#he takes his tea with formaldehyde

[lobotomize-d]

This is a will wood reference

Anyways gel pens 😻

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Soooo...I'm back-

Enjoy!

Take My Tea With Formaldehyde

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Chapter 15: Feeling Lighthearted

(More beneath the cut)

It was like a breath of fresh air to discover that things could get easier. Maybe it shouldn’t surprise him. Maybe it should have been obvious that he didn’t have to live in this quiet sort of misery any more, but it still feels as though it took Mumbo by surprise. It surprised him that doing things was easier. That it was easier to exist and actually feel like a human.

Having a clean apartment felt like a restart. The same way it feels like a restart when you finally shower after being sick, as if cleaning out the dirt had also cleaned up his mind. Getting back into routines, going to work, and taking care of himself was strangely easy. As much as he felt relieved about how simple it was, it also bugged him slightly. Things had changed, and it barely felt like it.

Maybe that was for the better.

As the days passed, he discovered small things that were suddenly a lot more convenient. Like finding stuff in the flat. Before, he had to go through piles of belongings that seemed to appear out of nowhere, but now everything was where it was supposed to be.

It was easier to get the energy to do the dishes, when he only had a small amount to do. Same went for doing laundry.

He had stopped sleeping in front of the TV, and had moved back into his bedroom. No longer did the blue light keep him awake, no longer was it his only company and, somehow, falling asleep in a clean room went quicker than in a messy one.

~

It was most likely not just the clean flat that made him feel better. Sure, it had definitely helped a lot, and had made day to day life a lot less overwhelming, but other things had to have helped as well.

The thing that had probably helped the most, the thing that felt like it was going to make the biggest difference, was that Mumbo was finally getting a therapist. It had been a long time coming, when he really reflected on the way that his mental state had declined so dramatically over the past months, but he hadn’t been ready. Maybe he still wasn’t, not to take that step by himself, at least.

Luckily, he had Iskall.

Iskall hadn't nagged him or forced him to get one. But they gently reminded him that it was an option whenever the opportunity arose. They helped him look, when he finally started to consider it, and reminded him to take a break when searching for options became too overwhelming. It took a little bit, but, eventually, the pair found one that seemed right.

Mumbo thought that it was a bit funny, in a way, that just trying to get help could be overwhelming. It’s just odd really, he would chuckle, that your mind wants to fight against getting the help you need.

That strange urge to run and hide from the help he was seeking was the clearest when Mumbo almost backed out of the first appointment. His legs had felt like jello, knees shaking like he was wearing shorts in a snowstorm. He hadn't been able to wipe the sweat off his palms, and his stomach had made him feel like throwing up what little food he'd been able to eat that day.

It was frightening, he had realized as he bit on the inside of his cheek. Getting help felt terrifying.

Hell, what would happen if it didn't help? What if the therapist thought that he was being silly? What if it turned out that he actually didn't have any issues, and functioned perfectly well, and was just making up stuff for attention? He must be blowing it out of proportion, right?

He was stuck on the kitchen floor for a little while, trying to force himself to calm down. He had sat down in a corner of the kitchen, a cup of tea he'd been meaning to drink cooling on the counter, his phone in hand, held with a desperate grip.

Mumbo chewed nervously and frantically on the inside of his cheek as he tried his hardest to breathe. He tried to run through all the various breathing exercises that he’d been learning, but nothing seemed to work. By the time that he bit at his cheek hard enough to draw blood, he finally managed to unlock his phone to call Iskall.

“Hallo?” Their voice erupted from the speaker, crackly and warped. “Iskall speaking.”

This was stupid. Childish even, Iskall surely would think so too. Mumbo's mind was telling him to hang up, he shouldn't have called. How can a grown man not get himself to go to the scheduled appointment? He was utterly ridiculous.

“Hi,” he forced out, blinking back the tears that were surging forward at the awful weight of his thoughts. “Um, it's Mumbo, I'm really sorry for calling, but I'm kinda, sorta- uh- on the verge of a breakdown?” Mumbo tried to be proud of himself for pushing through the feeling of hang-up-god-dammit-you-are-being-ridiculous that was spreading rapidly through his body and mind, but it was too hard. Everything was just too hard.

“Oh-” Iskall replied after what was probably only a couple of seconds, but still managed to feel so sudden that Mumbo almost jumped out of his skin. From the concern in their voice, he could vividly picture an Iskall with furrowed brows and downturned lips, and his hands only shook harder at the knowledge that he was causing them such concern. “Are you… hm, is there anything I can do to help?”

Mumbo nodded, fully aware that they couldn't see him. It made him feel even more stupid. “Yeah, uh- this is stupid, I'm sorry, but could you please come over?” He gasped, his chest tight. “I mean you don't have to, especially not if you're busy, but it would make everything just a tiny bit easier. I'm really sorry, you don't have to, I'm just panicking, it's silly, sorry.”

He heard Iskall let out a small, kind laugh, something so reassuring that he could’ve melted right then and there. “Hey, don't apologize, I asked if I could help. I'm currently not doing anything too important either way, so…” They went silent for a second. “I should probably be able to be at your place in about uh, forty minutes, I think? Is that okay? I just have a few things to finish up before leaving.”

Relief flooded Mumbo, rushing through him like ocean waves, calming after a storm. "Yeah, yeah, that'd be fine."

"You sure? I could maybe get to your place sooner, but-"

"No no, it's fine. I can wait," Mumbo responded, breathing calmer.

“Okay, I'll be there in a bit then,” Iskall replied, their voice even and calm. “Bye for now.”

“Bye.”

If Mumbo had to be honest with himself, he absolutely hated waiting. It usually paralyzed him, left him in a terrible stasis of sitting around and overthinking every possibility. However, this time it almost felt nice to have some time to gather himself before Iskall showed up.

During the forty minutes he spent waiting, he spent five of those sitting on the kitchen floor. Then he spent ten minutes laying on the floor instead, when it got difficult to breathe again. It took him a while to be able to stand up, his legs still feeling far too weak to even try, and he had lost track of the time when he eventually managed to get to his feet.

He took it slow, breathed in and out carefully, and leant on the counter with a shaky step forward. It wasn’t much, but still, he felt just that little bit better.

Mumbo glanced at the clock as he put his, now cold, cup of tea in the microwave, silently setting the timer and watching the seconds count down. He breathed in time with that too, using the boxy numbers as a reference for each inhale.

He flinched again when it beeped, despite his eagle-eyed focus on the timer, before slowly pulling the steaming cup out from inside. The last few minutes before Iskall’s arrival were spent sitting at the table just cradling the warm cup. He still felt too anxious to be able to drink it, but just holding it and letting the warmth put feeling back into his fingers was relaxing.

Then finally, the doorbell rang. A wave of silence filled Mumbo's head, his mind calming down a lot more. He had company now, Iskall was right outside. They’d listen to his worries, they’d take care of him.

Still a bit shaky, Mumbo made his way to the front door.

~

Iskall ended up sitting at the table with Mumbo for a while, as Mumbo vented his anxiety about the appointment. They didn't judge him, nor tell him that his anxiety was irrational, even though it surely was, they just listened in silence.

“You know, you don't have to go to therapy if you don't want to,” they said when Mumbo eventually ran out of steam, slumping back into his seat like a marionette with its strings cut.

He couldn’t stop himself from staring wide-eyed at the other for a few long moments, just watching Iskall’s expression, trying to understand exactly what they thought of him. “I-I know,” Mumbo settled on eventually. “I just…it feels like it would help. Even though I'm worried that it might not, or that I'm just exaggerating how I'm feeling, I feel like I should try.”

Iskall hummed in understanding. “I see, well…if you want - just as a suggestion - I could go with you?” They leant back in their chair as they took a sip of their tea. “I'd wait outside, then we could go for a coffee afterwards, and you can decide then if you'd like to go to another appointment.”

They paused for a moment, giving Mumbo a breath to process what they were suggesting, before pushing on.

“That way, you’ve given it a go. You’ve felt what it's like, and you can properly figure out if it's for you.” They nodded confidently, setting their teacup down with a quiet clink. “Also, it’d give you the opportunity to see if the therapist we’ve found is right for you or not.”

Mumbo turned the words over in his mind with a thoughtful hum. It seemed like a good idea, really. It did, in fact, make him feel better about the entire thing, and suddenly he realized just how badly he had been craving that familiar company. He hadn't even realized that he had felt like he had to go, despite not being fully sure if he wanted to; the thought of having a familiar face there to wave him in felt like a godsend.

It was like everything was finally clicking into place, and Mumbo hadn’t even realized that he was smiling.

He grinned up at Iskall, the warmth of his own tea seeping pleasantly into his hands. “Yeah,” Mumbo said, and it sounded almost confident. “Yeah, that'd be amazing.”

~

In the end, his therapist turned out to be lovely. She had a certain calm, understanding energy about her that made Mumbo relax almost as soon as he stepped into her office.

The entire situation still felt a bit weird, definitely, but that weirdness wasn’t so uncomfortable anymore. Instead, it felt almost exciting. He was glad that he was trying something new.

It just felt nice to talk to someone who didn't know him, and therefore wouldn't say things to just please him. Someone who listened just to listen, without Mumbo feeling as if he was a burden for talking. It was a bit anxiety inducing, since it was his first time, but it felt like that anxiety would disappear in the future, and by the end of the session, Mumbo felt a lot lighter.

“So?” Iskall asked with a smile, as the pair of them walked out of the building together.

“I'll go back next week,” Mumbo replied. “It was a lot nicer than I thought. I think it might genuinely help me a lot.”

Iskall smiled, the sort of smile that spreads so uncontrollably across your lips until the corners of your mouth ache. “That's good to hear,” they said, and they looked so happy. They looked so glad. “Now, how about that coffee?”

Mumbo only laughed in response. It might've just been his head making things up, but some part of him was so certain that smile looked proud.

It felt nice, to make his friend proud.

~

Another thing that helped was knowing that he had people who cared about him. Yes, he had his siblings and Iskall, but he had other people as well. They had fallen to the wayside a little in the midst of everything that had happened, a fact that Mumbo couldn’t help but feel guilty for, but that hadn’t seemed to change much. In fact, it felt exactly the same as it did before when Tango messaged him to invite him to hang out.

He said that he was planning a small get together, and had wondered if Mumbo was interested in joining. It would be him, Mumbo, Impulse, as well as a few of Tango's other friends: Zedaph, Skizz, and Cub.

The first thing Mumbo felt was a shockwave of anxiety. He couldn't say no to such a kind offer, but what if they didn't want him there? What if they just invited him out of courtesy? It would be out of character, sure, but he couldn’t blame them for not wanting to spend time with him. Especially when he had been so absent for the past few months.

But… something about that didn’t feel right.

So Mumbo took a step back, just like his therapist had once recommended to him. He took a second to breathe, to drink some water and refresh himself before looking at the message again. And, this time, as he looked over the first text that had been sent between them in weeks, (a text that very clearly wasn’t trying to pressure him or force him into anything; a text that left his options open), Mumbo knew that it was genuine.

He was a little ashamed of the surprise he felt at that, but it felt like a step in the right direction either way. Mumbo hadn’t ever really thought about it, but in the back of his mind there was a constant feeling that people - his friends, his colleagues, everyone - disliked him.

Getting invited to something and pushing past that feeling… it suddenly meant a lot more. It felt nice to know that people wanted to see him. It felt nice to know that people cared about him. Even if they weren't close, and even if they weren't Gr-

He pushed that thought away, good mood suddenly soured.

He should probably reply to Tango.

~

Mumbo felt a bit awkward as he stood outside of Tango's apartment, one shaking finger hovering above the doorbell. He knew that they wouldn't mind him being there, since he had been invited, but the muffled laughter sounding from inside made his heart twist.

Anxiety crept up his spine, whispering horrible promises into his ears. He really didn’t want to ruin the joy inside the flat, and a part of him worried that he would, whilst another stubbornly argued against it. He wasn’t sure how long he stood there like that, paralyzed under the frozen grasp of his fear, in half a mind to just turn around and leave. It might’ve been hours, though that was incredibly unlikely.

He only managed to snap out of his anxious daze when his phone pinged, a sharp noise that rang in his ears like the most obnoxious of yelling. He shook out his sweaty hands and took a deep breath, a voice that sounded suspiciously like Iskall’s in the back of his mind, telling him that he wasn’t alone. That it was okay to be here, and that it was okay if he needed to leave early. He was taking this at his own pace, and that’s alright.

He was welcome here, Mumbo reminded himself as he pressed the doorbell. He was visiting his friends, and they would be happy to see him.

It only took a second for the door to open, as if Tango had run for it the moment that Mumbo rang. He was laughing as he opened the door, his cheeks red with a full, rosy sort of happiness, and he beamed as he saw Mumbo waiting there.

“Dude!” Tango exclaimed, throwing his arms out for a hug. “I'm so happy that you decided to join, come on inside!”

Mumbo smiled in response, leaning into his hold with a deep inhale, before the pair were walking further into the apartment.

Tango handed him a hanger out of nowhere, gesturing to a rail where Mumbo could leave his coat. “Feel free to just leave that there. There's snacks in the kitchen if you want any, and we’re just hanging out in the living room for now!” He explained, hands waving around all the while. Mumbo responded with a nod.

“Awesome. Now, I gotta make sure that–” A loud crash interrupted whatever he was saying, and Mumbo watched a little dazedly as Tango’s brows shot up like something straight out of a cartoon, and he yelled, “Zedaph! I swear to God, if you–”

Whatever else he was trying to say was lost to another echoing crash, before Tango was sprinting back down the hall without so much as a second glance. Laughter erupted as the man disappeared around the corner, and Mumbo took another deep breath at the sudden chaos.

Well, he found himself relaxing. Might as well grab some food.

~

The energy in the living room was comfortable and infectious. As soon as Mumbo had sat down on the couch, a bag of crisps tucked under his arm, he got pulled into playing a board game.

As it turned out, Cub had brought a friend along as well, and Tango quickly decided that it would work best if they played in three separate teams. On one team it was Tango and Zedaph, another was Impulse and Skizz, and Mumbo ended up on a team with Cub, and his friend, Scar.

The first few rounds went pretty well, with Scar showing himself to be particularly adept at scamming everyone else out of points, including his own teammates, somehow. They quickly ended up in the lead, whilst Tango and Zed were second, and Impulse and Skizz were last. Lighthearted bickering was quick to follow between the two losing teams, which quickly distracted them from the game.

Mumbo silently watched them, his heart yet again twinged as it reminded him of the dynamic he, Iskall, and Grian used to have. He missed it. He missed it a lot, actually. He wished he could somehow turn back time, to before-

“Don't mind them,” Cub cut through the mayhem suddenly, as if noticing how Mumbo started to get lost in his thoughts. “The four of them have been close since high school, so they're bound to get a bit distracted,” he explained with a sharp grin.

“I can tell, they all seem to share a brain cell,” Mumbo smiled.

Cub leant back with a hearty laugh, folding his arms across his chest. “Yeah, I suppose they do.”

Quiet fell between them then, but Mumbo found it wasn’t uncomfortable. He didn’t have any qualms with sitting back to watch the chaos unfold, and breaking the silence didn’t feel intimidating either. Something about that felt… new.

“How long have you known them?” Mumbo asked quickly, trying not to dwell on it as he turned to face Cub.

“Hm, not that long, really. I met Impulse in university, and he introduced me to Tango and Zed within a week. Apparently Zed was even on the same course as me, I had just never noticed until after I’d met him.” He shrugged. “Skizz showed up a little while later, since he lived in another city. So- not long. Scar, on the other hand…”

At that, Scar leaned into their conversation in a way that told Mumbo he thought he was being inconspicuous, like a cat who thinks you can’t see them because they’re moving slowly. He really wasn’t.

“I've known Impulse for a while!” He started. “Honestly, I can’t remember where we met. One second I didn't know him, and then, bam! I had known him for years.” He laughed, something buttery and pleasant. “He must've introduced me to the others as well, except for Skizz, I hadn't met him until now. Actually–”

As Scar kept talking, Mumbo found he couldn't help but to listen. Something about him was magnetizing, a sort of natural charisma that made him impossible to dislike. It was so reminiscent of- of-

“Well, anyway, that’s how we snuck a rooster into our final!” Scar concluded, before turning his attention to Mumbo. “Mumbo! A little birdy told me that you're a fan of Ariana?”

Apparently, at some point during Scar’s rambling, the others managed to drag Cub into their weird argument, leaving Scar and Mumbo to their conversation. He had barely noticed when it happened, but now he was cursing being left alone. It felt like his heart had stopped, blood rushing in his ears as the world around them fell deathly silent.

Memories of the Fridays spent on his couch, watching videos together with Grian clouded his mind like smoke. Memories of them laughing together, of them sitting in comfortable silence together.

“Uh, yes, I am,” Mumbo coughed, trying to get that smoke out of his lungs as quickly as he could. “I-I’ve been into her music for a while now, I've followed her for a few years. Which is honestly pretty funny, since my childhood friend, Iskall, is her manager. So, um, yeah.” He smiled awkwardly at Scar, clearing his throat again.

“Oh!” Scar exclaimed, something lighting up in his eyes, “I guess it really is a small world!” He laughed again, clapping his hands together excitedly.

Mumbo honestly felt a bit confused now. “What do you mean?” He asked.

“Oh, well, I know Iskall as well! I happen to be Ariana's bodyguard, actually,” he replied casually, as if he were talking about the weather. As if everyone worked with the most well-known celebrity in the country.

Mumbo's brain was absolutely whirring with the new information, as he filed through all the information that he knew about Ariana, (which, unsurprisingly, was quite a lot.)

“Oh!” He gasped as he recalled the name of Ariana’s head of security. “You're Scar Goodtimes?” He didn’t really mean to ask, but the question slipped out with such ease that Mumbo couldn’t even find it in himself to be ashamed.

“The one and only!” Scar said. “So you know my full name, but didn't recognise me?” He asked curiously.

Mumbo blushed. “Well, I’m rather face blind, if I’m honest… I always have been! I've seen photos of you, but you tend to be dressed in suits and sunglasses, so, uh, sorry. If you hadn't said anything I probably wouldn't have realized.”

“Ah, I see,” Scar nodded with a strict understanding. “That makes sense!”

They were quiet for a second as Mumbo processed the information, sifting through the things that he knew about Scar’s work in his mind. Then, he spoke again, “I, er, I hope you don't mind me asking, but… what is she like? I only know what Iskall’s told me, but they haven’t said much.”

Scar looked thoughtful, mulling over the question for a minute or two before he started, “Well, it's a bit hard to say! She's very sweet, and polite. One of the most humble celebrities I've worked with, that’s for sure, but other than that, I don't actually know much.” The man looked as if he was debating something then, so Mumbo stayed quiet, even as his words came to a stop.

“... She struggles a bit with her mental health from time to time,” Scar eventually seemed to decide on. “And she's a very private lady. The person who knows the most about her is definitely Iskall, and I don't know either of them that well, unfortunately.”

Mumbo nodded, the answer not coming as a surprise. “Well, thank you, anyway. I couldn’t help but to ask, I must admit that I'm rather curious about her.”

“Ah, no worries! I would've asked as well if the roles were reversed.” Scar replied with a smile. “Well, while I might not know much about Ariana, I certainly found out quite a lot about roosters. Let me tell you–”

Scar started talking again, and as Mumbo listened he found himself watching the rest of the group. He couldn't help but miss his own, the ones that were as close to him as these friends were to each other. He couldn't help but to miss Grian.

He felt an urge to text him, to ask him how he was doing, to beg him to please come over again, can we just talk?

Mumbo pushed the urge away as much as he could.

~

After his visit at Tango's, Mumbo found himself missing freshly cooked meals. Impulse had cooked up a feast later into the evening, a wide spread of vegetables and meats, all seasoned and baked to perfection, and even the thought of them now made his mouth water.

He’d been living off of instant ramen and frozen meals for too long, and it left his fridge and cabinets far too empty for comfort. Instead of being filled with food that he could actually use, it was filled with random jars he didn't remember buying, sauces he never used, pickled things, and random packets that looked a bit too suspicious. The vegetables he did have didn't look fresh at all, and also, where the hell did all these tubes come from?

He sighed heavily, desperately wanting to put off buying food to another day, since it was pouring outside. He would rather stay at home, drink some tea and watch whatever crap was on TV, but then his stomach growled again and he remembered Impulse’s cooking, and… damn it, he should go to the store.

After all, what would Iskall say if they saw his fridge now? What would they think? What would Gr-

Mumbo shook his head, snapping out of the train of thought. He didn't want to think about him, but ever since he was at Tango's, he had started to pop up in his head more and more. He sighed, waited for his mind to clear a bit. It hurt too much to think about him, about the things that he might say.

So, instead of thinking, Mumbo grabbed some reusable bags and sat down at the kitchen table. He very pointedly avoided looking at Grian’s seat as he made a list of the things he needed.

He read through the list a few times, double checked that he’d written tea down, and glanced through the cabinets one last time to see if he needed anything else.

When he couldn't find anything missing, Mumbo grabbed his coat, pulled on his boots, and started towards the store.

~

Half of the time, Mumbo found grocery shopping to be the most dull, boring and uninteresting thing on the planet, and at other times, he found it therapeutic to walk through the isles listening to music, crossing things off from the list.

This time, it was definitely the latter.

That was another one of those things that had made life a little bit better, to find joy in ordinary chores and mundane tasks. There was something pleasant about doing what he needed to, about taking care of himself, about being able to do small things that he would have previously dreaded with a smile.

Somehow, his motivation for cooking a decent meal didn’t disappear while he was out grocery shopping, and he even left with a solid meal plan scribbled down on the back of his shopping list. He walked out of the doors with two hefty bags and a pleasant lightness on his shoulders even so, and, in his good mood, Mumbo decided that he’d walk the nicer route home. It was longer, sure, but it let him wind through some lovely little side-streets and a vibrant park or two.

He stumbled on a cute bakery as he walked, a small, independent looking store with fresh bread lining the windows. The scent from the bakery was absolutely heavenly, and he couldn't stop himself from going back to it, just to buy some bread. Sure, he had bread he'd bought at the grocery store and buying more things only made the bags harder to carry, but bakery bread was always a lot better, so it was worth it.

So, Mumbo ended up with bags that were heavy, filled to the absolute brim with fresh vegetables and ripe fruits, as well as two loaves of freshly baked bread. He had to stop a few times on the walk home to let his arms relax, otherwise he'd end up with aching arms and his food would most definitely end up getting dropped on the street. Yet, it didn't change how content he felt.

Even if it was still raining, even if his arms ached, and even if he had started to long for a cup of hot tea. He still felt content.

Then, Mumbo turned the corner onto his street.

He was nearly home, he could see his apartment building from where he stood, but that did nothing to stop the grocery bags from clattering out of his loose grip. The bread fell out, its beautiful crust soaked in a puddle on the pavement, and the punnet of apples came loose, fruit rolling across the ground. All of those good things were ruined in an instant, all of the things that he had been looking forward to were nothing more than a smushed pile against gray concrete.

But none of that mattered, and Mumbo wasn’t watching as eggs smashed and vegetables bruised. Instead, he was slack, staring straight ahead with weak, shaking hands.

Because right across the street, on the familiar, uneven doorstep of Mumbo’s apartment block, stood Grian.

He was rocking back and forth on his heels, his back turned to the street. Even so, Mumbo could see that he was twisting his hands anxiously, picking at the skin around his nails. It was almost picturesque, the way that he stood there on the empty side of the street, as if everyone had cleared out to give the two of them this moment - though, realistically, most people were probably just inside because of the rain.

Mumbo couldn’t care about the loss of his groceries as he blinked owlishly at Grian, frozen in place. He couldn't really believe his eyes as he took in every detail of the man’s silhouette, trying to convince himself that it wasn't just his imagination; that Grian was actually there.

He stared at him as he glanced up towards the window of Mumbo's flat, as he flitted between pacing or just tapping his foot, seemingly unaware of everything around him. He looked like he was deep in thought, as if he was trying to decide whether he should leave or not. Everytime that he steeled himself, spine straightening and hands curling into fists, he’d crumble, and go back to just standing outside the building, rocking back and forth.

Grian looked significantly better than the last time Mumbo saw him. His hair was in better shape, trimmed and washed, albeit wet from the rain. He wondered what style Grian usually let it sit in now, he wondered if that had changed, since they last saw each other so many weeks ago. His clothes looked clean, he was standing straighter, and he seemed to have put effort into what he was wearing.

All in all, he looked good. He looked better, so much better. If it wasn't for the pacing, Mumbo would've assumed that Grian was doing well.

It could have been hours that Mumbo stood there, glued to the pavement with watering, blinkless eyes, before Grian finally made up his mind on what he was going to do. He watched with horror as Grian turned around, walking in the opposite direction.

He hadn't seen Mumbo, hadn't noticed him.

He had decided to leave.

Mumbo’s heart dropped from his throat to his toes, fluttering with the desperate pace of a hummingbird, and yet, he couldn't move. He was frozen in place, deafening pulse hammering in his ears. He had to move! He had to!

It wasn't until a passerby walked into him, too busy looking at the groceries littering the ground, that Mumbo moved. In that moment he didn't care about the bread, he didn’t care about making himself a good, fresh meal, or the fact that there was traffic on the road. He didn't care if he ran into someone. He didn’t care if he made a fool of himself.

All he could care about was stopping Grian from leaving. He had to stop him from leaving.

His heart was yelling at him that if he didn't stop Grian from leaving, then this would be the last time he ever saw him. That they'd be stuck in this godawful limbo forever, neither of them ever gaining the strength to try and fix things between them. In those few seconds, where all he could see was the retreating outline of Grian’s rain-soaked hair, he was certain that was true.

It was true for both of them, but he could fix it. Right now, he could fix it.

That's why Mumbo ran out into the road without a second thought, throwing himself straight out into traffic, and only narrowly avoiding getting hit by a car. The driver slammed on their horn and rolled down the window to yell curses at him for his recklessness, but he could barely hear it.

Mumbo could only sprint as fast as he could, legs pumping under him like he was possessed. Adrenaline and fear and longing all melted together into some dangerous potion in his gut, he only cared about stopping Grian, he–

He didn't stop running until he caught up to Grian, his fingers first just brushing against the sleeve of his jacket as he remained just out of reach. In that split second, it was like Grian was nothing but a figment of his imagination, a shadow haunting him as he slipped through quivering fingers. It was only a moment, but the surge of absolute terror that rushed through him at that gave Mumbo a boost like nothing else.

Before he really knew what was happening, he had managed to grab Grian with a far sharper grip, long fingers tangling around his arm like a vice. He watched, tense and slightly lightheaded, as Grian yelled in response, spinning around like a whip as he tried to yank himself away.

His expression was sour, his eyelashes wet, as he seemed about ready to scream at whatever stranger had grabbed him until they let go.

Mumbo watched the exact instant that he realized who it was that was holding onto him.

Grian’s angry expression faded rapidly, first settling into a look of pure disbelief, before a hint of relief and happiness coloured his face. A smile was next, small and barely-there but still present enough to send fireworks shooting through Mumbo’s chest. He looked as if couldn't believe his eyes at all.

In a second, the happiness faded and his face crumpled like a child, something young and helpless and pained overtaking every inch of his expression. He looked sadder and more regretful than Mumbo had ever seen him, his mouth moving wordlessly as he stared up at the taller man.

Up close, Mumbo’s only thought was that he was glad Grian was truly doing better. With relief, he could see that Grian was wearing a small amount of makeup to highlight his features. It was polished, carefully placed and vibrant, but didn't hide the fact that he still had bags beneath his eyes. He still looked tired, a sleeplessness that may as well have been etched into his very bones, but the dark circles were so much less apparent than before.

Then, finally, Grian managed to croak, “Mumbo?” He said shakily, and Mumbo had never heard his name sound like an oath before. He had never heard someone call for him like they had been thinking of him for weeks, like they had been practicing holding the shape of his name on their tongue.

He could do nothing but stare, taking in every detail of the man’s face as the pair of them stood together, stuck in place. Mumbo’s tight, shaking grip stayed on Grian’s arm, his mind blank as he tried to think of a single word that would be a reply good enough for something as terrifying and profound as Grian’s own.

But he couldn’t; couldn’t do anything but gape as he spotted a half-smoked cigarette between Grian's fingers. He seemed to have forgotten it, unlit due to the rain, the smell only slightly present. How long had Grian been pacing? How long had he been out in the rain?

“Mumbo, listen, I–” Grian inhaled, about to continue, but was promptly cut off by Mumbo pulling him into a tight hug.

Grian gasped, and for a split second Mumbo was terrified that Grian wouldn't hug back, that he would resist, push Mumbo away, and leave. That this would be it, he would watch as Grian retreated away from him, and they would have forever missed their chance.

He could feel as Grian trembled. He didn't want to let go. He couldn't let go.

Then, he felt a pair of hands hovering over his back. At first they were careful, landing lightly on his soaking wet coat, but quickly they turned desperate. Those hands felt searching against him, grabbing fistfuls of as much fabric as they could reach, like whatever Grian could hold would stay with him forever. Like Mumbo would leave if Grian didn’t hold on tightly enough.

Mumbo barely registered that the other was crying, the tears blending with the rain, smudged into every other droplet that was already coating his shoulder.

"I'm sorry,” Grian sobbed, burying his head in Mumbo's shoulder. “I'm so sorry."

There were tears on Mumbo’s cheeks too as he pulled Grian as close as he could, burying his nose in damp, blond hair.

“It's okay, I'm here. It's okay," he reassured, and he wasn’t quite sure who he was talking to as he said it. It didn’t matter, they both heard it.

Neither wanted to let go, as they stood there in the pouring rain. Neither could bring themself to.

[artwithoutblood]

I’m enjoying the headcanons. We’ve seen Eri and now Aeron, now wondering about the rest of the girlies.

I can’t decide if Genesis bleaches his hair or uses henna. (Or it’s natural?) I feel like he takes a multipurpose product on tour to save room in his backpack so he smells like an orange/cinnamon/patchouli 2-in-1 shampoo + body bar or just uses grapefruit scented body wash on his hair and body. Maybe it’s just a bar of bubblegum scented soap from a pack bought for Micah. But then from his flag he’s a PoC and he has such long hair so he might also bring ten kinds of conditioning products with clashing scents.

I feel like he might enjoy chewing gum, like Juicy Fruit. Or Red Hots. He seems like the type to enjoy spicy salty or crunchy food, jiggle his leg or foot and chew on pens or toothpicks. (Or guitar picks.)

I’ve already headcanoned that Dorian reads middle aged mom romances alone in his library and possibly also reads the ones Erebus writes (if Eri doesn’t keep those secret that is - which he well might). While Dori suppresses gestures to seem calm and in control in front of the Fallen, he stims while writing letters by stroking and twiddling the ends of his hair. He drinks fruity tea and uses eucalyptus shampoo as a reprieve from the monotonous smell of dust and ashes. I wonder if he likes Parma violets.

Kayn rolls up an extra fur to slip inside his nest or bedroll beside him, to trap warm air and block the drafts. Or so he claims. He hugs the fur pillow as he hums himself to sleep and the Northern wind howls outside. He likes pemmican.

Apologies, I know very little about Ambrose but maybe he mixes drinks he imagines would taste like or appeal to you. Maybe you’re unknowingly the muse for the weekly special.

[I deleted my headcanons about how Eri can be both ace and bi as per his chart - and people can connect between them in a few ways - because it felt really intrusive to pick that apart. Can elaborate if wanted.]

Between his coffee creamer and the old books Eri possibly smells of vanillin, with a sharp tang that could be cigarettes, ink, venom, rubbing alcohol or formaldehyde. Or due to the oversensitivity to smells he carefully keeps himself not smelling of anything.

[Deleted my speculations on Aeron’s orientation and gender because while I have a strong sense of who I think they are it seems rude/nosy to say. And they seem to prefer not to.]

Aeron craves affection and likes having varied sensual/sensory experiences. Paint is up there but is not the only one. They seek out social and visual stimulation constantly and flirt socially with everyone because they just love to connect. I feel like they may enjoy strong perfume or cologne, going between both and varying the scents depending on the day. They seem like a jasmine sort of person but also mix it up with leather or cedarwood.

genesis packs literally an entire suitcase of hair products. being a demon means his hair color can be whatever, but that doesn't mean the hair just fixes itself. black vanilla shampoo, shea moisture. genesis probably falls into the 2C hair type. genesis braids micah's hair. he loves spicy food (even more than aeron) and can often by found chewing cinnamon or watermelon flavored gum.

i'm sure someone has brought him parma violets. dorian keeps a courtyard to grow fruits and flowers if he can. the smell of dusty books and the outside ash gets to him. he probably wears a flowery cologne as a result. he stims. he taps his pen against paper. he twirls his hair.

kayn does what he can to stay warm. there are pockets of warm air in the caves. his childhood bedroom still has a draft. he lines every piece of clothing with fur and sleeps twofold. he loves his dried berries and meat.

ambrose is a very intimate man. he wants to make you feel special when you first come to his bar (so you recommend him tk friends and come back another day!). he always plays 40s music. ella fitzgerald, frank sinatra. he keeps a vial of blood to drink from or to use in cocktails.

erebus is, as the books say, just a little guy. :)

he smells like alcohol and cigarettes - but in the smoke and sterile way. he tries to cover it with eucalyptus and orange. he stresses out, he turns to cigarettes. he tends to wallow in his own self-pity. aeron tells him he can smoke without damaging an already dying body if he just lets it die. once. erebus refuses. he coughs into his elbow and rolls his eyes.

aeron likes black cherry and jasmine. they smell like tea on some days; it's a preferred drink to coffee. they love social interaction. huge extrovert, but they aren't one to yell. they love whispers and gossip, and when they need to tune out, they thankfully can; it just takes a long stare out the window. give them a good party. give them a good ball.

[tulakhord]

got tagged in SOOO many tag games by @raylangivins asdfghjkl thank u ilu here are like, half of them lmao.

(1) shuffle your on repeat playlist and post the first 10 tracks stupid girl - garbage salt and vinegar - lights DIP N DRIP - cobrah disturbia - rihanna this hell - rina sawayama deep end - catty night crawling - miley cyrus feat. billy idol messy - kiiara jet black hearts - abigail barlow dancing on my own - robyn (2) a questionnaire!

Tea, coffee, or soda? coffee > everybody..... i do love tea tho. Dogs or cats? dogs bc one's sitting on my feet rn and he's pretty cute so. Can you play any instrument? forgot all the piano i once knew oops What's your sun sign? sagittarius for me as well! ♐️♐️ First song lyrics that pops into your head? how will i know if she really loves meee 🎵 Do you have any tattoos? not yet! indecision etc etc Favorite place you've travelled? british virgin islands What's the last movie you've watched? i literally do not remember but i'm seeing the d&d movie this weekend lmao What languages do you speak? only english, i'm pants at languages :( much like the instruments question i forgot the other ones orz Do you have any hobbies? omg so many, i love doing things lmao. rn i am actually doing campaign prep for ttrpg things while i watch hockey and fill this out, which is a whole category of hobbies by itself (writing! mini painting! drawing! map design! terrain builds! etc etc.) You can hang out with one fictional character for an hour, who do you choose? i was gonna be saucy and pick someone hot or someone whose brain i want to dissect like a formaldehyde frog but actually it is toothless i wanna go flying with the flying doggo Compliment yourself: i cooked a delicious dinner tonight! (3) ao3 first lines tagline

Rules: Share the first lines of ten of your most recent fanfics and tag ten people. If you have written fewer than ten, don’t be shy and share anyway (spoiler alert: rules are made to be broken…)

"most recent" i have published uhh nothing since 2021 hockey hols oops. i should maybe. fix that. anyway the point is that some of these are from my drafts folder ayy:

The chatter starts up at the end of every season, and every off-season Mat runs the fuck away to get away from it.

There’s three shadows standing over Eddie when he comes to, curled in on himself on the ground and damp with his own sweat.

The last dragons—barely hatchlings—die at Dragonstone. Perhaps it's only fitting that the last dragonspawn do too.

“I used to think about it,” admits Trevor. “You making me sorry for it.” (x)

Leon makes all his biggest mistakes in Las Vegas, and tonight is no exception. The team is flying high off a win they didn’t expect—off a win, strictly speaking, they did not deserve—and the music is good, and the lights are low, and the drinks keep coming. (x)

Raff is in the Dallas hotel room, and Joel didn’t invite him—didn’t expect him—but holy cannoli is Joel glad to see him there. (x)

The first thing to understand was Raff didn’t have a heart. (x)

As far as Jack was concerned, Taylor Hall could take his Nantucket wedding, his signed contract in Boston, his Biosteel invite and his mostly working body and all the other hallmarks of his happily ever after—and shove it up his own ass. (x)

He had made a conscious choice not to tell anyone about the situation, and indeed, not to think about the situation any more than could be helped. This had worked well for the past several years, except that it meant that Auston had not thought twice about extending the invitation for Dylan to join them for two weeks in Scottsdale. (x)

They’d tracked the old legends from planet to planet, each one emptier than the last: graveyards with no graves, detonation marks from imperial explosives scouring ancient stone, each once-sacred place swept clean of its history. (x)

tagging 10 of you i've seen in my notes lately, do one or two or all of em: @maddiebuckley @bluewaterhigh2005 @tobysziegler @st-louis @xreveux @parisebuyout2021 @chevalric @joeslie @marmolita @townhulls @bigbrotherlouis

[infinity0nhigh]

“A daydream spills from my corked head / Breaks free of my wooden neck / Left a nod over sleeping waves / Like bobbing bait for bathing cod / Floating flocks of candled swans / Slowly drift across wax ponds” “…we’re all too small to talk to God. yeah, we’re all too smart to talk to God.”

Spent most of last night dragging this lake for the corpses of all my past mistakes / Sell me out, joke’s on you / we are salt, and you are the wound”

“We all carry these things inside that no one else can see / they weigh us down like anchors, they drown us out at sea / I look up to the sky, there may be nothing there to see / but if I don’t believe in him, why would he believe in me?”

“They say the captain goes down with the ship, so when the world ends, will God go down with it?”

“I saw her with her hands tied back / And her rags were burning / Crawling out from a landfilled life / Scrawlin' her name upon the ceiling / Throw a coin in a fountain of dust / White noise, her ears are ringing / Got a ticket for a midnight hanging / Throw a bullet from a freight train leaving”

“Walking to the other side / with the devil trying to take my mind / and my soul’s just a silhouette, from the ashes of a cigarette. Sometimes, the jail can’t chain the cell / and the rain’s too plain to tell / all alone by a barren well / Scarecrow’s only scaring himself”

“Stretched to the limit, attention spans snap back, retract, collapse in the laugh tracks / Noise response, applause and hand claps / floodgates open to the sound of the rainbow / Breaking point’s on the verge of pointless / Fools anointed to the followers’ fanfare / Look for the common, not superficial / Code Red cola spurns conformity crisis / Perfunctory idols rewriting their Bibles, with magic markers running out of their ink / Lives in White-Out, turn the lights out / fax machine anthem’s got their hands up”

“Wishes bounce me weightless / the infrared scope on pointlessness / the bulls are sedated, and this fight’s fixed”

“I love everything about you that hurts, so lemme see your moves / lips pressed close to mine, true blue” “Trade baby blues for wide-eyed browns, I sleep in your old shirts and walk through this house in your shoes. I know it’s strange. It’s the strangest way of saying ‘I know I’m supposed to love you.’”

“It’s these substandard motels on the corner of Fourth and Fremont Street / appealing only ‘cause they’re just that unappealing / any practiced Catholic would cross themselves upon entering / The rooms have a hint of asbestos and maybe just a dash of formaldehyde / and the habit of decomposing right before your very eyes… along with the people inside / What a wonderful caricature of intimacy”

“When the moon fell in love with the sun, all was golden in the sky. All was golden when the day might the night.” “When the sun found the moon, she was drinking tea in a garden, under the green umbrella trees in the middle of summer. When the moon found the sun, he looked like he was barely hanging on, but her eyes changed his life in the middle of summer.”

“Give us this day our daily dose of faux affliction. Forgive our sins, forged at the pulpit, with forked tongues selling false sermons. / Because I am a new wave gospel sharp, and you’ll be thy witness / so gentlemen, if you’re gonna preach / for God’s sake, preach with conviction.”

“I’m breaking my teeth off trying to bite my lip. And there’s all kinds of redheaded women that I ain’t supposed to kiss. And it’s this color that never fails to turn me blue. So I just swallow it and hold onto it, and use it to scare the hell out of you.”

“Sister, I’m not much a poet, but a criminal, and you never had a chance.”

“I’m casually obsessed, and I’ve forgiven death. I am indifferent yet, I am a total wreck. I’m every cliché, but I simply do it best.” “Went to sleep a poet, and I woke up a fraud. To calm your nerves, I’m feeling for my clothes in the dark.”

“The next time the phone can wring my neck, it gets no answer. And the time that I spent telling it my roots; I’m shaking in my boots. But still it looks at me like an old friend I’ve betrayed. The dark side of the doormat is the one your shoes have frayed.”

“I’ll be stuck fixated on one star when the world is crashing down.”

“You claimed all this time that you would die for me. Why then, are you so surprised when you hear your own eulogy?”

“I fell from the heavens as a fetish blessed with an operatic skeleton. And as the stars watched me descend, I cracked a family tree and, broke off all the branches.”

…are some of my favorite lyrics.

[rebellum]

SOME DAY I will do a drag-y performance to will wood's me/myself/I its just such a mood

"I wish I could be a girl and that way you'd wish I could be your girlfriend-boyfriend" is just such a trans line in so many ways. Will wood means in it a kinda eggy not get trans/kinda trans fem way, but I mean it in a "being trans is so hard I often wish I were just my assigned gender at birth and gnc instead of trans" kind of way. Like, the desperation of 18 year old me knowing conversion therapy doesn't work but still looking it up because I thought maybe I'd be happier if I could at least really repress it enough that I could pretend to not be trans and just not be aware why i was sad and disliked my body and being a """woman"""

It's the most trans song ever in all directions

"If the shoe fits I won't try it on" as rejecting both assigned gender at birth and the associated gender production (masc/fem) but ALSO as in the way I think will wood means it which is "I don't want to be trans I'm not trans" (rejecting the label of transgender for whatever his reasons are)(I will clarify tho he DOES say he's also a transvestite)

"Take my tea with formaldehyde for my feminine side since the day that I died" is just so fitting as a trans person who was afab because I'm so femme and I like being femme but I dislike being perceived as a woman but also I wish I were a woman because life was so much easier when I was cis, and of course the trans fem perspective of "I need to fit in I need to be a normal man I have to repress my femininity or I will die"

"Am I pretty enough to lie to" / "am I pretty enough to fucking die" / "am I pretty now" is such a mood if you don't perform femininity in an appropriate way regardless of your agab if you're perceived to be feminine WRONG then you're in such danger and you have to wonder am I pretty yet? Am I pretty enough to get respect? But also like... Am I pretty enough to lie to? I know you don't see me as my gender, I know almost no one does, but can you lie anyways? Can you lie and say you see me as my gender? Can I fit into social/subcultural norms of this gender enough that even though people know I'm trans they'll lie and say they see me just as my gender? Am I pretty enough to earn respect? Am I pretty enough to lie to?

"But I love how you're on my side when I cross that line" with relation to partners whether it's a t4t relationship or one where a cis partner validates your gender identity and enjoys your gender fuckery

It's just SO trans and has SO many opportunities for a show, I'm thinking like, you know that old movie makeup magic trick with red/blue makeup and lighting? Doing that with masc and fem makeup so that you flash between appearing more masc or more fem throughout the song, "this body that they stuck me in" and I'm imagining tearing off gendered things like breast forms and flinging them down onto the stage to act like I'm dismembering my own body like I and so many others wish we could

Ahh I just wanna get into drag and performance SO BADLY

[luxwritesfanfic]

Don’t Take The Money

Poor reader thought it would end up being a normal Sunday but that must’ve been the mix of bleach and Pinesol fumes getting to their head. Or, the one where reader finds out they have more in common with the other woman in Sherlock’s life than they thought and Sherlock has an aneurysm at the revelation. Thanks for reading!

Sherlock Holmes/Reader

You were just waking up when Sherlock was moving around the bedroom trying to pack his overnight bag. You groaned at the noise of drawers being opened and hangers jostled and rolled over onto your stomach, propping yourself up on your elbows. “Sherlock? You’re leaving?”

He stopped in his tracks back towards the closet and moved to sit on the edge of the bed next to you. He looked down at you with fondness that so many people thought he was incapable of feeling and as always, it made your heart swell. Brushing a lock of hair behind your ear, you relished in his undivided attention.

“A case was brought to my attention. I won’t be gone for long, it’s a few towns over.” He insists, trying to ease your worries before they arise.

Although you’d miss him, it never did anyone any good when Sherlock was bored. He needed something to keep him occupied and you needed time to clean up the drywall shrapnel that constantly covered the couch due to the boredness. It would give you the opportunity to deep clean the flat and the idea wasn’t so bad.

“Is John going too?” Sherlock nodded. You don’t know why you asked, they always worked together.

You turned your head to kiss his palm and sat up to get out of bed. “Okay. I’ll make you breakfast before you guys leave. Nobody likes train food anyway.”

Sherlock moved to help you stand, one of the smiles he reserved just for you gracing his lips. “You take excellent care of me. But you should know, you don’t have to be useful for this to mean something to me.”

He caught you off guard, but he usually did when he read you like a book. Your whole life you’d made yourself useful and you weren’t sure if people liked you for you or for the fact that there’s nothing you wouldn’t do for them. You would do anything and everything for Sherlock and it didn’t have anything to do with being useful, honestly. You loved him dearly and you couldn’t imagine treating him like you felt anything less than that. You couldn’t help but kiss him.

“Omelettes or pancakes?”

—

Your shirt was soaked from washing the dishes and you smelled like a mixture of bleach and formaldehyde from scrubbing the fridge clean and removing the severed head that took up the space where your coffee creamer should be. You had done more loads of laundry than you could count, bleached the bloodstained tub from Sherlock’s latest pig quest, the entire flat smelled like Bahama breeze and you couldn’t be more content. The boys weren’t due back for a day or two so you figured you’d spend some time with Mrs. Hudson when you were done and see if you could meet up with Bucky and Greg for lunch. When you passed the kitchen on your way to your bedroom to change, you decided that this may be the only chance you ever get to clear off the dining room table. Sherlock’s science equipment had overrun it and you figured it wouldn’t hurt if you straightened it up just a bit.

You were in the midst of cleaning out Sherlock’s beakers when you heard the knock on the door. Figuring that John would have posted on his blog that they weren’t currently taking clients because they were on a case, you expected to see Mrs. Hudson and the mop she was letting you borrow. You cracked the door just enough to see who was on the other side and was surprised to see an older woman holding a plate of baked goods who wasn’t Mrs. Hudson.

“Hi... how can I help you?”

The woman in question’s eyes lit up at the sight of you and you weren’t sure why. She smiled and gestured to the platter in her hands. “Is Sherlock Holmes here?”

She must be a client, you thought. Shaking your head, you responded, “No, sorry! The boys off on a case. I’m a friend of theirs. Is there something I can help you with?”

She was looking past you into the flat and you weren’t sure what she was looking for. “Do you mind if I come in? I could really use a cup of tea. And I wanted to drop these cookies I made for Sherlock off.”

You looked at what she was holding and decided it wouldn’t really hurt to let her in, and the cookies looked amazing. Sherlock must have helped her in some way.

“Sure, come on in. Sorry about my clothes... I’ve been doing some spring cleaning.” You stepped aside and let her in. “So, are you a client of his?”

She went to place the platter on the table and you were excited that it was already worth cleaning off the table. “Not quite. I’ve known him his whole life and have loved him even longer.” She turned and smiled at you, seeing through you in a way that seemed eerily close to Sherlock.

You hummed, taking in her answer. Sherlock didn’t talk much about his friends, so you weren’t surprised that you never heard of her.

“Just a minute, I’m gonna change.”

You excused yourself to the bedroom where your phone was charging on the bed. After sending Sherlock a quick text that someone who wasn’t a client was here for him, you dug around in the closet for something clean and more appropriate.

The lady didn’t really seem like a threat and you were sure if it came down to it, you’d be able to protect yourself. You could chuck the skull on the mantle if need be, it was a hard hitter.

When you returned, she was wandering around the flat and looking at all of the pictures of you, Sherlock, and John that you’d recently framed and put out.

“You and Sherlock, you’re close, yes? Tell me about him. It’s been so long.” She was holding a picture that you took of you two in the back of a taxi. Sherlock was on his phone but you thought his hair looked extra good and the golden hour light made him look like an angel so you had to take the picture.

“Yeah, I mean. He’s a seriously great person. A brilliant detective, he’s so smart. He helps all these people for free, and he never complains if they don’t offer him anything. He hates when I tell him he’s a godsend but who else would do that? Um... he’s really funny, probably one of the funniest people I know. You just have to keep up with his humor. It can be kind of dry, but it’s there. He’s one of the most loyal people there is and he’d do anything for the people he cares about.”

It was so easy for you to speak so highly of him. It was like second nature.

“He can be stubborn sometimes, and he can be a little more blunt than he needs to be but... he’s amazing. There’s no other way to explain him, really. He’s got a light that comes from him that rivals the sun and I don’t think it could ever be dimmed.”

She turned back to you and slowly broke out into one of the biggest grins you’d ever seen someone wear. “You really love my son.”

“Your son?” You blinked, unsure of what was going on. You really started to look at the woman in front of you and you realized Sherlock had her eyes. A complete copy and paste. “Oh my God, you’re Sherlock’s mom. I never even introduced myself. I’m Y/N, a friend of-”

“You’re not his friend, dear, and I’m not blind. Old age takes a lot from you, but I could never miss the way my son shines. And you... you see it too.” She walked up to you, still holding the picture frame in her hands. “You love my son in a way that no one else has. Let me tell you all about him.”

—

You couldn’t stop laughing.

Sherlock’s mom had brought over tons of scrapbooks and old pictures that she had acquired over the years, and you had a feeling she knew you were here alone before she even knocked on the door. Mycroft, probably. You spent the whole day getting to know each other and taking a stroll down memory lane with her telling you all about Sherlock as a kid and how it was growing up with two geniuses as sons. She even gave you a copy of one of Sherlock’s high school pictures that you were going to cherish forever. She seemed so happy to have someone to talk to and assured you that spending time with you was the closest she had felt to Sherlock in a long time.

You insisted that she stay and let you make dinner, but she was as equally stubborn as Sherlock and ordered you takeaway as her treat. You tried to argue but she was having none of it. “My God, you scrubbed this whole flat clean. I’m not going to let you dirty your dishes. How does Chinese sound?”

—

Sherlock barreled up the steps with all the force he could muster in his legs and rushed in to see you, perfectly fine and all in one piece, having dinner with his mother.

“Sherlock!” You both exclaimed, his mother full of excitement and you full of worry.

“What’s wrong?” You ask, standing up from your end of the couch. “I thought you were on a case? Is everything okay?”

“I’ve been texting and calling you all day! You’re that daft that you couldn’t text back once all this time?” He’s still out of breath and he can feel his heartbeat in his ears. His tone is exasperated and you could hear the mix of anxiety and relief in his voice as he’d yet to acknowledge his mother. She seemed perfectly content to sit back and watch the situation unfold, amusement at her son’s unusual outburst gracing her features.

“My phone was dead! And then I put it on the charger and I forgot about it once your mom came, by the way!” You went to the bedroom and retrieved your phone to find a dozen missed texts and calls.

Probably just a client. SH

11:07 AM

Are you sure it’s not a client? SH

11:43 AM

Are they still there? SH

1:00 PM

Missed Call

1:17 PM

Missed Call

2:03 PM

Call me back. SH

3:26 PM

Y/N, I’m on a case. Call me back. SH

3:44 PM

Missed Call

4:13 PM

Is everything alright? SH

4:52 PM

Missed Call

5:08 PM

Missed Call

5:10 PM

Missed Call

5:12 PM

I’m boarding the train now and I’ll be there soon. Don’t worry. SH

5:21 PM

Sherlock followed after you, still without ever acknowledging his mother, and shut the door after himself. With his palms braced against the wooden door, he tried to ease the tension out of his bones through a deep breath as he watched you check your phone. He wasn’t worried about the case at all. It was mostly solved and what little was left John could do with ease. He felt the weight of the missed calls in his stomach like lead and the three hour train ride that he couldn’t curse to defy time any quicker. He had plenty of enemies and you had virtually none, so there would be no reason to think you’d hesitate to assist anyone who came to his door, especially if it was in the name of helping him. He thought he’d walk into a crime scene and he couldn’t shake those images out of his head.

You got up from the bed and walked over to him, reaching to wrap one arm around his neck and to take his hand in yours in the other. You pressed a kiss to his jaw, and then to his chin, over his eyelids, his nose, and then lastly you met his lips, murmuring “I’m sorry” in between every kiss. He didn’t usually voice it, but you had known him long enough to know when he was upset. He relaxed into your touch as he always did and you pulled away from him long enough to pull on the ends of his scarf. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. Let me help. We got takeaway for your mom and I but we can share mine. I got what you like anyway.”

He let you pull his scarf and jacket off and you were delighted to see he wasn’t really mad with you. You hang his jacket on the closet door and by the time you turn back to face him, he’s already making his way back out to the living room. Following after him, you see his mother gesturing him to come over.

“What are you doing here? I thought I told Mycroft to tell you I was away on business.” He was messing with the cuffs on his sleeves but his question was directed at his mother with unmistakable intent. She tsked at him, and you began to see even more similarities in their mannerisms.

“That’s no way to talk to your mother, William. I was spending some time with your darling partner here and I don’t even get a kiss or a hug?” She began gathering her belongings and threw her purse over her shoulder. You weren’t happy to see her go.

You did peak up at the name. “William? Your name is William?”

Sherlock groaned, ignoring you completely. You swore you could see a blush dusting his cheeks. In no time he was at the door, holding it open for his mother. “It’s getting rather late, don’t you agree? Father must be wondering where you are. Be sure to pay Mycroft a visit the next time you’re in town. I assure you, he always has time for family.”

She turned to you and blew you a kiss. “I had a great time with you today, I hope you’ll manage to bring Sherlock home more.”

Walking over to Sherlock, she paused to kiss his cheek and whisper in his ear, “I know you know what you could lose here. So be sure you don’t, Sherlock.”

Before she totally stepped out of the flat, she turned around one last time. “Promise me you’ll come home soon. Your father and I miss you dearly.”

“I heard you the first ten times. Goodnight and safe travels, mother.” Sherlock shut the door before his mother could get another word and your shoulders slumped.

“Hey, that was your mom! She’s really nice. We had a good day.” You started to clean up the coffee table and take the dishes into the kitchen. You couldn’t understand Sherlock’s relationship with his family but you were sure there was a lot of things you didn’t know. Still, it was nice to have a chance to bond with your (maybe one day) future family. It was then that you realized that Sherlock never said anything when his mother mentioned you being his partner. You two never really officially defined what you were, so to see him not object to an actual title made you feel all warm inside.

“No, you had a good day. I was trying to work a case and clear a man’s name while trying to figure out if I’d come home to you kidnapped or dead.” Sherlock rolled his eyes, watching you from the doorway. You looked back at him as you dropped the dishes into the sink and let out a sigh. You hated the fact that you let him down.

“I have to go back tomorrow to tie some loose ends with John. If you come with me, I have a feeling I’ll get over it a lot quicker.” His voice was quiet but full of mirth. He won’t hold this over your head, and you both know this, but if it makes him feel better you’ll follow him. You’d follow him to the ends of the Earth and off the edge if he lead you.

Sherlock pushed himself off of the doorway and walked towards the bedroom, unbuttoning his shirt as he went.

“So, you’re staying home tonight?” You swung around the  kitchen doorway and called out to the hall. You hadn’t even thought about Sherlock having to go back, and you couldn’t help but be excited that he would be there for you to fall asleep next to tonight. 

“You didn’t expect me to make the trip back at this hour, did you? Besides, I sleep better with you and it’s obvious that I don’t focus well if you’re not around, Which is why I need you to come with me tomorrow. It seems you owe me, anyway.” Sherlock takes a step back so you can see him in the bedroom doorway, and you can feel your heart in your throat.

He’s so beautiful, you think, all alabaster skin and lean muscle. He’s pulling a t-shirt over his head and you wonder if you could manifest a photographic memory long enough to commit him to memory. Of course he notices you staring, and you almost want to mention all the times you catch him staring at you but he changes the subject and opens the blankets for you and you shut up and follow him. You follow him and you love him and you wake up in the morning at the crack of dawn to run downstairs and order coffee from the shop next door before your train leaves, being sure to get them to write “William” on the cup. Sherlock doesn’t find this funny at all, but he still lets you fall asleep on his arm on the train ride there and doesn’t complain when his arm falls asleep right along with you.

He thinks that if this is the life his mother wished for him as a child, that would be one thing he could take off of his list of things she eventually needs to answer for. Because mothers know best, and when it came to you, she could have never been more right.

[fuckthisshitimin]

Borrowed Time, Chapter 4: About the life of Gertrude Robinson

Chapter 1: Are you afraid of death, Jon?

Chapter 2: Take my Picture (I want to last longer)

Chapter 3: I don't know.

read on ao3

September 30th, last autumn of Gerard Keay

6:30PM

Martin steps out of the cab, and Jon is all but wiggling uselessly, waiting for him to close the door to lunge forward, to hold him and assess the damage.

"Um, Jon?"

"Thanks for coming."

Jon can feel Martin's chest rising and falling, when he breathes in and sigh. This is the best feeling in the world.

"Sure. Anytime, Love."

7:40AM

“This is against protocol.”

If there is a thing Sasha James can say she knows all about, it is protocol. “You must understand I cannot make an exception for…” She takes her coat off nonetheless, putting it on the back of a chair as the voice of the man behind her fades to the back of her mind. “… as I understand it…” She tightens her grip on her working case, breathes in the familiar scent of a mortuary room. She has never been in this one before. She looks around, the table, the way he arranged the space, the cabinets and lights, almost like her own room but not quite, it’s just a bit off, it’s familiar and it’s unknown. The man that opened to her is on her heels when she makes her way to the body lying still. “…know about—”

“How long has she been here?”

He walks up to her, careful to keep his distance whilst still blocking her view of the body. “Ms. James, do not get me wrong, I truly admire your work, but you cannot be here.”

With a click of her tongue, she tries to walk past him. But he’s persistent. She spent an awful night on the train, barely catching a glimpse of the sun rising before she took the underground, another glimpse and another set of stairs to here, where the sun never shines. The white light would make it impossible to know if it is day or night, if not for the obvious red clock on the wall. If she cannot avoid him, she has to look him in the eyes. His suit is neatly pressed. His face is calm — unassuming. “Who are you?”

“Oliver Banks. I am to take care of Ms. Robinson’s body.”

He would be taller than her, were she not wearing heels, and she is grateful for the way her feet hurt just a bit, anchoring her. “No, you are not.” He opens his mouth to talk again — she won’t let him. “Not a thing you just said is true.”

“You cannot—”

“Mr. Banks. Your ventilated cabinet is old, barely up to European standards, and the labels on your formaldehyde are too faded to be legible. This is a health hazard, and if you prevent me from doing my work I can prevent you from doing yours, permanently.”

She locks eyes and yes, there is a flicker of fear now, if ever so small. She waits until he nods. She nods back. “Now if you won’t be too much of a bother, you can assist me with Mrs. Robinson’s preparations, and start by answering my questions. How long has she been here?”

Oliver Banks sighs, looking away from her and to the body. “Forty hours.”

“That’s too long.”

“They—”

“Gertrude Robinson didn’t care for excuses and neither do I. There is work to be done.” She sighs, too, relaxing slightly at the prospect of working. She knows how to do that. She needn’t be tough anymore. She takes off her shoes. Her tights can’t protect her from the cold cold floor. “Would you make me a cup of tea, please? Oh, and print out new labels.”

She is glad Mr. Banks doesn’t fight, and she starts with rearranging the supplies. The glycerin goes to the left corner of the trail, and the sewing kit on another table, behind her. She will get to that eventually. She takes a moment. Just a second, to look at Gertrude’s face. And she shivers when she feels eyes on her. She groans, wishing she had eyes that could glare like those of the deceased. Wishing she’d inherit this, if nothing else. “Sorry, I’ll— I’ll go. You called her Mrs. Robinson.”

She sighs, again. “She got married six years ago. Did you not read her will?”

He blinks, taking in the information, and when he doesn’t ask any more questions and gets busy — she hopes — making tea, she thinks he might not be such an awful assistant for today. She smiles at the dead woman. “I’m sorry our goodbye was so cold. And I hope you knew… I hope you knew I kept fond memories of you, still.” She gulps. A breath in.

6:00AM

He came as soon as he heard. He wasn’t even close to her. She didn’t like him, really, or at least it is the impression he had. It was always hard to tell what Gertrude Robinson was thinking and Jon cannot remember a time he saw her without this coldness in her eyes. She wasn’t antipathic, not really, polite and formal in all the ways you would expect a hundred-years-old cardigan-wearing Art History professor to be, but… There was something in her eyes, a dark greenish gray, in the way she held herself, all defenses up.

Maybe Jon is overthinking it.

He hadn’t thought about her for three years now.

But when he heard, when Elias Bouchard, of all people, called to say she was dead, something cold rushed through his veins and he had to be here. Had to not leave her alone.

He wonders if Elias called all of her students like he called him — it doesn’t seem feasible.

He fiddles with his phone, getting up when he hears footsteps approaching. The door opens, and Oliver yawns when he comes in, a fresh cup of tea in hands. The mortician spots him after a lull, not quite awake yet. It is barely six in the morning. He came early.

“Thank you,” Jon says, before hello, before anything else, for he is afraid he might forget.

“I expected you to have fallen asleep, honestly.”

He chuckles. Maybe taking Ritalin around the clock was an awful idea, but he didn’t fall asleep, and he didn’t intend to make a habit of it, either.

“You should go home and sleep.”

“Will you leave her alone?” The question slips from his lips before he can realize he’s about to talk, and he grimaces. Oliver will need breaks. Of course. To make tea, and pee, and eat, and all those things that the livings do and Gertrude Robinson won’t anymore. He cannot ask of Oliver to oversee his needs for a… for a gut feeling rooted in superstition and something Jon can’t even properly pinpoint.

“Doesn’t she have anyone else that could come?”

“I… I don’t know.”

“I packed a lunch, so I won’t have to leave the room for more than half an hour. That’s the best I can offer.”

Jon nods, ponders the options. It’s half an hour to home. “What time do you take your lunch break?”

Oliver sighs, and Jon thinks he knows what is on his mind. “One thirty.”

It seems like an awfully long morning, and Jon wants to say thank you again, but he just gets up, takes his bag from the floor, addressing a last look to the body. “I won’t make you wait.”

“If you do, I will have someone else watch over her body.”

“Thank you.” Jon says again, and he sounds as tired as he feels. “Thank you.”

“It is my job.”

11:30AM

A smile on her lips, Gerry can’t believe they haven’t seen her in five years. Her eyes are clearer than they remembered, and she doesn’t look so tired, for someone who texted through the night and spent the morning in here. “I brought what you asked,” they say, raising a large grocery bag.

She walks to him, hand raising instinctively to brush their hair, and they wish she would touch him, but she refrains from it and grabs the bag instead. They never were physical in their friendship. It would be strange, probably, to hold her now, but they had the strangest morning already so they doubt it would be worse. None of this feels real yet.

“Thanks for that. Must have been weird.”

“It was easy, at least. I brought all of her dresses. So, two.”

Sasha chuckles, and when Gerry’s eyes ineluctably find the body, she moves away to give them space. They raise their eyebrows. “Oh.” Turn away. “She’s naked.”

“Ah, right.”

“This is in my mind forever, Sasha.”

“I’ll cover her up, don’t make a fuss about it.”

“I am not making a fuss. I am just saying, if you ever see a naked old woman in my paintings, it is your fault.”

A chuckle, again, “She’s covered. Didn’t think you would mind.”

“I…” he frowns, turning back to the body. “I wonder if she would be okay with it.”

A shrug. “It’s just her body.”

He knows. She’s not there. Not when he comes closer and looks at her face, so very still. It isn’t the first time he sees a dead body. That would be their dad. Then, their mum. And now their whatever-she-was. They find they are strangely glad. The idea of dying before her felt… wrong. “Did you sew her lips already?”

“Yes. It’s mostly done. Did you find her make up?”

“No foundation I am afraid.”

“Shame. Her lipstick?”

They saw Gertrude Robinson with lipstick twice exactly. Same shade both times. On her wedding day, and when she buried her wife. “I did.”

“Great.”

They hear Sasha going through the bag, but they can’t get their eyes off the corpse. The body. It looks cold. And it is. Her hair isn’t done yet. “Peaceful is a weird look on you, Gertrude.”

The fumbling in the bag stops, and Gerry bites their lips. It resumes, and they add: “But I’m glad, still. Thank you for everything.”

He looks away finally with a long breath. The way Sasha examines the dresses, laid down on her table, reminds them of Jon, it is careful and important and generous, and they smile. “Will you take care of me, too?”

She frowns, takes a moment to look away from the dresses, and her voice is distant. “What?”

“When I’m gone, will you take care of my body, too?”

“Well I hope I’m reti—”

When she turns around and crosses Gerry’s eyes, she must see something on their face. It’s hopeful when she picks up her sentence where she left it. “I hope I’m retired by that point.”

“Sorry.”

“You’re joking.”

“I’m dead serious.”

“Now this is a joke.”

They chuckle. “Yes. Still true.” They can’t make out what’s on Sasha’s face, but it’s tight, and they do their best not to interpret it. They shrug. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

She glares, and they shrug, shoulders a bit too high, moving a bit too slow. “My therapist told me it’s normal to deflect with humor.”

“Gerry…”

“Take your time. What I asked, take your time. Need a moment?”

To this day, Gerry cannot say if this moment is weirder for them, or for the person they announce their imminent death to. It’s confusing to say the least, and he wishes he knew how to stop grieving something that isn’t gone yet.

“I… help me do her nails, okay?”

She sniffles, and the white light, unforgiving and cold on the three of them, makes for short sobs slipping through focused faces, grips tightening and a hand she holds maybe for the first time, Gerry can’t be sure, but with more intent she ever did, and they both let out a gasp when Gerry spots, on her left hand, the tiniest tattoos.

“I never knew she had any,” Sasha says, and she thinks she should have noticed. On the side of her ring finger that would be hidden by her middle finger, it reads, 13.03.14, and on the pinkie, a simple cursive agnes.

It makes for a knot in both their throats, and they hold each other’s hand firmly, hold each other up when they look existence in the eye, and it’s hard to breathe but they do. It is precious that they do.

[sorin-in-the-sixth-sense]

Currently blasting I/Me/Myself by Will Wood for daily serotonin, and holy shit this is literally genderfluid!snape’s anthem!

A few examples:

I’ve been feeling lightheaded

Since I lost enough weight to feel back in my skin

Snape, skinny. Snape, dysphoric

I, for one, as a whatever-gender-I’m-feelin-at-the-moment, can relate

Take my tea with formaldehyde for my

Feminine side since the day that I died

Snape’s femininity is not nearly talked about enough in the books, I personally headcannon his femininity as one of the few things he likes about himself. I imagine him in front of the mirror admiring his slender shoulders with his shirt hanging from the side, running his fingers down his pale neck to his collarbone... I’m distracting myself-

I wish I could be a girl, and that way

You'd wish I could be your girlfriend, boyfriend

Am I pretty enough to lie to

Snupin vibes, I’m just saying👀

No, I know that I'm wrong

But I love how you're on my side when I cross that line

I could imagine him taking advantage of his position as a Professor and Head of House, knowing he can get away with it (kinda?) because Dumbledore needs him anyway, and cant fire him, making him feel better about all the things the Mauraders got away with in his Hogwarts years. A bad coping mechanism, but it feels good.

Say my name like a slur, but I've been called worse

And I've heard it all before, no this isn't a first

The Mauraders, "Snivellous" Ugh, its almost too perfect

And if we go with the headcanon that his middle name is Tobias...

Am I pretty enough, am I pretty enough

To fucking die

😫

All identities are equally invalid

genderfluid genderfluid genderfluid

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk(;

[sunnyskies281]

So I saw this post by @laytontheories and thought “hey why not do something like that too?”

So I present to you:

A few Professor Layton characters as songs on Spotify that I listen too sometimes

Dimitri Allen: Touch-Tone Telephone

Dimitri Allen, a physicist who’s devoted his whole life to his research, finding Claire in future London and trying to explain what happened

I think it's time for you to know the awful truth, The truth about me, and the truth about you

Dimitri has to tell Claire what happened

I try to call you every day I'm rehearsing what to say when the truth comes out (of my very own mouth)

Dimitri recalls having a crush on Claire, how he tried to pluck up the courage to ask her out, but Hershel got there before him. How he’d stay up late some nights, debating whether to just go for it or not

'Cause you're the only person in the world who'd understand “Cause you're the only person in the world who'd understand the meaning of this

Claire is the only other person who knows what bill did. Claire’s the only other person who he trusts

The one who was right all along. Better to be laughed at than wrong.

I'm an expert just like you. And like you, I'm a genius before my time. Disbelieving, that's the real crime

Both these lines show Dimitri is still clinging to the faint idea that the time machine could work and save Claire from her fate.

Jean Descole: I/Me/Myself

Descole, broken into pieces after what happened to his family, has lost sight of who he is, and starts to question the very nature of himself. And it eventually ends up with him saying “fuck your gender roles”

Take my tea with formaldehyde for my Feminine side since the day that I died

“The day that I died” is referring to when his family was killed and he was overcome with grief

For some reason I find myself Lost in what you think of me And too confused to choose who I should be

He’s lost himself in his alter ego and is unable to figure out which persona is his real self

I get dressed up in shadows one leg at a time. We're so alike

This is specifically Targeted at Leon, saying they’re so alike in the way that they’re both hiding behind false pretenses and half baked excuses for all the shitty things they do

Say my name like a slur, but I've been called worse, And I've heard it all before, no this isn't a first

Another attack at Leon, this time at his warped views of sex and gender. Albeit this one is more because of my headcannons than because of cannon, so take it how you will.

I wish I could be a girl, and really I'd prefer it if you would use I, Me, Myself.

Another jab at Leon’s views on sex and gender

Aurora: Cabinet Man

Aurora, the last of the Azran Golems and emissary of the Azran people, isn’t human after all.

Electric desires had unraveled all my wires, Now I'm in the box for safekeeping

Aurora’s love for her friends was so strong it caused her to disappear

You can't win me, I can't be beat. I won't hurt you unless you cheat

Aurora isn’t human. She can’t just be killed like a normal person. And if you try to kill her, you’ll have hell to pay.

You can't see me behind the screen. I'm half human and half machine

…I think this line is self-explanatory

Someone's broken in, now they're painting on my skin. Breaking me and taking my quarters. Bashing in my face with a crowbar. Kicking me and pushing me over. Now they see my blood on their sneakers

Leon, thinking shes just a robot, stabs Aurora in the Azran sanctuary. And then… well, just read the lyrics.

[logosbot-tm-fics]

Take My Tea With Formaldehyde Masterpost

Summary:

Mumbo has a crush on Ariana Griande.

It's easy to see just how enamoured he is with her, forever keeping an eye on tour dates and music drops. She's unattainable - a growing celebrity who is finally beginning to secure her place in the spotlight - but that fact does little to quell the butterflies in his stomach at the very thought of her.

And really, it should be harmless.

It would be, if it wasn't for the fact that Mumbo is also head-over-heels in love with his best friend.

It would be, if his best friend wasn't changing. Withdrawing.

So then, the question becomes this: what's going on with Grian?

Ao3 Link: Take My Tea With Formaldehyde

Individual chapters

•Chapter 14

•Chapter 13

•Chapter 12

•Chapter 11

•Chapter 10

•Chapter 9

•Chapter 8

•Chapter 7

•Chapter 6

•Chapter 5

•Chapter 4

•Chapter 3

•Chapter 2

•Chapter 1

[julek]

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My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

so back when the year started, @srapsodia gave me the best birthday gift i could’ve ever asked for (my boys being Soft and In Bed) and i forgot to share them with the world. thank you, raps, for thinking of me and giving me Them <3

992 notes - Posted November 20, 2022

#4

read on ao3

When Geralt sees the body on the table, he shakes his head with something akin to fondness.

“We need to stop meeting like this,” he tells Jaskier, whose eyes haven’t opened yet, whose skin still shines pale and unblemished. “One day I’ll really dissect you.”

“Mm,” Jaskier grunts, displeased.

Geralt takes his apron off, given his services won’t be needed with this particular costumer, and leans back against the sink of the mortuary to wait. It usually takes Jaskier a few minutes to regain movement of his limbs, a few more minutes to get his words back.

“What was it this time?” Geralt asks conversationally, mostly because he knows Jaskier won’t answer him. “Jealous husband poisoned your meal? Didn’t look where you were going and shared a kiss with the local transport vehicle?”

“Hng.”

Geralt nods, reaching for the cabinet door. “I know it’s cold. I’m sorry. You know how it is.”

He lays a blanket over Jaskier’s still-rigid legs, and checks his pulse. Faint, but there.

“Just a few more minutes,” he says, watching blood slowly color Jaskier’s cheeks, flowing down the purple-blue veins under his eyes. His arms are twitching. “You want coffee or tea? I got croissants from the bakery you like.”

“‘ea,” Jaskier manages.

“Okay,” Geralt says. “We can breakfast upstairs. I know you don’t like the smell in here.”

Geralt does, though. There’s something about the smell of formaldehyde and antiseptic that soothes his mind. He’s surprised, really, that, for someone who’s visited his mortuary so many times, Jaskier still hasn’t gotten used to it.

Some things aren’t for him to know.

“Ah,” Geralt murmurs, Jaskier’s blue eyes blinking hazily at him. “Welcome back.”

Jaskier glowers at him. It looks more cute than menacing.

Geralt pushes Jaskier’s hair back, presses a kiss to his forehead. Ice cold, as usual.

“When I said I couldn’t do date night because work was busy,” he whispers, “I didn’t mean for you to literally show up at work.”

Jaskier raises his eyebrows, as if to say well, and immediately grimaces. Expressive facial gestures right after waking up mess up with the slow progress his body makes, and now he’ll be stuck with an inquisitive expression for a few hours.

Geralt definitely doesn’t laugh at him.

(He does). (A little). (He also makes some horrible puns). (Jaskier will make him pay, later).

Jaskier’s hand intertwines with his own. A weak embrace, but Geralt can feel the warmth of his touch in his soul.

“Roach missed you,” he tells him, linking their fingers together. “She’ll be delighted to see you.”

Jaskier’s head turns slightly.

“Well, maybe not delighted. Amused, at least.”

“Mm.”

Finally, Jaskier’s legs regain blood flow, and he shakes them out a little. Geralt helps him sit up on the table.

“How are you feeling?”

Jaskier nods. He looks tired, as he often does after waking up, but everything else seems normal.

“Okay,” Geralt says. He presses his forehead against Jaskier’s. “Still like your tea with four sugars, then?”

See the full post

1,000 notes - Posted May 28, 2022

#3

“Jas,” Geralt calls, not taking his eyes off his journal.

Jaskier stops strumming his lute with a palm on the strings. “Yes?”

“Would you pass me an orange from our pack?”

He hears Jaskier murmur an assent, and goes back to the ardent task of drawing a cockatrice that resembles the one he’d fought the week prior. There’s a rustling sound as Jaskier rifles through their things, a triumphant little ah-ha! as Jaskier, presumably, finds the orange, but then, there’s silence.

Geralt sketches the final lines of the cockatrice to his satisfaction, and takes a look behind him to see what could be taking Jaskier so long in the simple delivery of the fruit.

He finds Jaskier poking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth, brow furrowed in concentration as he picks at the orange between prying fingers.

“What are you doing?” Geralt asks, coming to crouch beside him.

“Oh!” Jaskier says, his eyes snapping up, as if he’d forgotten Geralt was there at all. “I was just getting all the white stuff out for you,” he says, and presents his palms to Geralt.

It’s a small orange, halved, bright and plump in Jaskier’s hands, and all the white tendrils have been carefully removed.

For him.

The orange almost flies into the other direction when Geralt surges to kiss him.

“Oh,” Jaskier says when they break apart, flustered and a little dazed. “What brought that on?”

Geralt smiles, taking one half of the orange into his hands.

“You.”

1,046 notes - Posted July 9, 2022

#2

“Yen,” Geralt says through gritted teeth. “It’s not wearing off.”

She peers at him across the table. “What isn’t?”

He growls. The potion, he wants to say, the stupid potion that had been innocently placed among his own elixirs, wearing a nondescript label and looking innocuous enough. The potion that is making his every thought escape through his tongue and jump out of his mouth, into the world of the living.

That potion.

“Mm,” she nods. “It’ll go away soon enough. The urge.”

They both follow Jaskier’s moving figure with their eyes, the bard prancing around the tavern floorboards with practiced ease and a salacious grin on his pink-bitten lips. They watch as he belts out a high note, sweat clinging to his skin, pooling in the hollow of his throat, uncovered now that he’s shed his doublet on the back of a chair.

Geralt tries very hard not to imagine what it would feel like to put his mouth there, because it’s a stupid thing to think, and because the filter that usually keeps stupid thoughts at the back of his mind where they belong is broken, and it would be very unwise to let such imaginings out in the wild.

But—

“Seems our bard has found himself some company,” Yennefer says, a smug smirk on her lips, as she waves in his general direction. “Such a handsome fellow, too.”

And, because he’s weak, Geralt tears his gaze from a knot on the wooden table and finds that Jaskier’s singing has stopped, and he’s now animatedly chatting with a patron. A broad-shouldered, heavy-handed man, with charming brown eyes and curls that bounce on his head every time he laughs that musical laughter at something Jaskier’s said, and a well-trimmed beard that frames his face ever so nicely. A man whose hand is resting on Jaskier’s forearm, his thumb rubbing distracted circles on it as Jaskier draws closer and closer.

Geralt’s tankard creaks ominously in his hand.

Yen has the gall to look amused. “Anything on your mind, dear?”

Geralt tries to ignore the way his mind is screaming at him, but it doesn’t work, of course, because that godsdamned serum is still coursing through his veins, still making him— “I want to draw my sword and place it on that man’s neck and watch him sweat, and when I’ve made sure he’s gone I want to take Jaskier back here and have him sit on my lap and show everyone who he belongs to.”

It all comes out in one breath, so fast that he doesn’t have time to feel ashamed, and he feels as though he’s never talked so much in his life. He probably hasn’t.

“Interesting,” says Yen, watching Jaskier saunter back to their table. “Very interesting.”

1,213 notes - Posted March 26, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Jaskier turns in his bedroll again.

“—fucking winter and its wintery fucking— cold as balls, ice frozen—”

“Jask?”

“—good for nothing— oh.” His tossing stops. The ground is so fucking cold. “Sorry, did I wake you?”

One golden eye peers at him. He would say Geralt looked annoyed, but he can’t see most of his face, tucked as it is under his cloak, so he chooses to interpret it as friendly concern. “Your muttering did.”

Jaskier smiles sheepishly at him, even though Geralt probably can’t see him either, with his scarf tied around his neck and covering most of his face. “Sorry. Just...”

“Can’t sleep?”

Jaskier shakes his head. It’s their fifth year on the Path together, the first one Geralt’s invited him along to spend the winter at Kaer Morhen with him — and Jaskier’s excited, really, but sleeping on the forest floor with a thin bedroll and definitely not enough blankets kind of dampens his spirits a little.

They’ve laid their bedrolls side by side, the fire keeping their feet warm, but still Jaskier can’t fend off the chill that’s seeped into his bones. He would blame it on his frilly, beautifully impractical clothing, with its soft but thin fabrics, with its stunning trim but no insulation, but if he did, he’d basically be agreeing with Geralt, and he can’t have that. Not even in the privacy of his own mind.

(He still hasn’t ruled out the possibility that Witchers are mind-readers). (Geralt is awfully quiet whenever Jaskier brings it up, and, well, one can never be too careful).

So he’s been tossing and turning and singing lullabies to himself in a feeble attempt of finally succumbing to a warm, deep sleep. Not that it’s worked, anyway.

The single golden eye looks considering, now.

“Wha—?” Jaskier manages before Geralt stands up, the bare skin under his sleep shirt immediately reacting to the cold air of the forest and erupting in gooseflesh.

Then, a blanket is being tossed to his face.

(It smells like horse).

“There,” says Geralt, not unkindly, his voice a bit rough. “That’ll help.”

“Well,” Jaskier replies, trying to adjust the blanket without taking his hands out of his bedroll, which proves impossible. “Thanks.”

Before he can sit up straight and, like a sane person, rearrange the blanket on top of himself, Geralt’s doing it for him. His hair is a mess from where he’s been laying on it and he’s squinting, but his hands are warm as they reach for the ends of the blanket and he tucks them into Jaskier’s bedroll, making sure his body is covered.

“You’re tucking me in,” Jaskier whispers, something that suspiciously feels like love standing on his heart a little.

Geralt smiles. He smiles his soft smile, the one where his lips stretch over his face and they’re pink and pretty and there’s a shine in his eyes.

“I guess I am,” he replies, checking no corners have been missed. “We’ll reach the mountain soon. No more cold nights after that.”

Jaskier smiles. He doesn’t know what it might look like on his face, lips chapped and slightly cracked. He hopes it shows his gratitude for him.

Geralt sits back on his haunches. The smile is still there. Fonder, somehow.

“What, no kiss goodnight?” Jaskier murmurs, because he’s an idiot, because he can’t help himself.

“Mm,” Geralt says, and for a second, Jaskier thinks he’s getting up to leave, but then Geralt leans forward and there’s a gentle, sweet kiss being pressed to his forehead. His smile is bigger when he turns away. “There. Goodnight.”

Jaskier can feel the warmth on his skin, the skin Geralt pressed a kiss to. He can feel it seeping into his bones.

When he turns around, blanket firmly secured, Geralt is watching him from his own bedroll.

“Goodnight,” he mouths at him, and Geralt closes his eyes.

His cloak is covering half his face again, but Jaskier can see the smile he’s hiding anyway.

1,612 notes - Posted May 4, 2022

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[little-lemon-lattes]

The Scheme

🌛Zelda Spellman x fem! reader

—Word count: 1.9k

— Triggers: Mention of murder and burning in a non-violent context

— Summary: We have part 2 to The Set Up! You and Zelda spend a blissful day together since kissing the night before, and make the most of being together before the mortuary fills with life- and typical Spellman scheming- again!

You were on Cloud-fucking-9.

The previous evening, you and Zelda had kissed. It had been truly extraordinary, even better than the few times you had allowed your mind to indulge in that kind of imagery concerning her. You had never felt that good with anyone before; well, minding that you had neither felt for anyone like that of which you had been trying to cover for the astonishing woman.

She currently lay in the grass next to you, cheek resting tentatively on your belly, as you both just watched each other in comfortable silence. Gosh, kissing Zelda had felt SO good that it had been hard to stop at just one. Like now. Her stunningly bright and beautiful green eyes were boring into yours, but you really couldn’t tell if she was trying to send you a signal or was just unwittingly that gorgeous on the daily. Probably the latter. You also had to remind yourself that, EVEN though you two already lived under the same roof, you would take things one step at a time together. The last 24 hours with Zelda had been like a dream, and the Spellman mortuary had a new air to it now that you knew where you stood.

That morning, you had woken just before dawn (which was much earlier than you preferred), likely still on a high from the feel of Zelda’s lips. Rather than lay there attempting to force yourself back to sleep, you rose from your pillow. Perhaps it was your always-lingering insecurity pulling some strings, but it suddenly seemed desperately important to you- then and there at 4:56am- that you find a way of proving to Zelda that she hadn’t made the wrong choice opening up to you the night before. Just one more bonus of Hilda’s disappearance that weekend being that the kitchen was inevitably free, within a few minutes you had decided to make a spot of breakfast to share. You would never admit it out loud, but you were also buzzing to showcase your culinary ability; of which had been somewhat hindered by the unspoken acknowledgement that Hilda was the kitchen witch of the house.

With that, you were out of bed and clothed in a black turtleneck and mom jeans, as you put the finishing touches on a French braid: all by 5:15. THe next two hours flew by as you whipped up black coffee, almond cake, black sausage, eggs, salmon, bagels, mushroom, and tomato. You were just laying out bloody-fleshed plums and yoghurt when you heard gentle footsteps on the landing above you. Smiling softly, you stopped to admire as the woman padded down the stairs, wrapped in a silky black robe and wiping bits of sleep from her eyes. She stopped dead as she spotted the food on the table, hand still raised to her eye.

“Surprise...?” you peeped.

Zelda’s hand flopped to her side as she tilted her head adorably, treating you to a giddy smile. And you were hopeless to try not to smile right back. That there was enough to have made the last two hours worth it. “

“What’s all this, y/n?”

“I, uh... breakfast?”

Zelda couldn’t help smiling a little more at the cute way you had made it seem like a question. “I see that,” she laughed, “but why?”

You forced an expression of mock pain onto your face.

“I am hurt, Spellman, hurt! Does there have to be a reason?”

All she did was raise her eyebrows in disbelief. You supposed it was probably best to build any chance you had together on honesty.

“Okay, FINE. I just... wanted to show you that last night wasn’t a mistake, in case you were having any doubts.”

Zelda trotted, cat-like, down from her post against the railing, and came to rest just half a metre in front of you.

“Why, there was absolutely nothing of the sort. I hardly slept a wink all night; your lips have something of a memorable feel to them, if I am honest.”

And this time, it was her that closed the space between you, snaking her arms around your waist to pull you closer. One long peck later, the bubblegum-pink shade of your cheeks matched hers in perfect unison, as if in competition.

Breakfast was sweet and long, spent thigh to thigh next to each other, chatting about all the things you had been too afraid to ask each other until that point.

The rest of the day was passed laying next to one another in the winter sunshine, beneath an age-old willow tree. After what felt like just minutes since you had arrived (but had really been hours), you pointed to the sky with the hand that wasn’t clasping Zelda’s.

“Look, the sun!”

You received a lazy “hmmm” in response. Twisting to face her on your left, you couldn’t fight your sigh of content. The High Priestess was laying with her eyes closed in utter bliss, the final rays of Sunday’s sunshine dancing across those glorious lashes.

“It’s setting, Zelda. Everyone will be back soon.” you murmured to her. It was as if you had thrown a bucket of ice over her. Cloud 9 disappeared with the snapping open of her eyes. The soft expression that had occupied her visage all day visibly hardened into her more familiar, stoic one. She leapt to her feet, snatching up the open novel beside her and swinging out her hand to you with force. Time and Space closed in around you the moment you took it, and, the next thing you knew, the two of you were outside the mortuary once more.

You turned to her sharply.

“What was that about?” you demanded. Standing silent for a moment, Zelda’s ears visibly pricked. After a few more moments, she seemed appeased, and swivelled to you. Her shoulders were tense, and you took note of her fingernails digging into her palm.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, “I didn’t mean to be so abrupt. I just... I am enthused about where you and I are headed, y/n, and I’m terrified that others may not share my enthusiasm. I want to enjoy things as they are at present for a while longer, before having to think about who needs to be involved in our business.”

It was understandable, you supposed, and admittedly: there was a certain appeal to keeping things 007-style, like that fantastic mortal film. You relaxed a bit, and instantly felt awful for raising your voice at her.

You reached for the woman’s shoulder.

“You’re right, Zelds. I understand.”

She looked unconvinced.

“Are you sure? You have every right to want to murder me right now, if you so wished. Although, only if you were to bury me in the Cain pit...” she added as an afterthought.

You had to giggle at that one.

“You’re safe for now, Zelda,” you teased, “now, come on! I need to find a good hiding spot for scaring the BANSHEES out of them when they get back!”

Hilda, Sabrina, and Ambrose literally stomped their feet in sheer disappointment when they arrived back at the house and hadn’t caught the pair of you locked in some form of intimate embrace.

“Aw man! What will I tell my friends?! I had Roz totally excited about y/n finally getting some action... Like, she seriously admitted that she had this big crush on her when she first met her; whiiiiich definitely earned a few looks from Harvey, to say the least. The take-away from it all is that we now know exactly how fragile that guy’s ego is, YIKES, is all I can say.”

All the while, Ambrose was muttering a consistent string of “fuck”s under his breath, and Hilda was deciding whether to scald Sabrina’s ass to Hades and back.

“Sabrina!” her aunt admonished in disbelief, “how could you be so careless?! If any of this gets back to your aunt Zelda, we should consider ourselves excommunicated from her presence for good!”  

All of them fought a cringe. Sabrina looked a bit sheepish.

Hilda turned to Ambrose.

“And what about you, mister? What’s with the constant profanities?”

Ambrose took a step back from his aunt, nobody was sure whether consciously or not. “Erm...hm. Yes. Well. I-” his sputtering was resembling a car trying to start up. Ambrose’s eyes suddenly seemed unable to reach past the witches’ knees.

  “-um. Damn. Hecate, yes, I have... just lost a particularly large sum of money to one Dorian Gray.”

Hilda’s eyes were ready to pop out of her head.   “I was so unequivocally certain that our plan would work! Now where I am supposed to come up with $1000?!”

He was a little manic. The only one of the three who seemed somewhat happy about Ambrose’s situation was Sabrina, sticking a finger at him. “HA! Now that makes what I did so much better!”

Her plum-coloured lips parted with glee, and without warning, her and her travel bag had disappeared. Ambrose made a furious mental note to pour formaldehyde in her evening tea for leaving him here alone. When he had finally built up the courage to look his otherwise cheery aunt in the eyes again, a flash of fear struck him at the murderous look in hers. A low growl exited her throat.

“Well,” she snapped, “I suppose there will be no more silly little attempts on our part to play Cupid.”

As quickly as it had started, her anger dissipated, and was replaced by a certain sadness. Her mouth raised just a fraction, into a tired little smile.

“ ’just thought that Zelds could do with something nice for once. We failed. It didn’t work.”

With that, she picked up her carpet bag and shuffled off up the stairs. Ambrose watched her go, now a lone silhouette in the entrance of their home.

Or so he thought. You waited until Ambrose had moodily trudged down to the embalming room before emerging from your spot in the broom closet. Sniffling a little from all the dust- those things hadn’t been flown for years, SO old fashioned- you felt a mix of emotion at what you had just heard. You hadn’t intended on becoming an audience to some type of scheme, and especially not one of which involved you.

At first, there was embarrassment. You hadn’t realised that your feelings were apparently so obvious! Paired with the fact that Zelda’s must have been too in order to warrant such a matchmaking scheme; along with that you had truly thought that you had done a superb job at keeping it all under wraps, you were left feeling a bit stupid. But then came the funny side of it all, imagining Hilda, Ambrose, and Sabrina sneaking about like the Pink Panther and holding secret meetings about your love life. And finally came the warmth, the realisation of exactly how much the Spellmans had grown to care for you- so much that they trusted you to love Zelda as much as they did.

The whole situation was entirely too much of an opportunity to just leave alone. Grinning with total delight and schemes cooking of your own, you rematerialised in Zelda’s study at the Academy. The loud CRACK that accompanied that particular piece of magic made the woman flinch. Her brow crinkled at the sight of you in front of her great oaken desk. She was a little taken aback, and (it delighted you even more) flustered to see you there.

“Y/n?”

“Zelda. I NEED to tell you what I just heard!”

A game was now afoot.

And your opponents weren’t finished yet either.

[belamourelysianlimerence]

SickLock

Location: 221b Baker St. London

Time: Tea time....so 4pm

Happening: Sherlock is a sick boy.

You came up from the kitchen, carrying a tray of Sherlocks favorite tea and biscuits, to help aid the poor boy in his wallowing ways.

Up the stairs, you went. Hearing a loud yet muffled sneeze from inside the apartment.

You set the tray down on a nearby stand, and open the door.

"If God grants me a pardon, I shall forever be faithful to his mercy!"

"...You have allergies, Shirley."

He blows his nose into a handkerchief.

"Death is knocking at my door, and what did I tell you about calling me that!?"

He squacked, before coughing horribly into his robed elbow.

You smirked at him, before picking up the tray and strolling inside, shutting the door behind you with your heel.

"Seasonal allergies."

You placed the tray on the floor, next to the 'dying detective'.

"My ears are ringing and my head feels like the clapper ' à l'intérieur de la cloche de la tour Elizabeth'."

You pout while handing him a cup of pre-poured tea.

"Courtesy of Mrs. Hudson."

He grumbled with the back of his hand resting on his sweat dampened forehead. His sultry and dark eyes closed.

"The nanny..."

You giggled.

"Be nice about her..."

You set his cup next to him, and picked up a cup of tea yourself.

"She does care about you, you know?"

You watch him while taking a sip.

He huffed before attempting to swallow.

Brows furrowing in pain at his sore throat.

"When will this fiasco end??"

He rasped.

"Drink your tea, beloved."

Dramatically weak, he raised the small cup to his dry, parched lips. Taking a hard swallow, he winced.

"The only time I'll accept poison in my tea."

You chuckled.

"Oh stop."

"And where is John!? He said he would come to my aid!"

"False! When we telegrammed Dr. Watson, he replied with advice to help you... and you..."

You moved so that you were above him, either hand on the side of his body.

"Beloved, weren't helpful as I was writing it. Shouting

'Tell him I'm in a irreversible condition! Tell him to come alone, lest his lovely Mary catch this deadly disease! Tell him I'm bleeding out if my eyes!'

Did not help my writing..."

He looked up at you. Watching your irises swirl with astounding color. 'Perhaps the poppies are getting to me.' He thought. 'Or perhaps this to be a new form of high...'

You had done your best to keep him away from the drugs he usually used. Alas, a story for another time. ;)

"This consumption of energy will be the end of me..."

You rolled your eyes and pushed yourself off of him to stand.

"Shirley..."

"I'm boored! Help me!"

You sighed.

"If I make you some things to keep your mind busy, will that help?"

".....perhaps."

"Fine."

It took you an hour to make a maze, a word search, a crossword, and to write a few riddles.

The look he gave you when he saw what you had done for him was a mix of shock and appreciation.... unfortunately he finished it all inside 5 minutes.

You made 3 more sets, and each time, he finished them quickly.

"What do you want from me??"

"I want stimulation!"

"...Why don't you make me a set of these."

"Hm... fine."

You switched places. Him at a desk and you on the floor, skimming through his books.

All the while sneezing and coughing, it had also taken him an hour, and when he handed them to you, you saw why.

"There is absolutely no way I'll be able do finish these."

"That is poor sportsmanship. You have to at least try."

He sat down next to you, and you began.

However, every time you went to make a decision, you could hear him over your shoulder.

"Ssss... mmm... I wouldn't do that if I were you."

"Will you let me try!?"

You shouted.

"Well, what's the point if you're just going to fail!"

He shouted back.

Sneezing once more, he groaned and placed his head on your shoulder.

"Spare me."

"Let me get you the medicine Dr. Watson sent you."

He attempted to pin you to the floor by the hem of your clothing.

"No! I told you I won't take it!"

"Ugh.."

You ripped your clothing out of his hands.

"You have drank Formaldehyde! Daily!!"

"I'd rather drink the blood of a hen than take that dreadful liquid John sent!"

From your coat pocket near the front door, you extracted the vile of medicine sent. The reddish, purple hue glittered in the last bits of the evening sun.

You brought it over to him.

He had his arms crossed and was pouting.

"I won't take it."

Like a child, you knelt down to his level.

"Sherlock."

He turned his head away.

You opened the lid.

"Sherlock!"

"I won't answer to you y/pn!"

You grabbed his chin and forced his eyes to yours.

"William..."

His stubborn expression softened.

No one ever called him by that name, except by his father in anger, and his mother in care.

No one else, not even his own brother. He never even told anyone who wasn't related to him his first name... except you. And he made you promise never to use it outside of the home or when company was present.

And you never did, until now.

"William, please."

His eyes softened as he practically melted.

The tender way you addressed him...

He couldn't think.

He opened his mouth to try to spit out some defiance, but you took that opportunity to place the lip of the vile against his own. His eyes creeping all over your face, taking in your features as he opened his mouth more to let you pour the medicine in. He took it quietly and swallowed it without complaint.

After a few moments of silence, his thoughts began to return.

"How dare you..."

He whispered.

You giggled and layed him down on the floor, covering him up in some fluffy blankets.

You started a fire, as it was known to get colder at the time of night that it had become.

You turned to look at him.

His eyes closed, breathing out of his mouth, swallowing at the dryness in his throat.

You sighed before standing to move into the room Dr. Watson once occupied. You had placed a few of your things in this room. A bed for one.

As you walked past him, you felt a snag at your boot.

"Don't leave me."

His hand tightly wrapped around your ankle.

You smirked at him, before moving to lay behind him. You wrapped your arm around his waist. He lifted his head slightly, and it took a moment before you understood and slipped your free arm under his head.

He laid his deep brown curls near your shoulder. Absent-mindedly nuzzling his head to get comfortable.

He gave a couple soft chuffs before taking a sigh and falling asleep, comfortably warm on the rug, surrounded by half read books and tea.

[morvantmortuary]

⛰ and ⭐️ for The October Arc? 🖤❤️🖤❤️

(SAAAM!!!! <3 hey babe!!! this got long - not too long, I promise!! but I'll still put it behind the cut so I don't clog up ya dash lol:

⛰️-  What was the hardest part?

I answered a version of this earlier, so I'll talk about what's hard for me right now. I think part of it is I tend to be kind of hard on myself when things take actual time?? to write??? like I said before, I have no idea how the fuck I thought I'd have everything done in one month now lmao. but lately I keep trying to remind myself that the only timetable that exists is the one that I keep trying to impose on myself in my head, and that one is way more flexible than I get myself all anxious about sometimes. especially coming up this semester, when I'm going to have like six weeks starting in march where I won't be able to write anything close to what my output has been because I'll be needing to write for my actual qualifying exams lmao. I know the people who have been kind enough to read this story will stick around if they want to, and if they come back later at one point and catch up on things bc they get caught up other places now that we're not in spooky season per se, that's fine by me. <3 it's still better than just keeping it all in my head to myself lmao. but people also seem to be really looking forward to more stuff with Hex, so I'm hoping plenty of people will still be hanging around for his turn!!

⭐- What’s a scene/paragraph you’re proud of?

you were one of the first people to tell me Hex was your favorite :) so here, have a piece from the snippet I had to cut from spellbound (reprise) that I'm hoping to post in a bit when it can stand on its own more:

[In 500 feet, veer beyond the veil.]

“You better have a damn good reason for this little detour.”

Hector didn’t have to look at Rora as he drove. The bright green tendrils that oozed off her in his peripheral vision told him she was watching him from across the car like he was a particularly interesting taxidermy specimen.

Like she couldn’t decide whether to plunge him in formaldehyde, or let him writhe in pain a little while longer.

He smiled to himself. It felt like home.

“A promise is a promise,” he muttered, his attention divided between the harshly bright cracked screen of his phone and the softer glowing figures that were meandering up and down this particular stretch of road.

It was a shabby little farm-to-market road from a more prosperous time in the state’s history - the pavement was barely in one piece, still, and there were no streetlights to speak of this far out.

That had everything to do with how many of them got here, he figured, some of them still sporting the oversaturated silver of their mortal wounds. There was a surprising range for such an out-of-the-way stretch: a man in a suit with the sharp lines of the Prohibition era, riddled with bullet holes; some scraped-up teenage boy in a torn leather jacket and pomade-sticky hair who was missing half his face; a cheerleader in a crushed 1980s bouffant with a six inch shard of windshield glass sticking out of her left eye. They were trapped here, in this desolate little nowhere, like cockroaches frozen under misapplied paint.

He didn’t always understand how - not yet - but they were proof that pain could bind a spirit as easily as sever one.

Their expressions ranged from dazed confusion to agony, only changing when they realized he could meet their gaze. When they saw him see them, their faces were almost always uniform: the same wide eyes, the same warped mouths as they echoed a cry for help that had never been heard.

He kept his eyes firmly on the road as he passed a young barefoot woman in a mid-century tea dress, her face swollen with mercury-colored bruises and a crumpled, spattered bundle clutched desperately to her chest. But his lips silently formed a prayer from his mother’s house as easily as breathing.

All of these were beyond help, no matter how desperate.

He was only here for the one he could still fix.

-

It was my first time writing from Hector's perspective, and I'm really looking forward to working out how his Sight functions just on a regular basis!! :) looking forward to sharing the rest with you soon!

thanks for being such a sweetheart, Sam, I really appreciate you being around and sharing this with me <3 here's hoping you like what comes next!! :D)

[catwithangerissues]

Okay so for your weekly prompt, Fukunaga and I/Me/Myself by Will Wood please! Thank you! :))

I/Me/Myself by Will Wood - Fukunaga Shōhei

✨Hey! Before anyone says it, I’m fully aware that this song is about gender identity! But, I couldn’t do it justice to use it quite that way here, so I instead used the upbeat tune to make a cute ending :) Please give the song a listen, cause holy shit he’s one of my favorite artists now✨

“I’ve been feeling lightheaded since I lost enough weight to fit back in my skin

Flower petals and feathers tether me to the ground (pound for pound)

Take my tea with formaldehyde for my feminine side since the day that I died

While I whittle my bones until I’m brittle, am I pretty now?

For some reason I find myself lost in what you think of me

And too confused to choose who I should be

And now you’ve got me thinking”

“You’ve got to tell them at some point bro!” Yamamoto had been going on and on for what felt like hours, telling Fukunaga about how he needed to finally confess to you, but it always ended up the same way.

The black haired boy was too scared to tell you how he felt, for fear that you didn’t feel the same way. He was pretty insecure about himself, he thought you could do so much better than him and that there was no chance you’d ever feel the same as he did.

He had been quietly talking to the other second years about his problem, he thought that Tora would be helpful because he’d push him out of his comfort zone in the way he needed, and he thought Kenma would be the voice of reason in comparison to the teams ace.

What he didn’t expect, but probably should’ve, was for Tora and Kenma’s inevitable fighting and commotion to draw the attention of two of the third years, minus Kai who had been talking to Lev at the time.

“Come on, Kenma! You know just a-“

“Oi, what’s this about?!” The libero and resident mom of the team was becoming noticeably annoyed with all the noise.

“Fukunaga won’t confess to y/n because he’s scared they don’t feel the same way!” Tora shouted while trying to pry Kenma off of his torso, only for Kuroo to separate the two.

Fukunaga looked down at the floor, and a layer of silence dawned on the entire gym. His pale face flushed, and he began fiddling with his hands out of embarrassment and nervousness.

You see, basically everyone knew of your little crush on Sho, except for him. The entire team had been trying for months to get him to ask you out already, because they had long since come to the conclusion that you were too much of a scaredy cat to make the first move yourself.

“I- I just find it hard to believe that they w-would ever feel the same way..” Fukunaga timidly explained.

“Are you kidding!? Y/n has been going on about you for months dude! Just do it already!” The mohawked ace was quickly silenced by a loud back of the neck smack from the captain. “If you keep telling like that, they’ll hear you.”

After a quick exchange of discipline to the yelling boy, Yaku had made his way over to Fukunaga to comfort him, fearing he’d explode or melt from embarrassment at any second, now that the entire gymnasium had been made aware once again of his situation.

For the next several minutes, Sho had effectively poured his heart out to the much shorter upperclassman. He told him of his fear of you not feeling the same way, as well as informing him of all his insecurities both physical and otherwise. But it’s what slipped out of his own mouth during his rant of confessions that really stuck with Fukunaga.

“I think I’m in love with y/n and I’m terrified.”

“I wish I could be a girl, and that way you’d wish I could be your girlfriend, boyfriend

Am I pretty enough to lie to?

I wish I could be a girl, and that way you’d wish I could be your girlfriend, boyfriend

Just little old me in a big, big world

Little old me in a big world

I wish I were a girl”

Later that night, he laid in bed, hands behind his head and one leg over the other, staring at the ceiling, thinking of the words that slipped from his lips earlier that day. He didn’t know if he really knew what love was, let alone if he even felt it for anyone but his family.

But the words changed something in his brain, like a switch had gone off, and he couldn’t help but feel as though he was running out of time to tell you how he felt.

You both still had another year before graduation, so it couldn’t be that, at least he thought so. Maybe it was that you were the most gorgeous and kind human he’d ever met and he feared someone snatching his best friend away from him. Or maybe it was the ever present fear of one of his team mates, most likely the tall Russian puppy dog or the shark toothed ace, would slip up and tell you how he felt without him knowing.

He spent the rest of that night talking himself up to telling you, how he’d been head over heels for you for what felt like forever, tomorrow. He had to, he couldn’t let the love of his life slip through his fingers. “Wait, did I just think that?!”

“I’ve been feeling lighthearted since I gained enough weight back to cover my bones

I get dressed up in shadows one leg at a time – we’re so alike

But if the shoe fits, then I won’t try it on

You’ll be walking out early, but the show must go on

No, I know that I’m wrong

But I love how you’re on my side when I cross that line

It’s been a point of contention between myself and this body that they stuck me in

The privilege of being born to be a man

And now you got me thinking”

He met you in the usual spot. Your bright smile at his presence instantly making his cheeks heat up. You two had small talk for a few minutes, it eased his nerves slightly, but the voice in his head was screaming for him to just rip off the bandaid. If you were going to reject him he may as well get it over with, he thought.

“I told them I couldn’t beca-“

“Y/n.” The black haired boy interrupted you. Turning your head to meet his gaze, he looked tense and deep on thought, but at the same time more focused than you’d ever seen him before.

“Yes, Sho?” Your curiosity got the better of you, long forgetting the story you were previously telling the boy.

He was noticeably nervous, hands shaking and you could tell he was straining to keep eye contact with you. You felt concern wash through your entire body at the sight, fearing he may be ill or something worse.

“I- I need to tell you something, t-that’s been on my mind for a while.” His voice trailed quieter towards the end of his sentence, his voice slightly wobbly. Your hands came up to his cheeks, effectively forcing him to look you in the eye, and yes, he blushed profusely at the closeness.

“I wish I could be a girl, and that way you’d wish I could be your girlfriend, boyfriend

Am I pretty enough to lie to?

I wish I could be a girl, and that way you’d wish I could be your girlfriend, boyfriend

Just little old me in a big, big world

Little old me in a big world

I wish”

His confession had been a surprise to you, but you were overjoyed at the newfound information that the shy quiet boy had actually felt the same as you all along.

You couldn’t stop smiling for hours after it happened, and from the looks of it, neither could Fukunaga. He held your hand firmly but carefully in his as the two of you walked to the gym, routinely getting ready for you to drop him off for practice. Planting a small kiss on his cheek and exchanging your goodbyes, he turned to walk into the large familiar building.

He was greeted by the loud congratulations and praise of his teammates, noticing they’d been watching through the windows of the building, he couldn’t help but chuckle. He spent the next few minutes answering endless questions, and even if he was normally used to the provocative jokes that his teammates made, he couldn’t help but turn bright red when he heard, “remember to use protection” followed by laughter, as they dispersed to being warming up for practice.

“Eating your prosthetic meat/meet your anesthetic criteria, pathetic seeing you become acetic

Say my name like a slur, but I’ve been called worse

I’ve heard it all before, no this isn’t a first

Let me be the void you fill with taxidermy fingerprints, taxonomize our differences

I am quantum physics, my witness brings me into existence”

-Flash forward a few years into the future-

The loud, upbeat music played throughout the small space the two of you shared, it seemed as though the notes resonated off of the floor under your feet as you listened. With his right hand on your waist and his left hand clasping your right, the two of you spun around enthusiastically to the music. The tile floors of your shared apartment kitchen were as smooth as a dance floor for the two of you. With loud laughter, poor dueting, and pounding heart rates, you couldn’t find it in you- no matter how deep you thought- to feel anything but love at this moment.

With your partner of a few years now, stable jobs and schooling going well, in your first apartment together, dancing in the empty space- as you hadn’t bought any furniture yet. As the late afternoon, orange sun rays bled through the small kitchen window and onto the tiles, you two twirled and dipped to the beat, feet moving without thinking. You saw his bright smile as you spun, his arms catching you with ease. You wanted to burn this memory into your brain forever and never forget it. If you weren’t already certain of your love for the black haired boy, you definitely were now.

“I wish I could be a girl, and that way you’d wish I could be your girlfriend, boyfriend

Am I pretty enough to love back?

No, not yet

I wish I could be a girl, and really I’d prefer it if you would use I/Me/Myself

Am I pretty enough?

Am I pretty enough to fucking die?

Little old me in a big world

Well I would give you my whole world

Little old me in a big world

I wish”

-Flash forward again-

You were brought from your thoughts by the noises of your partner getting ready for the day. The two of you had woken up well over an hour ago, but neither of you wanted to leave the others warm embrace.

You laid in bed, watching as your partner got ready. It wasn’t that watching your now fiancé getting ready for the day was very exciting, he liked to keep his routine simple. But as you watched the way he moved around quietly so as to not disturb you, as he gave a glance over to your tired form to check up on you every few minutes, only to smile when he caught you staring again. As he routinely kissed your forehead after gently lifting your hair out of the way with his thumb, and as he told you he loved you and he’d be home soon to treat you to dinner and a movie tonight in a whisper.

You could almost cry at the sense of relief, happiness, and thankfulness that washed over you. In this moment, you were more grateful than ever for his old high school team of energetic boys that talked him into asking you out all those years ago.

✨Tag list: @almalckd @toworuu ✨

🌱This was fucking cute don’t @ me. Thank you for requesting! I love this song 😭 not super happy with the way this was written but oh well :)