#but idk if he died or just left them but she was telling my mom abt the dad and

[non-un-topo]

Why does instagram keep giving me videos about grandparents like does it want me to fall on the floor sobbing today

[frankcastleonlyfans]

Hey! I read this and was wondering if you could write a drabble/imagine where Daemon has a very distressing nightmare where mom!reader didn't survive childbirth and what the family dynamics are like with that fact (like Daemon with a widowed father having to take care of 4 children, one of them being a newborn), but he wakes up and sees it was just a bad dream, please?

𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐍 𝐁𝐄𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐄 𝐈 𝐆𝐎

hii my lovely!! i'm so sorry if this is not what you wanted, i just tried to write everything from daemon's pov since it is his bad dream (i think he is a bit ooc idk), i tried to make it all brief and quick to feel like a dream too. i love writing angst now, i don't care if i'm bad at it.

reblogs, feedbacks and likes are appreciated. support your content creators 💓 please leave a comment if you like my work, and enjoy your reading.

dad!daemon x mom!reader au masterlist

"You did it, my love! You did it!" I said excitedly, kissing your sweaty forehead and cheeks.

I watched as the grand maester held the baby in his arms, announcing the birth of a girl. Another girl. I remember that once we talked about having another girl, when Alyssa was little. I said she needed company, so we tried for one more, and then Maegon was born. It took me 7 years to convince you to have another child, and you made me swear this would be our last one.

I turned to face you, as your tight grip on my hand softened. Your eyes were closed, the color of your skin got paler due the amount of blood you lost, but still there was a small smile in your lips.

“Y/N” I called into your ear, feeling your touch getting colder, “Wake up, my love. You need to see her face.”

I touched your face and jiggled you a little, hoping you would open your eyes and grumble about the pain. You didn't.

"She's not waking up!" I yelled and the maester came to check on you, "Is she unconscious? She lost a lot of blood, she may have lost her senses."

"She..." The maester frowned, but his eyes delivered the bad news before his lips did, "She is gone, my Prince."

I couldn't react. The cries of our newborn baby echoed in the room, and I thought about the cries of our children later. No, you couldn't be gone. You couldn't leave me, you wouldn't leave them. I told you I could not do this without you, how could you do this to me!?

My hands found your cold cheeks again, and I shook you once more, pleading you to wake up. You didn't.

I thought telling the children would be the hardest part, but actually the words that got stuck in my throat was the command Caraxes needed to burn your dead body. I took a deep breath, like you would have told me to, and then I said it. Maybe it was Maegon's grip in my leg, hiding himself behind me, maybe it was Rhaegon soft sobs, or even Alyssa's tough act avoiding to shed a tear, but somehow I found strength to do it, so I could get that over with. So I could mourn you alone.

I was praying that war would strike again, that The Triarchy would rise, so I could go into battle and release my anger upon my enemies. Or so I could die and be with you again. I thought my anger would vanish if I had someone to blame, and I did as I threatened the maester I would do if you died. Even killing dozens of people did not make it go away. You wouldn't want this.

It's been weeks since the last time I left my chambers. The maids were the ones taking care of the children, all of them. They would bring me Viserra sometimes, because I liked to see her eyes. Your eye, my eye. Our last one, and you finally had something of yourself in one of our children's features. It could be just one eye, but for me it was my whole world. I loved staring at your eyes. I miss them so much.

We moved to Dragonstone. Everything about the Red Keep reminded me of you, and I couldn't stand to be in our old shared chambers, where every corner had your scent.

I felt so scattered. I needed someone to help me with the children. Rhaenyra had been through many losts, her mother, Harwin, Laenor... She was the one to help me. And our children weren't alone, as their cousins were there for them. Alyssa and Jace became close, you would be happy about that.

"She is lovely." Rhaenyra grinned, playing with Viserra in her arms.

"She is." I agreed, paying no attention to her.

From the Princess' chambers, I watched the children in the yard. Alyssa, Rhaegon and Maegon were all in a corner, watching Rhaenyra's boys training. I thought coming to Dragonstone would make our daughter happy, since she was free to train with the boys if she wanted to. It didn't, she was quieter and closed, like the fire inside her burned down.

The same happened to our boys, who were never the same since you were gone. Rhaegon confessed to me that his brother cries every night, missing you to tell them bedtime stories. And he, our firstborn... You were always the one to talk about feelings. So when I see our son crying and slamming his sword against anything in his way at the training yard, what should I do? Tell me, my love, for I don't have your compassion. You were always the better parent.

"It brought them together, didn't it?" Rhaenyra asked.

I turned around to face her. Viserra was sleeping in her arms.

I nodded.

"You don't have to be alone, uncle. You can stay here, as long as you want to." Rhaenyra placed the sleeping babe on her bed, and came towards me, "We can make company to each other. I'm sure the girls will need a mother figure..."

"It's too soon, Rhaenyra. Too soon..."

"It's been four months, Daemon. I loved Y/N, but your life can't stop. The children will need a mother. Viserra is just a baby."

That speech convinced me. I told you I couldn't do it without you. Rhaenyra was there, practically begging me to marry her. I did it for the children, I did it for you. None of it was pleasant. It felt like every moment of my wedding was a torture, and vivid flashbacks of our wedding day kept replaying in my head. You were so beautiful... so full of life.

Fate was cruel to us, my love. The Gods punished me for being a bad person, a bad father, a bad man. They took you away from me, and I accepted my punishment, looking forward to the very day I'll meet you again. My love.

"My love..." You finally called for me.

"My love, wake up!"

Your husband woke up gasping for air, like he was trapped under water. While sweat runned down his forehead, his chest went up and down frenetic, as his hands desperately gripped on your body, pulling you closer to him.

"Daemon, what's wrong? Are you okay?" You asked, worried. He silently nodded with his head buried in your chest.

You frowned. That was unusual. If you could take a wild guess, you'd say Daemon was scared.

"Did you have a bad dream?" You muttered between soft kisses in his hair. He nodded, "Do you wish to talk about it?"

He nodded again.

[newpercyjfan]

“I plunge to my death” Percy Jackson Au

Ok first, if you somehow came up with this exact thing already, i wouldn’t know, I don’t even follow the Percy Jackson tag yet, but just tell me and I’ll take it down or tag it as an alt universe of your au and credit it, but I have like three other ones I’ll be posting so we’ll see.

- This au is connected to both the tv show and the book because I like what both did in terms of the arch episode.

- This mostly goes how the tv show episode goes, Percy gets poisoned, they get to the top of the arch, he sacrifices himself. But this time, he does pray to his dad as he falls over 100 ft to his death.

- His dad doesn’t answer. He’s the one who somehow last second, controls the water to save himself. He sinks to the bottom of the lake and gets stuck. He feels the poison and his wounds get slightly better.

-In this au, the nereid doesn’t actually help him get out of the water, because in this version it’s inspired by how in the books, when he left the water the wounds came back. If he leaves the lake, he could die.

- So he stays stuck there for almost three days while the nereids bring him seaweed and shit to eat, but eventually he gets sick of it.

- he learns that Poseidon didn’t really want him to leave, at least not yet, mainly because he knew if he left he would continue to be chased by monsters or die in some way and believed a war would come either way. Basically, if the Poseidon that said “heroes always end badly, I regret getting your mom pregnant” actually did something about it

- but of course, he can’t keep Perseus ‘I don’t listen to anybody but myself’ Jackson down in a lake without him going a lil crazy and he breaks the root holding him down and swims to shore, but the poison instantly kicks back in, and gets back in the water

- his father gifts him a hydrai (a large vase/urn basically that carry’s water) that holds basically a portal to the ocean in it. GUYS LISTEN, I HEARD THIS MYTH SOMEWHERE BUT WHEN I TRIED TO FIND THE SOURCE IT DISAPPEARED. I was positive I heard that there was a vase that held the ocean in it somewhere so just take my word 😭

- the mist makes it look like a water bottle with no label 😭💀💀💀

- Percy accepts the gift because he wants to get out of there, but he suddenly does not have a very good idea of the gods or specifically his father. I don’t think the nereid actually told him that his father really did care, at least a little bit, all he saw it as was his dad not thinking he would succeed/ he saw it as Zeus turning Thalia into a tree because he didn’t want to idk disprespect the other gods? Cause it was easier than defending her? That’s how Percy sees it anyways

- Meanwhile, Grover and annabeth are convinced he died. They looked and called for him, but there was no proof of his survival, so instead annabeth took his place in a lot of missions to fulfill the quest cause she’s a girl boss like that.

- I think her main theory of what happened to him is straight up “I saw him fall and didn’t see him land, so maybe he turned into the lake or a tree or something too” 💀😭

- anyways Percy gets chased by another monster but has no more fucks to give. He’s scary. He’s pale, has dark eyes and a taste for vengeance.

- he tries to find annabeth and Grover but they’re pretty ahead of him.

- my main idea is that they meet again in the underworld with hades and they are little wary honestly.

- also omg I didn’t think of this before but what if they thought, hey, he’s in the underworld, guess he did die 💀.

-But anyways what I thought would happen was annabeth and Grover get there first and annabeth has the backpack with the bolt in it. Hades asks if they wanted a trade and that’s why they came. He bluffs and tells them if they give him the bolt and the helmet he’d let go Percy’s mom or “bring back” percy. (Hades knows percy is not dead and is kinda pissed that Percy is constantly on the edge of death but making it because of his dad technically, and he can’t take him to punishment field or whatever he calls it idk)

- I think annabeth chooses percy and is about to give the bag over, but realizes he was tricked and he was never dead. But idk. There are so many diff ways this could go and I’d love to hear how you guys would write it. I’d love some reblog a that add to this idea.

Also I need unhinged percy content

(Sorry if the art or wording is bad, it’s late and I’m tired)

[lu-vin-it]

I've never requested before so idk if I'm doing it right and also idk if this is what u meant by soulmate au so feel free to just ignore it if it isnt- but maybe something where soulmates have the same mark or symbol as each other, and daryl and reader's is the little skull tattoo that he has on his hand?

Group of Outcasts

── ⋅⋅⋅ ────꒰ ୨ ♡ ୧ ꒱───────

Pairings: Daryl Dixon x Reader

Pronouns Used: None Mentioned

Word Count: 1,552

Warnings: None

A/N: Tysm to @stqrluvr for proofreading!!! Also one of the characters may or may not be named after @lov9r 🤫🤫

The day you got your soulmate mark was supposed to be the best day of your life, and for most, it was. However, when you get a skull on your hand, a lot of small minded— small town people, kinda go crazy. Plus, it didn’t help that you already had a bad rep around town due to your Mama leaving and your Daddy being a drunk. You were seen as trailer trash and nothing more.

It didn’t bother you all that much, it was a small small town and people were going to judge. You got used to the glares from Mrs. Thompson when you passed her house, the way the sea of students would part when you came down the hall, and the way police officers’ would pay extra close attention to you when you were around. 

So even after you became an adult and your Daddy died, you stayed in that town, it was all you knew, after all. You kept dealing with the glares, the parting, and the spying. 

Then people started getting sick. And people who were sick became these monsters. So you packed up your shit and went off. You lived alone in the woods for a while before coming across a group of 7 people. There was Timmy, a nice man in his fifties who was accompanied by his wife, Mia, a woman in her thirties, and their 8 year old daughter, Charlotte. There was also Cece, a seventeen year old girl who was desperate to prove herself to the group. And Grace, a twenty-something year old who reminded you a lot of Annie from Annie Get Your Gun. And last but not least, Johnny, a 16 year old boy, and his Dad, Sydney. 

You very quickly became the leader of the group. You led them around Georgia for a while before you ended up being caught by some walkers and lost everyone but Charlotte, Sydney, and Grace. So now here you are with 3 people to look after, despite being barely able to look out for yourself, stranded in the middle of Georgia with nothing. 

You were fucked. 

“Y/N.. when are we gonna be where we’re tryna be?” You let out a frustrated sigh. 

“Grace, I dunno how many times I can tell you. We aren’t going anywhere specifically. We’ll just find somewhere dry to camp for a bit. I don’t know how long it'll take for us to find somewhere like that so please have a little patience.” She glares at you in response. You return your eyes to the road ahead of you. You’d been through these parts many times searching for other signs of life but.. there was nothing. You often found yourself wondering if you four were the last humans alive. 

“Take a left up here. Should be a neighborhood right down the road.” Sydney says, pointing at an intersection. You do so. 

A few hours later you were slowly making your way through the neighborhood when you realized that Charlotte was missing. 

“Sydney, where the hell is Charlotte!?” 

“I.. I dunno she was just here..” Your heart drops. 

“When was she just here? You were the one in charge of her, where the hell is she?” 

“I—“

“Sydney.” 

“I helped her get out of the truck and.. and I thought she was behind me.” You let out a chuckle. And then another one, and another. Soon you were hysterically laughing. “Grace, go look for Charlotte around the truck.” The girl nods and runs off. “You and me,” You poke him in the chest. “Are gonna talk. What in the hell were you thinking?” 

“I was thinking; she ain’t my kid. She won’t ever be Johnny. You keep putting us together as if we’re gonna click just cause I’m a— I was a Dad. That’s unfair.” You scoff.

“Unfair? What’s unfair is that Charlotte lost her Mom and her Dad within ten minutes and now the man she looked up to left her for dead. That’s unfair. How about this? How about I leave you here.” His eyes widened. 

“You wouldn’t.” 

“I would.” 

“Uh.. Y/N?” You hear Grace yell. Your neck snaps to her direction where a man with an eyepatch is holding a gun to her temple. 

“Don’t take another step.” He says, his voice is coarse. 

“Let go of her.” You spit back, pulling your gun out. 

“I don’t think you want to do that.” 

“I think I do. Let her go.” 

“Why should I?” 

“Because if you don’t, I’m not afraid to blow your fucking brains out.” He laughs. 

“You couldn’t get me from this distance.” You see Grace slowly reach into her pocket and grab a knife. 

“Couldn’t I?” You tilt your head to the side. 

“N—“ Suddenly, the man starts screaming in agony. Grace had stabbed him in the neck. He fell to the ground, his gun going off a few times in the process. Grace grabbed the gun and shot him in the head. You run up to her. 

“Are you okay?” You put your hands on her shoulders. She was shaking.

“Did I just.. I just killed him, didn’t I?” You sigh.

“It was you or him, Grace.” She nods slowly. “Now let’s find Charlotte.” 

Thankfully, you did find Charlotte pretty quickly. She was hiding out in the truck after she realized she had forgotten her knife. 

Two days later, You, Grace, and Charlotte were getting some much needed sleep inside of a shed while Sydney kept watch. It wasn’t too long before the shed door burst open, waking all of you. Sydney slowly walked in, a man following him with a crossbow raised. 

“Who the hell are you?” You jump to your feet and stand in front of Charlotte. 

“Names Daryl.” 

“Okay, Daryl. What do you want?” 

“How many people are in your group?” You furrow your brows. 

“Syd, Grace, and Charlotte.” You pause. “What do you want?” 

“How many walkers have you killed?” You squint your eyes.

“Man what are tou talking about? Why would I keep track?” 

“How many people have you killed?” 

“What? None! What the hell is wrong with you?” 

“One.” Grace whispered. 

“There’s a community, ain’t too far. If we leave now, we can make it by dawn.” You glance at Sydney and Grace. 

“You’re just gonna barge in here, pointing a crossbow at Syd, ask me these unsettling questions and then invite us to move in with you?” You shake your head. “Go to hell.” The man stares into your eyes for a moment before removing the glove from his right hand. You look at him with confusion before finally realizing what he was showing you. He had a skull tattoo on his hand identical to the one on yours. He was your soulmate. “Oh.”

“So you comin’?” You nod slowly. 

“Yeah, we’re comin’.” 

The drive to the community, Alexandria, was quiet. Daryl barely spoke and you had the feeling that it was an all the time thing, not just because he didn’t know you. When you arrived at Alexandria, the gate opened almost immediately. You were welcomed in by a man named Rick Grimes. He asked you guys some questions before showing you to a house. 

It seemed too good to be true. There had to be some sort of catch. 

“Y/N! They’re having a little shin-dig tonight to welcome us into the community, you coming?” Grace asked as she walked into the house. You had been reading a book on the couch for the past day. 

“No.. you gonna take Charlotte?” 

“Yeah... That book good?” You nod mindlessly. “Must be.. ain’t seen you interactin’ with anyone at all. Not even your soulmate.” You glance at her. “Well.. if you change your mind.. I’ll see you there.” 

That night, you could hear the party happening all the way from your house. It was disrupting your book. Okay, and maybe you felt a little guilty about being so curt with Grace.. So you got up and walked to the party. You stood on the sidewalk staring at the house for a bit, wondering if you should go in. Parties were never your thing. People were never your thing. Was this even a good idea? 

“Hey..” You turn around, startled by the sudden voice. You’re relieved to see Daryl with two men behind him. 

“Oh, Hi.” 

“Er.. This is Aaron and Eric, guys this is Y/N.” You muster up a small smile for the men. 

“It’s nice to meet you both.” 

“Likewise! Are you heading in?” You glance at the house again and shrug. 

“Not sure if I’d be welcome.” 

“You can join us if you’d like? We always have dinner together when they throw parties. You can be a part of our little group of outcasts.” Aaron offers. You look at Daryl who raises his eyebrows. You nod. 

“Yeah, okay.” 

Dinner was lovely, although you didn’t talk much, you found yourself enjoying the company of the three men very much. 

“Maybe you can join in next time too!” Aaron said as he waved to you. 

“Absolutely. Thanks for having me.” You waved back and started walking to your house.

“Y/N, wait!” You turn around to see Daryl running towards you. 

“Yeah?” 

“Mind if I walk you home?” You smile. 

“Not at all.”

[thicctails]

"Viva la Viva, baby!"

So guess who watched Trolls 3 today~

Ngl, based on the trailers I had really low expectations for this movie, and it was really only after watching some TikToks with the villain song in them that I decided to give it a chance, and I'm so glad I did. 3 is by far my favourite of the entire series. Was not expecting to love Viva, but she was fantastic and I wish we had more screen time with her!

While I'm not entirely sure how I will/would integrate her into the Rough and Fluff AU, I decided to make a design for her anyways, complete with some little headcanons/additions. (Click the image for better quality)

More spoilery/AU discussions and 4th movie predictions below!

Okay okay, movie discussion first:

-I fucking LOVE the Putt Putt Trolls. Its so satisfying seeing how the trauma from the bergens being more fleshed out, and it makes perfect sense that they are as fearful as they are. I'm actually surprised there wasn't more pushback when Viva stopped them from executing Bridget and Gristle.

-(How did they escape actually? The tunnels collapsed, but were there other tunnels? Or did they have a different way out? How did so many, including the eldest heir to the throne, get left behind? Why did Peppy not get BOTH his daughter's immediately?)

-On the topic of Viva; notice how her ears are lower/sharper than Poppy's? I think that's typically a more masculine trait (not 100% bc we see some male trolls with softer/rounder ears) so uh yeah MTF Viva real suck my entire nards

-Fuck King Peppy. This guy gets worse every movie. He is the Dumbledoor/Sensi Wu of Trolls. Mans cannot just give Poppy relevant information to save his LIFE. I can understand not telling Poppy immediately, the grief of loosing his eldest daughter would understandably make that hard, but its been over 20 years now, and she deserved to know.

-Also, fuck most of Branch's brothers! I'm glad JD went back eventually (when exactly he did isn't clear, but sometime between the night of the escape and the first movie) but if he assumed Branch had died, why not try and contact his other siblings to tell them? Clay I can kinda understand with him not wanting to venture out beyond the mini golf area and leave the trolls he was helping to protect, but the rest of them? Not one of them tried to go back for their baby brother? Not even Floyd? When Trollstice was a thing?? Branch shoulda thrown hands fr.

-Rhonda the armadillo bus thing was hella cute and I want a plushie.

-I. Do not really like Crimp

-Velvet and Veneer slayed sooooooo hard. I hope Veneer makes a comeback.

-I also hope we see more of the other troll tribes again.

-The music for this movie was absolutely fire and I NEED a full cover of Sweet Dreams

-I wish the Grandma's death was touched on more than once for like .5 seconds. Like, come on guys, your brother just revealed a major trauma, and that your GRANDMA died!! For christ sake, maybe go apologize for fighting?? maybe go comfort him????

Movie numero 4 predictions:

-Broppy marriage. Branch fr said "Lets get married" by accident HES THINKING ABOUT IT

-Either Poppy/Viva get their mom back, or Branch gets one/both of his parents. Dreamworks will pull some bullshit out of their ass and say that uhm actually they escaped like years before the others did and have been, idk, trapped in the shadow realm or something.

-We see Chef/Creek again. Creek redemption ark would go crazy hard IF DONE RIGHT and I want to see that fear of some monster trying to eat all your friends come back again

-Broppy kid reveal at the end of the movie. Unbelievable amounts of Plush Toy Marketing and terrible spin offs ensue.

-backstory/lore/backstory/lore/backstory/lore/BACK

-I just want to see more Trollstice era stuff plz dreamworks

-We get a Sound of Silence reprise

-Branch/his brothers are revealed to be a hybrid/some kind of special troll. I am TELLING YOU this guy adapted to different kinds of music like it was NOTHING, something Poppy and the others struggled with. Hes got something in him I SWEAR

-Tiny diamond is, once again, part of the main supporting characters

Au shiz:

-If Viva IS put in, its going to most likely be during the sequel. Peppy is already going to be dragged through the mud, might have him mention something about a lost sibling near the end of the OG fic, and since the Pop trolls will be looking for a new home, maybe they'll run into her

-Branch's brothers will not be making an appearance. They simply dont fit into the narrative. I may do an alternate au with them included but who knows.

-Mildly considering making Tiny Diamond a Greek kid. (Guy x Creek) would make for some interesting angst.

[cncozutarapoto]

fun. x ATLA

Idk if anyone else in the fandom listens to fun., but I'm a big fan of pretty much the whole Some Nights album. I was listening to it last week (yes, even the Some Nights - Intro, which I don't vibe with) because it was speaking to me in terms of ATLA characters (certain songs reminded me of certain characters).

"But Turtle, Nate Reuss wasn't focused on ATLA when he was writing this album"

Ok, and? I'm gonna have some fun with this!

So here's each song and the character I think it fits (not all are exact fits & not every song is included, but most are)

1. Some Nights - Sokka

"This is it, boys, this is war/what are we waiting for?" feels very Sokka to me, especially since he considers himself a warrior and is the protector of Wolf Cove after Hakoda and the other men leave to fight the fire nation. Also "I still see your ghost" could reference Kya, but more likely Yue, since Sokka says that he sees Katara's face when he tries to remember his mother. The line about the martyr reminded me of Suki. Ok also the "miss my mom and dad for this" line?? Come on. Ok BUT "my heart is breaking for my sister and the con she called love/and then I look into my nephew's eyes" is just SCREAMING a Zutara or Kataang fic of some sort. Come on, right?? It's just begging to be written. Overall, this is very existential crisis-Sokka to me.

2. We Are Young - Katara

Ok so I wasn't fully sure what song to give Katara and it just didn't feel right to leave her out so I deadass just gave her this one like 5 minutes ago, but it still works. It would also be AU-based, but hear me out. I'm assuming y'all are most likely to know this song out of all of them. So Katara's at a bar after breaking up with her boyfriend (Aang) and the Gaang's all here. "My seat's been taken by some sunglasses askin' bout a scar" would be Zuko asking about the scars on Katara's hands that she couldn't fully heal after Aang's firebending accident. "But between the drinks and subtle things/the holes in my apologies/you know I'm trying hard to take it back" feels very Aang to me, especially since he's immature. Then right after, I feel like it switches to a more Zutara vibe for most of the song. Also "the moon is on my side/I have no reason to run" with Katara is such a sick combo omg.

3. Carry On - Zuko

The lyrics are very angsty. "You swore and said we are not/we are not shining stars/this I know, I never said we are" feels like a very Zuko & Iroh interaction to me. And also "though I've never been through hell like that/I've closed enough windows to know you can never look back" !!!! Like that feels very Season 3 Zuko to me. Also, no matter what, Zuko is forced to carry on, whether it's with Ozai, Azula, the Gaang... Although don't get me wrong, Zuko does take back his destiny, but I'm referring more to how he can't give up. Also Ursa tells Zuko and he later says how he struggles and fights, even though it's hard. "And we talked and talked about how our parents will die/all our neighbors and wives" Zuko is very familiar with the concept of mortality, he nearly died and he loses his mother at a young age. I'm sure he worries about when Iroh will die, as well as his friends. I feel like Zuko has a line about people leaving him, but I can't find it. Ok next point "and it's nice to know when I was left for dead/I was found and now I don't roam these streets/I am not the ghost you are to me" is very reminiscent of Zuko's relationship (or lack thereof) with Ozai. Also "may your past be the sound of your feet upon the ground" feels like a very Iroh line. Last point, "on our darkest day, when we're miles away/so we'll come and we'll find our way home" is very reminiscent of Zuko's redemption arc and how he returns home and retakes his place in the line of succession and becomes Fire Lord.

4. It Gets Better - Katara?

Honestly the "yes, I know it hurts at first/but it gets better" reminds me a lot of Katara. I also liked the line about fire in the sky and snow on the ground. Not too much else to say.

5. All Alone - Mai

I really encourage you guys to listen to this song, it was really interesting. The lyrics reminded me of Maiko, especially how Mai seems to not care about anything. The girl's voice reminded me a lot of Mai throughout the series, especially her interactions with Zuko. "I gave her to you/I don't need a toy/I thought you might appreciate it/I don't like the way it moves" reminds me of their interaction when Zuko tries to give Mai the shell on Ember Island. "How do you cry with inanimate eyes/you're never gonna smile/with the way that you're wired" also reminded me a lot of Mai's character throughout the series.

(I really like All Alright, but wasn't sure who it would fit well with)

6. One Foot - Toph

"I put one foot in front of the other" is very Toph, she is a fighter first and foremost. "I don't need a new love or a new life" also feels very her, Toph doesn't care as much about the more material things compared to the rest of the Gaang. I'm sure there's more that can be said about this connection, but I didn't really vibe with the song so much. Sorry Toph.

7. Out on the Town - Aang

Okay, Aang fans, I'm asking you to stick with me here. "Cause I know I'll never take the time/to unpack my missteps and call all of our friends" feels very much like season 3 Aang, where he doesn't face consequences for his actions and Bryke kinda places him on this pedestal of sorts. Also, this is a kataang breakup song to me. The chorus really feels like Aang to me, putting his feelings before those of other people, causing a scene, there being consequences (that he somehow gets out of, but that's not today's discussion). "But I'm waiting for the day you come back and say/'hey maybe I should change my mind'" reminds me of the first 2 times Aang kisses Katara and how he expects her to change her mind on how she feels about him. Also the repetition of "open up your heart".

Overall, I found the entire album to be very Zuko-coded.

If you read this far, I appreciate you!

[honorthysalad]

concerning your recent post about yoshiki’s dad, idk if it’s just me but i get the sense that mokmoklen is building him to also be gay and possibly in love with hikaru’s dad. like i feel insane just saying this but the vibes are there and i cant shake the feeling that its going to be a thing. in general though yoshiki’s dad’s current iteration is just. so lame. story-wise i really do miss how he was presented as this absent shadow in yoshiki’s life, one that was even threatening. i was holding out for him to be some sort of antagonist but nooo. like we needed another guy in the story. where is hikaru’s mom

yeah the more I thought about it the more I was like, Yoshiki's dad is probably intended to be a "This is what Yoshiki will turn out like if he doesn't have the strength to move on from Hikaru". On the other hand, I don't think it's done very interestingly, and Kurebayashi's husband already fulfills the niche of closeted gay man in a het marriage staying closeted for the sake of the family/kids and then having that all blow up and cause problems. I think the more interesting version is how the light novel presents him.

And of course, I am the biggest advocate for Yoshiki talking to Hikaru's mom. I literally griped with the fact that Yoshiki will talk to his dad instead of her because I feel like she's a very good parallel to Yoshiki, and also an example of someone who has dealt with their grief, which could be move us closer to coming to terms with Hikaru's death. Like Kouhei died under mysterious circumstances and left Hikaru's mom with solely raising Hikaru, just like Hikaru died under mysterious circumstances and left Yoshiki with the new responsibility of 'Hikaru' (+ how yoshiki compares 'hikaru' to a child).

But of course, Len dismisses the female characters by just having them not know anything. Why would Kouhei tell his friend all the Indoh family secrets and not his wife? Who fucking knows. It's not being examined at all by the manga when it really, really needs to be, and what I mean is that in ch17 Yoshiki goes 'it must only be told to men' and just. accepts that. unquestioningly. Like. why? why can't the women know? The only women we've seen who do are the Matsuuras who have had direct experience with it as compared to every other Joe Schmoe who just gets to know about it. I mean cmon Maki knows more about the dumbass thing than Hikaru's mom who is married to an Indoh.

I don't like how Len treats their female characters. I really don't, and while the manga isn't done so we can't know that these things won't ever be questioned or how they'll conclude, I really don't like what I'm seeing so far. Len says they treat straight and queer characters the same, but can the same be said for the male and female characters? I mean not to harp on the same example but it's so blatant it makes my head spin:

The fact that not only does the grandma not even get flavor text but Yoshiki's mother doesn't even get the courtesy of two lines above her head saying grandmother and grandfather. The space is noticeably empty. How we have all this information on Yoshiki's dad but very little on his mom. How she still doesn't even have eyes.

[nezz-cringe-crib]

teru mikami analysis bc i love him

hi i'm just here to rant about how much i love teru mikami's character because he's genuinely such a well written character. this is probably gonna be unorganized and just rambly. i might rewrite it later but for now i just need another reason to procrastinate and focus on my silly emos.

(oh yeah also spoilers if that isn't obvious)

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

mikami is probably one of the best representations of religious trauma (at least imo and from what i've seen). i haven't read the manga yet and a lot of this might just be me projecting, but either way he's still the top in my books. there's SO many scenes and details about him that remind me so much of myself when i was still heavily involved with christianity (and to be clear, this is my own interpretation, not me tryna shit on any religions. that's a big wompwomp no-no. respect ppl hoes). so here's some random bits about mikami that make me go "OH SHIT ME-CORE ALERT!!!!":

the entire thing with his mom. i know that when he reflects back on his mom's death, he talks about how he's happy the whole thing happened because "she's evil and god killed the evil for me thanks god" but i completely believe the whole thing is just him brainwashing himself. like think about it for a second. his mom just died in the same car crash that involved his main tormentors, and this was also right after he was holding a slight grudge against his mom for defending said tormentors (she obviously didn't do that. she was just trying to help mikami view the world from a more realistic point of view to keep him out of trouble, but when you're that young and that passionate about justice, to him it'll seem like she's defending the same evil he's trying to fight). when you combine these things together, this is just gonna lead to a WHOLE lot of conflicted and lost feelings, and we see that in mikami. he had just been through a rough conversation with his mom, and she died before he could even get a chance to really think about said convo. all he is left with is a mixed feeling of loss, resentment, and fear. however, on the other hand, her death meant that the tormentors she was defending had also died. so to him, it has to mean something, doesn't it? the group of bastards that had been ruining his and others' lives and had finally been rid of. and if this had happened right after his mother had been defending them, it has to be a sign, right? there has to be a reason for all this hurt, right? when mikami is viewing the world through these lenses, it makes sense that'd he'd suddenly want a reason to justify his mom's death, even though it feels unbelievably cruel. so he finds a reason, and he finds that reasoning through god. this is honestly something that i used to do a lot when i was still heavily invested in my church, and i'm sure there are others who have been in the same situation. when the world is unjustifiably cruel, people will make up justification for it. it's a fear tactic that many people fall prey to in religious environments, and if not treated, it can fester into much more toxic environments for the people around them.

^^^ tldr: mikami copes with his mom's death by telling himself "it's okay that my mom died!! she was working for satan and god had to kill her!! thanks god!!" and if that's not the most religious-trauma-core shit out there then idk what is.

ALSO LITERALLY JUST EVERYTHING WITH LIGHT'S DEATH???? YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH THAT SHIT HURT MAN. the realization that your god is not the god you thought you had been following used to be some of the scariest shit out there to me and mikami had it thrown right at his face when light died. not only was his god gone, but his god was never a god to begin with. he was just some guy. some pathetic guy who was now bleeding out and screaming on the ground. he had dedicated his life to this thing, and it was never real to begin with. and so he dies with it. because when the god revolving your life is gone, what other life do you really have? mikami was the perfect fucking example of that and i need it to be talked about more fucking please guys he's literally just like me fr i swear.

that's all i can think of right now tbh. if there's any typos in here no there isn't you're wrong nuhuh. anyways i fucking love mikami's character. he might be an antisocial autistic boyloser edgelord but he's MY antisocial autistic boyloser edgelord and i will defend him with my life. that hoe did EVERY wrong thing but your honor he is just a silly guy.

[beanghostprincess]

One piece AU everyone is marine except for Luffy. He gets into a fight with every single one of them and has to befriend and gain their trust in order to be a part of his crew. They all have their own personal vendetta against pirates.

It's a work in progress but please add some of your intake on this AU I want to hear it

Oh! That is such an awesome idea??? I love it!! Mmmm I would love to give you my thoughts on every mugiwara, but it's kind of difficult when it comes to characters like Robin or Franky. Or Zoro, even- But I'll try to tell you how I think Nami/Usopp/Sanji would become marines because it's tbh pretty easy.

Nami is an easy one: When Bellemere dies and Cocoyashi Village is invaded by Arlong, Nami just decides to follow her mom's steps and become a Marine to save the village because she manages to escape from Arlong. Then the story is basically the same, tbh. She becomes a marine, goes to the village to help from time to time, but she can't do anything bc of the corruption within the marines. She wants to help but she isn't actually free being a marine, yadda yadda yadda. Luffy appears. Same old story. She joins Luffy.

Usopp is an easy one too, tbh: He hates his father and pirates bc Yasopp left him to become one. He becomes a pirate to see the world and become stronger and also bc he thinks it's the only way he has to make Kaya proud and be able to tell her stories, and, well, bc he hates pirates. He goes to Syrup Village from time to time to visit her. And the story is basically the same, tbh. Luffy helps Kaya when Usopp can't do it on his own and he realizes that perhaps Yasopp had a (semi) valid reason to leave, and he wants to have a taste of those adventures too!

Sanji's story is a bit more complex, but hear me out: Everything is the same, except that the marines are who find him and Zeff on that rock. Zeff, ofc, being a pirate and all can't talk directly to the marines so he just manages to steal a boat. Don't ask how, you're the one with the AU, I'm just here for the vibes, bestie. And so Zeff wants Sanji to have a better life bc he's, you know, a kid. And even if he doesn't like marines, he still think the pirate life for this little eggplant isn't the best. But Sanji wants to stay with him!!! So Zeff says very mean and horrible things to him to make the kid hate him and make him go with the marines. Long story short, Sanji becomes a very skilled cook for the marines and he ofc can also fight. He hates pirates bc Zeff left him, but he has mixed feelings for the man bc he saved him. Uhhh, not sure how he meets Luffy. Perhaps they somehow find each other at the Baratie when Sanji just happens to be there too. Maybe he finds Zeff there again and they end up making amends after saying he hates pirates for so long. Perhaps making amends with him and meeting Luffy is what makes him join the straw hats!! Idk. I need time to think about that.

The other crew members are hard af so PLEASE I'd be so happy if you sent me an ask (or a DM, if you don't want people to know about your AU details yet) explaining your ideas <3 My friend said Chopper is just Sengoku's other goat and Chopper keeps telling him that he's not a goat and he becomes a doctor for the marines and I think that's the funniest thing-

[feelbokkie]

bokkie commentary time

okay, i'm up and chapter 20 has been up for a few hours so let me tell you how the chapter, and the entire series was supposed to go

because i generally don't plan out my fics much, but i planned this one out a lot because i didn't want to fuck it up

and there is still so much lore but i think the series needs to end here. it just feels...right

spoilers down below

okay, by now, you know (if you read my last explanation post) Lee Know was originally supposed to die.

The texts at the end where Minho was texting reader, that was always going to happen. Obviously, it was going to be reader texting him, but that is one of the few original details that i knew i had to keep. actually, this is idea comes all the way from when i started thinking about sorry right number.

originally, srn was going to be about reader texting the number of an ex boyfriend who passed which is now chan's number (because his old number got leaked or something) and he realizes that she's grieving and just lets her (she already lost so much). he mutes her number and goes on with his life, but over time he starts to kind of fall for her or at least gets some form of emotional attachment to her via text. then one day reader sends a text that is alarming and chan just happens to see it so he does something he probably should have, he calls her. talks her out of it and that how the love story starts. but none of that felt right so i scrapped that idea and came up with a more light hearted story for sorry right number and let one last dance be born.

reader left gifts behind for everyone, but she also left letters

it was a newer detail that i had been playing around with since i started chapter 19. but it felt too cliche. seungmin, for whatever reason, held onto reader's shopping bags from that day and kinda figured out what went to who. at least that was the original idea. now, readers stuff sit in her old bedroom back at the apartment, untouched until one day when minho eventually moves and decides to hand them out. the letters, he was going to find but i decided last minute that reader actually gave them to her mom not too long after they originally visited them because she didn't want them to get lost in the move. reader's mom was going to also visit her grave that day, see the kids and invite them over to her house so she could give them to her. but i think letting seungmin give those last messages was a better ending overall.

minho ends up buying seungmin's guitar from the pawn shop and gifting it back to him

he immediately went to find it after he heard he pawned it but held onto it for him until he thought he was ready for it. which wouldn't have been until like christmas or something.

reader was going to go to a dance company in australia

back when minho was going to die and chan was supposed to be a good guy, reader originally was supposed to join a company in australia. after he died there was eventually going to be a string of texts towards the end talking about her move and how both felix and chan went with her to help her adjust to life down in australia and how minho shouldn't worry about chan because she only had eyes for him

han and hyunjin made up

reader wanted han and hyunjin to be friends. she knew that they would be close if they got over themselves. after she died han runs into hyunjin in the hallway and gives his condolences. and hyunjin says something about how reader wanted them to at least be civil with each other and over time, him and changbin get integrated into the group

minho fucked chan's shit up

after the bar incident minho runs into chan in the hallway, or maybe he goes over there directly, (idk i never settled that part) and gives chan a black eye. reader only finds out because minho's hand was bruised and when she ran into chan in the hallway later, she put two and two together

i took so long writing the last chapter because i wasn't ready for the series to end

this year has been incredibly hard for me. i tried to not let on how bad it's been for me often but it's been really, really bad. this month especially. as many of you know, i'm grieving my oldest brother. this month, in two weeks exactly actually, marks the first year since he passed and i haven't been coping well at all. i'm no stranger to death but i'm absolutely shit when it comes to expressing my feelings, especially if they're personal (something, something childhood trauma and all that) but i have no problem crying and all that when it's fictional. which is probably why i wrote a fic that focuses heavily on grief. so i can finally grieve properly. and while i haven't writing this series allowed my to let out some of the tears that i've been bottling up since last year. but i didn't want to end the series because it's been pretty much the only thing keeping me from completely losing my shit. i originally was going to take this month off. i was going to finish back in november, cue my feelbokkimas posts and then disappear until january but i couldn't so here i am. thank you for taking this path with me and allowing me to write this story

[pedropascalsx]

parts left, parts gained. {javier peña x f! reader}

summary: javier filled in for a lecturer friend as they take an extended break from teaching following his return from colombia.

warnings: a little angst, sadness, mentions of prescribed medications, very soft! javier peña, oral (f) receiving, p in v sex.

word count: 4.8k

eating: explicit

a/n: idk what this is. idk why i wrote it and im begging y’all to expect nothing from it, because it’s not very good.

not beta’d or read back because i cant read my own work ok.

thank you to my sweet loves @queenofthefaceless and @theewokingdead for being so supportive as i struggled my way through this.

These days sleep feels more like a distant memory than an everyday occurrence. His body craves it, his joints ache and cry out in the form of swelling and painful locking as they beg for some sort of relief, but instead he lives the pain. He tells himself it’s a small price he deserves to pay for all the mistakes he made along the way. Not so much a reminder that he survived, more like proof that he is paying for some of the crimes he’s created in his head. Each pull of the trigger, each order that soaked the streets with blood; even if they deserved it, he couldn’t get past contributing to the blood bath.

Every ache or jolt of pain forces him to relive a memory that he refuses to bury or justify. Each mistake weighs him down more and more as time slowly ticks by.

Javier Peña may have left Colombia over a year ago, but Colombia refuses to leave him.

*

The shower was much too hot, the ache in his shoulders being replaced by a sharp stinging as the water rained down on him. The work he had completed on the ranch already that morning had added to the months of exhaustion he was drowning in.

He had been to see a doctor, was making weekly trips to a therapist and they’d both suggested medication. The latter wrote a script for a low dose sleeping aid that he refused to touch. It took him two days to pick up the prescription, he slowly stalked each aisle of the pharmacy owned by the lady that still affectionately referred to Javier as mijo - he had once spent his Saturdays sweeping the floors and refilling the Candy shelves to earn a little money and after his Mom had died.

She could see the years of disruption in his eyes. She could feel the way that half the people in her store looked upon him as a hero and the others still glared at him for leaving his childhood sweetheart at the altar.

Javier barely said a word to her, if he was honest he barely spoke to anyone these days. He responded in short answers to his therapist, some weeks he would start to give a little more and then for weeks afterwards he’d seem to scale back even more. His dad would get tidbits of information if and when Javier was willing to share it, but knew not to press on him.

The only time he ever really spoke was on Tuesdays and Thursday mornings when he filled in for a professor friend that had taken an extended leave of absence at the college he taught.

Criminal Justice. Justice. The word felt heavy on his tongue. Some days it felt like it would slip back down his throat and slowly choke him and maybe one day it would.

He stood there in front of those kids, dodging questions and snide remarks about what he had been up to when he was taking down Escobar and the Cali Cartel.

His schedule today would find him completing his lecture and making his way to the airport. He had been asked to attend a conference by the department head at the college, he would be attending with his teaching assistant and they’d be spending two nights in a hotel in Houston.

He finished up his shower with a groan and got dried and dressed before pulling a few shirts, pants and clear underwear into a suitcase. His fingers lingered over the orange bottle that housed the pills he had been so reluctant to take, ultimately sweeping them up with the tips of his fingers and just dropping them unceremoniously into the case, before zipping it up and making his way downstairs.

“You fixed up the gate?” his father called out from the paper he was reading and sipping his tea behind.

“Needed to be done,” he said with a slight shrug, “I got this conference so figured I'll get it done before I go.”

Chucho hummed out a sharp mhmm, the words that he wanted to say being kept back by years of knowing when to keep his mouth shut when it came to his son. He folded over his paper and placed it down on his lap, “You’ll give me a call when you get to Houston, let me know you arrived okay?”

“Course, pops, I'll see you in a few.”

The door lightly slammed shut behind him and he made his way to his truck, throwing his case in the back and climbing in and soaring towards the college.

A few days somewhere else might be a nice reset, he soothed to himself.

*

You were nervous. The backpack filled with far too many clothes rested uncomfortably on your shoulders as you walked into the lecture hall… and fuck you were late.

Traffic had been a nightmare and your stomach was filled with butterflies, you hated conferences and you hated having to mingle even more. The rooms always filled with men who seemed hellbent on tripping you up and raising an eyebrow at your choice of career.

You were secretly excited to spend a little time with Javier though. He was kind, quiet, always happy to help and the fact he’s outrageously handsome doesn’t help either.

Both of you had immediately hit it off, and you’d realised very quickly that certain subjects seemed completely off-limits to Professor Peña and he respected that you never pushed when it seemed like no one else had a problem with pushing him.

He simply nodded at you as you entered the lecture hall, eyes flickering back and forth to the crowd and you as you made your way to the desk on the far right hand side of where he was discussing the importance of time, and how rushing into something seldom ends well.

It never stops fascinating you how he pulled the attention of everyone in the room with very little effort, he didn’t need to create a fuss or spend hours working on displays to earn the attention of people; it was just him and his experience in the field that captivated people.

And sure… there was the old class clown that would make stupid comments or continuously reference Colombia and the rumours of reputation he had there that had followed him back to Laredo, but he never retaliated. He’d just ignore the comment and swiftly move on.

You took notes as he went on with the lecture, watching in awe as he took the time to make eye contact and answer each sensible question that was sent his way with his students. His hands tucked into his pants pocket as he did so. You’d made a joke the week before about how he needed a tweed jacket with elbow patches and then he’d really have the look and your heart fluttered at the memory of his eyes flashing up with something that didn’t just resemble sadness for a few seconds.

The minute the lecture had finished he gestured for you to meet him in the office on the side of the hall and you wasted no time in following him.

He handed you a small folder that housed an itinerary and a few pamphlets to local bars, restaurants and attractions situated around the hotel in Houston.

“I figured these would be of more use to you than I,” he said with a smirk, “Room service and the hotel bar will suit me just fine.”

“Same,” you replied with a little too much gusto and you couldn’t help but notice the way his lips curled up for a split second, “I’m uh- not a big fan of navigating places I don’t know well.”

“Gotcha.” He says before reaching into his own folder, “One last thing, so we only got one parking permit for the airport. So I was going to leave my truck here and I’ll get a cab to the airport and you can have the permit.”

“You don’t trust my driving?” you ask with a smirk, “What sense does it make for you to pay for a cab, Mr Peña?”

“Just Javi. And if you’re sure. I didn’t want to be presumptuous.”

“Feel free to presume away,” you quip back with a smile, “I need to grab some paperwork from the teacher's lounge but I'll only take a minute. It’s the beat up black sedan parked next to the library.” You hand him your key and he gives you a polite smile in return.

*

He barely talks on the ride to the airport, his hands resting comfortably in his lap as he looks out the window, occasionally tapping his finger to the hum of the radio.

“Have you ever been to Houston before?” he asks as you search the parking lot for a space.

“Nope, this will be the first time,” you say with a shrug, “I wanted to visit Houston as a kid but money was tight. I was really into Space and I've been meaning to visit since the Space Center opened a few years ago.”

“Mhmm,” he hums back before pointing out a spot, “Well, tomorrow is full, but maybe Saturday before we fly home. We’ve got an evening flight.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

*

“Why does liquor always taste better in an airport?” you ask, breaking the comfortable silence you had been sitting in for the last half hour.

“I think it’s psychological,” he says with a grin, “You have to pretend it tastes better to justify the price.”

You giggle at his response before taking a bite of the burger that he had insisted on buying you lunch for driving him to the airport.

“I keep having to remind myself they’re not taking me back there,” he says, staring out at the planes with a laugh that doesn’t quite reach his eyes.

It’s almost instinct the way your hand reaches out and covers his, giving him a few reassuring squeezes before pulling it back. “Not all of you came back, did it?” you ask with a soft gentleness to your voice that wasn’t there before.

“No,” he replies quickly.

*

The flight was quicker than they thought it would be, the wind seemed to be blowing in favour of the plane and it ended up on the tarmac twenty minutes earlier than expected.

Javi insisted on letting you have the window seat and didn’t complain once, not even when the lady beside him ended up using his shoulder as a pillow after falling asleep within minutes of being in the air. He stifled a laugh when it happened and just accepted his fate, graciously staying as still as he could as she enjoyed her slumber.

Secretly a fleeting feeling of jealousy swept through his stomach when he saw how easily she drifted off, how comfortable she was just letting herself sleep surrounded by a bunch of strangers and how she remained asleep until the pilot announced that the plane would be landing shortly.

She said nothing to him as she slowly lifted her head off of his shoulder, she just looked around and sighed as she realised she’d slept the entire flight.

“Straight to pick up the rental car and onto the hotel or did you want to go anywhere first?” he asked as you de boarded the plane.

“The hotel sounds good,” you say as you follow closely behind him, watching the way he seems to effortlessly weave throughout the crowd.

You perch on the edge of the sofa with both of your cases in front of you in the rental store as he chats to the clearly enamoured girl working behind the desk, you wonder if he’d flirt back if you weren't waiting there for him. But he seems almost oblivious to her affection, so focused on the task he’s in the middle of doing, that he somehow can’t see the way she’s fluttering her eyelashes and not so subtly pushing her cleavage together in the top you’re almost certain he can see down.

You’d heard the rumours, you’d read the articles and you’d been in Laredo long enough to know that Javier Peña had a bit of a reputation for being a ladies man, but you’d never witnessed it first hand.

He was always professional, always kept the students that kept no secret of finding him attractive at arms length and didn’t seem interested in crossing any lines with the female professors that shamelessly flirted with him in the staff room. Honestly, you had spent many nights wondering if he had a secret lover that he kept sheltered away from the rumours and lingering glances.

“Ready?” he calls out before grabbing both of your cases and making his way to the car.

*

“You know that you had an admirer back there?” you ask with a grin, “I could feel her shooting dagger into my back as we walked out the store.”

He scoffs before laughing, “She wrote her number on the pamphlet and promised to show me the best bars in houston.”

“Oh,” you say with a raised eyebrow, “Sounds like you’ve got a busy few days ahead of you.”

Jealousy is an ugly emotion and you bite down on your lip in an attempt to keep it at bay, you had no right to be jealous, and you didn’t want to make things uncomfortable by coming across as so.

“No,” he says, momentarily taking his eyes off the road to glance over at you, “I politely declined.”

*

He wouldn’t deny it if someone asked if he found you attractive, he doesn’t think he’d be able to. He’s thought that you’re gorgeous since the first time you bounced into his office, arm outstretched as you introduced yourself with a giggle that seemed to burrow its way into his chest.

You were smart, funny and you never made him feel like he owed you any explanations. From the moment he’d left Colombia he was bombarded with questions about where he’d been, how he took down Escobar and a few had even dared to ask how he could bear to show his face around Laredo again. The few small minded folk somehow louder than everyone else as they’d bought up his past mistakes and continued to berate him for it, as if he hadn’t been punishing himself for years and years.

It made him comfortable knowing he could sit down next to you and have a conversation that wouldn’t end up with you asking questions about things that he wasn’t ready to talk about. And thinking about him wouldn't be able to deny the relief he felt when he found out it would be you accompanying him on this trip.

You were easy for him to be around, always helpful, always cheerful and he was starting to look forward to the next few days.

*

“No,” he repeated sternly but fairly to the hotel receptionist, “It’s two rooms. I have the confirmation here.”

“There was an issue with the booking,” he said with an uncaring tone as he slammed the key down next to Javi’s paperwork, “We don’t have a second room to give to you, the company will send a cheque to reimburse you for the mistake, but we are fully booked and there is nothing else I can help you with at this moment.”

Javier bites down a growl as he swipes the key from the counter and looks across at you with sorry eyes, before walking towards the elevator.

“I’ll take the pull out,” he said not meeting your gaze, “Or I can find a different hotel if you’re uncomfortable sharing.”

“I'm not uncomfortable and you’re not taking the pull out. I am. You know you panic too much, Javi.”

“So I've been told,” he says with a slight roll of his eyes as he enters the elevator.

You bounce down the hall to the room, unlocking it and swiftly letting yourself in, Javier trailing closely behind.

He sighs from the frame of the door behind you as you stand in the middle of the room, “No pull out?”

“Nope,” you say with a shrug, “Just a regular couch. But I’ll be comfortable enough.”

“No you won’t.” He says from behind gritted teeth.

“Yes. I will. I’m going to take a shower, you’re going to order room service and we are going to take full advantage of the fact the department is paying for it all,” you grab your case from his hand and make your way into the bathroom, “I want whatever costs the most.”

*

“That water pressure is phenomenal,” you say with a giggle as you run your fingers through your hair and place yourself down next to him on the sofa. “Did you order room service?”

“Yeah, it shouldn't be too long. Hope you’re hungry because I might have gone a little overboard.”

“Sounds perfect,” you say as make yourself comfortable on the little couch and watch him channel surf before settling on Wheel of Fortune.

“I love Wheel of Fortune,” you admit with a giggle, “Reminds me of home.”

“Same,” he says with a smile, “You sure you’re not wanting to explore the bright lights of Houston TX?”

“I’ll pass. Unless you want to be my tour guide? You’ve visited before, right?”

“Maybe tomorrow,” he shrugs, “Dinner, movie and bed is all that’s on

the agenda tonight.”

His mind races for a few seconds as he considers taking a sleeping pill as the situation he’s in catches up to him. He doesn’t want to keep you up, he feels waves of guilt reaching back and forth in his stomach at the fact you’re adamant he gets to have the bed and just as he feels his anxiety begin to rise, he’s pulled back into the present by your sofa hand reaching out and gently squeezing his thigh.

“You still with me?” you ask gently as you begin to recognise the signs of an anxiety attack.

“Ye-yeah,” he stutters before the sound of rapid knocking at the door makes you both jump, “Hungry?”

*

The evening flies by, you both settled down comfortably on the bed as you watched a movie together. Still picking at leftovers from the feast you had delivered to the room.

“Me and my old partner Steve were sent on a stakeout in Medellin and ended up in this hotel that was far too fancy for either of us and he decided to order everything he’d ever wanted to try from the menu… Courtesy of the DEA of course! He passed out from eating too much and I spent the rest of the evening trying to focus on the target and not killing Steve for snoring so loudly.”

His fingertips run around in little circles on top of the bedspread as for the first time he speaks about a memory in Colombia without grimacing.

“Do you still speak to him?”

He nods a few times before talking, “Yeah, a couple of times a week. He and his wife adopted a little girl when we were out there… made me godfather after I returned home.”

“The picture on your desk in your office?” you ask as you think about it; a small child perched on his lap and pulling on his moustache as he just looks at her with an amused look on his face.

“Yep, that’s her, Olivia.”

“She’s cute. I wondered if she was your daughter for a while, and then I heard you mention you never had children of your own.”

He hums before turning his attention back to the television and you reach out again to squeeze his hand. You think it lingers for a second too long, until you go to pull it away and he curls his fist gently, keeping your fingers interlocked with his as he does so.

“Do you think you’ll continue teaching once Geoff is back?” you ask, the courage coming from somewhere deep inside your chest as you ask the question that’s been weighing on your mind for weeks.

“Maybe,” he murmurs before rubbing his chin, “Haven't really thought about it.”

“The kids would miss you,” you say with a smile, “I’ve never seen a class so interested in what their professor has to say until I saw you teach.”

“I guess I’ll have to see what they say once Geoff is back, no point making plans if they decide that don’t need me anymore.”

“Oh, please,” you say as a smile spreads across your face, “They’d snap you up within seconds. You can’t pretend you have heard how badly that they want you to take up a permanent position there?”

He breathes out a contented scoff before shrugging, “I might have a letter in my desk that’s asking if I’d consider it.”

“So much for having to see, Mr. Peña,” you say with an exaggerated gasp, “You already know how much we’d all miss you if you left us.”

“You’d miss the stories,” he quips back and much too quickly for your own liking you respond.

“No, I never ask for the stories,” your breath slightly hitches as you slowly finish the end of your sentence, “I’d miss the kind man that I thoroughly enjoy working under.”

You turn to face him, studying the way he’s studying you, already taking in every part of your face.

And then his lips are on yours, one of his hands is gripping the bottom of your chin as yours finds its place on his chest, his tongue pushing through your lips as he deepens the kiss further.

You’re not sure how long he kisses you for but you curse yourself every time you need to come up for air, but the second you’ve inhaled he’s pulling you back in for more, his mouth just as desperate as your own as you seek out to know him in the ways you’ve dreamed about for the past few months.

Your hands thumble with the buttons of his shirt, trying to remain as delicate and careful as they can as he transports you somewhere extraordinary with every trace of his lips.

Every move is slow, calculated and somehow more breathtaking than the one before. He takes his time, removes your dress in one fluid motion but slow enough so that he can take in every newly revealed inch of you as he does so. His hands trailing down your body, his lips gently latching up to the hardened bud of your nipple and his own breath hitching as you moan out a sign of pleasure as he rolls it between his teeth.

He continues his journey, his hands and lips covering every part of you that they can. His mouth chanting a silent prayer of worship as his lips reach the bottom of your belly button. He peppers a few light kisses there before lifting his head and asking a question that you have to tell yourself not to yell at in reply.

“Can I taste you, Cariño?”

“Yes.”

He pulls your panties down your legs slowly, watching your face the entire time he does so. “I’ve thought about doing this,” he admits in a whisper, “Got myself off wondering about the soft sounds you’d make as I buried my face in your pussy.”

And the second the final word has fallen from his lips he’s doing it, tasting you like it’s the most important thing he’ll ever do. You taste sweet with a slight tang, and his cock throbs with every lap of his tongue. It’s been a long time since he experienced the taste of a woman, his last sexual encounters being back in Colombia and even then he wasn’t about to spread them out and really enjoy them.

But this, this was heaven. There are no exaggerated sounds of pleasure. It is not a quick rough emotionless transaction with the ultimate goal just being his pleasure and some shared information.

He had all the time he wanted with you, and he was damn sure going to use it right.

The sounds you made were like nothing he heard before, soft whimpers, moans that you seemingly had no control over and they filled the room and provided a perfect melody to this glorious happenstance.

His tongue dipped inside of you, tasting you everywhere he could before pulling back up to your little bundle of nerves and drawing out your pleasure with a series of perfectly precise licks and sucks. The essence of you coating his chin as he pulled your first orgasm out of you and diving back in for another.

It took no time at all and the second time you came you did so with a cry of his name. He kept thinking over and over that he could get used to this, used to the feeling of your fingers tangled up in his now erratic hair, used to you chanting his name like a prayer as he came on his tongue and rewarded him with a gush of your pleasure. It was pure heaven.

He lapped up every last drop, he could have spent hours down there but he couldn’t ignore the way he cock was straining against his zipper.

He pushes himself back off the bed and unzips his pants, freeing his already leaking cock as he did so and stroking himself as he looked down at you. Loving the sight of your legs spread and bliss etched on your face, he strikes himself a few more times before moving back in between your legs and leaning down to cover your lips with his.

“Can I?” he asks and you give him the yes that he’d craved more than any other in his 40+ years.

He gently pushes a pillow beneath your hips and lines himself up with you, kissing you once more before pushing the tip off him in. The thickness of him is thrilling, it pinches slightly as he notches himself in bit by bit and finally fills you to the hilt. “You okay?” he asks.

“I'm good, are you?”

“Yeah,” he says with a chuckle, “I’m really good.”

His movements are slow, but powerful, the drag of his thick cock is almost overwhelming but you can’t get enough. One of his hands squeezes your hip gently as the other squeezes the soft swell of your breast. He doesn’t want any of this to feel rushed, so he takes his time, taking you apart. Exploring whichever part of your body he mouth can reach as he continues thrusting in and out of you, groaning in delight when you clench around him.

The grip you have on him is indescribable, the way you suck him straight back in as he thrusts out, your bodies more intune than either of you have ever experienced with another person.

His moves his hand off your breast and wets the tip of two of his fingers with his tongue before bringing it down to your clit, rubbing it gently as you everything starts to go black with pleasure. You chant his name over and over as you clamp down around him, squeezing his cock so tightly so his breath becomes shaky and you come apart around him. Soaking his cock as it continues moving it and out of you.

He pulls himself out and strokes himself to completion, covering your glistening spread pussy with his spend and collapsing beside you after he does so.

At this moment, time belongs to you both.

There is no rushing, no schedules, no deadlines to be met. There is you and him and the afterglow of your bodies meeting for the first time.

Eventually, you both move, he gently guides you into the shower where he takes you again, a little quicker this time but making sure to be just as thorough with your pleasure.

That night sleep comes to Javier, it comes before he knows it’s coming. He wakes to the sound of the hotel room alarm blaring and you groaning as you nuzzle your face into his neck.

You both arrive at the conference an hour late, and leave after barely an hour. You spend the rest of the day getting to know each other in more ways than one as he fucks you well into the night. Once again feeling the welcoming embrace of sleep and your own after he does so.

Both of you joined in some way or another until you arrived back in Laredo.

You were really right. He thinks to himself. Maybe he left a bigger part of him back in Colombia than he realised, but what he knew right now, is that he is ready to start letting thing go. And he ready to fill those gaps with something better than ever before.

[calkale]

Okay because i put my thoughts in the tags the first time heres some of my spn au thoughts

Also disclaimer i am changing the supernatural story so dont get mad at me for not including things or changing things you like this is my house and i write the au <3

Characters: Dean -> Mav, Cas -> Ice, Sam -> Slider, John Winchester-> Duke Mitchell, Mary Winchester -> Slider’s mom (her name is also Mary in my Slider lore so), Bobby -> Viper, Ash -> Goose, Ellen -> Carole, Jo -> Bradley (he’s like a teen in this but don’t worry theres no Jo and Dean content 🤮 thats his godson) 

-slider and mav aren’t actually related, they were both 6 (mav older by a few months) when their parents got married, duke was a widower and mary was never married 

-Getting this out of the way although i love the chevy impala i am a truck freak so mav drives his dads black 1990 toyota sr5 with an extended cab 

Backstory: -viper and duke were both navy pilots now “hunting buddies”, they took mav and slider out hunting occasionally but whenever they went on long “hunting trips” they left slider and mav at home, that’s because these hunting trips were monster hunting trips

-the same thing that happens to sam and deans mom happens to mav and sliders mom but when they’re both around the age of 10, since they’re older and not stupid they have a lot of questions that duke can’t just bullshit answers to so he tells them about monsters and what he thinks took their mom (because he doesn’t actually know at this point)

-since they no longer have a house they stay at vipers or go on the road with duke 

-once they both start high school slider wants to stop hunting and stay with viper to focus on school, his relationship with duke gets weird after that because duke wants him to keep hunting to find what killed his mom but slider wants to do well in school to make his mom proud, they come to an agreement where slider stays with viper but once a month he has to come hunting

-slider leaves for university (idk what hes studying), mav graduates but stays with duke, he starts hunting on his own 

Now time: -This au starts in 2005 like the show

-duke picks up a lead on the thing that killed mary but is super vague about it when telling viper and doesn’t tell mav anything, he says he’ll be gone for a week but a week and a half later theres no word from him, viper refuses to go after him because “he’s gonna get himself killed” and “ive been telling him to let it go for years” but mav still has to go look for him

-mav finds slider and this basically carries out exactly how it does in the show, he agrees to help for one day, when he gets back his gf is dead, agrees to ditch school 😎 to come help look for duke

story wise thats all i've got so far, i want ice to come into the story a lot sooner than cas does in the show and i dont remember when ash, ellen and jo come in but i want them to come in sooner too. hopefully ill actually work on this more but i hope you guys enjoy

Character descriptions:

Mav: -has the classic dean necklace given to him by slider

-dresses basically the same as 86 movie mav but with flannel 😎

-does wear his cowboy boots but he’s normally wearing work boots

-eyebrow scar eyebrow scar eyebrow scar!!!

Slider: -wears his mother’s wedding ring on a necklace, duke gave it to him after she died

-dresses like early season sam, carhartt jacket, hoodies, tshirts and baggy jeans

-silver eyebrow piercing 😎

Ice: -exactly the same as cas but with a dark grey trench coat

-his eyes always glow a little, not enough that its noticeable unless its in the dark

-has a grey hoodie and black jeans for when he needs to look a little less “formal” 

Goose: -has a mullet its a key part of ash’s character so 

-just think mater from cars personified mixed with goose idk

Carole: -dresses exactly like ellen 

-her classic curly meg ryan hair stays tho

bradley: -just a mini goose

Duke and Viper: -they look pretty much the same, just some dad with a mustache and flannel

-only difference is duke always wears his wedding ring

[last-starry-sky]

Girl's Night Out - ch. 2 pt. 3

friday|saturday|sunday

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

pairing: Ghost x shy!goth!f!reader

rating: E

summary: Oh Sunday, a day of endings. Everything is going so well until those pesky feelings get tangled and what has to happen, happens.

word count: 10.2k (bruh)

warning: mdni, not beta-read and barely edited, a truck-load of self doubt and issues from reader, size difference 💀, fingering, light d/s /praise/authority kink (idk what to exactly call it), mention of death of a parent, unprotected piv (she's explicitly on the pill tho), more domestic fluff, angst right at the end. a/n at the end!

Repeating my warning hear for all of the chapters, I have committed the ultimate, unforgivable sin in this: Ghost is maskless. So if that ruins it for you, sit this one out.

sunday

Simon was the one who woke you early the next morning. It was gentle and unintentional. The birds were singing outside, but the sun had not yet broken over the horizon. Your room was bathed in an intense blue that even your curtains couldn’t hold back. You had hardly noticed you weren’t dreaming as you felt his breath rustle through your hair and his hand trace over your shoulder in a circle. You let your hand fall against his left arm, outstretched into the middle of the bed. He had pulled you against his chest again, just like the first night. You ran your fingers over the flames between his tattoos, drinking in the warmth of his skin. You were so warm here, warm and protected and-

“Tell you about mine,” he whispered in his grumbly morning-voice, fingers now obviously tracing the outline of the skull and flowers on your shoulder blade, “if you tell me about yours.”

Oh.

Your hand stilled on his arm. His still traced their soothing pattern across your back. You should have felt the familiar pit form in your stomach, or your nerves begin to make you shake, but you didn’t. You blew out the breath you were holding. Maybe it was time to tell him.

“Don’t hav-” he started to say.

“Got it two years ago. For my dad,” you interrupted. 

You felt his fingers trace over the round lines of the skull at the center of your tattoo: the empty eye sockets, the nasal openings, the neat row of teeth. You had started to do the same to the large skull in the middle of his forearm. You let out another shaking breath. You could feel the questions he wanted to ask, that he wished he could pull directly from the ink in your skin and not have to use his mouth to form stumbling human words to. Words were wrong, you felt. Unnecessary. You tapped your fingers on his inked skin. That’s why you always held them in until it was too late. 

“He died five years ago. Cancer,” you whispered. 

“Sorry,” he said pressing his lips to the back of your head.

You let out a shaky breath, willing yourself not to cry. “It’s okay,” you whispered, “It was- he went quick. No pain,” you added, voice cracking. Simple words that shouldn’t have been so painful. Still so painful. 

His thumb smoothed over the banner that ran above and below the skull. You knew what he was going to ask before he opened his mouth.

“Wha’s this say?” he asked.

“Memento Mori,” you recited from memory.

“Latin?” he asked.

You nodded your head. “It’s an old saying: ‘Remember Death’. My dad loved philosophy, was always sending me books for my birthday,” you remembered wistfully, almost laughing. “It helped after he was gone to think about . . . everything like that.”

“Hows that?” he asked.

“That we all could die at any time. That all we have is this one life and in the end, we all end up the same.” You stroked the skull on his arm again, resting your hand against his wrist.  

“What about the flowers?” he asked shuffling down to press his face into your neck.

“One for my mom, my step-mom, and my brother,” you said with a shiver as he kissed slowly down your neck. 

“Which one’s which?” he said into the crook of your shoulder.

“The rose is for my step-mom. The sunflower is my mom’s. Their favorite flowers.” You sighed, wanting so desperately to turn around so you could kiss him, but his hand on your shoulder kept you in place. 

“What about your brother?” he asked, “Make it sound like he didn’t get his favorite.”

You sighed, this time in annoyance. “He wouldn’t pick. Said he ‘didn’t have one’, so I asked his fiance and my mom to pick for him.”

“What’d they pick?” he asked running his fingers down the long stem of the unfamiliar flower. 

“Lavender. It grows wild, like a weed almost, where he lives. His fiance said he refused to get rid of any of the plants in their yard when they moved into their house, that he would sit outside in the mornings after they bloomed, enjoying the smell. We all figured it’s his favorite, but he won’t admit to it.”

“Where’s he live?” he said, pressing a kiss to the top of your spine.

“Washington state,” you said uneasily. You were unsure if he would ever notice your strange accent or other non-British quirks. He hadn’t said anything yet. 

“You from there too?” he asked.

“No,” you said. You paused to refamiliarize your mouth with American English before you continued. “Grew up in Illinois.”

He laughed into your shoulder, pressing a kiss to the skull. You blushed. “Thought you sounded like an expat.” He slid his hand under your shirt and down your stomach to press you to him. You shivered against his hardening cock. “How’d y’ end up here?” he asked sinking his hand lower, past your panties. You were reminded that you had kicked your pants off in the night, too warm cuddled in Simon’s embrace. 

You gasped as he split your folds apart, his fingers following close behind, pressing and circling your clit. He didn’t expect you to keep talking like this, did he? He only gave you a few flicks of his wrist before he stopped. He leaned in to whisper huskily in your ear. 

“Hear me?”

You groaned, clenching on nothing, trying to collect your thoughts from the lustful haze he had drug you into. He was so fucking unfair sometimes and you hated that you loved it. 

“Yeah,” you finally answered, “It’s . . . complicated.”

“Don’t mind that,” he said flatly, reaching his hand up to squish your breast. His hands were softer today, but the texture of his skin still tingled deliciously as he rolled your nipple in his fingers. “Tell me.”

You sighed, bucking back against him. “My dad’s from- was from England. He moved to the states for work. He was working for an international firm and they needed a lawyer in Chicago. He met my mom while she was working there too and everything went off from there. Marriage. Kids.” His hand lightly started to trace down to your body again. It made you tremble in anticipation. “When they got divorced he moved back here. Got remarried.” he breached your labia and started to circle your clit again. “Not much else to say,” you sighed, bowing into his hand. 

“Yeah there is,” he said, his arm pulling your leg to rest over his, splaying you open for better access. He sent his hand lower to pump a finger into you. You let out a long moan as he did.

“W’as that?” you slurred, barely coherent.

“Why’d you leave?” he growled into your ear. The tone of his voice was sending you. “Grew up in the states. Whole family there.” he was pumping into you furiously. You gripped at his arm with both hands, face buried in the sheets. “Must’ve had a comfortable life. Why’d you go through all the trouble? Why leave ‘em behind?”

He hit your g-spot and you cried out, throwing your head back as you did. Simon took immediate advantage. He curled up his left arm to brace across your chest, holding you, arms and all, in place as he hit that spot again and again. You were crying out, trembling under his assault. Your head was empty of everything except the wild desire to cum. He bucked against your ass, groaning into your ear. His fingers squelched in your pussy with every movement. You were so close. 

“Why?” he demanded loudly, almost angry.

“No one else would go!” you cried, slamming into your peak hard with a full body shudder, tears falling from your eyes.

Simon pulled his fingers from you when he felt your tears hit his skin. It was too late though. You were already over the edge, bowing against his back, trembling against him, sobbing as you worked through the weirdest, most emotional, orgasm you’d ever had. You buried your face in your hands after you let out your last sob, ecstasy washed from you and replaced with shame. You’d ruined it. You’d ruined everything.

“Hey,” he said softly. He sat up to loom over you, his hand petting at your side. 

You didn’t want to look at him, but he rolled you onto your back and pulled your hands away. You didn’t fight him. He looked down at you sadly, a frown quirked across his mouth. He watched you wipe away your tears. 

“Shouldn’t have done that,” he whispered.

“Don’t,” you said, meaning to sound soft but your rough throat made it aggressive. 

You ran your hands up through your hair. You sat up too, leaning against the side of the window for support. You pulled your knees into your chest. 

“You deserve to know. To hear everything.” You sighed as you let your shoulders rest flat against the window, spine straight. “My dad called me one night. Didn’t really say anything, just said he missed me, wanted me to fly out if I could. That’s how he was. I was in a weird place in my life,” you said with a small huff of a laugh. That was putting it very gently. “I wasn’t really doing anything important, so I took him up on it. I flew out the next day.” You swallowed hard as you thought how to phrase what you wanted to say next. “I knew something was wrong when I saw my stepmom was there to pick me up at the airport. Dad always wanted to be the first one to see me.” Your voice broke at the end, tears starting to blur your vision again. “He was gone two weeks later.” You tried to wipe them away. “Shouldn’t be crying over it still, after all these years.”

Simon pulled himself close. He was looking at you, close to you, not trying to touch you, just still. Cautious. Thinking. Planning. A frown was still cut into his face. “I-I was too hard with you. Pushed you. Shouldn’t have-” He bit his lip. 

“I didn’t mind,” you confessed, wiping your eyes on the hem of your shirt. Simon was silent. You let out a breath. “I actually . . . I liked it,” you said in a whisper.

Simon finally moved, resting his back to wall on the other side of the window, rumpling the curtain. Light flooded his side of the room. He was quiet for a second. “What’d you mean?”

You took initiative, for once, and looked at him. His face was lit bright blue by the early morning sky. “I like it when you talk like that, when you’re fucking me,” you said looking up at him with your large, tear-rimmed eyes. When he didn’t respond, you looked away, laughing. “If that makes any sense,” you added.

“So, you get off when I’m mean to you?” he asked, suspicion dripping from his voice.

His crass phrasing made you smirk. “No, not mean,” you insisted, leaning forward. You searched for the right words and came up empty. “More like . . . dominant?”

“Commanding?” he added. You nodded. That was the perfect word, the one you had been searching for. He groaned, rolling back against the wall. He reached up and covered your hand on your knee with his. He ran his other hand over his face. “How’d I fuckin’ end up with a girl like you,” he mumbled into his hand. 

You heard him and it made you blanche. “Is that . . . bad?” you asked.

He removed his hand from his face and looked at you. “Christ no. It’s just-” he said squeezing your hand with a small laugh, “That’s my job. Tellin’ men what to do, where to go. Spendin’ weeks barkin’ out orders ‘til my voice is shot. Figures it would bleed over.” The possibility of his voice being deeper and rougher than it was now certainly was something you needed to think on further. 

He laughed a short little laugh and you joined him. His hand left your knee to pull around your shoulders. This was . . . good? You were hopeful.

“You don’t have to do it if you don’t want,” you told him, “Just don’t feel bad if you get a little mean or rough. I can handle it.” 

He laughed at that, that wide, wry smile spreading across his face. He quickly pivoted his body to slide his other arm under your legs. He scooped you up from the bed with a squeal. 

“Oh love,” he said with a smile, “you don’t want to see me when I’m mean,” he said carrying you out to the living room. 

He set you on the couch, wrapping you in the blanket, before wandering off to the kitchen without another word. You heard him dump the coffee grounds from yesterday in the trash and start a fresh pot. Then you heard him start to run the water in the sink, followed by dishes falling into the hot, soapy, water one by one. 

“Don’t have to do the dishes yet!” you called, not wanting to move from your warm spot on the couch.

“Want to!” he yelled back, the sound of your silverware clinked into the drying rack over the water and his voice. “Besides, need something to fill the time waiting for the coffee.”

“I could make breakfast?” you asked, remembering how much he had liked your slap-dash egg on toast yesterday. If you had time, you could really pull out all the stops to impress him. Simon didn’t respond, probably set on his decision. 

He came around the corner with two mugs of steaming coffee. “Don’t want you to move from there until you wake up, hear me?” he said handing you your cup. 

“Okay,” you said taking it from him. You sipped at the black coffee, wincing a bit. “You know I have cream and sugar, right?”

Simon was pulling your curtains open, dawn having finally broken. He stood looking out at the empty street while you talked. “I don’t mind,” he said taking a long drink from his own cup. 

You just stared at him. He had just told you that you were forbidden from getting up. You held your stare as you shuffled forward an inch, hopefully communicating your intentions. He understood your actions, quickly stepping over to snatch your cup from your hands.

“Thank you!” you called as he stalked back to the kitchen. 

You heard the refrigerator open, then your ceramic sugar pot, followed by a quick, tinkling, stir. He was back before you could tell him how you wanted it. As he leaned down to set the warm cup back in your hands, you hopped up to peck him on the lips. He tried to cover up his sleepy smile by turning away, sipping his bitter coffee, but you saw it. You hid your own in your mug of now more palatable coffee. 

He leaned against the window, letting you take up the couch. Nothing broke the silence between you while you followed his orders: drink your coffee and wake up. He must have spent the time as you did, thinking. You were wrapped up in plans for the day, which wasn’t much. With Simon here, you only had to put away your laundry and put fresh sheets on your bed. Not that you wanted to. You liked smelling him when you curled together at night. You had been right at the bar on Friday night. It wasn’t cologne or anything special that made him smell like that, it was just him. Even after spending two days surrounded by your laundry detergent and using your shower products. 

You pressed your legs together as you buried your face in your coffee. Fuck, thinking of him was winding you up again. You were still painfully wet and horny from before. You had hoped he would fuck you this morning, but things had gone sideways. You sighed. You hazarded a look up and, yep, he was watching you. You quickly turned back to your coffee, about to take a sip but you were left staring at the bottom of the cup. 

“Another?” he asked, still cooly leaning against the wall, the long line of his legs making him look so much taller. You nodded and he popped off to step toward you. You tried not to feel like jelly when your hands brushed as he took the cup from you. “Same?” he asked staring down at you. 

“Yeah,” you answered weakly, hoping you sounded tired and not desperately turned on, “It was good, however you made it.”

He chuckled and walked away, leaving you to bury your hands in your lap trying to relieve the pressure. You distracted yourself by watching people begin to go about their lives outside: walking their dogs and children, dressed up people on their way to church. 

The cup appeared next to your face, almost making you jump. You took it from him with shaking hands and a quick thanks. You took another drink as Simon took up post next to you, abandoning his position at the window. His hand came up to soothe over your shoulder. It was a simple, chaste, gesture, but it made you clench, blowing the steam off the top of your cup. 

“Plans for the day?” he asked, hand still massaging over your shoulder and back.

“Yeah,” you said leaning into the strong press of his hand. He stopped and you blew out another relieved breath. “Gotta get the laundry folded and put away. Pick up the apartment.” Your stomach rolled as he kneeled down to your level, his arm curling around your waist.

“Dishes are done,” he said pulling himself closer to your face, lips brushing together. “Leaves the rest of the day.”

You pushed yourself the last centimeter together, shivering as your mouths met. You heard Simon’s cup clank against the floor, his free hand then coming up to cup your jaw. You gripped your cup in your lap, keening as he pressed his tongue into your mouth. You moaned pitifully as he pulled away too soon. Simon carefully took the cup from your lap, setting it on the floor besides his own, before letting you pull him back. 

“Si,” you whimpered as he pulled away to breathe. 

“Jus’ for a little bit, love,” he groaned, pulling your legs off the couch so your body could face him, “Gotta get our work done first.”

Our work. You whined at the thought of it as he pressed back in to kiss you. You untangled your legs from the blanket, kicking it to the floor so you could loop your knees around his waist. You thought he was going to push you away when you felt his hands on your knees, but he just groaned as he ran his hands up your bare legs to your hips. His thumb innocently rubbed against the lace border of your panties. You bucked pitifully as he did.

He pulled away and looked down. “You ain’t-” he said huskily, turning into a low groan as he saw how soaked you were. “Ain’t no way.” He pressed his thumb to your wet panties, slicking up from your leaking hole as you shuddered. “Jesus,” he groaned, “an’ you said I was easy.”

“Si!” you cried against his mouth, “Please!”

“Please what?” he questioned, his tone turning on a dime, breath hot against your face. He pressed two fingers cruelly hard against your clothed clit, making you shudder again. 

“Please fuck me!” you cried, balling your hands in his shirt, all of your shyness melted away. “Want you to fuck me again. Need it.”

He claimed your mouth again, kissing you with a tenderness that mismatched with the rough pace of his hand. He locked the fingers of his free hand in the hair at the back of you head before pulling you away from his mouth.

“Tha’s what my girl wants, hmm?” he said breathlessly, voice hard. You were nodding, communicating all you could as he swirled your brain. You were laser focused on only one thing: my girl. He pressed your face back to his but refused to kiss you. “Then y’ gotta be good and get y’ work done after. Copy?”

“Copy,” you responded weakly. Fuck, you didn’t think you could sink any farther down into what he was doing to you, whatever it was called, but you loved it. You wanted it.

He hauled you up off the couch, spinning around and stomping off to your bed. A stripe of daylight still lit your bed where the Simon had moved the curtain. Simon dropped you on the mattress with seemly little care. You let out an oof as you landed.

“Okay?” he said shucking off his shirt. 

You nodded as he stood in between your legs, walking up the bed on his knees to you. When he got there, he leaned down to pull your shirt off. He lay over you, giving in for a moment to make out with you before kissing down your body to you navel. He shuffled both of you legs to one side of his chest. When he got there, he sat up, pulling your underwear up off your hips, letting them slide agonizingly slow up your legs, before tossing them behind him. 

He let your legs fall open, watching as the sticky, slick folds of your vagina opened as well. You’d thought you were brave before, but now you felt so scrutinized. You covered your face with your hands as Simon’s fingers stroked over you gently. You moaned as he circled your hole with those two thick fingers. 

You let your hands fall away as you looked up at him. He wasn’t looking at you face. He was lost: blush lightly coloring his cheeks, pupils dilated to consume his brown irises, breathing raspy and uneven, he was entirely concentrated on your little hole clenching so nicely for him. It made you moan at how much he wanted you, and how much you wanted him. 

“How’m I gonna fit in there?” he mumbled, pushing in just the tips of his fingers, swirling them around your slick, working the tight muscle open. Fuck, why was he choosing now to be so gentle?

“It’ll fit,” you sighed as he pushed his fingers in further.

Simon’s counter to your blissed out answer was to palm his cock against his briefs, emphasizing his size. 

“Couldn’t before,” he grunted.

You knit your brows together in frustration and pushed yourself down against his fingers, driving them in deeper. Simon gasped as you did. You squelched as he scissored his fingers apart, slick running down his fingers. 

“Make it fit,” you told him, voice hard and eyes serious as you humped against his hand, “Want all of you.”

“That’s my girl,” he said, locking eyes with you. The fingers of his other hand bit into your hip as he held you down. 

He pulled out his two fingers briefly before returning with three, completely ignoring your pleasure to focus on working you open wide and deep. Not that you didn’t get anything from it. You fell into the rhythmic pump of his hand, filling you up before twisting away. He was punching little gasps out out you at the height of every thrust. 

He leaned over you, giving in again to kiss you, letting you lock your arms around his neck. His stubble was longer today, pricking incessantly at your face. The thought of that stubble rubbing against your cunt as he ate you out shot like lightning through your mind. You were clenching around his fingers, stopping them from moving hardly at all, before you could stop yourself. He groaned against your mouth. He pushed his body up to slot evenly with you, splaying your legs open around him, allowing him to rut against you just once.

“Gonna fuckin’ kill me doin’ things like that, love. Y’ like it that much?” he whispered against your mouth. 

“Yes, Si. Just-” you said, pawing at the back of his head. He stroked, almost intentionally, over your g-spot, just as you spoke, sending you shuddering silently back against the bed. 

“What’s that love?” He asked, peppering slow kisses across your face, as he worked over that spot again and again and again.

“Si, please!” you managed to gasp out, fingers pulling at his short hair. You let out a long whine as he continued to stroke you open.

“Gettin’ y’ there, love, don’t worry. I’ll get you there,” he said sweet and low right in your ear. It made you want to sob. “Been so good f’ me so far. Lovely girl deserves to cum again, yeah?”

“-yeah,” you cried weakly, clutching him close to your face. Your head was swimming with delicious sparks again. He kissed at your top lip, parted as they were with your constant string of sighs and moans.

“Then cum f’ me,” he said rolling the rough pad of his thumb deliciously over your clit. 

That was all you needed. You were shuddering up the bed as you came with a high-pitched gasp. Your thoughts were everywhere and nowhere at once, leaving your head floating and empty. Aware of nothing but what was present, nothing but what you felt against your skin. You bowed up against his torso, his hand not stopping as he worked you gently through your high. 

“‘s a good girl,” he sighed against your neck, “So good f’ me.”

Fuck. That had you screwing your eyes shut even tighter and clenching around him again. He was going to be the death of you at this rate. Your hands clenched in his hair again. He chuckled, pulling his fingers from you. He gripped both your hips, pressing his thumbs into the dips above your pelvis. 

“Ready?” he breathed across your lips.

“As I’ll ever be,” you said blankly back, eyes as glassy as his were dark. 

With that, he pulled away, sitting back on his heels. He looked so beautiful in the morning light. That singular, golden stripe of light from the crack in your curtains, threw a line across his stomach, highlighting the divot of a long, vicious scar as well as the trail of delicate, dark gold hairs running down from his belly button. He looked down at you as he shucked off his briefs. You sighed at the sight of him, the tip was leaking strings where it knocked against his stomach. You were so fucking ready to have him inside you again.  

Have him . . . inside you, you thought again, running your mind over the thought like a bump in the wood you knew shouldn’t be there. You shot upright, heart pounding. Simon reeled back, surprise and concern painted on his face. 

“What-” all he could get out before you interrupted, wriggling off of the bed. 

“Forgot to take my pill! Be right back!” you exclaimed dashing naked out of the room. You were back half a minute later, Simon was still sat where you left him. “Sorry,” you said sitting back down, swallowing hard behind your hand, trying to force the little pill down your throat, “Hope I didn’t ruin the mood.”

“No, not at all,” he said helping you slide back into place, his hands running up your legs, “Didn’t know. Would have reminded you.” Of course he would have, you thought blushing. “Should’ve asked you earlier, honestly,” he added, leaning down over you again.

“Not tryin’ to baby trap you, Si,” you sighed as he nuzzled against your jaw, stubble pricking you. He pressed a kiss over the red marks he left. “Don’t even like it when guys cum in me, anyway.”

“Really,” he said flatly, kissing the side of your mouth. “When’s the last time that happened?”

You blew out a long breath, thinking back five years. Simon leaned over on his arm and stared down at you as you talked. 

“It was the first guy I was with when I moved here. I didn’t want anything serious, given . . . everything that had just happened and the chaos of my life. We were on again/off again, but I could tell he wanted more. I always got the icky feeling he wanted to knock me up so he could convince me to marry him.”

Simon raised his eyebrows at that, biting his lip. “Husband material,” he commented dryly.

“Glad I wised up and left him,” you said reaching over to run your hand over the blonde fuzz covering his jaw. He leaned into your hand, closing his eyes. “Told him a thousand times I didn’t want kids, but he never wanted to hear it,” you added lightly, almost as an afterthought. 

His eyes opened, flashing to yours. “Same,” he said rolling his head to kiss at your palm, then, grabbing your hand with his, your wrist. His eyes never left yours.

He pivoted over to lay in between your legs again. He scooped up your face in both his hands, tipping your head back so he could kiss you deeply. You raked your hands down his chest, melting into his touch. When you broke apart, you both sighed. Simon stopped to look down the press of your bodies. Neither of you could ignore his cock anymore as he knocked against you, sliding through the obscene wetness that painted you from your navel to your thighs. 

He caught a groan in his throat, closing his eyes at the sight. “Wanna fuck you so bad,” he said in a deep, strangled voice.

You stroked up his ribs soothingly until he opened his eyes to look down at you. You reached down, gently guiding his tip to rest at your entrance. The whole head popped in with no effort, causing him to jut forward with another strangled groan. 

“Gonna fuckin’ kill me, y’ know that? Doin’ shit like that. Fuckin’-” He cut himself off as he smashed down you kiss you. 

They were hungry, wild kisses, that ate your moans as he rutted himself deeper and deeper inside you. This was so entirely different from the first time you fucked. Different, but good. This wasn’t gentle, or just barely so. There had to be something left of his rational, human, brain still functioning right now as your slick coated his cock, sliding and stretching you open, that knew he had to stop if you showed any sign of pain. But there just wasn’t any pain. It was pure pleasure as his tip nailed that spot with every thrust and his thickness filled you better than anything or anyone ever had before. 

He palmed at your hip as he broke away from you again. “Fuckin’ hell, love,” he said shifting just a bit more forward, his balls pressing against your ass. You could have gasped. It was all in. “Y’ fuckin’ did it,” he said proudly. 

You smiled a stupid, blissed out smile up at him. The light from the window blinding you as it shone down across your chest and face. 

“Had help,” you sighed out, not wanting him to forget all of the hard work he had just done. 

He wasn’t one to rest on his laurels, apparently, as he was immediately shifting up on his knees, pulling you with him. He pressed his hand to your stomach, the butt of his palm just above your bikini line with fingers fanned out, reaching up over your belly button. He groaned as he pressed his hand down, slowly rutting into you at the same time, feeling himself inside you.

“Gonna fuck the shit outta y’,” he growled, keeping the same slow pace. He looked down at you. “‘s that what y’ want?”

You nodded, reaching for him. You wanted him wrapped in your arms again, breathing down your neck and kissing you as he gave you everything. He acquiesced to your silent plea, setting you down on the bed before leaning in to let you hold him. He kept one hand on your hip and the other slid up your neck to hold the back of your head. His fingers flexed against your scalp as he pressed in to kiss you. His cock followed right behind, driving into you slowly at first with his pace increasing as you squelched around him.

“Fuck love,” he broke away to say, every one of his thrusts punching out gasps and moans from you, “Doin’ so good f’ me. Such a good girl.”

“Si,” you sighed, head swirling as you clenched around him. You pulled him in to kiss you again. Good girl. It was pressing all the right buttons. His praise was your whole world right now.

“Fuck yeah, y’ like that?” he asked fucking into you at a brutal, even pace. “Like bein’ my good girl?”

“Yes,” you moaned out uncontrollably.  

“Know you do,” he said leaning in to nip at your neck, making you gasp. “Not stupid. I feel y’ tighten up when I do. Can feel it right now,” he said slamming forward as you clenched again. “Gonna make yourself cum again if y’ keep doin’ that.” 

You shuddered against him. Oh fuck, he was right. Even though he was absolutely railing you as hard as he possibly could, you were still on your way to your third orgasm today. And from what? His voice, just his praise?

He smoothed a hand over your forehead, grounding you. “D’ worry, love. I gotcha. Deserve something good after letting me fuck y’ like this, take this cock so well.”

“Si,” you moaned, brows pushed together, wishing you were like him and could string a coherent sentence together in the middle of sex. “I’m-”

“Close?” he correctly guessed. You nodded. “Want me t’ help?” You nodded again. “Nah, gotta say it, love,” he said in a teasing tone.

“Fuck, Si,” you moaned out, clenching your fingers in his hair as he happened to rut against your clit. “Help me, please. Please touch me.”

He placed a quick kiss across your lips before tearing himself away, leaving you sighing. 

“‘s what my girl wants? Play with her pretty pussy so she can cum?” he said moving his hand from your hip to just above your sex.

That sent your head into another galaxy. You threw your head back, covering your mouth to muffle your loud moan from alerting the whole street you were getting the best sex of your life.

“Yes, Si, please,” you pleaded, tears pricking at your eyes.  

He didn’t waste anytime. His thumb pressed into your slick, moving up and down your clit to the rhythm of his thrusts. It wasn’t fair, how good he made you feel, let alone how fast he made you cum every time. It also wasn’t fair that now he had rewired your brain, you needed him to say it before you let go.

“Si,” you begged, looking up at him with bleary eyes.

“What?” he said, cocking his head to the side, trying to reason out why you were crying.

“Tell me I can cum,” you whispered, embarrassed and blushing.

“Fuck,” Simon whispered harshly, his hips coming to a sudden stop. The room was filled with the harsh, haggard breathing from both of you. “Y’ fuckin’ serious?” he asked, almost angrily. You nodded, bucking your hips needily up and down his motionless cock, still desperate to cum. He pinned your hips down with both hands, stopping you. “Fuckin’ bust inside if y’ don’t stop that now.” he growled at you, jaw set. 

It should have scared you, but your sick brain loved it. A red-hot wire of need plunged through you, quenching with a hiss as it touched every part of your body. The sudden turn from praise to punishment thrilled some dark part of you.

“Fuckin’ can’t even cum on her own. Gotta do it for ‘er,” he said licking his thumb, even though you knew he knew he didn’t need it. It was all for show. His thumb worked you hard and with precision, leaving you a babbling mess against the sheets. “Ready now?” he said rough and uncaring as he looked down at you. “This needy little cunt ready to cum?”

“-yes,” you sighed barely above a whisper. 

“Then cum f’ me then,” he said through clenched teeth, his thumb pressing one last hard roll across your clit.

You bowed off the bed, flood gates to every positive emotion opening in your brain. You didn’t even hear yourself scream, though you know you did because Simon was immediately pressing his mouth to yours, saying something about waking the dead. His hands held your hips as you stuttered against his thrusts, wave after wave of pleasure lapping over you. If you’d thought you’d had the best orgasm of your life on Friday, you were dead wrong. This one left everything before in the dust. You felt yourself come back to reality as you lay flushed and sweaty against the sheets, chest heaving. 

You looked up when your brain started functioning again. Simon was looking down at you like you were God’s perfect creation, put here just for him. He gently ran his hand up your ribs, nuzzling his nose against yours. You knew it was just the afterglow, but you felt so warm. So safe and protected in his arms. He pressed a light kiss to your lips. Like you would walk through hell to have this heaven with him.

“Not much longer, love,” he said, slowly pumping into you again. “Did fuckin’ good. So fuckin’ good f’ me.”

You nodded weakly at him, content to lay back and let him do as he pleased. He had given you so much already, had worked so hard, waited so long. He grunted and sighed with every slow thrust. You could feel how soft and pliant you were now, giving him everything he wanted. 

“Lookit me,” he said suddenly, forcing your eyes up as he curled his hand around the back of your neck again. He leaned in and sighed against your lips. “Wanna cum while ‘m kissing you.”

You clenched, nodding as he pressed his tongue to yours. The thrusts of both his hips and tongue dissolving into slow, languid pumps. His thumb traced your jaw, following the movements of your mouth. 

“‘s too fucking good,” he said resting his forehead to yours, eyes shut and breathing ragged. 

Memento Mori, you wanted to remind him. All things must pass. To all things, an end. Even this thing: the little death.

He pressed forward again, cock squelching inside you. “Y’ ready?” he asked, having made peace with his impending orgasm while you had been waxing philosophical. 

You nodded. He did as he said he wanted, giving you his last desperate thrusts while sucking on your tongue. He pulled from you with a cry, the white ring you’d left around his cock making you clench around nothing as he wrapped his hand around himself, working himself with your slick. He shut his eyes as he released on you, painting stripes up to your neck with every pump. You thought he was going to fall over when he opened his eyes as saw what he’d done to you.  

“Fuckin’ beautiful,” he said falling forward onto his hands, including the one covered in cum. He lifted it up almost immediately. “Shit. Sorry.”

You laughed, light and blissful. “‘s okay,” you said borrowing his phrase. “Changing the sheets today, remember?”

He let himself fall down onto the mattress next to you, rolling over onto his back. You watched him close his eyes as a sweet smile took over his face. He turned his face away, but you saw the edges of his mouth curl up, a faint scar above his lip catching in the light. He was so beautiful like this, light shining through his hair in a blonde halo. It made your heart catch. You loved watching him, loved that he was comfortable around you, loved him. You loved him. 

Fuck. You pressed a hand to your mouth. No. No. No. No. No. This was not happening. Not with a one night stand, a random guy, a hook up from a club.

But he wasn’t those things, a terrible part of yourself tried to tell you. You’ve spent three days with him. He’s nice. He cares about you. You know him now. 

But did you? Did you really? Or were you both just pretending?

Simon broke your train of thought by sitting up, pulling himself across the mattress with his legs. 

“Shower?” He offered kindly, standing over you.

“Yeah . . .” you answered awkwardly, sitting up as well. You sat on the edge of the bed for a minute collecting yourself, still shocked from your revelation. Simon was waiting patiently. “You can go if you want,” you told him, brain not fully caught up. You wanted to take back the words as soon as they left your mouth. “Start the shower, I mean!” you said shocked, looking up at him. Oh god, how had you gone so wrong so fast? “Give me a minute. I’ll be in.”

He nodded and walked away without a word. Somehow, that hurt more. You slumped over to rest your head in your hands. You waited to hear the water running before you stood up. It stung where his drying cum pulled at your skin. 

Simon was nice in the shower, showing no sign that what you’d said had bothered him. He was content to wash your body for you again, seeming to get some little enjoyment from washing himself from you. He let you step away to wash your hair while he shaved with your borrowed razor. It impressed you how he could do such a good job, not missing any spots, without a mirror. Must be years of practice, years of having to get by while deployed. 

You left the shower first, wanting to get get dressed, in real clothes today, before making breakfast. You toweled off your hair while you stood naked in your bedroom, looking between your closet and wardrobe. You really wanted to wear something cute, something impressive to make up for slubbing around all day yesterday in sweats and an oversized t shirt. The problem was that it was still so cold in your apartment. 

You leafed through your skirts and pants. Nothing jumped out at you. Your dresses were all too short, or at least you thought until you doubled back to figure out what you had passed that felt so squishy and comfortable. You thought you had put a sweater in the wrong place, but no, it was a slouchy knit dress. You pulled it out and pressed it against your body. It fell to the middle of your thighs. That would work. You quickly threw on your underwear and a pair of tights. The dress, with an extra pair of socks pulled up over your knees, was super warm even as it fell off your shoulders. A set of tiered necklaces completed the look to your satisfaction.  

You were putting on your makeup by leaning rather awkwardly against the long mirror in your room, when Simon left the bathroom to collect his clothes. You caught his eye for a second in the mirror before he looked away. 

“I’ll wash your clothes for you, if you want,” you offered, pressing your lips together to smooth out your lipgloss. You thought it was a better option than lipstick, considering what happened last time.  

He nodded, tossing everything except for his briefs, which he put back on, into the laundry bin. He moved on to your bed next, pulling the sheets and blankets off. 

“You’ll have to run down,” he said as the sheets hit the bin with a soft whump. “In no state to be running around like this,” he added, gesturing to his several days old underwear. 

You pulled your eyeliner pencil away from your eye just in time to laugh. “Think you’d give the old lady across the hall a heart attack,” you told him returning to finish lining the bottom of your eye.

“The one with the little white dog?” he asked.

You pulled the pencil away again to stare at him in the mirror, which he didn’t meet, then turned to look at him face-to-face. “How . . . when?” you asked. You were pretty sure he had never ran into her.

“Was walkin’ her dog this mornin’ when we were . . . busy on the couch,” he said flatly, clearing his throat and crossing his arms. 

You turned away to look at the pencil shaking in your hand. Oh god, no. How fucking embarrassing. You were able to cap it before you threw it into your makeup bag, giving up on finishing that last bit. You decided that you would make breakfast first and then face any of your neighbors that had seen or heard you and Simon for the past three days. 

Simon had already left the room. He was pulling a hoodie from where it was doubled inside his coat. He pulled it on over his bare torso, zipping it up before he turned around, phone in his hand. The screen lit his face a cold blue, catching the hollows of his eyes in a macabre way as he stared at it blankly. You decided to not bother him, even as a pit twisted in your stomach, and headed into the kitchen. 

You were almost done with the two cheese and spinach omelets when Simon leaned in the kitchen, phone still in hand. 

“Your friends’ve been tryin’ t’ contact you. Let ‘em know you’re alive,” he said before clicking it shut. 

You slid the omelets onto the waiting plates with a sigh. Simon took them off the counter for you. He sat down to eat, digging right in if you could guess from the fork scraping, while you went to the pocket of your jacket you wore on Friday night to find your abandoned phone. It felt weird that you hadn’t thought all this time to check it, totally absorbed with- You stopped yourself. You dug around and found it eventually. You were lucky it still had battery. 

Your eyes widened when you opened your phone. 50 text messages. 10 missed calls. You groaned and wandered back to the table. You threw your phone down next to your cold coffee, deciding to eat before you got into it with your friends. 

“Okay?” Simon asked, cutting into his half-finished omelet. Good god, that man could inhale the food. You were already out of eggs because of him. 

“I don’t know,” you said breaking off a fluffy corner with your fork, steam, spinach and cheese running out. “I think my friends are overreacting a bit,” you said sliding your phone over to him as you took a bite. You’d done pretty good, if you could pat yourself on the back.  

Simon tapped on your screen. A small chuckle escaping from his full mouth as he saw the amount of texts and calls. “Should still let’em know I didn’t kill you,” he said sliding it back to you.

Your eyebrows knit together as you looked at him. “Why-” was all you could get out.

“Soap,” he said stopping to scrape up the last bits of food from his plate, “n’ Gaz’ve been ridin’ my ass about it too.” He put his fork down on his plate, leaning back with a contented sigh. “‘s damn good, love.”

You opened your phone and mentally prepared yourself to open your messages. It felt better, having Simon here with you, for some reason. Only five or so texts were from your friend’s cousin, and they weren’t overly dramatic or pushy. Simple questions scattered over several hours and days. Where did you go? Are you alright? Will you call me back?

You other friend had gone fully nuclear. From early early on Saturday morning to a few hours ago she had sent batches of texts. WHERE ARE YOU????? ARE YOU DEAD? CALL ME NOW. IM CALLING THE POLICE. IF THAT GUY FUCKING HURT YOU I’LL KILL HIM AND HIS FRIENDS. That was followed by several unanswered calls. You covered your face as you scrolled through her one-sided argument she had with herself in your messages. 

“I think my friend wants to murder you,” you said looking sheepishly over your phone. Simon shrugged as he sipped his coffee. You began to tap out a simple reply, just so she would know that, yes, you were alive and could chill out, when a call buzzed through. It was her. It scared you too much to pick up on the first ring, but you managed to hit the button with your shaking hands on the second. 

“H-” was all you could breath out before your friend let loose in your ear.

“OH MY GOD,” she screamed. You thought you heard feet hit the floor somewhere behind her. “I THOUGHT YOU WERE DEAD FOR TWO DAYS. TWO. DAYS.”

“I’m okay!” you shouted, trying to get through to her. 

“Where are you? Did that guy do anything to you?” you could hear her pacing around her apartment, her kitchen if you could guess by the tile under her feet.

“I’m at my place! Don’t worry!” you said with a huff. I’m an adult. I’m fine. Leave me alone, is what you really wanted to say. 

“Did he hurt you?” she asked sternly. You could tell her jaw was clenched. 

“No!” you said cutting another piece of your omelet, still very hungry. “I’m not hurt, or dead, or anything. I just want to eat my breakfast! Can I please do that?” you said trying to close the call. 

She sighed on the other end. Another voice was talking in the background. The TV? “Okay,” she said, finally deflating her anger. You could hear she was still tapping her foot against the tile though. “But you call me back later, okay? When you can? I want to talk to you. Actually talk.”

You rolled your eyes, agreeing with her, tacking on a quick goodbye before hanging up. You set down your phone and tore into your food before it could go cold. Simon watched you while he sipped on his coffee.

“That went well,” he commented. 

“Better than I expected,” you said stabbing at the last few broken chunks of egg. You sighed, tapping the tines of your fork on the plate before you just set it down. “I’ll run your clothes down.” 

You managed to run into not one, not two, but three of your neighbors while you ran back and forth washing and drying Simon’s clothes. The college student who lived above you was switching over her wash when you first went down to the basement. She, thankfully, was too absorbed in her phone to notice the obvious men’s clothing you were throwing in the washing machine. The second was the man who lived behind you. He’s a nice guy in his 30’s or 40’s who you’ve talked to once the whole time you’ve lived here. You were walking up the stairs after switching over your load to the dryer while he was on his way down with his own full basket. He asked you if there was a machine open, which you told him there was before bolting to your door. The third, of course, was the old woman with the white dog across the hall. She was leaving with her dog for another walk when you came back with the laundry. She smiled and waved at you, which you returned while trying to keep from turning to dust at the thought of her getting an eye full of Simon fingering you through your open window. 

You felt that the longest hour and a half of your life had passed by the time you came back with the cleaned and dried laundry. You just wanted to wrap yourself up in your blanket on the couch and try to forget you had work in the morning, but Simon had tasks for you. And, you remembered, you had promised him you would get everything done.

Not that he had been idle while you were out. Simon had done the cleaning and tidying you had pushed off all week: the blankets were folded on your couch, your shoes were put away in the front hall, your books had been restacked in the window. He was mopping when you came in the door with the laundry basket. He had picked you up in the hall, basket and all, and brought you over the wet part of the floor, sweetly setting you in your bedroom. You were surprised to see Simon had put the fresh set of sheets on the bed and made it up as well. 

You sat down on the side of your freshly made bed to fold your clothes and tried not to stare at him while he dressed. He sat down at the foot of the bed when he was done. The space in between the two of you was filled with a pyramid of balled up socks, piles of underwear, and a growing stack of clothes to hang.

“Need help?” he asked, trying to sit casually. His fingers were tapping nervously on the inside of his knee. He really did need something to keep his mind busy. “Got everything else done.”

“Thanks for that,” you said folding a t shirt. You threw it on the t shirt pile after you were done. You looked over your bins of laundry and piles on your bed with a sigh. “Just this is left.”

“And it’s almost two,” he said looking at his phone for the time. Before you could say anything he had already put together a plan. “You fold,” he insisted. “Just show me where it all goes and I’ll put away.”

“I really should make a little lunch. I didn’t realize how late it was getting.” The word late haunted you as soon as you said it. The clock was ticking ticking ticking now. Stop, you told yourself. You stood up and pulled out the top drawer of your dresser to show him what was inside. “This is underwear, socks, and . . . stuff,” you said floundering your hand at the miscellaneous tights and underthings you crammed in that drawer. “Just get started on that and I’ll make lunch.”

“Copy,” he said with a nod. 

Lunch was nothing special. You gave Simon the last piece of reheated lasagna and you made a salad with whatever vegetables you had left in the fridge on top of what was left of your mixed greens. He had gotten most of the clothes put away in that drawer by the time you called him over. It was another silent meal. You both spent the time watching the rain pick up. The sun was falling fast behind the gray clouds. For every bit of light you lost, your heart sank.

Simon, of course, insisted on doing the dishes again when you finished. You went back to folding, finishing the bins before he got back. It felt like he had taken longer than before, but you couldn’t find a reason to care. He went right back to loading your socks into the drawer, holding near five pairs at a time in his hand while doing so. You could have stood there and stared at his hands for the rest of the afternoon, but you shook your head and got back to work. You busied yourself with hanging things in your wardrobe. You felt that maybe, if you mostly had your back turned to him, he wouldn’t distract you and you would slowly stop thinking about him. Then, when the time came, it would be easier.

“You read all those books you have in the window?” he asked while delicately layering your panties in the drawer. 

“Ah, yeah,” you answered, staring at the inside of your wardrobe, unsure how much of a conversation he wanted to start. “It’s what I do in my freetime.”

“Read and cook,” he stated flatly. 

“I know,” you said with a little laugh, “I have a very exciting life.”

“What’s the last one you read?” he asked, opening the next drawer. It was filled with t shirts and pj’s. 

You bit your lip. “The one on top,” you said trying not to sound boring, because you knew exactly what you favorite book looked like: it’s black paperback cover beat and bent until the white paper underneath was showing through, it’s pages dog-eared, highlighted and re-highlighted, your own comments penciled in the margins. 

“Meditations?” he said, surprising you that he remembered the title. 

“Yeah, more like re-read, though. Not sure if that counts,” you said turning to collect the last armful of clothes to hang. Simon caught your eye as he closed the drawer. Amazing how he could pin you with his eyes even crouched on the floor. He stood up. It felt so weird to see him in clothes at this point. He felt so much bigger and taller.

“Suppose that’s up to you, book-reader,” he answered lightly ribbing you. His eyes were raking over you again. You turned around and quickly hung up what you had in your hands, not really caring if it was in the right spot. You just didn’t want him to see you blushing. 

“Work’s done!” you said, trying to sound happy, as you turned back to face him. 

Simon didn’t look happy. He’d crossed his arms over his chest, looking so much wider with the hoodie on. His face was hard and neutral, but there was a silent, dour energy to his eyes as they flicked from the floor to your face. He nodded, his head wandering to look over his shoulder to the door. 

“Nothing left to do, and it’s gettin’ late,” he said, eyes still on the door. “Rainin’ too.”

You inhaled sharply. Oh. Oh no. Oh this was happening now.  

“Yeah,” you answered weakly, heart beating hard, “I have-”

“Work in the morning?” he completed your sentence for you, shuffling his phone in his back pocket, looking behind himself. You nodded, watching him swallow hard. 

“Early,” you whispered. 

You felt your blood slow, pooling in your feet, pounding ominous and slow in your ears. No. This was not happening already. No, no, no, no, no- You concentrate on your fingernails digging into your palm and it breaks you out of your spiral. You watch your hand gesture for him to lead you out of the bedroom. It’s your arm, but not your action. 

A gust of wind drove a spatter of rain against your window as you walk behind him through the living room. Darkness had fully fallen, the street lights pouring down their fuzzy yellow light once again. You keep it together while he kneels to lace up his boots. You couldn’t be messy and clingy right now, not after how well you’ve done all weekend. You can’t break down babbling about how much you love him and want him to stay, please stay if you want, please you’ve never felt like this about anyone else before and it makes you want to cry.

He stood there staring at you as he zipped up his jacket. It was a quick, sudden sound. Something that had sounded so much like an exciting new beginning, of taking off the layers that separated your warm skin from each other, of breaking down and rebuilding three days ago now sounds like only one thing: Finality. Packed up. Put away. Done. 

You wondered if you should say something, anything as his hand closed around the doorknob, but you don’t.

“Bye,” he said with a nod, turning the handle.

“Bye,” you said back with a shiver. You wrapped your arms around yourself for warmth. As he stepped into the hallway you added, “Stay safe.”

He nodded again, not looking back, as your heavy metal door slammed closed behind him. You reached out on instinct to click it the last bit closed. You felt the vibrations in your hand as the outer door did the same. And with that, he was gone.

Gone.

You fell forward into the door, cold metal sending goosebumps up your arms. The cold shock as you press your forehead to the door temporarily keeps your tears at bay. You close your eyes as you let out a shaking breath. This is . . . fine. You’ll be okay, you lie to yourself. You let out the breath and open your eyes. You watch your tears spatter against the clean floor until your vision blurs.

You should feel pathetic as your knees hit the floor. You’re practically begging here, crying in front of your door, wishing and waiting for him to come back. You want him to walk back in the door, sweep you up in his strong arms, kissing away your tears and murmuring apology after apology. You cover your face as you let out a sob. You want to curl under the blankets on the couch with him. You want to chase him out of the kitchen while you cook again. You want to share the same stream of water in the shower. You don’t even try to wipe your tears away as you fall back against the wall, head thunking against the plaster. You just want to fall asleep to the sound of his breathing, to the rhythm of his heart beat, warm and protected in his arms. 

But that’s never going to happen again. He’s left. No number. Just gone. Just a name. 

He’s gone. 

He’s gone. 

He’s gone. 

-

a/n: WOW OKAY IM SORRY FOR MAKING IT SAD. I honestly had this all planned before . . . you know what happened ;_; Watch out for a poll about chapter three in a day or two!

[bluesberrys]

Part 2 of firecrackers backstory :3

I’m not the best at writing but if u have any tips/see grammar mistakes feel free to tell me :3

Tw- rape, illegal relation ship, underage sex, abuse

{idk what else but if you do think something is triggering and i should add it please tell me in the comments}

She took him to a corner near the police station and stopped, she crouched down next to him. “Hunny, i love you so much, we're gonna escape today and ill show you the real world, i know a place near the city, my friend can help us. But if this goes wrong i need you to have these '' she handed ??? a small map showing the village which was surrounded by forest, pretty far from the city but it could be made, there was a circle around an area in the forest, she also reached into her pocket and pulled out a small lighter and handed it to ???. “If something goes wrong I need you to run, I don’t care what happens, promise me you won’t look back” she looked into ??? Eyes, there was a sort of desperate look in it, like she knew something was gonna happen, like she just wanted to run and save herself but she couldn’t. She grabbed ??? hand and walked into the police station. She looked the officers in the eyes and said all Joshua had done, as if she had practiced this everyday of her life. The officers nodded and told her to come to the backroom to get her statement. ??? Sat in a chair waiting for his mom to come out but instead he heard the sound of a bang, one eerily close to the noise of a bullet. He saw specks of blood come from the door leading into the back on the floor and he felt a coldness in the air. He didn’t know why but he got up and ran, ran as fast as he could outside the police station. Tears welled up in his eyes, he heard shouting, he ran for a while but it was meaningless as he saw the figure of evil incarnate standing in the distance. Joshua stood there , hands crossed, a smug grin on his face. That was really all ??? Remember from that night, he just woke up the next day, it was around 2pm, far later than when he usually woke up, his mother woke him up at 10 usually but not any more... He left his room, and entered the living room, and then he saw something that made his stomach twist. A urns at upon the shelf in front the door that led outside, it was a deep red color, his mothers favorite color… a small post it note on it, it read “I think you know who this is, you dare think about escaping, know this will what become of you”. ??? felt tears escape his eyes, but he knew he had to escape, if his mother died than to let her life be wasted like this would be unforgivable. He waited for days for his dad to come home but he didn’t show up for weeks, though one day ??? Hearing a knock at his door , he opened it to see his so-called father. “I see you haven’t starved yet.” ???remained silent.

“OK LISTEN HERE YOU UNGREAFUL PEICE OF SHITt” Joshua slapped ???, hard enough to leave a red mark, a drastic change in demeanor though firecracker had grown to expect it. “YOUR THE REASON YOUR MOTHER DIED, IF YOU'D HAVE JUST STAYED BACK SHE WOULDN'T DIE” *this time Joshua punched him, the force was hard enough to knock ??? To the ground. The yelling and hitting continued on for a while. Though there was something about not being home for 3 days due to a church event, everything before and after that left ??? mind, it was a chance to escape. The following day he did everything his “dad” asked of him, being extra careful to not anger him. If he did there was a chance his dad might just stay home to beat him and that would foil his entire plan, no this had to be perfect. It came the night where his dad wasn’t home. He looked up at the urn holding his mothers ashes, he felt tears want to fall from his eyes, but he didn’t let them. Tears could make him break down, and breaking down was something he could not do, not when he was so close to freedom. He took the lighter him mom had given him as well as the map and opened the door to the outside. It had been a long while since he had been out but the air felt cool. But ?? Felt a sinking feeling, he felt like he was being watched. He immediately felt as hand wrapped around him trying to restrain him. His eyes turned to see a cop, not just any cop thought it was the one that had killed his mother. Immediately he felt a surge of anger and hit as hard as he could, he managed to knock the policeman off. “You really think your dad would just not leave any one back to watch you, you really must be stupid?” The policeman chuckled. He quickly got up and tried to get ?? Again. “Even if you de escape me you do realize there are more of us, we will stop you from leaving and soiling your fathers good name, do you even know how much the church pays us to do this?” Even if you go to the other end of the earth, your father could probably find you.” Thoes words made firecrackers heart sink, fuck, no matter what he did he would be caught. No, he had to escape, even if it meant he would have to fight his entire life for freedom he was gonna be free, firecracker immediately took out his lighter and set his house on fire, if he set one house on fir, it would surely spread, without the village and cult to praise Joshua he would be nothing. Right? The policeman continued to try and grab ???, but ??? kicked him hard once more, knocking him into the fire. He stared in horror at what he had done, but it was quickly overshadowed by shock as the house collapsed. Firecracker saw ashes in the air, it was hard to say if it was his mothers or if it was from the house, but he felt a whisper, as if his mother was telling him to run, to go and be free. So he quickly ran off into the forest, not daring to look back as he ran.

[vtforpedro]

long life update - TWs in tags

It feels like it's been ages. I'm so exhausted and in a lot of physical pain. Going on two months of it being the worst it's been right after a couple of months of the best it's been. Chronic pain + grief + trying to get help from doctors who should have their licenses revoked + dealing with a shit relationship with my mom + a good, decades-long friendship ending + the ongoing disability process with the SSA + LAW FIRMS.

I'm so fucking tired. I don't remember if I updated that the appeals council decided not to review my case because the 'judge followed the law' except that he didn't. So, as it turns out, my original attorney (and he did not tell me this) before he left, wrote that if they denied me, it should go to federal district court.

I'm now working with a NY law firm to take my case to federal court because my current law firm believes it has merit, and I guess they do, too. That's how fucked the decision was, and I'm glad my initial reaction of bewilderment and anger was spot on lol

The good news is, it should only take another year! ._.

My neurologist is the worst doctor I have ever come across and I'm quite literally stuck with him with nowhere else to go. I wish him upon no one. I'm so tired of calling the SSA, getting documents to them, signing things for law firms, contacting law firms, getting no responses, and contacting them all over and over again. I am in incredible physical pain, like this actively makes my neuro stuff worse. Everything makes it worse. I have autonomic testing in a few days, and idk if I'll get through it b/c I have to stop the meds that keep me out of the ER two days prior, and it scares me.

My relationship with my mom is fractured and I don't feel like family therapy is actually helping. I had to end a friendship with someone I love and care very much about but who was growing too comfortable mistreating me and I was giving them too many passes 😞 I've known them for the better part of two decades.

It's been over seven months since my cat Isis died. I don't know how. It feels like she was here just yesterday. Yet, all the nights I've sat and talked to her and wept are all too real. I miss her more than I can say. She was my soul cat. I keep thinking about tomorrow and how she'd be so nosy getting into EVERYthing when gifts are opened at Christmas. Having to stop her, move her, laugh because she was just so n o s y and it was hilarious. And she's not gonna be here for that ever again.

I'm having a really fucking hard time tonight. It's just hitting me how god-awful this year has been and how I have a bad week to look forward to before even getting to the new year lmao I have to stop taking so many of my medications 48hrs before 1.5-2hrs of testing to see if we can find out Yet Another Thing Wrong With Me but knowing my luck it'll be 'no findings' and the mystery of why my core body temp plummets to 93.9 in the blink of an eye won't be solved until I have suffered juuuuust enough.

It never ends. Never. I want to give up. I'm so tired of doing this. I don't want to anymore. It never. fucking. ends.

I absolutely cannot say it's all been bad, though. I've met incredible, warm, welcoming, giving, kind people this year. Y'all have helped me more than you know and I'm so so so lucky to be able to call you my friends. This year has sucked for so many of us, but I want to say I'm proud of you, and I love you all very much.

My fic is gonna be printed in a hardcover zine early next year. I participated in a Big Bang for the first time and that'll also go out early next year. I'm hosting a tiny event in my tiny fandom server that I'm super excited about. I have a raffle prize to write (bagginshield !!!! SO EXCITED to revisit the og otp) and a Valentine's gift to write for another fandom.

I posted 401,000 words this year and wrote many more unfinished wips, plus a long one (90k) that I am very invested in finishing.

I painted and drew so much this year. I improved a lot, too! I got a couple of portraits printed from inprnt to see how they looked, and it was MY art, and they were GORGEOUS. I thought I would hate seeing my art professionally printed, but no! I almost cried. They looked so lovely.

My cat Lilly had health issues almost immediately following Isis's passing, but she is doing so well right now. She's blossomed into another cat, and while she's not my constant companion, she is with me so much more than she used to be. When she walks onto my desk I am to stop everything and hold her like baby in my arms until she decides that's enough (or I really need to move) lmaaao she's such a goober. My heart cat. <3

I'm not doing well right now--my MH is bad. Especially tonight. But it felt good to write the good things.

I'm sorry for my lack of replies and kinda disappearing. I'm running on fumes. I hope next year will bring physical relief so emotional relief can happen.

For those of you facing difficulties of any kind, I am holding your hand in spirit.

[unreal-unearthing]

Hi, I know you like the character of Benson Kwan from Grey's Anatomy, I like him too and I would love for you to tell me your opinion about him and what you understand about him based on what the show has shown us and that clearly adds up to the things you assume and believe about him or any headcanon as well.

And sorry I know it says there ask a question and I didn't really ask anything, but I think it is understood that it is a request and you can refuse it. Also I'm sorry if what I write doesn't make sense or is poorly written, english is not my first language and I do what I can.

Haha, no problem. Thanks for asking, I love talking about grey’s. And I’m really enjoying the new intern class, but I think with blue the show and fandom are doing him pretty dirty.

I’ve posted some thoughts about him before:

I’d add to this that I think eventually the show is going to have to reckon with that contradiction in his character. He can be a bit of a shark (to use the show’s terminology) with the other residents, but is almost always kind and empathetic with the patients and their families. I think he’s going to have to really work thru how much his mom’s death changed him.

Other thoughts I’ve had about him and where I wish they’d take his character:

I think he’s probably a profoundly lonely character. He said it was always just him and his mom, so I don’t think he has any other family after she died.

And in the most recent episode we found out he went to Yale before having to move home (wherever that was?) when his mom’s cancer got bad. And then the only med school he could go to was in the caribbean and then he moved to Seattle for his residency. He’s moved around a lot and seems to keep people at arms length. So I don’t think he has any friends, really? When we wanted to check out a new bar in his neighborhood it seemed like Jules was the only person he could ask, and she said no.

I’d like to see them write him a good non-romantic relationship - either with a mentor or a friend. He needs to have arcs with someone besides Jules (I actually do like their relationship, I’m just tired of it being the only thing he’s got going on.) Him/Schmitt/new peds attending could be an interesting dynamic, now that we know Schmitt wants to do a peds fellowship. I also think him and Simone could be good friends if the show would let them (they have so much in common- they were both highly competitive, top-of-their-game types who had a sudden fall from grace)

(Also, idk if you watch station 19, but they’ve announced that it’s their last season, and I think they’re probably going to find a way to write Ben back into grey’s. I think they might have him come back to finish his residency, and I think they’d be a funny duo (think of how ben was with Edwards, for example)).

Also, I actually can’t remember if they said anything specific about his dad (if he died or left or whatever) just that he was raised by a single mom, so I think that could interesting as well. Like his dad coming in as a patient and him having to confront how angry he is at being left to deal with his moms cancer on his own would be classic grey’s.