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sondepoch · 4 years

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Day 1

10 Days (Jumin Han x Reader)

You didn't expect to find yourself locked in an engagement to Chairman Han, but with your own mother forcing you into it, you have no way of denying her. But as time continues and things change, you begin to develop affections for your fiance's son: Jumin Han. But the sad truth is that there's nothing either of you can do to stop the marriage, and you only have these 10 days before your future becomes reality. 10 days with Jumin Han.

Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7 | Day 8 | Day 9 | Day 10 | ✔

MASTERLIST

Perfection.

Your entire life, that was all you sought.

Perfection.

Your parents had raised you in an elite neighborhood, surrounded by the most prestigious of company, with the constant expectation that you'd be the best student in your school. Your room had been a paradise, your skin better than a model's, and you'd gone through years of training to always be the most ladylike in every room.

Perfection was never something you sought - but rather something that had always been expected of you.

From the day you were adopted at three years old, your parents had made it clear that the reason they had selected you of all the children was because you seemed the most moldable. The least resilient. The most willing.

And that much was true. You did everything they ever asked from you.

Now though, now that it feels like your whole life is about to end and your world is about to come crashing down: you can't help but think about that fateful day. You'd accepted their explanation at first, but now, you suspect that the reason for your adoption was because you best conformed to the image of what they wanted their child to look like. Just like your adoptive parents, you had (e/c) eyes and were (h/c), so to the public eye you looked like a natural daughter. And years of learning dance had toned your body to give you all the right curves and edges: true beauty, to any man who gazed upon you.

Even when your father had passed at the young age of forty years old, after protecting you from a drunk driver, he'd gazed upon you on his deathbed, telling you how much he loved you and how perfect you were.

But this whole time, I was incomplete, wasn't I? You think bitterly, as you stare at yourself in the mirror. You wish you have the courage to ask those words out loud to your mother, who's smoking a cigarette in the hotel room next to yours, just a call away; but why bother when you already know the answer?

No matter what you did, from bringing home trophies in middle school to skyrocketing the stocks of their company, your role as a daughter has never been fulfilled.

Until now.

You drop your gaze to the diamond band wrapped around your ring finger.

Perfection.

It's the ring that completes your package as the perfect daughter. In your life, you'd been slowly achieving all your parents' needs from you. Their demands had started superficial, with the requirement that you were beautiful and graceful. Then it delved deeper, and you had to make sure you were always ladylike and polite. Soon, your responsibilities turned to being the top student in all your classes and placing first in all your extracurricular competitions. Then, it had been soaring through college and working as the Director of Internal Affairs at your parents' company, BC-Sonic.

Yesterday, there had been only one thing left that your mother sought from you: an engagement to the wealthiest man in all of South Korea.

And as always, you'eve fulfilled their expectations.

Perfection.

There was no other word anyone could use to describe you.

If only you could feel the same way.

"(Y/N)," You hear your mother call from the other side of the wall. "Are you ready yet?"

You take a second glance at yourself in the mirror.

To please your fiancé, you'd changed into a stunning red gown with diamond jewelry to match the ring he'd placed on your finger just yesterday. It's the kind of dress that men love and women hate. The bottom of the dress hangs low, just barely scraping the floor when you stand upright in your heels, but there's a slit that reveals your provocative legs, trailing all the way up to wear your 'birthmark' is. As if that weren't enough, though the top half of you is far from modest and your back and shoulders are almost entirely bare, making you feel naked.

But you know you look radiant.

"Yes, Mother," You respond swiftly, satisfied with your appearance.

The woman wastes no time in entering your room, and she immediately comes over to you. Cigarette in hand, you can't help but tense at the sight of the burn stick even though you know it won't touch you.

"Chin up," She commands. "Shoulders back, jaw loose. Don't move your head when you walk, or your hair will come undone. Come here, sweetling, yes, perfect. Back straight, (Y/N). There you go, make sure to hold your posture. Eyes up, don't stare at the ground."

If your father was here, he'd scoff at your mother's remarks and tell you how pretty you look, and how Chairman Han won't back out of this marriage over something trivial as drooped shoulders.

But he's gone. And all I have left is Mother.

Your mother stiffens. "Remember, (Y/N). You will be a proper lady at all times. Just because your last name is changing doesn't mean that the media won't continue to associate you with me. Every public appearance you make must be perfect, hm?" The woman's eyes are cold as she reminds you of your duty. "Do not allow the paparazzi to waste the years of training that has brought you to this moment. Do not forget who you are for even a moment."

You swallow nervously, but don't allow your fear to show. "Yes, Mother."

"Are you ready to meet Chairman Han for the first time since the formalization of your engagement?"

"Yes, Mother."

"Good," She says, before looking at you quizzically. "I leave for my flight in fifteen minutes. I do not want any calls from you saying that you've messed this up. Do you hear me? Do not ruin this, (Y/N). Of all things, do not ruin this."

You meet her eyes for perhaps the first time today, and you can't decode the look in her eyes. What is it hidden behind that seemingly infinite abyss of (e/c)? Resentment? Wariness? Concern? You've never failed her before, she shouldn't have any reason to think ill of you.

Though for her, this is by far the greatest task she has requested of you in your entire life. You'd tried your best to hide your mislike for Chairman Han, but she was your mother. Not biologically, but still.

Does she sense your apprehension at marrying Chairman Han?

"I'll make you proud, Mother."

Whenever your thoughts fail you, those words won't. Because each time you speak them, you sincerely mean them.

No matter what your parents asked of you, you would do it. That's how it always had been.

Marrying Chairman Han will be no exception.

***

"Let's not order yet, my love," Your fiancé murmured, placing his menu down next to his plate.

Despite your confusion, you do the same. "Is something the matter?" You inquire, already fearing for the worst. What if the reason Chairman Han doesn't want to order is because he doesn't want to have dinner with you?

Horror floods your senses as you internally prepare for the worst.

What if he wants to cancel the engagement?

You try not to imagine your mother's fury if such a thing were to happen, already acutely aware of your trembling hands.

"Don't be nervous, (Y/N)," Chairman Han says, placing a hand on your cheek. His hand is gentle, but you have to remind yourself not to physically recoil from his touch. "It's just that I've invited my son to share dinner with us. Now that we're engaged, I think it's well past time he meets the woman I'm going to share the rest of my life with."

You smile softly at the Chairman, relieved that it was nothing more serious. "Your son agreed? The same man who declined all our previous invitation to dine together?" You laugh lightly, not truly offended by your future step-son's refusal to meet with you. It's no secret that Chairman Han is a womanizer, and there's no doubt that his son had thought that you were just another senseless fling.

"Don't be offended by him, he's just a little...clueless when it comes to some social cues."

You smile, unsure of what to respond with. You're about to compliment Chairman Han's tie when his gaze flits above you.

"Ah, Jumin! You're here!"

You freeze.

Jumin?

The man takes his seat at the round table and turns to greet you with a bored look in his eye.

As soon as his gaze meets yours though, his eyes widen. And yours do too, at the realization that this engagement will be far worse than you'd ever expected.

Of course, you think to yourself. How could you forget? Jumin Han had been your classmate nearly a decade ago when the two of you were in high school. The two of you hadn't been especially close—distant enough that you hadn't pieced together the fact that it was his father you're marrying—but still acquainted to the point where you knew a good amount of information about him.

Like the fact that he, your future step-son, is older than you by a good six months.

"Jumin, I'd like you to meet my fiancé. This is (Y/N). (Y/N) (L/N)...or, I suppose," The Chairman flashes you a bold grin. "(Y/N) Han."

You shift your gaze from the Chairman back to Jumin, terrified. What do you say? 'Nice to meet you?'

"It's been very long since I last saw you, (Y/N)," Jumin says stiffly, a cold expression on his face. "You've changed."

You swallow and try to remember your mother's instructions back in the hotel room. Be natural. Shoulders back, jaw loose. Back straight, eyes up.

As you force your body back into its proper posture, you feel yourself become more ladylike and somehow, your tongue unties itself and the words pour out of you. "Too long! How have you been, Jumin?"

You try not to cringe at the fakeness of your tone, but desperately hope that Jumin doesn't pick up on your fear. Of all the things to shake the foundations of your engagement, the fact that it's Jumin's father you're marrying is the worst.

Without a doubt, he's capable of convincing his father to cancel the engagement.

And that's the one thing you can't let happen.

"You two already know each other?" The Chairman asks.

Before you can respond, though, Jumin speaks up, his tone ice cold.

"Yes, I actually had the pleasure of knowing (Y/N) for four years when we were students. I suppose that's considerably longer than you've known her, Father?"

The Chairman raises an eyebrow, not liking the attitude he was getting from his son. "Excuse me, Jumin? It's true that I've only known sweet (Y/N) for a few weeks but our love is genuine, and I don't appreciate your implication."

"Your love is genuine?" Jumin responds swiftly. "Father, this girl is younger than me. You're marrying someone who should be your daughter."

You feel like this is a part where you should butt in and say something about how much you care about Chairman Han, despite his age, but thankfully the waiter interrupts the two men before you have to.

"Gentlemen, lady, might I take your orders?" He asks, and the tension in the room seems to settle.

Jumin orders his 'usual', whatever that is, but you haven't even had the opportunity to look at the menu. Momentarily flustered, you glance at your fiancé for help, but much to your relief, he orders for you.

He smiles generously at you once the waiter is gone as he pours you a glass of wine that had been brought to your table, and you try to ignore the fact that you won't be able to eat half of what he ordered for you.

"So, how is C&R doing?" You ask, trying to make conversation. "My family was checking this morning, and it seems that your stocks are faring extremely well."

"Business is going brilliantly, darling," The Chairman says, taking your comment as an invitation to regale you with all the details of how he secured two new investors in one day. You try to stay interested in what he's saying, but you find it difficult not to lose focus when the older man starts to rant about his theories for when the next depression will hit.

You spend the next few moments lost in your thoughts as you stare mindlessly into the man's eyes, seeming interested in his conversation but worlds away in mind. It's only when he dons a suspicious smile and slides his hand onto your thigh that you instinctively flinch, spilling wine on yourself.

You immediately stand up, apologizing for the mess while excusing yourself to the bathroom, finding an escape from the situation as fast as possible.

By the time you're in a stall, tears have already welled up in your eyes and you have to bend your body over and stare straight into the ground to prevent the tears from falling onto your cheeks. You can't risk ruining your makeup. You can't let Chairman Han think anything is wrong.

Calm down, (Y/N), You reason with yourself. If you're truly going to go through with this marriage, then you'll have to get used to Chairman Han touching you like that. You'll have to be prepared for even worse.

But just beginning to think about such awful things brings such a wave of nausea through your body that you decide it's best not to think about it at all, and you instead focus on your dress, dapping toilet paper at the small spot that's still wet.

You hear the bathroom door open, and initially pay it no mind until a familiar voice calls out to you.

"(Y/N)?"

Your heart nearly stops.

"J-Jumin?"

The voice pauses, before sighing. "Yeah. It's me."

Slowly, dreading the moment that's about to follow, you open the bathroom stall door and face the man, praying for this encounter to be over quickly.

"This is the woman's bathroom, in case you hadn't realized." You frown.

"I had." Jumin crosses his arms. "But I doubt you want to have this conversation in front of my father."

You stay silent.

"You spilled that wine on purpose," Jumin says. There's not an ounce of hesitation in his voice, and the way he says it, you can't even pretend that he's lying.

"On purpose, yes, but I do love your father." Woah. The way you said that so readily, you almost believe yourself.

Jumin takes a step closer to you, tilting your chin upward so he can better see your face in the fluorescent lights above. "You were crying," He says. Another fact.

"This was a nice dress. It's made me sad that I spilled wine on it."

"I don't recall you being that superficial."

"Why do you care?" You ask, taking a step back. Jumin's penetrating gaze bores into you, and you have to look away before your eyes can reveal how your heart feels.

"You've managed to convince my fool of a father that you're in love with him, and while I could not care less about you, I do mind what happens to him."

"I care about your father too," You say, but you can tell Jumin doesn't believe you.

"You care about him? Why, only ten seconds ago, you loved him. How much longer until you reveal your true intentions? I saw how fast you moved that wine glass, you can't tolerate his touch any more than you love him."

"I felt uncomfortable with you there," You respond swiftly. For a second, Jumin is taken aback, unsure of how to respond, and you take that as a victory. Have you finally said the right thing?

"Why are you doing this, (Y/N)? You could have almost any man you want, but really—my father? Your company is doing well enough that you don't need our finances, your family has more than enough connections, and it's not like..."

Jumin trailed off, his eyes narrowing.

"Is BC-Sonic in legal trouble?"

You practically roll your eyes at Jumin's absurd suggestion. "No!"

"Then why?!" Jumin asks. "Why have you targeted my father, of all the weak men in the world? What do you stand to gain from this marriage?"

You swallowed your doubts and took a step forward, knowing that if you had even the slightest hesitation when you uttered the following words Jumin wouldn't believe them. "Because I love him, Jumin."

And in that moment, it very well may have been true.

Near fifteen minutes later, the three of you are seated back at the table, making polite conversation about how C&R's export expansion goals would benefit from BC-Sonic's business connections in the Americas.

In fact, from a distance, the three of you look united. Jumin even smiles at you when you made a joke, and you feel a smidgen of hope flutter in your stomach when you realize that the three of you look almost like a family.

Your mother would be proud, you tell yourself, ignoring the fact that, to any outsider, they'd assume you to be betrothed to Jumin rather than his balding father.

Chairman Han is about to give Jumin some additional business advice when suddenly, he receives an emergency call from work.

You watch him from afar as he answers the phone, the pit of worry in your stomach growing stronger and stronger as you recognize the lines on his face contort into exasperation, then concern, and finally anger.

"(Y/N), darling, I'm afraid I have to fly out tonight," Chairman Han says, already wearing his jacket. "There's been some kind of security breach with our Director of International Communications and he's refusing to speak with me over the phone. I'll try to be back as quickly as possible, but..." The man trails off, and you realize where he's leading.

Where will you stay?

The words your mother said to you right before leaving suddenly seem more ominous than ever.

I do not want any calls from you saying that you've messed this up. Do you hear me? Do not ruin this for us, (Y/N).

Does this count as a mess-up? What will your parents say? Can this cause the engagement to be canceled?

"Jumin, would you mind allowing (Y/N) to rest in your apartment for the night? I'll be back as soon as I can, and I don't want her flying all the way out to the BC-Sonic headquarters just tonight."

You bite your lip.

Staying with Jumin, horrible as it sounds, is still better than admitting failure to your parents. You gaze at him with hopeful eyes, and when he reluctantly agrees to his father's request, you have to physically prevent yourself from jumping for joy.

Chairman Han still seems apprehensive about the situation, regret painted on his features even as he rushes out of the restaurant, but suddenly your entire world seems brighter without the prospect of entertaining the older gentleman for the evening.

Unfortunately for you, though, Jumin picks up on your newfound happiness.

"You say you love him, but the first genuine smile I've seen from you all night only comes after he's gone."

You frown at Jumin, mood dampened.

"And how would you know what one of my genuine smiles looks like?"

Jumin sighs, putting down his fork. "(Y/N), we were in the same class for five years. My memory isn't so poor that I'd forget something so memorable that easily."

"'Something so memorable?' Are you saying that my smile is weird?" You accuse Jumin jokingly, hoping him to distract him from the topic of your engagement to his father.

"Of course not," He blurts, but it feels like the tips of his ears are the slightest bit pinker than they were one second ago. "Just eat your food so the two of us can be out of here as quickly as possible. I'm sure you're as eager for this night to end as I am."

You ignore Jumin's rudeness, glancing down at your plate. You awkwardly stab the corner of the dish and take a hesitant bite of it before butting your fork down, immediately realizing that your entire dish is inedible to you.

"What's wrong with the food?" Jumin asks. "Did the chef make a mistake while cooking it?"

You drag your eyes away from Jumin, suddenly hating the situation.

You want to be anywhere but here, doing anything but this.

"(Y/N)?" Jumin asks again, more gentle this time.

"I can't," You murmur under your breath, too quiet for anyone to hear. But Jumin's expectant expression forces you to repeat yourself. "I can't!"

"You can't what?"

"I can't eat this meal."

"...Is there a reason?"

You stay silent, already knowing that if you tell Jumin the truth, he'll just use it as ammo to ridicule the engagement between you and Chairman Han.

But as the silence stretches from uncomfortable to unbearable, you force the words past your lips. "I'm allergic to tomatoes."

And the dish Chairman Han had ordered for you was tomato-wrapped scallops with pineapple quinoa.

"And you two claim to be in love," Jumin mutters under his breath, scoffing. Wordlessly, he switches his barely-touched plate for yours and makes no further attempts at conversation.

You don't need to read his mind to know the mocking thoughts flitting through his mind, ridiculing the fact that your own fiancé didn't know such a simple fact about you.

The rest of the evening is spent in silence. But from the way Jumin stabs his scallops, you sense something deeper. Cruelty? Anger? Hate?

Resentment.

MASTERLIST

Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7 | Day 8 | Day 9 | Day 10 | ✔

Word count: 3.6k

Notes: And that's the first chapter of this series! Some general info: As the name indicates, this work will have 10 chapters total (no epilogue planned), and right now I plan to be updating once per week on Saturdays :) And heads up - this WILL end in angst

Comment & Like

Next Update: 4/04/20

I do not own the rights to Mystic Messenger or any of the characters within it.

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thinkyoureholy · 5 years

Text

Fragile Figures [10]

Pairing : Choi San / [Fem] Reader

Genre : Angst, Violence, Language, Fluff, Smut, Character Death?, Mafia! AU, Hired Assassin! AU

Words : 3.1k

Pt 1. Pt 2. Pt 3. Pt 4. Pt 5. Pt 6. Pt 7. Pt 8. Pt 9. Pt 10. Pt 10.5. Pt 11. Pt 12.

━━━━━━ ◦ ❖ ◦ ━━━━━━

-San’s P.O.V-

I came to a screeching halt at the intersection she told me about. I was breathing heavy, my grip on the steering wheel so tight my knuckles had gone white a long time ago. I had tried to stop my shaking the moment I got into the car but nothing was working. I had this sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach and I was terrified. I don’t remember the last time I was ever this scared and it wasn’t even a fear for my own well being, no, I was scared for Y/N. Those bullets, every single one of them, they were all meant for her.

Go back.

I flinched at the sound of my own voice inside my head, my heart beating faster than it should be. Will I even be of any help? I completely froze back there, I was so scared of something happening to her that I didn’t know what to do. It had been years since I’ve felt so helpless. My mind had gone completely blank the moment I saw her scraped up arms after I had pushed her aside when I heard the sound of a shotgun being cocked. Knowing that she was bleeding and that there wasn’t anything I could do to stop her from getting hurt made me feel hopeless. Is this how it feels? Is this how it feels to see someone you care deeply for get hurt? I hate it. I hated every second of it. It made me feel weak.

Go back!

I jumped at the intensity of the voice, snapping out of it. When I did I was able to hear at least two gunshots in the distance. My blood ran cold at the sound, my body moving before I even knew what was happening. I turned the car around and headed back to where she was, the tires screeching across the pavement. I stepped on the accelerator and sped down the empty streets, coming to a stop just beside the alley. I had barely put the car in park before I jumped out of the car, running into the dark alley. My leg put up some resistance to the sudden movements but I pushed through the pain. Truthfully my leg was in bad shape. I didn’t say anything to Y/N because I knew she would just worry but...I had started losing the feeling in my leg seconds after being shot. But right now none of that mattered. All that mattered was getting to Y/N.

“Ah...you finally showed up.”

I came to a stop at the sound of his voice, looking around quickly. I spotted him in no time, surrounded by three others I didn’t recognize. I went for one of my knives but one of the men raised his gun, taking aim but Kanda stopped him. He placed a hand on the gun and lowered it, a sinister smile playing at his lips as he took a step towards me.

“Don’t kill this one...at least not yet. I want to see him suffer for a bit. I’ve always been curious what he looks like when he’s in pain since he’s been so good at hiding it but now...now I think this will be too much for him...” Kanda trailed off, looking down at the floor with that same smile on his face.

I followed his gaze and what I saw had me falling to my knees. My heart sank to the pit of my stomach when I took in the huge pool of blood around her. She was unconscious, or at least I hope she was because if she was-

“Don’t worry. She’s not dead...at least not yet.” Kanda said, taking slow steps over to me before placing his hand on the top of my head, “Let me know if she survives.”

And with that he was gone, along with his little entourage.

I stayed glued to my stop for a moment, not believing the sight that lay before me. That is until I snapped out of it when I saw her finger twitch. It was small and I almost didn’t catch it but this was enough to get me to move. I pushed myself up and ran to her, wasting no time in feeling for a heartbeat. I sighed in relief when I felt the beat of her heart but I couldn’t relax yet. It wasn’t as strong as it was supposed to be, it was weak. It must be because of all the blood she lost. I didn’t waste another second before I moved to scoop her into my arms but I wasn’t able to even do that. A searing pain travelled all throughout my arm, drawing a groan of pain from my lips. Shit, shit, shit. What do I do? If I can’t carry her then I can’t put her in the car and- I cut myself off, gritting my teeth as an idea popped into my head. Without further delay I grabbed onto her arm, pulling her up to a sitting position. I turned around and hoisted her onto my back, hooking my arms under her legs. I put most if not all of her weight onto my back as I didn’t straighten out all the way when I stood up, but doing so put strain on my leg. I ignored it completely and made my way to the car as quickly as I could, sitting her down into the passenger seat gently. Once I had strapped her in I made my way around the car and sped back to the house.

It didn’t take very long with how fast I was going. I put the car in park and jumped out, stopping for a moment when my surroundings started to move. Shit, I’m feeling light headed...it must be from the bloodloss. But I couldn’t stop now, I couldn’t afford to pass out now. I squeezed my eyes shut for a second before making my way over to Y/N. I pulled her out of the car as carefully as I could, hoisting her onto my back once more. I looked up towards the house, seeing the lights were on. Good, someone’s home to treat her. I would’ve done it myself but...I don’t know how much longer I’ll be awake for. I grit my teeth together as I made my way up the front door, my leg almost giving out at least three times. I forced myself to keep going, swinging the front door open.

I looked around to see them all standing in the kitchen or at least that's what I assumed. As soon as I walked through the doorway the room started spinning, no amount of closing my eyes was going to stop it this time. At the same time my leg finally gave out. No, no, no, not yet. I cursed to myself before I fell, feeling Y/N roll off my back at the same time. I faintly heard the guys shouting but I couldn't make out what they were saying as I finally gave in to the darkness that had wanted to take me the moment my leg got severely injured.

-Yunho's P.O.V-

My heart dropped at the sight of Y/N covered in so much blood. My body froze, my mind going blank as I just stood there. Hongjoong and Seonghwa were the first to move, Hongjoong going to Y/N while Seonghwa went to San.

"She's lost way too much blood, I can barely feel her heartbeat."

"He's not doing much better either. They both need blood transfusions. But his leg...his hamstring took all the damage..."

I snapped out of whatever trance I was in at their words, running over to them. I knelt beside Y/N, the blood that had pooled around her seeping into my jeans. I grimaced at the feeling of the warm liquid but ignored it, already lifting her body off the floor.

"Yeosang...Wooyoung...go get everything ready, we need to do surgery and we need to do it now. Mingi go get the things we need for blood transfusions. She and I have the same blood type so I'll be giving her some of mine but…" I trailed off, looking over to San who was being carried by Seonghwa and Jongho.

"We don't know his blood type so I'll be giving him some of mine. This O negative blood of mine has to come in handy somehow." Seonghwa said with a strained smile, "Hongjoong I'm gonna need your help with him. If I'm giving blood I won't be able to-"

"Then I'll give him some of mine instead." Jongho spoke up, cutting Seonghwa off, "You're not the only one here with O negative blood you know."

Seonghwa gave him a grateful smile, "Thanks kid. Now let's get to work, all of us. I'm not burying any bodies, not today."

I sat back, leaning my head against the wall behind me. I closed my eyes, hoping to go to sleep but Mingi had other ideas. He snapped his fingers inches away from my face, my eyes snapping open.

"You can't go to sleep, not yet at least. Here drink this since you refuse to eat."

I took the glass of orange juice from his hand but I didn't go to drink it. He sighed heavily, taking the cup out of my hands and brought it up to my lips, forcing me to drink at least a sip of it.

"I'm fine. I don't need anymore." I muttered as I pulled away, my eyes going over to Y/N.

Yeosang had just finished doing the last of the stitches. Some of the bullets had basically exploded when they hit her skin so instead of the bullet being whole she had fragments stuck in her. Her worst wound was the one she had on her hand. Since we don’t have much fat or muscles covering the bone on the back of our hands that bullet, it did some heavy damage. Yeosang said she’ll have trouble holding things with her right hand from here on out.

“Why the hell would she go there again? Last time she got hurt too but this-” I cut myself off as soon as my voice started breaking.

I exhaled shakily, rubbing a trembling hand over my face, “What if she didn’t make it, huh? What if next time she ends up dead?”

At these words the tears I had been holding back finally began to fall. I bit my bottom lip to stop myself from sobbing but the pain in my chest just got worse. I leaned forward, doubling over as I buried my face into my hands, the tears now flowing at a steady pace. I vaguely heard Mingi sigh before feeling him pat my back in a comforting way.

“Yunho...she’ll be fine. Yeosang said her life isn’t in danger anymore…” He mumbled, but his words had no effect.

I said nothing as I continued to cry. Soon my sorrow turned into anger. I convinced myself to be angry at San. This was all his fault. If he had just protected her she wouldn’t be in this condition. Though I knew my anger was severely misplaced I couldn’t stop myself from thinking the way I was. Without thinking I pushed myself up, walking out of the room briskly and over to the room San was in. I overheard one of the guys say he was awake already. I was able to confirm that he was in fact awake the moment I walked into the room he was staying in.

He was sitting up in his bed, his arm wrapped in bandages. He had his head bowed, as if staring at his bandaged leg, he didn't even move to look up when he heard me enter the room. Seonghwa, who had been staying with him since the start of all this, did move at seeing me enter.

"Yunho now isn't a good time." Seonghwa said in a hushed tone, placing a hand on my chest to get me to back off.

I shoved his hand away roughly, not taking my eyes off San, "I don't care if now isn't a good time, the bastard has to hear what I have to say whether he wants to or not."

"No Yunho-"

"Hyung it's fine. The sooner he gets everything off his chest the sooner he'll leave." San spoke up but still refused to lift his head.

Hyung? When did these two get so close? Last time I checked these two hardly ever interacted. I pushed Seonghwa aside, making my way over to San’s bed but even then he kept his head down. What the hell is up with this guy?

“Why didn’t you call us when things started to go bad?” I asked, trying to be as civil as possible.

“When you’re bleeding out the last thing on your mind is calling someone that won’t get there on time.”

I set my jaw, angry at his words. Without thinking I reached out and grabbed him by the collar, even then he never met my gaze. I felt Seonghwa grab at my arm roughly but I refused to let San go.

“Why did you even go alone with her in the first place? If you were that confident that you’d be all the help she needs you should have protected her properly.”

“I got her back here alive.” He growled out, finally looking me in the eye, “I sacrificed my fucking leg getting her here and this is the thanks I get? I will never be able to walk properly, at least not without a limp and you’re telling me I didn’t do enough? You’re telling me I caused more damage to myself for no reason?”

He glared into my eyes with an anger that caused a chill to go down my spine but there were other emotions swirling around in his eyes as well. I knew my anger shouldn’t be directed at him and I knew I was in the wrong here but I was blinded by my jealousy, even at a time like this. I was jealous that she had picked him to go with her on her separate mission, I was jealous that she has been choosing him over me since he got here, I was jealous that once again I was her second choice. Once, just once in my damn life I wanted her to pick me before anyone else and I had that luxury when Kanda was gone but now with San here I was pushed to the back burner, I absolutely hated it. I was second to Kanda and now I’m second to San.

“And what? I should have protected her properly? I would gladly give my life for her but the moment I got injured she stopped thinking about herself. You know her better than I do. She cares for others more than she cares for herself. She sent me to get the car and meet with her at the intersection three blocks from where we were. It was no use arguing with her, we all know how stubborn she is. Even though she was injured as well she used herself as a distraction, she drew their fire and I-” He cut himself off, choking with emotion as he shoved at my chest roughly.

As he continued to talk my grip had loosened a considerable amount so he was able to push me away with ease.

“Do you know how terrifying it is to see the person you love lying in a pool of their own blood?”

My hand twitched at my side at his words, “I do know, I know all too well. It’s the worst feeling in the world...and I’ve witnessed it twice; tonight and the night Kanda betrayed us all. Both times I was powerless to do anything to help.”

-San’s P.O.V-

I bowed my head once more, listening to him finally admit out loud the feeling he has for her. It was by no means a secret but to have him say them out loud...I wanted to be angry but I couldn’t find it in myself to actually be angered by his words. Instead I felt worse about the feelings I had. This was also the first time I admitted to loving her out loud and though it felt good to finally get it off my chest I couldn’t help but feel like shit. Even though I loved her so much...I wasn’t able to keep her safe. If I had been even a minute late Kanda would’ve surely killed her and if he did...I don’t know how I would’ve kept sane. Losing a leg meant nothing compared to how it would’ve felt having to lose her.

At that thought I unconsciously laid a hand over my thigh. The shell hadn’t done the worst of the damage...that was all me. I had aggravated the injury by moving so much, I made it worse by running and carrying Y/N. Had I just stayed still I would’ve been fine but now...I won’t be able to walk like I used to, much less run. My life of an assassin was practically over.

I flinched at the sound of the door slamming shut. Yunho must’ve left when he noticed I was done talking.

“How is she?”

“She’s stable, they managed to get all the bullets out, along with any of the fragments left behind.” Seonghwa explain, his tone of voice soft.

“Any permanent damage?”

He said nothing for a moment, causing me to look up at him but he diverted his gaze as he finally spoke, “Her hand, the bones shattered when the bullet hit and we--we couldn’t do much to save the nerves surrounding the area either. Yeosang did the best he could but even then...she’ll have trouble using her right hand from now on. Her grip won’t be as strong as it used to be so she won’t be able to hold things for long periods of time and she’ll have pain every once in awhile.”

By the time he finished talking I could feel the tears sliding down my cheeks. Seonghwa gave me a frown before placing a comforting hand on my shoulder. I bowed my head once more, burying my face in my hands. If only I had stayed with her, if only I had listened to the voice inside my head that told me not to leave. I knew something was going to happen but even then I…I left her.

If only I was stronger then she wouldn't have had to protect me...

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eilonwiiy · 4 years

Text

Bookends ; A Witchlands AU

Chapter 7

When a relentless Evrane encourages him to be more adventurous, Aeduan explores the possibility of what life might be without Owl. Meanwhile, Iseult can't help but feel that Safi is keeping something from her.

Summary: Iseult det Midenzi never expected to go to a top university, so when her mother falls ill and she is forced to drop out to make ends meet, life has never seemed so unfair. But when she starts working at the local library and is unexpectedly assigned in the Children’s Room, a certain monosyllabic man and his thrice-damned demon child start showing up and Iseult begins to wonder if the threads of fate have a plan for her after all.

Previous chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Ships: Iseult/Aeduan, Safi/Merik, and more… stay tuned!

Tags: modern AU, college setting, family, friendship, humor, fluff, slow-burn, romance, eventual smut

Read on AO3: here

Tag list: (please let me know if you’d like to be added!) @lseultdetmidenzi @twilightlegacy13

* . * . * . * .

Aeduan prowled the bookshelves in the Children’s Room barely containing his impatience. The room was unusually busy for the morning. He’d overheard one disgruntled parent grumble about the schools being closed for a teacher development day and thus every corner was crawling with rambunctious children. It didn’t help that Evrane and Owl were late. Or that the main desk was absent one black-haired librarian.

Wherever Iseult was, Aeduan envied her. The cacophony of electronic bells and whistles and high-pitched prepubescent voices migrating from the computer island was giving him a headache. Every couple minutes one of the more stern looking librarians would instruct them to keep their voices down, adding to the fray of noise as well as Aeduan’s irritation. The library should provide headphones, he thought grumpily.

“No books today?” came a voice behind Aeduan.

He turned around and found Evrane and Owl walking down the aisle.

“You’re late,” he said tersely.

“Yes, well,” Evrane breathed happily, clasping her hands together and sharing a look with Owl that he was surprised to see returned by the child, “we were finishing a puzzle.”

“A puzzle?” Aeduan stared at her incredulously. “Evrane-”

Evrane held up a finger. “Ah. Trust. Remember to trust me.”

They locked each other in a staring contest. Aeduan held in a breath, impulse strained against his chest-

He conceded with a curt nod. Evrane smiled.

“So what’s on the agenda this weekend?” Evrane asked as Aeduan knelt down to help Owl into her coat.

Aeduan shrugged. “The same as usual.” They had fallen into a post-session rhythm over the last few weeks, usually involving non-threatening topics like weekend plans or the weather.

“I’ll pick up the girls from school tomorrow and they’ll stay the weekend. Lisbet has some sort of group project she needs to go to for her science class, but other than that it should be uneventful.”

Evrane nodded, then eyed him more closely. “And what about you?”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. Do you have any plans?” The manner in which she asked this question suggested only innocent curiosity, but bells were going off in Aeduan’s head. He finished zipping Owl up and stood to face Evrane. He squared his shoulders.

“I just told you.”

“I mean any plans that don’t involve the girls. Or,” she added as an afterthought, “those girls, at least.”

“Owl will be-”

“Anyone who isn’t Owl, Lisbet, or Cora.”

Aeduan shook his head, confused. “Who would I-”

“I don’t know, Aeduan,” cut in Evrane, followed by a single exasperated laugh. “Perhaps a friend. Or maybe you’d like to do something on your own.”

Aeduan’s jaw locked. This was definitely outside of their mutually unspoken established topics of conversation. His chest swelled with barely controlled annoyance. “I can’t very well leave Owl at home without someone there to watch her.” Each word was pronounced with an obvious effort of forced civility.

“No, you can’t,” Evrane agreed brightly. “The people handling your adoption case will be very happy to know that you know that.”

“Then what exactly would you suggest I do? Get a babysitter?”

“Yes!”

Aeduan waved a hand between them. “Look, if you’re trying to offer-”

“No, of course I’m not volunteering. I know you would never willingly accept my help. Again,” added Evrane with a flash of her emerald eyes. Before Aeduan could bite back, she was already herding him back into her line of thought. “If not me, then someone else. Perhaps Lisbet. She’s responsible enough.”

“She’s young.”

“And perfectly capable.”

Aeduan pinched the bridge of his nose. He was suddenly very tired. Things had been going so well. Why was she pushing this? When he lowered his hand, he planned on asking her just that, but then she caught it with her own and everything inside him went quiet. The skin was warm and her touch forced his gaze to meet hers.

He’d seen her every week since she reentered his life, but only now was he suddenly struck by how much Evrane had changed in the last 13 years. Nothing could take away her beauty, but there were little wrinkles branching out from the corners of her eyes like tree roots. He wondered what she was seeing on his face.

“I’m only suggesting for your own sake,” she assured him calmly. She didn’t let go of his hand. “When was the last time you had a moment to yourself?”

Aeduan swallowed painfully. “I don’t know,” he admitted finally, the confession rough against his throat.

“Well,” Evrane smiled and she gave his hand encouraging squeeze before releasing it, “maybe it’s time to start thinking about what you can do to change that.”

* . * . * . * .

“Goat tits! This is the worst.”

“If you had done it last night-”

“Iz!”

Iseult hovered by Safi’s shoulder, coffee pot in hand, as her friend tried to scribble down her 9th and final (wrong) answer on a very crumpled looking piece of paper. Her giant calculus textbook lay open on the table, the polished circular area barely big enough for her other school materials, let alone that monstrosity, as it was meant for coffee, not serious work. Well, if you could call whatever Safi was doing serious, which incidentally, Safi didn’t.

“You do know all of that is wrong, right?” Iseult asked.

“Of course it’s all wrong!” Safi snapped, hand not stopping its’ frenzied movements. “What do I look like? A mathematician?!”

No, she didn’t. In fact, she didn’t really look much like Safi either. She’d spent far more time in the bathroom getting ready that morning than she normally did, and the result was a very different image than Iseult was used to seeing at 10 A.M.. Safi’s face was bare as it always was, far too beautiful to be needlessly hindered by make-up, but it looked fresh and clean, and the long shower she had taken had given her golden cheeks a lovely rosy glow. Her hair was prettily braided and pinned around her head like a crown and, if Iseult wasn’t mistaken, she thought she caught a whiff of fruity perfume on her. To top it all off, Safi had left her sweatpants and Cleaved Man hoodie crumpled on the floor and chosen to investigate the contents of her closet, leaving Iseult open-mouthed when she came sweeping out from behind the curtain into Jitters wearing a form fitting burgundy turtle-neck and floral corduroy skirt that showcased her long, lean legs and knee-high suede boots. There was a good chance her calculus professor wouldn’t even recognize her.

“Better to hand something in than nothing and get zero marks though. This,” Safi tapped the paper with her pencil, “shows I care.”

Iseult snorted. Safi put the last finishing touches on her (wrong) answer with a flourish, then carelessly stuck the sheet of paper into her open textbook and slammed it shut.

“I’d say ‘job well done’, but we both know that’s not true.”

Safi grinned smugly at Iseult, looking more than a little satisfied with herself.

“I think I deserve another donut after all that.”

“Of course you do,” Iseult said rolling her eyes and turning to retreat behind the coffee counter. She heard the scrape of Safi’s chair as she got up and followed her. While she got another pot of coffee started, Safi no doubt went to inspect the pastry display. A sharp gasp of horror came from behind her back.

“No sprinkles? What is this? The Grapes of Wrath?”

Iseult, wiping her hands on her apron, turned around. “You know, after watching you bullshit your way through your calculus homework, it’s comforting to hear you make a literary reference.”

Safi scrunched up her nose at the display case. “John Steinbeck taking up cranial space in my head doesn’t change the fact that there are no more sprinkled donuts.”

“Reference Jane Austen and maybe they’ll magically appear.”

Safi glanced over her shoulder, raising an eyebrow at Iseult. “You’re not as funny as you think you are.”

“And you will be fine going a day without a sprinkled donut despite what you may think. Pick something else.” Iseult felt like a mother reprimanding her child.

Safi looked back at the pastries with a forlorn sort of sigh. After a moment’s careful deliberation (for these truly are some of the hardest decisions we are presented with at 10 in the morning) she slid the glass door open and reached for a banana chocolate chip muffin.

“A sensible substitute,” Iseult congratulated, waving open a brown paper bag and holding it out for Safi to deposit her muffin into. Safi dropped it in, looking resentful, but Iseult knew she was hamming it up. Safi had no issues when it came to expressing her anger.

Safi took the bag from Iseult and glared down at its sprinkle-less contents. The raw judgement burning behind her eyes, all directed at a defenseless muffin, made Iseult think of something.

“Hey, you haven’t run into that guy from the bar on campus, have you?”

The paper bag crinkled under Safi’s hands as she rolled the top closed. “What guy?”

“That asshole who,” Iseult hesitated, mentally wincing at the memory, “yelled at you.”

Safi’s hands froze. “Ah,” she merely said, then resumed twisting the paper bag, despite it being well and closed. “The ingrate thwarted by a single button.”

“Yeah, him. Have you seen him?”

Safi gave the bag a final twist, then looked up at Iseult, offering her a closed-lip smile. Her shoulders bounced once and she shook her head. “Nope,” she said brightly. She strolled out from behind the counter and back to her table. “His tits probably fell off from frost exposure and he’s holed up in some hospital somewhere awaiting reconstructive surgery.”

Iseult watched Safi carefully. For whatever reason, her tone had snagged on something in Iseult and held her in place. Somewhere wrong. A lie, possibly.

But never, in all their years of friendship, had Safi lied to Iseult. And never had Iseult lied to Safi. They told each other everything. Safi had told Iseult about her uncle and the years she spent growing up with an alcoholic. She had told her about Chiseled Cheater and the false kisses they’d shared. She had told her about her parents and how she missed them and would trade anything to have them back. Anything, except Iseult.

And Iseult had told Safi about Gretchya. A childhood filled with loneliness and endless beratement. She had told her about not being able to make ends meet and needing to drop out of school. She had even told her that she had never been kissed until last summer.

Now, suddenly, Iseult was wishing she hadn’t asked about the Nubrevnan. The snag was no longer a snag, but twisting itself into a tangled web of wrongness with no obvious beginning or end.

“I have a proposition for you,” Safi announced, slicing through Iseult’s thoughts, though, the knot remained fully intact. A living, breathing thing now. The shift in topic seemed to feed it, pull it tighter into submission, so that all Iseult could do to contain it was stare at her friend.

“How would you like to go to a party on Friday night?”

“Well, you know how much I like parties,” Iseult managed to reply deadpanned.

“I know, but it’s at Vaness’ and I’ve always considered her parties more like sophisticated soirees, you know? She doesn’t put up with the bullshit you get at other parties on campus.”

“I guess.” Safi wasn’t wrong. Now busy working on her masters, Vaness didn’t have time to involve herself in the antics of college. In truth, she never had. It’s how she’d earned herself the title of the “Iron Bitch” in just the first week of her freshman year. Even before she graduated, she’d displayed a low tolerance for her peers and the debauchery they would find themselves in every weekend. Her parties always had an air of opulence around them and were strictly invitation only. Except for her infamous end-of-the-year party. That was open to everyone and it almost always ended with the cops shutting it down by sunrise. At least, they had last year. Iseult had been so drunk, she didn’t even remember how she’d gotten home that night.

“Are the Hell-Bards playing?” she asked, diverting her mind from racing off to memories she didn’t quite have the mental energy to duel with so early in the day.

“I said it was going to be a classy affair. Classy.”

“So, no?”

“No.”

“Good. At least the soundtrack to the evening won’t suck.”

Safi’s face brightened. “So you’ll come?”

Iseult relinquished a nod. “Yeah, I’ll go. If only to watch Vaness skewer Leopold with one of her nails.”

Safi bellied a laugh as she pulled on her coat. “I think he rather enjoys it. One may say he encourages it.”

“You think?” Iseult asked, genuinely curious.

Safi shrugged, then paused. A dangerous smile crawled onto her lips. “Jealous?”

“I could ask the same to you,” Iseult volleyed back. “Don’t even try to deny that you’ve never thought about Vaness in that way.”

Safi feigned insult. “I wouldn’t dream of it! There isn’t a soul among us that hasn’t fallen under her spell.” She started to back away towards the door. “Are we still on for dinner tonight?”

“Yep! But hold on, I have a favor I need to ask.”

Safi stopped her descent and took a couple calculated steps back towards the counter. “A favor?”

“A proposition,” Iseult amended, co-opting Safi’s earlier choice word.

“If it’s for me to ditch class and run away to Marstok with you, then the answer is yes. You’ve never had a better idea.”

“I was wondering,” Iseult went on pointedly, “if you’d be willing to go to Ryber and Tanzi’s book club with me next month.”

“I already said I would.”

“You did? When?”

Realization burst across Safi’s face. “Oh that’s right! I told Ryber and Tanzi last week. When we had lunch together.”

Iseult felt the line between her brow form before she could stop it. “You had lunch together?”

“Yeah, last week. Tuesday, maybe? We ran into each other on the way to the dining commons and ended eating together. They’re really great. I like them a lot.”

“Yeah,” Iseult was barely able to say. The image of Safi, Ryber, and Tanzi sitting at the dining commons, laughing together, without her made the knot in her chest from earlier drop into her stomach and melt into something different entirely. “I like them too."

“When is it again?” Safi asked.

Iseult swallowed hard. “She said they meet the second Friday of every other month.”

Safi whipped out her phone and tapped the screen a couple times before her eyebrows bounced in surprise. “Oh. So, Valentine’s Day?”

“Oh. Um, I guess,” Iseult replied. She hadn’t known that. Not that it made a difference. She’d never had a date for Valentine’s Day, nor any other calendar day of the year for that matter. Nothing in the last month had indicated that this year would be any different.

Iseult noted the small frown that appeared on Safi’s face as she looked down at her phone’s calendar for a moment too long before slipping it back into her coat pocket. With some effort, she smiled at Iseult.

“That should work for me. Unless I get roped into a shift at the Cleaved Man. Lord knows Stix probably has eight dates lined up for the evening.” Safi bristled with a resentful huff. She caught Iseult’s eye.

“So… are we going to Marstok or not?”

* . * . * . * .

Aeduan’s boots hit the concrete hard, his conversation with Evrane replaying over and over again in his head. He wished she hadn’t said anything. He wasn’t angry, but now that the idea was out there, he couldn’t stop thinking about it. A list was beginning to form with all the things he would do if he didn’t have to keep an eye on Owl every second of the day. Simple things, like going for a run in the evenings. Or taking a ride on his motorcycle when he needed to blow off steam. He missed the adrenaline, missed cutting through the air like nothing could hurt him. Maybe Evrane was right. Maybe Lisbet wasn’t too young to watch Owl. If not her, then who else could he trust with that responsibility?

A whimper broke out behind Aeduan. He’d been, without even realizing it, walking much too fast for Owl. Monster. 10 minutes and he was already forgetting the child.

“Sorry,” he murmured, stopping and kneeling down to make sure she’d heard him. Passersby walked around them on the busy sidewalk. He adjusted Owl’s scarf. Her eyes rolled down to the concrete.

Avoidance. She was avoiding him.

Aeduan’s heart sank, all fantasies of his motorcycle whooshing out of his head. How much of his conversation with Evrane had she understood?

“What would you like to do this weekend?” he asked her, his big hands curled around her scarf. “I think it’s supposed to snow overnight tomorrow. Want to build another fort for Blueberry? The other one is almost all melted.”

Owl said nothing.

“Or maybe we could have a snowball fight with Cora and Lisbet. I bet we can take them.”

Nothing.

Aeduan brought his forehead close to hers so that their noses were almost touching. “Maybe,” he whispered, drawing out the word, “we could make a decision over a muffin?”

Owl sour expression cracked. Relief flooded Aeduan’s heart when her black eyes made contact with his.

Stopping at Jitters after a session with Evrane was becoming somewhat of a weekly tradition. More than once he’d been tempted to pay a visit on days when they didn’t have an appointment at the library. There was something comforting about starting off the morning with a fresh pastry and hot cup of coffee. Or maybe he’d mooched off of Owl’s bowl of Cheerios for his own breakfast one too many times.

It wasn’t long before the bell above Jitters’ entrance door was jingling its welcome, but just as Aeduan stepped inside, he froze.

It wasn’t the grouchy barista from his first trip (though he had, unfortunately, seen her since then). No, it was Iseult behind the counter. Wearing an apron. Pouring coffee.

Iseult.

Her round face shone like the moon, as much of her chin length hair as possible pulled back in a messy bun and a headband resting on top of her head. Wisps of stray hairs fell around her face and in her eyes as she wiped her hands on her apron and pulled out a pile of receipts from the front pocket. Aeduan had never seen her so relaxed. Or with so much color in her face. Cheeks rosy pink, like she’d just finished with the lunch rush. It softened her somehow.

The bell hanging above Aeduan’s head stopped swaying and went silent. Waiting for the verdict.

He could run. Turn around and leave and the girl would be none the wiser. He’d have to make up some excuse to Owl, but how hard would that be?

Idiot, he cursed himself. He was a former police officer. The son of Ragnor Amalej. What would his father say if he saw him running for the hills because of a simple librarian? His mother would have smiled. She would have told him again the story of another man who was kind and quiet. A man who had stumbled over words and given her no choice but to fall in love with him.

That woke him up. He was not his father. And he certainly did not - and would never - have feelings for this plain girl, this librarian. That thought was enough encouragement to get him through the door.

Iseult’s head rose at the sound of the door slamming and the violent jangle of ringing that came with it. Her expression, so ordinarily cool and unreadable, popped with surprise at the sight of him.

“Aeduan.”

His name sounded breathless on her lips. Had he been paying attention to anything outside of her lovely, pale face, he would have felt the something it stirred inside him.

“I didn’t know you worked here,” remarked Aeduan matter-of-factly as he approached the counter.

Iseult’s features smoothed back into place. “Yes. I work here and-” Her gaze fluttered up to the ceiling for a second, then back down. She brushed her hair out of her eyes, possibly a nervous tick. “And at the library.”

Aeduan nodded. She was staring at him thoughtfully. Expectantly. He was here for a reason, wasn’t he?

“I was at the library today.”

“You were?”

“Yes.” Aeduan paused, then thinking that perhaps he should say something else, continued. “I wanted to get the next book in the My Father’s Dragon series… but you weren’t there.”

A small frown crinkled at the edge of Iseult’s eyes. “Was Hilga there? Or Rosa?”

“I-” Well, this was more than a little embarrassing. Good thing she didn’t know he was a former cop, top of his precinct, destined to make detective, and incapable of finding a book.

“I didn’t have time to ask,” he lied.

“Oh.” Such a small word. It carried the weight of thought that could not be read on her face. “I can look for it tomorrow.”

“You don’t have to-”

“It’s no trouble-”

“We’re only a couple chapters in-”

“I really don’t mind,” Iseult insisted. She hesitated, then added, “I can give you a call and let you know whether or not it’s in.”

“Oh. Well...” Aeduan took a bracing breath and tore a napkin from the basket on top of the display case, then grabbed one of the pens from the chipped mug sitting next to the register acting as a pencil holder. He clicked the top of the pen with his thumb, bent over the counter, and started writing. When he was finished, he slid it across the counter to Iseult.

“My number,” he explained.

Iseult peeled the napkin from the counter and held it up with both her hands. The way she held it made it look fragile, like it might break if she were to drop it. Her lips rolled inward, and for the first time since meeting her, she seemed to have trouble meeting his eyes.

“Thank you,” she finally said. Finally looking at him. “But I have your contact information at the library. From when you registered for a card.”

Aeduan could practically feel the inferno of embarrassment that ignited in his blood. He half-expected her to shove his number back to him or, hell-gates, what if she crumpled it up and tossed it in the trash? But instead she surprised him: she folded the napkin carefully and slipped it into the front pocket of her apron.

“Is there anything else I can help you with?”

Aeduan swallowed. Once. Twice. Then shook his head. “No,” he muttered, his voice little more than a rasp.

Iseult blinked. Confused. “You don’t want anything?”

“Want?” It took a moment for her meaning to penetrate his abnormally thick skull. “Right. Yes. Hot Coffee. Medium. And two blueberry lemon muffins.”

“To go?”

And away from this devastating conversation? “Yes.”

There would be no more attempt at conversing from his end. He was spent. While Iseult prepared his coffee, Aeduan busied himself with observing the cafe even though he’d seen it a dozen times before. It was emptier than usual. The same nondescript instrumental music played from the old stereo behind the counter. The only thing out of place was the smoldering mound of charred wood and ash in the fireplace. The normally popping fire seemed to have died and was in need of more wood.

“Do you want hazelnut?”

Aeduan jerked his head over his shoulder. “Excuse me?”

“Do you want hazelnut with your coffee? I sometimes like to top mine off with it. It goes really well with this blend.”

Aeduan split his gaze between Iseult and the small jar of ground hazelnut in her hand. He wasn’t even sure why she was asking him, but without his permission, his mouth was forming a succinct ‘sure’ and he returned his attention back to the cafe.

“Oh!”

Aeduan swung around at the sound of Iseult’s startled gasp. She wasn’t there.

Taking an urgent step forward, he braced his hands on the counter and craned his neck over the display case. “Iseult?”

“I-I’m alright,” a muffled voice came and a split-second later, she popped back up from behind the pastries. Color had blossomed on her cheeks, fanning out across the bridge of her nose. “S-she just startled me. That’s all.”

Aeduan’s eyes narrowed. “Who?” he demanded. And then he noticed Iseult’s downturned gaze traveling to a place next to him. Oh. Oh.

Owl was looking more red in the face than Iseult. It was alarming how much tension those two chubby cheeks could conjur. He knew this look. It was the same one she gave the car seat the moment before he would force her down in it and buckle her up.

Well, no time like the present. They’d been to the library enough times that he supposed it was time for a proper introduction, so he scooped her up in his arms, then angled them both to face Iseult.

“Owl, this is Iseult.” Iseult. He’d never said her name out loud before. It poured like honey from his mouth. He licked his lips; it took him a moment to form more words. “She works with Evrane at the library. She’s the librarian who picked out all your books we’ve been reading together.” When Owl made no show of having understood a word he said, he tried to coax some reaction out of her with a gentle bounce on his hip and an encouraging, “Wasn’t that nice of her?”

Owl twisted her head and hid her face in the crook of Aeduan's neck.

Well, it was a reaction. Just not the one he was hoping for.

He shifted on his feet and forced himself to look at Iseult. “Sorry,” he apologized gruffly. “She’s… shy.”

“That’s alright,” Iseult murmured, and Aeduan could have sworn he saw her lips harbor a small smile as she fidgeted with the strings of her apron. “I’m shy too.” Then, her lips quivered. “Is s-she... your daughter?”

No.

That’s what he was supposed to say. It was the truth, wasn’t it? Owl was nothing to him unless the adoption succeeded. Yet nothing had felt so wrong to him.

No.

The word stopped his heart. Sent his stomach to roil.

“I would like her to be,” Aeduan heard himself admit. A slow rasp. Like something heavy being dragged over concrete. “I… I’m applying for adoption.”

Aeduan watched Iseult’s pupils dilate. The tremble in her lips quieted. Then: “That is admirable.”

Aeduan exhaled. Warmth spread in his chest. He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t even notice Iseult tapping the keys on her register. He barely understood what she was saying when she said, “Your total comes to $5.79.”

Numbly, Aeduan pulled out his wallet from his back pocket with one hand while his other arm was full of Owl. He managed to pull out several bills and handed them across the counter. When she handed him back his change, he dropped it into the tip mug next to the register.

Owl seemed intent on staying hidden in his neck, so he did his best to pick up the bag of muffins and his coffee with one hand without dropping everything. The transaction was over, but Aeduan found himself staring at Iseult, her staring back at him, her hands folded over each other in front of her as though it was taking some effort not to fidget with her apron strings. It relaxed him somehow, seeing those delicate pearly white fingers locked together. She was nervous; he wasn’t alone.

Aeduan's wrist rolled at his side. He sucked in a breath. “Do you-”

The bell jangled as the entrance door swung open and a stick figure of a boy came flying in.

“Sorry, sorry I know I’m late!”

He was a blur of gangly limbs and patchwork colored skin - some dark, some light - as he skidded to halt behind the counter, heaping apologies onto Iseult like his life depended on it. On and on it went and Aeduan just stood there, despite the fact that he had nothing to do with whatever this stranger was babbling about. In the midst of the boy’s mounting hysteria, his voice pitching higher as it went on, Iseult’s eyes slid to Aeduan’s, her expression as quiet as ever. Something passed between them, but Aeduan wasn’t sure what.

“It’s alright, Cam,” Iseult finally interjected over the boy’s apologies. Again, she glanced over at Aeduan. She looked like she wanted to say something. But for some reason, Aeduan spared her the chance. He forced a rough cough from his lungs and, giving her a brusque nod, spun away from her entirely and made a beeline to the cream and sugar station. Behind his back, the boy’s voice piped up again, and Aeduan heard the shuffle of feet and voices trailing away as though they were moving their conversation to the back. Iseult obviously had her hands full with an incompetent employee. There was no reason he had to trap her in another staring match that would inevitably go nowhere.

Those eyes. Aeduan gritted his teeth as he uncovered his coffee thinking of them, how they had looked at him when she’d called him admirable. Him. Admirable. She had no right calling him that. She didn’t even know him.

Well, he reasoned, stirring cream into his coffee and watching the flecks of hazelnut Iseult added spin around and around and eventually become swallowed by the whirlpool, she hadn’t exactly called him admirable. She was only commending what he was doing with Owl admirable. Admirable. That was one word for it. Or stupid. Impulsive. Completely insane and beyond his reach.

The bells over the entrance door tinkled and Owl, who had been glued to his side for the last 5 minutes, stirred slightly in his arms, her tiny frame expanding and drooping with a sleepy sigh.

Hell-gates, what was he doing? Trying to adopt a kid? Who was he kidding? It didn’t matter who his father was or what family he came from or that Iseult thought it was admirable. He was still Aeduan Amalej. He may not wear the badge or carry a gun anymore, but he still had his reputation as the demon of his precinct who had given up his soul for the cause, for justice. That was something he couldn’t shed so easily.

Aeduan popped the lid back on his coffee cup and his hand froze. Cold crawled across the back of his neck like a spider. It was only when a familiar voice spoke from behind him did he know why.

“Well, well, if it isn’t my partner in justice.”

#the witchlands #baeseult #iseult det midenzi #aeduan #safiya fon hasstrel #owl #aeduan x iseult #truthwitch #bookends #my fics #mine

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angel-e-v-a · 4 years

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POSITIVE 20 QUESTIONS TAG GAME

I was tagged by @fierydeans, thanks so much darling, this is fun!!! ❤️❤️❤️

1. Name 4 fictional characters who showcase your personality the best, with explanations if you want.

Ouch, that’s hard, I have a very weird personality.

Temperance Brennan from Bones: For one part. I love to read, watch documentaries, have a scientific approach to life and little to no knowledge of popular culture and can appear unintentionally cold and offensive, but in fact am anything except cold.

Lucifer from Supernatural: I’m a very bitter bean who’s in more than an instance almost ruined her life and everything else around me because I’ve little to no idea what’s forgiveness. I variate between being very emotional and wanting to burn down everything. I love annoying people who annoy me. Also, family blows. Plus, I literally don’t know how to shut up and pay attention to me, I’m bored sums up 50 percent of my personality.

Yennefer of Vengerberg from The Witcher: I’ve never been shy a day in my life. I want everything. My biggest dream was to be important to someone, and I also had big self esteem issues on the account of my physical look. I’m super nice and sweet, but only with chosen group of people. Otherwise, I’m that snarky bitch™ .

Dean Winchester from Supernatural: Now, we may not share life views, and I’m definitively not the person that loves flirting, but gosh, do we share a temper. Besides, we have same taste in movies and music, we both don’t hold ourselves back and do what we want to at the moment, whether it’s too eat junk or drink until stupor. Also overly protective, and very much not above crude jokes and random childish innuendos.

2. Aesthetic

Too wild and messy for one. Blog consist of whatever I love/drool on.

3. Favorite musical/play?

Hamlet or Richard III. How am I supposed to decide?

4. What is the best compliment you’ve ever received?

People telling me I’m the smartest/one of the smartest people they met. It doesn’t do good to my ego or social life, but certainly the only type of compliment that makes me truly content.

5. How many times have you been in love?

Umm, five times? Though, three of those were more obsession than love. Only two of those experiences were positive, both in term of relationships and emotions, with my ex-boyfriend who I lived with for almost a year, and we parted just because we had nothing more in common, and with my husband, on the account of him being as sane as I’m.

6. Embarrassing story or fact about yourself that makes you laugh now?

Oh hahahahah, my, I have a lot of those. I once got so drunk on moonshine I just fell asleep at the table and woke 24 hours later. Friends were unsuccessfully trying to wake me up with loudest music all day. The other time my husband (boyfriend at the time, we knew each other for few weeks), made pirozhki and I, who weighted only 35 kg at the time, ate 40 of them!!! Imagine that! 40!!! I vomited all over the apartment, vomited all night and thought I was legit gonna die. And the first time I went to a Chinese restaurant (the worst thing it was with my boss) I loved the food so much, I was just ordering random things from the menu, up to the point the waiter could barely contain laughter when bringing plates. I got so bloated that when I left the place, I had to take of my skirt in the middle of the street because I couldn’t breathe. The luck is I had the tunic, which I sometimes wore as a dress with thighs, and sometimes as blouse with wide belt and skirt, so I wasn’t naked or flashing undies, but man, were people looking at me thinking I’m legit gonna strip bare in the middle of the street.

7. Favorite Disney/Pixar movie?

Hmm, I don’t really like many of them. Toy Story I think.

8. Favorite flower or plant?

Not much of a plant person. But I love roses, and poisonous flowers, and adore venus fly traps.

9. What’s your favorite holiday?

Birthdays. The only holidays I accept.

10. Name three things that made you laugh or smile this past week.

I just laughed like mad when recalling the embarrassing stories.

My dog doing dances to get more food, because it’s never enough.

I’m teaching my husband to play chess, because it’s not fair, I have nobody left to play chess with me and I miss it so much. And it’s quite hilarious, especially since he can’t stop thinking he gets a bonus move if he eats my figure.

11. What song would you play to introduce yourself to someone?

Look What You Made Me Do!!! It’s so me.

12. Name something that truly makes you feel peaceful even at your most stressed moments.

It’s usually books and shows and movies I like, and making gifs, but for the last couple of months, whenever I get to the point of blowing up I just watch over and over again that one blasted season of The Tomorrow People. Oh and since coronavirus, I got myself Yu-Gi-Oh! Legacy of the Duelist Link Evolution and can’t stop drinking with more than couple of days pause. It’s the year 2020 and all I’m doing is playing Duel Monsters and getting drunk, it feels like I’m back in my teenage-hood, somebody kill me pls.

13. What do you, did you, or would you study at college?

I'm a vet technician by profession (the one I learned for, never worked as one a day, I somehow wound up being a translator), but what I wanted to study the most is forensic medicine. However it was a no no (nobody wants to specialize those, they are needless around here). Now I just wanna scrape enough money to enroll either molecular biology or biochemistry and not let myself get intimidated by the fact I’m bad at math. I was bad at math before, but I still had top grade in chemistry. Surely college can’t be much worse.

14. This is kind of a weird one, but which outfit of yours makes you feel most like yourself?

My leather jacket, tights, black shirt and black boots. The blacker, the better.

15. What is a quote you live by?

You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist. ― Nietzsche

16. Name the funniest playlist name you have.

I don’t name them. Pah. Too lazy

17. Make a reference to an inside joke you have with someone you love with zero context.

It’s not dead enough.

18. What is a message you would give your younger self if given the chance?

Please, stop trying to off yourself and drinking all your money. Also stop being a total douche with everyone, not everybody hates you.

19. Who is your favorite family member? (If you have no good blood family members, feel free to mention someone in your found family)

My husband. He’s technically the only family member I have now, unless you count the dog, and a bunch of uncles who don’t really care and it’s mutual.

20. What’s a secret dream of yours?

World domination. Admit it’d be cool.

Thanks again, @fierydeans, I had loads of fun doing this!!!

Tagging: @blakechaos08 @stormborndean @brieflymaximumprincess @mrsimoshen @smolrowena @cherrypierowena @honeyeddeans and everybody who wants to do it.

#tag game

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hostgalli19 · 4 years

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Hallowvide Day 26: Samhainophobia

Chapter Summary: Samhain used to be scary. The costumes were meant to protect you for spirits and demons who wanted to harm you, nowadays, not so much.

Note: Here's today story, hope you enjoy it

Sir - Head of Manoir Vide Less - Member of Manoir Vide Mae - Member of Manoir Vide

Varga - Member of Manoir Vide Demon - Member of Manoir Vide Para (Paradox) - Member of Manoir Vide

Length: Tag List: @darkipliersdesk, @wilfordwarfstacheisbae, @lamiasluck, @scuttling-thoughtfully, @matt10nt, @bexiblitz, @kraefandoms, @ameliachastain, @ze-doktar-is-here, @ that-1-demon, @posts-random-art, @sack-the-kitsune, @royalspaceace, @wheezes-in-unsolved, @etcha12322, @thefrenchiestfry-jpg, @howchildishofme, @crazykuchen01, @sireniana,

Link to Ao3, Day 24 and Day 25

Date: 26/10/20 - 27/10/20 Time: 10:50 pm - 2:05 am

The Manoir was louder than usual given the Guests were getting their costumes ready for the party on the 31st. This was my first year attending the party.

I'm not quite sure what I'm going to go as I've only really dressed up for Halloween three times.

The first time was as a vampire, the second an angel with an ex-friend and the third was for work and I only remembered it was Halloween because of the decorations and the fact everyone was dressed up.

I honestly have no idea what I'm going to dress up as. Maybe a vampire I'm not entirely sure. I poked my head into the cinema after checking to make sure there was no bucket of blood over the door this time.

Mae, Deer, Demon, Para and Varga and promised they would never try and make either me or Sir like that ever again. I'm not scared of Samhain. The costumes now days were nowhere near as scary as they used to be.

The costumes were meant to scare unwanted spirits and demons away but now they invited trouble, that's how it seemed anyway.

I was on my way back from a craft shop with some supplies need to make some decorations for The Manoir (Lumin's webs were looking a little bare) when I was catcalled.

I looked around and groaned when I saw the group of humans standing at the mouth of the ally I walk down to get to the Manoir. Lovely, just what I need.

I smiled at thinly at the humans and tried to walk through the ally as quickly as possible.

I would have gone around but the other way closed and I wanted to get back to the Manoir as quickly as possible. I quickly flicked through my phone trying not to tense when I heard the group of humans start to follow me.

I wanted to walk faster but forced myself to keep walking like I hadn't noticed them. There was no way in hell I would be able to escape them.

I was wearing my running shoes, leggings and my black and blue polo shirt and my black vest.

I was suddenly very thankful the bag I was using to carry everything in didn't have a handle on it, that way the group of five humans following couldn't grab it.

I stumbled when one of the humans grabbed one of my braids. I yelped and clawed at the hand holding my hair until they let go. That's when I started to run.

The entrance to The Manoir wasn't that far away, I just needed to get near it and I would be perfectly safe. Sir never let anything happen to his Guests. I smiled when I heard the five humans stop at the sight of the building.

Manoir Vide looked like a run-down mansion to outsiders. They could see how truly beautiful it was, though the Manoir itself was currently over in Lumin's webs, horseshoes, and of course jack-o-lanterns.

It looked very much like a Haunted Mansion but to me, it was home. I gasped, completely out of breath when I finally reached the "Front Gate".

I took a minute to catch my breath, turning around to see the five humans had finally made up their mind and were following me, a few of them had picked up stones.

I turned back to the Manoir and dashed inside, being careful not to trip over the uneven stones that made up the pathway to the huge wooden front door.

I stumbled and fell over, scraping my hands, shins and knees on the stones. I tried to get up but my ankle protested. I just have rolled it when I fell over. I looked up when I heard a scream, no doubt someone had scared Deer.

I stumbled to my feet and limped towards the front door. I looked over my shoulder and smiled, Deer's scream had clearly alarmed the five humans following me. Good.

Walking was painful but I was safe. I stumbled and leaned against the table near the front door. I had never noticed it before. I yelped when I was grabbed and slammed against the wall, my ankle and knee making a dull pop sound.

Tears started leaking from my eyes as I stared at the person who grabbed me. It was one of the humans, the others in the group were laughing and telling jokes.

I opened my mouth to scream but the human holding my against the wall put their hand over my mouth. I breathe in through my nose and almost gagged at the overpowering scent of alcohol.

It was nauseating. I bit into the humans male's hand hard, hoping it would be enough to get them to let go. It wasn't unfortunately. They pushed me hard against the wall, the other hand across my neck.

I slammed my knee into his groin.

"HELP! AH, LET GO OF ME YOU BASTARD," I screamed, the man holding me slammed my head against a wall. I groaned and tried to stop myself from crying even more.

The Manoir had gone quite. I couldn't hear the piano in the ballroom, nor could I hear the movie playing in the Cinema. It was eerie. The Manoir was never this quite.

The humans had seemly noticed how quiet it suddenly was.

I could help but smile. Sir hated uninvited Guests wandering into the Manoir. If they were polite they were allowed to stay for a while, some never left while others, much like these humans were, dealt with in a much harsher way.

Intruders weren’t welcome.

We had several over the last month. Some from the nearby town thought to came investigate (stick their nose where it doesn’t belong), they had gotten a rather nasty surprise but they had escaped with their lives, and sanity intact.

Another, more recent intruder wasn’t so lucky. He may have gotten out of Manoir alive but he wouldn’t soon forget his time here. This particular intruder decided to insult Sir and the Manoir after he was kindly asked to leave.

"Hello gentlemen, lady. What are you doing here?" Sir questioned, appearing at the top of the staircase, sip a glass of wine. He did not look pleased, not that I really blamed him.

He very much hated it when there were intruders, or that’s the impression I had gotten from how he reacted when have had… unwanted Guests. The humans looked startled to see anyone here.

I groaned when the man holding my let go, I rubbed my throat and slide down the wall, quickly wiping away the tears dripping down my face. My eyes were stinging.

I yelped when I was lifted off the ground. I relaxed a little when I realised it was Sir’s aura. I giggled a little. I leaned against the railing to the stairs, enjoying the frightened look on the humans far too much.

The Humans looked alarmed and I couldn't help but smirk at the frightened look on their faces as Sir walked down the stairs, one hand still behind his back. I looked up when I heard a creak and saw Mae, Deer, Less, Paradox and Demon standing on the landing.

Demon looked down at the humans with a curious look on his face before scuttling up the wall and onto the ceiling to look down at the humans. They seemed unnerved.

While Demon's ability to climb the walls and stick to the ceiling was creepy I had since gotten used to it.

The humans tried to run out the door but were stopped when it slammed shut, the sound was deafening, the humans paled when they saw Lumin. He was reached halfway up their thighs. He did not look pleased.

They tried to scramble away from Lumin, bringing them closer to the staircase.

Sir stopped just before the bottom of the stairs, I didn't notice his cane until he removed his hand from behind his back. The humans back away as much as Lumin would allow them too.

He took another sip of his wine while he waited for the humans to speak. The man who had slammed be against the wall was stammering, trying to figure out how to get out of this situation.

"She told us to follow her. It was her doing," the man answered, I stared at him. That was a horrible excuse and was never going to work. Sir stared at them with a raised eyebrow. I shook my head when I looked over at me.

I winced and hopped around to sit down on the bottom step. It a little too painful to stay standing.

"I was walking from back the craft shop with decoration, they catcalled me and decided to follow me. I ended up tripping on one of the loose stones outside. I think I twisted my ankle and knee when he slammed me against the wall," I answered, leaning against the railing and briefly closing my eyes, I groaned when I felt myself being shaken.

I stared at Less wondering why she was trying to keep me awake.

I was tired and wanted to go to sleep.

"No Galia did not. If she had then you would not have slammed her against the wall given her a concussion after she screamed for help..." I didn't hear what Sir said after that as I passed out.

I woke up my couch in The Parlour, a cold bag on my head, my ankle and knee had already been wrapped. I had no idea what happened but didn't really care I just wanted to sleep.

I opened my eyes again when I heard a soft chittering and realised it was Bug and Lumin. Bug called onto the couch as did Lumin, he was much smaller now. I laughed at the feeling of Lumin scuttle up my body and settle in my hair.

It was his favourite place. I relaxed and went back to sleep. I could find out what happened later.

Note: Thankyou for reading. I may add to this later. If you want to read the other stories go to my profile and search “Hallowvide” and the particular day you want.

Link to Picture 1, Picture 2

#hallowvide2020 #my ao3 Markiplier Halloween stories #Markiplier #Markiplier egos #Samhain

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thecollegefootballguy · 4 years

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The Top 25 Teams of the Decade: #4 Oklahoma

Hello everybody, we’re celebrating the arrival of the 2020′s by looking at the 25 best programs of the previous decade.

We’ve made it to the top five! If you’ve been reading this whole time thank you. Here’s the 4th best team of the 2010′s:

University of Oklahoma Sooners

Record: 109-25 (.813) Conference Titles: 7 Bowl Seasons: 10 Major Bowls: 7 Playoff/BCS Berths: 4 Final Top 25 Finishes: 9 Final Top 10 Finishes: 6 Final Top 5 Finishes: 4 Best Season: Maybe 2017

Oklahoma was an odd duck in the decade of the 2010′s. The Sooners were one of the most consistent winners in the whole decade, but they were never good to actually win a title. The computers put their best team in 2011, when OU only managed a third place finish in the Big 12, yet they won 7 conference championships, more than any team in these past ten years.

Oklahoma more or less picked up where they left off in the 2000′s. The Sooners were also one of the best in the previous decade as well, perhaps even higher than 4th place, after all they actually won a national title in 2000. Bob Stoops had built up his squad into one of the two heads of the Big 12′s two-headed monster of OU and rival Texas. Both teams spent those years competing with each other and a select few other programs for national championships every year. In fact, Oklahoma’s 8-5 record in 2009 was considered a shocking under-performance, and that was with Heisman contender Sam Bradford out for essentially the entire season.

With Landry Jones having established himself at QB, the Sooners were expecting a return to form in 2010. Business as usual in Norman. OU began the year ranked 7th in the nation after finishing the previous year outside the top 25. That’s a vote of confidence. After avoiding a slip up in Game 1 against Utah State, Oklahoma torched #17 Florida State 47-17 at home which should have righted the ship. However, the Sooners kept struggling through their non-conference schedule, beating Air Force by three points and only managing to scrape past Cincinnati by two. September wasn’t exactly a confidence-builder, and it didn’t bode well for Red River. #8 OU held off #21 Texas 28-20 and then thumped Iowa State 52-0. It wasn’t a pretty 6-0, but halfway through the year and Oklahoma was still undefeated. That’s as far as they got. The #3 Sooners’ first true road test was a cross-division visit to #18 Missouri, where they were handed a 36-27 defeat by the Tigers. OU put away bloodless Colorado to climb to 7-1 before falling to unranked Texas A&M at Kyle Field 19-33. Oklahoma washed down to 19th in the polls, but with Texas Tech rebuilding and Baylor barely better than average, the Sooners only had one team to worry about. #14 OU entered Bedlam technically as an underdog to #10 Oklahoma State, but Oklahoma’s knack for crushing their arch-rival’s spirit would carry over from the 2000′s into the 2010′s. The Sooners won 47-41 and OU entered a three-way tie atop the Big 12 South with the Cowboys and A&M. The tiebreakers broke Oklahoma’s way and the now-#10 Sooners were pitted against rival #13 Nebraska in the Big 12 Championship Game. In an emotionally fraught game, heightened by NU’s impending departure for the Big Ten, OU gave their nemesis one final kick in the ass with a 23-20 victory after coming back from a 17-0 deficit. Oklahoma was 11-2 and Big 12 Champions, nowhere near good enough to be considered for the BCS Championship Game, but they’d get the conference’s slot in the Fiesta Bowl. The #9 Sooners blew out an overmatched #25 Connecticut 48-20 in Glendale. Another top ten finish in the books.

OU was really aiming high in 2011. Oklahoma was the preseason #1 and expectations were as high as could be with such a talented roster. However, a black cloud surrounded the program as the year began after the death of linebacker Austin Box back in May. After the Sooners beat up Tulsa to start the season, several players announced their intention to transfer. The bad vibes weren’t translating to the field. OU once again handled #5 Florida State, this time in Tallahassee 23-13. Oklahoma pushed past Missouri and murdered Ball State to once again go undefeated into Red River. This time, the Sooners left no doubt as they ran #11 Texas off the field in a 55-17 slaughter. It should have been smooth sailing heading into OU’s end of October date with Kansas State, but Oklahoma was upset by a not particularly good Texas Tech squad 38-41 in Norman. It was the Sooners’ first conference loss at home since 2001 and basically ended the national title hunt then and there. #11 OU rebounded by blowing out #10 Kansas State in Manhattan and then breezed past A&M in their last meeting with the Aggies as members of the Big 12. Oklahoma climbed back to 5th in the polls but were then upset by #25 Baylor 38-45 led by eventual Heisman Robert Griffin III. It was their first EVER loss to the BU. The Big 12′s contraction from 12 to 10 teams mucked with the schedule, so Bedlam was again played in Stillwater. I’d say home field advantage had some role to play in what happened but I don’t think the outcome would have changed if it had been played at Owen Field. #3 Oklahoma State handed the Sooners their most lopsided defeat in the contest since 1945 when the Cowboys blew up OU 44-10. Statistically, 9-3 Oklahoma was perhaps a top five team in the nation, but they weren’t anywhere close thanks to their three losses which placed them tied for 3rd in the standings with the Bears. The #19 Sooners beat unranked Iowa 31-14 in the Insight Bowl to end their frustrating season with a win.

Rinse and repeat. In 2012 OU began the year ranked 4th in the AP poll, and really, there was no expecting anybody else to win the Big 12 with Brandon Weeden and Justin Blackmon gone from OSU. Of course, Oklahoma lost 19-24 in Week 4 to #15 Kansas State, this year’s “it” team in the conference. The Sooners rebounded by winning three in a row, including smoking #15 Texas in Dallas for the second season in a row 63-21. The “it” team in all of college football in 2012 was Notre Dame. OU had the misfortune of scheduling the Irish for that season and #8 Oklahoma fell 13-30 at home. The Sooners won three straight again heading into Bedlam, this time #14 OU scraped past #22 Oklahoma State in an overtime shootout 51-48. KSU held the tiebreaker over Oklahoma, and took the Big 12′s spot in the Fiesta Bowl. The #12 Sooners were relegated to the Cotton Bowl, where they faced off against an old foe. #10 Texas A&M was the hottest team in the whole sport by the end of 2012, and the Aggies smoked OU 41-13. A second straight year of disappointing 10-3 finishes and a ranking outside of the top ten.

The frustrating 2011 and 2012 seasons finally caught up with Oklahoma. For the first time since their national championship season in 2000, the Sooners began the year ranked outside of the top ten, with a #16 ranking in the AP poll. OU did well without the bright spotlight, taking care of the non-conference schedule including paying back #22 Notre Dame 35-21 in South Bend. Oklahoma had only risen to 12th in the polls before Red River. The Sooners were facing an unranked Texas team that seemed to be falling apart. Mack Brown’s tenure was coming to an end. A few years prior, a bad UT squad would suggest that OU would now dominate the conference, but upstarts OSU and KSU had so far thwarted Oklahoma’s ambitions. Of course Texas won, beating their rivals 36-20 to send Mack out on top. The Sooners went back into cruise control, beating hapless Kansas and a frankly overrated #10 Texas Tech. 2013′s upstart was #5 Baylor, who blew out Oklahoma 41-12. OU was knocked down from 12th to 22nd, but they won out in workmanlike fashion. The #18 Sooners capped the regular season with a 33-24 victory over #6 Oklahoma State, denying the Cowboys a share of the Big 12 title. 10-2 OU was selected to face off against #3 Alabama in the Sugar Bowl. The Crimson Tide spent the lion’s share of 2013 as the #1 team in football, only kept out of the BCS Championship Game by the the Kick Six, a play that many people didn’t even know was possible until it happened on national tv. The game was considered a foregone conclusion, but nobody told Oklahoma. The #10 Sooners shocked everyone, upsetting the vaunted Tide 45-31. Whether OU was the only team to ever catch Saban’s Tide asleep or their modern no-huddle offense really did just overwhelm Bama, that strong 11-2 finish was miles ahead of their previous two disappointing 10-3 campaigns. We can also thank Oklahoma for shocking Alabama into adopting modern offensive principles, so thanks for that.

Of course the strong finish to the 2013 season put OU back into the spotlight in 2014. Oklahoma began the year #4 in the country, and certainly looked like it as they skipped through September in fast motion. It was a bit too easy, and Oklahoma was brought back down to earth by #25 TCU, who would end up being the Big 12′s upstart “it” team in 2014 (sort of). The Sooners broke in new Texas head coach Charlie Strong with a 31-26 win over the Longhorns, but then fell to #11 Kansas State in a crushing 31-30 loss. OU took care of business against Iowa State as they should have, but was handed their third loss on the year at the hands of #10 Baylor in an embarrassing 48-14 blowout at home. For the first time since later 2009, Oklahoma tumbled out of the polls. They’d only stay gone for a week before wins over Texas Tech and Kansas carried the Sooners back into the top 25. They could save face with a surefire win over 5-6 Oklahoma State and a bowl victory to earn another 10-3 record. It wasn’t ideal but hey. Instead, OU was shocked at home by the Cowboys, falling 38-35 in overtime to again fall out of the polls. Oklahoma was pitted against #18 Clemson in the Russel Athletic Bowl and they were taken to the shed, losing 40-6. It wasn’t the last time they’d see the Tigers in the postseason, or the last time they’d lose to them. The 8-5 finish was the Sooners’ worst in the 2010′s. Though many teams would kill to have that as their floor, it wasn’t gonna fly in Norman. Bob Stoops was under fire with some people speculating that he was overstaying his welcome the same way Mack Brown had in Texas.

Stoops canned co-offensive coordinators Josh Heupel and Jay Norvell following the disappointing finish in 2014 and brought in Lincoln Riley with the hopes of breathing new life into the program. How’d that turn out? Well, it was a bumpy transition to begin with. OU had trouble putting away #23 Tennessee and were taken to double overtime by the Vols in Week 2. Oklahoma began the year ranked 19th because they were coming off 8-5 and not 6-6, but after a victory over #23 West Virginia 44-24 in the first week of October they climbed up to 10th place. The Sooners were beginning to really enter the 2015 Playoff discussion when the Red River Shootout rolled around. Of course, they were upset by Texas, falling 17-24. OU tumbled back down to #19 in the AP, but the schedule eased up which really allowed transfer QB Baker Mayfield to take control of the offense. Oklahoma annihilated Kansas State, Texas Tech, KU, and ISU by a combined 232-50 including a 55-0 shutout in Manhattan. The end of the season was a murderer’s row featuring the three top teams in the Big 12 but the Sooners were up to the challenge. The first leg featured #12 OU travelling to Waco against undefeated Baylor, Oklahoma won 44-34. The Sooners vaulted into the top ten with the win and entered a tie for second place in the standings. They were tied with the #11 TCU Horned Frogs, who were next up on the docket. OU managed to scrape by with a 30-29 win and were now tied with Oklahoma State, meaning Bedlam was a contest for all the marbles. #5 Oklahoma blew out the Cowboys 58-23 to emphatically seal their 11-1 regular season record and the Big 12 Championship. The Sooners entered into the Playoff as the #4 seed, they were selected to play undefeated Clemson in the Orange Bowl. OU wasn’t able to get any scoring going against former DC Brent Venables’ staunch defense and fell 17-37. Oklahoma finished 11-2 and 5th in the polls. It was a pretty good rebound season.

The Sooners had an interesting year in 2016. With the return of Baker Mayfield, OU was expected to contend to make their way back to the Playoff. #3 Oklahoma began the year in NRG Stadium against the defending Peach Bowl champions #15 Houston. The Sooners were upset by the Cougars 23-33, severely denting their repeat hopes to get back to the top 4. OU dropped down to 14th in the poll, and basically cost Oklahoma an appearance on College Gameday. In Week 3, the Sooners hosted #3 Ohio State in a game that was billed as a Playoff preview. Instead, the Buckeyes ended OU’s Playoff hopes with an emphatic 45-24 victory in Norman. A 1-2 September knocked Oklahoma all the way out of the polls and cast a shadow over conference play. Big 12 competition began in October with a trip to #21 TCU. The Sooners overcame the Horned Frogs 52-46 to climb back into the top 25. OU managed to put away Texas 45-40 and then more easily handled Kansas State. In a matchup of future NFL Quarterbacks, Baker Mayfield outdueled Pat Mahomes of Texas Tech in Lubbock in an incredible 66-59 boat race. After this win, Oklahoma began to really settle into form. The Sooners beat Kansas and Iowa State without much fuss, which wasn’t too remarkable, but once again the final three games featured the three other best teams in the conference. By now, OU had climbed back into the top ten, and were hoping they could take advantage of potential chaos in the last month to make a final push for the Playoff. The first matchup featured #9 Oklahoma hosting #25 Baylor, the Sooners won handily 45-24. The next week, #8 OU went to Morgantown and blew out the #10 Mountaineers 56-28. Bedlam was again a battle for first place against #11 Oklahoma State. #7 Oklahoma ran over their rivals 38-20 to complete a perfect 9-0 season in Big 12 play. They’re still the only team to have ever had a perfect record in conference play since going to 9 league games. Unfortunately for the champs, the Sooners only made it to #7 in the Playoff rankings. They couldn’t live down the two non-conference losses in September, which was justified in this case. As Big 12 champions, OU faced off against #17 Auburn. As you might imagine, the 8-4 Tigers were a bit overmatched. Oklahoma won 35-19, completing another 11-2 season capped with a ten game win streak and a final #5 AP ranking. After the disappointing few seasons between 2011 and 2015, the program appeared to be entering a Renaissance under Stoops having won back to back conference titles. However, Stoops shocked the nation by announcing his retirement. He retired as one of the winningest coaches in the game and held 11 Big 12 titles in 18 seasons.

Stoops’ young OC Lincoln Riley was promoted as head coach. Even as a coordinator, Riley was one of the hottest names in coaching circles, even attracting NFL attention. Now Riley was given the reigns to fully flex his muscles. The Sooners erupted out of the gate in 2017, destroying UTEP as they should have, and in their second game of the year, easily handled #2 Ohio State on the back end trip of the home and home 31-16. The win vaulted #5 OU firmly into the top four with renewed Playoff hopes. Baker Mayfield was lighting up the competition and Oklahoma could easily outpace all comers. Sort of. A Baylor team that had completely collapsed and would finish the season 1-11 nearly beat the Sooners in Waco. Two weeks later after a bye, #3 OU was upset 31-38 by Iowa State. Oklahoma handled business through the rest of October with wins over UT, KSU, and Texas Tech. Once again, the schedule toughened up in November just in time for a Playoff push. #8 Oklahoma outpaced #11 Oklahoma State 62-52 and followed it up with a 38-20 victory over #8 TCU. It was enough to push the Sooners back into the top four and cruised to an 11-1 regular season record with easy wins over Kansas and West Virginia. In an effort to keep the Big 12 from getting snubbed from the Playoff like they did in 2014, the conference reinstated the Conference Championship Game in 2017. Which in this case could have backfired if #2 OU lost to the #10 Horned Frogs who themselves had no chance of making the top four. Thankfully Oklahoma once again handled Texas Christian, this time 41-17. Baker Mayfield was awarded the Heisman Trophy for leading the most dynamic offense in college football. This might have been the best Sooner team of the decade, and had the best chance of winning the national championship, but their dreams ended in the Rose Bowl. In the best semifinal game in the young Playoff era, OU blew a three-score lead to #3 Georgia and then lost in double overtime 48-54. It was another bitter disappointment, but as far as first years for head coaches go, it was pretty good: 12-2 with a final #4 ranking.

Heisman winner Baker Mayfield was gone in 2018, but Texas A&M transfer Kyler Murray was waiting in the wings to make a seamless transfer of power. For the second year in a row, Oklahoma began the year ranked 7th in the nation and the favorite to win the Big 12. The Sooners had no problem mopping up FAU and UCLA before paying ISU back 37-27 in Ames. Army’s triple option got under OU’s circuitry and took Oklahoma to overtime before falling 28-21. The Sooners boat raced Baylor 66-33 to end September 5-0. The only way to beat OU, it seemed, was to somehow outscore them. And guess what happened when they met Texas at the State Fair? The #19 Longhorns managed to outpace their rivals 48-45, dealing a huge blow to #7 Oklahoma’s Playoff aspirations. It was enough of a let down to get DC Mike Stoops fired. It was a road bump for sure, but the Sooners rebounded quite well. OU never even fell out of the top ten and demolished TCU and Kansas State before outpacing Texas Tech 51-46. Oklahoma went down to the wire in Bedlam again, but once again prevailed over the Cowboys 48-47. To end the season, the Sooners only beat Kansas by 15, which is relatively disappointing and then overcame #12 West Virginia 59-56. This time, the Big 12 Championship Game came in handy, as #5 Oklahoma parlayed their rematch with #9 Texas with a 39-27 victory. Kyler Murray was conferred the Heisman Trophy, the first time two QBs from the same school won it in back to back years. OU was given a 4 seed and had to go up against 13-0 #1 Alabama. It was a disaster. OU fell behind 28-0 after just 17 minutes of play. If you didn’t turn the TV off after the first quarter, you would have missed a valiant comeback attempt. Oklahoma actually outscored the Tide for the remainder of the game, but come on, they started out behind by four touchdowns. Bama won 45-34 and the Sooners were sent home with another 12-2 record and #4 finish.

With Kyler Murray gone to the NFL, the torch passed to former Tide QB Jalen Hurts of all people. Once again, OU was in the mix in the preseason, carrying over their 4th place ranking into 2019. Things basically went as expected. Hurts put up Heisman numbers as Oklahoma torched their way through the competition through the first half of the season. The defense had finally come together under new coordinator Alex Grinch, who had taken over for the lackluster Mike Stoops. The Sooners outscored their non-conference opponents 167-59 before annihilating Texas Tech and Kansas heading into Red River. This OU made sure to put their rivals away in the regular season, beating #11 Texas 34-27. Oklahoma manhandled West Virginia before finally being upset 41-48 by Kansas State. November was another brutal stretch, which began with a 42-41 win over emerging thorn-in-side Iowa State. In the regular season conference championship, the #10 Sooners faced off against undefeated #13 Baylor. The Bears were the “it” team in College Football in 2019 and took a lead deep into the game before OU snatched victory from the jaws of defeat in front of a shocked Waco crowd. #8 Oklahoma squeaked by TCU 28-24 before putting away #21 Oklahoma State 34-16 to end the regular season 11-1 yet again. The Sooners needed a bit of help getting back into the Playoff. #6 OU beat #7 Baylor in the Big 12 Championship Game, again ripping the Bears’ hearts out in with a touchdown win in overtime. Thankfully, #4 Georgia and #5 Utah lost their Championship Games, giving Oklahoma their third straight Playoff appearance. Unfortunately they had to face #1 LSU in the Peach Bowl. If Alabama dominated the Sooners in one quarter bad enough to beat OU in the 2018 semifinal, the Tigers did it for the whole 60 minutes. Louisiana State completely lit up Oklahoma 63-28 with most of the scoring coming in the first half. 12-2 and another loss in the semifinals for the third straight year.

What a weird decade. Oklahoma’s spent most of the 2010′s as one of the best teams in College Football, but they were never the best. The Sooners’ best years from a pure quality standpoint were in 2011 and 2017. In 2011, OU finished 10-3 and third place in the Big 12. In 2017, they featured the best offense in football and came excruciatingly close to a trip to the Championship Game. Hey, two Heismans and SEVEN Big 12 Championships. It wasn’t a total wash.

Oklahoma will certainly carry their success into the 2020′s. If I had to put money on which team would win the Big 12 the most times in the coming decade, it’d be the Sooners. I think you’d put your money down as well.

I’ve spent the last paragraph of each one of these Top 25 lists speaking on how each team performed against their rivals. OU had no problem on that front. Oklahoma went 8-3 against rival Texas, though those three losses really stung. The Sooners went 8-2 against Oklahoma State in arguably the Cowboys’ most successful decade in program history. That’s how you dominate little brother. Unfortunately the rivalry with Nebraska ended with conference realignment, but Oklahoma did get the last laugh with a win in the Big 12 CG in 2010.

#college football #Oklahoma Sooners

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timelordthirteen · 5 years

Text

Killing Time 19/?

Detective Weaver/Belle French, Explicit

Summary: A Woven Beauty Law & Order-ish AU. Written for Writer’s Month 2019.

Chapter Summary: Weaver and Belle share an intimate morning, some breakfast, and finally get a break in the case.

Notes: FINALLY. They are, for now, out of the woods, and I can back to this mess of a case. I promise I have a plan, and also that it is not entirely smooth sailing from here. You can blame @thatravenclawbitch. ;)

Warnings: Miscarriage reference and discussion. Please see AO3 for complete warnings and tags.

[AO3] Previous: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18]

Weaver woke up with two conflicting feelings in his chest.

The first was happiness, easily explained by the petite body pressed against his and the mess of dark hair tickling his nose. Belle was in his bed and his arms, after she’d said she loved him, that she’d never stopped loving him in spite of everything. He could barely believe it, after all the shit he’d put her through, and after everything that had happened in the last few weeks.

The second was out of place next to the contented warmth that spread over him as he used the arm around her stomach to pull her closer. He felt angry; angry at himself for failing her so badly, for giving up on their relationship because he was afraid it was beyond saving. He’d been an idiot for too long. Last night seemed like a turning point, a chance at a second chance, if they could make it work, and he was determined to try if she was willing.

He pushed up on his elbow to look at the clock on the bedside table. It was just after six, far too early to get up on a Saturday, even if they’d decided to work the weekend. Faint light streamed through the narrow slits in the blinds as the sun peeked between the buildings. Belle shifted, wiggling her backside against him, and he bit back a groan as his cock twitched. His body was always eager where she was concerned, and he knew he should roll away before things could go too far.

Instead, he pushed back, letting her feel his rapidly hardening length along the curve of her buttocks. She made a small noise, and he smiled into her hair as he slipped his arm up under her pillow and let his free hand creep upwards over the soft cotton of her tank top. She grumbled softly, but didn’t wake as she shifted, rubbing her face against the pillow.

There was no going back to sleep after he woke up, but he drifted in a cozy haze for a little bit, softly running his fingers up and down her arm, and trailing them gently through her wavy hair. He reveled in the quiet intimacy of it, of feeling her weight tipped back against his chest. It grounded him, made him present in the moment. Without her, he’d been listless and untethered, giving in to the rage that the dirty underbelly of the city made him feel with every murder, assault, and rape he investigated.

Belle’s love cleansed his soul and made it easier to let it all fade into the background noise of work and life. He supposed that’s why he’d been growing so frustrated trying to make heads or tails of Eloise Gardner, and why everything had come pouring out last night. What he’d had with Belle in the last couple of weeks had been superficial and lacking because they had both been holding back.

He sighed and gave her a squeeze, smirking as she finally stirred.

“Mmm, good morning,” Belle rasped, rolling her hips backwards.

“Morning,” he replied. His cock was still hard, and there was no way she wasn’t aware of it. She bit her lip and reached for his hand, taking it in hers and pulling it up to her chest. “You’re smiling.”

“Just marveling at how fucking lucky I am.” He pressed a kiss to her shoulder, right next to the thin strap of her top.

She hummed in response and kissed his knuckles followed by the back of his hand. “And just how lucky are you?”

Weaver grinned and nosed at the strap, pushing it to the curve of her arm until it slipped over. The front of her top sagged, baring more of her breast, and he licked his lips. “I’m hoping I’m about to be very lucky.”

Belle let out a deep, soft laugh as he kissed his way along her arm. She let go of his hand and it immediately went to her breast, cupping and squeezing the smooth flesh. His thumb rubbed at her nipple and she arched her back, trying to push back against his erection and forward towards his teasing hand.

“Oh,” she gasped. “I think you’re onto something there, Detective.”

His teeth scraped gently over her neck before he pressed a series of kisses to her cheek and jaw as his fingers tugged at her. She cried out and wriggled against him, pushing her shirt up further.

He stopped tormenting her breast just long enough to lift her leg up over his, spreading her enough to let the hard tip of his cock, still trapped by his boxers, press into her. She tensed and whimpered, her muscles trembling with desire.

He nipped at her earlobe and whispered, “You could be on something if you want.”

His cheesy innuendo would have made her roll her eyes normally, but waking up and feeling him pressed against her made her needy almost immediately. It had been too long since she’d had him inside her, and after last night she needed him as close as possible.

She hissed out a yes and tried to push down onto him, using her leg to leverage him even closer to her slick pussy.

He tweaked her nipple and scraped his teeth against her throat, enjoying the way her body shuddered. “What do you want, Belle?”

Her mouth fell open, her breath coming in short pants as her empty cunt throbbed. “Fuck me.”

His own breath stuttered as he anticipated how it would feel to just slide into her. “Like this?”

She liked it in this position some mornings, especially when she was already keyed up. It got them both off quickly, and usually they fell back asleep for a bit afterwards, wrapped up in each other and their shared post-orgasmic haze.

“Yes,” she gasped, reaching down to grasp at his leg, her short nails scraping his skin. “Yes, now, please.”

Weaver’s hand moved along her side to push her shorts down. Her hand came to help and they managed to wiggle her out of them in a matter of seconds. She moaned and reached back, grabbing him through his boxers. He hissed, his hips jerking under her touch.

“Fuck, Belle.”

He pulled away from her long enough to free himself of his boxers, and then rolled back, wrapping an arm around her to pull her against him. She lifted her leg, jutting her hips back, and he took himself in hand, running the tip of his cock through her slit. Her mouth opened and a desperate little noise slipped out as he stroked against her. His eyes squeezed shut at the sensation of her slick heat. She said his name, her voice catching as he moved, pushing his cock in easily, and she made that small high noise she always did when he first entered her.

Her nails dug into the mattress, hips rolling forward until he could sink all the way inside, his balls resting against her arse. He took a moment to breath, hoping to keep himself under control long enough to make sure he would ruin it by ending things too soon. Fingers found one of her pebbled nipples, exposed by her loosened top, and tweaked it roughly. When she arched and cried out, he could feel her pussy clench around him, and groaned.

“Ian,” she moaned. “Ian, move. Please - fuck -”

Weaver brought his hand down in front of her stomach to brace on the bed, and snapped his hips forward. She gasped, and he did it again, harder, until she began to move with him. They stayed there, on their sides, rocking into each other, over and over, forcing his cock deep into her wet heat. He thought about rolling onto his back and pulling her up to watch her ride him, or pushing her down and fucking her into the mattress, but this was somehow better, more intimate and it kept her as close to him as possible.

He felt his orgasm coming, and there was no way he’d come without her. He lifted his hand and pushed it between her legs, brushing his cock with his own fingers before he settled them on either side of her clit. It felt swollen, slick, and hard, and even that little pressure had her keening loudly. Belle cried out, high and loud, her cunt squeezing him with sharp pulses as she came, and Weaver let himself go, feeling all the tension that had been trapped in his body rush out of him all at once.

He hadn’t realized he was panting until his breath started coming back to him. He kissed her shoulder, her neck, and her ear as they both came down from the high. She held his hand tightly, not caring that his fingers were covered in her arousal, or that there was a sticky wet mess trapped between them. He squeezed her against him, and she let out a happy little sound.

“Good?” he asked, softly, smiling as he felt her nod. “I love you.”

Her sigh made her entire body relax more than it had in weeks. “I love you too.”

Granny’s diner might not have been in the best neighborhood, but it had the best post-sex pancakes and waffles.

Belle had declared this as fact some years ago, and it had become a fairly regular weekend occurrence for them while they were together. This was their first time returning to that tradition, and it did not go unnoticed.

“So,” Ruby said, looking back and forth between Belle and Weaver as she refilled their coffee cups. “I haven’t seen you guys here in a while. Together.”

Belle looked at Weaver, her bottom lip caught under her teeth, and shrugged. Weaver smiled and nodded. “And?”

Ruby arched an eyebrow, her lips twitching as she reserved a snarky comment. “Nothing, it’s just...nice. To see both of you.” She gave them each a pointed looked again. “Together.”

“Thanks, Ruby,” Belle mumbled, pulling her coffee cup towards her and wrapping her hands around it.

She felt almost embarrassed by Ruby’s acknowledgement. It reminded her of how stupid she’d been, and how she and Ian had let their relationship dissolve over what seemed like entirely fixable reasons in hindsight.

“Oh,” Ruby, stopping as she turned to leave their table. “Thanks for sending that guy our way last night.”

Weaver frowned for a moment, and then remembered the homeless man he’d encountered. “Uh, you’re...welcome?”

She smiled. “Turns out the Army taught him how to cook pretty decently, and since we’re down a cook after Billy quit…Granny gave him a job.”

Belle beamed. “Oh! That’s wonderful.”

“Yeah,” she continued, “he’s going to stay in my old apartment upstairs. It’s not the greatest, but it’s way better than sleeping on the street, right?” She turned and moved towards the main counter, then spun back around to tell them, “He starts tomorrow, and his name is Eddie!”

Weaver looked down at his coffee, a faint smile curving his lips until Belle reached over and held his folded hands in one of hers.

“See?” she said. “You did a good thing.”

He nodded and sighed. “Yeah, for once.”

“Stop it, Ian.” Her tilted as she looked at him. “I think both of us need to decide we’re not going to do that anymore and start fresh. Clean slate, okay?”

Nodding again, he turned one hand over and held hers, his thumb brushing over the back of her hand. “Okay.”

“And I also think it might be good for me to talk to Archie.”

He looked up and frowned. “Dr. Hopper? The consultant psychologist?”

“Yeah,” she said, giving his hand a squeeze. “I think...I think I need a neutral party, you know? Someone who’s outside everything and can be objective. I know I can’t be, and that’s - that’s part of the problem.”

“Makes sense.” Then he cleared his throat. “Why Hopper?”

One of her shoulders lifted in a shrug. “I know him, I trust him. He consults, but he still practices and sees his own patients, so it’s not like I’d be doing therapy at the office or anything. I need...I don’t know, perspective? Or something?”

Weaver hand tightened around hers, returning the small sign affection in what he hoped was a reassuring way. Therapy wasn’t his thing, even though he’d been required to speak to the department counselor twice in his career in Seattle, but what Belle was saying still resonated with him. They were both too involved to be objective, and if she wanted to reach out to someone and help herself, then he would support her wholeheartedly.

He just hoped it wouldn’t mean she stopped talking to him about it.

The words must have been said out loud because she let go of his hand and got up to slid into the booth next to him, her side pressed against his arm, and her hand holding his where it rested on his thigh. She nestled her head on his shoulder and pressed a soft kiss to a spot below his ear.

“I won’t,” she said softly. “I need to talk about things with you as much as I need to tell an objective party. I don’t want us to go back to the way things were.”

His head turned, catching her eyes looking up at him, and he swallowed. “Me too.”

She exhaled, her warm breath ghosting over his neck. “Maybe...we could go together?” She looked up again and saw his gaze narrow. “Not every time, just - just sometimes. I think it might help you too, if you let it.”

Weaver stiffened. He didn’t like the idea, but if it helped Belle… “I’ll think about it.”

A noncommittal answer was all she was likely to get right now, so she let the matter go.

As Belle moved back to her side of the table, Weaver’s phone rang. Rogers name and number flashed across the screen as he picked it up and answered. She watched as his face went through a series of expressions beginning with a frown and ending with his eyes wide and his mouth open.

“Are you sure?” he asked Rogers again, who patiently repeated for the third time that yes he was very sure and had the lab run the test twice. “Shit…”

He hung up the call and breathed out slowly before taking a large gulp of hot coffee. He had a feeling by the end of today caffeine wasn’t going to be enough.

“So?” Belle asked, eyebrows lifted. “What did he say?”

“They found a hair...on Eloise’s body,” he said, carefully.

“Yeah? We knew about that two days ago, it’s hers.”

He shook his head slowly. “No, it’s not.” Belle startled and sat up in her seat. “It’s Molly’s.”

“Molly Macreedy?” she hissed. He nodded, his lips pressed together as he met her eyes. Her lips parted and she tried to inhale and exhale steadily even as her heartbeat picked up. “How…?”

A hair from their first known victim was on the body of a woman Nick Branson claimed was his alibi? Her mind was spinning with questions and she blinked dazedly at Weaver, who seemed to be barely holding back a smile.

“Shit,” she breathed, her own mouth twitching and curving.

The excitement of their first real clue had them nearly giddy, as fucked up as that seemed, and a moment later they both broke into wide grins.

Weaver raised his arm and caught Ruby’s attention to let her know they were ready for their check, and pulled out a few bills. He folded them and tucked them under the edge of his coffee cup, enough to cover their usual bill, plus their customary more than necessary tip.

“Do you want to go home first, or to the office?” he asked, slipping his wallet back inside his jacket.

Belle felt a rush of something over her that raised goosebumps on her arms, and she immediately slid out of the booth. “The station,” she declared. “I need to see this report for myself.”

He followed her out of the diner, his left hand hovering at her back as they both moved at a rapid, anxious pace. At the car, she stopped and grabbed his arm before he could go around to the driver’s side, and pulled him to her. Her other hand went up around his neck and she drew him down for a hard, quick kiss. As they pulled away, they shared another smile.

Finally, things were looking decidedly up.

#rumbelle #rumbelle fic #woven beauty #woven beauty fic #killing time #fic #my woven beauty fic #lemon fic

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imperceptibility · 5 years

Text

清和 (Qinghe) -- by 来自远方 (Lai Zi Yuan Fang) -- ch. 1

Author → here

JJWXC → here

Disclaimer & summary → here

Translated by me

Index of characters → here

Ming Dynasty, year thirty-one of Hongwu, Beiping-fu

The third month of the year[1] should have been a time when the lakes and rivers were warming up and the flowers began blossoming, but instead, Beiping saw several snowstorms. The frigid wind swept along a skyful of snow. Like a knife scraping the bone, gust by gust, it blew against one’s cheeks until they stung sharply.

Dressed in hemp with his hands stowed in his sleeves, Meng Qinghe was squatting by the door, staring blankly at the patterns on the door bolt.

Half-chi-long icicles hung from the eaves. The northerly wind swirled. The window frames made noises, as if it were knocking upon a person’s heart.

The old cat lying by corner stood up with a meow, stretching and then licking its paw. With a couple of jumps, it reached the surface of the simple and crude table upon which rested some brushes and paper, ink and an inkwell. Leaving behind a few paw prints on the yellowing paper, it shook its whiskers in joyful satisfaction.

In the past, Meng Qinghe would have definitely stepped over to chase it away, but in that moment, he was not in the mood.

“The Ming Dynasty, during the reign of Hongwu, Beiping-fu...good heavens, you’ve got to be kidding me...”

When a person got unlucky, even the water they drank would get stuck in their teeth[2].

He had just been walking down the street, nothing out of the ordinary. Even so he ended up traveling through time — and six hundred years at that!

Just how in the world did he time travel? Was there a problem with the way he walked?

“How great would it be if this were a dream,” Qinghe gave his head a hard scratch, dejected and also helpless.

If he had known, he would rather have sold his body to entertain the masses by grabbing a pole and dancing the hula at his company’s annual dinner than sneaking out early.

What a shame that wishes were wonderful but reality was so often incomparably cruel. Cruel, just as the northerly wind blowing on him through the door crack.

Sigh...

His loose long hair flew. The hemp sack of a robe he was wearing might as well have not even been there.

It was so cold his teeth chattered. Rubbing his arms, Qinghe gritted his teeth. He was already here and his chances of returning to his time were slim to none. Even if he regretted things to the moon and back, it was futile. What he should be thinking about was how to keep living.

He did not require much much: three meals a day, a standalone house, no worries over food or clothing — that’d be enough.

Lacking in ambition? A good man not striving to accomplish things and win all the ladies?

He’d ask such a doubter to open their goddamn eyes. This was the reign of Hongwu. Beiping-fu was the Prince of Yan’s territory. Wanting to overflow with boldness in the presence of the likes of Taizu and Chengzu of Ming? Were they tired of how long their life was lasting?

As for winning all the ladies...sorry, he preferred men.

Undertaking heroic ventures and snatching up a beautiful woman might be a story to capture the imagination, but snatching up a man...well, better to forget about it.

Qinghe wiggled his fingers and pushed at the glasses that no longer rested on the bridge of his nose. As dictated by his profession, no matter what it was that he was going to do, he liked to lay out plans beforehand.

Right then, being a civil servant was a high risk job. The higher the position, the higher the likelihood of one’s head and neck taking their leave. The Hongwu Emperor’s bureaucratic reforms abolished the post of Grand Chancellor as well as the Six Ministries. On top of that, he set the record of ordering the execution of ten zu[3]. Jianwen Emperor, his grandson, was relatively good-natured, only intending to target his uncles. However, as it turned out, Jianwen’s military prowess was lacking and he would be usurped by one such uncle. Very few of the ministers who were adamantly loyal to him met a good end.

Thus, it was abundantly clear that taking the imperial exam to become a government official was not a viable path.

Becoming a merchant was also not a good way forward. For specifics, one could refer to the tycoon Shen Wansan, who loved to help others but who was sent away to Yunnan[4] by the Hongwu Emperor to experience life in the army.

Being a good, poor farmer was undoubtedly relatively safe, the prerequisite being that one did not encounter a year of calamities or run into a local tyrant or nasty member of the gentry with too formidable of a personal background.

Other than that, there was another path: enlisting in the military.

However, taking into account his actual situation, this matter was one that he needed to consider at greater length.

A noise sounded again from behind him. Qinghe turned his head to look at the old cat on his table, his lips cracking apart as he bared his teeth at the animal.

With his hair disheveled and a predatory glint in his eye, his thin face was exceptionally malevolent.

Meow!

The old cat bristled, leaping instantaneously from the table onto the roof beam.

Qinghe gave his hair a sassy flip. A perfect victory.

The satisfaction of a victory lasted all but two seconds before sorrow took its place. Gazing at the old cat that was chasing a mouse up on the roof beam, he was infinitely sad that even a cat was happier than him.

At least the cat could eat meat; he could not.

“Shi’erlang[5].” As he was drowning in the clutches of his sorrow, a quiet, hoarse call came from outside the door.

Qinghe did not respond. After a while, another quiet call came, peppered with coughing. No matter how hard his heart of stone was, he could not go on pretending that he had not heard.

Standing up, he shook out his limbs, an action of necessity due to the fact that he was frozen stiff.

Unbolting the door, he saw three haggard women dressed in hemp[6] standing outside. The one in the middle being supported was his mother. The other two supporting her were his older brothers’ wives.

“Mother, saozi[7].”

Going by the memories in his head, Qinghe bowed in greeting, letting the three of them into the room. When he had first arrived in this time period, the boy who was also named Meng Qinghe had already been gravely ill and soon breathed his last. The odd thing was, the memories of this body’s previous owner had remained in Qinghe’s mind.

“Shi’erlang, your datangbo[8] genuinely does not want us to live!”

His mother Meng-Wang-shi[9] coughed twice for each sentence she spoke. As for his sisters-in-law, Meng-Xu-shi and Meng-Zhang-shi, one stroked his mother’s back to ease her breathing while the other was busy consoling her. Their faces were pale and angry and helpless.

Their father-in-law was gone. Their men were also gone. Their xiaoshu[10] Meng Qinghe was only fourteen. What could he really do?

After listening to his mother’s lament, Qinghe’s brows also knotted together.

“What sweet words! ‘Lending a hand’, he says! He’s just scheming to get his hands on our measly family property!” Meng-Wang-shi took Qinghe’s hand in her own, her voice hoarse. “In order to pay for your father and your two brother’s funerals, we barely have anything left anyways! And now, he’s set his sights on even this...”

As she spoke, tears streamed down her face. “When your father and your brothers were alive, whenever something came up in the clan, we never denied them anything. To think their graves are not even cold yet and already your datangbo has turned hostile and is pushing us to the point of death! The fields that we sold, whose hands are they in now? And who took our ox that we used to plow the fields? And why did the teacher drive you out of school and back home? We all have Meng as our family name. How can he go so far? Does he not fear divine retribution?”

The more she spoke, the more stirred up her emotions became. Her wan face bloomed with pink and her coughing grew worse.

Before she finished her words, a cough sounded abruptly from outside the door. Qinghe looked over to find a short and stout man dressed in a dust-gray round-collared cotton padded jacket. The man’s face appeared simple and honest but his eyes carried a shred of shrewdness. It was his datangbo, Meng Guangxiao.

“Datangbo.”

Before Meng Guangxiao could open his mouth, Qinghe made his salutations and invited the man inside. After greeting him, Meng-Wang-shi sat to the side without a word. Qinghe’s two sisters-in-law stood behind Meng-Wang-shi with their heads slightly lowered, also keeping silent.

Meng Guangxiao indicated to Qinghe that there was no need to be so courteous. His tone was kind, as if he were genuinely a good-natured elder.

“Your father and brothers are gone. Your mother and sisters-in-law are women. You are still young. Whatever you need help with, I will not say no.”

Qinghe raised his clasped hands[11] and bowed deeply. “Thank you, datangbo.”

Gestures dictated by the etiquette of the ancients were still awkward when he performed them. Good thing most verbal communication consisted of vernacular language and not filled with archaic expressions. Otherwise, it was bound to induce a headache, no matter who was on the receiving end.

“However,” what Meng Guangxiao was saying took a turn, “Good nephew, you’ve seen the weather at the start of this year. After all these snowstorms, the springtime field-plowing will probably be delayed.”

Qinghe did not pick up the thread of conversation, not that Meng Guangxiao minded. He carried right on speaking. His words were not harsh but the meaning was clear: the weather at the start of the year was poor and everybody was having a hard time. Your family might be facing difficulties but nobody else was well off either. So should you not be repaying the money and food you had borrowed earlier?

“Putting others aside for now, your ertangbo’s family just added an extra member. He has a hard time saying the words so I have to play the part of the bad person,” Meng Guangxiao paused. “You know I have no other options.”

“Indeed,” Qinghe agreed readily, seemingly completely unaware of what Meng Guangxiao was up to. After a moment, a bit of an ashamed blush crept up onto Qinghe’s face, as if he had just recalled that there was no food at home. “Right now, we are truly in quite a predicament. Could I ask for a few more days?”

“Oh?”

“In a few days, I will definitely come up with some way to scrape together the money and the food. I will not make things difficult for you, datangbo.”

Meng Guangxiao eyed the boy suspiciously. He knew how things stood with this family. Ever since he was little, Meng Qinghe had had his nose buried so deep in his studies that he ended up growing into an otherwise clueless fool. After Meng Guangzhi and his two sons died, there was nobody else who could take charge of the household. Three funerals had exhausted pretty much all of their wealth, leaving behind a family of widows and orphans, guarding a big house and several mu of farmland. If it were not for the fact that he had his eyes on those three mu of top quality farmland and this house, Meng Guangxiao would not drop by so often, risking having all this bad luck stick to him for no reason.

It had yet to be twenty-seven days since the funerals. Ordinarily, Meng Guangxiao should have been in the mourning garment xiaogong[12] for his cousin. At worst, he should have been in dressed in sima. No matter how nice his words were, him paying a visit in his gray, cotton padded jacket showed that he placed no importance upon this family of widows and children.

So the saying went: one would be better off looking down on an old man with white hair than a youth in poverty.

One could look with disdain upon the enemy but should not view an opponent lightly.

Meng Guangxiao had committed both errors. To put it bluntly, it was going to serve him right to fall flat on his face at Qinghe’s hands.

“Datangbo, there are still a few mu of farmland and a house in my family’s possession. Once I find an intermediary to evaluate the price and manage to sell them, I should be able to repay some of the debt.”

Qinghe had carefully deliberated the words that made him want to wince and he barely avoided biting his tongue in the process of delivering them. Given that he wanted to dig a hole for Meng Guangxiao to jump into, his “act” had to be convincing. He was an expert at this sort of thing.

Meng Guangxiao barely kept down the rising corners of his mouth, but he was unable to disguise the contempt in his eyes. His oldest son’s earlier concerns were unnecessary after all, concerns about how shi’erlang was extremely intelligent to the point of not appearing so on the surface[13] and to not coerce him, lest it ruin the amicability between both families. As it were, this boy was but a fool.

But it was a good thing that he was a fool!

After sending Meng Guangxiao off, Meng-Wang-shi, who had kept her silence, tugged on Qinghe’s garment, her voice trembling: “Oh son, what has happened to you? How come you...”

What she wanted to say was: ‘Oh son, how come you have lost it? Why fall for the trap in a one-track minded fashion when you clearly know he covets our property? Besides, that bit of paper money that Meng Guangxiao, Meng Guangshun, and the others had lent us has already been taken back by them many fold through the sale of our fields. Moreover, they pocketed a significant amount during the planning of the funerals. Now, they dare to use this as an excuse to coerce us!’

Meng-Xu-shi and Meng-Zhang-shi’s expressions also showed confusion and reproach. If the remaining land and house were sold off, what were they, as a family, going to eat? Where were they going to live?

“Mother, do not worry.” Qinghe, on the other hand, was the image of ease. Helping Meng-Wang-shi rise to her feet, he spoke in a resolute tone: “Rest assured that I have a plan.”

They wanted his family’s land? He would give it.

They also wanted his family’s house? He would give that as well.

Them laughing at him for being a fool? Then let him be one.

Being a fool was a good thing. If a fool took things a little too far and acted outside the realm of normal logic, nobody would be able to really take issue with that, right?

Qinghe smiled. Meng-Wang-shi did not notice but Meng-Xu-shi and Meng-Zhang-shi exchanged a look, each with an expression showing the same befuddlement. Did xiaoshu just smile? And an eerie smile at that...

Chapter 2 ▶

T/N:

[1] This refers to the third month of the Chinese lunar calendar, which is the month following the spring equinox.

[2] This is a common saying about misfortune.

[3] Warning for violence in this note!!! In ancient times, family members often paid for the crimes of their (sufficiently close) relatives. The harshest punishment before executing ten zu was executing nine zu, considered as the eradication of an offender’s lineage. According to Baidu Baike, these nine included four on the father’s side (one’s family, those of one’s married paternal aunts, those of one’s married sisters, and those of one’s married daughters), three on the mother’s side (that of one’s maternal grandfather, that of one’s maternal grandmother, those of one’s married maternal aunts), and two one the wife’s side (that of one’s father-in-law, that of one’s mother-in-law). The tenth zu was one’s students.

Absolutely gruesome, yes, but that was what it was, the harshest capital punishment meted out. Just explaining this to drive home the point of what Qinghe, as a modern day person, knew of the Hongwu Emperor.

[4] Yunnan province, back then, was considered quite remote for the Han Chinese. And also, as it remains today, Yunnan was home to many ethnic minorities. Read: conflicts.

[5] Shi’erlang is literally “twelfth young man”. Sons were referred to as *insert number* young man, with the number corresponding to their age ranking within the family. In this case, no, Qinghe’s mom did not have twelve boys. It refers to him being the twelfth oldest of his generation within his clan.

[6] This is the second occurrence of the word hemp so I guess I should belatedly explain: white clothes made of hemp were worn in mourning.

[7] Saozi is how one calls one’s older brother’s wife. To note, though it is so in Qinghe’s case, it does not have to be one’s older brother by blood. Nowadays, it doesn’t even have to be legally such a brother’s wife.

[8] Bo is a paternal uncle who is older than one’s father. Tangbo is such an uncle who is a paternal cousin of one’s father. Da indicates this uncle is the oldest of such a generation in the family. Er (2), san (3), si (4), etc would label the subsequent such uncles.

[9] Taking Meng-Wang-shi as an example, this was how married woman were referred to back then, in the format of X-Y-shi, wherein X = the surname of her husband and Y = the surname of her father. They were rarely addressed by first names, as that was considered intimate.

[10] Xiaoshu is how one calls one’s husband’s younger brother.

[11] This was a gesture of respect.

[12] Of the traditional wufu or five mourning garments, whether one wears the zhancui, qicui, dagong/dahong, xiaogong/xiaohong, or sima (in order of coarseness of the fabric) depended upon the closeness of one’s relation to the deceased. Sima had the finest weave and were worn by the most distant of relatives that needed to wear mourning garments.

[13] This is an idiom, one of several of opposites originating from the works of Lao-Tzu. It means that the truly intelligent are so different from the average person that their actions fail to be understood, thus appearing stupid.

#Qinghe #Lai Zi Yuan Fang #novel #translation

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vgprintads · 6 years

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BEST OF 2018!

Okay, these years can stop sucking now...

I've been drafting this post for a few months now, because there has been a lot to take in. Politically, socially, and environmentally it was a stinker to say the least, not just here in the states, but throughout the industrialized world; stuff, that while not suitable for this blog, are still topics worth discussing with much more importance.

In the gaming world, it was another mixed bag of brilliance, greed, and incompetence. Fortnite, of course, being the biggest game story of them all but one that I don't have much opinion on it since I'm quite bad at it. Though Red Dead Redemption 2, which I also haven't played yet, is bound to be named as the years best for its depth and detail. Then of course, we got a new Smash Brothers, and with the surprise choice of Joker from Persona 5 as a DLC character, I have rekindled hopes that some of the bigger fan demands, namely a certain bear and bird double act, finally make the cut. Not to say there weren't any indie gems too: the joke horror game Baldi's Basics and Toby Fox's surprise release of Deltarune gave plenty to talk about.

But of course, the industry is still a creature of habit so disasters were also a plenty. The closing of Telltale Games; the announcement of that Diablo mobile game to a PC gaming crowd; the controversy of gambling through loot crates. But for me, it was the fiasco of Fallout 76, a game I have dumped a lot of time into but cannot recommend, not just because of its design choices but because Bethesda displayed a whole lot of incompetence--possibly maliciousness--with its public relations, so I may be skipping on those next id Software offerings until they learn to clean up thier act, which I know is an understatement.

And finally, we have Tumblr itself. I have a lot to say about @staff right now, mostly in vicious rants, but I need to wrap this all up and move on to the top posts. But let me beat this dead horse one last time: they fucked up big time and I have little sympathy for the position that they're in. I say that as someone who has had to go through their posts four times now and am certain will be doing it more until either Tumblr gives us a better warning system or I just leave; the latter becoming more and more intising every day.

But enough about that. It's time to celebrate the best of this year's content and prepare for another exciting year. In one form or another, I'll see you guys in 2019!

1). 1,309 notes - 02 August 2018

Sometimes I think this wasn’t even an ad, or just barely scraped the definition.

2). 1,256 notes - 18 January 2018

I didn’t anticipate so many people did get nostalgic over X-Play; I thought everyone hated G4, and I remember “is Morgan Webb even a gamer” being a recurring “joke.”

3). 1,041 notes - 13 July 2018

4). 596 notes - 09 January 2018

5). 591 notes - 08 February 2018

6). 572 notes - 07 November 2018

youtube

Fun Fact: Most of these likes came from non-porn spam bots. Haven’t figured out why. Must all be employed by SEAT

7). 523 notes - 11 August 2018

8). 479 notes - 21 September 2018

I’ve got plenty of these edgy N-Gage ads. In fact, they’re mostly the same but translated into different languages.

9). 465 notes - 05 February 2018

10). 435 notes - 06 January 2018

#tumblrtop10 #best of 2018 #vgpa: best of 2018

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incarnateirony · 7 years

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“Why do people say Misha saved the show? It’s J2′s show.”

So fun fact:

By industry standard, a show, within its first two episodes, TYPICALLY loses 15% of its demographic. (hence our high 2.5 becoming a low 2.2 between episodes 1 and 2.) It's whether it can fight back against that bump, and how long it can. S1 performed well until episode 8. As it progressed, we waffled from mid 2.5s as low as a 1.3, ranging mid-high 1.x, and ending at 1.6. That's why despite all the 2.2/4/5 at the start of the season, we averaged a 1.94. But that's okay. It's considered a solid show for the CW, even in that day. 2005-2006.

There is a rhyme, a reason, an ebb, and a flow to ratings. The fact that SPN diminished after its first season was no surprise. It's no insult.

2006-2007: Season 2 We started just around the demo our S1 finale ended at and waned, again. We petered down from 1.7 to 1.2 and by the end, averaged 1.38. Okay. A little concerning we're not holding the line, but not a critical loss, especially with even-then gradual loss to still-slow-moving TV decline with the infection of cable to american homes progressing like a silent cold. The issue is, this sunk us close to the bottom of the zone considered a solid investment.

2007-2008: Season 3 And then the decline continued, mostly within surrounding media averages of TV . 1.19. That's fine. Really our average value dropped just a point or two in the industry's eyes. The problem is, where S2 left us, that left us scraping the bottom of what was considered a solid or sound show investment, with a decently high budget investment (cited around 2-3 million/episode back then). But there were things going on outside of it. In 2008, the industry started seeing rapid conversion to cable. While social media expanded, barely any dreams were out in how to really apply it, streaming options were new ideas, but barely executed; ads devalued and more terrifyingly - the government put out the Digital Conversion Mandate.

Anyone old enough to be semi-adult around then may remember friends panicking that they wouldn't be able to use their rabbit ears anymore. Cable, expensive conversion box, or bust. By 2009, all TVs would click off unless you had cable or the converter, because all stations were being forced to click to digital. And some were doing it early.

As TV went from being mostly 8-10 or if lucky in your area, 12 options per household into basic cable packages offering 20-30, suddenly, options diversified. Grey's Anatomy's 9.3 of 2006-7 gouged to 7.16 by 2007-08 within a year, and it was a leader still at the time. And with the conversion box looming like a threat on the horizon, by 2008-09, Grey's would clip out at 5.73. And this reflected almost everywhere. Every major show, every major network. 10s became 5s within 2 seasons and those were our /top/ runners. And the industry wasn't updated to even know how to address this.

With Supernatural floating at the bottom of the "okay" barrel for their bubble, (as cited by Kripke, "We were on the bubble, and we didn't know if we'd make it"), this was a TERRIFYING time to be in production and a HORRIBLE place to be in.

2008-2009: Season 4 As Grey's dropped from 7.13 to 5.73, and others like it mirrored it or worse (at losses of 10-30% being common) or more than 20% of its raw demographic in a single year, you can understand where the panic in the industry was. Nobody knew how to handle this. Advertisement and thus income was getting boned right in the taint.

Supernatural, hanging at a 1.19 and praying for its life, already in gradual decline even in pre-crisis curve, could easily become one of those 30% downs. Projected curve would have put them around 0.83. Or, at that point, roughly 0.2 points beneath what would make advertisers even consider them while everything was going up in flames.

But instead, something magical happened. As Dean pulled himself from his grave, so did the show.

We didn't go down. We went up. And we were one of very, very few shows to do so.

Kripke said he was glad he had taken up the idea of angels, because it had rejuvinated the show, “in no small part thanks to this guy," as he gestured to Misha.

We rose. From 1.19. To 1.33 for the season average.

We bounced in the opposite direction as much as we were naturally slated to sink.

And as methods came to track this chaotic mess of transition, Supernatural's actual retention in the industry shone well, well above the previous seasons. Season 4 was performing, amidst the industry crash, 18.2% better than season 3 before it, with and 15.9% percent better in respective retention than season 2.

And as this pandemic continued through 2009-2010, Supernatural held. It held its level, its curve, and its virtue against time. We only really started sinking lower by late season 6, despite being in what was considered a bad timeslot; it was season 7 we nuked out for real; even in, again, respective industry curve. Now, fill in the blanks of what was going on in the show during this time, I've written much larger coverages of this since.

But by S8/2012-13, we were back on our feet to the S4 retention value in curve. By S9, we went higher than SPN had ever been before. We experienced a minor waffle in S10, but it still kept us higher than even season 1 with its high averages; S11-12, we crept up and stayed level in retention, while streaming options that mark sales and digital calls but fail to pour into demos skyrocketed in options and shows continued to sink. And season 13 is a beautiful beast so far; at our lowest possible projections short of unexpected crash and burn, we will at least match S9's retention; we have a chance of completely shattering it.

September 18th, 2008, when Misha Collins waltzed into the show, a new dynamic saved it from dropping through the floor both in ratings and even adapted industry curve while the entire television world turned on its head. And the only time it has fallen through that floor since is in the season they tried to remove him.

So whenever someone numbly, blindly asks, "where did this come from?" you don't even have to just say "Eric Kripke said it." It's true. Eric Kripke said it. But there was a reason he said it.

And he said it because Castiel inevitably saved the show.

And Kripke isn't the only one who's said it.

There is Ben Edlund,

And there is even Robert Singer as of last year,

both quite interesting statements with all the "Castiel isn't a lead", a point I've already shredded by-standard here: (Link - Re: Trivial Arguing on Leads)

People say Castiel rejuvinated or saved the show because Kripke said he did because he did, and it just takes paying attention to history outside of the SPN bubble to understand why.

#Supernatural #Misha Collins #saved the show #argue with tptb not me #writers #showrunners

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sambart93 · 6 years

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Final 31 [2018 Edition] Day 31: 2018 Resolutions Wrap Up

Here we are! We are on the final day and it’s now time to see how well I did over the year! My 2018 Resolutions are here, so without further ado...

1. 20 Doramas/SPs - (PASS) I succeeded this one!! I was very happy to finally get back into the world of doramas and such. While the beginning of the year was strong, I started watching doramas just because my friend wanted me to watch along with her and unfortunately, all her choices were absolute rubbish. So hopefully next year I can watch just as many, but watch much better ones.

2. 20 Movies - (PASS) I marathoned whole series of movies this year which felt so great! I managed to watch about catch up with Jinro Game, and watch almost all the Yamikin Dogs movies too! I also got to watch some long overdue stuff like Tomodachi Game and Survival Family which were so good! I am happy with the movies I saw this year. Next year looks even more promising though!

3. 12 Books - (PASS) I don’t think I could’ve done this if I hadn’t gotten behind and then marathoned about 2 years worth of Shingeki no Kyojin manga. That alone was about 6 or 7 volumes of content xD I had either really good or really shit books this year. Of course my main man Sanderson never failed me once! And this year I started to read all his work from the beginning which has been fun! Also finally read some LONG overdue books: Frankenstein, Dracula, Leviathan Wakes, Ready Player One, Alice in Wonderland, A Torch Against the Night. SO MANY GOOD BOOKS! I already have lists of the top 5 and top 36 books that are my utmost priority for this next coming year. 36 isn’t entirely impossible but it’s definitely a challenge for me, but I am excited!

4. Keep Up with Reviews - (FAIL) I’m going to be honest, reviews take a LOT of time, and I can’t exactly concentrate all that well when I’m at home. One review takes at least 4 hours, and when I have events every week, it really cuts down how much time I have to get these things out. I still have reports/review from JUNE that I still haven’t even started! I am seriously cutting down on outside events next year so hopefully I can catch up and keep up. I do love writing reviews but I just wish I had a better environment and more time to get through them all. Also me marathoning whole Korean Variety shows the last 6 months of this year have NOT helped. One episode is always about 90 minutes and I watch like 2 to 3 episodes every day so.... yeah that really sucked up a lot of the time I could’ve spent writing. I’ll sort it out, I promise!

5. Oshi Stages/Events Only - (PASS) I feel like I ONLY went to Oshi stuff this entire year... I’m trying to think of one play that didn’t have an oshi in it... even Tenimyu technically counts cos FUCKING HIGA, AM I RIGHT?! ... and I really thought it’d be saving me money; turns out NO! Because instead of going to seven DIFFERENT plays, I’ve just been going to the same oshi play 2, 3, 4 times instead! That is not productive Alex! So while I got very picky and more focused on my plays, I didn’t exactly save much money. BUT this year (especially towards the end of the year) I definitely didn’t feel like I had no money - unlike this time last year where I was in serious poverty and was scraping the barrel of all my bank accounts just to get by (yes I am shameless, and yes I really should admit the severity of my money spending), which means my money handling definitely got better which is good, but it’s still not at the level I want it at - we’re a LONG way off that. Luckily, I found more plays and production companies that I didn’t like this year (I’m looking right at you MARV!), and a lot of my favourite series either finished or no longer feature my oshis (TouStage, HakuMyu, K Stage, EnStage (for now) etc.) which means I should have more money staying in my bank account next year as well as more fucking time to sort out my mental health (it’s been very very bad the last 3 - 4 months, and money worries definitely don’t help)! PHEW!

6. Keep Complaints to Self and Be Positive on the Outside - (FAIL) I feel this hasn’t improved at all, especially at work. I know I shouldn’t be this vocal and this negative but my stupid brain works too fast for my common sense to kick in, and I end up complaining before my brain can say ‘hang on a minute bitch’ and then I feel like the worst fucking person afterwards. And, as mentioned above, my mental health has really been struggling since November so that’s not helped my negativity at all (one day I’ll probably open up about how bad it’s been but not right now, because I’m still dealing with it). But at least I am always trying to better myself on this one.

7. Travel Twice - (PASS) I definitely did this! I went to Sendai TWICE, I went to Nagoya, Osaka, Hakone, I finally went to Odawara (and Odawara Castle), I went to new places in Tokyo: Kichijoji, Nakameguro, Yomiura Land, Asakusa, Ikebukuro Aquarium. While it was all internal in Japan, I still managed some new places which makes me happy! But hopefully next year I have at least one external travel!

8. Save Money! - (MORE FAIL THAN PASS) I did manage to save some money: I started saving ALL my coins that weren’t 100 yen and that managed to total about 30,000yen by the end of the year which is great! But I am still very much financially unstable. And yes it is completely and entirely my fault. But at least I’m no where near as unstable and poor as this time last year! I’m not spending whole nights lying awake hungry and worrying about the fact I can’t afford food for the next 2 - 3 days unlike last year which is amazing progress (not really but...). While I did find out that saving coins is a great way for me to save up money, I am still not saving decent amounts every month. Hopefully next year is that year! This year I’ve managed to sort out some priorities and find out ways of cutting down on my spending, and I feel like next year I’ll be able to really hold my control on it, moreso than the last 2 years.

9. JLPT - (FAIL) HA let’s not talk about this one. I had every intention of doing the JLPT in December and I did seriously studying in July, August and beginning-September, but then SuJu came along and decided to do concerts the weekend of the exam so my brain went ‘fuck it! Not like you’re ever gunna pass anyway’, so I never applied and I stopped studying all together xD I haven’t picked up a book since September. I really have zero motivation to study Japanese anymore. And I’m going to be honest, the main reason I’ve lost all my motivation to study is because I have no fucking place TO study. I can’t study at work because people keep coming to my desk and my anxiety finds that extremely humiliating, embarrassing, and distracting to be discovered studying; I don’t have a spare desk in my room so I don’t want to study there; I don’t want to study in the living room because my roommates could come in at any moment which is again embarrassing, distracting and worrying; I can’t study at a restaurant or cafe because the air-con is fucking freezing and it’s just a different way of wasting and spending more money than necessary. I have NO place to study, so how can you (I’m speaking to the universe) expect me to take a fucking JLPT exam when I can’t even find a fucking place to study?! You see the pickle I’m in?

10. No Clearfiles, No Non-Fav Fandom TShirts or Bags - (PASS) I did it! And to be honest, I completely forgot I wasn’t buying these things anymore, I just naturally DIDN’T! Which is great! I am definitely stretching this buying ban far next year (you’ll see in tomorrow’s post), but I am excited and happy at how easy this has been!

11. Keep up with Dancing and Stretches - (PASS) I have whole weeks where I exercise ridiculously every day/night, and then some weeks where I’m doing the bare minimum, but at least I’m always conscious of how much I’m exercising and I’m always trying to keep myself in check when it comes to exercise. So I’d say this one is a success. I’m still enjoying stretching, I’m still enjoying my dancing, I enjoy walking so much. This is going well!

12. Spend Spare Time Studying - (FAIL) We already went through this; I stopped studying; K-Variety has taken over my life. No time or motivation to do such things!

TOTAL: 7/12 PASSED! - A little over 50% which is not that great but I personally feel like I made progress even in some of the failed sections which is great! I hope I can be more successful next year! But I think we can all agree that my mental health is definitely the biggest thing ruining my motivation and goals right now. So let’s get that sorted first!

What were your goals this year? Did you succeed? How did you do? Let me know below!

My 2019 Resolutions are all set and ready to be posted tomorrow morning! Thank you for sticking around the entire 31 days even though my fandoms stretch far and wide, I hope at least some of the posts you could relate to.

#final 31 days of the year #final 31 days of the year 2018 edition #2018 wrap up

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perksofwifi · 5 years

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General Motors: The Incredible Shrinking Automaker – The Big Picture

Daimler may have invented the automobile, and Ford may have invented the automobile factory, but General Motors invented the modern automobile company. When GM was founded in 1908, there were 253 automakers in the United States, all with entrepreneurs and engineers, dollar-men and dreamers, vying to make their fortunes with a technology that was going to change the world.

Henry Ford was the Bill Gates of the era, quick to grasp the potential of democratizing automobility. But GM’s Alfred Sloan was in many ways its Steve Jobs, intuitively understanding that adding form to function made the automobile more than mere transport, that it could transform need into desire.

GM not only pioneered the automotive design studio. It pioneered the electric self-starter and automatic transmission, two innovations that helped make the automobile even more accessible. It did the fundamental scientific research that led to the development of the catalytic converter and the airbag. It was experimenting with electric vehicles and autonomous drive systems before Elon Musk was born. It helped design and engineer the only car to have ever driven on the moon.

For almost 80 years, GM bestrode the automotive landscape like a colossus, making and selling more cars than any other automaker in the world. It held the top spot on the Fortune 500 list for more than three decades. When GM CEO Charles “Engine Charlie” Wilson said in 1953 that he thought what was good for the country was good for General Motors—and, more famously, vice versa—it was simply accepted as fact.

No more.

GM crashed into bankruptcy on June 1, 2009, the global financial crisis dealing a mortal blow to a company weakened by years of institutionalized arrogance and inept leadership. It survived, thanks to an injection of billions of dollars from the federal government that at one stage saw some 60 percent of the company owned by the U.S. taxpayer. And although GM paid back every cent it was obligated to pay to the Treasury, it has never really recovered. In the decade since, the company that was once the very definition of the power and strength and wealth of American capitalism has become the incredible shrinking automaker.

Last year GM sold 7.7 million vehicles worldwide, less than the 8.4 million retailed in the recession-recovery year of 2010, and well down from the 10 million it sold in 2016. It is now merely the world’s fourth-largest automaker in terms of sales, well behind Volkswagen Group, Toyota, and the Renault–Nissan–Mitsubishi alliance. Part of that is because GM lost Opel’s sales contribution when that company was sold to PSA Group in 2017, but there are deeper issues.

GM’s net revenues are little changed from a decade ago—$137.2 billion versus $135.6 billion—though, to be fair, the lengthy UAW strike last year is estimated to have cost the company $2.6 billion. Net income has improved over the decade, up from $5.6 billion in 2010 to $6.6 billion now. But it’s less than half the 2016 result, when GM’s global sales were 30 percent higher.

The recent announcement that GM is to shut down its Australian design, engineering, and sales operations in 2021—and retire the iconic Holden brand—continues the string of cutbacks, closures, and asset disposals over the past 10 years.

GM bean counters can no doubt give chapter and verse on why all this shrinkage makes good business sense; the fact the company lost $20 billion over 20 years in Europe, for example, suggests it was time to quit. (Yet PSA’s Carlos Tavares managed to get the business to turn a profit a year after he took the helm, so you have to wonder what the problem really was.)

But ponder this: Of the 7.7 million vehicles GM made last year, almost 84 percent were sold in North America and China. Once automaker to the world, GM is now almost entirely dependent on just two markets. And even in its home market, GM is slipping: In booming 2004, GM’s U.S. market share was 26 percent. Fifteen years later, it barely scrapes 18.

GM largely has itself to blame, of course. But it’s still sad to see the easy confidence and vaulting ambition that enabled Harley Earl’s rocket-age styling, Ed Cole’s small-block V-8, Zora Arkus-Duntov’s Corvette, and a thousand other exciting products and innovations that transformed the automotive age, is no more.

More from Angus MacKenzie:

Why Nobody Does it Better Than Our Car, Truck, and SUV of the Year Awards

Touch and Go: The Trouble (and Danger) With Touchscreens

The Future Cars of Pagani: What’s Next After the Huayra Roadster BC?

The 2020 Chevrolet Corvette Shows GM is Thinking Like Porsche

My Corvette Moment? When I Took the Mighty ZR1 All the Way to 200 MPH

The post General Motors: The Incredible Shrinking Automaker – The Big Picture appeared first on MotorTrend.

https://www.motortrend.com/news/general-motors-shrinks-holden-big-pic-may-20/ visto antes em https://www.motortrend.com

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soobadnoonecanstopher · 7 years

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The Price of Privilege - Part 3 (A Kyungsoo Series)

Genre: Romance Fluff/Angst/ Future Smut - Arranged Marriage / Royalty AU

Characters: Kyungsoo X You

Description: Your time has come to marry the man your family has selected to take your hand. As royalty these important matters are arranged for you, but when you meet your soon to be husband, he is nothing like you expected.

The Price of Privilege [M]: - part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8 , part 9 , part 10 , part 11, part 12 , part 13 , part 14, part 15

You knew about the formal dinner with Queen Hong before the day came. Such events required days of preparation. There was the dress, the makeup, the hair, the hours in the shower to get your skin clean and nice smelling enough to be fit for a meal with the queen. Not to mention the mental preparation it took to get your game face on and rid yourself of any and all emotion that might be misconstrued as weakness or ignorance.

You weren’t sure about the details of the dinner, except for the fact that Queen Hong was not going to be alone. Your mind wandered to the possibility and the King himself might make an appearance. Such things weren’t unheard of, although you didn’t want to think about it too much, should your nerves decide to act up tonight.

May had been scrolling through her phone with a tense look on her face all afternoon but every time you asked her what was wrong she just shook her head and avoided your eyes. You did hear her mumble something under her breath that sounded like

’stupid viral kiss’

and you were sure you heard a string of profanities that she never meant for you to hear after that.

Viral? Did someone catch a cold?

A knock on your door told you that the cue you had been awaiting for the last hour had finally come and you rose from the bench you had been seated stiffly on, careful of the pricy dress that seemed to be made of the kind of fabric that instantly wrinkled if you even looked at it the wrong way. It was expensive and beautiful and you hated the way it pinched at your ribs. Or maybe that was the fucking corset. Seriously? Was this thing even necessary? You inhaled as best as you could against the confines of your undergarments and ignored the lightheadedness that tickled your senses.

The butler at the door bowed his head deeply and you walked out of your room with May on your heels. You had not yet been to the formal dining hall of this place but it did not disappoint.

The table was larger than back at home, and seated around the table were the faces of the men you had met the first night you arrived, save one. One significant face was missing and you were led to a spot where you sat, hands in your lap, eyes at your fancy place setting and your ears listening for the door.

The next sound you heard from behind you pulled at your attention, but you forced your eyes down on your plate in front of you.

It was a low voice…well a throat clearing sound and it moved just behind where you sat like a statue of self control.

From your peripheral vision you saw the hand that grabbed the chair back and pulled, swatting away the server who tried to do it for him.

“Sir?” The quiet voice of the waiter called out and you saw a tray with a single shot of alcohol presented next to Kyungsoo.

He was quick to throw the shot back and wave the empty glass on the tray away. With a quick, curious glance around the room you saw a few of the other princes doing the same and you wondered what kind of demons they had to chase away if they couldn’t even stand a single formal dinner without first medicating like this.

“Your Highness,” a low voice was speaking to you from across the large dining table and you looked up, recognizing Chanyeol from the first day. His booming voice was so familiar to you after that first night that you couldn’t help but recognize him immediately. His smile was wide and genuine and you smiled in return. The tension you felt in your shoulders seemed to be worsening on the side where Kyungsoo sat.

Whose idea was it for you to be seated next to him?

The ice water flowing into your glass looked inviting and you reached for it as soon as it was topped off, hoping to wash away the sudden taste that you had recalled.

A sudden taste that you were certain was a phantom…a memory really. Brought on by the person who sat next to you who was now sitting there, breathing, being alive and being real and pulling at your eyes, begging for your to look at him.

The begging didn’t quit and when you finally gave in to it and turned your head enough to see his pretty profile, he had just licked his lips. You caught the tip of his tongue as it disappeared inside of his mouth and his eyes were focused on the wall opposite of his seat. Only there was no focus in them. He looked blank. Present merely in the physical form, Kyungsoo was not yet in any position to look at you, let alone greet you.

“Been busy have you?” You heard that low voice across from you again and you turned forward to meet Chanyeol’s eyes. And Chanyeol’s smirk that felt strangely uninvited.

You ticked your head, not quite sure what he meant, but unwilling to begin a conversation that would never finish once the queen arrived.

Below the table, you felt a knocking against your chair. You shifted in your seat, giving a bit of distance between yourself and the man at your side and the knocking stopped once you moved. His knee that had been bouncing up and down stilled once you shifted, as if you had somehow called attention to it and you heard him clear his throat once as he moved both of his hands below his table into his lap.

You hadn’t known him long, and you definitely didn’t know him well, but you felt a sudden calmness overflow your body with the realization that Do Kyungsoo seemed to be more nervous than you were right now.

The fidgeting didn’t quite stop, but it definitely grew less obvious. You knew by the flexing of the muscles in his wrist that he was doing something with his hands below the table. When you heard the booming voice behind you, announcing the queen’s arrival you were quick to rise with the rest of the attendees for her entrance.

She entered, greetings were made to her two sons who barely held eye contact with her and time and your awareness of reality seemed to enter an alternate state.

You were on autopilot. Nodding and smiling when required and you kept a watch out of the corner of your eye on the man who moved his fidgeting fingers above his lap now as he picked with non-existent fingernails at his cuticles.

Dinner courses were served. Fancy expensive food that was meant to be picked at and tasted, but never finished. Soups that you were to have four spoons of, at the most, as not to scrape the bottom of the bowl. A few swipes of a knife against a filet mignon to cut a tiny piece that would not come close to messing up your makeup as you ate it.

You watched the untouched courses leave Kyungsoo’s place and you figured he didn’t have the nerve to attempt to eat right now.

Your curiosity burned. And your annoyance burned even hotter for having so much weakness when it came to him.

Queen Hong had been discussing something with Jongin, her oldest son and his answers were short and polite. As if one might respond to a well respected elder of the family instead of to their mother. But May had said she hadn’t even seen him in the last five years while he had been away at school. The second her attention left her eldest and moved on to the youngest you saw the physical manifestation of relief take over Jongin’s face. His eyes dropped to his plate and he stabbed at his food, eating a few bites before he turned to the wine and drank nearly half of the glass.

“Now, Prince Kyungsoo,” Queen Hong’s voice spoke up, having moved on from Sehun to the next in line at the table and you heard the shift as he sat up straighter in his seat, his eyes glancing up briefly as she addressed him, “I trust the preparations for the wedding are going well?”

It wasn’t a question at all. And although you were definitely a vital part of said wedding, you weren’t taking any part of this conversation.

“Your Majesty, if I may,” Kyungsoo suddenly spoke up and the queen lowered the fork she had lifted to her lips. The silence that settled over the room was as pervasive as a drug coursing through your veins and you held your breath along with nearly every other person in that room except for the two who were doing the actual talking.

“Go ahead,” she said with a tense smile on her lips. Your mouth was dry and your ice water sat just out of your reach. You could feel the stem of it with your fingertips but you didn’t dare move enough to grab it. Such movement like that might call attention to you right now and that was the last thing you wanted.

“I have had my card returned to me,” he said quietly and your ears burned with the memory of the kiss.

Queen Hong tilted her head and her tense smile widened a bit as her eyes burned holes into his face.

“I have heard. Clearly the public is expecting the wedding to happen soon,” she said as she took the steak on the end of her fork into her mouth and continued to eat despite the stifling stillness around the room.

“The stocks are up because of what I did,” he said and she stopped chewing and narrowed her eyes.

“It’s a bit distasteful to discuss money over dinner.” She waved off a refill on her wine and something shifted in the posture of the man next to you. He turned to face her in his seat and you saw a deep inhale into his chest that perhaps was an involuntary reaction to the courage he was pulling from.

“About what we discussed last year, Your Majesty, France…I’ve been–” His voice was louder now, bolder and more direct as he spoke and you were having trouble following, being new to this family you weren’t sure they had any holdings in France, but anything was possible really.

“My answer was no a year ago, and it is still no.”

“You said if I could get the stocks up by half, you might reconsider. Your Majesty, if you just check the numbers you will see–” His voice was louder now and you felt it coming, as did everyone in the room. To your benefit you didn’t even jump when you heard the fork drop to her plate.

“I think I’ve been more than accommodating of your little hobbies. But abandoning your country for one of them is where I draw the line. Leave the cooking to the servants and do not bring this up again.”

Hobbies? Cooking? Maybe May could find out what this was about because you couldn’t deny any longer how little you knew about what you had just heard. Nor could you deny how much you wanted to know.

“Yes Your Majesty.” His response was quiet, his shoulders slumped and his eyes and ego well deflated.

Below the table the shaking in his knee had stopped and the picked skin around his thumb nail was red with dried blood.

The queen dismissed herself, citing a sudden and very pointed lack of appetite.

Once she was gone the oxygen seemed to return to the room and quiet conversations resumed around the room as the brothers talked and laughed with each other.

All except Kyungsoo who ignored everyone at the table, including you as he finished his food and drinks in silence.

“So when can we expect the next episode of this whirlwind romance?” Chanyeol was speaking to you over his mousse and you caught the quick glance in Kyungsoo’s direction as he spoke to you.

“I’m sorry?” You said, remembering his crypticism before the dinner started and slowly coming to the conclusion that he knew something you didn’t.

“Shut up Chanyeol,” Kyungsoo muttered in a low voice next to you and you noticed the way he stared down at his coffee instead of up into the now laughing eyes of his brother.

“Oh haven’t you seen it yet? Your video has gone viral.” Sehun was speaking now, and he held up his cell phone up for you to see. You had to squint to see across the table but you recognized the dress you were wearing that day.

The day he kissed you outside of the ice cream shop and the screaming voice of the young woman recording the video made it impossible to actually hear anything that was said.

“It went viral because you reposted it on your Instagram, Sehun,” Chanyeol laughed as he pushed the dessert away from him and reached for his wine.

“It was funny…and I can’t t help that I’m popular,” the youngest prince whined and you felt your pulse pushing blood up to the surface of your skin.

Your kiss replayed again and again on the screen and your eyes narrowed on the video as it played.

You saw his body lean in before his lips connected with yours and you saw the stupid way you closed your eyes the second he touched you.

You also saw the stiffness that overcame you with his kiss and that screamed out at you, broadcasting your inexperience in such things. Telling the whole world what they probably already suspected.

It was your first kiss. It was the first time another human being had touched you in such a way as to cause nervous butterflies in your stomach and a burning desire inside that you didn’t quite understand.

And they had all seen it. Not just the present company of assholes, but the whole country.

All so he could get his card back and get a chance to beg a favor of the queen.

Stocks he said. The stocks had risen after the kiss and you knew that this country and your country would see incredible economic gains from this union, from this wedding…you still felt more than just a little bitter about having your first kiss used in such a manner.

The bite of chocolate mousse that sat on the back of your tongue tasted bitter too and you reached for your water glass.

Halfway to the glass your hand took on a route of it’s own and you reached just to the side of where your ice water sat, grabbing the glass of wine instead.

You’d half drained it before you remembered that you had waved away the waiter who poured the wine for this dinner.

“Aww, they’re already sharing drinks. I can feel the love, can’t you Sehun?”

You had gone this far already. Might as well commit to it, right? You drained the rest of Kyungsoo’s wine glass and swallowed hard. Resisting the sour face you wanted to make at the taste of the strong alcohol.

The stares from around the room as you replaced his, now empty glass in front of his cup of coffee burned against your already burning face and you risked a look at his profile.

His jaw was set in a tense knot just below his ear and you knew he was biting down hard. His eyes focused ahead of himself, at that same spot on the wall he had been staring at before the dinner started and you noticed the red tint to the tips of his ears.

“M-Maybe if you release a sex tape next time…s-she’ll let you go to culinary school Kyungsoo.” Chanyeol was almost laughing too much for the words to be audible but the people around the room heard enough to laugh along with the noisy prince and you felt your annoyance flare up strong.

Aside from the blush on Kyungsoo’s neck that was creeping up his cheeks, you felt your own humiliation flooding through your body.

What the fuck was he blushing for? He had done this himself. He was the one who kissed you in public, making sure that he had the attention of the huge crowd of onlookers and not even pretending to want privacy for it.

You were the one who had your first kiss stolen and used in a plot for a stupid favor from the queen and for what? For culinary school? He wanted to go to school to be a fucking cook?

Why he couldn’t just hire his own private teacher in that fancy ass kitchen he spent hours and hours tinkering around in? What kind of permission would he need for that? He was already in there all day long, surely he could satisfy whatever need for knowledge without involving you in his schemes.

Maybe it was the wine in your belly mingling with the scraps of the fancy dinner you choked down, but you suddenly felt a fire burning inside you that didn’t at all calm down with the water you swallowed.

Perhaps the bitterness at the back of your throat had nothing to do with the chocolate, or the wine. Perhaps your real problem was this stubborn, megalomaniac who had not only humiliated you in front of all of his brothers, but who had now made it that the rest of the country saw just how powerless, weak, and ignorant you really were with that public stunt.

Images of your stiffened, innocent, inexperienced reaction to his lips on yours flashed through your memory again and again as the princes laughed and laughed at whatever add-on jokes they threw out at your expense and there was only so much being laughed at you could take. You needed to leave. You needed the quiet of your room and the maybe even the anger of your best friend to sooth your soul a little bit.

You needed to leave but you also itched for the final word. It must have been the wine that made you turn to him. The rolling eyes and the sarcastic smirk on his face as he tried not to laugh along with the others didn’t fool you. You knew he wasn’t making fun of you only because he was too embarrassed at being pulled into the jokes.

It must have been the wine that made you move closer to where he sat, the motion of your hands caught his attention from the corner of his eye and he looked at you with his smirk still well on his face.

When you lifted both hands and reached them out, vacillating in your mind between choking the life out of him and longing to feel the smooth warmth of the skin along his cheeks your hands moved to his face and his eyes darted around in mild panic, widening to full blown panic as you leaned in.

It was the wine he must have tasted on your lips as they reached his and the small grunt of surprise was the only sound you focused on. It was the only sound in the room because a heavy silence enveloped every single living breathing being at that table save for one. When you pushed your lips into his you felt him cave. Perhaps his lips were just that soft. Or maybe he was too surprised, either way when he caved, and his lips parted, you reached for him with your teeth, pulling his bottom lip well into your mouth you bit down and the first sound from his throat after the surprise was quiet. It was almost too quiet for your ears to hear but your hand had moved to the back of his neck now and the small vibration below your palm told you he had made it.

Was it a moan?

Whatever it was, it changed something inside of your chest and that fire that you failed to extinguish with ice water, stolen wine and a plethora of fine eats surged up hotter.

Your hand at the back of his neck pulled harder against him and you registered a new sound in the room. Something that sounded like a gasp..shock…surprise..scandal.

His lips were soft and his mouth was wet and a warm hand on your knee flexed soft fingers against your skin but that gasp…was an audience.

You pulled away suddenly, instantly missing the taste of his mouth and the warmth of his skin below your fingers.

Your retreat afforded you a new view of his face. Lips wet and open. Pink from your teeth and stunned into stillness and his eyes.

Those dark, hard, judging eyes that followed you whenever he graced you with a second of his attention, those eyes…were hidden below closed eyelids with dark lashes splayed over his pink cheeks.

You saw movement below his eyelids and you pushed yourself away from the table, lifted onto your wobbly legs and tried your best not to pass out from the deep breath you couldn’t quite inhale, yet futilely tried to take in.

“Thanks for the wine,” your own voice sounded a touch too affected, but the message had been well received with your kiss. It was only polite to thank him for his hospitality after all.

His eyes were open now and the hardness was back, though softened just a touch at first you saw his brows furrow as he pulled his bottom lip into his mouth.

“Ohh shit! You–” Chanyeol’s boisterous voice erupted like a party popper and you physically jumped from the sudden noise, but you were standing already and you used the distraction as your chance for an exit, “–you…and her….DAMN I can’t wait for the next video!”

You were out the door in a flash and you heard the echo of Kyungsoo’s response to the man who didn’t know when to quit.

“Shut the fuck up, Chanyeol,” his low rumble felt achingly familiar as it faded into the background noises behind you.

You walked in silence and solitude for a few minutes before you heard the surprised greeting of May, who had been mingling near the dining hall during the meal.

She had been chit-chatting with some other staff members as she waited and she had a look on her face that told you she knew a few things about what had taken place during dinner.

“What happened in there?!” Her hushed whisper was thoroughly scandalized sounding and you shook your head looking back at the various staff members within earshot.

“My room,” you said through gritted teeth and once you were both through the door the floodgates were opened.

You were met with ’oh my gods’ and ’no ways’ once you relayed the events from the moment you sat down at that table.

“So he wants to go to school in France?” Her face had all of the ‘WTF’ emotion you had kept off of yours during the dinner. “And that’s why he kissed you? So the queen would agree?”

You shrugged and nodded your head, wondering how long it would be until May found out about the revenge kiss you had just given to Kyungsoo moments earlier.

The next day May greeted you with a tense, disapproving expression on her face and you knew she found out.

But May being May…kept her much deserved scolding rights to herself.

You had mostly recovered from the stress from the dinner the evening prior when she returned to your room with a new sort of concern on her face.

“Umm…there’s a police officer here to see you.” Her whisper was tense and you frowned in confusion and disbelief that kept your legs stubbornly glued to the floor for a moment.

When you finally moved, she followed you close by, reaching for your hand as you made your way to the front of your home where you caught the sight of a uniformed police-woman standing at the front door talking to the butler.

The officer, you noticed, wore quite a bit of makeup and you felt a little taken aback at first glance. Her face was pretty and strangely familiar and as you approached she reached out a hand with a polite smile on her face.

“Hello, your Highness, I’m sorry we have to meet this way, but I’m afraid I will need you to come with me.” You shook the police woman’s hand quickly and the smile on her face was rueful. The sound of her voice was lower than you expected by the look of her, but you shook that away. Perhaps you were just being too judgemental, seeing such a pretty woman in full police uniform and all.

“W-Where are you taking her?” May’s voice broke through, loud and abrasive and you seriously doubted such an aggressive response was necessary.

“We just need to head over to the security office. There’s a bit of a problem involving a…stolen Maserati? The owner has decided to press charges.” The police officer frowned an exaggerated sad frown that looked just like an adult patronizing a young child about to throw a fit.

“C-Charges? He…That rat! I’ll ki–” May was too emotional again and you laid your hand over her shoulder to stop her before the death threat to a member of the royal family of this country could leave her lips in front of a police officer.

“May, it’s fine. I’ll go with officer…” the pause made the woman turn back around to face you with a small grimace on her lips for a moment before she opened her mouth to fill in the information you sought out.

“Officer Baekhee,” she said in that voice that was just a touch too low and she flipped her ponytail off her shoulder to her back with her hand.

You felt like a jerk for glancing down at her neck to search for an Adam’s apple, and even more of a jerk for finding none. Even her hands looked feminine enough, but you couldn’t shake the suspicions you had.

Not that it even mattered. It was none of your damn business. You nodded your head and followed the woman down the walkway, through the beautiful gardens. Once at the door of a separate building without any windows she lifted her hand and knocked twice.

“I’m coming too.” May said confidently.

“Oh, are you the accomplice?” Officer Baekhee said with a cheerful, nearly manic look in her eyes that made May take a small step back and away from you.

Her face that was so full of confidence and bravado fell and you saw genuine fear flash across her pretty features.

“A-Accomplice?” Her voice was smaller now and you shook your head in disagreement with the direction this conversation was quickly headed.

Officer Baekhee looked down at the palm of her hand and you could see something hastily scribbled across her flesh. She was squinting as she tried to make out the letters that had obviously begun to smudge now.

“May…Kim? I have here that a May Kim is listed as an accomplice in the crime.”

May let go of her tight grip she had been holding around your hand and you released her hand as you looked at her nervous expression.

“Umm…I’m…too young for prison,” May whispered into your ear as she tried her best to keep the message concealed from the officer, who was now scraping at her hand with her fingernail as she mouthed something she was trying to read. You noticed the note pad of paper sticking out of her shirt pocket and you wondered why she didn’t just use that for her notes instead of trying to fit everything on the palm of her hand. There was definitely something very very different about this woman.

“May had nothing to do with this. She is an employee of mine and was merely following orders,” you spoke up and the police woman looked up with wide eyes from her palm.

“She’s been…conditioned at a very early age to do exactly as I say,” you continued and you saw May glance at you out of the side of her eye, “I can make her do anything I say. She never ever disobeys.”

May scoffed and quickly covered her mouth with her open hand, turning the sound into a little cough and Officer Baekhee looked between the two of you with a single eyebrow raised in great doubt of your tails of May’s obedience.

“May,” you said, with your eyes still on the police officer and your voice loud and authoritative, “stand on one foot.”

You felt May shift her balance and when you looked down you saw one foot raised a few inches into the air. She was cooperating well but her expression was annoyed now. Didn’t the idiot know you were just trying to save her here? Why did she always have to bring her stupid pride into things.

“Make her quack like a duck,” Officer Baekhee said in a low whisper as she leaned in to you and of course it wasn’t very discrete. May heard and she groaned in irritation.

“May…You heard her. Let’s hear it.” Your voice was in control but your eyes were wide and begging.

She stood silently for what felt like days and you reached out and grabbed ahold of her forearm, pinching hard against the flesh. She yelped and jumped and closed her eyes tight. From her lips you heard the quietest little two quacking sounds and you smiled wide and triumphantly as you looked back into the amused face of the police officer.

You heard a slight commotion behind the door of the security room that you had been waiting in front of and the three of you turned when the door was pulled open. An older man wearing a security uniform looked into the face of the three of you, lingering a little too long on the police woman’s face before he pulled the door open.

“C-Can I help you?” The old man asked.

Officer Baekhee sprung into action, patting dramatically along her uniform as she sounded out a long ‘uhhhhh’ to buy some time. Eventually from her pocket she pulled out a small black leather bound badge that she held up to the man at the door.

“I’m here to speak with a Mr.,” abother pause and she was squinting down at her hand again, “Do Kyungsoo. He filed a complaint.”

The old man rolled his eyes, a wholly unprofessional reaction you thought, and he turned silently to walk back into the security office, leaving the door open behind him.

You heard him mumbling something under his breath about how this was interrupting his lunch and you were sure you heard the phrase ‘damn kids’. You wondered how this old man dared to disrespect an officer of the law so brazenly.

You saw the old man lift a big wrinkled hand and point down a hallway off to the left.

“He is there,” he said and he sat down to a half eaten sandwich and an open newspaper.

Through the door you saw him. Kyungsoo stood with his focus on one of the computer screens that lined the wall in front of him and his hands secured behind his back. When he heard the door open he turned to the noise and stopped mid turn to look into the face of Officer Baekhee who smiled wide and friendly. Kyungsoo seemed frozen as he looked from the woman’s face down the length of her and back up again.

What was wrong with everybody today? Couldn’t they just accept this woman as an officer of the law and leave it at that? I mean…sure she looked…interesting from certain angles, and you were pretty sure the lump you saw at the bottom of her shirt, right below where the fabric tucked into her slacks, was one fallen breast that had been shifted out from her bra. Perhaps a sock?

“What the hell–” Kyungsoo muttered under his breath and you saw the slow rise and fall of his chest as he inhaled deeply.

“Is there something wrong with Officer Baekhee?” You raised your voice, suddenly very annoyed at his reaction to this woman. He was being a rude ass and you weren’t about to stand for this kind of behavior.

Kyungsoo pulled his eyes from the woman in front of him and turned to face you.

“Nothing’s wrong…I just called a Police Man, I didn’t expect…”

Oh no he didn’t.

You rested your hand over Officer Baekhee’s shoulder and you saw her tick her head in your direction. The blush on her cheeks looked even more garish in the harsh lighting of the surveillance room.

“Officer Baekhee can I have just one word with you outside please?”

The look of surprise on her face was clear but she nodded as she quickly followed you out the door, away from where May and Kyungsoo waited and watched you make a quick exit with the police woman.

“W-What is it?” She sounded unsure and you reached for the wig you saw on her head. It was crooked and you could see bits of straight black hair peeking out below the waves of brown hair.

“I just wanted to say that you are doing an amazing job. I know how challenging this profession can be and clearly there are some who will never understand the struggles you face.” You tucked her black hair below the wig and straightened her bangs over her forehead as she watched your face with a look of shock that seemed to be changing the longer she looked at you.

Were her eyes wet? Shit, you didn’t mean to make her too emotional to do her job.

You lightly tapped against the ball of fabric you saw in the bottom of her top and she looked down with an embarrassed smile.

“No matter what happens in there…just remember that he and all of the other people like him are assholes and you are already a better human being than they are. You’re doing great and you look absolutely beautiful…okay?”

She reached inside her shirt through the collar and grabbed for the bundle of socks which you saw her stuff back inside of her bra. Suddenly she seemed to be having trouble meeting your eyes. She merely smiled and blinked a little too rapidly every time you tried to make eye contact. The sweet smile you had seen on her face so often in this short meeting had faded some and you could sense a very real change in her demeanor.

She was probably just embarrassed.

When you returned to the surveillance room May was staring daggers into the back of Kyungsoo’s head as he leafed through documents he had laid out on the desk in front of him.

Once everyone was back inside Officer Baekhee was back in charge of the conversation with what felt like a new flood of confidence that had taken over her body.

She was asking pointed questions directed at Kyungsoo and you honestly felt pretty good about the direction of her ‘investigation’ until Kyungsoo decided to press the spacebar on the computer keyboard in front of him.

The screens that lined the wall came to life suddenly and the image that had been stagnant, showing a closed garage door that looked so familiar to you, showed a small bit of movement at the side of the structure.

“As you can plainly see, I have a video of the crime.” Kyungsoo’s voice was flat and calm as Officer Baekhee squinted her eyes again, trying to make out the movement just off the screen of what you were sure was you as you danced in front of the garage, trying to get it open.

“I don’t see it. You can’t even see who that is.” She said with her arms over her chest. The socks shifted again, popping up unnaturally high and you noticed Kyungsoo glanced down at the woman’s chest when they moved.

His hand hit another key on the keyboard and the camera angle switched.

Clearly he was prepared. Directly in the middle of the screen you danced, in complete silence without a hint of music, you saw your limbs flailing wildly before you spun three times, got dizzy, took a stumble and finished with widely spread fingers on your shaking jazz hands.

May snorted loudly from the back of the room and you saw a smile on Officer Baekhee’s face that she bit down hard on to try and suppress quickly.

Kyungsoo’s face was immobile. He was a stone with wide blinking eyes and lips that never smiled, ever, unless he was pulling the wings off of a fly, or burning ants with a magnifying glass. He was probably one of those people who only laughed when others got hurt, instead of offering a helping hand. How in the world did you end up with this psychopath as your future husband?

May got her laughter from the back of the room under control with enough time for the video to change. From the angle of the shot you saw yourself run out of the frame and a long while later, much longer than it should take, you thought as you stared at the video and waited, the black sedan came bursting through the frame, over the cement driveway straight off the edge of the driveway, running over a row of bushes and flowers.

You saw the brake lights illuminate and the car stopped just in front of a tree in the middle of the yard.

You heard a deep sigh from Kyungsoo’s chest as he watched the video and he bit down on the inside of his cheek.

On the video, the car was moving again. As it reversed you saw the rows of bushes pulled up by the roots and several, not just the one as you originally thought, were left in your wake.

“Okay, this part takes…a very long time.” Kyungsoo was speaking again and you saw his hand press on another key.

The shot changed and you saw a long empty driveway seen from the vantage point of the front gate. At the end of the driveway, if you focused hard and squinted, you could see a black dot.

After about two solid minutes the dot grew larger and became car-shaped.

“How long does this go on for? Did you slow the video down?” Officer Baekhee was getting restless and Kyungsoo just looked back at your face with bored eyes before he answered the woman.

“No…this is real time. She just drove very, very slowly.” He pulled his top lip down in between his teeth and bit down. You noticed a tiny twitch at the corner of his lips and you wondered if he was trying not to laugh at you again.

“Can’t you just tell me how much you want for the damages?” You had had enough. He was very obviously doing this to torture you and once you saw the twitch in his lips you knew, you KNEW he was just going to make fun of you again.

“Wait, let me fast forward. This next part is great.” His lips were pulled wide now and you saw the first chuckle in his chest as he advanced the video. In this speed it actually looked like you knew how to drive quite well if you were being honest with yourself.

“How much could that car be to fix? I saw just a few scratches in the front.” You were whining now and Officer Baekhee was giggling now as Kyungsoo came into the frame and the frantic screaming began.

The video had no sound of course, but the screaming was practically audible just by the movement of your mouth and May’s purse flying at him again and again inside the vehicle.

“That was self defense.” You said as you pointed inside the vehicle on the screen.

He had paused the video now and your mouth was open in terror. His body was halfway hanging out the car and his legs stuck straight out through the window.

Behind you, May laughed under her breath and you shot her a glare that did not at all stop her giggles.

Kyungsoo was the most under control of any of the people in this room and he lifted his closed fist into the air in front of him.

“Grand theft auto.” A finger popped up. “Criminal trespassing.” He said as he lifted a second finger.

“You said she had a key to the car and had been living on the grounds.” Officer Baekhee spoke up and you turned to face her with a wide hopeful smile on your face.

She winked the smallest wink that you felt lift your mood up high into the room like a helium filled balloon.

Kyungsoo cleared his throat and glared across the desk at the police woman.

“Oh, sorry,” Officer Baekhee said. Giving Kyungsoo a wave of her hand for the floor to speak.

“Destruction of private property. The car is mine and she did not have permission to take it,” He lifted his chin into the air clearly very proud of himself in this moment. “And the bushes are imported.” He added with a smug eyebrow lift.

“Imported from where?” Officer Baekhee asked with a touch of disbelief in her voice that you couldn’t quite place.

“They are russian purple sage bushes….from Russia,” he said.

“Oh please,” she was clearly done with his nonsense now and crossed her arms over her chest in defiance, knocking the small note pad up and out of her pocket in the process, “that’s the species of the plant, not the origin. You really are grasping at straws here Mr. Do.”

“Baek–” Kyungsoo said in a low warning tone, stopping himself with an annoyed squint of his eyes before he placed his hand up to his forehead and pressed down against his temples. “I mean, Officer Baekhee.”

From the corner of your eye you caught May as she moved across the room and reached for the small notepad that had fallen from the police woman’s pocket.

You watched as she looked down at the notepad, looking up at you once, you shook your head no. But May being May shrugged and opened it. You watched her expression carefully as the bickering between Kyungsoo and the Officer droned on in the background.

May’s eyes were wide as she flipped page after page in the small book and with a swift motion she closed the thing all together, gripped the edges of the pages and flipped through them with her thumb. Her eyes went wider, her mouth fell open and she looked up into your face before those wide eyes shot to the pair who argued over the price of an imported bush.

May moved her arm up quickly, pulling at the hair that sat atop of Officer Baekhee’s head. She removed the wig in a swift motion and you gasped out loud when you saw it happen.

Baekhee’s hands flew up to her head and she let out a blood curdling scream and you tried to reach for May to stop her.

You had grabbed her hands and pulled the wig away from her grasp, but the thing was wrecked. The damage had already been done. The neat poly tail was destroyed and bits of hair fell out onto the floor below and now, Officer Baekhee would surely be humiliated.

“Look at the book. This isn’t Officer Baekhee,” May growled as she glared at the two people in the room.

You reached for the book in her hand and you opened it to see a single drawing on the top page. A drawing that looked exactly like Kyungsoo, with his hand over his lips and a very obvious blush on his face. The page below looked nearly identical but the further you turned into the page the more you saw slight changes. You remembered the way May had quickly flipped through the book before she freaked the fuck out and you closed it to do the same.

As you flipped you saw it for what it was.

It was an animation. A cartoon drawing animation that showed the view across a fancy dinner table as you sat in a seat next to Kyungsoo. Then turned, grabbed him, kissed him square on his lips and left the room. Leaving behind a shy blushing Kyungsoo.

It was the kiss from dinner as seen by one of the princes across the table.

“Prince Baekhyun,” May said with an exaggerated bow of her head and absolutely none of the respect she had been trained to show to a member of the royal family.

“He made me do it.” Baekhyun lifted one of his long fingers and pointed accusatorily at Kyungsoo who stood with a very definite frown on his face.

“I didn’t tell you to dress as a woman,” Kyungsoo said matter of factly and Baekhyun lifted his hand to his chest as he took a step back.

“I will have you know that I was doing great and I looked absolutely beautiful,” Baekhyun looked back at you with a wide smile and you bit down on your lip to control your laughter.

Something seemed to snap in Kyungsoo’s calm demeanor and he reached for the phone on the desk, quickly dialing numbers with his index finger. Your heart sank. Was he calling the real police now?

“What are you doing?” The panicked tone, surprisingly, didn’t come from you, but from Baekhyun who lunged forward to grab for the phone from Kyungsoo’s grip.

“What do you think I’m doing. I’m calling her.”

“W-Which one are you calling? Mel or Sel?” Baekhyun’s voice had risen two octaves and the two grunted as both tried to gain an upper hand on the handset of the phone.

“Does it matter which one? You didn’t possibly think you would get away with fucking twin sisters behind their backs did you?”

“Kyungsoo they are identical! How the hell was I supposed to know that it was a different one from the night before? I don’t think you understand what the word identical means.”

May had your hand again and she was pulling you out of the room. Your attention ping-ponged back and forth between the two brothers who didn’t seem to notice as you both quietly exited that surveillance room, even after the loud click of the door cut off their discussion just when someone seemed to have picked up on the other end of the phone call Kyungsoo had been making.

“Remind me again why you thought that kissing that terrible man was a good idea? And in front of all of them too…” May must have been feeling particularly relieved that Officer Baekhee wasn’t a real cop here to drag her away to the state penitentiary because she was nagging now as she dragged you through the estate gardens toward one of the side doors that was close to where your living quarters were.

“It was… for revenge?” Saying it out loud made it sound even dumber than when you had the thought in your head.

“Revenge? How is kissing him a good revenge move? Did you plan on giving him revenge blue balls too?” She had actually stopped walking to squint at the bright sunlight and berate you for the way you chose to deal with your prince problems.

“I hardly think he was that affected May.”

Your mind leapt in embarrassing directions with her colorful choice of metaphors and you shook your head as you tried to shake the thoughts away. No way. You hadn’t even looked there once. The thought never crossed your mind.

You also didn’t know exactly how fine he looked in sweatpants. You definitely didn’t watch him from your bedroom window as he left for his morning jog.

“Well the next time you want revenge, please reconsider doing something stupid like a revenge make-out session in his private kitchen, or a revenge blow job.” May was grinning now and you covered your loud gasp with your open hand.

“May!” You whispered over her stifled laughter, “I’ve never done any of that stuff!”

“Hey, I don’t know what other kinds of YouTube videos you’ve been watching.” You smacked her on her arm to get her to shut up and pushed into your room with an exhausted sigh.

Stupid Do Kyungsoo. Stupid May. Stupid Officer Baekhee.

A warm shower and the softness of your bed called to you, begging you to give up on the awake world and sink below it’s covers a bit early tonight.

When you woke up someone was shaking your shoulders and the darkness of your room was startling. You recognized May’s voice as she whispered your name but instead of sleeping next to you in your bed she was wrapped in a robe and standing over you next to the bed.

“Hmm?” Your drowsiness was persistent and her face looked different.

Her lips seemed flushed as if she had been biting them in worry and her cheeks were pink. Was this look just from sleep?

“You have to wake up, something is wrong.” She was whispering even though the room was empty except for the both of you and you sat up quickly at her words. The clock on the dresser read a little after 3am.

“What happened?” You asked in a groggy voice very thick with sleep.

“It’s…the prince. It’s Kyungsoo, something happened…I don’t. We don’t know what to do but S-Sehun thinks that maybe…if you go.”

Kyungsoo? Did something bad happen to Kyungsoo?

“Wait, Sehun?” May’s wide eyes blinked a few times and she bit down on her lip before she nodded her head and you couldn’t quite piece together the bits of information she had given you.

“Is he okay?” The sleep was gone, leaving behind a nauseousness that surged inside your belly.

“I don’t know.” She answered your question.

Was this concern? Worry? You knew it was yet your mind had trouble giving it such a caring sounding word.

It had to just be your body reacting to being startled awake.

“Where?” You had your sleep shorts and tank on and you quickly reached for a longer sweatshirt to pull over yourself.

“Kitchen,” she whispered and your slippers were on your feet as you rushed out the door.

May didn’t follow and you hardly paid any attention as you moved quickly through the long hallways toward his side of the house. The place where you knew he had his own private sanctuary.

You turned down the familiar hallway and you saw the door on the far end. It was the only door in this entire empty hallway and the lights on the other side of the door were off, yet as you moved closer and your rapid steps slowed and quieted down you could definitely hear something on the other side of the door.

Something that had you craning your neck and turning your ear to the rest against the door so you could make sense of the sounds.

He was singing. You heard his singing voice again only this time was miles apart from the singing you heard from this kitchen the first time you came.

This song was…broken. Staggered and peppered with soft cries that panged against your insides as you heard the words in his soft voice.

’Help me, I’m holding on for dear life Won’t look down, won’t open my eyes’

He sang the words to the song slowly, agonizing between each new line and you could hear what sounded like glass scraping across the floor as he did it.

’Keep my glass full until morning light Cause I’m just holding on for tonight’

Your hand pushed against the door and it gave.

The darkness beyond was oppressive.

’1-2-3, 1-2-3 Drink, Throw ‘em back, ‘til I lose count.’

The final word wasn’t sung, but shouted out with a loud grunt as the sounds of shattering glass screamed out into your senses.

“Kyungsoo,” you called out into the darkness and the sound of the glass fell to the floor and settled into an eerie quiet.

His singing had stopped when you spoke and you imagined that the light from the hallway shone through enough for him to be able to see you from where he was in the dark room.

“Who sent you?” His voice was hoarse and soft and from where he spoke you knew he was somewhere near the big industrial ovens that lined the back wall.

“Are you hurt?” You took a step into the room and felt the distinct crunch of glass under your slippers. They had hard soles. You would be fine as long as you moved slowly.

“Hurt?” You heard him say in a whisper, processing your question slowly. You heard another crunch below your feet and your leg bumped against something metal on the floor.

“Is there a light here?” You ran your hands along the wall as you moved, trying to find the switch and when you found it you flipped it expecting to flood the room in blinding light but when it was flipped nothing happened.

Another switch next to it had the same result and you heard a small laugh from the back of the room.

“Its all…broken.” He laughed again and you heard a clank and a noisy swallow.

The only light in the room was from the small window in the door and your eyes began to adjust to see shadows of shapes around the room.

Where flat oven doors should have been, you saw jagged holes and where cupboards were once clean and white they looked crooked and broken.

“What happened here?” You were heading toward the stoves in the back now, the more you could see the destruction around you in his kitchen. In his sanctuary.

“Did you come to finish?” He said in a broken voice and your fingertips ran along the hood of the stove just above where he sat. You found a switch and it clicked, filling the room with a soft yellow light that illuminated just how surprising it was that this worked. The exhaust hood was smashed in and hanging on by only wires.

His head hung down at his chest and from your view you could see the cuts and blood along the skin of his bare feet. One slipper was halfway across the room and another you couldn’t locate, but the room was beyond trashed.

It looked as if someone had taken a sledgehammer to the cupboards and appliances and the amount of glass that you saw covering the floor was shocking.

“I didn’t do this Kyungsoo. I didn’t come to do anything else either.”

“S-She,” you looked down at your feet and grabbed the nearly empty bottle of tequila that sat on its side next to him and his fingers that had their grip on the neck let go when you pulled it, “she found out I was applying anyway.”

“To your cooking school?” You crouched down on your heels so you could hear him clearer through the slurred speech and you saw him nod his head.

“Le Cordon Bleu Paris…it was just a preliminary acceptance until they received my full application. I had been working for weeks, but now–” he sighed a deep sigh and wiped at his face with blood stained fingertips.

You were moving around as he spoke and you lifted a sheet pan and found his other slipper. With both in your hands you knelt in front of him and slipped them onto his feet before you reached for him, running your hands slowly down his arms to reach for both of his hands.

“Will you come with me so I can help you?” You felt the grip of his hands go slack inside of your own hands and he shook his head.

“Please Kyungsoo?” You squeezed against his hands and you saw his head shake no again despite the fact that his grip tightened once more on your hands.

“No…you,” his eyes opened and he looked up into your face. The blackness of his irises ticked around your face before settled hard into your eyes again, “you’re too soft for this place. They’re going to destroy you. You have to leave. You have to go, why are you so stubborn? Why won’t you just go?”

“I made a promise to you…long before I ever knew you. I made the same promise to myself. And I never go back on my promises. Will you let me help you?” His eyes closed slowly with your words and you felt his hands grip against yours again, pulling now. You stood and backed up, trying to get him to stand on his feet, against whatever wounds he had sustained and the alcohol he had consumed he somehow managed to stand and when he steadied his swaying there was a different look in his eyes.

“I’m no better than the rest of them. You’ll be ruined by me.” He was walking now, slowly and he limped on one foot. You wrapped arms around his waist and he backed up at the contact. When you pulled at him again, forcing him to let you help him, he finally caved and you felt him rest his weight against your shoulders.

“I’m stronger than you think I am Kyungsoo,” you answered, hoping and praying that you were right.

A/N: the song Kyungsoo is singing is Puddle’s Pity Party Cover of Sia’s Chandelier. (Clown warning)

The Price of Privilege [M]: - part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8 , part 9 , part 10 , part 11, part 12 , part 13 , part 14, part 15

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