#best time to visit South Africa

[travelernight]

South Africa’s Winelands: Experiencing the Best Vines and Views

[lionheartlr]

Discover Bolivia: Your Ultimate Travel Guide

A Glimpse into Bolivia’s Rich History Bolivia, a landlocked country in South America, boasts a diverse and rich history. It was originally inhabited by ancient civilizations, including the Tiwanaku and the Inca Empire. Spanish conquistadors arrived in the 16th century, leading to centuries of colonial rule. Bolivia gained independence in 1825 but has since experienced a turbulent political…

[mossandfog]

A Traveller's Guide to South African Wildlife

South Africa is home to an abundance of breathtaking landscapes, distinct cultures and unique flora and fauna. Any trip to the country is bound to involve crossing paths with nature – encountering all different kinds of wildlife along the way. From rhinos and elephants to leopards and lions, these remarkable animals are sure to make your trip memorable. In order to make the most of your wildlife…

[bitchinbarzal]

Always Our Daughter | N Hischier

summary; even after you split, his mom will always consider you her daughter.

-

In all of your time with Nico, you’d always been close to his mother. Katja had treated you like a second daughter from the moment Nico had brought you home.

So when you split up she was heartbroken. You felt sorry to be loosing a second family but you knew this was best for you both.

Nina reached out a few times to check on you but they all went radio silent for a few weeks until you got a text from his mom.

hi sweetheart, just checking in! you’ve been busy! it’s been so strange not having you around, we’re so proud of you! Please reach out if you ever need anything — you’ll always be our daughter.

It felt nice that she thought about you.

It was a little sad how you felt. You missed them.

Everything was changing; you’d moved out of your shared apartment in Hoboken and up to Buffalo for cheaper rent. Your mom had taken all of your belongings out of your shared home back in Bern.

She’d sent you a picture of the house almost completely empty, considering you’d bought the house together in the off season you were the only one who was able to stay in Switzerland to decorate and Nico didn’t get much of a say.

you moved! your mother showed us pictures of your new house, it’s gorgeous! please let us know if you’ll be visiting us on your trip back to Bern this Christmas, we miss you so much.

When you finally found a place you got to work making it yours, trying to make it home.

you’d never lived alone, constantly moving from rental to rental in Jersey to accommodate Nico’s lifestyle. Your first apartment was perfect and you’d considered buying it but as the internet does, fans had shared your address online and you then had to move a further seven times for the same reasons.

When you’d finally settled on your home in Bern you had planned to make it your own, you made countless Pinterest boards for each room.

You stayed up late nights in the bedroom, laying on the mattress on the floor holding one another while you spoke about all of the things you’d do to the house and all of the memories it would hold.

You spoke about how you’d get married in the garden, how you’d bring your children home here and how you’d decorate their nursery’s.

you went to South Africa?! how was it, sweetheart? you always said you wanted to go… I saw on facebook you’re dating someone new, is he nice? We’d love to meet him. miss you sweetheart.

When Nico had finally settled payment and given you your half of the money for the house you decided to go on vacation. A vacation you’d spoken about going on with Nico countless times but hadn’t gotten around to it.

On the plane you’d been sat next to a guy who you got chatting with. He told you he was headed to Johannesburg to do work, he worked with a non profit.

The two of you spent the entire flight chatting away, getting to know one another and before you parted ways at the airport you exchanged phone numbers with the promise to call when you got back to the US.

hi sweetheart, your mother told us you got a new job! Congratulations sweetheart you’ll be great.

After you’d gotten home and Alex called you, he showed you all the stuff he’d done in South Africa and you were enamoured with it and began complaining about your job and how you wanted to help more people.

Being the captains girlfriend in New Jersey meant you took lead on fundraisers and community events, you missed it.

So Alex told you about an event organiser position that was open in his company so you went for the interview and got it.

It felt nice to be helping make a difference again.

happy new year love. it was so nice to see you last week, congratulations to you and alex. you’re going to be an amazing mother, nobody deserves this more than you. can’t wait to meet this little one! don’t become a stranger please…. we love you! x

Things with Alex moved quickly. He moved into your apartment, the two of you settled into a routine and only a few months in you found out you were pregnant.

It was a massive shock and you were something bordering excited and disappointed. You liked Alex, truly you did and it was nice to be sharing your life with someone again but this was all a lot happening in such a short period of time.

Whenever you thought about having babies you always imagined them with brunette hair, Nico’s nose crinkle and his beautiful big eyes.

You called your mom and cried for a little bit, she tried her very best to soothe you. At one point you considered calling Nico, just wanting someone who would make you feel better.

it’s been a while! A little girl…. congratulations sweetheart, not long until she’s here. nico sends his well wishes, Nina shared your photos with him I hope you don’t mind. let us know if you got our gift in the mail.

A little girl.

You posted it on instagram, a heart shaped cake with pink icing inside with the caption ‘my sweet slice of heaven ☁️🩷’

Nico saw it, everyone saw it. They all tried avoiding the conversation in the locker room but Nina sent it straight to him ‘HAVE YOU SEEN THIS?!? THAT SHOULD BE YOURS!!!’

Things with Alex hadn’t been so smooth sailing, he’d been making off handed comments about your body and you guys had been arguing about finances, with the additional costs of a baby coming you were trying to be smart. That wasn’t something you’d ever had to worry about with Nico, he’d fight you to keep your credit card in your purse. He always said his money was the least he could give you for everything you’d ever given him.

oh sweetheart. claudia is just perfect. she looks exactly like you and she’s got the chubbiest little cheeks. your mom told us what’s happened the past few months, I’m so sorry sweetheart, someday someone will come into your lives for you both and change it for the best. one day claudia will know just how strong her mommy is. we’re always here to support you; we’re so glad you reconnected with nico. he’s been showing us all the pictures and videos you send him, we’re so excited to meet her someday. take care of yourself schatz, we’ll see you when you come home x

Claudia, the love of your life.

Your babygirl was born and she was perfect. Everyone said she looked like you which you were grateful for, not a reminder of Alex who had taken off just before she was born.

You freaked out when you went into labour, all alone with nobody to call so you called the only person you knew you could rely on.

He was by your side, holding your hand and whispering words of encouragement in your ear.

“I can’t do it! I can’t!”

“You can Schatz, you can. You’re so strong you can” you cried out in pain, squeezing his hand tighter.

He named her.

“Does she have a name?” He asks, stroking the little girls cheek.

“Alex wanted to call her Emma but I don’t like it” you scrunched your nose in discontent “My mom gave me a book of Swiss names but Alex wouldn’t even let me look at it he didn’t like-“

“How about Claudia?” He asks and your eyes go wide before you give a soft smile, remembering back to the first night in your house, holding one another while you said

“and our babies! if it’s a girl, Claudia and if it’s a boy I’d like to use Luca”

You nod, eyes full of tears “Claudia… hi babygirl”

Even after you’d gotten home and settled into life with your little girl you kept in contact with Nico. He asked for updates at least four times a day and you would FaceTime when he was on the road.

The devils last game of the season was against the sabres and you took Claudia to her first NHL game.

Nico found you both, standing next to the ice he waved to the baby through the plexi

“Hi, Chäferli!”

happy birthday to Claudia! we can’t wait to give her gift, we may have gone a little overboard but you can’t blame us… she’s our first grandbaby!! love you and we’ll see you three later at her party.

“Happy birthday Chäferli!” Nico shouted, peppering kisses all over the one year olds face as she sat in her high chair eating her cupcake delivered specially from the team.

Your camera shutter caught both of their attention, the two looking over at you with smiles and you shrugged “Capturing the memories”

Nico shakes his head, unclipping Claudia from her high chair and waltzing over to where you stood in the kitchen with your camera pushing the camera down from your face to kiss you softly

“Best day of our lives” he mumbled and you stroked Claudia’s cheek while nodding

“Our precious girl, you made this family”

[squeakintothevoid]

Exmormon thoughts on the Book of Mormon Musical:

The whole thing was spectacularly irreverent

*does some googling* oh its written by the creators of south park, that makes sense

The bright and cheery forced smiles of the missionaries are accurate

The set is amazing, with it looking like an lds temple and everything. The backdrop with the clouds and the planets even looks like the giant murals they have in the temple visitors centers

I love the salt lake city backdrop with the mormon temple right in the middle surrounded by the more obvious corporations like McDonald's and stuff. Did you know the LDS church owns a mall in the same city? It even has a little river going through it

The spooky mormon hell dream sequence was the best thing i've ever witnessed. Especially as somebody who really did get guilt-fueled nightmares, albeit not as theatrical and hellish lol

Seeing the cups of coffee dancing in hell alongside Jeffrey Dahmer and Adolf Hitler was the best, my favorite moment

The song about turning off your uncomfortable/unapproved thoughts was also amazing. The actual phrase commonly used is putting the thought "on your shelf" to set it aside to think about later. There's literally a song they teach to toddlers about never frowning because nobody likes it and making yourself smile instead.

Hearing people crack up about things you used to believe sucks but finally you are surrounded by people who agree that this is ridiculous rather than people who think you are the crazy one for doubting

Mormons don't actually think Jesus was blond but they do think he visited America and most of the art makes him look northern European

Mormons don't really believe in a traditional hell or that Jesus hates you for sinning, but the level of guilt is still the same. Like that might as well be the case because your eternal afterlife is still at stake.

The "I Am Africa" song is so on point. Missionaries go to a foreign country and really do start wearing their traditional clothes and keep speaking the language even after coming home as if they really are part of the culture now

I was not expecting to see punk rock Darth Vader or Yoda or lieutenant Uhura or Sam and Frodo.

When Elder Price said "fuck," that was a blessed moment

I'm so glad I never actually went on a mission and could only relate so much. But that dedication to following all the rules in the missionary handbook is REAL and not even as intense as they portrayed it at times. The religious scrupulosity OCD is like no other. Like it's not unheard of for a missionary to keep working on their mission even if their mom or someone died while they were away.

There are still so many weird things about growing up mormon that they didn't even touch on. Like heaven being an MLM, multiple levels and everything.

Thanks for the read, feel free to ask any questions if you're curious because I like complaining about mormonism lol

[casualwriterssideblog]

Dating Jude on the Outside be like

A/n requests are open for head cannons and moldboard/face claims etc <3

-When Jude and you left Love Island, the first thing you did was visit your guy's family. Of course, it was a long distance at first, but you both needed time to get back in the swing of things. 

-And oh my God, when you guys got back to normal, Jude was the first one to buy you a plane ticket to South Africa so you could visit his family. It wasn't just his family who wanted to meet you; it was also his rally car family too! You bet every day one of the Love Island episodes came out, Jude. Rally friends all came over to one of their houses and watched, supporting You both.

-This boy prayed and hoped they wouldn't tease him around you, but they were his best friends, and they worked together, so of course they did! They also loved and adored You thought you balanced Jude with his relaxed Demeter and you with that little spice.

-Jude would show you off to anyone; he was so proud to be your boyfriend. It was adorable. He would have his arm around your waist.

-He would never admit it, but he is possessive, but not in a crazy way. He will give one or two warnings before he finally does something, just like with Finn, when he gave him a warning.

-You moved in with Jude, and you bet your butt that when Hamish comes to South Africa for work or just to visit you two, he and Jude will stay up for hours, just talking and having the best bromance.

- One of the times Hamish spent the night over there, there was a smell. Was it burnt Bacon? Or was it just a dream walking to the kitchen and seeing Hamish freaking out about his burnt bacon? Jude was trying to hold in his laughter when you saw the half-drink bottle of whiskey. You were going to kill them both that night. You made both of them sleep in the living room because the two men were too heavy to get upstairs!!

- Alright Alright, he will always be nervous to have you in a rally car. It's not like you don't trust him to drive, but he will never want to hurt you if something goes wrong. But of course, you kept begging him, so he took you to the track. Of course, he made sure there was a rolling cage for protection. 

-Right there, he fell in love with you all over again, seeing you giggling in the cute gear and helmet you have to wear, enjoying the turns and speed he was going at.

- Any time you got overwhelmed with work or upset by some drama that was going on, he would always calm you down. He hugs you, running his fingers through your hair and whispering sweet things, of course, with jokes there and there. 

-You will always be his number one fan when he completes a rally race. You would be sitting there with his crew, watching from where you were. Of course you get scared for him. Rally races are dangerous and unpredictable, but you loved the rush of seeing Jude win, and when he did, you always ran over and jumped in his arms, saying how proud you are of him. Even if he won first place or got in last, it didn't matter. 

- When both of you want to relax and wind down from work and socializing, Jude has a vinyl player and puts one of the discs on. When you both dance or talk about your guys future together, 

-We also know the boy is the big spoon; he isn't that needy, but he always has his hand on your body, or when he feels extra needy, he is always the big spoon. 

-This man has so many pictures of you on his phone; it's just too cute to show you off again! He loves posting you on his social media, and when people ask if he has a girlfriend, he brings out his favorite selfie of you.

-He has always been romantic at heart, cliche rose petals and flowers every day. That is just his love language. 

- You both use nicknames; he uses babe, just the typical cliche nicknames. 

[winniemaywebber]

Honeysuckle Rose

masterlist

part two

“This is the Greater Anglia service to Bury st Edmunds. Calling at Diss, Ipswich, Elmswell, Thurston and Bury st Edmunds.” 

The familiar voice of the train announcer startles Olive awake, her head banging against the strong plastic window. She finds that, embarrassingly, she'd been drooling and she wipes her chin with disgust. Pulling out a compact mirror from her handbag, she takes stock of her bleary red eyes, flushed cheeks and swollen lips, groaning at her rough appearance. All this was the result of a hangover, due to a celebration of her leaving the city the night prior. She had known it was a mistake the second she had agreed to having a going away party the very night before moving back to her hometown. Unfortunately, her fuck around and find out nature had consequences yet again, the movement of the train causing her stomach to churn, her insides doing somersaults and a subtle belch leaving an aftertaste of cheap cider clinging to her tongue. 

The countryside whizzes past the window as the train picks up speed from its previous stop, Olive trying her best to avoid looking at it. Squeezing her eyes shut, she wishes to be anywhere but here - here on this train, moving back to her hometown after finding a job after drama school didn't work out, her parents being extremely blasé about what she would do or where she would go next. They'd packed up and moved to South Africa on a whim six months prior, leaving Olive even more lost and confused than she already was after being thrust into adulthood and self sufficiency. It wasn't until Grandma Pearl had called two weeks ago, saying she needed an extra pair of hands at home while her regular helper Joan adjusted to widowhood. Olive had agreed - very begrudgingly, however. The thought of going back home after all this time had caused Olive's shoulders to seize up, the tension wracking her body.

“Wow, Olive Lewis!” a voice cries from across the carriage. Turning around, Olive sees a redheaded man walking cockily towards her. It's only when he's right in front of her and she smells his familiar scent that she recognizes him. “Long time!” 

“It sure has been, Kyle. How’ve you been?”

“Oh, good, good, thanks. You here to visit?”

“No, actually,” Olive says, gesturing towards her two large suitcases sat in the chairs opposite her. “I'm moving back. Moving in with Pearl for a little while.”

"Shit,” he says, his eyes suddenly full of sympathy. “I'm sorry things didn't work out.”

“Nah, don't be. It's okay. I think I need it, anyway. London's too loud, too overwhelming. Glad to be back.” It couldn't sound more untrue, despite the smile she'd plastered on her face. 

“Maybe we can grab a drink? Like old times.”

“Oh, yeah, Kyle. Cos that went so well the first time.” She blinks up at him through your lashes, lips pursed before pushing a breath out and smiling. “I'd like that,” she says. “Let me get settled and I'll call you. Same number?”

“Same number,” he responds, before beginning to walk away. “See ya, Olive.”

"Bye, Kyle!”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” she murmurs under her breath the second he's out of earshot. She'd been back in the county not even for half an hour and already the ghosts of her past were back to haunting her. Laying her head on the window and willing this migraine to disappear, she breathes out slowly, just wanting this day to be over. 

The train stops with a sudden jolt, Olive's head whacking against the plastic yet again. “Fuck me!” She yells, before staring apologetically at the other passengers. 

“Emergency stop. Cattle on train line. Thank you for your patience.” The booming, deep voice of the train conductor over the tannoy causes everyone to jump. So bloody British, a lady stands up and begins offering Murray Mints from a small bag. “We're going to be here a while,” she sings out, passing the bag along row by row. Taking one and smiling weakly in thanks, the nausea disappears the second the sweet is in her mouth. Peering out of the window once again, Olive takes in the place she grew up in, the beautiful green fields a shock to her eyes after living in a mostly gray, drizzly city like London for so long. 

Three dairy cows run along the field, the shell of an airplane stood in the middle of it. Trying her best to remember her local history, Olive recounts the model of the plane: a B-17, from when the Yanks had been stationed at nearby Thorpe Abbotts during the war. Feeling a strange nostalgia for a time she'll never get to experience, she pulls her book from her bag for the first time this journey, once again getting lost in A Midsummer Night's Dream.

taglist: @sagesolsticewrites @ginabaker1666 @piastrinho

Olive's playlist

part 2

[rose-swift13]

Hi, it’s me!

So I had planned to go to The Eras Tour in London on the 17th of August, however, my plans changed overnight when I got an email declaring that my British Visa got declined😭 not going to lie, I called my mom and cried for 15 minutes straight because I had planned to visit my best friend of 13 years, who I haven’t seen in 10 years) and go to the concert together🫶🏼 I had everything ready to go… this was going to be my first EVER @taylorswift concert because I live in South Africa and the exchange rates are so crazy and I wasn’t working as I was still in school everytime she had a show and I would watch all the videos online and be sad. BUT when I found out Taylor was going to London, I worked my ass off and saved all my money to get a ticket and get my bff and I a hotel for the night of the concert so we wouldn’t have to take the train all the way back to Newport. Then I was deemed as someone who they were “uncertain would return to my country of origin” like WHAT?! I have a full time job, a house to live in (with my parents) and all my family here… where was I going to go?!

Anyways, my beautiful mother decided to put together a night I wouldn’t forget!! She got a banner made for my at home Eras Tour and printed out pictures of the incredible Taylor Swift, my absolute idol, and stuck them all around on our patio. We had Eras themed drinks and snacks and cupcakes with 13 and TS on them and LOADS of friendship bracelets🫶🏼🦋 she put on Taylor Swift The Eras Tour film and we sing and danced all. night. long!!! And yes, maybe The Tortured Poets Department wasn’t part of my Eras Tour, but that doesn’t mean that I will EVER forget it!!!

I couldn’t be more grateful for my family for putting so much effort into this incredibly special and unforgettable evening for me🥹 and for putting up with me BLASTING Taylor’s music any chance I get! And for never making fun of me for it🫶🏼

Thank you @taylorswift and @taylornation for all the memories that will forever live in the back of my mind✨ I love you and your spectacular team to the Moon and to Saturn🫶🏼🪐

[muckmagister]

ANOTHER RAPID FIRE QUESTION ROUND!!!!! on the condition that it cannot help you escape the deserted island, what is one thing you would take to a deserted island? what's a book that changed your life in high school? what's your ideal job? what's your favorite ice cream flavor? what's your favorite place you ever visited and where would you like to visit someday? what's your favorite video game? again i can't think of any more questions but if you have something you would like to say. well. you can say it. bye bye 💖💖💖

oouhh my god that's a tough question to start with. like the boring answer would be some sort of multi tool but i suppose anything that helps me survive would eventually also help me leave. it'd have to be like. a ball. or some other sort of small nicknack that i could easily keep on me to play around with, oH or my childhood plushy. or actually like a lil instrument like a harmonica to learn that'd be cool. yeaah so like a rubiks cube or a harmonica or my plushie ^^

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy was like the only thing i read during middle/high school that wasn't required reading for a class it's fantastic. ok well it wasn't the only thing i read but it's the only thing i've reread like 5 times by now lmao. it definitely helped stoke my imagination and interest in physics with the dumbass sci-fi fkjdksjs

wuuuh i haven't thought too much about it but i think ideally i end up in some sort of pure mathematics research position; i imagine i'm also gonna end up teaching at a uni somewhere at the same time, which isn't bad honestly even though i'm an awful teacher ^^ i just love talking about and trying to explain that stuff. i don't know exactly where my passion comes from but it's just. sure i've always been good at it but more than that it's exciting! it's so exciting to learn about! maths isn't invented, it's discovered, and we're discovering it! and it's so complex and so stupid. it's embedded in everything and exists wholly outside of it. i also like philosophy lmao

ok ok, so. good. proper. vanilla icecream. like chocolate with fudgy bits and stuff is incredible, fruity/berry flavoured icecream is awesome too. but there's a reason vanilla became synonymous with default and it isn't because it's boring it's because it's the best. but yeah only if it's good, shitty vanilla icecream sucks ass. it's also incredibly close to be entirely honest i DO like a good berry icecream. but the simplicity and delicacy of vanilla just does it for me most of the time

i don't think i have a favourite place- i haven't traveled enough yet😭 the furthest i've been from home was just sydney and the gold coast and it was like. different but the same, all just australia still but somewhere else. but i've always wanted to tour through europe and japan and some bits in south africa and the americas and other places too though. i need to see everything

AHH terraria probably??!!!?! it's so hard to say but really terraria is probably the game i've played the most in my life. otherwise plazma burst is an old flash game that's close to my heart because of nostalgia. and cause it's fucking awesome still tbh. OHH and the henry stickmin games!!!! also nostalgia but they also fucking rock still. and then there's the basic answers like portal and skyrim because of course. i cried when i finally beat portal 2, it was literally one the first games i ever played on the xbox 360 we got when i was like 9-10 years old, and like, i'd get stuck at bits and not play for a while at a time so it ultimately took some two years to get through but when it happened it was just. ough.

[thepastisalreadywritten]

By Sam Metz

September 11, 2023

An earthquake has sown destruction and devastation in Morocco, where death and injury counts continue to rise as rescue crews dig out people both alive and dead in villages that were reduced to rubble.

Law enforcement and aid workers — both Moroccan and international — have arrived in the region south of the city of Marrakech that was hardest hit by the magnitude-6.8 tremor on Friday night and several aftershocks.

Residents await food, water and electricity, and giant boulders now block steep mountain roads.

Here’s what you need to know:

WHAT ARE THE AREAS MOST AFFECTED?

The epicenter was high in the Atlas Mountains about 70 kilometers (44 miles) south of Marrakech in Al Haouz province.

The region is largely rural, made up of red-rock mountains, picturesque gorges and glistening streams and lakes.

For residents like Hamid Idsalah, a 72-year-old mountain guide from the Ouargane Valley, it is unclear what the future holds.

Idsalah relies on Moroccan and foreign tourists who visit the region due to its proximity to both Marrakech and Toubkal, North Africa’s tallest peak and a destination for hikers and climbers.

“I can’t reconstruct my home. I don’t know what I’ll do. Still, I’m alive so I’ll wait,” he said as rescue teams traversed the unpaved road through the valley for the first time this weekend.

The earthquake shook most of Morocco and caused injury and death in other provinces, including Marrakech, Taroudant and Chichaoua.

WHO WAS AFFECTED?

Of the 2,122 deaths reported as of Sunday evening, 1,351 were in Al Haouz, a region with a population of around 570,000, according to Morocco’s 2014 census.

People speak a combination of Arabic and Tachelhit, Morroco’s most common Indigenous language.

Villages of clay and mud brick built into mountainsides have been destroyed.

Though tourism contributes to the economy, the province is largely agrarian.

And like much of North Africa, before the earthquake, Al Haouz was reckoning with record drought that dried rivers and lakes, imperiling the largely agricultural economy and way of life.

Outside a destroyed mosque in the town of Amizmiz, Abdelkadir Smana said the disaster would compound existing struggles in the area, which had reckoned with the coronavirus pandemic in addition to the drought.

“Before and now, it’s the same,” said the 85-year-old. “There wasn’t work or much at all.”

WHO IS PROVIDING AID?

Morocco has deployed ambulances, rescue crews and soldiers to the region to help assist with emergency response efforts.

Aid groups said the government has not made a broad appeal for help and accepted only limited foreign assistance.

The Interior Ministry said it was accepting search and rescue-focused international aid from Spain, Qatar, Britain and the United Arab Emirates, bypassing offers from French President Emmanuel Macron and U.S. President Joe Biden.

“We stand ready to provide any necessary assistance for the Moroccan people,” Biden said Sunday on a trip to Vietnam.

WHY IS MARRAKECH HISTORIC?

The earthquake cracked and crumbled parts of the walls that surround Marrakech’s old city, a UNESCO World Heritage site built in the 12th century.

Videos showed dust emanating from parts of the Koutoubia Mosque, one of the city’s best known historic sites.

The city is Morocco’s most widely visited destination, known for its palaces, spice markets, tanneries and Jemaa El Fna, its noisy square full of food vendors and musicians.

HOW DOES THIS COMPARE TO OTHER QUAKES?

Friday’s earthquake was Morocco’s strongest in over a century but, though such powerful tremors are rare, it isn’t the country’s deadliest.

Just over 60 years ago, the country was rocked by a magnitude-5.8 quake that killed over 12,000 people on its western coast, where the city of Agadir, southwest of Marrakech, crumbled.

That quake prompted changes in construction rules in Morocco, but many buildings, especially rural homes, are not built to withstand such tremors.

There had not been any earthquakes stronger than magnitude 6.0 within 310 miles (500 kilometers) of Friday’s tremor in at least a century, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Northern Morocco experiences earthquakes more often, including tremors of magnitude 6.4 in 2004 and magnitude 6.3 in 2016.

Elsewhere this year, a magnitude 7.8 temblor that shook Syria and Turkey killed more than 21,600 people.

The most devastating earthquakes in recent history have been above magnitude 7.0, including a 2015 tremor in Nepal that killed over 8,800 people and a 2008 quake that killed 87,500 in China.

WHAT ARE THE NEXT STEPS?

Emergency response efforts are likely to continue as teams traverse mountain roads to reach villages hit hardest by the earthquake.

Many communities lack food, water, electricity, and shelter.

But once aid crews and soldiers leave, the challenges facing hundreds of thousands who call the area home will likely remain.

Members of the Moroccan Parliament are scheduled to convene Monday to create a government fund for earthquake response at the request of King Mohammed VI.

[justforbooks]

In the childhood memories of more than one generation, Glynis Johns, who has died aged 100, will be best remembered as the Edwardian materfamilias of the hugely popular Walt Disney musical Mary Poppins (1964). Winifred Banks, married to David Tomlinson’s George W Banks, is the mother of Jane and Michael, the children in the care of the magical nanny played by Julie Andrews. A protester for the right to vote, Winifred delivers a spirited rendition of the song Sister Suffragette – “Our daughters’ daughters will adore us. And they’ll sing in grateful chorus: ‘Well done, Sister Suffragette!’” – as the children’s previous nanny tries to quit.

But the husky-voiced actor had other claims to fame from her more than 60 films and 30 stage productions. In 1973, Stephen Sondheim composed the song Send in the Clowns for Johns when she was cast in the leading role of the premiere production of his musical A Little Night Music, on Broadway. And she had won initial stardom in the British cinema as a mermaid.

In the title role of the film comedy Miranda (1948), she travels from Cornwall to London and causes romantic complications among the Chelsea set. Although the film’s whimsy may now seem strained, it was a great commercial success in its day, making Johns a top-liner in British movies. Miranda returned in a rather belated sequel, Mad About Men (1954).

By that time, Johns had moved almost completely from stage to films, where she was associated chiefly with lightweight roles, alternately fluffy and feisty. One of her most appealing opportunities came in the thriller State Secret (1950, released as The Great Manhunt in the US), playing a cabaret artiste in a fictitious Balkan country, and gamely singing Paper Doll in a wholly invented language.

It says something for her properties of youthfulness that at the age of 30 she could play a teenage schoolgirl in the melodrama Personal Affair (1953). The same year she played in two fanciful Walt Disney British productions, as Mary Tudor in The Sword and the Rose, and as the heroine wife of Rob Roy, and she went on to make her first Hollywood picture, the Danny Kaye comedy The Court Jester, in 1955. The following year she played a cameo role in the star-studded Around the World in 80 Days.

At the time Johns alternated between American and British films, generally in subordinate roles, but a rewarding one came in The Sundowners (1960), set in Australia, as a jolly barmaid who takes a shine to a visiting Englishman played by Peter Ustinov. It brought her an Oscar nomination as best supporting actress. Top billing came in a stylish horror movie, The Cabinet of Caligari (1962). She was well enough known to American audiences by this time to star in 1963 in Glynis, a TV sitcom series that ran for just one season.

In 1966 Johns returned to the London stage in The King’s Mare, as Anne of Cleves to Keith Michell’s Henry VIII. Her Welsh heritage came into play when she took the role of Myfanwy Price in a screen version of Dylan Thomas’s Under Milk Wood (1971) starring Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor and Peter O’Toole, and two years later came her great Broadway success as Desiree Armfeldt in A Little Night Music, which brought her a Tony award.

Glynis came from a show business background: her mother, Alice Steele (nee Wareham), was a concert pianist who performed under the name Alys Steele-Payne, and her father was the prolific character actor Mervyn Johns. He was a stalwart in particular of Ealing Studios films: father and daughter appeared together in an Ealing drama, The Halfway House (1944).

Though her vocal intonations pointed to her Welshness, Glynis was born in Pretoria, South Africa, where her parents were on tour. She was reportedly carried on to the stage at the age of three weeks, and it was not too much longer before she was appearing there in a professional capacity, making her performing debut at the Garrick theatre, London, as a dancer in a revue called Buckie’s Bears (1935).

Educated at Clifton high school, Bristol, and South Hampstead high school and the Cone School of Dancing in London, she rapidly graduated to juvenile acting roles in both theatre and cinema. Her first screen appearance came at the age of 14, as politician Ralph Richardson’s troublesome daughter in South Riding (1938), and on stage she was the young sister, another Miranda, in Esther McCracken’s comedies Quiet Wedding (1938) and Quiet Weekend (1941).

That year brought the opportunity to appear in the film 49th Parallel, starring Leslie Howard and Laurence Olivier in a spy thriller intended to bolster second world war support in the US. When the prospect of playing a mermaid came after the war, she was able to draw on her theatrical versatility: “I was quite an athlete, my muscles were strong from dancing, so the tail was just fine. I swam like a porpoise.”

Johns returned to the London stage in 1977, as Terence Rattigan’s choice to play the murderer Alma Rattenbury in his well-received dramatisation of the Rattenbury case, Cause Célèbre. Her acting appearances became sporadic, though in 1989 she starred with Rex Harrison and Stewart Granger on Broadway in Somerset Maugham’s The Circle.

She was occasionally a guest star in US television series such as Murder She Wrote and The Love Boat, and played Diane’s rich mother, Helen Chambers, in the first series of Cheers (1983) and Trudie Pepper in the sitcom Coming of Age (1988-89). By the time of her final films, While You Were Sleeping (1995) and Superstar (1999), she was a characterful grandmother.

Johns was married and divorced four times. Her first husband, from 1942 to 1948, was the actor Anthony Forwood. Their son, Gareth, also an actor, died in 2007. Marriages to two businessmen followed: David Foster, from 1952 to 1956, and Cecil Henderson, from 1960 to 1962. She was married to Elliott Arnold, a novelist, from 1964 to 1973, and is survived by a grandson and three great-grandchildren.

🔔 Glynis Margaret Payne Johns, actor, born 5 October 1923; died 4 January 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[ian-galagher]

weekly tag wednesday! &lt;3

hello friends and welcome to another tag game. lets dive in!

- thanks @creepkinginc for the tag 🤗🧡💚

how is your day going?

it's been alright! doing a ton of chores while hanging out with friends 🤗🧡💚💙

are you okay?

yeah I'm pretty good 🤗🧡

what is your favourite shade of your favourite colour?

that thing the sun does with orange when it sets, I like that 🤗🧡

are you single?

no

are you happy about that?

SO unhappy 🙄 leave me alone Gale! (that was a joke about Gale from Baldur's Gate 3 who, for some unknown reason, thinks we're in a relationship. I myself am still very much asexual and very happy about that)

what age do you feel in your brain?

sometimes I'm 12, sometimes 98, there is no in between

do you feel like the good times are behind you or ahead of you?

behind me (that sounded so sad, I'm mostly thinking about visiting South Africa and how I might never do that again but you never know!)

do you have a best friend?

yeah I do 🤗🧡💚

did you have a childhood pet?

I had the sweetest Russian hamster 🤗🧡

do you sing or whistle around the house?

yeah I do!

do you light candles or incense?

I don't really like the smell of incense but candles are alright!

are you busy Friday night?

always, if you mean talking to my friends on the internet

if you were a circus performer which act would you be in?

something with animals so I fear I'd be out of a job fast 😂 I would soon start up a business with the fortune teller scammer and we'd make... a fortune 🤗🧡💚

what is your favourite outfit?

jeans + something warm like a hoodie or a sweater

what's the last thing you created?

new Africa words

what is your favourite fic or book of all time?

just the one?! there's so many! there was this one fic that stayed with me over the years about a boy finding this old church with a window that looked out into another world. he climbed through and met a kelpie, a beautiful black horse. it was an amazing story.

what are you looking forward to?

writing, bg3ing...

what can put you immediately in a better mood?

same as Nosho, music! (also Nosho) 🤗🧡💚

do you like hugs?

from friends, yes!

what is something you wish people understood about you?

that noise can irritate me greatly and that my noise canceling earbuds are everything to me.

tagging a few lovely people! 🤗🧡 @spacerockwriting @dynamic-power @transmurderbug @mybrainismelted @transmickey @stocious @juliakayyy @jrooc @look-i-love-u @energievie @deathclassic @lee-ow @francesrose3

and everyone else who sees this! 🤗🧡

[darsynia]

They Show Their Truth (one single time) | Oneshot

gif from @marvelheroes

Summary: Steve's managed to keep how he feels about Natasha a secret, but the vision he saw in South Africa shook him.

Caring about Natasha Romanoff this much means that when there's a chance to heal her wounds by revealing his secret, Steve throws himself on the grenade, because of course he does.

Length/Warnings: 5,443 | Porn with plot, unrequited love. Minors DNI

Tags (please forgive me if this isn't your thing, feel free to ignore if so 💚): @ronearoundblindly @munstysmind @chickensarentcheap @themaradaniels @starryeyes2000 @deepbatched @chibijusstuff @caplanreblogsfics

This was written as a request for my friend @salovie a while back!

They Show Their Truth (one single time)

“I don’t trust a guy without a dark side.”

The worst part is that Stark would probably appreciate what Steve is struggling with. He might even trust Steve more because of it, and isn’t that just exactly the worst conclusion to draw, tonight?

Steve’s on his back on the floor in the Barton family room. He’d feel more comfortable if he could rest on his side with his back against the couch, second best to the wall, but every square foot of wall in this room is filled with shelving. Toys, books, puzzles; the accoutrements of a life he’ll never live, all stacked up with the chaotic order of an unexpected visit. The couch is ready for Natasha, with a sheet covering the cold, worn leather. He’s left her the handcrafted afghan and the better of the two pillows Clint’s wife had offered, and kept the sports fleece for himself.

It makes sense that they’ve put the two of them in here; whatever is going on between Bruce and Nat means it would be irresponsible to force them to share. Stark’s by himself on an air mattress in the laundry room instead of in the guest room with Bruce, because out of all of them, he’s the one most likely to accidentally set Banner off-- and just like Clint said, it’s not that they don’t trust Bruce. They don’t trust Tony.

Steve likes Laura Barton. It seems to him that she understands the purgatory they’re all putting themselves through, most of them, anyway. He sure as hell hopes she hasn’t caught on to his, but she couldn’t have.

If she had, she wouldn’t have put him in a room with Natasha.

He gets up and turns off the overhead light, using the chain, then flips off the switch. The ceiling fan’s breeze is just on the edge of too much, but if Nat wants it on, it’ll be set up so the light won’t disturb her. He walks over to the door and cracks it, listening. Laura and Natasha are still talking quietly in the kitchen. Steve pushes the door mostly shut again, and turns off the light that’s across the room from the couch, leaving just the one lamp directly next to it. 

He winces. The room is now bathed in an orange-yellow glow that reminds him of the quality of light in the vision he’d seen in South Africa. The truth is that practically everything here reminds him of the vision.

The glint of the sun off of the axe had reminded him of the flashbulbs.

One of Barton’s kids had spilled juice, and its blood red color had been like the wine on the soldier’s chest.

A rare moment of collective laughter in the dining room with Nick Fury had pulled Steve out of the moment and thrust him, unwillingly, back into the vision.

He’d had to walk away, away from the mirth, away from her red hair as she faced away from him, so similar to the twice-damned vision where Peggy Carter had asked him to dance. As he’d turned to say yes, she’d spun away, dress flying off to reveal a tight-fitting black jumpsuit, the brown wig falling away to red, her familiar, beloved face morphing into Natasha Romanoff’s familiar, beloved face.

Because she is. Beloved. Despite everything. No amount of brutal training at the gym until his hands are numb and bruised, no amount of self-denial or self-recrimination has cured him of it. Hell, no monk has ever kept himself as pure for the sake of his God as Steve Rogers has, for fear of thinking of his teammate in a way that is definitely unholy.

The result has been the exact opposite of his intention; all roads lead to Natasha in his mind, because as ever, Steve Rogers aspires for that which cannot be. The only thing he’s learned from being chosen for the program, from rejecting orders and saving his best friend despite everything, from crashing the plane to save the world, from waking up after seventy years on ice, is that fate loves to give him what he wants.

And he wants her.

“Not this time,” Steve murmurs from his position on the floor, one knee up, arm behind his head.

“Well, if that’s the way it’s gonna be,” Natasha says in a sultry, teasing voice from the doorway.

Steve launches himself into a stand as if she’s the personification of an enemy, and in a way, she is.

“I don’t know how to tell you this, Steve, but you’re a little edgy.”

“You and Clint are always telling me to rough it up a little, just trying to follow orders,” Steve jokes, backing up out of her way as she walks into the room.

“We were thinking more along the lines of getting you to watch some porn, grow some scruff,” she tells him. “So, you trying to be chivalrous, leaving me the couch and the best blanket?”

The tingling awareness he’s been fighting down for hours rears back to life at her provocative words, even more so when she immediately tempers them with a challenge about the couch. He knows her. Her behavior tells him that she thinks her words were reckless, that’s why she’s covering them. That means there was some truth to what she said, that they were revealing. If he were an enemy, it might be a trick to let him lower his guard, but she doesn’t know that he’s been fighting her in his mind for months. At least, he hopes to hell she doesn’t.

“Not at all,” Steve lies smoothly. “It’s pure math. I don’t fit.”

Nat turns her warm, impish gaze towards him and Steve feels a jolt of pure, unadulterated desire. Don’t, sweetheart. Don’t, he begs in his own head. She’s vulnerable, open, teasing, coy. Because she trusts him.

“Now, come on, soldier,” she says, sweetly mocking. “That’s boy scout math. Unimaginative math. I could probably fit the whole team on that couch if I had to. They might even enjoy it.”

He’s hardly ever seen her like this, but he knew she had it in reserve. “Well,” he says in his best regimental, Team Captain voice, hoping she won’t hear the regret he feels in pulling it out to dash water all over her lush, flirty flames. “That might be so, but that has nothing to do with sleeping.”

“Oh no, Steve,” she says, amused concern woven through the husk of her voice. “Turn it off, I absolutely cannot sleep with a Steve Rogers figurine in the room with me tonight!” Natasha comes over to him, her lips curved into a smile under furrowed eyebrows, and before he can fully understand what she’s doing, she’s got her hands on him, stroking along his back, and he’s hard, his heartbeat spiking, she’s going to know, fuck, fuck… 

“Nat, what--” he chokes out, throwing his arms out wide in hopes that he can talk himself down before she walks back around.

“I’m looking for the pull cord,” she says, resting a hand on his arm so she can lean over and catch his eye. “For your sayings. You know, ‘It’s the American Way!’ and ‘Do it for your country!’”

Every single thing she says sounds like innuendo to him. To think that Tony fucking Stark thought he doesn’t have a dark side. He’s sworn more in silent frustration about this gorgeous, unattainable woman than Stark probably has in the whole year, on purpose, out loud.

“Lay back and think of Uncle Sam?” Steve suggests, forcing his limbs to move, walking toward the other side of the room as he pulls his arms out of the long-sleeved overshirt he’s wearing.

“I’ve actually done that, you know. Multiple times,” Nat tells him, chuckling.

“Are you going to sleep in that? Do you want me to leave the room while you change?” he forces himself to ask. She’s got her own dark, long-sleeved shirt on, over a soft, grey thing that clings to her curves in a wholesome, farmhouse way that doesn’t stop him from finding it sexy in the slightest.

“You wouldn’t have to even if I wasn’t,” she tells him in a voice that chastises him for even asking.

I don’t trust a man without a dark side, Tony’s voice repeats, in his mind.

He should have just confessed to Stark. ‘Some nights I’m so desperate for thoughts of Natasha that I’ve tied my hands to my own bedpost. Just enough resistance so I wake up if my hands drift down to touch myself. It’s her face in my erotic dreams, her body in my everpresent thoughts. Not Peggy’s. I’m not wholesome, Stark. I’m a sinner. A hypocrite.’

“The figurine comment was metaphorical, Steve,” Nat is saying. She’s inches away from him somehow, because once again he’s caught up in his thoughts. “You okay? Tony said you were unaffected, but--”

“He’s wrong. She got to me.”

“Yeah,” Natasha breathes, looking up at him. “Me too.” Her eyes are troubled, hurt, practically anguished.

Steve’s resolve weakens, and he smiles down at her with a fraction of his feelings showing through as reassurance. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Nat looks up at the ceiling and does a little frustrated shiver. “Talk, no. I either need to--” she breaks off and looks at Steve, her eyes shining with repressed tears. “There’s something really wrong about punching Captain America in the face because I need a release of tension.”

He thinks he knows what her aborted sentence was. I either need to hit someone or fuck someone.

Steve says what he was thinking out loud. “People see me as standing for the way things ought to be. Fairness. Doing your duty. Things working out the way they’re supposed to.” He lets out a short, frustrated sigh. “Life doesn’t always happen that way, and reacting with frustration against that fact is very reasonable. If you need to, go ahead. Punch me.”

“She really did get to you,” Nat whispers.

“I mean it. You know I can take it, Natasha. Physically, I mean. I won’t take it personally.” He wants her to. If he can’t have her softness, he’ll take hardness over nothingness.

The regretful vulnerability is back on her face. “You wouldn’t say that if you knew why I need it.”

“They’re trying to tear us apart, Natasha. The best way not to tear is to reinforce the connections you already have.”

“It’s not about what I saw. At all. It’s about wanting someone and being rejected, not even because I’m not enough, but because he’s too broken.” She reels back in reaction to even saying the words, and impulsively, Steve reaches down and takes her wrists, shakes them until she responds by resisting his actions.

“You didn’t want to set him off in Clint’s house. You won’t set me off,” Steve lies. She already has, in exactly the wrong way. “Shove me, hit me, punish me. Get it out.” He pulls her hands, despite her resistance, until they’re flat on his chest. “He said he was too broken?”

Natasha’s lovely face crumples for a split second before her jaw tightens in anger. She shoves him; Steve was ready for it, doesn’t stop himself, lets the momentum carry him back a little.

“As if being broken is some kind of contagious!” she bites out, her voice angry but restrained. There are children sleeping in the house somewhere, after all. “As if I’m not a shattered teapot--” another shove. “--held together by the kind of toxic glue that builds up--” she punches his shoulder in a jab that does more than sting. “--in your system until I’ve killed you just by doing my job!”

For the word ‘job,’ Natasha drops back and her foot flies out, catching him in the chest. If they had been anywhere else, Steve would have let the full force of it knock him across the room, as intended, but he can’t risk the sound bringing someone who might see the heat he’s trying to repress. Instead, he takes the hit, his foot braced on the door, which shakes but doesn’t make much noise. Steve ends up on one knee, looking at Natasha, who is breathing heavily out of fury rather than exertion.

“Isn’t that just the perfect kind of symbolism,” she sighs, sounding defeated.

Steve raises his eyebrows, biting his cheek inside his mouth against the way his pants are pulled tight and uncomfortable against his arousal. That should be enough to kill it, but she’s walking toward him and all he can focus on are her hips, the way they sway. He wants to see what they look like with his hand gripping them, his thumb pressing against the thin, delicate skin that curves toward her inner thighs.

“You have my shoeprint on your chest, Rogers,” Nat says.

“What, it’s visible now?” he quips. The hold she’s got over him has been too close to the surface for too long.

“Now don’t go trying to make me feel better,” she says in that rich, amused voice of hers, tossing him a look before starting back toward the couch. It reminds him of the first time he ever wanted her; she’d said something in that tone and he’d found himself suddenly desperate to trace the origins of the sound with his lips and tongue against her neck.

“Any man who doesn’t want you is definitely broken,” Steve tells her, standing.

If she doesn’t recognize his confession, is that his fault?

“Even if that’s true, and I know it’s not, I’m just as easy to brush off,” she says, nodding at the way he’s wiping away the dust of her shoe so it doesn’t soil Laura Barton’s bedclothes. His hands still, not just because of what she’s said, but because Natasha’s rolling up the sheet and tossing it to the side, adding the pillow seconds later.

“What are you--” he starts, cutting himself off when she tugs the couch cushion off of the frame of the couch and sets it beside his makeshift bedroll. “Nat?”

He can’t sleep beside her. He can’t not sleep beside her, not after Bruce seems to have done his best to fracture her confidence into little pieces just so he could sweep her away more easily.

“You asked what you can do? You can do this.” Her words are short, choppy, defensive. “I can’t sleep next to Clint and take my confidence from him, not when he’s doing that for Laura right now. Unless you--”

“Here, my arms are longer,” Steve says, picking up the sheet and unfurling it over the cushions for her before she finishes that final, uncertain sentence.

“Thanks, Captain,” she tells him, her lips twitching up into a tiny, precious smile.

“At your service, Ma’am.”

He doesn’t let himself watch her wriggle into a comfortable sleeping position, choosing instead to walk over and turn out the light. He seeks out his own sparse sheet and too-short blanket in the fresh darkness, turning his back so his arms can’t seek her out in his sleep. Steve does scoot back far enough that he’s up against her cushions, the only concession he’ll allow himself to her nearness. He reminds himself sternly that it is just to give her the warmth and closeness she said she needed, nothing more.

Steve wakes to the feeling of a small hand worming its way under the tight shirt he’s wearing. He can feel Natasha’s body pressed up against his back, all softness and curves and forbidden sweetness.

Is she awake??  

This is the stuff of his nightmares, dreams he’s forcibly categorized as such because of the moral implications. Her arm has snuck under his, so he lifts his arm, hoping the change of pressure will be enough to wake her up. Instead, this earns him a closer snuggle, one where he can identify her breasts along his back, the dip of her pelvis molding against his ass.

“Nat?” he whispers.

“Cold,” she says, her lips and nose nuzzling the word against his shoulder. Steve doesn’t know what to think. Her hand on his stomach is warm. In his sleep-fuzzed laxity, he decides to react the way he assumes he would if he didn’t have an attachment to her, which is to roll over and encourage her to curl up against him to warm herself up.

Steve rolls onto his back, the movement brushing his body against her in thrilling ways.

“Mmm,” she murmurs, chasing his heat as he carefully scoots over so that she can slot into the warmth of the place he’d been lying. Steve only succeeds in moving about three inches before Natasha throws her right leg out and twines it around his left leg as she slips down from the thick cushions toward him. Before he fully understands what’s happening, she’s mostly on top of him, her head pillowed on his shoulder, her hot hand tucking ever so slightly into his waistband.

“Natasha, this can’t be what you do with Clint,” Steve hisses at her, desperate for her to stop moving before he shames himself with the speed of how fast he hardens for her. So far he’s controlling himself through sheer embarrassment on her behalf, but that won’t last much longer if she keeps squirming.

“Mmm, you’re right. He would have shoved me off by now, and we would have sparred about it or I’d have headed off to have a hot shower and a thorough conversation with my own hands,” she says, her voice wavering between an actual whisper and a tone husky with vocal fry.

Steve is nearly speechless. “Shower it is, then?” he suggests.

“Fresh out of hot water.” Natasha tells him, using a firm grip on his waistband to haul herself across his body to straddle him. Steve lifts both of his hands up over his head in self defense, but he’s essentially lost the battle. She’d removed her pants at some point in the night, and she’s sleep-mussed and gorgeous. Their enemies’ mental handiwork has done its job, led him right to what he’s always wanted, and it’ll be the end of them. She has to feel his reaction to her.

He closes his eyes and turns his head away. “I’m not going to fight you,” he says.

“That much is obvious,” she observes.

“What do you want me to say?” he asks between gritted teeth. “Put any man in this position and he’ll react the same.”

“Anything but that,” Natasha says in a small voice. Steve looks at her and sees pain in the angle of her head, the tightness around her eyes, the straightness of her back. She’s not putting all of her weight on him, he can tell, and just imagining the coiled strength that she’s exerting to rest so lightly and devastatingly against his thighs is undoing him.

She’s holding steady, but it feels like she’s pressing down thanks to his reaction to her. His body is gorging itself on a futile hope, and there’s no way that Natasha Romanoff doesn’t know this.

“I’m not Bruce,” he says, simply.

Her smile is a slice of pain. “Obviously,” she says, lowering herself fully and rocking her hips, pinning him with a challenging gaze.

Steve’s instinct is to stop her, but when he tries, his hands clutch naked skin and soft lace. The smile she offers him in response freezes him in place.

He shakes his head, delighted, miserable. “What are you looking for? Validation?”

“Goddamnit, Rogers, stop trying to fix everything,” she says, grinding against him again, making him gasp. “If the team’s fucked, the team’s fucked, so why not fuck the team, right? That’s what I’m trained for.”

The agony in her voice is all the worse because she doesn’t sound vulnerable anymore, and her eyes have lost the sheen of regret. She’s bitter, determined, and so broken in the process that Steve aches for her in a whole new, terrifying way. He reaches up to touch her face and she slaps at him before grabbing him, tearing open her shirt and clutching his hand to her breasts, fighting to keep him from fisting it.

Steve sits up, alarmed at her violence, and she tightens her thighs against him, rocking rhythmically.

“This is just sparring with different weapons, Nat, don’t do this,” he says.

“It’s all I have,” she snaps. “It’s my role. Tony would do it, you know he would.”

The jibe hits him in just the right way to be really painful, and Steve wrenches his hand away from her breast, trying to mitigate the way she’s ramping his desire up so skillfully with the drag of her body.

“Tony couldn’t, not in the way you want,” he says, his heart pounding, realizing that her plea for him not to fix it will have to be the one that will go unanswered. He knows exactly what she needs. Exactly. It’ll rip him apart to do this, in all of the best, soul-destroying ways, but it’s what she needs. Steve Rogers, throwing himself on the wire for his team.

“You and your stupid fucking rivalry--”

Steve interrupts her by arching his back, thrusting up against her, holding her gaze. “That’s not it.”

Natasha’s still hard-edged, scoffing. “I should have realized that would set you off. It must drive you crazy that his giant tower puts him ahead in your dick-measuring contest.”

“You think Tony wants you the way I want you? He doesn’t,” he says, blunt and honest. Her hips stutter in surprise, and Steve lets himself slide one hand up to the front clasp of her bra, flicking it open. “He’s known you longer, sure.” Natasha’s green eyes are wide, stunned. He takes advantage of her momentary stillness to hold her steady as he sits all the way up, sliding his other hand up to cup her face. “But would he throw away everything he has at the very thought of kissing you again, on purpose this time? No.”

“Steve?” she breathes, hesitant, haunted.

“Say the word and I’ll sleep on the porch and never mention this,” he tells her, hoping to hell she doesn’t.

“What even is ‘this?’” Natasha asks, tracing his face with doubtful eyes. “You trying to make up for Banner? I’m not a grenade, Rogers.” Her words are vulnerable but her voice isn’t. She’s using it as a weapon, pushing her sex appeal into the tone, sultry and challenging.

He watches himself push one of her wild curls back behind her ear, indulging a long-held desire that has nothing to do with the other ways he wants to touch her. “Seems like you’re trying to blow up like one. You just picked the exact wrong person to prove your point.” Steve makes eye contact with her. “Since when do I lie to you? About anything?”

“You want me,” she states dubiously, tossing her head, shaking it as she questions him, as if even saying it at all is too much to be believed.

“Very much.”

“I find it hard to believe this is anything more than a seventy-year--”

Steve buries his hand in the curls at the back of her head and kisses her, pouring all of his longing into the sweep of his lips, coaxing her to respond. For all the time he’s wanted this, he’d always thought if he got the chance again, it would be like the first time. Unexpected, unplanned, uncomplicated, unrepeatable. Not like this. Not with ardor, affection, adoration.

Natasha shifts toward him after a few seconds, letting out a small noise and tilting her head to deepen the kiss. Her movement sparks the napalm in his blood, little explosions of pleasure that follow her hand as she grabs his shirt, dragging it up his back to bare it for her fingernails. Steve can’t help it, he thrusts up into the sweet heat of her thighs in his lap, even as she gasps her mouth open for him to taste her. Natasha pulls back and rips off her shirt.

“Touch me, please, Steve, touch me,” she begs, grabbing his hand from where he’s been gripping her hip like a lifeline.

“I--” he starts, completely forgetting what he was going to say as he watches her throw her head back as soon as he palms her breast, shifting his grip so he can trace his thumb across her nipple. “Ahhhh, fuck,” she groans. Steve dips his head to suck an open-mouthed kiss against her neck at the same time he uses both hands to circle his thumbs across her nipples again. The sound she makes in response is as resonant and aching as he’d always hoped it would be, from the outside.

“Do you believe me now?” he says, each word a kiss.

“I might need more proof. You could be very dedicated to my well-being,” she laughs. It’s throaty and sexual, and he surprises her and even himself by the way he abandons what he was doing to hold her down as he grinds his hardness against her yet again, blatant and demanding. “Yeah?” she encourages.

“Yeah,” he pants, screwing his eyes shut to settle the overpowering urge he has to wreck everything about himself and the team, rip off their clothing and rut with her. He wants to keep this, and to hell with Banner and his reticence.

“So, you’re saying…” she dangles, reaching down and unbuttoning his pants, taking down the zipper, and lifting herself up long enough for him to yank everything down in a frantic rush. Steve can barely believe what’s happening until it happens-- she takes him in her hand at the same time she curls her other hand around his neck to haul him down for a filthy kiss. Every single nerve ending in his body is a conductor for her electricity, and the two of them together prompt a chemical reaction that send his pleasure centers into overdrive.

With a herculean effort, Steve pulls back from the kiss, cupping her face with one hand, the other fisted in the fleece beneath them, channeling all of his excess energy and desperation. He’s not in control, and he knows he could hurt her by accident.

“Was supposed to be about you,” he manages to say between a gasp and a groan at the way she’s working him with expert movements.

“Are you kidding? You should see your face,” Nat says in that rich, sensuous voice of hers. “Very complimentary. But how did you keep this from me?”

Steve drops his head, overcome, when she leans over and tongues his nipple in a completely unexpected, devastating move. “S’wrong,” he slurs. “Ahhhhh, stop, stop, Natasha, you-- stop.” She stills her hand slowly, easing him into the loss of it, and it’s so thoughtful, so thorough, so Natasha, that the action cuts the last threads that held his heart back from its inevitable fall.

“Bet you never thought you’d try to stop me,” she whispers in his ear, hooking her chin over his shoulder for a second, her various movements inexplicable until suddenly they’re not, she’s naked and sinking onto him, and Steve’s gone, he’s gone, his back arching, hips chasing her heat and tightness.

“Shhh, shhh,” Nat reassures. Her hands smooth over his back, his arms, his face, and finally he can open his eyes and see her, sweat-touched and exquisite.

“Natasha,” Steve whispers, shaking his head. He has never felt so clumsy and imprecise in his life. “I wanted to make you see,” he tries to explain. She’s given him everything he’s wanted, freely, somehow, but his goal had been to tear apart her insecurities, not force her to support him in exposing his own.

“You did. You are,” she says, but he shakes his head, noses a caress onto her shoulder.

“We’re all a mess in so many ways, the team,” Steve tells her, groaning as she tightens around him, seeking out her lips to taste the groan when he strokes his fingertips over her nipple. “Most of our strengths are outside-in. Yours is inside-out. You’re made of steel, coated in silk.”

“You always fuck so poetic?” she teases, but her eyes are luminous.

“Gotta get it all out now,” Steve whispers, seeing his peak on the horizon and craving as well as dreading it.

“Steve,” she warns, and he shakes his head.

“You know I’m right.”

Natasha leans over, kisses his neck just under his ear, and whispers, “That why you haven’t really touched me?” she challenges.

“I’m inside you, that’s not enough?” he groans, knowing it’s not, feeling caught out, hating and loving the way she absolutely knows him. His avoidance had been subconscious, but she’s a master of that domain.

Oh my, is she.

Natasha sets a hand on his shoulder and caresses him all the way down to his hand, pulling him, unresisting, to just above where they’re joined.

“Touch me, Steve. Make it so every time I see your hands I remember this. If I can’t keep you, if this is it, if this is all I get, give me that to remember this by,” she whispers.

“Fuck, Natasha, you can’t just--” he groans, so close to coming his vision is whiting out, but she stills her hips.

“You kept this from me,” she says.

She’s right.

As penance goes, it’s appropriate.

Steve turns his hand, lightly probing and swirling his fingers exactly where she wants him to. Her reaction rattles him to the core; Natasha had always struck him as an inherently sensual person, even if she only let small glimpses of that show at any given time, and rightly so. But even a light graze of his fingers against that sensitive part of her takes her apart. It’s wrecking to watch, and he craves the chance to see it over and over, again and again, in any and every possible way, even as his orgasm approaches exactly like the tiny death the poets call it.

“God, Steve, yes. Yes, fuck, please, please,” she babbles, her mouth pressed against his shoulder to muffle the noises just enough for propriety, or so he hopes. “Please, sweet-- ahhhhh!”

Because fate loves to give Steve just what he wants, they come apart at the same time, the cloying, clenching, glorious pleasure bearing down on him just as the woman he cares so much about shakes and shudders and begs in his arms.

They hold still for long enough that each of them has to know it’s just to prolong the inevitable.

“Count of three?” Natasha finally whispers.

“No need,” Steve says, and they slowly pull apart, avoiding eye contact. He’s trying to decide which shirt to soil when she brings him a package of non alcoholic baby wipes.

“Thanks,” he says.

“No, thank you,” Natasha says. It’s sincere, he realizes. No sarcasm, no innuendo, no amusement, just a sincere, heartfelt gratitude that feels simultaneously like a slap and a caress.

“You’re important to me,” he mutters, pulling his clothes back on.

“Right back at you, Cap,” Natasha tells him. It’s the transition, he can sense it. He settles back onto the sheet, facing her this time, a tiny concession to plausible deniability. She’s perceptive enough to catch it, of course, but they’ve got a shared secret, now, and that’s just the way things are. There’s just one more thing to do, one final rip through a single word written on a mostly torn piece of paper.

“Don’t give up on Banner,” Steve tells her, his tone as kind and matter-of-fact as he can make it, right now. “Today was probably the worst day of his life. People don’t make rational decisions on days like that.” The smile feels bitter and truthful on his lips.

Natasha’s lying on her side, lifted those few inches above him by the height of the cushions she’s resting on top of. Her expression had been sober, maybe even sad, but on hearing those words, a tiny fraction of lightness crosses her face. One corner of her lip turns up.

“Really?”

Steve’s paper metaphorically flutters to the floor, the bold block letters of the word landing imprecisely, but readable. UNRE QUITED, it reads. The meaning of the first four letters of the second half are not lost on him.

“Really.”

[chaifootsteps]

Log Anon here

Now, usually when I talk about other anons I act like some sort of god. Case and point that unending search threat. But now, I’ve been inspired to use my shitty writing skills to make lyrics about how much that anon’s song sucked.

———————————

ANON! Let’s start with the fact that this Rapper thought he was a genius.

Sitting there on a chair hoping that Viv would touch their penis.

Man, the whole thing is unreadable, agreeably irredeemable.

I’m filled with laughter that they didn’t think that grammar matter, making it damn unappeasable.

Here’s a lesson, never randomise where capitalise letters, it doesn’t make it better, make sure you fix this error.

Anon coming in here thinking their Chai’s terror, but you’re a joke so just give up the endeavour.

The damn block you wrote makes you a damn dope

As well next time you write keep the swears out or do you need some bloody soap?

Here’s things you should’ve realised before you started to theorise.

Chai speaks about Viv because Anon’s bring it up most of the time.

“to Survive or to live”, yo, Mr Potatohead, that line should’ve been cut in half since they don’t rhyme so I’m charging ya for this lyrical crime.

The irony of bringing up witch when you fail to spell.

The hell Chai getting caught for? Revealing pedophiles and workplace abuse?

I hope you know what you’re doing because hating that has no excuse.

You’re the damn fool, you drooling tool, for getting all blue because someone can live both on and off the wifi.

Honestly your likability is so low that when you visit, all of South Africa cry.

I’m seeing lines so unrefined, so horribly designed, that would make Shakespeare want to die.

I think the real freak is the one posted a mediocre rap to defend a bad show.

Every argument you bring up blows and annoyingly disrupts the flow.

Poor attitude? At least be brave and show your true account if you gonna diss.

You tried your shot at internet fame but too bad that by next month no one will know this exists.

The reason no one leaves the hate is because there’s still people who still need to learn.

Now where’s your next burns, oh wait, you playing favourites this turn?

Aw man, this is weak, you think you’re making them meek, you’re one weird freak.

Rhyming must be tough for a kindengartener, butthey know how to rhyme different words.

The logic you bring for Scienceservant name is worse than the smell of a pile of turds.

I ask the same question, is it worth it to do this when you’re nothing but absurd?

Damn, only a cuck can bother someone while trying to suck off another.

ANON! Why the fuck can’t you write?

You say Chai’s hiding but you are too, coward.

You act like you’re the best when your personality, scent and everything else are soured.

Boy, you’re the ending of Danny Phantom, bad, confusing, and an insult to creation itself.

Now go put on your diaper before you go pee yourself.

———————————

At least this won’t the worst rap on this blog

From the ballpit we come and to the ballpit we will all return.

[canirove]

The Princess & the Football Player | Chapter 23

Previous chapter | Next chapter

Masterlist

"Happy Valentine's Day, Declan Rice."

"Happy Valentine's Day, your Royal Highness. I'm sorry for calling you this late, today has been hectic."

"It's ok, don't worry. I've also had a busy day getting everything ready for my trip to South Africa."

"I'm gonna miss you so much when you leave..."

"You'll be fine, Declan. With all the games you are playing while I'm gone, you won't have time to miss me. And we'll be in the same time zone, we can keep calling each other."

"Yeah... But if I'm really needy, I'll have you kilometers away, not as close as I have you now."

"If you are needy, you have some of the photos from our Christmas dinner. Use them" I smirk.

"It isn't the same and you know it."

"Do you have early training tomorrow?"

"I sadly do, yes. Were you planning on paying me a visit?" he asks with a mischievous smile.

"Since you seem to be so needy..."

"Urgh, it sucks that we can't see each other on Valentines Day."

"It is like any other day, Declan."

"Yeah, but it is our first Valentine's Day together. I wanted to have a lovely dinner together, maybe watch a movie, then make love until the sun comes out... Those things."

"Those things" I laugh. "But are we back to making love?"

"It's Valentine's Day. You must be romantic."

"And on your birthday we fucked..."

"Because we had to celebrate that I was alive for another year."

"Ok" I laugh again. "So should I expect the same for my birthday in a couple of months?"

"You should. You definitely should" he says, giving me that look that makes my body burn.

"Eleanor!"

"Holy shit, mum!" I say, my phone slipping from my hands and hitting the floor as I get up from the sofa. "Have you never heard of these things called knocking or ringing the bell?"

"I'm your mother, I don't need to do that."

"Yes, you do need to do that. This is my house."

"Whatever. Have you seen this?" she says, showing me her phone.

"Oh, that. They made it official" I reply, looking at a photo of Roberta and Mason.

"You knew about this?"

"Of course I did, mum. She is my best friend."

"So you've been hanging out with him? With a football player?"

"Jesus, mum. Why do you always talk about them as if they were something disgusting? Did one of them break your heart as a teen or something?" I laugh.

"Don't be silly" she scoffs. "Have you been hanging out with him, yes or no?"

"I have, mum" I say, rolling my eyes. "Mason is a really nice guy, and he makes Roberta very happy."

"Mason. What type of name is that?" she chuckles.

"Oh my God, mum. Who cares?"

"I do. And I don't like you mingling with football players."

"What?"

"They are just a bunch of spoiled kids with too much money who spend it on ugly cars, uglier clothes and cheating on their wives."

"Oh wow" I laugh. "You just described half the boys I grew up with."

"Don't compare them, Eleanor. They aren't the same."

"Yeah, that's true. Football players earn their own money with their talent and have an actual job. These kids are just wasting their parents money and doing nothing. If they want a job, they don't have to worry, daddy will give them one."

"You are so... Urgh!" my mum says. "I truly hope the boy you are seeing isn't one of them."

"A spoiled rich kid? Nope, he isn't. And how do you know I am seeing someone?"

"Your grandmother told me when we had a chat on Christmas. But I was talking about a football player, not a decent boy from a good family."

"Decent. You love that word, don't you?" I laugh chuckle. "And you wouldn't say the same if you had been at the parties I've been to."

"Whatever. I just hope you have good taste."

"I have very good taste, mum. Don't worry" I smile.

"Good. And I better go, your dad is probably wondering where I am."

"I doubt it" I say to myself.

"What?"

"Nothing, nothing. Good night, mum."

"Goodnight, Eleanor" she says before leaving.

"Dec? Are you still there?" I say, picking my phone from the floor.

"Yeah..."

"I'm sorry you had to hear all that."

"Nah, it's ok. But the day I meet your mum... I fear for my life" he laughs. "Though I think you may be into something when you asked her if a football player dumped her, you know?"

"You think?"

"Yeah... Maybe, I don't know" he shrugs. "But she seems so bitter."

"She is bitter. I'll have to ask around, see if anyone knows something. And again, I'm sorry about everything she said."

"It's fine, don't worry. She may not like me, but I know you grandmother does and she is way scarier. It's good to know I have her on my side."

"It is, yes."

"Eleanor..."

"Uh?"

"We are gonna be fine, ok?"

"Yeah" I sigh.

"God, I wish I could be there to hug you."

"So do I."

"Ok, that's it. We are meeting tomorrow after training, clear your schedule."

"What?" I laugh.

"Tell them you don't feel ok or whatever. I know you are very clever when it comes to excuses to sneak around" Declan smirks. 

"Mr. Rice, what are you implying?" I smile.

"Let's meet tomorrow, Eleanor. Here, at my place. We can have lunch together and then just lay on the sofa cuddling for the rest of the day. We'll even turn off our phones so one bothers us."

"That sounds perfect."

"Do we have a date, then?"

"We do, yes."

"Perfect. See you tomorrow, Eleanor. I love you."

"I love you too, Declan."

[mythologer]

Peder Mønsted (Danish painter) 1859 - 1941

Sibylletemplet ved Tivoli (Temple of the Sibyl at Tivoli), 1884

oil on canvas

121 x 95 cm. (47.6 x in.)

signed, located and dated bottom right: P. Mønsted Tivoli 1884

private collection

© photo Bruun Rasmussen

Autotranslated Catalogue Note Bruun Rasmussen

Exhibited: Charlottenborg 1885 No. 294.Peter Mønsted made several trips to southern Europe in the 1880s, including Italy. Many of his best works date back to the decades before the turn of the century, where his work on light and color effects resulted in such mood-saturated works as the Tivoli picture here. Mønsted became extremely popular in his day and was one of the most wealthy of the Danish painters. His popularity is still high at times, and abroad has also caught the eye of the Danish painter, who equally skillfully mastered Italian summer days and Nordic snow landscapes.

* * *

Born at the end of the ‘golden age’ of Danish painting, Peder Mønsted can be described as a product of that era. A landscape painter renowned for the clarity of light common to the painters of that age, his naturalistic ‘plein-air’ views made him the leading Danish landscapist of his age. He was also known for a number of portraits, including that of King George I of Greece.

Mønsted was born in Balle Mölle, near Grenna in eastern Denmark. He studied at the Prince Ferdinand’s Drawing School, Aarhus where he studied under Andries Fritz (1828-1906), a landscape and portrait painter, before moving to Copenhagen. Here he studied at the Royal Academy of Art between 1875 and 1878, and was taught figure painting by Julius Exner (1825-1910). Here too he would have come across the work of artists such as Christen Kobke (1810-1848), an outstanding colourist and Pieter Christian Skorgaard (1817-1875), a romantic nationalist painter, a knowledge of whose work is seen in the Danish landscapes and beech forests of Mønsted’s. As early as 1874, at the age of 15, he took part in the December Exhibition in Copenhagen. In 1878 Mønsted left the Academy to study under the artist Peder Severin Kröyer (1851-1910).

Mønsted travelled extensively throughout his long career, being a frequent visitor to Switzerland, Italy and North Africa. In 1883 Mønsted travelled to Paris where he worked with W. A. Bouguereau (1825-1905) for four months. As early as 1884, he visited North Africa returning later in the decade. The early years of the 20th century saw Mønsted returning to Switzerland, the south of France and Italy, the latter being the source of inspiration for many Scandinavian artists of the 19th century. The war years curtailed Mønsted’s travel to Norway and Sweden, however the 1920’s and 1930’s saw him return to the Mediterranean. From 1879 to 1941 he exhibited regularly at the annual Charlottenborg Exhibition. Throughout his long career, Mønsted continued to paint the Danish landscape and coastline. His is a romantic, poetic view of nature; he was an artist who depicted the grandeur and monumental aspect of the landscape, with a remarkable eye for detail and colour.

His works can be found in museums in: Aalborg and Bantzen.