#he could be left alone unsupervised in the house by five months

[orangedogsquad]

Happy Birthday Mr 4-year-old Henry!!

To celebrate, he’s played with the cat’s toys, had big snoozes, and has had lots of treats. Sorry that you also have a physio appointment today, boy, but your physio only works Thursdays xD

[fangirl-in-general]

How would Rhys and Pierce react that reader who a friend of Ava is a witch?

OOOOO I love this idea!! Rhys and Pierce are not my number one characters so forgive me if I screw up their personalities a bit but here goes!!

Warnings: slight suggestive content, I am not a practicing witch so I intentionally left it a little vague when it came to actual practices, some language, slight violence in Pierce's oneshot, lmk if I missed anything!

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Rhys

It hadn't been more than a month since Ava called me screaming and crying over some 'demons' taking over her life.

"Please you have to get them out!! They're driving me crazy!!"

"Get them out?? I'm not an exorcist! I'm a witch!! And a new one at that! I can barely cast a hex much less dispel evil spirits! Girl, call a priest!!" Aca and I have always had each other's backs, ever since high school. I was always the one she would call when she needed something and considering how lonely we both were and how hard it became for her to rely on other people, I felt it was an honor. Though she did overdo it from time to time.

"Spirits? What no! There's actually five men in my house claiming to be demons!!" Wait what...

"IT'S DAEMOS HUMAN!!! CORRECT IT OR I WILL!!!" The unfamiliar voice on the other end of the phone made my heart sink to the floor and I immediately grabbed my keys and a can of wasp spray and raced out the door.

That was about two weeks ago, and I haven't left Ava alone since. They don't seem intent on taking advantage of her 'hospitality', but I wasn't going to take any chances. Especially not with how comfortable she had grown letting them wander about her house unsupervised. One of them went through her bra drawer like a lunatic for crying out loud!!! talking about 'sources of power' and what not.

Creeps...

Rhys, the only one who seemed relatively well adjusted, came and sat next to me at the kitchen counter. I kept my eyes glued to the cards in front of me.

The Tower Upright...

interesting

"Excuse me, I don't mean to intrude. What are those?"

A distracted smile makes its way to my face as I continue to shuffle the cards, another pops out. "Tarot cards. And you're not intruding as long as you don't take them from me like Asch did."

The Chariot reversed...

Rhys lets out a nervous chuckle and continues to inspect my actions. "Do they...do anything?"

I steal a glance; his brows are pressed together in concentration and his eyes pass between expectance and curiosity. "More or less. They're kind of like a guiding tool. We can use them to better understand ourselves and connect with the universe around us. They can be a useful way to prepare for coming events, or to better handle current ones. But most people don't believe in it so it's whatever I guess."

He gasps slightly. "Intriguing. So you use them to see the future and read minds?"

The snort that came out of me was far from intentional, but I honestly had no other idea how to react to that statement. "I mean, sure something like that."

"Can you read mine?"

I turned to him. "You want me to do a tarot reading for you?"

He nodded with more excitement than I had seen from any of them besides the pink one. I shrugged and began to reshuffle the cards. "Fine but just a basic one. I'm still a new witch and I don't wanna hear anything mean or judgy from someone who doesn't even-"

"You're a witch??"

For some reason I felt my blood run cold. I felt like a bug under a microscope, and I couldn't tell if the gaze he had fixed me with was simply observation, or calculation. Similar feelings with vastly different intentions. But both managed to send a shiver down my spine and a reluctant blush to my cheeks.

All I could muster was a nod before forcing myself back to shuffling.

"That's incredible!! Why did you not tell us before! Ava told us she was a powerful sorceress but TWO powerful magic users working together is surely a force to be reckoned with!! You must tell me what you know! I want to learn everything!"

His words forced a smile to my face, and I couldn't help the blush that accompanied it.

His praises continued. "I knew you had to be quite skilled to be so close to Princess Ava, but this explains it all! You were simply trying to hide your abilities so that we wouldn't expect your attack if something went wrong!! How incredibly intelligent!" He leaned forward, excitement practically bursting from him. "Please read this 'tarot' I simply must see your skills firsthand!"

I let a chuckle escape and went back to shuffling the deck. Two cards fell out.

"Death, and High Preist reversed..."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Peirce

"You know what Leif!! One of these days you're gonna wish you kept your dirty little mouth shut for once!!"

Leif was (as usual) doing nothing but being the biggest menace he possibly could be. Stealing my phone, going through my things, screaming in my ear, shit talking, etc.

To say I had enough was an understatement. The only thing that kept me from wringing his neck was a large muscley arm wrapping around my torso and throwing me over his shoulder. "Hey! Wha- PEIRCE!!" My screaming didn't stop him from wordlessly lugging me to my room and tossing me onto the bed. Now I know what you're thinking 'omg that's so sexy this is totally about to get fun' well I thought the exact same thing the first three times this happened, and I'll admit the thought still crosses my mind the twelve times it's happened since then but NO! This is still a (mostly) family friendly blog after all (for now).

Anyway, I sit up with a groan and glare at Peirce who has made himself comfortable in the chair in the corner of the room. This happens so often that it's practically scripted at this point. Leif is an ass, I get frustrated, Peirce gets tired, carries me to my room, then babysits me so I won't go out and try to strangle the antagonistic fiend in the other room.

At this point I'm done. I'm so sick of Leif and his attitude and lack of consequences. Just because they think Ava is a powerful sorceress and they don't think I'm anything more than her confidant doesn't mean they get to push me around. Leif is gonna get what's coming to him.

I glance at Peirce who is sitting arms crossed, still watching me though his gaze is softer now. I jump off the bed and head to my desk. digging through the drawers I pull out some candles and begin flipping through the book of incantations I keep tucked under a floorboard. I used to store said book in my nightstand drawer but surprise surprise, the guys went rummaging through my things and I don't trust them not to mess with it.

I'm missing a key piece to the puzzle. "Hey Peirce?"

A hum can be heard from the corner.

"Could I talk you into stealing some of Leif's hair for me?" I turn and give him the sweetest least guilty smile I could muster. He rises slowly and stalks over to me looming as he stared into my eyes as if inspecting for a motive. I'd be lying if I said I hadn't realized how much larger than me he was, because I had defiantly noticed, and it was absolutely something I thought of frequently.

He let out quiet grunt and left the room. I was probably imagining the blush on his cheeks, but the image was going to stay in my head for a painfully long time.

"Peirce w- OW!!! YOU PRICK WHAT THE HELL!!!"

Leif's screaming was nothing new, but it almost made my heart swell to know that Peirce was willing to potentially start a confrontation just to get something I asked without any context at all. 'I should definitely kiss him for that'

He came back into the room holding a suspiciously large chunk of blond hair and handed it to me. I smiled at him, and he nodded before following me over to my desk.

"What are you doing?" His voice always caught me off guard. It was a beautiful, gentle, sound that filled my ears like a deep breath after drowning. I wish he would talk more but I didn't ever want to force him.

"I'm gonna hex him."

"Leif?"

I hum a confirmation and turn to the desk with the supplies. He continues his questioning. "On Daemos it takes a very skilled witch to perform such a task. Are you a skilled witch?"

I nod. The 'skilled' aspect was more or less true. My mentor was very skilled, and I'd been training under her for almost two years now, but I still had a long way to go, and she'd probably scold me big time for simply attempting this... but who said she had to know.

"So you are...magic?"

I turned to look at him. He stood next to the desk, eyes fixed on the task before me, and I couldn't help but smile as I responded. "Yea, something like that. Why?"

A flash of concern passed over his face, but it was quickly replaced with a soft smile that almost melted my heart to the floor.

"It's good to be powerful. I'm glad to know you can keep yourself safe while I can't." Pierce's words shot straight to my heart and tears instantly welled in my eyes.

"Thank you...Pierce." The blush that filled his cheeks at my words was enough to distract me from the fact that I had already lit the candles and was now burning the hair I held in my hands. "OW! SHIT!"

The hair fell from my hands right onto the carpet below us causing a mini panicked stomp dance to shake the room and probably the downstairs neighbor's entire apartment but that also probably the least obnoxious thing they've heard from up here so what can you do I guess.

Welp...there goes that hex...

Pierce begins to walk out the door. "I will bring you more." and despite the screams from the other room, the only expression I could muster was a flustered smile.

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I hope you enjoyed!! Please feel free to send feed back, this whole blog is an attempt to work on my writing skills so I'm completely open to suggestions and constructive criticism!

Hope you all have the best day!

[ursuburbanmother]

I’m On Fire, But I’m Trying Not to Show It || Chapter Four

Pairings: Angus Tully x fem!reader

a/n: did you guys know fifty dollars back in ‘66 was like five hundred dollars??? I didn’t and now I wish I never did. Anyway I kinda just wanted to explore more of Angus and Y/n relationship before the event of the holdovers. So a little backstory on this one. I maybe got carried away. Also this is a long ish chapter cause I have MAJOR exams to take so yeah :0 it might be while till I update again.

Word Count: ~7.5k

Enjoy!

Four Years Before - June 12th, 1966

Your parents had fled to Barbados for a destination wedding which they would follow with a cruise they claimed to deserve. Although it was one of those rare occasions where they had extended an invitation, you had declined. The prospect of being able to stretch your legs on the couch without worrying if you would be crushing some unknown guest, or to be able to walk into rooms without crashing into a waiter passing out shrimp puffs, was much more appealing. You had been left behind with fifty dollars for your fun fund, as your mother called it, and a kiss on the forehead. The nanny your parents kept on retainer would check up on you occasionally only to find you were much better at cleaning up after your messes and doing ordinary tasks than your parents. She’d leave after a few hours and then over the course of the first week she stopped coming.

You had prepared yourself for a month of solitude after Angus had announced he’d be spending his vacation at a tennis camp in Montauk. You must have been reorganizing your bookshelf for the third time that day (once by alphabet, then by color, and finally by size) when you heard a knock at the door. The sun had just begun to set, the sky colored a purple-blue, and you cautiously decided to take your fathers golf club. You dropped the club shortly after opening the front door to find not the face of Norman Bates but of your best friend. You scanned his tear-stained face. His eyes were glossy and his cheeks rosy, like when one stands in the snow and is attacked by the harsh winds that nip at your skin.

He collapsed into your arms, and you are quick to hold him steady. He was crouched over, having had a growth spurt a few months earlier, making it hard for you to look at him eye to eye.

“What’s wrong?” You asked.

It was the summer of ‘66, where paranoid parents were starting to believe rock music would possess you. Ironically, it was the year Pet Sounds came out and you couldn’t stop rewinding the songs on your turntable. And most significantly it was the summer you spent with Angus.

He broke the news through jumbled words and choked down tears. How his father had been placed in a Mental Health hospital and how taking him to camp was just an excuse to make sure he wouldn’t be there when the people from the hospital came to pick his father up. They had apparently come early, mixing the dates up.

“Does your mom know you’re here?” You asked, hugging his torso.

“No. I'm sure she’ll be coming to check soon though,” he sniffled, “She’ll probably try to drag me to Montauk anyway and say that ‘it’ll be good for me’.”

You kiss his curls, “What if you stay here?”

He lifts his head up, “I’m not sure she’ll let me.”

“I think she will,” you reassured, “I am a very good guilt-tripper.”

“You can try if you want. How much did your parent’s leave you anyway?”

“Enough for both of us, don't worry. Even if we run out, we could whip something up to eat.”

His eyes widened, “Let's stick to take-out.”

Your house was the first place Angus’s mother looked in, just like he had predicted. He hid at the top of the stairs, staying away from his mom's line of sight as she pressed you for his whereabouts. You had been truthful about how he wanted to spend the next few nights here.

“Are you serious? I’m not going to leave two fourteen-year-olds alone, unattended, unsupervised! God knows what you’ll get up to.”

“We’re not going to do anything!” you argued, “We’re smart enough to not light the house on fire and to dial 911, in case we happen to. Angus just wants to be away for a little while. You should understand why,” you glared.

She looked down, shuffling her heeled feet.

“Besides, you take him away now he’s just to keep coming back here,” you sighed, stating the obvious.

She cleared her throat, coughing as she nodded, “Fine. Alright. Uhm- just make sure he calls me. Okay?”

“Okay,” you do your best to stop yourself from slamming the door in her face. "Bye.”

“The coast is clear,” you shout to Angus who came barreling down the stairs, skipping the last few steps.

“Did she look mad?”

You shrug, “A little. But she'll move on.”

He hums, agreeing as his eyes flicker around the room. He’s looking at the house he must have been at least a thousand times, whether because you invited him or because your parents did. And for the first time in either of your lives… it was completely silent. …

That first night Angus slept on your bedroom floor on a mattress you had dragged from the guest room. You had only your lamp on, and your window was open just wide enough to bring in the refreshing summer air. You were reading a few pages of your book to Angus, and when you glanced down you saw his eyes beginning to close.

“Do you want me to stop?”

“No. You have a nice voice is all.”

“Thank you. You do want to go to sleep though,” you observe.

“Should I turn off the lamp?” He says almost immediately. He lifts himself up slightly so he can reach your bedside table and waits for your permission to turn it off.

“Yes please.” You settle deep into your duvet. You turn to the side that faces Angus and wish him goodnight.

A few minutes later he speaks up again in a whisper. “Thank you again. For letting me stay here. I'll be out of here by next week, swear.”

“If you could, I would want you to stay here your whole life.” He scoffs at your words as you lean up with the support of your elbows to stare him down. “I’m serious. I only wish I could live in a house with you. Except somewhere far away from here.”

“By the beach,” he adds.

“Yeah. On a beach so obscure they can’t even send us mail because no one will know our address.”

“Oh no. How would your parents ever send you the invitation for your debutante ball?”

“I guess they’ll just have to throw it without me.”

“Shame,” Angus sighs. “I would love to see you in a white dress.”

You pause and then crash down back into your bed. You admire the garland that hangs above you. It’s made of postcards your parents sent you during their many endeavors. In that moment you're reminded of them and turn to Angus. “Oh. About that. My mom told me to tell you to prepare to be my escort in a few years.”

“Already?!” …

You and Angus had fallen into a routine. He’d sleep way later than you, sometimes until noon, and you’d wake him when you got too impatient and hungry for breakfast. He’d stir and groan to the point that it was obvious he was faking before finally getting up.

You would carry what you could from your kitchen pantry onto the backyard patio and eat under the summer sun. It was like an all-you-can-eat buffet of fig jam, English muffins and sometimes pears from the tree that stretched over your neighbor's fence. Afterward you and Angus continued your day in the green grass. He would sprawl himself out on a picnic blanket and read a comic book, wearing shades that were on the verge of tipping off his nose. Meanwhile you would tend to your mother's garden. You’d put on her straw hat too, just to make it feel like you were with her.

When you were little, you’d pull the weeds out of flower beds as your mom pruned her lavender. It was her dearest plant, and she treated them so, regularly nursing it to keep it alive. She’d motion for you to come with her and pick up the shears from the gardening shed. Eagerly obedient, you did as she said, and you would work together until called for lunch. Your mother was always a vivaciously elegant woman, always knowing the right things to say and charming anyone she met. You often wondered why you hadn’t inherited her brilliance, the one that made her seem as if she was glowing in any room she inhabited. It was odd that she’d often claim her ability to converse was her greatest ability when the two got along best when moving in silence.

You did your best to care for the plant too. Before you mom left, she asked to handle their upkeep. You took your duty seriously, checking in on them every day until you saw one sign of disarray.

That summer was like playing house. And although you never admit, for the fear that he’d read too much into and freak, it was exactly as you had often dreamed it to be. June and July passed quickly, and you hadn’t even noticed it. You imagined a life where it could just be you two forever, away from your parents and outside of stifling Massachusetts.

You imagined a life in an apartment described as ‘quaint,’ by the realtor to disguise the incredible small square footage. You wondered if he would like to be in a city like New York or Chicago. Somewhere that was always busy, and the chirping of morning birds was replaced by honking cars.

By the time August had rolled around, you could practically hear the unmistakable sound of the school bell ringing in your ear, warning you of its proximity. Thoughts about the future had you asking Angus one bleary Sunday afternoon, “Are you nervous about starting high school?”

Angus was pushing you on the tire swing, trying to give you motion sickness by twisting the ropes of the swing and letting them untangle a second later.

“Not really. It’ll be like eighth grade just with more tests.”

“I guess. But aren’t you nervous about making new friends and stuff? What if we tangled ourselves into a web so deep that we can’t talk to other people normally.”

“Then I have done my job of keeping you to myself.”

“Haha,” you deadpan, “Seriously though. Won’t you miss having me to talk to?”

“Of course I will. But you’ll write to me and crap… right?”

“Of course,” you echo his words back to him, “You’ll visit me when you get the chance too, correct?”

“Eh. If I’m not busy.”

“Angus!”

“Yes! Obviously, I will.” He pushes you a little harder.

“I do want you to be more out there though. Don’t go sulking in corners like you always do. People would really like you if you let them talk to you for more than one minute.”

“You’re starting to sound like my mother Y/n.”

“Seriously though. Did you notice we’re always addressed as ‘Y/n and Angus’ by teachers. Never just Y/n and never just Angus.”

“Yeah. But I like it. It’s like Bonnie and Clyde. You can’t separate them because then it sounds plain wrong.”

“Okay Clyde,” you roll your eyes. You stop swinging, scraping your shoes through the dirt until you are still.

“I’m giving us two weeks before we break down to each other over the phone.” You lose the hold you have on the tire swings and let them drop onto your lap. You simmer under the sun and enjoy the breeze that flows through your hair.

“Don’t go replacing me when you get to your school.”

“Don’t worry, you got a head start seven years ago. No one else will be able to catch up,” you smile teasingly. “Maybe I’ll find myself a boyfriend though. About time for the both of us, don’t you think?”

He frowns, “You don’t need a boyfriend.”

“Yes, I do. Everyone else does.”

“Since when do you do what other people do? I think you should stop talking to people who peer pressure you,” he flicks your forehead.

“Why?” You rub your forehead, “Do you want to be my boyfriend?” You smirk.

“Gross! No! I was just kidding. Get a boyfriend, I don’t care.”

“You wouldn’t care if I got a boyfriend?” You look at him skeptically.

“As long as he treats you nice and shit,” he rubs the back of his neck.

“It’s just that we do everything together Angus. There are some things I would like to get over with that I can’t do with you.”

“Like what?” Angus wrinkled his nose in confusion.

“Like hold hands and go to bowling alleys or whatever.”

“We’ve done that.”

“I like…kiss,” you whisper, fidgeting with your hands.

“Oh,” he chuckles awkwardly. “So would you want to do that … now?”

“What!” You shout, leaping off the swing and walking a few steps away from him. “I’m not asking you to,” you clarify, shaking your head.

“No, but I would like to be over and done with it too… so maybe we should just…” He motions his finger between you two.

“Uhm,” you laugh, tilting your head, “Wouldn’t that be weird?”

“Yeah, but it doesn’t mean anything. It’ll be just to check it off the list,” he shrugs nonchalantly.

“Um, yeah, okay,” you move closer to him in small timid strides. “You lean in though. I read that the guy is supposed to do that in my mother's Cosmopolitan.”

“Right, right,” he nods eagerly, interlocking your fingers together. With hesitancy he leans his head down and pulls you even closer to the point where you are bumping your noses. You close your eyes, and it's like your brain begins to spin like those show wheels with choices on them. Your brain tries to land on a feeling but loops on endlessly. His lips are softened by the humidity, and you don’t even notice it is over until a couple seconds after he pulls away.

When you think back on it, it really was the most 'first kiss moment’ to ever exist. It was more of a peck, both of you were bright red and shortly after you were as stiff as statues. Not knowing what else to do, Angus clears his throat and removes his hands from yours to wipe them on his shirt. “So, uh, what does your mothers Cosmo say to do afterward?”

You let out a breathy laugh, “I don’t know. I didn’t read that far.”

…

Christmas Eve - December 24th, 1970

After that summer, when you shared a weepy goodbye and headed off to your own high schools, it was undeniable that something had shifted between you both. Even if it often went unspoken. Neither you nor Angus had brought it up, but on occasion you would acknowledge it. Like last night after leaving the auditorium to return to the common room and pick up the dishes, your eyes drifted to the TV where a cheesy kiss scene was happening on screen. The two of you shared a knowing look that said, “That’s not how ours went down,” before shutting the television off and helping Mary into a more comfortable sleeping position.

You tried not to dwell on the past, but it was hard not to when the only thing in your childhood that had always been good, always been constant, was Angus. Every time you looked into his eyes it was like the decade you had spent together flashed by in a sequence of blurs. All he had to do was breathe a specific way in his sleep to remind you of some obscure memory that had died but he had brought back to life.

This morning you felt like you were ten again and Angus was trying to steal your bread rolls at Thanksgiving dinner. Except today he tried swiping your bacon as you shoved him off playfully.

“Get your own Angus,” you say playfully.

“I’ll trade you for my toast,” he offers.

Rolling your eyes you accept, grabbing the bacon and shoving it in his mouth, “Fine.”

“Thank you,” he says, muffled.

You munch on your toast and catch Mr. Hunhams stare.

“I see you two finally made up,” he comments with a sly smile on his face.

“Mm-hmm,” you cover your mouth with your hand as you chew and turn away embarrassed.

Mary joins you all a second later, emerging as usual with her coffee and a cigarette. She switches between eyeing the two men infront of her, “Why’d you two miss supper last night?”

Mr. Hunham and Angus freeze. “We went into town on, uh, some school-related business.”

“And you couldn’t call? You left me and Y/n out in the cold.”

“Yeah Angus,” you pout at him as he nudges your ankle under the table.

“Sorry,” Hunham turned to you, “And to Ms. L/n.”

“No worries. Really. I had fun,” you smile up at Mary who pats your shoulders gently.

Danny, a man you had been introduced to a few days ago, enters with a mop and bucket. You wave to him which he acknowledges with a slight bow of his head.

“Good morning, everybody.”

“Hi, Danny,” Mr. Hunham greets.

“Good morning. You can go on in and make yourself a plate,” Mary points to the kitchen.

“I just saw something funny,” Danny focuses onto your friend. “I walked into the gym, and somebody had vomited in there.”

Mary and you raise your eyebrows in sync.

“You don’t say. I don’t know anything about that,” Mr. Hunham feigns surprise.

“Yeah, me neither,” Angus wipes his mouth as he speaks.

“I’ll look into that right away. Thank you,” he dismisses the conversation.

“Mm-hmm. I see how it is. Trying to leave us out of your boy's club,” Mary tsks. Danny places the custodian supplies beside Angus' chair and walks away.

“Gross Angus,” you say, like it's his full name. You shake your head in disappointment. He nudges your ankle harder, shaking the silverware above. You fight back, beginning to use your hands as a defense. You two are soon in a game of tug of war.

“Knock it off you two! You are acting like fractious children!” Mr. Hunham scolds and stands up from his seat. Across the table, he tries to part your hands. “This is not how young scholarly men and women behave!”

You and Angus are too drunk on laughter to care. …

You and Angus are in a search for Mr. Hunham who stomped away upon realizing stopping you two was a fruitless cause. You intend to apologize; Angus intends to nod along as you speak. You follow the chatter you hear coming from the kitchen to find Mary replacing you as you as her sous chef.

“Hey that's my job,” you point at the potatoes Mr. Hunham is peeling.

“That’s the culinary industry for you. It’s cut-throat. You still want to be a part of it?” Mary peers over her glasses.

You run a hand through your hair, shrugging. “Um. Mr. Hunham?”

He stops his task, “Yes Miss L/n?”

“I want to apologize for my-,” Angus clears his throat, “Our behavior. You were right. It was very inappropriate. Emily Post would turn in her grave.”

“She certainly would. I accept your apology, however unnecessary. I understand it was that childlike spirit in you that is still intact that came out.”

You shoot him a quizzical look. “Uh yeah…”

Angus gasps behind you as he notices the tray of brownies on a table beside him.

“Brownies? God, yes. I want all of these.”

“Each of you just take one. The rest are for the Christmas party tonight.”

Angus snags you a brownie before practically chomping his down.

“What Christmas party? There’s a Christmas party?” He perks up like a dog being told he’s going out for a walk.

“Yeah, at Miss Crane’s house. I’m only gonna go for a little bit, show my face and say I was there. You know Miss Crane said she invited you too.”

“Who’s Miss Crane?” You ask, inspecting the brownie and wondering what Mary does so differently to get it to taste so good.

“School secretary,” said Angus with a full mouth. “Just one of the loveliest faculty members at Barton,” said Mr. Hunham at the same time.

A beat passed as you all noted the flustered expression that passed through Mr. Hunham face.

“Ah- anyways, she didn’t mean it. We were just making small talk.”

“If you don’t want to go, don’t go. I’ll take them.”

“Mary can take us,” problem solved, Angus thinks.

“Oh! Okay… so we are going! I packed a dress that’s been collecting dust in my luggage.”

“No, that’s not how it works. You’re under my supervision,” Mr. Hunham reminds.

“Okay, maybe it’s fine for you to sit around reading books all day, but I am losing my goddamn mind! Jesus!” Angus' suddenness makes you flinch. You avoid the flying brownie as he storms past you.

“Hey! Watch your mouth, young man. Not on Christmas Eve!” Mary yells after him.

“You, see?” Mr. Hunham points at his retreating figure. “I can’t trust him in a social situation.”

“Mr. Hunham, if you’re too chickenshit to go to that party, then just say so. But don’t fuck it up for the little asshole or his sweet little angel of a friend! What’s wrong with you? It’s just a party. What are you afraid of?”

“I don’t know,” Mr. Hunham said so quietly you could hardly hear him.

“Shit. Now you’ve got me nervous,” Mary wipes her hands on her apron.

You’re still standing there until they hear you go retreat the brownie and throw it in a nearby waste bin. “I could replace those?” You laugh uncomfortably.

“That’s alright sweetie. I want to come out of this party with my reputation intact,” Mary winks.

“Ouch,” you clutch your heart jokingly. “So can I go get dolled up?” …

Someway, somehow, Mary had gotten Hunham to take you to the party. You got ready in the room Ye-Joon and Alex had occupied before. You hadn’t anticipated wearing anything fancy, so the dress you had was a relatively simple one. It was red which fit the Christmas theme well enough and ended just above your knees. You hoped Mr. Hunham wouldn’t make a big deal out of it like Ms. Orchard probably would. You wore flats and did your hair the best you could without products. Although you had managed to give it some more volume by using some leftover soda cans that had yet to be thrown out. It was a common hack all Janie Patrick School girls learned in their freshman year. It was practically a seminar, as the senior girls taught you how to roll them into your hair just right.

You waltz out of your room, feeling as fresh as a daisy and catch Angus shaving. You sneak up behind him, putting your hands on his shoulder and looking at him through the mirror. “What is there to shave Augie? You’re as clean shaven as a newborn baby,” you tease.

You try to check your makeup and feel Angus stiffen under your touch. You remove your hands and see him staring at you open-mouthed.

“What?” You panic. Had you screwed up your hair? Was your mascara too clumpy on your lashes?

“Nothing,” he gives you a once over as he gulps. “You just, you look, you… you look pretty.”

“Oh,” you tuck your hair behind your ear, “Thank you. It’s just the makeup.”

“No, it’s not that. You always look pretty; I just never have a reason to tell you. But I can… today.”

“You look handsome everyday too…” you fidget with your hands.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” you smile up at him bashfully. Quickly you take the razor from his hands, “even more handsome once you change. We’re going to be late."

You run back to your room and try to regulate your breathing. In the reflection of the fogged-up window, you admire yourself momentarily. You suppose you do look pretty tonight. …

You four travel in Mr. Hunhams rickety car. You awe at the town Christmas lights before arriving in front of what you assumed to be Miss Cranes house. One by one you all enter, lingering by the front door like wallflowers. You inch closer to Angus, self-conscious suddenly. You loop your arms together when Miss Crane enters to greet you.

“Oh, hi. Oh, you made it! Welcome,” she pauses to address you and Angus, “Aw hi!”

“I'm so glad you're here,” she tells Mary.

She laughs at the flattery and refers to the brownies, “Where should I put these?”

“Um, oh,” Miss Crane lifts the cloth draped over the tray and gasps, “Those, I’ll be putting on my bedside table.”

“Oh! You're a wicked woman.”

“Oh, you have no idea,” she takes the tray off Mary's hands.

“Certainly a lot of people here,” Hunham comments, surveying the room. It is lively with Christmas classics blasting on the radio and kids running around playing tag. The entire house is decked out, almost looking like the spirit of Christmas had barfed out the decorations. Some adults take a swing of their liquor, others smoke, others do both as they chat.

“Yeah, yeah. Some family, friends from town. Only you guys from work.”

“That’s my mom on the couch,” She points to an older lady sitting by the silver and blue Christmas tree. Next to the woman dancing with her toddler who wears no pants. “Uh, that’s my sister Kathy and her son Marvin.”

As she continues to point out each invitee you wander with Angus further into the living room. He seems captivated by a snow globe on a mantel. He shakes it and watches as the snow falls around Santa. You too are enchanted by the sweet melody that plays from it.

“Angus!” Miss Crane snaps you both from your trance. Miss Crane stands next to a girl who appears to be around your age.

“This is Angus Tully. He’s one of our students at Barton. Angus, this is my niece, Elise,” she introduces.

“Niece Elise. Nice,” he glances at you, hoping you got the joke as Elise rolls her eyes at his word play. You give him a tight-lipped smile. “And is his friend Y/n L/n. She goes to the school across the lake from Barton. Janie Patrick’s.”

“Nice to meet you,” you stretch out your hand for her to shake. She does so awkwardly.

“And this is Mr. Hunham. He’s one of our finest teachers. History, right?

“Ancient Civilizations, yes”.

“And this is Mary Lamb. She’s the manager of the cafeteria.”

You don’t know why, but you start chewing your nails. A habit you had thought you had broken in the seventh grade. You bite down particularly hard every time Angus glances at Elise.

“Hey, why don’t you take Angus down to the basement and introduce him to our family tradition?” Miss Crane has a hint of something you can’t identify in her voice.

“Come on,” Elise tilts her head and hesitantly he seems to follow.

“Um. What about Y/n? Can’t she come?”

“Don't worry about that! I have someone I think she would like to meet,” Miss Crane nudges you forward.

“Oh?” you say worriedly.

Elise takes Angus away by the hand and distantly you hear him call out, “Wait what?”

“His name is Joseph Leery. He’s a freshman at Yale!” she gushes.

“Oh? Great? Go bulldogs? That’s the mascot, right?”

“Honey, save your charm for him!”

…

Angus descends downstairs. He repeatedly glances behind him, desperately searching for the remaining bits of your voice. “Um. Maybe I should go back upstairs? My friend Y/n doesn’t do so well with crowds so.”

“Nonsense! She’ll be fine. If I know Auntie Lydia, she’s probably introducing her to the Leery's son, Joe.”

“Joe?” Angus scowls at the name.

“Yeah. Family friend of ours.”

Elise leads him to an arts and craft table, full of scattered red, green, silver and white pipe cleaners. Glitter is spilled everywhere, and the kids take their time decorating their popsicle sticks.

“This is what you wanted to show me?”

“I grew up playing down here during my aunt’s parties. I think it’s kind of cool. There’s a purity to it. I mean, every child is an artist. The problem is remaining an artist when we grow up. Picasso said that.”

“Picasso’s cool,” Angus digs his hand further into his front pockets, “I saw Guérnica once. You know, the big mural, with the horse,” He tries to mimic it as best he can.

“Yeah, I know Guérnica. You really saw it?”

“Yeah. At the Museum of Modern Art in New York. It’s huge. My dad took me.” And Y/n too, he wants to say. Although if what Elise said was true, that Miss Crane fancied herself a modern-day cupid, then he figures he should try not to scare her off by bringing up another girl.

Although it's hard not to think of you when he thinks of his dad. His dad liked puzzles which you happened to have a plethora of that your parents had bought you to keep you entertained during long plane rides. This was before they trusted you enough to leave home alone.

In the winter you’d sit by the fireplace and lay out the puzzles of Monet’s Water Lilies. Then when the spring would offer you limited warmth, you’d all be found in the backyard of Angus’s house trying to piece together Van Gogh's Starry Night.

So many art inspired puzzles eventually had Angus’s father turn to you both and asking, “How would you guys like to see these in real life?”

That easter break had you three crammed into a yellow taxicab and enjoying New York pizza slices.

“Hey Guérnica,” she breaks through his nostalgia plagued mind, “You just gave me an idea,” she smiles.

…

Mr. Hunham stands by the funky-looking Christmas tree when he feels someone’s lips crash onto his cheek.

“Oh!” He says shocked. He feels as if he had just been dumped into a cold bucket of water.

“Mistletoe!” Miss Crane laughs, pointing at the little green and red plant that hangs on the ceiling. She hands him the Jim Beam he asked for earlier as she wipes the side of his face clean to get rid of any lipstick that might have been transferred.

“Yes, of course,” he laughs along, unsure of what else to do but to let her caress his face. “I didn’t you know you were quite the mastermind.”

Miss Crane tilts her head and motions him to elaborate

“Playing matchmaker for Mr. Tully and Ms. L/n.”

“Oh! Well, when Angus said they weren’t an item I figured they’d were itching for a chance to mingle outside of their little circle. I hope I didn’t overstep anything. After all I imagine they don’t get many opportunities to openly chat with people of the opposite sex! Dating is crucial in shaping character.”

“Yes, I imagine it is,” Mr. Hunham agrees, unsure if that is fact or fiction. He is awful at letting silence just be silence, so he does what he does best. Spew nonsensical facts.

“You know, it’s interesting. Aeneas carried mistletoe with him when he descended into Hades in search of his father.”

“Oh. Huh…” Now it is Miss Crane who is unsure of what to do with that.

“Um. Anyways. I like your tree. It’s really space age,” he comments and is hit slightly in the shoulder by her enthusiastic hand.

“I brought it to commemorate the moon landing!”

“Really? Wow.”

Miss Crane takes a sip of her punch, “So where is your family this Christmas.”

“Nowhere. I’m an only child. My mother died when I was young.”

“And your father?”

“Let's just say I left home when I was fifteen.” If Mr. Hunham had known this was what small talk topics had evolved into, then he must have been right in avoiding social functions all this time.

“You ran away?” She guesses.

“Worse. I got a scholarship to Barton. And from there, I went to college and never looked back.”

“But you did a little,” she points out.

“Hmm?”

“I mean you came back here.”

“Ah.” He really did not feel like being questioned so heavily tonight. Not to pat himself in the back, but he believes he's credible enough to label himself as a decent writer, able to handle the equal weight of a pen and his words with ease. But as a conversationalist, he figures even one of the dimwits in his Ancient Civilization classes have him beat.

“It feels kind of like home I guess,” he muses, “and I guess I thought I could make a difference. I mean, I used to think I could prepare them for the world even a little. Provide standard and grounding that Dr. Greene always drilled into us.”

Mr. Hunham can feel himself run out of breath, “But, uh the world doesn’t make sense anymore. I mean it's on fire. The rich don’t give a shit. Poor kids are cannon fodder. Integrity is a punchline. Trust is just the name of a bank.”

“Well…” Miss Crane tries to soothe him by running her hand back and forth on his arm, “look, if that's all true then now is when they most need someone like you.”

Mr. Hunham knows when he is being humored and told what people he wants to hear. He looks at Miss. Crane and for the first time in a while he is looked back at with genuineness.

…

Elise and Angus finger paint on a wide piece of blank paper. He’s mixing the colors, and they all tend to come out looking a sickly brown. Elise covers her side with an untainted red. She seems to be more into it than him as she incorporates real swirls and shapes onto their canvas.

“Am I doing this right?”

“There is no right or wrong,” she reassures. He feels her stare linger on him for a second. He is scared to look up. “Are you okay? You seem… gloomy.”

“Yeah. I’m fine. But, uh, tell me about this Joe guy.”

She looks at him suspiciously, “Why?”

“Just curious. Don’t think I’ve ever heard of him around my school is all.”

“Well probably because he graduated over a year ago.”

“So, he’s in college.”

“Yes. A freshman at Yale.”

“Yale!” He shouts loud enough for even the kids to glare at him for disturbing their fun. “Sorry,” he apologies to them.

“Would you say he’s cool,” he asks a millisecond later.

Elise tries not to laugh at his blatant desperation, “Yeah I would say so.”

“Funny?”

“He's basically Gene Wilder.”

“The dude from The Producers?!”

“Yes, and he was also a football quarterback.”

“What.”

“And valedictorian, and the heir to the Campbell Soup Company.”

“What the hell? Is this guy superman or,” Angus takes a minute to recognize the smug face on Elise. Finally, she breaks out in a loud giggle.

“Oh,” Angus sighs in relief, “You’re messing with me.”

“A little,” she says through fits of laughter. “Anyways if you’re so worried why don’t you go back up there?”

“I was just worried that he would try something. But technically he sounds alright.”

“Ah. So, you’re jealous?”

Angus rolls his eyes, “No. I’m a concerned friend.”

“I’m not sure about that. Concerned friends don’t start interrogating the girl they are on a hypothetical date with.”

She leans down to point at a glob of paint in the corner of the paper, “I think you even doodled her name.”

“Shit,” he curses under his breath, going over it and trying to cover it up along with his embarrassment.

“Don’t worry. It’s not like this was going to go be framed at the MET.”

“What are you implying anyway,” he narrows his eyes.

“You’re going crazy being gone from her for two minutes. What do you think I’m implying?”

Angus slumps his shoulders and admits what had been ignoring. It's like a message in a bottle he threw into the sea, desperately trying to avoid the shore. Even when it does reach land, the cap is tightly sealed, clinging on to the bottle and doing it best to remain unread. When it does pop open and the paper is unfolded, although it might be difficult to read, the message still exists. It still exists even though time fought so hard to destroy it.

“I do think about her that way. Sometimes. Then the rational side comes out and tells me that it's human nature for a girl and guy friend to think about each other that way.”

“Well, does she know you think about her that way?”

“No. Sometimes I imagine she feels the same, but you’d have to know her to understand why I’m so confused. She’s the most thoughtful, kind, and perfect person in the world. It's hard to tell if she’s showing that side to everyone or if I’m special enough for her to give me that treatment.”

“You know Picasso also said that ‘Everything you can imagine is real’.”

“Are you Picasso's biographer?”

Without missing a beat, Elise smirks and says, “Yes.”

Angus is up the stairs without having thanking her, too fueled by adrenaline to practice basic manners. He’ll have to tell Miss Crane to pass on the memo. He’s on the hunt for you but is yanked into the house's kitchen by a mysterious hand.

“Hey?” He asks, disoriented.

Danny is staring straight at him, with both hands on either side of his shoulder.

“I need you to find Mr. Hunham,” he orders. Angus looks past the man to see Mary weeping heavily into the sink. Understanding, he nods firmly and is back out the door.

…

Joseph Leery is not half bad. He’s kind of funny, clever and not a bad person to pass the time with. You sit in the back of Miss Crane's living room on a couch all to yourselves. He tells you how he’s majoring in English in hopes of becoming a journalist.

“What kind of journalist?”

“Investigative. I would love to be the next Upton Sinclair. Or Seymour Hersch.”

“Ew! The Jungle made me so sick for a week after. It was so gross.”

“I know but that's what made it so great. Exposing the meat packing industry probably put him on a few hit lists too.”

“Oh yeah definitely. So, then who are you planning to expose?”

He laughs, “I don’t know yet. Is there any chance you’re planning on becoming some corrupt politician?”

“Not in the foreseeable future. I’ll let you know if I ever do,” you giggle.

“What are you planning to do then?”

“Then? Um... Like as president? I don’t know. Fund schools-.”

“No,” he laughs harder, “I mean like with college and life. Do you have anything planned out?”

“Erm, not really. My parents probably want me to go to the Ivy Leagues and crap. I should have a plan, I know, but I guess I’ve been putting it on the back burner.”

“Why?”

You shift in your seat. “I have this friend. He’s sort of had this rocky life, not I haven’t, and I know it's stupid to mold your entire life to fit around one person’s but for him I would.”

Joseph sniffs and straightens his posture. “Sorry. Lydia didn’t mention you having a boyfriend.”

“No, I don’t,” you stress, “I just really care for him, you know. We’ve known each other for so long. He’s important to me.”

“Y/n have you ever read Persuasion?” he asked suddenly.

“Um, not yet. I know the gist of it.”

“Well, it's ultimately about regret, right? Anne spends eight years longing for Wentworth when she could have been with him instead, had she not given into pressures. The point of the novel is not to wait to love the person you’re sure is it for you.”

“Love?” You hear someone say above you. You look up to see Angus, his arms stiff by his side. He glowers at Joseph. You jump off the seat and on operating on some strange reflex you go to fix his shirt collar that has stood up.

“What's wrong?”

“What were you guys talking about?” he interrogates.

“Books. Why?”

Angus doesn’t buy it but ignores the gnawing feeling in his gut, “Mary needs us in the kitchen. Go ahead, I still need to get Hunham.”

“Oh…Alright,” you turn and wave to your brief companion. “Maybe I’ll see you around.”

“Yeah maybe,” Joseph lifts his canned soda as if to say cheers.

You walk on ahead as Angus loiters behind, silently scrutinizing him.

Joseph takes a sip from his coke and points towards the direction you disappeared to. “Your girl went that way man.”

Angus rolls his eyes but leaves, nonetheless.

…

Miss Crane and Paul are sitting next to each other, their drink half-finished. They can feel the red tinge on their cheeks and themselves becoming looser.

“Are you planning anything special for tomorrow?” Lydia inquires.

“No. Why? Are you having a…”

“No, I just thought maybe you’d be doing something special for Angus and Y/n.”

Mr. Hunham shakes his head and Miss Crane lets out a small gasp, “You should! Help preserve some of the magic. Angus may be a little difficult, but he’s still just a kid. So is Y/n. And life catches up to them so fast. Them,” she stares at her lap, contemplating. “Ha. Us!”

“You’re a very sweet person, Miss Crane,” he compliments.

Miss Crane melts, “So are you, when you want to be,” she quips, “and it’s Lydia.”

He enjoys the feeling of camaraderie between them. He feels a cool breeze at the back of his neck and the sound of the door opening.

“Excuse me for a minute,” Miss Crane gets up and moves past him.

Mr. Hunham turns in time to see a man take off his coat, a gift under his arm. A moment later Miss Crane is there to receive him with a kiss. Together they walk away, and Mr. Hunham is left alone. Once again.

“Mr. Hunham, could you come with me, please?” Angus nearly trips as he stumbles over to the teacher.

“Yeah, what is it?” He sighs as he gets up with a groan.

“Come on, it's serious,” Angus leaps away. Peeking at him at the corner to see is Hunham is following, “Come on.”

Mr. Hunham is dragged into the kitchen, where he spots Mary, crying quietly to herself. Danny is next to her. You’re across the room biting your nails and hinting at Mr. Hunham to do something.

“Mary? You alright?” he questions, even though he knows it's in vain.

“Just leave me alone,” She mumbles.

“Want me to take you home?” Danny offers, placing what he thinks is a consoling hand on her back.

“Back off! Back off!” Mary whisper-shouts, her hands shaking down in anger. Mr. Hunham shuts the door, giving her privacy if nothing else.

“He’s gone,” she erupts into full on sobs. The mask comes off and she’s no longer Mary, the woman who appears to deal with grief like it was nothing but a bump on the road. Instead, it's Mary, who lost a son and whose grief has entirely consumed her until she can no longer breathe.

…

Angus and Mr. Hunham support Mary on both sides, as they make their way to the car. “I was right. This is why I hate parties. That was a disaster. Total disaster!”

“Speak for yourself. I was having a pretty profound conversation. I was about to make some serious life altering moves,” he blurts, angry and unable to believe his window opportunity was slammed shut. He had an internal plan. That'd he’d whisk you away from stupid Joseph and ask you to dance, maybe lead you to a mistletoe and see where it goes.

“With whom? The niece? Are you kidding me? This poor woman is bereft, and all you can think about is some silly girl.”

“I don’t need you feeling sorry for me.”

“I’m not talking about Elise; I'm just saying this is the first good thing that came from being in this prison with you.”

“Need I remind you it’s not my fault you’re stuck here? Do you think I want to babysit you? I was praying to the God I don’t believe in that your mother would pick up the phone, or your father would arrive in a helicopter or a submarine or a flying fucking saucer to take you-.”

“My father’s dead,”

“Angus-,” he hears you say but he holds up his hand for you to stop speaking.

Mr. Hunham stops dead in his rant, “But I thought your father-.”

“That’s just some rich guy my mom married. Give me your keys,” he sticks out his hand.

“It’s unlocked.”

Furiously, Angus stomps away. You excuse yourself from the two adults before doing your damnedest to not slip on the ice. Flats at this time of the year were not your best idea.

“Angus,” you reach him, tugging at the back of his jacket so that he’ll slow down. “Why did you say that?”

“Say what?”

“The thing about your dad,” you mumble.

“The way my mom and Stanley talk about him, he might as well be don’t you think?”

“You don’t mean that,” you scold. “What happened? Are you really this mad about Elise?”

“No. Damn it. I don’t even like Elise.”

“Oh,” despite the circumstance, you can’t help but feel giddy. “Then what is it?”

“You seemed to be having a pretty good time yourself with Joe on that couch.”

“Joe?” You cross your arms. “You mean Joseph?”

“Oh great. You have a nickname for him.”

“Angus, Joseph is his legal name, that's the opposite of a nickname.”

“I don’t want to talk about Joe,” he says. You both reach the end of the block where Hunhams car is parked. In the distance you see them come closer, their feet crushing the white snow.

“You brought him up,” you massage your temple. You think back of the endless list of books you have read, or the many movies you’ve watched. You scour through the genres. You think of how Joseph managed to connect to life. You think of the rewatch of Cactus Flower with Mary. How envious Ingrid Bergman character was every time she saw Julian talk to Toni.

“Angus, were you jealous of Joseph?”

He stops his ongoing struggle with the car handle, finally prying it open.

“Were you jealous of Elise?” he asks you.

You frown and fixate on the pavement; your nails dig into your palm as your hands turn into fists. Deafening silence engulfs you before Angus exhales heavily. Before you can speak, Mr. Hunham arrives and motions for you to scooch over so he can open the passenger side for Mary.

“Sorry,” you apologize and get in the backseat.

“Straight to bed you hear me,” Mr. Hunham warns once you are all buckled in. “Enough theatrics for one day.”

“Mmhmm,” Angus responds, but all he is doing is looking at you.

[robbiefletcher]

a steady stream of smoke. hands red from the cold. the tell-tale rattle of a chain-link fence. slipping between the cracks. vanishing into a crowd. being able to sleep anywhere. stealing every lighter you’ve ever been leant. a hooded jumper under a workman’s jacket. thinking on your feet. being smarter than anyone gives you credit for. breaking and entering. sneaking your hand into somebody’s pocket. having your own back. doing whatever it takes to ensure your survival.

statistics.

full name:  robert fletcher nickname(s):  robbie, rob, bobby name meaning:  bright fame age:  twenty-five date of birth:  october 6th star sign:  libra place of birth:  tower hamlets, london current location:  various boroughs, london gender:  cis-male pronouns:  he/him sexual orientation:  figuring it out (but can and does sleep with people of all genders) religion:  agnostic occupation:  pickpocket family:  alfie fletcher (father, estranged) deepti adama (mother, estranged) education level:  a handful of gcses (left formal education at sixteen) living arrangements:  homeless financial status:  poor spoken languages:  english

inspirations.

jess mariano (gilmore girls) james cook (skins) jim hawkins (treasure planet) patrick verona (10 things i hate about you) ronan lynch (the raven cycle) eggsy unwin (kingsman) the artful dodger (oliver twist)

biography. (tws for neglect, parental abandonment, poverty)

Born in Tower Hamlets (a very poor area of London) in 1997.

Robbie’s parents were both barely nineteen when he was born, and adults in name only.

After six months his father realised he wasn’t particularly suited to family life, and disappeared off into the great blue yonder, never to be seen again.

Robbie’s mother couldn’t cope alone. With no support system behind her, an infant son to raise and no money to speak of, the odds were stacked against her. She spent a lot of time away from Robbie, ostensibly trying to cobble together the rent for the derelict flat they shared, but typically going out in pursuit of her lost youth.

The police finally came when Robbie was five. A neighbour reported seeing him hanging around the tower block they lived in at all hours of the day and night, never at school and seemingly unsupervised.

He was taken into care that same day, and hasn’t had any contact with either of his parents since.

He was fostered a few times in his early days in the system, but never for longer than a few months, and he always ended up right back at the group home. He was troubled, and he made trouble wherever he went.

In spite of this, he was obviously a clever boy, but categorically refused to try at school. He learned to read far later than his peers, but when he did, he scoured every book in the care home twice over.

Robbie started stealing as early as ten. First little things, sweets and magazines from the corner shop, but bigger when he realised he could get away with it. Some of the stuff he stole he’d resell to his peers on the playground, and then on street corners and down alleys as he got older.

Once you reach a certain age, it’s practically a given that nobody’s going to adopt you. But that was fine with Robbie, he didn’t need or want new parents, he was fine by himself.

He finally left care at eighteen, with a job as a waiter and a room at a halfway house until something more permanent could be arranged.

To start with, he really did try going straight, becoming an upstanding member of society, but what was the point? You broke your back all day for nothing, while other people felt entitled to treat you like a dog.

He was back to his old tricks in less than a year. He left the halfway house and his terrible job and didn’t look back, calling the city of London in its entirety his home, and robbing strangers to get by. He’s always said that possession is a matter of perspective, and it seemed that way now more than ever.

He’s been on the Jolly Rogers’ books (such as they are) for about five years. He’s very good at what he does, but he tries to keep his head down as much as possible - after all, what kind of thief likes to draw attention to themselves?

other things.

Robbie is passionate about urban exploration, and knows the best ways into almost every abandoned building in London. It's come in handy more than once.

When it comes to his work, there's no better opportunity to pick an unsuspecting idiot's pockets than at a tube station during rush hour. With nearly three hundred of them across six zones, he's spoilt for choice, and rarely has to hit up the same place twice in quick succession.

He hasn't had a fixed address since he was eighteen, though he can usually find somewhere to get his head down for a night or two - whether it's a friend's floor, the back of a city bus, or the bed of a one night stand, Robbie has developed a knack for being able to fall asleep anywhere.

Robbie smokes like a chimney, and thinks vaping is genuinely one of the most embarrassing things a person can do.

All his worldly possessions fit into one duffel bag. Sentimentality is a luxury.

The cinema is his happy place, and he does his best to see as many new releases as possible, regardless of what the film is about or what the reviews are like. His favourite film of the last year was Everything, Everywhere, All At Once, which he actually paid to see a second time.

As of writing this, Robbie has never been in love. Any relationship he’s been in (though “relationship” is a strong word to describe Robbie’s fleeting entanglements) has been based on what the other person can do for him, rather than any reciprocated feelings on his part. Men like him aren’t made for soft things, and if the dynamic starts trending that way, he’s quick to nip it in the bud.

[hockey-fics]

When We’re 25 ~ Nathan MacKinnon 

Summary: Twenty-five seemed so old for two eleven year olds sitting on the grassy field behind their school. Who would have thought promises made 14 years ago could change everything?

Word Count: ~4,000

Warnings: None

Video Source of Gif

A/N: Unedited and based a lot in the past so I tried to put together an accurate timeline but please forgive me if I didn’t get years quite right. 

Nathan MacKinnon. People always asked about your relationship with him. People always had. Because you were inseparable from the day you met. It was when you were eight years old and your third grade teacher put him beside you while completing her seating plan for the year when you first met. 

A few days later Nate invited you to come play soccer during recess. You spent all of five minutes playing soccer with the boys before heading off to the edge of the soccer field, picking a handful of wildflowers. You gave them to Nathan while walking back into the school after the bell rang and they stayed in his desk until they were shrivelled up and dead. 

You started going to each others houses after school and on weekends. His parents and your parents grew closer through the frequent trips to each other’s houses dropping off or picking one of you up. 

In grade four you weren’t in the same class as Nate and you cried the morning of your first day back at school. But still you still saw each other at every recess and lunch break. He would occasionally swap out playing soccer to spend the break with you. Other times you would drag your friends up to the soccer field to hang out on the sidelines, simply to be near him. 

It started early, the teasing from your friends. They would giggle and talk about how they were certain you two ‘like liked’ each other. Your parents made occasional comments too. Comments that would make your cheeks burn and turn a dark shade of red. Through everything you had always denied liking Nathan. 

When you were eleven years old your older cousin was getting married and your family took a trip across the country for the wedding. When you got back to school you were bombarded with questions from your friends about the trip. You talked about how magical it all was, gushing about the dress, the cake, the dancing, and in true childhood fashion, that the hotel you stayed in had a pool. Jeremy, a boy in your class, was sitting nearby, listening in on the conversation. “Too bad nobody will every want to marry you,” Jeremy muttered when you had finished talking. 

“Jeremy, you’re so mean,” your best friend had defended quickly.

“it’s just the truth,” he had replied matter-of-factly. 

You tried your best not to let Jeremy’s comment hurt your feelings. But the tears that welled up in your eyes betrayed you and before anyone had the chance to say anything else you were on your feet and fleeing to the closest bathroom so nobody could see your emotions. 

You were in the bathroom for awhile before your friend came in, coaxing you out of the bathroom stall. “Nate punched him,” she had said, so simply, as if it didn’t mean anything. 

You were shocked when she told you, scared about the trouble he was going to get into. And he did get into trouble, a week of missed recess breaks. 

You sat outside on the grassy hill behind the school with Nathan that day after school. 

“Sorry you got in trouble,” you told him. 

“He upset you.”

“You shouldn’t have hit him.”

“He shouldn’t have been mean to you.”

You had looked over at Nate and knew in that moment that he didn’t even know why he punched Jeremy, didn’t know what Jeremy had even said, just that he had made you cry. “He told me nobody would ever want to marry me.”

“He’s wrong.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I’d marry you,” Nathan had told you so simply that it made you giggle even at that age. 

“We’re too young,” you had replied, as if that was the only reason you two couldn’t get married. 

“When we’re older then.”

“You’re going to marry me when we’re older?”

Nathan nodded, pulling a tiny wild daisy from the ground and handing it to you. “If we aren’t already married to other people.”

“When?” You asked him, twirling the flower between your fingers. 

Nate contemplated the answer for awhile before saying anything. “Twenty-five?”

Twenty-five had seemed so far from that day. You were only eleven and you thought you would have it all figured out by the time you were 25. “Okay,” you had told him. 

The two years Nathan had spent playing hockey in Minnesota were incredibly difficult for you. You were 12 and going through so many changes in your life. The only thing you really wanted was to have your best friend around. 

When you were both 14 and Nathan had moved back from Minnesota to play in Halifax you went back to being practically inseparable. You went to as many of his games as possible. Even when you both had homework to do you insisted on being together, working quietly on separate assignments till it devolved into talking and laughing. Any opportunity to hang out together you would take it. 

When you were 16 you managed to convince Nate to come to a house party with you. One of the kids in your class had been left alone for the weekend which inevitably meant he was going to throw a party. Nate spent most of the night sipping coca-cola while you consumed jungle juice and cheap beer. 

Of course a game of truth or dare was suggested that night because you were all high school students who had access to alcohol and an unsupervised home. The lack of seating in the house had left you sitting on Nathan’s lap, his arms wrapped around your waist, your back pressed into him. 

“Y/N,” Lexie said. “Truth or dare?”

You had immediately opted for a dare. You were a bad liar sober, you knew there was no way you could have lied convincingly if they asked something you didn’t want to admit. 

“I dare you to kiss Adam.”

Adam was a year older than you, intimidatingly cool and attractive to you at the time. You had just turned 16 and you were beginning to feel embarrassed about the fact that you hadn’t had your first kiss. But that was not how you wanted it to happen. You hadn’t realized how long you had sat there in surprise till you felt Nathan run his hand over your arm. He knew. He knew that you hadn’t had your first kiss before and he had detected your anxiety immediately. 

“She’s not doing that,” Nate had declared a moment later. 

“Why not?” Lexie questioned, eyes narrowed and voice annoyed. 

“Because we’re dating.”

You had tried to keep your composure in the face of such a bold lie. You remembered the looks your friends had given you, even they were uncertain whether it was a lie or not because of how believable it would have been. 

“You’re lying,” Lexie had challenged. 

“Why would I lie about that?” Nathan slid his hands down to your legs, tugging you sideways on his lap and bringing one of his hands to the side of your face, turning your head to look at him. “They’ll believe us if I kiss you,” Nathan whispers. 

You swallow heavily, staring into his eyes. You wanted to kiss him, but you didn’t think this was how you wanted it to happen. You could feel the eyes of everyone playing the game in the room and suddenly the attention felt like too much. “I want to go,” you whispered back. 

Nathan didn’t need to hear anything else. He placed his hands on your waist, quickly helping you up before standing up himself. “We’re going to go home,” Nate announced as you walked out with him, hearing a chorus of ‘oohs’ in regard to you two leaving together after that announcement. 

You walked back in the direction of your house in silence for awhile until you passed by a park and you grabbed Nate’s hand, stopping him in his tracks. “Lets go on the swings,” you suggested. 

The two of you sat on the swings and talked for awhile, not about what happened at the party at first. “I just want it over with,” you finally blurted out. 

“Want what over with?” 

You had looked over at Nathan, fingers grasping the chain of the swing so hard your knuckles had gone white. “My first kiss.”

“If we’re going to get married we may as well try kissing now,” Nathan had said, laughing as he did. You knew the part about getting married was a joke so you assumed the rest was as well, giggling softly. 

Nathan stood up and walked in front of you, his hands moving to yours, gently pulling them off the chains of the swing. “I’m serious.”

Slowly you stood up, looking up at him with wide eyes. “What if I’m bad at it?”

“You won’t be,” Nathan had assured you, one hand around your back as he pulled you closer. “Do you want to?”

You had simply nodded, as if you were physically unable to say yes. Nathan had kissed you that night. Your first kiss ever. Afterwards you didn’t say much as he walked you home, waiting till you were inside before going back to his own house. 

Neither of you talked about the kiss again. You told everyone afterwards that you didn’t work out in a relationship that you were still friends. But a year and a half later, when you were almost 18 you brought it up again.

“You know how you let me kiss you to get my first kiss out of the way?” You asked, sitting on your bed with your school work spread out in front of you. Nate had been sitting beside you with his math textbook and a messy sheet of equations in his lap. 

Nate had looked over at you, eyebrows raised in curiosity. “Well I kissed you, but yeah. Why?”

“Would you do it again?”

“You can’t have your first kiss twice.”

“Not my first kiss….my first…time.”

Nathan had stared at you blankly for a few seconds, seemed skeptical, like you were tricking him into admitting something. “Yes,” he had finally told you. 

“Okay,” you had replied, slowly moving all your books off your bed. And Nathan did exactly what he said, taking your virginity that afternoon. And he was gentle and kind and everything you were hoping he would be. You trusted him with everything and you were glad you had trusted him with this too. Even though it happened only a few months before he was drafted into the NHL and then moved to Colorado. 

You stayed close when he moved. You texted and called and visited each other as much as you could. And you always remained determined that you were just friends. But you never felt the same connection you felt with him as you felt with anyone you had actually dated. You never felt as comfortable, as safe, as secure. 

Nathan had always done his absolute best to make sure he was there for your birthdays. There were a few years where he couldn’t make it work because of games. A couple of those years you decided to go to him, celebrating your birthday with a few friends in a hockey arena watching an Avs game before dragging Nathan out for drinks with everyone. 

This year he was particularly insistent about coming to visit for your birthday. It was your 25th and he was making it out to seem like a much bigger deal than you thought it was. It was just another day. 

He had come up the day before your birthday and the two of you spent every waking minute together. The day of your birthday you woke up to Nathan making you breakfast, coffee already brewed. 

“This is pretty impressive,” you said, shuffling tiredly into the kitchen and wrapping your arms around him, your head on his shoulder. “Thank you.”

“It’s your birthday, you deserve everything.” He wraps his arms around you, pressing a gentle kiss to the top of your head. “Now sit down.”

Giggling you pull away from him, taking a seat on one of the barstools at the kitchen island. “Ally said you guys made plans later but that I need to dress nice,” you comment, watching as Nathan flips a couple pancakes onto a plate. “Will you tell me what we’re doing?”

“No,” Nathan chuckles, setting the pancakes in front of you. 

Glaring at him you pick up your fork. “Fine, but will you at least come with me and help me pick out something suitable to wear tonight?”

“Sure,” Nathan chuckles, getting himself some breakfast and joining you to eat. 

Later that day you step out of a fitting room in a knee length red wrap dress, glancing in the mirror before looking at Nathan. “What do you think of this one?”

“You look incredible,” Nathan says, leaning forward in the chair he was sitting in. 

You glance over as one of the sales associates comes into the back, looking between you and Nathan for a minute. “Anniversary dinner?”

Laughing softly you shake your head. “My birthday.”

“Oh,” she says, smiling softly. “You two are just really cute.”

“We’re going to get married,” Nathan chuckles. 

“We’re not,” you tell the sales associate quickly, glancing at Nathan through the mirror. “He’s joking, we’re just friends.”

“Oh,” she comments again, grabbing a few dresses from a hanger before heading back into the store. 

“Nathan, what the hell?” You exclaim, giggling as you turn back around to look at him. “Is this the one?” You ask, gesturing to the dress and changing the topic. 

“Yeah, that’s the one.”

After changing back into your clothes you and Nathan take the dress to the front counter. When you notice Nathan pulling out his wallet you quickly push his hand away. “No,” you say quietly. 

“It’s your birthday,” he retorts, pulling a credit card out of his wallet. 

Rolling your eyes you give in, knowing you weren’t going to get out of letting him pay for it. Once you two leave the store you grab a coffee, spending the day doing nothing but hanging out with each other. And to be honest there wasn’t a single other thing you would have rather been doing. Whenever Nate was in town or you were in Denver it felt like a missing piece in your life was filled. 

It was many hours later before you were fully dressed and ready for the night, heading out with Nathan who insisted on driving because he refused to tell you where you were actually going. But it wasn’t long before you realized it was your favourite restaurant which you didn’t go to often because of the price and fact that you needed to make reservations weeks in advance if you wanted to be sure you could get in. 

Glancing over at Nate you smile softly, watching his eyes focused on the road in front of him. I love you. It wasn’t the first time you wanted to say it. In fact, you had even said it before. But it was always followed up by ‘you’re my best friend’ to take away from what it really meant. Nate looks over at you, catching you watching him. 

“What?” Nate asks, looking back out the window as he slows down and pulls into a spot near the front of the restaurant. 

“Nothing,” you tell him quietly, reaching over and unbuckling your seatbelt. “I’m just really glad you’re here.”

“Me too,” he replies, quickly climbing out of the car. Your attention is caught by the speed with which Nate hops out of the car, hurrying around the front of it. 

You can’t help but giggle, watching as he gets to your side, pulling the door open. “Almost broke into a sprint there,” you tease, eyes widening as Nate grabs your hand to help you out of the car. “It’s my birthday, not my coronation.”

Nate chuckles, closing the door behind you once you were out of the car. “Anything for you.”

You glance down at your hands, Nate’s hand still locked with yours. But you don’t pull away, keeping the embrace as you two walk up to the restaurant and all the way to the table where a group of your friends were already waiting. 

“Happy birthday,” your best friend cheers, hopping up to wrap her arms around you. “You and Nate look cozy,” she whispers in her ear while her arms were around you. 

Laughing you shake your head, pulling away. “Just friends,” you remind her, for what felt like the millionth time. 

“Right,” she draws out, rolling her eyes with a playful smile. 

After a few more happy birthday hugs and hellos you sit down beside Nate. Chatter ensues around the table as drinks are ordered. Shortly after you have a glass of pinot noir in front of you and Nate has moved a little closer, his arm around the back of your chair.

The dinner goes by quicker than you would have liked. A few glasses of wine and a delicious dinner later your friends are handing over the gifts they had brought with them. After you had opened the gifts from your friends you notice Nate watching you closely, clutching a little box in his hand. 

“Happy birthday,” he whispers as he hands the box to you. 

Opening it slowly you look down at the gorgeous necklace in the box. You knew immediately that it cost more than all the other jewelry you owned combined and it was more than you could have ever asked for or anticipated. “Nathan,” you whisper, looking up at him. “Thank you so much…you didn’t have to.”

“Oh my god, put it on,” your friend comments, downing the rest of her martini. 

You slowly and carefully pull the necklace out of the box and Nate stands up, helping you put the necklace on without hesitation. “Happy twenty-fifth,” he whispers before sitting back down. 

As soon as the words leave his mouth it all comes back to you. 25. You look over at him, staring into his eyes to try and figure out if he knew the weight of 25 as well or if he was simply saying it because it was a fact, you were 25 now. But you know that he remembered too. 

You try to keep your focus on the moment, on the dinner and your friends. But you couldn’t stop your thoughts from drifting the rest of the night. To Nate. To the necklace. To how much you loved him. To the fact that you were both 25 now. 

After dinner everyone heads outside and you can’t stop yourself from taking Nathan’s hand, pulling him a little closer. Outside you say goodbyes as everyone heads off in their Ubers. There was no question that you would be spending the night with Nathan. Your friends were around all the time and they knew when Nathan was in town you wanted to be around him as much as humanly possible. 

Once everyone was gone you turn to look up at Nate. The sky was dark, the evening cool but not too cold. The street was unbelievably quiet, as if the world had been put on pause. Everything felt perfect. “So we’re both twenty-five now,” you whisper. 

Nathan takes your other hand in his, pulling you a little closer. “And neither of us are married.”

Laughing softly you shake your head. “Twenty-five seemed so old at the time. I really thought we’d have it all figured out.”

“I do have something figured out.”

“Just one thing?” you tease. 

“One pretty big thing,” Nate tells you, voice quiet. 

“And what is it?”

“That I love you,” Nate says. “So much more than I’ve ever let you know. And I would marry you right now if that’s what you actually wanted but I don’t think a daisy when we were eleven is a great proposal.”

You inhale sharply, your lungs not seeming to be able to take in or exhale air steadily anymore. “Nathan,” you whisper, taking your hands from his and quickly lifting them up to wrap your arms around him. “I…I love you too. I have for so long.” Pulling back you look into Nathan’s eyes for a couple minutes before leaning closer. Nathan gets the hint quickly, closing the space and kissing you gently. It’s soft and passionate and so full of emotions that you feel a little dizzy, like you weren’t even on the planet in that moment anymore. Like it was all a fuzzy, incredibly dream. 

“Let’s go back to my apartment,” you whisper against his lips, still clutching onto him as if the second you let go everything that had just happened would vanish from reality. 

But you force yourself to pull away from him, to get into your car and go back to your apartment. 

You get to your apartment and you’re barely through the door before your hands are back all over him. He’s held you before, cuddled and hugged but when his hands slide around your waist this time it fills you with an unfamiliar excitement. Kissing Nate felt so natural, like you were made for each other. It’s not long before you’ve made your way into the bedroom, clothes scattered around the floor. 

While it’s not the first time you had slept with Nathan it’s the first time that it felt like it meant something real. 

The next morning you wake up wrapped in Nathan’s arms, a far cry from the mornings before when you woke up alone with Nate on the couch. The morning is slow as you climb out of bed, spending the morning cuddled on the couch watching tv and drinking coffee in nothing but Nathan’s t-shirt. 

“What now?” You ask after being up for a couple hours, back pressed to Nate’s chest, his arm draped over your shoulders. 

“What do you mean?” Nathan asks softly. 

“This…us. You’re going back to Denver tomorrow morning and we…,” you trail off, trying to hold back the fact that you were on the verge of tears. Blinking quickly you try to keep the tears from spilling from your eyes. 

“We what?” Nate’s voice is gentle but you can tell he doesn’t realize you’re about to cry, doesn’t realize how upset you are. 

You can’t stop the uneven inhale that makes your shoulders shake and Nate clues into your emotions. He reaches over, taking the mug of coffee out of your hands and setting it on the table beside him. He gently tugs your arm to turn you around and face him, pulling you into him. You rest your head on his shoulder as you let a couple tears slip from your eyes. “I don’t want you to go.”

Nate swallows heavily, running his hand along your back. “Come with me.”

A sarcastic laugh shakes your body as you pull back to look into Nate’s eyes. “I can’t just go with you. I have a job here, an apartment, and you live in a different country. I can’t just…leave.”

“I’d help you figure it out, you know we can deal with all that,” Nate whispers. 

“It’s so sudden, I don’t even know what we are. Are we together? Are we still friends?”

“We’ll always be friends,” Nathan tells you, leaning forward to kiss you gently. “But I think we’re beyond being just friends at this point.”

You kiss him back, you can’t stop yourself. Because it’s been years in the making. Years of developing feelings. It’s a few minutes before you manage to pull yourself back from Nate again. “What if I can’t find a job in Denver? Am I getting my own apartment? I can’t just move to a new country without some kind of, I don’t know…visa.” 

“Slow down,” Nathan says quietly, chuckling. “You don’t need it all figured out today. Come visit for a couple weeks, stay at my place, we can figure out the rest together.”

“Okay…I’ll go with you.”

“I love you,” Nate says gently. 

“I love you too.”

[lastxviolet]

The Assistant - CH. 1

Description: Summary - Her sixth year at Hogwarts was supposed to be relatively peaceful but after an incident on the Hogwarts express, Violet Wilkes finds herself the newest target of the Weasley twins. This, combined with a dark family secret, and the Triwizard tournament, makes her first few months back more exciting and stressful than every year before.

pairing: George Weasley x Original Female Character

warnings: pg-13. slow burn, eventual smut hehe

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28218804/chapters/69148695

The Dark Mark.

Cloaked figures running, burning, torturing.

The threat of a second war.

Screaming.

A sharp train whistle brought Violet Wilkes back into her body on Platform 9 ¾, its sound tearing her mind away from the horrifying morning news in the Daily Prophet just last week. The moving pictures on the papers front page had barely left her thoughts, even now, as she was steps away from saying goodbye to her family for nearly a year, the dark mark burned behind her eyelids with every blink.

She walked ahead of her parents and little sister, weaving through the crowd of fawning mothers and sniffling siblings, towards the very last car in the line, dreading the long journey ahead more and more with every step.

For the past five years, she had seriously considered not returning to Hogwarts, solely because of the egregious train ride from London, and this year was no different, except for the pit in her stomach from the thought of noise, people, and confined space was joined by the fear of her family's hypothetical imminent doom at the hands of Death Eaters. Despite the fact that no one else shared her fears.

She'd told them all week that the events at the Quidditch World Cup weren't a fluke. No one conjured the most fearsome symbol in their world nearly thirteen years after its disappearance, by accident. It meant something.

A terrible something.

And now, she was leaving them. Defenseless.

Her father hadn't picked up his wand in nearly a decade, and her mother had no magical abilities to speak of. Her sister, Olivia, would surely be a powerful witch in the coming years but for now, she remained a timid ten-year-old. They hardly stood a chance without her. That was if the events last week were as dire and fearsome as she believed them to be.

Of all people, she thought her father would understand her worry but he insisted that it wasn't going to be like 'last time.' Even then, she'd made him swear that he would brush up on his spells and hexes just in case you-know-who had returned and picked up where he'd left off, targeting blood traitors and their families.

The train whistle cut through the commotion again and they sped up to make the 11:00 departure. She glanced down at her watch; 10:58.

If they hurried, she'd make it. But if they didn't, the train would mosey on without her. Not that she'd mind.

She looked around at her fellow hustling peers pouring into the train and exhaled sharply. What if she just stopped? Dropped to her knees and refused to move. Missed the train and begged her father to let her go to a muggle school as her mother had. Her fingers gripped the iron handrail in the vestibule of the final car, and she hesitated, ready to throw herself back onto the platform but deep down, she knew it was already too late. There was no avoiding the journey ahead.

Her sister launched into her arms, squeezing tight before her mother's arms replaced them around her neck. She kissed her father's cheek last, lingering on his kind, dark blue eyes, staring at their own mirrored pupils in her head. He pressed one more kiss onto her forehead before stepping back to wrap his arms around the other halves of her heart.

A blood-traitor.

How could anyone call him a blood traitor?

Easy, she thought. It was the same way her housemates called her a half-blood. With condescending smirks and dead eyes.

She turned to enter the car so they couldn't see the tear falling down her cheek and rushed to wipe it away before she came back into view through the last window.

Her sister called out a final time when the train began to slowly move away and a wave of dread constricted her lungs. The sound was too similar to the screams she heard in her nightmares nearly every night. Fog from her breath on the window obscured the final visible moments of her family's smiling faces and wildly waving arms as the platform disappeared from view.

11:00. As one torturous moment ended, another, 8-hour-long one, began. The ruckus of running feet, excited hello's, and sporadic spell work was instantaneous and completely impossible to ignore. She closed her eyes and tried to tune it out.

She couldn't conceive why a wizarding school would trust their unsupervised adolescent students to not blow each other up when muggle schools barely trusted their docile coeds to use the bathroom alone. Other people's happiness didn't normally give her such a headache but the lack of professor supervision provided no perimeters on her peer's ability to run amuck.

She felt her stomach flip with the swaying movement. Bile burned her throat, as the seat underneath her moved back and forth, rocking in a nauseating pattern. The noise, in combination with the repetitive piercing whistle and lurching wheels thudding through London, was dizzying.

Distraction. She needed a distraction.

Calloused leather brushed her hip, reminding her that she'd anticipated this very moment. She thanked her past self profusely and dug through the bag until the pebbly fabric of her favorite muggle book scratched her fingertips.

The deep blue hardcover still precariously clung to its title even after years of wear and tear, reading and rereading. She caressed the carved gold words with a shaky, anxious finger.

The Princess Bride

By William Goldman

It was a pity that the Hogwarts library didn't cater to muggle-born students, she thought. Even in Muggle Studies class, assigned readings were books about muggles, written by the magical beings that walked among them. Wizard writers were wonderful but their ability to write compelling fiction was limited when they can do the unthinkable with the mindless flick of a wand.

She flipped it open and paused to admire her mother's swirly signature on the dedication page before turning to the first chapter.

"I've been saying it so long to you, you just wouldn't listen. Every time you said 'Farm Boy do this' you thought I was answering 'As you wish' but that's only because you were hearing wrong. 'I love you' was what it was, but you never heard, and you never heard."

"I hear you now, and I promise you this: I will never love anyone else. Only Westley. Until I die."

Eventually, the disorienting blur of houses, trees, and cars ceased— replaced by much more appealing, rolling hills and sprawling fields. The speed of the train was barely discernible as the scenery outside the window moved in slow motion, barely changing, monotonous and still, a comfort to her dizzy head.

She glanced towards the glass doors that were protecting her from the chaos throughout the halls and determined that the motion sickness and general discomfort had been suppressed. She took a deep breath and weighed the options for the second half of the trip. Stay, and finish the beloved book that lay open in her lap, or leave, and trade all peace for conversation.

Alone, but also lonely.

She'd probably missed loads of drama on the first half of the ride, and Sadie would surely be furious with her for being absent.

Sadie Baldock had plopped down next to her at the Slytherin table one random morning during her second week at Hogwarts. Happy to have some company, she'd let the energetic girl talk her ear off for the entire meal, not once interrupting or telling her to shut up, even though it would've been warranted. They'd been best friends ever since and she'd been an absolute treasure for the entirety of their past five years.

Despite Sadies strong personality and pension for gossip, she understood and accepted that Violet had no desire to be attached at the hip to anyone and gladly gave her space.

Alone and lonely, was much better than being suffocated, she thought. This had been her preference, even before she arrived at Hogwarts, and was sorted into Slytherin, her supposed 'family' away from home.

She scoffed and shook her head.

Family, yeah right.

Other houses might consider themselves family. Hers, however, felt more like a cage.

Families weren't supposed to be judgmental, at least not to the degree that her peers were. Families didn't shun disgraced peers for impure bloodlines or enforce generational loyalty without question. In recent years, the house had shed any sense of camaraderie left, even between those with pure-blood and ancient ties.

Due to this, tensions ran high and tempers were like time-bombs. It was exhausting to bite her tongue enough to remain cordial with most of the somewhat sane peers in her house and fly under the radar of the rest. She clenched her jaw, remembering Draco Malfoy and crew taunting her half-blood status and muggle mother.

Exhausting, but necessary, for self-preservation and peaceful existence. She occasionally betrayed herself with a viper-quick temper that was always simmering in her chest but most took it for stereotypical Slytherin nastiness, and not a haunting disdain for those who shared her green and silver uniform. This, a knack for potions and a morbidly dark wardrobe were perhaps the only evidence of a correct sorting.

Oh well, she thought. It was a bit late in her career to be considering a house change, besides, the sorting hat was a sod old brute who insisted that he was never wrong.

In actuality though, it wasn't all terrible. At least she had Sadie and the few other perks that came with the snake emblem.

The dungeons provided cool darkness that deprived the senses of any reason for restlessness and anxiety. Although the green uniform occasionally invited disapproving glances, it complimented her dark blue eyes and strawberry blonde hair much better than the blue and white of Ravenclaw, or heaven forbid the bright red Gryffindor insignia. And, she was only a few feet away from the potions classroom, where she'd managed to instate herself as one of the only students their head of house, Professor Severus Snape, did not actively hate. The bond had been painstakingly cultivated over the years the only that way he would allow; speaking when spoken to, correct answers, and perfect potions.

She stared out the window, focusing on the rolling hills, trying to let go of the gnawing feeling in the back of her mind that couldn't help but wonder if the hat had gotten it wrong.

Introspection was one of her biggest flaws. Sadie was constantly telling her to get out of her head and she knew that she was right. But, analysis always felt necessary, even about moments and emotions long gone. Sorting through every feeling, decision, movement; double-checking every second to make sure they were all accounted for, was compulsory.

Even now, six years later, she wondered whether she even truly belonged in Slytherin, and whether or not being sorted into the other houses would've been easier or even different at all. Would it have been better to be sorted into her father's Hufflepuff house?

Maybe, but unfortunately, when considering where to place her, the sorting hat had ignored her father and zeroed in on the countless other Wilkes before him, all in Slytherin, before deciding that she would be forced to pick up the lineage again. Not that any of them would ever know, or care.

She felt a shiver down her spine.

It was for the best that they hadn't any idea of her existence, let alone the continuation of their legacy.

She squeezed her eyes closed and the beautiful scenery outside dissolved into the Dark Mark behind her lids and the memory of photos she'd secretly found amongst her father's old school things. Photos of a boy, a few years older than her father, clad in green standing next to his younger brother in yellow and black.

A legacy, broken. A legacy, reborn.

She felt her heartbeat quicken and tried desperately to conjure the image of her sister, next year, with the sorting hat on her head, yelling any other house's name.

Screams from the next train car over tore her away from her thoughts. She jumped slightly and shook her head, glad for a distraction from the oncoming downward spiral. She'd forgotten where she was for a moment but another chorus of "no's" and laughter bursting through the door at the front of the cabin pulled her back to reality.

Pushing the doors apart slightly, she poked her head into the hall and moved to step out but voices stopped her. Loud, obnoxious, exuberant voices yelled something about "research" to an amused audience.

The Weasley twins.

Maybe the imminent doom she'd been worrying about wouldn't come at the hands of Death Eaters at all, but two idiotic and insufferable redheads instead.

She searched for an escape, eyes moving frantically, but her only option seemed to be a jump from the back door and onto the tracks below. Why hadn't she left to find Sadie when she'd had the chance?

Rolling her eyes as far back into her head as they would go, she sunk back down onto the bench and held her breath, hoping to miraculously turn invisible before the twins could sour her mood further.

"C'mon George, one last try," a voice belonging to Fred Weasley yelled over the last wave of students laughing and telling the twins to get lost.

She groaned, knowing that they were indeed coming for her. She couldn't think of a single time during her years at Hogwarts when she'd enjoyed the terroristic Weasley antics, but this moment was particularly ill-timed. Their talents for pranking were legendary and despite being in the same year, she'd never been a target or victim. But, it seemed as though her time had come.

She screwed her eyes shut, trying to find a single positive about the cursed situation. The nerves twisted her stomach into a knot while she listened to nearing footsteps. Maybe, if she played along and let them get it out of their system, they would leave quicker, and get back to ignoring her.

Another couple of torturous seconds crawled by before the twin who she thought might be George yanked open the cabin door.

She forced herself to breathe and tilted her head to meet them with a perturbed expression glued to her face; brows furrowed, lips pursed, and arms crossed. Every Slytherin instinct whispered in her ear to hex them back to London but the exhaustion from her emotional goodbye a few hours ago overwhelmed any anger left, resigning her to accept this fate without much of a fight.

"Well hello, Violet. Today is your lucky day."

She was right, the one coming in first was George Weasley. She recognized the two moles on the left side of his neck from Herbology last year when she'd fantasized about slashing his jugular when he wouldn't shut up.

He moved her feet from the bench opposite her, and she stared at him, noting that his slightly crooked nose also distinguished him from the brother coming in second. Once seated, they stared at her with intense brown eyes, and eager slack-jaw smiles —incredibly sharp features exaggerated by flowing radioactive red hair, waiting for an answer.

"Is that so?" she growled, conjuring a deadpan stare.

The twins straightened their chests and leaned forward simultaneously. "Yes, indeed," Fred said, the excitement in his face and voice completely unaffected by her cold response. "And we'll tell you why. George?"

"For a limited time only, you have the incredible opportunity to join us on an intellectual exploration," George explained. She shot him a disapproving glance before shifting back to Fred who was nodding fervently at his brother's side. "Groundbreaking research," he added, sensing her apprehension.

"I've never exactly thought of you two as intellectual," she sneered.

"Been thinking about us though?" George teased.

She cursed herself for the blush that formed instantly and shifted her gaze back to Fred who was still waiting anxiously to explain the situation.

"All you need to do is eat this delicious toffee," Fred said, producing a brown lump from his robe.

He shoved it towards her and unsuccessfully tried to hide the mischievous glint in his eye with a sweet smile.

She glared at him, remaining silent, unsure of what to say next. What were they trying to pull? And why did they think that she was going to fall for it this easily? Did they think she was stupid?

She narrowed her eyes and tried to ignore her bruised dignity. "You're joking," she drawled, earning fake looks of concern from both of the twins. "What makes you think I'm going to fall for that?"

Fred's long red hair covered his face slightly as he shook his head. "See this is where everyone keeps misunderstanding us, George."

George leaned across the small space between them. "Indeed Fred —Violet darling, clearly our offer is much too transparent to be a prank," he said, now a little too close for comfort. "This is product research for our business so please try and take it seriously."

She scowled at the pet name and leaned away. Why was he being so familiar with her?

Gryffindors. Always too friendly to be trusted. At least her fellow Slytherins never tried to hide their agenda, no matter how much their bluntness stung.

It was difficult to gauge how to best get rid of them. Their puppy dog eyes didn't seem to be affected by rudeness, if anything, it seemed to egg them on further. She decided to try another route instead, hoping to catch them off guard.

"Fine. In the spirit of transparency, say that I do eat it," she said. "What will happen to me?"

Their coy confidence turned to surprise. "It's only ever been tested on a Muggle so we have no clue," George confessed matter-o-factly. "Hence it being such a great research opportunity."

"You'd be a pioneer," Fred finished, a stupid confident grin returning to his face. "Maybe even a legend."

Violet looked down at Fred's outstretched arm and plucked the brown ball from his hand. She stared at it skeptically and brought it up to her nose. It smelled just like normal toffee, but no way it was that simple.

The twins exchanged a nervous glance and she could tell that they were holding their breath.

They most likely doubted her ability to take a joke and were probably nervous about the outcome of their prank, if she did indeed fall for it.

She couldn't blame them, of course. Last year, Blaise Zabini, one of Malfoy's toadies, joked about her mother being a muggle during the Halloween feast, and nearly the whole school had witnessed her merciless rebuttal. She stifled a smile, remembering the look on his face when she'd stuck her wand in his mouth and said "Langlock." His friends had scrambled and scratched to open his mouth again and Madam Pomfrey had about reached her wits end trying to figure out how to separate his tongue from the roof of his mouth. She wondered if they'd been there for that, but the sudden hesitation in George's smile told her they were well aware of her short fuse.

Lucky for them though, she didn't have enough energy to fly off the handle today.

She slipped her wand out of her bag and touched the tip to the toffee, muttering a revealing charm. "Specialis Revelio."

The twins lunged forward to snatch their sweet back, but she was quicker.

"An engorgement charm?"

"That's cheating," Fred protested.

"What is this?"

They stared at her with a mixture of defeat and annoyance.

"It's a ton-tongue-toffee," George said grimly. "The newest product from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes."

She remembered him talking about his plans for a joke shop constantly in Herbology, while his gaggle of admiring Gryffindors hung onto every word but she never thought he could be serious about such a stupid career endeavor.

She frowned. "That's idiotic."

"That's the whole point," Fred snapped. "It would've been funny if you hadn't taken the easy way out."

"What would have been funny?" she countered, relishing in their sudden mood shift from smug to perturbed. "Me casting a counter-charm as soon as I felt my tongue swelling? I thought you two were supposed to be good at pranks."

She tried to hide her delight at the ability to get under their skin. Their presence was unwelcome but not as completely intolerable as she had expected, even as their cheerful nature and goofy grins faded, they were almost bearable.

Suddenly, she saw something dark shift over George's gaze. "Well then eat it, if you're so sure."

Violet's eyes widened, unprepared for the confident challenge. Irritation moved swiftly through her chest. She tried to hide her nerves and glanced down at the ball in her hand. It would be easier to tell them to leave, or even get up and walk away but she couldn't let a Weasley best her.

If living inside of her head was her first flaw, then pride was her second.

Her eyes bore holes into George's, and regardless of what happened next, his look of shock was prize enough as she popped the lump into her mouth. The toffee was a little warm and soft but not inedible, she wondered if their mother had made it.

Her mouth was fuzzy before she even swallowed, and as she had suspected, her tongue began to swell profusely. She poked the tip of her wand to her tongue as it flopped out of her mouth, nearly reaching twice its size.

"Reducio."

The twin's mouths dropped open in shock before they exchanged a curious glance. Even though the counter-charm came out with a slight lisp, as quick as it had happened, her mouth closed around her normal-sized tongue, the caramel-like taste of toffee on her lips all that remained of the prank.

She broke her staring contest with George and glanced back to Fred, but neither looked like they were going to say anything.

Arrogance replaced her irritation and she just couldn't hold back.

"Had you not thought of that?" She asked with a smug smile. "I hope none of your other products are so easily reversible. Who would want to buy something so temporary? Faulty merchandise is hardly a way to run a business."

They both stared at her in displeasure, but George looked more enraged than anything, not that she cared about hurting his feelings. This was turning out to be quite fun, she thought.

"Well, you've been a lovely assistant," Fred said, trying to quell the tension and clearly over the situation. "C'mon Georgie, finding someone less capable than Wilkes will be a snap."

George didn't budge. He just stared back at her, his brow furrowed, like he couldn't remember her name anymore. The thoughtful expression was freaking her out. She waited for him to return to the annoying ginger twat who had entered her cabin without permission but his expression didn't change.

His eyes searched hers for something but she couldn't tell what. She chanted 'fuck off' in her head, hoping that he could see the sentiment reflected in her eyes.

How odd, looking at them now, they weren't identical at all. While Fred seemed to operate as their crazy motor, George was something else…steering wheel maybe? Regardless, she was glad their exchange was coming to an end.

"What would you suggest then?" George inquired with a sneer, standing up to follow his brother out the door. "Since you're so smart."

As if she'd help them.

George loomed over her, blocking her view of anything else. She stared up at him defiantly, not letting his size intimidate her. The question lingered in the thick air between them, ringing in her ears over and over. Surprisingly, she did indeed have an answer to his inquiry, not that she was going to say anything. They didn't deserve her help, even if she could mask it as superiority. She waited for him to leave but he seemed just as content sitting in their tension as she was.

He smirked and that threw her over the edge.

Besting him in his expertise would be a satisfying final nail in the coffin and he'd asked for it. She didn't mind him this way, begging her to intellectually best him.

"Potions," she blurted.

She watched his eyes widen. "What?"

"Potions," she repeated wearily. "If you had used Swelling Solution, it wouldn't have been detectable by a revealing charm and no one would take the time to brew its antidote. Victims would be stuck with a fat tongue until the effects wore off, which, apparently, is funny."

It had meant to sound smug but it came out too much like she was tutoring him in earnest. He looked just as surprised at her tone as she was and stood up a little straighter, before reaching for the door. She glanced down at her hands, aware of his eyes still on her, and cursed the sincerity in her voice, hoping he wouldn't take it seriously or respond.

Thankfully, the door clicked shut and his footsteps disappeared down the hall, without another word. She sighed in relief and stuffed the book back into her bag to finally go find Sadie.

Violet shook the strange interaction with the Weasleys from her head and pushed through, packed train car, after packed train car before reaching the self-anointed 'Slytherin Only' door. Out of all the options on the train, her house had managed to claim the worst one. The tables and benches were much more uncomfortable than the stuffy cabins and the openness of the room made every ride a free-for-all.

The window fogged from her breath for a moment but through the sea of green, black, and silver, she could just make out the short, dark-haired girl she'd been looking for.

She wove through the room, focusing on Sadie's scowling face, at the back table. She followed the witch's death glare to a gaggle of girls surrounding Draco Malfoy across the room, holding up some Quidditch pamphlet that was somehow making them squeal. She pushed through a group of large boys lurking around a few older sixth years and successfully made it the length of the train without anyone trying to speak with her, or leer something hurtful, which was prone to happen.

"I was beginning to wonder if you even got on," Sadie said.

"Please, hold your applause," she responded, thankful to hear her friend's voice after months apart.

Sadie smirked knowingly. "Did you yak?"

Violet sat on the bench across from her. "Nope. Almost threw myself out of the window near Manchester though, when the Weasley twins raided my compartment."

She thought about recounting the entirety of the strange interaction but decided against it, as Sadie already seemed perturbed enough.

"Merlin, those spazzy gits never take a day off. We haven't even started the school year yet," she murmured. "Please tell me you unleashed your wrath on them."

Before she could answer, a chorus of ooh's and ahh's erupted from the show going on at the front table.

"Oi get a room or shut the hell up," Sadie yelled, earning her more than a few dirty looks around the room and an especially sour sneer from Malfoy himself.

"Shove off, Baldock," Malfoy sneered.

Normally, Violet would've laughed but she didn't particularly feel like drawing attention to herself today so she turned to avoid his gaze.

"I swear, those girls should be over that albino twat by now," she scowled, staring daggers into Malfoy's back.

"Not everyone has your refined taste Sades."

Her friend fell silent, gazing towards the blond boy dreamily. "Vi, do you think I could kill him? Snap him like a twig or something?"

She laughed and turned slightly, ensuring that Malfoy's ominous gaze was off of them. "Surely he deserves a more painful death than that."

She shifted in her seat to rest the side of her face against the window and smiled at Sadie's hearty, murderous cackle. The cool glass quelled any queasiness left as she watched the sunset over Scotland, signaling that the ride was almost over. Despite her surroundings and previous disposition, it was quite beautiful.

As she has suspected, Sadie recounted the first couple hours of the ride with impeccable detail. Pansy Parkinson had gotten an unfortunate haircut, Theodore Knott had gotten hotter over the summer, and Malfoy wouldn't shut up about the Quidditch World Cup.

Her mind snapped to the dark mark once again. Of course, the Malfoy's had been in attendance.

"He was there?" she whispered across the table.

"Of course he was. As if his family would miss an opportunity to show off to the whole world," Sadie said rolling her eyes.

"What did he say about it?"

"Just the usual. Father this, ministers box that. Gloating twat."

"Did he say anything about the ending…about the Dark Mark?"

Violet's ears rang.

A forgotten picture she'd stumbled upon in her father's abandoned school photo album flashed in her mind once more. Lucious Malfoy swinging his arm around her uncle, clad in Slytherin robes, a year before the war started. Their smiling faces were unburdened from what was yet to come.

The same Lucious Malfoy who was charged with being a Death Eater, but ultimately exonerated.

Sadie shrugged. "Just that he saw Potter running scared like a little girl," she said plainly before launching into the details of her summer. It was the same every year; she fought with her sisters and mother all summer long, and then cried like a baby while saying goodbye to them on the platform.

Violet attempted to tune her out and glanced at the cruel blonde.

This was the closest she'd been to him in nearly two years. Ever since Lucious had recognized her father on the platform, she'd taken every precaution to dodge him in every meal, class, or school event, in order to avoid the things that he knew about her.

The image of both Malfoy's smiles twitching smugly as Lucious recanted the Wilkes family history to his monstrous son on the train platform flashed in her mind. Her father had ushered the family away, uncaring of the secrets that would follow her to school and unwilling to speak about it.

She knew he knew, and even though he had every opportunity to tell the whole school, he didn't. Or rather, hadn't yet, like she knew he would someday. She could tell that he was waiting for the most opportune time by the way he said half-blood, and blood traitor instead of her name and the way his eyes were always just a little too confident when regarding her. The anticipation and fear seemed to be torture enough, for him. Surely though, it was only a matter of time.

His presence suddenly became too much. The thought of sharing a room with someone so amused by the ridicule of anyone who wasn't of pure-blood made the taste of bile claw up her throat.

"Sades," she interrupted her friend who was still animatedly speaking. "Wanna head back to mine and change?"

The dark-haired witch nodded and chattered on.

She led them both back down the train, breathing freely again among less threatening red, blue, and yellow students. She was relieved to have Sadie rambling at her side, yelling at first years in their way, and shoving leering seventh-year boys back into the cabins.

They finally reached the last car, and suddenly, she felt her breath hitch in her throat. A tall redhead was leaning against the wall outside of her cabin. He was staring down at his shoes and muttering something. She couldn't tell which one it was from this angle but had a hunch.

Two times in one day? She must be cursed.

Her stomach tangled itself once more with nerves. Maybe he'd come back to enact some cruel revenge on her, for thwarting his prank. She gripped Sadies hand a little tighter, thankful to have her as a backup if things went south. The sound of her footsteps made him finally lookup. She wasn't expecting the expressionless look on his face, and suddenly she doubted that he wanted to harm her at all.

Sadie saw him not a second later and pushed past her, letting go of her hand and yelling, "Bothering her once wasn't enough, you back for more Weasley?"

George's calm face suddenly contorted into panic as Sadie shoved past him and into the cabin. Violet didn't move, and stared at him from a few paces away, unsure of what he was doing if not pranking her.

She hadn't noticed his height earlier when they were sitting, but now that she stood in front of him, it was a shock to be eye level with his chest. Concealing her nervousness to the best of her ability, she met his eyes.

"What?" She said deadpan, hoping to convey his unwelcomeness as much as Sadie had.

He furrowed his brow and looked down at the ground for a moment, failing to hide a flustered blush.

"Sorry…erm — I thought I forgot something —talk to you later," he mumbled through a forced smile. The sudden change in demeanor was surprising. His attempt at confidence was oddly manufactured and she saw, for the first time, a glimmer of shyness.

Git. He probably needed his brother for backup.

Before she could say anything, he brushed past her and sped down the hall and out the door.

"What the bloody hell was that," Sadie said, scrunching her nose in annoyance. "Freaks, the lot of them."

Violet's stomach detangled itself and she turned to watch the floppy long hair retreat from view. She nodded in agreement but kept her mouth closed.

[nanoland]

new chapter (lucifer fic)

Ponder on the Narrow House, part 6 

Mazikeen/Eve/Michael  

(Whole thing can be read on AO3.) 

0  

Fuck the next bounty.

After thinking about it for ten seconds, Mazikeen turned them around and started driving straight for Los Angeles.

Eve can talk to him. Not me. He needs to talk to someone, and Eve will do.

Barely half a mile later, Amenadiel dropped out of the sky and landed in the middle of the road, just far enough away for her to bring the car to a screeching halt before it would otherwise have slammed into him like wet clay into a steel wall.

“We’ve got a problem,” he said, looking exhausted.

She snorted and pointed skyward. “Yeah. This? Not gonna lie, I was expecting something like this. But I thought it would take, like, at least a month.”

Wincing, Amenadiel said, “No, that’s… that’s a different problem and Chloe’s promised to discuss it with him. Maze, we need you back at Lux. Now.”

“Hi, Amenadiel!” Eve called, waving.

He succeeded in smiling at her without even glancing at Michael, despite his younger brother sitting right at her side, glaring fixedly.

“Why?” demanded Mazikeen, tensely drumming her fingers on the wheel. (Inner voice hissing, Shouldn’t have left him alone, you dumb bitch, you’ve been doing this for centuries and you know what he’s like when you leave him alone for more than five minutes.) “Seriously – what could he possibly need me for? He’s God.”

Sighing, Amenadiel put his wings away. “Mazikeen, we’re all well aware that Lucy often… has difficulty focusing. To put it mildly. There’s a lot more for him to focus on now than ever before. He’s trying to undo climate change. To that end, he started refreezing all the melted ice in the Arctic. But he did it too quickly and, resultantly, there are several hundred trapped ships we need to save and several thousand dead penguins to resurrect and, to be honest, he hasn’t really got the hang of resurrection yet – you remember what Dan looked like for the first few hours after Lucifer brought him back to life…”

“Eurgh. Yeah. Yuck. Totes not the kinda shit you’d wanna see in Happy Feet.”

Michael was snickering.

“Right. And then there are all the changes he’s been making locally,” Amenadiel went on. “The expansion of Lux, the overnight disappearance of all Los Angeles’ firearms, his deciding that the city’s white supremacist population should grow a third ear so they can be easily identified, and, well, it turns out that a lot of Chloe’s colleagues at the police station-…”

“I get it, I get it. Chaos everywhere. As usual. What, exactly, is the problem he wants me to fix?”

Amenadiel exhaled heavily. “The demons. The ones you brought from Hell to help us defeat Michael.”

“Oh, so you do remember I exist,” Michael muttered.

Stonily ignoring him, Amenadiel said, “They’re still on Earth and they’re causing trouble. The one called Dromos, in particular. He’s gathered followers and they’ve surrounded Lux.”

Her brother’s face – his real face, not the human puppet he wore – flashed through her mind’s eye; a memory from when they were unruly children and had raced through Hell together, using the stone pillars that they’d not yet known were cells as an obstacle course. She’d been faster; he, more athletic. Together with a few cousins, they’d made a fearsome team, and not even their meanest older siblings had bullied them.

She folded her arms and looked away. “They’re demons. Lucifer can deal with them. Snap his fingers and turn them into rats or whatever. Make them explode.”

“Mazikeen,” Eve murmured, soft and low, touching her shoulder. “You don’t want that. They’re your family.”

Amenadiel blinked, as though that hadn’t occurred to him. “Er… yes, there’s that. There’s also the fact that Lucifer doesn’t want all of humanity to see him as the type of God who casually annihilates his enemies; a harsh, vindictive God. He wants to be liked. To be loved.”

“Fine. So why don’t you and the other angels sort it out?”

“Come now, Maze. A bunch of angels and a bunch of demons waging war in the midst of a bustling city? Humans will die. But you’re the Queen of Hell now and, by extension, the Queen of Demons. If you command Dromos to stand down, he will. This can all be resolved peacefully.”

Eve’s fingertips were cool against her skin.

Mazikeen looked back at the sky. The cloud letters were starting to dissolve. “What does he want?”

“Who?”

“Dromos. He doesn’t act on instinct. He’s a planner. He wants something.”

Shrugging, Amenadiel said, “He shouted at me about demanding an audience with the king. I didn’t ask for details. I don’t really care. Dromos isn’t someone I’m inclined to listen to at the best of times. The last time the wretch showed his face on Earth, he kidnapped my son.”

“Mmm. Kinda like your sister was gonna do. Kinda like you were gonna do, now that I think about it.”

“Maze!” he gasped, sounding shocked and hurt. “You can’t compared poor Remiel’s misguided actions to-…”

“I’ll do it,” she interrupted. “Take me to Lux. Now.”

“Excuse me? What about us?” snapped Michael.

Mazikeen met Eve’s gentle gaze. “You don’t need to be involved in this. My family drama, it – it’s not pretty.”

“My son killed my son,” said Eve, taking her hand. “My husband loved another woman. I’m used to drama.”

Swallowing, Mazikeen glanced at Michael. “And you, wimp?”

Feigning disinterest – feigning it badly – he said, “You showed up to my last domestic dispute. Guess this’ll make us square.”

“I’ve only got two arms. I can’t carry all of you,” Amenadiel pointed out.

Mazikeen rubbed her chin. “No… but you can carry the car, right?”

0

He didn’t have time for this. There was so much to do.

“World hunger,” he recited as he bounced from one laptop to the next, all twenty-three of them displaying a different article or video by a leading scientific or sociological mind, “wealth inequality, pollution, cancer, droughts, racism, elderly abuse, housing shortages, cruelty to animals…”

“Lucifer,” said Linda patiently, sitting on his best couch with her legs crossed, a cup of coffee and a laptop of her own beside her. “You said you wanted my advice as to how you should manage this whole ‘being God’ business.”

“I do, doctor! Very much. Your input is invaluable. Blast, where did I put that map of Alaska? I’m thinking of making it bigger; slotting it in alongside the Arctic to help stabilise all that new ice.”

“Right. Thanks. So here – here is what I’m suggesting now; slow down. Seriously. Take a breath, step back, and think your next move through.”

He scoffed. “‘Slow down’? Doctor, I need to work at least three times faster if I’m to keep up with everything. There are people suffering everywhere, millions of them! There are sinners in need of punishment! I’m seriously considering asking Chloe to be my Deputy God. I never imagined omnipotence would entail so much paperwork and she’s always been better at that than me.”

Outside the penthouse, many stories below, the chanting grew louder. None of the human police officers, journalists, and gawkers who’d gathered to watch could understand it; it was in Lilim.

Cursing, Lucifer strode to the balcony and shouted down, “For the last time, would you all kindly piss off? I’m trying to fix an entire planet here!”

He heard the elevator open and moaned. “Detective, not now. Please. I’m very sorry I haven’t returned your calls – I swear I’m not avoiding you – it’s just that I’ve got a lot on my plate today and we did already agree to meet for supper at-…”

“Lucifer,” said Linda, sounding terrified.

“Lucifer,” said someone else, sounding irritable.

Now that he was God, rage didn’t turn his eyes red anymore. It turned them gold and blindingly bright, like spotlights. Fists clenched, he turned to see Dromos step into the penthouse, once again clad in the flesh of the late Father Kinley and wearing a leather jacket.

“Nice trick, making all the doors disappear. Finally decided to climb up the side of the building with a sledgehammer and burrow my way through into the elevator shaft,” said the demon, hands in his pockets and concrete dust coating his beard and his bald head. “I want to talk to you, sire.”

Storming across the room while Linda remained frozen, white-faced, on the couch, Lucifer snarled, “You! You have the nerve to come here, to stand before me, after what you did to my nephew?”

He took Dromos by the neck and lifted him off the ground, his wings opening in fury (he had six of them now).

Stoical even as he choked, Dromos said, “I need. To talk. I will leave immediately afterwards.”

“Oh, you’ll leave, alright! You’ll be lucky if I don’t throw you into an active volcano, you accursed traitor!”

Dromos’ stolen skin began to sizzle beneath his fingers. He waited until the demon’s face was wrinkled with pain before throwing him to the floor hard enough to crack the wood and make a crater.

“I will leave,” Dromos gasped, coughing up blood, “when I have spoken.”

“What could you possibly have to say for yourself? Kidnapper. Child-thief.”

Still on the couch, Linda said tremulously, “Lucifer, you’re… you’re hurting him. Stop it. Please.”

“Let us stay!” shouted Dromos, and coughed again before dragging himself up onto his knees. “On Earth. That’s what I came to say. Let your erstwhile subjects stay on Earth if they choose – at least, those who served you in the battle against Michael. Don’t force them to return to Hell. Let them, let us choose where we live, going forward. That’s my request, your Majesty. My only request.”

Lucifer boggled at him. “Is that a joke? Demons? On Earth, indefinitely, unsupervised? Are you out of your tiny mind, Dromos?”

Baring teeth, Dromos said, “Why not? What does it matter to you now? You’ve got everything you could possibly want. Everything anyone could possibly want! All we’re asking is the freedom to come and go as we please.”

“No.”

He spoke the word bluntly, and then he stepped back, adjusting his cuffs. Regaining his composure. “Never. You’re dangerous and untrustworthy. This world is for humans, not you. Good grief, haven’t I got enough to preoccupy my mind, without the added stress of demons rampaging around town?”

“We won’t rampage. We just-…”

“Why are you even coming to me with this? Mazikeen’s the new Queen of Hell. Didn’t you get the memo?”

Dromos wiped blood from his lips. “I don’t know if my sister and I are on speaking terms right now. And she may be Queen, but you’re God; I assumed you would be tasked with such decisions. After all, there’s never been a demon in charge of Hell before. We were told – we were always told – that only angels could rule us. I don’t doubt Mazikeen’s competence, but I…”

He seemed to run out of steam, spreading his hands and finishing weakly, “Lucifer, you’re the king. You’ve been the king for millions of years. For my entire life. Look, if you really don’t want us leaving Hell, then can you at least use your newfound power to improve it? Let us have the things mortals enjoy? Pianos, dogs, blankets, weekends, all that stuff?”

Lucifer rolled his eyes. “That would rather defeat the purpose, wouldn’t it? Hell is supposed to be a place of punishment. The ultimate consequence awaiting sinners. I need a carrot and a stick, Dromos. How else am I supposed to convince people to behave if I don’t? Imagine a rapist arriving in Hell and being confronted with demons playing pianos and walking their dogs. Wouldn’t have quite the desired effect, would it?”

Dromos was quiet for a moment, then said without inflection, “Perhaps you could find somewhere else to put rapists. Somewhere other than our home.”

Throwing up his arms, Lucifer said, “More demands! Don’t you see how selfish you’re being? Here I am, doing my best to end all suffering, and you’re complaining about babysitting a few evil-doers – which, might I remind you, is your job. Nay, your very reason for existence. Always has been. Why’re you getting stroppy about it now?”

“I think,” Linda began, taking a tentative step forward before stopping and clearing her throat. “Excuse me. May I interrupt? Um. Okay, so I think that maybe Dromos has a point here, Lucifer.”

“Doctor! This is the creature that stole your baby!”

“Yes, I know. And I’m not saying I forgive him for that, but…”

“I wasn’t going to eat the brat,” Dromos grumbled. “I was going to make him a king.”

“You took him away from his mother!” Lucifer shouted.

“Gentlemen!” said Linda, sharply. “Please! Let’s try to talk this through like adults.”

Overcome with frustration, and only vaguely aware that he’d not been sleeping well lately, Lucifer kicked the nearest chair. “I can’t believe you’re siding with him, doctor.”

“I’m not siding with anyone. I-…”

“You don’t know these people like I do. You didn’t spend millions of years in Hell alongside them. The only demon you’ve ever gotten acquainted with is Maze, and she’s not like the others; even without a soul, she’s learned how to behave like a more-or-less civilised adult, barring the occasional tantrum. But your average, baseline demon has nothing to them besides wrath and cruelty. Lilith made them to be weapons and that’s all they really are. I mean – just imagine, for a moment, how hard it was for me. To go from the Silver City, the most beautiful place ever created, to a lightless nightmare realm full of these bloodthirsty animals. To be surrounded by them, for endless eons, while they nattered mindlessly on and on about how much they love torture and pain and…”  

He trailed off. Linda and Dromos were both looking past him.

To the elevator. Where – oh – Mazikeen was standing.

Where Mazikeen was crying.

No sobs, not like when Dan had died. No expression at all, really. Just open eyes, motionless muscles, and steady tears.

Before Lucifer could say a word, she pressed the button to close the elevator doors.

“Wait!” he yelped, sprinting over to stop them.

He needn’t have bothered. Now that he was God, objects did whatever he told them to do. The doors stilled, half-open.

“That sounded wrong,” he acknowledged, clasping her shoulders in apology. “You completely missed the context. What I was trying to say was-…”

“Don’t touch me.”

It was a phrase he’d heard many times before from mortal lovers to whom he had accidentally revealed his Devil Face. Some of them said it in horror. Some of them, the religious ones, said it in anger.

Mazikeen looked neither horrified nor angry. She looked sick. As though the very sight of him turned her stomach.

Lumbering over, Dromos stepped into the elevator alongside her and pointedly pressed the button again. With no idea what to do or say, Lucifer allowed the machinery to work.

The elevator closed.

“What have I done?” he asked Linda.

0

Nothing I didn’t know.

“Maze?” called Eve, waiting by the car with the others as Mazikeen stepped out of Lux’s front door and into the sunlight.

The door hadn’t been there when they’d arrived. She’d been forced to use Dromos’ route. Lucifer must have decided to put it back. He could do that now. Just decide things. Didn’t need servants, nor followers, nor anyone. Sure didn’t need a ‘more-or-less civilised adult’ whose kin were animals.

“Maze! Wait!”

Mazikeen didn’t know where she was going, only that she was walking very quickly and felt that she’d die if she stopped. She heard Eve’s heels patter on the pavement and heard her say her name a third time, quiet and worried, and that was what stilled her feet.

“What happened?” murmured Eve, cupping her face.

The fifty or so demons who’d been standing around outside Lux when Amenadiel had set the car and its passengers down were still there. Instead of chanting to get their king’s attention, they were now looking at her.

Michael and Amenadiel stood among them, the latter having been trying to convince them to stop blocking traffic.

Which was what she should have been doing. It was what he’d brought her here to do. But she’d been gripped by a sudden, violent need to see Lucifer, to check on him, just quickly, before tending to her siblings. Once a bodyguard, always a bodyguard.

Except that wasn’t what I was. Not to him. To him, I was a Rottweiler on a leash.

“Are you alright?” asked Amenadiel, his eyes overflowing with concern.

That was what cracked her.

To him. Not to everyone. Not to Eve, or Amenadiel, or Linda. It’s not that I’m incapable of earning love and respect.

I’m just incapable of earning his.

Her legs gave out. She crumpled against Lux’s outside wall and started to weep properly, loud and bitter.

Eve immediately dropped down beside her, holding her tight. Michael shuffled closer, rubbing his shoulder while his mouth opened and shut, testing out sentences that were never spoken.

Then Dromos was there, kneeling, his face sad and tired.

“We did what we were told,” she said to him in Lilim, through sniffles. “We obeyed. We were loyal. We… we…”

“We are alone, sister,” he replied. “But I think we always were.”

“We obeyed!”

“We obeyed Lilith and she left. We obeyed Lucifer and he left. No one wants us, Mazikeen. It’s just the truth.”

She took a shuddering breath and squeezed her eyes shut. “No. I want us.”

Seizing his jacket’s shoulder, she hauled herself to her feet and addressed the crowd, her voice raw: “I want you! You’re my family and I want you! And I swear I will be the queen you deserve, for as long as you’ll have me!”

Her human skin fell away, the left side of her face turning cold, bony, and brittle.

Stepping back to join their siblings, Dromos asked hesitantly, “What would you have us do, then, my queen? What are your orders?”

Hurriedly drying her eyes, she studied them one by one. “Whoever wants to can stay here. But I’m going home. Hell is going to be ours, Dromos. No more damned souls. No more angels. It’s ours now and we’re going to make it into something we can love.”

She turned to face Eve and Michael, her heart pounding. “You’ll come with me, yeah? You’ll stand with me?”

“Always,” said Eve, closing in to kiss her.

“Whatever,” Michael muttered, clearly just relieved that the crying part was over.

Amenadiel sighed, shaking his head gravely. “Mazikeen, are you sure this is what you want? You won’t be able to leave Hell on your own – you’ll need to contact me.”

“Yeah. At least until this one grows his feathers back,” she said, gesturing at Michael. “That’s okay. You’ll always come when I call, right?”

“Of course. You’re my friend, Maze. I’m sorry if I haven’t said that often enough.”

Fuck it. Cringing on the inside, Mazikeen drew Amenadiel into a quick, gruff hug. “You too, idiot.”

[midnightsvns]

Now I see daylight — a Twilight fanfic

summary: Edward spent his life so long in a ninety-year midnight. Now, all he sees is daylight. A short story about Nessie’s first prom. “How could I ever tell her how grateful I was? Grateful that she could always see past the worst of me and my mistakes. Grateful that she had unlimited selflessness, giving us the family I’d envisioned for her, but thought impossible for me. Grateful that she was all too happy to be the first and only love of my existence. Grateful that cruel fate, after our various ordeals, had turned merciful to bring us to this heaven.” words: 8,280.

AN: so. i was absolutely wrecked after reading the very sad note on which midnight sun ended. to lick my wounds, i wrote this fic, set 12 years after breaking dawn, on the day of nessie’s prom. 404 plot not found just fluff of edward & bella being happy with their now adult daughter. title/summary inspired by the t.s. song daylight. full text under the cut!

Bella and I walked with hands intertwined in the woods behind our house, on our way to the cottage a few miles away that served as our daughter Renesmee’s “room.” When she turned seven, we decided she deserved a space of her own, a space that was removed from her supernatural family who could hear every move she made even if she had a whole floor of the house to herself. It was not unlike the first cottage the three of us had lived in together, back in Forks, in the first year of Bella and I’s marriage. To me, those days seemed as close as yesterday—in reality, twelve years had passed like the blink of an eye. Our daughter was all grown-up now, about to graduate high school for the first time, and today was her very first prom.

We walked at human pace, enjoying the lights and the sounds of early morning in the forest. Before Bella, I would have hated moving at such a glacial pace, always wanting to reach my destination as fast as possible, never lingering under the sunlight long enough to contemplate the diamond-like sparkling of my marble skin. A constant reminder of my inhumanity. But now I relished having the chance to see my wife in the light of day. I knew that all the poets and philosophers who, for two thousand of years, had tried to define beauty, to describe it, had irrevocably failed—because none of them had been fortunate enough to witness Bella smiling and shining under the golden rays of sunlight. I squeezed her hand and chuckled to myself.

Bella, of course, noticed my jocularity. “What are you thinking about?” she wondered.

“I thought that was my line,” I replied, grinning at her. Bella easily controlled her gift now, raising and lowering her mental shields at will. Except in special moments of communication, her shields were always up. She could maintain shields around other people, too, granting peace for me and privacy for my family. The quiet that resulted inside my head was a balm; I could be thankful for it for a hundred years and it would not be enough.

She sighed, and her eyes were suddenly downcast. “Well, I’m glad one of us is cheerful enough to laugh today.” She stopped walking, let go of my hand, and sought shelter under the shadow of a large evergreen tree. I regretted seeing her move away from the sunshine.

Her mournful tone surprised me. “What’s wrong, love? You’ve been looking forward to Renesmee’s prom for weeks now.” It was all I heard the ladies at the house discussing as of late. Alice, our very own literal visionary, was making all their dresses, works of art that were sure to rival even the most revered of Paris’ haute couture scene. Rosalie was browsing our family’s sizable collection of jewelry—composed of heirlooms from our human lives and the very many anniversary gifts from over the decades—for the perfect sets of accessories that would go with Alice’s creations. Esme was renovating and redecorating the front room, the staircase, and the porch, in preparation for today’s sure-to-be endless photo opportunities.

Bella looked up at me, her golden eyes looking regretful. “I just… can’t help but be a little sad that she’s grown up so fast. She’s only twelve, Edward. I spent more time as a clumsy, awkward human child than I’ve spent as her mother,” Bella said, sighing again. “And now she’s graduating and going off to college for the first time? She’s not an adult! How are we even sure she’s fit to be by herself in the human world already? How is she gonna eat? How will she hunt? What if she needs us, or she gets hurt and Carlisle can’t get to her in time? She can’t just go to a human doctor!” Her voice got more and more agitated with every worry she voiced. “And what if she starts dating? And she doesn’t tell us because we’re not there?! She says she’s not interested in anyone romantically now, boys or otherwise, but it’s her first four years in college! She’s bound to catch the sights of some… some no-good jerk who—”

“Stop, Bella,” I said gently, interrupting her before she could spiral any further. I had to resist the urge to laugh at her tirade. It reminded me of the time I went on a very similar, equally anxious rant. Emmett had thought I was a crazy person, worrying about the myriad things that could wipe the human girl I loved out of existence. This time, though, these worries were much easier for me to assuage than when I was fretting over Bella’s mortality and her uncanny ability to attract danger.

I joined her under the cover of the tree and held her marble face in my hands. “Love, I understand wholly all of your anxieties. They’re mine, too. But we need to put a significant amount of trust and faith in our daughter if we want to stay sane during the next four years,” I said earnestly, cracking a little smile, and then started addressing Bella’s concerns one at a time.

“I’m also sad that it has been just twelve short years, and already, we have to let her go. And as much as we may not like it, she is an adult now. She has been for five years. I know she grew up too fast, but if that is the small sacrifice that makes the miracle of her existence possible, then so be it. And she’s had no problems being around humans since she started high school with us when she was eight. As for her eating habits, well, I am worried about the amount of junk food she’ll consume once she is left unsupervised. And she doesn’t need to hunt as frequently as we do…. Once, maybe twice, a month, she can come back here and any one of us would love to go hunting with her. She is also not so fragile that she would ever need the care of any other doctors than Carlisle, Rosalie, or me. As for her first romantic relationship, well... she’s smart, strong-willed. We have to trust that we have raised her well enough that she’ll be responsible, that she’ll know how to protect her heart, and that she’ll be comfortable enough to turn to us for any questions she might have. You are a good mother, Bella. You raised an amazing young woman.” She looked as though she was about to argue, but she said nothing. She must have lowered her shield because I heard her thoughts instead: We raised an amazing young woman. You, Carlisle, Esme, Rose, Alice, Emmett, and Jasper… Even Charlie, Sue, Jacob, and Seth. It really does take a village. Her smile was wry.

I shook my head and smiled back at her. She was still bad at taking compliments. “We just have to trust Ness, love. As much as I would never want to see her hurt, we have to let her make her own mistakes. To let her take risks. And we have to give her freedom while she still thinks it’s ours to grant. If she thinks she’s not ready for this yet, or becomes overwhelmed in any way, she knows she can come back home at any time. All we can do is be there for her, and as long as she knows she’s not alone in this, that she never has to carry the world on her shoulders because we’re supposed to carry part of it for her… She will be fine.”

I looked straight into my wife’s eyes, still holding her face, hoping I had eased her anxieties a little. She visibly relaxed, then placed her hands over mine.

“You know, I really hate it when you make sense,” Bella stated matter-of-factly, glaring at me and pouting a little. I laughed and gave her a soft kiss on the cheek. Then I pulled her close to my side and led us back on the way to Renesmee’s cottage. If, thirteen years ago, anyone—even Alice—had told me that someday I would be trying to soothe Bella after a bout of anxiety instead of the other way around, I would have laughed in their face.

We made it to the cottage in companionable silence, and Bella’s mood seemed cheerier than before, back to being excited for the day’s events. She knocked on the door, calling for Nessie to wake up, but our daughter opened the door in a flash, greeting us with a chipper hello and a wave to indicate that we should let ourselves in.

“Good morning, Ness. You’re up early,” I commented. Not that our daughter was a late sleeper, but she was also not what one would call a morning person.

“I’m very well-rested, thank you,” she said, walking to the couch in the middle of the cottage’s main living area and plopping down onto it.

“How many hours did you sleep last night?” I asked, suspicious. Half-human, half-vampire hybrid though she was, Carlisle’s recommendation was still at least seven hours of sleep a night, and she often ignored it.

“Seven,” she replied too fast. I raised an eyebrow.

“Okay, six. Maybe five total…” she grimaced, sheepish now. “I was reading books! And I finished a movie.” I was unhappy to hear it. We really didn’t have an exact number of how many hours of sleep she needed each night, but I was sure five wasn’t enough for anyone, human or otherwise. I shook my head and sat next to her on the couch.

The cottage was a cozy place, with a kitchenette in the main room, one bedroom and a small bathroom down a narrow hallway. The main area was where Nessie spent most of her time, a rectangular room with big windows that let in a generous amount of natural light. The wide wall in front of the couch served as the canvas for a mural of the turquoise sea and white-sand beach at Isle Esme, painted from memory by Bella and Renesmee. The three of us had spent two weeks there a couple of years ago to celebrate Nessie’s birthday and my tenth wedding anniversary with Bella. It was my favorite painting in the world.

On the eastern wall was a bay window, Renesmee’s favorite reading nook, flanked by two tall bookshelves. And in front of the couch was a low coffee table, cluttered with books, stacks of paper, journals, pens, paints and paintbrushes, canvasses, coffee mugs, and a laptop. I sighed. The organized chaos, as Ness often referred to it, reminded me much of her mother’s old room at the Swan residence. Bella started tidying up the table immediately, replacing books onto the shelves and rearranging the mess on the table. I turned my attention to the kitchenette’s dirty dishes and the haphazardly discarded clothes on the couch, shaking my head at the untidiness. She spent her days with us either at school or at the main house, and sometimes even slept there when she felt like it. How could one girl create so much disarray after one night?

“Mom, Dad, stop it, I’ll do that later…” Nessie admonished us halfheartedly, but we were done cleaning up before she finished speaking the sentence.

“Did you already have breakfast, honey?” Bella asked.

Ness nodded and grinned. “I had cereal and two Pop-Tarts.”

Wonderful. Clearly she knew how to make healthy choices. I almost wished for the time before she had outgrown her distaste for human food. At least on a diet of animal blood, we knew she was getting some nutrients.

Bella rolled her eyes, although I knew she wasn’t really annoyed. “Esme will make you eat some fruit at the house. Are you ready to go now? Alice wants to do a final fitting of your dress, just in case she needs to make any changes.”

“It’s too bad Aunt Alice can’t see me in her visions. She could just decide to make any changes and then know which ones are right,” Nessie mused, then shook her head and bounded up from the couch, walking quickly down the hallway and into her bedroom. She came out a second later, hands deftly fastening a necklace on the nape of her neck. It was the necklace Rosalie had given her as a present for her birthday last year, a thin platinum chain and an oval pendant with the family crest on it. We filed out of the cottage, and Bella locked the door behind her.

The three of us walked together, Nessie in the middle. I asked her what books she was reading last night that she had gotten so little sleep. Instead of communicating verbally, she held my hand and showed me.

I started seeing her memories from only a few hours ago, implanted into my mind as seamlessly as though they were my own. I saw her reading all seven books of C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia series and watching the first film adaptation. I saw how much she’d enjoyed them. Then, I saw her thoughts on the character Aslan, the wise talking lion and savior of Narnia. She admired him, his kindness and wisdom and compassion…. Suddenly, I saw my own face mixed in with images of the lion. She was trying to tell me the lion reminded her of me.

It shocked me. I’d enjoyed the world of Narnia at the time they were published and became widely popular in the 1950s, and even Bella had told me it was one of her favorite book series. As a lonely immortal, I’d always taken comfort in the fact that I had an Aslan-like figure in my life to look up to. My father, Carlisle. It never occurred to me to think that I could ever fill that role for someone else.

I must be doing something right, I marveled to myself. If Renesmee could liken me to someone who reminded me so much of Carlisle, then perhaps fatherhood wasn’t as lost on me as I had so often felt it was. It was like I was walking on a cloud, an invisible weight lifted off my shoulders. I wrapped my arm around Nessie as we walked, trying to let her know how much I appreciated the privilege of her sharing her thoughts with me. And then she surprised us by speaking in a serious tone.

She moved away from under my arm and moved a few paces ahead, turning around so she could face us. She walked backwards as she talked, her footing steady and sure. “Momma, Daddy, I don’t think I’ve thanked either of you yet… for allowing me to go and study on my own. I know you’ve always tried to let me have a normal childhood, to make sure I never missed out on anything. I love living with you guys. I love talking to Grandpa Carlisle about history and art. I love helping Grandma work on houses. I love shopping and appreciating fashion with Aunt Alice and Aunt Rose. I love playing chess with Uncle Jasper and Uncle Emmett. I love our piano lessons, Daddy, and our two-person exclusive book club, Momma. I love going back to Forks on holidays to visit Grandpa Charlie. I love our baseball games. But now I’m ready to experience the world for myself. I know it must be hard to let me go and that you’re scared for me. I’m scared, too….”

If my heart were still alive, it might have grown in size from the joy I felt. Renesmee rarely addressed us this way anymore. It was always Mom and Dad or Edward and Bella, if we were in public. It carried me back to the days when she was still just a little child. A rapidly growing, highly intelligent child, but still our little child. She was always so perceptive; it was as though she’d sensed the essence of the conversation Bella and I had had before we reached the cottage, and this sober declaration was her way of telling us she understood.

“You have nothing to thank us for, sweetheart,” I said quickly, at the same time that Bella hurried to ask Nessie what she was afraid of, concern in her voice.

Our daughter blew out a long breath. “I’m scared of living alone, of being completely responsible for myself. But I’m really excited about it, too, and most of the time the excitement overpowers any doubts I have. I’m certain I wanna do this, and don’t they always say that something isn’t worth doing if you’re not at least a little bit afraid?” she asked, her smile reaching her deep brown eyes.

Bella paused and left my side to grasp our daughter by the shoulders. “All we want, Nessie, all we will ever want, is your happiness. And we want you to find out what that means for you on your own terms. If you decide tomorrow that you’d be happy never going to college at all, none of us will argue with your decision. But I can see how sure you are about going. I can’t promise you that I won’t be worried sick and that I won’t be calling you multiple times a day until you’re very, very annoyed with me… But I know you can take care of yourself now, and I can’t wait to see what you do next, baby.” Bella’s lovely voice sounded assured, no trace of the anxiety she’d confided in me just moments earlier. This was what I meant whenever I told Bella she was a good mother, and seeing her in action never failed to earn my awe.

“Thank you, Momma,” Renesmee said sincerely, circling her arms around Bella, and Bella hugged her back. “And I promise I will never be annoyed by your calls, even if you call a hundred times a day,” she said, grinning. “I won’t ignore yours, either, Daddy.”

This made me and Bella laugh. Of course Nessie would make time to take her crazy parents’ calls. No one was sweeter than our daughter.

Their hug ended, and we kept walking. Suddenly there was a glint of mischief in Renesmee’s eyes, and then she touched my arm and Bella’s to tell us we were being challenged to a race. Before the thought was even fully communicated she had already taken off running to the house. I shook my head and chuckled as we hurried after her. She couldn’t quite run as fast as vampires, but the head start might be enough to guarantee her win.

When we reached the house, my brothers were waiting outside for us to arrive. They both had cameras in hand—Jasper a professional digital SLR and Emmett a Polaroid instant camera. With Bella around, I couldn’t hear their minds, so I raised an eyebrow at the both of them in question. What were they up to now?

“Nessie’s already in the house, you rusty old slowpokes,” Emmett said in greeting, mocking me and Bella. But mostly me. “And to think you used to be the fastest, Edward. What a fall from grace. Let me take a picture of this really embarrassing moment for you real quick.” He positioned the instant camera near my face and pressed a button, and it started whirring as it printed out the picture. He grinned and deposited it into a large red handbag, presumably Rosalie’s, that he had slung over his shoulder.

I rolled my eyes at my brother and asked what they were doing with the cameras instead of responding to Emmett’s attempts at vexing me. It was Jasper who answered. “We’re having a photography competition. Whoever contributes the most shots for Esme’s photo albums will win. She’s planning to keep one for us and one to send to Forks for Charlie, so we’ll need a lot of pictures.”

“Yeah, and the winner—who will definitely be me—gets to skip the bake sale that Esme is going to for some hospital fundraiser,” Emmett explained with an arrogant smile. I rolled my eyes again. Of course my brothers had found a way to turn this day into some kind of contest.

“Doesn’t the Polaroid give you a pretty significant disadvantage, Em?” I pointed out, wondering how much film he was lugging around in Rose’s handbag.

“Just because it’ll be more challenging doesn’t mean I can’t still win,” he replied, shrugging. “The pictures I take will be better. Plus, the easy way is overrated, don’t you think?”

Jasper shook his head at Emmett’s smugness, then told me and Bella to pose for a picture. I turned to Bella and she turned to me, and I held both of her hands. I smiled adoringly down at her as she stared back up at me with her deep, amber eyes. We weren’t looking at the cameras, but I heard the workings of the two small devices as my brothers captured the moment.

“Aww, you two are disgusting,” Emmett chuckled as Jasper showed the photograph to all of us on the camera’s tiny screen. “Esme’s going to love that one.” The Polaroid Emmett had taken was still developing, and he shoved it inside the red bag with all the others. Then they went inside to find better subjects for their contest.

Bella and I made our way inside as well. The house was alive with the whole family looking forward to tonight’s events. I heard Alice, Rosalie, and Nessie in Alice’s room, chattering and working away on their gowns. I heard Esme in the kitchen, making breakfast for Renesmee or perhaps practicing some recipes for the upcoming bake sale. I heard Jasper and Emmett running around everyone like a couple of paparazzi, taking pictures left and right. Only Carlisle was absent, hard at work at the hospital, but he’d be back in time to see us all off to prom tonight. Bella kissed my cheek in farewell before joining Nessie with her aunts upstairs.

I gravitated towards the piano, as I often did. I scanned the perfect mental repository of all the music I knew, trying out a few bars from different pieces—some my own compositions and some written by better musicians than I—but none of them spoke to me…. Until one did. I sat down and began playing the first notes of “Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity” from Holst’s orchestral suite, The Planets. It was a piece that sounded abundantly better when played by a full orchestra, but I enjoyed it regardless. My hands glided quickly across the piano keys to produce the quick, jaunty chords of the exposition. Then the development came in ritardando, varying from the cheery main theme to take a strangely calm, nostalgic turn. Although it evoked feelings of nostalgia, it wasn’t sad. Only pensive about a time already past. The piece concluded a tempo, returning to the happy and powerful main theme. I didn’t realize how much the song reflected my mood until I was already finished playing it.

Knowing her thoughts were protected by Bella’s shield, Esme offered me her kind compliments out loud from the kitchen. “That was wonderful, Edward,” she gushed. “I have always been so fond of that piece. Please play some more, darling.” I murmured a thanks, then obliged my mother and started playing her favorite, the very song I had played for Bella the first time I brought her home to meet my family. Even though the memory was tainted by the agony and danger of the events that followed, I still looked back on it with some joy. That was the night Bella became a part of our family.

The day went on that way, calm and peaceful, everyone busy with their respective tasks. Nessie came down to join me once in the afternoon and let me hear a new composition she was working on. It was her best yet, and I told her as much. Bella came downstairs as well, listening to me play and rereading Persuasion by Jane Austen while she sat beside me on the piano bench.

Before long, it was time for us to get dressed and ready for the prom. I quickly changed into my dark brown suit. The color had been my only stipulation, the rest decided by Alice’s keen sense of fashion. Since that overcast Thursday morning—the day that had been my turn to ask questions—my favorite color had never wavered from brown. The chocolate-brown color of Bella’s human eyes was not just preserved fondly in my memories, but alive forever in Nessie, and it was beyond the bounds of possibility for me to separate such a color from the meaning of all my happiness.

After I was dressed, I tried to peek into Alice’s room to see if they were ready to go, but Alice, annoying as ever, blocked my entrance and told me to wait with Esme and Carlisle downstairs. I rolled my eyes but followed her instructions. Arguing with Alice was almost never worth it.

Carlisle was just arriving home from work right as I was coming down the stairs, and when he saw me, his eyes lit up. “Why, you look great, Edward,” he praised, setting his medical bag down on a table in the foyer. I thanked him humbly. He reached up and loosened his tie, likely more out of habit than out of a need to be more comfortable. It struck me as a very fatherly thing to do. Esme came out of the front room, greeting Carlisle with a bright smile and a quick kiss. “You’re home just in time, dear. I think the girls are almost done helping Nessie get ready.”

I snorted. At this rate, we were never going to leave the house in time. “Alice, we’ll be late!” I shouted in the direction of the stairs, knowing she could hear me perfectly.

“No, we won’t!” Alice chimed back confidently. I sighed.

Jasper and Emmett were already in their tuxedos and bounded quickly down the stairs, cameras still in hand. Rosalie was the one who joined us next, looking devastating in a burgundy mermaid dress. Emmett looked like he was about to combust. Jasper smirked at our brother’s dumbstruck expression, snapping a few pictures.

Then it was my turn to be dumbstruck as Bella started down the stairs, moving at full speed to be at my side in an instant. “Alice wouldn’t let me see Ness wearing her dress yet,” she complained, but all my attention was on her at that moment. She looked positively incredible wearing a knee-length, square-necked light azure dress, held up by thin straps with flutter sleeves and inset with a thousand little rhinestones that looked like stars. My wife could have been Selene herself, come down from the moon. I ran my fingers gently through Bella’s long, straight brown locks and pressed my palm to her cheek. And for the nth time in so many years, I was glad for the deal I’d made with Bella on our first wedding anniversary. “You look beautiful, love. Absolutely arresting,” I said honestly.

“I know,” Bella said, beaming up at me, and I laughed happily. This was our deal: whenever I told her the indisputable truth about how beautiful she looked, all she had to say in response was that she knew. In exchange, I was forbidden from spending money on gifts for her for exactly five years, and five years was such a short time for creatures such as we that the zero-gifts rule felt like it was lifted immediately. I circumvented the moratorium, anyway, by getting gifts that were for both Bella and Nessie, or both Bella and Esme…. It may not have been the fairest of contracts, but my intentions were of the purest kind. I leaned down and pulled my beautiful goddess of a wife into a deep kiss, and I felt her wide smile as her arms wrapped around my neck. We only broke away from each other when we heard Alice skipping down the stairs, dressed in a white two-piece cocktail dress that made her look like a mischievous fairy.

“Get ready, everyone!” Alice squealed, clapping her hands in anticipation. “I can’t wait to see your reactions, I know you’ll all just die.”

My sister was right. Renesmee—our only daughter, the greatest joy of our lives—stood at the top of the stairs in a gorgeous, peach pink off-shoulder gown decorated with the same little rhinestones that were on her mother’s dress and delicate leaf-patterned lace appliques, and she was a sight to die for. As she walked slowly down the stairs, one hand on the banister, Emmett and Jasper took pictures fervently, documenting the entire moment. I saw Bella press her hand to her chest, eyes soft and adoring.

“Well, how do I look?” Nessie asked when she reached the bottom of the stairs, a half-smile on her face. Her soft bronze hair fell in long, spiral waves down her shoulders, and on her neck, she still wore the necklace she’d put on this morning. She spun around in a circle, indulging the attention we lavished on her, understanding that today would not have been such a significant event for us if not for her. Esme made me, Bella, and Nessie pose for pictures by the staircase, then on the couch in the front room, and then outside on the porch. After Esme was satisfied with the pictures of the three of us, Jasper and Emmett set up a tripod and took a photo with all nine of us in the front room, our latest family portrait. When the photoshoot was done, we all filed into our vehicles to make our way to school. Bella and Nessie rode with me in the Volvo, and my siblings rode in Rosalie’s M3.

We made it to the high school just in time, and even from the car, I could already hear the booming electronic dance music and the excited prattle of hundreds of human children crowded around in the school gym. I prepared myself for the barrage of human thoughts I would have to hear tonight; the only people Bella would shield here were our family. Although Bella could shield a roomful of people from me easily, I still needed to be on the lookout for any suspicious minds when we were in public like this. The three of us met the rest of my siblings at the doors to the gym and joined the throng of high schoolers, looking like they were having the time of their lives. Little did they know how many lethal supernatural creatures had just descended upon this party. If they knew, maybe they wouldn’t be so happy.

“Are you ready for your first—but definitely not last—prom, Carlie?” Emmett asked my daughter, grinning. Nessie went by her middle name at school to be less conspicuous. At first, Bella was greatly displeased by the necessity of this precaution, but she couldn’t deny the rationale. We stood out more than enough being newcomers in a small town like this one, with our sheer number, our wealth, our beauty, and our semi-frequent ‘family trips’ to avoid the sun.

“Time to dance the night away!” Nessie said, grinning back at her uncle. She bounded away from us to meet a couple of her classmates, two girls who reminded me of Bella’s human friends, not physically, but in their manner and thoughts. Ness didn’t have many friends, and we had started to worry that her only interaction with other living beings was isolated to her family, but she rarely found her human classmates interesting, and when she did, it was because she genuinely had something in common with them.

The girl who was like Jessica, a brown-haired girl named Lindsay, shouted over the loud music at Nessie in greeting. “Oh my God, look how gorgeous you are!” Jesus, she looks like she belongs in some runway show right now. I wonder what designer this dress is by? Probably cost a million bucks…. I kind of hate her. Lindsay’s thoughts were petty and vitriolic, and I resisted the urge to march over there and shield my daughter from the bitter girl. That would have done more harm than good, so I settled for rolling my eyes and whispering in my wife’s ear about the girl’s thoughts. It was gossipy and ungentlemanly, but I had to share the burden of being powerless to protect Nessie from a fake friend.

“Oh, that girl is in my English class,” Bella said, looking unsurprised. “I knew she was mean, but I liked her Shakespeare essays. Nessie thinks she’s smart.” I scoffed and tuned in to the other girl’s thoughts—Annie, a girl with short, pink-dyed hair who made me think of Angela. She greeted Nessie with a hug, and thought, Wow, she looks like a princess. I should ask her to take a selfie with me! My mom will be super bummed if I don’t take a lot of pics tonight…. Annie pulled out a smartphone, and the three girls smiled as the little device flashed and snapped their ‘selfies.’ And then they ran to the dance floor together, jumping and laughing to the music.

I stayed with Bella in a darkened corner, and we watched Renesmee enjoying herself. Occasionally, one of my siblings would pull us away and make us dance to the upbeat music, but neither of us were particularly fond of the DJ’s infernal choices. The DJ, a baby-faced young boy called Drew who had Spanish class with me, exclusively played EDM and bastardized remix versions of classic love songs. By the ninth EDM song in a row, I finally put my proverbial foot down and crashed the DJ booth on stage to bribe him with a fifty dollar bill so he would play a song of my choosing. The boy was astonished and could barely say anything back to me, but as I walked through the crowd to reach Bella again, Johnny Ace’s “Pledging My Love” started blaring through the loudspeakers. I took Bella’s hand as we walked to the middle of the dance floor, and once we were there, I pulled her close to me and led us in a slow, intimate dance.

“This is the most romantic song I know,” Bella whispered, her head resting on my chest as we swayed slowly in a circle.

I chuckled. “Once upon a time, in a very old and decrepit truck, this song came on the radio and provided an apt soundtrack for the most romantic day of my life. Do you still remember that?”

Bella lifted her head from my chest and looked up at me, her eyebrows knitted together playfully. “My God, thirteen years and you’re still hating on the truck? I think you’ve got some issues to sort out there, honey,” she said, her beautiful lips turned up in a smirk. Then her face became more earnest. “But of course I remember. That was one of the best days of my life, too.”

Her amber eyes looked so full of love, so full of sincerity, that I felt like falling to my knees. As a mature vampire, more than a decade after her transformation, she should have no more than a few blurry recollections of her human life. But Bella felt so strongly about me, about the memories we’d made, that she vehemently held on to our past, even as each day, each minute, and each second brought us further away from it. I kissed her, always trying to let her know how precious she was to me. The song was nearly over, and I sighed. I could have stayed there dancing with her forever and never need anything more.

“Smile, please!” I heard Renesmee say, Emmett’s Polaroid camera in her hand. She snapped a photo of us. Then she turned the camera around, sandwiched herself between her mother and I, stuck her tongue out goofily, and pressed the button on the camera to take a picture again. Bella laughed.

“Where did your friends go?” Bella asked. “I was starting to think you guys would never get tired of dancing together.”

“Oh, they went back to their dates,” Nessie said nonchalantly. “So I decided to annoy Uncle Em by taking his camera.” A folky, lullaby-like acoustic song was now playing through the speakers.

“Oh—I love this song so much!” Nessie gasped. “Please dance with me, Dad?” She whispered the last word to keep any humans from hearing.

How could I refuse her? “Of course, sweetheart.”

Bella smiled and took the camera and the Polaroids from Nessie, saying something about finding Emmett and his big red bag. I led my daughter in a slow dance around the crowd, her hands resting on my shoulders.

“You and Mom looked amazing dancing together like that,” Nessie said casually, but by the look on her face, I could feel how serious the conversation was going to be. “I know the story, Dad. I know everything you went through before you could get here. And I am so happy that it worked out for you. Seeing how much you love Momma, how much she loves you… it makes me never wanna settle for anything less than that.”

My brows furrowed. “Is that why you said no to the boys who asked you to be their date tonight? Because you don’t love any of them?”

We kept swaying to the music, and Nessie chuckled. “Kind of. It’s true I said no because I don’t feel a connection to any of them, but also because I didn’t want tonight to be about some stranger hanging out around our family. I wanted it to just be us, so we could be ourselves.”

My heart swelled. Nessie always thought of our family first. That wasn’t her responsibility, and we would’ve been all too happy to pretend to be human and normal for any prom date of her choice, but she thought of us first. She was so like her mother in some ways.

“What did you mean, then? About never settling for anything less?” I asked. Something about the way she’d said it worried me, made me feel as though there were insecurities underneath her positive tone that needed to be addressed.

She took a deep breath. “I just… I realized that real love like I’ve seen with you and Mom, Grandma and Grandpa, Uncle Em and Aunt Rose, Uncle Jasper and Aunt Alice… it’s rare and it’s wonderful. And I think I would prefer waiting for a love where I could feel everything there is to feel rather than try to force something with anyone I’m not sure about. And I realize I could be waiting forever if I keep waiting for something perfect, but that’s the point, isn’t it? And I can’t imagine how I would ever find something like that. And that’s all right, I think.”

Renesmee’s words were full of conviction, and I started thinking about how, someday, the day would come when we would be dancing just like this—I would be in a tuxedo and she would be in a big white dress—at her wedding, for the father-daughter dance. Like her, I could not imagine yet the person she would marry, but I saw our family there. I saw Charlie desperately trying to ignore how our faces still remained unchanged. I saw Jacob, whom Renesmee considered her best friend, taking a break from managing his own auto repair shop to be there as her best man. It would be the happiest day of her life, just as how my wedding had been one of the happiest days of mine, and it saddened me that she couldn’t see herself finding that happiness one day. But I understood Nessie’s conclusions—or maybe more accurately, her fears—about not finding love. When I was still alone, I’d come to similar conclusions that the kind of happiness I saw in my family was simply not meant for me. Even when I’d found Bella, I always chose the saddest path, never daring to hope that I could have happiness with her forever.

“I admire your position about refusing to settle, Ness, because you deserve only the best. And I was just like you once. Before I found your mother, I never saw the point in pursuing relationships that I knew weren’t going to be meaningful. But you shouldn’t let yourself believe that you won’t find what you’re looking for.” I brushed a stray lock of curly bronze hair behind Nessie’s ear, hoping she could hear the honesty in what I was saying. “You know that for our kind, waiting through decades of being alone before finding who you’re meant for is more common than finding that right away….So please, don’t be so resigned. You are entirely too young to resign yourself to an eternity of being alone. It will work out, somehow,” I finished, echoing Esme’s confident words to Bella long ago when our relationship was at its very beginning.

Renesmee nodded, and I hoped my reassurances had lifted a little of the weight off her shoulders. I didn’t need to have Jasper’s gift for empathy to know that existing in both our world and the human world, not quite belonging in either, was a difficult thing to process. I didn’t know what the future held for my daughter—none of us did—but I looked forward to it with the same optimism my own parents had always had for me.

The acoustic ballad we were dancing to ended softly, and I escorted her away from the dance floor so we could rejoin our family.

“My feet kind of hurt,” Nessie complained as we found Bella sitting beside Rosalie on some folding chairs, but a smile was still bright on her face. She was having such fun tonight.

“Do you want to go home, baby?” Bella asked as Nessie dragged over another chair to sit down between Bella and Rose. Nessie rested her head on Rose’s shoulder, and Rose circled her arm around Nessie in a one-armed hug. “You’ve been dancing all night, I’m sure you’re tired.”

“Yeah, I think I wanna go home,” Ness said, sounding a little sleepy.

Suddenly, Lindsay and Annie appeared out of the crowd as an upbeat pop song started playing. “Carlie, come dance with us!” one of the human girls said.

Nessie perked up. “Wait, I love this song! Just one last!” she said enthusiastically, heading back to the dance floor with her friends. I shook my head, amazed at her energy. I sat down on the seat that Nessie had just vacated.

“We’re still a go for tomorrow, right, Rose?” I asked Rose discreetly. If the weather was safe enough for us to be out, we were going into the city tomorrow so Rose could help me pick out Nessie’s very first car. She learned how to drive when she was seven but always used the cars that belonged to the rest of the family. Now that she was going to college, she needed a vehicle to be able to get around on her own. Bella was coming with us, too, to be the voice of reason. Apparently, Rose was just as likely as I was to pick a car that Bella would deem—and this was her word—‘overkill.’ Rose only nodded in response, but I saw the corners of her mouth turn up a little.

We all watched as Nessie danced to one last song with her friends, and I could pick her lovely voice out of the babble of other noise as she sang along. “There’s a mountaintop that I’m dreamin’ of…. If you need me, you know where I’ll be!”

“She’ll call us constantly once she’s in college, right?” Bella asked me in an emotional whisper, looking at our daughter jumping up and down and singing with her friends. Since she became a vampire, I rarely thought of my wife as vulnerable anymore, but she looked vulnerable now. If our bodies were still capable of shedding tears, I wondered if she would be crying. Honestly, I realized I wanted to cry as well. Renesmee was ready to create her own life, and she needed us less and less every day. Years ago, I’d thought loving Bella was the greatest accomplishment of my life, the only good thing I would ever do. I’d thought that, after a hundred years of emptiness, loving Bella as thoroughly and as completely as I did was the strongest feeling I would ever experience. But Nessie—she proved those assumptions wrong, time and again. It was an honor to have raised her, and I knew Bella felt the same.

I held Bella’s hand and kissed her temple. “I’m sure she will, love. I’m sure she will.”

After a few moments, the song was over, and Nessie was saying her goodbyes to her friends. When she had made her way back to us, she cried, “My feet are killing me! Please never let me dance all night in heels ever again.”

Bella let out a short laugh. “It’s fine, baby. You can take off your shoes and your dad will carry you to the car.”

“Oh, bless!” she exclaimed. Bella laughed again. Nessie pulled off her heels, which Bella promptly carried for her, and our daughter let me lift her up in my arms. As we walked, Bella wrapped her arm around my waist. I glanced up at the night sky and saw the pale moon untrammeled by the usual gray clouds, bathing the high school parking lot in its ghostly light. It conjured up memories of a similar evening. Another prom night—Bella’s very first. I’d carried her in my arms just like this, and I remembered how desperate I’d been, how important it was for me that she did not miss her prom, in case her future children ever asked about it. I wanted to make sure she wouldn’t have an empty story for them because of me. And here we were, thirteen years later, with the miracle of our own child in my arms, Bella’s arm around me. Not even the sweetest of my dreams could compare to the reality we lived in now. I stared at Bella’s face, wondering if her thoughts had taken the same turn mine had. She pressed a hand to her throat, remembering how I’d kissed her there that night. We shared a secret smile.

When we reached the car, Bella opened the door to the backseat, and I sat Ness gently down in the middle, making sure her limbs were in comfortable positions. “Thanks, Dad,” she whispered, looking seconds away from succumbing to sleep. Bella got in beside her, and I sat in the driver’s seat to take us back home.

At moments like this, I still struggled to believe how I could have been given so much happiness, so much unadulterated joy that went beyond the ambit of anything I had ever dared to dream of for myself.

It felt like a reward I didn’t deserve. Maybe it was futile, looking for reasons when I knew I would get no answers. But in all my musings, the only conclusion I came to that made any kind of sense was that… it was because of Bella.

Because of Bella and her goodness, that rare kindness I saw only in her—she was why I was allowed all this happiness. And I was just the fool lucky enough to be in the range of her shining sun. Lucky enough to love her and be loved by her.

How could I ever tell her how grateful I was? Grateful that she could always see past the worst of me and my mistakes. Grateful that she had unlimited selflessness, giving us the family I’d envisioned for her, but thought impossible for me. Grateful that she was all too happy to be the first and only love of my existence. Grateful that cruel fate, after our various ordeals, had turned merciful to bring us to this heaven.

I looked back at them again, Nessie now sleeping soundly on Bella’s lap, and Bella absentmindedly twining her fingers through the mess of bronze curls fanned out on the soft fabric of her dress. “She’s dreaming,” Bella whispered. I could see Nessie’s hand on Bella’s arm, inadvertently letting Bella see the pictures she was swimming through in the land of her dreams.

I was sure that no words in any of the languages I knew could ever sufficiently reveal the feelings of peace and contentment that I felt, staring at them, the two halves of my heart, at ease in the backseat.

Bella caught me looking then, her golden eyes piercing through mine in the rearview mirror. She smiled, lowered her shields, and allowed me to hear one thought: I love you.

“I love you, too, Bella,” I whispered. I willed the past and the future that stretched out infinitely before us to give those words weight, seeming too simple and inadequate to convey the depth of what I felt.

No, I didn’t have the words that could tell Bella how grateful I was for her. For Renesmee. For our family. Perhaps I never would…. But that was fine. I had the rest of forever to try and find the words. Forever and forever and forever. I smiled and felt lighter than if my heart were not made of stone, and sped up the car to take us faster towards home.

[ellewritesathing]

Faking It  -  IV

Summary: You’d done plenty of dumb things in your life, but the dumbest had to be picking Greendale’s latest bad-boy to pretend to be your boyfriend.

Masterlist Prev. | Part 4

Word-count: 3.4k+

A/N: this gif has nothing to do with this part but i thought it was cute and couldn’t find a kitchen gif that fit. hope you enjoy the drama lmao 💕

Of all the ways you saw taking Caliban’s hand the day you met, you hadn’t anticipated the very obvious outcome: that you’d develop feelings for him. Actual, real, not fake feelings. But it’s not like it was your fault - no, you blamed the blonde asshole himself. They just didn’t make guys like him in Greendale, so he completely blindsided you by being … well, himself.  

He was intimidating enough that other guys left you alone, and - even though plenty of people found him as charming as you did - he made it very clear that he had no interest in any of them. He was infuriatingly good at everything he did and he looked good while doing it. He laughed at all your shitty jokes and actually listened to you when you spoke. How the hell were you supposed to not be attracted to someone who would sit with you while you worked on your art projects and quote poetry in an offhand effort to distract you? 

Who the hell could even quote poetry in real life? 

Not you. Not anyone that you’d ever met. 

Caliban was just different in all the ways that made your heart race. 

The fact that your friends liked him didn’t hurt either. Harvey still rolled his eyes whenever Caliban showed up or made the others laugh, but his anger must have subsided at least a little because you’d caught them joking around between practices. Theo loved Caliban; the two of them had inside jokes, knew each other’s lunch orders, and partnered up for chemistry. Roz would read a book and annotate it before handing it off to Caliban to read, and she liked that Caliban made you smile. Sabrina liked having someone to do dumb and borderline illegal stuff with. They liked him, and now you liked them. The fuckers. 

“Are you listening to a word I’m saying?” Sabrina asked, nudging you with her elbow. “You’ve been staring at the baseball field for like five minutes.”

“Of course I’m listening,” you lied. You sat up straighter and tugged your clothing back into place. “Quite frankly, I’m insulted you’d think that I wasn’t paying attention to The Great Kinkle Family Reunion.” 

Sabrina tilted her head and smiled politely, that’s how you knew trouble was coming. “Then tell me what you should do when Uncle Tristan starts talking about horses,” she said. 

“Uh …”  

“Exactly.” Sabrina laughed and looked down at the field where Harvey, Theo, Caliban, and the rest of the team were running laps. “I’ve been to every family get together since I met Harvey, and they all end horribly. Caliban’s mom was really sweet to host one, but she’s in way over her head. Have you met her, by the way?” 

“No,” you said. You couldn’t tell if that was weird or not. Were fake girlfriends supposed to meet their partner’s mothers? “But I’m kinda surprised she’s doing this given everything I’ve heard about her and the Kinkles. They weren’t exactly the most supportive of her.” 

“Yeah, I don’t know why Harvey’s such a sweetheart when the rest of the family is … It was probably Tommy, now that I think about it,” Sabrina said. She shook her head and turned to look at you before taking your hands in hers. “I just wanted to check-in and make sure you’re ready for this.” 

“Brina, I can handle this.” You squeezed her hands reassuringly. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve got a pretty mean right hook. Ask Colin Anderson. If there’s a fight, I’ll be golden.” 

Sabrina laughed and let go of your hands. “I’m trying to prevent that fight, but good to know.” 

You laughed and bumped her with your arm. “Looks like practice is letting out. You wanna head down?” 

“Nah.” Sabrina put on her brightest smile and waved down to a very tired-looking Harvey. “Let them de-stink first.” 

---

After two weeks of prep and cover stories, the day of the Great Reunion was here. You’d woken up disgustingly early in order to get yourself together and drive over to Caliban’s to help them set everything up. 

You weren’t sure what you expected their house to look like, but clashed with the black BMW parked in the garage. It was a sweet, two-story house with a wraparound porch and balloons in the front yard. The house was painted a soft sunshine shade of yellow and had rocking chairs, hanging plants, and rose beds in the front. It was the picture-perfect house for anyone other than Caliban, but it still fit. 

Different. 

Gathering up your nerve and the rest of your belongings, you made your way to the door and pressed the doorbell. The tiny pothos plant felt as awkward as you did while it sat in your hands and waited for someone to open the door. 

Thank God it was Caliban and not his mom. 

He smiled amusedly at your plant before looking up at you. “Is that for me?” 

“I know it’s a lame gift but I didn’t know if your mom was allergic to cut flowers and I’m not old enough to buy her wine,” you said in a rush. You frowned slightly and tilted your head. “Well, not legally at least.” 

Caliban laughed and reached out to take one of your hands and lead you inside. “It’s perfect. Thank you.” 

You didn’t know what else to say as Caliban led you to the kitchen. The house was as much of a surprise inside as it was outside, and it smelled like freshly baked bread. It was colorful and covered in old photos. He seemed very at home here and lighter than you’d ever seen him elsewhere. No, not lighter. Happier.

“Wait.” You stopped dead and let go of Caliban to reach out for a photo of the cutest little boy with missing front teeth and a mess of blonde curls around his dirty face. “Is this you?” You couldn’t help the laugh that came out when Caliban looked pained at your discovery. “Aw, Abercrombie, you were so cute! What’s on your face?” 

Caliban sighed and took the photo out of your hand, looking embarrassed for probably the first time in his life. “I was seven years old and I liked eating chocolate. Is that a problem?” 

“Oh, no, no, no,” a woman said as she rounded a corner and laughed. She had the most beautiful long, brown hair and kind eyes. “You didn’t just like chocolate. If you came anywhere near it, you used to eat yourself into a sugar coma. I couldn’t bake anything around you without you eating the batter before it even got into the oven.” 

She laughed and ruffled Caliban’s hair before smiling at you. You didn’t know anyone could ruffle his hair without losing a hand. 

“You must be the lovely new girlfriend I’ve heard so much about,” she said. “I’m Isobel. Is that for me?” 

Isobel pointed at your little pot plant and jolted you back to life. “Uh, yeah,” you said and held the plant out to her. Her hands were warm as she took the plant from you. “I wasn’t too sure what to bring but I didn’t want to come empty-handed.” 

“Oh, not at all. This little guy is perfect!” Isobel lifted up the plant to look at it. “I’m going to give him some water and put him in the front. Do you guys want to get settled in the kitchen so long?” 

“Of course,” Caliban said with a gentle smile. His mom gave him another playful bump and disappeared into some other part of the house while Caliban held a hand out to you. “Shall we?” 

“Who are you?” you teased with wide eyes as you took his hand in yours.

You followed him into the kitchen and took a seat at the breakfast bar. They were here for maybe a month and their house already felt like more of a home than yours ever did. How they afforded it all, you had no idea, but Caliban never spoke about his birth dad and you didn’t want to push. All you knew was he gave Caliban his blonde hair and bone structure, nothing more and nothing less.

You were snapped out of your thoughts by the sight of Caliban in a sunflower printed apron. Clearly, your efforts to contain your amusement weren’t nearly as stellar as you thought they were because Caliban raised an eyebrow at you over all the baking supplies on the counter. 

“What’s the matter?” he asked. 

“I didn’t peg you for an apron guy is all,” you said with a small shrug, doing your best to sound nonchalant and not totally, completely chalant. 

“I don’t like getting my clothes dirty,” Caliban said defensively. “Without an apron, anything can stain your shirt.” 

“I think I’ll take the risk,” you said as you tapped the counter. “I trust myself and don’t think anyone’s going to splatter batter on me.” 

“Batter, maybe not …” Caliban tilted his head to the side. “But flour?” 

“Flour?” 

Before you had the chance to ask what he meant, Caliban threw a handful of flour at you. He laughed at how shocked you were and you took that opportunity to reach across the counter and throw some flour at him. Soon enough the two of you were running around the kitchen, covered in flour, and laughing until your sides hurt. 

Caliban wrapped his arms around you and scooped you up, ignoring your pleading and cries that were cut short by laughter. You were still mid-air with Caliban’s face close to your own when Isobel came back. 

“Hey, hey, hey!” Isobel put her hands out to get your attention. “We have guests coming in an hour and the two of you are making a mess in my kitchen.” 

Caliban set you down, but the two of you were still tangled up and filthy. You didn’t know what to say to the woman you’d met fifteen minutes ago and whose kitchen you’d subsequently ruined.

Isobel laughed and shook her head. “It’s my own fault for leaving this one unsupervised,” she teased, pointing a finger at Caliban as she made her way around to start cleaning up. “Go clean yourselves up. Come back when you don’t like friendly ghosts.” 

Luckily for you, flour was relatively easy to get out because you weren’t wearing dark colors for once. It took a while to get it out of your hair and make it look presentable, but it was hard to be too mad at the mess when it was such a fun time making it. 

When you got back downstairs, you could hear people laughing and talking in the kitchen. It was still too early for guests but it was clear that it wasn’t just Caliban and his mom. 

You were right. You rounded the corner to find Caliban freshly-changed, his mom kneading some dough, and a very pretty redhead with big doe-eyes all laughing at some inside joke. It made you feel painfully other. 

“Oh, Luce,” Isobel said when she noticed you come in, waving you over. “You have to meet Caliban’s girlfriend. She’s a gem.” 

Luce ... As in Lucy? Lucy from California? Harvey’s first crush? Lucy. 

This was going to end badly. 

Lucy tilted her head as she turned to look at you. You could see the gears turning in her head as she looked you over. “Girlfriend?” she asked with a friendly (but fake) smile.

“The one and only,” you said with an over-confident smile as you walked over and interlaced your hand with Caliban’s. You wrapped your other hand around his arm, just like the first day you met. You introduced yourself with a friendly yet fake smile of your own. 

“You guys moved up here a few months ago and Caliban’s completely forgotten about me,” Lucy teased to Isobel. She moved some hair out of her face and looked over at you again. “He used to tell me everything. We were like this.” She crossed her index and middle finger over each other with a smile. 

You’d have liked to show her one of your fingers. 

But you didn’t. All you did was smile and make some polite conversation while not letting go of Caliban. You weren’t sure why you were being so defensive. It’s not like you and Caliban were actually dating, but you didn’t like Lucy. Not only did she break Harvey’s heart and cause all the damage you’d spent the better part of two months fixing, but she also just rubbed you the wrong way. 

“Okay, not to ruin all the fun,” Isobel said after a while. “But guests should be coming soon. Why don’t you kids make sure everything is set up in the back and keep an ear out for any early birds?” 

“Sure thing,” Lucy said, hopping off her seat and leading the way to the backyard. 

You started following when Caliban caught your arm and said something to his mom about getting more supplies from the garage. He didn’t say anything else as he led the way and neither did you, but that was mostly just because you were being petty. 

Caliban led you to the middle of the garage and tugged on the old light to illuminate the dusty room around you. He lifted your intertwined hands and folded them over each other as he thought about what he was going to say. 

You couldn’t wait that long. 

“So, what’s the deal with you and Lucy? And I want the truth this time.” 

Caliban laughed and shook his head as he looked up at the old light above you. He took a breath before saying, “Lucinda’s my best friend, pretty much my only friend before yours so kindly took me in. If I’d known she’d be here today, I would have said something.” 

“Wait, you were best friends with the girl who broke up your family?” you asked. 

“She apologized,” Caliban said. “And, besides, you’re friends with Harvey.” 

“Harvey’s never made out with me,” you said, untangling your hand from his so that you could cross your arms over your chest. 

Caliban narrowed his eyes slightly as he took in your newly defensive stance, and then he laughed without saying anything else. He looked amused when he met your scowling gaze again. “I can’t believe you’re jealous,” he said. “Don’t misunderstand me, it’s incredibly attractive but-” 

“I am not jealous,” you said. “I couldn’t care less.” 

“I’m sure,” Caliban said with a sarcastic smile. He rolled his eyes as he stepped closer and cupped your face before leaning down to be millimeters away from your face. “Forget about her, alright? I assure you, you’re the only fake girlfriend for me.” 

Before you had the chance to say something witty in return, the garage door flew open and the devil herself stood in the opening. 

“There you are!” Lucy said. “Cal, I need help with these streamers. I’m way too short to get them where your mom wants them.” 

“I’ll be right out,” Caliban said without taking his eyes off yours. He pressed a kiss to your forehead before taking a step back and leaving you in the dusty and dim garage. 

You shot a warning text to Harvey about Lucy before you went out to help the others. Though he never answered, he must have got it because he was surprisingly okay when he and Sabrina got there. You and Sabrina shared a look when Lucy got a bit handsy with her hello, but neither of you said anything. 

That’s how most of the get together went; you and Sabrina sharing secret, sarcastic looks and staying out of trouble. Well, mostly. You still didn’t know what to say when Uncle Tristan started talking about horses, but Caliban came to your rescue and the rest was smooth sailing. 

Until an hour went by when you couldn’t find Caliban anywhere. You asked around but no one had seen him, but his mom pointed you in the direction of his room. Isobel held onto your arm before you could leave. 

“Um, I’m sorry if this seems a bit strange but I …” Isobel smiled and looked down at her hand on your arm before letting go, clearly trying to respect whatever boundaries you may have had. “Caliban’s been a lot happier since we moved here and I think that has to do with you. I just wanted to say thank you.” 

“Oh, uh- It’s nothing. I’m just a girl and I’m sure Caliban’s brought a few of us around by now with cheekbones like that,” you said with a smile. 

“No, Caliban’s never brought anyone home before,” Isobel said, looking like she was trying to remember anything to the contrary. “Sorry, hun, I’ve gotta go. Jan’s calling me over. Good luck with the search!” 

“Thanks,” you said quietly. 

Isobel disappeared into the sea of Kinkles and you made your way to Caliban’s room. You took your time going up the stairs, looking at all the photos on the wall as you did. It was nice to see that Caliban was just as angry and angsty now as he was at  14 years old. 

It was strangely quiet upstairs compared to the rest of the house and the party in the backyard. Quite enough that you could hear someone giggling upstairs, someone decidedly not Caliban. 

Roz would have told you to face it head-on and not to sneak around like a creep. Thankfully, Roz wasn’t there to say anything. 

You tiptoed as casually as you could to Caliban’s room. The room felt more like the Caliban you knew than the rest of the house did: big windows without any blinds, a tornado of books and sketches on every surface available, and a very pretty redhead making out with him. 

“She kissed you, huh?” you asked, echoing the story of when they were younger before turning on your heel and slamming the door behind you. Your heart ached annoyingly when Caliban called out for you as he followed behind you, but your brain told it to suck it up until you were out of the house.

By sheer force of will, you made it back downstairs without turning around, but then Caliban managed to get a hold of your hand and spin you around to face him. 

“Would you please let me explain?” Caliban asked. 

“No,” you said, pulling your hand away from him. “Look, it’s not like you have anything to explain anyway, okay?” He reached out for you again and you took a step back so you wouldn’t be confused by his touch. “You and me? We were a fake relationship. Maybe this is the universe saying it’s time it came to a real end.” 

You knew what he’d say if you weren’t arguing. He’d ask you, with that annoying smile of his, when you started letting the universe tell you what to do. Or he’d make some comment about the universe being a bastard. But all he did now was set his jaw and look down at his hand. 

“What are you saying?” 

“I’m saying this is it,” you said. “Goodbye, Caliban.” 

You weren’t sure why you expected him to say something else, to fight for your fake relationship, but all that expectation just led to disappointment. Caliban flexed his hand but didn’t say anything else as you pushed past him to get your stuff from the kitchen so you could rush to your car to cry. 

Harvey was tapping on your window just before you started the car. Curse your five-minute breakdown for being long enough for him to notice you were gone. 

“What?” you asked as you rolled down the window. 

“Are you okay?” Harvey asked. “You ran out of there so fast-” 

“You were right, okay?” You put your car in reverse before looking back up at him. “Caliban’s not a good guy and you warned me. Will you just let me go so I can cry somewhere that’s not here?” 

“Hey, you know that’s not what I meant,” Harvey said softly, reaching through the window for you. “Let me come with-” 

“No. Go have fun with your family. I need to get out of here.” 

“But-” 

“Harvey, move or I will drive over your foot.” 

You didn’t think he was going to do it, but Harvey took a very reluctant step back and put his hands up in surrender. He wasn’t going to fight for you either, not that you’d given him much of a chance. Harvey was stood there, watching you drive away until he disappeared in your rearview mirror. 

Music blared in an attempt to drown out your thoughts, but there was one you couldn’t get rid of no matter how hard you tried. Sabrina was right - every Kinkle family get together ended horribly.

Tagged:  @miss--moose​  @marrypuffsstuff​  @harryscarolinaa​  @igorsbby​​  @foji2000​​  @mschfavngz​​  @artaxerxesthegreat​​  @thxmagic​​  @strawberriesandknives​​  @xealia​​  @hotmessindisguise​​  @reheated-coffee​​  @shelby-x​​  @perseny-blog​​  @millie-753​​  @luneerius​​  @shizzybarnaclee​​  @lettherebelovex​​  @throughparisallthroughrome​  @ietss​  @thebookwormlife​  @mechanicalanimalz​  @mariamermaid​  @nqbmf​  @drrramaaaqweeen​ 

[chickensarentcheap]

Best Part of Me - Chapter 4

Warnings: none

Tagging: @c-a-v-a-l-r-y​, @alievans007​, @thunderintheshadows​, @innerpaperexpertcloud​

While it is a more peaceful existence, it is often a lonelier one. The safety and security of seclusion at times feeling like isolation. Their property…their home itself…is beautiful beyond anything she could have imagined; surrounded by the sights and sounds of nature, the dense and lush woodlands and the pristine beach and majesty of the ocean. Aside from the noise and activity of their own residence, they are very much shut off from the rest of the world; two hundred yards from their closest neighbour, tucked at the very end of a three kilometer stretch of recently paved road. Weeks can pass by before she even sees another human being, let alone speaks to them.  There’d been scares and complications during the last three months of her final pregnancy and she’d had to relegate herself to living the life of a ‘shut in’ for the sake of both her health and that of her unborn daughter; never leaving the property aside from specialist appointments. Addie had been an incredibly determined little girl; wanting to make her debut long before it was safe for her to do so. It had been nothing short of a miracle when the doctors had managed to tide things over until week thirty-four, and everyone that had been providing care had thought she’d been in the NICU for the long haul. Only for her to prove them all wrong; being released after only a week and a half.

 A fighter. All five pounds, ten ounces of her.

 Normally Esme would spend the first part of her morning -after the older kids had been shipped off to school-  on the beach; Addie in the carrier strapped to her body, Declan toddling along beside them, allowing him to stop every so often to splash and stomp in the water or play in the sand. Today they walk the road instead, Mac’s leash secured around her waist, one hand pushing the baby in her stroller, the other tightly gripping Declan by the wrist. He is quick and has no fear and won’t think twice about bolting into the woods or onto someone else’s property.

 The pavement is hot but comfortable against their bare feet. It was one of the things that she had found so unusual at about Australia at first; no one ever seemed to wear shoes unless going into businesses, and even then, occasionally footwear would be noticeably absent. It is one of the charming ‘quirks’, going hand in hand with their laid-back natures and accents and hilarious slang words. An entirely different way of life; a refreshing and welcoming change of pace. Everyone seeming much more relaxed and calmer.  Friendly. Always willing to help one another out, whether friends or strangers. And while Colorado had been lovely in its own right, it often felt too ‘fast.’ That life was constantly hectic, barely given you a chance to catch your breath, never mind admire your surroundings. Everything about Australia is incredible to her; the scenery, the people, the way you just take time to enjoy everyone and everything around you.

 But it is still lonely at times. Outside of her own family, she doesn’t really have a life; no relatives that can visit, no friends to talk to or hang out with. It has been that way for years; long before she’d ever met Tyler. Once her first marriage had disintegrated, she’d begun the long and arduous journey of ‘rediscovery;’ more than content with the job she had, jumping from place to place, and living out of suitcases, never forming bonds, or putting down roots. She’s older now though; almost thirty-six. And lately she’s found herself craving more.  She had thought that she was perfect content with just being a wife and a mother, but her heart has begun to yearn for something extra.  Mom friends that she can talk to whether it be face to face or through a text, other women she could have lunch dates and engage in ‘girl talk’ with. Needing to be more than that someone’s spouse. Someone’s mother. Needing…wanting… to exist outside of the comforts of those two realms.

 And she feels guilty for that. As if she’s taking every thing she already has for granted. That she is makes her selfish for wanting more and she should just be happy with the way her life already is. She has a lot more than a lot of women in the world:  a supportive, loving, and helpful husband, five beautiful and amazing kids. Shouldn’t that be enough?

 ****

 It is a beautiful morning. Brilliant sunshine, the sky a vivid shade of blue and cluttered with enormous, pure white clouds. The temperature is always cooler where they are; a few to several degrees lower thanks to the abundance of trees and the winds that roll in off the ocean. And she is comfortable in a pair of tattered and weather jean shorts and a hoodie over her t-shirt, one of her husband’s ball caps pulled low over her eyes. It’s become a habit that she wishes she could break herself of; a hat used more for disguise than a cute accessory or protection from the sun. That paranoia still lingers; that there could always be someone out there watching, hell bent on revenge and looking for the perfect opportunity to enforce it.

 The walk is slow going; Declan routinely stopping to investigate things, whether it be rocks and sticks he finds particularly interesting, or wildlife that lingers at the tree line that he wants to watch. He is infinitely curious about the world around him, noticing everything and anything, big or small. He hasn’t met and animal or person he hasn’t liked, and vice vera. Out of the five, he’s the ‘charming’ one; able to melt hearts with those striking blue eyes and mischievous smile. Extremely affectionate and loving to everyone he meets, even old ladies in the grocery store who always seem to be enamoured by the thick red hair and the outrageously long eyelashes. While Esme may be biased -as all mothers are- he is just damn cute. A sweet little personality to go along with an even sweeter face. And she can’t resist pausing to take pictures of him with her phone; so adorable in his backwards baseball hat, loose tendrils of hair sticking out at the ears.

 She sends one of the photos -of Declan holding a baby garter snake and flashing that trademark smile that crinkles the corners of his eyes (his father’s smile)- to her husband’s cell, along with a text that reads: see what cute babies you make?

 The house closest to them has been up for sale for three months; a one-story white stucco place with elaborate Japanese inspired front gardens and an interlocking brick driveway. The property itself is much smaller that what they own, but no less stunning. She notices that not only has the ‘for sale’ sign been taken down, but there’s a bright blue Suzuki hatch back in the driveway; tailgate up, surrounded by boxes being unloaded by the home’s new owner. A tall, statuesque blond with vibrant pink, purple, and aquamarine highlights in her shoulder length tresses. And she watches -albeit briefly- as the woman continues to remove items from the back of the car. The couple that had lived there before had been in their eighties and absolutely hated kids and would complain about Millie and the twins ‘running wild and unsupervised’ in the road despite the fact that their father would have been  less than ten feet away. Never directing the complaints to Tyler himself, but waiting until they’d see him leave and then knock on the door to confront her. So it’s nice to see someone younger. That hopefully won’t be such a miserable asshole.

 The front door of the house has been left open and a pug comes waddling out; immediately noticing them at the end of the driveway, which starts off a round of barking from both the smaller dog and Mac and absolute excitement from Declan who begins repeatedly shrieking ‘oggie!’ and tries to yank his wrist out of her grasp. He’s incredibly strong for a little guy; heavy, solid, and powerful. And Mac -still barking yet thankfully not bolting- parks himself right in front of the toddler to block his path.

 The woman in the driveway smiles and waves to them in greeting, and that’s when Esme makes the ultimate mistake; letting go of her son’s hand to wave back. He seizes the opportunity; taking off up the driveway the second he feels his mother’s grasp release.

 “Oh my god Declan! Get back here!” she bellows, and unleashes Mac from around her waist, allowing the dog to chase after him. At the most he’ll grab the toddler by the back of the shirt or knock him to the ground. He’s done it before with each one of the kids; showing an incredible instinct -and with no training- to protect the little humans. “Declan William!” she hollers as she hurries after him and the dog. The latter now making friends with the initially startled pug; the new homeowner scooping Declan up and settling him on her hip.

 “Well hey there cutie,” the blond gushes, gently taking hold of his hands as he tries to tear the unique and colourful glasses off her face. “Who are you?”

 “This is Declan,” Esme responds. “And he’s not usually this much of a shit head, I swear.”

 “You’re just a curious little man, aren’t you! You just wanted to come and meet Stan-Lee. Here, let me introduce you…” their new neighbour drops down to one knee and places Declan on her thigh, taking his hand in hers and then running it over the pug’s fur. The toddler giggling with the dog licks at his hand. “See that? He likes you already! He loves to meet new friends. Especially little ones.”

 “I am so sorry,” Esme can feel the blush in her cheeks. “I’m usually not that stupid. Letting him get away like that. Especially on the road. Although no one but us ever comes down this far. We used to get people that would speed down here and park on our property to get into the woods. But we own all that, so my husband went out and scared the crap out of them with a hunting rifle and they never came back. You must think I’m a shitty parent.”

 The blond waves off the mere suggestion. “Not at all. They get away sometimes. No matter how hard we try to stop them. Not to mention he’s crazy strong! Two? Two and a half?”

 “Seventeen months. I know. He’s absurdly tall. But so is his dad. I am sorry he ran over like that. Bothering you and your dog and…”

 “It’s no bother. Honest. I’m Salena,” she offers a hand, and Esme accepts it warmly.

 “I’m Esme. And that’s Mac,” she nods at the German Shepherd as he playfights with the pug. “It’s actually Macaroni. Don’t ask. My son named him. And this is Adeline,” she gestures to the stroller. “Be we call her Addie.”

 “Is this your little sister?” Salena speaks to Declan as she places him on the ground and takes him by the hand, leading him to the stroller. “How about you show me your little sister. I bet she’s a cutie, just like you. May I?” she asks Esme, taking hold of the corner of the blanket that covers the buggy.

 “Of course.”

 She peels the blanket back, then places a hand over her chest. “Oh my gracious! Look at you, pretty girl! Aren’t you just a darling! You’re just new.”

 “Very new,” Esme confirms. “Only two weeks.”

 “And you already look like that?”  Salena looks over the top rim of her glasses as she eyes Esme from head to toe.

 “Please! The clothes hide everything, trust me. I’m huge. And I feel gross.”

 “You’re crazy! You look amazing. Are these your only two?”

 “No. There’s three more,” she says, and the neighbour’s eyes widen. “Five-year-old twin boys and a soon to be six-year-old daughter. I know,’ she laughs. “I’m crazy.”

 “I just can’t believe that body’s had five kids. Five’s the limit?”

 “Four was the original limit but by husband wanted one more. I don’t know who is more insane. Me or him.”

 “Well if these two are as beautiful as they are, I can only imagine what the other three look like. The red hair comes from your husband?”

 “His mother. Declan’s the only one with it. The other three are blond. Or light brown. Whatever you want to call it. And the last one is all me. Which I feel I deserved after having four that look and act exactly like their father. All that work and getting fat and I don’t get one that looks like me? That is some bullshit.”

 “Would you like to come in?” Salena inquires, nodding towards the house. “I have a breakfast casserole in the oven, and it is way too much for just one person, even with leftovers.”

 “We shouldn’t. We were just on a walk before lunch and we don’t want to impose or…”

 “You won’t be imposing at all. We can sit out back and chat some more. You’re the first person I’ve met since moving to Cookstown. I was staying a hotel right in town while waiting for the house to close. It would be nice to have a friend that’s close by.”

 It’s tempting, and as much as she loves the idea of having a friend…especially a neighbour…she knows Tyler will be hesitant. He’s severely overprotective. Beginning after Dhaka and becoming increasingly worse over the years, hitting its peak after the McMann incident. In his mind, everyone is a possible threat. Including the neighbour with the funky glasses and the colorful hair.

 “Just stay for a little while,” the other woman urges. “Just for something to eat and a little chat. I don’t bite. I promise.”

 “It’s not that and it’s not you, believe me,” Esme attempts to explain. “This is going to sound really weird, but things went really bad before we moved here and I’m a little…apprehensive…when it comes to new people. It’s not personal. I swear. It’s all my own issues.”

 “I promise I am not a serial killer. Just come in and have some lunch and let me spend some more with this cutie pie,” she tickles Declan’s stomach until he’s giggling hysterically and beaming up at her with the utmost adoration. “Just an hour,” she says. “If I bore you or I annoy before then, you can leave. I won’t hold you hostage.”

 “Okay,” Esme finally agrees, as Salena scoops Declan up once more and leads the way towards the house.

 ****

He receives the text message just as he pulls his truck up in front of his father’s new place; a small, cottage style bungalow in a newly established retirement and nursing care community in Port Douglas. It had been bittersweet when he’d eventually found out that the old man had sold the family home. The years there hadn’t all been horrible; there’d been a handful of good memories made between those four walls. That house was the last physical tie that Tyler had had to his mother, and the new owners had bulldozed it with plans on custom build for the lot. The demolition had finally erased all the dark secrets that the place had once held. All the cruel words, all the tears, all the holes in the walls, all the beatings.

 Killing the engine, his pulls his cell from the side pocket of his cargos and checks the message. A slow smile spreading across his face when he sees the picture of his youngest son, and the words that his wife had sent afterwards. If there is one thing they excel at, it’s making beautiful children. And the activities that help with the actual creation of them. He texts her back, telling her that they’ve just reached his dad’s place and have two stops afterwards close to home. That he loves her and the kids and will see them soon.

 He begins to ask where she is but decides against it. It will only irritate her if she feels as if he’s keeping tabs on her and attempting to control her. She claims he’s overprotective to the point of suffocation, something that the therapist had said they’d touch on in the next session. Why he is the way he is and what he can do to either control it or stop it altogether. Tyler doesn’t necessarily want to be that way; he doesn’t want her to feel as if he’s locking her away in the house and controlling every move she makes. But he’s already come so close to losing her. Twice. And he doesn’t want to take the chance of there being a third time.

 So he doesn’t ask. Even though it gnaws at his stomach that she’s out there. Off the property. With two of his kids in tow. Instead he pockets his cell, pulls the keys from the ignition, and then finishes the coffee that sits in one of the cup holders between the front seats.

 “How are we going to explain me?” Ovi inquires. “Am I just going to be some guy that you hired or…?”

 “He already knows all about you.”

 “How much does he know? Or what does he know?”

 “Your folks were friends of mine and Esme’s, they died, left us you in their will. Nice and simple. It doesn’t need to be complicated.”

 The lying never stops. Not when it comes to the old life. To the old Tyler. But at this stage in the game -with his father not functioning properly in the first place- he doesn’t see the need to burden the old man with the truth. Chances are he’d be extremely pissed and/or disgusted and wouldn’t even remember what he’d been told the next day.

 “And you think he believes it?” Ovi asks.

 “Mate, I don’t even know if he knows who I am anymore. Chances are he doesn’t even remember I have a wife and kids. Or that I even told him about you already. But if he asks, that’s what we tell him. Got it?”

 Ovi nods.

 Tyler opens the compartment between their seats and fishes out the extra bottle of anti anxiety meds. It’s always smart to have them on hand; never knowing what situations or environments will bring on an attack. But he can already feel the heaviness in his chest and the dryness in his mouth, and he takes three of the pills and places them under his tongue, waiting for them to full dissolve before putting the bottle in his pocket.

 It’s a hell of a way to live. Having to dope yourself up just to be able to get out of the goddamn car.

 And he’s plain fucking sick of it.

 ****

 The personal support worker greets them at the front door; a short and stocky Aboriginal woman clad in brightly patterned scrubs and bearing a name tag that identifies her as Maggie. She as kind, almost sad eyes, and a soft, pleasant smile and her grip is deceptively strong when she shakes their hands.

 “You must be Trevor,” she addresses him.

 “Tyler,” he gently corrects, and removing his sunglasses, hangs them on the neck of his t-shirt.

 She offers an apologetic smile. “He told me he was expecting someone named Trevor.”

 “Trevor was his brother. My uncle. He died twenty years ago. But I’m Tyler. His son.”

 “This happens, you know,” she sighs. “Moment when they can’t remember the people in the present, but they remember the ones from the past. It isn’t personal. It’s just the disease. It’s a cruel thing; what it does to people.”

 He nods in agreement, trying to at least appear sympathetic. But he feels nothing. No empathy. No pity. No sorrow that his father is slipping away. No regrets that they’ve let the years go by without even attempting a reconciliation.

 “You just moved back, I hear,” Maggie comments, as she leads them from the front foyer and towards the back of the house. “Were you gone long?”

 “Five and a half years.”

 “That’s a long time to be away from home. What made you come back?”

 “I came into some money and I was able to retire early,” Tyler explains. It’s not a total lie; that part did happen. It just wasn’t as easy as he’s making it sound. “My wife and I decided this was the best place to raise our kids.”

 “Well I can’t argue with that. Is this them?”  Maggie pauses in the hall between the living room and kitchen, nodding at the frame photographs on the wall. “Your kids?”

 It’s their school pictures from last year when they’d still been in Telluride. Before they’d ever heard of Michael McMann. And one of Declan when he’d just been a baby; not even crawling or walking yet.

 Tyler nods. “They’re a year older now. And we added another. A little girl. Two weeks old.”

 Maggie arches an eyebrow. “You’re telling me you have five kids?”

 “Yup.”

 “Five kids,” she breathes and shakes her head. “Boy, you’re either both brave as hell or you’re both just plain crazy.”

 “Maybe both?” Ovi suggests, and then laughs when Tyler directs a playful elbow into his stomach.

 “I actually have six kids,” Tyler says. “If we count him,” he jerks a thumb over his shoulder. “When he’s not being a smart ass.”

 Maggie looks Ovi up and down. “You’re one of his…” she nods at Tyler. “…kids?”

 The young man nods.

 “And just how does that work? When you look like you do…” she looks at Tyler, then at Ovi. “…and you look like you do.”

 “They took me in,” Ovi explains. “Six years ago. After my parents died. It was in my mother’s will. That I was supposed to go to Tyler. So…. here I am.”

 “Here he is,” Tyler confirms, and tousles Ovi’s hair. “Congratulations. It’s a boy. All six foot one and two hundred pounds of him.”

 “He’s not my father, but he is my dad,” Ovi says. “And that’s good enough for me.”

 Maggie gives a slow nod of agreement, and then once again leads the way down the hall. “Your father insisted we put those pictures up as soon as he moved in. He’s extremely proud of his grandkids.”

 Tyler doubts it. On both counts.

 “He’s having one of his ‘okay’ days,” she says. “Woke up knowing what day is, what month, what year.”

 “But thinks his dead brother is going to show up,” Tyler tosses out. And again, nothing. Not even the slightest hint of sadness. The man doesn’t deserve any. Not after the life he’s lived. Not with all the things he’s said and all the things he’s done.

 “He may have just screwed the name up,” she suggests. “I mean, you’re his son. He obviously knows your name.”

 “I haven’t been his son in a long time,” Tyler says. It doesn’t hurt to admit. It just is what it is. In the same way that Ovi may still bear the Mahajan name, but his father had stopped being a part of his life a long time ago because of his own selfish and evil choices. Just as Tyler’s old man had destroyed their relationship with the use of a belt or a fist or whatever else his father could get his hands on.

 “You’ll always be his son,” Maggie’s tone has a scolding tone to it. “He helped give you life.”

 “That’s about all he did. He knocked my mum up. That’s it. I know you mean well, but you shouldn’t be lecturing about how things are between him and I. I lived with him. You didn’t. So how about we just cut the chit chat and you mind your own business.”

 She holds her hands up un surrender, then nods towards the sliding glass door that leads out onto a small patio. “He’s out there. Likes to sit in the sun and listen to the birds. He’s a very sweet man. Very gentle. Very good to us.”

 Tyler gives a derisive snort. It will be a cold day in hell before he acknowledges any of those traits. Because before the old man’s brain started going on him, he was a tyrant. Controlling and manipulative. Drinking far too much. Treating his mother like a slave and then degrading her and beating her if she dared stand up for herself. And when she’d died, all that cruelty and abuse had been turned onto his only child. He could forgive what his father had done to him, but there’s no goddamn way he’d ever forgive him for what he’d done to his mum.

 ****

 His father sits in an old porch swing; frail and sickly looking, a far cry from the man he’d been the last time Tyler had seen him six years ago. When he’d still carried himself with a hint of cockiness and superiority; shoulders still broad, eyes still icy and intimidating. He’s a shell of his former self, and Tyler almost hates himself for viewing this as a form of karma. That after years of treating people horribly, the old man has been reduced to needing help from complete strangers to perform even the smallest of tasks.

 “William, “ Maggie speaks from the doorway. “You have company. Your son and your...” she looks at Ovi for clarification as to just who he is.

 “Grandson,” Tyler finishes for her.

 “Your son and your grandson are here,” she continues. “They’ve come to visit.”

 Tyler gives her a small, appreciative smile and then waits until she steps back into the house and shuts the door before turning to Ovi. “Why don’t you go and find that list he supposedly made of the things we need to fix. Probably on the fridge or the kitchen table or...”

 “TV,” his father speaks up. “It’s by the TV.”

 Tyler smirks. “Go check there. See what you can do on your own. I’ll be in in a few.”

 Ovi nods, then gives a nervous smile and a small wave when he notices Tyler’s father watching him, a puzzled look on his face.

 “Go on,” Tyler encourages. “I need a few minutes here.”

 “Okay,” Ovi agrees, and slips back into the house.

 “Hey dad,” Tyler greets, as he grabs one of the patio chairs and places it facing the swing, sighing heavily as he sinks down into it. “You know who I am right?”

 His father nods, then leans forward and takes a hold of Tyler’s chin, turning his face to one side, then the other. “They let you keep that fur in the army?”

 “I’m not in the army anymore. I haven’t been in it for a long time.”

 “The war is over? They sent you home? From Afghanistan?”

 “I was in Afghanistan sixteen years ago. The war’s been over for a while. That one at least.”

 “So you’re home now?”

 Tyler nods.

 “I don’t know if I have enough room here for you. There’s not a lot of space. I had to get rid of the old place and downsize and...”

 “Dad, I have my own place to live. In Cookstown. With my wife and my kids.”

 He looks puzzled. “You have more than one now? When did that happen? Wasn’t Sarah just getting ready to have Austin?”

 Tyler sighs and runs a hand through his hair, then over his face. “Sarah and I haven’t been together in a long time. Since Austin died. That’s almost sixteen years ago now.”

 His father cocks his head to the side, confusion in his eyes and lining his face. “It is?”

 “I got married again. You were at the wedding. In Sydney. Same little place you and mum got married at. Near the opera house.”

 “Tiny little dark haired thing?”

 “Esme. You made a joke about her having a weird name.”

 “Esme...Esme...” his eyes squint as he tries to remember. “...cute wee thing. I like her. She’s a sweetheart. You’re still married to her?”

 “Six years and counting. She’s still putting up with me somehow. Do you remember meeting your granddaughter? Amelia? I brought her to the old house.”

 His father nods.

 “She’s going to be six in a couple months. I’ve also got twin boys that just turned five. Tyler and Tanner and another boy that’s seventeen months, Declan. And we just had another baby two weeks ago. A little girl. Adeline.”

 The old man smiles. “Your mother’s name.”

 “We call her Addie for short.”

 “That’s nice. Real nice. That you named her after your mother. She loved you so much, you know. Your mother. You were her pride and joy. The light of her life. I’d never seen her so as happy as she was the day you were born. She was a good mom to you. A real good mom.”

 “Yeah....” Tyler clears his throat noisily, trying to rid himself of the lump of emotion that sits squarely in his windpipe. “...she was.”

 “She’s a good mom? Your wife?”

 “She’s an incredible mom. I couldn’t have asked for a better mother for my kids. Or for a better woman to give me children.”

 “Six years?” his father asks. That you’ve been together?”

 “Six years and a couple of months,” Tyler confirms. “I haven’t screwed this one up. Not yet, anyway.”

 “Must be a good woman. A strong woman. To put up with the likes of you. You’ve always been a handful.”  It isn’t said with malice; there’s a soft smile curving the old man’s lips.

 “She keeps hanging in there. Keeps giving me another chance every time I screw up. Which has been a lot, unfortunately. But she never gives up on us. On me.”

 “Don’t let her get away. You’ll regret it if you do. And treat her right. Don’t make the same mistakes I did. You’re better than that. You always have been. You’re better than me. Thank Christ.”

 “Well I guess that’s one thing I do have to thank you for,” Tyler muses. “Showing me how not to be.”

 “And you’re back home? In Australia?”

 “We were in Colorado. We just move back six months ago. We should get you out to the house. You’d love it. It’s right on the beach. Awesome spot. And you’d get to see Amelia again. And meet your other grandkids.”

 His father smiles. “I’d like that.”

 “Maybe for Amelia’s birthday,” Tyler suggests, and then stares down at his hands; palms up, studying all the callouses and scars that years on the job have left behind.

 There’s so much he wants to say. Things that he needs to get off his chest in regard to the nightmare that he’d lived through growing up. He wants to punish his father; make him feel even the slightest bit of regret and remorse for all the things he’s said and done.

 But he doesn’t. Because whatever he says will never come close to the torment that’s always taking place in father’s broken mind.

[onpagetwentyone]

NIGHTFALL (Devil’s Night #4)

Penelope Douglas

PUBLICATION DETAILS

Kindle Edition, 621 pages

Published July 24th 2020 by Penelope Douglas LLC

SYNOPSIS

From New York Times bestselling author Penelope Douglas comes the thrilling, final installment in the Devil’s Night series…

What happens when it’s five against one and nowhere to run?

EMORY

They call it Blackchurch. A secluded mansion in a remote, undisclosed location where the wealthy and powerful send their misbehaving sons to cool off away from prying eyes.

Will Grayson has always been an animal, though. Reckless, wild, and someone who was never bound by a single rule other than to do exactly what he wanted. There was no way his grandfather was going risk him humiliating the family again.

Not that the last time was entirely his fault. He might’ve enjoyed backing me into corners in high school when no one was looking, so they wouldn’t catch on that Mr. Popular actually wanted a piece of that quiet, little nerd he loved to torture so much, but…

He could also be warm. And fierce in keeping me safe.

The truth is… He has a right to hate me.

It’s all my fault. Everything.

Devils Night. The videos. The arrests.

I’m to blame for all of it.

And I regret nothing.

WILL

I never minded being locked up. I learned a long time ago that being treated like an animal gives you permission to act like one. No one has ever looked at me any other way.

Their only mistake is believing anything I do is an accident. I can sit in this house with no Internet, television, liquor, or girls, but I’ll come out of here with something far more frightening to my enemies.

A plan.

And a new pack of wolves.

I just didn’t expect one of my enemies to come to me.

I don’t know who smuggled her in or if they meant to leave her here, but I can smell her hiding in the house. She’s here.

And as the security detail leaves the supplies, the gates close, and the door to my gilded cage opens, giving me free reign of the house and grounds for another unsupervised month, I remember with a smile…

Blackchurch houses five prisoners. I’m only one of her problems.

*Nightfall is a full-length, romantic suspense suitable for readers 18+. It’s necessary to read the prior installments in the series before starting this story.

RATING

5/5

REVIEW

Ok. I’ve been waiting for this for a long time and now that it’s here and now that I’ve finished reading, I don’t know what to do with my life anymore.

This book left me speechless. I’ve been trying my best to write something to justify what I feel towards this book but I just can’t think of the right words. See, I hate talking about the books I loved because I can’t think of anything aside from the fact that this book is awesome.

Let me try.

Nightfall is about William Aaron Paine Grayson III also known as Will Grayson and Emory Sophie Scott (we know nothing about her pre-Nightfall but she was mentioned in Corrupt, Erika and Micheal’s book).

Will Grayson is the 4th Horseman. While we’ve known Damon as the anti-hero in the series, Will is the exact opposite (at least in this aspect, we know he’s capable of doing unspeakable stuff. LMAO!), he’s the sweetest. Emory is our resident nerd. She’s not the strongest of all the characters but she’s the smartest. I love how she tried to ignore Will and she ended up failing. I enjoyed reading about what happened nine years ago before they went to prison more than the scenes in the present. The best boyfriend award goes to Will and Will alone. I can’t stop swooning on those parts where he’s trying to charm Emory. He’s the cutest.

Ok, I don’t want to go into details but yep, this book is definitely one of the best novels ever. I enjoyed Corrupt and Killswitch but Nightfall and Hideaway will always be my favorite Penelope Douglas book. Her writing style is awesome and she definitely knows where and when to put twists in all the books in these series. There are no dull moments and I was never disappointed. I’m glad everyone got their happily ever-after.

I’m curious about Kai’s son tho. I  hope Madden, Athos and Ivarsen will have their respective books. That is if Penelope Douglas plans to write them, of course. A reader can dream, guys.

Anyway, if you’re planning to read this book:

Trigger warnings: abuse, violence. It’s also quite dark and definitely for readers 18 years old and above only.

Happy reading!

xo,

Jeland

[rogersradio]

princess | joe mazzello

prompt:

“its just me and you now, huh?”

“the baby won’t stop crying and i don’t know what to do, please help”

“I’ll be home tomorrow morning at 9,” You said as you gathered your bags. “I wrote her whole bedtime routine and posted it on her nursery mirror so you can see it when you walk in.”

Joe followed you to the kitchen as you made your final checks, patting yourself down to make sure you had everything. “Her eating schedule is on the fridge and her food is where it usually is,” You rambled off. As you walked into the kitchen to grab a waterbottle, Joe leaned against the island and crossed his arms. “And of course, don’t leave her unsupervised. Unless she’s in the playpen or during her nap times; but even then always have the monitor on. I think I charged it last night-“

“Babe,” Joe interrupted. You looked up at him. “We’re going to be fine. I’m her father too.”

You let out a sigh. You knew Joe was the best father in the world, but your first time away from your baby was already stressful enough. There was bountiful ways that something could go wrong; enough to make you forget the positives. “I know you are,” You softly smiled. He smirked, as if to acknowledge you were overreacting, and grabbed your wrists. He pulled you close to him and cupped his hand on the back of your head, gently kissing your forehead. “I love you,” He whispered. Standing up from his leaning position he spoke louder, “And we’re going to be fine! Right Emma?”

The baby sitting in the high chair stared innocently back at her parents, not necessarily knowing what was going on. You laughed at her confused look while Joe smiled at her with open arms. “Right?” The baby’s facial expression didn’t change. “Tough crowd,” Joe shrugged. You chuckled and walked over to her, kissing her head. “See you tomorrow, Princess. Be good for Dad, okay?”

Emma’s big hazel eyes looked back up at you, her mouth slightly open. Your heart melted each time she looked up at you, and this time was all the same. She was a spitting image of you, with Joe’s eyes and hair; a near perfect balance of the two of you.

“Okay,” You walked over to the front door, Joe right behind you. “Wallet, keys, phone, suitcase,” You checked off, “I think I’m good to go.”

“You’re going to do great,” Joe said, giving you a quick kiss right after. “Show that jury who’s boss.”

You smiled and grabbed your suitcase as Joe opened the door for you. You blew one last kiss to Emma and headed out the door, saying bye to Joe as he watched you get in your car and drive off. Once you were safely down the street, he closed the door and securely locked it. He turned around and walked back into the kitchen. The nine month old’s eyes tracked his every move as he walked in front of her high chair and put his hands on his hips. “Well, it’s just me and you now huh?”

The baby cracked a toothless smile, showing off her bright pink lips. Joe smiled. “That’s my girl.”

2:30 p.m.

Joe sat back in the rocking chair, gently swaying and reading a book from the shelf. His voice was low and soft, and Emma was resting in his left arm. Her nursery was only lit by the soft sunlight peering through the pink curtains, so the room was shaded a kind of red. As he neared the end of the story, he glanced down at his daughter that was resting in the crook of his left arm. Her eyes were fluttering shut, and he gave it a few more minutes of rocking before he would set her down.

After he assumed he was in the clear, he carefully stood up and braced the baby by putting his other hand under her. He slightly bounced as he made his way over to the crib, staring down at her rosy face. Being a father was something Joe had always wanted, and he soaked up every minute of it.

He slowly lowered her into her crib, wincing when she started to squirm in his arms. It was pending doom for him; he couldn’t stand when she cried. He set her in the crib and swiftly slipped out of the room, shutting the door as quietly as he could. He let out a sigh of relief and began to walk down the hallway and into the living room. Once he was turning on the monitor, a sudden cry came from the nursery.

“Oh no,” He groaned to himself. He remembered what you both had been practicing over the last few months: letting her cry for nearly 5 minutes before going to try and settle her. Your doctor said babies at this age would most likely quit after that time, since they’re just crying to cry.

He sat down in the couch, monitor in hand, and scrolled through Facebook to try to distract himself. He never did this alone before. You had always been there to assure him she wasn’t crying out of pain, or to talk to him about projects when you could tell he was anxious about her. He didn’t have that now.

When the five minutes had past and her crying had yet to cease, Joe got up from the couch and shuffled down to the nursery. He opened the door and felt his heart break at her wailing. “Hey, hey,” He cooed, “What’s wrong?” He reached down and picked her up, holding her close to his chest. “You’re okay, princess.”

Nothing that Joe did could make her stop. He sang, rocked, walked around the house, but to no avail. Eventually, he gave in, and pulled up his phone from his pocket. Dialling your number and balancing Emma in his other arm, he brought the phone up to his ear and prayed that you would answer. When he heard your voice at the other end of the line, he nearly cried.

“Y/N! Thank God. Look, the baby won’t stop crying and I don’t know what to do - shh, shh, you’re okay, Em - please help me!” He panicked into the phone.

You did your best not to laugh. “Honey, calm down. Did you rock her?”

“Yes.”

“Did you give her a bottle beforehand?”

“Yes, warmed.”

“Okay,” You pondered for a moment. “Why don’t you take her outside on the back porch? She loves to be outside, maybe it’ll calm her down - a new setting.”

“Babe?”

“Yes, Joe?”

“You’re a goddess.”

After hanging up, Joe opened the sliding glass door to the backyard and stepped outside. It was a beautiful day, with a comfortable temperature, clear skies, and a light breeze. Like a miracle, only moments after being outside the crying ceased. Joe smiled out of relief and laughed a little, “Is that what you wanted?”

He continued to bounce as she looked around, taking in all that was around her. Joe took the pad of his thumb and gently swept it across her cheek, wiping away the stray tear. “We’re okay,” He accounced, “We’re gonna be okay.”

[izzyaro]

Legacy preview (Harry is Salazar)

I’m still stuck on the next chapter of ‘Strange Visitors’, so here’s a rough draft of the first chapter of the reincarnated Founders fic.

-

Harry Potter woke up two weeks before his ninth birthday and decided he was going to leave home.

This in itself wasn't particularly unusual. Harry, like many young boys, had often thought about leaving home. After all, being able to go wherever they wanted, without anyone telling them what to do, was the dream of many children.

Harry Potter probably thought about it more often than most though. He thought about it whenever his uncle shouted at him, or whenever his aunt sneered at him. He thought about it when his cousin and his gang chased him so they could try to stuff his head down the toilet, and whenever his teachers looked at him with vapid expressions of pity.

In short, Harry Potter had thought about it nearly every day for the past seven years.

The difference between Harry and all the other children with similar dreams was that Harry was perfectly capable of carrying making his dream a reality.

Harry had been planning his escape for a long time, but recent events had forced his hand. It wasn't unusual for Harry to get far better reports from his teachers than his cousin Dudley. It also wasn't difficult, considering Dudley had the intelligence of a juvenile rabbit, but for some reason Vernon and Petunia had never gotten used to it. They had taken to ignoring it after even their most severe threats failed to get Harry to dumb himself down, but this year they couldn't ignore the rather pointed note attached to Harry's report from his headmistress. Miss Pevensie was old but she wasn't stupid, and she wasn't blind enough to miss the differences between loud, spoiled Dudley and his little ghost of a cousin. Harry had been sent to his cupboard the second Vernon had seen the letter, but his uncle's shouts about child services and reports of abuse had been impossible to ignore.

Harry didn't care. Maybe the authorities would help, but they never had before and he had no intention of taking his chances. 

So the next morning, Harry decided that enough was enough. He left his schoolbooks behind, instead packing the few tolerable clothes he possessed into his small rucksack. There was nothing else he cared to take; everything he owned had been broken by Dudley before being passed on to him. He dressed in his school uniform, and looked round his cupboard for the last time.

Really, Harry hadn't had to stay in the cupboard. Young as he was, there were plenty ways he could have persuaded or intimidated his relatives into giving him Dudley's spare room. In the end though he hadn't bothered with the effort. He had never been planning on staying long, and the less the Dursleys knew about what he could do the better. More importantly, the less the other authorities knew about his abilities the better.

Harry wasn't stupid. He might know very little about how his world worked in this time, but no society would be so idiotic as to leave children with their power unsupervised. Any intentional displays of magic would undoubtedly attract attention, and that would lead to questions that Harry had no desire to answer.

For example, how he knew about magic at all.

Harry snorted softly. That question alone could cause utter chaos. Much better to wait until he had more information

A sharp rap on the door woke Harry from his thoughts.

"Hurry up, or you'll be late, boy."

Harry's lip curled, but he opened the door without comment. Petunia eyed him, and sneered. "You've missed breakfast, but that can't be helped. We're leaving now."

Harry said nothing. Instead he just met her pale blue eyes with his green ones. Petunia's lips thinned, but instead of scolding him, she just shook her head sharply. "Don't be late."

She hurried Dudley out the door with far more haste than normal, and Harry was gratified to see a gleam of fear and confusion in her eyes as she glanced back over her shoulder. Then the door slammed shut and Harry was alone in the house.

Vernon hadn't been happy, but after Dudley threw four tantrums in a row about the freak walking into school with him, he had agreed that Harry would leave five minutes after Dudley and Petunia every morning. Harry hadn't particularly minded; any time away from Dudley was fine by him, and he had been amused by how quickly the teachers picked up on their unusual situation, but he appreciated the arrangement now.

It was tempting to leave a suitable farewell for the Dursleys, but Harry resisted the impulse. He wanted as good a head start as he could get before the chaos started. Not that it really mattered, considering where he was going, but it would draw things out for his charming relatives. Instead, Harry headed up to the attic.

One of the first things Harry could remember was Petunia telling him never to go into the attic. Naturally, it was one of the first things Harry had done, once he was strong enough. The place was full of Vernon and Petunia's rubbish, but there were a few things of interest. Harry shoved a stack of Dudley’s old pre-school work out the way until he found the box of dusty photo albums he had been looking for. He was keen to leave as soon as possible, but he had never been able to resist the urge to take a look. 

Harry carefully picked up one of the more faded albums and opened it. Two smiling Muggles beamed up at him, and Harry felt his own lips twitch up. The photo was in black and white, but he knew from other photos that his grandmother’s eyes were exactly the same colour as his own. Both of his grandparents were blond though, so Harry’s hair colour had presumably come from his father’s side. That was all Harry knew about his father, but he pushed that thought to one side. There would be information about him somewhere, and Harry had no intention of stopping until he found it. 

Reluctantly, Harry set that album aside and found the newer ones. These ones were all in colour, and there was a familiar tightness in Harry’s chest as he looked at his mother’s face. If he hadn’t found these photos, Harry wouldn’t even have known her name. He thanked every god he knew that someone had recorded the date and people present on the back of each photo. There were some of Lily and Petunia as small children, sometimes with a tiny wrinkled old woman who Harry assumed was his great-grandmother, and then there were some of Lily as a young lady, laughing and carefree, with her whole future before her.

Harry’s fingers trembled as he traced his mother’s face. What had happened? He knew absolutely nothing about their lives. He didn't know why they had met their deaths by the Killing Curse, if that was the green light in his nightmares was, or why he had been placed with people who might be his blood relatives but still loathed him simply for who he was. He didn’t know why none of their friends had ever tried to check on him.

Harry didn't have answers to those questions. But he was going to find out. 

For now though, he had wasted enough time. He raided the albums for his favourite pictures, and placed the photos carefully in a plastic wallet he’d borrowed from Dudley’s school supplies. He needed them more than Petunia did. Harry cast a final quick glance round, then settled his rucksack more comfortably on his shoulders and closed his eyes.

It wasn't the best idea he had ever had. Apparition was tricky even for a grown wizard. Harry remembered all too vividly the last time he had tried it at this young age, but he forced the memories away with a shudder. Thinking about that wouldn't help. He was tempted to wait a few more months, just to let his magic stabilise, but he dismissed the thought almost immediately. The situation with the Dursleys had become intolerable, and Harry knew he could do this. He had before after all.

So Harry Potter summoned up all the magic he possessed and concentrated on the one place he could truly call home.

There was the familiar awful-wonderful twisting wrenching bending stretching sensation then Harry landed on cold stone and his mind burst into song.

'Welcome home, Salazar!"

Salazar Slytherin, founder of Hogwarts, now nearly nine year old Harry Potter closed his eyes and let the magic of Hogwarts surround him. Wards wrapped around him as easily as if a day had passed rather than a thousand years, and tears fell unheeded as Hogwarts' love and respect soothed his battered mind and soul. 

'Thank you,' he finally managed. ‘It is good to be home.’

Hogwarts seemed to hum louder, and for a minute Harry let himself just bask in the warmth of her welcome. It had been so long since anyone had treated him with more than wary pity.

But there was something he had to know.

'Have any of the others been here?'

There was a heavy sigh and Harry's heart sank even before the soft whisper sounded. 'Only you.'

Harry drew in a deep, shuddering breath. Where could they be? He couldn't do this without them. He rubbed fiercely at his eyes and tried to think. He had made no plans to be reborn after his death, and he wouldn't have had time to carry out any rituals anyway, considering the nature of his demise. That meant that someone, be it a god, the fates, or even magic itself, had intervened.

Whoever it was, they had to have brought the others back too. Harry didn't know what was going on, but he did know that he couldn't do it alone. He needed his family.

But if they weren't here, where were they?

'They may not be old enough,' Hogwarts pointed out. 'Witches and wizards do not come here until they are eleven now, and you are younger than that.'

Harry sat back and nodded. 'You're right. I just hope they get here soon.' If they didn't... His mind shied away from the possibility.

'The new school year starts in six weeks,' Hogwarts offered. 'One or all of them might arrive then.'

'I hope so,' said Harry quietly.

Hogwarts wrapped his mind in another gentle hug, and Harry leaned into the contact. 'You are not alone, Salazar. You will never be alone.'

Harry smiled. He knew he was right. He took a deep breath, then got to his feet. He couldn't sit around waiting for his friends for the next six weeks. He might be only a child, but there was still plenty he could do. Especially here in Hogwarts.

There was one immediate matter to deal with. 'What happened in here?'

Harry had decided to land in the Chamber of Secrets out of sheer practicality. He hadn't been sure when the holidays for Hogwarts would be, and hadn't wanted to risk landing in the middle of a crowded corridor. As the Chamber was hidden, and sealed to any but a Parselmouth, it had seemed the most suitable location.

Which it was. It was also half flooded with water.

'Ah,' said Hogwarts. There was a clear note of embarrassment in her voice. 'Well, things got a little complicated when the Muggles invented plumbing. One of Selene's descendants had to rework the entire system.'

Harry pinched the bridge of his nose. 'Right. I'll deal with that later. What about Issa?'

'She is well,' Hogwarts assured him. 'But she is very old, and sleeps a great deal.'

Harry smiled. 'I'm not surprised. I'll wake her once I settle in.' He looked around and sighed. 'Looks like I'll be staying in the Room of Requirement after all.' He would make time to come down and visit Issa later, and he would also have to make sure his wards on the rest of the Chamber had held. There were things down here that were never meant to see the light of day again.

But that could wait for another day. Harry climbed to his feet, picked up his rucksack, and willed himself to the Room of Requirement.

Harry reappeared in an exact replica of his old chambers, and smiled. 'Thank you.'

'My pleasure,' Hogwarts replied. 

Harry let out a contented sigh as he shrugged out of his rucksack. He had missed Hogwarts, and he had missed having his own space, and it was so good to be home. 'Have any students found this place yet?' 

'Not for many years,' said Hogwarts with a chuckle. 'Even the teachers have only ever found it by accident.'

Harry smirked. 'Rowena will be pleased to hear that.' He started taking his clothes out of his rucksack, then paused. Looking at the stained and baggy cast-offs made him think of the Dursleys, and he had no intention of thinking about those people unless he absolutely had to. ‘Do we still keep spare robes?'

There was a slight pause before Hogwarts replied. 'We do. But, Salazar, there is a house-elf outside who wishes to speak with you.'

Harry closed his eyes for a moment. 'I should have expected that.' He set the clothes down on the bed and took a deep breath. 'Let them in.'

Hogwarts touched his mind in a brief second of comfort, then the door swung open to reveal an old house-elf. He was dressed in a clean tea towel with the Hogwarts crest on it, and his eyes went as wide as saucers when he caught sight of Harry. Harry smiled and knelt down so they were at eye level. 

"Hello," he said gently. "Please come in. What's your name?"

The house-elf visibly swallowed and took a few steps into the room. "I is called Pento," he said. 

Harry nodded. "It's nice to meet you, Pento. Why are you here?"

Pento hesitated, then lifted his head to meet Harry's gaze properly. "We house-elves felt the old Master return," he said clearly. "We did not understand, but we are here to serve, and serve we will, if that is Master’s wish."

For a moment, Harry could only stare at him. The house-elves were bound to Hogwarts, and so Harry had guessed that they would be alerted to his presence, but he hadn't expected them to recognise him. Pento's ears fell. "Have we displeased, Master?" he asked tentatively.

Harry blinked and shook his head. "No, Pento. Not at all." He took a breath. "Thank you for your service. All I ask is that you do not tell anyone that I am here."

Pento nodded vigorously. "I understand, Master." He gave Harry a warm smile. "All of Hogwarts is happy that you is home."

Harry suddenly found it impossible to speak around the lump in his throat. "I'm very happy to be home too, Pento."

Pento tilted his head to one side, and studied Harry for a long minute. "Master needs looking after," he said suddenly. "Master has not been happy in a long time." His eyes narrowed as they took in Harry's clothes. "Pento will send elves to help Master." He bowed very low, then disappeared with a loud crack.

Harry sat back on his heels and shook his head. He had forgotten how protective house-elves could be of masters they felt deserved it. Not for the first time he mentally thanked Helga for being so passionate in her advocacy of house-elf rights. He, Godric and Rowena had learned easily as much from her as she had from them. None of them had treated house-elves badly to begin with, all their families having taught them better than that, but Helga was something else.

The thought of his friends sent a sharp pang through Harry's chest. He missed them more than he could say. His hands curled into fists, and he felt Hogwarts' silent support. He would find them again. No matter how long it took.

In the meantime, however, he had a lot of catching up to do.

[enziroth]

No Future (Part 18)

This is now the longest chapter in the story, almost 500 words more than the previous longest chapter, so buckle up. I’ve been taking a lot longer to get out the most recent updates, but it’s probably because they keep getting longer because the story’s moving faster and faster.

Hope you guys enjoy!

The first cannonball landed far away.

The dust cloud that rose up around where it had landed was tinted pink, and Sanji watched as fragments of candy were flung into the air to fall amongst the other houses. The sound of it hit a half-second later, its impact echoing through the streets right along with the screams that rose in the distance.

They all moved at once.

Sanji kicked open the door to his carriage, diving out and rolling on the grass. Cannonballs that large could only come from battleships, and though the first one had missed them by almost a mile, Sanji knew they’d get closer.

Smoothie was standing, her empty plate tossed aside, towering taller than he’d ever seen her before. She held her arm out in front of her and barked orders into a transponder snail, taking off down the road towards the shore with footsteps that shook the ground as blue-shirted chefs scrambled madly to get out of her way.

Candy sprung from the ground, a massive golden wave crawling upwards to solidify into a hard, shiny wall that shielded the clearing. Perospero shouted at the children on the grass, startling them out of their after-meal drowsiness and leading them in a wild stampede back to the safety of the mansion.

At the edge of the clearing, watching the chefs struggle to load up the carriages and guards pour in from the outer streets to guard the children, Sanji abruptly realized what situation he was in.

Smoothie was nowhere in sight, though he could still hear her pounding footsteps fading in the distance. Perospero wasn’t anywhere to be seen as well, having disappeared inside the mansion with the brats. The chefs he’d arrived with were already racing off back the way they’d came, and the guards were busy watching the skies.

Another cannonball flew through the air, this time landing close enough that Sanji could feel the earth shake beneath his feet. Nobody ordered him to stay put, nobody rushed to his side to defend him. Nobody even so much as looked at him. Smoothie was supposed to be his guard, taking Katakuri’s place as his temporary jailer, but she was long gone now.

There’s nobody watching.

Sanji didn’t waste time. He sidestepped behind the carriage, leaning his back against it and listening intently. No voices called for him; no one seemed to even notice he’d moved.

Heat crackled through his veins, a thrill rising beneath his skin. This might be the chance he was waiting for, the distraction he needed to slip away and return to his crew. He knew the invaders weren’t his friends, just by the sheer knowledge that Usopp and Franky would never use something as boring as cannonballs when they had plants and lasers at their disposal, but they couldn’t have gotten this far into Big Mom’s territory without a sizeable fleet.

With a fleet came ships, and with ships, Sanji finally had a way out of here.

He waited for the piercing screech of another incoming cannonball to distract the guards before he slid out from behind the cover of the wagon, sprinting for the houses on the near side of the clearing. He ducked into the nearest doorframe, once more holding his breath and listening closely.

Nothing but the cries of civilians. He was truly alone.

Hope soared in him, rising so quickly he felt almost lightheaded. In all the hours he’d spent planning for escape, all the nights he’d lain awake thinking of when he should run for it, he’d never even dared dream of an opportunity like this.

In fact, it had been so completely unexpected that Sanji found himself at a loss. In all the scenarios in his head, he’d imagined his crew would be the one invading to save him. His planned first step after getting away from Katakuri was always to run straight to Luffy, and he knew that together they’d be able to handle whatever the Big Mom Pirates threw at them.

But here, there was no Luffy, and as the cannonfire began to truly rain down, Sanji paused to think about his situation.

Even unsupervised, with Katakuri missing and the island under attack, his ‘perfect opportunity’ wasn’t really perfect at all. He’d seen firsthand how fast the Charlottes could mobilize their forces, and unless the invaders were another Yonko’s crew, they’d be slaughtered whenever the heavy hitters arrived. Sanji had watched Smoothie herself heading to the island’s port; at the very least, he risked being recognized and recaptured if he tried to steal a ship.

Even if he did manage to sneak onboard unnoticed, he’d still have to sail with enemy colors all the way through the heart of Big Mom’s territory. He had no doubt that the Charlottes would hunt down every last ship of those who’d been stupid enough to attack them, and if he was caught trying to escape, he knew he’d lose all the freedoms he’d worked so hard to earn over the past months.

The adrenaline that had surged through him moments before curled in on itself, wilting in the face of logic. There in the doorway, listening to the distant booming of cannons and the rallying shouts of soldiers, Sanji was forced to face reality.

He wasn’t going to escape like this.

The safest course of action, the one that would guarantee he kept Katakuri’s trust, would be to go back to Perospero with the kids and pretend he’d been searching for them all along. No doubt he’d be thrown in a cell or something until everything quieted down, but nobody could accuse him of trying to escape. The invasion would be repelled, and life would go back to normal until his crew really did come for him.

But his feet refused to move. After all this time spent under the heavy presence of people who kept him from everything he loved, it went against every nerve in his body to walk away from freedom and back into the glorified cage.

You’re so close! His mind was screaming at him. Nobody’s watching! Run for it! You won’t get another chance!

It’s suicide to try, he argued back, still frozen in the doorway. The odds of success are too low, and the punishment for failure is far too high. I have to go back. The longer I stay away, the more suspicious I look.

But still his feet refused.

An eerie, high-pitched whistling filled the air, and Sanji had the sudden sense that something big was coming right now. His legs finally unfroze in the face of imminent danger, not bothering to look up as he took off running down the alley as fast as he could. He made it past four houses, five, six-

The world exploded in white.

 Sanji stayed low to the ground until the ringing in his ears stopped, blinking away the spotty afterimages of the blast. The sickly-sweet scent of burning sugar hit him a moment later, the rush of air that it came with as hot as a furnace.

He turned to his side to avoid breathing it in, registering the sight of a line of destroyed gingerbread houses burning merrily behind him. He hadn’t made it out of the bomb’s reach, but judging by how he was still in one piece, he’d at least managed to avoid the worst of it.

Flames roared at the end of the street, and Sanji stumbled to his feet, glancing around to regain his bearings. The bomb had landed behind him, right by the kids’ mansion; he wouldn’t be surprised if the place had been blown to pieces.

There goes that plan.

He slipped behind the shattered gumdrop wall of a house, waiting for someone to come running down the street to escape the building. The Charlotte brats were absolute monsters, and it he wouldn’t put it past them to survive something like that, especially considering how tough Perospero could make those candy walls of his.

The kids would probably ignore him if they saw him, but Perospero was the last person Sanji wanted to run into right now. Smoothie had shown herself to be reasonable so far, and Katakuri had proved well enough that he wanted Sanji alive, but there was an air around Perospero that kept Sanji distinctly on-edge. Now that he hadn’t had the chance to blatantly turn himself in, he doubted the man would trust him.

Nobody came. Screaming rose in the distance, more cannonballs booming in the streets to his left, but he couldn’t hear anything that sounded like Perospero or the kids.

Maybe they made it into the mirror realm. There were mirrors all over the place, and there certainly had to be some in the mansion itself.

Thinking of mirrors reminded Sanji of his own situation, and he cast a frantic look around to see if any were nearby. If he could get the attention of whoever was behind them, he might be able to-

Danger, above.

Sanji ducked, just in time to avoid the slash. It cut through the candy-cane building beside him and into the gumdrop one he was hiding behind, hard sugar walls cracking and groaning as they collapsed in on themselves. He kept low, slipping through a crack in the bottom of the wall out into the alley next to it.

People coming this way.

Sanji pressed himself against the wall of the next house over, searching around for a place to hide. The building right behind him had caved in, gingerbread sheets propped up in a way that provided a perfect place to hide, and he was already taking a step towards it when he noticed movement beneath the shelter.

Yellow flashed in the light of the setting sun, and even over the crackling of the fire, Sanji could hear a child’s voice hushing another. He took another step forward and leaned over to get a better look, that particular shade of yellow sparking a vague memory.

It was the girl with the pixie nose and the little flowers in her hair. He recognized her from dinner; she’d been the one to first try the turkey, leading her older siblings back to the table. Crouched down next to her beneath the makeshift shelter was the kid with the spotted hood, and a buck-toothed boy he didn’t recognize.

Kids? What the fuck are they doing here? Sure, the mansion had been smashed to bits, but Perospero had been there. Sanji had figured the guy would want to keep the brats all together. Had they run when the first cannonball had landed, and gotten separated from the rest?

But he had bigger things to worry about now, like the dozen or so men that stepped over the jagged shards of candy-cane and right into the alley he was hiding in. They weren’t wearing the bright pastels of Big Mom soldiers, and judging by the unfamiliar jolly roger tattooed on the biggest one’s blood-stained chest, they weren’t here to be friendly either.

Sanji had sensed them coming, but the sight of the kids had distracted him, and now there was no way to avoid being noticed. He stepped back, swinging to the side just in time to dodge the volley of bullets that came his way.

“Come out here, you little fucker,” the big one snarled, tossing his used pistols aside and drawing two more from a belt around his waist. “I know you’re there. Too scared to face me, pussy?”

None of them looked particularly intimidating, likely just a few lucky grunts that had made it past the chaos at the port, but Sanji wasn’t looking to waste his time on fodder. He had to find a mirror, and he had no interest in being anywhere near the Charlotte brats when their older siblings weren’t around. He’d gotten in enough trouble because of them before; he wasn’t looking forward to dealing with that again.

The men spread out, advancing down towards the alley and sending a few more easily-dodged volleys his way, but Sanji was on the move. He kicked his way through a fallen gingerbread wall, sliding through into the next house too fast for the others to take aim. He looked to the sky, trying to decide if it was worth it to jump and risk the cannonballs so he could get an aerial view.

A girl’s high-pitched screech rent the air, and Sanji instinctively wrenched around towards it. Through the hole he’d busted in the side of the house, he could see the little girl from before on her back on the ground. There were tears in her eyes, and he could hear the low chuckling of the man with the guns above the roar of the flames.

It wasn’t his problem, though.

Pirates like these would only be looking for hostages, something they could use to make sure the stronger fighters didn’t slaughter them on sight. The girl might be panicking now, but the second she got it in her head to fight back, she’d easily crush all of them. For people who’d been brave enough to attack a Yonko’s territory head-on, they were fools to attempt to kidnap Big Mom’s actual children.

Then again, being absolute morons was a pretty good reason to attack a Yonko’s territory as well.

Sanji turned away, his mind moving on to other things, only to wrench right back around when a gunshot and another, more desperate scream echoed in the alley behind him.

The man had bent down now, both pistols cocked as he loomed over the child, one smoking with the remnants of what must’ve been a warning shot. With her back on the ground, the girl didn’t look nearly as fearsome as she had at the dinner table, and from an angle like this she didn’t even seem much bigger than a normal child.

In contrast, the man looked like the devil himself, light from the nearby fires flaring up and casting long shadows on his face. The man’s grin promised the farthest thing from mercy, cruel delight flashing in his eyes. “I knew that fat bitch’s spawn was around here somewhere.”

He raised his pistol, aimed straight at her face, and the kid trembled, crawling backwards as fast as she could. She was so scared, just a little girl inside even for all her size, her hands going up to cover her eyes-

Reiju’s hands, reaching through twisted bars to free him from hell itself-

Sanji launched himself straight through the building in a split-second, pure white-hot rage surging inside of him. His heel whipped out, striking the man’s hand hard enough that he heard bones crunch as the gun went flying.

He turned sideways to dodge the startled half-punch aimed for his head, then kicked out again, this time catching the man in the gut and shooting him clear down the alley to crash into a hard-candy building at the end of the street.

Sanji let his outstretched leg hang in the air for a few moments, waiting for the other men to recognize the defeat of their leader. It took them longer than it should have, more than one dumbly staring at the space Sanji was standing where the other man had been just seconds before.

“Why are you fighting a kid,” he said, planting his foot, spreading his arms and grinning wide, “when I’m right here?”

They went down quickly in a flurry of kicks that none were near fast enough to dodge, and Sanji had just finished a particularly satisfying blow right in the last one’s face when danger rang out in his head.

Above, from the left.

Sanji kicked off the wall, launching himself sideways to avoid the slash that cleaved the wall he’d just been standing next to in half. So that was where the swordsman of the group had gone to; none of the fighters he’d just downed had looked strong enough to cut the candy-cane earlier.

Two more cuts crisscrossed the wall, the structure attached to it crumbling as a man stepped through. Gold earrings glittered in the low light of the flames, and Sanji recognized the same jolly roger skull marked on his chest. When he raised his sword, it was spattered with blood, and also something that looked a lot like buttercream.

Sanji titled his head to the side, hand sliding to his back pocket for his lighter as he sized the man up. This one was stronger than the others, a definite aura coming off him as he sized Sanji up himself, but he was nothing compared to others Sanji had faced before. The slowness with which he’d swung, the ungraceful way he was holding his blade now…Zoro would yell at him for days if he knew Sanji had thought of the guy as an actual swordsman.

The man smiled at him, a wide grin that showed more than a couple teeth missing. “It’s your lucky day. You get to be killed by Galewind Gardy, the fastest blade in the-”

“Look,” Sanji cut him off, waving his hand. “The faster you shut up, the faster I kick your ass. The faster I kick your ass, the faster I can get out of here. How about that?”

The man’s ugly smile dropped into an equally ugly scowl. “Listen here, you little shit, I ain’t got time to-”

What a coincidence. Sanji didn’t have time for this either. “Just swing your shiny stick at me so I can knock your head off, alright?”

The man finally shut up, his eyes narrowing as he settled into a proper fighting stance.

Sanji shifted his weight to his back leg, ready to lunge forward as soon as his enemy moved. The other man was strong enough to use armament haki, but he relied pretty heavily on that sword-

He felt the familiar pressure before he sensed the incoming danger, his feet kicking him backwards before he even realized he’d moved. His opponent lunged forward, weapon outstretched in a deadly thrust, but it never even came close.

A golden blur burst through the pile of rubble next to them, spearing straight through Sanji’s opponent and sinking several feet into the next house over from its sheer momentum.

A black leather-clad leg stepped past the rubble and into the alley.

Katakuri’s massive frame filled the open space and made it seem much smaller than it actually was, his boots planted in the wreckage of two separate houses beneath him as he stood upright. His yellow eyes gleamed in the night, his face a dark shadow too far up for the light of the flames to reach.

The gold gaze moved, weight landing heavy on Sanji as it found him far below. The familiarity of it was almost comforting, though the knowledge the feeling brought was significantly less so. His jailer was back; if he’d ever had the slightest chance to escape, he’d just lost it now.

“Big brother!”

“Big brother Katakuri!”

“Brotheeeer!”

Three voices rose in a wailing cry at the same time, three bodies bursting through the rubble to swarm their older brother. They wrapped their arms around his legs, hugging his boots and clinging tight to him, screeching their relief all the while.

Katakuri’s gaze left Sanji, focusing instead on his younger siblings. He knelt to the ground to reach them, his face finally coming into the light. He seemed no different from how he usually was, that easy calm still there in his expression, the scarf he always wore still neatly in place.

He whispered something to them in a low voice, and in the distance, Sanji recognized Perospero calling out. It seemed like these few weren’t the only ones who’d gotten scattered when the bomb had gone off, and Sanji counted himself lucky that he hadn’t run into any more of the little brats.

After a few more whispered words, the kids left their brother’s side and raced around the burning alley towards the sound of Perospero’s shouting, stopping to sneer at the unconscious pirates who’d threatened them before. The little girl Sanji had protected kicked one of them, the force enough to lift the man several feet up before he crashed back down again.

Watching her toss him around like he was nothing, Sanji wondered why he’d even bothered in the first place.

Katakuri was looking at him now, his trident retrieved and planted points-down into the cracked candy street as he kneeled down to get a closer look at Sanji. The familiar pressure was back on him, washing over his arms and chest and face as Katakuri searched him all over.

Whatever he was looking for, he didn’t seem to find it. His voice was loud when he spoke, clear enough to cut through the crackling of flames and the far-off shouts of soldiers. “When I came to the mansion, it was already under attack. You ran, I suppose.”

“Yeah,” Sanji told him, keeping his own voice carefully even. “Smoothie disappeared. Couldn’t find Perospero. Was looking for a mirror when these guys found me.”

“Smoothie should have stayed with you. I had already been called to deal with the attack.” There was no accusation in his tone, nor any anger. It seemed like the man was more disappointed at his sister’s choice to abandon him than anything else.

“You know, I had it under control,” Sanji told him with a hint of annoyance, even as relief washed through him at how easily Katakuri accepted his explanation. It was true that he could have dealt with the swordsman on his own, though. Even though he was nowhere near his full strength, the guy had been far too weak to really pose a threat to him. His slashes had been slow and his guard had been sloppy, and one good hit would’ve been more than enough to knock him cold.

Katakuri ignored him, gazing down at the bodies on the ground. He pointed at one with the end of his trident, the gunman Sanji had knocked out earlier. A shoe-shaped bruise was just beginning to rise on the man’s bare chest. “This one’s still alive. Who is he?”

Sanji shrugged, reaching into his back pocket for his lighter and a cigarette. It felt like ages since he’d last had one at dinner, but it couldn’t have been more than half an hour ago at the most. “I dunno. Just some random guy, he was pointing a gun at the kid so I-”

Katakuri pulled his trident back, then in one fluid movement, flipped it around and crushed the man’s skull with the end of its blunt handle.

Sanji paused with the lighter halfway to his face, blinking once, then a few more times for good measure. Surely the ash had gotten into his eyes. Surely he’d been mistaken in what he’d seen.

But even as he blinked, the image stayed the same.

Katakuri lifted the trident and it came away with a wet sound, glistening distinctly red. It was too dark to see close to the ground, and the man had been too weak for Sanji to sense an aura from him in the first place, but it didn’t take an observation haki user to know that the guy wasn’t ever getting up again.

Katakuri ground the handle against the hard-candy tiles of the street to wipe off the gore on the bottom, a casual, well-practiced movement. “You fought them, then. You aren’t injured?”

“No. I’m fine.” His words sounded a little flat to his own ears. He knew that the pirates in this part of the seas were known for their cruelty, and he’d even seen firsthand what this particular band of them could do, but somehow it still took him off-guard to see it from Katakuri. There was something disconcerting in the ease with which he’d done it, something that clashed hard with his memory of the man standing in his kitchen and reading out dessert requests from his younger siblings.

The sense of warning he’d felt earlier had settled into a dull ache as he’d been deciding whether or not to escape, but all of a sudden, the feeling rushed back in full force. His mind was going berserk, telling him that something was still very, very wrong.

Sanji kept his head down as Katakuri moved, spearing another downed pirate with a sickening squelch.

Could it be Katakuri himself had set it off again? He was a powerful enemy, and even if he wasn’t attacking Sanji at the moment, it was easy to understand why his presence would put him on edge. Still, this feeling of innate wrongness wasn’t at all like the icy fear he’d felt when he’d gotten out of bed in the middle of the night to find the man standing in his doorway. This was something…deeper.

It couldn’t be the killing itself bothering him, either. Sanji had killed plenty of times before. It was a necessity sometimes, a mercy others, and even on rare occasions an accident. Death was nothing new to him, especially since he’d become well acquainted with it so early in life.

The way Katakuri had done it had certainly bothered him, a simple, quick blow as if dealing death was an offhand matter to him. It hadn’t been in the heat of battle. The man wasn’t a danger to anyone anymore. Katakuri had killed him on the mere mention of a threat to his siblings, a threat that had never really been a true one, but he hadn’t cared about that.

He’d killed because it was the natural thing to do. If anyone endangered his family, they died, and that was the end of it. Sanji wasn’t like that himself, but it was still something he could understand. So why wasn’t the roiling in his gut going away?

He thought I was a threat to his siblings, once. Why didn’t he kill me like that?

Sanji shied away from the thought.

Katakuri looked to the burning horizon, the sounds of cannonfire still ringing as loud as ever. The noises of gunfire and clashing steel were growing ever closer, and though Sanji couldn’t see as far as Katakuri could, it was easy to tell that the battle wasn’t nearly over yet.

It had to be the invaders that were tipping off his internal warning system, not Katakuri. The space around him was a jumbled-up mess in his mind’s eye except for the heavy presence of the man right next to him, but it was reasonable to assume that the other pirates had brought plenty of their own strong fighters with them. More than likely, he’d just picked up on some of them nearby, and that was what had sent all these frantic warning signals flooding his system.

Well, if the battle wasn’t over yet, that meant he had a good opportunity to disperse all that agitated energy in the best way. It felt like it had been ages since he’d sparred with Katakuri, and nothing was quite as satisfying as a good, hard-won fight.

“So,” Sanji exhaled, breathing out smoke and grinning up at Katakuri. “Are we gonna kick some ass, or what?”

 Two minutes later, Sanji faced the still-rippling surface of the mirror Katakuri had shoved him through, fighting and failing to suppress the insulted frown that twisted across his face. He couldn’t help it; that kind of treatment hurt.

“Just for the record, I still fucking hate you,” he told the glass, but Katakuri probably couldn’t hear him.

Alternate ending:

“Oh, it’s fine,” Brulee said from behind him, munching on a slice of something that smelled suspiciously like his coconut mille crepe cake. “He does that to me, too.”

[solivar]

First Weirdness of the New Year

So, some things that I must make clear or all the rest will not seem wondrous.

Firstly, I live in the sticks. The boonies. Upon the Left Asscheek of Nowhere. The town to which our street address belongs is actually six miles away, two different townships plow/salt or not plow/salt our road depending on the whims of the local governments in question, and there are approximately two street lights, located five miles apart, neither of which is near my house.

Secondly, it is the custom of my family to burn a bayberry candle for luck in the new year on New Year’s Day. Normally we try to burn a bayberry votive because you can stick it in a votive holder and put the votive holder in a larger container to help diffuse the heat and it will be thoroughly burnt to its conclusion by the end of the day. This year, however, we could only find an eight in bayberry taper, which I put on to begin burning at noon, as is the custom.

By 10:30 last night, literally everyone else in the house was asleep but I was sitting up, watching said taper burn down its last half-inch because it is extremely bad luck to blow out the lucky bayberry taper -- it must be allowed to burn out on its own -- and it is also a bad idea to leave a burning candle unsupervised. So I was supervising alone, even the dogs having abandoned me in favor of bunking down with my mother in law, not that I can blame them: the standing air temperature has been in the single digits during the day and it was definitely a two dog night. 

The full moon was hanging high in the sky and, with the snow laying on the ground, there was a certain luster of midday going on outside. I could not help but notice this as I got up to refresh my drink. Our neighbors across the street moved recently and so their house was dark but their lawn, open and snow-covered, glowed palest blue in the moonlight, scattered here and there with splotches of black that I knew were shrubs and boulders that jutted up through the turf/snow. It was strikingly beautiful so I stood at our front door for a bit looking out at it and then I saw something move.

It wasn’t big, whatever it was, but it separated itself from the shadow of one of the shrubs and skittered across the lawn into another shadow so quickly at first I thought I was seeing things. Then another little skittering thing followed it, and a third. By that point, I was absolutely sure I wasn’t seeing things but the little skittery things weren’t like anything I’d seen in our neighborhood before. Don’t get me wrong: we’ve got plenty of wildlife in this area -- raccoons and possums and foxes and also at least two feral cats (smoke gray with orange eyes, black and white tuxedo with green eyes) that I’ve seen over the last few months, both on my front patio. Further to the north, there are coyotes but I haven’t seen or heard any around here yet. 

As I stood watching, a fourth, visibly larger thing separated itself from the shadows and loped rather than skittered across the lawn -- and stopped, right out in the open, and looked in my direction. I didn’t see its eyes. I didn’t even really see its face. But I knew it was looking at me and so I retreated back into the kitchen from the entrance vestibule where we keep our refrigerator, and closed the half-door behind me. By then the candle was all-but burnt out, just a tiny bit of flame clinging to the wick inside the candlestick, so I went to the bathroom to wash up and change into my night clothes and, as I did, something landed on the roof with an audible thump and squeak and skittering.

Now to give you a mental image: the property on which I live is hilly. The spot where the house sits is on the flattest part and then the upper field rises immediately off the side yard at a sharp angle so that, when you’re standing high enough up on the hill, you can actually see the entire roof of the house, the back yard, the parking area, and the remains of the old animal enclosure from when this place was a functioning farmette. No trees directly overhang the house itself except for one, in the front of the property, next to the patio and the front door, and no real way to climb up to the roof without a ladder.

I went back to the kitchen and retrieved the maglite -- the giant, heavy, could be used as an improvised melee weapon in a pinch metal flashlight -- and listened. Whatever it was was moving around on the roof -- skitterskitterskitter -- and it sounded as though it were sliding, because the roof is, to put it mildly, snow and ice covered right now. I could hear it moving toward the back, where there’s a second, flatter roof covering the sunroom, which happens to be where my kids and I have our bedrooms. The house was originally meant to be a seasonally occupied hunting cabin, and the sunroom is eastward facing and is literally more windows than solid walls, plus a (blocked by a bookcase) door into the fenced-in back yard. I padded back into the kids’ room, which is on the far end of the sunroom closest to the hill, following the noise and, as I came into that part of the room, the whatever-it-was hit the flatter roof -- skitterskitterskitter -- audibly slid and fell off the roof with an absolute unholy screech.

I flipped on the maglite and shone it out the window, which had the effect of blinding me because the windows on that side are inside window -> insect screens -> heavy outer storm windows so I got three hits of reflected light instead of one. I caught glimpse of movement but didn’t get any better look at whatever it was. The skitter-thump-screech woke up my younger son, who is a light sleeper, and wanted to know what was that, which unfortunately I could not answer. He also could not get to sleep, so I dragged an inflatable mattress into their room and set up on the floor with him cuddled next to me, half-dozing until the alarm went off at 4:15 so I could get my husband up for work.

I put on my snow boots and went out to check the yard outside the house on the hillward side this morning as soon as it was light out enough to see. Whatever it was did not leave tracks in the ice-crusted snow that I could find. I refrained from trying to climb the icy, snow covered hill to see if I could get a look at the roof, because I could see myself falling and breaking a leg doing it. Hopefully, this was just one-off weirdness.

[heiligenscheiss]

TRAUMA

Small introduction to a family tragedy

I was born as the eldest daughter of a total of 6 children and grew up without a father. My mother was an unbalanced person, a choleric, heavy smoker, and very often blind with anger. When I was around 3-4 years old, she had a second child and then five more children from five different men.

I lived in constant fear of their attacks and outbursts. She also beat her men when they didn't do what she wanted. She turned the tables once when the man struggled. She wanted to jump from the balcony on the 14th floor because the argument turned into a brawl.

Right from the start, I had to help out with the household and look after my younger siblings. I had to pick her up from kindergarten and take care of her. I grew up on the 14th floor in Neuperlach. I can hardly remember the things that happened to me before I was about 5 years old. I started school when I was 7 years old, I was very restless and did not perform well. I experienced sexual abuse when I was very young (around 5 years old) by the children of the neighborhood and within the family by my cousins. My privacy and the development of my sexuality were not respected. I had to bathe with my brothers even though I already felt shame and didn't want to. Our mother didn't care for us. When we were hungry or thirsty, we didn't dare ask because that would make her angry. So we secretly fed on sweets and snacks and got fat from them; especially me. Then she called me a "fat freak, jellyfish, buffing monster or elephant".

My entire everyday life was always characterized by fear, I was constantly mistreated, beaten and humiliated by my mother and violently insulted with expressions like hooker, slut, fat child. When I was 9 years old, I came to the Logos curative education center. The youth welfare office was made aware of the school, which had seen bruises on me. I never talked about it myself, I didn't know that what happened to me was important. When visiting once a month on the weekend, there were further negative experiences.

I had to take responsibility for my siblings and for everything that happened to them and face their punishments, which mostly consisted of insults. She hissed at me and beat me around the apartment. Christmas and birthdays were terrible experiences.

I couldn't get along at school, got bullied and couldn't concentrate, and got worse and worse. The way in which the children in the home dealt with sexuality disturbed me because of my traumatization and I fled to my mother's home. When I was 12 I asked if I could change homes and came to Augsburg in a girls' dormitory. There I was always an outsider and the youngest.

I didn't find a connection at secondary school either. I couldn't take it anymore and switched back to secondary school. In the home, I clashed with the educators and was sometimes locked in the cellar during the day as a punishment.

I was sent on cure and lost 50 pounds in six weeks. Then I had to find my way around my gender identity. I took drugs (THC and ecstasy) for the first time when I was about 14 years old. During this time I had to think a lot about my childhood. The first memories broke out, before I had successfully suppressed them. I suddenly realized that I had had a terrible childhood. The drugs numbed me a little. Because I couldn't buy anything anymore, I stole a VCR in the home. I was thrown out of the home and had to move back to my mother in Munich. I couldn't have made a better suggestion, nor was I made a better one. I started a qualification course at the employment office. I could only stay with my mother for 2 months because she beat me again for no reason. I found refuge in a youth hostel, where I stolen again and was thrown out again.

I was able to move into a shared apartment in the orphanage, where I could stay for a year. But I couldn't get into the group and at the age of 18 I was looking for a place in a shared flat for girls. I was never able to come to terms with my many traumas because I was constantly in need of existence.

Since I did not provide any services, the youth welfare office withdrew its support and I ended up in the women's shelter. I started a school education, which I couldn't finish for mental reasons. I received an application for housing with urgency level 9, and so I got out of the women's shelter. After the qualification I started four training courses and dropped out because of my mental problems, instability and threat to my existence.

I broke off contact with my family because I could no longer cope with the anti-social tone and behavior of my mother in general. I felt better for a while, but then I got depression again. I managed to start training as a social worker after being flown out of the group home for illegal pets.

After that I was in the women's shelter for 1 year. I moved from the women's shelter to an “intermediate flat share” when I received an apartment proposal. In this apartment I was left unsupervised. During this time I got livelihood problems and rent debts. I didn't know my way around, had too much to do with my education, and didn't want to ask for help anymore because I thought the socio-educational non-profit aid organizations such as B. the counseling service for women, would have a bad opinion of me.

I then moved into an apartment with my ex-boyfriend (V). When he was no longer dependent on me, he started beating me up. I had to look for a new apartment and move from there to another. I had to throw myself into high expenses because of that, so I had to steal again. Now 4 years after the relationship, I still bear the joint liabilities from the rental agreement.

Before the birth of my son, I was declared unfit to rent because the apartment that my ex-boyfriend last lived in alone was left in a terrible, dirty and unrenovated condition.

I found out about the pregnancy on July 12, 2011; that was shocking news for me as I was using contraception. My son must have been born in December and was born a little early and healthy on July 21st. I've been happy about that since that day. I have been homeless since July 1st and have been living in the women's shelter since July 27th. Since October 21 am I in hair to stabilize myself The situation is difficult for me; however, it helps my psyche a lot and I have a fixed daily structure again. I feel alone without the father of my child (S), with whom I have been friends for 2 years. But I can take it because it is important to me that I can live with my son in the near future.

I am urgently looking for accommodation for myself and my child in order to be able to meet the obligations of motherhood. The well-being of my child is my top priority, has top priority and I would do anything to be able to live with my child.

Abuses my mother committed to me:

Until I was just 9 years old, I was mistreated in the worst possible way. I've spent the days in constant fear. My mother dragged me around the apartment by my hair, threw me against cupboards, my toys and those of my siblings in garbage bags that I had to dispose of myself.

I will now briefly write down the worst abuse here:

Once my mother immersed me in a full bathtub until I passed out, I passed out for a long time and spent a day or two in severe shock. Another time she poured urine down my throat and spat in my face. Another time she choked me sitting on top of me to the point of unconsciousness, that was a kind of near-death experience for me. One more time she pushed my breath away until I passed out. She ran through the apartment with a hammer and smashed the furniture.

I took drugs:

THC aged 13-14

Alcohol and 15 yrs. THC

Ecstasy, alcohol, mushrooms, THC at 18 years

Since the people from the scene were criminals and I had no money to use drugs, I turned away from it and have not been using drugs or alcohol since I was 22 years old.