jon outright says he wants a fresh start. But Jay, Jay's someone with such deep connections to what he just lost, what he likely WANTS to get back. His country. His mother. His sense of self. But. He says yes.

(Sidenote. FIRST I LOVE YOU WOOOOOOOOOO) To quote my buddy Dami: Oh, the drama of needing a future with someone who can't get over the past.

It is left unclear, by the end, whether or not Jay is saying yes to this because he genuinely wants to, or if he's only saying yes because he doesn't want to lose Jon, too. Jon doesn't stop to question whether or not Jay's only reaching after him because Jon's walking away. We, the audience, are left to ponder that for ourselves.

How much of Jay saying yes is him just accepting that this is the best he's going to get? That he's never going to be understood because nobody wants to understand?

He's an afterthought to Nia, an obstacle at best, and to Jon he's a particularly handsome prop in this little fantasy he has of running away and starting new. He's either not thought of at all, or when he is thought about, it's in the context of how he can emotionally fulfill the other person And you get why Jon did this. He's desperate, he's hurting, he just got tangible evidence that the time he has with the people he loves isn't ever guaranteed. He's been needing space from Clark and Lois for MONTHS because god knows they haven't been fulfilling his emotional needs. In a very real sense, Jay is who he has.

But wanting someone to stay with you so much that you'll... Not even ignore, but just not ever consider what they may want. The intentional isolation, moving halfway across the country away from all support systems. The need to cling to someone.

It reminds me of... something. Someone.

Don't tell Jon I made this comparison. He'll kill himself. Jon and Ultraman ARE similar. They're both such deeply lonely people who cling very tightly and even though it manifests in different ways and even though they have different core thoughts about it. The effect at the end of the day is the same, isn't it?

Is loving Jay not a brutal act of destruction?

There's so many more details about this story I love. Jon & Nia's conversation being vague enough that you have no idea how Jon meant what he told her but you KNOW how NIA took it (girl you can do better hes literally ugly!). Jon breaking a pillar by bonking his head against it (LMFAO). The pretty lies vs ugly truth dichotomy of Jay vs Nia here.

But this one scene, man. This one fucking scene takes the cake. STELLAR work all around. Every panel counts.

This better lead into a full Superman & Gossamer run or SOMETHING or I'm going to have WORDS with DC's editorial staff.

[vidavalor]

Lesley and Maud

@drconstellation wrote a really interesting meta about our favorite International Express Package Dude that got my brain humming about him and his wife. What can they tell us about Crowley & Aziraphale and the story as a whole?

As the good doctor's above meta points out, Lesley is not the type to question, well... basically anything. While he is a likable character and we root for him to survive and keep living what seems like his nice and peaceful life with his sweet wife, he is also one of the most exasperating characters in Good Omens because what starts out seeming like just his devotion to his job turns out to be a lack of questioning on such a level as to directly be the cause of his death and the enabling of Armageddon.

We initially might admire Lesley's devotion to extracting a sense of self from his job. While we think he's maybe working a bit too hard and while we know what packages he's going to be delivering and so want him to just go back to bed and be safe with his wife, it's hard to hate a man who sees his duty as service to others. The world really does need people who will, for the most part, just deliver packages without asking what's in them or questioning the process because they are upholding the privacy, dignity and freedom of others in doing so. They are helping others to live their lives so these people deserve respect for what they do. On the one hand, Lesley not asking details regarding the packages seems like a way of not seeing it as his business which, well... fair. It's not his business.

It's just that Lesley takes this way, way too far... past a point of reasonable behavior because, at some point, questions need to be asked, if only for preserving safety for yourself or others.

As his story continues, we increasingly are silently begging Lesley to question something, anything about these packages he's been assigned to deliver on this Saturday morning, instead of just doing it. We need him to stop because he's further triggering Armageddon with each delivery he makes, right? We also just care about him and it becomes evident that this man has zero self-preservation skills. He delivers a package to a group of people armed to the teeth. Most chilling, he doesn't seem to think twice about the fact that he doesn't have to deliver a message to Death if he doesn't actually want to.

What's so unnerving about Lesley, though, is that while we can appreciate the idea that he doesn't get involved with whatever is happening when he's delivering these packages, his lack of interest in them is symbolizing the fact that he is just a profoundly incurious person. His story seems to be asking the question of at what point that becomes a moral failing.

On the one hand, a definition of freedom could include someone's right to not care about how others live. The problem with this is that everything and everyone is interconnected. We have a responsibility to one another and to the planet we are all sharing. At what point does inaction become a form of negative action? Lesley is different from other incurious characters in the series. He's not the Nazi Zombie Flesheaters, for instance, whose lack of imagination, curiosity, critical thinking skills and empathy lead them to believe them superior to others and to take action to oppress others. Greta, Glozier and Harmony are villainous because of those things but Lesley is subtly just as interesting a story along a similar theme.

No one, at first pass, would call Lesley a villain and he's definitely sympathetic at times but, mostly, he's pitiable. We feel kind of sorry for him. We definitely feel sorry for his wife, who at least questioned Lesley's lack of questioning and tried to look after him a bit. As Lesley's story continues, though, he becomes increasingly tragic. He just continues to do what he's been ordered to do, a cog in the machine, and even continues that after he dies doing it and comes back to life. Lesley isn't even terribly curious about all of that. He's just like whoa, what a day! to Crowley and Aziraphale-- two powerful, supernatural beings who are so mind-fucked by the events of the last day that they're drinking on a park bench and beginning the first of what we know will be a thousand conversations about What It All Means.

Lesley seems to be something of a nod towards the sheep mindset of religious fundamentalists and cult followers, etc. He doesn't think for himself. The question with his story is at what point does that go from being he's a sad and tragic character we feel a bit sorry for to he's that but he's actually also an antagonistic character because his actions-- or inactions, really-- are doing harm?

As Lesley approached Pollution with their package, God's narration gave us backstory on Lesley and Maud's relationship to the polluted river which Pollution was admiring. God tells us that the river never used to be polluted like this and that, back when it wasn't, Lesley and Maud would come to this park and walk and picnic and spoon and fork along the river. God's narration specifically says Lesley and Maud stopped coming to the river when it was polluted and, since the river is still polluted, is pointing out the fact that these two that had an emotional attachment to the river as part of the history of their love for one another have done nothing to change the state of their environment and are letting it worsen.

Lesley then doesn't counter Pollution's assessment of the environmental devastation as "beautiful," even when it's evident that Lesley disagrees with that statement. This is one of Lesley's only personal opinions that we are allowed to glimpse but, in seeing it, we actually can think a bit worse of him. How much of his time and effort would it take to do join others in doing something about the river? Not just even any river, but the one alongside which he courted the wife he loves?

He doesn't question enough, though, to see that he can. He's not curious enough about anything. He only blindly follows what he's been told to think and believe and do.

In this way, while Lesley is a deliverer, he's actually a parallel to-- but the exact opposite of-- our professional deliverer (professional midwife), Crowley.

Crowley's signature trait is his asking of questions. He does not blindly follow the directions of others the way that Lesley does. In the Job minisode that declares Crowley a deliverer, we know that his outfit is inspired by that of one of the Bible's most famous deliverers, Moses, in Cecil B. Demille's The Ten Commandments, as in the scene when Moses turns his staff into a serpent. Crowley's parallel of Jesus is the other big "deliverer from sin" in the Bible. In the "professional midwife" scene, Crowley literally delivers Sitis from evil by stopping her from cursing God.

Crowley's role in the series is around delivering people anew from their pain. He's a cobbler-- he repairs and re-pairs people. He plays Cupid with Maggie and Nina to help both of them live more fulfilling lives. He pairs Mr. Brown up with Mutt, knowing that Mr. Brown needs some kindness and human magic in his life. At other times, he's literally delivering something or someone-- the antichrist baby in the picnic basket. Black market alcohol to The Windmill.

In addition to this, he's a deliverer in the rescuer sense. He comes to people's emotional rescue and, with Aziraphale, that and sometimes his literal rescue.

So, while Crowley is a more expansive definition of a deliverer, Lesley is paralleling him in a much more basic sort of way-- he delivers packages-- and contrasting Crowley as he parallels him, in that Lesley doesn't ask questions.

Let's bring in some word stuff and look at Lesley's name and that of his wife's for a moment...

Lesley's name is, structurally, the same as Crowley's and is also a gender-neutral name, which pairs well with Crowley. Additionally, the first part of his name-- les-- is both French for a plural sense of the & them... The Them... and also derogatory/occasionally reclaimed throughout history slang for a lesbian. So, yes, Crowley-esque already but the actual definition of Lesley is even more so.

Lesley is thought to come from the Gaelic leas celyn, which means holly garden. A garden for the Serpent of Eden who is a gardener, yes, but the holly is even more important. Holly is a red berry-- a Crowley-colored fruit-- that is synonymous with Christmas, the holiday around the birth of Crowley's other contrasting parallel, Jesus. Additionally, holly shares etymological roots with Hell... so, there's both Heaven and Hell in this.

Then, there's Lesley's wife, Maud. Maud is a name in its own right as well as being a nickname of the name from which it is derived, which is Mathilde. Mathilde means mighty in battle.

Let's talk about why that's perfect for a character who predominantly parallels Aziraphale, as there is perhaps not a word that describes Aziraphale better than the mighty might.

On the one hand, when we talk about might, we talk about strength. We use it in terms of describing raw power-- "the might of NATO's collective armed forces", say, or "she pulled open the door using all her might."

On the other hand, as the other tense of the word may, it's a polite word about possibility and permission. This word that means strong and force not to be reckoned with is also a word of consent.

You'd be hard-pressed to find a word more Aziraphale than that.

It would appear that Crowley agrees because several scenes suggest that they are using might as descriptive for Aziraphale in their wordplay. One would imagine Crowley would find it hard to resist not just because of the perfectly Aziraphaleness of the word but also for the sake of blasphemy because what do people call God?

The Almighty. 😉

Additionally, might has a homophone of mite, another insect for the bees/flies/ants/murder hornets figurative language fiesta. The dust mite does seem good for antiquarian bookseller Aziraphale. The word mite is also in the action of the righteous angel that also means to strike down with love and infatuation-- to smite.

Gabriel smiting the dust mites 🤭

But let's factor in the 'battle' part of this meaning as well. There are two ways to read "mighty in battle" and they are both correct when applied to Aziraphale.

One is that Aziraphale is "mighty in battle" in the sense that he has to do a lot of battling. A battle is not just a clash in a war where war is large-scale military conflict but an internal battle. It's battling your own inner demons. Aziraphale is "mighty in battle" in the sense that he has has to fight through a lot but he is also "mighty in battle" in the other way to take the phrase-- he is mighty (strong) in battle. He's full of inner strength that helps him to get through those battles. This is also perfectly Aziraphale because mental health struggles are not weakness and Aziraphale is a character who exemplifies that very well. He has times when he doesn't feel very strong but he is overall a strong person, as are so many who struggle. He's mighty in battle.

Additionally, there's that if you break down Maud a bit, you get mau, which is a form of cat. Her name is a kind of cat and she calls Lesley "tiger."

As @jotun-philosopher has been looking at, Crowley and Aziraphale have a thing about lions. Crowley's desk chair in S1 and Aziraphale's signet ring are lions. It's probably tied to the two of them watching Adam kill the lion from the wall in Eden. While Maud and Lesley are using tigers, Crowley and Aziraphale are using the parallel lions, and both are types of big cats.

From a language perspective, cats are fun animal parallels because they're gender-neutral. While cats have a history of feminine-associations-- see: common, cat-related euphemisms for a vagina, for starters-- jazz-era slang used cat for masculine-presenting beings just as much. A cat in that context was a man who was cool-- a real hep cat.

When Shadwell asks Crowley in 1967 if he is "a witch or warlock or someone who calls his cat funny names", Crowley responded by saying: "Not a witch. No pets." One of the end results there is that Crowley said he didn't have any pets (which is kind of a lie, as he has The Plants lol) but he never says that he doesn't have a cat, does he? He doesn't have a cat in the pet sense but he has one in the person sense and they absolutely call each other "funny names"-- in the punny, pet name sense, not in a witchy sense.

So, anyway, lots of paralleling big cats. Lions and tigers (and bears somewhere, I'm sure, oh my!).

Ok, so, Lesley and Maud are very Crowley and Aziraphale and what can the brief glimpse of their relationship maybe tell us about Crowley and Aziraphale's?

There's a lot here in the scene with Maud. Have a look at the colors in it to start. Their bedroom is white (Aziraphale) and shades of a silvery, light grey (Crowley). Aziraphale's sweater that he wears in the bookshop is basically the same color as Maud and Lesley's sheets.

It's the burst of brighter color here, though, that really stands out and that is Maud's night clothes.

That is an orangey-pink color-- it's a coral pink or a salmon pink. It's a pink of the sea. Over here, I went on about the use of shades of pink-- the color of love, romance and health-- in the series, as well as fish-and-the-sea as Crowley and Aziraphale's figurative language for sex. Maud and Lesley's bedroom is a mix of Crowley and Aziraphale colors, offset by a color symbolic of a healthy romantic life. In this way, they don't differ from Crowley and Aziraphale, but their circumstances in this same scene show where they do.

The scene that introduces these two to parallel Crowley and Aziraphale is centered around Lesley and Maud in their version of the one room in the bookshop we still haven't yet been in but which has been alluded to in other ways-- their bedroom. The scene is centered around Maud waking up in bed while Lesley is leaving to go make his deliveries. Just by knowing Crowley and Aziraphale, we can see where they would differ from Lesley and Maud in a parallel situation to this scene.

The first difference is that this is an unusual occurrence for Maud and Lesley. Maud is used to having her partner in bed with her on Saturday mornings. She is surprised that he is up and going to work. She will miss him and wishes he doesn't have to go but she also isn't too concerned about him because, in their world, she does not have to be.

During this scene, the audience is actually a bit more worried about Lesley than Maud (or Lesley) are because we already have enough context to be able to assume that we're meeting Lesley because he's the guy who is going to go deliver the stuff to summon The Four Horsepeople of the Apocalypse. We're all hey, nice guy, maybe you should stay in bed with your wife. Just call in sick, man. What's coming up for you will absolutely not be worth it! It makes sense, though, that Lesley and Maud don't feel that same level of threat because, while there is some risk to delivering packages, most days Lesley is just dropping off people's new stuff from the internet. This man delivers blenders and socks and books and stuff. Maud is sure he'll be fine and home by dinner.

Now, compare that to Crowley and Aziraphale...

Crowley and Aziraphale would love to live like Lesley and Maud. To get married and share a little place somewhere together and not park The Bentley streets away and to still be snuggling in bed when the sun comes up in the morning without worrying that they're going to get caught and be killed. In their world, it's not a rare thing for Crowley to be slipping out of bed before sunrise as that's the norm.

There is a lot to suggest that "the rules" of their relationship to which Aziraphale is referring in Lockdown are basically that it's too dangerous for Crowley to stay the night and that he leaves the bookshop before the sun comes up to keep them from being caught. In other posts, some of us have also talked about the idea that slipping out the side door of the bookshop is how Crowley became friendly with Mrs. Sandwich and looked at things like Crowley parking The Bentley away from the shop in different scenes, especially when he's staying into the night in 2008 in 1.01.

The "no nightingale" scene from Romeo & Juliet being Romeo sneaking out of Juliet's bed before dawn. The "no nightlife" dream:

"Dining at the Ritz" also has a secondary meaning related to this. While dining today means eating any type of snack or meal at any time of the day, it didn't originally mean that. It once only referred to eating breakfast. The Ritz is homophonic for "the writs." Writs are written works. "Dining at The Ritz" means dining at The Ritz but it also means something that Crowley and Aziraphale still have not yet done that we've seen-- having breakfast in the bookshop.

Meanwhile, Aziraphale would kill to live with Maud's sense of surety that her husband will return after he leaves. S2, in particular, gets into Aziraphale's trauma from once having Crowley disappeared to Hell in front of him. Living as a demon is a lot more dangerous for Crowley than delivering packages is for Lesley and Aziraphale worries every time Crowley leaves that he might not come back, to a point that Crowley is shown reassuring Aziraphale that he'll return, something it's doubtful he's saying in the scene below for the first time.

But something of note here, too, is that while this scene that introduces Lesley and Maud starts off with pretty clear Crowley = Lesley and Aziraphale = Maud paralleling, Crowley and Aziraphale mirror one another and basically all pairs of characters in the series are mixed parallels of both of them. This is true of even some parallels where one character seems to skew pretty heavily towards one character over the other, like Anathema and Newt, as well as ones that are shown to be pretty well-mixed parallels, like Maggie and Nina in S2 or Gabriel and Beez. So, where do Lesley and Maud start to flip parallels a bit?

It's in when Lesley delivers his last package-- the message to Death-- and then the Lesley = Aziraphale holds through the end of S1, setting up Aziraphale mirroring some Lesley in S2.

Lesley sees what he is to deliver to Death and, again, doesn't ask questions (FFS LESLEY lol) but when he feels he's trapped by the package he must deliver, what does he do? He writes a note for his wife and leaves it on the dash of his truck. The note is simple and to the point. It just reads: I love you, Maud.

Its mirror scene? Aziraphale having The Bentley play Crowley "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square."

Suddenly, we have a whole different tone to Lesley's story happening-- just as the end of S2 expanded to show us a whole different tone to Aziraphale's. Suddenly, the suicide ideation that smashes up at the end of a certain short story about S2's beloved bananafish feels at play here in these stories as well.

Maybe Lesley was never quite as okay as he seemed and that's why he was willing to leave his wife a note and deliver a package to Death. Maybe he didn't exactly mean to die but he also never saw himself as an individual enough to question a directive that would lead to his death. Maybe, contrasting Lesley, there's Aziraphale in S2, going around the neighborhood with his Lesley-like clipboard and giving away his possessions, delivering his own end times, it not yet clear that he's pushing himself too fast too quickly and is headed for a breakdown.

Lesley and Aziraphale are both the only characters to see Death appear in front of them in the series so far and a fall is a kind of death. Lesley is one of the only characters in the series to actually die and he's basically S1's version of The Second Coming already, as he comes back to life when Adam resets reality. Lesley's story is tied to The Final 15 more than we might realize though we likely have to wait until S3 to see it all play out.

Lesley is still on the clock after coming back to life lol. He has learned exactly nothing from this. Him living is somehow as much of a tragedy as if he had died because what happened to him does not appear to have really affected him much and he is still just carrying on, doing the job that is his entire identity. He's picking up a box from two random dudes on a bench in front of a church all wow, what a day, huh! Like, dude... go the fuck home to your wife. You died. Take the evening off. Why the hell are you still at work?!

In this way, he's the complete opposite of both Crowley and Aziraphale, really, as both of them ask enough questions that, even at their worst, they'll never be masking a lack of a sense of self through a false sense of purpose as much as Lesley is.

Whatever else of his story Crowley and Aziraphale wind up mirroring won't be exactly the same but the paralleling stories also meeting a bit for the first time at the end of S1, when Lesley picks up the box, is quite sweet, in that it's not even really the box so much that ties the stories together but the mention of the absent Maud.

Lesley tells the main characters whose story he's crossed into that, if he were to tell his wife what happened to him that day, she wouldn't believe him, right? It's what he says before walking away with the box, leaving us with thoughts of Maud. As Lesley's story finishes in the season, so too does the parallel, and we get to the heart of it through the mention of Lesley's wife, as that is then what causes Aziraphale to look at Crowley with thoughtful fondness. It is taking the spousal parallel the audience sees and showing the characters themselves seeing it, too, as Aziraphale thinks about how he doesn't have to worry that his wife won't believe him today because she's been through it all with him.

Lesley and Maud began in the story seeming to be living the kind of life that Crowley and Aziraphale would love to have for themselves-- and there are elements of that life that Crowley and Aziraphale really would love to have. They're dying for their cottage and some cozy mornings of domestic fluff. What the story winds up showing us, though, is that Crowley and Aziraphale, individually and together, are much more free-thinking than Lesley and that they know one another so much better than Lesley and Maud do. While Lesley and Maud may have a marriage licence and the ability to be in bed together at dawn, they aren't sharing their lives and living a curious, free-thinking one together in the way that Crowley and Aziraphale already do.

[cuckaracha]

Ohhh please give Ace opinions. I love seeing people yap about Ace

With pleasure ^_^!

V spoilers talk! V

Most of my opinions were revealed to be sort of true on the last episode so it wouldn't surprise me if this is one-to-one what everyone believes now: Ace to me seems like an extremely love starved person, like, its so painfully obvious that he's faced some sort of neglect in his life. So much so to the point that he keeps himself guarded all the time to avoid falling for the trap of liking someone and then they immediately turn on him. Hence what he said to Levi during the trial. Ace is feels too much. He's well aware of his surroundings and how shitty he acts, but if he doesn't feel anger or fear, the loneliness kicks in. It's a toxic cycle of self-hatred, low self-esteem and cynicism. Though I do believe that it's mostly the situation making his bad habits shine more brightly, because during the prologue/chapter1, Ace is kind of just a bratty jock. He cracks jokes, he hangs out with everyone and he seems to not be plagued as much by his fear unless you breach the topic.

Hence why I personally think that there's no other person like Levi to be used as foil for him. Regardless of how you think on their relationship, be it romantic or platonic or whatever, it's nothing new that their attitudes clash so much, it comes back around to them covering each other's weakness very well. A little guy that feels to much and is scared of giving out of fear of being hurt, and a big guy that feels too little that gives to others out of necessity. So when taken to their natural extreme, they would very obviously have problems, specially under the circumstances that they're both in. Ace, tragically believing the one thing he knew he shouldn't have, and Levi hopelessly attempting to fix what he inadvertently broke. It's peak toxic yaoi imo.

(which also, at least in my opinion, makes Levi the one true Ace lover. None of the other boys have as much of their nuance intrinsically mangle with Ace's as him. But again, that's just me. Ship this little freak with however boy you want. Fuck it. Make him a slut even.)

The other thing that has popped in my mind a lot is his family situation. I know with my take of his family, he's like a middle child or whatever, but that was just me wanting to be contrarian to the obvious, more solid interpretation of Ace being the eldest of the 9 brothers. Because when you think about, him being forced into jockeying by his family to maintain them economically makes sense. He hates it, but if he doesn't do it, he'll be the loser everyone knows him to be. He'd be disposed of by his family, believing that they only care about him for his talent and the money that comes from it. And if he doesn't do it, the job might fall to one of his younger siblings. Something he can't morally do. Because as much of a stupid little shithead as he is, he's not an idiot. Ace knows what's right and what's wrong. He understands the cruelty of the world to an extent. And as such. He's forced into being the breadmaker for his big ass family until the day he either retires or dies.

All this to say. I love Ace Markey. He's such a silly little goofball full of depression and anxiety that is one fart away from going insane. Like I haven't even touched on my thoughts on Taylor (which I also got right on my earlier theory) and how that affects the Ace economy. I relate so much to this guy it's fucking unreal. I don't think I've ever hyperfixated on a character this much. Like. So much so that I even got a fucking custom plushie made out of him and am constantly drawing him.

Anyways thanks for listening to my old man ramble, have an Ace my friend Fennex made.